The Day of the Dhimmi is Done - Michael Lumish, PhD, proprietor. (mike.lumish@gmail.com)
Monday, December 31, 2012
Study: Christianity disappearing from Mideast
Mike L.
One of the more frustrating aspects of this story is the apparent disinterest by western Christians in it. If western Christians, or indeed anyone else, speaks out against the persecution of non-Muslims by Muslims in the Middle East they are smeared as vile racists and "Islamophobes."
This is particularly true within progressive-left circles where issues around "race" are turned entirely upside down. The only way not to be considered racist within today's left is to be racist and, conversely, if one is not racist then one is often accused of racism.
If one is not to be smeared as a racist on the left one must treat the "subaltern other," particularly Arab-Muslims, as little children who hold no responsibility for either their words or behavior. In this way, racism is considered not racist. However, if one believes in universal human rights and thus believes that people should be treated with basic human decency everywhere in the world and, therefore, one criticizes the Arab-Muslim Middle East for their treatment of Christians, or Jews, or Gays, or women, then one is considered "racist."
The hypocrisy on this issue is just so vast that it becomes, like white wallpaper, an imperceivable backdrop. It is for this reason that someone like Pam Geller who speaks out against Jihadi violence is considered a bigot, while those who in a racist manner turn a blind eye to Jihadi violence are not.
It is for this reason, also, that if I point to a video of an imam screaming for Jewish blood it makes me a bigot in the eyes of the left.
Up is down and black is white.
On the racist anti-racist left today the only way not to be racist is to be racist and if one is not racist then one is. In this way the racist anti-racist left has emerged as the most deeply bigoted political movement in the west today outside of political Islam, itself.
The western left has gone straight down the rabbit hole.
UK Christianophobia report states Christians in Middle East face persecution 'intensifying with rise of militant Islam'; in Israel, however, Christian population is thriving
A new study warns that Christianity is at the risk of being wiped out in the biblical heartlands of the Middle East. According to the London Daily Telegraph, which cites the study, 10% of Christians worldwide – approximately 200 million – are “socially disadvantaged, harassed or actively oppressed for their beliefs.”Among the various consequences of the rise of political Islam under the false moniker "Arab Spring" has been an intensification of the persecution of Middle Eastern Christians. They are, in fact, being driven out of the region.
With over 2.3 billion Christians around the world, the study notes that Christians face the most persecution in the region of the world where Christianity first originated – the Middle East...
Published by a leading independent British think tank, Civitas, the report stated that Western politicians and media generally ignore widespread persecution of Christians in the Middle East and elsewhere in the world "because they are afraid they will be accused of racism."
One of the more frustrating aspects of this story is the apparent disinterest by western Christians in it. If western Christians, or indeed anyone else, speaks out against the persecution of non-Muslims by Muslims in the Middle East they are smeared as vile racists and "Islamophobes."
This is particularly true within progressive-left circles where issues around "race" are turned entirely upside down. The only way not to be considered racist within today's left is to be racist and, conversely, if one is not racist then one is often accused of racism.
If one is not to be smeared as a racist on the left one must treat the "subaltern other," particularly Arab-Muslims, as little children who hold no responsibility for either their words or behavior. In this way, racism is considered not racist. However, if one believes in universal human rights and thus believes that people should be treated with basic human decency everywhere in the world and, therefore, one criticizes the Arab-Muslim Middle East for their treatment of Christians, or Jews, or Gays, or women, then one is considered "racist."
The hypocrisy on this issue is just so vast that it becomes, like white wallpaper, an imperceivable backdrop. It is for this reason that someone like Pam Geller who speaks out against Jihadi violence is considered a bigot, while those who in a racist manner turn a blind eye to Jihadi violence are not.
It is for this reason, also, that if I point to a video of an imam screaming for Jewish blood it makes me a bigot in the eyes of the left.
Up is down and black is white.
On the racist anti-racist left today the only way not to be racist is to be racist and if one is not racist then one is. In this way the racist anti-racist left has emerged as the most deeply bigoted political movement in the west today outside of political Islam, itself.
The western left has gone straight down the rabbit hole.
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Obama touts Hagel as possible defense secretary and best friend that Israel could possibly ever have
Mike L.
Besides, everyone knows that the best way to be friendly toward Israel is tough love... a good raping, perhaps.
What Israel clearly needs are more friends like Chuck Hagel and Barack Obama and Peter Beinart and Rashid Khalidi and Thomas Friedman and Edward Said and Jeremy ben Ami and Noam Chomsky and Yassir Arafat.
What we need is a Secretary of Defense who understands that Hezbollah and Hamas are great friends to the United States, but that Israel needs a good ass-whooping so that it will stop building housing for its people in the city of Jerusalem... because, y'know, Jews building housing for themselves in the ancient Jewish capital city is an outrageous violation of the peace process and you cannot expect peace-loving Arabs to put up with such an intrusion on their sovereignty.
Ask Barack Obama, he'll tell you. Obama understands that despite two thousand years of diaspora and persecution and pogroms and riots and expulsions, all leading to that rocking good time that Jews had in Europe in the middle of the twentieth century, that the Jewish state of Israel doesn't really, necessarily want peace because they have not explored their souls enough.
There wasn't enough soul-searching going on in Auschwitz... what with all the volleyball games and ping-pong tournaments, I guess.
Jews are apparently not introspective enough. We have not done a thorough enough job of exploring our souls to Herr Sigmund Obama's satisfaction or to determine whether or not we want more Jihadis chopping the heads off of our three month old baby daughters.
Or so this insidious moron seems to think.
US president offers strong support for former Republican senator as potential defense secretary who's been criticized for his record on IsraelYes, I am sure that Chuck Hagel is the best friend that Israel ever had and has Israel's back and is more supportive of the Jewish state than anyone who has ever lived, much like Obama himself.
President Barack Obama offered strong support for former Republican Senator Chuck Hagel as the potential next US defense secretary but said in remarks aired on Sunday that he had not yet decided on a nominee for the Pentagon post.
Hagel is considered a leading candidate to replace outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, but the former Nebraska lawmaker has come under criticism for his record on Israel and for a comment that being gay was an inhibiting factor for being an ambassador.
"I've served with Chuck Hagel. I know him. He is a patriot. He is somebody who has done extraordinary work both in the United States Senate, somebody who served this country with valor in Vietnam," Obama told NBC's "Meet the Press" in an interview taped on Saturday and broadcast on Sunday.
Besides, everyone knows that the best way to be friendly toward Israel is tough love... a good raping, perhaps.
What Israel clearly needs are more friends like Chuck Hagel and Barack Obama and Peter Beinart and Rashid Khalidi and Thomas Friedman and Edward Said and Jeremy ben Ami and Noam Chomsky and Yassir Arafat.
What we need is a Secretary of Defense who understands that Hezbollah and Hamas are great friends to the United States, but that Israel needs a good ass-whooping so that it will stop building housing for its people in the city of Jerusalem... because, y'know, Jews building housing for themselves in the ancient Jewish capital city is an outrageous violation of the peace process and you cannot expect peace-loving Arabs to put up with such an intrusion on their sovereignty.
Ask Barack Obama, he'll tell you. Obama understands that despite two thousand years of diaspora and persecution and pogroms and riots and expulsions, all leading to that rocking good time that Jews had in Europe in the middle of the twentieth century, that the Jewish state of Israel doesn't really, necessarily want peace because they have not explored their souls enough.
There wasn't enough soul-searching going on in Auschwitz... what with all the volleyball games and ping-pong tournaments, I guess.
Jews are apparently not introspective enough. We have not done a thorough enough job of exploring our souls to Herr Sigmund Obama's satisfaction or to determine whether or not we want more Jihadis chopping the heads off of our three month old baby daughters.
Or so this insidious moron seems to think.
Saturday, December 29, 2012
Muslim Brotherhood Tops List of 2012 Anti-Semitic Slurs
Mike L.
How is it that liberal American Jews got so ideologically twisted that they could support an American president with a foreign policy that is so radically conservative that it bolsters the foremost hard-right, genocidally anti-Jewish organization on the planet today?
Progressive-left American Jewry is deeply in denial and Barack Obama's support for the Brotherhood is anything but liberal. There is nothing the least little bit liberal about oppressing women, murdering Gays, driving non-Muslims out of the Middle East, and advocating for the genocide of the Jews.
When you support the Brotherhood that is what you are supporting and that is, despite his best intentions... presuming he has "best intentions"... what Barack Obama supports. On domestic policy Obama is a liberal, but on foreign policy he is deeply conservative, even radically conservative and far to the right of your average Republican.
The Muslim Brotherhood topped the Simon Weisenthal Center’s list of anti-Semitic/anti-Israel slurs of 2012. The two main offenders were the organizations moral guide, Mohammed Badie, and Futouh abd al-Nabi Mansour, an Egyptian cleric who heads the religious endowment for the Matrouh Governate.It can't be emphasized enough that this is the organization that Barack Obama supports and helped usher into power in Egypt.
Badie was quoted as saying: “the Jews have dominated the land, spread corruption on earth, spilled the blood of believers and in their actions profaned holy places. Zionists only understand the language of force and will not relent without duress. this will happen only through holy Jihad.”
How is it that liberal American Jews got so ideologically twisted that they could support an American president with a foreign policy that is so radically conservative that it bolsters the foremost hard-right, genocidally anti-Jewish organization on the planet today?
Progressive-left American Jewry is deeply in denial and Barack Obama's support for the Brotherhood is anything but liberal. There is nothing the least little bit liberal about oppressing women, murdering Gays, driving non-Muslims out of the Middle East, and advocating for the genocide of the Jews.
When you support the Brotherhood that is what you are supporting and that is, despite his best intentions... presuming he has "best intentions"... what Barack Obama supports. On domestic policy Obama is a liberal, but on foreign policy he is deeply conservative, even radically conservative and far to the right of your average Republican.
Friday, December 28, 2012
The Failures of Progressive-Left Zionism: Political Islam
Mike L.
When I look at Israel Thrives site statistics, I am pleased to see that the piece below, The Failures of Progressive-Left Zionism: Political Islam, originally published on May 9, 2012, continues to be among the most read bits of analysis that I have done here.
The failure of progressive-left Zionism can perhaps be forgiven due to the fact that we are now in a transitional phase of Jewish / Israeli world politics. We are at this moment directly in between the Oslo era and whatever is following. Progressive-left diaspora Jews do not wish to give up Oslo because they see no other alternative to it beyond the single-state solution and, therefore, are desperately trying to hold back a speeding train. The problem is that they cannot stop the train and, yet, they refuse to let go.
History has no such compunction.
We are now officially in the post-Oslo era. If Barack Obama helped kill Oslo via his foolish demand for "total settlement freeze," Mahmoud Abbas and the international community buried the damn thing entirely when they voted to recognize "Palestine" as a non-member state, thus abrogating the terms of the agreement. This means, sadly, that all bets are off and anything can happen. One thing that is certain is that the situation looks grim. The Palestinians, with a little help from their European and American friends, are even so emboldened as to protest that Jews living in Lod, a small city within the borders of Israel proper, represent "settlements" and therefore vow resistance.
This is, of course, pure anti-Jewish racism of the type that we have known century upon century for millennia. Palestinians refuse to allow Jews to live in freedom on historically Jewish land and the reason that they do so is because Jewish sovereignty on any bit of land that was ever a part of the umma is considered a desecration of Islam. Thus the rise of political Islam throughout the Middle East should be of primary concern to Jewish people everywhere, but it is not.
Progressive-left diaspora Jews cannot bring themselves to really discuss in a public manner the rise of political Islam because they know in doing so they risk being smeared as racists... they should know this very well because they certainly indulge in this contemptuous practice enough themselves.
In any case, the brief piece below remains among the top read pieces published at Israel Thrives.
...
The Failures of Progressive-Left Zionism: Political Islam
Progressive-left Jewish Zionists are failing the Jewish people.
The first way in which progressive-left Zionism is failing is in its ostrich-like reluctance to acknowledge, and seriously discuss, the rise of the Jihad throughout the Muslim Middle East. This failure is exceedingly dangerous because the Jews of the Middle East represent something like 1/70th of the total population there and much of that total is moving toward genocidal Islamism. Just as progressive diaspora Jews were basically silent during the rise of Nazi Germany, so they are silent now. We cannot know what the rise of political Islam will mean to the Jewish people in the long term, but we do know that this particular trend is anti-Semitic, and genocidal, to the core.
The failure of progressive-left Jews to address this issue represents a very dangerous form of cowardice and / or ideological blinkertude.
Throughout the 1990s and the Bush II era I did not give much credence to Republican or conservative concerns about terrorism or, as they might say, "Islamofascism." During the Clinton years I assumed that Islamist terrorism was a bogey-man and during the Bush years I resented what I took to be the using of the so-called War on Terrorism to cynically move funds in various directions and to bolster the political careers of prominent conservatives and Republicans.
It is this, by the way, which represents the backdrop for progressive Jewish unwillingness to understand that times have changed. And times have changed. When I was still a Democrat the radical Jihad was pretty much limited to Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, Qaeda, and the Taliban. One country and a number of fringe organizations, one of which gave us 9/11.
Now we have Iran, Hez, Hamas, Qaeda, the Taliban, and increasingly, Turkey, Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Lebanon, Morocco, Yemen, Bahrain, Nigeria, and Sudan. When progressive-left Jews ignore the Jihadi fruits of the so-called "Arab Spring," or explain it away as "the blessings of democracy," as Obama does, they are veiling the fact that the entire Middle East is going through an Islamist awakening, not a democratic one. The Muslim Brotherhood, an organization with an historical provenance that goes to Nazi Germany, is finally taking over Egypt.
The American president does not mind and, sadly, neither do progressive-left diaspora Jews.
I would suggest that this is a major problem, but the question is "why?" Why do progressive-left diaspora Jews absolutely refuse to acknowledge, and seriously discuss, what is the foremost geo-political happening since the demise of the Soviet Union? How is it possible that, just as with the rise of Nazi Germany, progressive-left Jews are failing to acknowledge what is before their very eyes? The answer is cowardice and ideological blindness. They are afraid to say anything, or even really think anything on this question, not out of fear of Jihadis, but out of a social fear of their fellow progressives for whom any reference to political Islam is taken as a form of "Islamophobia." The Jews of the Middle East are increasingly surrounded by a vicious political movement which would see them dead, yet progressive-left diaspora Jews close their eyes and turn away because they do not want to be called mean names by their fellow progressives.
They are, in a sense, swapping Political Correctness for the well-being of the Jewish people. The best that they will do is go after safe, but largely irrelevant, targets like fringe-right Skin-heads or Klansmen, wherein their fellow non-Jewish progressives will give them a nice kitsel behind the ear.
This represents the first, but not the only, sad failure of contemporary progressive-left Zionism.
{They might as well be mutes.}
Zach Has Some Words
This was published by Zach (of Matt and Zach fame) over at the Huffington Post Monitor, but I like the elegance of the argument and have decided to swipe this material. I hope that Zach doesn't mind. - Mike L.
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Here's a tactic that Matt and I have been using for a while, and think it would probably be useful for the kind of online, anonymous arguments that inevitably crop up on websites like the Huffington Post, but others as well.
The most common argument that any Palestinian supporter or Israel hater will use is to simply start talking, ranting or copying and pasting a large block of text about the poor, suffering Palestinians. It can be about any topic, any subject, from any point in time, and all of their fellow travelers will praise them. But the trouble is that this is a two-sided conflict. So how should you respond?
Respond by saying: "Wow. It sounds like the lives of the Palestinians are really difficult. Maybe they should consider making peace?"
Although this may come off as callous, it's also the truth: if the settlements are stealing Palestinian land, why don't the Palestinians make peace and stop the settlements? If the Palestinians don't like people dying at the hand of IDF soldiers, why not make peace so that they won't be fighting each other any more?
There are two ways that anti-Zionists usually respond to this argument. Either "We can't make peace because of ________," or "how are we supposed to make peace when Israel is doing ________." That blank is most often filled by settlements and pizza analogies, but it can also be blockades and "occupation." When they say this, what they are really saying is that settlements, for example, is more important to the Palestinians than peace. If you had any other group of people saying that land is more important to them than the lives and welfare of their people....well, that's also pretty callous.
This would seem like a good tactic because they are deflecting back to Israel, but now the conversation has stopped been them screaming lies about Israel and you pointing out they are wrong. Now they are explaining why the Palestinians are justified in refusing to make peace and you telling them how ridiculous that is. The focus of the conversation has shifted to Palestinian intransigence, which is how it should be. Palestinian intransigence is the root cause of the conflict and in turn their own suffering, and that is what we should be talking about.
Let's not forget either that other people have made peace and stopped fighting after being treated waaaay worse than the Palestinians. Japan had not one but two cities almost completely wiped out by atomic bombs and they were still able to move on and secure a better future for their country. The Palestinians seem to enjoy finding excuses why they have to keep fighting (for "justice" or whatever) and there's no reason why they shouldn't be called on it.
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Here's a tactic that Matt and I have been using for a while, and think it would probably be useful for the kind of online, anonymous arguments that inevitably crop up on websites like the Huffington Post, but others as well.
The most common argument that any Palestinian supporter or Israel hater will use is to simply start talking, ranting or copying and pasting a large block of text about the poor, suffering Palestinians. It can be about any topic, any subject, from any point in time, and all of their fellow travelers will praise them. But the trouble is that this is a two-sided conflict. So how should you respond?
Respond by saying: "Wow. It sounds like the lives of the Palestinians are really difficult. Maybe they should consider making peace?"
Although this may come off as callous, it's also the truth: if the settlements are stealing Palestinian land, why don't the Palestinians make peace and stop the settlements? If the Palestinians don't like people dying at the hand of IDF soldiers, why not make peace so that they won't be fighting each other any more?
There are two ways that anti-Zionists usually respond to this argument. Either "We can't make peace because of ________," or "how are we supposed to make peace when Israel is doing ________." That blank is most often filled by settlements and pizza analogies, but it can also be blockades and "occupation." When they say this, what they are really saying is that settlements, for example, is more important to the Palestinians than peace. If you had any other group of people saying that land is more important to them than the lives and welfare of their people....well, that's also pretty callous.
This would seem like a good tactic because they are deflecting back to Israel, but now the conversation has stopped been them screaming lies about Israel and you pointing out they are wrong. Now they are explaining why the Palestinians are justified in refusing to make peace and you telling them how ridiculous that is. The focus of the conversation has shifted to Palestinian intransigence, which is how it should be. Palestinian intransigence is the root cause of the conflict and in turn their own suffering, and that is what we should be talking about.
Let's not forget either that other people have made peace and stopped fighting after being treated waaaay worse than the Palestinians. Japan had not one but two cities almost completely wiped out by atomic bombs and they were still able to move on and secure a better future for their country. The Palestinians seem to enjoy finding excuses why they have to keep fighting (for "justice" or whatever) and there's no reason why they shouldn't be called on it.
Thursday, December 27, 2012
New Israeli Elections Poll Shows Likud Slipping, Naftali Bennett’s Party on the Rise
Mike L.
It was killed by Palestinian-Arab hostility and intransigence and by the international left which perpetually excoriates and undermines Israel while ignoring, if not abetting, the rise of political Islam. Meanwhile the diaspora Jewish left seems entirely out of ideas. For so many years the presumption was that if only Israel would put a leash on settlement activity (which it did, anyway, but no one seemed to notice or care) then we could coax the Palestinians back to the negotiating table where a formal end of hostilities could be banged out within a two-state solution.
Progressive-left Jews generally blamed their right-leaning coreligionists in Israel for Palestinian intransigence rather than laying that blame at the feet of the Palestinians, themselves, where it rightly belongs. Decade after decade Jihadis scream for Jewish blood and decade after decade progressive Zionists blame their fellow Jews in Israel, and in the territories, for Arab hostility toward them.
Now that Mahmoud Abbas, with the collusion of the international community at the United Nations, has formally killed off the Oslo Accords, progressive-left Zionism is left with no clue, nothing to say, and near zero political prospects. (Will Meretz even have a presence in the next Knesset?) This has opened additional political space for the pro-Israeli right-wing to make their case and to advance electorally. The Israeli right wants to either annex all of Judea and Samaria or, along with Naftali Bennett, some of Judea and Samaria, namely "Area C." The Israeli center seems to want to maintain the status quo, while the delicate Israeli left is out in the cold, dreaming their fading and delusional dreams of Oslo.
In the mean time, the hostile Obama administration is considering promoting an even more hostile Chuck Hagel to the position of Secretary of Defense which would send a very clear message to both Iran and to the Palestinian Authority that Israel cannot depend on the United States to "have its back." That message, in fact, should already be crystal clear to all but the most left-leaning of ideologues who consistently refuse to acknowledge what is directly in their faces.
2013 is going to be a very challenging year for the Jewish state of Israel and the very last people in this world that they can count on are those progressive Zionists who continue to point the trembling finger of blame at their fellow Jews in Israel. Israelis know this, of course, which is part of the reason that the left has lost so much support within that country. Israeli Jews are not so stupid as to support a political movement, or an American president, that is hostile toward them.
It's just basic common sense.
A new poll released by Israel Radio Thursday showed that the Likud-Yisrael Beytenu ticket is still the favorite to win next month’s elections in Israel with 34 seats in the Knesset.
Labor placed second with less than half the projected Knesset seats of its competitor, with 16.The Israeli left is dead, dead, dead.
Naftali Bennett’s party, Bayit Yehudi, was unaffected by his recent controversial statements and is projected to come in a close third, with 15 seats.
It was killed by Palestinian-Arab hostility and intransigence and by the international left which perpetually excoriates and undermines Israel while ignoring, if not abetting, the rise of political Islam. Meanwhile the diaspora Jewish left seems entirely out of ideas. For so many years the presumption was that if only Israel would put a leash on settlement activity (which it did, anyway, but no one seemed to notice or care) then we could coax the Palestinians back to the negotiating table where a formal end of hostilities could be banged out within a two-state solution.
Progressive-left Jews generally blamed their right-leaning coreligionists in Israel for Palestinian intransigence rather than laying that blame at the feet of the Palestinians, themselves, where it rightly belongs. Decade after decade Jihadis scream for Jewish blood and decade after decade progressive Zionists blame their fellow Jews in Israel, and in the territories, for Arab hostility toward them.
Now that Mahmoud Abbas, with the collusion of the international community at the United Nations, has formally killed off the Oslo Accords, progressive-left Zionism is left with no clue, nothing to say, and near zero political prospects. (Will Meretz even have a presence in the next Knesset?) This has opened additional political space for the pro-Israeli right-wing to make their case and to advance electorally. The Israeli right wants to either annex all of Judea and Samaria or, along with Naftali Bennett, some of Judea and Samaria, namely "Area C." The Israeli center seems to want to maintain the status quo, while the delicate Israeli left is out in the cold, dreaming their fading and delusional dreams of Oslo.
In the mean time, the hostile Obama administration is considering promoting an even more hostile Chuck Hagel to the position of Secretary of Defense which would send a very clear message to both Iran and to the Palestinian Authority that Israel cannot depend on the United States to "have its back." That message, in fact, should already be crystal clear to all but the most left-leaning of ideologues who consistently refuse to acknowledge what is directly in their faces.
2013 is going to be a very challenging year for the Jewish state of Israel and the very last people in this world that they can count on are those progressive Zionists who continue to point the trembling finger of blame at their fellow Jews in Israel. Israelis know this, of course, which is part of the reason that the left has lost so much support within that country. Israeli Jews are not so stupid as to support a political movement, or an American president, that is hostile toward them.
It's just basic common sense.
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
NAFTALI BENNETT
Mike L.
One of the rising stars in Israeli politics today is Naftali Bennett of the right-leaning Jewish Home party which is poised to make considerable electoral gains in the upcoming elections. Bennett has recently come under fire for an ill-considered remark suggesting that, as a soldier, he would disobey IDF orders to evict Jewish "settlers" from their homes. He has since backed off that statement.
Nonetheless, this is someone who we are likely to be hearing from going forward and in the brief video above he lays out the "Bennett Plan" for Judea and Samaria.
What he suggests is that Israel annex "Area C" which contains around 360,000 Jews and about 50,000 Arabs, giving all residents full citizenship if they wish. In areas A and B, which contain about 1.8 million Arabs, and very few Jews, he would offer them local autonomy, but not statehood. Statehood would need to be denied on the grounds that the local Arab population is perpetually hostile and therefore Israel cannot afford a militarized Palestinian state looking down upon, and lobbing rockets at, the Israelis along the coastal plains.
He would ensure transportational contiguity between all sections of areas A and B and would, taking a page from Netanyahu's book, heavily invest in the Arab economy of that region in order to help ease tensions.
Somewhat to his left is PM Netanyahu and to his left is Tzippi Livni, who still holds out hope for a negotiated conclusion of hostilities. To his right is Jerusalem Post columnist Martin Sherman who argues that Bennett's plan is unworkable and that Israel should annex all of Judea and Samaria, giving the local Arabs limited autonomy without the national franchise.
What I think is that it should be obvious by now that the local Arabs have no intention whatsoever of agreeing to a state for themselves in peace next to Israel and therefore Oslo is over. In fact, by declaring "Palestine" non-member state status at the United Nations, both the Palestinian Authority and the international community have abrogated, and thus concluded, the Oslo accords. For this reason I would not support Livni or her newly formed Hatnuah party.
My argument, for some time now, has been that Israel needs to declare its final borders and remove the IDF to behind those borders. Bennett's plan probably comes closest to that suggestion, although I do not know that Israel should annex all of area C as it is currently constituted. I would argue that the regions of Israeli annexation should contain all the major settlement blocs near the "green line," but leave as much territorial contiguity possible for an Arab state, with Ramallah as the capital.
In any case, Israel should not allow the division of the Jewish capital of Jerusalem.
The "Palestinians" have earned the lovely city of Ramallah and they should have it.
One of the rising stars in Israeli politics today is Naftali Bennett of the right-leaning Jewish Home party which is poised to make considerable electoral gains in the upcoming elections. Bennett has recently come under fire for an ill-considered remark suggesting that, as a soldier, he would disobey IDF orders to evict Jewish "settlers" from their homes. He has since backed off that statement.
Nonetheless, this is someone who we are likely to be hearing from going forward and in the brief video above he lays out the "Bennett Plan" for Judea and Samaria.
What he suggests is that Israel annex "Area C" which contains around 360,000 Jews and about 50,000 Arabs, giving all residents full citizenship if they wish. In areas A and B, which contain about 1.8 million Arabs, and very few Jews, he would offer them local autonomy, but not statehood. Statehood would need to be denied on the grounds that the local Arab population is perpetually hostile and therefore Israel cannot afford a militarized Palestinian state looking down upon, and lobbing rockets at, the Israelis along the coastal plains.
He would ensure transportational contiguity between all sections of areas A and B and would, taking a page from Netanyahu's book, heavily invest in the Arab economy of that region in order to help ease tensions.
Somewhat to his left is PM Netanyahu and to his left is Tzippi Livni, who still holds out hope for a negotiated conclusion of hostilities. To his right is Jerusalem Post columnist Martin Sherman who argues that Bennett's plan is unworkable and that Israel should annex all of Judea and Samaria, giving the local Arabs limited autonomy without the national franchise.
What I think is that it should be obvious by now that the local Arabs have no intention whatsoever of agreeing to a state for themselves in peace next to Israel and therefore Oslo is over. In fact, by declaring "Palestine" non-member state status at the United Nations, both the Palestinian Authority and the international community have abrogated, and thus concluded, the Oslo accords. For this reason I would not support Livni or her newly formed Hatnuah party.
My argument, for some time now, has been that Israel needs to declare its final borders and remove the IDF to behind those borders. Bennett's plan probably comes closest to that suggestion, although I do not know that Israel should annex all of area C as it is currently constituted. I would argue that the regions of Israeli annexation should contain all the major settlement blocs near the "green line," but leave as much territorial contiguity possible for an Arab state, with Ramallah as the capital.
In any case, Israel should not allow the division of the Jewish capital of Jerusalem.
The "Palestinians" have earned the lovely city of Ramallah and they should have it.
Monday, December 24, 2012
Indian Jews from 'Lost Tribe' move to Israel
Mike L.
Other than the fact that it just pleases me to no end, I don't.
G-d bless them and keep them.
Some 50 Jews believed to be descended from one of 10 Lost Tribes of Israel make aliyahOne might think that because I posted this I would have something to say about it.
A group of 50 Jews said to descend from one of the 10 Lost Tribes immigrated to Israel Thursday from their village in northeastern India.
The members of the Bnei Menashe community prayed in their local synagogue and then hugged their crying relatives before heading off to the airport in the Manipur state capital of Imphal, 34 miles away.
The Bnei Menashe say they are descended from Jews banished from ancient Israel to India in the eighth century BC.
Other than the fact that it just pleases me to no end, I don't.
G-d bless them and keep them.
Sunday, December 23, 2012
Military Source Confirms: Palestinians Fired Rocket From Gaza Strip
Mike L.
On Sunday, the Palestinians launched a rocket from the Gaza Strip, an official military source confirmed.
The rocket was fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel, and landed in an open area near Ashkelon. It was the first launch to reach Israel since the end of Operation Pillar of Defense month ago.
Recently the IDF identified at least one attempt to launch a mortar shell, which landed within Gazan territory.
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Mob in Pakistan kills man accused of burning Koran
Mike L.
Now, is it wrong for me to call those people... oh, I don't know... SAVAGES, perhaps?
If I call them SAVAGES does that make me a racist-Islamophobic-bigot?
What if a bunch of Israeli Jews in Judea had done such a thing to someone who had burned the Torah? Not only would they be called SAVAGES, but the entire international left would have orgasms of self-righteous delight in a sadistic and monumental anti-Israel / anti-Jewish hate-fest throughout the western world.
On Daily Kos and the Huffington Post and the UK Guardian, and hundreds of other venues, large and small, they would scream their bleeding heads off about Israeli-Jewish savagery, but since it's a mob of Pakistani Muslims no one cares.
Does this not say something about the international left?
I think it does.
Something not very flattering, I'm afraid.
Some 200 people break into police station in southern town of Dadu, seize mentally ill Muslim man accused of burning copy of Islam's holy book and beat him to deathMentally unstable, beaten to death by a mob of 200, and then set aflame. Gee, I hope that they had the human decency to burn him after he died.
A mob in southern Pakistan stormed a police station to seize a mentally unstable Muslim man accused of burning a copy of Islam's holy book, beat him to death, and then set his body afire, police said Saturday.
Now, is it wrong for me to call those people... oh, I don't know... SAVAGES, perhaps?
If I call them SAVAGES does that make me a racist-Islamophobic-bigot?
What if a bunch of Israeli Jews in Judea had done such a thing to someone who had burned the Torah? Not only would they be called SAVAGES, but the entire international left would have orgasms of self-righteous delight in a sadistic and monumental anti-Israel / anti-Jewish hate-fest throughout the western world.
On Daily Kos and the Huffington Post and the UK Guardian, and hundreds of other venues, large and small, they would scream their bleeding heads off about Israeli-Jewish savagery, but since it's a mob of Pakistani Muslims no one cares.
Does this not say something about the international left?
I think it does.
Something not very flattering, I'm afraid.
Friday, December 21, 2012
Protecting the Child from Darkness
(Cross-posted at oldschooltwentysix)
I have been meaning to write several posts of late, but here it is that I finally get around to it. What was timely then has since been passed by events. In the interim came the Connecticut elementary school killings, a momentous tragedy, exploited by the media until it becomes just another spectacle for mass consumption, diversion, indoctrination, until the next thing comes along. My heart goes out to all those whose lives have been altered. One can hope something positive may result from this darkness.
Darkness affects the child in other ways. The first post I planned to write dealt with children, too, and education, but along the much different lines of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, adopted in 1959 by the UN General Assembly as a precursor to the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which codified its principles into international law. Principle 10 of the Declaration says:
No behavior by others, like building settlements (even if illegal), can justify or absolve responsibility for this behavior, as a type of offset. It is a violation of the child in every instance. States have an independent legal duty under the CRC treaty to protect the child against all other forms of exploitation prejudicial to any aspects of the child's welfare.
How far away has the international community drifted when it actually promotes the very things it agrees in law and spirit not to do? Recently, a poem read by hosts of a youth program on Palestinian Authority TV glorified plane hijackings, terror, and hatred of Israel and the US, including:
The program, Speak Up, is co-produced with the Palestinian youth NGO PYALARA, funded by the EU, the World Bank, Switzerland, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden. It has also praised suicide terrorists in their TV programs, saying that they are "role models."
What boggles my mind even more is the ignorance I observe in many well-intentioned, highly educated people, who define themselves as progressive, when it comes to the matter in general, combined with a tendency toward overall indifference that sees things as tit for tat, unable to discern a qualitative distinction concerning the ongoing conflict between Arabs and Jews.
That is the other post I intended to do, and it will follow relatively soon.
(Hat tip to Elder of Ziyon and Palestinian Media Watch)
I have been meaning to write several posts of late, but here it is that I finally get around to it. What was timely then has since been passed by events. In the interim came the Connecticut elementary school killings, a momentous tragedy, exploited by the media until it becomes just another spectacle for mass consumption, diversion, indoctrination, until the next thing comes along. My heart goes out to all those whose lives have been altered. One can hope something positive may result from this darkness.
Darkness affects the child in other ways. The first post I planned to write dealt with children, too, and education, but along the much different lines of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, adopted in 1959 by the UN General Assembly as a precursor to the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which codified its principles into international law. Principle 10 of the Declaration says:
The child shall be protected from practices which may foster racial, religious and any other form of discrimination. He shall be brought up in a spirit of understanding, tolerance, friendship among peoples, peace and universal brotherhood, and in full consciousness that his energy and talents should be devoted to the service of his fellow men.How far astray the international community has drifted from its role to give protection when it refuses to take a stand against something so basic as this:
No behavior by others, like building settlements (even if illegal), can justify or absolve responsibility for this behavior, as a type of offset. It is a violation of the child in every instance. States have an independent legal duty under the CRC treaty to protect the child against all other forms of exploitation prejudicial to any aspects of the child's welfare.
How far away has the international community drifted when it actually promotes the very things it agrees in law and spirit not to do? Recently, a poem read by hosts of a youth program on Palestinian Authority TV glorified plane hijackings, terror, and hatred of Israel and the US, including:
“Expect us always, expect us where least expected. We’re in every airport, and in every ticket… A small rifle in the hand of a small boy can kill the big one.”
The program, Speak Up, is co-produced with the Palestinian youth NGO PYALARA, funded by the EU, the World Bank, Switzerland, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden. It has also praised suicide terrorists in their TV programs, saying that they are "role models."
What boggles my mind even more is the ignorance I observe in many well-intentioned, highly educated people, who define themselves as progressive, when it comes to the matter in general, combined with a tendency toward overall indifference that sees things as tit for tat, unable to discern a qualitative distinction concerning the ongoing conflict between Arabs and Jews.
That is the other post I intended to do, and it will follow relatively soon.
(Hat tip to Elder of Ziyon and Palestinian Media Watch)
The Human Rights of the Jewish People - 2
Mike L.
This is the second part of a series of brief musings on Dan Bielak's piece It's about Standing Up for the Human Rights of the Jewish People.
In that piece Dan writes:
This falsehood is front and center in "progressive" post-colonial views on the matter. The allegedly anti-racist, post-colonial left frames the conflict as one between a largely innocent local population that is oppressed and occupied by European Jews in a manner not entirely dissimilar from, say, the English in India or the French in Indo-China. And just as these European colonial projects were morally unjust and had to be abandoned, so the European Jewish colonial project in "Palestine" is likewise morally unjust.
This is the often unspoken assumption that western pro-Palestinian activists, and many pro-Palestinian western governments, bring to the table in their consideration of the matter. And what this means, of course, is that Israel is essentially guilty before the conversation even takes place. Just as post-colonial theory breaks the world down into white western oppressors and the non-white, non-western oppressed, so the Arab-Israel conflict is viewed in just the same manner.
The central problem, of course, is that this ideological lens through which western pro-Palestinian activists and governments view the conflict is entirely ahistorical and false. The reason that Dan points out that the majority of Jewish Israelis are Mizrahim, rather than Ashkenazim from Europe, is because it shows up the lie that the western pro-Palestinian stance is grounded in. Once we acknowledge that the majority of Jews in Israel are the descendants of Jews who never left the Middle East and who, in fact, have been the victim of Arab-Muslim imperial domination for thirteen hundred years prior to the end of dhimmitude early in the twentieth century, then the entire western pro-Palestinian narrative gets turned entirely on its head.
The Jews have historical truth on our side (which is a big part of Dan's point) and the truth is that it is the Arabs who have perpetually oppressed and dominated the Jews of the Middle East since the 7th century. Israel is not a colonial project, but just the reverse. Israel is, itself, a post-colonial project in the sense that it represents Jewish freedom from Arab-Muslim imperialism from the 7th century to the close of World War I.
And this is why Dan is absolutely right to point out that over fifty percent of the Jewish population of Israel are Mizrahim, which is to say that they are, themselves, the descendants of traditionally persecuted "people of color."
They are not the oppressors, but the descendants of the oppressed and that goes for all the Jews in Israel. The purpose of Zionism was never to dominate anyone, but to free the Jews from the aggression and persecution by hostile powers in both Europe and the Middle East. To oppose Zionism from the left is, thus, to oppose the very meaning of western anti-colonialism.
Furthermore, to hold Israel to a constant double-standard that is not applied to the surrounding countries is to undermine the values that the progressive-left claims to uphold and to demonstrate a deep anti-Semitism, to boot. The progressive-left betrayal of Israel is, thus, the progressive-left sell-out of its claimed foundational values.
It represents the betrayal not only of the Jews, but of the left's very reason to be.
This is the second part of a series of brief musings on Dan Bielak's piece It's about Standing Up for the Human Rights of the Jewish People.
In that piece Dan writes:
The still living members of, and the descendants of, the approximately 800,000 to 1,000,000 Jewish refugees from Muslim states in the Middle East who found refuge in Israel: Approximately fifty percent of the Jewish population of Israel (they call themselves Mizrahi, which means "Eastern" in Hebrew)One of the great misconceptions among westerners who concern themselves with the Arab-Israel conflict is the notion that Jewish Israelis are European colonists while the local Arabs are the "indigenous people of color."
This falsehood is front and center in "progressive" post-colonial views on the matter. The allegedly anti-racist, post-colonial left frames the conflict as one between a largely innocent local population that is oppressed and occupied by European Jews in a manner not entirely dissimilar from, say, the English in India or the French in Indo-China. And just as these European colonial projects were morally unjust and had to be abandoned, so the European Jewish colonial project in "Palestine" is likewise morally unjust.
This is the often unspoken assumption that western pro-Palestinian activists, and many pro-Palestinian western governments, bring to the table in their consideration of the matter. And what this means, of course, is that Israel is essentially guilty before the conversation even takes place. Just as post-colonial theory breaks the world down into white western oppressors and the non-white, non-western oppressed, so the Arab-Israel conflict is viewed in just the same manner.
The central problem, of course, is that this ideological lens through which western pro-Palestinian activists and governments view the conflict is entirely ahistorical and false. The reason that Dan points out that the majority of Jewish Israelis are Mizrahim, rather than Ashkenazim from Europe, is because it shows up the lie that the western pro-Palestinian stance is grounded in. Once we acknowledge that the majority of Jews in Israel are the descendants of Jews who never left the Middle East and who, in fact, have been the victim of Arab-Muslim imperial domination for thirteen hundred years prior to the end of dhimmitude early in the twentieth century, then the entire western pro-Palestinian narrative gets turned entirely on its head.
The Jews have historical truth on our side (which is a big part of Dan's point) and the truth is that it is the Arabs who have perpetually oppressed and dominated the Jews of the Middle East since the 7th century. Israel is not a colonial project, but just the reverse. Israel is, itself, a post-colonial project in the sense that it represents Jewish freedom from Arab-Muslim imperialism from the 7th century to the close of World War I.
And this is why Dan is absolutely right to point out that over fifty percent of the Jewish population of Israel are Mizrahim, which is to say that they are, themselves, the descendants of traditionally persecuted "people of color."
They are not the oppressors, but the descendants of the oppressed and that goes for all the Jews in Israel. The purpose of Zionism was never to dominate anyone, but to free the Jews from the aggression and persecution by hostile powers in both Europe and the Middle East. To oppose Zionism from the left is, thus, to oppose the very meaning of western anti-colonialism.
Furthermore, to hold Israel to a constant double-standard that is not applied to the surrounding countries is to undermine the values that the progressive-left claims to uphold and to demonstrate a deep anti-Semitism, to boot. The progressive-left betrayal of Israel is, thus, the progressive-left sell-out of its claimed foundational values.
It represents the betrayal not only of the Jews, but of the left's very reason to be.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
The Israel Thrives Office Christmas Party
Mike L.
{A Tip 'O the Kippa to Joshua Pundit.}
FROM: Patty Lewis, Human Resources Director
TO: All Employees
DATE: November 1, 2012
RE: Gala Christmas Party
I'm happy to inform you that the company Christmas Party will take place on December 23rd, starting at noon in the private function room at the Grill House. There will be a cash bar and plenty of drinks! We'll have a small band playing traditional carols... feel free to sing along.
And don't be surprised if our CEO shows up dressed as Santa Claus!
A Christmas tree will be lit at 1:00 PM. Exchanges of gifts among employees can be done at that time; however, no gift should be over $10.00 to make the giving of gifts easy for everyone's pockets. This gathering is only for employees!
Our CEO will make a special announcement at that time!
Merry Christmas to you and your family,
Patty
------------------------------------------------------------------------
FROM: Patty Lewis, Human Resources Director
TO: All Employees
DATE: November 2, 2012
RE: Gala Holiday Party
In no way was yesterday's memo intended to exclude our Jewish employees. We recognize that Hanukkah is an important holiday, which often coincides with Christmas, though unfortunately not this year. However, from now on, we're calling it our " Holiday Party."
The same policy applies to any other employees who are not Christians and to those still celebrating Reconciliation Day. There will be no Christmas tree and no Christmas carols will be sung. We will have other types of music for your enjoyment.
Happy now?
Happy Holidays to you and your family,
Patty
--------------------------------------------------------
FROM: Patty Lewis, Human Resources Director
TO: All Employees
DATE: November 5, 2012
RE: Holiday Party
Regarding the note I received from a member of Alcoholics Anonymous requesting a non-drinking table, you didn't sign your name. I'm happy to accommodate this request, but if I put a sign on a table that reads, "AA Only", you wouldn't be anonymous anymore.
How am I supposed to handle this? Somebody?
And sorry, but forget about the gift exchange, no gifts are allowed since the union members feel that $10.00 is too much money and the executives believe $10.00 is a little chintzy.
REMEMBER: NO GIFTS EXCHANGE WILL BE ALLOWED.
PATTY
--------------------------------------------------------
FROM: Patty Lewis, Human Resources Director
To: All Employees
DATE: November 7, 2012
RE: Generic Holiday Party
What a diverse group we are! I had no idea that December 20th begins the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which forbids eating and drinking during daylight hours. There goes the party!
Seriously, we can appreciate how a luncheon at this time of year does not accommodate our Muslim employees' beliefs. Perhaps the Grill House can hold off on serving your meal until the end of the party or else package everything for you to take it home in little foil doggy bags. Will that work?
Meanwhile, I've arranged for members of Weight Watchers to sit farthest from the dessert buffet, and pregnant women will get the table closest to the restrooms.
Gays are allowed to sit with each other.Lesbians do not have to sit with Gay men, each group will have their own table.Yes, there will be flower arrangement for the Gay men's table.
To the person asking permission to cross dress, the Grill House asks that no cross-dressing be allowed, apparently because of concerns about confusion in the restrooms.
Sorry.
We will have booster seats for short people. Low-fat food will be available for those on a diet.
I am sorry to report that we cannot control the amount of salt used in the food . The Grill House suggests that people with high blood pressure taste a bite first.
There will be fresh "low sugar" fruits as dessert for diabetics, but the restaurant cannot supply "no sugar" desserts. Sorry!
Did I miss anything?!?!?
Patty
--------------------------------------------------------
FROM: Patty Lewis, Human Resources Director
TO: All #*%^ing Employees
DATE: November 12, 2012
RE: The #*%^ing Holiday Party
I've had it with you vegetarian pricks!!!
We're going to keep this party at the Grill House whether you like it or not, so you can sit quietly at the table furthest from the "grill of death," as you so quaintly put it, and you'll get your f*%^ing salad bar, including organic tomatoes.
But you know, tomatoes have feelings, too. They scream when you slice them. I've heard them scream. I'm hearing them scream right NOW!
The rest of you f*%^ing wierdos can kiss my *ss. I hope you all have a rotten holiday! Drive drunk and die.
The B*tch from H*ll!!!
PATTY
--------------------------------------------------------
FROM: Joan Bishop, Acting Human Resources Director
DATE: November 14, 2012
RE: Patty Lewis and Holiday Party
I'm sure I speak for all of us in wishing Patty Lewis a speedy recovery and I'll continue to forward your cards to her.
In the meantime, management has decided to cancel our Holiday Party and give everyone the afternoon of the 23rd off with full pay.
Happy Holidays!
Joan
Bubula Please (Content Warning)
Mike L.
A buddy of mine sent me this video entitled, "Bubula Please" and I think that it's absolutely hysterical.
HOWEVER, the video contains outright vulgarity and may offend the sensibilities of some people.
FYI
This is not quite as wholesome as the Maccabeats, I'm afraid.
A buddy of mine sent me this video entitled, "Bubula Please" and I think that it's absolutely hysterical.
HOWEVER, the video contains outright vulgarity and may offend the sensibilities of some people.
FYI
This is not quite as wholesome as the Maccabeats, I'm afraid.
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
The Human Rights of the Jewish People - 1
{Cross-posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
Mike L.
Dan Bielak has written a piece entitled It's about Standing Up for the Human Rights of the Jewish People that I would like to take a little time exploring. It is one of Dan's persistent themes that what those of us who care about the well-being of Israel must do is simply tell the truth of the Jews in the Middle East.
I must admit that when someone starts speaking to me about the truth I tend to cringe because I recognize the inherent subjectivity and inevitable bias in considering truth in history, much less politics. The most important book to date on the difficulties of historical and academic objectivity is Peter Novick's That Noble Dream: The 'Objectivity Question' and the American Historical Profession.
Nonetheless, and Novick would agree, most in the social sciences recognize "truth" as an ideal to be striven towards and is not entirely subjective, or comprised of mere "narratives," as post-structural theory might imply. I want, therefore, to hold Dan's piece out as a reference for further discussion and intend to do so by highlighting, as the spirit moves me going forward, some of his bullet points.
Today, let's look at this.
Dan writes:
I guess one question to ask would be, do the people who form and spread opinions about the Arab-Israel conflict know about the Jewish refugees? The Jewish nakba, if you will. I do not know the answer to that question.
Directly after the Holocaust, and right on the heels of the establishment of Israel, the Arab countries chased out their Jews. People were killed and property was absconded from Jews all throughout the Middle East so that now there are virtually no Jews left throughout that part of the world other than in Israel. These Jewish refugees were absorbed into Israeli society and therefore are not refugees any longer and certainly their children are not.
