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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL: MEMORIAL TO FALLEN IDF SOLDIERS
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, April 30, 2009. |
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This is one of Yehoshua Halevi's Golden Light Images, taken April 28, 2009. Yehoshua Halevi writes: "HOW I GOT THE SHOT: Today is Yom Hazikaron in Israel, Memorial Day for fallen soldiers and victims of terrorism. Each year, the list grows longer and now stands at 22,570 names. Across Israel, in every city, town, and kibbutz, at historic sites and countless schools and public buildings, memorials are a solemn reminder of the courage and sacrifice upon which Israel was built. I took this shot at night at Latrun, a tank museum and memorial situated on the road linking Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, following an emotional ceremony in which 500 new Israel Defense Forces recruits marked the completion of their basic training. A lone wreath lay at the base of a wall inscribed with hundreds of names. The unusual color is the result of the camera's rendering of the artificial halogen spotlights illuminating the wall. I could have adjusted the color to something more familiar to the eye, but the warm tone enhances the somber feeling of the picture. I could also easily have moved closer to the wall to capture one or more of the names in sharp focus, but I prefer this interpretation, in which the vast number of names is evident, but no single name is identifiable. Those who gave their lives in defense of Israel are remembered painfully and proudly by those who knew them personally, not just today, but every day. All of us, whether we knew them or not, owe them a debt of gratitude for our national existence. May we go from strength to strength!
Contact Yehoshua Halevi by email at smile@goldenlightimages.com
and visit his website:
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THE REAL TRAGEDY IN ISRAEL
Posted by Ted Belman, April 30, 2009. | |
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A narrative has emerged that Israel's settlements in the West Bank are a "tragedy." The fatal flaw lies in the original sin of supposedly lawless occupation of land, in contravention of the Geneva Convention. It makes a strong emotional pitch to a sense of justice, a major influence on the thinking of many American Jews. But the narrative is built on a flawed foundation. For example, Gershom Gorenberg in his Op-Ed in the New York Times, "Israel's Tragedy Foretold," on March 10, 2006, opines that Israelis and their leaders have finally seen the light, namely that Israel should abandon the settlements. In so concluding, Mr. Gorenberg puts his faith in an opinion by Legal Counsel to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, one Theodor Merion who wrote in 1967 "My conclusion is that civilian settlement in the administered territories contravenes the explicit provisions of the Fourth Geneva Convention." Mr Gorenberg laments that Israel, in disregard of this advice, started to build settlements with the "sadly mistaken confidence that the legal, ethical and diplomatic difficulties of settlement could somehow be avoided." The tragedy, according to Mr. Gorenberg, is that Israel now has to untangle the mess at great human and financial cost. Mr. Meron's conclusion has been thoroughly discredited by legal scholars over the years and Mr. Gorenberg's thesis which rests upon it must suffer the same fate. Professor Talia Einhorn, Adjunct Professor of Law, Tel Aviv University, in The Status of Palestine/Land of Israel and Its Settlement Under Public International Law published by NATIV Online in 1993, advises In 1967, following the Six Day War, the territories of Yesha, which had been originally designated for the Jewish national home according to the Mandate document, returned to Israeli rule. Leading international law scholars opined that Israel was in lawful control of Yesha, that no other state could show better title than Israel to Yesha's territory, and that this territory was not "occupied" in the sense of the Geneva Convention, since those rules are designed to assure the reversion of the former legitimate sovereign which, in this case, does not exist. Israel was therefore entitled to declare that it has exercised its sovereign powers over Yesha. One of the "leading international scholars" she refers to was the late Eugene W. Rostow, Dean of Yale Law School, US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs between 1966 and 1969. The New Republic, on April 23, 1990, published his article entitled, Historical Approach to the Issue of Legality of Jewish Settlement Activity, in which he argued "...The Palestine Mandate, recognizing "the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country," is dedicated to "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, ..." In 1991, The New Republic published another article by Dean Rostow, entitled "Resolved: are the settlements legal?" Israeli West Bank policies in which he again argued, It is common even for American journalists to write that Security Council Resolution 242 is "deliberately ambiguous," as though the parties are equally free to rely on their own reading of its key provisions. Now that Israel has withdrawn from Gaza, this percentage has increased. Thus the "occupation" was and is legal, having been authorized by the Security Council and the settlements are legal pursuant to the trust created by the British Mandate. In accordance with Israel's rights, The Oslo Accords did not restrict further settlement. The Mitchell Report which recommended a freeze on settlement activity was incorporated into the Roadmap which Israel accepted. The Palestinian Authority is in fundamental breach of its obligations under the Roadmap. Therefore, Israel is not bound to maintain the freeze. The fact remains that Israel has every right, according to international law, to defend its citizens, to remain in occupation, to build settlements and to refuse to acknowledge a "right of return". The tragedy is that the Arabs refused to accept the existence of the State of Israel and have refused to negotiate peace based on the intent of Resolution 242. Anwar Sadat broke the mold in 1979 and was assassinated for his pains. The tragedy is that the Arabs have refused to absorb the Arab refugees as Israel absorbed the Jewish refugees, preferring instead to doom them to live in squalor as a means of putting pressure on Israel. The late King Hussein of Jordan was the only exception. He too recognized the State of Israel. The tragedy is that the PA created and empowered by the Oslo Accords choose to make war rather than peace thereby sacrificing the well being of the people it represented. And the tragedy is that the world aided and abetted it in this endeavor never once demanding that it honor its obligations or else. Addendum: A compilation of dozens of legal articles on Israel's Legal Rights
to Judea, Samaria, and Gaza can be found at
http://www.geocities.com/israelwhitepaper
Ted Belman is a Canadian lawyer. He hosts the IsraPundit website.
This article is archived at
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THE OBAMA DOCTRINE
Posted by Ralph Peters, April 30, 2009. |
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This article was written by
Ralph Peters, who is is Fox News' strategic analyst.
It appeared yesterday in the New York Post
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AFTER a mere 100 days, the "Obama Doctrine" for our foreign and security poli cies has emerged. And it's terrifying. The combination of dizzying naivete, dislike of our allies, disdain for our military, distrust of our intelligence services and distaste for our own country promises the worst foreign policy of our lifetimes. That includes President Jimmy Carter's abysmal record of failure. The core tenets of the Obama Doctrine to date would make a charter member of the Weather Underground cheer: We're to blame. If there are problems anywhere, they're America's fault. This central conviction of leftist ideology appears to have soaked so thoroughly into our president's consciousness during his lengthy friendships with extremists that it's now second nature to him. Problems can be negotiated away. From Somali pirates to Moscow's belligerency, Obama and his Cabinet see a good chat as the best response to a challenge. Our president got to the Oval Office by talking, not doing, and his faith in his powers of persuasion is unlimited. An acquaintance who may have our government's best grasp of the Russians shakes his head at the tone in Washington. The current mantra: "We have to get over our Cold War thinking." Great — except that it's the Russians who've revived Cold War hostility. The Taliban devours Pakistan, and we want to talk. President Hugo Chavez destroys Venezuela's democracy, and we want to talk. Iran pursues nuclear weapons with refreshed enthusiasm . . . and we want to talk. Problems that can't be talked out can be bought off. Pakistan, a nuke-armed state of 170 million Muslims seething with anti-Americanism stirred up by our "friends," faces a crack-up as its once-monolithic military splinters. Obama's answer? Send billions of dollars that will disappear and weapons that may soon be used against our troops. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton thinks the solution to piracy is a generous program to rebuild Somalia. (Been there, done that.) She'd also like to hand Hamas a billion bucks. The "Las Vegas law" applies: You can buy sex but not enduring love. We can't defeat terror with welfare checks. Islamist terrorism doesn't exist. The term's even been banned from government departments. As Muslim extremists slaughter innocent victims by the thousands, we're assured Islam's a "religion of peace" that contributed profoundly to our country's development. (Huh?) It's as if 9/11 never happened. The "nonterrorists" drenching the greater Middle East in blood and threatening us as loudly as they can are just victims of our aggression. It's all our fault. Terrorists do exist, though — among our returning veterans and amid those Americans who don't subscribe to MoveOn.org's revulsion at our country. Israel's the obstacle to Middle East peace. Palestinians are all victims. Hamas consists of struggling community activists. The terrorists are in the Israeli military. Our nukes threaten world peace and we need to get rid of them. Other states only maintain or seek nuclear arsenals because we worry them. If we can get down to zero nukes, peace will reign on earth. Forget that only our nuclear weapons prevented World War III and that they still deter potential enemies. Just get rid of them, OK? Our military is dangerous. Beyond Obama's cynically choreographed appearances with our troops, he and his coterie clearly disdain military advice and uniformed service. The administration views our troops as primitive creatures who must be collared and leashed, not as part of any solutions. Our intelligence services are even more dangerous than our military. The administration's already begun to gut our intelligence capabilities. Carter at least pretended to study the problem. Obama's plunging straight in with the demoralization of our shadow warriors. It's only torture if we do it. Blame President George W. Bush. Should the Obama Doctrine lead to new terror attacks (sorry, Janet: I meant "man-caused disasters") or to foreign-policy humiliations, it won't be Obama's fault, but Bush's. We're becoming a third-world country, succumbing to a sickening (in both senses of the word) culture of blame. And that culture is fostered by breathtaking ignorance. We now have a president who doesn't know that Pakistan was founded as a democracy, a secretary of state who thinks we created the Taliban, a head of the Department of Homeland Security who doesn't believe Islamist terrorists exist and a vice president who claims FDR gave televised speeches during the Depression. If Bush had made such gaffes, the media would've mocked him. But Obama and his entourage excite orgasmic forgiveness among journalists. Which brings us to the Obama Doctrine's final tenet: Our media sluts will portray defeat as victory. Contact LEL by email at lel817@yahoo.com |
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ILANI HALIMI TRIAL BEGINS TODAY: MUSLIM GANG TORTURED JEWISH BOY TO DEATH
Posted by LEL, April 30, 2009. |
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This was written by Debbie Schlussel and it appeared yesterday on her website: http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2009/04/ilani_halimi_tr.html |
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Today, the trial of the Muslim killers of Ilan Halimi began. Unfortunately, the trial is closed because two of the TWENTY-SEVEN barbarian Muslims (redundant) who murdered him are minors. Three years ago, I told you the story of how Halimi, of blessed memory, was kidnapped by a Muslim gang of 27 in France, after luring him with an attractive woman. The Muslims, headed by Youssouf Fofana, held Halimi captive for 24 days, while they tortured him and called his parents who heard his screams in the background, while his torturers shouted anti-Semitic slurs. For 24 days, the Muslims burned Ilan Halimi with cigarettes and an iron, beat him, cut off his fingers, and otherwise brutally tortured him. His "crime": He was a Jew. 
Throughout, Muslim neighbors in the building heard his screams and cries from torture. And they did nothing. In the end, the Muslims dumped his mostly lifeless, cut-up, burned body (80% of it was covered in burns) on railroad tracks, and he died shortly thereafter. He was only 23. From the coverage of today's first day of trial: The leader of the "barbarians," Youssouf Fofana, smirked at Halimi's relatives and shouted "Allahu akbar!" ("God is Greatest!" in Arabic) [DS: Um, it actually means "allah is the greater" or "the greatest," meaning greater than your or my G-d] at them as he entered the courtroom. Bearded and wearing a white tracksuit, Fofana gave his identity during formal questioning by the judge as "Arabs African revolt barbarian salafist army." The 28-year-old said he was born on February 13, 2006, in Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois, the date and place of Halimi's death. During his time in detention, Fofana, a young French man of Ivorian origin, has bombarded the magistrates investigating the case with letters full of anti-Semitic insults. ... After the murder, Fofana fled to Ivory Coast. From there he made death threats by telephone to Halimi's father and girlfriend. He was extradited to France on March 4, 2006. From previous coverage of the Halimi murder: The items found in the torture chamber included extremist Islamic literature and leaflets of a pro-Palestinian charity blacklisted by the United States and Israel. The charity, the Comite de Bienfaisance et de Soutien aux Palestiniens (CBSP), a Hamas-affiliated fund, is still active in France despite the exposure of its members and financial support tying it directly to terrorist activities in the Palestinian Authority. What happened to Ilan is not the first attempt of this kind. The gang tried to pull off similar crimes before with four of the six previous victims being Jewish. Similar stories are only now surfacing. French daily newspaper Le Parisien reported that the gang's last victim was a fifty-year-old Jewish man, who had driven home a girl who attempted to seduce his twenty-year-old son. As I noted back in 2006, Ilan Halimi looks like he could be an Arab. That's because his family of Sephardic Jews left Arab countries, so that they could live in peace and without harassment and persecution from Muslims. But they could not escape Islamic anti-Semitism and barbarism. The problem long ago exported itself from greater Islamic barbaria to France, where it has long been at home. This is France, but it could easily happen here in the United States. If you think otherwise, you're a fool. If you watch the second video, below, the Jewish leader in the community is still burying his head in the sand, as do the American Jewish community establishment's self-appointed liberal leaders. He talks about how the Jews and Muslims all get along and still get along. That's a big lie. There is a reason for the mass Jewish emigration from France to Israel: violent Muslim attacks on France's Jews. Also, note that French television (Muslim Arab reporter Karim Hakiki — he's not biased, right?) keeps saying the neighbors were unaware or didn't hear. A complete and obvious lie. They heard, but they did nothing, because the inhumane Islamic culture accepts wanton torture and murder, especially of non-Muslims, particularly Jews. Watch how this Arab Muslim a-hole "reporter," Hakiki excuses this gang and claims they were not anti-Semitic. Uh-huh. Liar. That French television holds a debate whether or not this was anti-Semitism, tells you everything you need to know about France. It's lost forever. More like Al-France de Mohammed. The Nazis never left France. They just have a different religion. And an invasion at Omaha Beach of Normandy won't stop them this time. It's too late.
Contact LEL by email at lel817@yahoo.com
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FROM ISRAEL: UNEASE
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 30, 2009. |
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With the state of world affairs, it would be difficult indeed to feel a sense of ease. In an "exclusive" today the Jerusalem Post reported that PM Netanyahu, when he goes to the US on May 18, plans to tell President Obama that Israel will accept "some form" of the Arab peace plan. While the first impulse is to fear that he's caved already — I intend to give Netanyahu the benefit of the doubt here. At least until I know more. We must remember that this is not an official announcement. The Post got this from "sources" close to government planning. And then, we need to know what "some form" of the plan means. The Arab (Saudi) plan is a recipe for Israel's destruction, calling as it does for our return to '67 lines and "return of refugees." Netanyahu is not about to sign off on either of these. Then, what? ~~~~~~~~~~ Aaron Lerner, on his IMRA website today, asks if Netanyahu is doing some "fancy verbal footwork." And indeed that may be precisely the case. It may be that Netanyahu wants to appear to have given Obama something, without actually giving him anything. Yes, he can intone, this and this part of the plan resonate with us. Then Obama can put out press releases about how he is already moving matters along. While Netanyahu, knowing full well that all the pieces are not going to fall into place, remains confident of the outcome: no "two state solution," no withdrawals from Judea and Samaria, no dividing Jerusalem. But this high level game-playing is risky. It requires nerves of steel and the ability to know when to stop. Otherwise you're on your way down that slippery slope, and something truly is conceded. ~~~~~~~~~~ But there is more. And it's most unsettling. According to the Post report, Israel "will compromise on the Palestinian issue to obtain more direct and aggressive US assistance on the Iranian front." This linking of the two issues was verbalized last week by Secretary Clinton. What she suggested was that we won't get support from the Arab states for taking on Iran unless the Arabs see we are moving on Palestinian negotiations. This was both offensive and off base, for behind the bluster is the Arab desire to see us stand strong against Iran. So, is Netanyahu caving in response to what she said, or is he trying to maneuver the situation to his advantage? The next question to be asked, of course, is what the quid pro quo would be: Precisely what sort of US assistance on the Iranian front would be sufficient for Netanyahu to become more "flexible" with regard to the Palestinians? Additional sophisticated weaponry or equipment? Permission to fly over Iraq? Here I make a speculation, coming from nothing but my own sense of the situation and my understanding of our prime minister. The issue of the danger of Iran has loomed large in Netanyahu's consciousness for some time. He's been speaking consistently and forcefully about the need to take action. Could it be that he's doing an abbreviated sort of triage here? If — and it would be rightly so — he sees Iran as THE existential danger to us, he would conclude that it's the threat most important to counter. And, even as he still intends to hold the ground against a Palestinian state, he would see caving (or appearing to cave) on that issue, up to a point, wise if it allows us to more effectively take on Iran. Only speculation. Only questions. For now. ~~~~~~~~~~ It's actually easy to see why Netanyahu, along with a great many of us, is being driven to distraction by Obama's stance on Iran. Yesterday, the White House rejected any suggestion of putting time limits on its negotiations with Iran and suggested that this process could take a long time. White House National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer told reporters that "it's not appropriate at this time to be trying to establish timetables, but rather seeing how the engagement can move forward...there are opportunities there for us to engage with the Iranian government." But in terms of Iranian nuclear development we don't have a long time. This is precisely what the Israeli government has been imploring the US not to do. ~~~~~~~~~~ To exacerbate the situation, there is this: Mehdi Ghazanfari, head of the Iranian Trade Promotion Agency, has told an Iranian news agency that Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France and the United Kingdom have carried out some $15.4 billion in bilateral trade with Iran over the past year. And people wonder why sanctions haven't worked. What these self-serving, short-sighted nations are doing is in defiance of UN Security Council sanctions imposed on Iran. ~~~~~~~~~~ Larry Summers, Obama's chief economic adviser, went to a Yom Ha'atzmaut celebration at the Israeli Embassy in Washington yesterday, carrying a message from the president: Obama, he said, would pursue peace, but not at all costs. His administration remains committed to the security and independence of Israel. Not remotely do I believe this. Summers explained that Obama would pursue, "Peace that defends innocent people, peace that guarantees freedom, peace that does not reward terror, peace that the Middle East deserves after such a long time." What platitudinous and vacuous words. ~~~~~~~~~~ Putting the lie more definitively to the conciliatory words above is a report from the World Tribune, citing Israeli intelligence sources. One source was quoted as saying: "Obama wants to make friends with our worst enemies and [those who were] until now the worst enemies of the United States. Under this policy, we are more than irrelevant. We have become an obstacle." The prediction being made is that Obama would continue to appease Syria, and Iran, believing that this would make it more possible to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan. "Obama will want to show Iran, Syria and radical Muslims that the United States could pressure Israel on a strategic level. The pressure has already begun and will intensify throughout the next year or two." The report further said that the Obama administration would ignore Israeli advice, and, indeed, that is precisely what we're seeing with regard to US refusal to put time limits on talks with Iran. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THE HUMAN RIGHTS COALITION AGAINST RADICAL ISLAM
Posted by Janet Lehr, April 30, 2009. |
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Islam is a threat to world peace. Presently there are Radical Muslims fighting in countries across the world, including, but not limited to: India, Thailand, the Philippines, Ethiopia, Israel, Iraq, Lebanon, Iran, Afghanistan, Russia and "Western" states such as the United States, Australia and Western Europe. The Human Rights Coalition Against Radical Islam is not anti-Muslim. On the contrary! Radical Islam is a threat to Muslims even more than it is to non-Muslims. More Muslims have died due to Radical Islam than non-Muslims. The Taliban makes life a living hell for citizens of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Women are honor killed and gays have been killed for the mere crime of being gay. It is with an eye towards protecting human rights around the world that this diverse group has formed. WHY a Human Rights Coalition Against Radical Islam? Radical Islam is a worldwide threat against human rights.1 Radical Islam is defined as an ideology that uses Islam as a justification for committing violence and terror, preaching hatred, and advocating for a fundamentalist theocracy governed by strict Sharia (Islamic) law. The Human Rights Coalition Against Radical Islam advocates on behalf of humanity across the world, including those Muslims who are themselves victims of Radical Islam. The Taliban makes life a living hell for citizens of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Women have been "honor" killed for trivial and imagined "crimes" and gays have been killed for the mere "crime" of being gay. Who are we and what are our goals? 1. We are a coalition of organizations and individuals representing a full cross-section of the American people. Americans of every race, color and creed are represented in this coalition of groups — all have been personally affected by the spread of Radical Islam. As such, individuals from continents across the world and religions from around the world have joined together to say "YES to human rights" and "NO to radical Islam." The religions and ideologies represented include Christians of numerous denominations, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims and Secular Humanists. Supporting coalition members include: 9/11 Families for a Secure America, ACT Manhattan, AFSI, Aish, Alliance of Interfaith Resistance, AMCHA, Americas for Peace and Tolerance, Arabs for Israel, Chinese Community Relations Council (CCRC), Clarion Fund, David Projec, Foundation Nepalese, Gathering of Eagles-NY, Hasbara Fellowships, Hindu Human Rights Watch, Indian-American Intellectual Forum, International Foundation of Bangladashi Hindus, Iraq Modei,Mothers Against Terrorism, Namdari Sikh Foundation, R.E.A.L. Courage, School of Law's National Security and Law Society Fordham University, Snapped Shot, Sikh Recognition Trust, Stand With Us, Sudan Freedom Walk, Women United, Code Red, ZOA (Committee in Formation) 2. Our mission is to educate the American people to the threat of Radical Islam and Sharia Law, and to challenge those enablers and apologists who would diminish our vigilance in opposing this virulent threat to humanistic values and values of tolerance. With education comes mobilization to action, as noted in mission statement #3, below. 3. Our strategy is to leverage the strengths of our coalition participants: 1) to conduct physical events such as marches, demonstrations, and leafleting; 2) to utilize the Internet to spread our message; 3) to promote media appearances by those who support our cause; 4) to utilize print and video to educate the public and the media to the threats we face; 5) to lobby locally and in Washington DC with letter writing campaigns; 6) to picket media and other outlets which promote the anti-human rights agenda of Radical Islam; 7) to expand our outreach to include educational seminars at local community centers, churches, synagogues and schools. 4. Our group seeks to promote a human rights agenda. The specific enemies of human rights we are struggling against are, in addition to ignorance and apathy, those groups and individuals in the United States and elsewhere who are part of, or supporters of, Radical Islam. These groups include, amongst others, Al Queda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Deobandi Islamists, the Iranian regime, and other supporters known as Wahhabists (fundamentalist Muslims and Islamists). Additional groups and ideologies that fight against human rights are the "enablers" of Radical Islam. These groups and ideologies include "political correctness," the mainstream media (which often blame terror attacks on 'South Asians' or 'militants', rather than simply naming the enemy, and which seeks to employ tactics of moral equivalence), university faculties (which often employ known members of terror groups, such as Sami Al-Arian, and Rashid Khalidi, who was a PLO spokesperson, and similarly teach "post-modern" moral equivalence), student groups such as the International Solidarity Movement (which acts as "human shields" and aids and abets Radical Islam); and "human rights" groups, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the United Nations (which, through ignorance, misunderstanding, paternalism, willful blindness or guilt, fail to appreciate Radical Islam's threat to decency, tolerance and peace). These "human rights" groups have taken over the English language, claiming they believe in 'peace', when in fact they are often aiding and abeting Radical Islam. 5. This group will be tarred and feathered in the press as being 'Islamophobic', even as we seek to promote the human rights of Muslims. Our group will always show a tolerant and moderate message of human rights; however, it is a simple fact that those who seek to promote the truth about Radical Islam face the claim of being "Islamophobic." In order to avoid pitfalls others have fallen into, this group will never debate theology. The group's goal is not to present Islam as inherently one way or another, but rather to showcase the human rights atrocities going on across the world, in order to spur action. If necessary, a legal defense fund will be set up to ensure Islam is a threat to world peace. Presently there are Radical Muslims fighting in countries across the world, including, but not limited to: India, Thailand, the Philippines, Ethiopia, Israel, Iraq, Lebanon, Iran, Afghanistan, Russia and "Western" states such as the United States, Australia and Western Europe. The Human Rights Coalition Against Radical Islam is not anti-Muslim. On the contrary! Radical Islam is a threat to Muslims even more than it is to non-Muslims. More Muslims have died due to Radical Islam than non-Muslims. The Taliban makes life a living hell for citizens of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Women are honor killed and gays have been killed for the mere crime of being gay. It is with an eye towards protecting human rights around the world that this diverse group has formed. Janet Lehr is editor/publisher of a daily e-mail called "Israel Lives." She can be contacted at janetlehr@israellives.com |
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THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF WISHFUL THINKING
Posted by Barry Rubin, April 30, 2009. |
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Congratulations, the conflict is over! Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad isn't a radical, aggressive Islamist and Holocaust denier but a peacenik! Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is against war and terrorism! How do we know this? They told us? Well, no, they didn't actually tell us. What happened is that they told us they would go on being radical, aggressive, and terrorism-sponsoring. They just did it in a way that a lot of people engaged in wishful thinking-and who fervently believe that no one could actually be radical or luxuriate in political violence-heard something different. Case Number 1: Iran
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave an interview to George
Stephanopoulos of ABC.
First the relevant exchange: STEPHANOPOULOS: If the Palestinian people negotiate an agreement with Israel and the Palestinian people vote and support that agreement, a two state solution, will Iran support it? AHMADINEJAD: Nobody should interfere, allow the Palestinian people to decide for themselves. Whatever they decide.... STEPHANOPOULOS: If they choose a two state solution with Israel, that's fine. AHMADINEJAD: Well, what we are saying is that you and us should not determine the course of things beforehand. Allow the Palestinian people to make their own decisions. STEPHANOPOULOS: But if they choose a two state solution, if they choose to recognize Israel's existence, Iran will as well? AHMADINEJAD; Let me approach this from another perspective. If the Palestinians decide that the Zionist regime needs to leave all Palestinian lands, would the American administration accept their decision? Will they accept this Palestinian point of view? STEPHANOPOULOS: I'll ask them. But I'm asking you if Palestinians accept the existence of Israel, would Iran support that?.... STEPHANOPOULOS: If the Palestinians sign an agreement with Israel, will Iran support it? AHMADINEJAD: Whatever decision they take is fine with us. We are not going to determine anything. Whatever decision they take, we will support that. We think that this is the right of the Palestinian people, however we fully expect other states to do so as well. And how did the Israeli online service of Yediot Aharnot newspaper, YNet News, play this? Here's the headline: ""Ahmadinejad 'fine' with two-state solution." Well, not exactly. He refused to say that. All Ahmadinejad said was that he would support what the Palestinian people decided. What does that mean? First, he personally believes that they would never accept a two-state solution so there's nothing to worry about in that respect. Second, of course, he knows that Hamas would never agree to such a thing and Hamas already controls how people vote in the Gaza Strip. One might presume that if a referendum was held there, the vote would be "100 percent" against a two-state solution. In addition, Hamas and others opposing a two-state solution would get between 30 and 70 percent of votes in the West Bank. A lot of Fatah supporters would also vote against it. The exact numbers aren't important because whether the number is the higher or lower figure such a proposition would always be defeated. Third, any two-state solution would only be made by Fatah. Iran supports Hamas. If Fatah and the Palestinian Authority were to make a deal with Israel, Tehran would still back Hamas in overthrowing that government, using the deal to portray its rival as treasonous. Once Hamas took over the state of Palestine, it would tear up all the agreements and invite in the Iranian military. So in effect Ahmadinejad just said that he would never accept a two-state solution but why put that in clear words when the dumb Westerners can be left to interpret it as they wish. But Ahmadinejad also put a little bomb in the interview which no one seems to notice. Let me repeat one of his answers: AHMADINEJAD; "Let me approach this from another perspective. If the Palestinians decide that the Zionist regime needs to leave all Palestinian lands, would the American administration accept their decision? Will they accept this Palestinian point of view?" What's he saying here? "All Palestinian lands" might sound like saying the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem to Western ears, but everyone in Iran and among the Palestinians knows this means: all of Israel plus all the territories it captured in 1967. So here's what the Iranian president is saying: Suppose the Palestinians vote that they want all of Israel, would the United States accept that? The answer, of course, is "no" and so, Ahmadinejad is saying: I'm the one in favor of democracy and you're against it. (According to him, of course, Israelis have no rights to a state so they don't get to vote.) Ahmadinejad has built his own career on regarding the West as extremely stupid, cowardly, and easy to fool. Many or most of his colleagues in the Iranian regime agree with him. I could write at this point that the one exception was when in the mid-1980s the United States was appearing ready to attack Iran unless it ended the Iran-Iraq war. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini did so but I think he was misreading American intentions (albeit to the credit of U.S. policymakers in pulling off that bluff). Still, I'm tempted to say that up to now that the Iranian leaders' assumption has never proven to be wrong. Unfortunately, as I predicted, Western newspapers like the Daily Telegraph are now reporting that Ahmadinejad is ready to accept a two-state solution. Here are headlines in Canada for April 27: Toronto Globe & Mail: "Iran prepared to back Palestinian deal with Israel, Ahmadinejad National Post: "Iranian president appears to recognize Israel's right to exist for first time" And Agence France Presse: "Iran 'Ready to Back Mideast Peace Deal'" Come to think of it, Ahmadinejad refuses to accept two-state solution and is cheered as having done so; Israel's government repeatedly endorses two-state solution and is accused of not doing so! Case Number 2: Syria YNet reports that Syrian president Bashar al-Assad: "says Hamas and Hizbullah will never threaten Israel with his country's help" in an interview in al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper. Is that what the Syrian president said? For here is the precise quote "They both will never attack Israel through Syria under any circumstances." Not exactly the same thing. Syria never let's terrorist groups attack from its soil — and that's been the policy more than 40 years — because Damascus knows that Israel will retaliate against Syria if that happens. So the simple alternative is: let them attack through Lebanon, which can't defend itself against either terrorists or Israel. If and when Israel retaliates against facilities on Lebanese soil, Syrian leaders don't lose much sleep. And, of course, when Assad says that Hamas won't attack Israel through Syria, that's because it attacks Israel from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Syria supplies weapons to both Hizballah and Hamas which have been used to attack Israel. So to say that Syria won't let anyone attack from its own territory is nothing new and is in no way saying it won't help them attack Israel. Syria gives terrorists safe haven, training, bases, equipment, guns, and money to do so, no matter where the terror squads depart from on the morning of their mission. Now one needs just sit back and wait for the media around the world to report that Syria has promised not to sponsor terrorists attacking Israel and is now a truly peacenik government. Let me know when you see these reports. As always, one can only quote Shakespeare, one of the world's greatest political analysts:
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), with Walter Laqueur (Viking-Penguin); the paperback edition of The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan); A Chronological History of Terrorism, with Judy Colp Rubin, (Sharpe); and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley). To read and subscribe to MERIA, GLORIA articles, or to order books, go to http://www.gloria-center.org. His blog, Rubin Reports is at http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/. This article is archived at
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OBAMA WILL NEVER ENDANGER OUR STALWART ALLY ISRAEL. YEAH, RIGHT
Posted by Kenneth Price, Ph.D., April 29, 2009. |
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Part I: To hell with demanding that the "Palestinian Authority" stop teaching its children that Jews are descended from apes and pigs, and the highest duty of a "Palestinian" child is to kill Jews and himself as a shahid. The policy of the U.S. of A., now, is to establish a terrorist army run by Fatah or Hamas (whichever kills the other — it doesn't matter who wins) that will serve as the "Palestinian" Arabs speznatz guerilla troops to attack Israeli civilians and infrastructure during the next Arab assault against Israel. And when American troops from Iraq join the Arab forces, as the British did in 1948, to help the Arabs crush the Jews, what do the Jews of America do? "US General: Fatah Soldiers are 'Founders of Palestinian State'"
Palestinian Authority special forces were praised by an American general this week for becoming the founders of a new Arab country within Israel's current borders. "As I look at you, I couldn't be more proud of the fact that you stepped up to be the founders of a Palestinian state," U.S. Lt.-Gen. Keith Dayton told a battalion in his speech to the troops Monday in Tulkarm. Dayton is responsible for the military training of the PA special forces. The statement was reported by the Reuters news service. The American government has spent tens of millions of dollars outfitting the PA troops, which it calls "special forces," possibly in order to avoid contradicting the Oslo Accords that limit military activities of the PA. Dayton has been overseeing their training, which takes place in Jordan and at a base built in Jericho with U.S. funds. Weapons for the "special forces" are provided by Arab countries, with Israeli approval. The Olmert administration also approved a gift of armored personnel carriers from Russia with the stipulation that they be unarmed. In addition, Russia had wanted to hand over two helicopters to the PA as well. Dayton told Reuters that the Obama administration plans to expand the training program for 1,500 more PA troops, creating three more battalions, in the next 12 months. Dayton already has supervised the training of 1,600 troops, most of whom are deployed in large PA-controlled Arab cities, including Jenin, Shechem and Hevron. Despite their presence, the IDF continues to carry out the task of arresting terrorists, particularly at night when the PA forces do not operate. "If it goes the way the administration has asked for, we will accelerate dramatically what we are doing here in terms of training and equipment, and filling in the gaps in between," Dayton said during his visit in Tulkarm, located almost adjacent to the Judea-Samaria separation barrier and only a few miles east of Netanya. The additional training program requires approval from Congress for more funding that would allow the construction for more PA military bases in Judea and Samaria. Without defining the cost of the additional training and construction, Dayton stated it will entail "more financial support than we have ever had before." Both the past Bush administration and the current Obama government declared the training helps the standing and security of PA Chairman and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas, who is seen as a moderate peace partner for Israel. Officials in the Obama administration have said that the budget for Dayton will grow from $75 million last year to $130 million in 2009. Fatah and the rival PA faction, the Hamas terrorist organization, are trying to reach a unity agreement which would make Hamas a recipient of American aid. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has stated that American financing would be problematic if Hamas joins Fatah without recognizing Israel's right to exist, and disarming.
Fatah also does not officially recognize Israel, and Abbas said on Tuesday he refuses to view the country as a "Jewish State."
Part II: Gee, there used to be another State in that area, someplace, once upon a time. What was it called? Oh yeah, "Israel" or something like that. Barrack Hussein replaced it with a Hamas State that is now in the process of subverting Jordan and Egypt, and after Iran finishes accumulating enough nukes, will join with Iran to take over Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. The joke's on America. The people who put Barrack Hussein in the White House don't have Israel around to protect them anymore. Heil the new Caliphate. This was written by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook
Itamar Marcus is director of PMW — Palestinian Media Watch — (http://www.pmw.org.il). PMW is based in Jerusalem. Barbara Crook, a writer and university lecturer based in Ottawa, Canada, is PMW's North American representative. Mahmoud Abbas: "I do not accept the Jewish State, call it what you will" 
Palestinian Authority president and Fatah chairman Mahmoud Abbas stated unequivocally Monday that he does not accept the Jewish state. "I say this clearly: I do not accept the Jewish State, call it what you will," he said at a preliminary conference of the Palestinian Youth Parliament in Ramallah. At the end of the conference, Abbas was presented with a large framed map of "Palestine," covering the entire area of Israel. The photo of the map being held aloft by a smiling Abbas was featured in a prominent front-page position in both PA daily newspapers. Note that the word "Palestine" appears on the map in English.
Contact Kenneth Price at consultingdoc@sbcglobal.net
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REPORT: INTELLIGENCE WARNS ISRAEL IS NOW AN 'OBSTACLE TO OBAMA'
Posted by Avodah, April 29, 2009. |
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This was written by Gil Ronen and it appeared in Arutz-7
and is archived at
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(IsraelNN.com) According to a classified intelligence assessment handed to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, U.S. President Barack Obama and his senior advisors wish to "incrementally diminish U.S. strategic cooperation with Israel." A report in World Tribune (Which is a reliable news source) quoted an Israeli source familiar with the intelligence assessment who said that "Obama wants to make friends with our worst enemies and [those who were] until now the worst enemies of the United States. Under this policy," the source added, "we are more than irrelevant. We have become an obstacle." According to the report, which has not been corroborated by news sources other than World Tribune, Israeli sources said the U.S. Administration would reject Israel's intelligence opinions on Iran and Syria while advancing the Obama plan to reconcile with the two states, although both were listed as state sponsors of terrorism by the U.S. State Department. The Israeli intelligence document reportedly predicted that Obama would maintain his policy of appeasing Iran and Syria through 2010. It determined that Obama is convinced that appeasing Iran and Syria would make a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan possible. Pressure on Israel "Obama will want to show Iran, Syria and radical Muslims that the United States could pressure Israel on a strategic level," the source said. "The pressure has already begun and will intensify throughout the next year or two." At the same time, the intelligence officials estimated that Obama would restrict U.S. arms exports to Israel in an effort to deny it systems that it could use in a raid on Iran or Syria. The intelligence sources said this policy was begun during the last year of the Bush administration and predicted that it would intensify under Obama. Carter: US and Syria Close to Full Relations Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said on Tuesday that the U.S. and Syria are close to restoring full diplomatic ties. "Syrian President Bashar Assad is very eager to restore full ties with Washington," Carter told Haaretz. "I wouldn't be surprised if it happens this year," he added, speaking on the phone from Quito, Ecuador, at the start of a four-nation South American trip. Carter plans to meet Assad in Syria in early June. Meanwhile, Syrian President Bashar Assad said Tuesday that Obama would face "a serious crisis in the Middle East" if he does not fix the mistakes made by his predecessor George W. Bush, within a year's time. On a visit to Vienna after meeting Austrian leaders and intellectuals, Assad called on the U.S. to rapidly withdraw its troops from Iraq. This, he claimed, would resolve "50 per cent of the problem," Austrian news agency APA reported. However, by appeasing Iran and Syria the U.S. is risking alienating Egypt. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak warned Egypt's rivals in the Middle East Wednesday that he would not tolerate what he called their "tampering with security and stability" in his country, a reference to Iran and the Hizbullah terror militia that it supports. Mubarak's comments were his the most strongly worded ones since Egypt accused the Hizbullah of plotting attacks in the country. They were also meant to send a strong message to the group's backers in Iran. Contact Avodah at Avodah15@aol.com and visit his website:
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DURBAN II WOULD HAVE BEEN FUNNY, WERE ABUSES BY THE SELF-APPOINTED ARBITERS NOT SO VILE
Posted by Shaul Ceder, April 29, 2009. |
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This was written by Heather Robinson. |
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Serious defense of Israel shone alongside clever and zany protest at the United Nations Conference Against Racism in Geneva, Switzerland earlier this week. For representatives of countries like China, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Cuba to sit on a Council that obsessively attacks Israel instead of focusing on widespread, egregious human rights abuses around the world — including abuses these governments themselves perpetrate routinely — would be funny if it were not nauseating. Similarly, for delegates to sit and lap up the racist tirade of Mahmoud "the-Holocaust-is-a-Myth" Ahmadinejad at a conference that purports to fight racism is comedy worthy of Mel Brooks, except it is not fiction. But because alongside the viciousness of it, the absurdity is undeniable, it was somehow fitting that protestors included both Harvard law prof Alan Dershowitz, who made an eloquent defense of Israel, and a group of French Jewish students wearing rainbow wigs who shouted "racist!" and tossed a red nose at the would-be-Hitler-of-today to highlight what a farce the conference was. Dersh pointed out that nations like Israel, which have internal mechanisms for investigating human rights abuses and are open societies where people can criticize their governments without fear are not in need of monitoring and lectures from countries like China, Egypt, Cuba, and Saudi Arabia, where people can't speak out without fear and where human rights abuses are widespread and horrific. The French Jewish students' humorous and bold act took guts. The fact it could be funny reflects the reality that enough people of good will have said "Never again" to true, institutionalized racism and dehumanization, and to tyrants who seek world domination. Heaven help us all if the enemies of freedom and democracy — who, not surprisingly, are Israel's enemies — were ever to be in a position of greater power. These countries already abuse the powerless, and those within their borders who seek intellectual, sexual, or spiritual freedom. For those who suffer their fascism, and for those of us who are sincere defenders of human rights, there is nothing funny about that. Contact the Ceders at ceder@netvision.net.il |
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A 'Magnificent' 'Deeply Personal Letter' to Jonathan Pollard
Posted by Justice For Jonathan Pollard, April 29, 2009. |
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Jonathan Pollard described the letter below to his wife, Esther, as "magnificent" and "deeply personal." Pollard said he was "humbled by its sentiments" and "strengthened" by its message. It is reprinted below with the permission of the author who has requested that his identity not be revealed. |
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Jonathan Pollard
Dear Jonathan, January 20th of this year* will be marked on the calendar of so many thousands of justice-loving Americans and Jews everywhere as a day of mourning. As the hours of the day wore on and no sign of a response to our desperate pleas for mercy surfaced, hope turned into despair. We sobbed in pain, but mostly in impotence. And yet, I admit, we did not do enough. Just as the dwellers of Jerusalem of old betrayed her, so too all those of us who consider ourselves just and compassionate betrayed you. We simply did not care enough. We thought it below our dignity to grovel, to plead. We calculated that too strong of a plea may upset the cozy relationship of our people with the political body of this great nation. We sinned because we cowardly engaged in political calculations, when, instead, we should have demanded justice, regardless. You have become a symbol of courage. You have rejected cynical political overtures because you had the good of our People in mind, even as they could have bought your release. You have not only become a champion for those who love the Land but you have, in fact, become their Savior. You have been kind and you have spoken kindly of our People, despite unspeakable cruelty meted out to you for doing so. On the verse (Judges 6:14): "The Lord turned to him [Gideon] and said 'Go in this strength of yours and deliver Israel from the Midianites. I herewith make you my messenger'", Rashi, in the name of the Midrash Tanhuma, comments "The words 'in this strength' mean on the strength of the merit of having spoken in defense of [i.e. having advocated for] my children." The Midrash Tanhuma explains in greater length that at the time of Gideon, the Israelites came under the cruel domination of the Midianites. G-d sought someone who could intercede for the Israelites but could not find such a person because the generation lacked piety and good works. No sooner did Gideon begin to advocate for them, however, G-d revealed himself to him and said 'Go in this strength of yours and deliver Israel from the Midianites", in this strength should be understood to mean on the strength of the merit of interceding for My children. The Zohar carries this thought even further: "G-d sees with great favor those who speak well of His people. How do we know this? From the story of Gideon. Gideon was neither an upright man, nor the son of an upright man and yet, because he spoke well of Israel, G-d said to him, 'Go in this strength of yours and deliver Israel from the Midianites" To what strength, asks the Zohar, does the verse refer? To the good you have spoken about My Children." May your continued advocacy of our interests save us from those who wish to see the destruction of our nation and may you see and participate very promptly in the full redemption promised to the children of Israel. Your broken-hearted friend.
