The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. MacNeil: Good evening. The Middle East once again leads the news. Iraq's Saddam Hussein appealed to Arabs to fight the U.S. presence in the Persian Gulf, Pres. Bush said if sanctions did not convince Saddam, we will review our options. More Western hostages were allowed to leave Iraq. We'll have details in a moment. Judy Woodruff is in Washington tonight. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: After the News Summary and with Congress now returned from its summer recess, we get congressional perspectives on the deepening U.S. [FOCUS - CONGRESSIONAL VIEW] involvement in the Gulf, then two different sorts of Arab views [FOCUS - ARAB- AMERICANS], one from Arab-Americans discovering divided loyalties, the other a Charlayne Hunter-Gault conversation [CONVERSATION] with a Palestinian newspaper editor living in Jordan.NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: Saddam Hussein today again called on Arabs to fight a holy war against the U.S. presence in the Persian Gulf. A government spokesman read the comments on Iraqi television. Saddam called for the overthrow of King Fahd of Saudi Arabia and Egypt's President Mubarak, and claimed Iraqi children were dying because of the blockade. The White House said there was no evidence of that. Pres. Bush discussed the Gulf crisis with more than 30 Congressmen and Senators at the White House this morning. He told them, "We must keep pressure on Iraq and convince Saddam Hussein that time is against him." But he said, if sanctions did not succeed, "we will review our options.". Pres. Bush will address a joint session of Congress next Tuesday night. He's expected to deal with the Persian Gulf. It'll follow the President's weekend summit with Soviet Pres. Gorbachev in Helsinki. In Moscow, Gorbachev met with Iraq's foreign minister on the crisis. No details were released. Before Iraq invaded Kuwait, the Soviet Union was Iraq's main arms supplier. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sec. of State James Baker today had more to say about U.S. troops maintaining a long-term presence in the Gulf. He said they might be part of a new regional security arrangement to deal with any future crisis in that part of the world. Baker spoke today before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

JAMES BAKER, Sec. of State: I think it's worthwhile for us to begin the process of considering possible regional security structures and arrangements that will guarantee an equilibrium in this region that will produce peace or that would be likely to produce a peaceful environment. In doing so, we would expect to work with friends and allies to create a more durable order, not in any sense, Mr. Chairman, to impose ourselves, but to find mutually acceptable arrangements which would guarantee peace and prosperity. Any such arrangement would have to fit regional realities. We have no particular model such as NATO in mind. I made the point yesterday that NATO had preserved the peace for 40 years against an aggressor who had nuclear weapons in Europe, but that should not be equated with the idea that somehow we are calling for a NATO of the Middle East. I can't tell you today what role the United States might or might not play in any such structure. I said yesterday in the other body that we'd been in the Gulf for a long time, since about 1946 or '7, and that it wouldn't be unreasonable to think that perhaps we might have a continued Naval presence in the Gulf, but we're not talking about anything that would in any way substitute for or be in lieu of continued work with and through the United Nations.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sec. Baker leaves tonight for a fund-raising trip to the Gulf region and Europe. The Bush administration is seeking more than $25 billion in support from U.S. allies to help pay for the Persian Gulf operation. Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady has already visited European leaders. Today he received a commitment from British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher but no specific amount was mentioned. He now travels to Korea and Japan.

MR. MacNeil: A Japanese government spokesman said today that his country was considering legal changes to allow the dispatch of troops to the Middle East. Japan's constitution currently forbids such a deployment outside its borders. Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze was in Tokyo today for meetings with his Japanese counterpart. They issued an unprecedented joint statement condemning Iraq for taking foreign hostages and calling for its withdrawal from Kuwait. It was the first time since World War II that the two countries had made a joint declaration on a matter of international affairs. A leading French general today defended his country's commitment to the international force in the Gulf region. He was answering criticism that France had not contributed enough manpower to the effort. Gen. Ramon Germanos said, "The Americans decided to send a particularly large force. When we engage in a crisis that could lead to war, we weigh those risks. We do not ask that each ally has to have the same number of dead.". He said there were nearly 9,000 French troops in the region.

MS. WOODRUFF: Another group of Western hostages in Iraq was allowed to fly to Jordan today. There were 10 Americans among the 171 women and children on the flights. This afternoon, 24 Americans who flew out of Baghdad earlier this week arrived back in the U.S. at Newark Airport in New Jersey. The group included five men. Meanwhile, the situation at the refugee camps at the Jordanian border area of Ruweishid failed to improve. We have a report narrated by Roderick Pratt of Worldwide Television News.

MR. PRATT: Some supplies are beginning to get through to the tens of thousands of people trapped in Ruweishid, but nothing like enough. Jordanian soldiers have to intervene to prevent the scramble turning into a riot and none too gently. The truck carries only bottled water and bread rolls. Their distribution is less than systematic. Tempers quickly fray. For many people, it's the first food they've had for days. Rough toilet facilities have been set up at the various tented camps, segregated by nationality. The alternative is the desert. The situation at Ruweishid is getting more desperate by the day. The Jordanian government admits it can't cope and has attacked the international community for not doing more. The countries from which these people come cannot afford to lay on enough planes and ships to get them out quickly enough. For many, it could be weeks before they're allowed to make the four hour journey to Amman and home. For those who chose to escape through Turkey, the situation is a little easier. Most of the people who crossed into Turkey through this border post at Tabor have been repatriated. The only group still stuck in Turkey in significant numbers are the Bangladeshees, whose government, among the poorest in the world, has yet to evacuate them.

