Word: humanizing
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Dubcek! Dubcek!" Who ever expected to see the day when Alexander Dubcek, the man who first tried to give East European Communism a "human face," would return to Prague so triumphantly, or be welcomed so deliriously? Yet day after day, as the leaden skies of late autumn began turning to dusk, the crowds beneath the statue of St. Wenceslas in downtown Prague kept growing, in size and in confidence. By late last week they had swelled into the largest protests in Czechoslovakia's history: a half million chanting, shouting, horn- honking people, all bent on ousting the repressive rule...
Referring to Moscow's evident relief at the dramatic turn in Prague, playwright Vaclav Havel, leader of Czechoslovakia's human rights movement, said wryly, "We cannot rule out the situation that all occupiers of this country will have renounced the occupation, and only the occupied will still stand behind it." Added Havel, who is known for his absurdist dramas: "It is like something out of my own plays...
...mass movement to overthrow Jakes would be led by him and his artistic and literary confreres, Havel would have been the first to laugh. But as the most prominent figure in Prague's rapidly coalescing opposition, Havel has rocketed to near cult status. "I am a writer and human rights activist, not a politician," insisted Havel. But as a Western diplomat in Prague put it, "Unlikely but true, he's the Lech Walesa of Prague...
...favor of the occupation as a human rights activist, but I have to tell you--there has never been a freer press in any part of the Arab world than the all-too un-free press that today exists in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. For the first time in Arab history there has been a relatively independent press, too censored by my standards, too censored by your standards, and most importantly--too censored by Israeli standards. Israel does not always comply with its own high standards of human rights in the West Bank...
Maybe it's just me; but I do not see any indication in the above quotation of intellectual inconsistancy or of Dershowitz's defending Israeli tactics in the territories, or of any "apologetic" attitude towards Israeli human rights violations whatsoever. Unfortunately, recognition of the facts would have meant that Larew's Dershowitz as "rationalizer" argument couldn't hold much weight...