*J4JP NOTE: January 20, 2009 was President George Bush's last day in office — the last possible day to grant Jonathan Pollard's petition for clemency. Bush did not reject the petition, but neither did he grant it. He left it on in-coming President Obama's desk, where it may continue to be used by the State Department against Israel and the Jews. Contact J4JP at justice4jp@gmail.com |
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FARMER BUILDS MODEL OF BIBLICAL TEMPLE
Posted by Boris Celser, April 29, 2009. |
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This appeared February 26, 2009 in the Telegraph (UK) and is
archived at
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Alec Garrard, 78, has dedicated a massive 33,000 hours to constructing the ancient Herod's Temple, which measures a whopping 20ft by 12ft. The pensioner has hand-baked and painted every clay brick and tile and even sculpted 4,000 tiny human figures to populate the courtyards. 
Alec Gerrard constructed the amazing 1:100 scale model, which is now housed in a huge building in his back garden. Historical experts believe the model is the best representation in the world of what the Jewish temple actually looked like and it has attracted thousands of visitors from all over the globe. But Mr Garrard, who started the elaborate project in his 40's, says his masterpiece will not be finished in his lifetime. "I've always loved making models and as I was getting older I started to think about making one big project which would see me through to the end of my life," he said. "I have an interest in buildings and religion so I thought maybe I could combine the two and I came up with the idea of doing the Temple. "I'd seen one or two examples of it in Biblical exhibitions, but I thought they were rubbish and I knew I could do better. 
"I have been working on it for decades but it will never be finished as I'm always finding something new to add." 
Mr Garrard, from Norfolk, spent more than three years researching the Temple, which was destroyed by the Romans 2000 years ago and deemed to be one of the most remarkable buildings of ancient times. He then started to construct the amazing 1:100 scale model, which is now housed in a huge building in his back garden. 
Mr Garrard sculpted and painted 4,000 figures, measuring just half an inch and all wearing their correct costumes including 32 versions of Jesus. 
Visitors come from all over the world to see the model and Mr Garrard provides binoculars so they can see all the details. "Everything is made by hand. I cut plywood frames for the walls and buildings and all the clay bricks and tiles were baked in the oven then stuck together," he said. 
Boris Celser is a Canadian. Contact him at celser@telusplanet.net |
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ONLY A FEW NAZIS
Posted by Barbara Taverna, April 29, 2009. |
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This is from the Fresno Zionism website.
http://fresnozionism.org/archives/1213 |
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The administration is looking for a way to keep aid flowing if the Palestinians form a government that includes elements of Hamas, the militant anti-Israel group that controls Gaza. Obama wants to alter language in the fiscal 2009 catchall spending law (PL 111-8) that makes the State Department worry about the possibility of a cutoff of aid to the Palestinian government should Hamas join the more moderate [sic] Fatah party in a power-sharing arrangement. The administration said it is focused on ensuring that a Palestinian government meets internationally accepted conditions regarding Israel. "This legislation is consistent with our policy," said Benjamin Chang, a spokesman for the National Security Council. "It would prohibit assistance to a government that does not accept the Quartet principles but would preserve the president's flexibility to provide such assistance if that government were to accept and comply with the Quartet principles," he said, referring to requirements that a Palestinian government accept Israel's right to exist, renounce violence and abide by prior Israeli-Palestinian agreements. In other words, Hamas can participate in a Palestinian government which receives US aid as long as the official policy of that government meets the "Quartet principles" — even though Hamas rejects them. Of course, it is not clear if Hamas would participate in a government which did agree to them, but you can bet that efforts will be made to find a magic formula to make the problem go away. Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill) likened this to supporting a government that had "only a few Nazis in it". The absurdity of the situation is remarkable: There is no Palestinian state or economy; they are totally dependent on international aid (mostly originating in the US). This is because their leadership (Fatah and Hamas) and their allies in the Mideast have always chosen war over acceptance of Israel. Many Palestinians living in Hamas-controlled Gaza allegedly 'work' for the Palestinian Authority [PA], so they get salaries from the PA, funded by the US and paid via Israel. Others have refugee status, so they receive aid from the UN. Hamas also gets direct aid in the form of money and munitions from Iran. All its resources are used to make war on Israel. When Israel struck back, the US agreed to pay to rebuild the damage in Gaza! But nobody can figure out how to do this without aiding Hamas. Meanwhile, there's a world-wide clamor to legitimize Hamas — despite the fact that it's hard to find a more antisemitic and violent bunch anywhere. Maybe the problem is that the Obama administration is looking at things from the wrong angle. Maybe the absolute top priority in the Mideast today should not be establishing a Palestinian state? Maybe acting to stop the destabilizing activities of Iran — its sponsorship of Hezbollah in attacking Israel, destabilizing Lebanon and even Egypt, its support of Hamas, its attempt to control half the world's oil supply by nuclear blackmail — is more important than establishing yet another Arab state ruled by racist thugs like those of Hamas and Fatah? Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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RAISING THE GREEN-LINE VEIL
Posted by Barbara Taverna, April 29, 2009. |
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This was written by Yisrael Medad and it appeared in the
Jerusalem Post
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I hope you are not shocked if I tell you that a terrible secret-not-a-secret has been revealed. And that secret is that there most probably won't be a full peace between Jews and Arabs in the territory of the former Mandate of Palestine, no matter what borders are delineated. We had the Chaim Weizmann borders of 1919 (from the Litani in the north to the Hejaz Railway in the east, see note 8), the Ze'ev Jabotinsky borders (all of TransJordan included), Peel Commission Borders or UN Resolution 181 and much more. And why do I arrive at that conclusion? From what the President of the Palestinian Authority said. Mideast: Abbas refuses to recognise Israel as Jewish state: Name yourself, it's not my business. Name yourself the Hebrew Socialist Republic. All I know is that there is the state of Israel, in the borders of 1967, not one centimetre more, not one centimetre less. Anything else, I do not accept. Many observers believe the so called 'green line' — the pre-1967 Six-Day War ceasefire line between Israel and Jordan — should be the basis for an international border between Israel and the West Bank in the creation of a future Palestinian state..." One Likud MK, Ofir Akunis, caught on quick: "This means that the Palestinians don't want two states for two people, but two states for one people: Even the Foreign Ministry was forced to adapt to the new boss and issued a declaration which stated: "The recognition of Israel as the sovereign state of the Jewish people is an essential and necessary step in the historic process of reconciliation between Israel and the Palestinians." The moral of the incident? The vast majority of Arabs who insist on referring to themselves as Palestinians — have you ever heard of a people who insist on calling themselves by a foreign language, Latin, rather than their own tongue? And there is an Arabic term Belad El-Sham but it's a bit embarrassing because: Palestine constitutes the southwestern part of a huge geographical unity in the eastern part of the Arab world, which is Belad El-Sham. In addition to Palestine, Sham contains Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. It used to have common borders with these countries, in addition to Egypt." You see, even Arabs know that Palestine is not a separate and distinct geo-political national entity. And we won't meander into the issue of Suriyya al-Janubiyya, Southern Syria. Israel we need know is still perceived as an unacceptable presence in the "Arab/Muslim Middle East". A non-identifiable Israel — not Jewish — is perhaps possible, the old slogan of "secular democratic Palestine" comes to my mind from the mid-1960s. We can't be us, the 3000 year-old Jewish people, with our religion, our culture, our consciousness, our beliefs, our philosophy and our history. No, that must disappear. No Jew can pray on the Temple Mount because, as the Arabs claim, the Temple wasn't there nor can an atheist archeologist dig there for it is too dangerous in that something Jewish might be discovered. Well, Mr. Abbas, after managing to hide your past as a holocaust denier, this slips out. Now, you're a Jewish national homeland denier. You cannot be a peace partner. Your moderation is false. Your willingness to compromise is false. The veil of the Green Line as a border is lifted. There is no Green Line because there is no Jewish state. The state of Israel possesses no historic imperative, no historic basis, no true legitimacy. And those who sought you out recently, like former prime minister Olmert and former foreign minister Livni were false in their diplomacy for it was an unfaithful expression of Zionism. And as goes Abbas, goes the peace. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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61 THINGS I LIKE ABOUT ISRAEL — FOR ISRAEL AT 61
Posted by Steven Plaut, April 29, 2009. |
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(1.) Well, Obama, Hillary, the Left, and now suddenly even Bibi Netanyahu demand that Israel agree to a "two-state solution." They of course assume that some sort of arrangement involving two states actually could serve as a solution, as opposed to a plan for the annihilation of Israel in stages. But hey, I am always up for a challenge. So here is my own proposal for a workable two-state solution! The Jews keep their state, and the Arabs give up 21 of their 22
states, leaving them with one state, and then we would have a two-state SOLUTION!
(2.) 61 things I like best about Israel — for Israel's 61st birthday 1. Israel is the only country in the world where people can read the Bible and understand it. 2. Israel is the only country in the world where, if someone calls you a "dirty Jew", it means you need a bath (old Efraim Kishon quip, but still good). 3. Israel is the only country in the world where formal dress means a new clean T-shirt, sandals and jeans. 4. Israel is the only country in the world where one need not check the ingredients on the products in the supermarket to avoid ending up with things containing pork. 5. Israel is a country where the same drivers who cuss you and flip you the bird will immediately pull over and offer you all forms of help if you look like you need it. 6. Israel is the only country in the world with Avihu Medina, Zohar Argov and Daklon (godfathers of "Oriental Music"). 7. Israel is the only country in the world with bus drivers and taxi drivers who read Spinoza and Maimonides. 8. Israel is the only country in the world where you dare not gossip about other people on the bus in Mandarin, Russian, Hindi, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Polish or Romanian, lest others on the bus understand what you are saying. 9. Israel is the only country in the world with northern European standards of living and southern European weather. It is the only place on earth with an Israeli spring, the most glorious time of year on the planet. 10. Israel is the only country in the world where no one cares what rules say when an important goal can be achieved by bending them. 11. Israel is the only country in the world where a pisher like me can once in a while get invited to give a talk at the parliament, or can get in to speak to a cabinet minister. 12. Israel is the only country in the world where reservists are bossed around and commanded by officers, male and female, younger than their own children. 13. Israel is the only country in the world with Eli Yatzpan (comedian). 14. Israel is the only country in the world where "small talk" consists of loud, angry debate over politics and religion. 15. Israel is the only country in the world with Jerusalem, even if Israeli leftists would like to turn it over to the barbarians. 16. Israel is the only country in the world where the coffee is already so good that Starbucks went bankrupt trying to break into the local market. 17. Israel is the only country in the world where the mothers learn their mother tongue from their children (old Efraim Kishon quip, but still good). 18. Israel is the only country in the world where the people understand Israeli humor. 19. Israel is the only country in the world where the news is broadcast over the loudspeakers on buses, where people listen to news updates every half hour, or whose people are capable of locating Bosnia and Macedonia on a map of the world. 20. Israel is one of the few places in the world where the sun sets into the Mediterranean Sea. 21. Israel is the only country in the world where, when people say the "modern later era", they are referring to the time of Jesus. 22. Israel is the only country in the world whose soldiers eat three sets of salads a day, none of which contain any lettuce (which is not really a food), and where olives ARE a food and even a main course in a meal, rather than something one tosses into a martini. 23. Israel is the only country in the world where one is unlikely to be able to dig a cellar without hitting ancient archeological artifacts. 24. Israel is the only country in the world where the leading writers in the country take buses. 25. Israel is the only country in the world where the graffiti is in Hebrew. 26. Israel is the only country in the world where the "black folks" walking around all wear yarmulkes. 27. Israel is the only country in the world that has a National Book Week, during which almost everyone attends a book fair and buys books. 28. Israel is the only country in the world where the ultra-Orthodox Jews beat up the police and not the other way around. 29. Israel is the only country in the world where inviting someone "out for a drink" means drinking cola or coffee or tea. 30. Israel is the only country in the world where people who want to go up in an elevator push the down button because they think this makes the elevator come down to get them. 31. Israel is the only country in the world with white almond blossoms in January, purple "Judas Tree" blossoms in March, and crocus flowers in October. 32. Israel is the only country in the world where bank robbers kiss the mezuzah as they leave with their loot. 33. Israel is the only country in the world with "Eretz Yisrael music". 34. Israel is one of the few countries in the world that truly likes and admires the United States. 35. Israel is the only country in the world that introduces applications of high-tech gadgets and devices, such as printers in banks that print out your statement on demand, years ahead of the United States and decades ahead of Europe. 36. Israel is the only country in the world that has the weather and landscape of California without the earthquakes. 37. Israel is the only country in the world where everyone on a flight gets to know one another before the plane lands. In many cases, they also get to know the pilot and all about his health or marital problems. 38. Israel is the only country in the world where no one has a foreign accent because everyone has a foreign accent. 39. Israel is the only country in the world where people cuss using dirty words in Russian or Arabic because Hebrew has never developed them. 40. Israel is the only country in the world where patients visiting physicians end up giving the doctor advice. 41. Israel is the only country in the world where everyone strikes up conversations while waiting in lines. 42. Israel is the only country in the world where people choose which books to read and which plays to see based on what they plan to discuss with their friends in Friday evening "salon" get-togethers. 43. Israel is the only country in the world where hot water is an event and not a condition ("in" joke; you have to live in Israel to figure it out). 44. Krembos. 45. Israel is the only country in the world where people call an attache case a "James Bond" and the "@" sign is called a "strudel". 46. Kumquats. 47. The obsession with sunflower seeds. 48. The kumzitz on the beach. 49. The people who eat watermelon with salt or with salty cheese. The wagons with horses that still sell watermelons on the streets, screaming "watermelon on the knife", whatever that means. 50. Israel is the only country in the world where kids read Harry Potter in Hebrew. 51. Hyssop (za'atar). 52. Memorial Day in Israel is actually a day for remembering and not for buying pool furniture at the mall. 53. Really, really good bread! 54. Israel is the only country in the world where there is the most mysterious and mystical calm ambience in the streets on Yom Kippur, which cannot be explained unless you have experienced it. 55. In Israel, kids can really sleep in a succah because it will not rain on them. 56. Israel is the only country in the world where making a call to God is a local call (old quip, still good). 57. Where you here Hebrew songs set to bazouki and Ood music. 58. Zohar Argov (yes, I know I already mentioned him, but he deserves a second mention) 59. Sunsets in Jerusalem 60. Where people read English, write Hebrew, and joke in Yiddish 61. A Story: A few years back, I took the kids to the Haifa beach promenade during Passover, where they had French fries. While sitting there, some Russian Jews who had not been in the country very long came and sat down. They ordered some salads, and asked the Arab waiter to bring it to them with Matzos because they did not want to eat Chometz during Passover. Then they asked the Arab to also bring them beers. The Arab stood and explained to them that it was not only bread that is Chometz but actually beer is also considered chometz and so is also prohibited for consumption by Jews during Passover. The Russians thanked him for explaining that to them. I was reminded about the section in Pirkei Avot where it says one must feel beholden and gratitutude to anyone who teaches one Torah or even a single Hebrew letter. These Russian Jews were beholden to their Arab waiter for teaching them Torah. Only in Israel! Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@econ.haifa.ac.il His website address is
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"WAR WITHIN 18 MONTHS..."
Posted by Eli E. Hertz, April 28, 2009. |
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During the king's recent visit to the U.S. he touched on the following:
Hypocrisy Aside — Rebuttal The Arabs never established nor recognized a Palestinian state during the two decades (1948-1967) prior to the Six-Day War when the West Bank was under Jordanian control, nor did the Palestinians clamor for autonomy or independence during those years under Jordanian rule. Jerusalem for that matter, has never served as an Arab capital for the simple reason that there has never been a Palestinian Arab state. In 1968, the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) turned Jordan into a staging area for sending terrorists into the West Bank and Israel. In the course of three years, 141 Israelis were killed along Israel's border with Jordan. Only in September 1970 was the PLO ousted to Lebanon by Jordan's King Hussein after the PLO went one step too far: Skyjacking three civilian airliners to Jordan, then blowing up the empty planes on the tarmac. During the battle between Jordan's Arab Legion and Palestinian Arab forces (known later as 'Black September') the Jordanians massacred more than 3,000 of their Palestinian 'brethren' in just 10 days. Culturally, Palestinians cannot distinguish their endeavors from other Arabs. The only innovations Palestinians can take credit for are using skyjackings — which they initiated in 1968 as a political instrument, and suicide bombers — refined since the advent of the Oslo Accords in 1993 as a political weapon that is turning Arab's own youth into suicide bombers that target other civilians.
Eli E. Hertz is president of Myths and Facts, Inc. The
organization's objective is to provide policymakers, national
leadership, the media and the public-at-large with information and
viewpoints that are founded on factual and reliable content. Contact
him at today@mythsandfacts.org
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FROM ISRAEL: CELEBRATE ISRAEL!
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 28, 2009. |
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April 28, 2009 We are a miracle. From the ashes of the Holocaust, in a mere 61 years, we have established a vibrant and very special state. A place of life, beauty, and extraordinary lovingkindness, along with whatever pain we endure. In due course, I will return to the news. But at sundown tonight we begin Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day. A celebration to be begun with prayers and thanksgiving, and to be followed by dancing in the streets, fireworks, and, tomorrow, "al ha aish" — barbecue. Here I share a couple of YouTube videos about Israel. "Cool Facts About Israel" (A year old, but no matter.)
"If I Forget Thee Oh! Jerusalem"
And from my website, pictures showing the stunning beauty of our land:
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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BLAMING THE VICTIMS: DESCENDANTS OF GERMAN JEWS AND THEIR ROLE IN HATRED OF MODERN JEWS AND ISRAEL
Posted by Seth J. Frantzman, April 28, 2009 |
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April 22, 2009 Why are German Jews and their descendants and people that call themselves "descendants of Holocaust survivors" so prominent in anti-Israel activity and in describing modern Jews as 'nazis'? They claim to be standing up for 'never again' and that the Holocaust forces them to be 'lone voices'. But they aren't alone. There is a disproportionate involvement by the descendants of Weimer and this must have other explanations. As a proviso it should be stated, not all Holocaust survivors and their descendants hate Israel, most do not, but a great majority of the most extreme anti-Jewish and anti-Israel Jewish voices are people who claim to be related to Holocaust survivors. A massively disproportionate number of them are descendants of German-Jews who make up a tiny sliver of the Jewish people. One of the most disturbing trends that appeared in full force this Holocaust memorial day is the twisting of the traditional view of Jews as victims so that Jews are actually accused of crimes in the present because of their having been victims. As participants from all over the world took place in the annual March of the Living and as Alan Dershowitz was carted away by police in Geneva for wanting to protest Ahmadinjed's appearance at the Durban II conference on racism, people discussed the importance and role of the Holocaust in everyday life today. One of the most interesting pieces of research to come out on this subject is research about the connection between the Holocaust and radical left-wing peace movements. Dr. Tova Benski, chair of the Behavioral Sciences Department at the College of Management in Rishon Lezion, has shown that around 80 percent of the female members of peace organizations, such as Women in Black, are middle-aged Ashkenazi women...second-generation Holocaust survivors." What is interesting is what motivates these women. They declared in the research that it was important to them "not to be like the Germans." They claim the Holocaust was a main "legitimizing factor for the establishment of the state [of Israel] " But then these women make a radical claim. They assert that Jews 'unify the enemy', turning all of the world into an 'other' that is seen as always suppressing Jews. Jews claim to be the "eternal victim...we have always been the victims; we continue to be the victims." Benski, who sympathizes with these activist women, notes that "rather than subscribe to a unified idea of the historical 'enemy,' these women are putting a specific, particular face on the Palestinians... rather than adopt the usual idea of perpetual Jewish victimhood, these women are saying, 'We don't want to be the oppressors. We don't want to do to anyone what was done to us." These daughters of Holocaust survivors actually step over the line and claim that modern day Israel is akin to the Nazis and that they are the lone voices opposing this new Nazism and protecting the new Jews, the Palestinians. Why did the Holocaust get twisted around like this? Why did the actual victims of the Holocaust, the Jews, get turned into something negative and pernicious for being victims. If a person is raped and she becomes wary of walking alone at night do we claim she is "unifying the enemy" and making all men her enemy simply because she was an actual victim and now fears repetition of what happened to her? Consider Merav Michaeli's 'From Kasztner to Shalit' which also claims that the idea of Jews as victims is unacceptable. She claims that in Israel "only death is really sacred. Holocaust Remembrance Day is a good example of how in Israel the dead become heroes who get commemorated." Michaeli castigates that state for calling on people not to forget and for spending money on memorials; "after all, our leaders are interested in perpetuity, and death is eternal...the State of Israel accepts only the new Jew, the belligerent Israeli." Once again Jews are insulted for being victims and there is an insinuation that the victims are used or manipulated by modern day Jews who are only "belligerent." Consider the account of Bernice Eisenstein, author of 'I was the Child of Holocaust Survivors', who describes the Holocaust as "a drug" and that she "dealt in the pain of the Holocaust...my parents were in Auschwitz, can you compete with that?" There is a subtle perversion to all of these observations, from Benski to Michaeli and Eisenstein. The tragedy of it all is the way the Holocaust is twisted around so that discussion of Jewish victims is negative, it is a 'drug', or that discussion of memorializing them is negative because it is somehow fake and that any vow that it will 'never happen again' represents a 'billigerent' attitude that is almost racist against the world because it 'unify's the enemy.' Writing on April 23rd Larry Derner noted that "the trauma to the Jews during the Holocaust has, over the years, been twisted into the aggression of the Jews in today's Israel... Jewish victimhood has not been redemptive; that instead, it's fueled Israel's victimization of Palestinians" But Sephardim, Mizrahim, Ethiopians and most of Russian Jewry, who together form the majority of Israel's population, didn't have this "trauma". Their narrative of being Holocaust survivors. Furthermore its twisted to turn Holocaust survivors into people who are thus aggressors simply because of the Holocaust. The truth is that the wealthy leftist Ashkenazi Holocaust survivors seek to colonize the Jewish people with their trauma. They want to turn the Jewish people into the 'new Nazis' so that they, the children of Holocaust survivors can do what their relatives didn't do, 'stand up to Nazis'. Now they can be the heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto, except in this case they are standing up to their own people. The reason they hate their own people goes back to their yearning to live in the Weimer Republic from whence many of their German-Jewish relatives fled or lived. The Weimer republic for these people is the greatest thing that ever existed. A republic of permissiveness and anything goes, a socialist extremist republic where prostitutes offered 'mother-daughter sex' on the street. This was the temple of these people, most of whome were assimilated Jews like Karl Marx who hated Judaism and hated their fellow Jews. Such was their hate of the Jews then that when Ostjuden began immigrating to Germany they refused to even see this 'dirt' as Jewish. The same is replicated today in the hatred of religious Jews by the secular leftist Ashkenazi elite in Israel which refers to them as 'bloodsuckers' and 'nazis' on a daily basis at the university. These leftist descandants of Holocaust survivors claim that the living Holocaust survivors didn't get enough support from the government but it is they who are obsessed with comparing everything to the Holocaust. They claim Israel manipulates the Holocaust to its own ends but it is they who manipulate the Holocaust to their ends. And it is eminently clear the degree to which they do this. From Norman Finkelstein to Amira Hass and Avraham Burg, all those who hate Israel and accuse it of Nazism, all claim to be children of Holocaust survivors and all of them see a new Holocaust in Israel. All of the hate Israel and seek its destruction. All of them accuse Israel of 'using' the Holocaust. Consider how Michael Neumann, editor of the radical anti-semitic website Counterpunch and author of The Case Against Israel describes himself. "Born 1946, the son of German Jewish refugees." German and Jewish. Those are the twin keys in discerning who these people are. From Baruch Kimmerling to all the heads of Peace Now, HaMoked and Yesh Gvul the economic and historical details are the same: Wealthy, Leftist, Ashkenazi, German-Jewish. The German-Jews and their Holocaust survivor children and grand-children have set about destroying the Jewish people and Israel in order to take revenge for the Holocaust, for the destruction for their Weimer Republic and the fact that Israel's early leaders didn't allow for them to create a republic of self-hate, akin to Weimer, in Israel. They tried. Judah Magnes, head of the Hebrew University, tried to stem Jewish immigration so he and his could be a permanent minority in Israel. Leo Baeck, head of the German Jewish community during the Holocaust, collaborated with the Nazis at Thereisenstadt, hiding information about the Holocaust from fellow Jews. Today Leo Baeck and Judah Magnes are hallowed names on the left and among intellectuals. There is no doubt of the link between German Jewry, its descendants and the hatred of Israel. Amos Elon is but one example. The author of Pity of It All has even moved back to Europe, to live in the Diaspora because he hates Israel. All of the leftist anti-Israel professors at Israeli universities are Ashkenazi, such as Neve Gordon or Ilan Pappe, the majority of them are also German-Jews such as Moshe Zimmerman, who compared Israeli to Nazis, to Moshe Zuckermann, a scholar of German at Tel Aviv University and Tanya Reinhardt author of books on the 'conflict' and a disciple of the late Dr. Kimmerling. German-Jews, all. We will never know why exactly they hate the Jewish people. But it is apparent they want to colonize the Jewish people. They want all Jews to be Holocaust survivors. Then they want to claim that the Holocaust forces the Jews to become the 'new nazis' because Jews are 'trapped in a cycle' and only these few lone voices will stand against the "Jew-Nazi" people. In order to defeat this heresy Jews must free themselves from the dominance of the German-Jewish leftist Ashkenazi elite. Only by embracing the true history of the Jews, outside of Germany, can Jews be free of this albatross. When people read the Derfners and Eisensteins and the massively prolific intellectual descendants of Holocaust survivors and German Jewry they must remind themselves that this is not their narrative. This narrative of suffering Holocaust survivors who become Nazis is a myth. The Sabras of Israel of 1948 were all either born in Israel and were from Eastern Europe. Many of the right wing members of Begin's fighting organization were from religious families or Sephardi background. Ariel Sharon was born in Israel. They all were. The German-Jews never contributed to the war effort of 1948 or of 1967. Any claims that Dayan and Allon and the generals of 1967 styled themselves "Prussians" is incorrect. They imagined themselves as Prussian Generals, but they were not. The German-Jews, arriving in Israel and finding no place for themselves and living in cities and becoming wealthy and an elite decided that they could place their mantle of suffering onto Israel and then transform it into a new Germany and then castigate it as a 'nazi' state. We must not submit to the German heresy. We must fight it with every ounce of our blood. We are not holocaust survivors forced to commit the crimes of the Holocaust. We are simply burdened by the existence of German-Jewry's trauma and self hate about itself and its vanished civilization of the Weimer Republic. The next time someone tells you that "as a Holocaust survivor I know that the Jewish people use the Holocaust to become eternal victims and suppress the Palestinians" it would be best to say "but I'm not a Holocaust survivor and neither are the majority of those serving in the IDF. This trauma you speak of forcing me to harm Palestinians, I don't have this trauma. So now find a new explanation." The German-Jews are the only people in the world that could suffer a Holocaust and then blame their own people for the Holocaust by turning them into people who play victim, pretending that all of their people suffered the Holocaust just to bash them for being victims destined to victimize. We will not be colonized by German-Jewry. The Larry Derfners live in their own Ashkenazi world where everyone is a leftist survivor and they all have this narrative of traum and suffering. But they live in a bubble. Derfner says "the trauma to the Jews during the Holocaust has, over the years, been twisted into the aggression of the Jews in today's Israel." But it is just the trauma of the Derfners and Finkelsteins and Zimmermans and Reinhardts and Hasses. It is not the trauma of the Feredos and Barzanis and Valeros. Why can't the Jewish people be free of the intellectual slavery of the German-Jews? Why can't we fight a war of anti-colonialism against this heresy to throw it off. German-Jews are self-hating and have psychological problems that they have had since the 1920s when their republic began to vanish, but the Jews in all their diversity deserve better than to be saddled with German-Jewish psychological problems, a sort of Freudian German-Jewish complex of self hate and imagininations that they are the lone voices and the new Nazis at the same time. German-Jews need Nazis, they need to be the single voice fighting it, and they want it all to exist among Jews so that Judaism can be destroyed at their hands because they resent that most Jews survived while their civilization did not. But we cannot allow the Ethiopians and Sephardim to be sacrificed on the pyre of German Jewish intellectualism. We must save them. We must save Ashkenazim from the poison of "I am a Holocaust survivor, I have a unique voice to critique Israel which is starting to resemble Nazi Germany." I am not a Holocaust survivor. No one in my family has a connection to the Holocaust. I don't have this ridiculous 'trauma' of becoming a Nazi because I was a victim. Why must the Jews be punished for the Holocaust? Let the German Jews have their intellectual illness, but save us from it. Why are the victims being blamed? Why is the Holocaust twisted around so that it alone 'legitimizes' the creation of Israel, as if the Haganah and Jewish Agency and JNF and Balfour declaration and Herzl all came after 1939 and not before? There is a very real importance in discussing the over-use of the Holocaust as pulp fiction in numerous new movies such as the Reader. There is a very real importance in discussing the way in which the Holocaust or accusations of "nazi" are unacceptable. But people shouldn't lose sight of reality. The victims were victims. Jews didn't ask to have this done to them and they don't manipulate the history of the Holocaust in order to be 'eternal victims'. Contact Seth J. Frantzman at sfrantzman@hotmail.com and visit his website: http://journalterraincognita.blogspot.com These essays appeared on his website. |
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FROM DESTRUCTION TO REBIRTH
Posted by Gennadiy Baruch Faybyshenko, April 28, 2009. |
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We are in a special period of time going from Yom HaShoah to Yom Ha'Atzmaut, from Holocaust's Remembrance Day to Israel's Independence Day. A nation like no others mentioned in the second book of Samuel 7:24, the Jewish people defy the laws of nature that apply to other nations. For example, normally, before something can be destroyed, it must first be created; something that was destroyed does not get born. Since the time when Jacob took the blessing from Esau, Esau's anger has manifested itself for all his generations to come. Many historians trying to understand the minds of anti-Semites conclude that hatred for Jews is a natural and inexplicable phenomenon. The Holy Scriptures tells us that Esau had a son Eliphaz who had a son named Amalek (Gen 36:12). Amalek inherited the hate from Esau for not being blessed as the first born because it could have been him and his descendants that would become a chosen nation; instead Esau's descendants became southern European nations. The Amalekites, seeking every way to destroy the Jewish people, are implacable because their hatred is eternal. We see Amalek in almost every generation, with Haman (the son of Hammedatha the Agagite which is the title of the Amalekite rulers Agag), the Crusaders who sought to destroy Jews because they believed that Jews contributed to the death of their god. During the Inquisition, the Spanish Amalek, when retaliating against the Muslims, who occupied Spain, also went against the Jews who were peaceful citizens. Various Amalekites have presented themselves throughout history, including the pogroms in Russia and other European states. And the horrible Amalek of the twentieth century, Adolf Hitler, y'mach sh'mo v'zichro (may his name and memory be obliterated). Those who believed that Hitler was the last Amalek have been proven wrong by today's incarnation, Persia's current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who hates Jews with all his might and dreams of wiping Jews off the face of the Earth. I've met many people who have studied the minds of Nazis and failed to uncover some reason or source of the Jew-hatred. Yesterday the world openly spoke of destroying Jews, but in the current era of political correctness, the world finds it necessary to be more subtle. Since Israel represents world Jewry today, it is much easier to be anti-Zionist and advocate wiping Israel off the face of the earth — "euphemisms" for the rabid-sounding reality: anti-Semitism and wiping Jews off the face of the earth. However, at the end of the day, the anti-Semites go and destroy Jewish cemeteries, attack Jewish people, vandalize their property everywhere else in the world in addition to Israel. We are told by the sages that the Amalekites assimilated all over the world, yet it shocks us that the president of Switzerland invited the Iranian president to openly deny the Holocaust and shook his hand at the Geneva conference dedicated against racism in the world. We remember in 1948 when five large Arab armies mobilized to attack the newborn Jewish State while the whole world stood idly by. But when the Jews became victorious, all of a sudden the whole world, represented by the United Nations, demanded that Israel stop, and placed its troops on the temporary borders. And we remember when the Arab armies wanted to wipe out Israel in 1967, the UN peacekeeping troops simply walked away. We remember that the Soviet government was able to bomb crematoria and gas chambers and purposely delayed, resulting in tens of thousands of Jewish deaths. And we especially remember the American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (y'mach sh'mo v'zicrho) who refused to bomb railroads that lead to Auschwitz while having all the military plans on hands, but year later bombed oil tankers that were right next to Auschwitz without freeing Jews because he was afraid that the "Jewish problem" would become an American problem. And we remember how he turned away the ship named Saint Louis that was filled with Jews seeking sanctuary from death in Germany. He did not have to send warplanes; all he had to do was to allow 936 Jews into the United States. We remember that England refused to allow Jews to escape the Nazis by emigrating to the Land then known as Palestine, instead turning the ships around, sending them back to their death in Germany. The world stood idly by the Holocaust. And if, G-d forbid, something similar would be on the current horizon, the world will stand idly by again. The world loves us after every Holocaust. They get the pleasure of building us museums and monuments dedicated to the Holocaust Era. They love to accuse one another other of doing nothing to help us. They simply love to see dead Jews. As Hitler said once, he hates Jews because they bring "ethics and morality" and the nations love to live as barbarians. That is not up to the gentiles to change the course. It is G-d who runs the course of history, and He swore that He will keep Israel until the end of times. The answer to the Holocaust is Israel: the third Jewish commonwealth that is the beginning of the final redemption. Despite the world's hatred, Israel will survive, with G-d's help, and will emerge more powerful than ever. Our prophets said that in the final days, the nations will gather their armies around Jerusalem and then G-d will reveal Himself and crush the evil nations into oblivion and will send them straight to hell. The world witnessed the miracle after the Jewish people were almost annihilated; the new State of Israel was miraculously reborn. A day before, the world thought that Jews would be history, but the next day they were on top. It is no coincidence that Yom HaShoah falls on 27th of Nissan and Yom Ha'Atzmaut on 5th of Iyar. There are eight days in between, just eight steps. The distance is almost infinite but yet reachable only if we believe that everything is in the hands of the Creator who created heaven and earth. It is according to His will alone that our fate rests. It is no coincidence that those dates fall on the counting of the Omer between holidays of Passover and Shavuot where each day for fifty days is like a step, and each day we take a step higher. Do not cower at the world's babbling about the Jews. Strong faith in G-d is the only Jewish way. Gennadiy Baruch Faybyshenko is National Director of Bnai Elim. Contact him at Gennadiy1981@yahoo.com |
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THE GENOCIDE MECHANISM
Posted by Gadi Eshel, April 28, 2009. |
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This was written by Itamar Marcus, and it appeared Apr. 25, 2009 in The Jerusalem Post. The writer is director of Palestinian Media Watch. Ways of genocide: One of them, you know, is to crown a ruler that would tilt his people to that end — albeit democratically and in with sophisticated savvy. For example, demonize a nation which refuses to do itself in and have its land Islamized, even though the euphemism used to promote it these days — "two-state-solution," is much much nicer than the notorious "final solution". However, the more proven way, is to rely on the numbers. See
"Muslim Demographics" at
Gadi |
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Survivors of the genocides in Rwanda and Darfur spoke in Geneva this week at the parallel conference on human rights to counter the UN Durban II event. Listening to them describe how they were systematically demonized by the killers made it clear that genocide does not happen in a vacuum. The hate condition of a population willing and anxious to commit genocide needs nurturing. Genocide must be framed positively to get the necessary broad public support. Common to the framing of all genocide is a very specific kind of demonization. In Rwanda, the Hutus taught that the Tutsis were cockroaches and snakes. Tutsi women were portrayed as cunning seductresses who used beauty and sexual power to conquer the Hutus. In Bosnia, a fictitious news report said Muslims were feeding Serb children to animals at the Sarajevo zoo. Radio Rwanda repeatedly broadcast a warning that Hutus were about to be attacked by Tutsis, to convince the Hutus that they needed to attack first to protect themselves. This demonization included two specific components. First, the victims had to be perceived as a clear and present threat, so that the killers were convinced they were acting in self-defense. Second, the victims were dehumanized, so that the killers convinced themselves that they were not destroying real human beings. A decent person will not join in a murder of innocents, but a decent person might join in the killing of a subhuman who is threatening his very existence. Framing genocide as self-defense can turn decent people into killers. Protection of children and family can turn a calm neighbor into a passionate murderer, because self-defense is always justified. In Darfur and Rwanda, all that was necessary to turn a society of ordinary people into killers was to convince them that they were in danger, and that the people endangering them were less than human.
LOOKING BACK on Jewish history, it is clear that the method used to foment violence against Jews has always involved the same framing of "self-defense," with only the details changed. So when Jews were falsely accused of poisoning wells in the Middle Ages, causing thousands of deaths, even decent people joined in the killings. They did not perceive themselves as murderers because they were defending themselves and their families. When Jews were believed to be using blood of children for Passover matzot, even decent people felt comfortable massacring Jews, as they were defending their children from a horrific torture. Even Hitler used this argument of self-defense in Mein Kampf: "In this case [given the Jews' threat to the German people] the only salvation remaining was war, war with all the weapons the human spirit, reason, and will could muster... If the Jew... is victorious over the peoples of this world, then his crown will be the funeral wreath of humanity... Thus I believe today that I am acting according to the will of the almighty creator: When I defend myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord." Hitler, too, packaged his genocide as legitimate self-defense. The details may change in each society, but the framing is always the same.
EXAMINING PALESTINIAN hate promotion today, it is especially striking and disconcerting that these components of the past genocides against Jews are prominent elements of the hate promotion of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas against Jews and Israelis. Two items on Hamas TV earlier this month clearly document this. Hamas TV broadcast a skit featuring actors playing a Jewish father and son, in traditional hassidic garb, discussing the hatred of Muslims their Jewish religion mandated. The father even revives the age-old libel that Jews drink the blood of Muslims: "Shimon, look, my son, I want to teach you a few things. You have to hate the Muslims... we want to kill the Muslims, we Jews want to drink the blood of Muslims." He later criticizes his son for washing his hands in water before prayer: "We have to wash our hands with the blood of Muslims" (Al-Aksa TV, April 3). Ironically, the Hamas accusation that Jews drink Muslim blood came the week before Passover, the anniversary of many horrific blood libels. That same day, a Hamas religious leader ended his sermon with the promise of eventual genocide of the Jews. But to frame it properly, he opened with a depiction of Jews as the enemies of humanity: The Jews are inherently evil, seek to rule the world and are a threat to Muslims and all of humanity. This is how Ziad Abu Alhaj framed it: "Hatred for Muhammad and Islam is in their [Jews'] souls, they are naturally disposed to it... Israel is a cancer that wants to rule the world." He concluded that the Jews are destined to be annihilated: "The time will come, by Allah's will, when their property will be destroyed and their children will be exterminated, and no Jew or Zionist will be left on the face of this earth" (Al-Aksa TV, April 3).
