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THINK-ISRAEL |
| THINK-ISRAEL features essays and commentaries that provide context for current events in Israel. The war Islam is waging against Israel and the West is a top priority. We report on global anti-Semitism, Islamism and creeping Sharia.We aim to make sense of what's going on. |
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We are told that there is a difference between extremist Islam and
peaceloving normal Islam.
Judging by their behavior, Muslims are anti-West, anti-Democracy, anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-Buddhist, and anti-Hindu. Muslims are involved in 25 of some 30 conflicts going on in the world: in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Bosnia, Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, Cyprus, East Timor, India, Indonesia (2 provinces), Kashmir, Kazakastan, Kosovo, Kurdistan, Macedonia, the Middle East, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Somalia, Sudan, Russia-Chechnya, Tajikistan, Thailand, Uganda and Uzbekistan. Doesn't this mean that extremist Islam is the norm and normal Islam is extremely rare? |
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"The Palestinian people does not
exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for
continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab
unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians,
Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical
reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people,
since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a
distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism.
"For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa. While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan." (PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein, March 31, 1977, interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw.) [The Palestinian leadership, including Ahmed Shukar and Yasir Arafat, has openly admitted Palestinian "peoplehood" is a fraud; read this.] |
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The total for all the 22 Arab League
countries is 6,145,389 square miles (SM). By comparison, all 50 states of
the United States have a total of 3,787,318 SM. Israel has
8,463 SM, about one-sixth of that of the State of Michigan.
Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and Afghanistan are Muslim but not Arab and are
not included.
World Arab population: 300 million; World Jewish population: 13.6 million; Israel's Jewish population: 5.4 million. (reference: Dr. Wilbert Simkovitz, http://dehai.org/archives/dehai_news_archive/ apr04/0223.htmldehai.org/archives/dehai_news_archive/apr04/0223.html) |
| "It has no heart. It has no spine. Its mouth serves as its anus. It has a diffuse net of nerves instead of a brain. Is it a jelly fish or an Israeli politician? Pick one. Whichever one you picked, you were right." (Eliezar Edwards, June 20, 2005) |
| To Israeli Secularists: You want a normal country, like everybody else? I will tell you how. Forget ads featuring bikini-clad hotsies. Forget promoting "alternative" life styles. The secret is to adopt the right attitude. A normal country doesn't give up an inch of land that belongs to it. A normal country doesn't let its citizens go hungry while it feeds its enemy and gives them medical care. A normal country doesn't let foreigners take over its holy sites Hebron, the Temple Mount, Joseph's Tomb. Looking at what counts, it's the religious Jews of Samaria and Judea and the Golan that are acting normal, not you. (Eliezar Edwards, March 20, 2008) |
| Some 900,000 Jews left behind $300 billion in assets when they were forced to flee for their lives from the Arab countries in the 1940s. They hold deeds for five times Israel's size. (Independent Media Centre, Winnipeg) |
| A Palestinian State? You want that? OK. BUT not in Israel. No way. Not now. Not ever. Put this Arab state in Dubai or Kuwait or Saudi Arabia or Libya or Syria. Make it big. Fill it with the Po' Arab "refugees". And with the Arabs of Gaza and Samaria and Judea (AKA West Bank). And treasonous Arabs who have Israeli citizenship. Build a big fence around it. Let them learn to develop the infrastructure of a state. Or let them destroy themselves, if that's what they prefer. If they ever become civilized, then it's time to consider letting them join the human race. (Eliezar Edwards, August, 2008) [For an early excellent solution, read Eli E. Hertz, "The U.S. Congress in 1922," here.] |
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"The sudden frequency of highly-publicized verbal attacks on Jewish
residents of Judea and Samaria is not a coincidence," [Yesha Council
head Danny] Dayan said. "This is a well-orchestrated attempt to
demonize an entire community for political purposes, while using the
worst tools available to the inciter: distortion of facts,
generalization, blatant lies, and preaching hate, ... video clips used
by multiple media outlets were later proven to have been taken out of
context. (Arutz-7, December 8, 2008)
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| What is ironic is that Israel belongs exclusively to the Jews by International Law. (Google Think-Israel for articles by Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, etc., for the legal basis of Israel's ownership of Israel and the Territories.) So why do the Arabs insist the land is theirs? Because the Jews have been so crazy for peace, they have been willing to share, to give up pieces of their tiny country, for a piece of paper. The Arabs created a phony people in 1964, called the "Palestinians" and blanketed the world with the mantra that they were the Palestinians and Palestine was theirs. There has not ever been a country or a state called Palestine. There have been Palestinians. During the British Mandate from 1922 to 1948 the Jews called where they lived Palestine. They played music in the Palestine Philharmonic. They read the Palestine Post (now the Jerusalem Post.) As the Palestine Brigade, they fought in the British Army in World War 2. The Arabs also fought hard for Hitler (Eliezar Edwards, December, 2008. |
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"... during the late 1940s, more than 40 million refuges around the
world were resettled, except for one people. They remain defined as
refugees, wallowing 60 years later in 59 UNRWA refugee camps, financed
by $400 million contributed annually by nations of the world to
nurture the promise of the "right of return" to Arab neighborhoods and
Arab villages from 1948 that no longer exist." (Noam Bedein, Jerusalem
Post, January 6, 2009.)
