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THE GATHERING STORM: REDUX or DÉJÀ VU?

by Alex Rose

  

"The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot serve their being repeated." [Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, the American prosecutor at Nuremberg]

The Question

This essay sets out to examine the similarity of the political climate of the 1930's with that prevailing today. As such it touches on history, economics, appeasement, denial, betrayal, indifference, anti-Semitism, warnings and lack of awareness. It is a study of human behavior which impacted and continues to affect the Jews. Indeed, there is a mood today which very much resembles the 1930's. Is it this emotional atmosphere that reminds us in some ways of the 1930s? Or is it because world events appear to be repeating the essentials of the 1930s? Let us recount some necessary data about that historic period.

The Pre World War 2 Period

In 1923, the German government was in economic trouble. With France occupying the Ruhr District, the German workers went on strike, which caused the economy greater stress. Germany had lost almost all of the value of its money. Rival political gangs -- from the Left and the Right -- fought openly in the streets. With troubles within the government, Adolph Hitler, head of the Nazi party, saw a perfect opportunity to overthrow the Bavarian and German government. His mini-revolution failed and led to his serving 9 months of a five year sentence in prison. We are informed by Fredric C. Jaher that "The worst episodes of anti-Semitism occurred during or soon after times of crisis — crusades, religious schisms, plagues, economic breakdowns, wars and revolutions — when the community felt most threatened." [A Scapegoat in the New Wilderness: The Origins and the Rise of anti-Semitism in America].

Hitler took full advantage of the poor economy, disseminating hateful lies about Jewish responsibility for it, while concurrently attempting to improve it.

In the 1933 General Election, Hitler dropped anti-Semitic rhetoric in his speeches, which gained him considerable financial contributions, Once in power, he returned to his former self, blaming Jews for all of Germany's problems and for the country's losing World War 1 (WW1). By way of his actions and his speeches, the hostility towards the German Jews increased to a point where Jews could no longer earn a living in Germany. With the passing of the Nuremberg Laws on Citizenship and Race in 1935, Jews were stripped of their German citizenship and Jewish emigration increased. These trends, rising anti-Semitism and Jewish emigration continued through to November 9-10th, 1938 when Kristallnacht ["The Night of Broken Glass"] occurred. On this occasion, there was mass destruction of Jewish property, 91 Jews were killed and 30,000 Jewish men [a quarter of the Jewish population] were taken to concentration camps.

The notable historian, Hebrew University Professor Yehuda Bauer, once concluded that "Anti-Semitism was a central cause of World War 2". Indeed, Anti-Semitism was one of the most powerful weapons used by the Nazis to gain the support of the masses. In the Nazi party press, and in the Nazi publications, Hitler's Mein Kampf's, racist doctrines were openly espoused.

Michael Edan in his The History of Past Appeasement Serves as a Warning for the Future comments:

"There was no opposition from either war-wearied allied country. Hitler was allowed to gain not only an incredibly valuable military advantage, but he also achieved a huge political victory against his cautious generals. He had been right and they wrong in assessing the Allies' weakness. But most of all, the revelation of the Allies' shocking display of apathy and weakness would be a huge asset to Hitler over the next three years."

Edan also includes notable remarks from George Bush in his address May 15, 2008 to the Knesset on the mindset of appeasement (Read it here.) As example

"As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

Neville Chamberlain became Prime Minister of Britain on May 28, 1937. For the next two years, his conservative government engaged in a foreign policy governed largely by the specter of appeasement. It was based on Chamberlain's belief that Germany had been ill-treated by the Allies following its defeat during WW1.

From December 1938, as the Holocaust loomed large through November 1947 when the UN decided in favor of partitioning Western Palestine between Jews and Arabs, the British Administration contributed to many negative activities against the Jewish enclave in Palestine. To mention but a few: failure to rescue 10, 000 Jewish children from central Europe; treachery which culminated in the infamous publication of MacDonald White Paper where it was stated that the authors of the Balfour Declaration "could not have intended that Palestine should be converted into a Jewish state against the will of the Arab population of the country"; and continued blocking of Jewish immigration into Palestine for 6 years and incarcerating tens of thousands of survivors in concentration camps in Cyprus, even sending some back to their European ports of origin.

Winston Churchill's 6 volume The Second World War and, in particular, the first volume, "The Gathering Storm", provides useful insight into the Middle East events of the time. In particular, there is detailed coverage of Churchill's opposition to the appeasement of Hitler during the 1930's. Indeed, there is nothing very controversial about the claims that Churchill was alone in his opposition to appeasement. He said it himself in 1948, and it is generally acknowledged. Churchill's views of this period as "the years that the locust hath eaten," when the Western powers, by their own folly, allowed Germany to rearm, sent a message: "never again" must this be allowed to happen. He spent much effort in attempting to warn of the danger which Hitler posed to Europe and of the lack of Britain's preparedness for war.

Churchill describes in full the Munich settlement of 1938, when Chamberlain accepted the transfer of parts of Czechoslovakia to Germany as the price to pay for "peace in our time". His biographer, Martin Gilbert, stresses Churchill's support for the Jewish claims to Palestine in a letter from London to a well-spoken friend, by drawing attention to actions taken in 1922 by way of legislation presented to the League of Nations, to the effect that the Jews were in Palestine "of right, and not sufferance". This is an important statement given Arab rhetoric about being ill-treated for European misdemeanors during the Holocaust.

David Fromkin's A Peace to end all Peace concerns itself with the political origins of the present day Middle East, concluding with the piecemeal territorial settlements of 1922, when political lines were arbitrarily drawn to bear a striking resemblance to today's country boundaries. He makes the observation that most contemporary discussions on the Middle East ignore how the current systems of states were formed. This assumption he notes is displaced from reality. The process, in fact was one of the Europeans, England and, on the fringes, France, crafting the Middle East [a term invented in 1902] as a way to grab new expansions to their empires by carving up the fallen Ottoman Empire and establishing influence as they had done with other countries after the war.

It was a road littered with misinformation on all sides, disastrous assumptions and unwarranted mistakes, egos, and blatant power snatching. In particular, Fromkin confirms what has been generally known in that the British promise of independence to the Arabs if they helped in the war effort really intended British dominion. On the other hand, the Arabs did not meet their commitments to Britain. Ultimately, the British gave support to Feisal and Abdullah as the rulers of Iraq and Transjordan after unilaterally severing the latter from Palestine. It should be noted that neither of these Arab leaders had significant historical connection with these territories. The consequence of these developments as borne out by subsequent history has been that the borders and the governments created would be in dispute with global aspirations.