MS. WOODRUFF: Nearly 1/2 million foreigners have fled Iraq and Kuwait since the Iraqi invasion on August 2nd. FOCUS - CONGRESSIONAL VIEW

MS. WOODRUFF: Now we turn to some congressional views on the developments in and about the Persian Gulf. With us are two House members that were part of a bipartisan congressional delegation which returned earlier this week from the Middle East. Rep. Dante Fascell, Democrat from Florida, is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Bud Shuster, Republican from Pennsylvania, is a member of the House Select Committee on Intelligence. Also back from a trip to the Persian Gulf is Sen. William Cohen, Republican from Maine. He is the vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Joseph Biden, Democrat from Delaware, he is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The two Senators join us from Capitol Hill. Gentlemen, let me ask you first about this charge by Saddam Hussein today that Iraqi babies are dying as a result of the sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries. Congressman Fascell, do you have any information to either confirm or refute the administration's statement that that's just not so, that we don't have any such --

REP. DANTE FASCELL, Chairman, Foreign Affairs Committee: No, we don't have any information, Judy, but you know, Saddam Hussein will say anything and will do anything, and he's been making statements of that character for a long time now and he's just trying to focus attention on our activity, that's all, and trying to turn the blame to us instead of himself.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Shuster, do you have any information on that?

REP. BUD SHUSTER, [R] Pennsylvania: Intelligence estimates are that they have at least 60 days' supply of food, so once again, we see Saddam simply lying.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sixty more days.

REP. SHUSTER: Perhaps it would be about 45 now.

MS. WOODRUFF: Is that your information, Sen. Cohen, Sen. Biden?

SEN. WILLIAM COHEN, [R] Maine: That's correct. I'd also point out if Iraqi children were tobe dying as such, it's because of Saddam Hussein being in Kuwait, and because he's feeding his soldiers rather than his children, but there's no basis for the report as far as I'm concerned.

MS. WOODRUFF: And Sen. Biden.

SEN. JOSEPH BIDEN, [D] Delaware: I know of no basis for his comments.

MS. WOODRUFF: The President said today, as we reported, that if for some reasons these sanctions don't work, as he put it, there will be an opportunity to view other options. Three of you, at least three of you were in the meeting with the President today. Congressman Fascell, what do you think the President was referring to? Did he get specific?

REP. FASCELL: No, he didn't get specific. He's just making it clear that all of his options are open. He's not foreclosing anything, not making any decision, or limiting himself. He's just leaving all of his options open, depending on what happens.

MS. WOODRUFF: What do you think he means, Congressman Shuster?

REP. SHUSTER: First, we should emphasize that the blockade is working. We have stopped the export of Iraqi oil. That's very significant. But I think our vital interests are involved here, and so if it should turn out that the blockade isn't working, then we may well find ourselves having to resort to military force. I hope that we don't come to that, but it's an alternative that we can't discount.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sen. Cohen, you were in that meeting today, is that correct, with the President?

SEN. COHEN: Yes.

MS. WOODRUFF: What do you think -- when the President says the sanctions aren't working, what does working mean? What are we trying to accomplish, is it just the pullout from Kuwait, what is it?

SEN. COHEN: Well, I think it's to bring Saddam Hussein to his senses. It's designed to put enough pressure in a way of cut off of supplies by the world community that he will be forced to retreat back to Iraq, and then we will proceed to see whether or not we can impose some sort of process for dismantling this monster that we've created. We have been successful in arming this particular individual well beyond his country's needs, and then we'll have to go forward to see what kind of international sanctions can be brought to bear to prevent him from continuing his military build up and expansionism.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sen. Biden, do you think it's clear in the minds of most of the members you speak with what exactly the administration's goals are? Is there any doubt in your mind about what those goals are?

SEN. BIDEN: No, there's no doubt, it seems to me, Judy, as to what the administration's goals are, and one of the overwhelming goals, I might add, an ancillary goal, is to make sure that this continues to be the world against Iraq, not the United States against Iraq, and so when the President reiterates that he leaves all his options open, which he should, in the past what he has talked about is that being done in the context of a continued world cooperation. The world, the United Nations may conclude that if the blockade doesn't work, we don't call it a blockade, but if the attempt to cut off all economic intercourse with Iraq does not work, that other options may be available. I think it's only prudent for the President to suggest, as they say, that he's not ruling anything in or anything out.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Fascell, I was going to say, do you have an idea specifically of what the administration might do?

REP. FASCELL: No, I do not. But the emphasis that the President has made is there would not be unilateral action. As far as right now is concerned, the emphasis is on the continuation of international effort predicated on the unusual, unprecedented international support we now have as the Senator just said, this is the world condemning Iraq and its naked aggression and an attempt to corner the world's market on oil and intimidate all countries both in the third world and the industrialized world. We just can't let that happen, and I think it's remarkable that under United States leadership that world opinion has been consolidated to do something about it.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sec. Baker talked again today, Congressman Shuster, he talked about this, House testimony yesterday and today in the Senate, about this regional security force, and he talked about guaranteeing an equilibrium. Do you understand what it is the administration is beginning to talk about? What does that mean?

REP. SHUSTER: I think the Secretary's floating a good idea, but it's just the germ of an idea, but after we're past this crisis in the long run, something like this should be put together. I think it's also important to recognize that the countries over there make up such an organization could well be quite different from our traditional allies over there. It's been very sad to notice, in fact, to see overwhelming evidence that King Hussein, a long supposed friend --

MS. WOODRUFF: Of Jordan.

