Comments on reads 5/31 II

MARTIN SHERMAN: Richard Beinart and Peter Goldstone – Part I (MUST READ)

In two recent articles, I made the following statements: “Peter Beinart [has] for all intents and purposes declared political war on Israel.” Indeed he has.

And, “There are only two possible explanations for [Beinart’s] actions: He is either sincere or he is not. If he is sincere, he is merely a ‘useful idiot,’ and he should be treated as such. If he is not, then he is engaging in activities that are intentionally detrimental to Israel. He is, therefore, an enemy – and should be treated as such.” Indeed he should.

Beinart has placed himself in precisely the same category as another self-professed “dedicated Zionist” – Richard Goldstone. He should be treated in precisely the same manner – by both the Jewish establishment and Israeli officialdom.

…

It was recently announced that Beinart has been invited to speak at the 2012 Israeli Presidential Conference later this month.

This is a scandalous blunder of breathtaking proportions.

Indeed, it is difficult to think of anything less appropriate. It is a slap in the face for the large swathes of the Israeli public for which he has expressed such deep and undisguised distaste. It is an unconscionable insult to millions for whom Beinart has demonstrated his unmitigated contempt.

Think of it: Would anyone dream of inviting Richard Goldstone to such an event? If not, neither should Beinart be invited. He is more hypocritical, more detrimental and more undeserving.

FP: There were many excellent critiques of Beinart’s oeuvre, but when Martin Sherman decides to take him on, the result is devastating. Read it all (and see next).

 

Ron Radosh: Obama’s Insult to American Jews, the Same Day as His ‘Gaffe’ on Poland

Now let us look at the first part of the president’s statement, about his claim that “he had so many Jewish friends in Chicago.” These “friends,” of course, were the kind of Jews that Peter Beinart praises for being the right kind of Jews who were critical of Israel, rather than the wrong kind that support Israel such as the members of AIPAC. They were Jews like the late very left-wing rabbi whom Obama befriended in Chicago, a man typical of all leftist Jews who support every “progressive” cause at home and save their criticism for the Jewish state they purport to care about — if only it takes steps that might endanger its security, but which the leftist Jews living in the United States believe it must take if it is to have their full support. And of course, his Jewish friends included the likes of Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod, the latter who himself came from a very left-wing Jewish milieu.

Finally, revealing the president’s arrogance and chutzpah, to use the old Yiddish word, he actually told the Conservative Jewish rabbis that “he probably knows about Judaism more than any other president, because he read about it — and wondered how come no one asks speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner or Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell about their support to Israel.” No one asks them about it, although Obama did not pause to consider why no one does, because in their case there is no question about the solid commitment they have to Israel. The president’s record, on the other hand, has included many times at which he seemed to turn drastically away from any genuine concern for Israel’s security needs.

As John Podhoretz quickly pointed out, the president’s bragging is “transparently absurd.” Every single president until our modern age knew more about Judaism from the Old Testament. Harry Truman, to take one example I am most familiar with, quoted from its pages in his Farewell Address in which he reiterated his hopes for Israel’s success. Truman many times told people how familiar he was with the quest of Jews for a homeland from his reading of the Bible. Even Jimmy Carter, despite his current disdain for Israel as a supposed “apartheid state,” is, as Podhoretz writes, “more conversant in the lore of Biblical Judaism” than Barack Obama.

FP: I don’t think any of the Jews invited by Obama felt insulted because they either are gullible, or they don’t really care much about Israel. Had they had the capacity for feeling insulted, they wouldn’t have accepted the invitation. They probably know as much about Judaism as Obama:

Adam Kredo: Don’t Know Much About His

“It became obvious in the Cairo speech in 2009 that neither the President nor the advisers upon whom he relied, like Rahm Emanuel, really knew all that much about the Jewish community or about Jewish history,” Elliott Abrams, a national security adviser in the administration of George W. Bush, told the Free Beacon.

“What they knew well was how to raise money among liberal Jews in the Democratic Party,” Abrams said. “That doesn’t give you much insight into the history and emotions of Israelis, nor into Israeli politics, nor into the views of the sizeable minority of American Jews who are not liberal Democrats.”

“So you have a president who gives a seder every year, but who doesn’t have much sympathy or understanding of the history being discussed around seder tables in this country and in Israel,” he said.

…

Late last year, the president again tied the peace process to the Democratic uprisings in Egypt during a conference call with rabbis.

“The most important thing we can do to stabilize the strategic situation for Israel is if we can actually resolve the Palestinian-Israeli crisis because that’s what feeds so much of the tumult in Egypt,” Obama said. “That’s what I think has created the deep tension between Turkey and Israel, and Turkey has historically been a friend and ally of Israel’s. That’s why we think direct negotiations are so critical.”

Obama’s multitude of misleading claims show that he is using discredited historical notions to further his political goals, historians say.

I’ve been on record for quite a while that one aspect of Obama’s realignment with Islamists is to scare Israel into major concessions. Well, this is now becoming clear to others too, but only a few.

But don’t think that Obama is discriminatory in his ignorance about Judaism. He is equally ignorant on all subjects, as Barry Rubin points out (see my previous post).

 

Jennifer Rubin: A threat for seeking U.N. accountability

The Palestinian News and Information Agency reports: “Head of the PLO refugees’ affairs department Zakaria al-Agha strongly criticized in a statement on Thursday a bill submitted by the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee on Palestinian refugees . . . Agha described the bill as ‘a conspiracy to liquidate the issue of refugees and [United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees] UNRWA’s role,’ warning of serious repercussions in the region if the bill is approved as it aims to drop the Palestinian right of return and end the function of UNRWA as caretaker of the Palestinian refugees.”

A Republican on Capitol Hill well versed in this issue was irate. He told me: “This threat is absolutely outrageous and needs to be addressed immediately by Mahmoud Abbas. If this statement is allowed to stand, Congress can only assume that the PLO is issuing a veiled threat of violence or incitement to violence against the United States in retaliation for an internal congressional reporting requirement that has no direct impact on any Palestinian.”

There is also a larger issue at stake here. Clifford May, of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, argues that the Obama administration has made a shift in the U.S. approach to the so-called “right of return.” … He notes that meanwhile the Palestinian Authority has done everything possible to expand and concretize the refugee issue:

…

Why not? Because statelessness makes them more lethal weapons of war. Ambassador Abdullah explained: “When we have a state accepted as a member of the United Nations, this is not the end of the conflict. This is not a solution to the conflict. This is only a new framework that will change the rules of the game.”

But in this fight about merely identifying who is who among beneficiaries of U.S. taxpayer money via UNRWA, the State Department has sided with UNRWA, the Palestinian Authority and the effort to maintain an ever-expanding mass of “refugees:” As May notes, “That the State Department would provide support for such rejectionism — disregarding the policy of three administrations while failing to comprehend how this undermines any possible ‘peace process’ — is breathtaking.”

FP: When senator Leahy was implying that the bill is not in the interest of the US, it’s this is sort of threat that he had in mind. Since the right of return is the core objective of the Palestinians, any attempt to touch the refugee issue will be met with major violence. So, as I so often argued, the “refugee problem” is not solvable except via the right of return and many in the US (and the West), including the Obama administration are concluding that it might well be the most expedient solution.

Hence the shift that May refers to: it is the logical conclusion of the direction of Obama’s ME policy. After all, that “shitty little country”, that “wound” has become too inconvenient by insisting on survival. If Israel ultimately caves and retreats unilaterally from the West Bank ( like Barak proposed in a Netanyahu government), don’t be surprised if, at some point, Obama will demand the implementation of the right of return.

Comments on reads 5/31 (UPDATED)

'Hamas will grow stronger if Israel doesn't attack Gaza'

Israel Security Agency head Yoram Cohen tells lawmakers that Gaza has turned into a weapons depot since Israeli forces withdrew • Some of Hamas' operational abilities have surpassed those of Hezbollah, he says.