Fromkin notes Churchill's contribution to the cause of Zionism, and indeed to resolving all the problems of the Middle Eastern settlement following the WW1 war. He points out how in 1921, Winston Churchill warned an Arab delegation to the effect that "The British Government means to carry out the Balfour Declaration. I have told you so again and again. I told you so at Jerusalem. I told you so at the House of Commons the other day. I tell you so now. They mean to carry out the Balfour Declaration. They do." He did not believe that the Arabs even in a thousand years could bring modern technology to Palestine.

However, Churchill is remembered for not encouraging Jewish building of a national home on both sides of the Jordan River, and instead established a separate Arab state on the western side, which is today known as Jordan. Justifying this action in 1922 as Colonial Secretary, he stated to a group of Palestinian Arabs that a national home for the Jews in Palestine "will be good for the world, good for the Jews, good for the British Empire". Further, he added that it would also be "good for Arabs who dwell in Palestine."

Despite the goodwill of Churchill and the Balfour Declaration, one finds in traversing history from the time of the British Mandate, a continuous act of appeasement in the British betrayal of their commitment to the Jews. The 1917 Declaration "view[ed] with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object" while not jeopardizing the "civil and religious" — note not political — rights of non-Jews in Palestine. In terms of the Mandate, the British were to implement the Declaration and to specifically support "close Jewish settlement in the land".

At the time, a contest between the British officials in the Middle East and their political masters in Whitehall prevailed. The former were intent on marginalizing the Zionist goals for a state. In their persistence to foster an Arab autonomy under their dominion, they assumed control of the first British military administration in Palestine, followed by that of the civilian body. The power wielded by the British Middle East officials was such that:

Following the 1947 UN Declaration, the British continued to obstruct Jewish attempts to defend themselves while blocking Jewish reinforcements from travelling to isolated settlements under attack. They would also blockade Mediterranean ports to Jewish immigrants and potential reinforcements in addition to making numerous diplomatic attempts to block the Zionists efforts to establish a state, particularly in the US and UN. Also reported was the British nefarious handing over ammunition dumps and key points to the Arabs and the opening of land frontiers to invading Arab armies to whom they supplied weapons.

Vladimir Zev Jabotinsky, clear-eyed analyst and far-sighted prophet

No history of the Middle East would be complete without capturing the impact on that history by Vladimir Zev Jabotinsky, the most important right wing Revisionist Zionist leader, author, orator, soldier, founder of the Jewish Self-Defense Organization in Odessa and major activist in the formation of the Jewish Legion. Further, any history covering the subject of appeasement would significantly have Jabotinsky's imprint on it. Early on in his life, Jabotinsky demonstrated a remarkable understanding of human behavior. This featured in his comprehension of both British politicians concerned with the Middle East, and the Arabs.

As early as 1918, his observations were beyond those of his peers, recognizable by this statement:

"The matter is not ... an issue between the Jewish people and the Arab inhabitants of Palestine, but between the Jewish people and the Arab people. The latter, numbering 250 million has [territory equivalent to] half of Europe, while the Jewish people, numbering 10 million and wandering the earth hasn't got a stone. Will the Arab people stand opposed? [Will it insist?] that ... they have it [all] forever and ever, while he who has nothing shall forever have nothing?"

Later, in 1923, Jabotinsky remarkably observed that agreement with the Arabs was not possible, because they "look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux looked upon his prairie. To think that the Arabs will voluntarily consent to the realization of Zionism in return for the cultural and economic benefits we can bestow on them is infantile."

Just as Winston Churchill issued warnings against the Nazis and Hitler, Zev Jabotinsky engaged in an ongoing struggle against the enactment of appeasement though warnings. These are the words of Jabotinsky written in Warsaw, Poland on Tisha BaAv, 1937, two years before the Nazis invaded Poland.

"It is already three years that I am calling upon you, Polish Jewry, who are the crown of World Jewry. I continue to warn you incessantly that a catastrophe is coming closer. I became grey and old in these years, my heart pleads, that you, dear brothers and sisters, do not see the volcano which will soon begin to spit it's all consuming lava. I see that you are not seeing this because you are immersed and sunk in your daily worries. Today, however, I demand from you trust. You were convinced already that my prognoses have already proven to be right. If you think differently, then drive me out of your midst! However, if you do believe me, then listen to me in this twelfth hour: In the name of G-d! Let anyone of you save himself, as long as there is still time, and time there is very little. What else I would like to say to you on this day of Tisha BeAv is whoever of you will escape from catastrophe; he or she will live to see the exalted moment of a great Jewish wedding — the rebirth and rise of a Jewish state. I don't know if I will be privileged to see it, but my son will! I believe in this, as I am sure that tomorrow morning the sun will rise. Eliminate the Diaspora or the Diaspora will surely eliminate you."

In 1919, the only Zionist leaders who supported Jabotinsky's idea for the creation of a Jewish League were Chaim Weizmann, a Professor at Manchester University, and Meir Grossman, founder and editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Following the rejection of his political program by the Zionist Executive, Jabotinsky resigned and founded the New Zionist Organization (NZO) to conduct independent political activity for free immigration and the establishment of the Jewish State.

Later in the 1930's the NZO called for a policy aimed at speedy "evacuation" of the Jewish masses from the "danger zone" in Eastern and Central Europe, based on "alliances" with the governments of those countries. A ten-year plan for the transfer to and absorption in Palestine of 1,500,000 Jews was prepared in 1938. In 1938-39 the scheme gained the sympathy of Polish government circles, which seemed to be ready to intervene with the British government and raise the problem of Jewish mass emigration at the League of Nations. But Jewish public opinion overwhelmingly opposed the "evacuation plan" as unwarranted and irresponsible publicity, playing into the hands of "anti-Semitic governments". At the same time the Revisionists were instrumental in transforming "illegal" immigration to Palestine from a trickle into a mass movement, which brought thousands of European Jews in "illegal" ships to the shores of Palestine until 1940. The NZO opposed and combated the partition of Palestine as proposed in 1937 by the Palestine Royal Commission. Jabotinsky testified in London before the commission, while Benjamin Akzin, acting president of the New Zionist Organization and Professor of Constitutional and Political Science at Hebrew University gave evidence before the Palestine Partition Commission. He warned that partition would lead to an Arab-Jewish war and advocated the "evacuation" scheme before the intergovernmental Refugee Committee in Evian, France, in 1938, whereby Jews would emigrate from the "danger zone" in Eastern and Central Europe to Palestine.

In his book, And We Are Not Saved [1963], David Wdowinski, a prominent ghetto fighter, stated that Anielewicz, one of the leaders of the famous Warsaw ghetto uprising, had originally received his inspiration in Jabotinsky's Betar Youth movement. Colonel J.H. Patterson, Commander of the Zion Mule Corps and the Jewish Legion, went so far as to say that the "parallel between Jabotinsky and Winston Churchill was truly striking."

