Empire - Marwan's Postscript - Pakistan

Barack Obama has pledged to deploy 30 thousand extra troops to fight in Afghanistan and is expanding the US military's theatre of operation into Pakistan.

Opinion polls show public support for this move which the US administration says is being done to end what it calls human rights violations in the north-west of Pakistan.

When the Taliban recently flogged a young Pakistani woman in public for committing adultery, and the Afghan parliament introduced laws that severely restrict women's rights, there was a strong public indignation in many parts of the world.

Marwan Bishara says the US should be cautious in its latest "moral crusade".