In October 1935, Fascist Italy invaded Abyssinia and, not surprisingly, subdued it within six months. There was resistance of at least as many Ethiopians as there were Italian invaders. But the Italians had modern arms and also mustard gas while most of the locals fought with guns from the previous century and with spears. At the same time, the Fascist army massacred the locals almost casually. The conquest of the oldest Christian polity (save for Armenia) in the world by a tyranny with the imperial delusions of Rome did not cause a great fuss in the world. The Pope welcomed it. Big surprise. After all, the Christianity practiced in the country was as old as Roman Catholicism, perhaps older, and besides its adherence to a form of Orthodoxy it had other strange customs and strange beliefs. The British liberated Ethiopia in 1941, in some degree due to the brilliant and unconventional tactics of my hero Orde Wingate who in the decade before had helped establish the Jewish defense army in Palestine and in the immediate years afterward would craft a resistance to the Japanese in Burma. But this is taking my story too far. After the world ignored the Ethiopian tragedy, the emperor Haille Selassie came to the League of Nations in June 1936 to point out that a member nation had been conquered and attached to the Fascist dictatorship in southern Europe. The League yawned. And yawned. When he asked what assistance the 52 member nations and the big powers would allow to his country, it yawned some more. This yawning was the precedent for the Nazi attachment of Czech Sudetenland and Austria. And Holland and Belgium and Denmark and France... Much more than the Fascist uprising against Republican Spain, the abandonment of Ethiopia was the first round in the Second World War. Now an ironic post-script to this infamy by the League, the first last best hope for peace, Ethiopia has seemed to stop in its tracks aggression by terror of the Islamic jihad. I do not pretend that Ethiopia has a sterling record in human rights. But it has been through its era of African Stalinism under President Mengistu. And it crawls towards freedom. Somalia under reckless sharia rules with aggressive designs--no, with aggressive actions--against its own people and its neighbor, Christian Ethiopia with a sizeable Muslim population, has already proven to be a threat to civilized life, however primordial and inarticulate. So read in Wednesday's Times what to me is an exhilarating report by Jeffrey Gettleman announcing that "Islamists in Somalia Retreat from Ethiopia-Backed Forces." And more: "The Islamist fighters, who had seemed invincible after taking Magdishu from the city war-lords in June, now seem powerless to stop the steady advance of the internationally recognized transitional government and the Ethiopian forces that are backing it." This may not be an auguring for everything to come elsewhere. But it is the first battle in the war against fanatic Islam anywhere that seems to be winnable. It is true that the Ethiopians have better and more advanced equipment. But they are fighting not only the local jihadists. They are fighting also "thousands of fighters from Eritrea, Yemen, Syria and Libya (who) have streamed into Somalia to wage a holy war against Ethiopia." Like the fighters, foreign and native, in Iraq. Which reminds me of Bob Marley. I know he would be in this fight if he hadn't died a quarter of a century ago. Check out of some of his lyrics here, here, here, and here. One of my kids, Jesse, and I were in Jerusalem on the day that Marley died. There was a Rasta club on King George Street, and it suddenly filled up with young people, Israeli young people who love freedom and loved Marley and his music. He, in turn, loved them and also their prayers.