Mike L.
{A Big Tip 'O the Kippa to Our Friend Shirl in Oz.}
By the way, when Laurie and I were in Tel Aviv, last New Year, we saw a Chassid in full get-up pushing a baby carriage down the street on roller-skates!
It's one of the most dynamic cities that I've been to, actually.
And the food was much better than I expected, as well... despite the fact that the falafel truck guy here in Oakland, during the Saturday farmers' market at Grand Lake, makes better falafels than any I have had anywhere, including Haifa, Tel Aviv, and Jerusalem.
It's sad, I know!
I wonder if Dusty would agree?
Hey, Dusty, have you had the falafel at the Grand Lake farmers' market?
The Day of the Dhimmi is Done - Michael Lumish, PhD, proprietor. (mike.lumish@gmail.com)
Monday, July 30, 2012
Romney Recognizes Jerusalem
Mike L.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has made a point during his trip to Israel to recognize that Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish state. The Jerusalem Post reports:
This represents a very distinct contrast to the Obama administration which holds the Jewish state in such contempt, and thus the Jewish people in such contempt, that it will not even recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. How can we possibly think of Obama as a friend of Israel when he will not even recognize its capital? And what's worse, of course, is that he pretended to do so when he was running for president in 2008. In 2008 Barack Obama stood up before the Jewish people and claimed:
The fact that Obama lied was revealed as early as March, 2010, during Joe Biden's visit to that country. When the Israeli Interior Ministry announced approval for 1,600 housing units in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood of north-eastern Jerusalem, suddenly not only did the Obama administration no longer consider Jerusalem to be the capital of Israel which must remain undivided, but his people said that the announcement was an "insult" and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reportedly harangued Benjamin Netanyahu on a 45 minute phone call over the issue.
The Obama administration publicly, loudly, and in a manner intended to demonstrate "daylight" between the United States and the Jewish state told the world, particularly the Arab and Muslim worlds, that the status of Jerusalem was entirely up for grabs. Just as Obama voided 3,500 years of Jewish history in his 2009 Cairo speech when he claimed that the founding of Israel was due to the Holocaust, rather than to the long, long history of Jewish people on that land, so he voids 3,500 years of Jewish history now by implying that the capital of the Jewish nation may, or may not, actually be Jewish.
If the Palestinians had not demonstrated their ongoing intention to destroy the Jewish state of Israel through never accepting a state for themselves in peace next to the Jewish one, I might not mind if Israel felt itself so gracious as to give away Jewish land for yet another Arab state. Unfortunately the Palestinians have well-demonstrated their ongoing malice because they absolutely refuse a negotiated conclusion of hostilities. That being the case, their viciously corrupt and anti-Semitic leadership should be allowed no sovereignty in the Jewish city of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem has been the capital of the Jewish nation long before London, Paris, or New York even existed as cities. This matters not one whit to Barack Obama who has so little respect or friendship for the Jewish people that he lied to us when he said that Jerusalem should remain the undivided capital of the Jewish state.
He lied directly to our faces.
Perhaps Romney can do better.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has made a point during his trip to Israel to recognize that Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish state. The Jerusalem Post reports:
After the speech, in comments he made before meeting the prime minister for the second time that day, for dinner, Romney made it a point to refer to Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, putting distance between him and the Obama administration, whose spokesmen in recent weeks have been unable to name Israel’s capital.
This represents a very distinct contrast to the Obama administration which holds the Jewish state in such contempt, and thus the Jewish people in such contempt, that it will not even recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. How can we possibly think of Obama as a friend of Israel when he will not even recognize its capital? And what's worse, of course, is that he pretended to do so when he was running for president in 2008. In 2008 Barack Obama stood up before the Jewish people and claimed:Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided.So, Obama recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and then, elected to the presidency, he changed his mind. In other words, he lied to us about something as central to the hearts of the Jewish people as the status of the ancient city of Jerusalem and he did so in a way that was blatant, callous, and obvious... yet he still expects you to support him.
The fact that Obama lied was revealed as early as March, 2010, during Joe Biden's visit to that country. When the Israeli Interior Ministry announced approval for 1,600 housing units in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood of north-eastern Jerusalem, suddenly not only did the Obama administration no longer consider Jerusalem to be the capital of Israel which must remain undivided, but his people said that the announcement was an "insult" and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reportedly harangued Benjamin Netanyahu on a 45 minute phone call over the issue.
The Obama administration publicly, loudly, and in a manner intended to demonstrate "daylight" between the United States and the Jewish state told the world, particularly the Arab and Muslim worlds, that the status of Jerusalem was entirely up for grabs. Just as Obama voided 3,500 years of Jewish history in his 2009 Cairo speech when he claimed that the founding of Israel was due to the Holocaust, rather than to the long, long history of Jewish people on that land, so he voids 3,500 years of Jewish history now by implying that the capital of the Jewish nation may, or may not, actually be Jewish.
If the Palestinians had not demonstrated their ongoing intention to destroy the Jewish state of Israel through never accepting a state for themselves in peace next to the Jewish one, I might not mind if Israel felt itself so gracious as to give away Jewish land for yet another Arab state. Unfortunately the Palestinians have well-demonstrated their ongoing malice because they absolutely refuse a negotiated conclusion of hostilities. That being the case, their viciously corrupt and anti-Semitic leadership should be allowed no sovereignty in the Jewish city of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem has been the capital of the Jewish nation long before London, Paris, or New York even existed as cities. This matters not one whit to Barack Obama who has so little respect or friendship for the Jewish people that he lied to us when he said that Jerusalem should remain the undivided capital of the Jewish state.
He lied directly to our faces.
Perhaps Romney can do better.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Why Australia Should Have Boycotted The London Olympic Games
geoffff
Is it too late?
You would have to be an Australian to appreciate how shrill that sounds.
Australia has never boycotted the Olympic Games let alone one in London. There have been Australians winning medals at every one. Even in 1980 when the US President implored us to boycott the Moscow Olympics over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan we let the team go if they wanted to so long as they did not appear under Australian emblems or anthem.. Many stayed home but most went. That is easy to understand.They appeared under the IOC flag in the opening ceremony if they appeared at all. Fine.
Sport is one of the things that define us as a people. It is one of the things that defines all peoples. It is something that defines us as people. Isn't that the whole point of the Olympic ideal? Is there some other point?
A few days ago the Lebanese judo team was scheduled to train in the same facility as the Israeli team. They demanded that a screen be placed between them so that they did not have to see the Jews working out.
The IOC complied.
The families of the Israeli team who were murdered by Nazi insurgents* (maybe it's past time we starting calling these people what they are) asked for a moment of silence in their memory at the opening ceremony.
The IOC refused.
What is going on here? As an Australian I would like to know.
Here is a man who has an opinion that should be heard. This is who he is in his own words:
And here is a sample of what he has to say:
I wouldn't be going away either.
See what else he has to say here.
OK. Pulling the team out now might be a little over the top. But surely as Australians we must see there is something stinking and rotten going on in the world and that it has always been close to the core of the IOC.. Nor should there be any surprise it has now reached London. You only have to note who was the Labour candidate to run the city at the last election.
At what point are we going to say enough is enough?
Torturing and murdering athletes and coaches in front of the whole world is not enough? An athlete who is killed in a tragic training accident is enough but this is not? Why?
You know why. It is because of who they were.
Slinking off to some side show at Guildhall or somewhere from which the Jew haters could exclude themselves is moral cowardice of the worst kind and we all know it and It makes no difference at all if the families were there.
Consider the IOC.. They could not honour the memory of the victims of this unspeakably ugly crime before the whole world in the same way that it was committed because there were too many people and countries that would find even the suggestion contemptible.
They prefer screens.
As a Jew* (never forget by the way it is they who define the Jews and they are known to be liberal with the definition. If Rupert Murdoch can be a Jew so can anybody), apart from the usual disgust you would hope all people feel I guess there is some relief that there are still signs of empathy. As an Australian I'm not sure what I feel. I'm glad our Parliament stood in respect but at what point is enough enough?
In our lifetimes in certain regions of the US a man could be dragged by a mob and brutally murdered in public because of an allegation against him. They kept the photographs. You can find them in an instant if you want to. Sometimes they didn't even bother wearing their hoods. Unlike Munich.
Australians need not get smug about this as we all know. Not by any means. We know what this is. It does not get uglier. We all have reason to be embarrassed by it.. We all have a reason to stand against it.
At what point is enough, enough? Here's a modest proposal.
Until the IOC is reformed and this racist shit is eliminated and in particular until there is proper respect for the families of the murdered athletes and coaches of the Munich massacre Australian athletes should not compete under the Australian flag. They can compete if they must but under the IOC flag or no flag at all.
Are we brave enough? Would it help?
Probably not. Probably not as well but it might.
The point is to make the bigots boycott the ceremony and show themselves for what they are in front of the whole world. Let them explain themselves. Why aren't they there. Put them under the spotlight. Sometimes it helps if only to clear some more minds of the delusion this has anything to do with the welfare of the Palestinian people.
Here is an opportunity to show the world that murdering people in front of the world because of who they are is un-Australian and not only do we want no part of it but we want no part of an international body that equivocates on this.
Even if they run the Olympic Games. Especially if they run the Olympic Games.
This immediately raises the United Nations but let's be serious for a moment and do something in the pursuit of peace, doesn't cost anything and is thoroughly Australian as well and leave the UN out of it..The UN and peace have no right to be in the same sentence other than this one anyway.. So let's talk sport. I think we will find there are many who speak the language.
It's too late for London but is it too late to send a message to the IOC for next time?
Australians prefer their sport direct, fresh, raw and unpolluted by cheating, corruption, drugs and racism. It is unacceptable to refuse to honour the murdered athletes and coaches of 1980 and to stand in sympathy with their families solely because of their nationality, race or religion. Politics are unavoidable but this introduces something foul that defiles any decent concept of the Olympic spirit. It is something that we choose not to have our flag associated with.
If the IOC can not or will not deliver untainted sport then it is time to sack the IOC in the interest of sport.
For certain there are many people around the world who feel the same. What if this were to become global with others urging their countries refuse symbolic association with something that so plainly disgraces and debases sport. A global campaign to clean out the IOC or face boycott-lite as a minimum. You know. A little like Methodist BDS except not morally depraved.