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Derived from the Afrikaan words apart (apart) and
heid (hood), apartheid is the state policy of racial
segregation involving political, legal and economic discrimination
based on notions of racial superiority. How one can even begin to
compare Israel, the Middle East's only liberal democracy, to such a
regime is beyond comprehension. Today, in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, Palestinian women, who were once among the most educated and avant-garde in the Arab world, are coerced into wearing the hijab, while in Israel women of all faiths are free from all forms of religious repression. In Israel, homosexuals live free from harassment, while in Iran they are lynched in the public square. In Israel, alleged criminalsincluding terrorists captured by policeare given due process, while in other Middle Eastern countries they are decapitated or, in the case of terrorists, glorified as martyrs. (Yoram Elron, "The Myth Of Israeli Apartheid" National Post, March 6, 2009) |
| "Land for Peace" is a medicine based on the wrong diagnosis. The war against Israel is not a territorial conflict and thus can not be solved with territorial concessions. Giving away an area does not help. Hamas cum suis are not fighting for pieces of land but for the total final victory of Islam, to which the rapid destruction of Israel is only a transitional stage. The conflict is jihad, the violent duty of every Muslim. Israel is located on the fault line of the dar-al-Islam and dar-al-Harb. To Islam, all of Israel is occupied territory and Tel Aviv is as much a "settlement" as was Netzarim. (Geert Wilders and Martin Bosma, "Land for peace doesn't work", Gates of Vienna Blogspot, January 6, 2009) |
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HERE'S ONE FOR YOU PUZZLE FANS.
JONATHAN POLLARD NEVER ENDANGERED
AMERICA. HE GAVE ISRAEL INFORMATION IT WAS SUPPOSED TO GET ANYWAYS.
WHY HAS HE SAT IN JAIL LONGER THAN PEOPLE WHO GOT AMERICANS KILLED.
WHO OR WHAT GROUP IS KEEPING HIM FROM FREEDOM? AND WHY?
THERE'S A NEW PRESIDENT. THE LAST ONE DIDN'T DO WHAT'S RIGHT. MAYBE THIS ONE WILL. IT'S UP TO US. SO GET BACK TO WORK. KEEP CALLING. AND PRAY.
Every call is tallied by subject matter.
To write to Jonathan: Jonathan Pollard #09185-016. c/o FCI Butner. POB 1000. Butner, NC. USA 27509-1000 |
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May-June, 2009
This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. The Blog-Eds page for the month is updated every few days. A Blog-Ed page has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. To go to the list, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page. May 2009 BLOG-EDS
READ MORE
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March-April, 2009
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WHO NEEDS A PALESTINIAN STATE?
Who needs a Palestinian State, Sultan Knish asks and answers it this
way: aside from the Administration in Washington and the European
Union, it's "the dictators of a dozen Arab states who agree that the
only thing that will fix the region is adding another Arab
dictatorship to the place, and subtracting the area's one
democracy." That's it in a nutshell. As it is, the diplomats are
pressing harder for a state than are the Palestinians themselves. A
state doesn't particularly appeal to those Cultists of Death
the fabricated Palestinian people whose unity derives from
their common source of support, charity from various world
governments, and the pride they take in their talent for killing.
WHITHER THE "PEACE PROCESS"?
Ted Belman summarizes the latest thinking on the Peace Process --
creating a Palestinian state in Biblical Israel. Israel believes she
can hold firm until the Palestinians do what they've committed
themselves to but have never honored: stopping their violence. The
American Administration believes it can make magic happen: two states
in the Middle East, one of them Muslim, "living side by side in peace
and security." The Arabs believe they can force Israel to accept the
Saudi peace plan that will destroy Israel by flooding it with
Palestinians; a Palestinian state is unimportant to them. All ignore
that by international resolution, there is "the irrevocable right of
Jews to settle in the area of Palestine..."anywhere between the Jordan
River and the Mediterranean Sea. The land is Jewish all of it
including the West Bank by irrevocable legal trust conferred
by the League of Nations and continued by the United Nations.
In 1922 it was also confirmed by a unanimous endorsorsement by
both Houses of Congress, So, as Belman writes, "... it lies ill in the
mouth for the U.S. to now deny Jews the right to settle the lands. It
is the settlement freeze that's illegal, not the settlements."
THE QUESTION OF THE APPLICABILITY OF THE FOURTH GENEVA CONVENTION ON OCCUPATION TO JUDEA, SAMARIA AND GAZA
Howard Grief makes clear why applying rules from the Fourth Geneva
Convention (FGC) to Israel's ownership of Judea and Samaria (the "West
Bank") and Gaza rests on dubious and incomplete interpretions of FGC.
Briefly, the IDF can not be considered a "hostile army" occupying
Judea, Samaria and Gaza because these areas did not belong to Jordan
or Egypt. By irrevocable trust, the land belonged to Israel. He also
overturns the myth that Israel is an occupier of Arab land, because
Mandated Palestine was never Arab land. This is an important paper. We
have included appendices on some basic documents that indicate that
the Peace Process and the Two-State solution violate
Israel's irrevocable right to Mandated Palestine.
