Thursday, November 30, 2006
Bin Laden Calendar at the University of Haifa
1. Remembering Milton Friedman:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378512986&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
2. Haifa U. Arab Student Calendar Honors Bin-Laden, Nasrallah
Wednesday, November 29, 2006 / 8 Kislev 5767
An Arab student calendar distributed at Haifa University marks the dates
of major terrorist attacks, as well as significant dates in the lives of
Arab terrorists such as Osama Bin-Laden.
The calendar, sponsored by the Islamic Movement - based in the Israeli
city Um El-Fahm - marks the birthday of Al-Qaeda founder Bin-Laden, the
date of PLO leader Yasser Arafat's death, and significant dates in the
lives of Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah and jailed Fatah arch-terrorist
Marwan Barghouti.
Also noted in the calendar are the anniversaries of the 9/11 attacks on
the Twin Towers in New York and of recent kidnappings of IDF soldiers.
Students belonging to the Islamic Movement rejected criticism by many that
the material constituted incitement. Mouad Hatib, the university student
who was responsible for distribution of the calendars, said, "I don't
understand the big fuss. It's a calendar for Arab students at the
university... We mention Nasrallah and the date of the kidnapping of the
two soldiers and the killing of eight others as a brave operation that led
to the Lebanon war."
Regarding the marking of dates in the lives of Nasrallah, Bin-Laden and
others, Hatib said, "It's important that the Arab public remembers its
leaders."
University officials initially did not object to the journals when the
written contents were brought before the administration for review. "Once
it was brought to the attention of the dean that the calendar contains
sympathetic pictures of people such as Nasrallah and of the attack on the
Twin Towers, the permission [to distribute the material] was not renewed,"
a university administration statement said. "We have learned lessons as a
result of this incident, and full attention will be given hereafter also
to pictures in material to be distributed at the university."
A statement released by the Haifa University Student Union said, "We are
shocked, and we see as very serious the fact that, on the university
campus, calendars were distributed including pictures of terrorists who
publicly call for the liquidation of the State of Israel."
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
The Lunatic Professor Noble
1. Last year I published a piece on the lunatic anti-Semitic Luddite from
York University, David Noble, here:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19932
Here is a selection (go to web page for full article):
Noble combines Luddism and dislike of Christianity with utter contempt and
hatred for Jews and Judaism. He is a leftist hater of Jews who himself
was born Jewish, a fact that helps him defend himself against charges of
anti-Semitism. Self-hating Jewish academics are common on campus today,
and range all the way from the phony sophisticates like MIT.s Chomsky and
NYU.s Tony Judt, all the way down to the vulgar neo-nazi buffoonery of
DePaul.s Norman Finkelstein. Like those others, Noble has a long history
of bashing Israel and demonizing Zionism. He has maliciously tried to
stir up anti-Jewish passions at York, where he alleges that the board of
the York University Foundation, the school.s fundraising arm, is biased by
.the presence and influence of staunch pro-Israel lobbyists, activists and
fundraising agencies.. Meaning Jews.
In late November 2004, Noble got into trouble for biting the hand that
pays his York salary. He was attacked by his own administration for
handing out information sheets regarding the York Foundation. He
maintained that the presence of Jews on the board affects the .political
conduct of York's administration. in important ways, such as the
.silencing of pro-Palestinian voices. on York.s campus. The University
then issued a press release on Nov. 19, 2004, condemning material Noble
had been distributing at a campus event a day earlier as "targeting Jewish
members of the York community." Noble is tied to local pro-Palestinian
groups, who back him in his nuisance litigation against York. Meanwhile,
he has been condemned by the Canadian Jewish Congress and the United
Jewish Appeal Federation of Greater Toronto for his anti-Jewish and
anti-Israel activities.
But Noble.s latest high-visibility antic has been against the right of
Jewish students at York University to observe Yom Kippur. Most
universities try to accommodate Jewish students, often asking professors
not to schedule exams in the Jewish High Holidays. York actually cancels
classes altogether. Noble maintains that this is .discriminatory and
illegal., because classes are not cancelled (unless later made up) for
every holiday of every other conceivable religious persuasion. Chris
Morley, a spokesperson for Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, said canceling
classes on holidays .is a decision the university has the authority to
make,. adding that .it seems the York policy is reasonable..
Prof. Martin Lockshin, an observant Jew who teaches at York and is on the
university.s senate, said that the holiday policy follows a general York
principle of respecting religious diversity; but - more importantly - it
avoids problems that would be created when many students and faculty
cannot attend class. York also holds no classes on Christmas and Good
Friday, but Noble threatened to hold classes on Good Friday as a political
statement. Noble demanded that York stop accommodating Jewish students
and he threatened to hold classes on the Jewish High Holidays to show his
contempt for them. When threatened by the administration, Noble claimed
he would henceforth cancel all classes for any holiday of any sort for any
religion, including those of Bahais, Zoroastrians, and Wiccans.
Now just for the record, on Yom Kippur the Jewish students at York (Jews
are 10% of the student body there) fast for 26 hours, pray the entire day,
and may neither write nor use electricity. So it makes perfect sense to
make accommodations for them, and I am sure that if anyone can find any
Christian, Hindu or Moslem holidays on which people fast for 26 hours,
York would similarly be happy to oblige them.
*****
Anyway, now Noble is suing his own university again and some Jewish groups
for pointing out that he is an Anti-Semite:
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_PrintFriendly&c=Article&cid=1164149417204&call_pageid=968350130169
Professor suing York U.
Jewish groups also target of lawsuit
Claims they suggested he was anti-Semitic
Nov. 22, 2006. 01:00 AM
LOUISE BROWN
EDUCATION REPORTER
History professor David Noble is suing York University's fundraising
foundation and several Jewish organizations for defamation, claiming they
suggested he is anti-Semitic to try to gag criticism of their activities.
Noble, 61, who is Jewish, has brought a $25 million lawsuit against the
York University Foundation, including outgoing York president Lorna
Marsden, as well as the Canadian Jewish Congress' Ontario region, Hillel
of Greater Toronto and the United Jewish Appeal of Greater Toronto for
their criticism of flyers he distributed.