The author Arthur Koestler in his inimitable concise form, aptly summed up Jabotinsky's career:

"Jabotinsky was a National Liberal in the great 19th century tradition, a revolutionary of the 1848 brand, successor to Garibaldi and Mazzini. He was one of the most colorful figures that modern Jewry has produced. He wrote prose in eight languages, poetry in four, translated Dante and Poe into Hebrew plus Hebrew poetry into Russian. His publications, under the pen-name 'Altelena', range from novels to studies in comprehensive phonetics. He was idolized by the young, endowed with exceptional charm and a brilliant speaker."

Jabotinsky was a great lover of the bible and the Talmud. He derived from the bible his best philosophical and literary ideas and thoughts. In retrospect as the State of Israel continues to face crucial problems involving its territorial integrity and economic survival, the legacy left by Jabotinsky to the Jewish state was that we must always be mindful of the lessons from the days of old — from the Maccabees and Bar Kochba. As a political Zionist, Jabotinsky was the heir of Herzl with the augmented concept of military preparedness. From his youth he preached the consolidation of Jewish strength and position. Though, by nature, he was a man of peace, and a liberal in the broad sense of the word, he knew that the strength of arms became the spoken language of the twentieth century.

In an article which appeared in The Nation of May 3, 1933, Ludwig Lewinsohn, one of the very few American Jewish intellectuals who interested himself in Jewish affairs, sounded an alarm. Quoting the German Propaganda Minister, Dr. Joseph Goebbels, from the Frankfurter Zeitung of April 2nd, "The Jews must be eliminated from German civilization and, if possible from the whole world, at any cost", which served as a prelude to Kristallnacht, November 9-10, 1938. Lewinsohn described the people in control of Germany as pathologically bloodthirsty and the assault upon German Jewry a gigantic atrocity. The Germans were not alone in stirring his ire, which extended to Jewish communists and other assimilationists. Considering the time difference between the publishing of his article and the activities up to Kristallnacht, his was indeed an insightful warning. This was a period when Jews who were fully integrated into German society and culture were evicted from every sector of professionalism — public employment, higher education, publishing, media and theatre. Classified by Hitler as "non-Aryans", they faced legal blows accompanied by widespread violence as Stormtroopers assaulted and murdered them without provocation. To this, Lewinsohn remarks,

"This German persecution is the first...in which the persecuted have sold out spiritually to their oppressors ... they have eviscerated themselves; they have for generations extruded from their consciousness all Jewish content ... They are in fact as Germanized as it is possible for them to be and have nothing within them wherewith to bear their Jewish fate."

Needless to say, the article drew criticism from the usual Jewish detractors, among whom the American Jewish author, Elmer Rice led the pack. His perverted and heavily biased diatribe is not worthy of repeating.

Rabbi Lewis of Congregation Etz Chaim in Marietta, Georgia in his First Day Rosh Hashanah 2010 address recalled meeting an elderly family friend, Joe Magun from Cherry Hill, NJ. The Rabbi had just returned from a Lithuanian tour during which he visited the famous Choral Synagogue in Kovno. Magun pointed out that when he had lived in Kovno as a child, his home was near the Choral Synagogue. He particularly remembered the Sabbath in 1938 when Vladimir Jabotinsky came to the synagogue. He observed a fiery orator, an unflinching Zionist radical, whose politics were to the far right. He could still hear the words burning in his ears as Jobotinsky cried out, "he's coming, Jews abandon your city." Continuing, Mr. Magun explained how the Jews in Kovno thought that they were safe from the Nazis and from Hitler in Lithuania. They had lived there for a thousand years but Jabotinsky was right — his warning prophetic. They [presumably his family] got out but most did not. Before the war there were 37 synagogues in Kovno for 38,000 Jews and at this time only one to cater for a total population of approximately 500.

Weighing in on the words "most did not" brings to mind an acknowledgement of consequence stated on the RCA web site, FailedMessiah.com, which reads, "Jabotinsky was in many ways a modern Jewish Prophet, who spent the pre-Holocaust years traveling throughout Europe urging Jews to leave while there was still time. He was opposed on religious grounds by the Gedolim [ultra orthodox Jewish rabbinical leaders], who for the most part commanded Jews to remain in Europe. In his masterpiece, "Eim Habanim Semeichah", Rabbi Yisachar Shlomo Teichtal, uses such language to describe the behavior of his ultra-orthodox peers as "they refuse to accept the truth", "do not answer a fool according to his folly", "we must not blindly follow the Tzaddikim [righteous] who oppose Aliyah [immigration to Palestine]" and "the exile-Jew refuses to learn from the past". An eminent Zionist rabbi Tzvi Yehadah Hacohen Kook, who lived in Israel and died there in 1982, asked and answered the question, "Should we listen to a Gadol [righteous Jew], who errs? — a person who is [seriously] certain that a sage is mistaken should not follow his decision" in his book, Torat Eretz Yisrael. He employs Jewish law [Halacha] to establish his argument concerning opposition to Zionism and this, of course, is particularly applicable to Holocaust times.

Liberal Jews also opposed Jabotinsky in his massive effort to encourage Jews to escape Hitler's clutch by emigrating to Palestine. The Camp Jabotinsky web site describes how as the Nazis were rising to power, reform Rabbi Leo Baeck misleadingly told German Jews "the Nazis like dark clouds will pass". Baeck, and many other leaders of the German Jewish establishment, urged German Jews to ignore Jabotinsky and his warnings of doom and his call for Jews to arm with guns.

Reform leaders renounced almost all ties to their ancient Homeland. They rejected the idea of reestablishing Jewish sovereignty in Palestine, for they saw it as a major threat to their dreams of integrating into gentile society. Generally, for the Jewish liberals the usual Jewish malediction of denial prevailed.

A few years later most of those Jews who laughed the loudest at Jabotinsky's prophetic warnings would end up in the chimney stacks of Auschwitz.

Deja Vu? Redux? In the Here and Now

Enter now the era of contemporary times, where the danger zone is not Germany, but the Middle East. The reasons may differ but the radicalized fundamentalists seem to gain ground with little effort, just as the Nazis did for well over a decade. There is, first, a remarkable resemblance in the handling of the Middle East by the US State Department to that of the British Colonial Office. Patterns of unheeded warnings, appeasement, denial and the absurdity of the so-called "land for peace" formula [previously coined as facts on the ground], can be readily demonstrated. There are some differences in that there has been a concentrated effort to delegitimize the modern state of Israel by the world of Islam. Further, whereas the US replaced the British as the key player, the US has emphasized its role as that of an honest broker. Now, it is true that nations have interests and that preferences will be allotted to them over any attempts at even handedness. It is equally true that in the past, one US president, Jimmy Carter, demonstrated an outward preference for the Arabs over the Israelis, much as we are now viewing in the case of President Barak Obama.