ON TWISTED HIGHWAYS TO "PALESTINE" WHY "OCCUPATION" IS STILL A LIE
Louis Beres provides clearly-stated facts and long-term contextual
history that makes it clear that "the so-called 'Palestinian
Territories' are not occupied by Israel." They are
Israeli. The context enriches the legal discussion on Israeli's right
to Mandated Palestine by Howard Grief (see above).
FORCED TO CONCEDE A BIRTHRIGHT?
Victor Sharpe points out in this essay that tearing off pieces of
Israeli land supposedly for peace is not new. And the result has been
greater Arab hostility, not peace. The objective now is to hack
Biblical Israel out of tiny Israel. It has begun by Arabs creating
facts on the ground building illegally in Samaria and Judea --
while the Israeli government devotes its time to harassing the Jews in
Samaria and Judea who understand it isn't enough to own the land
legally; Jews have to hold the land physically.
Sharpe asks, "How long before the majority of politicians in the
Knesset finally accept that Jews have returned to their ancestral and
Biblical land, a land which presently stretches from the Mediterranean
Sea to the Jordan River." Until they themselves are persuaded, how can
they communicate the facts to outsiders?
WHY TIME IS ON ISRAEL'S SIDE: A LONG-TERM PERSPECTIVE ON ISRAEL'S SECURITY CHALLENGES
Max Singer succinctly summarizes Israel's major political and security
problem: "... the Palestinians are determined to destroy Israel, and
no concessions or improvements in our treatment of them will induce
them to give up their goal." He argues that democracy is globally on
the rise, and so long as Israel can continue to keep terror attacks at
what he calls "tolerable levels", then within a decade, Israel can
count on America to stifle the jihadist threat to the West. I wish he
had given voice to how to handle related problems: as long as Israel
continues a defensive minimalist policy, the morale of her citizens
will continue to drop, while foreign diplomats, seeing Israel as an
easy mark, will likely demand more and more concessions from her. Then
too, what if, while Israel waits, Iran does just what she says she
will. There is also the nightmare possibility that America will become
a much weaker country, a weak reed to rely on.
THE ROLE OF RADICAL ISLAMIC GROUPS IN ISRAEL: IMPLICATIONS FOR ISRAELI-ARAB COEXISTENCE
As Mordechai Kedar writes, "The core question is to whom does this
country belong? According to the Arab narrative, this has been an Arab
Islamic state since the days of Omar, the caliph who conquered the
country in the seventh century. According to the Islamic approach,
since Islam began in 622 CE, all of history before that time has no
meaning or significance." Nor do they accept that modern Israel holds
the land because it overcame Arab invasions of Israel. Nevertheless,
many of the names of the resident Arabs reflect the fact that they are
not native to Israel but came originally from Egypt or Syria or Jordan
or Lebanon or Iraq. And not that long ago. It is true that Islam
insists that "land can only go one way, to become Islamic, and it can
never go the other way," but why ever should we sane Westerners accept this
Islam-centric view?
BASIC THOUGHTS FOR THE NEW PRIME MINISTER
In this essay, Louse René Beres astutely advices the new prime
minister of Israel to move cautiously. Some fundamental questions need
to be answered: for example, for Israel's viability, is any form of diplomacy
indicated? He notes that in its eagerness for peace, Israel has been
too quick to follow directives from the "civilized world." As a
result, it has yielded up Israeli land in return for nothing. Yet the
Jews continue to hope for a negotiated peace while the Arabs speak
plainly and truthfully that it is their "irremediable intention to
annihilate the Jewish state." "For both Palestinian insurgents and
Iran's president, conflict with Israel is always an all or nothing
proposition [...] On the Palestinian and Iranian side, Oslo and 'Road
Map' expectations have never been seen as anything more than a
cost-effective method of dismantling Israel." If Israel is to survive,
it must cast off some of its deepest-held fantasies, peace-seeking
strategies and fallacious assumptions because it is dealing with Arab
realists who know just what they want. They may on occasion need to
slow down and may occasionally agree to negotiate, but they are never
deviated from their goal the destruction of Israel as a
prerequisite to attacking the West. There is no middle ground and
Israel should not be frittering away valuable time trying for measures
like a demilitarized Palestinian state that look good
but that have no substance. Beres' advice is both obvious and sensible:
abrogate the Oslo Accord. It was a terrible and deadly mistake.
POLITICS OF PALESTINIAN DEMOGRAPHY
Yoram Ettinger, who writes on the assesment of demographic data
for Jews and Arabs, says about this essay by Yakov Faitelson:
"Faitelson refutes Demographic Fatalism and documents Demographic
Optimism. Faitelson highlights critical errors committed by
demographic fatalism: understating Jewish fertility rate; overstating
Arab fertility rate; ignoring the potency of annual Jewish Aliya
(immigration) since 1882; overlooking the high Arab emigration;
attributing to Jews West normative European demographic patterns,
while Jewish demographics and Jews in general have been
non-normative; accepting Palestinian Bureau of Statistics numbers
without scrutiny, while these numbers have been inflated
dramatically." Faitelson's essay is an excellent summary of actual
demographic trends in Israel and the Territories.