FP: Now, where else did we experience this before? Yet another example that Israel constantly fails to learn from its blunders. It keeps exacerbating its dangerous circumstances to a suicidal point. No wonder that top military and security officials promote surrender—they know the consequences of their failures:

Israel Matazv: Barak has been through everything and learned nothing

Barak - along with Shimon Peres - is a politician about whom it can be said that he has been through everything and learned nothing. It was Barak who fled a training accident at Tzehilim, leaving IDF soldiers to die as he left in his helicopter. It was Barak that tried unsuccessfully to reach a deal with Yasser Arafat at Camp David twelve summers ago and got a violent intifada in return for his flexibility. It was Barak who left an IDF soldier to die while he sought 'permission' from Yasser Arafat to rescue the soldier on Rosh HaShanna twelve years ago. It was Barak who continued to try to give away the store to Arafat, while that intifada raged, in a bid to save his seat as Prime Minister. And it was Barak who, as Defense Minister, passed on the opportunity to finish off Hamas during Operation Cast Lead.

I suppose we should not be surprised that Ehud Barak now wants to 'unilaterally withdraw' from Judea and Samaria.

Israel should consider a unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank if negotiations with the Palestinians fail, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Wednesday.

Barak received support for his position from Amos Yadlin, the former head of Military Intelligence who now serves as director of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv.
Yadlin presented a report at a conference at the think tank claiming that the chance for a peaceful negotiated resolution with the Palestinian Authority was not attainable in the near future and therefore needed to consider a unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank.
Yadlin said that INSS decided to recommend unilateral action due to an understanding that the PA leadership was not willing to compromise on the right of return for refugees and was also unlikely to recognize Israel's identity as a Jewish state.
"If it turns out that it is not possible to reach an agreement, we need to consider an interim arrangement or alternatively a unilateral step," Barak said at the conference. "Israel cannot permit this to remain in deadlock."

But here's where it gets rich: The 'Palestinians' are unwilling to 'accept' a unilateral withdrawal (also here).

Presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh Wednesday told WAFA that any Israeli unilateral measure leading to the establishment of a state with temporary borders is unacceptable.

Abu Rudeineh’s statements came in response to earlier statements by the Israeli Minister of Defence, Ehud Barak, that Israel should consider unilateral moves and withdrawal from the West Bank if negotiations with the Palestinians failed.
This Israeli policy leads to the continuation of the conflict; it does not lead to a solution, rather it ends the concept of the two-state solution, added Abu Rudeineh.
He emphasized that the Palestinians are “committed to a just and comprehensive solution of a state within 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital and without Jerusalem nothing will be accepted.”

In 2009, we were told that Prime Minister Netanyahu 'needed' Ehud Barak to show that his was not 'just' a rightist government. But Barak now controls only five Knesset seats, and is the leader of a party that is unlikely to pass the threshold in the next Knesset election. And so, unless he is taken into the Likud, he will not even be an MK after November 2013. In light of Barak's continued argument for Leftist positions that most of the current government opposes, and in light of the presence in Netanyahu's own party of Moshe 'Boogie' Yaalon, who is also a former IDF chief of staff, one has to wonder why Barak remains Defense Minister.

Unless, of course, Netanyahu really is a closet Leftist.

FP: As I’ve often written here, Barak is the most decorated utter failure in Israel’s history, and he has learned from experience as much as Obama learned from his. The top existential danger for Israel is not the Arabs or the West, but its own failed elite.
As to Netanyahu, expect him to follow in the steps of Olmert and Sharon. Barak would have not made such a statement without Netanyahu’s knowledge and agreement. I already stated my suspicion that the main purpose of the broader coalition is some “grand gesture” to the Arabs.
Incidentally:

Clinton rejects Barak's unilateral withdrawal
"The United States believes there is no substitute for direct talks between the parties," said the US secretary of state.

Since both the Palestinians and Clinton reject a withdrawal, one cannot help but wondering if that’s not per se a good reason to do it. The West and Palestinians probably realize that if the blessed occupation ends, the Palestinians won’t be able to scapegoat it for their own failures and their real goal will be exposed. It is much more advantageous to use it as an excuse for everything, particularly have the West pressure Israel for suicidal concessions.

But such temptation for withdrawal should be resisted, because without the IDF restraining them, the Arabs won’t be able to resist their own temptation to attack Israel from a much more dangerous position. The world does no longer much care for Israel’s existence and in such circumstances it will, at best, wash its hands of its destruction.


Daniel Greenfield: The Patriotism of Palestinianism (MUST READ)

Each century brings forth its own patriots. Once upon a time we had Patrick Henry, today we have Senator Patrick Leahy, who declared in the Senate that his opposition to an amendment that would  distinguish how much of the UNRWA's funding goes to actual refugees versus fake refugees was a patriotic act.
"I always look at what is in the United States’ interest first and foremost, and this would hurt the United States’ interests,” Senator Leahy stated firmly. It is of course difficult to find as compelling a national interest as the UNRWA, a refugee agency created exclusively for the benefit of five million Arabs, approximately 30,000 of whom are actual refugees, but all of whom hate the United States.
…
As a city which will soon celebrate its 50 year anniversary, Baqa'a is older than many modern Israeli cities and is as much a refugee camp as any of them. The only difference between Baqa'a and Ariel, is that no one in Baqa'a does anything for themselves because they are all eternal refugees with an entire UN agency dedicated to wiping their bottoms for them. A unique and singular honor in a world full of authentic refugees who have been driven out by rape squads and genocide, without getting their own minders in blue.

FP: Since the core of the Arab Israeli conflict is not land, but the right of return, the most effective way to resolve it would have been to count the genuine refugees and treat them just the rest of the refugees in the world. The UNRWA strategy has made the problem unsolvable except by returning them to Israel, which was exactly the intention of the Arabs. The reaction by Leahy and the Department of State before him validates my prediction that counting will happen when pigs fly, now that a frightened West in decline has decided that Israel’s existence is not a priority. The source of US decline—just like that of Israel’s existential danger (see previous)—is its elite.



Bill Katz: ARE YOU BELIEVING THIS?

This is a serious news story:

The Commerce Department is considering naming Arab Americans a socially and economically disadvantaged minority group that is eligible for special business assistance.
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) petitioned Commerce earlier this year to ask that Arab Americans be made eligible for the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), which helps minority entrepreneurs gain access to capital, contracts and trade opportunities.
…
In making the case for minority status, ADC highlighted the National Security Entry Exit Registration System, "which required non-immigrants to register at ports of entry and targeted males from Arab nations; stricter travel guidelines; and ‘no-fly lists’ that predominantly contained the names of Arab-Americans," according to MBDA’s summary of the petition.

I certainly don't favor blind discrimination against anyone, but there are reasons why the actions taken are carried out.  Just as there are reasons why the NYPD has more manpower in certain areas. 
I heard informed comments just a few days ago that when Arab investors and bankers have meetings in New York, American bankers attend in huge numbers, to try to do business.  It is hardly a secret that the Saudi lobby spends vastly more in the United States each year than the Israeli lobby could even dream of.
This petition sounds to me more political than economic.  Individual cases could certainly be heard, but special group rights?  I don't think so.

FP: Europe started to dhimmify itself only after Muslims reached a certain mass and they committed some level of violence to scare the natives. In the US apparently there is no need for those conditions to take for self-dhimmification.