Not remembered, nor appreciated, has been the cunning reversal of the good-guy and bad-guy and the narrowing of the size of the conflict by using terminology that describes the conflict as Israeli-Palestinian rather than Arab-Israeli. Thus was reenacted a reversal of a play upon an incident in biblical history. This event is one with extreme ramifications whereby Israel is portrayed as Goliath and the newly-minted Palestinians as David. This trickery was achieved by casting the latter as a minority relative to the far larger Arab population. Of course, the "Palestinians" are, in fact, a tool of Pan Arabism in its quest to eliminate Israel.

Ignoring international law, either deliberately or in ignorance, by treating UN General Assembly Resolutions as official decisions instead of polite suggestions, has also loomed large in replacing myths for facts in support of "Palestinian" positions.

Disciples of this mythology surfaced around the end of the Six Day War. The expression "peace process" became the staple type in every quarter concerned with vacuous peacemaking. UN Resolution 242 established the "land for peace" formula, which has served as the basis for negotiations between Israel and her Arab neighbors initially and subsequently at Oslo, the so-called Palestinians.

Rael Jean Isaac in her classic, Israel Divided [1976], provides a full account of the two major movements born in Israel in the aftermath of the Six Day War: i.e, the Land of Israel movement, which sought to incorporate all captured territory into the boundaries of Israel, and the Peace Movement, which sought survival by conciliating Arab neighbors. In fact over the years the former has made extraordinary concessions while the latter has assumed the position of peace at any price. Indeed, the Arabs have demonstrated the fallacy of the Peace Now stance. What greater example is there of this than Sharon's withdrawal from Gaza? The Disengagement fiasco not only resulted in the voting into power of Hamas by the "Palestinian" masses, but a war between Israel and Hamas and demands by the UN, EU, US and UK for even greater accommodations by Israel, despite Arab intransigence.

With the passage of time and the advent of Muslim terrorism, new dynamics have entered the equation. Aircraft hijacking first occurred on September 6, 1970 when five jet aircraft bound for New York City were boarded by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the pilots forced to fly to and land in Dawson's Field, a remote desert airstrip near Zarka, Jordan. The era of aircraft hijacking progressed to the infamous Entebbe incident, which was ended by a daring Israeli rescue of the hostages on July 4, 1976 and escalated subsequently to the even more catastrophic World Trade Center attack on September 11, 2001.

The first suicide attack in Israel occurred on July 6, 1989 when the 25 year old Abd al-Hadi Ghanayem, a Palestinian Islamic Jihad member seized the steering wheel from the driver of the Tel-Aviv-Jerusalem bus 405 and ploughed it over a steep precipice into a ravine. Sixteen civilians were killed in the attack while the terrorist survived "suicide", was treated for injuries, convicted in an Israeli court and convicted to serve 16 life sentences on murder, hijacking and terrorism charges. In the period following the Declaration of Principles [DOP] of September, 1993, specifically from April 1994 through to July 2008, 148 suicide attacks were recorded. Writing in the September/October 2001 issue of Midstream, Leo Haber comments,

"We at Midstream cannot help noting the following. Hijacking of airplanes, suicide bombings — don't these two terrorist methodologies ring a bell? Airplane hijacking was one of the earliest atrocities carried out by terrorists against Israelis and Jews... Suicide bombings have been the latest barbaric enterprise visited upon Jewish men, women and children..." [...] "Hijacking of airplanes, suicide bombings — the alpha and omega of evil terrorist techniques, and let us not be coy in naming them Arab terrorist techniques."

Given the usual nervousness about being labeled a "racist", he does add the ever-present addendum that such identification does not in the least justify antipathy against all Arabs or Muslims. We are thus reminded of the obsession with yet another media pet in the form of "Arab moderation".

A re-read of J.B. Kelly's 1980 treatise on Islam [Islam Through the Looking Glass] proves to be most instructive. That this is so is simply because the language befits current events. He speaks about misconceptions that have prevailed in the West about the nature of Islamic society and government in the Middle East and the belief there is nothing to fear from Islam. "Almost the whole of the strategy pursued by the Western powers in the Middle East since the end of the Second World War lies about us in ruins, leaving our vital economic and political interests in the region virtually defenseless — and this at a time when they are more gravely menaced than ever before."

In the case of Israel, he observes the alleged intolerable affront to Muslim sensibilities afforded by the creation of the state of Israel. Then there is the perception of Israeli intransigence in refusing to concede the "just demands of the Arab states for the restitution of occupied Arab lands and restoration of the rights of the Palestinian people." Perhaps this is a concession when weighed against the "anger and indignation aroused in them [the Arabs] by the continued existence of Israel."

To Kelly, the West's capacity for self-delusion is boundless. "The Western democracies — or at least their governments — have persisted, through thick and thin, insult and deceit, in proclaiming their faith in the rationality of the regimes in power in the Gulf States." He could have questioned by whom and how the Arabs were empowered in the UN.

Gil Carl Alroy's noteworthy Arab Moderation: Ends and Means appeared in booklet form during 1982. He explains that rather than embracing the principle that the Arab-Israeli conflict should be resolved through negotiations involving an exchange of territory for peace as touted by President Reagan on September 1, 1982, the Arabs embarked on the alternative of Jihad. Jihad meaning a holy war, the way of direct armed assault, would no longer serve its purpose because the Arabs recognized following the Six Day War defeat that it proved to be counterproductive. Thus they would pursue the other religious alternative known as Hudaybiyah, conceived by Prophet Mohammad himself.

This entails acceptance of a truce concomitant with negotiations aimed at securing as much territory as possible thus placing Israel in a weakened strategic position for the ultimate military assault. In time it came to be known as Arafat's phased plan. Alroy waxes large on the fantasy world which passes for Middle East reality among westerners in the promotion of the land for peace doctrine. He provides many quotes from Arab leaders suggesting their non-acceptance of Israel while supporting the new formula. At no time have the Arabs dropped their demand for the return of refugees to Israel nor their insistence of Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders and in some instances even the 1948 borders. He explicitly states "Even total withdrawal will not change the Arab's desire to remove it [Israel] from the map." As the repetitive attempts at securing peace though land exchange continues to this day we are reminded of an Einstein quote. He defined insanity as "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

The late Yaacov Herzog, former Israel Ambassador to Canada and advisor to several Israeli Prime Ministers was engaged in a heated debate with the late Professor Toynbee at McGill University on January 31, 1961. This exhaustive debate included a vigorous discussion on Arab rejection of UN partition plan, the ensuing war and on the Palestinian refugees. This is a precise extract of a few of Herzog's remarks and quotes:

"For the Arabs in Palestine the killing now transcends all other considerations" — Sir Alexander Cadogen, British Representative at UN.