THIS DEMONIZATION and dehumanization of Jews is not limited to Hamas. Although hesitant to call for explicit murdering of Jews while seeking Western money, the PA continues its unrelenting framing of genocide as self-defense and for the common good. In the PA-Fatah media today, Jews and Israelis are demonized through malicious libels, including such lies as the assertion that Israel intentionally spreads AIDS and drugs among Palestinians, conducts Nazi-like medical experiments on Palestinian prisoners and is planning to destroy the Aksa Mosque. Says the Palestinian chief religious justice, Tayseer al-Tamimi: "The AIDS issue needs to receive due attention... since we neighbor a society [Israel] where the disease is widespread and which acts to transmit [AIDS] to Palestinian society. The occupying authorities, especially in Jerusalem, are working to spread drugs and drug addiction, without a doubt" (PA radio, February 17, 2008). And this from Dr. Mutawakil Tahalk, head of the Palestinian Writers' Union and former PA deputy minister: "We saw how they [Zionists] stab bellies of pregnant women, slaughter infants and eat life in cold blood. They targeted children and the wombs of women so this people won't reproduce" (PATV, March 4, 2008). A July 2008 article in Al-Ayyam accused Israeli settlers of releasing rats in Jerusalem's Old City "to turn the [Arab] residents' life into a living hell, forcing then to leave..." (July 17, 2008). A PA TV video clip juxtaposes scenes of a real Israeli tank with fictitious scenes of a child actor being shot, creating the fiction that Israelis deliberately target and shoot Palestinian children (PATV, May 15, 2008). Just as the Tutsis were described as cockroaches and snakes, both Hamas and the PA have described Jews as loathsome and dangerous animals, including cockroaches, spiders, scorpions and alligators. While each libel is somewhat different, their essence is the same: The Israelis and the Jews are dangerous, they are not human, we need to defend ourselves from them and we are clearly justified in doing so. It is tragic that this framing of genocide as necessary self-defense has been so chillingly successful. A poll after last year's murders of eight teenage yeshiva students found that "84 percent of Palestinians support the terror attack killing eight young students in a Jerusalem yeshiva on March 6, 2008" (Poll by Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, The New York Times, March 19, 2008). How can an entire Palestinian society support the murder of children? Clearly, the framing of Jews and Israelis as mortally dangerous to Palestinians has been totally successful. Israel now faces a society that is very possibly past the stage of genocide framing and at the point of seeing the killing of Israelis, even teens, as justified. All that would be necessary for the population to go along with the final script, detailed so many times by its leaders, would be the means. Contact Gadi Eshel at gadi.eshel@ptk.co.il |
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ISRAEL — NATIONAL LIBERATION OF THE ABORIGINAL JEWS FROM THE TWIN FASCISMS OF PAN-ARABISM AND ISLAMISM
Posted by American, April 28, 2009. |
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This was a comment sent by Cohen to Jonah Goldberg to the Corner at
National Review |
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...Israel as the result of the national liberation movement of the region's aboriginal Jews. Liberation of the aboriginal Jews (and anyone else lucky enough to find refuge within Israel's borders) from the twin fascisms of pan-Arabism and Islamism which have oppressed and even eliminated so many of the region's aboriginal ethnic groups. Israel's aboriginal Jews were not unique in accepting outside help (and even immigration) in their liberation struggle. Lebanon's Maronites, Egypt's Copts, Iraq and Turkey's Kurds, and Iran's Zoroastrians have all sought and received outside help in their liberation struggles, each group according to its own circumstances. Richard Cohen's remark that Israel is a "mistake" because it was a mistake to found a European Jewish state inside the "Arab" region is not only ignorant of this history, but it is self-hating in the sense that he tacitly validates the aboriginal liberation struggle of many peoples but singly denies validity to the liberation struggle of the region's aboriginal Jews. Contact American at American1627@yahoo.com |
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THE BRAVERY OF DIASPORA JEWRY HELPS ISRAEL A GREAT DEAL
Posted by Saul Goldman, April 27, 2009. |
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Read Isi Leibler, "Diaspora Jews And The War" in the Jerusalem Post
So, let us ALL immediately make some phone-calls and send some
faxes in response to the following call by the brave and devoted
National Council of Young Israel
U.S. LEADERS, DO NOT ADVOCATE A PALESTINIAN STATE! The NCYI is launching a campaign which encourages people to call and e-mail the Israeli Embassy in Washington D.C. and express four fundamental points: 1. I support the State of Israel. 2. I oppose the division of Jerusalem. 3. I oppose the creation of an independent Palestinian state within Israel's borders. 4. I urge Prime Minister Netanyahu to stay strong and I support his efforts to guarantee the security of the State of Israel. (For more information: http://www.youngisrael.org |
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(SUMMARY) America's stated intent to pursue an independent Palestinian state is untenable and unfeasible. Contact American political leaders and urge them not to push Israel to create a Palestinian state. Telephone and fax are better than email if you can. If you phone, ask for message to be read back to you so you make sure it's clear: NO PALESTINIAN STATE. White House 202-456-1111,
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Senator John Kerry (Chairman, Senate Foreign Relations Committee)
Congressman Howard Berman
Congressman Gary Ackerman (Chairman, Congressional Subcommittee,
Middle East and South Asia)
American Jews in US and Israel, please sign the following petition AND
send to all of your contacts. This urges the American Jewish
organizations to follow Young Israel's great lead and insist that the
American government STOP twisting Israel's arm to set up a
Palestinian state a bike-ride away from Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv and
Ben-Gurion airport! Go to
Contact Saul Goldman at gold7910@bellsouth.net |
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FROM ISRAEL: WE REMEMBER
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 27, 2009. |
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When the siren sounds tonight at 8:00 across the nation, we will begin Yom HaZikaron — the Day of Remembrance — and we will pay tribute to all those who have fallen for Israel. It is because of our soldiers that we stand as a nation, and their sacrifices are keenly felt. A national ceremony will be held at the Kotel (Western Wall). Tomorrow at 10:00 AM another siren will sound, and people all over Israel will stop what they are doing and stand silently in honor of the fallen. ~~~~~~~~~~ So far, so good. Very good indeed. Now Minister of Strategic Affairs (and former chief of staff) Moshe (Bogie) Ya'alon has given an interview to the Jerusalem Post. Among the points he made: — President Obama must set a time frame and benchmarks for his negotiations with Iran, or else they will use the dialogue to stall for time as they move towards nuclear capacity."What is happening between the Western world and the Islamic jihadists of Iran is a process that is built on previous surrenders and concessions," he said. "What the West needs to do is stand up against this wave and confront it." He rejects the Saudi plan: "From our perspective, the pre-1967 borders are not defensible. To go onto this track is dangerous." [Note: the idea that the 1967 armistice lines were "borders" is so thoroughly ingrained in the public discourse, per the constant prodding of Palestinian PR, that even Ya'alon, who rejects return to those lines, refers to "borders."] What the government, which is close to completing its assessment, favors, Yaalon said, is a "bottoms up" approach. This means that before anything else happens the PA has to institute serious educational, political, security and economic reforms. This is the only thing that remotely makes sense. But Obama — who wants to impose a Palestinian state by tomorrow, damn whether it can be a successful state — is not going to like it. ~~~~~~~~~~ The enormous irony of the US desire for talks with Iran without preconditions is that Ahmadinejad is calling for "a clear cut framework" and a "clear agenda" in talks with the Americans. This means he wants control over what will be discussed. In fact, in an ABC "This Week" interview yesterday, he said that the nuclear program was a "special issue": "We think that the nuclear issue needs to be resolved in the context of the agency and regulations. We are just utilizing our legal rights." Sounds to me as if he's telling the Americans that he'll be happy to talk, but not about nuclear development. Rather puts the ball in Obama's court, I think. ~~~~~~~~~~ Never let it be said that we don't have friends (at least in some contexts). Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini proudly expresses a sense of commitment to Israel, and says that the Italian boycott of Durban 2 was required. "...We could not participate in an event where, once again, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was manipulated and Israel labeled a racist nation, as happened in 2001. The events of [last] Monday afternoon [Ahmadinejad's talk] confirmed that foresight." Frattini says there were three key issues in the proposed document for the conference that were of concern to Italy: approval of the Durban 2001 document, which singled out Israel; insufficient treatment of the Holocaust; and motions aimed at limiting freedom of expression regarding criticism of religions and their followers. "An international forum on a crucial issue such as racism cannot be exploited to attack Israel," he declared. "The EU displayed political weakness and lost an occasion for expressing unity." ~~~~~~~~~~ In point of fact, the Durban 2 conference was not quite the disaster that had been anticipated — did not have the horrific tenor of the first conference, where virulently anti-Israel groups demonstrated and documents where produced that charged Israel with every evil under the sun. Satisfactory? Productive for the sake of human rights? Of course not. But this time we were prepared, and the willingness of several states to pull out (in part as the result of intense Israeli diplomatic effort) undercut the legitimacy of the proceedings. My own opinion is that the organizers overplayed their hand; to have Ahmadinejad as key note speaker at a human rights conference is nothing short of farcical. Who but states such as Libya and Cuba could find him acceptable? UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay added to the sense of farce when she concluded the conference on Friday by calling it "a celebration of tolerance and dignity for all." So much for what we can expect from the UN. Frattini recalled a former American proposal (I believe it was by John Bolton) that Western democracies form a separate coalition. ~~~~~~~~~~ Precisely what has gotten into King Abdullah of Jordan? In the US, he met with President Obama and called for serious negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians based on the concept of two states. Then, on the "Meet the Press" television show yesterday, he referred to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the "core issue" of the Middle East. Not only is he advocating strenuously for a Palestinian state, he has suggested that one of the main reasons that Iran is working towards nuclear development is because Palestinians are suffering and there is the matter of Jerusalem [which is in Israeli hands]. Now, really... If you know the ideology of the Mullahs in Iran, and their goal of controlling the entire region in order to impose Shiite Islam, and you know that the US is referred to as the Big Satan, you know that a whole lot more than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict occupies them. But see for yourself:
Until not long ago it was well known in intelligence circles that Abdullah preferred Israel at his border rather than a PA state. What he feared was a Hamas take-over that would cause instability in his nation. And now? I'm not sure how to read him. Is he playing to Obama (very likely)? Afraid that Netanyahu might propose a federation of Palestinian areas with Jordan? ~~~~~~~~~~ Pope Benedict XVI is coming to Israel on May 16, and the signals about what is likely to transpire when he's here are not positive. He is scheduled to visit Jerusalem, Nazareth, and Bethlehem — as well as the nearby al-Aida UNRWA refugee camp, where he will preach. Fouad Twal, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem and president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Holy Land, said yesterday that the camp "symbolizes the refugees' suffering and their right of return." Their right of return? According to YNet, the stage hosting the Pope was supposed to be built in a school yard, but Palestinians violated an agreement regarding this with Israel (which controls the area) and built the stage instead near the security fence. A demolition order has been issued and the stage is supposed to be re-built. Insisted Twal: "The fence will be seen from the location of the pope's seat." In due course there will be more to say on this issue. ~~~~~~~~~~ PA President Mahmoud Abbas gave an impassioned speech in Ramallah today: "A Jewish state, what is that supposed to mean? You can call yourselves as you like, but I don't accept it and I say so publicly," he declared. Accepting a "Jewish state" would mean relinquishing the "right of return" — which is, in fact, a device for ensuring an Arab majority inside Israel, and which has been promoted among the people as a sacred and inalienable right. The current Palestinian position is not "two states for two people," but ultimately "two states for one people." "All I know is that there is the state of Israel, in the borders of 1967, not one centimeter more, not one centimeter less. Anything else, I don't accept." The Palestinians would have not only Har Habayit — the Temple Mount — but also the Kotel, with no sharing. He further said that there will be no negotiations unless Netanyahu puts a total freeze on construction in Judea and Samaria, something Netanyahu has said he does not intend to do. No negotiations? That's fine. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THOUGHT POLICE MUSCLE UP IN BRITAIN
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 26, 2009. |
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This article was written by Hal G. P. Colebatch and appeared April 21, 2009
in The Australian
Hal G. P. Colebatch's Blair's Britain was chosen as a book of the year by The Spectator in 1999. |
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BRITAIN appears to be evolving into the first modern soft totalitarian state. As a sometime teacher of political science and international law, I do not use the term totalitarian loosely. There are no concentration camps or gulags but there are thought police with unprecedented powers to dictate ways of thinking and sniff out heresy, and there can be harsh punishments for dissent. Nikolai Bukharin claimed one of the Bolshevik Revolution's principal tasks was "to alter people's actual psychology". Britain is not Bolshevik, but a campaign to alter people's psychology and create a new Homo britannicus is under way without even a fig leaf of disguise. The Government is pushing ahead with legislation that will criminalise politically incorrect jokes, with a maximum punishment of up to seven years' prison. The House of Lords tried to insert a free-speech amendment, but Justice Secretary Jack Straw knocked it out. It was Straw who previously called for a redefinition of Englishness and suggested the "global baggage of empire" was linked to soccer violence by "racist and xenophobic white males". He claimed the English "propensity for violence" was used to subjugate Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and that the English as a race were "potentially very aggressive". In the past 10 years I have collected reports of many instances of draconian punishments, including the arrest and criminal prosecution of children, for thought-crimes and offences against political correctness. Countryside Restoration Trust chairman and columnist Robin Page said at a rally against the Government's anti-hunting laws in Gloucestershire in 2002: "If you are a black vegetarian Muslim asylum-seeking one-legged lesbian lorry driver, I want the same rights as you." Page was arrested, and after four months he received a letter saying no charges would be pressed, but that: "If further evidence comes to our attention whereby your involvement is implicated, we will seek to initiate proceedings." It took him five years to clear his name. Page was at least an adult. In September 2006, a 14-year-old schoolgirl, Codie Stott, asked a teacher if she could sit with another group to do a science project as all the girls with her spoke only Urdu. The teacher's first response, according to Stott, was to scream at her: "It's racist, you're going to get done by the police!" Upset and terrified, the schoolgirl went outside to calm down. The teacher called the police and a few days later, presumably after officialdom had thought the matter over, she was arrested and taken to a police station, where she was fingerprinted and photographed. According to her mother, she was placed in a bare cell for 3 1/2 hours. She was questioned on suspicion of committing a racial public order offence and then released without charge. The school was said to be investigating what further action to take, not against the teacher, but against Stott. Headmaster Anthony Edkins reportedly said: "An allegation of a serious nature was made concerning a racially motivated remark. We aim to ensure a caring and tolerant attitude towards pupils of all ethnic backgrounds and will not stand for racism in any form." A 10-year-old child was arrested and brought before a judge, for having allegedly called an 11-year-old boya "Paki" and "bin Laden" during a playground argument at a primary school (the other boy had called him a skunk and a Teletubby). When it reached the court the case had cost taxpayers pound stg. 25,000. The accused was so distressed that he had stopped attending school. The judge, Jonathan Finestein, said: "Have we really got to the stage where we are prosecuting 10-year-old boys because of political correctness? There are major crimes out there and the police don't bother to prosecute. This is nonsense." Finestein was fiercely attacked by teaching union leaders, as in those witch-hunt trials where any who spoke in defence of an accused or pointed to defects in the prosecution were immediately targeted as witches and candidates for burning. Hate-crime police investigated Basil Brush, a puppet fox on children's television, who had made a joke about Gypsies. The BBC confessed that Brush had behaved inappropriately and assured police that the episode would be banned. A bishop was warned by the police for not having done enough to "celebrate diversity", the enforcing of which is now apparently a police function. A Christian home for retired clergy and religious workers lost a grant because it would not reveal to official snoopers how many of the residents were homosexual. That they had never been asked was taken as evidence of homophobia. Muslim parents who objected to young children being given books advocating same-sex marriage and adoption at one school last year had their wishes respected and the offending material withdrawn. This year, Muslim and Christian parents at another school objecting to the same material have not only had their objections ignored but have been threatened with prosecution if they withdraw their children. There have been innumerable cases in recent months of people in schools, hospitals and other institutions losing their jobs because of various religious scruples, often, as in the East Germany of yore, not shouted fanatically from the rooftops but betrayed in private conversations and reported to authorities. The crime of one nurse was to offer to pray for a patient, who did not complain but merely mentioned the matter to another nurse. A primary school receptionist, Jennie Cain, whose five-year-old daughter was told off for talking about Jesus in class, faces the sack for seeking support from her church. A private email from her to other members of the church asking for prayers fell into the hands of school authorities. Permissiveness as well as draconianism can be deployed to destroy socially accepted norms and values. The Royal Navy, for instance, has installed a satanist chapel in a warship to accommodate the proclivities of a satanist crew member. "What would Nelson have said?" is a British newspaper cliche about navy scandals, but in this case seems a legitimate question. Satanist paraphernalia is also supplied to prison inmates who need it. This campaign seems to come from unelected or quasi-governmental bodies controlling various institutions, which are more or less unanswerable to electors, more than it does directly from the Government, although the Government helps drive it and condones it in a fudged and deniable manner. Any one of these incidents might be dismissed as an aberration, but taken together — and I have only mentioned a tiny sample; more are reported almost every day — they add up to a pretty clear picture. Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
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IRANIAN ROULETTE
Posted by Marcia Leal, April 26, 2009. |
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This was written by David Solway and appeared April 24, 2009
in Front Page Magazine
David Solway is the award-winning author of over twenty-five books of poetry, criticism, educational theory, and travel. He is a contributor to magazines as varied as the Atlantic, the Sewanee Review, Books in Canada, and the Partisan Review. His most recent book is The Big Lie: On Terror, Antisemitism, and Identity. |
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At the infamous Evian Conference that met on the shores of Lake Geneva in 1938, the Jewish victims of Nazi oppression were betrayed by Western leaders, who protested against the Nazi atrocities but steadfastly refused to help the growing number of Jewish refugees. Today, once again on the shores of Lake Geneva, another international conference has been convened, ostensibly against racism, discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance, but as everyone knows its principal purpose is to shield the real abusers of human rights from censure while vilifying and scapegoating the Jewish state. Same approximate venue, same approximate agenda. Thus, when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered his defamatory anti-Israeli speech at the Palace of Nations on Monday of this week, the general reaction was to be expected. It was unanimously deplored by duly offended European leaders, but the underlying reality was very different. Many walked out but, when it came to the conference itself, most walked straight back in. Though properly scandalized, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner downplayed Ahmadinejad's virulent remarks as "predictable" and opined that the conference was "not a failure at all but the beginning of a success" (Jerusalem Post, April 21, 2009). Neither was the European Union much disturbed beneath its veneer of practised indignation, releasing a statement to the effect that it had "no outstanding difficulty of substance" with the Durban II draft document. It then committed itself, with the exception of a sprinkling of member states, to participate fully in the proceedings. This capitulation was both as shameful and as "predictable" as Ahmadinejad's malignant speech, and betokened, to adjust Kouchner's rhetoric, not the beginning of a success but a careening failure of will, nerve and intelligence, shared by the West as a whole. Our political leaders, the majority of our public intellectuals and the mainstream media have not realized, or myopically refuse to realize, what is at stake as the historical drama in which we are implicated unfolds — a drama in which Iran and Israel are the central actors. Let us imagine a terrifying possibility. We know that Iran has vowed to unleash nuclear havoc upon Israel. Should Israel respond in kind, as it would have every right to do, the damage may not be confined to a localized area. Many people are callous enough to accept the nuclear probability of Tel Aviv and Tehran reduced to rubble and ash, so long as they can get on with their lives. What they do not realize is that they too are in the line of fire. An atomic missile falling on Kharg Island, for example, Iran's major oil depot in the Persian Gulf, would ignite a radioactive oil fire that could probably not be extinguished and the skies would gradually darken over us all. Such a conflagration would more likely than not have to burn itself out, when it might well be too late to recover from its effect on climate and agriculture. Israel would undoubtedly do its utmost to avoid striking such installations, but Iran remains one vast inflammable oil well. An errant nuclear-tipped missile, launched from either side, may have planetary consequences. Krakatoa would be as nothing in comparison. Saddam lighting up a number of oil wells in Kuwait would not even qualify as a harbinger of what would occur — we recall that it took several months for American engineers to control a relatively minor irritation in the aftermath of the first Gulf War. We are now living what may be the most precarious moment in the recorded history of the world as we continue to play the dangerous game of Iranian roulette — the game in which not one but five of the six chambers are loaded. Antisemites would probably argue that Israel and not Iran is the danger and therefore it is Israel that should be dealt with before an imminent Iranian attack. Such an attitude gets its priorities backwards and is, of course, pure evasive nonsense to boot. The fact is that Israel can only be bullied so far and no farther. It will not go docilely nor should it be expected to forgive an "international community" that has abandoned the Jewish people yet once again to the spectre of extermination. In the current play of innocuous strategies vis à vis Iran, of abject appeasement and feeble sanction, juicy carrot and twig-like stick, this is not a fifth act we should placidly discount. Former American ambassador to the UN John Bolton, one of our most reliable analysts, has warned that "there are no incentives that will dissuade Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons" (Newsmax, January 28, 2009). And so far, no disincentives either. If Ahmadinejad gets his way, the still-concealed Twelfth Imam, who is said to bring a new "world order" in fire and brimstone and raise the Caliphate upon its embers, may not remain in occultation for much longer. * * According to the Iranian newspaper Kargozaran for March 16, 2008, Cabinet Secretary Majid Doostali explained that "just as Imam Zaman's occultation had a prelude and a main period, his return too has a prelude and a main period," and that Ahmadinejad's administration "was the prelude to the return." The President of the Islamic Management Scientific Society at the Qom Seminary School, one Hojjatoleslam Sammameddin Ghavani, has even proposed the establishment of a "Ministry of Waiting" to facilitate the arrival of the Hidden Imam. Ahmadinejad has announced that the Imam Zaman would emerge from occultation within two years — the period of waiting (Rooz Online Iran, August 26, 2008). Skeptical westerners who would pass this off as merely a quaint belief not to be taken seriously should reconsider. In Radical Islam: Medieval Theology and Modern Politics, historian Emmanuel Sivan warns of precisely this menace in his discussion of Shi'a belief and thought, its vision of an "ideal, legitimate state to be instituted by its leader, the Hidden Imam." Over the course of history, he writes, a "minority of Shi'ites, quite substantial and dangerous at times, would move from pessimistic idealism to an optimistic brand of the same approach — the imam's arrival is imminent, God's kingdom is bound to be brought upon earth by this messiah (mahdi), and one should help precipitate its descent by armed revolt" (emphasis added). Ahmadinejad has made clear his intention to prompt the advent of the Mahdi by initiating an act of apocalyptic violence. It's not a bad plan from the Imamic perspective. Accelerate the Mahdi's arrival by bringing about a nuclear cataclysm and reap the reward of either of two outcomes. Israel is destroyed and Iran survives since, as Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani has informed us, Iran can absorb "thirty or forty million martyrs" in its march toward a global Caliphate. Alternatively, Iran is also consumed and very possibly the world along with it, a global conquest to be savored from a position of vantage in Jannah, the Garden of Eternal Delights. Either way, victory. Fear-mongering? Think again. Those who would argue that such a scenario makes no sense and is in fact counter-productive have simply not grasped the metality in question. A nuclear weapon is only a bigger suicide bomb and there are prospective "martyrs" aplenty. You die the same whether you are wearing an explosive vest or, like Dr. Strangelove, riding a nuclear bomb to earth. We are told by the pundits, secure in their upholstery, that the mullahs like the good life and Ahmadinejad relishes his junketing too much to jeopardize such advantages. Besides, the Iranians are busy signing trade deals with diverse European nations, which suggests they envisage a viable future. If that is the case, why then have they announced their morbid purpose in advance of carrying it out, putting Israel on alert and inviting a pre-emptive strike which would instantly deprive them of the perks they are said to enjoy and render their trade deals null and void? Why even take the chance? The game is obviously not worth the radioactive candle — unless it is not a game at all. The aim is to ensure that Iran stays afloat while it prepares to accomplish its mission, predicated on the calculated risk that neither srael nor America will intervene in time to deflect its trajectory. It's a gamble, but one the Iranians are confident they can win. (And they certainly have nothing to worry about from a flaccid and propitiatory Europe.) We should make no mistake about this. Iran itself is the missile that is gradually being armed and fueled. True, there is madness in the method, but the method is nonetheless singularly effective, given the intention. We should do well to keep in mind that we are not treating with a cadre of lucid and sensible actors who can be trusted to be reasonable — as we understand reasonableness. They are labile, invidious and locked in a mental universe that is utterly foreign to our own. When, after the signing of the Balfour Declaration, Israel's first President Chaim Weizmann said, "We hear the steps of the Messiah," he was speaking metaphorically. When Ahmadinejad and his gang talk of the coming of the Mahdi, they mean it quite literally, and therein lies the peril. In his pledge to "wipe Israel off the map," the second part of Ahmadinejad's statement was not reported by the mainstream press: "as the Imam said." The original statement delivered in Farsi at the "World without Zionism" conference held in Tehran on October 26, 2005 translates literally as: Israel "must be erased from the page of time," a slogan draped across Shihab-3 missiles at military parades, which makes the intent rather obvious. "Wiped off the map" is the non-literal translation provided by the New York Times. The Iranian newscaster who reported the address phrased the purport of the statement as "erasing Israel, this disgraceful stain, from the world." Many of Iran's enablers in Western intellectual and political circles, such as Professor Juan Cole of the University of Michigan, Jonathan Steele of the Guardian, Stephen Walt of "Israel Lobby" fame, the despicable Jimmy Carter and American Congressmen Denis Kucinich and Ron Paul, have tried to soft-pedal Ahmadinejad's threat. The Economist's Middle East correspondent Max Rodendeck speaks dismissively of Iran's "nuclear gadgetry." This is like putting Jimmy Carter before the hearse. The downward appraisal by the American National Intelligence Estimate of Iran's nuclear program, which reduced the threat index and thereby mitigated the urgency of the situation, turns out to have been totally misguided. It was subsequently reversed by director Michael McConnell at a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on February 5, 2008. Ahmadinejad, who plainly belongs to Sivan's "substantial and dangerous" minority, is in many quarters regarded as a "clown" whose invitations to speak at prestigious political and educational institutions and whose media-reported rants are therefore harmless, as, for example, his ludicrous claim at the United Nations food summit in Rome in June 2008 that Zionism is responsible for rising food prices throughout the world. People forget that Hitler in the early days of his rule was similarly regarded, before he started another world war and presided over a genocide. Ahmadinejad looks and acts like a small-time crook, but he will soon have his finger on a big-time button. Nor should we be deceived by his apparent buffoonery. He means what he says and he needs to be taken at his word. * * Political madmen should not be indulged and coddled by presumably saner people since such madmen are usually far more ruthless and far shrewder — and far madder — than they are assumed to be. Political madmen need to be disarmed, neutralized or taken out, one way or another. The British government and the German industrialists who tolerated Hitler learned their lesson too late and were no less responsible than the German Chancellor himself for inflicting carnage upon the world. The Holocaust was their doing as well. For by their indifference to or secret sympathy with the Nazi project, they were equally complicit. But the current situation is not strictly analogous. To begin with, we live in the nuclear age — there is no margin for error. Politically speaking, many of us appear to behave as if we were suffering from an advanced stage of retardation. We are still susceptible to a kind of Maginot-thought, always fighting the last war, or even the one before that. This leisurely approach to geopolitical reality is not only passé but potentially catastrophic. Further, Jews now have their own nation and are no longer powerless to react or to exact vengeance. For if Israel finds itself in the throes of annihilation in a second Holocaust, left to smoulder in the world's guilty unconcern, no one can dictate to it what its response should be. And no one should consider himself exempt from the consequences. It is time to rub the slumber from our eyes. Should Iran carry out its promise to destroy Israel, whether directly or by proxy, thus hastening the looming parousia of the long-awaited Mahdi, and Israel retaliate in nuclear reprisal, the region will be set ablaze. The fact that the world economy would crater far more severely than anything we are experiencing today is almost beside the point. Far worse, the effect on the global ecology might well be disastrous and possibly terminal, and we, too, like our foolish predecessors, will have learned too late that blindness and make-believe never work. The writing is not only on the wall; it is in the documents, the proclamations, the newspapers, the texts of speeches. All we need do is read. Our attention has been distracted by other volatile nuclear powers, such as Pakistan and North Korea. Pakistan in particular, if the inchmeal approach of the Taliban toward the capital is not halted, will need to be robustly confronted. But in an oil-drenched region primed to go up in flames, in which one nation is acquiring offensive nuclear ordnance which it vows to use and another is ready to respond defensively, the immediate world-threat is Iran. It must be dealt with in short order, whether militarily or economically, and its nuclear designs effectively negated. For if we do not wake up, the day may dawn when we do not wake up. Contact Marcia Leal at marcia.leal.eejh@gmail.com |
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OBAMA ADVISED TO SUSPEND INTELLIGENCE, MILITARY DIALOGUE WITH ISRAEL
Posted by David P. Steinman, April 26, 2009. |
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This was posted by Alaska Paul on the April 24, 2009 Civil, Well-Reasoned
Discourse Rantburg website:
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WASHINGTON — A leading ally of President Barack Obama and critic of the Israel lobby in the United States has outlined a proposed U.S. campaign to pressure Israel that would suspend the intelligence dialogue between the two countries. Because even though Hamas wants all the Juice dead, and Fatah wants them dead, and Islamic Jihad wants them dead, the Israelis have to endorse a two-state solution and bend on the right of return. Israel's "special relationship" with the United States has been low-hanging fruit for the unrelenting and politically victorious critics of the Bush administration's War on Terror which targeted militants in Iraq, Iran and Syria in coordination with Israel's security agencies.
Stephen Walt, a U.S. professor of international affairs at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, who co-authored with John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago a controversial study on the Israeli lobby in the United States, has drafted recommendations for the Obama administration to pressure the new Israeli government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to accept a Palestinian state in the West Bank. [Any guarantees of Israeli security? crickets] Walt, regarded as influential in the U.S. diplomatic community, said the campaign should begin by administration criticism of Israel and support for United Nations resolutions that condemn the Jewish state. "U.S. officials could even describe Israel's occupation [of the West Bank] as 'contrary to democracy,' 'unwise,' 'cruel,' or 'unjust,'" Walt wrote in the U.S. magazine Foreign Policy. "Altering the rhetoric would send a clear signal to the Israeli government and its citizens that their government's opposition to a two-state solution was jeopardizing the special relationship." [What about Hamas and their opposition to a two-state solution?] Netanyahu was scheduled to fly to Washington to meet Obama in May 2009. But on April 16, the Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot reported that Netanyahu was expected to cancel his visit amid an assessment that Obama would refuse to meet the Israeli prime minister. "Within four years there will be a permanent settlement between Israel and Palestinians," White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel was quoted by Yediot as saying. "We don't care who the prime minister is." [A bit arrogant, doncha think?] Walt's report, titled "Can the United States Put Pressure on Israel: A User's Guide." marked the latest recommendations to the Obama administration to revise U.S. policy toward Israel.
In March 2009, a report by a bipartisan panel of foreign policy analysts called on the White House to pressure Israel as part of an effort to resolve the U.S. conflict with the Arab world. The book by Walt and Mearshimer, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, generated controversy but also served to validate a growing alternative foreign policy consensus for a new administration elected in large part on the basis of the repudiation of the 43rd U.S. president. But the book was also repudiated by such ideologically opposed former foreign policy officials as former Secretary of State (1982-89) George Shultz and former N.Y. Times correspondent and former President of the Council on Foreign Relations Leslie Gelb. "Anyone who thinks that Jewish groups constitute a homogeneous 'lobby' ought to spend some time dealing with them," Shultz wrote in the U.S. News and World Report. "For example, my decision to open a dialogue with Yasser Arafat after he met certain conditions evoked a wide spectrum of responses from the government of Israel, its political parties, and American Jewish groups who weighed in on one side or the other. ... The United States supports Israel not because of favoritism based on political pressure or influence but because the American people, and their leaders, say that supporting Israel is politically sound and morally just. ... So, on every level, those who blame Israel and its Jewish supporters for U.S. policies they do not support are wrong. They are wrong because, to begin with, support for Israel is in our best interests. They are also wrong because Israel and its supporters have the right to try to influence U.S. policy. And they are wrong because the U.S. government is responsible for the policies it adopts, not any other state or any of the myriad lobbies and groups that battle daily — sometimes with lies — to win America's support." Leslie Gelb wrote in the New York Times Book Review that the scholarship was shoddy and that the authors were biased. "More troublingly, [Walt and Mearsheimer] dont seriously review the facts of the two most critical issues to Israel and the lobby — arms sales to Arab states and the question of a Palestinian state — matters on which the American position has consistently run counter to the so-called all-powerful Jewish lobby. For several decades, administration after administration has sold Saudi Arabia and other Arab states first-rate modern weapons, against the all-out opposition of Israel and the lobby. And make no mistake, these arms have represented genuine security risks to Israel... And on the policy issue that has counted most to Israel and the lobby — preventing the United States from accepting a Palestinian state prior to a negotiated deal between Israel and the Palestinians — its fair to say Washington has quietly sided with the Palestinians for a long time." Walt warned against any immediate attempt by Obama to reduce the $3 billion in annual U.S. military aid to Israel. He said this would result in a battle with the Democratic-controlled Congress. "There's a lot of potential leverage here, but it's probably not the best stick to use, at least not at first," Walt said. "Trying to trim or cut the aid package will trigger an open and undoubtedly ugly confrontation in Congress — where the influence of AIPAC and other hard-line groups in the Israel lobby is greatest. So that's not where I'd start." But Walt urged Obama to reduce U.S. strategic cooperation with Israel. He said the administration could suspend the dialogue between the Israeli and U.S. intelligence communities as well as that of the Israeli military and the Defense Department. "Today, such a step would surely get the attention of Israel's security establishment," Walt said. [And would get the attention of Iran and its proxies. And deprive us of needed intel. Nice thinking, Walt ...] Walt also recommended that the United States reduce its procurement of Israeli defense equipment, another step that would not require congressional approval. Israel has sold a range of armor, munitions and platforms deployed by the U.S. military in Afghanistan and Iraq. [Now we are talking about jeopardizing the lives of our troops. Our military picks equipment for its forces from Israel based upon performance.] "Obama could instruct Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to slow or decrease these purchases, which would send an unmistakable signal that it was no longer business-as-usual," Walt said. "Given the battering Israel's economy has taken in the current global recession, this step would get noticed too. And most of these measures could be implemented by the Executive Branch alone, thereby outflanking die-hard defenders of the special relationship in Congress." [That also means lessening the links of cooperation between the US Military and the IDF. We do share information and tactics for mutual survival against a common enemy. The ramifications of Obama's policies are far ranging and serious, if not deadly.] |
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FROM ISRAEL: A REFLECTION
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 26, 2009. |
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I would like to go back to the positions espoused by PM Netanyahu and FM Lieberman — which I referred to Friday with relief and satisfaction — in order to consider the possibilities and the ramifications in a bit more detail. I've received comments from some readers regarding the fact that our government should "just say no": Should tell the international community that negotiating with the Palestinians is not in our best interest and that we will not do so. There's no question about the fact that when our government finally works out its policy with regard to dealing with Palestinians — which will be done within the month, before Netanyahu goes to Washington to meet with Obama — there will be those who will see our prime minister as having softened and started down the road to something that he shouldn't be doing. For it's likely that he will be agreeing to some form of negotiations with the Palestinians under certain conditions. ~~~~~~~~~~ But, as I see it, our government has an incredibly tough job to do. I most certainly believe that we must speak up for ourselves and stand strong — I hope this is obvious. The world won't respect us unless we respect ourselves and defend our rights. We've demeaned ourselves seriously over the last few years with an eagerness to make one-side concessions. This cannot and will not be undone in a day. There is a process. We cannot operate in a vacuum and cannot go back in time some 18 years (not all at once, certainly). The painful reality is that we've had governments that lost their way. Governments that caved and appeased. ~~~~~~~~~~ But there's more involved than simply appeasing. There has been a failure by these governments to tell our narrative — to promote our history and our legal rights. It was so bad that at certain times there were orders coming from our foreign ministry — mostly notably when Shimon Peres headed that ministry — blocking the release of negative information about the Palestinians. If the people knew the worst, you see, they wouldn't have supported the "peace process." But while we were being "reticent" in the name of peace, the Palestinians were doing their utmost to promote their narrative and their spin on history. They have no respect for truth in this regard, play the "victim" to the hilt, and have been very effective. So what we have today is a world that believes there is a "people" called the Palestinians, who were indigenous in this land, and have an absolute right to a state here. Many have been erroneously convinced that the '67 armistice lines represent our "true" borders, and, unquestionably, there is a good percentage of those in the international community that also perceives the "refugees" as having a "right of return." ~~~~~~~~~~ There has been a breathtaking tendency within the Western world to cut the Palestinians slack, and an eagerness to fund them at unprecedented levels without demanding genuine accountability. For reasons that are not rational, the world is caught up in the notion that this group of Arabs is particularly deserving of support — while the Kurds (a genuine people seeking a state), the suffering people of Darfur, as well as many others, receive far less in the way of attention and assistance. There are, additionally, self-righteous leftists who are actually willing to accept that terrorism committed by Palestinians isn't really terrorism, but rather, as the Palestinians explain, simply a response to the "occupation." Perhaps the most terrible part of it all is that there is some part of the Israeli populace that has forgotten who it is and buys into at least some of the Palestinian narrative, as well. Tzipi Livni espoused a position that was self-demeaning drivel. But a lot of people, we must remember, voted for her. ~~~~~~~~~~ With all of this is yet one other factor. Our various governments signed on/consented to agreements — starting with Oslo. We cannot pretend this didn't happen. Within a democracy there is a level at which each government must honor what came before. Our current government is examining the parameters here, which are complex. Verbal agreements — anything promised by Olmert, for example — are not binding. The Road Map may not be binding because it had a time frame that has elapsed. ~~~~~~~~~~ So, here we have Netanyahu and his government, who must try to analyze what a proper stand is, minimize damage, and forthrightly protect Israeli interests. We have stepped back from full control of Palestinian population areas in Judea and Samaria (while we still move in for security purposes). They control their local affairs such as schools and municipal governments, and have broader representation via the PA, which maintains radio and press. And we have permitted them to develop their security/army forces, which receive American assistance. We are not about to move back in militarily, throw out the PA, and assume complete control of these areas now. So what do we do? ~~~~~~~~~~ The first thing I'm seeing, which is what I applauded, is that our leaders are starting the process of changing the paradigm of thinking on this issue. "This isn't about settlers," said Lieberman. "The West Bank is disputed territory," declared Netanyahu. They're both absolutely right. These things and a thousand others must be said again and again, until perceptions begin to shift. Oslo didn't call for a full Palestinian state. (Surprised?) UN Resolution 242, after the Six Day war, didn't even mention Palestinians. There is a requirement in various agreements that the Palestinians cease incitement, but their textbooks still promote Jihad. An on, and on, and on. ~~~~~~~~~~ I certainly cannot speak for particulars — not only am I not on the inside, they haven't been defined yet. But the broad sense of what I'm seeing is that Netanyahu envisions some sort of autonomy for the Palestinians that is short of full sovereignty. He wants to retain control in a variety of dimensions — their borders, their airspace, etc. — and insists on demilitarization. His position is that a full sovereignty would threaten our security — as indeed it would. This, at some point, theoretically would require negotiations with the Palestinians. But what Netanyahu is talking about is reciprocity. I would be very shocked and disappointed if he went the route of "showing good faith" and conceding something to the Palestinians. There's reason to believe that he intends to demand that they get their act together and do the things they're supposed to do (and we might easily start with those textbooks). In addition, I would hope, there would be an insistence that the Palestinians show willingness to compromise — that's one part of reciprocity. It has been made clear that Jerusalem will not be on the table, nor will the relinquishment of areas necessary for security. No return to '67 lines, certainly, or dismantlement of major settlements. And no deal of any kind until the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Thus do I say that a proposed autonomy would "theoretically" require negotiations. Because no PA negotiating team would sit down with an Israeli government that won't at least consider meeting their stipulations — which are maximalist in the extreme. To put it simply, if they did they would be endangering their lives. ~~~~~~~~~~ Is it within the realm of possibility that as the Palestinians scream and yell that Israel is not sincere about wanting peace (something Abbas is already doing) they will successfully prevail on the international community to heavily pressure Israel — and that Netanyahu will then cave? Yes, it is. We remain deeply hopeful, but not at ease. Vigilance is the order of the day. (King Abdullah of Jordan told the Post that Netanyahu is "saying
the right words" with regard to peace with the Palestinians —
The possibilities are absolutely nil that Netanyahu would cave to a degree that would actually satisfy the Palestinians. Certainly he wouldn't sign off on return to '67 lines, division of Jerusalem, etc. etc. Thus I don't see any danger of a Palestinian state actually being formed. What I do fear, however, is the possibility of erosion of that newly emerging strong stand on behalf of Israel. We cannot re-educate our own people and shift the paradigm of thinking internationally unless we are consistent in demanding our rights and expressing our national dignity. ~~~~~~~~~~ I will add here — as a point of information — that there have been other proposals for dealing with the Palestinians beyond giving them a state, the most notable being (former MK and Rabbi) Benny Elon's "Right Road to Peace," which envisions an autonomous area, with local self rule and ultimately enfranchisement via Jordan. This is a plan that I thoroughly endorse. In this plan, Israel retains sovereignty over all the land to the Jordan River. The Palestinians would be treated as a group living inside of Israel that is entitled to local autonomy and has citizenship elsewhere. This is more desirable than the Netanyahu plan, which, as I understand it, would grant land areas to the Palestinians for their autonomy. Elon's plan also calls for the complete dismantlement of UNRWA and resettlement of the "refugees" in other places. The necessity of doing away with UNRWA is frequently overlooked, but it is one I will return to. It is years ago that I first wrote, in a major report on UNRWA, that there can be no peace here until the refugee issue is resolved — UNRWA promotes and sustains that refugee status. ~~~~~~~~~~ Additionally, there have been proposals that Jordan federate with/annex Judea and Samaria — or, more accurately, the parts of it that would be Palestinian areas, and that Egypt do the same with respect to Gaza. There is some solid rationale for this, as these countries controlled these respective areas from 1949-67, and the cultural linkages are strong. Terrorism would then be dealt with by the forces of the respective states involved. And the Palestinians would not have to develop an independent economy. The stumbling block, of course, is a reluctance on the part of Jordan and Egypt. As well, there is a serious issue of having an extended Egyptian border adjacent to us: Gaza has always been seen as a roadblock to Egyptian infiltration into Israel in time of war. ~~~~~~~~~~ I turn now, as promised, to a look at what Sec. of State Clinton is saying. Last week she met with the House Foreign Appropriations Middle East Subcommittee, with regard to the Obama administration's allocation of $840 million for the Palestinians. The policy she enunciated was this: Were a unity government of Hamas and Fatah to be established, the US would work with that government only if it agreed to abide by Quartet stipulations, and all the ministers appointed to that government were on board with these stipulations. However, there would be no requirement that Hamas itself, as a party to the unity government, also declare itself in conformity with those stipulations. Can you believe it? Believe it. This is exactly what Fatah leader Mohammad Dahlan told Hamas not long ago: Join us in a unity government. We won't ask you to recognize Israel or past agreements. Only the unity government will have to do this. I mocked this convoluted approach when Dahlan said it, and I mock it now. It's game playing. Some of the Congresspersons meeting with Clinton were less than enamored with her suggestion. Mark Kirk (D-IL) wanted to consider an amendment to the allocations that would prevent this "flexibility." He said he had just spoken with King Abdullah of Jordan, who had told him that Hamas ministers follow orders from Teheran. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said to Clinton, "it seems to me unworkable to have Hamas organizing terrorist attacks against Israel at the same time it has the power to appoint ministers to a coalition. " Nita Lowey (D-NY) expressed similar concerns. ~~~~~~~~~~ Clinton suggested that Obama wanted to pursue this policy not just in the matter of allocations, but also with regard to "peace negotiations." Obama is really eager to push those "peace negations" along. And so, if a unity government were to be established, we would be asked to negotiate with it even though one of its constituent parties still embraced terrorism. Demonstrates a deep and enduring commitment to our security, does it not? Mitchell, when he was here, assured us this would be the case. Right? ~~~~~~~~~~ Fatah and Hamas are actually coming together in Cairo again today for one last effort at establishing that unity government. According to Khaled Abu Toameh, chances of success are considered slim, as neither side is prepared to adjust its stance and wide gaps remain. A key source of disagreement is the eagerness by Fatah to demonstrate acceptance of previous agreements with Israel. While Hamas, for its part, accuses Fatah of being a pawn of Israel and the US, with Fatah coordinating with the US in the training of security forces. Both Hamas and Fatah are accusing the other of arresting members of their party. ~~~~~~~~~~ And one last word about Hillary, who also said: "For Israel to get the kind of strong support it's looking for vis-a-vis Iran, it can't stay on the sidelines with respect to the Palestinians and the peace efforts...they go hand-in-hand. This is the sort of blackmail that we can expect from the Obama government. On the face of it, it's nonsense. The Arab countries aren't doing Israel a favor by supporting efforts against Iran. They're doing themselves a favor — they're plenty frightened. In fact, while they would be loathe to say so publicly, there are Gulf states that would be glad to see Israel take on Iran. Israel's readiness to establish a Palestinian state would be irrelevant to the Arab states in this context. Especially is this so as most of the Arab states don't really care a wit about the Palestinians. Their pressure for a Palestinian state is simply a technique for weakening Israel. Apparently State Department spokesman Robert Wood reflected an understanding of what nonsense Hillary had spoken, when he said on Friday that "these are two separate issues, and we believe they can be dealt with simultaneously...we must and can deal with these issues, these separate issues, very seriously." Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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BAD NEWS — BIBI'S CANDIDATE FOR US ENVOY SAYS ISRAEL MUST
UNILATERALLY QUIT WEST BANK
Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 26, 2009. |
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It seems that the old, weak, spurned Bibi of Wye and Hebron is here again.
