Malaysia: Mahathir Mohamad, modern Malaysia's founding father and moderate Islam's self-styled champion, denounced the Bush administration yesterday as a "rogue regime" bent on terrorising innocent civilians.
Reflecting the rage felt across the Muslim world over abuse scandals in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, and continuing violence in Palestine and Iraq, Mr Mahathir (79) said president George Bush and other US politicians were "ignorant" people who believed might made right - a return to colonial-era "old thinking".
Speaking at his offices in Putrajaya, near Kuala Lumpur, Mr Mahathir also claimed that the Israeli government had been given a free hand by Washington to continue to expropriate Palestinian land and entrench its control over Jerusalem. The war on terror would not end until the Middle East conflict was justly resolved, he said. Asked whether he regretted his statement that "Jews rule the world by proxy", which caused an international furore in 2003, Mr Mahathir said he took nothing back.
"US politicians are scared stiff of the Jews because anybody who votes against the Jews will lose elections. The Jews in America are supporting the Jews in Israel. Israel and other Jews control the most powerful nation in the world. And that is what I mean [ about Jews controlling the world]. I stand by that view."
Earlier in the day, he had lectured students at his Perdana Leadership Foundation on the importance of education and development in the Muslim world to defend the Islamic faith. The problem was not Islam itself, he said, but the many incorrect interpretations of the Koran that were exploited by extremists.
But Mr Mahathir's strongest criticism was directed outwards. Even though he retired as Malaysia's longest-serving prime minister in 2003, many in the region still regard him as the country's leader and one of Asia's most influential voices.
"The US is the most powerful nation," he said. "It can ignore the world if it wants to do anything. It breaks international law.
"The US war on terror is a way of terrorising people. If you are an Iraqi and you are expecting to be bombed, aren't you terrified? If you have done nothing, if you are an innocent Iraqi citizen and you are expecting any time a rocket to fly in and blow you to pieces, aren't you terrified?
"That is terror [ and] the US is as guilty of terrorism as the people who crashed their planes into the buildings . . . Bush doesn't understand the rest of the world."