USING THE PRESENT TO FABRICATE HISTORY; USING HISTORY TO FABRICATE THE PRESENT
A major reason Israel has communication problems is that the Arabs do
so well fictionalizing history. This goes over well with an ignorant
media. It is a truism that we see the present in terms of our history.
Seth Frantzman makes the case for the converse: we see historical
events in terms of our present biases. "... western slavery is seen as
the greatest evil while Muslim slavery, which began earlier and
murdered more people, is seen as positive and tolerant, all because we
have a common view of the Old South as evil and Modern Islam as
tolerant and diverse." Similarly, the PLO's new image as "moderate" is
projected backwards. "People forget its role in Lebanon and Jordan,
its mass murder of Olympic Athletes or its bombing of synagogues in
Europe. People even forget that it was founded long before 1967, along
with Fatah, and that its original goal was not the liberation of
Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, but the opposite, only the
destruction of Israel inside the Green Line." Part I presents a
grotesque example of how the past is imagined as a doppelganger of the
present in a book by a Holocaust survivor, who loathes Israel and
blames America for the botchup in the Middle East. Part II describes
the reality of life in Iraq in the 1920s. Despite our
projected-backwards belief bolstering the assertion that modern-day
Islam is tolerant, minorities in Muslim countries Egypt's
treatment of the Copts is an egregious example were and are
actively discouraged from maintaining their identities, until in many
cases, they dwindle away. Part III gives us insight into at least one
reason why Muslim countries are said to be tolerant and benign
their treatment by journalists as amplified in the Main Stream Press.
PESSACH COMES
Moshe Saperstein is in top form, his black humor at split-second
timing as he records what he sees as his deteriorating body which,
all things considered, doesn't bother him as much as the soupy-headed
ideas of much of the Israeli administration. in one essay, Rachel
Saperstein writes of Aryeh Eldad surgeon, politician and defender
of the Jews of Gush Katif, when they were senselessly ripped out of
their homes in Gaza and his father, who she never met. She makes us
wish that we too knew both father and son.
THERE'S ROOM AT THE 'TREE' FOR YOU
Catriel Sugarman provides us with a brief but clear history of the
Christian need to convert Jews. In modern times, this urgency has
spawned Messianic Judaism. Initially conceived as a ruse to entice
Jews into Christianity, it has as do all social engineeering
projects had unintended consequences. It has mostly attracted
Christians, some of whom try to live more or less "Jewish" while they
acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah, some of whom see themselves as the
real Jews and are increasingly hostile to Judaism and some of whom
have used it as a half way house to Judaism or Noahidism. It has also
helped galvinize Jewish groups such as Jews for Judaism, Chabad and
Aish HaTorah to work to stem the tide of Jews moving out of Judaism
out of indifference, ignorance or amorphous spiritual longings. To
date, missionaries of whatever stripe have been more of a problem in
America, but Israel is also being targetted. A fascinating essay.
THE SYRIAN FOOL'S ERRAND
A major problem for the new Israeli administration is an American
president who has not shown good instinctive judgment. He appears to
have no familiarity with the major problem besetting the globe --
if anything, he has ignored the global Islamic insurgency and put all
his eggs in the 'let's reason together' diplomacy basket. In this
essay Bruce Thornton points out that Washington's last attempt at
engaging Syria in diplomatic talks is but the latest of a long
sequence of fool's errands. We've been there, done that. Again and
again. It doesn't work. Why? The basic reason is simple but always
ignored by diplomats and other fantasists: the Arab countries refuse
to have a non-Muslim state in the Middle East. As a result, as
Thornton writes, "We in the West assume that the Arab countries really
want peace and coexistence with Israel, if only the Palestinian Arabs
get their own state and the 'occupation' is ended. So ...
A REALITY CHECK ABOUT GAZA
The IDF fought in a disciplined fashion in Gaza, but they were
hamstrung by the politicians, who feared a bad press. The IDF wasn't
allowed to finish the job -- to destroy the sources and resources that
continue to enable the Gazan terrorists to lob missiles at Israeli
cities. In consequence, Hamas can, and does, claim victory. As Martin
Sherman writes, Israel suffered a "calamitous diplomatic defeat" and
"its international standing and image suffered." Sherman suggests the
root cause of the poor showing in 2007 in Lebanon and now in Gaza is
"a loss of faith in 'Victory' both as valid cognitive concept and as
an attainable military objective... the real victor in both campaigns
was in fact the myth of the 'The Impossibility of Victory.'" Israel
needs to understand it will continue to be harassed by foreign
politicians and local arabs until it is willing to "inflict a
degrading defeat" on the radical Arabs and by military means make them
understand that their "path can and will only lead to
disgrace and dishonor."
THE FAITHFUL CHILDREN
In the previous article, Martin Sherman indicated that convincing the
politicians to change their belief structure is a major Israeli
problem. In this essay, Patricia Berlyn writes of the IDF soldiers, who are
disciplined and moral and more than willing to fight for their
country. She writes about three of these soldiers and how they behaved
during the Gaza campaign. Despite their discipline and compassion, the
world press still managed to demonize them. And their politicians made
sure they will have to fight again to finish Hamas' war from Gaza.
JIHADI PIRATES ON HIGH SEAS: WHAT'S THE DRIVING FORCE BEHIND THEM?