Australians know the history. The IOC should be reminded of its.. Reform. Or else.
Hat tip: Eleanor
Cross posted: Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
Update.
Did you know that in 1908 and 1912 New Zealanders and Australians competed in the same team and were called Australasians ?
I didn't.
Yuk. That's appalling.
I suppose that was one way of getting them used to the idea of Gallipoli.
Is it too late?
You would have to be an Australian to appreciate how shrill that sounds.
Australia has never boycotted the Olympic Games let alone one in London. There have been Australians winning medals at every one. Even in 1980 when the US President implored us to boycott the Moscow Olympics over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan we let the team go if they wanted to so long as they did not appear under Australian emblems or anthem.. Many stayed home but most went. That is easy to understand.They appeared under the IOC flag in the opening ceremony if they appeared at all. Fine.
Sport is one of the things that define us as a people. It is one of the things that defines all peoples. It is something that defines us as people. Isn't that the whole point of the Olympic ideal? Is there some other point?
A few days ago the Lebanese judo team was scheduled to train in the same facility as the Israeli team. They demanded that a screen be placed between them so that they did not have to see the Jews working out.
The IOC complied.
The families of the Israeli team who were murdered by Nazi insurgents* (maybe it's past time we starting calling these people what they are) asked for a moment of silence in their memory at the opening ceremony.
The IOC refused.
What is going on here? As an Australian I would like to know.
Here is a man who has an opinion that should be heard. This is who he is in his own words:
"The threat of the IOC coming after me does not scare me anymore. When you have no more dignity, you have nothing to lose. So, members of the IOC -- my name is Guri Weinberg and I am the son of Moshe Weinberg, the wrestling coach murdered at the 1972 Olympics. And I am not going away."
And here is a sample of what he has to say:
"In 1996, I, along with other Munich orphans and three of the widows, were invited for the first time to the Olympic Games in Atlanta. Before the Opening Ceremony, we met with Alex Gilady. Gilady has been a member of the IOC's Radio and Television Commission since 1984 and has been the senior vice president of NBC Sports since 1996.
"I have known Mr. Gilady since I was a kid; in fact, I grew up with his daughter. He had been supportive in the past regarding our plea for a moment of silence during the Opening Ceremonies, so we arrived with high hopes. Gilady informed us that a moment of silence was not possible because if the IOC had a moment of silence for the Israeli athletes, they would also have to do the same for the Palestinians who died at the Olympics in 1972.
"My mother said, "But no Palestinian athletes died."
"Gilady responded, "Well, there were Palestinians who died at the 1972 Olympics."
"I heard one of the widows say to Gilady, "Are you equating the murder of my husband to the terrorists that killed him?
"Silence.
"Then Ilana Romano burst out with a cry that has haunted me to this day. She screamed at Gilady, "How DARE you! You KNOW what they did to my husband! They let him lay there for hours, dying slowly, and then finished him off by castrating him and shoving it in his mouth, ALEX!"
"I looked at Gilady's face as he sat there, stone cold with no emotion. This man knew these athletes personally. This man led the Israeli media delegation at the 1972 Olympics and saw this atrocity first hand. This man saw my father's dead, naked body thrown out front of the Olympic Village for all the world to see.
"Without a hint of empathy, Gilady excused himself from our meeting. "
I wouldn't be going away either.
See what else he has to say here.
OK. Pulling the team out now might be a little over the top. But surely as Australians we must see there is something stinking and rotten going on in the world and that it has always been close to the core of the IOC.. Nor should there be any surprise it has now reached London. You only have to note who was the Labour candidate to run the city at the last election.
At what point are we going to say enough is enough?
Torturing and murdering athletes and coaches in front of the whole world is not enough? An athlete who is killed in a tragic training accident is enough but this is not? Why?
You know why. It is because of who they were.
Slinking off to some side show at Guildhall or somewhere from which the Jew haters could exclude themselves is moral cowardice of the worst kind and we all know it and It makes no difference at all if the families were there.
Consider the IOC.. They could not honour the memory of the victims of this unspeakably ugly crime before the whole world in the same way that it was committed because there were too many people and countries that would find even the suggestion contemptible.
They prefer screens.
As a Jew* (never forget by the way it is they who define the Jews and they are known to be liberal with the definition. If Rupert Murdoch can be a Jew so can anybody), apart from the usual disgust you would hope all people feel I guess there is some relief that there are still signs of empathy. As an Australian I'm not sure what I feel. I'm glad our Parliament stood in respect but at what point is enough enough?
In our lifetimes in certain regions of the US a man could be dragged by a mob and brutally murdered in public because of an allegation against him. They kept the photographs. You can find them in an instant if you want to. Sometimes they didn't even bother wearing their hoods. Unlike Munich.
Australians need not get smug about this as we all know. Not by any means. We know what this is. It does not get uglier. We all have reason to be embarrassed by it.. We all have a reason to stand against it.
At what point is enough, enough? Here's a modest proposal.
Until the IOC is reformed and this racist shit is eliminated and in particular until there is proper respect for the families of the murdered athletes and coaches of the Munich massacre Australian athletes should not compete under the Australian flag. They can compete if they must but under the IOC flag or no flag at all.
Are we brave enough? Would it help?
Probably not. Probably not as well but it might.
The point is to make the bigots boycott the ceremony and show themselves for what they are in front of the whole world. Let them explain themselves. Why aren't they there. Put them under the spotlight. Sometimes it helps if only to clear some more minds of the delusion this has anything to do with the welfare of the Palestinian people.
Here is an opportunity to show the world that murdering people in front of the world because of who they are is un-Australian and not only do we want no part of it but we want no part of an international body that equivocates on this.
Even if they run the Olympic Games. Especially if they run the Olympic Games.
This immediately raises the United Nations but let's be serious for a moment and do something in the pursuit of peace, doesn't cost anything and is thoroughly Australian as well and leave the UN out of it..The UN and peace have no right to be in the same sentence other than this one anyway.. So let's talk sport. I think we will find there are many who speak the language.
It's too late for London but is it too late to send a message to the IOC for next time?
Australians prefer their sport direct, fresh, raw and unpolluted by cheating, corruption, drugs and racism. It is unacceptable to refuse to honour the murdered athletes and coaches of 1980 and to stand in sympathy with their families solely because of their nationality, race or religion. Politics are unavoidable but this introduces something foul that defiles any decent concept of the Olympic spirit. It is something that we choose not to have our flag associated with.
If the IOC can not or will not deliver untainted sport then it is time to sack the IOC in the interest of sport.
For certain there are many people around the world who feel the same. What if this were to become global with others urging their countries refuse symbolic association with something that so plainly disgraces and debases sport. A global campaign to clean out the IOC or face boycott-lite as a minimum. You know. A little like Methodist BDS except not morally depraved.
Australians know the history. The IOC should be reminded of its.. Reform. Or else.
Hat tip: Eleanor
Cross posted: Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
Update.
Did you know that in 1908 and 1912 New Zealanders and Australians competed in the same team and were called Australasians ?
I didn't.
Yuk. That's appalling.
I suppose that was one way of getting them used to the idea of Gallipoli.
2 rockets explode near Sderot
Mike L.
Our friends on the left basically fall into two camps. The smaller of these camps think that the tiny Jewish minority in the Middle East richly deserve whatever Arab-Palestinian violence comes their way.
The larger of these camps think that whether or not the tiny Jewish minority in the Middle East deserve this violence, they have a moral imperative to simply take it without striking back... much as we did during the long centuries of dhimmitude.
Some friends.
Meanwhile on Daily Kos we read this:
Right because recognizing the City of David as the capital of the Jewish state shouldn't be done because it would further anger Muslim countries. That makes sense.
And we read this:
None of this is an anomaly. The progressive-left is absolutely crawling with people who despise the Jewish state of Israel, but what I find particularly sad are the ways in which "progressive Zionists" constantly make excuses for their fellow Israel Hating compadres.
Is there any other people on the entire planet that would embrace a political movement which is directly in opposition to their own well-being?
I do not think so.
Gaza-based terrorists fire two rockets at western Negev; no injuries reported
Two rockets fired from the Gaza Strip exploded in an open area near Sderot on Saturday evening. No injuries or damage were reported.
A 29-year-old woman was lightly injured when running to a protected space. She was taken to the Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon shortly after.
Our friends on the left basically fall into two camps. The smaller of these camps think that the tiny Jewish minority in the Middle East richly deserve whatever Arab-Palestinian violence comes their way.
The larger of these camps think that whether or not the tiny Jewish minority in the Middle East deserve this violence, they have a moral imperative to simply take it without striking back... much as we did during the long centuries of dhimmitude.
Some friends.
Meanwhile on Daily Kos we read this:
It gets worse (5+ / 0-)
Per TPM.
It looks like Romney may state that Jerusalem should be the capital of Israel. If so, that would be a rejection of both Democratic and Republican administrations. It will also alienate Muslim countries to a remarkable extreme. This is really, really, really bad.
"Empty vessels make the loudest sound, they have the least wit and are the greatest blabbers" Plato
by Empty Vessel on Fri Jul 27, 2012 at 03:03:44 PM PDT
Right because recognizing the City of David as the capital of the Jewish state shouldn't be done because it would further anger Muslim countries. That makes sense.
And we read this:
That is a $70 million waste (3+ / 0-)
I think it is long past time to stop U.S. funding of the State of Israel and their apartheid regime.....stop it all....money for west bank settlements, 'border fences', military help, etc.
by LakeSuperior on Fri Jul 27, 2012 at 03:06:37 PM PDT
None of this is an anomaly. The progressive-left is absolutely crawling with people who despise the Jewish state of Israel, but what I find particularly sad are the ways in which "progressive Zionists" constantly make excuses for their fellow Israel Hating compadres.
Is there any other people on the entire planet that would embrace a political movement which is directly in opposition to their own well-being?
I do not think so.
Friday, July 27, 2012
Obama Administration Still Unclear Where Jerusalem Is
Mike L.
Carney Refuses To Identify Capital Of Israel Twice In White House Press Briefing.
So, Barack Obama believes that Jews need to engage in further "self-reflection" to determine whether or not we truly want to live in peace and his administration has no idea what the capital of Israel is.
Good to know!
I wish more Jewish people had enough self-respect to understand when they're being taken for granted by a contemptuous president.