Scott Johnson: The friends of Barack Obama

Haaretz gives us the text, which appears to have been altered slightly since it was originally posted:

Earlier Tuesday afternoon, Obama and White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew met about 20 Conservative Jewish community leaders. …
“I not going to tell you again how I even feel about Israel, but why [are] we still talking about it,” Obama said, reminding his guests that all his friends in Chicago were Jewish – and at the beginning of his political career he was accused of being a puppet of the Israel lobby. …
Obama also stressed he probably knows about Judaism more than any other president, because he read about it – and wondered how come no one asks Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner or Senate minority leader Mitch McConnel [sic] about their support to Israel.”

Bill Kristol makes three points in his midrash, as Obama would call it:

1. The reason no one asks John Boehner or Mitch McConnell about their support for Israel is … because they really do support Israel. The reason people ask Barack Obama about his support for Israel is because his support for Israel has been equivocal.
2. It’s truly pathetic that Obama has to reach for the tired (to say the least) trope that some of his best friends were Jewish. Actually, one wishes more of his best friends were pro-Israel Christians. They might have had more luck convincing him, a fellow Christian, that he should be pro-Israel.
3. And the claim that Obama knows more about Judaism than any president? His vanity boggles the mind. One could begin by citing Adams and Madison, who knew Hebrew, or Harry Truman, who knew Jewish history … but it’s silly to dignify this claim with a rebuttal. In thinking about the presidents since Truman, though, I’d guess the president who knew the most about Judaism was Jimmy Carter, who taught Sunday school and had a deep interest in religion. So let’s stipulate that of the modern presidents, Carter and Obama “know” the most about Judaism. But what is it they know? In Obama’s case, one could ask whether what he “knows” is what he learned from Rashid Khalidi and Jeremiah Wright.

JoshuaPundit’s Obama 'Some Of My Best Friends Are Jews' expands on this:

President Obama certainly does know about Judaism. He knows so much that he threw a Passover seder in the White House featuring non-Kosher food, and made a point of insisting that Israel has no right to Jewish religious sites. He's so immersed in respect for Judaism that he rounded up a horde of sympathetic left wing rabbis for a conference call and insisted that they insert selected talking points supporting ObamaCare into their high Holiday sermons, an almost unbelievable act of sacrilege on the holiest days of the Jewish religion, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

He has so much respect for Jews and Judaism that he proudly attended Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam sponsored Million Man March, one of the worst public displays of outright and overt Jew hatred in American history.

Oh, and his friends? Let's look at President Obama's best friends - people like Reverend Jeremiah Wright ( another buddy of Louis Farrakhan's from way back) , Rashid Khalidi, Khalid al-Mansour, Bill Ayers, Al Sharpton, Edward Said and a host of others who could not be said to be friendly to Jews by any stretch of the imagination.

FP: I concur with Yid wit a Lid "Rabbi Obama" And The Shame Brought By Leaders of Conservative Judaism who can only say about Obama’s blatant lies חרא של פרות! (translated as Cow Sh*t! in English)

I reiterate my earlier comment that Obama expressed how he really feels about Israel at the Chicago party thrown to him by his Arab friends. That’s why the LA Times refuses to release the tape of it to the public. If an American newspaper feels it necessary to go as far as to withhold it, rest assured that there’s something horrible on it. 

Incidentally, Israel government has just decided to recognize and pay Conservative and Reform rabbis in Israel.

Dr. Gabi Avital: Reform or regression?

Why do Reform rabbis want to join a system they despise?

Israelis know why: most religious parties in Israel feed at the public trough.

If the Israeli version of Reform/Conservative Judaism is anything like its American counterpart, that was a very big mistake—more leftism publicly funded. No wonder the left is pleased:

Uzi Baram: The Reform movement saves Judaism

This country is not supposed to represent Orthodoxy alone.

Is it an acceptable price to pay for releasing the chokehold of Orthodoxy on the country? Possibly, but it is a heavy one.



Jake Tapper: President Obama Causes Outrage with Reference to ‘Polish Death Camp’

Poles and Polish-Americans expressed outrage today at President Obama’s reference earlier to “a Polish death camp” — as opposed to a Nazi death camp in German-occupied Poland.

“The White House will apologize for this outrageous error,” Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski tweeted.  Sikorski said that Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk “will make a statement in the morning. It’s a pity that this important ceremony was upstaged by ignorance and incompetence.”

The president had been trying to honor a famous Pole, awarding a Presidential Medal of Freedom to Jan Karski, a resistance fighter who sneaked behind enemy lines to bear witness to the atrocities being committed against Jews. President Obama referred to him being smuggled “into the Warsaw ghetto and a Polish death camp to see for himself.”

Sikorski also tonight tweeted a link to an Economist story noting that “few things annoy Poles more than being blamed for the crimes committed by the Nazi occupiers of their homeland. For many years, Polish media, diplomats and politicians have tried to persuade outsiders to stop using the phrase ‘Polish death camps’ as a shorthand description of Auschwitz and other exemplars of Nazi brutality and mass murder. Unfortunately this seems to have escaped BaracK Obama’s staff seem not to have noticed this.”
…
It seems likely that a more formal apology will need to be issued.

FP: If I were Polish I would not insist on an apology for the following reason:

Debbie Schlussel: Poles Were Complicit in Holocaust: Outrage Over Obama “Gaffe” is Fraudulent, Ignorant

Barack Obama has done enough legitimately bad things that we don’t need to manufacture phony outrage over things he does that really aren’t so bad. Such is the case with the feigned shock and fake moralizing over his comments, yesterday, about German Nazi death camps in Poland being a Polish death camp. Here’s a tip for Poland and ignoramuses in the lumpenconservatariat who now engage in revisionist history: Poles murdered millions of Jews, they maintained several death camps, and they wiped out almost all of both sides of my family, as well as those in hundreds of thousands of other Jewish families. This wasn’t just the Nazis. It was tens of thousands of eager Poles and more. Obama made no gaffe here. Poland’s willing executioners took their significant place among Hitler’s willing executioners.

There is a reason why Poland was so easily occupied by the Germans. Yeah, I know–they were “just taking orders.” Just taking orders when they helped round up Jews and helped man gas chambers. As if Nazis from Germany did this alone! Polish police all too happily worked with the SS to round up Jews. Polish police all too easily took their place in helping run and operate the death camps. Facts are stubborn things. But, sadly, not as stubborn as morons and blind partisans.
…
Are you kidding? Someone needs to remind Mr. Tusk that his people were the ones doing the hurting and the turning over to the Nazis and the mass murder of at least half of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust, some of them from my family. You are “hurt” by calling Nazi death camps, “Polish”???? Um, where were they? Who helped operate them and round up and turn in the camps’ Jewish occupants, soon to be turned into ash and fumes?

There is a reason that President Obama, yesterday, awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously to Jan Karski, the former Polish underground officer who provided early eyewitness accounts of Nazi Germany’s genocide of European Jews. And that’s because Karski was unlike most of his fellow Poles, who hated Jews just as the Nazis did and proudly turned them over to the Nazis and/or participated in the mass murderous Judenrein. Even in the Polish underground, hatred of Jews was legion. My great-uncle was in the Polish underground, until they slit his throat while he was sleeping because, one day, the head of the Polish underground demanded a cleansing of its Jews, too.

No Jew should offer the Poles an apology in the name of America, like JoshuaPundit did.
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UPDATE: I expressed my disagreement with Rob's apology in a comment on his blog thread in which he offered it and he responded with his disagreement with me. Here is the link for those interested: 
http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=16816866&postID=1793664096285744323&page=1&token=1338524619150&isPopup=true
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Unfortunately, that’s not the reason that Obama refuses to apologize, or why he used that expression:

Barry Rubin: If Obama Doesn’t Understand European History He Can’t Get the America’s Future History right

President Barack Obama’s mistaken reference to Nazi German death camps as “Polish death camps” is being ridiculed by critics as an example of incompetence. That misses the point.  The defense is that it was on his teleprompter. That misses the point, too.