The flyers accused the university of being biased in favour of Israel and
restricting pro-Palestinian groups on campus more harshly than others.
Noble distributed the flyers, titled "The Tail that Wags the Dog," on
campus in 2004. They named directors and staff of the York University
Foundation and cited various members' links with pro-Israel agencies, such
as the United Jewish Appeal.
In response, Noble said, members of Hillel of Greater Toronto sent a fax
to the university expressing concern that the flyer suggested "Jews
control York University" . something Noble denies having said.
He said he criticized York figures for their political views on Israel,
not their ethnicity or religion.
The university later issued a news release condemning what Marsden called
"this highly offensive material, which singles out certain members of the
York community on the basis of their ethnicity and political views."
While it did not name Noble, it quoted a Jewish student leader who was
concerned about "such inflammatory material," and said "it is unacceptable
for any students to be exposed to this type of bigotry."
Angry his claims were being called bigoted, Noble has already filed a
union grievance seeking an apology and $10 million in damages for
defamation.
Noble has also filed a complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission
against York for its long-standing practice of cancelling all classes on
Jewish high holidays, such as Yom Kippur.
York established the policy years ago at the request of Jewish students,
but it allows any student to obtain a change of schedule if a class
conflicts with a religious holiday.
In response, Noble, an outspoken critic of the policy, cancels his own
classes on Muslim holidays as well.
"Look, I have very diverse classes and I want to dramatize the point that
we are a multicultural, publicly funded university, so we should either
recognize all religious high holidays or none," he has said.
York has an estimated 5,000 Jewish students, roughly 10 per cent of its
student body, and it began cancelling classes on Rosh Hashanah and Yom
Kippur 40 years ago.
Last year, Noble said he would hold classes on the Jewish holidays in
defiance of York's policy, but he changed his mind after a student filed a
complaint and he received threatening phone messages.
*****
3. Dhimmi Watch story:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/014198.php
4. Lego Concentration Camp Sets:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/793427.html
Losing wars because of over-concern for casualties
1. Ted Sternberg kindly translated this very important piece that
appeared as a guest Op-Ed in Haaretz:
Over-sensitivity to battlefield casualties
The IDF's concern over battlefield casualties reflects misguided
thinking and stands in opposition to public opinion
by Efraim Inbar
One of the misguided strategic concepts, displayed by Israel's
military and political leadership during the second Lebanon war was an
exaggerated concern over battlefield casualties. Even the IDF's chief
of manpower, Major General Elazar Stern, has complained that the IDF
showed "excessive sensitivity" to its own casualties, and revealed
that one battle against Hizbollah ended up suspended on account of the
loss of a certain number of soldiers.
Nonetheless, faced with the threat coming from Hizbollah, there was
enthusiastic public support for offensive operations -- even when
losses were be inevitable. Most Israelis wanted a clear-cut victory
and were prepared to pay a high price for it.
The reluctance to use ground forces constitutes evidence of a large
gap between the thinking of Israel's leadership, and that of its
people. Israel's political and military leadership believes, and
incorrectly, that the public is weary of the protracted conflict and
is no longer willing to pay its price. Ehud Olmert has expressed this
sentiment in the past and in so doing reflected an identical feeling
on the part of the rest of the leadership. The Oslo process'
decision-makers, especially Itzhak Rabin, were also motivated by these
mistaken assessments as to the fighting spirit of the Israeli public.
This current of thought, widespread among Israel's political
leadership since the 90s, has influenced the military leadership and
in so doing has made casualty-prevension the IDF's essential
operational characteristic. Some in the academic community argue that
Israel, like other western democratic regimes, is unable to conduct
wars on account of a reluctance to take casualties. However, this
assumption about the "post-heroic" western way of war is not grounded
in reality.
Numerous studies show that a recoiling from battlefield casualties is
not a decisive trait among the American public. Moreover, the
American political leadership is able to draw on a great reservoir of
support for costly military operations, so long as those operations
are likely to be successful. What the public recoils from is defeat,
and not battlefield casualties.
From a strategic standpoint, Israel's reluctance to use ground forces
is damaging as a signal of weakness. The widespread perception,
within the Arab world, that Israeli society is sensitive, and to an
extreme, to human loss, only invites aggression. That perception, in
essence, is what moved the Palestinians to launch a war of terror
against Israel in September 2000. And it is that perception, too,
that underlay Hassan Nasralla's theory that the IDF was a "spiderweb"
easily ripped apart.
The army's concern over battlefield casualties, and the Israeli
leadership's hesitations over the matter of conducting large-scale
operations also constitute a breach of the basic social contract on
which the State of Israel was founded. Under that social contract,
the citizens concede some of their freedoms, and they are prepared to
bear the burden, in exchange for the State's taking on the obligation
to provide them with security. The state is a social institution that
exercises a monopoly on the use of force, and as such the state's
raison d'etre is to provide security. The Zionist rationale was based
on the aspiration to put an end to the Diaspora Jews' helplessness and
to set up a state whose principal duty would be to protect its Jewish
citizens -- through force if necessary.
Absolute and all-enveloping defense is not, to be sure, a realistic
objective, but it seems that the Jewish State now finds it difficult
to fulfill even its most basic function at even a minimal level. Four
thousand Katyushas last summer, and an unending rain of Kassams over
the northern Negev, raise the question of why the Israeli people
should keep paying taxes to maintain a strong army, if the state is
reluctant to use it to defend the citizenry?
--------
The author is Professor of Political Science at Bar Ilan University and
director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies.
2. The anti-Semitic ultra-moonbat Mark Levine (he writes it LeVine) at the
University of California at Irvine has identified who was REALLY behind
the assassination of Pierre Gemayel, the anti-Syria politician in Lebanon
murdered by Syria. "Professor" Levine says it is Israel. See
http://concerneducistudent.blogspot.com/2006/11/uci-professor-mark-levine-only-jews.html
A shame the Lebanese think it was Syria:
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=77115
3. Let's bomb Iran:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378495469&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
4. From the Wall St Journal:
November 28, 2006
Dial Joe-4-Ch.vez
November 28, 2006; Page A14
Venezuelan strongman Hugo Ch.vez is an ally of the Iranian mullahs, a
supporter of North Korea, a close friend of Fidel Castro and a good
customer for Vladimir Putin's weapon factories. Now he's also a business
partner of Joseph P. Kennedy II.
