On Dec. 29, Prime Minister Zapatero held a news conference proclaiming that the peace initiative he had started with the Basque separatist movement ETA months before was making progress.

“Are we better off now with a permanent cease-fire, or when we had bombs, car bombs and explosions?” he asked. “This time next year, we will be better off than we are today.”

The next morning, on December 30th, a bomb ETA had planted in a Renault van exploded in the five-story parking garage of Madrid’s new air terminal, killing two people and causing tens of millions of dollars of damage to Spain’s glittery showpiece of modernity.

Even after the bombing, Mr. Zapatero seemed reluctant to end talks with ETA. In his first public statement to the nation on the night of the bombing, he ordered only a “suspension.” Call this a victory for terrorism.

At a meeting of regional presidents last Friday, Mr. Zapatero made an unfortunate verbal slip, at first referring to the terrorist attack as a “tragic accident,” then immediately correcting himself and calling it a “tragic attack.” Call this a victory for terrorism.

Zapatero and his party were swept into power just three days after the horrible Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people and wounded more than 1400 on March 11th, 2004. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the series of bombings. Shortly after that Zapatero made good on his campaign promise to remove the Spanish forces fighting in Iraq. Call this a victory for terrorism.

Spain has been victimised for over 40 yeas by Basque terrorists called ETA, who adopted a policy of armed struggle in 1968, resulting in over 850 deaths so far. Standing up to these killers was not this Prime Minister’s plan — instead in June 2005, he offered to hold talks with the armed group ETA if it renounces violence. Call this a victory for terrorism.

Hundred of thousands of people, including relatives of those killed or wounded by bomb attacks by the Basque separatists, packed the streets of Madrid to protest the government offer. The demonstrators shouted slogans against Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and his Socialist government and demanded the resignation of the government’s ombudsman for victims of terrorism, Gregorio Peces Barba.

During the Israeli/Hezbollah conflict in Lebanon in July 2006, true to his leftist leanings the Spanish prime minister accused Israel of using “abusive force” while wearing a Palestinian scarf similar to Yasser Arafat. Call this a victory for terrorism.

There is a long list of Democrats who oppose the troop surge, want the soldiers out of Iraq and believe instead that the U.S. should be negotiating with Iran and Syria. Democrats like, John Edwards, Teddy Kennedy, Barbara Boxer, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Chris Dodd, and Joe Biden. Call this a victory for terrorism.

On December 22nd, 2006, Al Qaeda in a taped message by Ayman al Zawahri said to leaders of the Democratic party that credit for the defeat of congressional Republicans belongs to the terrorists. Zawahri says he has two messages for American Democrats.

“The first is that you aren’t the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen — the Muslim Ummah’s vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq — are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost,”

Call this a victory for terrorism.

Posted: 0040PST 01/15/07
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