An American ship was recently hijacked by Somali pirates. The
captain, Richard Phillips, acted heroically in protecting his crew as
did the Navy snipers who took out the pirates. As reported in the
Main Stream Media (MSM), Prez Obama got the credit. Actually the
initiative came from the on-the-scene commander (see
here.) while an indecisive Obama was still averaging out the
advice from his multiple advisors. Further, the MSM ignored the fact
that the pirates were Muslim and Jihadist. Walid Phares explains the
significance of the episode thus: " [The pirates are] in fact part of
a regional Jihadi apparatus ... [that] is not limited to the pirates
but involves hostile forces from the mid Red Sea to East Africa. The
Somali pirates are merely one facet of this grand circle."
BARAKA
Boris Zubry has drawn on his experiences working in Saudi Arabia in
several previous stories. In this one, he writes about a man named
Baraka, an illiterate Muslim, a good observer, a philosopher of sorts.
In our society he'd be called a homeless person. In his environment,
he blends in. In this soliloquy he muses on a life filled with
ugliness, abuse and death. Orphaned in Turkey he is routed to Gaza,
where he and other immigrants from the Ottoman Empire "the refuse of
the great empire, would" he writes, "claim this territory as our own.
Who could say back then that they would teach us to hate the Jews more
than the Turks?" He has been transformed into a "Palestinian." He has
become member of a welfare group supported by the world and a useful
weapon to club the Jews, but he is never allowed to be his own person.
PALESTINIAN MODERATES WANT PEACE WITH HAMAS, NOT ISRAEL
Months, if not years, of western and Israeli propaganda went out the
window when Smiling Abbas the Good Terrorist, Israel's 'peace
partner' announced he doesn't accept the Jewish state. Another
assertion that the PLO-PA moderates want to live in peace with
Israel was also punctured, as Barry Rubin demonstrates, when a
leader of the moderates, Muhammad Dahlan, made it clear he seeks peace
with Hamas, not with Israel. And the two are mutually exclusive.
THE USE OF MOSQUES FOR MILITARY AND POLITICAL PURPOSES BY HAMAS AND OTHER TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS AND ISLAMIC GROUPS
The Western mind doesn't see churches or synagogues as places to store
and launch weaponry so it has difficulty believing Muslims have a
different attitude towards mosques. Reuven Erlich provides us with
detailed evidence that terror groups and their clerics find it
acceptable to use the mosque for military purposes. Interestingly
enough, this is not a recent innovation. As Erlich notes, "A commonly
held view by Muslim religious scholars is that a mosque is more than
just a place of worship and can have military and political uses,
because in Muslim tradition Muhammad himself used the mosque for such
purposes." What needs to be emphasized is that when a mosque is used
to store explosives, launch missiles and train terrorists, it can not
claim "the special protection afforded houses of worship [by
international law] and may become legitimate targets for attack."
ISLAM SHOULD PROVE IT'S A RELIGION OF PEACE
Geert Wilders' film FITNA links actual footage of violence committed
by Islamists to quotes from the Koran. In consequence, Wilders has
been accused of hate crime, and disrespect to Islam. Tawfik Hamid cut
through the nonsense and asks the right question: "[is the] blame with
Mr. Wilders, who simply exposed Islamic radicalism, or with those who
promote and engage in this religious extremism." Phased thus, the
answer is obvious. Hamid suggests it's time that Muslim scholars
reinterpret the Koran to eliminate barbaric practices and the
denigrating of other religions. These practices have no place in
modern civilization. A fine idea but I'm not holding my breath.
WHAT IS MARXISM?
Nowadays, Communism seldom commands front-page headlines and "You're a
Communist" has ceased to be a dreaded exclamation of disapprobation,
So many a younger American haven't a clue to what Communism is.
Marxism, the parent of Communism, unfortunately, is still very
much with us and nicely sums up the ideology common to extreme
left-wingers, socialists, communists, power-to-the-peoplers,
wealth-distributors, welfare-staters, nanny-staters, radical judicial
activists, illiberal liberals, identity-politicians and radical theologians. Steven Plaut
defines Marxism for us in clear terms. It is particularly necessary,
now that the new administration in Washington seems to have embarked
on yet another version of Marxism.
SHARIAH'S BROTHERHOOD
Given Pres. Obama's new policy of showing Islam unreserved (and
perhaps undeserved) respect, the command centers of current-day
Islamism are having an easier time in attempting to make Sharia law
universal. In the latest scheme, the United Nations is urged to
criminalize Islamophobia. Islamophobia is an odd term it doesn't
mean an irrational fear of Islam. It means in practice any word or
deed that will upset a Muslim. "The demand that no criticism of Islam
be permitted is the preeminent feature of the Muslim Brotherhood's
efforts in the West." As Frank Gaffney, Jr. points out "the 1990 Cairo
Declaration on Human Rights in Islam ... concludes with the caveat
that, 'All the rights and freedoms stipulated in this Declaration are
subject to the Islamic Shariah.' Translation: Liberties enshrined in
the UN's foundational Universal Declaration of Human Rights are
largely rendered null and void." You are urged to contact the White
House and speak against this threat to American freedom of speech.