{A Tip 'O the Kippa to the Elder of Ziyon.}
Carney Refuses To Identify Capital Of Israel Twice In White House Press Briefing.
So, Barack Obama believes that Jews need to engage in further "self-reflection" to determine whether or not we truly want to live in peace and his administration has no idea what the capital of Israel is.
Good to know!
I wish more Jewish people had enough self-respect to understand when they're being taken for granted by a contemptuous president.
{A Tip 'O the Kippa to the Elder of Ziyon.}
Palestinians Welcome IOC's Rejection of Moment of Silence
Mike L.
LONDON - The Palestinians are praising the International Olympic Committee's decision not to hold a moment of silence in memory of the 11 Israeli athletes murdered in the 1972 Munich Olympics in the London Games' opening ceremony, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Friday.
Jibril Rajoub, chairman of the Palestinian Olympic Committee, sent a thank you letter to IOC President President Jacques Rogge...
"Sport is a bridge for love, unification and for spreading peace among the nations," he wrote. "It must not be a cause for divisiveness and for the spreading of racism."
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Stuart Has Words on "Breaking Bad Karma"
As anyone who participates here knows there is always the chance that I will front page a comment. The comment below by Stuart is thoughtful and deserves to be front paged. His topic is this exceedingly unfortunate piece by pop culture writer Anna Breslaw at The Tablet entitled, "Breaking Bad Karma," wherein she suggests that Holocaust survivors are actually "villains masquerading as victims."
She claims that Holocaust survivors are Judenscheisse, if you can possibly imagine.
.
.
.
I read that piece. I found it interesting. (don't get all pissed off yet, I also found it appalling.)
I'm not familiar with the AMC series. Not sure I've ever heard of it. But the storyline seems to share the same dark genesis as both Weeds and The Big C (showtime series). Survival through some catastrophic tragedy allows people to justify every bad shitty thing they do the rest of their lives.
True? Not in my experience. And the author's lede notwithstanding, my experience would most often lead me to think about the holocaust survivors I've known. Why does my experience bring me to the exact opposite conclusion of the author? I suspect it's because I'm somewhere around 30 years older than the author. I haven't known a handful of old and soon to be dead holocaust survivors. I've known dozens, maybe scores, some of them with vivid memories, that were only 15 or 20 years older than me. As an adult, some of them were almost my contemporaries. I grew up surrounded by a handful of surviors.
If there was any common thread among their personalities, other than them being survivors, it never occurred to me before. And as I've thought about it for the last 30 minutes, still nothing is apparent. They were jerks and they were angels. Ordinary and extraordinary. Frugal and spendthrifts. Loyal and untrustworthy. Some of them talked freely about their experiences. And some never at all.
My most recent personal interaction with a survivor was at the 1st seder this year. The mother of a friend, and purely coincidentally a friend of my mother, I've known her for more than 30 years. She's old now, recently suffered a stroke. At close to 90 and very fragile, sex is still one of her favorite discussion topics. Until that night a few months ago, I had never once heard her mention what she went through. She talked about it for a few tearful minutes. Her daughter, sitting next to her, with her jaw dropping at what her mother was sharing, had never once heard her mother mention a single experience from the 18 months she spent in a concentration camp.
Does the author's age excuse the appalling broad brush she uses to paint holocaust survivors? Hardly. Or for that matter, even labeling them with "extreme will to live". I suspect most that she has had contact with were very young during the holocaust. And probably survived because of their youth, and quite possibly the extreme desires of parents and other adults around them to keep them alive, as much as anything they did themselves.
Interesting that she's estranged from her father. I wonder whose fault that is.
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Culch her? I hardly know her!
JayinPhiladelphia
As my father would say... ;)
Okay, so let me explain.
I've totally dropped the ball so far on a regular feature I want to do here, which is an every-other-week food post. At least, only so far! Hopefully not for much longer. I'll surely start this up in August some time, earlier rather than later. I should have a bit more time in two weeks or so.
One of my favorite regular blog features are the weekly "Postcard from Israel" photo diaries at CiF Watch. In a 'former blogging life,' I was mainly known as a food writer and photo diarist. Until I jumped into I-P at Daily Kos (heh), from which point my blogging experiences have never quite been the same. Turns out some of the very same people who once enjoyed and supported my Kunstlerian rants on urban planning and architecture, and my photo diaries from community gardens and farmers' markets... did not quite appreciate my later 'coming out' as a supporter of Israel and as a strong critic of the all-too-prevalent 'progressive' antisemitism on sites like the aforementioned. Shockingly enough.
I always admired Tablet, at least until they started publishing and defending sick filth that would even make Philip Weiss and (maybe, unless there were potential book sales in it for him) David Harris-Gershon cringe. I still think they have a nice balance of politics, news and culture; and I'd like to see more comprehensive pro-Israel, proudly-Jewish sites gain similar prominence in 'the blogosphere,' such as it is.
I'd like to expand our community a bit here on Israel Thrives, with occasional cultural entries such as food diaries and coverage of local events, etc etc. That's still what I do best, after all, so I'll try my darndest to do so from here on out.
Until then, here's what I'd do for breakfast on Saturday if I didn't have to catch an intercity train in the morning. Argh! Okay, maybe next weekend. It's still the height of summer produce season here in Philadelphia, so tomatoes and cukes and all the other good stuff will surely be around at our farmers' markets next Saturday morning.
And shakshuka will always be my last meal (if I'm fortunate enough to be able to make that choice!)...
As my father would say... ;)
Okay, so let me explain.
I've totally dropped the ball so far on a regular feature I want to do here, which is an every-other-week food post. At least, only so far! Hopefully not for much longer. I'll surely start this up in August some time, earlier rather than later. I should have a bit more time in two weeks or so.
One of my favorite regular blog features are the weekly "Postcard from Israel" photo diaries at CiF Watch. In a 'former blogging life,' I was mainly known as a food writer and photo diarist. Until I jumped into I-P at Daily Kos (heh), from which point my blogging experiences have never quite been the same. Turns out some of the very same people who once enjoyed and supported my Kunstlerian rants on urban planning and architecture, and my photo diaries from community gardens and farmers' markets... did not quite appreciate my later 'coming out' as a supporter of Israel and as a strong critic of the all-too-prevalent 'progressive' antisemitism on sites like the aforementioned. Shockingly enough.
I always admired Tablet, at least until they started publishing and defending sick filth that would even make Philip Weiss and (maybe, unless there were potential book sales in it for him) David Harris-Gershon cringe. I still think they have a nice balance of politics, news and culture; and I'd like to see more comprehensive pro-Israel, proudly-Jewish sites gain similar prominence in 'the blogosphere,' such as it is.
I'd like to expand our community a bit here on Israel Thrives, with occasional cultural entries such as food diaries and coverage of local events, etc etc. That's still what I do best, after all, so I'll try my darndest to do so from here on out.
Until then, here's what I'd do for breakfast on Saturday if I didn't have to catch an intercity train in the morning. Argh! Okay, maybe next weekend. It's still the height of summer produce season here in Philadelphia, so tomatoes and cukes and all the other good stuff will surely be around at our farmers' markets next Saturday morning.
And shakshuka will always be my last meal (if I'm fortunate enough to be able to make that choice!)...
Despite What the Obama Administration Thinks, Jerusalem is the Capital of Israel
Although the Obama administration does not seem to know where Jerusalem actually is, the mayor of Tel Aviv assures us that the City of David is the capital of the Jewish state.
By the way, didn't Obama claim in a 2008 speech to AIPAC that “Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided”? Yes, I believe he did. And, yet, somehow, Obama's Department of State does not concur.
This is because Obama lied to American Jewry in that 2008 speech. You can be sure that if Obama really thought that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel that his Department of State would have gotten that word, as well.
They didn't and the fact that they didn't gives me yet another reason not to trust this president.
It's just common sense. The guy lied to us. Period.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
More on Nazism and the Brotherhood
Mike L.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
When we think about the rise of radical Islam in the Middle East and the Obama administration's bolstering of that movement, particularly in Egypt, it is helpful to know some history of the Brotherhood and its connection to Nazi ideology.
As I have mentioned many times on this blog Matthias Küntzel (author of Jihad and Jew-Hatred: Islamism, Nazism and the Roots of 9/11) is among the foremost scholars working on this question. Below is a bit of a 2008 interview (pdf) which should be required reading for anyone who intends to form an opinion on the Brotherhood:
The first thing to understand, and it is virtually never mentioned in the mass media, is the "personal contacts and ideological affinities between early Islamism and late Nazism."
This is a key point that must be addressed because we need to know just who these people are that the Obama administration is helping into power in Egypt. The fact of the matter, however much they may pose as "moderate" for a gullible western audience, is that the Brotherhood is a fascist movement, heavily influenced by European fascism of the early-middle twentieth century.
So the Mufti, who is the father of Palestinian nationalism, merged early Islamic Jew Hatred with the Nazi variety during the 1930s.
The Mufti combined Nazi anti-Semitism with traditional Islamic Jew Hatred and used both to "mobilize the masses" in the 1920s. It was the Arab riots and revolts throughout the 1920s and 1930s that led the British to issue the infamous White Paper restricting Jewish immigration to mandated Palestine directly during the Holocaust.
There is much more to this interview and I very much recommend that it be read in full. I may continue this little exercise going forward, but for the moment the purpose is simply to point out... to insist, really... that the Muslim Brotherhood has historical connections to Nazi ideology and that we must bare this in mind when we consider the US-Brotherhood connection under the Obama administration.
The point, it should be understood, is not that Barack Obama intends to support an Islamic variant of fascism in today's Middle East. I have to go on the assumption that he has no such intention. Instead there are two possible explanations for Obama's behavior, ignorance and / or the sincere belief that either the Brotherhood has moderated itself or that bringing it into power will serve to moderate it.
Sometimes pundits will say that the Muslim Brotherhood has given up on the violent Jihad with the obvious implication being that there is nothing to fear from them. If that is the case, however, how is it that the Brotherhood calls for a renewed Caliphate with Jerusalem as its capital?
One of my foremost criticisms of the progressive-left, and particularly the Jewish left, is their insensibility concerning the rise of radical Islam. They are almost entirely incapable of discussing what is perhaps the foremost international political development of our time for reasons that amount to social cowardice.