REP. SHUSTER: King Hussein of Jordan, a long supposed friend of the United States, has really been duplicitous in dealing with us and other Arab states, and in fact, he's chosen to take sides with Saddam. I think he's going to pay a heavy price for that in the Arab world, and I think he should pay a heavy price for that in his long-term relationship with the United States as well.

MS. WOODRUFF: Do you have a sense though when the administration talks about this regional security force of what countries would be involved, how long an engagement are we talking about?

REP. SHUSTER: I think it could be a long-term -- you hate to use the NATO example because it could be quite different -- but, nevertheless, a long-term standing arrangement. Egypt would have to be a cornerstone of any arrangement.

REP. FASCELL: What we see right now, Bud, if you'll excuse me, is the potential, the opportunity, because for the first time you've got coming together in the Arab world on common ground with a matter that deals with something other than Israel, and it's very important to build on that relationship and that confidence that has now been created, and I think what the Secretary has in mind is that we can build on this association. If the outcome of this is successful, and I'm sure it will be, then we can deal with other problems in that area, and also contain either Saddam Hussein and Iraq from further activities, if he's still around, or his successor.

MS. WOODRUFF: What is that going to entail though? Sen. Cohen, just for the sake of this discussion, what was the American U.S. presence in the Gulf before all this happened? We had, what, a number of ships over there, but no land forces, obviously?

SEN. COHEN: We have a very cooperative arrangement with a number of gulf states. Obviously, we've had an arrangement of friendship with Saudi Arabia, with Egypt, with Oman, with Bahrain, and I think that what the Secretary has in mind is somehow extending that, regularizing that type of contact, and conduct with them, but I think we have to be careful. We cannot institutionalize that. It would be very difficult to have a METO versus a NATO, a MidEast Treaty Organization. Who would be in command? Would we have the United States in charge of Arab forces? Would we have a relationship with Syria, which right now we have a tactical relationship with them, but not the kind of friendship that we could establish at least in the immediate future that would be part of this organization. So we have a lot of questions, plus that whole issue of equilibrium. To what extent would the beefing up of the forces in that region pose a potential threat to the State of Israel? So we've got a lot of questions to ask and to answer, but I think it's right for the Secretary to at least raise the question.

SEN. BIDEN: Judy, if I could make a comment.

MS. WOODRUFF: Please to me.

SEN. BIDEN: It seems to me that the President initially announced to what amounted to a corollary to the Carter doctrine. The Carter doctrine said we are not going to let any outside influence come into the Persian Gulf, we had the Soviet Union in mind at the time of Afghanistan, and change the equilibrium, for the lack of a better word, in the Gulf. Then he came along and he said he was essentially following through in the Carter doctrine by sending troops to the area, but, in fact, he announced, in fact, a new doctrine, and that was we were going to intercede where one nation within the Persian Gulf region attempted to change the equilibrium. It seems to me what the Secretary is saying is that conceptually he wants to move beyond that. He doesn't want us to be left in the position where we become the policemen for the Middle East. And he's looking for a way conceptually I think to find a longer-term solution where we have not only members in the Middle East that with whom we are loosely or tightly associated with, but also Europeans and potentially the Soviets. One thing to keep in mind, any comparison to NATO or any other alliance, we have always had alliances with nations with whom we've had shared values. We are not talking about democracies in the Middle East. Our friends are not democrats in the Middle East, and so this gets very complicated along with the question of whether or not we're also talking about providing a nuclear umbrella for the Middle East, and so I just think the Secretary, in my view, only conjecture on my part, is moving us beyond the sort of corollary to the Carter doctrine, which I don't think we found ourselves very comfortable with long- term, and is trying to figure out how we move from here without any specificity.

REP. FASCELL: In other words, there's another caveat too, if I might add just very quickly, and that is the Secretary made it very clear the United States would not do anything that would disadvantage Israel, in other words, reaffirmation of the qualitative advantage for Israel both militarily and economically, and that assurance, of course, is vital.

MS. WOODRUFF: Is there general agreement though on what would be the purpose of this long, this extended presence? I mean, are we there, the Secretary used the term today, to guarantee equilibrium, to guarantee security, is that a euphemism for cheap oil?

REP. SHUSTER: I think it's more than cheap oil. I think it's the free flow of oil to the world, and that is our vital interest, and while there are other principles involved here, such as the principle of non-aggression, fundamentally for the United States, we must protect the free flow of oil, because it's our vital life line.

REP. FASCELL: Well, it's not just for us either. It's for all the industrialized world, and even the third world will suffer. If Saddam Hussein had gotten control of 40 to 60 percent of the world's oil, you can just bet your bottom dollar, we would have all been in great difficulty, so it's more than just cheap gas at the pump that's involved here. As Bud says, it's the free flow of energy.

SEN. COHEN: Judy, could I add just one comment?

MS. WOODRUFF: Sure.

SEN. COHEN: This not only involves a regional alliance as such for purposes of ensuring stability as far as the free flow of oil. It also has to do with preventing an unnecessary build up of arms. We've had an absolute frenzy of arms sales to the Middle East, and so that kind of security in the region --

MS. WOODRUFF: But the United States has been selling them to them?