The former Democratic Congressman describes the deal he's cooked up with
Mr. Ch.vez as charity for low-income consumers of heating oil. But it's
worth asking what the price of this largesse is to Venezuelans and to U.S.
security interests.
The arrangement is this: Mr. Ch.vez's Citgo -- a Houston-based oil company
owned by the Venezuelan government -- is supplying home heating oil to Mr.
Kennedy's Citizens Energy Corporation at a 40% discount. Citizens, a
nonprofit outfit, says it passes the savings onto the poor, aiming to help
400,000 homes in 16 states that would otherwise have trouble heating their
homes. In the process, Mr. Kennedy happens to get a high-profile publicity
plug. If you think you qualify, says the television ad that drew our
attention to this partnership, just dial 1-877-Joe-4-Oil.
Generous Joe is not the only one polishing his public image here. In the
mold of the Castro strategy of sending armies of "doctors" and "teachers"
among the Latin American poor, Mr. Ch.vez is trying to shape U.S. public
opinion in the hope that more gringos will come to see the Ch.vez
government as benevolent.
Massachusetts Democrats seem especially eager to help. In a September 29,
2005, "confidential memorandum" addressed to "President Hugo Ch.vez" and
uncovered by a Congressional committee, William Delahunt (D., Mass.)
gushed that it was a "pleasure" to have met with the strongman "to discuss
your generous offer." The Democrat advised Mr. Ch.vez to steer his oil
through Mr. Kennedy's nonprofit and declared that "from a public relations
perspective" the discount oil scheme "is an extraordinary opportunity to
address urgent needs of people living in poverty, while showcasing the
compassion of your nation."
Compassion? If fighting poverty is the goal, Mr. Delahunt would do better
to remind Mr. Ch.vez that charity begins at home. The U.S. is far richer
than Venezuela and since Hurricane Hugo took power in 1999 Venezuelan
living standards have suffered despite soaring oil prices. Annual
inflation averaged more than 20% between 2001 and 2005, imposing a tax on
the poorest. Meanwhile, an insecure investment climate has taken a harsh
toll on private-sector employment and shrunk the middle class.
In his eight years in power, Mr. Kennedy's business partner has also
polarized Venezuela with his class warfare, rewritten the constitution,
politicized the judiciary, the electoral council and military, and
announced he plans to rule until 2021. Freedom House now ranks Venezuela
34th out of 35 countries in the Western Hemisphere in press freedom. Only
the Cuban press is more repressed.
Transparency International puts Venezuela second to last in the Hemisphere
in its 2006 "corruption perception index." And then there was that
revealing rant against President Bush ("the devil") at the United Nations
in September. Even Mr. Delahunt criticized his Venezuelan buddy after that
one.
But Mr. Kennedy keeps on trucking. Last week in a telephone interview with
the Washington Post, he defended his Ch.vez subsidy deal as "morally
righteous," arguing that the Citgo contribution to his nonprofit is only
"one-half of one percent" of Citgo oil and product sales in the U.S.
We dialed Joe-4-Oil ourselves to ask directly whether it is also
"righteous" to assist an anti-American tyrant at the expense of the
Venezuelan people. In between berating our reporter for daring to ask such
a thing, Mr. Kennedy said that Mr. Ch.vez has done "so much more" for the
poor than any previous government. As for democracy, he said there was
"ample room for improvement in the ways that people get elected in
Venezuela as well as in Florida." Mr. Ch.vez chose his partner well.
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116468351673134156.html
5. Time to start killing the terrorists
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25696
6. Israel's leading serial rapist escaped from prison by simply walking
away. But before he left, he had posted a registered letter complaining
about the phone monopoly. It seem sthat only Bezeq is allowed to run
phones inside prisons and Benny Sela thinks there should be competition.
Pretty sad when a serial rapist understands economics better than the
Israeli government.
7. Ehud Olmert has proposed a new strategic plan for dealing with the
Kassam blitz of the Negev and the Hamasification of Gaza and Judea and
Samaria:
He is proposing new retreats and capitulations by Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/793415.html
After all, the ones so far have worked so well!
8. No percentage in it for me, but I really like singer Avraham Fried:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=116393
9. Headline in Haaretz (Hebrew)
"Byzantine Arch discovered in the rubble of a grand synagogue that was
blown up".
And just who blew up the synagogue in question? The synagogue is the
"Horva" synagogue, which included the Nachmanides amongs its members. It
sits in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem and it
was blown up by the Jordanians in 1948. You would have to search the fine
print though to learn that in the Haaretz piece.
Of course, for Haaretz, the Jordanian bombing of the synagogue represents
a peace plan that should also be applied in the West Bank and has already
been applied in the Gaza Strip.
Monday, November 27, 2006
Miscellaneous
1. Mikey Lerner explains Thankgiving to the Islamofascists:
http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/thanksgiving_meditation_2006_to_the_force_of_life_and_love_in_the_universe/0011833
2. Amazingly, this appeared in Haaretz:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/792491.html
Not a word about Sderot
By Alexander Yakobson
A petition by the international organization Faculty for
Israeli-Palestinian Peace (Haaretz Hebrew edition, November 22) sharply
denounces the Israel Defense Forces' activity in Gaza due to "the repeated
killing of civilians by Israel and an ongoing military operation that
began with a disproportionate response to the abduction of an Israeli
soldier."
There is clearly some attempt to maintain balance in the advertisement: In
addition to the harsh criticism of Israel and a statement attributing the
violence to the occupation, there is a condemnation of "all forms of
violence against civilians by the two sides" and a call to the Palestinian
Hamas government "to declare that its goal is not the destruction of
Israel." All in all, this is a relatively moderate text, and the many
Israeli academics who signed it include relatively moderate people.