This makes standard progressive-left, including standard "progressive Zionist," opinions on the Arab-Israel conflict almost entirely worthless because they fail to take into account the fact that it is radical Islam, itself, which is driving the conflict. The reason that there is no peace is not because Jews are building housing for themselves in Judea, but because the Arab world absolutely refuses to allow Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land and they do so for religious reasons.
You may ignore it, but ignorance will not make it go away.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
When we think about the rise of radical Islam in the Middle East and the Obama administration's bolstering of that movement, particularly in Egypt, it is helpful to know some history of the Brotherhood and its connection to Nazi ideology.
As I have mentioned many times on this blog Matthias Küntzel (author of Jihad and Jew-Hatred: Islamism, Nazism and the Roots of 9/11) is among the foremost scholars working on this question. Below is a bit of a 2008 interview (pdf) which should be required reading for anyone who intends to form an opinion on the Brotherhood:
Bridges between early Islamism and late Nazism
Alan Johnson: In your book you show that from the 1930s to the mid 1940s there was a growth of ‘personal contacts and ideological affinities between early Islamism and late Nazism.’ Let’s talk about two people who acted as bridges between an older, doctrinal or Koranic anti-Judaism and a modern political and Islamist antiSemitism, influenced by Nazism: Haj Amin al-Husseini, the mufti of Jerusalem, and Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. First, who was Haj Amin al-Husseini and what was his central achievement?
The first thing to understand, and it is virtually never mentioned in the mass media, is the "personal contacts and ideological affinities between early Islamism and late Nazism."
This is a key point that must be addressed because we need to know just who these people are that the Obama administration is helping into power in Egypt. The fact of the matter, however much they may pose as "moderate" for a gullible western audience, is that the Brotherhood is a fascist movement, heavily influenced by European fascism of the early-middle twentieth century.
Matthias Küntzel: The main achievement of Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, was to combine the Jew-hatred of ancient Islam with modern antiSemitism into a new and persuasive rhetoric. I discovered a speech he gave in 1937 with the title, ‘Jewry and Islam.’ Here, he intermingled modern anti-Semitism the stories of very early Islam, going back and forth from the 7th and the 20th centuries, and connecting both kinds of Jew-hatred. This was something new.
So the Mufti, who is the father of Palestinian nationalism, merged early Islamic Jew Hatred with the Nazi variety during the 1930s.
When Churchill visited Jerusalem in March 1921, just before the British Mandate, he was given a petition by the then Palestinian leadership which was very antisemitic. But it was a purely European anti-Semitism – about the alleged Jewish responsibility for the First World War, about how later Jews incited the Russian Revolution and so on. It was ridiculous and no Muslim of that time would have been able to understand any of this, because it was really a précis of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion! This was not the way to mobilise the Arab masses. It was the Mufti who realised this. He was always a special case in this regard. High ranking Muslims at this time rarely wanted to mobilise masses, but Haj Amin al-Husseini
did. Indeed it was a mass mobilisation that in 1921 led to his appointment as Mufti,against other Jerusalem notables.
The Mufti combined Nazi anti-Semitism with traditional Islamic Jew Hatred and used both to "mobilize the masses" in the 1920s. It was the Arab riots and revolts throughout the 1920s and 1930s that led the British to issue the infamous White Paper restricting Jewish immigration to mandated Palestine directly during the Holocaust.
Here was a modern feature – the mobilisation of masses to rescue your position. To this end he invented a form of Islamic anti-Semitism which was able to reach the illiterate masses by recruiting their religious feelings and by repeating the antiJewish verses from the Koran and Hadith again and again. Thus, we find for the first time in about 100 years the famous Hadith about the stones and the trees that want to kill Jews – a Hadith which constitutes today a part of the Hamas Charter – mentioned in the Mufti’s speech of 1937.
The Mufti was the most important founder of modern Islamic anti-Semitism and this achievement – with all its after-effects – is more important than his role during the Nazi time. Amin el-Husseini is often reduced to this time. But I think that what he did before and after this period of time was much more important. Before, he created the new antisemitic rhetoric, the rhetoric the Islamists would spread. Between 1946 and 1948, he played a key role in mobilising the Arab world against Israel. Sometimes individuals can change a lot, and the Mufti was by far the best-known representative of the Muslim world at that time, among other things because of his broadcasting of pro-Nazi and antisemitic sermons into the Middle East during the war over the Berlin short wave transmitter. He pursued his passion after May 8, 1945 and stirred up a specifically antisemitic hatred against the Jews in Palestine and Israel.
There is much more to this interview and I very much recommend that it be read in full. I may continue this little exercise going forward, but for the moment the purpose is simply to point out... to insist, really... that the Muslim Brotherhood has historical connections to Nazi ideology and that we must bare this in mind when we consider the US-Brotherhood connection under the Obama administration.
The point, it should be understood, is not that Barack Obama intends to support an Islamic variant of fascism in today's Middle East. I have to go on the assumption that he has no such intention. Instead there are two possible explanations for Obama's behavior, ignorance and / or the sincere belief that either the Brotherhood has moderated itself or that bringing it into power will serve to moderate it.
Sometimes pundits will say that the Muslim Brotherhood has given up on the violent Jihad with the obvious implication being that there is nothing to fear from them. If that is the case, however, how is it that the Brotherhood calls for a renewed Caliphate with Jerusalem as its capital?
One of my foremost criticisms of the progressive-left, and particularly the Jewish left, is their insensibility concerning the rise of radical Islam. They are almost entirely incapable of discussing what is perhaps the foremost international political development of our time for reasons that amount to social cowardice.
This makes standard progressive-left, including standard "progressive Zionist," opinions on the Arab-Israel conflict almost entirely worthless because they fail to take into account the fact that it is radical Islam, itself, which is driving the conflict. The reason that there is no peace is not because Jews are building housing for themselves in Judea, but because the Arab world absolutely refuses to allow Jewish sovereignty on Jewish land and they do so for religious reasons.
You may ignore it, but ignorance will not make it go away.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Volleyboy Accuses JayinPhiladelphia of Threatening His Family (Update)
Mike L.
There is a tendency among political partisans to cast aspersions on the integrity of their political opponents. This tendency is as old as humanity. It is also entirely inconsistent with the values of anything that we could consider to be either liberal or progressive or just decent from a human standpoint.
As the owner of this blog, I feel some responsibility for those who front-page here to the extent that their doing so may sometimes cause them personal grief or even threat. Without taking ourselves too seriously, it nonetheless remains the case that we are challenging prevailing orthodoxies on the progressive-left because all of us, or almost all of us, come out of the political left. We are, for the most part, progressive or liberal Jews who are concerned about the fact that the progressive movement is turning against the state of Israel and, thereby, turning against the well-being of the Jewish people.
This being the case, I take it seriously when someone like Volleyboy1 accuses JayinPhiladelphia, one of our front-pagers, with threatening him and his family.
In a recent comment, Volleyboy1 wrote this:
This is a very serious charge by Volleyboy1 against JayinPhiladelphia. It is serious enough that Volleyboy1 goes forward to say:
Given the serious nature of Volleyboy1's charge against Jay, and given the fact that he tells me that he will hold me responsible for it... whatever that means, exactly... it is necessary to determine the truth of the charge.
The first question to ask is whether or not JayinPhiladelphia has threatened either Volleyboy1 or his family. A threat, of course, is "a statement of an intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action on someone in retribution for something done..."
Jay has done no such thing. Jay has not threatened Volleyboy1. Jay has not in anyway suggested that he intends to harm anyone, least of all Volleyboy's children and I defy Volleyboy1 to show us where Jay has done so on Israel Thrives.
He won't because he can't for the simple reason that it never happened.
One could argue, however, that Jay's "outing" of VB presents a potential danger to VB and his family and is, thus, threatening. Those of us who advocate for the Jewish state, as I do, as Jay does, and as VB does, always recognize that there is, at least, some measure of risk in doing so, given the hatred for Israel that exists in the world. Pro-Israel advocacy is very definitely not for the timid.
Therefore, if Jay gave away Volleyboy1's true name or his town of residency or posted a picture of the guy, this would constitute outing and thus could represent a potential danger for VB and his children. As someone who has chosen to out myself, I suspect that such a danger is small, but that is my choice only to make for me, not for anyone to make for someone else.
But the fact of the matter is that Jay, as Volleyboy1 himself implies, did not out him. Jay did not give away either VB's name or his town of residency, nor has he posted a picture of him. So, the fact of the matter is that Jay has neither threatened Volleyboy1, nor outed him.
The truth is, as Jay points out, the only one who has come anywhere near close to outing VB is Volleyboy1, himself. On his Daily Kos profile Volleyboy1 shows us a picture of himself. He tells us which state in the United States that he lives in. He tells us what he does for a living and some of the hobbies he enjoys. He, in fact, tells us far, far more about himself than Jay did, yet it is Jay whose reputation gets dragged through the mud for "threatening" Volleyboy.
This, my friends, is entirely unjust and it raises the question of just why Volleyboy1 makes the accusations that he has. Why has Volleyboy1 gone to such lengths to hurt Jay's reputation with such an accusation and why has he threatened to hold me responsible for the consequences of this non-threat?
Those are good questions.
I have to say, though, that I have over the last few days struggled with the question of how to reply to VB's charge... or even if to bother. I mean, there I was, standing waist deep in the Sacramento River, fishing for striped bass in Rio Vista, when Laurie (who was lounging in an orange and black Giants lawn chair and noodling around on her cell) says to me, "Gee, you should see what is going on in your blog!"
{This, by the way, is me and my pelican friend that very day! That is a pelican, is it not? One bold bird for sure, I tell ya. I fed him some anchovies, just to be nice... or so that he would not attack! Laurie snapped the shot.}
Anyway, upon returning home and looking at the site, I assumed that any rational and intelligent human being could look at VB's accusation of Jay, and his personal threat to me, and find both to be entirely irrational. But I cannot count on that, which is why I am bothering to lay out the case.
The fact is that Volleyboy1 uses defamation as a political club and this is just one example of it. The problem here, however, is not merely Volleyboy1. The real problem is blind partisanship and the tendency to look upon fellow Jews who support Israel, but with whom we politically disagree, as enemies to be demeaned and dehumanized and marginalized.
That's the problem and that is precisely what we have in this case.