SEN. COHEN: Absolutely. We have a role that we have played in creating this monster as has the Soviet Union, the French, and the Western Europeans. All of us have participated in the creation of what I've described as the robo killer, but now we've got to see to it that we find ways of dismantling that so you don't have this feeding frenzy for everybody trying to get in and create new armed monsters in the region, so global security and regional security will involve disarmament policies as well.

MS. WOODRUFF: If you'll excuse me, and I'll come to you, Sen. Biden. Another aspect of all this is this notion of the United States being policemen, but now we're not just the policemen. We're going around and saying we're going to ask for financial support to be the policemen. We're asking some of our wealthy allies and we're saying to our poorer allies like Egypt that we're going to forgive the debt, military debt that they owe us. Is this the new system that we're going to be operating on, sort of buying and selling and trading in our security role?

SEN. BIDEN: I hope not. I hope that's not the reason. As the Secretary put it well today, he said we're talking about shared responsibilities, and what we have done has taken the lead in organizing the world to respond to a nation that has acted totally inappropriately, and fortunately, we've been able to do it under the general umbrella of the United Nations. And that's the point I wanted to make on what Sen. Cohen has just said, off of what Sen. Cohen has just said. I asked the Secretary today whether the President would be in his meetings with Gorbachev, trying in the context of a new security arrangement for the Middle East, be talking about short and long-term commitments on the part of the major arms suppliers, the United States, the Soviet Union, and the European nations, to work out arrangements whereby we would all agree that we would not transfer technology and/or weaponry, so that once this is dealt with, the prospect of another hydra headed monster like the fellow from Iraq beginning, being able to put himself in a position to threaten the region was greatly diminished, but this notion of paying your way is not something where as one has suggested, I heard a commentary made that we've essentially become the mercenaries, the Hessians of 1990. We are doing our part. We are reminding people of their responsibility to do their part. Some can't do it in terms of troops like Germany and Japan. They should do it in other ways.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Shuster.

REP. SHUSTER: Even though Egypt is playing an absolutely crucial role here, I get heartburn when we talk about complete forgiveness of the debt. I think if some of the other nations were to step up to bat and be supportive, helping to underwrite some of that debt for Egypt, then we perhaps could take a look at forgiving some of it also.

MS. WOODRUFF: You mean some of the other wealthier nations?

REP. SHUSTER: Yes. Anywhere from the Saudisto Japan, West Germany. If they were to say, we'll cover 50 percent of that debt, if you, the United States, cover 50 percent of it, then I think on the Hill that might be salable.

MS. WOODRUFF: But can the United States afford, I mean, how much more can the United States afford? We forgive Egypt's debt, we may be asked to forgive the debt of some other countries involved here, not to mention the enormous military --

REP. FASCELL: Judy, there are all kinds of plans that have been proffered to deal with the economic problem and the reality of overhanging debt around the world. This is not new and it's certainly not a precedent. It's just a reality in the context of say, let's say before this action arose in the Middle East, we were all concerned with what to do about outstanding debt created either by the United States or by other countries, and it's still a problem. And now it should not be complicated because we're in the Middle East crisis. We still have to deal with the debt problem. Egypt cannot pay, can't even pay the interest on it. Israel can't pay.

REP. SHUSTER: If we can get other countries to pay 50 percent of Egypt's debt to us, we're going to be 50 percent ahead, because Egypt can't repay anything today.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sen. Cohen.

SEN. COHEN: Well, if I could offer just one word, we met with many leaders in the Arab world, King Fahd among them, and the word that was given to us is that they would be very eager to help those countries who are making a sacrifice on behalf of maintaining at least stability in the region, helping to protect their interest as well. That I would think would be a very good avenue. We have the Kuwaitis. We have about $100 billion invested in foreign assets now. The Kuwaitis, the Saudis and others could, in fact, make a contribution by helping to defray the expense that has been incurred by Egypt who in turn ought to be congratulated and commended. President Mubarak is a very courageous man for making that commitment and I think that they could share that particular burden and ease that on the taxpayers.

SEN. BIDEN: Judy, to follow up on the point that Bill has just made, one of the things that we have to keep in mind is there is a serious problem with Arab, Pan-Arab nationalism. The average Arab throughout the Arab world is not real crazy about the sheikhs and about the kings and about those who control the vast majority of the wealth, which they view as their birthright, and so it's very important that the Saudis see in their own interest their willingness to go out and help the poorer nations so they increase the stake that the poor Arab countries have in the maintenance of stability and peace in the region. The notion though that they should come in and pay our debt I think is quite frankly, well, one that I don't particularly think is a good idea.

MS. WOODRUFF: All right, well, gentlemen, we appreciate you all being with us, Senators on Capitol Hill, Congressman Fascell, Congressman Shuster, thank you all very much.

MR. MacNeil: Still ahead on the Newshour, the divided views of Arab-Americans on the Gulf crisis, and Charlayne Hunter-Gault gets the Palestinian perspective. FOCUS - ARAB-AMERICANS

MR. MacNeil: This Gulf crisis that has stimulated national pride and anxiety about war for millions of Americans has meant an agonizing month for Arab-Americans, torn between old and new loyalties. Correspondent Jeffrey Kaye of public station KCET-Los Angeles reports.

MR. KAYE: There are an estimated 200,000 Arabs spread out throughout Southern California, the second largest concentration of Arabs in the United States. One recent evening at the Cedar Club in Hollywood, a group of ex-patriots from several Arab countries engaged in favorite pastimes, playing pool and cards, smoking, and discussing Middle East politics. Most here oppose the U.S. presence in the Gulf.