"The world would now see a war of extermination and momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and Crusades" — Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League, BBC broadcast, May 15, 1948.

The Arab refugee problem was the result of the war proclaimed by the Arabs. But these [refugees] have been nurtured on hate, vengeance and destruction, and if we take them back, they can rip us apart. [... for thirteen years on the basis of a Resolution of 1948 talking of those wishing to live in peace].

No they [UN] did not take a decision that the refugees have to be returned to Israel. Within the context of this [UN, 1948] Resolution the refugee problem is referred to and the Commission was supposed to study the possibilities either of repatriation or of compensation, but all this within the general context of a peace settlement.

The Arab living today in Transjordan is not a Pole living in Britain. He is living in his own surroundings, in an environment of rising Arab nationalism, religious, cultural identity of background and psychology. The problem will never be solved until the Arab governments are prepared to cooperate in a humanitarian solution.

Some Differences between Then and Now

Simply having more babies than the host country has become a major tool for the Muslim invasion of foreign countries. It does not stretch one's imagination to see how demographics has become supportive in the Arab quest for Israel's destruction. Speaking at a Tel Aviv Conference on December 5, 2010, Dutch MP Geert Wilders made several key points which hinge on Arab demographics:

Israel is constantly blamed for the plight of the Palestinian refugees. Why has this problem not been resolved? Because neither their leaders nor the Arab nations want the problem to be solved. These refugees are being used as a demographic weapon against Israel. Islam conditions Muslims to hate Jews.

A peaceful solution must be found for the refugees in the camps in Lebanon, Gaza and elsewhere. As far back as 1965, King Hussein stated, "Those organizations which seek to differentiate between Palestinians and Jordanians are traitors" and in 1981 he repeated this by saying, "Jordan is Palestine and Palestine is Jordan." Since Jordan is Palestine, it is the duty of the Jordanian government to welcome all Palestinian refugees who voluntarily want to settle there. Allowing an influx of a large number of hate-filled encamped Palestinian Arabs into the compressed space of Judea and Samaria will lead to radicalization. In 1988, as the first Intifada raged, Jordan renounced any claim of sovereignty to the so-called West Bank. This, however, does not detract from the truth, nor from reality.

"Land for peace "cannot result in a peaceful situation without endangering the existence of Israel.

The world must recognize that there has been an independent Palestinian state since 1946, and it is the Kingdom of Jordan.

The Jewish state needs defensible borders.

The issue of Muslim demography is not confined to Israel but is of worldwide concern. According to the Pew Research Center October 2009 study, of the world's population as reported by Wikipedia, roughly 25% are Muslims. The vast majority of them are Suni, while the balance are Shi'a [10-13%]. The study found more Muslims in Germany than in Lebanon and more in China than in Syria. Further, approximately 50 countries are majority Muslim.

It can be shown that an increasing Muslim minority inside a non-Muslim country may lead to a claim for secession and can culminate in civil war. This has been the history of India, Cyprus, Lebanon, Bosnia, Kosovo, Chechnya, the Philippines and Thailand. [See, for example, Ohri's book, Chapter 1 here, and continuing a chapter per issue until here.]

A second difference from the 1930's is the current enthusiasm of the West for multiculturalism against the earlier desire, especially in Europe, for racial purity. Samuel P. Huntington, author of the acclaimed The Clash of Civilizations has been criticized for his view that it isn't Islamic fundamentalism we should worry about but Islam itself; and his criticism of multiculturalism. Here are a few statements from his 1998 work:

Religion is not a small difference but possibly the most profound difference that can exist between people.

Some westerners, including ex-President Bill Clinton, have argued that the West does not have problems with Islam, only with violent Islamic extremists. Fourteen hundred years of history demonstrate otherwise.

The doctrines of Islam dictate war against unbelievers...the Koran and other statements of Muslim beliefs contain few prohibitions on violence...concept of non-violence is absent from Muslim doctrine and practice.

Saudi Arabia spent billions of dollars supporting Muslim causes throughout the world from mosques and textbooks to political parties, Islamic organizations and terrorist movements, and was relatively indiscriminate in doing so.

In every country with a predominantly Muslim population, it was more Islamic in every way [culturally, socially, politically] than 15 years earlier.

American idealism, moralism, humanitarian instincts, naiveté and ignorance concerning the Balkans led them to be pro-Bosnian and anti-Serb. "There can be neither peace nor coexistence between the Islamic religion and non-Islamic systems" [The Islamic Declaration — 1970 book by Bosnian Izetbegovic, leader of the Muslim party of the Democratic Action].

The hateful expressions emanating from Muslim/Arab leaders which has followed is now an everyday phenomenon. Iranian Ahmadinejad says,

"The Islamic umma [community] will not allow its historic enemy to live in its heartland...we should not settle for a piece of land... Anyone who signs a treaty which recognizes the entity of Israel means he has signed a surrender of the Muslim world...[T]his regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem] must be eliminated from the pages of history".

He also claimed in his speech in an interior ministry conference hall that the issue of Palestine would be over "the day that all refugees return to their homes [and] a democratic government elected by the people comes to power". Does he mean the creation of a democracy which resembles Iran? At least he demonstrates honesty by acknowledging the lifelong non acceptance of Jews by the World of Islam.

Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah has this to offer in a September 18, 2009 speech:

"Historic Palestine, from the sea to the river, belongs to the people of Palestine and to the whole [Muslim] nation" and further elaborates "[Israel] is a usurper and occupation entity, aggressive, cancerous, illegitimate, and illegal presence" which nobody is "permitted to recognize its existence." He continues "[We] will never recognize Israel ...will not work with Israel. We will not normalize ties with Israel. We will not surrender to Israel. We will not accept Israel even if the whole world recognizes it. Our faith, belief, and declaration will remain unchanged, that Israel is an illegal presence [and] a cancerous gland, and must be wiped out of existence."

Mohammed Abbas who has universally been categorized as a moderate, has publicly declared, "I will never allow a single Israeli to live among us on Palestinian land" and he has insisted on the return of the Arab refugees.

Considering the present day acts of appeasements by the US, EU, UN, Russia and the US, the worldwide escalation in anti-Semitism, the worldwide economic collapse, Muslim terrorist acts, denial, guilt-ridden Jews, Israel's Arab neighbors' failure to recognize the state of Israel, Muslim demographics, and warnings by astute observers on the danger thereof, one must surely detect the signs of yet another "Gathering Storm". Sarah Stern writing in the EMET Blog of January 4, 2011 reminds us of Churchill's consequential warning, "Those who appease the crocodile get eaten last." She also points to the prevailing environment which existed as early as October, 1941 at the time of the Holocaust, reflected by David Wyman in his seminal book, The Abandonment of the Jews. Wyman wrote about the American government's failure to respond decisively to the extermination threat, of American Jewish leaders' faith "in the powers that be", of a lack of Jewish unity, of a lack of Jewish leadership and of American Jewish leaders' inability to break out of a business as usual pattern.