After all, you don’t need to be a historical genius to have caught that error even if it was on the teleprompter. I am not suggesting that Obama doesn't know that the Nazi Germans operated the death camps. Nevertheless, what this is really about is that Obama does not see himself as emerging from European history and, truth be told and despite his university degrees, doesn't know much about it.

On one level, that is rather obvious. His father was Kenyan. But, of course, his mother was an American of European descent. Still,  Obama has not chosen to focus on his simultaneously half-African/half-European parentage. He has identified himself as an African-American, and the word African here has to be taken literally, not just as a matter of ancestry from three centuries ago.  The only exception to this stance, I believe, was a reference to Irish ancestry during a visit to that country and a feeble, rather insultingly stereotyped, attempt at an Irish accent.

Forget about this as a matter of race or skin color. Think of it as a matter of geographical choice. Obama draws heavily from Third World standpoints, something quite evident in his choice of church, for example. I cannot recall his ever quoting a European political philosopher. He has never to my knowledge made any reference publicly to Communism. In his books, the emphasis is on feelings, personal experiences, and ideas that come out of his head. 
…
It’s fine to have a president who doesn’t come from a European background personally or physically but not so good to have a president who doesn’t grasp the meaning of modern European history. That’s why they used to have those Western Civilization courses required of every college student, a standard whose loss has been devastating in the production of credentialed ignoramuses.

That’s why neither was Karski honored for his uniqueness or courage. As per a previous post, many of the honorees were selected for electoral purposes.

Looks like Western Civilization without education will not exist for long.



Israel: Iran supporting mass murder in Syria

Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani says Western military intervention in Syria would harm Israel as well • Israeli official responds: "One can only imagine what would happen if Iran possessed nuclear weapons."

FP: If the world does not care about massacred Arabs, can you imagine how much it would care if Jews were massacred?

BTW:

White House: Iran engages in 'malignant behavior' in Syria

Spokesman accuses Iran of "malignant behavior" for propping up Assad; Iran continues to expand "nefarious influence" in region"; Washington tries to convince China, Russia of "horrific" risks of escalation.

If you were Iran, wouldn’t you hold the West in contempt?



Azerbaijan security services foil attack at Eurovision Song Contest

Forty suspects arrested over planned attacks on contest venue and hotels in Baku • Targets included Israeli band Izabo • Band members shocked by the report.

FP: Why exactly are they shocked? Apparently neither Israelis nor the West have internalized the reality of global Jihad.



Israel hands over remains of Palestinian terrorists

Palestinian Authority receives remains of 91 terrorists buried in Israel • All were killed in suicide bombings or other attacks on Israeli targets • Israel hopes the gesture will open the door to resuming peace talks.

FP: My suggestion is to stop filling Israeli jails with murderers who invite the kidnapping of Israelis, play to Western gullibility via hunger strikes while they plan more murders. Produce more bodies with which to make gestures.



Journalists to protest against Blau indictment

Jerusalem Journalists Association plans protest outside Justice Ministry over A-G’s decision to indict Haaretz reporter Uri Blau.

FP: Oh, how prompt they are with Israel, relative to their almost complete silence about what Islamic states do to their journalists.

Comments on reads 5/30 II

Rachel Neuwirth and John Landau: Peter Beinart: Trojan Horse in the Temple

Why are we Jews laying out the red carpet to this man? And why, in general, are we Jews so friendly and deferential to our worst enemies?

One reason is that, despite the efforts of our enemies through the ages to portray us as super-sophisticated criminal masterminds, we Jews are actually very simple-minded and naive, at least where our enemies are concerned.

Beinart professes at every opportunity to love Israel and to even be a “Zionist.” He boasts that he even has an Israeli flag displayed on the wall of his six-year-old son’s room. This seems to render his Jewish audiences oblivious to Beinart’s repetition and endorsement of nearly every element of the Arab world’s anti-Israel narrative and his overwhelmingly negative characterization of Israel as an “undemocratic” society.

Not that Beinart isn’t also a clever debater. His principal tactic is to make so many false or misleading statements all at once that it is impossible to reply to or even to keep track of them all. Inevitably, some of them will sink subliminally into the minds of his audience, if they are the least bit open to suggestion. Also in his arsenal of debating tactics are distortions by omission and false assumptions implied by his tone and the drift of his argument. These methods are especially insidious since they do not require the “lie direct” and make it difficult for the audience to examine the implied assumptions on which they atore based.

FP: Jews, particularly in the Diaspora, like everybody else, have their share of simple-mindedness and naivity, only anti-Semites believe otherwise. Edward Luttwak points in an interview I referred to previously that, in fact, Jews are actually more prone to this:

Why are so many Jews so stupid about politics?

They have not had a state for 2,000 years, they have had no power or responsibility and it will take centuries before they catch up with the instinctive political understanding that any ordinary Englishman has. They don’t understand politics, and of course they confuse their friends and their enemies, and that is the ultimate political proof of imbecility.

Neuwirth and Landau are, therefore correct about Beinart’s audiences:

To return to our initial point, however, the warm welcome accorded to Beinart by Jewish communities and congregations throughout the country is far more worrisome than Beinart’s own remarks, which would make little difference if he were not so readily admitted to Jewish communities like the Trojan Horse inside Troy.  For example, in his introductory remarks to a debate between Beinart and David Suissa at Hollywood’s Temple Israel, John Rosove, the rabbi of the congregation, not only assured his audience of Beinart’s love and loyalty for Israel, but warned them in stern tones never even to question it. By shielding Beinart from any questioning of his motives and objectives for incessantly bashing Israel, Rosove and others acting as hosts for Beinart’s presentations of course give his message a “heksher” (or rabbinical seal of approval). They have accepted the gift borne by the Greeks and brought it into the temple.

But Beinart is neither naive, nor simple-minded. If he were he would believe his arguments  correct and, therefore, would perceive no need to employ those tactics, let alone be able to come up with and be good at them. The fact that he does use them indicates shrewdness in exploiting this Jewish weakness.

One sign that he should not be taken seriously is his notion that displaying an Israeli flag in his son’s room is Zionism.

As I wrote before, Beinart is an opportunist, assimilated lefty. In a trend set by Mearsheimer and Walt—whose intellectual laziness Beinart also emulates--he sensed an anti-Israel atmosphere and jumped on the bandwagon from a failing career to exploit it for fame and fortune.

Want to see real naivity and simple-mindedness (it’s not just Jews, but Westerners in general). Check this out:

Elliott Abrams: Going Directly To The Wastebasket: Another Plan For The “Peace Process”

Some “peace processors” never give up. In The New York Times today, four of them try an old and very bad idea: forget about negotiations, and substitute the views of some un-elected elderly “statesmen” and of the UN Security Council.

FP: When god distributed stupidity, peace processors stood several times in line. Here’s the UN these idiots want to give authority to define peace:

Wonkette: Robert Mugabe, Beacon Of Hope, Appointed Tourism Ambassador By U.N.

Robert Mugabe, yes, that one, the continued monomaniacal leader and premier “land reformer” of Zimbabwe, has a new job! In addition to the old job! Because he is getting bored with reforming land and “winning” elections and having lots of friends do things for him with guns pointed at their heads and wads of worthless cash stuffed down their back pockets. It turns out the United Nations, not even your high school’s model United Nations team, but the real thing, has appointed Mugabe as a “leader for tourism” in the UN’s World Tourism Organization. Is this like when an alcoholic celebrity is asked to do community service? Also, Mugabe is under a travel ban, which makes this extra wonderful.

Hell, those idiots probably they’re just the wise “elders” to be appointed for the job. I guess idiocy is a requirement for UN work. Just consider Annan and Ban.

 

Michael Singh: How Tehran is outflanking Obama

There is an interest that both Iran and the United States hold in common: staving off military action, whether by the U.S. or Israel. From there, however, U.S. and Iranian motivations diverge; understanding this divergence is key to understanding why the talks thus far have failed.