Prime Minister Netanyahu is being pressured to appoint Professor Michael Oren as Ambassador to the U.S. Oren espouses his theory that the Palestinians, Syrians, Iranians and all Muslims will accept a Jewish State if Israel abandons Judea, Samaria, the Jordan Valley, the Golan Heights, all the settlements and a divided Jerusalem.
This surrender would cause the expulsion of between 300,000 and 500,000 Jewish men, women and children from their Land, homes, farms, businesses, schools, universities, holy sites, synagogues and all other Jewish-built infrastructure. The loss of their ways of life — the cost of the lost infrastructure — the future costs of re-settling half a million Jews are all incalculable — so far. Whatever numbers you could possibly imagine would probably be a vast under-estimate of the real costs in human life and real money. Are these merely the fantasies of a naive, unworldly Professor? Many in the academic world (not all) cannot deal with reality and opt for 'visions' instead. Moreover, if Bibi does actually appoint Oren, it would be a clear statement that Prime Minister Netanyahu not only agrees with Professor Oren's theories (visions), but that he (Bibi) intends to implement them according to the 'dictats' of the Wahhabi Muslim Saudi King's plans. These are also the 'diktats' of President Obama and his advisory team of Jew-hating Arabists. If you thought only Left-leaning politicians have a franchise on stupidity, think again. We just went through the treachery of Ehud Olmert, Ehud Barak and Tzipi Livni — only to discover the syndrome of surrendering Land to a vicious culture of Islam is still with us through the warped thinking of the new Prime Minister who thought it appropriate to retain Ehud Barak who (when he was Prime Minister) desperately tried to gift 97% of the territories to Yassir Arafat. Surely, there must be mind-altering drinking water in Jerusalem to create a contingent of such psychopathic leaders who seem determined to commit national suicide in the name of the Israeli people. It's time for an overdue garbage pick-up of addled politicians to be dumped on the ash heap of history. A politician once bought is easily purchased again and again. It's just a matter of negotiating the price. It might be appropriate to send Netanyahu a card with a spine — (taken from any medical photo) reminding him that he once had a stiff spine — like his brother, Yoni's. But, over the years his has become like rubber whenever he meets America diplomatic Arabists. Prime Minister Netanyahu will soon go to Washington where Hillary Clinton will give him marching orders from the mouth of the Arabist Barack Hussein Obama. He could use a newly stiffened spine to resist the threats from a U.S. Government who seems to be carrying water for the Saudis, the Iranians and the Palestinians. Michael Oren served as a proud soldier during the expulsions four years ago and has promoted the expulsion policy ever since Summer 2005. Apparently, a PR firm is pushing this expulsions advocate as the next ambassador to the USA, as are some people connected to Bibi. Not all of of Bibi's advisors favor appointing an expulsion advocate into such a key policy position.
This below is an April 24, 2009 Haaretz article by Barak Ravid called "Candidate for U.S. envoy: Israel must unilaterally quit West Bank." |
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's candidate for Israeli ambassador to Washington, Dr. Michael Oren, supports a unilateral Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and an evacuation of most of the settlements. Oren, a visiting Georgetown University professor, said in a lecture there last month, "The only alternative for Israel to save itself as a Jewish state is by unilaterally withdrawing from the West Bank and evacuating most of the settlements." Oren, a Middle East expert and senior researcher at Jerusalem's Shalem Center, gave a 90-minute lecture entitled "The Gaza Crisis from an Historical and Personal Perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." Answering questions from attendees, Oren voiced his opinions about possible solutions to the conflict and the policy Israel should take. He emphasized that he does not represent the majority of Israelis. "I may be the last of the standing unilateralists," he said. "The only thing that can save Israel as a Jewish state is by unilaterally withdrawing our settlements from the West Bank," and waiting for a new Palestinian leadership. Oren said he does not believe that a solution to the conflict could be achieved at this stage. Instead we should find ways to "better manage the conflict, to relieve tensions and ameliorate the conditions under which people live to ensure against future flare ups." "Peace as a solution is not a question of next week but a generational issue," he said. "One of the lessons that the failed Oslo process has taught us is that peace must be built from the bottom up. We cannot impose peace from the top down, it doesn't percolate from the top down." Establishing a Palestinian state would require the evacuation of tens of thousands of Jewish settlers from the West Bank and from holy cities like Hebron, Oren said. To take such a traumatic step most Israelis must be convinced that they would be getting "absolute peace" and the "end of the conflict," he said. Oren said he supported the disengagement from the Gaza Strip. After they started firing Qassam rockets from Gaza, he said Natan Sharansky asked him if the disengagement wasn't a mistake. Oren said he replied that it had not been. The mistake was Israel's failure to react to the Qassam fire, which sent a message of weakness to the entire Middle East. Oren also spoke about his personal experience regarding the Gaza Strip and said he had "traumatic relations" with the Gaza Strip and Hamas leadership. He said he could only regret the killing of civilians in Gaza in the course of Operation Cast Lead and especially the daughters of Dr.Az A-Din Abu Ayash. But as an Israeli, he also cannot forget that his sister-in-law was killed by a suicide bomber from Gaza and that 70,000 Palestinians cheered the attack in the Gaza stadium, he said. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel and Gamla. He is a member of the Board of Directors and a research associate of the Freeman Center For Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm). Contact him at gwinston@gwinstonglobal.org |
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WHAT GAZA REALLY MEANS
Posted by MS Kramer, April 26, 2009. |
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We recently enjoyed listening to Dr. Asher Susser, from the Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University. This Middle East specialist taught last year at Brandeis University during his sabbatical. A native of South Africa, Susser was addressing an organization of South African Israelis in the nearby town of Kfar Saba. Dr. Susser's talk was on the importance of the recent Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, the real meaning of which was Israel's long-term survivability in the region. According to Susser, Israel will face violence from every side, until we impress upon our neighbors Israel's potency and the prohibitive price they will pay for aggression against us. The war Israel fought in Gaza wasn't really against Hamas; it was Israel versus Iran. Susser explained that Iran has "regional hegemonic designs" in the Middle East. (Translation: Iran wants to be the superpower of the region.) In the "new" Middle East, as Susser sees it, Israel must constantly prove its military prowess, because our country is surrounded by 300+ million Arabs in their 22 states, plus Iran and other antagonistic Muslim countries. More than half of the Arab population is under 20 years of age, with few opportunities for employment. The ongoing emigration of young Arabs to Europe and North America will accelerate, with upwards of 100 million leaving for greener pastures in the next generation. Still, Susser predicted that in 20 years the Arabs in the Middle East will total 450 million. Although Arab population growth is on the rise, Susser says Arab political power is declining. During the mid-1960s, Israel's newspapers were full of stories on Egypt and Nasser, and the news items were dissected weekly on Israel radio. But today, Egypt might not even be mentioned in a 3-hour lecture on the Middle East, despite being the most populous Arab country with the largest armed forces. Susser named the Muslim, non-Arab countries of Iran and Turkey, as well as Israel, as the region's big players. Among Egypt's current problems, Susser mentioned its porous borders and its corrupt army and police. Sudan, claimed in the 1950s by Egypt, has been totally independent for years, and is now an Arab embarrassment. Summing up the other major Arab countries, Susser noted that Syria plays second fiddle to Iran, even in Lebanon which it once controlled; Iraq is still a mess and in danger of falling apart; and Saudi Arabia's per capita income is falling. Meanwhile, Iran is already a great regional power. It benefited from the fall of Saddam Hussein, whom Susser called the Arabs' former eastern gatekeeper. Iraq's minority Sunni population, kept at the top of the economic heap by Saddam, has been replaced by the Shiites, the largest group in Iraq. This is very advantageous for the Iranians, who are also Shiites. Hizbollah, Iran's Shiite proxy in Lebanon, is poised to take over the government there. Hamas, while not Shiite, is Iran's proxy in Gaza and may soon displace Fatah in the West Bank. Not to mention Iran's nuclear weapons capability, which is rapidly reaching maturity. According to Susser, Israel's deterrent power has worked in Lebanon since the recent Second Lebanon War, because Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, is afraid to appear in public and Israel's northern region remains relatively quiet. Tellingly, Hezbollah didn't lift a finger to help Hamas during Operation Cast Lead. In Gaza, Hamas has no real appetite to fight now. They are shooting rockets sporadically into Israel only to win negotiating points and to appease the Gazan public. So, Israel's deterrence has knocked Iran back twice. Additionally, Egypt has cooperated with Israel against Iran, especially on the high seas in an attempt to improve its tattered status. Saudi Arabia and Jordan also are relying on Israel's strength, but they have even less power than Egypt. Susser declared that "Israel is the backbone of the Arab moderates." Turkey is the other powerful state in the region that could help counter Iran, which borders Turkey on the east. Compared to the deep-seated enmity that Arab states have towards Israel, Turkey is relatively friendly. Historically, the Ottoman Turks opened their lands to Jews in 1492 and treated Jews better than the Europeans or Arabs. After WWI, Ataturk, the legendary revolutionary leader who championed Turkish secular nationalism, was an admirer of the early Zionist leaders and copied some of their methods. Like Israel, Turkey has one foot in Europe and one in the Middle East. Lately however, secularism has been retreating before Islamism, bringing the Turkish government closer to Arab ones. Nevertheless, Susser says that there is an enduring military relationship between Turkey and Israel, one which won't be discarded lightly, though it's unlikely that it will regain the strength that it had in the 1990s. As to military options with the Palestinians, Susser pointed out that Israel sent only one division of troops into Gaza during Operation Cast Lead, which is less than 10% of its fighting force. Hamas and Hezbollah have certainly taken note of Israel's relative restrained war effort, which nevertheless resulted in huge destruction in Gaza. So, while Israel doesn't have the military power to reshape the Middle East, as America has done in Iraq, it is capable of reducing the Palestinian cities to rubble if provoked too often or too much. The Palestinians themselves have a fragmented political society, with no viable leadership with whom Israel can negotiate. Susser thinks that the chance of negotiating an end of conflict is close to zero, because Hamas won't consider it and Fatah lead Mahmoud Abbas couldn't accomplish it, even if he wanted to. The Palestinians are unlikely to compromise on their core issue of the right of return for refugees, because they are locked into their vision of the 1948 Nakba (catastrophe) suffered at the hands of the Jews (according to the Arab narrative). Susser does believe that some matters can be settled at least temporarily, which is a continuation of the status quo: Israel concedes a little, then is forced to retrench when Palestinian violence erupts rather than quiet. Susser identifies two mistakes of the early Zionists. The first was that the Jews would become the majority in Palestine after the 1917 Balfour Declaration, but this didn't occur until the 1950s. The second, very naïve mistake was that the Arabs would eventually acquiesce to Zionism because it had already brought modern methods and economic benefits to the region. Susser agrees with former Prime Minister Sharon's tactic of withdrawal to keep Israel "Jewish". Thus he thinks that Israel must withdraw from parts of the West Bank, like it did in all of Gaza. Regarding Iran's nuclear threat, Susser believes that an Israeli air attack wouldn't be able to produce a permanent halt to Iran's progress, but that Israel can't acquiesce to Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. In conclusion, Susser emphasized that though we might be the strongest power in the region, time is working against us, as our international legitimacy is undermined and the possibility of Israel being replaced by a one-state solution (an Arab/Jewish secular state which eventually becomes yet another Arab state) gains popularity. Though he negated the possibility of reaching a two-state solution with the PLO and Hamas in the foreseeable future, Susser hopes for some sort of interim arrangement which is not a unilateral Israeli action, as was Sharon's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza. He stressed that we Israelis have to act proactively and must not allow Hamas to set the agenda. He supports the use of overwhelming force to make the price unbearable for Hamas (or Hezbollah) to continue belligerent tactics. Dr. Susser's remarks were very well received by the audience, which knew the professor well from previous talks. He answered every question and remained after the event ended to take a few more. While I don't agree with all of his conclusions, I think that Asher Susser exhibits some of the erudition and personality traits that have made Bernard Lewis the dean of the older generation of Middle East specialists. Steve Kramer lives in Alfe Menashe. He has written a weekly opinion column for the Jewish Times of southern New Jersey (www.jewishtimes-sj.com) for the last ten years. He writes, "They're about history, politics, touring, or whatever excites me." |
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MIKE HUCKABEE: 'THIS TWO-STATE SOLUTION IS NONSENSE'
Posted by Carl from Jerusalem, April 26, 2009. |
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Shavua tov, a good week to everyone. Now that he's no longer running for President (or is he?) Mike Huckabee seems to get it (Hat Tip: Hot Air). Mike Huckabee stakes out a position well to the right of both
parties in an interview with an evangelical magazine:
WORLD: What about Israel and the Palestinians? Any hope there? Hmmm. Well, you all know that I agree with him. This actually is not the first time Huckabee has made a statement
like this. This is from August 2008
"It is a historic reality that Jerusalem, and the entire land, was originally intended to be a homeland for the Jewish people," he said. "The Palestinians should in fact have a place and opportunity to settle but it doesn't have to be in Jerusalem." Here's what he said (and what I said about it) in December 2007
when he was still running for President) I felt better about Huckabee when I started to look for his position on a 'Palestinian' Carl from Jerusalem lives in Jerusalem and runs the IsraelMatzav
website. This essay is archived at
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NUKES IN THE HANDS OF MUSLIM JIHADISTS
Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 25, 2009. |
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It's very interesting that the Obama Administration, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, is all excited and agitated about the Muslim Taliban radical Terrorists moving closer to Pakistan's capital. The excitement stems from the fact that Pakistan has know operational nuclear weapons which would be considered a catastrophe if they fell into the hands of Islamic Terrorists like the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Compare that with the Obama Administration telling Israel that they cannot take out Iran's Islamic Nuclear facilities. The Iranians through their President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have repeatedly pledged to wipe Israel off the fact of the planet. What is the difference between the Taliban and Al Qaeda getting control of the Islamic Nuclear Bombs and Missiles when Iran completes their well-known plans to acquire operations Nuclear Bombs and Missiles? U.S. Intel knows very well that the infamous Dr. Omar Abdul Khan, father of Pakistani nuclear weapons also transferred technology to Iran and several other Middle Eastern nations. Why have two American Presidents thwarted Israel plans of survival by taking out Iran's Nuclear capabilities which are an existential threat to that small nation? Israel bombed Saddam Hussein's Nuclear Plant at Osirak in 1981 and, although the world nations first condemned that act, they were very grateful when they had to enter the First Gulf War, Desert Storm, and could feel safer without Saddam's Nukes. President George W. Bush implied during his term that he would order the strike by using the superior U.S. Forces against Iran's Nuclear facilities, which are scattered at many different sites. (See the excellent map of National Geographic August 2008 which shows by site and name of all the various installations.) Then he was ambushed by the false report by the CIA-NIC-FBI to effect that Iran had ceased its Nuclear Development and, therefore, therefore was no need to strike Iran. The facts later emerged in that same NIE (National Intelligence Estimate) of December 3, 2007 that, actually, this was a false report initiated by the State Department in order to "protect" Iran. Bush, at the end of his term, refused assistance to Israel by not allowing Israel to fly over Iraq on their way to Iran. Now, under Obama, and through a warning by VP Joe Biden, Israel was not to undertake any mission to destroy Iran's Nuclear capability. Obama was, instead, to use 'diplomacy' and talk Iran out of further development of enriching Uranium or developing longer range missiles. Israel was offered the opportunity to suffer a nuclear strike by Iran so Obama could chance a successful negotiation so Iran would continue selling us oil and not block the shipping lanes in the Gulf of Hormuz. Few believe Iran's Mullahs, Ayatollahs and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can be talked down from what he considers their Islamic destiny and, of course, the returning "Mahdi" (a Messiah of sorts who died as a child when he fell into a well and disappeared — or so the myth goes). Note how "Mahdi" fits right into the center of Ahmadinejad's name. Iran has been steadily developing Nuclear Capability for more than 30 years to include purchasing four to six tactical Nuclear artillery shells from East Germany when the Soviet Union collapsed and their soldiers were selling off their uniforms and equipment just to get money for food. I have opined in previous articles that the plan of Obama's team of Washington Arabists intends to force Israel into striking Iran as a matter of survival and having no choice (Ein Breira). If Israel could be forced to defend her very existence which would theoretically shield the U.S. from a Muslim-Islamic backlash. Then Obama's Arabists and the Left-leaning Media could violently condemn Israel moving toward the State Department goal of cutting off arms, technology, intelligence and finally severing relations with the only democracy in the Middle East. Some will recall that, after Israel bombed Saddam Hussein's Osirak Nuclear Plant, the Arabs and most other nations were secretly delighted. But, in public they bashed Israel and the U.S. cut-off delivery of a wing of F-16s to be delivered to Israel. Israel is said to be capable of destroying Iran's Nukes and, more importantly, Nuclear development sites. This despite U.S. virtually embargo of assistance. I refer you to a Debka Report of April 15, 2009 and to National Geographic of August, 2008 with a fairly complete map of all Iran's nuclear sites. I wonder if the Obama Administration will be held accountable if a Nuclear Bomb transferred from Iran to "sleeper cells" in America blows up an American city and contaminates 3 to 7 States with drifting Nuclear debris. Since Obama and Democrats now wish to bring Bush era authorities who approved enhanced interrogation to head off another 9/11, I suppose that would apply to his Administration and appointed Arabists should the U.S. be struck due to their appeasement and lack of security intelligence. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel and Gamla. He is a member of the Board of Directors and a research associate of the Freeman Center For Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm). Contact him at gwinston@gwinstonglobal.org |
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FRIDAY ROUNDUP — THE RELIGION OF MODERATE TORTURE
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 25, 2009. |
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This comes from the Sultan Knish website. |
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ABC News aired a tape showing the brother of the crown prince of the UAE and the Emir of Dubai brutally torturing a farmer in a way that was supposed to be unique to Saddam and his progeny. A video tape smuggled out of the United Arab Emirates shows a member of the country's royal family mercilessly torturing a man with whips, electric cattle prods and wooden planks with protruding nails. http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=7402099&page=1 A man in a UAE police uniform is seen on the tape tying the victim's arms and legs, and later holding him down as the Sheikh pours salt on the man's wounds and then drives over him with his Mercedes SUV. "The incidents depicted in the video tapes were not part of a pattern of behavior," the Interior Ministry's statement declared. The Minister of the Interior is also one of Sheikh Issa's brother. The government statement said its review found "all rules, policies and procedures were followed correctly by the Police Department." Naturally. The UAE is a dictatorship. The only differences between the UAE or Saddam's Iraq lies in military strength and the image they choose to present to the world. Meanwhile much of the same media and Hollywood celebrities who wax indignant about the US waterboarding of Al Queda terrorists, bought into the whole Dubai mirage, investing huge money in property, including the "world islands" that are now speedily turning worthless. There is no such thing as a moderate Arab Muslim state. There are only those who put on a moderate appearance because of their weakness. When you get down to the ruling family, there is no real difference. The UAE and their Dubai wonderland is ruled by the same bunch of jumped up desert thugs turned billionaires as Saudi Arabia or Jordan or the former Iraq. Pull back the curtain and you can see the torture chambers. The real ones, not the kid gloves that the US handles Osama Bin Laden's terrorists with. Terrorists partly funded by the UAE and their royal family. To those who say criminal prosecution of terrorists is the answer, witness how criminal prosecution in the UK utterly failed to hold the Easter Bombing terrorists, who are now free and wending their way through England's court system for possible deportation. This while Obama is preparing to move Gitmo terrorists into your neighborhood. The Obama administration is preparing to admit into the United States as many as seven Chinese Muslims who have been imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay in the first release of any of the detainees into this country, according to current and former U.S. officials. Their release is seen as a crucial step to plans, announced by President Obama during his first week in office, to close the prison and relocate the detainees. Administration officials also believe that settling some of them in American communities will set an example, helping to persuade other nations to accept Guantanamo detainees too. But the decision to release the Chinese Muslims, known as Uighurs, is not final and faces challenges from within the government, as well as likely public opposition. Among government agencies, the Homeland Security Department has registered concerns about the plan. There are 17 Uighurs (pronounced WEE-gers) at Guantanamo. A U.S. official familiar with the discussions over their release said that as many as seven could be resettled in the U.S., possibly in two or more small groups. Officials have not said where in the United States they might live. But many Uighur immigrants from China live in Washington's Virginia suburbs, and advocates have urged that the detainees be resettled near people who speak their language and are familiar with their customs... Yes including their peculiar custom of strapping on bomb vests and exploding themselves in public areas, such as say in the Washington area. Better be sure you pronounce Wee-gurs right. Speaking of scary things in the Washington area, Boker Tov Boulder has more on Obama's corps of the living brainwashed volunteers Not only will this 'army' of community organizers eventually involve as many as 8 — 9 million people, it will be MANDATORY for anyone who gets federal student loans. Welcome to the Obama Youth. Check your mind and conscience at the door. Meanwhile Debbie Schlussel takes a closer look at Obama\Pelosi targeting Harman\AIPAC just in time for Obama's own gathering showdown with Israel. While the NSA wanted to wiretap the Congressman who had contacts with a terrorist while in the Middle East, they nixed it because they thought it wouldn't go over to wiretap a U.S. Congressman. Yes, the NSA had court approval to wiretap Harman ... because the NSA sought it. Why didn't the NSA seek court approval on the pan-Islamist Member of Congress? Why the double standard? And the targets of the Harman transcript release are interesting, too. The target isn't just Harman. Keith Weissman and Steve Rosen — the two men under indictment, former employees of pro-Israel lobby AIPAC — were entrapped at the direction of David W. Szady, head of counterintelligence for the FBI from 2001 to 2006. Szady, well known as an Islamo-sympathizing, anti-Semitic FBI agent, was intent on exposing Israel in a negative light. He dreamed up the whole scheme, using Weissman and Rosen, to show "balance" to his Islamic world buddies — to show that America was not just going after them (as if America has gone after much of them at all). The FBI honcho also had a vendetta to settle because he was upset that Israel was cooperating with the NYPD in counterterrorism investigations that led to NYPD arrests of terrorist in New York — arrests that showed up the incompetent FBI and its floundering counterterrorism efforts. The Pentagon employee, Lawrence Franklin, was also entrapped because he was one of the few in the Pentagon who actually got it on jihad and the Iranian threat, one of the few who was known to be pro-Israel. This was a "kill three birds with one stone" operation. A brilliant man with several graduate degrees and expertise on the Middle East, Franklin has been reduced to serving as a car parking valet at night. And though the alleged transcript — which reports claim shows Harman promising to ask the Justice department for leniency for Rosen and Weissman — has yet to surface, reporters and bloggers are slobbering over the allegations, repeating them as fact. In fact, Rosen and Weissman didn't need Harman's calls for "leniency." They never committed espionage and even the federal judge on the case sees it as a frame-up job. The judge has asked the Justice Department why the case should continue, and there is every indication the Department will soon drop this witch-hunt. The release of this transcript from two years ago was done deliberately to hurt Rosen and Weissman and their chance at a chance at real justice after two years of persecution. There is no evidence that Harman ever followed through on helping their case or ever contacted the Justice Department on their behalf. But the release of the transcript was designed to put them (and Israel) forever under suspicion that the charges in their case were not dropped because they are baseless but because of bribery of a U.S. Congresswoman. That's not to mention the fact that Jane Harman was far more hawkish than most Democrats, a reason Nancy Pelosi didn't pick her for Intelligence Committee Chairman. Harman supported the NSA wiretaps. She was hawkish against Islamofascism. And she strongly supported Israel. But why should conservative bloggers who claim to support these things care, when they can easily savage this Democrat and Israel a spying, bribing enemy in one fell swoop? Meanwhile in Israel, the Religion of Peace, which of course respects the Jewish forefathers, whom they claim as their own, and is no way Nazific, scrawled Swastikas on Joseph's Tomb. This comes after Palestinian Arabs brutally seized the tomb in an extended firefight, with the Israeli government backing down to international pressure and abandoning its own soldiers under fire. It has been the heroic efforts of individual Jewish pilgrims who risked their lives to maintain access to the tomb. In 2001, within less than an hour of the original Israeli retreat, Palestinian rioters overtook Joseph's Tomb and reportedly ransacked and then partially destroyed the structure. The tomb is located just outside the modern city of Nablus, or biblical Shechem, in the northern West Bank. Under the 1993 Oslo Accords, which granted nearby strategic territory to the Palestinians, Joseph's Tomb was supposed to be accessible to Jews and Christians. But following repeated attacks against Jewish worshippers at the holy site by gunmen associated with then-Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat's militias, then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak in October 2000 ordered an Israeli unilateral retreat from the area. Immediately following the Israeli retreat, Palestinian rioters overtook Joseph's Tomb and reportedly began to ransack the site. Palestinian mobs reportedly tore apart books, destroying prayer stands and grinding out stone carvings in the Tomb's interior. Palestinians hoisted a Muslim flag over the tomb. Amin Maqbul, an official from Arafat's office, visited the tomb to deliver a speech declaring, "Today was the first step to liberate (Jerusalem)." One BBC reporter described the scene: "The site was reduced to smoldering rubble — festooned with Palestinian and Islamic flags — cheering Arab crowd." Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: REASONS FOR GRATITUDE
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 24, 2009. |
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Before Shabbat I would like to focus on sources of hope. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has given an interview to The Jerusalem Post — his first such interview since taking office. If the international community wants to help bring stability to the area, he said, they should "stop speaking in slogans." His counterparts tend to speak as if they are in a campaign, using words like "occupation," "settlements," and "settlers." The slogans they rely upon — such as "land for peace" and "two-state solution" are overly simplistic and ignore the root of the ongoing conflict. "It's impossible to artificially impose any political solution. It will fail, for sure. You cannot start a peace process from nothing." The issues to deal with are "economy, security, stability." Lieberman was emphatic in stating that there could be no negotiations that entertained the possibility of "right of return." "It cannot be on the table, I'm not willing to discuss the 'right of return' of even one refugee." At the same time, he indicated that "somebody who really wants a solution, someone who desires a real peace and a real agreement, must realize that this would be impossible without recognizing Israel as a Jewish state... "[The real reason for the deadlock with the Palestinians] is not occupation, not settlements and not settlers. This conflict is really a very deep conflict..." What is more, it would be "impossible to resolve any problems in our region without resolving the Iranian problem [which is related to Hezbollah in Lebanon, Syria, and Hamas in Gaza]. He believes the prime responsibility for Iran rests with the international community. ~~~~~~~~~~ Meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu responded to EU threats to suspend an upgrade in its relationship with Israel. "Don't set conditions for us," Netanyahu told Czech Premier Mirek Topolanek during his visit here. When Topolanek brought up the issue of settlements, Netanyahu responded, "If Israelis can't build homes in the West Bank then Palestinians shouldn't be allowed to either. I have no plans to build new settlements, but if someone wants to build a new home [in an existing one], I don't think there's a problem." The West Bank, he said, was "disputed territory" over which negotiations must be held. This cedes nothing. ~~~~~~~~~~ Understand that a very short time ago we had a foreign minister and a prime minister who couldn't wait to give away parts of Israel, divide Jerusalem and push our people back to the '67 lines, all in the name of what we "had to do" for peace. So, Baruch Hashem for what we have now: Leaders who won't be threatened and stand for Israeli rights. May their strength increase. There will be more to say on this. ~~~~~~~~~~ I'll look at Hillary's latest statement (a stupid threat) after Shabbat. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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OBAMA'S MISLEADING AFFINITY FOR JEWS AND JUDAISM
Posted by LEL, April 24, 2009. |
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This article was written by Matthew Hausman
It appeared on IsraPundit
Matthew M. Hausman is a trial attorney and writer who lives and works in Connecticut. A former journalist, Mr. Hausman continues to write on a variety of topics, including science, health and medicine, Jewish issues and foreign affairs, and has been a legal affairs columnist for a number of publications. He is active in Jewish communal affairs, and has served on the boards of several nonprofit organizations and associations. |
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President Obama has gotten significant public relations mileage by appointing nearly a minyan of Jews to his Cabinet, by holding a Seder in the White House, and by his association with his wife's cousin, Capers Funnye, an African-American rabbi in Chicago. But these items, achievements and relationships are superficial only and fail to reflect that the Administration truly has any affinity for real Jewish values or concern for Israel. Rather, they are used to distract attention from the Administration's already troubling miscues with respect to Israel and Middle East peace. The Administration's direction can be gauged more accurately by its tangible statements, acts and policy pronouncements. For example, the Congressional Quarterly last week reported that the President is requesting Congress to amend the law that presently requires a cessation of U.S. financial aid to the Palestinian Authority in the event of a power sharing arrangement between Hamas and Fatah. (This request was close in time to his signing of an office waiver and $800 million supplemental appropriations bill in favor of the PLO on the eve of Passover.) Under the law in its current form, American aid would cease if Hamas, which is still recognized as a terrorist organization under U.S. law, joins Fatah in the PA government. If Mr. Obama obtains his amendment, American funding will continue to flow to the PA even if Hamas joins it in a governing coalition without renouncing terror or recognizing Israel's right to exist. That is, American aid will flow to a terror group sworn to the destruction of an ally (although one could reasonably argue that the PLO still constitutes such a terror group). Of perhaps greater concern is Mr. Obama's attempted rapprochement with the Islamist regime in Tehran. As recently reported by the DEBKAfile, the President continues to court Iran in a way that effectively reverses prior U.S. policy and contravenes the imposition or continuation of sanctions. Reports predict that this about face will enable the Islamic Republic to continue developing its nuclear capabilities and its arms program. That the Iranian nuclear threat to Israel will become a practical reality in the near future does not seem to bother the Administration, and is all the more alarming given recent reports that it has warned Israel to refrain from engaging in military action necessary to protect herself from Iran. One is left to wonder how much of this Iranian policy is influenced by the Administration's open courting of Islamists or those with Islamist sympathies and its solicitation of their input in matters of foreign policy. Perhaps the greatest concern for Israel at this stage is the Administration's statements concerning its plans to enforce a final two-state solution within the next four years, a goal that was confirmed in press accounts by White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. The strategy to impose the President's ill-conceived vision on Israel in spite of the disastrous aftermath of the disengagement from Gaza, the Arab world's refusal to recognize Israel's right to exist before she is forced to capitulate without negotiation, and the Arabs' continuing and adamant refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state is alarming. Moreover, this scenario does not bode well for the continued existence of Israel as a Jewish state, which according to some reported intelligence analyses might well not survive another 20 years in such an environment. The Administration's attempts to cozy up to the Arab-Muslim world are consistent with the President's embrace of the so-called Saudi Peace Initiative, upon which the foregoing prescription for "peace" seems to be based, and his continued courting of the abusive regimes that will figure prominently in Second Durban Conference. These attempts to curry favor from bad actors are epitomized by his swooning embrace of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which is setting an anti-Israel and antisemitic agenda for Durban II despite his pledge to intervene in the agenda process and prevent another moral travesty. These hard facts are lost in the self-congratulatory euphoria of Mr. Obama's Jewish supporters, who focus on his Passover ploy and family connections as evidence of his affinity for the Jewish People and his concern for Israel. These politicos express no qualms with his troubling statements to the Arab press or even his refusal to apply the word "terrorism" to the Arab and Muslim groups that engage in it. Such concrete acts and omissions reflect the Administration's intentions concerning Israel more clearly than its ridiculous cursory embrace of Jewish rituals or its affirmation of supposed Jewish family ties. Unfortunately, its disturbing record is being ignored by those who prefer to spout warm and fuzzy stories about the White House's patronizing affinity for the Jewish People. It doesn't matter whether the President truly has any Jewish relatives, hosts a Seder, or co-opts any other Jewish ritual or cultural experience in attempting to camouflage the likely harm to Israel of an ominous Mideast policy. What does matter is that the undeniable fracturing of the United States' relationship with Israel cannot be ignored away by the Administration's lip service to Jewish symbols or its revisionist regard for Jewish history. Those who claim to support Israel must be roused from their political slumber and forced to distinguish between superficial expressions and substantive acts, to criticize the Administration openly and vocally when it takes actions that compromise the safety and security of Israel, and to object to any transparent attempts to patronize them for political gain. The failure to do so has serious implications for Israel's survival as a Jewish State. Contact LEL at lel817@yahoo.com |
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'WORLD LEADERS MUST DROP 'LAND FOR PEACE' SLOGANS, STOP IRAN'
Posted by David Horovitz and Amir Mizroch, April 24, 2009. |
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The international community has to "stop speaking in slogans" if it really wants to help the new Israeli government work toward a solution to the Palestinian conflict and help bring stability to the Middle East, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday, in his first interview with an Israeli newspaper since taking the job. "Over the last two weeks I've had many conversations with my colleagues around the world," he said. "Just today, I saw the political adviser to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Chinese foreign minister and the Czech prime minister. And everybody, you know, speaks with you like you're in a campaign: Occupation, settlements, settlers..." Slogans like these, and others Lieberman cited, such as "land for peace" and "two-state solution," were both overly simplistic and ignored the root causes of the ongoing conflict, he said. The fact was, said the Israel Beiteinu leader, that the Palestinian issue was "deadlocked" despite the best efforts of a series of dovish Israeli governments. "Israel has proved its good intentions, our desire for peace," he said. The path forward, he said, lay in ensuring security for Israel, an improved economy for the Palestinians, and stability for both. "Economy, security, stability," he repeated. "It's impossible to artificially impose any political solution. It will fail, for sure. You cannot start any peace process from nothing. You must create the right situation, the right focus, the right conditions." He said the government would be completing its thorough foreign policy review in the next two weeks, and that it would be made public for the first time at the scheduled May 18 White House talks between US President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. The foreign minister spoke as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Israel on Thursday that it risks losing Arab support for combating threats from Iran if it rejects peace negotiations with the Palestinians. Clinton said Arab nations had conditioned helping Israel counter Iran on Jerusalem's commitment to the peace process. In the course of his wide-ranging interview, which will appear in full in Tuesday's Jerusalem Post Independence Day supplement, Lieberman insistently refused to rule in, or rule out, Palestinian statehood alongside Israel as the essence of a permanent accord, but emphatically endorsed Netanyahu's declared desire not to rule over a single Palestinian. Equally emphatically, he said no peace proposal that so much as entertained the notion of a "right of return" to Israel for Palestinian refugees could serve as a basis for negotiation. "It cannot be on the table. I'm not ready to even discuss the 'right of return' of even one refugee," he said. But he also made clear that Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state was not a precondition for progress. "You know, we don't want to torpedo the process," he said. "But somebody who really wants a solution, somebody who really desires a real peace and a real agreement, must realize that this would be impossible to achieve without recognizing Israel as a Jewish state." Lieberman said the new government would have no dealings with Hamas, which needed to be "suffocated," and that the international community also had to maintain the long-standing Quartet preconditions for dealing with the Islamist group. The real reason for the deadlock with the Palestinians, said Lieberman, "is not occupation, not settlements and not settlers. This conflict is really a very deep conflict. It started like other national conflicts. [But] today it's a more religious conflict. Today you have the influence of some nonrational players, like al-Qaida." And the biggest obstacle to any comprehensive solution, he said, "is not Israel. It is not the Palestinians. It's the Iranians." Lieberman said the prime responsibility for thwarting Iran's march to a nuclear capability lay with the international community, not Israel, and especially the five permanent members of the Security Council. He was confident that stringent economic sanctions could yet achieve the desired result, and said he did not even "want to think about the consequences of a crazy nuclear arms race in the region." He said it would be "impossible to resolve any problem in our region without resolving the Iranian problem." This, he said, related to Lebanon, Syria and problems with Islamic extremist terror in Egypt, the Gaza Strip and Iraq. Nonetheless, Lieberman stressed that Israel did not regard stopping Iran as a precondition for Israeli efforts to make progress with the Palestinians. Quite the reverse, he said. "No, we must start with the Palestinian issues because it's our interest to resolve this problem. But there should be no illusions. To achieve an agreement, to achieve an end of conflict, with no more bloodshed, no more terror, no more claims — that's impossible until Iran [is addressed]." Noting what he called Syria's deepening ties with Iran, Lieberman said he saw no point whatsoever in resuming the indirect talks with Damascus conducted by the last government. "We don't see any good will from the Syrian side," he said. "Only the threats, like 'If you're not ready to talk, we'll retake the Golan by military action...'" Asked whether it troubled him to be perceived as an extremist in some circles, including overseas, Lieberman laughed and said, "So it's easy for me to surprise them." He said he believed his international colleagues "respect me, and that they understand that I say what I mean, and I mean every word that I say." As to whether his legal problems — he is under police investigation for alleged corruption — or other factors might lead to his ouster from the job, he said he believed this coalition would serve its full term, and that he would serve the full term as foreign minister. — This article appeared today in the Jerusalem Post
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NPR & KELERMAN MISS AN OPPORTUNITY
Posted by Truth Provider, April 23, 2009. |
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Dear friends, A nervous King Addullah of Jordan visited President Obama in the White House yesterday. Why nervous? Because it is becoming clearer every day that his preferred Two States "solution" is quickly slipping away. After all, Jordan is already a Palestinian state, something the king tries to ignore or avoid, as he desperately tries to have Israel bail him out of reality. On NPR's Morning Edition, Wednesday, April 22, 2009, Michele
Kelerman had the opportunity to ask the King some serious questions.
Is Michele Kelerman an Arab sympathiser, or an ignoramus who knows little or nothing about the history and geography of Israel and Jordan, or in owe of interviewing a King, or all of the above? Why is NPR pretending to be a serious news organization? Here are the questions Kelerman should have asked King Abdullah and did not: 1) In view of what happened in Gaza (Hamas rule and violence) how can Israel feel secure with a Palestinian state in Judea & Samaria (West Bank) 8km from Tel Aviv? Following is the piece from NPR. Judge it for yourself. Your Truth Provider,
It is called
"King Abdullah: Core Middle East Problem Must Be Resolved" and was
written by Michele Kelemen
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Morning Edition, April 22, 2009: President Obama says he wants to see Israel and the Palestinians step back from the abyss and revive stalled peace talks, and he is inviting Israeli, Palestinian and Egyptian leaders to the White House for separate talks in the coming weeks. Jordan's King Abdullah, the first Arab leader to meet Obama in the White House, says he came away convinced that the U.S. is preparing for a regional approach, trying to promote Arab Israeli peace on several different tracks. In an interview with NPR, King Abdullah said he thinks the new approach will be to try to restart Israeli-Palestinian talks and, simultaneously, to work on the Israeli-Lebanese and Israeli-Syrian tracks. The ultimate "prize" for the Israelis, King Abdullah said, is recognition by the 57 Arab and Muslim nations that don't have relations with the Jewish state. He says Israel is at a critical juncture now and has to decide whether it wants to be "integrated into the neighborhood" or continue to be "fortress Israel." Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has raised the idea of an "economic peace" with the Palestinians. King Abdullah argues that "if economic outreach to the Palestinians is going to be a substitute for a two-state solution, it is never going to work." There are "certain baby steps" that both Israelis and Palestinians can take to create a better atmosphere for negotiations, "hopefully under an American umbrella," he said. Obama also spoke about the need for both sides to make some "gestures of good faith" in the coming months and "step back from the abyss." The trip to Washington wasn't only business for the Jordanian king. He took advantage of some downtime to ride his motorcycle to Harpers Ferry, W.Va., and Gettysburg, Pa., to "decompress" and take in a bit of American history.
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IS ISRAEL CRYING WOLF?