YOUNG MAN: Let us do it by ourselves. Nobody can interfere from our side. We have to solve our problems.

MR. KAYE: Does everyone agree with this?

ARAB-AMERICAN MAN: Actually we do.

MR. KAYE: Where are you from?

ARAB-AMERICAN MAN: I'm a Christian Lebanese.

MR. KAYE: You're from Lebanon. Anyone here from Iraq?

MAN: I am.

ARAB-AMERICAN MAN: He is.

MR. KAYE: You are. Do you support Saddam Hussein?

MAN: Well, he's the leader I believe and he knows what's going on in the country and he knows how to deal with it, as the president, just like the father in the house with a family. He has his own reasons for whatever action he's taken.

MR. KAYE: Only one man voiced opposition to the Iraqi leader.

OTHER MAN: The problem is leaders like Saddam Hussein. Personally, I don't see my future living in peace with such a leader. I am against Saddam Hussein and I will come to the United States from Saudi Arabia.

MR. KAYE: But since most Arabs in this country come from the poorer Arab states, there is little sympathy for oil rich Arab countries like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

ARAB: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, all the small countries, you have a lot of money and you could invest it inside of those countries, instead of invest it out.

MR. KAYE: Is that what this is about in a sense is rich versus poor?

ARAB: Exactly. Those countries, like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, all the small countries, we have oil, but it's supposed to be sharing with other countries.

MR. KAYE: At Arab-American TV, producers are providing coverage of the crisis for a daily news program shown in 12 American cities. Wahid Boctor is the Egyptian-born president of the small network. He says judging from the calls he's received from Arab-Americans, there is strong support for Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.

WAHID BOCTOR: A funny one was, I don't know if it's funny, but instead of having 22 dictators, we'd better have 1 dictator, so we can deal with one.

MR. KAYE: Are people supporting Saddam? Are they supporting his action?

WAHID BOCTOR: No, no, most support the action, not Saddam the man.

MR. KAYE: What is in the action that they support?

MR. BOCTOR: What they support in the action is changing the status quo in the Middle East. People have been sick and tired of seeing themselves, you know, the Arabs being treated badly, but you know, it's a double standard. Being for 40 years, having Israel always putting the Palestinian down, taking the Arab land --

MR. KAYE: When you say double standard, you're talking about the world view of Israel.

MR. BOCTOR: Yes, and the support of America to Israel, that's the most important thing. It's the support of the United States to Israel.

MR. KAYE: And now this has changed the situation?

MR. BOCTOR: It did not change it. It made it appear to the world clear.

MR. KAYE: It made the double standard more clear.

MR. BOCTOR: More clear. Wide in the open. They have to deal with the two questions.

MR. KAYE: Joseph Haiek also sees a double standard in the hostage issue. Haiek is a Palestinian, a publisher who's lived in the U.S. for 24 years. He feels Arabs living under Israeli rule, particularly those in prison, should also be considered hostages.

JOSEPH HAIEK: Because they threw stones on the army and they are by thousands in jail, and we have been, including the Lebanese religious, one or more, they are until now, they pick them up from their homes and they are hostages today.

MR. KAYE: Does that in your mind justify at all the holding of hostages by Saddam Hussein?

MR. HAIEK: Nothing gives justification to anyone in the world to take hostages. Like I said before, who is taking hostages is wrong, and this is, I'm repeating that again, but why one side of the hostages is wrong, why the other one taking hostages is okay?

MR. KAYE: Yacoub Khoury feels the same way. Khoury was born in Jordan and has been in the United States for 20 years. He and his brother run a mini market in Long Beach, California. Khoury's 13 year old son helps out. The boy says his American friends call him Fred, but that he prefers his real name of Fadi. It's an expression of his father's Arab nationalism.

YACOUB KHOURY: I'm an American, but my tradition and my background is an Arab, so I still feel with my people too.

MR. KAYE: What do you think about what's going on?

MR. KHOURY: Well, I think the Americans are interfering in the area not for the good cause of the whole world in the long run, to be honest with you.

MR. KAYE: So you'd like to see the Americans out?

MR. KHOURY: Definitely.

MR. KAYE: Would you like to see the Iraqis out of Kuwait?

MR. KHOURY: It's a different issue now. Kuwait was originally part of Iraq and I think that the Iraqis have a right to get it back. It's their land and their resources and the few sheikhs, a handful of sheikhs in Kuwait --

MR. KAYE: Sheikhs.

MR. KHOURY: Yes. They cannot control that big volume of oil against the will of the Arab nation.

MR. KAYE: Do you see Saddam as a hero?

MR. KHOURY: Yes, I do. I'll just say it since all the Arab world sees him as a hero. All in the occupied Palestine, they see him as a hero and the hope for liberation.

MR. KAYE: That same theme was repeated at a recent Los Angeles rally. Arab nationalists invoked the goal of one united Arab country. "We ask Americans get out of Arab land," said Khoury, a board member of the United Arab Community Club. Young Fadi Khoury handed out leaflets. Pictures of Saddam Hussein adorned the hall. The man widely depicted in the West as another Hitler was hailed as an Arab hero. Here he was compared to Saladine, the 12th century sultan who defeated the crusaders.

SPEAKER AT MEETING: Now we have the modern Saladine, the hero to the Arabs, Saddam Hussein. [applause]

MR. KAYE: While a few speakers spoke in English, most used Arabic. We asked Wahid Boctor of Arab-American TV to attend the rally so he could explain what was going on.

WAHID BOCTOR: Most of them, everybody, not most of them, they are supporting 100 percent the move of Saddam Hussein and they are completely denouncing the American involvement in the cause and they want it to be resolved between Arabs and between Hussein.

MR. KAYE: Is it support for Hussein or opposition to the American movement?

MR. BOCTOR: Support for Hussein and opposition to Americans, but first support to Hussein.

MR. KAYE: But first support to Hussein. Under what theory?

MR. BOCTOR: That he's helping the poor and liberating the Arab country, Arab lands from the imperialists.

OTHER SPEAKER AT MEETING: And our people join Saddam Hussein of liberating the Arab world. [applause]

SPOKESMAN: I can understand their feeling because for a long time now nobody has really stood up in that kind of vigor against the West, but they have to understand they live here. They don't really live in Iraq. They have not endured the lifestylein Iraq.

MR. KAYE: This man is from Iraq. He is a Kurd, a member of a tribe which in 1988 was the victim of Saddam Hussein's poison gas. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he fears for his family still in Iraq. He feels Arab-Americans who support Saddam are misguided.

SPOKESMAN: A hundred miles from the Iraqi border has been, all villages have been completely razed to the ground and those people have been relocated to other concentration camps. And if they ask, if the people here ask, they can find out where these concentration camps are and they can find out what he has done to the Iraqi people. So they have to be very rational in thinking what is the best, most democratic way of solving this problem, rather than side against Americans, have Americans work with them to find a solution to this. It might be a way now for the Iraqi people to start something against this, again, tyrant who has ruled Iraq for the last 23 years.

MR. KAYE: Because their numbers are comparatively small, Arabs in Los Angeles who oppose Saddam have been less visible. Kuwaitis did stage a demonstration soon after the invasion. And Kuwaiti- American businessman Adnan Alsaleh went on Arab television to state his case. Alsaleh has been helping Kuwaiti students, businessmen, and vacationers who were in Los Angeles at the time of the invasion.

DR. FADHEL ALQEEL: Of course, I am very worried about my family and I have my cousins with me on vacation with me and we can't hear anything from their parents in Kuwait. The international lines were disconnected and we can't get hold of them.

MAJID ALSHATTI: If one has to think of the individual members of the family, then you become more, you become in the state of depression, however, currently I think most of the Kuwaitis are really not thinking of individual members. Rather, they're thinking of the whole country at large and that's what's keeping us going.

MR. KAYE: Are you afraid that either world leaders or the American public will say, will start questioning the American policy and fear a protracted engagement in the Middle East?

ADNAN ALSALEH: I think Americans are very intelligent and first they stand for what is right. And second, they all realize the strategic importance of the oil, and it's the blood of the world. And Pres. Bush is doing what he's doing to protect the world economy and the United States' interest. CONVERSATION

MS. WOODRUFF: Finally tonight, another in our series of special conversations on the crisis. It comes from Charlayne Hunter-Gault on assignment in Jordan. Sharing borders with both Israel and Iraq, Jordan is caught up in many of the conflicts of the Middle East. Palestinians account for almost 60 percent of its 3.6 million people. In Jordan's capital city, Amman, Charlayne talked with journalist Ramy Khouri, a Jordanian citizen of Palestinian descent. He was born and educated in the United States, where his father worked at the United Nations. His wife, Ellen, was born in the former British protectorate of Palestine. The family has lived in a middle class neighborhood in Amman for the past 15 years. Rami Khouri has been the editor of "The Daily Jordan Times", and is now a book publisher and host of a weekly public affairs television program. A few days ago in his garden, he shared with Charlayne his view of what's happening in the Arab world.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: How worried are you about the situation right now?

RAMY KHOURI, Journalist: I'm a little bit less worried than I was two weeks ago, because at the beginning of this crisis, the initial mind set of theAmericans and the British particularly was very militaristic and you had this sort of Rambo mentality to send in the troops and beat 'em up. Now I think what's happened in the last week is that we've had a slight shift in the focus of people's mind set, and I think people have realized first the consequences of a war. The consequences of a war would be rather catastrophic, both for the indigenous people of the region and for Western interests in terms of the possible destruction of oil fields and things like that and also the long-term consequences of the war between say the Americans and the Iraqis. You are going to unite a tremendous anti- American sentiment that will sweep the whole Arab world. I think people started to realize this, and I think also what's happened is the West has probably reassessed a little bit its initial interpretation of Saddam Hussein. I think the whole Western approach during the first week was Saddam Hussein is going to take over Saudi Arabia and attack the oil fields, and I don't think that's true. I'm quite convinced myself and many others are here that what Saddam Hussein did in Kuwait was basically designed to send a message to the Kuwaits and to deal with very serious bilateral disputes that they had that go back to the turn of the century. There was no intention by the Iraqis ever to go and try to occupy the rest of the Gulf or the Arabian Peninsula. Why George Bush and Dick Cheney and the Western world thought that this was going to happen is something that the Americans have to reassess. The Americans have always been very good at collecting information through satellites and their people on the ground, but they've been very poor at interpreting this data and very weak at really understanding what drives Arabs and Muslims or Iranians, and we're seeing it now very clearly.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Do Arabs understand?

MR. KHOURI: I think the Arab mind is very clear. I think the confusion is in the Western inability to appreciate what the Arabs want and what the Arabs are saying, and there is a very important historical reason for the kind of split we're getting in the Arab world now with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries and Egypt and Syria and Morocco a little bit, sort of sending their troops against Iraq and many of the other Arab countries sort of being more sympathetic to what Iraq is doing in trying to stand up to this Western led military confrontation.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But haven't most of the, all of the Arab countries have condemned Saddam's move into Kuwait?