Iranian officials publicly dismiss but likely privately worry about the consequences of war, while U.S. officials often seem more worried about the consequences of military action than about the Iranian nuclear program a strike would be designed to destroy.

…

For Iran, meanwhile, there is little indication that the talks are aimed at building confidence or opening up the broader possibility of U.S.-Iran rapprochement. Indeed, there is ample evidence that the Iranian regime views normal relations with the United States as undesirable, even threatening, while it views a nuclear weapons capability as strategically vital.

Giving up the latter for the former would make little sense to Tehran.

Prolonging the talks serves a threefold purpose for Iran beyond merely buying time or delaying an attack: first, to enhance Iranian prestige by sitting as co

-equal with the world’s great powers and discussing the great regional and global issues of the day; second, to secure tacit acceptance of nuclear advances once deemed unacceptable and third, to gain relief from sanctions without making major concessions.

In this round, Iran appears to have made progress toward the first and second goals, but not the third. Regarding the first, Iran reportedly included in its proposals items relating to Syria and other regional issues — clearly legitimizing its role as a regional power player.

Regarding the second, Iran’s low-level uranium enrichment appears off the table for discussion, and Western analysts now frequently assert that insisting on the full suspension of enrichment and reprocessing by Iran is “unrealistic,” even though it is called for in a series of UN Security Council resolutions.

The focus instead is now on Iran’s 20% enrichment. While the recent discovery of 27%-enriched uranium at Iran’s Fordo facility may have an innocent explanation, it would come as little surprise were Iran to pocket the P5-plus-1 concessions and move the goalposts once again.

FP: Doesn’t it sound much like the Palestinian negotiating strategy? No matter how many time it is subjected to this, the West just does not learn. And am I not right that the West is clueless about its enemies, as Barry Rubin also argues?

 

A Big Tent Society

More and more scholars in the United States are researching the Koran. But they lack a scholarly organization -- and some say they need to travel to Britain for an appropriate scholarly meeting.

This scenario might change in the next few years.

On Tuesday, the Society of Biblical Literature, an organization devoted to the critical study of the Bible, announced that it had received a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to explore the formation of a Society for Qur’anic  Studies. The goal of the three-year, $140,000 project is to set up a society that could provide support to scholars of the Koran beyond the institutions they work for, with the goal of encouraging more collaborative research, holding conferences, publishing a journal and offering other kinds of professional support, such as career development.

The organization would, in many ways, resemble established scholarly groups such as the American Historical Association or the Modern Language Association, officials said. They stressed that the agenda of this new organization would not be determined by the Society of Biblical Literature, which would only provide some infrastructure.

FP: Heh, heh, good luck. You can certainly engage in a critical study of the bible, but try to do that with the Quran. That’s probably one reason why such an organization has not existed to date. Just watch how it is taken over by Islamists.

 

Diseases Grow at Psychiatry Meeting–Thanks to Big Pharma

The first week in May brought a new leader in France and new prospects for same sex couples seeking marriage. But at the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting in Philadelphia, attended by 11,000 psychiatrists, it was the same old same old. Instead of listening to the public outcry about overmedicated children, soldiers, elderly and everyday people watching too many drug ads, the psychiatry group re-affirmed its resolve to pathologize healthy people and even rolled out new groups to target.

This is the year the APA puts the finishing touches on DSM-5, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, a compendium that determines what treatments insurers will cover, what disorders merit funding as "public health" threats and of course, Pharma marketing and profits. Some question the objectivity of a disorder manual written by those who stand to benefit from an enlarged patient pool and new diseases. Furthering the appearance of self-dealing is the revelation that 57 percent of the DSM-5's authors have Pharma links.

No kidding. Present at this year's meeting were former APA president Alan F. Schatzberg, MD and Charles Nemeroff, MD, both investigated by Congress for murky Pharma income. Schatzberg and Nemeroff are co-editors of the APA-published Textbook of Psychopharmacology whose 2009 edition cites the work of Richard Borison, MD former psychiatry chief at the Augusta Veterans Affairs medical center who was sentenced to 15 years in prison for a $10 million clinical trial fraud. Also present was S. Charles Schulz, MD, who was investigated for financial links to AstraZeneca believed to alter his scientific conclusions.

FP: Part and parcel of decline.

 

RECOMMENDED READS

CAMERA: Citizen Klein and the East Jerusalem Citizenship Stats

Melanie Phillips: Zionism and bigotry

Dennis Ross: Saudi king vowed to obtain nuclear bomb after Iran

Israeli researchers: Group of Colorado Indians have genetic Jewish roots

Comments on reads 5/30

Matt Taibbi: SEC: Taking on Big Firms is 'Tempting,' But We Prefer Whaling on Little Guys

FP: Do yourself a favor and read Taibbi’s latest if you want to disabuse yourself of the illusion of the US being a capitalist, competitive free market economy. You will have to pinch yourself.

 

Bill Katz: NOTHING, JUST NOTHING

The United States and some other western countries have responded to the latest Syrian massacre by expelling some Syrian diplomats.  This is an insult to the dead, a minor slap on the wrist for a major murder.  And clownish former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan added to the farce by saying how pleased he was that Syrian President Assad also condemned the killings...even though Assad's forces carried them out.  It is pathetic, just pathetic, and there's a complete absence of American leadership.  Watching carefully is the Iranian regime, a close ally of Syria, which must be very pleased.

FP: To all those who doubt that the West as a power is finished. And here’s is mre evidence of US decline Obama gave out the Medal of Freedom at the White House yesterday, Is education too important to be left to the educators? (more on this last one in the next post).

 

JoshuaPundit: Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood Candidate: Christians Must "Convert, Pay Tribute, or Leave"

According to the Egyptian website, El Bashayer, Muhammad Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate, has declared that he will "achieve the Islamic conquest (fath) of Egypt for the second time, and make all Christians convert to Islam, emigrate or else pay the jizya," the financial tribute required of dhimmis (non-Muslims) living under Muslim rule.

Morsi reportedly made these comments in an interview at the headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, adding "We will not allow Ahmed Shafiq [his contending presidential candidate] or anyone else to impede our second Islamic conquest of Egypt."

When asked what he thought about many Christian Copts coming out to vote for his secular opponent, Ahmed Shafiq, Morsi reportedly said, "They need to know that conquest is coming, and Egypt will be Islamic, and that they must pay jizya or emigrate."

Now it's important to note two things. First, that this is a secular leaning website rather than an Islamist one and second that Morsi is normally cagey enough to keep these sentiments to himself, although there's no question that this is standard Muslim Brotherhood dogma.

Either he thought he was speaking to a fellow Islamist, or he is so confident of victory that he no longer feels he has to hide these sentiments until after the election.

FP: If there is one thing that works against Islamists is their tendency is to overreach; their supremacist-triumphalist instinct is difficult for them to control. But Mursi does have good grounds for confidence: he and the other Islamist candidate had together almost 50% of the voters. A candidate from the Mubarak old regime may be too much for the left candidate and they may well stay home. And this high-stakes situation is precisely when the formidable MB organization can be critical.

I will reiterate two core points (1) there is no constituency in the Arab world for Western style democracy (2) even if a secular president is elected and the army maintains some control, the Islamist parliament a free to act MB will over time Islamize the institutions—public, private, educational, military. The rest is conversation.

 

Debbie Schlussel: Want a Mosque Next Door to Your House? What if it Produced 2-3 Islamic Terrorists?

Would you want a mosque that bred 2-3 Islamic terrorists–including one that massacred several college students and two others that plotted to mass murder many other innocent civilians–in your neighborhood? How ’bout right next door in a bigfoot mosque where a small house used to be?