WARFARE THROUGH MISUSE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW
Previous articles on Lawfare -- waging war by using the muscle of the
legal system -- have focussed on specific cases and countries. In this
article, Elizabeth Samson points out lawfare has acquired a global
reach, using three legal manipulations: involving the International
courts; "misus[ing] legal terminology to manipulate international
institutions and the public"; and the "prosecution of foreign nationals in
domestic courts for military and civilian action." Consequently, as
she points out, "...the rule of law, a weapon designed to subdue
dictators and tyrants is now being misused to empower the very same,
and being manipulated to subvert real justice and indisputable truth.
That is not the purpose the law is designed to serve." Lawfare is a
particularly effective tool for Islamists to use because as Samson
writes, "Lawfare is exponentially effective because one lawsuit can
silence thousands who have neither the time nor the financial
resources to challenge well-funded terror financiers or the vast
machine of the international judicial system."
SHARIA'S INROADS AROUND THE WORLD
Olivier Guitta reviews the latest inroads Sharia law is making
globally. In Pakistan, Sharia law has been imposed in the Swat valley.
In Europe, it has made significant advances in the judiciary of
several countries Italy, France and Denmark where the courts
have ignored the laws of the land and have ruled in accordance with
Islamic law. In England, many Englishmen are enthusiastically in favor
of adopting portions of Sharia law. They may eventually find that just
as it's impossible to be a little pregnant, it is impossible to adopt
a portion of sharia law.
EUROPE'S RIGHT TURN
Bruce Bawer, an American who has lived in Europe for many years, is an
astute observer of western Europe's changing political and social
mores. Once proud of putting their socialist idealism into welfare
practice, Europeans are finding that they can no longer afford the
huge influx of Muslims living on their benevolence while attempting to
subvert them to Sharia law. As one consequence, their socialized
health and education systems are broken. As another, political
alliances are in turmoil: while many voters are reacting to the
deterioration of their countries by turning politically to the right,
the entrenched political establishments are reacting by ignoring the
Muslim threat and focussing on demonizing right-wing politicians. The
U.S.A. should take warning.
IRAN SETTING UP SHOP SOUTH OF THE BORDER
Iran doesn't just rant and polish her nuclear skills. It looks like
she's taking advantage of a naive administration in Washington to
infiltrate into Mexico. It's possible, of course, that Iran is lonely
and just wants to chat with a fellow oil-producer. But we know that
Muslims Hezbollah included come in from Mexico, blending in with
the Mexican illegals, and occasionally leaving prayer mats at the
border. It will certainly be nice for the Iranians to have America
ignore them while they explore business opportunities with Mexican
politicos and maybe even important Mexicans like the ones that run the
drug cartels.
NAIVETE KILLS
Barry Rubin writes of the arrogance and self-delusion of the ignorant
reporter. He writes, "It never ceases to amaze me that people who
know nothing about the Middle East, in this case Roger Cohen but many
other names come to mind, can suddenly proclaim themselves experts
and make the most elementary errors involving the lives of other
people. It also never ceases to amaze me that people can visit a
country, especially a dictatorship, be wined and dined, handed a line
and believe it so thoroughly that their mind is closed ever after."
They return and praise dictators, explain how justified the
terrorists are and whitewash the Muslim Brotherhood. Unfortunately,
too often, they write for influential newspapers that help certify
they are to be taken seriously. They act in this generation as the
notorious Walter Duranty did in the 1920-30s when he assured New
York Times readers the Soviet dictatorship which was busy
starving millions of Kulaks wa benevolent, doing a fine job
and was just right for the Russian people. Rubin suggests reasons why
"the gap between reality and perception [is] so much wider on the
Middle East than on other subjects or areas of the world."
TEXTBOOK LIES ABOUT ISLAM
Raymond Ibrahim discusses the treatment of Islam and Muslims in
textbooks used to educate our children, noting that "key subjects like
jihad, Islamic law, [and] the status of women are whitewashed."
Textbooks mislead "by projecting Western interpretations onto Islam."
As Ibrahim writes, "... necessary knowledge is not merely ignored, but
not even acknowledged as real in the first place. When American
universities [or high schools] fail to teach Islamic doctrine and
history accurately, a flawed epistemology permeates society at large.
And since new students and new professors come from this already
conditioned - towards - Islam society, not only do they not question
the lack of accurate knowledge and education; they perpetuate it." So
it is that while textbooks in Muslim countries openly teach hatred and
hostility for non-Muslims, or infidels,..." in this country,
"the government is now pushing to ban Arabic words connotative of
Islamic ideology from formal analysis..." Ibrahim asks, "if children
are sheltered from ugly truths today, how can they ever be expected to
confront them as adults tomorrow?"
THE VOICE OF AMERICA SILENCED ON RADICAL ISLAM
It is a telling point that almost 8 years after 9/11 we still don't
have agreed-upon terminology to label the Muslims who declared war
against the West, America and Israel in particular. In fact, as Daniel
Pipes makes frighteningly clear, the situation has deteriorated from
an inability to decide whether all Islam was resurgent or only a small
percentage say 150 to 200 million Muslims was on the
rampage. Now, in both England and U.S.A., the trend among our leaders
is never to use terrorist and Muslim or Islamist
and fundamentalist in the same breathe. In Orwellian fashion,
we will soon have no vocabulary or only a neutered vocabulary to name
the enemy. This is the thinking in the Administration in Washington,
the State Department, Homeland Security, the National Counter
Terrorism Center, and many in the media. Islamic terrorism is now
considered as 'anti-Islamic activity', as if the ones suffering are
the Muslims, not us.