It is precisely for this reason that it is worthwhile noting what is not
in this text. There are no Qassams. Sderot's name does not appear. The
firing of rockets at Israeli communities is not mentioned at all. It is
impossible for the reader to even guess from what is written that the
wide-scale military operations in Gaza not only started in the wake of the
soldier's abduction and the killing of his comrades, but also in an
attempt to stop, or at least reduce, the systematic firing of rockets at
Sderot and other Israeli communities. There is also no mention of the fact
that the firing of Qassams resumed soon after Israel's withdrawal from the
Gaza Strip.
Of course, it is possible to argue that Israel is again reacting in a
"disproportionate" way in this case. One can argue about this claim. But
how is it possible to completely ignore the firing of Qassams in the long
and detailed text that claims to describe the events in Gaza, the
background for them and the desirable solution for the crisis? What moral
justification is there for those who conceal such a "marginal detail" to
preach morality?
If the authors of the petition had bothered to accuse Israel, as is
customary, of a "disproportionate" response to the Qassams, it would have
been possible to ask them what a proportionate and legitimate response by
the state should look like after the firing of rockets at its communities
from a densely populated area. This poses a dilemma that is not simple at
all. It is customary to say that Israel has a right to defend its
citizens, but it must do so within the framework of international law. But
those who declare this usually interpret international law in a way that
denies Israel any real possibility of defending itself against the methods
of warfare employed against it.
The Qassams are fired from the very heart of the Palestinian civilian
population; no one tries to deny or hide this fact. Under these
conditions, any attempt to strike against the missile launchers entails a
serious risk of injuring civilians. There should be an effort to avoid
causing such injury as much as possible. But, over time, there is no power
in the world that can prevent the killing of citizens when live firing
positions are located next to their home.
The authors of the petition do not address this dilemma. They do not even
bother to say the problem should be resolved diplomatically. The firing of
rockets against the citizens of Israel simply appears to them as a matter
not worthy of mention.
It is clear that this text (and similar ones, which are not uncommon) can
only infuriate the Israeli public, which is the target audience the
authors of the petition are addressing. This fact in itself still does not
invalidate the petition. For the sake of truth and justice, it is
sometimes appropriate to infuriate the public. But is it appropriate to do
this for the sake of falsehood and injustice?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/hasen/objects/pages/PrintArticleEn.jhtml?itemNo=792491
3. Oh dear - the threat of free speech on campus:
http://www.stljewishlight.com/topstories/320641723180141.php
4. Maybe move them to Ben Gurion University?
Ohio store owner demands artist remove gingerbread Nazis from window
By: Associated Press
Published: November 22, 2006
An artist's work made of gingerbread Nazis drew complaints after it was
displayed in a hardware store window, prompting the store owner to demand
the artwork be removed.
Charlie Palmer covered the gingerbread men during the weekend and said he
wanted them out of his business by Tuesday.
"He's gone way overboard this time," Palmer said of artist Keith McGuckin.
"A few of his other displays were on the edge, but never that crazy."
McGuckin said he chose the subject to provoke thought, not to offend.
"I can differentiate between real Nazis and the atrocities they performed
compared to these little gingerbread men, but I guess some people can't,"
said McGuckin, 50.
Palmer left one of McGuckin's displays uncovered: a depiction of a
suicidal snowman sitting under a hairdryer.
"I want people to say 'Oh, my gosh,"' McGuckin said. "And once they look
at it, say: 'It is kind of pretty."'
Last winter, McGuckin used Palmer's window to display a "caroler-bashing"
snowman and a little boy excited about using his chemistry set to create
the illegal drug crystal methamphetamine.
McGuckin is searching for new display space in the town, home of Oberlin
College and known for its left-leaning, beads-and-incense image.
"Maybe I just find beauty in bizarre places," he said.
5. The ISM's Kapo:
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25618
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Holocaust Denial on University of Haifa Chat List
1.
Anti-Semites debate Hitler's guilt on the "ALEF" chat list for
anti-Zionists, which operates under the auspices of the University of
Haifa and on the official university computer. Must be read to be
believed:
http://www.paulbogdanor.com/elam-hitler.html
Note how one member is an open fan of David Irving:
http://www.paulbogdanor.com/elam.html and also
Scroll down http://www.fpp.co.uk/docs/trial/RadDi180400.html
To tell the university heads what you think of the fact that such material
is being disseminated on official university facilities: contact
President of the University of Haifa
Prof. Aaron Ben-Ze.ev
Fax: 972-4-8240281
E-mail: abenzeev@univ.haifa.ac.il
and
Rector of the University of Haifa
Prof. Yossi Ben-Artzi
Fax: 972-4-8342101
Email: yossib@univ.haifa.ac.il
2. Believe it or not, this appeared in HAARETZ:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/790428.html
Both attacked and condemned
By Yoel Marcus
For several years, there have been two items at the start of the news
broadcasts every morning: the weather forecast and the firing of Qassams
on Sderot. On April 16, 2001, the first Qassam was fired. Experts examined
the remnants of the first rocket in amazement and said it is a primitive
missile produced in primitive metal shops. Handmade. Not serious.
Two months later, this primitive killed two inhabitants of Sderot, one a
child. And for more than five years now, this primitive has been
improving, both in power and range. It is nearing strategic sites on the
outskirts of Ashkelon. From the air and from the ground, Israel has
eliminated scores, if not hundreds of primitive metal shops, but the
rockets continue to grow and attack Israeli locales.
They have turned the inhabitants of Sderot into chips for death poker. The
numbers of dead are not reckoned in the thousands or hundreds, but the
inhabitants of the town are dying of fright every day. The 20-second
warning seems like a joke; the inhabitants run across the street as though
racing against the second hand. One manages to find shelter, another is
stricken with disaster and a leg is amputated.
The mobbing of the buses that Arcadi Gaydamak put at the disposal of
Sderot residents, for a vacation away from the fear to Eilat, proves what
17 Qassams in one day, one woman killed and two people wounded, just like
that, for no particular reason, do to a town that does not know how to
combat despair. The inhabitants admit that were they not of meager means,
they would have abandoned the city.
After the Israel Defense Forces' bombardment of Beit Hanun, in which 19
Palestinians were killed by mistake, a huge majority at the United Nations
sees Israel as the cruel aggressor. Its apology was not accepted. Perhaps
it wasn't entirely believed. But have you ever heard Hamas apologizing for
killing women and children? Have they ever asked forgiveness for the
firing on Sderot? They have been firing on a civilian locale for more than
six years now, and it is Israel that is defined as the aggressor.