…

The picture shows Mohammad Labadi, a board member for the Islamic Society of Northern Illinois University standing in front of a DeKalb house that is currently a mosque. He and the mosque members want to expand this house into a giant mosque. Note that there is a house next door and that it’s in the middle of a neighborhood. Would you want that in your neighborhood? Think the presence of a giant mosque smack dab in the middle of your street will enhance property values? Wanna hear the call to prayer at 4:30 in the morning or 11:30 at night?

These people trying to expand have utter chutzpah. But they have it because we let them. Because we are too wimpy to say no, and when we do, the few brave ones who fight the good fight are persecuted and excluded by everyone else.

And that’s not to mention Steven Kazmierczak, who in February 2008 committed a murderous massacre against Northern Illinois University students, killing five and injuring 21 before he committed suicide. As I reported on this site, this terrorist, Kazmierczak, apparently converted to Islam at NIU and was reportedly converted by and prayed at this same mosque. Kazmierczak learned Arabic and was doing a college paper in favor of HAMAS, which he supported. Where do you think he learned all of this? At the mosque.

Then, there’s Derrick Shareef, an Islamic terrorist who plotted to blow up an Illinois shopping mall and shoot up Jews at a synagogue. Guess where he prayed? Same mosque in DeKalb. Shareef’s roommate , Hassan Abujihaad, plotted to murder American military personnel while he served aboard a US Navy ship. So now it’s possibly three Islamic terrorists influenced by this mosque. Praise allah. Authorities, by the way, called each of three of these terrorists, a “lone wolf,” but apparently they weren’t so lonely or alone. It appears they had the commonality of this mosque. The mosque is a Muslim Student Union outfit–yup, the US branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. Want that in your neighborhood?

…

Hilarious. The ACLU is suddenly concerned about “all faiths.” Problem is, it constantly works against every faith EXCEPT its target for butt-snorkeling, Islam. Um, what about the civil liberty to enjoy your home and property without a gazillion HAMAS supporters crowding your street and waking you up at all hours all of the time?

FP: This is how things started in Europe and look where they are now. Note also that this happens in an academic institution, where there’s young minds to indoctrinate. And what facilitates this is self-dhimmification.

 

Israel Matzav: Obama paying for African illegals to defecate in Israel's streets, but much of the money is disappearing

In case you're wondering why many Israelis aren't happy about our illegal immigrants, take a close look at the picture. It was taken on the streets of Tel Aviv....

The Israeli web site Kr8 (link in Hebrew) reports that the Obama administration is sending between $1,000 and $2,000 per month per illegal immigrant to Israel via the United Nations. Why this money is being sent via the UN is not clear, but what is clear is that a lot of it is being skimmed off the top. Kr8 reports that Israel is paying NIS 1,500 per month for rent, and approximately NIS 180-200 per month for health insurance. Both items should cost a lot more than that.

…

But it gets worse. Kr8 also reports that American tax free foundations (it names the Ford Foundation but there are presumably others) are donating money to the New Israel Fund, which is organizing the illegals. You know, community organizing. Kr8 goes on to speculate about connections between the Ford Foundation and the CIA, and the possibility that the illegals may be used in the future to foment a rebellion against Israel.

And then there is this from JDL UK:

What is fairly well known is that the police bring the 'refugees' from the Egypt/Israel border, right up, all the way to south Tel Aviv, the central bus station. But that's not all. What else is now coming to light, is that with these funds, these illegals are somehow opening businesses and will soon start their own newspaper!

There is further testimony in the audio interview in which it is alleged government inspectors frequently close down illegal Jewish-owned businesses, but not the illegal businesses belonging to the illegal immigrants.

This financial improbability of all this likely hints towards further sources of funding, which as yet are undetected.

FP: In a previous post I expressed concern that with Sinai becoming a play area for Bedouins and Al-Qaeda, they may resort to pumping Israel full of migrants as a way to undermine its existence. Little did I know that Obama is funding the migrants and via the UN. This alone should serve as a red flag. The Obama administration has already made displeasure noises about how Israel treats the migrants. Don’t be surprised if Obama, the UN and EU demand to keep the migrants and give them full resident rights, and even forbid their deportation.

 

'Israel should consider opening humanitarian corridor to Syria''

Vice Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz says Israel must think of ways to help Syrian civilians • More countries expel Syrian diplomats over Houla massacre • France says it won't rule out military intervention as long as the U.N. Security Council approves it.

FP: Any involvement by Israel or the West in an intra-Arab/Muslim conflict would be a blunder and “no good deed will go unpunished”.

 

RECOMMENDED READS

Daniel Greenfield: Nocturne in Black and White

CAMERA: A Gross Manipulation

Comments on reads 5/29 II

Daniel Pipes: Count Palestine Refugees?

Worse: those alive in 1948 are dying off and in about fifty years not a single real refugee will remain alive, whereas (extrapolating from an authoritative estimate in Refugee Survey Quarterly by Mike Dumper) their fake refugee descendants will number about 20 million. Unchecked, that population will grow like Topsy until the end of time.

This matters because the refugee status has harmful effects: It blights the lives of these millions of non-refugees by disenfranchising them while imposing an ugly, unrealistic irredentist dream on them; worse, the refugee status preserves them as a permanent dagger aimed at Israel's heart, threatening the Jewish state and disrupting the Middle East.

The fetid, dark heart of the Arab war on Israel, I have long argued, lies not in disputes over Jerusalem, checkpoints, or "settlements." Rather, it concerns the so-called Palestine refugees.

So called because of the nearly 5 million official refugees served by UNRWA (short for the "United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East"), only about 1 percent are real refugees who fit the agency's definition of "people whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict." The other 99 percent are descendants of those refugees, or what I call fake refugees.

FP: Indeed, the core of the conflict are the refugees, because short of a military victory, or effective Western pressure on Israel to commit suicide, the right of return is the only way to destroy the Jewish state, which is the true strategic goal of the Arabs. Pipes also notes, as I did earlier, that there are a lot of fake refugees with their own descendants.

There are already too many of them to be effectively resettled in a Palestinian state, something which they are not particularly keen on. Resettling them in place can destabilize and change the character of Arab states (this is obvious for Lebanon and Jordan); no Arab state is interested in digesting millions of frustrated, militarized Palestinians. Surveys show that they would prefer to resettle in the West, which already has serious immigrant problems and don’t need any exacerbation.

Which is why the right of return to Israel is the most convenient option for all and why the West does not care much anymore if Israel survives. And as Pipes observes, the more time passes, that option turns from the most convenient option to the only alternative.

 

Israel Matzav: A constitution by judicial fiat?

In an article that is behind the JPost's paywall, Evelyn Gordon examines the Israeli Supreme Court's efforts to legislate a constitution. I got this one by email and will post most of it.

Former Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch made a truly shocking comment last week. Speaking at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, she began, reasonably enough, by arguing that Israel needs a complete constitution to protect democracy and human rights. Then came the bombshell: “She said that the goal of completing a constitution could either be undertaken by the court itself through its decisions or by the Knesset through passing additional Basic Laws,” The Jerusalem Post reported.

In short, our former Supreme Court president thinks “democracy” is perfectly compatible with having unelected judges write a constitution and then impose it by fiat. In real democracies, constitutions require ratification by the people or their elected representatives. But Beinisch evidently prefers Soviet-style democracy, in which unelected officials makes the real decisions while the “elected legislature” is merely for show.

FP: I was always suspicious of Israel’s Supreme Court in the absence of a constitution and its constant ability to undermine governments and the Knesset validated my suspicion. What is considered in America judicial activism is nothing compared with that.

 

Jacques Neriah: Al-Qaeda and the Jihadists Join the Battle against the Syrian Regime

• The battle over Syria has descended into sectarian strife led by extreme Salafists and other Islamic splinter organizations in a carefully orchestrated uprising coordinated and fueled by al-Qaeda operatives.