Posted by GWY, April 23, 2009. |
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This article was written by Dr. Eran Lerman, who is the Director of the
American Jewish Committee's Israel/Middle East Office. It appeared
on the Aish website
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Roger Cohen should have a conversation with my daughter. There are moments when I try to imagine what a conversation would be like between Roger Cohen, the well-traveled and sophisticated New York Times columnist who has made it his personal project, in recent weeks, to undermine Israel's case on the Iranian nuclear threat, and my youngest daughter. True, she is not an intelligence officer (I am, or rather was, once upon a time); nor is she a "bellicose" (Cohen's choice of words) Israeli general or politician. She is just a vulnerable 17-year-old with a tendency to take very seriously being told she is marked for destruction. She has often demanded to know what I have done, and what Israeli and American leaders have done recently, to make sure that she gets to be 25 — given that she sees, in the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the embodiment of a design to have her dead. I wish I could tell her that Mr. Cohen, a knowledgeable man, has recently been to Iran and is now in possession of a mature understanding — which all of us here, hysterical children that we are, sorely lack — of the mullahs' real (and relatively benign) intentions. Even better, I would have loved to let him come over for dinner and have a go at soothing her fears, which are deep and real, and shared by many in Israel, young and old alike, who are not playing strategic games; they are simply frightened. But somehow, reading his recent spate of essays, I am not sure he is up to the task. Neither am I. Cohen's case, favoring a firm American rejection of what he describes, in effect, as Israeli manipulative tactics, rests on several foundations. They need to be taken seriously — and addressed, one by one: that Israel is "crying wolf"; that Iran was never all that dynamically engaged in pursuit of the bomb; that the problem is Israeli hegemony, not the Iranian threat; that the Arab leaders are not really worried; that the mullahs are, in fact, rational; and that they are nice to their Jews (they were apparently nice to Mr. Cohen, in any case). And then, if this all turns out to be wrong — a delusional gamble with our lives and the stability of the region at stake, not to mention the future of the nonproliferation regime — Cohen's argument is that we still have time, plenty of time, to make amends. Not so:
Contact GWY by email at gwy123@aol.com |
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HEARST AND THE HOLOCAUST
Posted by Shaul Ceder, April 23, 2009. |
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This was written by
Rafael Medoff and it appeared yesterday in the Jerusalem Post
Rafael Medoff is director of the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies and author of Blowing the Whistle on Genocide: Josiah E. DuBois, Jr. and the Struggle for a US Response to the Holocaust. |
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Three rare paintings once owned by media magnate William Randolph Hearst were last week returned to the family of the German Jews who were forced by the Nazis to sell them for a pittance. The return of the artwork was an act of justice made all the more fitting by the little-known fact that Hearst played an important role in promoting the rescue of Jews from the Holocaust. The 16-century Italian Renaissance paintings originally belonged to German Jewish gallery owners Jacob and Rosa Oppenheimer, but when the Oppenheimers fled Hitler in 1933, the Nazis auctioned off their confiscated assets for a fraction of their value. Hearst, an avid art collector, purchased the paintings from a different gallery two years later and was evidently unaware of their origin. "If he had found out, even after he purchased them, Mr. Hearst in all indications would have returned them," said Hearst Museum director Hoyt Fields. Admittedly, Hearst was an unlikely ally for the Jews. His sensationalist style of journalism, strong attacks on president Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal and pre-World War II isolationism made him anathema to much of the American Jewish community. Hearst's meeting with Hitler in 1934, his sympathetic remarks about some of Nazi Germany's policies in the early and mid 1930s and his publication of articles by both Hitler and Mussolini, reinforced his image among American Jews as a reactionary, and possibly even a closet anti-Semite. Kristallnacht appears to have been the turning point for Hearst. The nationwide Nazi pogrom in which nearly a hundred Jews were murdered, 200 synagogues were burned down and thousands of Jewish homes and businesses were ransacked convinced him that Hitler was "making the flag of National Socialism a symbol of national savagery." After Kristallnacht, Hearst began advocating creation of "a homeland for dispossessed or persecuted Jews." When news of the mass murder of Europe's Jews began reaching the United States in 1941-1942, the Hearst newspaper chain gave it prominent coverage — by contrast with newspapers such as The New York Times, which routinely confined it to the back pages (as Prof. Laurel Leff documented in her definitive study, Buried by 'The Times'). In 1943, Hearst served as an honorary chairman of the Emergency Conference to Save the Jewish People of Europe, which was organized by the activist Bergson Group to demonstrate that rescue was possible — in contrast to the Roosevelt administration's claim that the only way to rescue the Jews was to win the war. When the Bergson group in late 1943 initiated a congressional resolution urging FDR to create a government agency to rescue Jewish refugees, Hearst directed his newspaper chain to promote the resolution and he personally authored signed editorials endorsing it. One declared: "Remember, Americans, this is not a Jewish problem. It is a human problem." "Hearst was the only newspaper owner who supported us without any qualifications or reservations," Samuel Merlin, a leader of the Bergson Group, recalled in a postwar interview. "All his papers. He gave us pages after pages free. He gave us the whole editorial page — Hearst himself. He gave orders to print our material." The group's leader, Peter Bergson (Hillel Kook), noted that he and his colleagues endured some criticism because of their relationship with Hearst. "We were even attacked as 'fascists' because we approached William Randolph Hearst several times," he recalled. But the Bergsonites were not dissuaded. "What right did we have to decide who should save the Jews?" Bergson asked rhetorically. "For God's sake, we would go to anybody. I mean, would we need a rabbi to say 'Save the Jews'? We were delighted that we got Hearst to say 'Save the Jews.'" The support of Hearst's 34 newspapers gave the congressional resolution an important boost, helped keep the refugee issue in the public eye, and focused negative attention on the Roosevelt administration's opposition to rescue action. By early 1944, the combined pressure from Congress, the Bergson Group and the Treasury Department convinced FDR to establish the War Refugee Board, a government agency devoted to rescuing Jews from Hitler. During the last 15 months of the war, the board played a major role in the rescue of an estimated 200,000 Jews. In the minds of many Americans, William Randolph Hearst will be forever associated with the greedy and dishonest main character in the 1941 film, Citizen Kane. But whatever his unflattering traits, the real life Hearst had other qualities as well, including genuine compassion for the persecuted Jews of Europe and a determination to help rescue them from the Holocaust.
Contact the Ceders at ceder@netvision.net.il |
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'DON'T EXECUTE ARAB FOR SELLING LAND TO JEW'
Posted by Hillel Fendel, April 23, 2009. |
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(IsraelNN.com) As a Palestinian Authority Arab faces the death sentence for selling land to Jews, a civil rights group asks Prime Minister Netanyahu to demand that PA rescind death penalty for the "crime." The Yesha (Judea and Samaria) Civil Rights Organization has written an urgent letter to Binyamin Netanyahu and ministers in his government in light of the opening of the trial this week. According to PA law, the defendant faces the death penalty if convicted. The letter, addressed to Netanyahu and the Ministers of Justice, Defense, and Public Security, states, "The Land of Israel is now the only place in the world where the law officially bans the sale of land to Jews because they are Jews. Even worse, the punishment for violators is actually death." The organization says that Netanyahu's government must set an ultimatum: "No negotiations with the Palestinian Authority until this anti-Semitic law is rescinded. This demand takes precedence even over the insistence that the PA recognize Israel as a Jewish state." The trial of the Hevron resident in a special PA court began on Tuesday, with the defendant accused of having sold land in the Hevron area to Jews. The Yesha group asks Netanyahu and the ministers to step in to save the man, who is being charged with treason. Israel's intervention in the past has caused the PA to release others who had been jailed on suspicion of selling land to Jews. These include Arab-Israelis living in eastern Jerusalem. Strook: "Such a Law is a Red Light for Diplomatic Relations" Orit Strook of the Jewish Community of Hevron, the director of the Yesha Civil Rights group, says, "Israel would never have diplomatic relations with any country that has on its books a law forbidding the sale of land to Jews." Her organization's letter states that the confiscation of Beit HaShalom (Peace House) from its rightful Jewish owners in Hevron several months ago is directly related to the fact that Arabs must fear for their lives when selling to Jews: "The Israeli authorities act as if the Arab sellers are free people, when in fact a gun is pointed at their heads and they must do everything they can to hide their actions — and this is why they claimed after the sale of Beit HaShalom [to Jews] that they never sold it." "So long as the 'Palestinian rule of law' is not uprooted from its source," the letter concludes, "all the talk about Israeli rule of law in Judea and Samaria has no foothold in reality." Hillel Fendel is senior news editor at Arutz Sheva
This article appeared in Arutz-7
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'I'M A ZIONIST': ACTIVISTS PROTEST IN GENEVA
Posted by LEL, April 23, 2009. |
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This was written by Tovah Lazaroff, jerusalem post
correspondent, The Jerusalem Post.
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Shouting "I'm a Zionist" in English and French, several thousand pro-Israel activists rallied Wednesday in Geneva against the United Nations' week-long anti-racism conference, which opened with a call from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to eradicate Zionism. Standing on a makeshift podium, in the concrete square just outside the UN building where Ahmadinejad had stated that Zionism was "the paragon of racism," historian Gil Troy of McGill University told the crowd he was proud that Israel was a country where Pessah Seders were held with Darfur refugees who had found a home there. To his left, a number of protesters held a large sign that stated: "Zionism is our response to racism." It was one of a host of activities held by Jewish groups from all over the world, who this week headed to Geneva determined to combat the kind of anti-Semitism that dominated the 2001 UN World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, which was held in Durban, South Africa. The Geneva Jewish community, with the help of Chabad, opened a visitors' center a short distance from the conference venue, where they handed out coffee, sandwiches and provided meeting rooms as well as computers. Fearful that people might be traumatized by what they saw and heard at the conference, the community even had a psychologist on call. But although Durban II was preceded by a two day anti-Israel conference by non-governmental groups and a number of small anti-Israel rallies were held — including one that compared Israel's actions in Gaza with those of the Warsaw ghetto — the atmosphere around the conference did not replicate Durban I. A federation of 20 Jewish groups headed by the World Jewish Congress and B'nai B'rith International lobbied diplomatically behind the scenes to influence the conference proceedings. To counter the anti-Israel rhetoric, the non-governmental group UN Watch gathered together victims of racism and genocide from places such as Rwanda and Darfur. To focus attention on the many human rights abuses occurring in those countries and around the world, UN Watch held two side conferences of its own this week and organized a side panel in the UN building with victims of racism and genocide. Well-known human rights advocates such as Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, Prof. Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University, former Canadian justice minister Irwin Cotler and former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky came to Geneva to oppose the conference. As he sat at the pro-Israel rally on Wednesday evening, former US Ambassador Alfred H. Moses, who heads UN Watch, told The Jerusalem Post that he felt a victory had been achieved in Geneva. "We changed what could have been a tragic travesty into a triumph," said Moses. Instead of hearing only Israeli wrongs, he said, emphasis has been placed back where it should be — on worldwide human rights abuses. Speaking at a UN Watch event earlier in the day, French philosopher and author Bernard-Henri Levy said that the 2009 UN's anti-racism document was only barely acceptable. The Durban conferences, he said, should be replaced by a Geneva III, which speaks on behalf of worldwide victims. Gibreil Hamid of Darfur said at the UN Watch Forum Wednesday morning that he is "one of the lucky ones" who survived the massacres there. The United Nations now has become a "awful word" for him as a result of its failure to deal with the mass killings in his country. But even as Jewish groups on Wednesday took stock of their success in providing alternative forums for human rights issues and in keeping new anti-Israel language out of the 2009 summary document, they also noted with concern that the text refers to Israel in a document that speaks about racism. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict was political, not racial, and as such it had no place in a text about racism, said Betty Ehrenberg of the World Jewish Congress. Reframing the conflict as a racial one opened the door to criminalizing Israel's actions and ultimately delegitimizing it, she said. Richard Heideman, who headed the B'nai B'rith delegation to Geneva and who was also at the first Durban conference in South Africa, said that holding the event in Geneva where there is a UN infrastructure helped, as did the elimination of the NGO forum that existed in the first conference. At that event, he said, there were signs "of death to the murdering Jews" and "offensive slurs against Israel, Zionists and the Jewish people." On the other hand, unlike Durban I, that kind of attack was brought into the plenum itself by Ahmadinejad's speech, he said. Contact LEL at lel817@yahoo.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: MAZEL TOV
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 22, 2009. |
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"Mazel Tov" Congratulations, that is. The National Council of Young Israel (NCYI) — the umbrella organization of the Young Israel movement Orthodox synagogues in N. America — has released a statement saying that the "two state solution" being promoted by the US government is "untenable and unfeasible." This position is most welcome and long overdue. The Jewish establishment in the U.S. has been, to a very large extent, toeing the line of the US government with regard to "two states" as the key to peace in the region. Now NCYI President Shlomo Z. Mostofsky, addressing the refusal of the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, says, "It is unconscionable for the United States to attempt to jump-start peace talks prior to recognizing a basic premise that must be accepted by all parties..." NCYI is now mounting a campaign to encourage people to contact appropriate US leaders and urge them to oppose the creation of a Palestinian state. At the bottom of this posting I will supply contact information for the individuals they recommend being in touch with, as well as key arguments to use. ~~~~~~~~~~ The NCYI declaration is a response to President Obama's push for that "two state solution." Yesterday he made a statement indicating that he expects to see "concrete steps toward peace" made by both sides, because "we can't talk forever." Guess no one has told him that we're not even talking right now, because after a year of Annapolis conversations nothing happened. We know what he's going to demand of us: some permutation of a freeze on settlements and a removal of checkpoints. May our government be strong enough to refuse. (The weak link, of course is FM Barak.) But what of the PA? The equation has been so one-sided that very little is demanded of the Palestinians. What we see is US-sponsored training of security forces, who will, in theory, combat terrorism. But this is highly problematic as there's a very real question of which authority these forces will answer to. I'd like to see, at a minimum, a demand that all incitement be removed from PA textbooks. The possibility for a "two state solution" are nil, but that won't stop an arrogant Obama from trying to push it through. ~~~~~~~~~~ I provide here major sections of a report on Day Two of Durban 2, by Anne Bayefsky of Eye on the UN: "On Tuesday, the UN's racist anti-racism conference 'Durban II' rammed through a final declaration three days before its scheduled conclusion. On Monday Iranian President Ahamadinejad had opened the substantive program by denying the Holocaust and spewing Anti-Semitism. A day later UN members rewarded Iran by electing it one of three Vice-Chairs of the committee which adopted the final declaration. ~~~~~~~~~~ We shouldn't expect much of Britain, for certain. Right now, in light of Israel's recent activities in Gaza, it is reviewing all arms exports to Israel. This is not a crisis, as all British arms exports to us constitute less than 1% of what we import. It's a question of attitude. What is more, in line with that same attitude, Britain is about to permit Hamas politburo leader Khaled Mashaal to address a meeting of MPs and peers in the British parliament via video link from Damascus. The invitation to the event reads: "Most serious commentators now believe that there can be no peace in the Middle East without talking to Hamas. In addition, we may be facing the last chance for a two-state solution." I would love to ask the organizers of this event how a "two-state solution" can be achieved when Fatah and Hamas function separately, and Hamas is adamant about not recognizing Israel and not renouncing terror. It wouldn't pay me, however. I've spoken to British officials, and find they are never at a loss for answers, convoluted though they may be. ~~~~~~~~~~ We had heard during our Gaza operation that Hamas officials hid in Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. Now the IDF has revealed that Hamas PM Ismail Haniyeh set up a command center in that hospital. Hamas field commanders took advantage of the daily self-imposed IDF cessation of military activity, intended to permit humanitarian supplies to get into Gaza, to enter the hospital and receive instructions. ~~~~~~~~~~ When Avigdor Lieberman assumed the post of Foreign Minister, the Egyptians were none too happy about it. In fact, they said they would have nothing to do with him unless he apologized because he had severely criticized Mubarak for never visiting Israel, except for Rabin's funeral. Well, Egyptian Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman is in Israel now, and apparently the Egyptians have had a change of heart, or of policy, anyway. Suleiman met during the day today with PM Netanyahu, and with Defense Minister Ehud Barak. And tonight he met with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. ~~~~~~~~~~ Remember the cartoons about Mohammad published in Denmark in 2005 that set off world-wide Muslim riots? The editor who originally commissioned and published them, Flemming Rose, is currently here in Israel, the guest of the Shasha Center for Strategic Studies of Hebrew University. In a lecture at the Center, Rose said that the Organization of Islamic States is pushing at Durban 2 for "a new world order" that would impose "nondemocratic and illiberal values on the West." The attempt is to re-write the rules of human rights and international law in a manner that undermines Western values of liberty: "We're seeing an erosion of support in the West for freedom of expression in the guise of preventing incitement against Islam." The alarm that Rose is sounding should be heeded with utmost seriousness. ~~~~~~~~~~ Those to contact regarding a "two state solution": President Barack Obama
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
Senator John Kerry (Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee)
Congressman Howard Berman (Chairman of the Congressional Committee on Foreign Affairs)
Congressman Gary Ackerman (Chairman of the Congress. Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia)
~~~~~~~~~~ Reasons why the US should not be promoting a "two-state solution" follow. It's sufficient to select just a few and appropriate to keep communication relatively brief. Remember, arguments should be couched in terms that interest elected US officials — not in terms of what is good for Israel or what religious Jews believe about rights in Israel. You want to be heard; talk truthfully, but in their terms. — If the US attempts this again, and fails, the administration loses international prestige. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THE DEMASQUÉ OF THE PEACE PROCESS
Posted by Jan Willem van der Hoeven, April 22, 2009. |
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The following clearly written and expressed article by a fellow
dutchman of mine, Johan Rhodius, is refreshing in its clarity.
Johan Rhodius has worked for almost 28 years as an attorney in private practice in the Netherlands and for two years with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Africa. May it bring sense to many especially during these days for renewed threats against Israel. |
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It was my privilege to attend the Jerusalem premiere of this film and the ensuing discussion with many of the people who feature in this film, like Sharansky, Caroline Glick and Dore Gold. The film promotes the two state solution. The first question to the panel was why the film promoted the two state solution as this concept is passé. One member of the panel answered that the two state solution had validity as otherwise Israel would be confronted with the one state solution. As the discussion developed I realized — with all respect to those who took part in it — that is was not only a waste of time, but counterproductive: As if Israel is the problem of the Arab — Israel conflict and the one who has to provide the solution. I felt increasingly uncomfortable with the word solution. Firstly it implies that there is a problem. And there Ãs a problem. The problem is that most Arab states and groups like Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah and Al Qaida and others want to annihilate Israel. That is in breach with international law; sometimes it is useful to mention the obvious. I will refer to those who want to annihilate Israel as the Arabs or the Muslims, although I am fully aware that not every Arab or Muslim wants to annihilate Israel. And even if the large majority of the Arabs and Muslims want to really live in peace with Israel, one never or hardly hears from that silent majority; so they are irrelevant in that respect. Israel is not the problem. Israel is — like about 140 other states — a sovereign state. Period. "Next question please ". The problem has to be solved by the one who has the problem: The Muslims. The problem is not be solved by the one who does not have the problem, Israel. Even stronger: the one who does not have the problem, can for that very reason not solve the problem. Legal procedures are often decided by the question which party has the onus of proof, the obligation to proof something. If you cannot prove your point, you lose the case. In this case the party who has to solve the problem. For that reason it is very important in legal procedures to put forward your view and only your view and only react to the view of your opponent where necessary to clarify your own position or refute the view of your opponent if it is incorrect. So not to appropriate the view of your opponent as your own and deal with that. The two-state solution, the one-state solution or whatever solution is not — at least not originally — the view of Israel (Israel just wanted a state of her own), but of Israel's enemies. It is therefore very unwise to take whatever solution as starting point for a discussion. In doing so — and that is what Israel and Dershowitz do — they appropriate the problem, draw the problem to themselves. That is very dangerous. It makes Israel the problem and Israel the one who has to solve the problem. And if the problem is not solved, the consequences of the problem are for Israel. That is the corner in which the Muslims have maneuvered Israel. And the US, Europe and the rest of the non-Muslim world, represented by the Quartet, have taken over this Muslim view. By the way very much to the detriment of that non-Muslim world. The fact that the Muslims cannot solve their problem — the annihilation of Israel — means that they lose the "procedure". Period. Moreover the fact that the Muslims cannot solve their problem, does not therefore mean that it is up to Israel to solve this problem. Because then again Israel would fall into the trap of appropriating the problem of the Muslims. Moreover Israel cannot solve this problem as it would have to annihilate itself, commit suicide. The second reason why I do not like the word solution — in that respect I hate it — that in German solution is Lösung. Hitler had a Lösung, the Endlösung. The Muslims were in agreement with that Endlösung. See the contacts of Arabs with Eichmann in 1936 and the contacts between Hitler and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. The Muslim view has not changed. They see as the solution of the problem the dissolution of Israel and of the Jews. The conclusion is that the problem that Muslims want to annihilate Israel, the Jews, cannot be solved. The sooner Israel and the rest of the non-Muslim world come to that realization, the better. In the interest of the whole world. Also in the interest of the Muslim world, of that vast majority of Muslims that want really to live in peace with Israel, like almost all other people live peacefully next to their neighbors, this is yours and that is mine. Then the Muslim world would eventually use their energy for what it is meant to be used for: to build and not to destroy, to live and not to kill. I speak about Muslims and not about Arabs. On purpose. The conflict Muslims have with Israel and with the rest of the non-Muslim world is not a matter of territory or something else, but of religion. Islam wants to dominate the whole world. The Muslims are very consistent: They say what they do and do what they say. And so should the non-Muslim world be: if we do not agree with the Muslim view, we should say so. And do so. That is the solution of the problem. Then we have the maximum possible peace in our world. Jan Willem van der Hoeven is Director International Christian Zionist Center. Contact him by email at iczc@iczc.org.il and visit the web-site: www.israelmybeloved.com |
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ATLANTIC MONTHLY: DOES THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY REALLY WANT A STATE?
Posted by Ramy Dishy, April 22, 2009. |
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This was written by Yehudah Lev Kay and it appeared in Arutz Sheva (www.IsraelNationalNews.com). |
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(IsraelNN.com) An editorial in the latest issue of the prestigious Atlantic Monthly posits that the Palestinian Authority may never have a state because it does not want one. Writer Robert Kaplan claims that statelessness has more appeal to the PA than statehood. Kaplan's ideas are based on a recent study by John Hopkins professor Jakub Grygiel in which he claims that in the modern era, technologies have given minority groups more power to communicate and commit violent acts without the need for a formal state. He claims that the lack of a state, rather than being a detriment, enables the group to maintain its extremist views while avoiding the complicated task of governing. Grygiel cites as a case in point the Hizbullah terrorist group. "Though probably capable of taking over the weak central government of Lebanon, Hizbullah has preferred to maintain its sub-state role, thereby limiting its responsibility and hence its vulnerability to attacks," he writes. "Having a state would most likely weaken the ability of Hizbullah to attack Israel, whose military forces could find easy targets." "Statelessness provides impunity from the retaliatory actions of a powerful state," Grygiel points out, in one of the main thrusts of his study. Hamas, once it gained independence from Israel, faced exactly the problem Hizbullah chooses to avoid, according to Kaplan. "It was the very quasi-statehood achieved by Hamas in...Gaza...that made it easier for Israel to bomb it," he explains. The implications for the Palestinian Authority are just as clear. "Statehood would mean openly compromising with Israel," he writes. "Better the glory of victimhood ... As a stateless people, Palestinians can lob rockets into Israel, but not be wholly blamed in the eyes of the international community. Statehood would, perforce, put an end to such license." As proof that the Palestinian Authority prefers to remain stateless, Kaplan points out that although former Prime Minister Ehud Barak made vast concessions to late PA Chairman Yasir Arafat at Camp David in 2000, the PA leader chose not to compromise. As Kaplan explains, Arafat "may have seen that as a more morally and emotionally satisfying conclusion to a life of statelessness than that of making the unenchanting concessions association with achieving statehood." Contact Ramy Dishy at clement32@rogers.com |
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YOUNG ISRAEL MOVEMENT URGES U.S. TO RETHINK "TWO-STATE SOLUTION"
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 22, 2009. |
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact:
YOUNG ISRAEL MOVEMENT URGES U.S. TO RETHINK "TWO-STATE SOLUTION" POLICY;
Launches Grass Roots Effort Aimed At Shifting U.S. Approach Towards Israel And The Palestinians The National Council of Young Israel (NCYI) today urged American political leaders to reconsider its "two-state solution" policy with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian situation. The NCYI also announced that they are initiating a grass roots effort intended to enlighten U.S. leaders as to the dangers of advocating for an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel. The National Council of Young Israel's actions come in the wake of recent statements by U.S. diplomatic leaders which signal that the United States intends to aggressively pursue a "two-state solution" as a prerequisite to peace in the region. NCYI President Shlomo Z. Mostofsky, Esq. questioned the logic of putting forth a proposal that is virtually certain to fail. He cited a number of outstanding issues that essentially preclude the furtherance of any peace talks prior to them being addressed and resolved. For example, Mostofsky pointed to the fact that the Palestinian Authority's Chief Justice recently reminded Palestinians that selling land to Jews is considered "high treason," a crime that carries with it a death sentence. In fact, numerous Palestinians have been put to death over the years for allegedly selling property to Jews. "It is unfathomable to engage in any serious discussion about peace while the Palestinians' longstanding racist policy of equating selling land to a Jew with a death sentence remains in effect," said Mostofsky. "We question how the United States could decide to engage in direct interaction with a regime that advocates a housing policy which undermines all of the protections that America's fair housing policies expressly seek to preserve for its own citizenry." Mostofsky also cited the ongoing saga involving Israeli MIA Gilad Shalit as a barrier to any peace agreement. "So long as the Palestinians continue to use this young man's life as a bargaining chip, their assertion that they are interested in peace is absolutely meaningless," said Mostofsky. "Until Gilad Shalit is unconditionally released and reunited with his family, the prospect of peace is a mere fantasy." During his recent visit to Israel, President Obama's Special Envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell, said that "a two-state solution is the only solution." During a meeting with Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, he said: "U.S. policy favors, in respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a two-state solution which will have a Palestinian state living in peace alongside the Jewish state of Israel." Just several days ago, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of State described the United States' policy with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the "pursuit of a two-state solution with the two countries living side-by-side in peace." "Recent statements by American governmental leaders signify a disturbing trend with regard to the United States' approach towards Israel," said Mostofsky. "Many American policymakers erroneously consider the creation of an independent Palestinian state side-by-side with Israel to be paramount to achieving a peaceful resolution of the situation in the Middle East. The National Council of Young Israel firmly believes that an independent Palestinian state would compound the complex problems that currently exist and open the door to a new wave of acts of terror directed at innocent Israeli civilians. America's stated intent to pursue an independent Palestinian state is untenable and unfeasible in light of the Palestinians' well-documented hatred of the Jewish people and resentment of the Jewish state." Mostofsky also noted that the United States has rejected Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's demand that the Palestinians acknowledge Israel as a Jewish state before renewing peace talks. Several days ago, Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed his cabinet about Israel's position on this point. "We insist that the Palestinians — in any diplomatic settlement with us — will recognize the State of Israel as the national state of the Jewish people," said the Prime Minister. "[t]here is no doubt that we are being asked to recognize the Palestinian state as the national state for the Palestinian people, but...the Palestinians have no intention of recognizing the national state of the Jewish people. [t]here is no doubt that we insist that they recognize the State of Israel as the national state of the Jewish people." "It is unconscionable for the United States to attempt to jump-start peace talks prior to recognizing a basic premise that must be accepted by all parties before a fruitful conversation could be had," said Mostofsky. "In the absence of the recognition that Israel is a Jewish state, any dialogue between the parties will in essence be futile." In addition, Mostofsky noted that Prime Minister Netanyahu's concerns that ceding control of Israeli land to the Palestinians would exacerbate the situation need to be taken seriously by the United States. The Gaza experience proves that the land for peace concept does not work. Mostofsky also reiterated the National Council of Young Israel's staunch opposition to any division of Jerusalem as part of any potential peace discussions. "You cannot divide the indivisible," said Mostofsky. "We strongly oppose any proposal to split the eternal capital of the Jewish people. The division of Jerusalem would create an irreparable void in the soul and spirit of the Jewish nation, and we urge the United States not to make this a condition precedent to any potential peace agreement." In addition, Mostofsky openly questioned how anyone could possible suggest that control of Jewish holy sites, and for that matter, the Christian holy sites, be relinquished to the Palestinians. "One need not look any further than Joseph's Tomb to understand the ramifications of entrusting the Palestinians with caring for a holy site," said Mostofsky. "If past performance is any indication, the Palestinians are in no way equipped to assume such an awesome responsibility and should not be permitted to do so." Mostofsky also urged the United States to consider what would happen in the event that the two-state solution, which it is advocating, eventually fails. "With a reluctance to deploy additional U.S. troops to overseas destinations, we question how the United States will be in a position to step in and manage control of the situation if the experiment regarding the creation of an independent Palestinian state ultimately fails," said Mostofsky. "What steps will be taken to ensure the safety and security of the Israeli people if their newly empowered Palestinian neighbors unleash a fresh barrage of terrorist acts at them from their own backyards? What role is the United States prepared to play in that event to restore a sense of stability to the region?" Mostofsky said that the National Council of Young Israel is encouraging its 25,000 member families, its over 200 branch synagogues throughout the United States, and American citizens throughout the world, to contact American political leaders and urge them to oppose any call for the creation of a Palestinian state. According to Mostofsky, the NCYI is urging people to call, email, and fax the White House, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Senator John Kerry (Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee), Congressman Howard Berman (Chairman of the Congressional Committee on Foreign Affairs), and Congressman Gary Ackerman (Chairman of the Congressional Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia). Additional information can be found by visiting the National Council of Young Israel's website at www.youngisrael.org. * * * * * N. Aaron Troodler
Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: WHERE TO BEGIN?
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 21, 2009. |
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[I apologize if you receive this twice — there seems to be a computer glitch.] Never before have I attached a PowerPoint presentation to my posting. But today is Holocaust Memorial Day, and the presentation — of a memorial in Miami Beach FL — is so movingly evocative that I decided to make the exception. Thank you, Gittel N. ~~~~~~~~~~ On Sunday, a group of former Partisans (essentially, guerilla fighters against the Nazis) visited an Israeli Air Force Base, where they met with pilots and saw a pair of jets take off in a drill. One woman, with numbers tattooed on her arm, asked an officer if his pilots could reach Iran. "They can reach anywhere," he told her. Another woman, in a wheel chair, said, "What I ask of you is to make sure there will not be another Holocaust." ~~~~~~~~~~ I now have a list of the nations who walked out on Ahmadinejad's speech yesterday in Geneva — 23 EU nations and two others. They are listed at the bottom of this posting I had indicated yesterday that they returned to continue participation. And, indeed, in the main they did, the French envoy, for example, claiming that dialogue is in and of itself valuable. But the Czech Republic — bravo! — has left for good. ~~~~~~~~~~ Much is being made of the fact that Ahmadinejad made an adjustment in his talk in Farsi yesterday, cutting out a denial of the Holocaust that had been in the print version distributed by the Iranian government. Are we supposed to be satisfied that instead he "just" said that we used the Holocaust as a "pretext" for aggression again Palestinians and that ours was the "most cruel and racist regime," which must be "eradicated"? Representatives of the Vatican are saying they were able to remain through the talk, since there was no Holocaust denial, this apparently being their only red line. (Our relationship with the Vatican leaves a good deal to be desired right now.) ~~~~~~~~~~ Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and Secretary General of Durban 2, while labeling Ahmadinejad's remarks "totally objectionable," defended his right to make them. "...everybody has a right to speak, and more especially a head of state. And that was his right." I find this fascinating. For one of the issues of contention within the preparatory meetings of the conference was that of free speech. The Arab/Muslim states are attempting to muzzle criticism of radical Islam, calling such criticism unacceptable Islamophobia. Their position, essentially, is that it is wrong to make any connection between Jihad/terrorism and dedication of the Jihadists/terrorists to Islam, in whose name they act. ~~~~~~~~~~ As some of you reading this know, in response to the comment of one reader who told me things are even worse than what I described the other day with regard to Obama, I've been engaged in dialogue with a handful of people, seeking a broad and thoughtful picture of the situation. Here, briefly, I summarize, acknowledging that the situation (or my perception of it) may well shift: The biggest worry with regard to Obama is not what he'll do to Israel directly, but what he's doing to the US and generating in world dynamics. We here in Israel must learn to stand on our own feet and know when and how to say 'no.' As would be expected, there is some difference of opinion regarding how effective Congress can and will be in blocking Obama, and there are different perspectives on the development of a grass roots protest movement — a backlash, with the tea parties possibly the beginning. At least one savvy and well-connected individual I communicated with believes that saner and wiser heads in the Democrat party rein in Obama from time to time — convincing him, for example, not to attend Durban 2. Another experienced activist made what I thought an astute observation: that "he is still so impressed with the way so much of the American public views him with adulation that he has the naive impression that he can win over our enemies, too, by the force of his personality!" Obama's approval ratings are slowly dropping but, indeed, the majority of Americans are still for him, and seem to have no clue. They are not focused on the Middle East and are shockingly oblivious to the dangers of Iran. Mainstream media are not telling the story. The major critique of Obama is coming from right-wing radio talk shows and Fox news (and right wing Internet sites and blogs) — and what I wonder is if they are preaching to the choir. One thing I had not mentioned before, and should, is the attempt by US Homefront Security to label right wing protesters as a dangerous threat to the country. This is a serious and worrisome business, suggesting a diminution of civil liberties. ~~~~~~~~~~ Part of what is troubling about Obama is not what he's already done (although there's plenty of that) but rather an intuitive feeling he generates in his critics regarding where he's coming from and what he's about. There is a recognition that traditional American values are being abandoned wholesale and that the nation is being led who-knows-where. This is a function of a number of things, including whom Obama appoints, who his mentors and financial supporters have been, as well as his eagerness to go an "international" route and his aforementioned courting of the Muslim world. There is an unsettling arrogance about him that rings bells, and an authoritarian approach that is anti-democratic. ~~~~~~~~~~ Analyst Barry Rubin, in a recent piece, shared thought on some of these issues. While he is more sanguine than I, he makes some interesting points. Obama's position on Iran presents dangers to Israel, says Rubin, as does an approach that "emboldens radical, terrorist, Islamist forces and demoralizes relatively moderate Arab regimes." But his position on Israel and the "two state solution" actually is not that different from that of his predecessors. Bush pushed Annapolis and Condoleezza was constantly pressuring us for concessions. Obama, Rubin tells us, is inherently anti-Israel, but has learned that "he could insult large sections of the American people and abandon the most basic assumptions of American patriotism and get away with it. In contrast, he learned that it is politically costly to attack Israel." Most significantly, according to Rubin — and I've addressed this numerous times — the Palestinians are not ready to make even the smallest concession or compromise in the interests of achieving that "two state solution." This makes Obama considerably less dangerous than he would be if the Palestinians cooperated. No matter what he wishes, he cannot achieve the impossible. ~~~~~~~~~~ There has been much said regarding PM Netanyahu's demand that the Palestinians recognize us as a Jewish state, and whether he's back-tracked on this. (I don't think he has.) He made a statement about this at the Cabinet meeting yesterday: We don't know yet what the nature of a settlement we might offer to the Palestinians will be, as this is currently being formulated. We want them to rule over themselves except for powers that threaten our security and existence. [Note: He does not say we will give them a state.] However, one thing is clear: "We insist that the Palestinians — in any diplomatic settlement with us — will recognize the State of Israel as the national state of the Jewish people. ~~~~~~~~~~ Those who walked out on Ahmadinejad's talk: Austria, Belgium, Britain, Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden — all EU nations, plus Morocco, and St. Kitts and Nevis (a federated two-island nation in the Caribbean). Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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PALESTINIAN STATE: DEAL-BREAKER
Posted by Yoram Ettinger, April 22, 2009. |
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The road to peace goes through Arab capitals. The Palestinian issue was a deal-breaker during Israel-Egypt peace negotiation. In defiance of Jimmy Carter and Zbigniew Brzezinski — the "Palestine Firsters" — and in spite of Palestinian terrorist threats, Menachem Begin and Jordan's top military command impressed upon their Israeli colleagues the need to oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state. Anwar Sadat introduced a Palestinian-bypass, thus concluding a peace accord. Their determination to overcome White House and Foggy Bottom preoccupation with the Palestinian issue as, supposedly, the root core of the Arab-Israeli conflict and Middle East violence produced a peace treaty. It has lowered the prospect of an Arab-Israeli war, has decreased regional tension and has advanced US interests. The Israel-Egypt precedent documents that the road to peace goes through Arab capitals and not through Ramallah or Gaza; that the Palestinian issue does not constitute the crown jewel of Arab politics; that the Palestinians do not possess veto power over Arab policy-making; that the Palestinian issue has not been the cause of the Arab-Israeli conflict; and that the Palestinian issue has been employed by Middle Eastern radicals as fuel — and not as water — for the regional fire. During the October 1998 Israel-Jordan peace ceremony, Jordan's top military command impressed upon their Israeli colleagues the need to oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River, since "it would constitute a death-sentence for the Hashemite regime." They expressed their disillusionment with Palestinian commitments, "which are signed in the morning and violated in the evening." The Israel-Jordan and Israel-Egypt peace treaties have withstood Palestinian opposition and have prevailed, despite an ongoing Israeli war against Palestinian PLO and Hamas terrorism. A dramatic departure from the roadmap of the Israel-Egypt and Israel-Jordan peace treaties was taken in the 1993 Oslo Accords and their derivatives: the Hebron and Wye Accords; the Camp David II and Sharm El-Sheikh conferences; the "Disengagement"; the Zinni and Mitchell Plans; and the Quartet's Road Map toward a two-state solution. Never has a "peace process" yielded so much failure, hate education, terrorism and bloodshed and no success. Oslo and its byproducts have subordinated Israel-Arab peace, Israel's national security and US vital interests to the resolution of the Palestinian issue. Switching focus from the Israel-Arab track to the Israel-Palestinian track, and irrespective of Western and Israeli good intentions, the Oslo Accords and their offspring have played into the hands of Middle Eastern rogue regimes and terrorists. The "Palestine First" approach has produced dozens of initiatives, conferences, summits, agreements and ceasefire episodes, which have yielded a series of short-lived illusions of peace and a false sense of security. The There has not been inter-Arab compliance with most inter-Arab agreements during the last 1,400 years. agreements have been promptly and systematically violated and crashed — since 1993 — by an unprecedented wave of Palestinian hate education, which is the manufacturing line of generic terrorism and homicide bombing. The "two-state solution" is based on a series of erroneous assumptions, ignoring documented precedents, and therefore constitutes an erroneous policy. "Israel and Palestine living side-by-side in peace" — while the PLO and Hamas have been engaged in a horrific civil war, while there has not been inter-Arab peace during the last 1,400 years, while there has not been inter-Arab compliance with most inter-Arab agreements during the last 1,400 years, while there has not been a single Arab democracy during the last 1,400 years? The "two-state solution" has exacerbated regional turbulence, has fueled terrorism, has promoted war and has reduced the prospects for peace, thus undermining the national security of both the US and Israel. Finally, drafting demography to the cause of the two-state solution constitutes either a dramatic mistake or an outrageous act of misleading the public (please see my discussion of the demographic issue here). Ambassador Yoram Ettinger is a consultant on US-Israel relations as well as the Chairman of Special Projects at the Ariel Center for Policy Research. Formerly the Minister for Congressional Affairs to Israel's Embassy in Washington, DC, Ettinger also served as Consul General of Israel to the Southwestern US. He is a former editor of Contemporary Mideast Backgrounder, and is the author of the Jerusalem Cloakroom series of reports. Contact him at yoramtex@netvision.net.il Previous documents are posted at The Ettinger Report: http://yoramettinger.newsnet.co.il. |
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THE FIRE FROM THE SYNAGOGUES MAY EASILY SPREAD TO WESTMINSTER ABBEY
Posted by Doris Wise Montrose, April 21, 2009. |
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Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors insists that the moral imperative derived from the last Holocaust commits all people of good will to prevent the next one. "In those days before the war," Chaim Weizmann said in recalling international vexation with the Jews, "our protests were regarded as provocations. Our very refusal to subscribe to our own death sentence became a public nuisance." "The fire from the synagogues may easily spread to Westminster Abbey... If a government is allowed to destroy a whole community which has committed no crime... it means the beginning of anarchy and the destruction of the basis of civilization. The powers which stand looking on, without taking measures to prevent the crime, will one day be themselves visited by severe punishment." This article below was written by Sarah Honig and it appeared Apr. 16, 2009 in the Jerusalem Post. The article is called "Never since the 1930s." |
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Minimal intellectual honesty compels us Jews to admit that we live in dangerous times — so dangerous that they cannot but remind us of the noxious atmosphere that led to the incomparable tragedy we will solemnly commemorate this Tuesday. Never in its annals was the phoenix-like Jewish state — literally arisen from the ashes of incinerated Jewish multitudes — so defamed, so unaccepted by the so-called family of nations and so tossed in a howling tempest of ill will. Never since the 1930s have we experienced isolation so suffocating and so ubiquitous. Never since the 1930s did our collective pariah-status breed among us a resignation so deep-seated that it appears to border on apathy. What makes our times so chillingly similar to the era that conceived and tolerated the Holocaust is the broad social respectability accorded Jew-bashing. It matters little if the pretext is the fake ogre the Nazis called "International Judaism," or the state that the Jews established so they would never be defenseless again. What matters is that Jewish self-defense in the framework of the Jewish state is as assiduously demonized as was the nonexistent cabal of the Elders of Zion.