Volleyboy1 is seeking to drag Jay's good name through the mud because Jay is one of my frontpagers and VB sees this blog as an ideological opponent and therefore an enemy. The reason for this is because I am opposed to the Obama administration's treatment of the Jewish state and VB is an Obama advocate.
That's the bottom line.
Volleyboy1 is kicking Jay in the teeth because Jay has chosen to post here despite the fact that VB has defamed Israel Thrives as a racist "hate site." Thus what Volleyboy1 deals in is not so much analysis as it is defamation. For example, we have a whole long list of things that are verboten for discussion on the progressive-left which makes the movement irrelevant, or worse, when it comes to the Arab-Israel conflict, yet instead of honestly addressing these concerns Volleyboy1 chooses to defame and dehumanize and delegitimize those who he decides are his political opponents.
Instead of pointing the trembling finger of accusation at Jay, or at me for that matter, Volleyboy1 could answer the question of just why it is, for example, that "progressive Zionists" refuse to place the Arab-Israel conflict into anything that even resembles an historical context through discussing the long history of Arab-Muslim imperialism in the Middle East along with the consequent dhimmitude of our ancestors there?
This, however, he will not do because one is shamed as a "racist" on the progressive-left for speaking honestly about Arab-Muslim majoritarian injustice toward the Jewish minority in the Middle East. So, instead, Volleyboy1 uses the charge of "racism" as a club. Instead of analyzing, he strikes at people's integrity in order to undermine them among others. He seeks to ruin reputations.
There is nothing liberal or progressive about such a tactic. Quite the contrary.
It is purely defamation of character and nothing more.
Update:
Here is something that I would like to know.
How is it that Jay's friends in the Volleyboy camp ("the group") refuse to acknowledge in public that Volleyboy1 has defamed Jay?
You know as well as I that Jay has not threatened Volleyboy's children, yet I do not see you standing up to a bully who is dragging your friend's reputation through the mud.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
{Cowards.}
There is a tendency among political partisans to cast aspersions on the integrity of their political opponents. This tendency is as old as humanity. It is also entirely inconsistent with the values of anything that we could consider to be either liberal or progressive or just decent from a human standpoint.As the owner of this blog, I feel some responsibility for those who front-page here to the extent that their doing so may sometimes cause them personal grief or even threat. Without taking ourselves too seriously, it nonetheless remains the case that we are challenging prevailing orthodoxies on the progressive-left because all of us, or almost all of us, come out of the political left. We are, for the most part, progressive or liberal Jews who are concerned about the fact that the progressive movement is turning against the state of Israel and, thereby, turning against the well-being of the Jewish people.
This being the case, I take it seriously when someone like Volleyboy1 accuses JayinPhiladelphia, one of our front-pagers, with threatening him and his family.
In a recent comment, Volleyboy1 wrote this:
Hey Jay... Are you threatening me or my family? I just want to know right now. You seem to want to take personal information and publish that on the web in some sick outbreak of whatever psychosis you suffer from. You do realize that by doing so you would put others at risk including children.
You have a problem with me that is one thing but you will not threaten my family in any way, shape or form. Do I need to be clearer?
This is a very serious charge by Volleyboy1 against JayinPhiladelphia. It is serious enough that Volleyboy1 goes forward to say:
And Mike - you own this blog. Should something happen because this crazy a-hole is using your blog as "jump off point" then I hold you responsible.
Given the serious nature of Volleyboy1's charge against Jay, and given the fact that he tells me that he will hold me responsible for it... whatever that means, exactly... it is necessary to determine the truth of the charge.
The first question to ask is whether or not JayinPhiladelphia has threatened either Volleyboy1 or his family. A threat, of course, is "a statement of an intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action on someone in retribution for something done..."
Jay has done no such thing. Jay has not threatened Volleyboy1. Jay has not in anyway suggested that he intends to harm anyone, least of all Volleyboy's children and I defy Volleyboy1 to show us where Jay has done so on Israel Thrives.
He won't because he can't for the simple reason that it never happened.
One could argue, however, that Jay's "outing" of VB presents a potential danger to VB and his family and is, thus, threatening. Those of us who advocate for the Jewish state, as I do, as Jay does, and as VB does, always recognize that there is, at least, some measure of risk in doing so, given the hatred for Israel that exists in the world. Pro-Israel advocacy is very definitely not for the timid.
Therefore, if Jay gave away Volleyboy1's true name or his town of residency or posted a picture of the guy, this would constitute outing and thus could represent a potential danger for VB and his children. As someone who has chosen to out myself, I suspect that such a danger is small, but that is my choice only to make for me, not for anyone to make for someone else.
But the fact of the matter is that Jay, as Volleyboy1 himself implies, did not out him. Jay did not give away either VB's name or his town of residency, nor has he posted a picture of him. So, the fact of the matter is that Jay has neither threatened Volleyboy1, nor outed him.
The truth is, as Jay points out, the only one who has come anywhere near close to outing VB is Volleyboy1, himself. On his Daily Kos profile Volleyboy1 shows us a picture of himself. He tells us which state in the United States that he lives in. He tells us what he does for a living and some of the hobbies he enjoys. He, in fact, tells us far, far more about himself than Jay did, yet it is Jay whose reputation gets dragged through the mud for "threatening" Volleyboy.
This, my friends, is entirely unjust and it raises the question of just why Volleyboy1 makes the accusations that he has. Why has Volleyboy1 gone to such lengths to hurt Jay's reputation with such an accusation and why has he threatened to hold me responsible for the consequences of this non-threat?
Those are good questions.
I have to say, though, that I have over the last few days struggled with the question of how to reply to VB's charge... or even if to bother. I mean, there I was, standing waist deep in the Sacramento River, fishing for striped bass in Rio Vista, when Laurie (who was lounging in an orange and black Giants lawn chair and noodling around on her cell) says to me, "Gee, you should see what is going on in your blog!"{This, by the way, is me and my pelican friend that very day! That is a pelican, is it not? One bold bird for sure, I tell ya. I fed him some anchovies, just to be nice... or so that he would not attack! Laurie snapped the shot.}
Anyway, upon returning home and looking at the site, I assumed that any rational and intelligent human being could look at VB's accusation of Jay, and his personal threat to me, and find both to be entirely irrational. But I cannot count on that, which is why I am bothering to lay out the case.
The fact is that Volleyboy1 uses defamation as a political club and this is just one example of it. The problem here, however, is not merely Volleyboy1. The real problem is blind partisanship and the tendency to look upon fellow Jews who support Israel, but with whom we politically disagree, as enemies to be demeaned and dehumanized and marginalized.
That's the problem and that is precisely what we have in this case.
Volleyboy1 is seeking to drag Jay's good name through the mud because Jay is one of my frontpagers and VB sees this blog as an ideological opponent and therefore an enemy. The reason for this is because I am opposed to the Obama administration's treatment of the Jewish state and VB is an Obama advocate.
That's the bottom line.
Volleyboy1 is kicking Jay in the teeth because Jay has chosen to post here despite the fact that VB has defamed Israel Thrives as a racist "hate site." Thus what Volleyboy1 deals in is not so much analysis as it is defamation. For example, we have a whole long list of things that are verboten for discussion on the progressive-left which makes the movement irrelevant, or worse, when it comes to the Arab-Israel conflict, yet instead of honestly addressing these concerns Volleyboy1 chooses to defame and dehumanize and delegitimize those who he decides are his political opponents.
Instead of pointing the trembling finger of accusation at Jay, or at me for that matter, Volleyboy1 could answer the question of just why it is, for example, that "progressive Zionists" refuse to place the Arab-Israel conflict into anything that even resembles an historical context through discussing the long history of Arab-Muslim imperialism in the Middle East along with the consequent dhimmitude of our ancestors there?
This, however, he will not do because one is shamed as a "racist" on the progressive-left for speaking honestly about Arab-Muslim majoritarian injustice toward the Jewish minority in the Middle East. So, instead, Volleyboy1 uses the charge of "racism" as a club. Instead of analyzing, he strikes at people's integrity in order to undermine them among others. He seeks to ruin reputations.
There is nothing liberal or progressive about such a tactic. Quite the contrary.
It is purely defamation of character and nothing more.
Update:Here is something that I would like to know.
How is it that Jay's friends in the Volleyboy camp ("the group") refuse to acknowledge in public that Volleyboy1 has defamed Jay?
You know as well as I that Jay has not threatened Volleyboy's children, yet I do not see you standing up to a bully who is dragging your friend's reputation through the mud.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
{Cowards.}
Sunday, July 22, 2012
This is for Mad
Mike L.
I was going to put this on the right side of the screen tomorrow, but somehow it just seems more appropriate to front-page it and dedicate it to the Madscientist... despite the fact that most of you will not know who he is.
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Friday, July 20, 2012
American Dhimmi
geoffff
Who would have thought it would get to the stage that the only true friends the Christians of the Middle East have in the West are the atheists and the Jews?
Instead, in Europe at least, the Christians respond to Christian persecution by religious fanatics and Nazis by attacking Israel and the Jews. They call this "speaking truth to power". I'm glad I'm not a British Methodist or something. If I were I'd be feeling pretty unmanly about such brazen moral cowardice.
At least we have the United States to stand up to it. Or do we?
It seems that will depend on who the American people vote for in November.
Pat Condell says it straight in a way no one else can match.
cross posted Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
Who would have thought it would get to the stage that the only true friends the Christians of the Middle East have in the West are the atheists and the Jews?
Instead, in Europe at least, the Christians respond to Christian persecution by religious fanatics and Nazis by attacking Israel and the Jews. They call this "speaking truth to power". I'm glad I'm not a British Methodist or something. If I were I'd be feeling pretty unmanly about such brazen moral cowardice.
At least we have the United States to stand up to it. Or do we?
It seems that will depend on who the American people vote for in November.
Pat Condell says it straight in a way no one else can match.
cross posted Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
Remember the 11: Bob Costas Will
JayinPhiladelphia
One month ago, I praised the decision of the Australian Parliament to honor the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches who were murdered in Munich 40 years ago, simply for being Jews representing Israel.
Bob Costas isn't going to let the IOC's cowardice go, either...
Remember the 11.
David Berger
Yosef Gutfreund
Moshe Weinberg
Eliezer Halfin
Marc Slavin
Zeev Friedman
Yosef Romano
Kehat Schorr
Andre Spitzer
Amitzur Shapira
Yaacov Springer
One month ago, I praised the decision of the Australian Parliament to honor the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches who were murdered in Munich 40 years ago, simply for being Jews representing Israel.
Bob Costas isn't going to let the IOC's cowardice go, either...
"I intend to note that the IOC denied the request," Costas told The Hollywood Reporter. "Many people find that denial more than puzzling but insensitive. Here's a minute of silence right now."As Elder of Ziyon and others have since mentioned, the Israeli Olympic Team can also force their own minute of silence during introductions. And I hope they do.
Remember the 11.
David Berger
Yosef Gutfreund
Moshe Weinberg
Eliezer Halfin
Marc Slavin
Zeev Friedman
Yosef Romano
Kehat Schorr
Andre Spitzer
Amitzur Shapira
Yaacov Springer
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Watching BDS Fail, Right At Home
JayinPhiladelphia
Here in my little corner of North Philadelphia, Kensington, we have a new(-ish) late night Middle Eastern cafe and c-store open on Front Street under the El. Best falafel I've found here yet, and their house-made hummus certainly ain't bad either. I regularly stop in for both. Fun thing I noticed last time I was in, though - in addition to their house-made product, they're also carrying Sabra hummus!
I guess nobody told the Palestinian family, my neighbors, my friends, who run this place, that they're supposed to boycott Teh Jooz(!). Here in our North Philadelphia neighborhood, one of the most ethnically diverse inner city neighborhoods remaining in America (any which way you turn, you can find yourself on a Jamaican, Dominican, Puerto Rican, African American, Arab, Irish, Polish, Vietnamese, Salvadoran, Korean, Mexican or Haitian block), we intrinsically know that if one of us ain't doing well, then eventually none of the rest of us will either. We stand together, and have for generations. If we have a problem, we talk it out. That's just the way it is. That's how we make things work.
That's the only way.
My theory is that the BDSers have never lived amongst a diverse urban population (and likely never will, since most would poop themselves even looking at pictures of neighborhoods like Kensington), and therefore do not know how to get along with others, and how to solve problems. Ideological extremism works for them, in their comfortable little abodes, when they're not the ones who have to do the fighting. But for those of us who do, it's a whole different story.
Like the Palestinian family which carries (the frankly inferior) Sabra hummus, right next to their own (excellent) home-made product.
BDSers - are my friends down the street not "Palestinian Civil Society?" Perhaps some should consider their "call," as well.
I call on comfortable, suburban White Guilt BDSers to examine how local urban economies work. Here in America, and elsewhere. Standing invitation, any time. If they can get off their keyboards and get over their fear of actually walking around poor urban neighborhoods, and interacting with those of us who live in such places, that is.
We don't bite. Hard. ;)
Here in my little corner of North Philadelphia, Kensington, we have a new(-ish) late night Middle Eastern cafe and c-store open on Front Street under the El. Best falafel I've found here yet, and their house-made hummus certainly ain't bad either. I regularly stop in for both. Fun thing I noticed last time I was in, though - in addition to their house-made product, they're also carrying Sabra hummus!
I guess nobody told the Palestinian family, my neighbors, my friends, who run this place, that they're supposed to boycott Teh Jooz(!). Here in our North Philadelphia neighborhood, one of the most ethnically diverse inner city neighborhoods remaining in America (any which way you turn, you can find yourself on a Jamaican, Dominican, Puerto Rican, African American, Arab, Irish, Polish, Vietnamese, Salvadoran, Korean, Mexican or Haitian block), we intrinsically know that if one of us ain't doing well, then eventually none of the rest of us will either. We stand together, and have for generations. If we have a problem, we talk it out. That's just the way it is. That's how we make things work.
That's the only way.
My theory is that the BDSers have never lived amongst a diverse urban population (and likely never will, since most would poop themselves even looking at pictures of neighborhoods like Kensington), and therefore do not know how to get along with others, and how to solve problems. Ideological extremism works for them, in their comfortable little abodes, when they're not the ones who have to do the fighting. But for those of us who do, it's a whole different story.
Like the Palestinian family which carries (the frankly inferior) Sabra hummus, right next to their own (excellent) home-made product.
BDSers - are my friends down the street not "Palestinian Civil Society?" Perhaps some should consider their "call," as well.
I call on comfortable, suburban White Guilt BDSers to examine how local urban economies work. Here in America, and elsewhere. Standing invitation, any time. If they can get off their keyboards and get over their fear of actually walking around poor urban neighborhoods, and interacting with those of us who live in such places, that is.
We don't bite. Hard. ;)
I Surrender!
Mike L.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
To My Jihadi Friends:
I surrender!
You have been in the Jew Killing Business for, what?, 1,400 years now? I must say, I think that you've done a splendid job. Just look at the Middle East. This huge expanse of land and the Jews only occupy some fraction of one percent of it. If you guys had not been so vigilant in your genocidal attempts against us, who knows how much of that land we might be living on today?
That is, you've done an exceptional job of keeping our numbers artificially low and you should be commended for your efforts. I'm sure that Big Daddy Allah is very proud of your work.
Oh, and by the way, I have to say that I find the argument that you made yesterday in Bulgaria to be quite compelling. Nicely done. Well said.
In any case, I surrender! I give up! Take me, I'm yours!
To My Progressive Friends:
I want to thank you for telling little Jewish kids that the reason that Jihadis seek to kill us is because we're mean to the Palestinians and that if only we would stop being mean to the Palestinians then they would stop trying to kill us. This is the message that you guys have been sending us for decades and I appreciate it very much. It's necessary for Jewish people to understand that the reason that Jihadis seek to kill us is because we aren't nice enough and that we need to redouble our efforts at niceness.
It's particularly important that Jewish children understand this.
I fully understand your moral superiority to the Jewish state of Israel, if not to Jewish people, in general, and will do what I can to make the bad Jews be more like the good Jews.
To the Good Jews:
The good Jews are my absolute favorite Jews.
These are Jewish liberals or progressives or leftists (or whatever) who agree with progressives, in general, that the real problem here is not the Jihadis (who they barely even acknowledge the existence of because to do so would make one a racist, a vile "Islamophobe"), but bad Jews.
The good Jews understand, along with progressives, that the problem is not radical Islam or Islamism or the Jihad... or any of that... but bad Jews who must be stopped at all costs. The problem is not anti-Jewish incitement emanating from throughout the Muslim Middle East, but Avigdor Lieberman.
Were it not for Avigdor Lieberman or Benjamin Netanyahu or the Likud there would be peace now and therefore what is necessary is excoriating these people and dragging their names and reputations through the mud and driving them out of public life by any means necessary, including, but not limited to, defamation of character.
So, I surrender.
You guys are right.
The Jihadis are right that Jews are the children of apes and pigs and need to be slaughtered wherever we might be found.
The progressives are right, with their profound sense of history, that the reason that the Jihadis seek to kill us is because we're mean to the Palestinians. If we weren't mean to the Palestinians the Jihadis would be as gentle as narcophied lambs.
And progressive Jews are right that the real problem is those Jews over there, the bad Jews. The Jews who believe in Jewish self-defense. The Jews who are willing to stand up for the Jewish people. Those Jews who insist upon living in Judea. Those Jews give all the rest of us a bad name, so it's no wonder that our non-Jewish progressive friends blame us for the violence against us because clearly we deserve it... but that's because of the bad Jews!
{'Scuse me. Must go throw up, now.}
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Clinton Pushes Netanyahu to Apologize
Mike L.
So, the Obama administration wants Israel to apologize to Turkey for Turkey's attack upon it during the Mavi Marmara affair.
Obama wants Israel to arm the Palestinians.
And Obama wants Israel to release Palestinian prisoners, apparently with no regard whatsoever to the guilt, or innocence, of those prisoners.
And all this needs to be done so that the Palestinians might consider accepting a state for themselves on historically Jewish land.
I seeeeeee.
Yes, what a terrific friend the Obama administration is to the Jewish state and to the Jewish people.
How in this world could anyone think that the Obama administration is anything other than Israel's Best Friend Forever (BFF)?
Clinton pushes Netanyahu to apologize to Turkey, take steps to bring PA back to talks
US secretary of state reportedly urges prime minister to transfer small arms and release prisoners in bid to restart peace talks
The US secretary of state, in Israel as the last leg of a tour through Asia, also told Netanyahu that Jerusalem should transfer small arms to the PA in order to help get the Palestinians back to the negotiating table, according to Ynet news. She also called on Netanyahu to release Palestinian prisoners. Both moves have been mentioned as Palestinian prerequisites for coming back to talks.
So, the Obama administration wants Israel to apologize to Turkey for Turkey's attack upon it during the Mavi Marmara affair.
Obama wants Israel to arm the Palestinians.
And Obama wants Israel to release Palestinian prisoners, apparently with no regard whatsoever to the guilt, or innocence, of those prisoners.
And all this needs to be done so that the Palestinians might consider accepting a state for themselves on historically Jewish land.
I seeeeeee.
Yes, what a terrific friend the Obama administration is to the Jewish state and to the Jewish people.
How in this world could anyone think that the Obama administration is anything other than Israel's Best Friend Forever (BFF)?
The Bulgaria Bombing (Update 4 - The Idiocy Update)
5 dead in suicide bombing on Israeli bus in Bulgaria
At least 20 injured after attack on Israeli tour bus at the Burgas Airport on 18th anniversary of Iran-sponsored bombing of Jewish center in Argentina; Bulgarian FM in touch with Liberman, headed to site.
We do not know which of the Islamist groups did this.
Update 1:
PM: All signs point to Iran in Bulgaria attack
By JPOST.COM STAFF 07/18/2012 19:55
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Wednesday said Iran is likely behind the attack on Israeli civilians in Bulgaria, Army Radio reported.
Netanyahu pointed to Iran-sponsored attacks against Israeli targets in Thailand and India in recent months, and noted the 18th anniversary of the AMIA Jewish center bombing in Argentina.
For the moment, at least, I would take any Iran speculation with a grain of salt. Obviously Netanyahu is in a position to know things that we do not, but just as obviously we still do not know which Islamist group did this.
Why is Obama supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, again?
