I saw the video and it is very difficult to see how it could have been taken out of context. Unless it is an outright forgery, there are some very , very serious questions to be put to Tsvangarai.
Could the tape be a forgery? It would be interesting to find out who ordered and for what purpose. The aggrandizement of Ben-Menashe could be a reason, but the evidene produced seemed very convincing. They had paper trail for the alleged contract. If it is a scam, it is a very, very professional job - the video isn't a bunch of fuzzy arabs talking under a slab of hiss, the audio is relativey clear and Tsvangarai is identitifiable.
Were it a forgery I suppose that all fingers would be pointing to the one man other than Ben-Menashe who is likely to gain from this - Robert Mugabe.
One thing that did strike me was that it was somewhat odd that this Canadian firm would be so open about discussing its engagement in a contract to kill someone - a contract which it apparently never intended to honour (that's their version). Nevertheless they received $97,000. So it's a hit, or it's fraud...
The basic point made in the SBS documentary, however, was that there are some very valid criticisms of the MDC which go almost completely unreported. A large number of Zanu-PF people have been beaten and harassed by the MDC. The MDC does, as a matter of fact, receive big funding from overseas. It represents most white people's interests, but represents a smaller section of blacks. Its land reform program, although more equitable, are likely to take a long time - so long that white farmers support it. It is a land reform which is also evidently very unconvincing to the majority of Zimbabweans, given their poor electoral showing.
Many people support Zanu-PF for the horribly unequitable 'land reforms' - which at least have given some people land to grow their food rather than to harvest someone elses' tobacco. The documentary was extraordinarily good in stating all this with a measure of balance - the perspective was not that of Evil Zanu PF party hacks taking land from innocent whites and their workers, but rather of the ordinary people who are affected by these policies. And the effects, it shows, are mixed.
Thiago Oppermann
From: Michael Pugliese <debsian at pacbell.net> Subject: Re: Alleged plot to kill Mugabe
Ari Ben-Menashe has as much credibility as Donald Duck. http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Ari+Ben-Menashe+October+Surprise+
SALON Daily Clicks: Media Circus ... as former Israeli intelligence officer Ari Ben-Menashe (discredited, according to Parry ... no truth to the October Surprise, calls Robert Parry "a very ... www.salonmagazine.com/media/media960611.html
Meanwhile, scores of rural supporters of the MDC have been killed in Zimbabwe. Michael Pugliese