Word: azanarã
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Evidence now suggests that al Qaeda carried out last week’s Madrid bombings in retaliation for Spain’s involvement in the Iraqi invasion and ongoing occupation. Before the attacks, Prime Minister Azanar??s Popular party enjoyed a comfortable lead in the polls. On Sunday they were ousted by incoming Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and his Socialist party. Conservative pundits, like New York Times columnist David Brooks, have been quick to denounce the Spaniards for appeasing Al Qaeda. Their arguments are not without merit, but they are overly crude...
...starters, the Spanish public did not change its position on Iraq in the aftermath of the attacks; 90 percent of the electorate opposed Azanar??s decision to send troops in the first place. The majority of swing voters—those who switched their votes to the Socialists in the wake of bombings—had planned to vote for Azanar??s Popular Party in spite of its policy on Iraq...
...difference is that Spaniards lashed out at their own government. On the eve of the election, for example, furious protestors marched through the streets of Madrid, chanting “Our Dead, Your War.” But voters were most angered by Azanar??s poor handling of the crisis. Distrust of the government had already begun to grow in recent months, as official claims that Iraq possessed WMD’s proved unfounded. This distrust only deepened in the immediate aftermath of the bombings, after Azanar assigned blame to the Basque terrorist group ETA, an act many...
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