Word: pretexts
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Indeed, the evidence suggests that Sharon’s visit was merely a pretext for an uprising that had been planned long in advance. Imad al-Faluji, the Palestinian Authority (PA) minister for communications, put it plainly during a speech in Gaza in December 2000 (reported by the Arabic-language newspaper Al-Ayyam): “The PA had begun to prepare for the outbreak of the current intifada since the return from the Camp David negotiations, by request of President Yasser Arafat…and not as a specific protest against Sharon’s visit...
...cronyism most Palestinians have of Arafat's administration. The welfare arm also cares for the families of suicide bombers and others who have died fighting the Israelis, making suicide bombing a macabre form of life insurance in impoverished Palestinian communities. The social services performed by Hamas also create a pretext for the massive funding the organization receives from Muslim charities throughout the Persian Gulf and beyond...
Surely enough, cultural critics have trumpeted the detrimental impact of the cell phone on society. Are we not disingenuous hedons, appropriating a gadget with the pretext of boosting efficiency, when in fact we use that technology for useless chit-chat? Even the most avid cell phone apologists concede that this is a rhetorical question. Of course cell phones are mostly frivolous and only occasionally useful. Ultimately, users argue, the cell phone is a benign force, and on the rare occasion that it seems absolutely necessary (“Where are you, I’m outside Mather?...
...public to support a more aggressive campaign against Arafat's administration. Israeli political analysts believe it was Netanyahu's challenge for the leadership of the Likud party that drove Sharon to make his ill-fated visit to Jerusalem's Temple Mount a year ago, which became the pretext for the Palestinian intifada...
China claims that Choephel's research was a pretext for collecting sensitive information. The official news report of his sentence concluded he had been sent "by the Dalai [Lama] clique with expenditures and equipment provided by a certain foreign country." But shortly before his disappearance, Choephel sent the first 16 hours of his videotapes out of the country with American tourists. The tapes show folk songs and dances that seem to pose little threat to any country's national security...