Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Auld Lang Zion
1. Auld Lang Zion
Should auld accomplice be forgot,
And never brought to trial?
Should auld Osloids, friend, be forgot,
In days of auld lang Zion?
For betraying auld lang Zion, my dear,
For abasing auld lang Zion.
Should their accomplice be forgot,
In days of auld lang Zion?
We yids hae run aboot the world,
Under fire the whole time.
We've wandered mony a weary foot,
To reach auld lang Zion.
Save auld lang Zion, my dear,
Save auld lang Zion,
Indict those Oslo blaggards, dear,
For the sake of auld lang Zion!!!
2. Wall Street Journal: Israel's Right in the 'Disputed' Territories
By DANNY AYALON
The recent statements by the European Union's new foreign relations chief Catherine Ashton criticizing Israel have once again brought international attention to Jerusalem and the settlements. However, little appears to be truly understood about Israel's rights to what are generally called the "occupied territories" but what really are "disputed territories."
That's because the land now known as the West Bank cannot be considered "occupied" in the legal sense of the word as it had not attained recognized sovereignty before Israel's conquest. Contrary to some beliefs there has never been a Palestinian state, and no other nation has ever established Jerusalem as its capital despite it being under Islamic control for hundreds of years.
The name "West Bank" was first used in 1950 by the Jordanians when they annexed the land to differentiate it from the rest of the country, which is on the east bank of the river Jordan. The boundaries of this territory were set only one year before during the armistice agreement between Israel and Jordan that ended the war that began in 1948 when five Arab armies invaded the nascent Jewish State. It was at Jordan's insistence that the 1949 armistice line became not a recognized international border but only a line separating armies. The Armistice Agreement specifically stated: "No provision of this Agreement shall in any way prejudice the rights, claims, and positions of either Party hereto in the peaceful settlement of the Palestine questions, the provisions of this Agreement being dictated exclusively by military considerations." (Italics added.) This boundary became the famous "Green Line," so named because the military officials during the armistice talks used a green pen to draw the line on the map.
After the Six Day War, when once again Arab armies sought to destroy Israel and the Jewish state subsequently captured the West Bank and other territory, the United Nations sought to create an enduring solution to the conflict. U.N. Security Council Resolution 242 is probably one of the most misunderstood documents in the international arena. While many, especially the Palestinians, push the idea that the document demands that Israel return everything captured over the Green Line, nothing could be further from the truth. The resolution calls for "peace within secure and recognized boundaries," but nowhere does it mention where those boundaries should be.
It is best to understand the intentions of the drafters of the resolution before considering other interpretations. Eugene V. Rostow, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs in 1967 and a drafter of the resolution, stated in 1990: "Security Council Resolution 242 and (subsequent U.N. Security Council Resolution) 338... rest on two principles, Israel may administer the territory until its Arab neighbors make peace; and when peace is made, Israel should withdraw to "secure and recognized borders," which need not be the same as the Armistice Demarcation Lines of 194."
Lord Caradon, the British U.N. Ambassador at the time and the resolution's main drafter who introduced it to the Council, said in 1974 unequivocally that, "It would have been wrong to demand that Israel return to its positions of June 4, 1967, because those positions were undesirable and artificial."
The U.S. ambassador to the U.N. at the time, former Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg, made the issue even clearer when he stated in 1973 that, "the resolution speaks of withdrawal from occupied territories without defining the extent of withdrawal." This would encompass "less than a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from occupied territory, inasmuch as Israel's prior frontiers had proven to be notably insecure."
Even the Soviet delegate to the U.N., Vasily Kuznetsov, who fought against the final text, conceded that the resolution gave Israel the right to "withdraw its forces only to those lines it considers appropriate."
After the war in 1967, when Jews started returning to their historic heartland in the West Bank, or Judea and Samaria, as the territory had been known around the world for 2,000 years until the Jordanians renamed it, the issue of settlements arose. However, Rostow found no legal impediment to Jewish settlement in these territories. He maintained that the original British Mandate of Palestine still applies to the West Bank. He said "the Jewish right of settlement in Palestine west of the Jordan River, that is, in Israel, the West Bank, Jerusalem, was made unassailable. That right has never been terminated and cannot be terminated except by a recognized peace between Israel and its neighbors." There is no internationally binding document pertaining to this territory that has nullified this right of Jewish settlement since.
And yet, there is this perception that Israel is occupying stolen land and that the Palestinians are the only party with national, legal and historic rights to it. Not only is this morally and factually incorrect, but the more this narrative is being accepted, the less likely the Palestinians feel the need to come to the negotiating table. Statements like those of Lady Ashton's are not only incorrect; they push a negotiated solution further away.
Mr. Ayalon is the deputy foreign minister of Israel.