Rafael Medoff echoed the same mood in his The Deafening Silence , an example of which were comments addressed by the Polish underground to their courier Jan Karski:

"Jewish leaders abroad won't be interested. At eleven in the morning, you will begin telling them about the anguish of the Jews in Poland, but at one o'clock they will ask you to halt the narrative so they can have lunch. This is a difference which cannot be bridged. They will go on lunching at the regular hour at their favorite restaurant, so they cannot understand what is happening in Poland."

So much for "standing by your brothers' blood"!

Today, J Street commands more attention than Z Street. Apparently, self-hating Jews can always find a greater accommodation than Jabotisnky Jews raised in the spirit of dignity with a positive identity ["Hadar"]. The Holocaust, rather than providing lessons in a most awful and ugly period in history has become a disgusting entertainment medium. Elie Wiesel's plea for a world that is not insensitive and indifferent draws little attention. Sadly, for the most part it simply has not happened, yet another indicator of nothing having been learnt. Wiesel astutely observed that silence does not help the victim. In spite of his liberal tendencies relative to the "Palestinians", there is a limit to what he is willing to concede as reflected in The New York Times of April 15, 2010.

"For me, the Jew that I am, Jerusalem is above politics. It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city; it is what binds one Jew to another in a way that is hard to explain. When a Jew visits Jerusalem for the first time, it is not the first time, it is a homecoming. The first song I heard was my mother's lullaby about, and for, Jerusalem. Its sadness and its joy are part of our collective memory."

 

ON AUGUST 18, 2010, The Wall Street Journal published a remarkable account of contemporary conditions written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former Member of the Dutch parliament and a former Muslim. The piece entitled, "How to Win the Clash of Civilizations" is based on Samuel Huntington's famous model and is all the more remarkable considering that it appeared well before today's turbulence in the world of Islam. A few significant paraphrased statements from the article:

  1. Opposition to proposed mosque at Ground Zero, eviction of American missionaries from Morocco, minaret ban in Switzerland, burqa ban in France are framed in the Western media as issues of religious intolerance. But that is not their essence. Fundamentally, they are symptoms of the "Clash of Civilizations", particularly the clash between Islam and the West.

  2. The West is declining in relative power, Islam is exploding demographically, and Asian civilizations — especially China — are economically ascendant.

  3. The West's Universalist pretensions are increasingly bringing it into conflict with the other civilizations, most seriously with Islam and China.

  4. According to President Obama, the media and other One World Viewers, Turkey is an island of Muslim of Muslim moderation in a sea of extremism. This "dream" has visibly been shattered with President Erdogan's embrace of Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, particularly given his blatantly stolen re-election, Turkey's non-support in the US effort to tighten UN sanctions aimed at stopping Iran's nuclear arms program and Turkey's sponsoring of the "aid flotilla", designed to break Israel's blockade of Gaza and to hand Hamas a public relations victory.

  5. Other than Iraq's precarious democracy, all the Arab countries [August 2010] are ruled by despots of various stripes. All the opposition groups that have any meaningful support are run by Islamist outfits like the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.

  6. In Indonesia and Malaysia, Islamist movements are demanding the expansion of Shariah law. In Egypt, Hosni Mubarak's time is running out. Analysts have observed that in free and fair elections, a Muslim Brotherhood victory cannot be ruled out. [August 2010].

  7. Algeria? Somalia? Sudan? It is hard to think of a single predominantly Muslim country that is behaving according to the One World script.

  8. The greatest advantage of Huntington's civilization model of international relations is that it reflects the world as it is — not as we wish it to be. It allows us to distinguish friends from enemies. It helps us to identify the internal conflicts within civilizations, particularly the historic rivalries between, Arabs, Turks and Persians for leadership of the Islamic world.

  9. We need to recognize the extent to which the advance of radical Islam is the result of an active propaganda campaign. According to a CIA report written in 2003, the Saudis invested at least $2 billion a year over a 30 year period to spread their brand of fundamentalist Islam. The Western response in promoting our own civilization was negligible.

  10. Our civilization is not indestructible. It needs to be actively defended. This is perhaps Huntington's most important insight.

Putting it together. A first approximation

There is a present-day gathering storm. It is not a replica of the earlier increase in Jew-hatred that led to the Holocaust but it has some of the necessary conditions including a dramatic, unmodulated and sustained condemnation of the Jews for what they do -- or don't do -- while guaranteeing their passivity by reassuring them that all is well, or will be well if they would work a little harder to satisfy the Arab demands. At the same time, fury at the Jew justifies Arab hostility and terrorist activity.

'Work will make you Free' sign at entrance to a Concentration Camp


The Surface Agenda:

It was no secret in the 1930's that Germany was re-arming. A joke from that time went like this. A man working in a factory assembling baby carriages stole parts and at home tried to reassemble them into a carriage, while waiting for the birth of his child. But no matter how he assembled the parts, they ended up as a rifle. Fear of a resurgent Germany was dampened by the conditioned guilt that the Western Allies hadn't been kinder when Germany was forced to sue for peace in WW1. Today, the pseudo-concern for the injustice done the Palestinian has the same role. It excuses what the Arabs do while castigating Israel for its supposed sins against the "Palestinian."

Two contemporary pieces make the point admirably. Bat Ye'or's book, Eurabia was published in 2005 and Evelyn Gordon's article "The Deadly Price of Pursuing Peace" appeared in the Commentary edition of January 2010.

It is Europe that has internalized, justified and sanctified the "Palestinian cause" — that is, the vilification of Israel. Europe's anti-Israel strategy, initiated in the 1970's, will not change. The Europeans have never ceased to reassure Israel on its "safe and recognized" borders, as if the 1949 armistice lines were safe. Bat Ye'or warns against optimism given the strategic, political and economic contingencies of Europe's Arab and Muslim policies; to the changed demographic pattern of Europe due to Muslim immigration; and to the disintegration of Europe's identity. In addressing these policies, Bat Ye'or discusses an implacable and disdainful hate for the State of Israel, for what it represents and stands for, and the glorification of Palestinianism, which is an ideology for the elimination of the Jews, as in former days of Nazism.

She prophesized that the countries of the Arab League and the Islamic Conference saw in this alliance with Europe the means to separate Europe from America; to divide and weaken the Western camp; to destroy Israel; to achieve technological parity with Europe; and, through the Mediterranean Partnership, to set up a vast Euro-Arab demographic, political, economic and cultural zone. Of course she could not have known that America would vote in Obama, who would find no need for separation and would willingly pursue the same goals.

Evelyn Gordon asks why Israel's standing has fallen so precipitously despite its numerous concessions for peace since 1993 and astutely concludes that this is not despite Oslo but because of  it. Her observations point to how the pursuit of "peace" has not only failed, but has harmed Israel's image, because, thanks to Oslo and her hopes for peace, Israel began downplaying her legitimate right to Samaria and Judea and hedged giving up the land with conditions while the "Palestinians" boldly asserted a claim and demanded an unconditional takeover. In time, "[a]nd with no competing narrative to challenge it any longer, the view of Israel as a thief, with all its attendant consequences, has gained unprecedented traction." Gordon closes in on two points of particular importance, which are quoted in full.

— "But if Palestinians have 'legitimate rights' to this land, it must belong to them.

— "And if Israel is 'occupying' the land, it must belong to Israel."

Referring to Obama's Cairo speech, "... on July 17, the left-wing Haaretz's star columnist Yoel Marcus wrote that Obama's 'disregard of our historical connection to the land of Israel' was 'extremely upsetting'. Marcus concluded that 'as a leader who aspires to solve the problems of the world through dialogue, we expect him to come to Israel and declare here courageously, before the entire world, that our connection to this land began long before the Israeli-Arab conflict and the Holocaust, and that 4,000 years ago, Jews already stood on the ground where he now stands.' If even a hard core Oslo supporter such as Marcus can be provoked into reasserting Israel's claim to the land, then there is hope for reviving such sentiments across the Israeli political spectrum."

Gordon succinctly demonstrates to there indeed being an answer to the oft-asked leftist question "what is the alternative?" Indeed, as this writer has all too frequently pointed out that, whereas Israeli leaders have persistently talked of peace, the Arabs speak of rights and claims. It is time to challenge One World theories and beliefs in Arab and Muslim "moderation". Since Saudi Arabia proclaimed a "peace plan", perhaps it could demonstrate its sincerity by encouraging the Palestinians to agree voluntarily to relocate to Jordan [a legitimate Palestinian country], Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq etc., wherever their family origins happen to be. Could not the unused vast areas of land owned by the Arab countries together with available money be employed in a productive solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict?

Anti-Semitism as weapon. Political Corrrectness as inhibitor

To date, the Jihadists work mostly by stealth and we don't see the armies, mass troop movements, armadas of navy ships and the huge bomber fleets of World War 2. But there are attitudinal similarities.

In anti-Semitism, Hitler found an explanation for his failures, a rationalization for his sufferings — the Jews and their conspiracy. The Jews were the single cause of his tensions and humiliation. He adopted the crude simplistic outlook on life convincing himself and others that the Jews were the source of all evil in this world. Hitler found a purpose in life, cleansing the German race from the clutches of the Jews. Hatred of the Jews became his obsession, his creed, faith and religion. At the same time, he was able to take advantage of the failed German economy following WW1. He gained the support of the German people through huge tax breaks, introduced social benefits and, in particular, ensured that not a single German [other than Jews] went hungry.

In similar fashion, today's Jew-hate unites disparate undertakings, uniting the Marxist left with the hostile Muslim. But while hatred of Judaism is intrinsic to Islam -- as it is to Marxism -- and destroying Israel is a major ambition and a necessary step, it isn't the be-all hate of the Nazi era. As Muslims has often voiced, "Israel is the Little Satan. The West is the Big Satan."

While our enemies are forthright in stating their goals, political correctness won't allow us to say we are fighting resurgent Islam. Instead, Western countries emphasize at every opportunity that it is a war against terrorists and not Islam. This prevents us from developing the energy and determination and, yes, hatred we need to counter Islam's global ambition effectively. Our goals remain fuzzy; our activities half-hearted.

Political correctness won't allow us to say that civilians do suffer in war when they get in the way. Arafat, recognizing a revision to the rules of the game, was quick to develop a strategy whereby terrorists on the defensive mingled with civilians while engaging in open warfare. This tactic is ongoing and has placed the West including Israel at a great disadvantage.

The disastrous state of the world economy undoubtedly aids and abets the "longest hatred" and is contributory in the current worldwide delegitimization of Israel. However, by far, the greater factor motivating Muslim opposition to Israel is fostered by religious beliefs. As explained by Bruce Bawer, Radical Islam is intent on destroying the West from within through worldwide demographics and by making full use of established democracy. It is rapidly succeeding in returning anti-Semitism to a frightening level, a manifestation of fundamentalist Islam and extreme hatred. We are now witnessing again what Jabotinsky once termed the "anti-Semitism of Men", a subjective revulsion against the Jew, powerful and permanent enough to become anything from a hobby to a religion. This as explained by him is unlike the "anti-Semitism of Things", the more common ostracism Jews experienced in Poland and other countries; the German strain carried pandemic contagion. It could spill over and infect an entire continent.

Blaming Israel has become all too common a justification for this growing monster. It is accompanied by gross denial of its magnitude just as terrorist suicidal attacks and massacres are considered justified -- Israel is blamed, not the Arabs. No small advocate of this outlook is that of the President of the United States, Barak Hussein Obama. He has yet to explain how he expects to liberalize Arab countries when Saudi Arabia promotes a "peace plan" for Israel while not entertaining a single Jewish citizen.

The Larger Agenda

As Hitler saw little to block him, his expectations and ambition grew. WW2 was caused by Hitler's attempt to expand the German borders. It was a war with a clearly defined enemy in which it was permissible to treat civilians as an integral component of the enemy -- just as the Muslims target civilians in any of the many groups they despise. Only after the invasion of Poland in 1939 and the reluctant declaration of war on Germany, did Hitler look further afield. Hitler's ultimate objective was to overcome Europe, the Allies and to destroy all Jews.

Until fairly late in the game, we were told Hitler was only interested in making conditions better for his country. Nowadays, we are reassured that resurgent Islam is not a danger. It may not take much imagination to see a similarity between the chaotic post-WW1 rearrangements in politics and the chaotic instability and radicalization of the Middle East. Nevertheless, despite the unfolding scenario in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya, the media, Obama and the rest of the leftist disciples hasten to assure us that the Muslim Brotherhood -- which has been building the infra-structure of a successful invasion for some 80 years -- is not of concern. It should not be surprising since the same chorus is forever assuring us that Radical Muslims constitute an inconsequential minority. If this is so, why do the Imams and Muslim political leaders not condemn the Muslim terrorists? Dore Gold's expose on "The Muslim Brotherhood and the Egyptian Crisis" [Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, February 2, 2011] demonstrates a definite need for concern. The articles by Dr. Harold Brackman, the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs [July 10, 2008], Frank Gaffney, and Jeff Jacoby provide ample evidence as to why we need to fear the Muslim Brotherhood. They are the oldest and largest Islamic Group who currently promote Jihad. Their primary goal is focused on returning to fundamental Islam based on Sharia Law. In the past they were linked to the Nazis and they had close ties with that vile anti-Semite, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. They were behind the assassination of Anwar Sadat and actively support Hamas. Never mind that the appeasers consider them moderate because of their focus on social service activities and their supposed renouncement of violence.