ISLAM AND THE WEST: LINES OF DEMARCATION
In this thoughtful essay, Roger Scruton asks why radical Islam is so
successful in the war they initiated against the west. True, they are
dedicated to jihad, and confident they will succeed, but a major
reason for their gain is that, unfortunately, the West is not
confident. Scruton fears we may be at a point "in which the legitimate
claims of our own culture and inheritance will be ignored or
downplayed in an attempt to prove our peaceful intentions." Scuton
undertakes to "spell out some of the critical features of the Western
inheritance which must be understood and defended in our current
confrontation." He stresses that we can not succumb to the
debilitating belief that we are to blame for Islam's behavior. "...
our enemies' hatred of us is entirely unjustified; and ... their
implacable enmity cannot be defused by our breast-beating." An
important essay. Read it carefully.
FOLLOWING THE HERD
In the last issue of Think-Israel, Steven Plaut discussed the
politicization of the Lancet, a prestigious British medical
journal. In this essay, Barbara Barron writes of other professional
journals in England that have succumbed to one-sided politics,
publishing inaccurate and unprofessional pro-Palestinian articles that
indulge in attributing all Palestinian ills to the machinations of the
Zionist entity. As Barron points out: "The deliberate use of a
professional body's publication to promulgate personal political
views, especially when many of these are based upon lies and
misconceptions, is unethical as well as immoral. Any professional body
which actively encourages this by publishing it is in gross
dereliction of its duty."
EXPOSED: HOW PALESTINIAN FIXERS MANIPULATE THEIR MEDIA BOSSES
There's a problem when foreign journalists need to depend on locals to
translate and smooth the way, especially when the locals have a
third-world political agenda and no sense of fairness or professional
ethics. The locals "can be selective with the information they feed
the journalist or, at worst, mistranslate the words of the interview
subjects." In Israel and the Territories, far too often the Arab
fixers and translators "encourage journalists to report exclusively on
the 'evils' of the Israeli occupation, rather than on the lack of
democratic freedoms or human rights abuses in the West Bank and Gaza."
This becomes the 'news' fed to the newpaper's readers. This essay by
Honest Reporting Staff presents a case study of one such betweener --
Nidal Rafa, who is both committed to the Palestinian 'cause' and a
presumably-impartial employee of CNN and NPR. She was often the
gatekeeper for what got through to the final reader; and she didn't
let professional standards and ethics stand in the way of obscuring
the facts in favor of the image she wanted to project. She was finally
outed when she indulged in an unprofessional tirade during a talk
given by Danny Ayalon, Israel's ex-ambassador to the United States --
and this was caught on tape..
POISONING THE AMERICAN MIND
This is an interesting case study on NPR's anti-Israel stance by
Daniel Doron. NPR promotes the notion that Palestinian Arabs are a
noble folk with a noble mission to win back their homeland,
occupied by Israel, who has no business being in the Middle East. They
aren't indoctrinated with hate; no, of course not. The Palestinians
resort to terrorism because they are weak and poor and have few
resources. Israel is excoriated if despite trying to avoid the
human shields the terrorists cynically use they hit one child.
The Arabs, of course, are given a free pass, no matter how many Jewish
children they deliberately kill. A noble mission is a powerful excuse.
Just as interesting is the indignation shown by those who deny NPR's
obvious bias. Doron records one such letter and his response.
WHO WAS IT THAT DEMOLISHED THE WORLD TRADE CENTER (WTC)?
Ron Mossad takes on the conspiracy theorists who are sure it was the
Jooz that attacked the World Trade Center. This time it's a chemistry
teacher that's sure nano-thermite was the method used to ignite the
buildings to a high enough heat to destroy the structure. What remains
a mystery is how, when the culprits are known the Saudis who
learned to fly a plane but not how to land it and the planes
crashing into the building were witnessed by anyone owning a TV set,
it is still the Jews who are blamed. But why stop there? In
conspiracy-think, there was no Holocaust. Or it was greatly
exaggerated. And the recent stock market and housing market crash?
Maybe you think it was the politicians who forced the banks to lend to
people who couldn't afford the homes they bought. Maybe you think it's
groups like ACORN that used "the people" to persuade the politicians
to insist the banks make risky loans. Maybe you think it was the
bankers who saw a way to make a lot of money. The conspiracy theorists
know better they know it's the Jews.
A METAPOLITICAL VIEW OF USEFUL IDIOTS
For the last 30-35 years, Israel's leaders have pursued a monomaniacal
policy of "land for peace," despite the fact that the Arabs continue
to say openly and demonstrate that they wish to destroy Israel,
not make peace. When Israel showed the Arab countries she could rebuff
direct attack, they started following a phased peace-and-war strategy
-- taking over in stages. Unfortunately, Israel's wrongheaded policy
is reinforced by useful idiots in the Administration in Washington,
who believe that, unlike all who have previously tried their hand at a
two-state solution, they will succeed. They won't.