• The Syrian National Council, the main opposition group, could well be in a process of disintegration, as the Free Syrian Army (FSA) did not recognize its authority. Yet the FSA is no longer the sole force in the fight against Assad.

• As in Egypt, in Syria the Muslim Brothers have succeeded in appropriating (some would call it hijacking) the revolt and ultimately becoming its backbone. Moreover, Muslim fighters from around the globe are coming to join the ranks in the battle against Assad.

• The gradual transformation of the Syrian opposition into a movement led by extremist Muslims allied with al-Qaeda does not serve the opposition well. The majority of Syrians do not identify with those radicals. The more the opposition wears the mask of al-Qaeda, the more there is cohesion in the ranks around Assad.

• Recent street fighting in Tripoli, Lebanon, between Alawites and Sunnis is a reflection of the wider war between two alliances, with Syria, Iran, and Hizbullah opposed by an alliance led by Saudi Arabia and its allies, including its Salafist and Muslim fundamentalist troops.

• In addition, the battle over the future of Syria is symptomatic of the revival of the Cold War between the West – with the U.S., UK, France, and Turkey backing the anti-Assad forces – and Russia, steadfast behind the Alawite regime.

FP: It was predictable and it is exactly what I predicted. I used the term “Arabs reverting to their natural state”, which Luttwak also uses in his interview.

 

Robert Fisk: The West is horrified by children's slaughter now. Soon we'll forget

But the Middle East is littered with a hundred Houlas, their dead children piled among the statistics, with knives and ropes as well as guns among the murder weapons. And what if Assad's soldiers let their Alawite militia do their dirty work? Didn't the Algerian FLN regime use "home guard" units to murder its opponents in the 1990s? Didn't Gaddafi have his loyalist militias last year, and Mubarak his jailbird drugged-up ex-cops, the baltagi, to bash opponents of his regime? Didn't Israel use its Lebanese Phalangist proxies to intimidate and kill its opponents in Lebanon? Wasn't this, too, "rule by murder"? And come to think of it, wasn't it Bashar al-Assad's uncle Rifaat's Special Forces who massacred the insurgents of Hama in 1982 – speak this not too loudly, for Rifaat lives now between Paris and London – and so who thinks Bashar can't get away with Houla?

FP: Do you notice something that is out of pattern? Well, Fisk just cannot help himself. He cannot possibly expose the murderous nature of Arabs without taking a stab at Israel too. One may question whether the comportment of Israel allowing Lebanese Christians to enter camps and massacre Palestinians, but this was clearly an inter-Arab event that validates the flaw in Arab culture that does not exist in the Israeli culture.

 

CAMERA: Mainliners Speak Truth to Jewish, Not Arab and Muslim Power

If you have a tough time understanding this statement, here it is in plain English:

1. Yes, our public witness about the Middle East is pretty one-sided, but we do a lot of stuff behind the scenes that doesn't make it onto our website. Trust us.

2. Palestinian Christians ask us to make a lot of statements about Israel, so we do.

3. Christians elsewhere in the Middle East don't want us to speak up about abuses in their countries because it might make people, Muslims especially, angry, so we don't.

With this statement, Global Ministries tacitly acknowledges that will speak truth to Jewish, but not Muslim or Arab power. With its one-sided witness, the organization rewards hostage taking on a grand scale. Countries where Christians are murdered and oppressed by Islamists on a regular basis are given a pass for fear that criticism will encourage more violence against these communities – as if violence isn't already a problem. Israel on the other hand, is regularly condemned because it is safe to do so.

Eventually, human rights activists will have to come to grips with the role Islamist violence plays in distorting indigenous Christian witness about peace and human rights issues in the Middle East. Christians living under the threat of Islamist violence have every reason to stay quiet about the misdeeds of the rulers who can either protect or oppress them and have every reason to exaggerate the sins of the Jewish state, which has become the designated scapegoat in the region. By pointing the finger of blame at the Jewish state, these Christians can achieve a modicum of safety, at least for the short term.

By cooperating with this process, Global Ministries and other mainline institutions encourage the spread of a culture of impunity – which is so evident in places like Egypt and Iraq – into the international arena.

FP: This is not much different than the Catholic Church’s silence during the Holocaust in order to protect its interests and members in Germany. And they keep telling us that religion is the principal if not the sole source of morality and truth.

 

Israel Matzav: US Commerce Department to label Arab-Americans a 'disadvantaged minority'?

Silly me. I thought the influence of Arab Americans in the US was based upon their middle and upper class status. Apparently not. The US Commerce Department is now considering labeling Arab-Americans a 'disadvantaged minority' (Hat Tip: Joe L).

The Commerce Department is considering naming Arab Americans a socially and economically disadvantaged minority group that is eligible for special business assistance.The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) petitioned Commerce earlier this year to ask that Arab Americans be made eligible for the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), which helps minority entrepreneurs gain access to capital, contracts and trade opportunities.

The ADC petition cited “discrimination and prejudice in American society[,] resulting in conditions under which Arab-American individuals have been unable to compete in a business world.” The group claimed discrimination against Arab Americans increased after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

You have until June 27 to let the Commerce Department know how you feel about this.

FP: I was wondering what took them so long.

Wall Street ditches Obama, backs Romney

Deep-pocketed financiers have abandoned President Obama and are flocking to Mitt Romney in droves, providing more donations to his campaign than any other industry except retired workers. (And that's not really an industry.)

Individuals who work in the securities and investment industry have given the Romney campaign $8.5 million through the end of April, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

Over the same time period, Obama has brought in only $3 million from securities and investment workers, and the industry is only the campaign's fifth largest source of funds.

"They have basically ditched Obama," said John Dunbar, the managing editor for politics at the Center for Public Integrity. "Romney is just a much friendlier candidate if you are a banker."

FP: No matter who is president, Wall Street rules. I still think Obama will be re-elected, and if he is don’t expect him to go against Wall Street.

 

Cell Tower Deaths and The Six Billion Dollar Bet

 

 

 

FP: The dark side of the corporate welfare state. Examples of capitalist senility.

 

RECOMMENDED READS

Bret Stephens: On Iran, We'll Probably Get Fooled Again

Of marbles and men

George Friedman: Egypt Now Stuck Between Army and Islamists

Comments on reads 5/29

Barry Rubin: How Can Obama’s Middle East Policy Possibly Get Worse? Answer: Look at Syria

The U.S. government’s main activity was to entrust to the Turkish Islamist regime the job of forming an umbrella Syrian opposition leadership. Not surprisingly, Ankara pursued its own interest by assembling a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated group, the Syrian National Congress. Though several members resigned, complaining of the radical Islamist control, the Obama Administration is still trying to force hostile oppositionists to join.

Now a new and equally terrible policy is unveiled. I’ll let the New York Times’ reporters explain it:

“President Obama will push for the departure of President Bashar al-Assad under a plan that calls for a negotiated political settlement that would satisfy Syrian opposition groups but that could leave remnants of Assad’s government in place. The success of the plan hinges on Russia, one of Assad’s staunchest allies, which has strongly opposed his removal. Obama, administration officials said, will press the proposal with President Putin of Russia at their meeting next month. Obama’s national security adviser raised the plan with Putin in Moscow three weeks ago.”

…

– “The success of the plan hinges on Russia, one of Assad’s staunchest allies, which has strongly opposed his removal.”

Just think about that sentence! The Obama Administration wants to depend on a country that’s disdainful of U.S. interests, wants to sabotage them, and is on the opposite side! The president wants to ask a country that is “strongly opposed” Assad’s removal to remove Assad!

And finally, equally amazingly:

“Obama, administration officials said, will press the proposal with President Putin of Russia at their meeting next month. Obama’s national security adviser raised the plan with Putin in Moscow three weeks ago.”