The Take-Home Lesson

as in the 1930's America remains largely ignorant of the danger to itself from a self-confident hate-driven group with global ambitions. Professor Bernard Lewis is on record as commenting, "I think there is a general tendency to underestimate the threat" and to America, "two words — wake up." Indeed, for the skeptics, let them Google, "list of world attacks by Muslims", "major Palestinian Terror Attacks since Oslo", "Islamic Terror Attacks on American Soil", "Terrorist Attacks in the US or Against Americans", "Wikipedia — List of terrorist incidents", "A History of Terrorism in Israel", and www.conceptwizard.com/pipeline_of_ hatred.com [video].

In the WW2 it was only when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor that America woke up to the danger of a world dominated by dictators and fascist ideologies. Today, we need to ignore the fantasy of a multicultural benevolent world society and reorganize our defenses on the basis of reality. As Professor Bernard Lewis noted in his address to the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism at Hebrew University on February 16, 2010:

"Historically, it is important to remember that Muslims made two previous attempts to conquer Europe — the first was in the 7th century and the second in the 19th Century. The third attempt which we are witnessing now seems to have a much better chance at success. This current conquest is being waged in the form of peaceful migration rather than military aggression. As such, it is that much harder for Europe to defend itself."

As for Israel, its government needs to heed the words of historian Andrew Roberts as spoken in his address to the Anglo-Israel Association on December 9, 2009:

"None of us can pretend to know what lies ahead for Israel, but if she decides preemptively to strike against such a threat [Iran] — in the same way that Nelson preemptively sank the Danish fleet at Copenhagen and Churchill preemptively sank the Vichy Fleet at Oran — then she can expect nothing but condemnation from the British Foreign Office. She should ignore such criticism, because for all the fine work done by the Association over the past six decades — work that's clearly needed as much now as ever before — Britain has only been at best a fair-weather friend to Israel. Although history does not repeat itself, if its cadences do occasionally rhyme, and if the witness of history is testament to anything, it is testament to this: That in her hopes of averting the threat of a Second Holocaust - only Israel can be relied upon to act decisively inthe best interests of Jews."
 

This essay has been a summary of some of the major considerations in a comparison of present-day conditions and those that preceded World War 2. I believe that in today's environment we can see the features of yet another Gathering Storm. I hope to develop some of these ideas in later essays.
 

GENERAL REFERENCES

In contemporary times, the leading political international voices opposing appeasement are undoubtedly those of Dutch MP, Geert Wilders and Italian MP, Fiamma Nirenstein. Israel's MK's Dr. Aryeh Eldad, Uzi Landau, Avigdor Lieberman, Danny Danon, Danny Ayalon, Tzipi Hotovely, former Ambassador Yoram Ettinger and Ronald Lauder, to a lesser extent, contribute to the debate. Among the names of media personalities arguing the case against the fallacies of appeasement, are Melanie Philips, Oriana Fallaci [died in 2006], Brigitte Gabriel, Noni Darwish, David Horowitz, Glenn Beck and Nidra Poller.

NOTE: These below are in addition to those cited in the text:

Michael Makovsky, Churchill's Promised Land and Statecraft

Riley McMahon, Freedom Hero: Winston Churchill

Howard M.Sachar A History of Israel from the Rise of Zionism to Our Time, 3rd Edition, 2006

Shmuel Katz, Battleground: Facts and Fantasy in Palestine

Fern Sidman, "Jabotinsky Legacy Lauded in Manhattan," Jewish Press, September, 2008

Ze'Ev Jabotinsky, The War and the Jew

"Ze'Ev [Vladimir] Jabotinsky 1880-1940,"
www.ou.org/chagim/yomhaatzmauth/jabo.html.

Fern Sidman, "Remembering Ze'Ev Jabotinsky on his 70th Yahrtzeit," Arutz Sheva, August 19, 2010

Morton Zuckerman, "Israel's Historic Achievement," US News & World Report, May 16, 2008

Robert Murdoch, My Right Word (Quotes from Jabotinsky), ADL, October 15, 2010

Melanie Philips Londonistan

Bruce Bawer, While Europe Slept

Mark Steyn, America Alone

Professor Paul Eidelberg, The Clash of Two Decadent Civilizations, Ariel Center for Policy Research, Policy Paper #144, December 2002

A. Lentin, Guilt at Versailles: Lloyd George and the Pre-History of Appeasement

Professor Leslie R. Marchant, The History of Appeasement Repeats Itself

Winston Churchill, Zionism verses Bolshevism: A Struggle for the Soul of the Jewish People

Martin Gilbert, Letter from London: A well-spoken Friend

Mark Steyn, "Israel Today, the West Tomorrow," Commentary, May 2009

Churchill, A Life by Martin Gilbert [1992].

B. Shechtman The Life & Times of Jabotinsky: Rebel and Statesman by

Aaron David Miller, The False Religion of Mideast Peace

Seth Leibsohn, "Land for Peace" National Review, June 18, 2007

Dr. Rivka Shapak Lissak, "Is Israel the Goliath of the Middle East?", RSL Actuality History

Dr. Gerhard Falk, Land for Peace: A Liberal Illusion http://jbuff.com/c11000.htm

Dr. Gerhard Falk , "Anti-Jewish Jews" http://jbuff.com/c04208.htm

David S. Wyman, Abandonment of the Jews

Yoshiko Sagamori, "Have you ever thought in the unfolding conflict between the Muslim world and the civilization ..." www.netanyahu.org/havyouevthou.html, November 6, 2002

Dr. Harold Brackman, "Hitler Put Them in their Place", Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood's Jihad Against Jews, Judaism and Israel, Simon Wiesenthal Center

Senate Committee on Homeland and Governmental Affairs, Report on the Roots of Violent Islamist Extremism and Efforts to Counter it: The Muslim Brotherhood, July 10, 2008

Frank Gaffney, The Muslim Brotherhood: Our Enemy in its own Words

Jeff Jacoby, No Room at table for the Muslim Brotherhood

Raymond Ibrahim, Islam's History of Ant-Semitism

Edward Alexander, The Jewish Wars
 

Alex Rose is an engineering consultant. He was formerly on the Executive of Americans for a Safe Israel and a founding member of CAMERA, NY City. He made Aliyah in 2003 and now resides in Ashkelon. He can be contacted at alexrenee@bezeqint.net.

 

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