Israel is the only country in the world in which one of its cities is a
target for rockets every day. One wonders how France would react if Dijon
and Rouen were under bombardment. No country would put up with the
situation in which one of its cities is a permanent shooting range, and
where crossing a street or going to the grocery store has become death
poker. The head of the Shin Bet security service is reporting to the
Knesset Foreign Relations and Defense Committee that there are 33 tons of
explosives and hundreds of missiles and rockets of all types in the hands
of Hamas. The aim is to hit the Achilles' heel of Israel, which is the
home front.
Israel withdrew unilaterally from the Gaza Strip, thus signaling that it
is capable of not only dismantling Jewish settlements, but also returning
territories to the Palestinians under a peace agreement. Regrettably, it
is now becoming clear that the most extreme and pessimistic Jewish
settlers are the ones who were right. The Palestinians do not want to
recognize Israel or come to terms with its existence. And this time, under
the baton of Hamas, they are once again not missing a single opportunity
to miss an opportunity.
Instead of building up and developing the territory that Israel evacuated,
like the Egyptians did in Sinai, they have turned Gush Katif into a base
for firing daily at the inhabitants of the Negev, first and foremost those
of Sderot; firing that is aimed at civilians, women and children. The
warnings of former prime minister Ariel Sharon and Chief of Staff Dan
Halutz that if Qassams are fired after the evacuation of Gaza, Israel's
response would be stringent did not really frighten them. We invaded Beit
Hanun, we fired from the air, but it didn't help. The second war in
Lebanon undermined the standing of the IDF when it revealed the weakness
of the home front.
All of Israel's attempts to put an end to the firing of the Qassams, even
with Egyptian and European mediation, have proven fruitless. Israel is
finding itself both attacked and condemned. And diplomats and journalists
are finding themselves repeating over and over the same mantra - the
situation cannot continue like this. If Hamas continues to torpedo all
discussions by not recognizing Israel and employing terror against its
citizens, there will be no choice but to revert to the Biblical method of
an eye for an eye. This threat is banal and repeats itself; but what is
there left to do, since a leader has yet to arise, either here or there,
to help us reinvigorate the headlines with discussions and peace.
3.
http://www.jewishpress.com/page.do/19964/%27It_Is_In_Our_Hands%27_%3A_%3Ci%3EThe_Aumann_Doctrine%2C_Unvarnished_And_Profound%3C%2Fi%3E.html
'It Is In Our Hands' : The Aumann Doctrine, Unvarnished And Profound
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By: Phyllis Chesler, Ph.D. Wednesday, November 22, 2006
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Last week, on a wet and windy night in Manhattan, hundreds flocked
into the beautiful main sanctuary of Kehillat Jeshurun to hear
Nobel-laureate economist and Israeli citizen Robert (Yisrael) Aumann
preach the word.
Unpretentiously, sporting an open shirt and a very long white
flowing beard, Professor Aumann stood on the bimah (synagogue platform)
and addressed us in perfect English. Here was a man who fled Nazi Germany
when he was a teenager, found refuge and an education in America, then
moved to Israel fifty years ago. Now he was back in New York to deliver a
sobering message under the rubric of the Bella and Harry Wexner
Distinguished Speakers Series on the occasion of Mrs. Wexner.s fifth
yahrzeit.
Dr. Aumann is a plain-talker, slow, deliberate, occasionally funny,
but easy to understand. He is also profound. While the audience was
respectful, and very attentive, their applause was reserved. The hour was
late, and many were in their 60.s, 70.s, even 80.s. Jews also have a long
history of not wanting to listen to hard, prophetic truths. We love life,
hate war, and want to live our lives in peace. We always hope things will
get better, but we also know that they can be . and have sometimes been .
a lot worse. We don.t always want to plan ahead.
For example, in 1980 I participated in a United Nations
international conference in Copenhagen where Israel was demonized in
unprecedented ways. The conference, which was supposed to have been about
women, had been hijacked by a Soviet- and Arab-orchestrated campaign
against Israel.
Afterward, I flew to Israel and was interviewed in all the major
media about an emerging anti-Semitism. I returned home and met with many
American-Jewish organizations. I proposed that they consider working on
programs to combat the anti-Israel propaganda that would eventually
overwhelm us. Everyone gave me a very polite, even warm, hearing, but it
did not lead to anyone tackling the project.
Now here we are many years later, after Oslo, a second intifada,
Gaza and Lebanon. Professor Aumann made no false promises, did not
enumerate .ten easy steps to an immediate and lasting peace. that many
Jews insist on hearing. What he did suggest was bracing, stoic, measured,
challenging, useful . and therefore perhaps even hopeful.
Dr. Aumann got right to the point, saying what needed to be said
with gravity and clarity. Although these last six years of the intifada
have been very hard both for Israelis and for all who love Israel, this
great man told them that our children and grandchildren and even
great-grandchildren will still be fighting for peace in the Middle East.
Yes, peace will come . but not for a long time.
Dr. Aumann pointed out that .war is always with us, it.s a
phenomenon, not a specific event.. He suggested that we study war as a
.general phenomenon,. not war as it occurs in one place or another. He
asked: .Can war be rational? His answer: .Yes. It is a mistake to say that
war is irrational..
In his view, .our Arab cousins and enemies. and their .shahids. are
very .rational.. They know what they want and they are patient . they have
all the time in the world. They are also .highly idealistic.. Treating
them as .irrational madmen. is wrong.
Our enemies are motivated . we motivate them. .They want the Jews
out. They believe they can accomplish this through violence and the
cultivation of patience.. Dr. Aumann said that the expulsion of Jews, by
Jews, from Gaza came about because of the anxious Jewish need for .peace
now,. but that in his view, such anxiety and impatience led directly to
the recent war in Lebanon, a war he believes Israel lost.
He is convinced there is no room for equivocation: The only way to
bring about peace .is to convince our Arab cousins that we are not the
Crusaders. We are here to stay. They must be convinced that we will not
move, that we also have time. And even if we want peace in 10-20 years we
have to change our policy now. Our people, not just our government, were
all responsible for the expulsion and for each and every act of
capitulation..