OBAMA AS MUSLIM APOLOGIST: AMERICA "ENRICHED" BY ISLAM
Dr. Paul Williams takes issue with Pres. Obama's attempt to rewrite
history when he said that over the centuries "the United States has
been enriched by Muslim Americans." In fact, no Muslim was in the army
as late as World War 1 and less than 5000 lived here as late as 1975.
His assertion that America "is not and never will be at war with
Islam" ignories that even in Washington's time, American ships were
harassed by the Barbary pirates, an earlier version of today's Somali
pirates. The larger issue, of course, is whether Americans "must deny
their heritage as a people for the sake of globalism,
multiculturalism, and a New World Order."
U. PENN HILLEL WORKING WITH HAMAS-SUPPORTING MUSLIM STUDENT ASSOCIATION (MSA)
Arab student venomous hostility to Jewish students became a front-page
issue in 2002 when, at San Francisco State University, they physicaly
attacked a group of Jewish students from Hillel, which, ironically,
was marching around singing about the joys of peace. But apparently
many Jews still refuse to accept that they have been selected as
attackable objects of hate by the Muslims. Beila Rabinowitz and
William Mayer chronicle a recent example at U Penn, where Hillel has
partnered with Muslim Student Association (MSA), a Muslim Brotherhood
offshoot, to promote Shari'a law. They should look at Muslim websites,
which make it clear that living with Jews in love and peace is not a
Muslim goal. By participating in these "sham dialogues" the Jews don't
persuade the Arabs to become peaceful. They do lose their
self-respect.
IS SELF-HATE A GOD OF THE JEWS?
After reading so many books and articles by self-effacing Jews whose
hearts go out to the Palestinians, never to the Jews, Seth Frantzman
wonders if there aren't really two Judaisms, "one of Jews and the
other of 'the Jews'." The first group practices the Jewish religion;
the second talks about "being Jewish" and "what Jews should do." They
distort the meaning of Jewish symbols and Jewish holidays to gain
sympathy for the Palestinians and other causes, always for a group
other than the Jews. Frantzman prefers actual, authentic Judaism,
where one is instructed to kill one's intractable enemies, to the
practise of the Jews in name only, who define "every cause as a 'duty'
of Jews and who ceaselessly heap scorn and hate on other Jews because
they believe those Jews reflect badly on them."
WAVES OF FREEDOM
Steve Kramer writes of the years just after World War 2 when the
survivors of the Holocaust were still languishing in temporary
quarters in camps in Europe. The drive was on to bring these survivors
to Palestine, despite the illegal and immoral ban the British had
placed on Jewish immigration. The English had received the Mandate for
Palestine to help Jews build their homeland. They did not honor their
mandate, even when Hitler's policy of exterminating Jews made
Palestine a desperately-needed haven. They encouraged Arab immigration
and made bringing in Jews a hanging offense. After the War, ten
American boats were retrofitted to transport civilians to Palestine.
Kramer tells the story of one of these ships, HaTikvah. and the
American volunteers, Jews and non-Jews, who manned it.
ESPIONAGE AND THE ZIONIST ENDEAVOR
What a Eric Ambler plot for a novel! It is 1948 and a secret and very
large arms deal between a Swiss company and Egyptian and Jordanian
envoys is finalized in the office of the British minister of state for
foreign affairs, with Ethopia acting as beard for arms that will
actually be shipped to various Arab states. If all goes well, there'd
be no chance of survival for the soon-to-be-born state of Israel.
Fortunately, French intelligence and the Swiss Government learn of the
"Swiss-Ethiopian" arms sale, and it falls through. This isn't fiction;
it happened. Meir Zamir traces the ramifications of the transaction
for us, with the Hagana and France pitted against England and the Arab
states. Subplots include England engineering a crisis in Syria to oust
France, France planting a mole in the British Legation in Beirut and
the Hagana seizing British diplomatic mail en route to the port of
Haifa. It is a fascinating detailed look at a real-life spy thriller
with duped diplomats, blackmailable leaders, spies, moles and
duplicitous British politicians who schemed to divide Palestine among
the Arab countries, not help it become a Jewish state. The underlying
theme is the contrast between the actual manipulations by the colonial
powers and their official position of neutrality in the Arab-Israel
confllict. Scene 1 was soon followed by the invasion of the fledgling
state of Israel by the neighboring Arab countries.
REMEMBERING THE MASSACRE OF THE HADASSAH CONVOY APRIL 13, 1948
Alex Grobman recalls the last days of the Mandate period. Jews fought
against the British to take the land already granted them and fought
side by side with the British against the Germans. They also provided
experts in fighting local medical problems blood diseases,
jaundice, dysentery, exotic fevers and an abundance of
disease-carrying insects and poisonous snakes. The local Arabs, led by
the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin el-Husseini, an associate of Adolph
Hitler, violently attacked both Jew and Brit. Grobman focuses on the
day they ambushed a convoy of non-combatant Jews and massacred most of
them, while the Brits, who had promised safe passage, watched and did
nothing.
This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions
and editorials and share articles they find informative. The Blog-Eds
page for the month is updated every few days.
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March 2009 BLOG-EDS
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