The Arab refugees, of course, were put up in camps by the surrounding Arab nations who use them, generation upon generation, as pawns in their ongoing war against Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land to this day.
I do not know the extent to which people know this, including people who persistently spit hatred and fire at the Jewish state of Israel. But if they do know it then they are moral hypocrites. If they don't know it, perhaps they should learn a little more history before spouting their righteous opinions in the public sphere.
In any case, Dan is right on the money when he says that this whole issue is about standing up for the human rights of the Jewish people. That is precisely what this is about. Over the recent decades the Arabs have successfully portrayed their ongoing aggression against the Jews in the Middle East as a matter of the "national liberation of the Palestinian people."
Before that they simply spoke of pushing the Jews into the sea and before that we were dhimmis under Muslim imperial rule.
I just find it remarkable that 13 centuries of Jewish oppression in the Middle East seems to have been airbrushed out of popular knowledge, even among Jews. Although dhimmitude varied in different times and different places it always represented second or third class citizenship for Mizrahim within Muslim societies.
And this must be recognized as a big part of the context out of which Israel emerged.
Mike L.
Dan Bielak has written a piece entitled It's about Standing Up for the Human Rights of the Jewish People that I would like to take a little time exploring. It is one of Dan's persistent themes that what those of us who care about the well-being of Israel must do is simply tell the truth of the Jews in the Middle East.
I must admit that when someone starts speaking to me about the truth I tend to cringe because I recognize the inherent subjectivity and inevitable bias in considering truth in history, much less politics. The most important book to date on the difficulties of historical and academic objectivity is Peter Novick's That Noble Dream: The 'Objectivity Question' and the American Historical Profession.
Nonetheless, and Novick would agree, most in the social sciences recognize "truth" as an ideal to be striven towards and is not entirely subjective, or comprised of mere "narratives," as post-structural theory might imply. I want, therefore, to hold Dan's piece out as a reference for further discussion and intend to do so by highlighting, as the spirit moves me going forward, some of his bullet points.
Today, let's look at this.
Dan writes:
Refugees caused by the conflict between the Muslim Arab states in the Middle East and Israel: Approximately 400,000 to 700,000 Arab refugees from Israel; Approximately 800,000 to 1,000,000 Jewish refugees from Muslim states in the Middle EastI don't know about these numbers, really, but they are reasonably close to the ones that normally get bandied about. I know of no reputable study that comes close to a definitive statement on the numbers, but that doesn't mean such a study is not out there. Generally we read about 700,000, or so, refugees from both sides, with the Jewish side being somewhat higher.
I guess one question to ask would be, do the people who form and spread opinions about the Arab-Israel conflict know about the Jewish refugees? The Jewish nakba, if you will. I do not know the answer to that question.
Directly after the Holocaust, and right on the heels of the establishment of Israel, the Arab countries chased out their Jews. People were killed and property was absconded from Jews all throughout the Middle East so that now there are virtually no Jews left throughout that part of the world other than in Israel. These Jewish refugees were absorbed into Israeli society and therefore are not refugees any longer and certainly their children are not.
The Arab refugees, of course, were put up in camps by the surrounding Arab nations who use them, generation upon generation, as pawns in their ongoing war against Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land to this day.
I do not know the extent to which people know this, including people who persistently spit hatred and fire at the Jewish state of Israel. But if they do know it then they are moral hypocrites. If they don't know it, perhaps they should learn a little more history before spouting their righteous opinions in the public sphere.
In any case, Dan is right on the money when he says that this whole issue is about standing up for the human rights of the Jewish people. That is precisely what this is about. Over the recent decades the Arabs have successfully portrayed their ongoing aggression against the Jews in the Middle East as a matter of the "national liberation of the Palestinian people."
Before that they simply spoke of pushing the Jews into the sea and before that we were dhimmis under Muslim imperial rule.
I just find it remarkable that 13 centuries of Jewish oppression in the Middle East seems to have been airbrushed out of popular knowledge, even among Jews. Although dhimmitude varied in different times and different places it always represented second or third class citizenship for Mizrahim within Muslim societies.
And this must be recognized as a big part of the context out of which Israel emerged.
'Israel must rescind settlement plans'
Mike L.
This game is rigged. The UN is malicious and the EU is not much better. But what they count on are:
How is it that a people that is so successful in all sorts of endeavors, from science to art, are something akin to moronic when it comes to politics?
The Arabs are leading the Jews around by the nose and the western powers, including the president of the United States, are helping them do it. Meanwhile nice, well-meaning Jewish liberals think that if only the Jews in Israel would be nicer than they would have peace. If only the Jews would stop trying to protect themselves and allow theocratic murderers ease of access to their children then there would be peace. If only the Jews in the Middle East would jump through enough hoops. If only they would all line up together facing Mecca and hop up and down on one foot while playing the kazoo, then the "Palestinians" would be happy and make nice.
Fools.
The European countries, with the lone, sole exception of the Czech Republic have sold Israel down the river because over the decades Arab-Soviet propaganda has been effective and because basic human decency is too politically inconvenient for the European countries. {Shocking, I know.} Nonetheless, Israel must hold its ground because if it caves it's doomed.
It'll be blood in the water.
UN steps up pressure on Israel over settlements
The four European members of the UN Security Council - France, Britain, Germany and Portugal are criticizing Israel and demanding an immediate halt to new settlement construction.So, despite the fact that the Arabs have refused offer after offer for a negotiated settlement for 75 years, now, and continue to incite genocidal hatred toward Jews while shooting rockets into southern Israel and despite the fact that it was the UN, itself, that just abrogated the terms of Oslo, they blame Israel for wrecking the two-state solution for daring to build housing for its citizenry just outside of the eastern section of Jerusalem.
The European countries issued a statement saying they were "extremely concerned by and strongly oppose" Israel’s plans to expand construction of east Jerusalem neighborhoods and West Bank settlements and urged the Jewish state to "immediately" cease all settlement activities.
"Israel's announcements to accelerate the construction of settlements send a negative message and are undermining faith in its willingness to negotiate," the statement by France, Germany, Portugal and UK read.
"The viability of the two-state solution, that is key for Israel's long-term security is threatened by the systematic expansion of settlements. Settlements are illegal under international law and detrimental to any international efforts to restart peace negotiations and secure a two-state solution…. We call on the Israeli government to rescind these plans and recall that we will not recognize any changes to the pre-1967 borders, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties," the statement read.
This game is rigged. The UN is malicious and the EU is not much better. But what they count on are:
Liberal. Jewish. Suckers.
How is it that a people that is so successful in all sorts of endeavors, from science to art, are something akin to moronic when it comes to politics?
The Arabs are leading the Jews around by the nose and the western powers, including the president of the United States, are helping them do it. Meanwhile nice, well-meaning Jewish liberals think that if only the Jews in Israel would be nicer than they would have peace. If only the Jews would stop trying to protect themselves and allow theocratic murderers ease of access to their children then there would be peace. If only the Jews in the Middle East would jump through enough hoops. If only they would all line up together facing Mecca and hop up and down on one foot while playing the kazoo, then the "Palestinians" would be happy and make nice.
Fools.
The European countries, with the lone, sole exception of the Czech Republic have sold Israel down the river because over the decades Arab-Soviet propaganda has been effective and because basic human decency is too politically inconvenient for the European countries. {Shocking, I know.} Nonetheless, Israel must hold its ground because if it caves it's doomed.
It'll be blood in the water.
Latest Times of Israel Piece
Mike L.
A conversation with Jon Haber of Divest This!
We're starting a chit-chat around Robert Wistrich’s From Ambivalence to Betrayal: The Left, the Jews, and Israel.
Jon has a five part series that you might find very interesting.
I encourage you guys to read and join in the conversation in the final part:
From Ambivalence to Betrayal – Fini
A conversation with Jon Haber of Divest This!
We're starting a chit-chat around Robert Wistrich’s From Ambivalence to Betrayal: The Left, the Jews, and Israel.
Jon has a five part series that you might find very interesting.
I encourage you guys to read and join in the conversation in the final part:
From Ambivalence to Betrayal – Fini
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
US, UK attack 'provocative' Jerusalem construction plans
Mike L.
For 75 years now the Jews of the Middle East have agreed to divide Jewish land into a Jewish state and yet another Arab-Muslim state. The Arabs have perpetually refused to accept any such state if it means living in peace with Israel, yet the western powers, and this hostile American president, continue to blame the Jews of the Middle East for Arab-Muslim aggression toward them.
All throughout the course of this year the Palestinians shot rockets into southern Israel making that part of the country virtually unlivable and giving little Jewish kids Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and the western left gave its silent assent. When Israel finally responded Hillary Clinton rode into town to save Hamas from the direct consequences of its own behavior. Then the United Nations formally destroyed the "Oslo peace process" through declaring "Palestine" a state. And now the United States and Europe are displeased because Jews are building homes for themselves on the outskirts of the eastern section of Jerusalem?
This is a sucker's game and the biggest suckers are progressive-left Jews who continue to think that if only Israel would get down on its hands and knees then the Arabs will finally, after fourteen hundred years of hatred and aggression, agree to leave the Jewish people in peace. And, needless to say, they are fully prepared to join with anti-Semitic anti-Zionists in viciously castigating any Jew with a spine who stands up for the Jewish people and the Jewish state.
What a disgrace.
State Department's Nuland says US "deeply disappointed" with Israeli plan to construct thousands of apartments in east Jerusalem; UK's Hague calls move an "obstacle to peace, two-state solution."The west is holding Israel hostage.
Both the United States and the United Kingdom on Tuesday attacked Israel's plans to construct thousands of new Jewish apartments in east Jerusalem, calling the move a "provocation" and saying it endangered the fragile peace process.
"We are deeply disappointed that Israel insists on continuing this pattern of provocative action. These repeated announcements and plans of new construction run counter to the cause of peace," US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters.
"Israel's leaders continually say that they support a path towards a two-state solution yet these actions only put that goal further at risk.
"So we again call on Israel, and the Palestinians, to cease any kinds of counterproductive, unilateral actions and take concrete steps to return to direct negotiations," Nuland said.
For 75 years now the Jews of the Middle East have agreed to divide Jewish land into a Jewish state and yet another Arab-Muslim state. The Arabs have perpetually refused to accept any such state if it means living in peace with Israel, yet the western powers, and this hostile American president, continue to blame the Jews of the Middle East for Arab-Muslim aggression toward them.
All throughout the course of this year the Palestinians shot rockets into southern Israel making that part of the country virtually unlivable and giving little Jewish kids Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and the western left gave its silent assent. When Israel finally responded Hillary Clinton rode into town to save Hamas from the direct consequences of its own behavior. Then the United Nations formally destroyed the "Oslo peace process" through declaring "Palestine" a state. And now the United States and Europe are displeased because Jews are building homes for themselves on the outskirts of the eastern section of Jerusalem?
This is a sucker's game and the biggest suckers are progressive-left Jews who continue to think that if only Israel would get down on its hands and knees then the Arabs will finally, after fourteen hundred years of hatred and aggression, agree to leave the Jewish people in peace. And, needless to say, they are fully prepared to join with anti-Semitic anti-Zionists in viciously castigating any Jew with a spine who stands up for the Jewish people and the Jewish state.
What a disgrace.
Poll: Palestinians Overwhelmingly Want War with Israel
Mike L.
After all, if, as they tell us, Israel is a fascist, apartheid, racist state, stealing land, water, and air from the natives, then it deserves whatever beating it gets and if Jews support this vile, rogue country then they deserve whatever beating they get. This is the inescapable implication of the progressive movement when it comes to their growing disdain for Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land.
As far as the international left goes, Jews were fine in the ovens, but it is decidedly uncool for Jews to prevent themselves, or their children, from going back into those ovens. Arab-Muslim theocrats can scream to the heavens about the righteous necessity of killing Jews in the name of Allah, but if Jews object too loudly then those Jews are "Islamophobes." And, worse yet, if those Jews dare to defend themselves then they are not only racist, but violent racist aggressors, to boot.
The only Jews that are really tolerated on the left are the most dhimmitudenous. If, as a Jew, you know your place and understand that Israel is guilty of crimes against the peaceful, "indigenous" population and, better yet, if you actively oppose "conservative" Jews with spines and spread hatred toward them, then you can operate on the progressive-left "as-a-Jew." In fact, although your comrades won't like it, you can even advocate, within certain narrow and self-enforced ideological constraints, for the state of Israel.
Otherwise, not so much.
In a new poll, run by “Arab World for Research & Development“, of 1200 Arabs living in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, 87.7% answered that Hamas’s “armed struggle” is the best means for achieving Palestinian independence.
The results of the recent Gaza conflict prove that armed struggle, as adopted by Hamas, is the best means of achieving Palestinian independence:
Strongly agree 55.6%In other words, something very close to 90 percent of Arabs living in Gaza and the territories still believe that it's open season on Jews. And why shouldn't they when the UN and the western governments and the international left continually give us reasons why Arabs, particularly of the Palestinian variety, have every right to try to murder Jews in the Middle East?
Agree 32.1%
Disagree 9.1%
Strongly disagree 1.2%
I don’t know 2.1%
After all, if, as they tell us, Israel is a fascist, apartheid, racist state, stealing land, water, and air from the natives, then it deserves whatever beating it gets and if Jews support this vile, rogue country then they deserve whatever beating they get. This is the inescapable implication of the progressive movement when it comes to their growing disdain for Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land.
As far as the international left goes, Jews were fine in the ovens, but it is decidedly uncool for Jews to prevent themselves, or their children, from going back into those ovens. Arab-Muslim theocrats can scream to the heavens about the righteous necessity of killing Jews in the name of Allah, but if Jews object too loudly then those Jews are "Islamophobes." And, worse yet, if those Jews dare to defend themselves then they are not only racist, but violent racist aggressors, to boot.
The only Jews that are really tolerated on the left are the most dhimmitudenous. If, as a Jew, you know your place and understand that Israel is guilty of crimes against the peaceful, "indigenous" population and, better yet, if you actively oppose "conservative" Jews with spines and spread hatred toward them, then you can operate on the progressive-left "as-a-Jew." In fact, although your comrades won't like it, you can even advocate, within certain narrow and self-enforced ideological constraints, for the state of Israel.
Otherwise, not so much.
Monday, December 17, 2012
Ministry to advance approvals of 6,500 units in east J'lem
Mike L.
Good for them.
When the UN recently voted in favor of giving "Palestine" non-member state status it, essentially, voted down the Oslo agreements. Israel therefore has little reason not to build anywhere in Jerusalem that it chooses. When Hamas bombed the holy hell out of southern Israel throughout last year, culminating in a horrendous bombardment in the middle of November, and the international community remained silent, they proved their moral vacancy. When they arose as one to condemn Jewish self-defense in the face of those rocket attacks, they proved their moral hypocrisy.
For those who are concerned about the apparent demise of the two-state solution, it has to be noted that the foundation for two states can come about either through negotiations or unilaterally. Since the Arabs, including the Palestinian Arabs, have rejected every offer for a state in peace next to Israel going back to 1937, this means that they have conclusively rejected a negotiated settlement. The Palestinians have shown us time and time again that what they want is the demise of Israel. Recent polling even demonstrates that almost 90 percent of Palestinians in Gaza and the territories favor violence against innocent Israeli civilians.
Israel cannot count on the international community nor, obviously, the United Nations. Israel cannot count on the European governments nor the two-faced Obama administration. Nor can Israel count on the international left which interprets Jewish self-defense as a form of aggression. Nor can Israel really count on many "progressive" diaspora Jews who believe in their hearts that Israel is mainly responsible for Arab aggression against it.
Israel can count only on itself. And perhaps that's how it should be.
If there is to be a two state solution, Israel will have to lay the necessary ground through a unilateral declaration of final borders.
Otherwise you can forget about it.
After three years in limbo following major diplomatic crises between US, Israel, 1,500 apartment units in Ramat Shlomo receive final approval; more units expected to be approved throughout the week; PA condemn decision.
After spending nearly three years in limbo for causing a major diplomatic crises between the United States and Israel, the 1,500 apartment units in Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo received final approval from the Interior Ministry on Monday. This means construction can begin in the coming year.So three years after the Obama administration threw a hissy-fit because the Israeli interior ministry gave its approval to build in a part of Jerusalem that everyone knew would be part of Israel in any negotiated settlement, now Israel has given final approval and they can start building all those houses and apartments and shopping malls and day-care centers.
Good for them.
When the UN recently voted in favor of giving "Palestine" non-member state status it, essentially, voted down the Oslo agreements. Israel therefore has little reason not to build anywhere in Jerusalem that it chooses. When Hamas bombed the holy hell out of southern Israel throughout last year, culminating in a horrendous bombardment in the middle of November, and the international community remained silent, they proved their moral vacancy. When they arose as one to condemn Jewish self-defense in the face of those rocket attacks, they proved their moral hypocrisy.
For those who are concerned about the apparent demise of the two-state solution, it has to be noted that the foundation for two states can come about either through negotiations or unilaterally. Since the Arabs, including the Palestinian Arabs, have rejected every offer for a state in peace next to Israel going back to 1937, this means that they have conclusively rejected a negotiated settlement. The Palestinians have shown us time and time again that what they want is the demise of Israel. Recent polling even demonstrates that almost 90 percent of Palestinians in Gaza and the territories favor violence against innocent Israeli civilians.
Israel cannot count on the international community nor, obviously, the United Nations. Israel cannot count on the European governments nor the two-faced Obama administration. Nor can Israel count on the international left which interprets Jewish self-defense as a form of aggression. Nor can Israel really count on many "progressive" diaspora Jews who believe in their hearts that Israel is mainly responsible for Arab aggression against it.
Israel can count only on itself. And perhaps that's how it should be.
If there is to be a two state solution, Israel will have to lay the necessary ground through a unilateral declaration of final borders.
Otherwise you can forget about it.
It's about Standing Up for the Human Rights of the Jewish People
plucky: having or showing determined courage in the face of difficulties.
It's not about "belief in God". It's not about "belief in the Bible". It's not about "Jewish values and culture".
It's about truth and justice. It's about standing up for the human rights of the Jewish people.
- Refugees caused by the conflict between the Muslim Arab states in the Middle East and Israel: Approximately 400,000 to 700,000 Arab refugees from Israel; Approximately 800,000 to 1,000,000 Jewish refugees from Muslim states in the Middle East
- The still living members of, and the descendants of, the approximately 800,000 to 1,000,000 Jewish refugees from Muslim states in the Middle East who found refuge in Israel: Approximately fifty percent of the Jewish population of Israel (they call themselves Mizrahi, which means "Eastern" in Hebrew)
- The group of Arab people who are now called "The Palestinians": The still living members of, and the currently several million descendants of, the 400,000 to 700,000 Arab refugees from the 1948 Muslim Arab attack on Israel by the armies of several Arab states; They live in what is now called "The West Bank" (Judea (Yehouda) and Sameria (Shomron)), which is currently governed by Fatah-PLO (which is now called "The Palestinian Authority"), and in what is now called "The Gaza Strip", which is currently governed by Hamas, and in 'refugee camps' in Arab states in the Middle East, and do not live in Israel, and are not citizens of Israel, and have been kept as refugees for over sixty years by Arab leaders and by the leaders of Western countries
- Non-Arab and non-Jewish refugees from other countries since 1945: Tens of millions -- most of whom have been relocated to, and absorbed into, the countries to which they fled or were expelled (such as several million ethnically German people who lived in the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia (Sudeten Germans) who immediately after World War II were expelled from the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia and who were subsequently relocated to, and absorbed into, Germany)
- The still living members of, and the descendants of, the Arab people who did not flee from Israel immediately before nor during, and who were not among the few Arab people who were expelled from Israel during, the 1948 Muslim Arab attack on Israel by the armies of several Arab states: Approximately twenty percent of the citizenry of Israel
- Number of Arab national states in the world: Over twenty
- Number of Muslim states in the world: Over fifty
- Number of officially Christian states in the world: Several
- National states in the world: Numerous
- Number of Jewish national states in the world: One
- Size of the land area of the Jewish national state: Approximately two percent of the total land area of the Middle East
- Population of the Jewish national state: Approximately 7.5 million
- Arab non-Jewish citizenry of the Jewish national state: Approximately 1.5 million - Muslim Arab, Christian Arab, Druze Arab
- The land of Israel (and the land of "The West Bank" (Judea and Sameria), and the land of "The Gaza Strip"): Approximately one third of the British Mandate of Palestine
- Jordan: An Arab state created, under the name "Transjordan", by British officials between 1922 and 1924 in British Mandate Palestine; Granted autonomy by Britain in 1946 and subsequently renamed to the name "Jordan"
- The land of Jordan: Approximately two thirds of the British Mandate of Palestine
- "The West Bank": Occupied by Jordan from 1949 to 1967; Judea (Yehouda) and Sameria (Shomron); Renamed to the name "The West Bank" by Jordan, with Jordan referring to Judea (Yehouda) and Sameria (Shomron) as "the west bank" of the Jordan river
- "The Gaza Strip": Occupied by Egypt from 1949 to 1967
- The PLO (the Palestine Liberation Organization): Founded in 1964; Founded by the KGB of the Soviet regime of Russia and by the then-President of then-Soviet-supported Egypt, Gamal Abdel Nasser; The 1964 PLO Charter[1] (and the 1968 revised, and current, PLO Charter[2]) states that the goal of the PLO is the destruction of what the PLO Charter calls "the Zionist" "occupation" of "Palestine"
- The founder of the ‘Palestinian movement’: Haj Amin al-Husseini - a member of the Arab aristocratic Husseini family; an early leader of the Muslim Brotherhood; a resident of Germany from 1941 to 1945; an adjoined official of the Nazi regime of Germany; a planner of, and participator in, the mass murder of approximately six million Jewish people in Europe by the Nazi regime of Germany; the head of the Arab Higher Committee; as the head of the Arab Higher Committee, the coordinator of the 1948 Muslim Arab attack on Israel by the armies of several Arab states; the originator of Fatah; the mentor of Yasser Arafat
- Fatah: Founded in 1958; Founded by veterans of an organization (the Arab Higher Committee) of the founder of the ‘Palestinian movement’ and co-architect of the Nazi ‘Final Solution’ (the mass-murder of approximately six million Jewish people in Europe by the Nazi regime of Germany approximately seventy years ago), Haj Amin al-Husseini
- Yasser Arafat: The prodigy of Haj Amin al-Husseini; soon after World War II was trained in Egypt by German former Nazi officials at the behest of his mentor Haj Amin al-Husseini; was the head of Fatah; In the mid 1960's, was trained in Russia by the KGB to become the head of the PLO; Between 1969 and 1970 took the position of head of the PLO
- Hamas: Founded in the late 1980's; an official arm of the Muslim Brotherhood; The Hamas Charter (The Hamas Covenant)[3] calls for the murder of all of the Jewish people in the world
- The organizations of the ‘Palestinian movement’: The terrorist racist ideologically genocidally anti-Jewish organizations/organization Fatah-PLO (which is now called "The Palestinian Authority"), and the terrorist racist ideologically genocidally anti-Jewish organization Hamas
- The land of Israel for centuries until the early twentieth century: A mostly barren, and diseased, wasteland; a part of the Islamic Ottoman Turkish empire
- The Arab people in the land of Israel until the early part of the twentieth century: Few, and largely sick
- The Jewish people who immigrated to the land of Israel in the early part of the twentieth century: Revived and re-established the soil in the land of Israel, drained the swamps in the land of Israel, irrigated the land of Israel, developed huge agricultural industry in the land of Israel, installed electrical power in the land of Israel, built the infrastructure of the nation of Israel
- The Arab people in the land of Israel after the development of the land of Israel by the Jewish people who immigrated to the land of Israel in the early part of the 20th century: Many more than there had been before the development of the land of Israel by the early twentieth century Jewish immigrants to the land of Israel
- The ‘Palestinian movement’: A racist ideologically genocidal anti-Jewish political movement whose sole purpose is the destruction of the nation of the Jewish people and which was founded in the early 1920's with the sole purpose of preventing the re-founding of the nation of the Jewish people and whose founder was a co-architect of the Nazi ‘Final Solution’
- Israel: The liberal democratic very small sole nation of the Jewish people
"Anti-Zionism": Contemporary genocidal anti-Jewish racism.
Notes:
Sunday, December 16, 2012
'First we take Damascus, then Tel Aviv'
Mike L.
When western "progressives" claim that Israel is a racist, colonialist, imperialist, apartheid, neo-fascist, racist state they are acting as dupes for the Islamists by explaining in western terms to a western audience just why it is that in this particular generation the Jews, yet again, deserve a good ass kicking.
The horrendous irony, of course, is that they are using the language of "human rights" and "social justice" in order to help bring about the conditions under which the Jews can be robbed of our means of self-defense.
This is not about justice for the Palestinians, but about a terrible injustice toward the Jews of the Middle East by the much, much larger majoritarian Arab-Muslim population in that region. Among my various criticisms of "progressive Zionists" is their general failure to recognize that the problem is not with "conservative" Jews who they've decided are their real enemy, but with the larger Arab-Muslim world and its ongoing genocidally racist tendency toward us.
Salafist leader warns that once rebels topple Assad's regime they will set their sights on Israel; says 'We won't rest until Palestine is liberated'The long Arab war against the Jews in the Middle East is not about justice for any allegedly "indigenous" population, but about wiping away Jewish sovereignty on historically Jewish land because it offends al-Sharia.
The leader of the radical Salafist movement in Jordan, whose organization actively supports the Syrian rebels' efforts to topple President Bashar Assad's regime warned Sunday that once the Damascus opposition achieves its primary goal, it will set its sights on Israel.
The group's leader, Abed Shihadeh, who is also known as Abu Muhammad al-Tahawi, spoke at the funeral of a Jihadist who committed a suicide attack in Amman last week.
When western "progressives" claim that Israel is a racist, colonialist, imperialist, apartheid, neo-fascist, racist state they are acting as dupes for the Islamists by explaining in western terms to a western audience just why it is that in this particular generation the Jews, yet again, deserve a good ass kicking.
The horrendous irony, of course, is that they are using the language of "human rights" and "social justice" in order to help bring about the conditions under which the Jews can be robbed of our means of self-defense.
This is not about justice for the Palestinians, but about a terrible injustice toward the Jews of the Middle East by the much, much larger majoritarian Arab-Muslim population in that region. Among my various criticisms of "progressive Zionists" is their general failure to recognize that the problem is not with "conservative" Jews who they've decided are their real enemy, but with the larger Arab-Muslim world and its ongoing genocidally racist tendency toward us.
England drops Hebrew from officially recognized languages
Mike L.
The U.K. government has dropped Hebrew as an official recognized language for the purpose of teaching it to school children, according to press reports.
The government exclusion of Hebrew from the provided list of officially recognized languages for primary schools could damage Jewish education, the Board of Deputies warned this week.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Hebron group: 3rd intifada has begun
Mike L.
Video posted by newly-established group headed by members of Hamas, Fatah, Islamic Jihad and PFLP says it will fight to recover 'all of Palestine - from sea to the river'
Palestinians in the West Bank city of Hebron have distributed a video declaring the establishment of the "National Union Battalions," which according to them will be jointly headed by members of Hamas, Fatah, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front or the Liberation of Palestine as a means of consolidating the struggle against Israel.=
In its announcement, the group stressed that while it supports the UN's recognition of Palestine as a non-member observer state, it will fight to recover "all of Palestine – from the sea to the river."From the comments:
Israel is Getting What it Asks For
World condemnation and Isolation. Resistance by thse it illegally occupies, colonizes, steals water and taxes from and uses for target practice.. What do you expect? That the Pals would be as compliant of victims of war crimes as the Jews were in the 1930's?
Doug, Rochester, USA (12.15.12)The Arabs have no intention whatsoever of allowing the Jews of the Middle East to live in peace and much of the western world, perhaps most, feel quite like Doug does. Which is to say, everything is the fault of those malicious Jews and they deserve whatever beating they get.
Friday, December 14, 2012
The Newtown Massacre
Mike L.
That's where I am from.
My father worked in Newtown for many years and we lived two towns over in Trumbull, Connecticut as I was growing up. Traveling northward from Long Island Sound it goes Bridgeport, Trumbull, Monroe, Newtown. I, in fact, worked there myself one summer during college.
This is just unbelievable.
Newtown is very much a quiet bedroom community. It wasn't that long before I showed up there that it was basically just farm country. It's a very nice area, actually and the last place on the planet where I would expect this kind of misery.
Newtown, Connecticut, is not the kind of place where anyone would expect bad things to happen. In fact, Newtown, Connecticut, is not the kind of place where anyone would expect anything to happen... ever.
This is just tragic and it hits close to home for me, personally. Our old house in Trumbull is maybe 5 or 6 miles from where the shooting took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Sandy Hook is a sort-of local place name, an area within Newtown.
This is just tragic.
I just can't believe it.
Newtown?
Really??
Newtown??
I am just flabbergasted.
That's where I am from.
My father worked in Newtown for many years and we lived two towns over in Trumbull, Connecticut as I was growing up. Traveling northward from Long Island Sound it goes Bridgeport, Trumbull, Monroe, Newtown. I, in fact, worked there myself one summer during college.
This is just unbelievable.
Newtown is very much a quiet bedroom community. It wasn't that long before I showed up there that it was basically just farm country. It's a very nice area, actually and the last place on the planet where I would expect this kind of misery.
Newtown, Connecticut, is not the kind of place where anyone would expect bad things to happen. In fact, Newtown, Connecticut, is not the kind of place where anyone would expect anything to happen... ever.
This is just tragic and it hits close to home for me, personally. Our old house in Trumbull is maybe 5 or 6 miles from where the shooting took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Sandy Hook is a sort-of local place name, an area within Newtown.
This is just tragic.
I just can't believe it.
Newtown?
Really??
Newtown??
I am just flabbergasted.
Ah, the memories
Mike L.
It's been a few years, now, since the Mavi Marmara episode. The Freedom Flotilla! Righteous, non-violent, peace activists facing off against those brutal, racist, militaristic Jews!
At the time I was still active on left-wing political blogs and, I have to say, it was quite an eye-opener. For years some on the political right had been suggesting that there was a "red-green alliance." People like David Horowitz and Caroline Glick persistently told the world that the international left was actually siding with bloodthirsty terrorists against American interests and against the Jews of the Middle East. I, of course, didn't believe that for one single moment. I had marched against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and had consistently opposed Bush II administration foreign policy since 9/11. I had (and continue to have) all sorts of friends on the political left, both virtual and real.
Heck, Laurie, herself, is self-identified as on the left. (She even threatened to divorce me if I registered as a Republican, but I feel fairly confident that she was kidding... kinda!)
So, you can only imagine my shock and awe when I learned that, no, Horowitz and Glick were, in fact, correct. There is an element on the left that literally considers Jihadis to be "freedom fighters." Again and again we were told that these flotilla people were "peace activists." Knive and pipe-wielding peace activists. And, yet, the fact of the matter is that the Mavi Marmara, and other crafts in the "flotilla" carried a combination of western-left activist types and actual Jihadis calling for the murder of Jews.
Like this guy.
They even sang a traditional Islamist song having to do with Mohammed's armies returning to murder Jews.
I couldn't believe it. How was it possible that my own ideological brothers and sisters were actively, literally, and materially joining with radical Islamists who wanted to martyr themselves in a Jihad against the Jewish state of Israel? When I asked that question in various progressive-left venues it was generally ignored, but not always. Anyone who actually dares to raise this question often gets his reputation dragged through the mud by Democratic party partisans who, instead of honestly dealing with the problem in a straight-forward manner, rely on the dirtiest political tactics possible. They demean and deflect, accuse and deny, and even sometimes threaten violence.
They didn't want to face it, then, and they still do not want to face it. And now we have a president of the United States who tells the world that the rise of the Arab Spring, also known as the rise of political Islam, is a good thing. Political Islam seeks the oppression of women, the murder of Gays, the genocide of the Jews, and is chasing non-Muslims out of the Middle East entirely and Obama tells us that this about democracy. If it weren't so sickening, it would be absolutely laughable.
One of the many things that the western progressive-left doesn't seem to understand is that this policy of supporting Islamists throughout the Middle East represents a hard-line, radically conservative foreign policy. There is nothing "liberal" about an American foreign policy that supports the most reactionary, violent, and conservative political movement in the world today.
I never have gotten a reasonable answer as to why so much of the alleged "left" refuses to acknowledge the rise of the Jihad or their own participation in the success of that movement. Most progressives do not actively support it, but simply turn a blind eye. The president of the United States, however, does actively support the rise of political Islam as we saw over the last year, or thereabouts, in Egypt. I do not know that this is what he thinks that he is doing, but I don't care about his intentions, what I care about is his behavior and the results.
I can no more deny the truth of that statement then I can somehow deny the fact that in my last peace rally in San Francisco's Civic Center I saw a banner that combined a Star of David with a Nazi swastika. Was I to pretend that it wasn't there? Was I supposed to keep my mouth shut so as not to offend progressives who have clearly thrown their own values directly into the toilet?
The bottom line is that the western progressive-left has abandoned women in the Middle East, Gays in the Middle East, and non-Muslims in the Middle East, including those tenacious Jews.
Ah, the memories.
It's been a few years, now, since the Mavi Marmara episode. The Freedom Flotilla! Righteous, non-violent, peace activists facing off against those brutal, racist, militaristic Jews!
At the time I was still active on left-wing political blogs and, I have to say, it was quite an eye-opener. For years some on the political right had been suggesting that there was a "red-green alliance." People like David Horowitz and Caroline Glick persistently told the world that the international left was actually siding with bloodthirsty terrorists against American interests and against the Jews of the Middle East. I, of course, didn't believe that for one single moment. I had marched against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and had consistently opposed Bush II administration foreign policy since 9/11. I had (and continue to have) all sorts of friends on the political left, both virtual and real.
Heck, Laurie, herself, is self-identified as on the left. (She even threatened to divorce me if I registered as a Republican, but I feel fairly confident that she was kidding... kinda!)
So, you can only imagine my shock and awe when I learned that, no, Horowitz and Glick were, in fact, correct. There is an element on the left that literally considers Jihadis to be "freedom fighters." Again and again we were told that these flotilla people were "peace activists." Knive and pipe-wielding peace activists. And, yet, the fact of the matter is that the Mavi Marmara, and other crafts in the "flotilla" carried a combination of western-left activist types and actual Jihadis calling for the murder of Jews.
Like this guy.
They even sang a traditional Islamist song having to do with Mohammed's armies returning to murder Jews.
I couldn't believe it. How was it possible that my own ideological brothers and sisters were actively, literally, and materially joining with radical Islamists who wanted to martyr themselves in a Jihad against the Jewish state of Israel? When I asked that question in various progressive-left venues it was generally ignored, but not always. Anyone who actually dares to raise this question often gets his reputation dragged through the mud by Democratic party partisans who, instead of honestly dealing with the problem in a straight-forward manner, rely on the dirtiest political tactics possible. They demean and deflect, accuse and deny, and even sometimes threaten violence.
They didn't want to face it, then, and they still do not want to face it. And now we have a president of the United States who tells the world that the rise of the Arab Spring, also known as the rise of political Islam, is a good thing. Political Islam seeks the oppression of women, the murder of Gays, the genocide of the Jews, and is chasing non-Muslims out of the Middle East entirely and Obama tells us that this about democracy. If it weren't so sickening, it would be absolutely laughable.