JEWISH SELF-preservation today is as illegitimate as it was then, and assailing it is as bon ton as in those dark days before the great cataclysm. The vulgar bigotry of thugs — whether brown-shirted and in hobnailed boots or skin-headed or keffiyeh-wrapped — was and is facilitated by the ideologically-honed vitriol of an ostensibly exemplary, honorable sort. They rationalize their abhorrence as decent and de rigueur. They were the ones who once made it possible for the storm troopers to terrorize and who now vindicate jihadist terror. Once more the self-professed spokespersons of enlightenment and free speech horrifyingly shout down and shut up the objects of their scorn. Reviling the Jewish state is today just as proper and urbane as turning sophisticated noses up at Jews was for the prewar smart-set. Verses like T.S. Eliot's "The rats are underneath the piles/The Jew is underneath the lot" were received with knowing winks and smug nods of approval by his literary milieu. Jews were judged as deserving repugnance, and the then-guardians of virtue perceived nothing untoward in the diabolical portraiture. To be sure, Eliot-style spitefulness is crude by today's slyer standards, but the bottom-line is unchanged. No need to badmouth Jews indelicately when Judeophobic ends can be more effectively achieved via compassion for the Jews' would-be annihilators. When the latter are painted as oppressed victims, Jews per force emerge as ruthless oppressors. When Jews, moreover, are called Israelis, their maligners can fend off accusations of anti-Semitism. Such accusations are anyhow brandished as proof of manipulative intent to silence all criticism of the Jewish state. Calculated, circuitous reasoning eventually turns Jew-haters into righteous, persecuted underdogs, while Israelis are cast as ferocious hounds. It's thus possible to seethe with anti-Semitism without admitting it. This in turn enables self-loathing Jews to join the denunciation-fest, present themselves as morally superior to benighted "other" Jews and thereby strive for their own personal exoneration from Jewish guilt. Hate-mongers need only claim that they just cannot abide the suffering inflicted by Nazi-clone Jews/Israelis on pitiable Palestinians. By equating Jewish/Israeli "crimes" with the Holocaust, the ploy becomes altogether irresistible. It no longer matters that Israel's army is humane to its own detriment, or that the Palestinians are merely the vanguard of the pan-Arab/Muslim drive to ethnically cleanse this region of any negligible Jewish vestige. It doesn't even matter that Arabs in general and Palestinians in particular were avid cheerleaders and collaborators in the original Holocaust. Pop-culture banality nearly casts Jews/Israelis as the bad guys of the Holocaust saga. In the topsy-turvy reality of shallow pop-conscience, descendents of history's worst mass murderers and most indifferent onlookers now decontaminate their heritage by arrogantly portraying descendents of the most downtrodden as flagrantly evil. Exploiting the Holocaust to condemn the children of Holocaust survivors for seeking to preempt a Holocaust sequel must be the epitome of cynicism. But this cynicism is the basic prerequisite for progressive credentials.
THAT'S WHY The New York Times published Pat Oliphant's cartoon featuring a gigantic, headless, sword-wielding, goose-stepping, uniformed fiend wheeling a razor-fanged Star of David that threatens to run down a tiny, defenseless Gazan woman and baby. Every last demonizing stereotype is there, yet the guise is of an indignant liberal commentary rather than the Der Sturmer calumny it replicates. The Australian-born Oliphant, moreover, is no gutter-agitator. He's the world's most widely syndicated political cartoonist, the winner of numerous awards, including the Pulitzer, and his works have been exhibited in no less than Washington's National Portrait Gallery. Even more disheartening is the fact that Oliphant's distortive cliche is so commonplace. In bastions of professed broadmindedness, deploring "Israeli excesses" is the barest minimum expected of upstanding persons of goodwill and forward-thinking inclinations. It's an indispensable accessory for the liberal image. Any young quasi-cultured person one might encounter overseas is likely not to like us. That has nothing to do with malice and everything to do with the trendy indoctrination of the do-gooders in crowd. Said do-gooders orchestrate sinister demonstrations outside Israeli embassies. They throng at college campuses to heckle and abuse any speaker suspected of pro-Israeli sentiments (or of not being sufficiently anti-Israel). They clamor for boycotts of all Israeli products. In freedom's name they initiate inherently incongruous academic boycotts of Israeli universities (which are renowned for unconstrained nonconformity and pluralism). They disrupt sporting events in which Israelis compete. Some even purport to champion opposition to genocide by abiding chants like "Hamas! Hamas! All Jews to the gas!" They so detest bloodshed and injustice that they vehemently deprecate any remotely feasible plan to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear warheads. The politically correct thing to do is not impede tyrants who broadcast their bloodcurdling intentions before every available microphone. World peace will supposedly be secured by restraining Israel. Submissive Jews/Israelis are presumably assured the affections of do-gooder non-anti-Semites. Which brings us right back to the 1930s, when Jews couldn't have been more powerless or compliant. Nonetheless, their helplessness won them no kind consideration. "In those days before the war," Chaim Weizmann said in recalling international vexation with the Jews, "our protests were regarded as provocations. Our very refusal to subscribe to our own death sentence became a public nuisance." Words that could be spoken today. This also goes for Weizmann's warning to Anthony Eden: "The fire from the synagogues may easily spread to Westminster Abbey... If a government is allowed to destroy a whole community which has committed no crime... it means the beginning of anarchy and the destruction of the basis of civilization. The powers which stand looking on, without taking measures to prevent the crime, will one day be themselves visited by severe punishment." Children Of Jewish Holocaust Survivors (CJHSLA) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to the protection of freedom and actively promotes the right of the State of Israel to not only exist, but to flourish, as a Jewish state. CJHS insists that the moral imperative derived from the last Holocaust commits all people of good will to prevent the next one. A safe and secure Israel is vital to world interest.
This article appeared in
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SIZE MATTERS: TIME TO FOCUS ON THE QUANTITY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE
Posted by Michael Freund, April 21, 2009. |
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A startling new study reveals that had it not been for the Holocaust, there would be some 32 million Jews in the world today, rather than just 13 million. Just imagine a world in which a vibrant and ample Jewish people, more than double its present size, was not beset by the constant threat of demographic diminution and assimilatory attenuation. As I argue in the column below from the Jerusalem, the study's findings raise a related yet no less important question: To what extent does it matter how many Jews there are in the world? While many Jews tend to discount or minimize the importance of our numbers, I believe the time has come to shift our focus, and to start emphasizing not only quality, but quantity as well. Whether in basketball, business or international diplomacy, size truly does matter. This appeared today in Jerusalem Post
Comments and feedback may be sent to: letters@jpost.com or to me directly. thanks,
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Earlier this week, just in time for Holocaust Remembrance Day, a news item appeared in the media that sent a shiver up my spine. According to the report, distinguished demographer Sergio Della Pergola of the Hebrew University has concluded that had it not been for the Holocaust, there would be 32 million Jews in the world today, rather than just 13 million. The Holocaust, he noted, had "struck a mortal blow particularly at the Jews of Eastern Europe because of their especially young age structure." This, he said, had caused "significant long-term demographic damage" with ramifications "far beyond what we think." Indeed, as Della Pergola points out, the percentage of Jews in the world today is steadily declining. Whereas prior to World War II, there were eight Jews per thousand people in the world, the figure now stands at just two per every thousand, and it is heading southward. These findings are a timely and chilling reminder of the unfathomable destruction which the Holocaust wrought. Not only did it claim the six million who were murdered by the Germans and their collaborators, but it also took away their children, grandchildren and all of their descendants, forever depriving the Jewish people of untold millions of precious souls. In other words, the scope of the killing, magnified over time, becomes ever more extensive and incomprehensible. Just imagine a world in which a vibrant and ample Jewish people, more than double its present size, was not beset by the constant threat of demographic diminution and assimilatory attenuation. Consider for a moment the cultural and spiritual riches that we would be producing, the mighty intellectual and cerebral contributions to mankind that we could be making, and you begin to realize the extent of what has been lost.
BUT IN ADDITION to all the "what ifs," Della Pergola's research inevitably raises a related question, albeit one far more philosophical and theological in nature: To what extent does it matter how many Jews there are? Traditionally, of course, we have never placed a great deal of emphasis on the size or dimensions of the Jewish people. For the past 2000 years, living at the mercy of others, we tended to focus more on quality rather than quantity. That, perhaps, is why many Jews tend to discount or minimize the importance of our numbers, arguing that what really matters is whether we are working effectively to fulfill our national destiny. But this mode of thinking, I believe, is a product of exile, a function of the fact that we were more concerned with surviving, rather than thriving. In the process, we tended to lose sight of the important role that numbers can and do play in the life of a nation. Go back to the Bible, for example, where demographic prowess is repeatedly emphasized. In Genesis 13, God assures Abraham that his descendants shall be as numerous as the dust of the earth. The medieval commentator Rashi explains the promise as follows: "Just as the dust can not be counted, so too shall your seed be beyond counting." Similar pledges were made to the patriarchs Isaac and Jacob, and when Moses addressed Israel before his death, he too prophesied that God would multiply them "a thousand times over" (Deuteronomy 1:10-11). This, says the Ha'emek Davar commentary, is a promise that relates both to the quality and the quantity of the Jewish people.
SOMEHOW, WHILE we were getting collectively beaten up in the Diaspora over the centuries, we seem to have moved away from this approach. But now might be just the time to start rethinking it. After all, size does matter, whether in basketball, business or international diplomacy. And to make a difference in the world and live up to our national mission as Jews, we need a much larger and more diverse "team" at our disposal. This means that we not only need to work harder at keeping Jews Jewish, but we also must expand our horizons and look for other ways to boost our numbers. A good place to start would be with descendants of Jews, with communities that have a historical connection with the Jewish people and are now interested in returning. These include the Bnei Menashe of northeastern India, who are descended from a lost tribe of Israel, the Bnei Anousim of Spain, Portugal and South America (whom historians refer to by the derogatory term "Marranos"), the "Hidden Jews" of Poland from the Holocaust-era, as well as others. Through no fault of their own, these people's ancestors were taken by force from the Jewish people, and we owe it to them and their descendants to embrace them and welcome them back home. Doing so will not only right a historical wrong, but it will strengthen us numerically and spiritually as well. If you are still not convinced of the importance of numbers, consider the following. In his A History of the Jews, Paul Johnson notes that during the Herodian era there were eight million Jews in the world, "constituting about 10 percent of the Roman empire." At around the same time, a census in China conducted by the Han dynasty found that there were 57.5 million Chinese, or seven Chinese for every Jew. Jump ahead 2000 years to the present, and the numbers are of course quite different, with China seeking ways to limit its growth beyond 1.1 billion people, even as Jewry desperately searches for ways to maintain its 13 million members. We might never be able to match China's demographics, but we can and should look for new opportunities for growth. Our precarious state as a people, and the threats we face at home and abroad, demand as much.
The writer serves as chairman of Shavei Israel (www.shavei.org), a
Jerusalem-based group that assists 'lost Jews' seeking to return to
the Jewish people.
This article appeared today in the Jerusalem Post and is archived at
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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL: HATACHANA FALLS IN NACHAL AYUN
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, April 21, 2009. |
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This is one of Yehoshua Halevi's Golden Light Images. Yehoshua Halevi writes: "HOW I GOT THE SHOT: Standing at the base of a thundering double waterfall, spray misting in my hair and eyes, it's hard to imagine Israel has a water shortage. But return to this spot at the start of summer and you'll be lucky to see even a trickle of water dribbling over the 15-meter cliff. The Ayun Stream flows through Metulla, at the northernmost point of the Galilee panhandle. The park's canyon and highlands offer a family-friendly, two-hour hike that bypasses four waterfalls, of which Hatachana Falls, pictured here, is the most spectacular. For the photographer, this waterfall is also easily — and safely —
accessible from a variety of angles. I photographed at the base of the
waterfall, where I had to continually cover my camera with a handy
bandana as I composed to prevent the lens from gathering moisture. I
like this shot, taken right on the trail from above, because it best
conveys the overall grandeur of the site. Moving water lends itself to
two possible interpretations. A very fast shutter speed will capture
the flying molecules in total sharpness. Alternatively, in this photo,
I slowed the shutter speed to 1/6 of a second to smooth out the
cascading water for a more romantic rendering. Either way, the camera
captures a view of nature that remains hidden to the human eye.
Contact Yehoshua Halevi by email at smile@goldenlightimages.com
and visit his website:
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FROM ISRAEL: OBSCENE!
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 20, 2009. |
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Today a racist conference began in Geneva. Tonight began Yom HaShoah — Holocaust Memorial Day. Not only has the juxtaposition of these two events not gone unnoted, it carries a particular bitterness. The number of nations that decided not to attend Durban 2 is respectable. The more absent themselves, the less legitimacy the proceedings have. Germany, New Zealand, and Poland joined the line-up of those staying away. Biggest disappointments are Great Britain and France, which are in attendance. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner declared that the French representative would walk out "immediately" if the proceedings were racist or anti-Israel; and today he had his chance to prove it. Representatives of the EU, we were told, would be there as "observer" to make sure no "red lines" were crossed — and would "respond appropriately" to any "unacceptable" statement. And, it should be noted, the Vatican opted to participate. ~~~~~~~~~~ Biggest surprise, at least for me, was the statement by President Obama, declaring that the US could not attend the conference because of "hypocritical antagonism" towards Israel. "Our participation would have involved putting our imprimatur on something we just didn't believe in." Many had thought at the last moment he would decide to attend. There is only speculation as to why he didn't. ~~~~~~~~~~ Yesterday, Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz met Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for a meeting over dinner. All very "civilized." Today, Foreign Minister Lieberman — with Netanyahu's approval — called Israel's Ambassador in Switzerland, Ilan Elgar, back to Jerusalem for consultations as a sign of protest. Later, the Foreign Ministry summoned Monika Schmutz-Kirgoz, the head of Switzerland's diplomatic mission to Israel, for an "urgent discussion" to convey Israel's serious displeasure with the Ahmadinejad meeting. Said a Foreign Ministry spokesman: "A meeting with Ahmadinejad badly damages the international moral coalition against Iran and serves as a dishonorable move which should never take place. A head of state who has some respect for himself should not shake the hand of the Holocaust denier from Tehran." What matters most to me is that our Israeli representatives demonstrated enormous respect for our state by protesting this way. No shrinking violets here, but rather proud Israelis taking a forceful position. President Merz, who was not pleased, indicated that he had a right to do this as Switzerland is a neutral country. The Swiss were "neutral" during the Holocaust too, and gave quiet assistance to the Nazis. In a struggle against evil declared neutrality is itself immoral. ~~~~~~~~~~ So what happened at the opening day of the conference? Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave the key note address and called for the elimination of Israel. Israel, he said, was founded on the "pretext of suffering" after WWII. [ON Holocaust Remembrance Day, he speaks about a pretext!!] But Israel founded a "cruel and repressive racist regime." "Governments must be encouraged and supported in their fights at eradicating this barbaric racism. Efforts must be made to put an end to Zionism." In the course of his statements, dozens of delegates walked out. At this time I do not have exact information on which nations they represented; most were EU connected. But they didn't stay out. They returned to participate, in the face of the evidence of how the conference was hijacked, with the argument that they couldn't leave the conference to the racists. But they delude themselves, for the majority of those present didn't walk out and applauded the Iranian president. ~~~~~~~~~~ Present during the proceedings were some Jewish students, some from Israel and some — who donned clown wigs when Ahmadinejad began to speak, to show that the proceedings were a circus — from France. They came to heckle him, and were escorted from the auditorium. But they received a round of applause. ~~~~~~~~~~ UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon did not walk out but later deplored Ahmadinejad's remarks. ~~~~~~~~~~ From the Israeli Foreign Ministry came this statement: "The offensive and inflammatory incitement and humiliating and intolerable appeal to racist hate by the Iranian President, which were expressed during the first hours of the conference, constitute clear proof, for those who still require it, that the conference's agenda has been taken hostage and been diverted from real and necessary racism-related deliberations — to a brazen attack on Israel." ~~~~~~~~~~ The Holocaust Memorial Ceremony at Yad VaShem tonight was dedicated to Children of the Holocaust. Every year survivors light six torches in memory of the six million. Those who did this year were all young children at the start of the Holocaust. But there were seven, not six, because one set of identical twins was included: Iudit Barnea and Lia Huber (nées Tchengar). They were among the twins who endured the infamous twin experiments of Mengele. ~~~~~~~~~~ Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, one of the speakers at the Ceremony, said: "We will not let the Holocaust deniers perpetrate another holocaust on the Jewish people,. This is the highest responsibility of the State of Israel and of myself as prime minister. "Israel is the shield and the hope of the Jewish People. Here we create for the glory of our people and all of mankind. The country's achievements in every field — culture and science, medicine and security — are groundbreaking. We are a nation small in number but of great fortitude," ~~~~~~~~~~ Yet another speaker was IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-General Gabi Ashkenazi: "Even today we still face elements that seek to destroy us, those who hate us, Holocaust deniers and various leaders who openly call for our extermination. Stand tall, Israel! ~~~~~~~~~~ With all of the obscenity I've described here, I'm tempted to call this obscene as well. Or else just mind-numbingly stupid. The US tonight let it be known that even though Ahmadinejad gave a nasty speech today, it was still interested in direct negotiations with him. This was part of President Obama's policy of engagement. In a statement of particular profundity, State Department spokesman Robert Wood, speaking to reporters in Washington, said, "The comments that he made ... frankly feed racial hatred. If Iran ... wants a different relationship with the international community, it's got to change its behavior and stop this horrible rhetoric." ~~~~~~~~~~ So much more to write, but tomorrow awaits. I close here with a link to my piece on YNet that went up today, "PA's Fallacious Premises":
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THE TEENAGER WHO EXPOSED AUSCHWITZ
Posted by Shaul Ceder, April 20, 2009. |
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This was written by Rafael Medoff and it appeared in the Jerusalem Post..
Rafael Medoff is director of the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies. The address of the website is www.WymanInstitute.org |
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This month marks the 65th anniversary of a daring escape from Auschwitz, by a teenager who then revealed the truth about the death camp — only to be ignored by the Allied leadership. In March 1944, the Germans occupied Hungary and began preparing to deport that country's Jews — numbering approximately 750,0000 — to Auschwitz. A 19-year-old prisoner named Rudolf Vrba, together with fellow-inmate Alfred Wetzler, decided to do something that almost nobody had ever done before: escape from Auschwitz. They were determined to alert the world about the doom that Hungarian Jews would soon face. On April 7, Vrba and Wetzler slipped away from their slave labor battalion and hid in a hollowed-out woodpile near the edge of the camp. On the advice of Soviet prisoners of war, the fugitives sprinkled the area with tobacco and gasoline, which confused the German dogs that were used to search for them. On their second day in the woodpile, Vrba and Wetzler heard Allied warplanes overhead. "They came closer and closer — then bombs began to crunch not far away," Vrba later recalled in his searing memoir I Cannot Forgive. "Our pulses quickened. Were they going to bomb the camp? Was the secret out?... Was this the end of Auschwitz?" THE ALLIED PLANES were actually bombing German oil factories in and around the Auschwitz complex. The idea of bombing the death camp had not yet been proposed to the Allied leadership, and details such as the location of the gas chambers and crematoria were not yet known to the Allied war command. But that was about to change. On April 10, in the dead of night, Vrba and Wetzler emerged from the woodpile and began an 11-day, 80-mile trek to Slovakia. There they met with Jewish leaders and dictated a 30-page report that came to be known as the "Auschwitz Protocols." It included details of the mass-murder process, maps pinpointing the gas chambers and crematoria and warnings of the impending slaughter of Hungary's Jews. "One million Hungarian [Jews] are going to die," Vrba told them. "Auschwitz is ready for them. But if you tell them now, they will rebel. They will never go to the ovens." A COPY of the report was given to Rudolf Kastner, a Budapest Jewish leader. Instead of publicizing the information, Kastner negotiated a deal that involved bribing the Germans to permit a train with 1,684 of his relatives, friends and Hungarian Jewish leaders to leave the country. Kastner's action became the centerpiece of a controversial trial in Israel after the war. Another copy of Vrba's Auschwitz Protocols was given to Rabbi Michoel Dov Weissmandl, a rescue activist in Bratislava, who then wrote the first known appeal for the use of Allied air power to disrupt the mass murder. Weissmandl's plea to the Allies to bomb the railroad lines between Hungary and Auschwitz reached the Roosevelt administration in June. Assistant secretary of war John McCloy responded that the request was "impracticable" because it would require "diversion of considerable air support essential to the success of our forces now engaged in decisive operations." He also claimed the War Department's position was based on "a study" of the issue. But no evidence of such a study has ever been found by researchers. In reality, McCloy's position was based on the War Department's standing policy that no military resources should be allocated for "rescuing victims of enemy oppression."
VRBA'S REPORT convinced the Jewish Agency leadership in Palestine to change its position on bombing. Agency leaders initially opposed bombing Auschwitz because they believed it was a labor camp, not a death camp. But after receiving the Auschwitz Protocols in June, agency officials lobbied British, American and Soviet officials to bomb the camp or the railways leading to it. Their requests were rebuffed. Most important, a condensed version of the Auschwitz Protocols reached the US government's War Refugee Board in June. It helped galvanize the board to mobilize international pressure on Hungary to halt the deportations to Auschwitz. Although that effort came too late for the more than 400,000 Hungarian Jews who had been shipped to their doom, it did spare the 200,000-plus who were still alive in Budapest. The full version of the Vrba report was actually held up in Switzerland for three months by US diplomats who regarded it as low priority. And when the report finally reached Washington in October, the Office of War Information opposed distributing it; OWI director Elmer Davis claimed the report was actually part of a Nazi conspiracy to "create contempt for the [Jewish] inmates" by showing that the Jews were not resisting their killers. Fortunately, Davis and his cockamamie theories were too late to blunt the impact of the Auschwitz Protocols. The Hungarian deportations had been stopped, and Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler had played a significant role in bringing that about. Contact the Ceders at ceder@netvision.net.il |
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PRESENTING THE 1943 WARSAW GHETTO UPRISING NY TIMES-STYLE
Posted by Dr. Gadi Eshel, April 20, 2009. |
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Tonight, is the Holocaust Memorial Day (Yom HaSho'ah) in Israel. It has been set so as to mark the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, and it is hence named Sho'ah and G'vurah ("Holocaust and Fortitude"). See below recent findings, that tie it to current-day threats. |
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Contact Dr. Eshel at gadi.eshel@ptk.co.il |
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REVIEW OF ISRAEL APARTHEID WEEK
Posted by Rachel Golem, April 19, 2009. | |
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My light-hearted attack on the looney left. | |
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This article is archived at
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COLUMBIA PROFESSOR MASSAD IS A BULLY AND DOES NOT DESERVE LIFETIME EMPLOYMENT
Posted by Barbara Sommer, April 19, 2009. |
| This appeared April 13, 2009 in the New York Daily News. |
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There is a deeply disturbing report that Columbia University has granted tenure to a teacher who used his classroom as a platform for propagating offensive teachings about Jews — and bullied his students to boot. Joseph Massad should have no place on the faculty of a world-class institution of higher learning, let alone a university located in New York. He showed himself to lack the quality of mind and temperament necessary to serve among the Columbia professoriate. Massad is a Jordanian-born Palestinian who teaches in the department of Middle East and Asian languages and cultures. That he does not belong in Morningside Heights became clear in 2005, when a university investigation concluded he "exceeded commonly accepted bounds" of teaching. How? By threatening to banish a student who had asked a question that challenged Massad's Israel-is-evil point of view. "If you're going to deny the atrocities being committed against Palestinians, then you can get out of my classroom," he said. On another occasion, Massad demanded that a student, a former Israeli soldier, tell him how many Palestinians he had killed. Said to be a scholar of contemporary Arab politics and culture, Massad crosses into lunacy regarding Jews. In one article, he proclaimed that Jews are infected by a mass psychosis that drives them to persecute Palestinians, put Israel's record on a par with Nazi mass murders and said Palestinians are the "real Jews" while Jews are the real anti-Semites. Although Massad had grossly violated a student's academic freedom, Columbia chose to consider his fitness in its process for granting tenure, or lifetime appointment. Generally, professors leave if they don't get tenure. In October, there was hope Columbia would dump Massad after Provost Alan Brinkley moved to block his tenure. But now, a crackpot California professor writes on a blog that the university gave Massad its blessings. In a message addressed "to all the Zionist hoodlums out there," As'ad AbuKhalil wrote that "dear Joseph Massad deservedly received his tenure." This happened, he went on, despite "dirty tricks" and "sinister propaganda" by said Zionist hoodlums. Columbia would not confirm or deny AbuKhalil's report. If it is correct, President Lee Bollinger and board of trustees Chairman William Campbell have let the university down and owe an apology to New York, most especially its Jewish community.
Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: DELUDED AND DANGEROUS
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 19, 2009. |
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America has lost her way, and I sit here in Israel aghast at what I'm seeing. From the beginning of his candidacy it was clear that Obama was going to be bad news. But I confess that I never imagined quite how bad it would be. I never imagined that a turn-around — from what America had been to what it now is — was possible so quickly. The president of the United States grovels before tyrants and makes it possible for enemies of the free world to garner strength. He speaks without dignity as an American and courts Muslims who wish the Western world ill. Incrementally, I've been writing about this — about the demeaning bow to the king of Saudi Arabia, for example; the diminishing of requirements placed on Iran if there are to be face-to-face negotiations, so that the US is now to the left (!) of Europe; the patent foolishness of speaking of "moderate" Taliban with whom the US soldiers might connect. It goes on and on. Not only would Obama diminish US stature in the world, he would reduce America's defensive capability, as he is in favor of cutting the US nuclear arsenal and reducing the American missile defense system. Could it possibly be that he imagines that US enemies, facing a kinder, gentler America, would opt to follow suit? Can it possibly be that the US electorate will continue to sit still for this? According to commentator Caroline Glick, ultimately there will be a turn-around and the issue is one of preventing damage until that happens. ~~~~~~~~~~ From the perspective here, there are serious concerns about US positions that are not in Israel's best interest. That goes for pressure for a "two-state solution" and efforts to discourage or block Israel from attacking Iranian nuclear facilities. (There are many analysts who link the two issues.) The ability of the Netanyahu government to stand strong right now — and to make the best possible decisions for Israel — is incredibly important. ~~~~~~~~~~ Today PM Netanyahu held the first of what will be a series of policy review forums on Israeli-Palestinian issues, in order to formulate policy before he meets with President Obama in a month. In attendance were Defense Minister Barak, Foreign Minister Lieberman, Uzi Arad — head of the National Security Council and the prime minister's national security advisor, and Amos Gilad, head of the Defense Ministry's Security-Diplomatic Bureau. What made news from that meeting was that Barak was pushing for an development of an Israeli peace plan based on the Arab "Peace Initiative" that would lead to a Palestinian state, but that would meet all Israeli demands for security and recognition as a Jewish state. To put matters baldly, I don't know what the hell this man is talking about. For it is an impossibility to fashion a "peace plan" that meets legitimate Israeli demands and is also based on the Arab initiative — which is a plan for Israeli destruction. But — even though I don't know what Netanyahu and the others said in response to this suggestion, and I am mindful that this is the press take on matters — I begin to feel unease in the pit of my stomach. ~~~~~~~~~~ In response to a Netanyahu demand that the PA recognize Israel as a Jewish state, has come a resounding — and not unexpected — refusal to do so. Azzam al-Ahmed, a confidant of Abbas and senior Fatah official, declared yesterday that "We reject Netanyahu's demand to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. This demand illustrates the racist nature of its government..." The Palestinians come out swinging every time, and expect the world to swallow their statements. But it behooves me to point out that the sanctimonious charges made here are from a representative of a political entity that wants to establish a state, based on Islam, that is totally Judenrein. Exactly who is racist? ~~~~~~~~~~ Netanyahu has clarified his position on the matter. Despite press claims to the contrary, he says, he never refused to talk to the Palestinians before they recognize us as a Jewish state, rather, what he says is that any progress in talks will be dependent upon this. This felt to me like a back-tracking, but I checked it and indeed he seems to be telling it straight. The simple fact of the matter is that our prime minister is enduring incredible pressures. He is trying to walk a path that is in Israel's best interest without being so "in your face" that he incurs unnecessary international hostility. What I implore Israelis reading this to do, then, is to contact Netanyahu, praise him for his positions, and let him know that the nation is behind him Please, also encourage others in Israel to do the same. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu:
~~~~~~~~~~ And I urge all US citizens reading this to contact elected representatives there. Those who should be contacted: Howard Berman (D-CA 28th), Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee
Congressman Berman is a straight-talking man. Ileana Ros-Lehtenin (FL 18th), Ranking Republican on House Foreign Affairs Committee
Ileana is one of the best friends we have in the House. She gets it and should hear that we appreciate her. John Kerry (D-MA), Chair, Foreign Relations Committee
Let us say that Senator Kerry is not one of Israel's better friends. Richard Lugar (IN), Ranking Republican on Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Neither is Senator Lugar where we might hope he would be.
The message is simple (please, stated in your own words as possible). Do not allow pressure to be placed on Israel with regard to a two-state solution. Such a solution is not even viable as there is no one partner with which Israel can negotiate, and the current situation represents a threat to Israeli security. What is more, Israel must be supported in her right to self-defense with regard to Iran. ~~~~~~~~~~ One of the priorities listed by Likud as the new government was being formed was education. And we now have the first good news on that front. Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar has appointed Dr. Shimshon Shoshani to be Director-General of the Ministry. Shoshani has just announced a new program that will require all elementary and high school students in the country to visit Jerusalem and learn about the capital. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Durban 2 Forum begins in Geneva tomorrow. Along with Israel, Canada, the US, Italy, and now Australia and Holland, have decided not to participate. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, saying that this is a "hypocrisy forum," has called on more states to refuse to attend. "The fact that a racist like Ahmadinejad is the main speaker proves the true aim and nature of the conference." According to YNet, it appears Germany may not attend, and other EU nations may stay away as well. Over the last two days NGOs have been gearing up with anti-Israel activities preliminary to the main Forum. Yesterday, the Israel Review Conference, a coalition of anti-Israel NGOs, met. Today the global Campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel held workshops. Included was discussion of a European resistance movement, based on the concept "We are all Hezbollah, we are all Hamas. The world stopped Nazism, the world stopped Apartheid, we will stop Zionism." This gives you an idea of precisely how obscene and hateful — and terrorist-embracing — this gathering is. Maybe some nations still considering their options will get the message. ~~~~~~~~~~
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THE PROFESSOR'S PARANOIA
Posted by Jonathan Schanzer, April 19, 2009. |
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Rashid Khalidi, the former PLO spokesman-turned Columbia University professor, is convinced that Israel has constructed a "matrix of control" in the Middle East. Khalidi once cited books and articles to back up his skewed views of Middle East history. Now he cites obscure Internet claims of an "occupation settlement industrial complex." On April 1, Khalidi gave a one-hour phone briefing to Brit Tzedek v'Shalom (The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace) — a leftist organization based in Chicago. While occasionally sounding balanced and insightful, he launched into short rants throughout the call. Notably, about eight minutes in, he began to froth about a "network of interests which is bound up with the maintenance of this matrix of control. The occupation settlement industrial complex — a network of companies that an Israeli Web site called 'whoprofits' put together." Based on this site, which published a disclaimer about the "accuracy, completeness, usefulness of any information and/or documents disclosed," along with input from radical leftists like Jeff Halper and Palestinian apologists like Amira Haas, Khalidi claimed there are "hundreds of companies, hi-tech companies, that keep the databases on which Israel manages... the four million Palestinians... The telephone databases to the security companies that manage the checkpoints to the companies that build the roads... the settler-only roads." And so on and so forth. This assertion is outrageous on several levels. The Palestinians constitute a never-ending financial and political burden for the Jewish state. From within the Palestinian population also comes a constant terrorist threat which requires millions of dollars in training and resources each year to counter. To imply that Israel prospers from this albatross is preposterous. Khalidi must also be called out for attempting to further the canard of "settler-only roads." Media analyst Tamar Sternthal pointed out in 2003 that such roads do not exist. "There are no roads in the West Bank or Gaza which are open only to settler traffic." Khalidi, who claims to be an expert on the Palestinians, should know better. He should also know better than to assert, as he did, that the United States is responsible for the Palestinian civil war between Hamas and Fatah. Khalidi called the internecine conflict "a function of external powers like the United States... doing all they can to split the Palestinians in service of their own narrow objectives." To his credit, Khalidi also includes Iran among those "external powers." But his swipe at Washington is far off the mark. The Obama administration desperately seeks to reconcile these two factions in its effort to establish an interlocutor for future Palestinian-Israeli negotiations. KHALIDI THEN launched into a harangue about the influence of a right-wing Jewish lobby, echoing the dangerous sentiments of the discredited book The Israel Lobby by Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer: "If you look at where AIPAC, say, stands, or at where the Conference of Presidents stands, or at where the American Jewish Committee stands, or at where the ADL stands, I mean, they're sort of to the right of Genghis Khan. They're somewhere between Likud and... I don't know... Avigdor Lieberman." Khalidi again misses by a wide margin. These organizations are almost monolithically liberal and Democratic in outlook, and warmly embrace the notion of a negotiated two-state solution. Yet, Khalidi asserted, based on nothing he could possibly cite as proof, that "most of the people who head these organizations voted for [Arizona Sen. John] McCain." He concluded his thoughts about the Jewish lobby in this way: "The leadership — which is to the right of McCain — represent, you know, a bunch of people who are in another universe." In his smear of these groups, Khalidi was preaching to the choir. Brit Tzedek stands at the fringe of the Jewish political spectrum, and ultimately yearns to gain influence through the demise of AIPAC and its other competitors. Khalidi also preached to his obsequious audience that the Palestinian violence against Israel is not anti-Semitic. Rather, he asserts that the fears of Palestinian anti-Semitic violence held by Israelis and world Jewry stem from a persecution complex. The former spokesman for the PLO, an organization responsible for killing hundreds of Jews, claims that the Jews of Israel "read into their present everything that they've experienced in their past, so that the Palestinians and the Arabs are just the latest version of the Cossacks, the Nazis, the Inquisition, the this, the that.... one has nothing to do with the other." "Palestinian resistance to Israel has nothing to do with European anti-Semitism," he insisted. Yet it is widely known that the mainstream Palestinian press engages in Holocaust denial and blood libel. For years, Palestinian school textbooks have been teaching children anti-Semitic ideas. And if that weren't enough, Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf is consistently a best-selling book in the West Bank and Gaza. Khalidi even contradicted himself on this topic, admitting earlier in the call that Hamas was vehemently anti-Semitic. Indeed, the Hamas charter states that, "Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Muslim people." The conference call, in the end, confirmed that Khalidi's scholarship continues to slip from research into naked advocacy. In this case, advocacy has slipped further into paranoia. The appeal of Khalidi's radical scholarship, particularly among Jews, is inexplicable. Yet he continues his disinformation campaign among students and activists alike, demonstrating the continued need for reform in Middle Eastern studies today. The writer, a former US Treasury intelligence analyst, is deputy executive director of the Jewish Policy Center and author of Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine (Palgrave Macmillan 2008). JPC intern Samara Greenberg contributed to this article. This article appeared yesterday in the Jerusalem Post
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STATEMENT BY ANNE BAYEFSKY AT THE THIRD SUBSTANTIVE PREPARATORY MEETING OF THE DURBAN REVIEW CONFERENCE
Posted by Anne Bayefsky, April 17, 2009. |
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United Nations, Palais des Nations, GENEVA, Switzerland The eyes of millions of victims of racism, xenophobia and intolerance are upon YOU, the representatives of states and the United Nations. And instead of hope you have given them despair. Instead of truth you have handed them diplomatic double-talk. Instead of combating antisemitism you have handed them a reason for Jews to fear UN-driven hatemongering on a global scale. The Durban conference — allegedly dedicated to combating racism, antisemitism and other forms of intolerance — will open April 20th on the anniversary of the birth of Adolf Hitler without agreement on even so much as remembering the Holocaust and the war against the Jews. Your draft words on the Holocaust — the very foundation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights — have been narrowed to the barest mention from previous versions. And if the minor reference survives at all — it will be a testament to your interest in Jews that died 60 years ago, while tolerating and encouraging the murder of Jews in the here and now. Furthermore, the draft before you demonizes the Jewish state of Israel and then has the audacity to pretend to care about antisemitism in a single word buried among 17 pages. Antisemitism means discrimination against the Jewish people. Since it is evident that almost none of you have the courage to say it, the face of modern antisemitism IS the UN — your — discrimination against Israel, the embodiment of the Jewish people's right to self-determination. Over and over again we have heard a massive misinformation campaign about the content of these proceedings and the draft before you. We have heard the tale that this draft does not single out Israel, that the hate has been removed, that the fault of the antisemitism at Durban I was that of NGOs while states and the UN were blameless. Perhaps you think that journalists and victims will not bother to read for themselves the Durban Declaration adopted by some governments. There is only one state mentioned in it — Israel. There is only one state associated with racist practices in it — Israel. And yet the very first thing that this draft before you does is to reaffirm that abomination, abomination for Jews and Arabs living in Israel's free and democratic society, and for all the victims of racism ignored therein. Lawyers call it incorporation by reference when they hope nobody reads the small print. The propaganda stops here. We have read it. We understand the game. And we decry the ugly effort to repeat the Durban agenda to isolate and defeat Israel politically, as every effort to do so militarily for decades has failed. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Chair of this Preparatory Committee also told us this week that the Durban Declaration in all its aspects is a consensus text. Perhaps they are unfamiliar with the Canadian reservations made in Durban in 2001 which state categorically that the Middle East language was outside the conference's jurisdiction and not agreed. Perhaps they failed to notice that one of the world's greatest democracies, the United States, voted with its feet and walked out of the Durban I hatefest? The Durban Declaration has never represented a global consensus among free and democratic nations. When the head of the Islamic conference treats Durban as a bible, in their words, it is more accurately a defamation of religions. This week you decided which states ought to serve in a leadership role at next week's conference. Among them are some of the world's leading practitioners of racism, not those interested in ending it. You have also decided to hand a global megaphone to the President of a state which advocates genocide and denies the Holocaust. So in a state of shock and dismay we address ourselves not to the human rights abusers that glorify the Durban Declaration or its next incarnation, but to democracies — and we ask: Will Germany sit on Hitler's birthday and listen to the speech of an advocate of genocide against the Jewish people and grant legitimacy to the forum which tolerates his presence? What about the United Kingdom, the birthplace of the Magna Carta? Or France that helped to ship last generation's Jews to crematoriums? You could have fought racism. You chose instead to fight Jews. You could have promoted the universal standards against racism already in existence. You chose instead to diminish their importance in the name of alleged cultural preferences. You could have protected freedom of expression. You chose instead to undermine it by twisted concepts of incitement. You could have brought victims of racism together in a common cause. You chose instead to pit victims against each other in an ugly struggle for meagre recognition. For those democracies that remain under these circumstances you are ultimately responsible for what can only be called an appalling disservice to real victims of racism, xenophobia and related intolerance around the world. Contact Anne Bayefsky at anne.bayefsky@touro.edu |
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ISLAMISTS OF THE WORLD UNITE; YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE EXCEPT ANY PRETEXT OF BEING MODERATE
Posted by Barry Rubin, April 16, 2009. |
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It's a development of tremendous importance and you probably won't be hearing about it from anywhere but here. Mahdi Akef, supreme guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, has defied his own country's government to ally himself with Hizballah. What makes this such a remarkable and high-risk step? — The Muslim Brotherhood is Sunni Muslim; the Lebanese Hizballah group is Shia. Brotherhood leaders do not view Shia Islamists as brothers and in the past have been alarmed at the rising power of Shia forces in Lebanon and Iraq. — Hizballah is a client of Iran's regime. As a Shia and non-Arab power, Iran is not on the Brotherhood's Ramadan greeting card list. — Egypt's government has just announced a major Hizballah effort to destabilize the country by staging terrorist attacks there. Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah has openly called for the overthrow of Egypt's regime. He has now acknowledged connections with the arrested terrorists, though he claims their mission was to help Hamas and attack Israel. The Egyptian government has rejected this justification. As a result, siding with Hizballah risks a government-sponsored wave of suppression against the Brotherhood. — This step also makes the Brotherhood look unpatriotic in Arab and Sunni terms to millions of Egyptians by siding with Persian Iranians and Shia Muslims. — Akef's statement tears the chador off the pretension that the Brotherhood has become moderate. Of course, while not engaging in political violence within Egypt, it has long supported terrorism against Israel and the United States (in Iraq). Now, to this is added backing an Iran-Syria takeover of Lebanon and at least the image of accepting armed struggle against the Egyptian government by others. What did Akef and his colleagues say that was so significant? The story is told in the London-based Arabic newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsat, April 15. Put into a seemingly innocuous framework of supporting the Palestinians, the Brotherhood's new line ends up in some shocking conclusions. Akef said that Hamas should be supported, "By any means necessary." The implication is, since the Brotherhood has always favored abrogation of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty that Egypt should go to war with Israel on behalf of the Palestinians. A Brotherhood government would probably do just that. Hussein Ibrahim, deputy leader of the Brotherhood's parliamentary bloc, which includes about 20 percent of the legislators, in calling for full Egyptian support of Hamas, stated, "Our enemy and Hizballah's enemy are the same." That enemy would seem to be Israel. But is Israel the only such enemy? Akef took Hizballah's side against Egypt's rulers. Since Hizballah leader Nasrallah had denied he was doing anything against Egypt, everyone should take his word for it rather than that of Egyptian President Husni Mubarak. In a statement to Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, Akef said there were two competing camps in the region, respectively waving the banners of "cooperative resistance" and of the "protection of the state's sovereignty." Countries like Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia are rejecting Iranian influence and Islamist takeovers in the name of their own continued sovereignty. Yet "resistance" is the basic slogan of the Iranian-led coalition. Akef insisted that he didn't seek to compromise Egypt's sovereignty. But asked how he could reconcile these two "axes" and why Egypt should help Hizballah he responded: "There are two agendas [in the region]...an agenda working to protect and support the resistance against the Zionist enemy, and an agenda that only cares about satisfying the Americans and the Zionists." Any Arab listener must take this to mean that there are the properly struggling forces — Iran, Syria, Hamas, Hizballah — and the vile traitors — Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the Iraqi government. In addition, it is obvious that if there was a large-scale Hizballah attack on Israel from Egypt — with multiple suicide bombers coming from Egyptian territory to try to commit a September 11-type attack in Israel — Cairo would be dragged into a major crisis with Israel. War could result. This is, after all, what has happened in the past. What the Brotherhood wants from Egypt — as the PLO did in the 1960s and 1970s in Jordan and later in Lebanon — is to give up its sovereignty and act as a military base from which Hamas can do anything it wants. Such behavior not only led to repeated military clashes as Israel retaliated against Jordan and Lebanon but also to serious destabilization within those two countries. Ibrahim made another telling statement in saying that the Muslim Brotherhood "do not see any contradiction in supporting the resistance and protecting the state's sovereignty. We are in support of the resistance, in Gaza, and Palestine, and Lebanon...." Why, however, did he include Lebanon? After all, the overwhelming majority of Lebanese Sunnis oppose Hizballah, viewing it as an arm of Syrian-Iranian power. The apparent answer is that Hizballah is fighting Israel and that the Palestinian issue overrides every other consideration. Yet the Brotherhood is making choices. It certainly doesn't support the Palestinian Authority, controlled by nationalist forces, but only the Islamist Hamas. And it opposes having an independent Palestinian state created through a peace process with Israel. Moreover, so what if both Hizballah and the Brotherhood support Hamas? One would expect that the Brotherhood would feel itself engaged in a battle of influence with Hizballah as to who would be Hamas's patron, and that of a supposed future Islamist Palestine. Could Brotherhood leaders not have noticed that in Lebanon there is no Hamas among Palestinians there because Iran and Hizballah seek to control them directly? Under cover of supporting "the Palestinians," then, the Brotherhood's priority is on backing Islamist revolution in Iraq, Lebanon, among the Palestinians, Egypt, and elsewhere. The Brotherhood doesn't engage in violence not out of principle but because the Egyptian government is too strong, the Brotherhood is too weak, and it hopes to make gains through elections aided by "useful idiots" in the West. If it feels the power balance shift in the future, it would have no compunction about launching a revolution. And as it gains in power, the extremism of its program will be more openly exposed. When Ibrahim says, "Our enemy and Hizballah's enemy are the same," it sends two messages to the Egyptian government and those who oppose an Islamist Egypt. First, that enemy includes the Egyptian regime itself. Second, the Brotherhood's friends and Hizballah's friends are also the same. In this analysis, the conclusion as to who the Brotherhood wants Egyptian Muslims to support is inevitable: who is fighting the hardest and being the most intransigent? The "resistance" led by Iran, which may have nuclear weapons in a year or so. Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and co-author of "Yasir Arafat: A Political Biography" and "Hating America: A History" (Oxford University Press). His latest book is The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). Prof. Rubin's columns can now be read online at http://gloria.idc.ac.il/columns/column.html. Contact him at profbarryrubin@yahoo.com |