3. Texas terrorist had some curious reading preferences: http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2009/12/why-did-nidal-hasan-read-the-middle-east-forum
4. This reads like a Plaut spoof, but it is for real: http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2009/12/27/avatar-the-spiritual-progressive-movie-of-the-decade/ and companion piece: http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2009/12/28/avatar-and-whiteness/
And this one is even funnier: http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2009/12/26/the-seven-moral-principles-of-kwanzaa/
5. A different Dayenu: http://www.jewishpress.com/pageroute.do/41995
6. Repost of old item: Israel's Music Man
The Israeli Labor Party recently selected Ehud Barak, who had been prime minister from 1999 to 2001, to serve as its party chief and contender for prime minister in the next election, probably in 2008.
Barak has always been associated in my mind with music - as well as the incredibly harmful policies he has advocated since entering politics. True, Barak was a military hero. He even entered Beirut disguised as a woman to assassinate terrorists, a scene recorded in the movie "Munich." You can imagine how many jokes at his expense that triggered.
But once he left the army, he went out shopping for political ideas and ended up buying the silliest ones available on the Shimon Peres/Oslo vintage clothing rack. He attempted to turn the Golan Heights over to Syria, which would have allowed the Syrian military to advance to the shores of the Sea of Galilee. This inspired me at the time to write a parody of an old Bobby Darin classic, with Ehud Barak singing "Splish Splash I was taking a Ba'ath."
It continued: "Splish, Splash! I jumped back in the bath. Well how was I to knowt here was appeasement going on?"
Later, due to Barak's disastrous policies as prime minister and his attempt to hand over Jerusalem to the PLO savages, a new song seemed called for. Barak had just been creamed in a landslide electoral defeat by Ariel Sharon. The new piece was to the tune of Harry Belafonte's "Banana Boat Song." It went:
EH HOOD, day EH EH HOOD
Ehud's done and we wan him go home
EH, he say EH, he say EH, he say EH,
he say EH, he say EH-ay-ay-HOOD
Ehud's done and we wan him go home
They shoots all night from ole Ramallah
(Ehud's done and we wan him go home)
As all night he wave white bandana
(Ehud's done and we wan him go home)
Come, Mr. Tally Mon, tally me election
Ehud's done and we wan him go home
Come, Mr. Tally Mon, tally the rejection
Ehud's done and we wan him go home
Barak is often proclaimed by the media to be the "most decorated Israeli general." But last summer he effectively dropped 4,000 Katyusha rockets on northern Israel, because those attacks were a direct result of his having ordered Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon.
And now Barak is desperately looking for a new campaign jingle. Being a helpful sort, I thought I would give him a hand.
To understand the new song, you need to recall that in 1998 Barak declared: "I imagine that if I were a Palestinian of the right age, I would, at some stage, have joined one of the terror organizations."
My proposed campaign song for Reb Ehud is based on the wonderful "If I Were a Rich Man" from "Fiddler on the Roof." (Unfortunately Tevye is not running for prime minister.)
Ready? Here goes!
Dear God, you made so many, many cowardly people.
I realize, of course, that it's no shame to be a coward.
But it's no great honor, either!
So, what would have been so terrible if
I had a small dose of gumption?
(music)
If I were a terrorist,
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
All day long I'd biddy biddy bomb.
If I were a Hamas man.
I wouldn't have to work hard.
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
If I were a biddy bomber bum,
Yidle-diddle-didle-didle BOMB.
I'd have a big tall house with virgins by the dozen,
Right in the midst of Gaza town.
A fine tin roof with real al-Kassams below.
There would be one long rocket just going up,
And one even longer coming down,
And one more leading nowhere, just for show.
I'd fill my yard with chicks and turkeys
and other Labor chiefs,
For all the town to see and hear.
And each loud "cheep" and "squawk"
and "honk" and "quack"
Would ring like a Kassam in my ear,
As if to say "Here lives a Tanzim man."
If I were a terrorist,
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
All day long I'd biddy biddy bomb.
If I were a Hamas man.
I wouldn't have to work hard.
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
If I were a biddy bomber bum,
Yidle-diddle-didle-didle BOMB.
The most important men in town
would come to fawn on me!
They would ask me to be appeased by them,
Like Shimon Peres the Kind.
"If you please, Reb Ehud..."
"Pardon me, Reb Ehud..."
Posing problems that would cross a Tanzim's mind!
And it won't make one bit of difference
if I answer war or peace.
When you're me, they think you really know!
If I were a terrorist,
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
All day long I'd biddy biddy bomb.
If I were a Hamas man.
I wouldn't have to work hard.
Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba
deedle deedle dum.
If I were a biddy bomber bum,
Yidle-diddle-didle-didle BOMB.
Lord who made the lion and the lamb,
You decreed I should be what I am.
Would it spoil some vast eternal plan
If I were a ter-ror-ist MAN!!!
(Curtain closes)
7. Anti-Semitic Comic Book: : http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=35&x_article=1777
And
8. Need an updated list of Hitlerjugend? Go to http://usacbi.org/
9. CNN's Bash-Israel Fidelista: http://frontpagemag.com/2009/12/30/ted-turner-billionaire-funder-of-the-left/