One of the many things that the western progressive-left doesn't seem to understand is that this policy of supporting Islamists throughout the Middle East represents a hard-line, radically conservative foreign policy. There is nothing "liberal" about an American foreign policy that supports the most reactionary, violent, and conservative political movement in the world today.
I never have gotten a reasonable answer as to why so much of the alleged "left" refuses to acknowledge the rise of the Jihad or their own participation in the success of that movement. Most progressives do not actively support it, but simply turn a blind eye. The president of the United States, however, does actively support the rise of political Islam as we saw over the last year, or thereabouts, in Egypt. I do not know that this is what he thinks that he is doing, but I don't care about his intentions, what I care about is his behavior and the results.
I can no more deny the truth of that statement then I can somehow deny the fact that in my last peace rally in San Francisco's Civic Center I saw a banner that combined a Star of David with a Nazi swastika. Was I to pretend that it wasn't there? Was I supposed to keep my mouth shut so as not to offend progressives who have clearly thrown their own values directly into the toilet?
The bottom line is that the western progressive-left has abandoned women in the Middle East, Gays in the Middle East, and non-Muslims in the Middle East, including those tenacious Jews.
Ah, the memories.
Thursday, December 13, 2012
Hebron: Soldiers shoot Palestinian who threw firebomb
Mike L.
The Jews of the Middle East are no longer dhimmis. Those of us who live where Jews originally come from were second and third class citizens under the boot of Arab-Muslim imperialism for around thirteen hundred years but, with the fall of the Ottoman empire, those days are done.
Free at last. Free at last. Thank G-d Almighty, we are free at last.
And what that means is that it is no longer open season on the Jews in the Middle East. And what that means is that the Arab-Muslim majority can no longer beat the holy crap out of Jews with impunity.
And what that means is that when they try to hurt us they may very well get it right back in their faces.
These are simple, obvious facts whether Peter Beinart or Jeremy Ben-Ami or "progressive Zionists" like it or not.
The main thing that Israel needs to do is declare her final borders. Until she does that the Jews of the Middle East will remain hostages of the Palestinians, the larger Arab-Muslim world, the UN, the EU, and the western left.
Israel needs to free itself... and, thereby, free the rest of us, as well.
Teenager who hurled Molotov cocktail at troops near checkpoint evacuated to local hospital with severe wounds after being shot in the chest
IDF soldiers opened fire on a 17-year-old Palestinian who apparently hurled a Molotov cocktail in their direction during clashes near the Hashoter checkpoint in Hebron Thursday evening. The Palestinian sustained severe injuries...The Palestinians need to take responsibility for the foreseeable results of their own behavior.
The confrontations followed several days of violent riots in the region. Last week saw two incidents in which IDF troops were forced to retreat after being attacked by stone-throwing mobs, and on Tuesday an army vehicle caught fire while Palestinian protesters hurled Molotov cocktails and stones at soldiers in Naalin.
The Jews of the Middle East are no longer dhimmis. Those of us who live where Jews originally come from were second and third class citizens under the boot of Arab-Muslim imperialism for around thirteen hundred years but, with the fall of the Ottoman empire, those days are done.
Free at last. Free at last. Thank G-d Almighty, we are free at last.
And what that means is that it is no longer open season on the Jews in the Middle East. And what that means is that the Arab-Muslim majority can no longer beat the holy crap out of Jews with impunity.
And what that means is that when they try to hurt us they may very well get it right back in their faces.
These are simple, obvious facts whether Peter Beinart or Jeremy Ben-Ami or "progressive Zionists" like it or not.
The main thing that Israel needs to do is declare her final borders. Until she does that the Jews of the Middle East will remain hostages of the Palestinians, the larger Arab-Muslim world, the UN, the EU, and the western left.
Israel needs to free itself... and, thereby, free the rest of us, as well.
The day of the dhimmi is done
Mike L.
{Originally published at the Times of Israel.}
We often hear that the Palestinians deserve a state of their own, but one must wonder just what that means? On what basis do we decide who deserves statehood? Do all peoples everywhere deserve a state of their own? Is statehood something people deserve merely by virtue of being a people or are there other contributing factors? Is it possible that some peoples deserve statehood while others do not or that some peoples deserve statehood more than others? And if it is true that all peoples deserve statehood how is it that the international community seems not to care about Tibetan statehood or Kurdish statehood or Basque statehood? Surely if all peoples deserve statehood the Tibetans and Kurds and Basque have at least as much claim as the Palestinian Arabs.
In a recent piece for the Times of Israel, Judea Pearl, the father of slain American journalist Daniel Pearl, addresses this question. He writes:
Ironically, there was no reason for us to avoid the moral aspect of the issue, as this aspect has been and remains Israel’s strongest point in the debate. It can be summarized in one sentence: “A nation deserves a state to the extent that its children are taught that their neighbors deserve one too. In other words, no society, however in need, is entitled to what it denies to others.”Since the Palestinians generally deny that the Jews deserve a state on our historical homeland, there is absolutely no reason why they deserve a state in… our historical homeland. The area which the Jordanians dubbed the “West Bank” has been known as Judea and Samaria for at least thirty-five hundred years. The Romans may have renamed it Syria-Palaestina, but that doesn’t erase the millenia long Jewish presence on that land. The Jews were in Judea and Samaria for thousands of years before Muhammed’s armies showed up in the 7th century and started kicking in skulls.
The Arab-Muslim world has been persecuting the Jews of the Middle East for fourteen centuries and they continue to do so. The recently created “Palestinians” are a subset of the larger Arab nation and the focal point of Arab-Muslim aggression against the Jews. From my perspective, as a Jew, I fail to see just how it is that the Jews owe the Arabs anything. Justice would suggest that the Arabs deserve a measure of retribution for the way they’ve treated the Jews under the imperial rule of Arab-Muslim conquest, but since the Jews are a highly civilized people we seek no such justice for ourselves because what we mainly want is to be left in peace.
Does this mean that the Palestinians should not get a state? No, it does not. If Israel wishes to be so gracious as to give over the heart of our ancestral homeland to a terrorist organization hell-bent on our destruction, so be it, but it is entirely up to the Israelis. It is not up to the Americans, nor the Europeans, nor the United Nations, nor the Arab world. It is up to the Jews as represented, in this instance, by the government of the State of Israel. If you Israelis think that it’s in your own best interest to give up that land, or some portion of that land, to the Palestinians in the hopes that they will then cease teaching their children that we are the sons of apes and pigs and that Allah enjoys nothing so much as seeing us slaughtered, I would not object.
For a long time I labored under the delusion that the Palestinians wanted autonomy. One need only glance at the history of Palestinian rejectionism of a Palestinian state in peace next to the Jewish one, going all the way back to the Peel Commission of 1937, to conclude that mere autonomy is not what the Palestinians want. Or, more precisely, they want autonomy on all of our land and therefore the abolishment, by any means necessary, of the Jewish State of Israel. This, needless to say, we simply will not allow. Perhaps if the Arab-Muslim world had been a somewhat more hospitable place to the Jewish people under their rule, for all those centuries, we might feel differently on this matter. Sadly, it wasn’t and we don’t.
The Palestinians can offer their children meaningful and productive lives and even meaningful and productive lives in a Palestinian state, but this will never come so long as they continue their aggression against the Jewish people. So long as the Palestinians continue to raise up little suicide bombers or teach their children to despise both Jews and the Jewish state, then Israel will continue to put up check-points and barriers and blockades for the purpose of protecting their own children. There was a time, not so long ago, when the Jewish people were helpless in the face of Arab, Muslim, or European aggression, but those days are over.
The day of the dhimmi is done.
The sooner that the Palestinians accept that fact the better off things will be for everyone, particularly their own children.
The United Nations just bestowed “non-member state” status onto the Palestinian Authority, but the United Nations cannot bestow an actual state upon anyone. The reason for this is because statehood is not something which can be deserved or bestowed, but something which must be earned through the arduous process of its very creation. On November 29, 1947, the UN did not bestow statehood upon the Jews because the Jews deserved autonomy. What the UN did was simply recognize a condition that already existed. The Zionists of the late nineteenth and early-mid twentieth century built the material, economic, and political infrastructure of a state. They did the hard work necessary for the emergence of that state. Until the Palestinians do likewise there will be no state for the UN to actually recognize.
What the UN recognized in its recent vote is merely the ghost of the Palestinian state that might have been.
Denmark: Jews warned not to wear religious symbols
Mike L.
They don't care and they've never cared. They didn't care during World War II and they do not care today. Israel is on its own and the hyper-critical Jewish left just gives her enemies additional fodder with which to smack her in the face.
Amid rising anti-Israel sentiment, Israeli envoy warns Jews in Copenhagen to keep low profile; in Spain, embassy fights back against boycottDo you see our "progressive" friends speaking out against rising international anti-Jewish racism, because I sure do not.
After facing an onslaught of anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli incidents recently, Israeli officials in Denmark and Spain have decided to call for precautionary measures.
Israeli and Jewish officials in Denmark on Wednesday warned Jews to avoid openly wearing religious symbols and dress when moving about Copenhagen amid rising anti-Israeli sentiment.
"We advise Israelis who come to Denmark and want to go to the synagogue to wait to don their skullcaps until they enter the building and not to wear them in the street, irrespective of whether the areas they are visiting are seen as being safe," Israel's ambassador to Denmark, Arthur Avnon, told AFP.
They don't care and they've never cared. They didn't care during World War II and they do not care today. Israel is on its own and the hyper-critical Jewish left just gives her enemies additional fodder with which to smack her in the face.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Female Border Guard officer kills Palestinian waving toy gun
Mike L.
We are constantly told what terrible brutes the Israelis are, but the truth of the matter is that if the IDF was even half as horrible as Palestinians tell us they are then they wouldn't challenge them so frequently.
Remember the little Palestinian blondie girl from a few weeks ago who screamed at, and punched, an Israeli soldier? The same one that had done so previously at the encouragement of her Palestinian activist parents?
The reason that they pull this kind of nonsense is because the IDF is, in fact, a very humane army and therefore the Palestinians feel like they can get away with virtually anything. They also know that if the IDF dares to defend the Jewish people in the Middle East the international left will rise up around the world screeching about Israeli aggression. The European governments will condemn it and this American president will make certain that Israel's enemies, like Hamas, remain in a standing posture.
Nonetheless, I blame Palestinian parents and the Palestinian culture that encourages this kind of stupidity, but I also wonder about the Jewish inclination to strive for an ethereal moral standing that the world will never acknowledge.
In any case, the IDF is probably the single most moral army on the entire planet... but it's still an army.
A Border Guard officer shot and killed a Palestinian youth Wednesday after he threatened troops stationed near the Cave of the Patriarchs in the West Bank city of Hebron, with what later turned out to be a toy gun.How did they ever get the idea that pulling a weapon, fake or otherwise, on an Israeli soldier, female or otherwise, might not get them injured or dead?
An initial inquiry derived that the Palestinian walked up to the troops stationed at the checkpoint and pulled a gun on one of the officers. A female Border Guard officer noticed the event and fired at him, killing him.
We are constantly told what terrible brutes the Israelis are, but the truth of the matter is that if the IDF was even half as horrible as Palestinians tell us they are then they wouldn't challenge them so frequently.
Remember the little Palestinian blondie girl from a few weeks ago who screamed at, and punched, an Israeli soldier? The same one that had done so previously at the encouragement of her Palestinian activist parents?
The reason that they pull this kind of nonsense is because the IDF is, in fact, a very humane army and therefore the Palestinians feel like they can get away with virtually anything. They also know that if the IDF dares to defend the Jewish people in the Middle East the international left will rise up around the world screeching about Israeli aggression. The European governments will condemn it and this American president will make certain that Israel's enemies, like Hamas, remain in a standing posture.
Nonetheless, I blame Palestinian parents and the Palestinian culture that encourages this kind of stupidity, but I also wonder about the Jewish inclination to strive for an ethereal moral standing that the world will never acknowledge.
In any case, the IDF is probably the single most moral army on the entire planet... but it's still an army.
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