Update 2:
White House condemns Bulgaria attack
July 18, 2012
WASHINGTON—The White House is condemning "in the strongest possible terms" a deadly blast in Bulgaria that struck a bus of Israeli tourists.
White House press secretary Jay Carney says the United States "condemns such attacks on innocent people, especially children, in the strongest possible terms." Carney says President Barack Obama's "thoughts and prayers are with the families of those killed and injured."
Carney says the U.S. stands with the Israeli people and the people of Bulgaria. He says the Obama administration was working to learn all the facts in the case but the U.S.'s "commitment to Israel's security remains unshakeable."
Israel has blamed Iran for the deadly blast in Burgas that killed at least three Israeli tourists.
The very last thing in this world that the Obama government has is a commitment to Israel's security. One cannot support the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and claim to have Israel's back or to be a friend of the Jewish people.
Furthermore, of course, the ideological-political-religious movement that is behind the Bulgaria bombing is also behind the Brotherhood. You cannot condemn one while embracing the other.
Update 3:
Here is an interesting thread from Daily Kos.
yup, neocons from all over are trying to start (26+ / 0-)
a war with Iran.......
which must be avoided at all costs,imo
I belong to the “US” of America, not the “ME,$,ME,$,ME,$” of America!
by SeaTurtle on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 10:59:40 AM PDT
Jewish kids are slaughtered but, really, what this is all about our those evil warmongering "neocons." Notice the 26 recommends.
Not everyone is buying, tho:
Wut? (4+ / 0-)
Israel's killed in Bulgaria...neocons did this?
Wut?
Somebody said Party! I got excited. I love Parties! Especially Parties with exclamation marks! Now I'm sad because there's not a Party! h/t AnnetteK ;-)
by EdMass on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 11:20:51 AM PDT
But others are:
neocons are looking for a justification to have (19+ / 0-)
that war. just like iraq did 9/11 with their weapons of mass distraction and little bottles of anthrax
witness
by Friend of the court on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 11:30:29 AM PDT
And even more are:
And some may wonder if..... (4+ / 0-)
....they would go so far as to create a justification.
Malama Pono.
by Bensdad on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 01:01:42 PM PDT
Create a justification?
The idea being, of course, that Israel killed those Jews in order to start a war with Iran.
But, apparently, it's:
not an unheard of phenomon. Gulf of Tonkin. (4+ / 0-)
Real World Chick
by real world chick on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 01:13:52 PM PDT
And:
Remember the Maine! (4+ / 0-)
Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance.
by Horace Boothroyd III on Wed Jul 18, 2012 at 01:24:37 PM PDT
Indeed.
Remember the Maine.
Update 4:
Some guy seems to think that when I say:
the ideological-political-religious movement that is behind the Bulgaria bombing is also behind the Brotherhood.
and that:
You cannot condemn one while embracing the other.
That it means that:
the bombing in Bulgaria is by the same people that also "love" and support the Brotherhood. So therefore... Obama supports the Bombing.
What kind of irrational and entirely irresponsible imbecility does it take to draw the conclusion that I think that Obama supports the bombing?
The point is not that Obama supports the bombing, but that he has an entirely incoherent foreign policy that is exceedingly dangerous to the state of Israel, and thus exceedingly dangerous toward Jews, in general, not to mention exceedingly dangerous to the United States of America.
He is at war with Qaeda, yet embraces the Brotherhood, despite the fact that the Brotherhood is the parent organization of Qaeda.
He opposes the attack on Jewish kids in Bulgaria, yet is OK with one of the organizations that has done the most to promote anti-Semitism since the fall of Nazi Germany.
That's the point.
The point is that the president of the United States is clueless and contradictory in his foreign policy and that is exceedingly dangerous for all of us.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Good News is Always Welcome
Mike L.
I do not really know what to make of this little story, but at least it's hopeful.
Israeli appointed to senior position in UN
United Nations names David Scharia as legal coordinator for the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED), making him the only Israeli to serve in top security position in UN Secretariat
I do not really know what to make of this little story, but at least it's hopeful.
Barack Obama's Defamation of the Jews
Mike L.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
Obama's inclination to defame the Jews of the Middle East seems almost instinctive and done without any reflection or even conscious malice.
Obama says 'failed' to push Mideast peace
In interview with ABC7, US president says he feels he hasn’t been able to achieve desired progress in Israeli-Palestinian peace process. 'Parties have to want it as well,' he says
The direct quote from the Y-Net article is this:
"I have not been able to move the peace process forward in the Middle East the way I wanted."
"It's something we focused on very early. But the truth of the matter is that the parties, they've got to want it as well."
Barack Obama believes that neither side wants peace.
That is precisely what he is saying in the quote above. "The parties, they've got to want it as well."
So, what does this message convey to the world? It tells the world that the reason that there is no end to the Long Arab War against the Jews is because even the Jews do not want an end to their own persecution. We apparently have not done enough in the way of serious "self-reflection" as Obama has recommended of us in the past.
The good news is that this might indicate that Obama is washing his hands of the matter. One can certainly hope, although I wouldn't count on it. When I voted for Obama I thought that he could possibly bring about peace between Arab and Jew in the Middle East. At the time I was still suffering under the Oslo Delusion and thought that if Israel made the right kind of concessions then the Palestinians would agree to an end of hostilities in a two-state solution.
I could not have been more wrong.
Be that as it may, it still must be acknowledged that the Jewish people do want peace. The Palestinians have refused offer after offer for a state for themselves, going back to the Peel Commission Report of 1937, long before they even called themselves "Palestinians." Yet this American president tells us that we don't really want peace.
And you're still going to vote for this guy, eh?
It makes me begin to wonder just what diaspora "progressive" Jews actually think about the Jewish people? I am a diaspora liberal Jew by any meaningful definition of the word "liberal," but I no longer consider myself a progressive. The progressive movement gives anti-Semitic anti-Zionists a seat at the progressive table and that means that self-respecting Jews should probably go elsewhere. That has been my choice, at any rate.
But, my point is that diaspora Jews, even liberal diaspora Jews, will probably not even recognize when they have been insulted by the president of the United States. I consider it a pretty substantial insult, actually. He does not believe that YOU honestly want peace or, at the very least, that our Israeli brothers and sisters do.
One of my persistent themes has been the necessity of acknowledging the obvious. It is obvious that Barack Obama has not much in the way of respect for, or understanding of, or affection for, the Jewish people as a whole. If he did he would not defame the Jews of the Middle East by claiming that they, and by obvious extension we, do not want peace.
My question is this:
Are you going to object or do you actually agree?
My suspicion is that most "progressive" Jews actually agree.
Am I wrong?
Monday, July 16, 2012
Brief Notes: I Want Diversity of Opinion
Mike L.
I do.
This blog is small, but the questions that we address are vital. They are vital not only to the Jewish people, but to the American people, the west more generally, and to people in the Middle East, Muslim, Christian, and Jew.
There are two questions foremost in my mind at the moment, the Levy ruling and Obama administration support for the Muslim Brotherhood. On the former, I have yet to draw a conclusion. Apparently the Israeli court system has decided that Jews building homes for themselves in Judea is, in fact, not illegal.
Shocking, I know.
It's also true that 40 prominent "Jewish leaders" have sent a letter to Benjamin Netanyahu objecting to the wisdom of such a ruling. In my mind, the court is out, but I am turning things over in my head and would very much like to hear opinion.
What I am more concerned about is Obama's embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood and the failure of American Jewry, particularly liberal American Jewry, to object. This is a huge mistake. How is it that American Jews have learned so little from World War II? I was born in the 1960s, but even I know that when a large group of people start screaming for Jewish blood that they should be taken seriously. The Muslim Brotherhood has been screaming for Jewish blood for 85 years and now, with the help of the Obama administration, they are in control of Egypt.
Make of this what you will, but it cries out for discussion.
{And echo chambers suck.}
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Obama Administration Supports Jew Hatred in the Middle East
Mike L.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
At this point it should be well beyond dispute that the Obama administration supports the Muslim Brotherhood, the foremost anti-Semitic organization on the planet with historical and ideological roots that go to Nazi Germany. In a recent joint press conference with Brotherhood Foreign Minister Amr, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said this:
Yes. How nice. The Obama administration is telling the world that the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is a good thing because it happened through democratic means. Of course, it is also true that Adolph Hitler came to power via democratic means, as well. The obvious conclusion is that mere voting does not a democracy make and that we should not be in the business of promoting fascism even if the fascist organization in question comes to power through the voting booth.
And lest one think that I exaggerate in regard the Brotherhood and that they are really a moderate organization, I will refer you to this video of a Mursi campaign rally in which the participants screamed for the conquest of Jerusalem.
Clinton continues:
In other words, not only has the Obama administration helped bring the Muslim Brotherhood into power in Egypt, it is prepared, during difficult economic times, to fork over American tax dollars to it, as well.
Is this an example of that three dimensional chess that Barack Obama is allegedly playing? The Muslim Brotherhood is devoted to al-Sharia and the Sharia is most certainly not compatible with women's rights, with the rights of Gay people to live free from harassment, nor compatible with the rights of Jews, Christians, and other dhimmis to live free in a Sharia state. Thus when Clinton talks about President Mursi protecting the rights of all Egyptians she must mean under a system that is entirely incompatible with the ideology of the very organization that they helped bring to power. We already have reports, as I pointed out yesterday, that the Muslim Brotherhood suppressed the Christian vote in Egypt at gunpoint, yet Clinton has the temerity to talk about the Brotherhood as if they have some secular democratic commitment to social justice and human rights. They don't.
This is entirely false or can only be taken as true if one does not consider violence against Jews to be violence at all. An entire generation of Egyptians and Israelis have not grown up without knowing war and it is scandalous that Clinton would say so. Only the Egyptians of this generation have grown up without knowing war. The Jews of the Middle East, however, remain entirely under siege and are suffering under a war of aggression against them that has been ongoing since the 1920s. Did Hillary forget the Second Terror War (intifada) that the Palestinians launched against the Jews of the Middle East? Has she forgotten the ten thousand Qassams and Katyusha rockets that Hamas and Islamic Jihad rained upon the heads of Israelis since Israel ethnically cleansed every Jew out of Gaza, as insisted upon by the international left?
Or are we to believe that violence against Jews somehow does not count as violence?
Shared strategic interest? The Egyptians just voted in the Muslim Brotherhood which is the parent organization of al-Qaeda, which the administration claims to be at war with. Just what strategic interests can the United States share with an organization devoted to the restoration of the Caliphate with Jerusalem as its capital? Just what strategic interests can the United States share with an organization that is the parent of al-Qaeda which killed 3,000 Americans on 9/11?
The bottom line is that the Obama administration helped bring the Muslim Brotherhood into power and continues to support an organization with a long history of fascism, terrorism, and Jew Hatred. Obama met with the Brotherhood in the spring of '09 when they were still a relatively insignificant force in world politics. Obama made a point of inviting the Brotherhood to his Cairo speech, wherein he threw 3,000 years of Jewish history out the window by suggesting that Israel is the result of the Holocaust. Obama cleared the way for the rise of the Brotherhood in Egypt by rallying for the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. Obama interfered in Egyptian internal politics on the side of the Brotherhood in their struggle with the Egyptian military. And now Obama is giving the Brotherhood an extensive financial package in order to maintain power in that country.
And, despite all this, the Obama administration, and the progressive-left, more generally, still expects Jewish people, the very target of Muslim Brotherhood malice, to support them in their efforts and in their reelection campaign. I can think of nothing more foolish than to do so, yet I am also well aware that the majority of American "progressive" Jews will support this president no matter what he does, always finding excuses for the very worst of his behavior toward the Jews of the Middle East.
What a disgrace.
Supporting fascism, even if it happens to be Islamic fascism, is not the liberal thing to do.
{Cross-Posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
At this point it should be well beyond dispute that the Obama administration supports the Muslim Brotherhood, the foremost anti-Semitic organization on the planet with historical and ideological roots that go to Nazi Germany. In a recent joint press conference with Brotherhood Foreign Minister Amr, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said this:
I have come to Cairo to reaffirm the strong support of the United States for the Egyptian people and for your democratic transition.
Yes. How nice. The Obama administration is telling the world that the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is a good thing because it happened through democratic means. Of course, it is also true that Adolph Hitler came to power via democratic means, as well. The obvious conclusion is that mere voting does not a democracy make and that we should not be in the business of promoting fascism even if the fascist organization in question comes to power through the voting booth.
And lest one think that I exaggerate in regard the Brotherhood and that they are really a moderate organization, I will refer you to this video of a Mursi campaign rally in which the participants screamed for the conquest of Jerusalem.
Clinton continues:
In close consultation with the United States Congress, the Obama Administration is preparing to provide budget support to help Egypt stabilize its economy and to use debt relief to foster innovation, growth, and job creation. As Egypt takes these steps to shore up your economy, we will support you with international financial institutions and other donors.
We are also focused on increasing trade, investment, and entrepreneurship to create jobs and are ready to make available $250 million in loan guarantees to Egyptian small-and-medium-sized businesses. We are sending a high-level delegation of American businesses in early September to explore new investment and trade opportunities, and we will be creating the U.S.-Egypt Enterprise Fund. We’ll launch that fund with $60 million.
In other words, not only has the Obama administration helped bring the Muslim Brotherhood into power in Egypt, it is prepared, during difficult economic times, to fork over American tax dollars to it, as well.
Second, the President and I discussed the importance of keeping Egypt’s democratic transition moving forward, and I commended him on his pledge to serve all Egyptians, including women and minorities and to protect the rights of all Egyptians.
Is this an example of that three dimensional chess that Barack Obama is allegedly playing? The Muslim Brotherhood is devoted to al-Sharia and the Sharia is most certainly not compatible with women's rights, with the rights of Gay people to live free from harassment, nor compatible with the rights of Jews, Christians, and other dhimmis to live free in a Sharia state. Thus when Clinton talks about President Mursi protecting the rights of all Egyptians she must mean under a system that is entirely incompatible with the ideology of the very organization that they helped bring to power. We already have reports, as I pointed out yesterday, that the Muslim Brotherhood suppressed the Christian vote in Egypt at gunpoint, yet Clinton has the temerity to talk about the Brotherhood as if they have some secular democratic commitment to social justice and human rights. They don't.
More than three decades ago, Egypt and Israel signed a treaty that has allowed a generation to grow up without knowing war.
This is entirely false or can only be taken as true if one does not consider violence against Jews to be violence at all. An entire generation of Egyptians and Israelis have not grown up without knowing war and it is scandalous that Clinton would say so. Only the Egyptians of this generation have grown up without knowing war. The Jews of the Middle East, however, remain entirely under siege and are suffering under a war of aggression against them that has been ongoing since the 1920s. Did Hillary forget the Second Terror War (intifada) that the Palestinians launched against the Jews of the Middle East? Has she forgotten the ten thousand Qassams and Katyusha rockets that Hamas and Islamic Jihad rained upon the heads of Israelis since Israel ethnically cleansed every Jew out of Gaza, as insisted upon by the international left?
Or are we to believe that violence against Jews somehow does not count as violence?
We believe America’s shared strategic interest with Egypt far outnumber our differences.
Shared strategic interest? The Egyptians just voted in the Muslim Brotherhood which is the parent organization of al-Qaeda, which the administration claims to be at war with. Just what strategic interests can the United States share with an organization devoted to the restoration of the Caliphate with Jerusalem as its capital? Just what strategic interests can the United States share with an organization that is the parent of al-Qaeda which killed 3,000 Americans on 9/11?
The bottom line is that the Obama administration helped bring the Muslim Brotherhood into power and continues to support an organization with a long history of fascism, terrorism, and Jew Hatred. Obama met with the Brotherhood in the spring of '09 when they were still a relatively insignificant force in world politics. Obama made a point of inviting the Brotherhood to his Cairo speech, wherein he threw 3,000 years of Jewish history out the window by suggesting that Israel is the result of the Holocaust. Obama cleared the way for the rise of the Brotherhood in Egypt by rallying for the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. Obama interfered in Egyptian internal politics on the side of the Brotherhood in their struggle with the Egyptian military. And now Obama is giving the Brotherhood an extensive financial package in order to maintain power in that country.
And, despite all this, the Obama administration, and the progressive-left, more generally, still expects Jewish people, the very target of Muslim Brotherhood malice, to support them in their efforts and in their reelection campaign. I can think of nothing more foolish than to do so, yet I am also well aware that the majority of American "progressive" Jews will support this president no matter what he does, always finding excuses for the very worst of his behavior toward the Jews of the Middle East.
What a disgrace.
Supporting fascism, even if it happens to be Islamic fascism, is not the liberal thing to do.
Saturday, July 14, 2012
There Is Hope For The World
geoffff
Dunno about Europe though.
For those of you left a little saddened about that attempt at a conversation with our outspoken country clergyman ( a beautiful part of the world, by the way, I have been there many times) here's something to cheer you up.
More about the Clerical Antizionists* later
Moscow 2012
Young people put on a flash mob dancing
to an 83 year old American song written by a
Russian born American-Jew whose last
name is the capital of Germany.
Hat tip My old mate Ken
cross posted Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
The Brotherhood Kept Copts from Voting in Egypt
Mike L.
Al-Ahram is reporting that Christian Egyptians, the Copts, were kept from voting by Brotherhood thugs in the recent election.
The translation is poor, because it comes from the Google automatic translate function, but here it is:
I wonder if the Catholic Church or any of the Protestant denominations... like, say, oh, the Methodists... will care?
Al-Ahram is reporting that Christian Egyptians, the Copts, were kept from voting by Brotherhood thugs in the recent election.
The translation is poor, because it comes from the Google automatic translate function, but here it is:
Rally: Brotherhood prevented Copts from voting
Source: Al-Ahram daily
Nabil Zaki, spokesman of the party assembly that he had learned from many people in the level that the Brotherhood shut down entire streets and prevent the Copts from the vote at gunpoint and was making threats to the families of Christianity if you allow her children to get out the vote and repeated at several points.
I wonder if the Catholic Church or any of the Protestant denominations... like, say, oh, the Methodists... will care?
Trying To Engage British Methodists on Human Rights
geoffff
Or should I say Clerical Antizionists?
Anyway don't waste your time
I left this on this blog a few hours ago
G’day Richard Hall,
Here it is
Anyway I'm still here if they want to say something or hear another point of view. I doubt it though. My guess is that these people would prefer to regard these attempts at dialogue as something else.
Or should I say Clerical Antizionists?
Anyway don't waste your time
I left this on this blog a few hours ago
G’day Richard Hall,
Will you try please to help me with this horrible on going human rights violation on a massive scale I am trying in our feeble human way to do something about?
I know this is a strange appeal from the other side of the world but I have looked at your blog and thought that in some sort of way you could do something..
Please help with perhaps one of the great moral dilemmas of our day. The surrender of a whole nation to …
....
....
The reply?
You guessed it.
Here it is
07.14.12 at 8:52 am
[deleted by admin]
Forget it, “geoffff”
UPDATE!
And since?
Well nothing really.
Anyway I'm still here if they want to say something or hear another point of view. I doubt it though. My guess is that these people would prefer to regard these attempts at dialogue as something else.
FURTHER UPDATE!
British Humour!
- 07.14.12 at 12:16 pm
- Hope you’ve got Happy Joyous Hanukkah on JMG Records (2007)
4
07.14.12 at 12:34 pm5
07.14.12 at 1:47 pm- In a fit of pedagogical masochism, I visited geofffff’s — sorry, geofff’s — website, where I discovered a laudatory reference to Melanie Phillips. I guess this is the same Mad Mel who wrote the Islamophilic Londonistan, sensitively likens gay relationships to bestiality, learnedly denies anthropogenic climate change, and lovingly longs to see the back of Rowan Williams. I think we’re at the orc-end of the blogosphere here, folks.
- 07.14.12 at 1:58 pm
- 07.14.12 at 2:19 pm
- That’s what gets me, Richard: some folk come here not to engage but to vandalise the place. Heigh-ho — it’s a pity, really.
- 07.14.12 at 4:56 pm
A measure of civility?
It is a pity. He would like to engage.
But I'm an orc . Therefore I might say something rude.
LAST UPDATE
cross posted Geoffff's Joint Bar Grill
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I know the songs are pretty weak but the game is sufferable.
If you want a serious and informed public discussion on this subject then you are welcome at my blog. In any event I'm about to post this there.