MR. KHOURI: I think, yes, I think virtually all Arabs will tell you, as I would, that Saddam Hussein should not have attacked and occupied Kuwait, and annexed it as he says now, but this is not where we're at now. I mean, this is what happened in the first week of the conflict. What's happening now and the reason that Iraq has been able to generate a lot of support from the grassroots of the Arab world is that the basic situation now has been transformed into a kind of a confrontation between the Arabs and the Arabs' aspirations and the tradition of Western imperial armies coming into the region and dictating to us political arrangements and the borders of countries and economic links and strategic ties. And what we have to appreciate I think, the single most important reason probably for the kinds of things we're seeing in the Arab world today, is that most of the Arab world, the political frontiers, were drawn up in the period right after World War I, between World War I and World War II, when the British, the French, and the Italians were the colonial powers in the region. And as they left, then the people got independence, they left behind them a very artificial, unreal, unstable, untenable pattern of little countries. I mean, the countries in the Gulf are the most sort of unusual. We're all dinky toy countries. We're not real countries. What's Bahrain, and Katar and Kuwait? I mean, these countries have six, hundred, eight hundred thousand natives. You can get three World Trade Centers in New York, and that's what the population of some of these countries are. And most of them had tremendous imbalances in human resources, geography, water, Arabal land, oil, demographic people power, and so you get this ridiculous situation where you have countries that simply cannot feed themselves, countries that cannot employ their people. All these artificialities were then compounded by political and strategic allegiances and alliances, so that you end up in a situation today where many of the countries, as we see in the Gulf, when something goes wrong, they automatically have to turn to the West to bring in the Western armies and save us, but what happened, in fact, was all of the contradictions that were the seeds of contradictions that we saw in the early part of the 20th century have come to fruition in the last decade, and this was compounded by the sort of agony or of being unable to deal with the Israeli-American threat, the lack of democracy within our countries, the kind of silly rivalries between Arab countries, Arab countries fighting each other one day and the next day uniting with one another, our inability to develop coherent links internationally, either commercially or politically, all of these things came together in the 1980s, and what you had was a sense of tremendous frustration and disenchantment and anger, humiliation even on the part of the man and woman of the street and, therefore, it's no surprise that during the early '80s, you started having the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in many parts of the region, and this is a Muslim region, and people turn to their religion in times of confusion or distress or defeat, and if you look back on the last sort of eight or ten years, the two most important political forces that have started to come up from within the grassroots of the Arab world are either Islamic fundamentalism or democratic pluralism, people demanding democracy, people demanding human rights, people demanding the accountability of public officials, and no more corruption, no more mismanagement.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: So how does that account for what's happening today, I mean, a tremendous almost positive sentiment towards Saddam?

MR. KHOURI: What Saddam Hussein did by attacking Kuwait and then by presenting himself as an Arab leader, an Arab power that is standing up to the West, then the Americans and the Brits, the Western armies all came in, so the confrontation was transformed from Kuwait-Iraq to Arabs and the West, and this rekindled in people's minds all of these sort of subdued and suppressed feelings of frustration and anger and all of this feeling now is directed at the West, because the feeling in the Arab world now is all of her problems or most of them date back to this problem of the Western and imperial colonial armies, and Israel is seen as a part of that coming in here throughout the century, preventing us from developing a real unified Arab identity and an Arab political structure, and the rage, the anger in the Arabs is so strong that it just needed somebody to push this button and it all came flowing out.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: But the West would look at this and say, yes, but is this the way in the 20th century world to change that, I mean, to go in, invade another country, I mean, how does the Arab world respond to that?

MR. KHOURI: Well, I think most people will tell you it is a little a bit problematic to deal with invasions of countries invading other countries, but then the overriding sentiment in the Arab world is that the problems between Iraq and Kuwait are really Arab problems to be dealt with by the Arabs. Now we don't come to you in North America and tell you how to deal with the cocaine problem in Columbia, or the lack of democracy in Nicaragua. That's your problem there. We don't tell you how to deal with immigrants coming in from Mexico illegally or whatever problems you have. As long as the events in the Middle East here do not directly impact on your strategic national interests, which are basically access to oil, what we do amongst ourselves is really none of your business. And this is the feeling I think by most people that Iraq had very serious and profound grievances against Kuwait and some other Gulf countries. And they tried for years to deal with them, border issues, oil pricing issues, accesses to waterways. Iraq and Kuwait have never agreed on their frontier. Kuwait was created at the beginning of the century. For 80 years, the Kuwaitis and the Iraqis have never agreed on their frontier. We simply want to redraw the political map that was drawn for us by Winston Churchill and the Western powers in the first part of the century, and that's our -- this is our part of the world. This is not an appendage of America or a periphery of NATO. What the Arabs are saying is that we are really fed up with people coming to us and saying, oh, this guy jails his political prisoners or kills people. Well, look, there are a lot of bad guys around the world that the United States and Britain not only supported but sold arms to for years and years, the Shah of Iran and Ceausescu and Ferdinand Marcos and Zeal Hark and the South African apartheid regime and Samosa. You know, there's a whole history of the Western democracy supporting tyrants, and even Iraq, the West sold him guns for years. You were very happy when he was fighting Iran, because then Iran was the bad guy. And you were very pleased for him to beat them up and to check this expansion of Islamic fundamentalism, and you, the United States was giving Saddam Hussein agricultural credits, and then the question of chemical weapons again. Of course, he shouldn't use chemical weapons against his own people. Nobody should do that, but he probably felt his back was, he was in a war, he felt that his country was going to get destroyed. What did the United States do when you were at war during World War II? You're the only country in the world that's used nuclear weapons. You used napom and Agent Orange in Vietnam, so how in the world can the United States come to us and preach the reality of not using weapons of mass destruction? And this is what we are fed up with, this is what the Arabs are saying, we don't like your double standards. You come to us and you say the self-determination of Kuwait is a sacred thing in international law. Well, we tell you, baloney. If you're really concerned about self-determination and the territorial sovereignty of countries, and the political sovereignty and the inviolability of borders, what have you been doing for Palestine in the last 50 years, what about Lebanon? We're fed up with double standards. We're fed up with the Arabs being told to accept a different standard of morality and human rights and political sovereignty than other people. And the reason the Arabs have responded, many Arabs have responded to Saddam is because by changing the terms of reference of this conflict, by making it the Arabs standing up to the West, what Saddam Hussein has done has told the Arabs is here is a chance to stand up for your dignity, here is a chance to stand up for the future of your children to live in dignity, and the Arabs are saying we want this.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: So you see this as a real turning point in the Arab world?

