March 2, 2002

New York Knicks defeat Seattle SuperSonics, 89-87; photos (M)

Pres Bush has approved plans to send as many as 100 troops, mostly Special Forces, to train Yemeni military to fight terrorists, specifically Al Qaeda fighters hiding in country; increasingly broad campaign stirs Democratic complaints that administration demands virually unlimited funds without answering to Congress; latest operations aim to crush isolated but potent Islamic insurgents; Special Forces would be limited to training and equipping nations requesting help, but not calling in air strikes; Americans will be discouraged from even firing weapons except in self-defense; Yemen is key center of support for Osama bin Laden, home to well-armed tribal forces, at least 20 senior Qaeda officials and scores of fighters trained in Afghanistan (M)

New York Mets lose, 7-1, to St Louis Cardinals in Mets home exhibition opener; photos (M)

ABC News president David Westin tells his top executives that his bosses blindsided him, failing to tell him of plan to remove Nightline to make room for David Letterman, whom network hs tried to lure from CBS; photos; Westin is reported 'ashen,' talking of tremendous blow to ABC News from news he learned in call from The New York Times; outcome is unclear with Letterman on vacation; Nightline anchor Ted Koppel declines comment; executives at parent Walt Disney Co insist they will not allow sentimental attachment to 'aging news program' stand in way of corporate ship; Letterman, who has strained relations with CBS Television head Leslie Moonves, has made clear he will not go to ABC if it leads directly to Koppel's departure (M)

Handful of Islamic scholars, bucking threats of violence for questioning words of Koran, are quietly investigating origins of Muslim holy book, offering radically new theories about text's meaning and rise of Islam; photos; German scholar who uses pseudonym Christoph Luxemberg uses earliest copies to maintain that portions are derived from pre-existing Christian Aramaic texts that were misinterpreted by later scholars who prepared modern texts; he posits that 'virgins' supposedly awaiting martyrs in paradise are actually 'white raisins' of crystal clarity; his work has no publisher, given cases of Salman Rushdie and Suliman Bashear, who was thrown from window at University of Nablus for arguing that Islam developed gradually, not fully formed from mouth of Mohammad; scholar at US campus says fear and political correctness make it impossible to say other than 'sugary nonsense'; authors Patricia Crone and Michael Cook suggest Muhammad was seen originally not as founder of new religion but as Old Testament-style preacher on Messiah, so that earliest followers may have seen themselves retaking place in Holy Land alongside Jewish cousins (M)