He recommended that Jews, like their enemies, adopt a posture of
patience: .If you are patient, you may get peace one day. If you want
peace now, you won.t get it..
In his view, Jews .need a sense of the future.. Jews are so
desperate for peace that .we run around in a frenzy, we can.t wait, we
expel people from their homes in an unprecedented act of barbarism,
self-hatred, and stupidity. We fall all over ourselves with anxiety and
self-hatred..
Dr. Aumann again stressed that the shahids are not madmen. Their
goal is to get the Jews out of the Middle East. They have a vision of the
future and are determined as well as persistent. These are qualities the
professor respects, even .envies,. and he urges Jews and Israelis to adopt
just such qualities.
.Persistence and determination,. he declared, .are omnipotent.. Here
he quoted Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin, Winston Churchill, Thomas
Edison and Bella Wexner, the noted philanthropist whose name was stamped
on the evening.s proceedings . all of whom believed that persistence and
determination are everything.
.The Jewish nation, .he concluded, .will survive, no matter what.
But I am not sure about the State of Israel.. He barely paused before
reminding us that .it is in our hands. If we persevere, if we demonstrate
that no amount of violence will budge us, if we are willing to be patient,
if we stop appeasing them . it is in our hands..
People were invited to join Dr. Aumann for refreshments. I came
right home instead, compelled to share his words with you.
Dr. Phyllis Chesler is the author of many works, including the
bestseller .Women and Madness. (1972), .The New Anti-Semitism. (2003) and
.The Death of Feminism: What.s Next in the Struggle for Women.s Freedom.
(2005). Her forthcoming book is titled .The Islamization of America.. An
Emerita professor of psychology and women.s studies and the co-founder of
the Association for Women in Psychology and the National Women.s Health
Network, she is currently on the board of Scholars for Peace in the Middle
East and may be contacted through her website, www.phyllis-chesler.com.
4. Campus anti-Semitism
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25635http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25635
5. Goobers:
http://www.jewishpress.com/page.do/19956/Jimmy_Carter%27s_Disingenuous_Diplomacy.html
6. Green fascism:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25622
7. There are no non-military solutions to the problems of terrorism:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378459135&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
8. Peace through cowardice:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3330953,00.html
9. Telling the Left to shut up:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=53015
10. Today Michigan, tomorrow Tel Aviv University?
http://nationaljournal.com/taylor.htm
Monday, November 20, 2006
Fleeing and Fleas
Of course, all of Olmert's "doctrine", if that is the correct word, is based on fleeing before terrorists and abandoning Jewish homes in acts of capitulation. First we had the flight from Gaza, in which Olmert and his friends ordered the entire Jewish population of the Gaza Strip to be forcibly removed as an act of capitulation to terrorism. That flight of cowardice produced the thousands of Kassam rockets now landing on Sderot. So when Sderot residents "flee" to Eilat, they are simply trying to get away from the rockets brought down upon them by Olmert's own fleeing from Gaza.
Then there is Olmert's still-operative grand plan to repeat the cowardly flight out of Gaza in the West Bank, so that thousands more rockets can be fired out of the West Bank into Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. And finally there was Olmert's cowardly flight out of the area of southern Lebanon that Israel took this past summer, a flight of cowardice that simply makes the next war with the Hizbollah a matter of time. (Ok, I admit it, I was off. I had predicted the next war would take place this past Succot. Like the famous obituary about Mark Twain, I was just a little premature.)
2. This Week's Israeli Communist Professor
He is Oded Goldreich, a communist professor of Computer Science and Math at the Weizmann Institute. That is notable, because Weizmann ordinarily is not a well-known den for leftist moonbats.
There is an old stereotype of math professors who do complex advanced math but cannot add three plus three when it comes to the real world.
Goldreich is an open supporter of Israel's Stalinist communist party HADASH. He endorses it here on his personal web page: http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~oded/politics.html . He opines at length about how awful capitalism is and how wonderful communism is here: http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~oded/politicsJan03.html
He endorses the Arab version of history here: http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~oded/PS/pi.pdf
He has signed all those anti-Israel petitions, including the ones promoting a "right of return" for Palestinians, meaning their right to destroy Israel (http://oznik.com/words/040712.html ), demands for internation involvement in order to curtail Israeli sovereignty (http://www.dasbistro.com/pipermail/clarkgreen/2003-April/001218.html ), called for granting terrorist Tali Fahima a Nobel Prize (http://jacobk9.tripod.com/id25.html ), and has endorsed calls for boycotts of Israeli schools (http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/archives/2005_05.html )
3. In the sharpest of contrasts, now let me introduce you to Professor Hillel Weiss, a well-known professor of Jewish Thought at Bar Ilan University (http://www.biu.ac.il/faculty/hillelweiss/ ).
Weiss is from the correct side of the political arena. He is active in the Professors for a Strong Israel and in the movement that opposes unilateral capitulations like last summer's Gaza "withdrawal". He holds a law degree although is not a practicing lawyer.
And he has been the victim of police harassment these past few weeks. First, the police interrogated him for opposing the "Gay Pride Parade" in Jerusalem. Weiss had called for it to be cancelled, and stated that he endorses all means for preventing the holding of the "parade" in Jerusalem, even "Acts of Pinhas". The police took that as a call for violence. You know, the very same police who seem unable to recognize it when Arab pro-terrorists and Jewish leftist pro-terrorists endorse violence, terrorism, and even genocide.
Now the most amazing thing about this is that Israeli prosecutors, products of the Israeli school system, even know who Pinhas was. And since Pinhas is often traditionally considered to reappear as Elijah the Prophet, my suggestion to Hillel is that every person singing about Elijah also be brought in for police questioning. (Remember those violent acts that Elijah did to the prophets of Baal? Isn't singing about Elijah clearly an act of incitement?)
Then, yesterday Weiss was called in again for interrogation, this time for a different matter. It seems that Weiss is involved in a group in Israel calling itself "The Sanhedrin". It is a group of rabbis and other public figures who issue opinions about matters of the day. A while back, the "Sanhedrin" sent letters to various police and army officers who had been involved in the eviction of Jews from their homes in Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip. When these did not show up to answer questions before the "Sanhedrin", the "Sanhedrin" wrote letters to the synagogues in which these folks are members and asked that the people involved in the evictions not be called up to the Torah in aliyot. In post-democratic Israel, that also evidently constitutes an act of "incitement".
Perhaps the best comment on Israel's dual judicial system (one for leftists and the other for everyone else) was a column by lawyer Yoram Shiftal in the weekly "Besheva" from Nov 16, 06. Unfortunately it is only in Hebrew and not on line, but perhaps someone out there will translate and post it. In any case, Shiftal argues that for all intents and purposes Israel's prosecutor's office is little more than a branch of the Meretz far-left party. Of the dozens of department heads within the prosecutor's office, every single one is a leftist. There had been one non-leftist, but she retired. The control of the office by those who belong to the leftist Meretz fringe explains the selective enforcement of the law, endlessly prosecuting rightists but never indicting leftists for treason and "incitement", and for the frequent involvement of the prosecution in promoting anti-religious litigation.
4. Barnard Alumnae Opposing Tenure for Anthropologist BY GABRIELLE BIRKNER - Staff Reporter of the Sun
November 16, 2006
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/43652
A group of Barnard College alumnae is attempting to stop their alma mater from giving tenure to an assistant professor who minimizes Jews' historical connection to Israel.
In her 2001 book, "Facts on the Ground: Archaeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society," published by the University of Chicago, the professor of anthropology, Nadia Abu El-Haj says Israeli archaeology manipulates evidence to justify a modern Jewish state in the region.
Relying heavily on the input of anonymous archaeologists, tour guides, and tour participants, the book portrays Israeli archaeologists as ideologues who, driven by a desire to "efface Zionism's colonial dimension," have fabricated Jews' territorial claims to Israel.
Contacted by phone and e-mail, Ms. Abu El-Haj would not comment on the book, or her position at Barnard.
While "Facts on the Ground" has been warmly received by some biblical "minimalists," or "biblical revisionists" ... academics who contend the Bible was written centuries later than is widely accepted and, that the text has little or no historical relevance ... it has been widely dismissed by archaeologists as a political treatise, full of erroneous statements and unsubstantiated claims.
In "Facts on the Ground," Ms. Abu el-Haj suggests Jerusalem was destroyed not by the Romans, but by the Jews themselves due to rising class tensions among them. Yet, the 1st-century historian and scribe Josephus described in great detail the Roman siege of Jerusalem. Additionally, carvings in the Arch of Titus in Rome depict the Roman General Titus showing off menorahs and other objects looted from the Second Temple.
In another passage, Ms. Abu El-Haj relates how a tourist questions a Jerusalem tour guide's explanation that the Judean King Hezekiah saved the city from an Assyrian conquest in 701 B.C.E. The tourist refutes the statement, claiming that Hezekiah's actions actually led to the destruction of the nearby Israelite kingdom. "Although the tourist's objection would appear to undermine the guide's interpretation .. this is a ludicrous claim, since the Israelite kingdom had been conquered twenty-one years earlier!" an archaeology professor at Israeli's Bar-Ilan University, Aren Maeir, wrote two years ago in a University of Chicago journal, Isis.
The Assyrian conquest of Samaria in 722 B.C.E. is confirmed in Assyrian annals, which provide copious descriptions of the kingdom's fall, according to a retired professor of Near East archaeology at the University of Arizona, William Dever.
Mr. Dever, who has authored more than 20 books on Middle East History, said Ms. Abu El-Haj seems intent on writing Jews out of ancient Middle East history, and demonizing a generation of apolitical Israeli archaeologists in the process. Barnard should deny Ms. Abu El-Haj tenure, he said, "not because she's Palestinian or pro-Palestinian or a leftist, but because her scholarship is faulty, misleading and dangerous."
A 1982 Barnard alumna, Paula Stern, said she is "horrified by the possibility that Barnard College would consider appointing" Ms. Abu El-Haj to its permanent faculty.
Particularly troubling, Ms. Stern said, is Ms. Abu El-Haj's conclusion that the Palestinians who in 2000 desecrated Joseph's Tomb ... a Jewish holy site in the West Bank city of Nablus ... need to be "understood in relation to a colonial-national history in which modern political rights have been substantiated in and expanded through the material signs of historic presence."
In a recent e-mail message to fellow Barnard graduates, Ms. Stern, who lives in Israel, wrote, "In Abu El Haj's view, deliberately destroying ancient buildings is not to be condemned, it is to be ...analyzed as a form of resistance to the Israeli state.'" Ms. Stern urged fellow Barnard graduates to contact the college's president "if you share my concern about the implications of hiring a young scholar who writes with so little respect for the use of evidence."
The president of Barnard College, Judith Shapiro, herself a cultural anthropologist, has received about 20 emails from individuals who oppose tenure for Ms. Abu El-Haj, a Barnard spokeswoman, Elizabeth Gildersleeve, said. "Her studies are on a controversial subject, and that can stir the pot," Ms. Gildersleeve said.
Many of the academics who reviewed "Facts on the Ground" rejected the author's methodology and her conclusions. "Abu El-Haj has written a flimsy and supercilious book that does no justice to either her putative subject or the political agenda she wishes to advance. It should be avoided," a biblical archaeologist, a former adjunct professor at Purchase College, Alexander Joffe, wrote in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies. Mr. Joffe now works for an Israel advocacy organization, the David Project.
Bar-Ilan University's Mr. Maeir, in a telephone interview, said archaeologists in Israel ... like archaeologists elsewhere ... have used their work for nationalistic purposes in the past. He said the field has evolved in recent decades, and its Israeli practitioners are not "out there working on this nationalist, jingoistic agenda of proving the Zionist point of view, and negating the Arab point of view," as Ms. Abu El-Haj would have readers believe.
Ms. Abu El-Haj portrays Western scholarship as colonialist and imperialist. "The work of archaeology in Palestine/Israel is a cardinal institutional location of the ongoing practice of colonial nationhood producing facts through which historical-national claims, territorial transformations, heritage objects and historicities ...happen,'" she wrote.