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OBAMA ADMINISTRATION STACKING THE DECK WITH ISLAMISTS
Posted by M. Zuhdi Jasser, April 16, 2009. |
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As we try to understand where the Obama administration will fall with regards to the global threat of political Islam, the first few months have provided a number of hints, not least of which was the tenor of the recent visit to Turkey. It was painfully obvious after witnessing the length to which the Obama team went to avoid any substantive discussion on political Islam and the threat it poses to human rights abroad and domestically. Domestically, in the weeks preceding his trip, Islamists inside the Beltway began to more openly play their cards to what they obviously perceive to be a friendly administration. Groups like the Congressional Muslim Staffers Association (CMSA) are trying to establish themselves in a position of influence inside the White House, the House, and the Senate. It's the Ideology! First just review some of the activities and commentary of Beltway Islamists since the transition and the Inauguration. On January 8th, the Congressional Muslim Staffers Association sent out an email announcing that they would be hosting an inaugural gala titled, "Muslim Inauguration Gala". Guests included Congressman Keith Ellison, (D-MN), Cong. Andre Carson (D-IN), "Representatives of the Obama Administration", Rev. Walter Fauntroy (DC-Delegate), Zaid Shakir and Hamza Yusef (of the Zaytuna Institute), Fmr. Capt. James Yee, Senegalese President Abduolaye Wade, CAIR Michigan Director, Dawud Walid, and Johari Abdul-Malik of the Muslim Alliance of North America. This list reads like a Who's Who of leading Islamists in the United States, all of whom share the ideological framework of political Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood. One need not look far to see the types of ideas shared by these Muslims. For example, Mr. Johari Abdul-Malik spoke just last year at a July 2008 London conference of the "Radical Middle Way". This Radical Middle Way, sadly British government supported, is an ideological outgrowth of the ideas of Sheikh Yusef Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. Abdul-Malik stated the following about the Obama campaign and Islamist activism in a speech entitled "Can Muslims Trust Obama?" Now Barak Obama has been able to identify himself as both black and white. When he's in Chicago he's black, when he's in Kansas he's white, and when he's in Hawaii he's Hawaiian [audience laugh]. He actually is Hawaiian because he was born there..." "In the place that we live now the strategy for Muslim Americans now, is to place the priority of regime change in Washington. Because the White House was putting out this message that we need regime change in Iraq, we need democracy and freedom in Iran. Malcolm said `when they told me to go out and find the enemy I don't have to go as far as Vietnam to find that enemy, I can find the enemy right here. So if we're willing to fight for freedom there, then we ought to be able to fight for freedom here.' So in America, we're looking for regime change in Washington. And the only regime change that we can look forward to in the near future is to get the Democrats in the White House and put the Republicans, as Malcolm would say, `in the dog house'...." After his speech, Mr. Abdul-Malik was asked whether it was permitted to vote in American elections according to Islam. In response he stated, "I could take the examples and say subhān Allah, how can you do that, it's a Christian system and it's unlawful. The Nagashi of Ethiopia, he was secretly a Muslim and head of State — that's permissible." Mr. Abdul-Malik is actually very proud of the political tarring and feathering he does as an imam at a mosque (classical Islamism) in Northern Virginia and in fact predicts the utility of soon a Muslim candidate for a `full-fledged candidate for President": "I told some Muslims, you know, we should invite some of our political enemies to our rallies and meetings so that they can be taught and so we can say we love them, and let them say `no no no.' And by the way, this really did happen. One candidate in northern Virginia came to the mosque and he was attacked by some conservatives, saying `why did you go to the mosque?' and he said `no, I'm not with them at all-believe me-I'm not.' It was political suicide for her, but we helped him. We put the tar on him, opened up a pillow case and waited for a wind to start blowing and feathered him right there. So I think the question of political accountability will be there for whoever wins.... our thought would be to run a full-fledged Muslim candidate for President. In which all the questions would not be about the economy, not about jobs, healthcare — it would be about Islam." Abdul-Malik also makes no bones about discussing how the election of President Obama is a step forward in the project of Islamization and the long term goal of Islamist domination which falls right in lock-step with that of the Muslim Brotherhood as revealed in their manifesto. He said: "This is our challenge; to say `ok, I'm not a Muslim but I'm fascinated by the nation of Muslims and Islam and so on and so on... People of da'wa think that the outcome is to turn everyone into a Muslim and that will turn the tide. That was not the case in Yathrib, at the time of the Prophet (saw), it was not the case in Andalusia, it was not the case in so many civilisations that Islam had impacted upon. It took hundreds of years in some societies for Muslims to become 50% of the population but they had those four sections of the population to say `we will not have racists and bigots and sexists to have dominance over people who are fair minded, reasonable and rational... " Abdul-Malik finally makes a very revealing statement about his prediction about the collapse of the United States government: "For me, again, I'm not putting my faith in the Government. My faith is in Allah, I don't believe in the Government. If I believed in the Government, then we would have been involved in the civil rights movement. Slavery — my people were slaves, I don't know if you know that, we did not rely on the good will of the Government to get us out of slavery. We organised internally and externally to end slavery. Now what your idea would have been would be to get out of the abolitionist movement. Eventually the United States Government will fall under its own weight and you'll be free" Notice Abdul Malik's reference to "Muslim nation". Notice his reference to "regime change." Notice the magic number of `50% Muslim' where Abdul Malik's Muslim political party (aka Muslim Brotherhood) can then control the electorate and enact their interpretation of "shar'ia' law" as a majority in their mobocracy. This was just a peek into Abdul Malik's beliefs. He is no small fish in the American Islamist community. He is a protégé of Siraj Wahhaj, the well known Islamist and unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 WTC bombing. He is President of the Coordinating Council of Muslim Organizations (CCMO) and the outreach director for Dar-Al Hijra mosque in Northern Virginia. The CCMO represents more than 50 Muslim organizations and mosques in the D.C. area. This same group, true to Islamist separatist ideology recently signed a statement from the "grand pooba of Islamist organizations in the United States" (the American Muslim Task Force) suspending their relationship with the FBI. Hardly the action of a "mainstream Muslim group." Each of the invitees to the Muslim Inaugural shindig has a plethora of speeches and writings in the public space which documents their own transnational agenda of political Islam. Abdul-Malik told his colleagues long before how, "...even under the pressures that you and I know about, the deen of Islam is growing because people see even within all of this struggle it is better to be a Muslim under these conditions than to be a kaffir under any conditions... before Allah closes our eyes for the last time you will see Islam move from being the second largest religion in America — that's where we are now — to being the first religion in America." Look into the comments and ideologies of others at this so-called `Muslim' gala. These Islamist headliners have long been spreading their collectivist, socialist and oppressive ideologies of political Islam across the world. It seems that no one is paying much attention to ideology anymore. Roll Call ran a piece discussing the gala quoting Kucinich and Ellison. They included this comment from CMSA coordinator and staff of Cong. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ), Assad Akhter, "People really want to believe in this president...it has a lot to do with who he is and the campaign he ran. He involved different groups, and they feel they had a part in this." Revealingly, it did not seem to be very important to Casey Hynes of Roll Call to query any Muslim organizations who chose not to attend this gala. Stacking the Deck With that platform laid out, the CMSA also began a push during the transition to distribute a "Resume Book" of Muslims to offices on the Hill including the House, Senate, and the White House. The email from Mr. Saleh on November 20, 2008 stated, "This is an important initiative that CMSA feels is greatly needed to promote the hiring of talented Muslim American staffers in the 111th Congress. It is CMSA's desire to provide Congressional Leadership, new Member Offices, and Committee Chairs with Resume Books that represents the diverse, highly educated, and young professional Muslim American community. This can only happen if a broad cross-section of the Muslim American community receives the "Request for Resumes." In a subsequent email, Mr. Williams lists some of the positions sought to be filled including Chief of Staff, Professional Staff, Legislative Director, Legislative Assistant, Press, and Scheduling. A Chicago Tribune report of March 29, 2009 soft-peddled the move as "driven by community leaders...and bumped up two weeks ahead of schedule because White House officials heard about the venture" quoting J. Saleh Williams of the CMSA who put together the `book' of around 49 names from a list of greater than 300 Muslims. This is an oddly soft piece from the Tribune considering many of the leadership of CMSA have worked closely with leaders of the Muslim American Society in D.C. and other Islamist groups which the same Tribune reporter exhaustively connected to the international movement of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in her November 19 2004 in her exposé on the MB in the United States. Williams further told the Tribune that, "it was mostly under the radar...we thought it would put President Obama in a precarious position. We didn't know how closely he wanted to appear to be working with the Muslim American community." This group of Islamists is, here, openly telling reporters that they are advocating for placement in positions of influence "under the radar." They do this with the appearance and false assumption that somehow all Muslims in the U.S. would be overjoyed by their activities and ideology. The report by Abdul-Ullah went on to also link other global Islamist ideologies for outreach to their resume book initiative including outreach to the Syrian and Iranian governments and Islamist complaints about the FBI's counterterrorism efforts inside a few mosques. Abdul Malik Mujahid of the Muslim Democrats also pointed to the example of Zalmay Khalilzad who was appointed as Ambassador to Iraq and then to the U.N. under the Bush administration as an example of someone they emulate. I have a sneaking suspicion Mr. Khalilzad would never have even entertained allowing his resume to be placed in a booklet which offers no other unifying ideas except being Muslim and advocates of political Islam. Some could try to say that there is absolutely nothing wrong with an effort by any `faith group' to place its `best and brightest' in positions of influence in government. The point here is not to disagree with that sentiment at all. But this is not an effort by all "Muslims" but rather by Islamists. As anti-Islamist Muslims, the mission of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD), is to point out that this group and other Islamists hardly represent a `diverse' group of Muslim Americans and in fact this type of collectivization of Muslims only caters to the Islamist agenda. Most anti-Islamist and non-Islamist Muslims would likely be less than pleased to have Muslims who all arise from the Islamist ideological movement claim to represent "Muslim interests" or the "Muslim community" in the United States. One would be hard pressed to find any statements made by members and leaders of the CMSA against the Islamic state or the global movement and ideas of political Islam (i.e. the Muslim Brotherhood). Affirmative action for Muslims As made abundantly clear here at the outset, Mr. Abdul Malik and his colleagues at the Coordinating Council of Muslim Organizations (CCMO) of D.C and the CMSA have a long history of supporting Islamism and the advocacy of shar'ia law in society. Their statements are all part of the public record and easily discoverable. Forwarding a group of resumes under the heading of "Muslim" to House offices or the White House, I actually find rather offensive as a Muslim. Those who actually seek the integration and success of Muslims in the United States should do so not as a result of filling slots simply filled into quotas saved for "Muslims" but rather because they have achieved their success because of the merits of their work. I would hope that my children achieve their successes because of merit not because of their chosen faith and their minority identity. At AIFD we have a mantra, which is that "we are Americans who happen to be Muslim rather than Muslims who demand to be American". My parents came to the United States in the 1960s because they understood our nation to be a meritocracy and not one plagued with the inequities of political correctness which are more concerned with immutable characteristics of individuals such as race or religion than with real equality and merit. Islamists thrive on identity politics and the deceptive collectivization of Muslims into one "bloc". This resume book and the Islamist interests of the CMSA feed into that mentality where the faith identity of Muslims is not a private matter of concern only in the mosque and at home. Their resume book is all about influence for Islamists under the banner of `being Muslim." The CMSA campaign feeds on the guilt of Americans who are concerned about discrimination and want to make sure that the tribal leaders of Islamist organizations have no means by which to point to any `paucity' of Muslim representation in their administration or beltway leadership. It also feeds on the disenfranchisement of Muslims while telling them that such campaigns will correct that disenfranchisement. Under the banner of religion, these groups feign democracy and politics but actually put into place primarily the interests of political Islam. Will the post-racial candidate be a post-racial President? If the Obama administration or any group in leadership uses the fruit of this effort to fill their staff rolls they will be simply grabbing the lowest hanging fruit which showed up in a booklet on their desk quite by design. This, in fact, seems un-American from an administration which prides itself on being a "post-racial" candidacy which spent little time on identity politics and purported to want to focus on ideas. While being Muslim is not a race but rather a belief, the Islamist mindset of collectivizing all Muslims feeds into that same mentality of minority victimization which candidate Obama avoided. My hope and prayer as an American and as a Muslim is that this administration, our President, seek candidates first on merit and then if some happen to be Muslim so be it. I may not agree with the ideology of the Obama administration, but from both sides of the aisle, we should be able to assume that no political leaders be advocates of Islamism since shar'ia law is incompatible with our Constitution. But to first choose from a booklet of resumes which are fed to them from Islamists is wrong any way you look at it. After missing so many opportunities from the inauguration to Obama's speech in Ankara, it is time for the Obama administration to make it clear that advocates of political Islam will not find a welcome home in their administration. Rather their administration should make it a domestic and foreign policy litmus test that the ideology of all its staff, whether Muslim or not, be anti-Islamist — that is advocates of liberty and freedom over the establishment of political Islam. M. Zuhdi Jasser is the founder and Chairman of theAmerican Islamic Forum for Democracybased in Phoenix Arizona. He is a former U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander, a physician in private practice, and a community activist. He can be reached atZuhdi@aifdemocracy.org. This article appeared in FSM
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ASSASSINATION PLAN ON FIRST BLACK U.S. PRESIDENT COMES FROM ARAB/MUSLIM WORLD
Posted by Shaul Ceder, April 16, 2009. |
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This was written by Julia Gorin. It was posted on April 10th, 2009 in Political Mavens. |
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I've been compiling notes for some time for an article that I may or may not find the time to write. It concerns the closer kinship and loyalty that American blacks feel toward Muslims than they do toward Jews, despite the deeper historical roots that Jews and blacks have in this country than do blacks and Muslims or Arabs. In fact, Martin Luther King Jr.'s lawyer Clarence B. Jones last year penned an article trying to somewhat shame black people for their antagonism toward Jews and less directly their antagonism and/or indifference to Israel's plight, on which the security of world Jewry (and more) hinges. No doubt it's not lost on him that black people have been more inclined to sympathize with the "darker," Palestinian side in the Middle East conflict — the supposed "underdog" — than with the Jews of Israel. While Jews have toiled for blacks in their hours of need — and even given their lives in the pursuit — blacks are more inclined to toil for Muslims/Arabs. Part of that toil, of course, will eventually require that blacks side against and even ostracize the Jews. (Not just blacks, of course, but Western society at large — and this is well underway; while Jews believe the planet is big enough for both them and Muslims, the latter don't see it that way and are the ones making the world choose.) One of my quips touching on the issue goes as follows: For some reason, Jews think they have more in common with black people than white people. Unfortunately for them, black people think they have more in common with Muslims. So while black people (and far more non-black people, but I'm trying to make a point) stand with Muslims, and while hip hop culture and now mainstream fashion sport the traditional Arabic scarf — something that began as a show of solidarity with our hijackers ala Stockholm Syndrome — and while they all stand by as the hijackers kill fellow hostages (the Jews), let me point out that the plot revealed this week to assassinate America's first black president is brought to you by the Arab/Muslim world: US authorities confirmed that Turkish police have arrested a man who claims to have plotted to kill US President Barack Obama when he visited Turkey...On Monday, the Saudi daily Al Watan reported that Turkish security services has arrested a man of Syrian descent who was planning to assassinate Obama during his trip to Turkey. According to the report, the man, who was arrested on Friday, was carrying a press card identifying him as an employee of Al Jazeera. He reportedly confessed to his intention to stab Obama with a knife and said that he was aided by three accomplices. The report stated that Turkish authorities were still unsure as to whether the press card was a fake or whether it had actually been issued the man by the Qatari news network. I'll close with another relevant joke of mine: I don't buy this business about Muslims being "the new black man." If that's the case, why are so many black men converting to Islam? What — they didn't feel black enough? Oh I know why: they must want a piece of that lucrative Muslim-run African slave trade. As for that ubiquitous Arabic scarf that young people and older ignoramuses are donning, let me just say that if the popular saying is "Once you go black, you don't go back," see what happens once you go Muslim and try to go back. There ain't no going back. There also ain't no music allowed in Islam. Sure, it's all fun and diversity...until you can't shake your ass to hip hop anymore. Contact the Ceders at ceder@netvision.net.il |
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FROM ISRAEL: PERSPECTIVE AND REALITY
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 16, 2009. |
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Pesach ended last night here in Israel, and ends after dark tonight elsewhere in the world. But before returning to what passes as mundane reality, it seems to me that a bit of sharing from Pesach is in order: Yesterday in shul the Torah reading was from the section in Exodus (Shemot) that includes Shirat HaYam — the song of gratitude to Hashem sung by the children of Israel after coming through the divided Sea. This was a culmination of the miracle of the rescue — the redeeming — of the people from slavery in Egypt. All of the people were witness to — beneficiaries of — the miracle of the parting of the Sea. ~~~~~~~~~~ What occurs to me this year, more powerfully perhaps than ever, is that we are very much witness to — and beneficiaries of — a modern miracle: The creation of the modern State of Israel and the return of the people to the Land. It is all of a piece, of course, and yet we often fail to see it with clarity. ~~~~~~~~~~ And I'll carry this one step further: There is a Midrash — a traditional story beyond the Torah that is instructive — about Nachshon Ben Aminadav, head of the tribe of Judah. Moses stood at the Sea of Reeds, with the Egyptians pursuing the Israelites, and he prayed for the people to be saved, the Midrash tell us, but the Sea hadn't split. Then Nachshon, having faith that it would, walked into the water up to his chest. And because he had faith and was willing to act on it, the water split, and the people followed. The early pioneers who came here to build a state were like Nachshon. And the implications for us here today are enormously important. ~~~~~~~~~~ This said, let us begin to look at what's happening: US Envoy George Mitchell is here, promoting as ever his dedication to a "two-state solution" that will, he says, bring peace and security to the region. He is looking for "understandings" with Israel on the issues. Yesterday he met with Defense Minister Ehud Barak, during the day, today, with President Shimon Peres and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. And this evening with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu had met with Lieberman and Barak on Monday to prepare for these meetings. Lieberman, following his meeting with Mitchell, indicated that he anticipated further meetings and opportunities for "deep dialogue." According to a release from the Foreign Minister's office, Lieberman told Mitchell that "thus far, the traditional approach has not brought any results or solutions." He then proceeded to point out the "far reaching concessions" that have been made and what we've seen in response — diplomatic process at a stand-still, acts of aggression against us, etc. etc. Lieberman said he expected the international community to support Israel not only in her need for security, but also to affirm a commitment to Israel's Jewish character. ~~~~~~~~~~ Let this man's strength continue! He speaks with pride and a strong sense of entitlement as an Israeli. This continues to be encouraging and so very welcome. And other ministers are delivering similar messages. Speaking on Army Radio today, Interior Minister Eli Yishai (Shas) said: "The preferable course of diplomatic action at this time is two economies for two peoples and not two states for two peoples. The American emissary also knows that forcing the region into virtual diplomatic discourse will only breed the opposite results." While Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud), in an interview on Israel Radio, said: "The Annapolis outline has failed and is no longer binding. [Netanyahu will] formulate a diplomatic approach that takes into account all of the different elements, and first and foremost Israel's security." ~~~~~~~~~~ Prime Minister Netanyahu, meeting tonight with Mitchell, was most certainly on the same track. He advised the US envoy that Israel would not risk another Hamas-controlled state (Hamastan) at her border. By this is meant our eastern border, with Judea and Samaria becoming an independent Palestinian state that is terrorist. What is more, Netanyahu said the Palestinians must recognize Israel as a Jewish state before there can be negotiations. And to this I say, simply, oh joy! How long I've waited to hear this simple, basic demand. Our RIGHT to be so recognized has to be out there, boldly. They don't, they won't recognize us as a Jewish state. This fact has to be center-front and broadly exposed. ~~~~~~~~~~ But then, sigh, we have Shimon Peres, who should have retired a long time ago. He advised Mitchell not to be discouraged by "negative voices": "There is an opening point for promoting the political process. No door to peace has been closed and I believe that this year is a decisive year in the Middle East. We do not have time to waste." But wait! Didn't Livni and Olmert say that last year was the "decisive year"? Remember the "small window of opportunity"? I think someone needs to tell Peres that the window closed. And Peres ought to be informed at the same time that as president he is supposed to remain non-political. ~~~~~~~~~~ Egypt and Saudi Arabia have put forth a proposal for a coordinating committee of some sort to serve as an umbrella over the Hamas government in Gaza and the PA (Fatah) government in Judea and Samaria. I'm picking up various versions of what's intended — merely a bridge to a unity government or something more permanent — but what's clear is that this has been proposed because there has been no way to solidify a genuine unity government. A primary reason there is an eagerness to do this is because there is supposed to be one address for receiving funds and coordinating the reconstruction of Gaza. The PA is not receptive because such a committee would have the effect of providing de facto legitimacy for Hamas in Gaza. While Hamas is eager to receive assurance that it would not have to abide by PA policies if it accepted the committee — that it would retain a sort of autonomy. ~~~~~~~~~~ Mitchell will be meeting with PA officials in Ramallah, and I'd love to be a fly on the wall at those discussions. MEMRI has up a video clip of Saeb Erekat, chief PA negotiator, in which he says that in November 2008, Olmert offered Abbas the '67 lines as borders, with some adjustments (a land trade of 6.5%) and some joint control of what is called the "Holy Basin" — the area including the Temple Mount, Kotel, etc. But, says Erekat, Abbas (aka Abu Mazen) responded that: "I am not in a marketplace or a bazaar. I came to demarcate the borders of Palestine — the June 4, 1967 borders (sic) — without detracting a single inch, and without detracting a single stone from Jerusalem." (Note: the June 4, 1967 lines were armistice lines, not borders at all and not intended to be permanent.) Instructive to see the clip, which has translation, and to share it with others — especially those who actually still imagine we have a "partner for peace."
~~~~~~~~~~ The time for Durban 2 approaches and the issues remain hot, and deeply troubling. It begins on April 20 — the anniversary of Hitler's birth. Those controlling the document for the conference are touting a new "improved" version. But this is nonsense. What has happened is that offensive language directed at Israel was excised, but the very first clause reaffirms in toto the declaration from the first conference in 2001, which is where all of the offensive language directed at Israel now resides. What is more, Israeli Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Roni Leshno Yaar, told the Jerusalem Post that: "If anything it is worse than the previous text because it includes a reference to foreign occupation which in the diplomatic world is code for Israel... We are worse off than we were yesterday." ~~~~~~~~~~ If anyone still has doubts as to how outrageous this all is, there is the decision by the planning committee: Libya will serve as the Chair of the "Main Committee" running the conference; Iran will to preside as Vice-Chair, and Cuba will be the Rapporteur. On the afternoon of the first day, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a Holocaust denier, will address those assembled. This might be considered just an exceedingly sick joke, if the implications weren't so very serious. There have been hints that the US might attend after all, but I've seen nothing substantive to indicate that this is so (at least yet). Given this line-up and the ludicrousness of having the above nations running the show, I am aghast that any Western democracy would participate, and yet it looks as if many, if not most, will. This means they will provide legitimacy to the proceedings while being outvoted. At present, aside from the US, only Israel, Canada and Italy have declared they will not attend ~~~~~~~~~~ Last time around the most virulent statements against Israel came out of an NGO gathering that ran parallel to the actual conference. And, wouldn't you know it, an anti-Israel NGO gathering is scheduled for April 18 and 19th, with an anti-Israel rally on the 18th. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Human Rights Council, an exceedingly anti-Israel group, will be doing an "investigation" of possible war crimes in Gaza, led by South African judge Richard Goldstone. The original mandate offered to him was to investigate only Israel (which gives us a clue as to the Council's predisposition), but he demanded that investigation of Hamas actions be included. But this not withstanding, Israel has decided not to cooperate with the investigation, because it is considered to be inherently biased — essentially a set-up. In three years, the council has passed 32 resolutions, and 26 have been against Israel. ~~~~~~~~~~ According to a New York Times report, the US will not demand that Iran halt uranium enrichment as a pre-condition for talks. On Monday, State Department acting spokesman Robert Wood said: "It's important to remind everyone that we are willing to engage Iran without preconditions. And we'll just see whether Iran is willing to take up that offer." What is more, Israel is deeply concerned about a refusal on the part of the US to put a deadline on talks with Iran, as Israeli officials have strongly urged. One State Department official cited this week simply said, "We are focused on the engagement track for now." ~~~~~~~~~~ Most likely the US will sit down with Iran in conjunction with the other permanent members of the Security Council — China, Russia, Britain, and France — plus Germany (called P5 + 1). When and where this may happen is not known, but it would be the first time the US sat down with Iran in 30 years. The demand of the international community, at least until now, has been for cessation of nuclear activity first. It is Obama who is weakening this. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Jerusalem Post has reported that because of the growing threat from Iran, later this year Israel and the United States will hold a massive exercise to jointly test three different ballistic missile defense systems. This exercise, to be held in Israel and called Juniper Cobra, is unprecedented. It will include the newly developed Arrow 2, as well as America's THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) and the ship-based Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System. ~~~~~~~~~~ According to UPI, the Gulf states are preparing for an Iranian response to an Israeli attack, which is assumed to be coming soon. They are setting up Patriot missiles defense systems, and taking other precautions. ~~~~~~~~~~ Just days ago, a Hezbollah terror cell of some 50 people was uncovered in the Sinai and arrested; Egypt had received intelligence on this from the CIA, the Mossad, and other intelligence services. Reports were that the cell was targeting Israeli tourists in Egypt and facilitating smuggling of weapons into Gaza, but the Hezbollah activity in fact was intended to be broader than this. There are sources suggesting that one possible target was ships in the Suez canal. Even beyond this, there is reason to believe that this was a threat to the Egyptian government more directly. The centuries-old hostility between Sunni Egypt and Shiite Iran should not be minimized, and it is Iran that is directly behind the Hezbollah activity. ~~~~~~~~~~ On Monday, a Hamas bomb factory was found in a mosque near Kfar Saba in Samaria. On Tuesday, an unmanned Palestinian fishing boat was remotely detonated as it approach an Israeli navy ship off the coast of Gaza. The boat, which was in an area that is off-limits to Palestinian fishermen, was carrying hundreds of kilograms of explosives. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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MITCHELL WANTS A PA STATE?
Posted by Molly, April 16, 2009. |
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So, Mr. Mitchell insists on a state for the nouveau-"people" created by Jimmy Carter and his two dearest friends: Shimon — the weeper — Peres and his bloody friend, the Egyptian assassin Yasser? Well, swell. Just be sure to tell Mitchell there's no objection from Israel just so long as this new PA state is planted in Saudi Arabia. Mitchell and Baker and the Clintons can first bow to their benefactors and then call in their chips by insisting — in light of the gifts bestowed on the Saudi royals by the American Taxpayer and the sacrifices of the Americans who died defending the Saudis — that the Saudis cooperate by donating land for Carter's nouveau people ... or else the American People will insist that Citigroup file bankruptcy, which will wipe out Citi's Saudi shareholders. BTW — if Israeli bureaucrats and their idiot-Supremes are too feeble to recall that the original Palestinians were and still are Jewish, then the people of Israel must rise up and remind them by showing everyone the way to peace ... by creating a new and separate state for Palestinian Jews! OK to use the same methods taught by Yasser and approved by Korrupt Kofi Annan who is famous for saying that "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom-fighter." Yep. It's a two-way street. It's just another case of what's "Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander," Another thought: if the new US policy is that hordes of an identifiable ethnic group can swarm into any democratic state and make demands for their own state to be carved from the lands of their hosts, then there's nothing to protect the Bush Family from being forced to return their ranch and the rest of Texas to the Mexicans who want a "new" state of "Aztlan". And the Church of England can indeed be razed and replaced with a nice gold-domed mosque governed by Sharia. Yep, let's see how the UK will enjoy watching their own blood flow in their own streets for a welcome change. Better still, tell Mitchell to calm down. Israel has a right and the power to restore to itself all the lands stolen from it over the years by the US State Department and the fascist relics in the Brit Foreign Office. If the BFO and the US State Department refuse to see the light they are creating at the end of the terrorist's tunnel ... then the Brits can kiss the Falkland Islands goodbye! And Jordan can kiss its a$$ goodbye. And Israel shall retake all lands from the ocean to the sea ... and then some. And the same for Spain: they can sat adios to Perequil Island! Viva to the Patriots of Israel! We are the NON-evangelical — that is, secular — Christians for Zion: Contact Molly at pelago2000@gmail.com |
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HOW TO DERAIL IRAN'S NUCLEAR PROGRAM WITHOUT SENDING A SINGLE PLANE OR MISSILE
Posted by Jerry Gordon, April 15, 2009. |
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Bret Stephens had a column in the Wall Street Journal, "Hiroshima 2.0". The upshot of the piece was about the threat of Cyber warfare by Russia and China to our infrastructure, in particular our electrical grid. Stephens noted how devastating this could be: A senior intelligence official told the Journal that, "If we go to war with them, they will try to turn them on." To get a better sense of what all this is about, type the words "Cyber attack" and "generator" into YouTube. The first result should be a short clip from the Department of Homeland Security, leaked to CNN — see here — a couple of years ago, showing an electric generator under a simulated cyber attack at the Idaho National Laboratory. Within seconds the generator begins to shake violently. Within a minute, it's up in smoke. Now imagine the attack being conducted against 60 large generators, simultaneously. Imagine, too, similar attacks against chemical plants, causing Bhopal-style toxic leaks. Imagine malicious software codes planted in U.S. weapons systems, which could lie undetected until triggered by a set of conditions similar to mobilization. "It's as though we've entered something like the nuclear era without a Hiroshima," says Scott Borg, director and chief economist of the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit, a nonprofit, nongovernmental organization that consults with government and industry about potential cyber attacks. "People aren't aware that everything has changed." Two years ago, while attending the Intelligence Summit in St. Petersburg, Florida, where I was presenting on the Translator Scandal, I chanced to attend a session by Dr. William A. Radasky, a member of the 2004 Congressional Study Commission on the Electro-Magnetic Pulse threat. A defense scientist in the audience and I struck up a conversation during a break about whether there was an alternative to using an EMP attack on Iran to disable their infrastructure and the power feeding those whirling centrifuges enriching uranium in the cascade halls at the Natan facility. He smiled and suggested I investigate RF warfare techniques that might be used to spin the centrifuges to very high rpm levels causing them to crash out of control. I tucked that thought away for further reference until this Stephens piece prompted me to revisit the Iranian nuclear problem. The reverse logic of what occurred in the video of the cyber attack at the DHS Idaho National Labs was why our government couldn't launch a cyber attack on Iran's power infrastructure? My guess is that our government might be wary of such a possibility for fear of counter-attack by Iranian sponsored Cyber Jihadis. For that matter, why couldn't Israel with a very talented computer security software pool of military talent do that? After all the IDF has a program to search out talented high school students for its electronic warfare and SIGINT functions with the eventual thought of sending them into the IDF for duty assignments using their talents, in effect, an incubator. These IDF computer wizards have become the world's premier information security cyber-entrepreneurs. Note this observation about Israel's prowess in the computer field and the IDF's role in fostering it from an article in SC Magazine U.K., "Briefing Israel-Focus on the Future." In the past 15 to 20 years, as global networks expanded, the army has engaged in protecting Israel's networks and has trained individuals to protect their country electronically, as well as physically and even develop security technology. But personnel leave the army, and the country found itself with a cornucopia of talented, well-trained and ambitious computing experts. "Israel is indeed in a unique security situation," says Efrat Schneider, marketing manager at Trustware. "The threat is not just physical, it is computerized as well. That's why there is mandatory military service for all citizens." Trustware is a good example of how military personnel have formed the basis of Israel's infosec industry. The company's chief executive, Israel Baharav, served in the air force and held top-level executive and operational roles in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), including head of air force intelligence and head of IDF strategic planning. I suspect that Israel must be pursuing this pre-emptive Cyber attack scenario on Iran's infrastructure. If launched, it would be a devastating threat to the life-blood of the tottering Iranian economy. Further it could force the shutdown of the nuclear enrichment and weapons development project so avidly pursued by the Supreme Ruler of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khamenei and his Shia Mahdist puppet, President Ahmadinejad. Moreover, it would be disruptive of the command and control net of the Revolutionary Guards. A prelude to an internal uprising and regime change could be a distiunct possibility. Think of it as a pre-emptive attack against Iran's infrastructure supporting the nuclear project without losing one aircraft or firing one missile. Of course if that occurred, the Mullahs in charge in Tehran would doubtless let loose their reprisals by their proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas. However, these cyber attacks against their infrastructure can be cloaked or `spoofed' as to origin. How are the Iranians to know whether Israel, the US or another country launched these potentially devastating cyber attacks and against whom to take reprisals? The Bret Stephens Wall Street Journal article triggered the counter intuitive thought. The cyber attack would be the equivalent of "the Assassins Mace or Killer Ap" against Iran's quest for nuclear weapons. The questions is has this been thought of and become a priority of ours or the Israel's Information Warfare development programs? If it has, then those technical back room boffins, as the Brits call them, may have developed a powerful weapon to deal with terror sponsoring rogue states. This is worth a try. It beats the alternative of throwing blood and treasure at a suicide mission to take out the nuclear nightmare conjured up by the Mullahs at every opportunity. This appeared in Red County online
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3 VIEWS OF OBAMA'S RECENT DIPLOMATIC ACTIVITIES
Posted by David Meir-Levi, April 15, 2009. |
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Below are three recent commentaries on Obama's recent activities. 1. Caroline Glick (correctly, in my opinion) castigates Obama for a catastrophic world tour which signals our allies that he is not with them, and signals our enemies that he is not a threat to them. He has forgotten that old adage from Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus (a few centuries after Cicero): vis pacem, para bellam (if you want peace, you'd better prepare for war). And he has pretty much thrown Israel under the proverbial bus. 2. Raymond Ibrahim's commentary on Obama's instinctive, and therefore deeply humiliating, bow (bended knee and bending forward from the waist = a real bow) to the Saudi king (it is obviously humiliating, because otherwise the State department would not be denying it). Note that he did not bow to the Queen of England. What could have prompted him to bow to the world's most notorious violator of human rights and the funder of much of the Islamo-fascist terrorism that has killed thousands of Americans? 3.) Steve Plaut's tongue-in-cheek letter from Shimon Peres....making some obvious points about the hypocrisy of using force against the Somali pirates while demanding that Israel restrain its use of force in its war agianst Arab terrorists. It is hard to know what is really going on. As I see it, there are three possibilities. a.) Obama is a complete naif and displays disastrous naivete in his diplomatic interactions....interactions which will get us in to deep doodoo when Iran goes nuclear. or b.) He is the manchurian candidate, and is setting up the USA and western civilization for an Islamo-fascist take-over. or c.) He is sly beyond belief, and crafty beyond the singing of it, and by all of this pro-Arab and pro-Muslim and pro-terrorist and pro-Iranian and anti-Israel behavior he is actually giving our enemies a warm and heart-felt welcome and an invitation to dialogue, so that when they torch his olive branches, he can claim the moral high ground and declare that since he made the offers of peace and cooperation, the ball is in their court and if they resort to violence, then the USA's violent responses to violence will be fully justified....as will Israel's. I hope it is #c. David ML |
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1.) Glick on Obama's catastrophic world tour
Like it or not, the United States of America is no longer the world's policeman. This was the message of Barack Obama's presidential journey to Britain, France, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Iraq this past week. Somewhere between apologizing for American history — both distant and recent; genuflecting before the unelected, bigoted king of Saudi Arabia; announcing that he will slash the US's nuclear arsenal, scrap much of America's missile defense programs and emasculate the US Navy; leaving Japan to face North Korea and China alone; telling the Czechs, Poles and their fellow former Soviet colonies, "Don't worry, be happy," as he leaves them to Moscow's tender mercies; humiliating Iraq's leaders while kowtowing to Iran; preparing for an open confrontation with Israel; and thanking Islam for its great contribution to American history, President Obama made clear to the world's aggressors that America will not be confronting them for the foreseeable future. Whether they are aggressors like Russia, proliferators like North Korea, terror exporters like nuclear-armed Pakistan or would-be genocidal-terror-supporting nuclear states like Iran, today, under the new administration, none of them has any reason to fear Washington. This news is music to the ears of the American Left and their friends in Europe. Obama's supporters like billionaire George Soros couldn't be more excited at the self-induced demise of the American superpower. CNN's former (anti-)Israel bureau chief Walter Rodgers wrote ecstatically in the Christian Science Monitor on Wednesday, "America's... superpower status, is being downgraded as rapidly as its economy." The pro-Obama US and European media are so pleased with America's abdication of power that they took the rare step of applauding Obama at his press conference in London. Indeed, the media's enthusiasm for Obama appeared to grow with each presidential statement of contrition for America's past uses of force, each savage attack he leveled against his predecessor George W. Bush, each swipe he took at Israel, and each statement of gratitude for the blessings of Islam he uttered. But while the media couldn't get enough of the new US leader, America's most stable allies worldwide began a desperate search for a reset button that would cause the administration to take back its abandonment of America's role as the protector of the free world. Tokyo was distraught by the administration's reaction to North Korea's three-stage ballistic missile test. Japan recognized the betrayal inherent in Defense Secretary Robert Gates's announcement ahead of Pyongyang's newest provocation that the US would only shoot the missile down if it targeted US territory. In one sentence, uttered not in secret consultations, but declared to the world on CNN, Gates abrogated America's strategic commitment to Japan's defense. India, for its part, is concerned by Obama's repeated assertions that its refusal to transfer control over the disputed Jammu and Kashmir provinces to Pakistan inspires Pakistani terror against India. It is equally distressed at the Obama administration's refusal to make ending Pakistan's support for jihadist terror groups attacking India a central component of its strategy for contending with Pakistan and Afghanistan. In general, Indian officials have expressed deep concern over the Obama administration's apparent lack of regard for India as an ally and a significant strategic counterweight to China. Then there is Iraq. During his brief visit to Baghdad on Tuesday afternoon, Obama didn't even pretend that he would ensure that Iraqi democracy and freedom are secured before US forces are withdrawn next year. The most supportive statement he could muster came during his conversation with Turkish students in Istanbul earlier in the day. There he said, "I have a responsibility to make sure that as we bring troops out, that we do so in a careful enough way that we don't see a complete collapse into violence." Hearing Obama's statements, and watching him and his advisers make daily declarations of friendship to Iran's mullahs, Iraqi leaders are considering their options for surviving the rapidly approaching storm. Then there is Europe. Although Obama received enthusiastic applause from his audience in Prague when he announced his intention to destroy the US's nuclear arsenal, drastically scale back its missile defense programs and forge a new alliance with Russia, his words were anything but music to the ears of the leaders of former Soviet satellites threatened by Russia. The Czech, Polish, Georgian and Ukrainian governments were quick to recognize that Obama's strong desire to curry favor with the Kremlin and weaken his own country will imperil their ability to withstand Russian aggression. It is not a coincidence, for instance, that the day Obama returned to Washington, Georgia's Moscow-sponsored opposition announced its plan to launch massive protests in Tblisi to force the ouster of pro-Western, anti-Russian Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili. And as for Russia, like Iran, which responded to Obama's latest ode to the
mullahs by opening a nuclear fuel plant and announcing it has 7,000 advanced
centrifuges in operation, so Moscow reacted to Obama's fig leaf with a
machine gun, announcing its refusal to support sanctions against North Korea
and repeating its false claim that Iran's nuclear program is nonaggressive.
Finally there is Israel. If Obama's assertions that Israel must support the
immediate establishment of a Palestinian state, his declarations of support
for the so-called Saudi "peace plan," which requires Israel to commit
national suicide in exchange for "peace" with the Arab world, and his
continuous and increasingly frantic appeals for Iran to "engage" his
administration weren't enough to show Israel that Obama is sacrificing the
US's alliance with the Jewish state in a bid to appease the Arabs and Iran,
on Tuesday Vice President Joseph Biden made this policy explicit.