It’s Obama, not Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who is pushing this plan to put Russia in control! If your enemy tries to fool or cheat you, that’s a problem. If you beg him and hand him the means to do so, that’s a betrayal of U.S. interests.

…

But so what? It’s still possible to come up with a better policy than this, a policy that would make Obama look good as well as serve U.S. interests. He could call for Assad’s overthrow; back truly moderate oppositionists; subvert Islamist influence; and send arms and money, but only to the moderates. In order to portray himself as decisive, heroic, and a friend of democracy, Obama could take every possible overt and covert opportunity to weaken Assad, even helping at a low cost to create a no-fly zone and safe havens. None of this is going to happen.

FP: Obama’s Syrian policy is atrocious, but it was predictable and is hardly surprising. The entire ME is now in turmoil and extremely hostile to American interests as a result of American decline accelerated by an incompetent, narcissistic president who is himself not exactly a fan of the US. Having either stood by or facilitated the Islamization of regimes across the ME and lost credibility with both friends and enemies, a bankrupt US has neither the power nor the influence on which it used to rely to prevent exactly these current circumstances, which I I have labeled The PostWest. A waning superpower has many sharks in the water and the instinct is to treat enemies as friends in the delusion that they will be kind to it.

So while I agree with Rubin that Obama’s policies are atrocious, I do not think that any of the alternatives he suggests would have made much of a difference, because they are based on an illusion of power.

Here’s more evidence:

With new indictment, Erdogan seeks to 'crush ties to Israel'

Turkish high criminal court unanimously upholds indictments against four Israeli military officers for their alleged involvement in 2010 raid on flotilla killing nine Turks • Former IDF chief Lt. Gen. (res.) Gabi Ashkenazi: I won't visit Turkey.

Erdogan’s ability to veto Israel’s participation at the NATO conference is already an indicator of  American weakness. What is more, Israel’s TV has reported that the US has conditioned the supply of drones to the Turkish army on Turkey’s repairing relations with Israel. Erdogan’s response was to take the legal action against top Israeli officers.

Now this:

PM defends IDF officers indicted by Turkish court

Former No. 3 at Pentagon calls on Israel to act 'more strategically' and reconcile with Turkey; Liberman tells visiting German president that Ankara cannot "intimidate" IDF officers.

Draw your own conclusion.

 

Poll: 80% of Palestinian believe PA is corrupt

If new Palestinian elections were held today, West Bank's ruling Fatah faction would still win, survey reveals.

FP: The choice Palestinians have is either corruption, Islamism or both. They’re as ready as they will ever be. Let’s give them a state.

 

Brotherhood candidate vows freedom for women

Mursi says there will be "no imposition on women to wear the veil" should he win in next month's run-off elections.

FP: And those who believe this, I have a bridge in Brooklyn and a tower in Paris to sell you. With Carter assuring that the MB will preserve the peace treaty, we have nothing to worry about: this has nothing to do with the election, they are really moderate.

 

Shin Bet uncovers prisoner plot to kidnap Israelis

Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails hatched plan with former prisoners to kidnap Israelis as bargaining chips for their release.

FP: Let’s improve their conditions. And let’s release more than 1000 prisoners in future exchange deals.

 

Ya'alon hints at Israeli role in 'Flame' virus

Israel's superior technology "opens up all kinds of possibilities," says vice premier on new virus found attacking Iran.

In comments that could be construed as suggesting that Israel is behind the "Flame" virus, the latest piece of malicious software to attack Iranian computers, Vice Premier Moshe Ya'alon on Tuesday said that "whoever sees the Iranian threat as a serious threat would be likely to take different steps, including these, in order to hurt them."

Speaking in an interview with Army Radio, Ya'alon further hinted that Jerusalem was behind the cyber attack, saying "Israel is blessed to be a nation possessing superior technology. These achievements of ours open up all kinds of possibilities for us."

FP: Israeli leaders are increasingly all blabbermouths and no action—when you do nothing you must keep talking to obscure the lack of action.

The West is much more dependent on technology than its enemies and is more vulnerable to software attacks.

 

Bill Katz: CHRISTIANS STONED IN FRANCE

A group of  "North African youths" invaded a church in France yesterday and launched handfuls of pebbles at about 150 parishioners.  Fortunately, no one was seriously injured, but the "youths" escaped.  Coming to a country near you, unless we abandon this childlike "acceptance" of every "culture" that comes down the pike.  Sadly, France just elected a socialist government whose supporters are still in the "we must understand" phase of adolescence.

FP: Oh, they will understand alright. When it’s too late.

 

State ordered to fund non-Orthodox community rabbis

Attorney-general tells government that it will have to fund non-Orthodox community rabbis according to local demand • Petition originally made in 2005 by Israel Religious Action Center and female rabbi whose community funds her salary.

FP: As an anti-theist I against any funding of religion by the state, but an effective way to loosen the Orthodox choke on Israel political system is to promote the conservative and reform versions of Judaism, and give them the same status, which would also help with aliyah.

 

Navy deploys to protect natural gas finds off Israel's coast

As hopes grow for Israel’s gas reserves at sea, some worry how the navy can protect the facilities from Hezbollah attacks • "We will do our best, but without a major boost to our capabilities, our best will not be enough," says senior military planner.

FP: As soon as the gas reserves were discovered at sea I expressed concern that this will tempt its enemies, who are in dire economic straits, to instigate attacks. I doubt that the West has even an inkling of strategic thinking to realize its own interest in supporting Israel in such an eventuality.

 

Jan Karski, from hell on earth to US presidential honor

Karski was able to secure a meeting with British Foreign Minister Anthony Eden, but Eden showed little interest in Karski’s account of the slaughter of the Jews. The prime minister, Winston Churchill, was said to be too busy to see him at all. Karski did succeed in generating a number of sympathetic reports in the British press and BBC Radio.

The enterprising young Pole arrived in the United States in July 1943. One of his first meetings was with Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter. Karski described the Warsaw Ghetto, the Izbica transit station, and the systematic annihilation of European Jewry. Frankfurter’s response: “I am unable to believe you.”

On July 28, the young Polish courier met with President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in the Oval Office, for more than an hour. Karski began by describing the activities of the Polish underground. The president listened with fascination, asked questions and offered unsolicited advice, some of it a bit eccentric — such as his idea of putting skis on small airplanes to fly underground messengers between England and Poland during the winter. But when Karski related details of the mass killings of the Jews, Roosevelt had nothing to say. The president was, as Karski politely put it, “rather noncommittal.”

FP: You want to bet this is exactly what’ll happen if Israel or Jews around the world get in trouble?

The New USSR (MUST WATCH!)

 

 

FP: I have referred several times here to the abomination that is the EU. This film demonstrates how right I was.

There are two important aspects. One is that the EU has much more to do with the decline of Europe and its Islamization than hits the eye.

But more importantly the other is that while the Soviet republics were coerced into the USSR at the barrel of guns, the European states have surrendered their sovereignty and rights of their own volition. Of course, the choice was not exactly the public’s in each country, but of their politicians who, under their nation’s laws, do not have the authority for surrendering to what is essentially an unelected foreign power. What is more, not only did the publics that signed the EU treaties were lied to, but some of them voted against the treaties and the treaties were cosmetically improved to reverse those votes too.

Which goes to show that (1) the anti-democratic instinct of all politicians is not much different than the bolsheviks’ and (2) they never learn that succumbing to this instinct is destructive via incompetence, coercion and corruption—the very forces that destroyed the USSR on the left and Nazi Germany on the right.

 

RECOMMENDED BOOKS

The Monster: How a Gang of Predatory Lenders and Wall Street Bankers Fleeced America--and Spawned a Global Crisis (9780312610531): Michael W. Hudson: Books