MR. KHOURI: Absolutely. This is probably the beginning of the most important historical and political change in the Arab world since the beginning of this century. There are about four or five countries where we have young nation democracies starting, Jordan, Yemen, Tunis, Algeria. Those are probably the most interesting examples.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: Those are the ones supporting Saddam.

MR. KHOURI: Those are the ones supporting Saddam.

MS. HUNTER-GAULT: How do you explain that?

MR. KHOURI: I explain it by the fact that where there is freedom and democracy and an ability of people to express their political sentiments in the Arab world, they're supporting Saddam. If the people of Syria and Egypt and Saudi Arabia and other places could express themselves freely, a lot of them would say the same thing, and the West should start looking at this. Look at the places around the world where the West, particularly the United States, has been moved by the quest for liberty. Look at the image of Amman and Tiananmen Square standing up to the Chinese tanks, the image of the Afghan guerrilla fighters fighting against the Russians in Afghanistan, the image of the black South Africans fighting the police dogs and the fire hose, the image of the blacks in the South and the United States in the '50s and '60s standing up to the police, and this is exactly what we see ourselves doing. We are trying to express a desire to live in dignity and freedom and an honest life. What we're seeing here in Jordan, and I think we see it in other parts of the Middle East where people are allowed to express themselves, is a real sort of excitement. There's almost a political adrenalin flowing. People for the first time in my life in the Arab world, people are imagining the possibility of redrawing the political order. We've got around 200 million Arabs who are standing up and saying, give me liberty or give me death. We have 200 million Patrick Henrys around here saying that we are standing up and we want to fight the battle that will give us the liberty and the future of our children that we have aspired for for all of the century, not only the century, but for the last 500 years. We had 400 years of Ottoman Turkish occupation and the last 100 years have been a mess. And we don't want this to go on. We want liberty. We want dignity. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: In other news today, Pres. Bush and National Drug Policy Director William Bennett issued an update on the administration's drug fighting efforts. The President said progress had been made in the one year since a national policy was implemented.

PRES. BUSH: The crisis is far from over, but there are clear signs of progress. So-called "casual drug" use is continuing to decline. There are early promising signs that even the problem of hard core addiction has taken a turn for the better, and today in America, cocaine is harder to find, more expensive, less pure than it was just one year ago. Statistics like these help put perspective inthe very real progress that we've made in this war on drugs.

MR. MacNeil: On Capitol Hill, Congressman John Conyers, Democrat from Michigan, said the war is being lost in the inner-cities. He said the only dramatic improvements were among the educated middle class. That view was also expressed by New York City's police chief before a Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing.

LEE BROWN, New York City Police Commissioner: In many neighborhoods of our cities, we see only an increase in misery, an increase in despair brought on by drugs. We see people trapped in a losing battle of hopelessness. We see children being born into despair. We who've watched this happen are not surprised that school systems across the country are now concerned about the arrival of the first generation of crack babies in the classroom.

MR. MacNeil: The launch of the space shuttle Columbia was postponed again today because of another fuel leak. The shuttle was scheduled for lift off from Cape Canaveral shortly after midnight. Last May, a launch was scrubbed when a hydrogen leak was discovered. Last week, a second attempt was delayed by a faulty communications link with a $150 million telescope in the cargo bay. RECAP

MS. WOODRUFF: Again, recapping today's developments in the United States, Saddam Hussein called on the Arab world to fight the Western military presence in the region. He also said Iraqi children are dying because of the U.N. embargo. The White House said there was no evidence to support the claim. Pres. Bush told congressional leaders he will consider other options if the blockade fails. Britain pledged to help pay for the multinational force in the Gulf, and Japan said it is considering sending troops to the area. And another group of Western hostages, including 10 Americans, were allowed to leave Baghdad. Good night, Robin.

MR. MacNeil: Good night, Judy. That's the Newshour tonight. Tomorrow night we'll talk to Israel's foreign minister, David Levy, after he meets with Pres. Bush, and Charlayne Hunter-Gault looks at what's behind the crisis in the Middle East with Iraq's oil minister. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.