When Biden told CNN that Israel would be "ill-advised" to attack Iran's
nuclear installations, he made clear that from the administration's
perspective, an Israeli strike that prevents Iran from becoming a nuclear
power is less acceptable than a nuclear-armed Iran. That is, the Obama
administration prefers to see Iran become a nuclear power than to see Israel
secure its very existence.
AMERICA'S BETRAYAL of its democratic allies makes each of them more vulnerable to aggression at the hands of their enemies — enemies the Obama administration is now actively attempting to appease. And as the US strengthens their adversaries at their expense, these spurned democracies must consider their options for surviving as free societies in this new, threatening, post-American environment. For the most part, America's scorned allies lack the ability to defeat their enemies on their own. India cannot easily defeat nuclear-armed Pakistan, which itself is fragmenting into disparate anti-Indian nuclear-wielding Islamist and Islamist-supporting factions. Japan today cannot face North Korea — which acts as a Chinese proxy — on its
own without risking a confrontation with China.
Russia's invasion of Georgia last August showed clearly that its former
republics and satellites have no way of escaping Moscow's grip alone.
This week's Arab League conference at Doha demonstrated to Iraq's leaders
that their Arab brethren are incapable and unwilling to confront Iran.
And the Obama administration's intense efforts to woo Iran coupled with its
plan to slash the US's missile defense programs — including those in which
Israel participates — and reportedly pressure Israel to dismantle its own
purported nuclear arsenal — make clear that Israel today stands alone against Iran.
THE RISKS that the newly inaugurated post-American world pose for America's threatened friends are clear. But viable opportunities for survival do exist, and Israel can and must play a central role in developing them. Specifically, Israel must move swiftly to develop active strategic alliances with Japan, Iraq, Poland, and the Czech Republic and it must expand its alliance with India. With Israel's technological capabilities, its intelligence and military expertise, it can play a vital role in shoring up these countries' capacities to contain the rogue states that threaten them. And by containing the likes of Russia, North Korea and Pakistan, they will make it easier for Israel to contain Iran even in the face of US support for the mullahs. The possibilities for strategic cooperation between and among all of these states and Israel run the gamut from intelligence sharing to military training, to missile defense, naval development, satellite collaboration, to nuclear cooperation. In addition, of course, expanded economic ties between and among these states can aid each of them in the struggle to stay afloat during the current global economic crisis. Although far from risk free, these opportunities are realistic because they are founded on stable, shared interests. This is the case despite the fact that none of these potential alliances will likely amount to increased support for Israel in international forums. Dependent as they are on Arab oil, these potential allies cannot be expected to vote with Israel in the UN General Assembly. But this should not concern Jerusalem. The only thing that should concern Jerusalem today is how to weaken Iran both directly by attacking its nuclear installations, and indirectly by weakening its international partners in Moscow, Pyongyang, Islamabad and beyond in the absence of US support. If Japan is able to contain North Korea and so limit Pyongyang's freedom to proliferate its nuclear weapons and missiles to Iran and Syria and beyond, Israel is better off. So, too, Israel is better off if Russia is contained by democratic governments in Eastern and Central Europe. These nations in turn are better off if Iran is contained and prevented from threatening them both directly and indirectly through its strategic partners in North Korea, Syria and Russia, and its terror affiliates in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. For the past 16 years, successive Israeli governments have wrongly believed
that politics trump strategic interests. The notion that informed Israel's
decision-makers — not unlike the notion that now informs the Obama
administration — was that Israel's strategic interests would be secured as a
consequence of its efforts to appease its enemies by weakening itself.
Appreciative of Israel's sacrifices for peace, the nations of the
world —
and particularly the US, the Arabs and Europe — would come to Israel's
defense in its hour of need. Now that the hour of need has arrived, Israel's
political strategy for securing itself has been exposed as a complete fiasco.
The good news is that no doubt sooner rather than later, Obama's similarly
disastrous bid to denude the US of its military power under the naive
assumption that it will be able to use its new stature as a morally pure
strategic weakling to win its enemies over to its side will fail
spectacularly and America's foreign policy will revert to strategic rationality.
But to survive the current period of American strategic madness, Israel and
the US's other unwanted allies must build alliances with one another —
covertly if need be — to contain their adversaries in the absence of
America. If they do so successfully, then the damage to global security
induced by Obama's emasculation of his country will be limited. If on the
other hand, they fail, then America's eventual return to its senses will
likely come too late for its allies — if not for America itself.
2.) Raymond Ibrahim on Obama's bow and other aspects of foreign policy Obama's Abominable Obeisance: Cultural Perspectives
Is Obama's deep bow (with slightly bent knee) to the Saudi king as bad as it seems? The White House, apparently forgetful that we live in the Internet age, where everything is swiftly documented and disseminated — or else thinking it leads a blind nation — insists the president did not bow. He supposedly always bends in half when shaking hands with shorter people, though he certainly seemed quite erect when saluting the British queen, who is much shorter than the Saudi king. Obama bowed; this much is certainly not open to debate. All that is left now is to place his odious obeisance in context. As such, history has much to say about the seemingly innocuous bow. Millennia before the current war between the West and Islam — the war Obama insists does not exist in the first place — the ancient Greeks (forebears of Western civilization) warred with the Persians (forebears of the soon-to-be-nuclear Islamic theocracy, Iran). Writing in the 5th century B.C., the Greek historian Herodotus explained: "When the Persians meet one another in the roads, you can see whether those who meet are of equal rank. For instead of greeting by words, they kiss each other on the mouth; but if one of them is inferior to the other, they kiss one another on the cheeks." This explanation reminds one of Bush's hand-holding/kissing sessions with the same Saudi monarch, which some insist exonerate Obama's bow. Not so; as the Greek historian explains above, such behavior is representative of equal rank in Eastern cultures. As for Obama's conduct, Herodotus continues, "yet if one is of much less noble rank than the other, he falls down before him and worships him." "Much less noble rank"? Could Obama, like his wife Michelle, who only recently became proud of America, be operating under the conviction that being American is not all that noble? As for "falls down before him and worships," this phrase is a translation of the Greek word proskunesis, which means "to make obeisance," to "worship, adore," as one would a god, or king, or god-king. Basically, to fall on one's face in prostration to another. Connotatively, it implies "to make like a dog" — base, servile, and submissive. While common to the caste-like system of Persia, prostration was something the freedom-loving Greeks scorned. Indeed, wars were waged simply because the Greeks refused to submit — literally and figuratively — to Persian tyranny. According to Arrian's chronicle, at the height of Alexander the Great's power — when his hubris against the gods and megalomania against man were most burgeoning — he decided to implement the proskunesis in his court, provoking controversy among the Macedonians, until one of their numbers, Callisthenes, rebuked him by saying, "Will you actually compel the Greeks as well, the freest of mankind, to do you obeisance?" Another close companion to Alexander, Clitus, vexed at the former's increasing pomposity and the lack of manly dignity at his court, told Alexander, in the words of the historian Plutarch, that "he [Alexander] had better live and converse with barbarians and slaves who would not scruple to bow the knee to his Persian girdle." His words cost him his life. It was one decade ago, when I studied ancient history with Victor Davis Hanson, that I last examined the proskunesis (never thinking the day was nigh when it would have modern applicability — and thanks to a U.S. president!). Recently corresponding with VDH about this whole sordid affair, he confirmed that "the Macedonians seemed to really have felt proskunesis was about the worst thing someone could do." In light of the West's ancestors' utter contempt for proskunesis, let us now examine Obama's prostration in context: First, it must be affirmed that, as with ancient Greeks, Americans find bows, prostrations, and other servile gestures distasteful. Interestingly, the Muslim world shares this same view, particularly so-called "radicals," who are constantly condemning "manmade" governments, such as democracies, as systems of "human-worship" to be eschewed at all cost. Writes Ayman al-Zawahiri: "Know that democracy, that is, 'rule of the people,' is a new religion that deifies the masses by giving them the right to legislate without being shackled down to any other authority" (The Al Qaeda Reader, p. 130). This, by the way, is why the Saudi monarch does not tamper with Sharia: doing so would be tantamount to self-apotheosis. Expecting prostrations from others would be viewed little better by the theocrats surrounding him. (Watch the video and note that, while the king proceeded with an extended right arm, Obama dived in with a bow, almost taking the former aback.) In short, both Muslims and Americans (at least until very recently for the latter) find bowing to be an odious enterprise and therefore do not offer it to, nor expect it from, others. Conversely, some Far Eastern cultures incorporate the bow. Had Obama been in Japan and bowed (and received a reciprocal bow signifying equality), his actions would have been culturally appropriate (not to mention expected). Yet, Obama had as much reason to bow to a Muslim as he would have to a Christian or Jew. Yet surely he didn't bow to Abdullah due to the latter's exalted status in the Muslim world ("Guardian of the Two Sanctities"), a status that schoolboy Obama in Muslim Indonesia must have viewed with awe, but rather out of politeness, because Abdullah is a king, royalty. Not so. Were this true, upon meeting the British queen — equal "royalty" — Obama would have stooped to her as well. (Nor can his iPod gift be considered surrogate.) Whatever prompted that rather instinctive bow — Obama may be used to bending the knee to Saudi royalty, considering that Saudis may have paid his college tuition — and regardless of antiquated notions of "honor" and "dignity," merely diplomatically, it was a bad move. Not only is the Wahhabi king symbolic of the most "radical" form of Islam — it's not for nothing that 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers, not to mention bin Laden, were Saudis — but his Sharia-enforcing kingdom is cited as one of the worst human rights violators in the world. Bowing to this man was therefore symbolically a bow of submission to radical Islam and all its attendant human rights violations. This is compounded by the fact that, immediately preceding this ignoble bow, Obama was busy profusely apologizing to the Islamic world, insisting that the U.S. is not at war with Islam — and "never will be." Jihadis the world over must have been relieved to know that not only does the leader of the most powerful Western nation have no intention of naming them or placing them in context — so much for that first strategy of warfare, "know your enemy" — but that nothing they do in the future will ever cause the sleeping infidel giant's leader to arouse it. Similarly, Obama's obeisance should give nuke-seeking Iran even more hope in its endeavors. After all, if the leader of the free West so readily bends the knee to Wahhabi despotism, how long before he bows to Iran, the true heir of proskunesis-Persia? And if he does not fully bow willingly, that is only more incentive for Iran to hasten and acquire nukes, so he can be made to bow unwillingly. Finally, any would-be "moderates" or assertive governments who may have been serious about combating radical Islam and its attendant humanitarian abuses via Sharia have, through Obama's bow to the personification of radical Islam, just received a clear message: aside from occasional, perfunctory lip service, you're really on your own. As for all those who would defend Obama's bow by saying he was being "diplomatic," because, you know, we "need" Saudi oil, how does that justify bowing, unprecedented from an American president, unexpected from the Saudi king? When Alexander the Great, drunk with hubris, took on despotic ways, demanding that others prostrate themselves before him, the Macedonians revolted; some were put to death. What a long way Western civilization has come when today the leader of the free world and heir to democratic ancient Greece, far from despotically demanding that others offer him obeisance, voluntarily opts to prostrate himself — and in essence, all of America — before another. And what another. Originally published at:
Raymond Ibrahim is the associate director of the Middle East Forum and the author of The Al Qaeda Reader, translations of religious texts and propaganda.
3.) Prof. Steven Plaut's sarcastic letter from Shimon Peres. An Open Letter from President Shimon Peres to President Barack Obama
Dear Mr. President, I am shocked, Mister President, truly shocked. After all the hope you have inspired for a new America, after your denunciation of American arrogance, after your pledge to solve problems with the world's terrorists through talking, here you go and order the American Navy SEALS to violate the human rights of the Somalian pirates without so much as reading them their Miranda rights! Have you lost your senses? Why could you not have learned from the lessons offered to you by Israel in its successful strategy to get Gilad Shavit released from captivity! After all, we have worked quietly and peacefully for more than three years to obtain Shavit's freedom. Why could you not have been content to do the same with Captain Phillips? What happened to your promise to deal with all forms of activism in the world being perpetrated by misunderstood militants through civilized talking? Mister President Minister, I have a great amount of experience in dealing successfully with terrorism and violence, and this is why I wish to explain to you why your actions were unjustified and simply unforgivable. The first thing you must realize is that one can only make peace with one's enemies. With one's friends there is no need to make peace. There is no military solution to the problems of terrorism, and this is why you should have sought a diplomatic solution to the holding of Captain Richard Phillips. "No Justice, No Peace," as they say. You must now invite the leaders of this Somalian protest organization responsible for the hijacking of the ship and the holding of Captain Phillips to the White House. You must learn to feel their pain and understand their needs. 
But most importantly, you must end the illegal occupation of territory that does not belong to you! First, you must withdraw from Guam and Hawaii and remove all the illegal Anglo-Saxon settlers there. But that is just a beginning. Large sections of the United States, including the Southwest, are illegally occupied territories. Some even have a Hispanic majority. The solution is to create two states for two peoples inside Illinois itself. One will be for the Americans and the other for the Somali pirates. Then there is the matter of the status of Washington, DC. It has a sizeable Somali minority, many of whom drive taxis. Your selfish insistence that the District of Columbia remain American is racist and insensitive. You must end the apartheid regime inside America and turn Washington into the shared capital of two states. Then you must pay compensation to the families of the Somali pirates mercilessly killed in cold blood by your Navy SEALS. You must grant them survivor benefits from the American social security administration and lands inside Yellowstone Park. This is not even the first time that you Americans violated the civil rights of pirates. Your crimes go all the way back to Thomas Jefferson and his imperialist attacks on the Barbary coast pirates. The aggressors were led by that racist warmonger Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr., who attacked pirate ships in Tripoli for no better reason than that they had hijacked the USS Philadelphia. Did you not learn anything from that early bout of American imperialist insensitivity? You must offer the pirates Internet web services and five-star tourist hotels in exchange for their promising to abandon violence. After all, that is how we turned Yasser Arafat into a peace partner. You see, military force serves no role any more in the post-modern universe. It is passe. It is archaic. Today, consumer interests dominate the world, and the Somali activists of the earth will surely wish to make peace in exchange for some profits from participating in global trade. The attacks on the American ship by the Somali pirates came because you have been insufficiently sensitive to the needs of the Other. You should have negotiated with them even while the ship was under attack. Conditioning negotiations on an end to violence is a no-win situation. It will simply prolong the bloodshed! You must put your own house in order, eliminate inequality and injustice inside Chicago, and then the militants will no longer target you. The key is to build a New Middle Africa, one in which everyone is so busy with the important matters of developing tourism, infrastructure investments and high-technology that they will have no time to pursue violence. Begin by declaring a unilateral ceasefire! Mister President, blessed is the peacemaker. Remember Martin Luther King! Go meet with the legitimate representatives of the Somali pirates. The entire world will support you and congratulate you if you respond to the attack on the American ship by disarming the United States and opening serious dialogue with the pirate activists. All we are saying is give peace a chance. Yitzhak Rabin would have approved. Yes, chaver, what you need is shalom, salaam, peace. You will be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in recognition. Do not allow yourself to be drawn down into the gutter of retaliation. Violence never achieves anything. History has no lessons. History is the dead past. Follow my example! Provide the Somali pirate organization with anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles so that they can battle against the true radicals and extremists. And they will do so with no ACLU or Supreme Court to restrain them! Demonstrate your humanity by paying pensions to any widows and orphans of the militants killed by the Navy SEALS. Mister President, my own peace policies have eliminated war, bloodshed and terror from the Middle East. We now have only peace partners. If you follow in my footsteps, you can achieve the same lofty goals. Peacefully yours,
David Meir-Levi is an American-born Israeli,
currently living in Palo Alto. His expertise is in Near Eastern
studies and the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He is Director
of Peace and Education at Israel Peace Initiative (www.ipi-usa.org).
Contact him at david_meirlevi@hotmail.com
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RULES YOU CAN BELIEVE IN
Posted by Morris J. Amitay, April 14, 2009. |
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With so much happening both in and around the Middle East nowadays, how can Israel's real friends make sense of it all? The solution might be to follow a set of commonsense rules that have served me well during my years here in Washington. The first rule is: WHENEVER THINGS LOOK BAD, THEY CAN ALWAYS GET WORSE — AND USUALLY DO. For instance, if you were troubled that our new president's first phone call to a foreign leader was to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, it got even worse when he sent his "why can't we all be friends" video to Iran. And then came the president's deep bow to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, a new low. A follow on rule to the first: ANYONE IN THE MEDIA, CONGRESS OR THE WHITE HOUSE WHO DENIGRATES OR APOLOGIZES FOR THE UNITED STATES INVARIABLY IS NOT A FRIEND OF ISRAEL. The two countries share so many values, interests and goals, that this self-abnegation is invariably perceived as weakness and exploited by the enemies of both. Another general rule to follow is: EVERYTHING IS RELATIVE AND SHOULD BE COMPARED TO SOMETHING OR SOMEONE ELSE. For instance, compared to Arafat, Abbas doesn't look so bad — literally and figuratively. And compared to Chas Freeman, Zbigniew Brzezinski could almost pass for a Zionist. But aside from comparison of personalities, compared to the Saudi "peace plan", the Road Map almost looks terrific. A rule which often can predict the competence of Washington policymakers is: IT'S NOT WHAT YOU KNOW, OR WHO YOU KNOW, BUT WHERE YOU'VE BEEN. Applying this to a first term senator's quest for the presidency, it should have resulted in a "slam dunk" victory for John McCain. However, another political rule seems to have trumped the first: YOU CAN FOOL SOME OF THE PEOPLE SOME OF THE TIME, BUT NOT ALL OF THE PEOPLE ALL OF THE TIME. Only time will tell if the second half of this rule applies to the current occupant of the White House. Another useful rule to apply: DO NOT TRUST THE STATE DEPARTMENT TO DEFEND AMERICAN INTERESTS. The operating philosophy of our State Department (or as President Kennedy referred to it, the "fudge factory") is when in doubt — obfuscate. Should this fail — appease. And finally — concede. The latest obfuscation has our country no longer fighting a "Global War on Terrorism," but involved instead in "overseas contingency operations". Taking a page from State, our Department of Homeland Security is no longer concerned about terrorist attacks, just "man-caused disasters" (both Bernie Madoff and Osama bin Laden come to mind here). An easy rule to follow: DO NOT BELIEVE WHAT YOU READ OR HEAR ABOUT ISRAEL IN THE NEW YORK TIMES OR NPR. This rule not only applies to editorial commentary, but to the uncritical reporting of Arab "eyewitness accounts" as facts, when experience shows these statements have to be taken with a whole pound of salt. Unwarranted and erroneous criticism of Israel also unfortunately emanates from a misguided (at best) minority of Jewish Americans who always blame Israel first. From the "Breira" movement of forty years ago to the J St. "it's all our fault" supporters of today, there continues to be fringe groups blinded by their own self-righteousness. Santayana's famous quote, "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it", underscores yet another one of my rules: NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE SELF-DELUSION AND THE IGNORANCE OF HISTORY OF OUR MIDDLE EAST POLICYMAKERS. From the "Rogers Plan" of 1969 (the beginning of my own hands on experience), to the Mitchell mission of today — and a long list of failed peace initiatives in between, reality has consistently taken a back seat to wishful thinking. While Israeli leadership may be more reluctant to speak truth to American peace processors, Israel's adversaries have fewer compunctions. It is not only Hamas and Iran that demonstrate by word and deed that under no circumstance will they ever recognize the "Zionist entity". We recently have heard a favorite (and reportedly well paid) "moderate", Muhammad Dahlan, declare on PA television, "I want to say in my own name and in the name of all my fellow members of the Fatah movement, we are not asking Hamas to recognize Israel's right to exist. Rather, we are asking Hamas not to do so because Fatah never recognized Israel's right to exist." So while the Obama administration parrots the mantra of two democratic states living side by side in peace, who are they really kidding? It seems obvious that you won't find Santayana's admonition included in the president's current Middle East briefing book. A final rule to keep in mind looking at the Middle East is: ALWAYS LOOK AT THE BIG PICTURE. Simply put, it is that the Israelis are the good guys, while their Arab enemies are not. Keep this is mind and you should be on the right track at least 95% of the time! And a final comforting thought — WHY WORRY? In the end (depending, of course, on one's age and health), we will all meet the same fate. So in the absence of divine intervention during our lifetimes, we will have to leave real peace in the Middle East to future generations. Hopefully, they will be guided by at least some of my rules. Morrie Amitay is a former Executive Director of AIPAC and founder of the pro-Israel Washington PAC (www.washingtonpac.com). |
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IRAN'S WESTERN ENABLERS
Posted by Shaul Ceder, April 14, 2009. |
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This was written by Caroline B. Glick and it appeared today in Jewish World Review. Caroline B. Glick is the senior Middle East Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC and the deputy managing editor of The Jerusalem Post. Comment by clicking here. |
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Egypt's recent actions against Hizbullah operatives are a watershed event for understanding the nature of the threat that Iran constitutes for both regional and global security. For many Israelis, Egypt's actions came as a surprise. For years this country has been appealing to Egypt to take action against Hizbullah operatives in its territory. With minor exceptions, it has refused. Believing that its operatives threatened only us, the Mubarak regime preferred to turn a blind eye. Then too, now seems a strange time for Egypt to be proving Israel correct. Senior ministers in the new Netanyahu government have for years been outspoken critics of Egypt for its refusal to act against Hizbullah and for its support for the Hizbullah/Iran-sponsored Hamas terror group. By going after Hizbullah now, Egypt is legitimizing both their criticism and the Netanyahu government itself. This in turn seems to go against Egypt's basic interest of weakening Israel politically in general, and weakening rightist Israeli governments in particular. But none of this seemed to interest Egyptian officials last week when they announced the arrest of 49 Hizbullah operatives and pointed a finger at Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah and his bosses in Teheran, openly accusing them of seeking to undermine Egypt's national security. The question is what caused Egypt to suddenly act? It appears that two things are motivating the Mubarak regime. First, there is the nature of the Hizbullah network it uncovered. According to the Egyptian Justice Ministry's statements, the arrested operatives were not confining their operations to weapons smuggling to Gaza. They were also targeting Egypt. The Egyptian state prosecution alleges that while operating as Iranian agents, they were scouting targets along the Suez Canal. That is, they were planning strategic strikes against Egypt's economic lifeline. The second aspect of the network that clearly concerned Egyptian authorities was what it showed about the breadth of cooperation between the regime's primary opponent — the Muslim Brotherhood — and the Iranian regime. Forty-one of the suspects arrested are Egyptian citizens, apparently aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood. This alignment is signaled by two things. First, many of them have hired Muslim Brotherhood activist Muntaser al-Zayat as their defense attorney. And second, Muslim Brotherhood spokesmen have decried the arrests. For instance, in an interview with Gulf News last Thursday, Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Issam el-Erian defended Hizbullah (and Iran) against his own government, claiming that Nasrallah and the Iranian ayatollahs are right to accuse President Hosni Mubarak of being little more than an Israeli stooge. In his words, "The Egyptian government must redraw its national security policies to include Israeli threats against Arab counties like Syria and Lebanon and to consider threats against Palestinians by Israelis as a threat against its national security." In a nutshell then, both the Hizbullah network's targets and its relationship to Egypt's Sunni Islamist opposition expose clearly the danger the Iranian regime constitutes to Egypt. Iran seeks to undermine and defeat opponents throughout the world through both direct military/terrorist/sabotage operations and through ideological subversion. It is the confluence of both of these aspects of Iran's revolutionary ambitions that forced Egypt to act now, regardless of the impact of its actions on the political fortunes of the Netanyahu government. And it is not a bit surprising that Egypt was forced to act at such a politically inopportune time.
THROUGHOUT the region and indeed throughout much of the world, Iran's star is on the rise. Its burgeoning nuclear program acts as a second arm of a pincer-like campaign against its opponents. The asymmetric and ideological warfare it wages through its terror and state proxies are the campaign's first arm. Together, these two strategic arms are raising the stakes of Iran's challenge to its neighbors and to the West to unprecedented and unacceptable heights. Morocco is so concerned about Iranian subversion of its Sunni population that last month it cut off diplomatic ties with Teheran. Iran's great leap forward has been exposed by recent events. Last month's Arab League summit in Doha exemplified how Iran has successfully split the Arab world between its proxies and its opponents. For the past three years, and particularly since the 2006 war between Israel and Iran's Hizbullah in Lebanon, Arab League states have been increasingly polarized around the issue of Iran. The country has used its satellite states of Syria, Sudan and Qatar, as well as its burgeoning alliances with Muslim Brotherhood branches in Egypt, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority and elsewhere, to legitimize its rapidly escalating assaults on Sunni regimes throughout the region. Although Egypt and Saudi Arabia successfully blocked Qatar from inviting Iran and Hamas to the summit, by using the good offices of Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Thani and Syrian President Bashar Assad, the Iranians were able to get their anti-Saudi/Egyptian platform passed. As the Middle East Media Research Institute chronicled in a report on the proceedings, Assad successfully abrogated the so-called Saudi peace plan that the Arab League adopted in 2002. According to a new Syrian-backed resolution, any Arab rapprochement with Israel would be contingent on Israel first destroying itself by withdrawing into indefensible borders and being overwhelmed by millions of hostile foreign Arab immigrants. Sensing what awaited him at the summit, Mubarak chose to stay home and send a junior emissary in his place. Saudi King Abdullah said nothing throughout the two-day Arab love-fest with Iran. Both leaders emerged weakened and humiliated. In recent years, Iran has expanded its sphere of influence to strategic points around the region. Two recent additions to Iran's axis are Eritrea and Somalia. Iran and Eritrea signed a strategic alliance last year that grants Iranian Revolutionary Guard units basing rights in the strategically vital Bab al-Mandab strait that controls the chokepoint connecting the Indian Ocean with the Red Sea. As for Somalia — whose position along the Gulf of Aden provides it a similarly critical maritime posture — Iran has been exploiting its condition as a failed state for several years. In 2006, the UN reported that some 720 Somali jihadists aligned with al-Qaida fought with Hizbullah in Lebanon during its war against Israel. According to an analysis of Iran's coopting of Somali jihadists published in November 2006 by the on-line Long War Journal, in exchange for the Somali operatives' assistance, Iran and Syria provided advanced military training to the Somalis who had just established the al-Qaida-affiliated Islamic Courts Union regime in the country. Teheran equipped the ICU with anti-aircraft missiles, grenade launchers, machine guns, ammunition, medicine, uniforms and other supplies both before and after it took control of Somalia. The UN report also linked the ICU to Iran's nuclear program. Its alleged that Iranian agents were operating in ICU chief Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys's hometown of Dusa Mareb, where they sought to buy uranium. Beyond the Horn of Africa, of course, Iran has been consistently expanding its influence in Iraq and Afghanistan. In both countries the mullahs simultaneously sponsor the insurgencies and offer themselves as the US's indispensible partner for stabilizing the countries they are destabilizing. What is perhaps most jarring about Iran's ever-expanding influence is the disparate responses it elicits from Israel and Sunni regimes like Egypt and Saudi Arabia on the one hand, and the West on the other. Whereas Israel and the Sunni Arab states warn about Iran daily, far from acknowledging or confronting this ever-expanding Iranian menace, the US and the Europeans have been alternatively ignoring it and appeasing it. If the US were taking the Iranian threat seriously, the Obama administration would not be begging Iran to negotiate with it after Teheran demonstrated that it has complete control over the nuclear fuel cycle. If the US were interested in contending with the danger Iran constitutes to global security, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would not be absurdly arguing that the US cannot verify whether Iran's announcement that it is now operating 7,000 centrifuges and its opening of another nuclear site signify an increase in its nuclear capacity. Were the US taking Iran seriously, it would not be asking Iran to help out in Afghanistan and Iraq. It would not be treating Somali piracy as a strategically insignificant nuisance. It would not be ignoring Eritrea's newfound subservience to Iran. It would not be maintaining the Central Command's headquarters in Qatar. And, of course, it would not be permitting Iran to move forward with its nuclear weapons program.
THEN THERE is Britain. Last week Michael Ledeen from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies reported that Britain's decision to recognize Hizbullah is part of a deal it struck with Iran and Hizbullah in exchange for five Britons who have been held hostage in Iraq by Hizbullah/Iran-affiliated terrorists for two years. According to the deal, in exchange for the British hostages, London agreed to recognize Hizbullah and the US agreed to release a number of Shi'ite terrorists its forces in Iraq have captured. As Tariq Alhomayed, the editor of Asharq al-Awsat, noted in response to the news, the deal puts paid Nasrallah's contention that Hizbullah does not operate outside Lebanon except to wage war against Israel. But it also points to a severe problem with the West. If Britain was willing to acknowledge and contend with the grave threat Iran constitutes for global security, it would not accept the authority of Hizbullah or Iran to negotiate the release of British hostages in Iraq. Instead it would place responsibility for achieving the release of the British hostages on the sovereign Iraqi government and use all the means at its disposal to strengthen that government against agents of Iranian influence in the country. So, too, rather than participate in the deal, the US would seek to destroy the Iranian-controlled operatives holding the hostages and discredit and defeat the Iraqi political forces operating under Iranian control. Certainly if the US were taking the Iranian threat seriously, it would announce that any withdrawal of US combat forces from Iraq will be linked to the complete defeat of agents of Iranian influence in Iraq. The West's refusal to contend with the burgeoning Iranian menace no doubt has something to do with the West's physical distance from Iran. Whereas Middle Eastern countries have no choice but to deal with Iran, the US and its European allies apparently believe that they can still pretend away the danger. But of course they cannot. From the Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden to Hizbullah cells from Iraq to Canada; from Iranian agents in British universities to Hizbullah and Iranian military advisers in South and Central America, the West, like the Middle East, is being infiltrated and surrounded. Egypt's open assault on Hizbullah is yet another warning that concerted action must be taken against the mullocracy. Unfortunately, the absence of Western resolve signals that this warning, too, will go unheeded. Contact the Ceders at ceder@netvision.net.il |
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HOMELAND SECURITY ON GUARD FOR 'RIGHT-WING EXTREMISTS'
Posted by Bryna Berchuck, April 14, 2009. |
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In Israel, the Government is still harassing religious Jews in Hebron and Jews holding down the fort in Samaria and Judea. Jewish farmers are harassed, while the European Union builds huge houses on the hilltops for the Arab terrorists. If a Jew and an Arab fight in court, put your money on the Arab to win. It's hard to believe this is happening in a Jewish State, isn't it? In America, we're starting to behave the same way. The FBI gives courses in Sharia Law! They aren't gunning after the Shariasts who want to substitute Islamic Law for the Constitution. They are training people in how to apply it! And who has Homeland Security decided is the enemy? Not the practitioners of the Religion of Peace. Hey we can't even call them terrorists anymore. They are practioners of man-made disasters. No, the real enemy is the 'right-wing extremist.' You all know right-wing extremists. You might even be one. That's a person that thinks the Government shouldn't take our hard-earned money to 'share' with everyone who doesn't want to bother working. A right-wing extremist doesn't want to builld up a huge cadre of petty government bureaucrats whose only loyalty is to the Democratic party and who will have the power to tell us what medical treatment we should have and what books our children should read. We'd better start electing some people who believe in the Constitution before we have some form of National Socialism here in the United States of America. Yes, Virginia, it can happen here. This is from World Net Daily. |
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WASHINGTON — A newly unclassified Department of Homeland Security report warns against the possibility of violence by unnamed "right-wing extremists" concerned about illegal immigration, increasing federal power, restrictions on firearms, abortion and the loss of U.S. sovereignty and singles out returning war veterans as particular threats. The report, titled "Right-wing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment," dated April 7, states that "threats from white supremacist and violent anti-government groups during 2009 have been largely rhetorical and have not indicated plans to carry out violent acts." However, the document, first reported by talk-radio host and WND columnist Roger Hedgecock, goes on to suggest worsening economic woes, potential new legislative restrictions on firearms and "the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their communities could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks." Are you ready for a second Declaration of Independence? Sign the petition promoting true freedom once again! The report from DHS' Office of Intelligence and Analysis defines right-wing extremism in the U.S. as "divided into those groups, movements and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups) and those that are mainly anti-government, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration." "[T]he consequences of a prolonged economic downturn — including real estate foreclosures, unemployment and an inability to obtain credit — could create a fertile recruiting environment for right-wing extremists and even result in confrontations between such groups and government authorities similar to those in the past," the report says. It adds that "growth in these groups subsided in reaction to increased government scrutiny as a result of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and disrupted plots, improvements in the economy and the continued U.S. standing as the pre-eminent world power." "Proposed imposition of firearms restrictions and weapons bans likely would attract new members into the ranks of right-wing extremist groups as well as potentially spur some of them to begin planning and training for violence against the government," the report continues. "The high volume of purchases and stockpiling of weapons and ammunition by right-wing extremists in anticipation of restrictions and bans in some parts of the country continue to be a primary concern to law enforcement." Most notable is the report's focus on the impact of returning war veterans. "Returning veterans possess combat skills and experience that are attractive to right-wing extremists," it says. "DHS/I&A is concerned that right-wing extremists will attempt to recruit and radicalize veterans in order to boost their violent capacities." The report cites the April 4 shooting deaths of three police officers in Pittsburgh as an example of what may be coming, claiming the alleged gunman holds a racist ideology and believes in anti-government conspiracy theories about gun confiscations, citizen detention camps and "a Jewish-controlled 'one-world government.'" It also suggests the election of an African-American president and the prospect of his policy changes "are proving to be a driving force for right-wing extremist recruitment and radicalization." The report also mentions "'end times' prophecies could motivate extremist individuals and groups to stockpile food, ammunition and weapons. These teachings also have been linked with the radicalization of domestic extremist individuals and groups in the past, such as the violent Christian Identity organizations and extremist members of the militia movement." "DHS/I&A assesses that right-wing extremist groups' frustration over a perceived lack of government action on illegal immigration has the potential to incite individuals or small groups toward violence," the report continues. The report states the DHS will be working with state and local partners over the next several months to determine the levels of right-wing extremist activity in the U.S. Last month, the chief of the Missouri highway patrol blasted a report issued by the Missouri Information Analysis Center that linked conservative groups to domestic terrorism, assuring that such reports no longer will be issued. The report had been compiled with the assistance of DHS. The report warned law enforcement agencies to watch for suspicious individuals who may have bumper stickers for third-party political candidates such as Ron Paul, Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin. It further warned law enforcement to watch out for individuals with "radical" ideologies based on Christian views, such as opposing illegal immigration, abortion and federal taxes. Chief James Keathley of the Missouri State Patrol issued a statement that the release of the report, which outraged conservatives nationwide, prompted him to "take a hard look" at the procedures through which the report was released by the MIAC. "My review of the procedures used by the MIAC in the three years since its inception indicates that the mechanism in place for oversight of reports needs improvement," he wrote. "Until two weeks ago, the process for release of reports from the MIAC to law enforcement officers around the state required no review by leaders of the Missouri State Highway Patrol or the Department of Public Safety." "For that reason, I have ordered the MIAC to permanently cease distribution of the militia report," he said. "Further, I am creating a new process for oversight of reports drafted by the MIAC that will require leaders of the Missouri State Highway Patrol and the Department of Public Safety to review the content of these reports before they are shared with law enforcement. My office will also undertake a review of the origin of the report by MIAC." PALESTINIAN ARAB DOCTRINE OF GENOCIDE Hamas Covenant, schools, mosques, and media teach its society, "Oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him...", etc.. So does the Palestinian Authority. Both factions' militias there attack Jews, as taught, and the populations there celebrate successful murders of Jews. Britain denies that reality. Its media claim that Israel dehumanizes those Arabs and delights in murdering them. Actually, every major Israeli organization condemns hatred of Arabs, while every major Arab organization exhorts hatred of Jews. The British media ignores Arab murder of Jews, but waxes indignant when Israeli self-defense kills Arabs. That is how Britain portrayed Israel's 2002 raid into Jenin against terrorists who had slain 133 Israelis. The Israeli raid killed 52 Arabs who fought against them or were used as human shields, losing 23 of its own troops doing so. Britain's media called that a massacre of Arabs, attempted genocide, as bad as 9/11. That journalism is perverse. Britain has a long history of antisemitism. This has been aggravated by the infiltration of the Labor Party and unions by hard-bitten Trotskyites, internecine rivals of the Communists (Prof. Steven Plaut, 3/30). DRAMA AT UNIVERSITY & ON TV IN GAZA "Following are excerpts from a drama show presented at the Gaza Islamic University, during a festival commemorating Hamas founder Ahmad Yassin. The show aired on Al-Aqsa TV on April 4, 2009. To view this clip, visit http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/2073.htm.
To view more clips on Al-Aqsa TV, visit
'You Must Drink From the Blood of Muslims. But Mix It With Soda Water' Jewish father: 'We Jews hate the Muslims. We love killing Muslims. We Jews love drinking the blood of Muslims and the blood of Arabs. Are you Arabs? Are you Muslims? I hate you. Yes, I hate you. I hate you in order to please God. In order to please God. In order to please God.' Shimon, his son: 'Dad, I don't know how God could possibly be pleased with you when you stink so much. You haven't taken a shower for two years, yet you talk about pleasing God.' Father: 'In order to please God. Shimon, my son, I'd like to teach you something. You must hate the Muslims.'" (www.imra.org.il, 4/7.) |
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GAYS UNDER ATTACK IN IRAQ; DRAMA AT UNIVERSITY & ON TV IN GAZA; OBAMA'S NOTION OF PALESTINIAN ARAB MOTHERS
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 14, 2009. |
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GAYS UNDER ATTACK IN IRAQ Moktada al-Sadr, the anti-American cleric in Iraq, has prayer services denouncing homosexuality. Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali-al-Sistani, said that Gays and lesbians should be "punished, in fact, killed." Such executions are taking place in Iraq. Most of them are "honor killings" by family members. Others are by death squads. This reaction is not consonant with the increased tolerance of Iraqi women to dress more in Western style (Timothy Williams & Tareq Maher, NY Times, 4/8, A1). Months ago, I came across reports of oppression of gays in the Palestinian Authority. Gays there flee to Israel, for sanctuary. Oddly, one hears of organized gays in the US taking an anti-Israel line. EUROPEAN UNION VS. ISRAEL For the second time in a month, the European Union (E.U.) has issued vague threats against Israel. This time it threatened not to upgrade its trade with Israel, unless the new Israeli government commits to E.U. policy on the Arab-Israel conflict. That policy is statehood for the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/, Arutz-7, 3/30). Does the E.U. know better than Israel's elected government what is good for Israel. What arrogance! Wasn't the E.U. a major critic of the US for allegedly imposing its policies upon other countries? Now the E.U. is doing it. Hypocrisy! The E.U. insist that the P.A. get sovereignty, without justifying it. The E.U. could not justify it. The P.A. has violated all its agreements, include the prerequisite for peace — eradicating terrorism and the indoctrination in religious warfare. BRITAIN HEADING OFF TERRORIST RECRUITS? British police think that they can study Muslim school children and identify those who are vulnerable to recruitment by terrorists. One police method was cited. Police would examine students compositions for sympathy for al-Qaida (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/, Arutz-7, 3/30). ISRAELI ARAB VIEW OF IRAN An Arab party's first female MK in Israel welcomes Iran's development of nuclear weapons and its influence on the Palestinian Authority. She explains that Iran would counter Israel, which is dangerous (http://www.imra.org.il/, 3/31). Iran's influence is by supporting Hamas terrorism. Iran threatens to use a-bombs. OBAMA'S NOTION OF PALESTINIAN ARAB MOTHERS At a Turkish student roundtable, Pres. Obama said he would oppose al-Qaeda both militarily and ideologically. He would support education systems that do not indoctrinate in terrorism. [He's proposed financing decent schools in Pakistan.] In proposing statehood for Palestinian Arabs in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza, he said, "I have to believe that the mothers of Palestinians and the mothers of Israelis hope the same thing for their children. They want them not to be vulnerable to violence. They don't want, when their child gets on a bus, to worry that that bus might explode. They don't want their child to have to suffer indignities because of who they are." He wishes the mothers were in charge. He urges Israelis to understand the viewpoint of the Arabs (www.imra.org.il, 4/8). Yes, the civilized world must oppose Radical Islam as an ideology as well as a military force, to save itself. Let's see whether the President works out how. No, what he says he believes about mothers not only is mistake but pernicious. It equates the two peoples as causes of violence. The problem is not Israel. Israelis do not hate Arab Muslims "because of who they are." If more Israelis understood the viewpoint of the Palestinian Arabs, they would stop offering them territory in exchange for hoped-for-peace. The reason is that Islamist ideology largely consists of hatred of the Jewish people and a desire to conquer them. One doesn't need mothers to be in charge of Israel, because Israel does not commit terrorism and doesn't want war. Arabs in the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) don't have to worry about their buses being blown up, because Israelis do not blow up buses. It's different with the Muslim Arabs. Pres. Obama does not seem to have studied what P.A. mothers want. Nor does it matter what they want — P.A. mothers are not in charge. Both halves of the P.A. are male, Radical Muslim dictatorships. P.A. society indoctrinates in the virtue of suicide bombing. It honors and subsidizes families of suicide bombers. Mothers there have been filmed encouraging children to murder. I've seen numerous polls showing that most of the P.A. population wants to conquer Israel. Almost half of them approve of suicide bombing. Disapproval of suicide bombing rarely is on ethical grounds but in terms of whether it pays. Turning back to the President's pledge to oppose education systems that indoctrinate in terrorism, he doesn't oppose the P.A. education system, though it does indoctrinate in terrorism. The US subsidizes the P.A., and Obama has added to that subsidy. The US even arms the P.A. in Judea-Samaria. Obama is continuing the mixed up policy of his predecessor, in which he engages against some terrorists and "engages" with others. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |