Political wit alive and kicking
Recent cartoons rip apart the goings on in Afghanistan and Palestine

As the new Afghan transitional government prepares to take control of the country later this month, pundits the world over have been taking aim at the potential scenarios to occur.

Egyptian cartoonists have been having a field day. A recent cartoon in Al-Akhbar by Mustafa Hussein and Ahmed Ragab, portrays Afghanistan as a tiny bowl of food. A group of men -- each representing a different Afghan faction -- are gathered around the bowl with their sleeves rolled up, preparing to dig in to the meal. The Taliban are looking on from behind a door as the Northern Alliance, the Bashtun, the Tajik, and the Shiaa are all aiming to claim their share of the tiny bowl of food.

Nearby, two veiled women are saying, "They're attacking the food... because they've been fasting for 6 years."

Another very revealing cartoon -- this time by Gomaa in Al-Ahram -- shows two cages... One belongs to the Taliban and is labeled "Al-Tataroof... fundamentalism"... The other belongs to the Northern Alliance and is labeled "Al-Fawda... chaos"...

A man -- representing Afghanistan -- is being led out of the first cage (The Taliban's fundamentalism) and put into the second cage (The Northern Alliance's chaos)

As Israel's multi-pronged assault on the Palestinians intensifies, with blessings from the US, a telling cartoon by Gomaa in Al-Ahram portrays the peace process and the US's promise of a Palestinian state as an awful symphony being played by a tuxedo-clad George Bush on the piano. At the microphone, singing like a croaking diva, is a corpulent Ariel Sharon... Instead of notes coming out of his mouth, however, all we hear is "Takh... owww, boom boom"... the sounds of tanks, bullets and death.

Palestine and the world, meanwhile, stand listening to this farcical composition, with their hands over their ears, from the awful noise.