More mainstream archaeologists, according to Mr. Dever, trace the origins of the Israelite state to the 10th or 9th century B.C.E., contend that Bible was written in 8th or 7th century B.C.E., and that the biblical stories are "based on some historical facts. "Their minds are made up," Mr. Dever said of the minimalists, whom he calls "nihilists."
"They never pay any attention to archaeological evidence, except to discredit it," Mr. Dever said.
One of the most prominent minimalist academics, Keith Whitelam, a professor of religious studies at England's University of Sheffield, in an e-mail interview with The New York Sun, hailed "Facts on the Ground" as a "first-rate book." "It is important to study how national identity is constructed and the assumptions which are then built into academic work on history and archaeology," he wrote. " ...Facts on the Ground' is a very fine contribution to that debate and our understanding of the processes." Mr. Whitelam is the author of "The Invention of Ancient Israel: The Silencing of Palestinian History."
A history and religion professor at Northwestern University, Jacob Lassner, in a 2003 review of "Facts on the Ground" published in Middle East Quarterly, wrote that minimalist archaeological claims have become a popular vehicle for those with decidedly anti-Zionist motives, writing "it is only those who deny Israel's right to exist or contest the legitimacy of its current borders who deny altogether or compromise Israel's links to the past."
Even so, Mr. Lassner told The New York Sun said efforts by Barnard alumnae to block Ms. Abu El-Haj from receiving tenure would likely prove ineffectual. "Universities don't react to pressure of alumni on matters of tenure," he said. "It's not going to do very much good for alumnae to start complaining, especially if they're not scholars."
5. Blaming the Jews for the Jihad:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25571
Saturday, November 18, 2006
De-Pappefication Now!
1. De-Pappefication:
BOOK REVIEW BY DAVID PRYCE-JONES: RAUS MIT UNS - THE ETHNIC CLEANSING OF
PALESTINE BY ILAN PAPPE (ONEWORLD PUBLICATIONS 313PP B#16.99)
Published in: www.literaryreview.co.uk
November 13, 2006
http://www.literaryreview.co.uk/pryce-jones_11_06.html
Ilan Pappe is an Israeli academic who has made his name by hating Israel
and everything it stands for. In his view, expressed with obsession and a
degree of paranoia, Jewish nationalism, that is to say Zionism, has been
from its outset a deliberate tool for dispossessing the Palestinians; and
therefore it is to be condemned root and branch. He reserves the
Palestinian term of Nakba, meaning catastrophe, for describing what to
Israelis is their war of independence of 1948. To him, Israeli politicians
and soldiers, one and all, are so many murderers. Forests have been
planted only to cover up the past. Houses are b monstrous villas and
palaces for rich American Jewsb . Everything Israeli is ugly, everything
Palestinian is beautiful. One day, he supposes, the Israelis may well
consummate their original crime with something even worse. The only
possible alternative lies in the immediate return of every Palestinian to
his original home, and that will mean the end of the state whose existence
so offends Pappe. This, of course, is exactly the inflexible position
taken by Hamas and the PLO.
The readerb s initial reaction must be one of pity. Poor man! What a
strain it must be to belong to a nation whose members are so
overwhelmingly unbearable that he longs for them to be overpowered by
others. Yet there is more to it than that. Sad and creepy though it is,
Pappeb s anger is open to rational analysis.
The doctrinal element pushing Pappe into anti-Zionism is his prominent
involvement in the Israeli Communist Party, known as Hadash. An outcrop of
pure Stalinism and always a marginal movement, Communism in Israel
rejected Zionism in favour of internationalism, according to which Jews
and Arabs were to form a state together. Events, indeed the whole thrust
of history, have proven this to be a complete illusion, but Pappe remains
one of a minute handful still in its grip.
The further emotional element pushing Pappe towards his hatred of Zionism
is best elucidated by J L Talmon in his profound book, The Myth of the
Nation and the Vision of Revolution. Among the b horribly charged and
tormenting questionsb Talmon asks is why so many Jews have adopted
identities that seemingly allow them to deny their Jewishness. Uncountable
numbers of Jews have followed the example of the Karl Marxes, Trotskys and
Rosa Luxemburgs who sought identities as Communists and revolutionaries in
the hope that this would allow them to merge with those who otherwise
would be their persecutors. Some Communists - like Lazar Kaganovich, and
many in the KGB as well as leaders in the Soviet satellites - set about
the deliberate destruction of the Jewish religion and culture. Talmon
speaks openly of the neurosis and b morbid masochismb motivating such
unhappy people.
In Nazi Germany a few Jews tried to camouflage themselves in a similar
manner. Felix Jacoby opened his Kiel University lectures in 1933 by
comparing Hitler to the Emperor Augustus. Dr Hans-Joachim Schoeps and Max
Naumann even formed a movement of Jews for Hitler. With gallows humour,
other Jews replied that this movementb s slogan was Raus mit Uns, or Out
with Us. In Israel today, Neturei Karta, a sect of ultra-Orthodox Jews,
believes that the Messiah alone should bring about a Jewish state, and
that Israel is therefore an impiety fit for destruction. In New York they
have a branch called Jews Against Zionism, and recently they welcomed
President Ahmedinejad in person there, supporting his call for genocide in
Israel. Pappe is the secular and political version of these sectarians. As
often happens, extremists have come from opposing poles only to reach the
same conclusion.
Zionism, in Pappeb s conventional Marxist view, had nothing to do with the
need for Jews to survive persecution by Europeans or Arabs, but was only a
settler and colonialist movement cynically directed by British
imperialists and their greedy Jewish collaborators. He characterises David
Ben-Gurion, the driving personality in the latter stages of the foundation
of the state of Israel, as someone who always intended to expel
Palestinians from the land. To bring this about, he assembled a body which
Pappe refers to as the Consultancy, but the details of who these people
were, and what they really did, he fails to give us, instead preferring to
conjure an aura of sinister conspiracy. The Israelis were always the
stronger party and knew that they would win out at the end of the British
Mandate in 1948, Pappe says. In contrast, the Palestinians were
defenceless and hardly violent at all, designated victims whose villages
were mercilessly overrun and many of the inhabitants butchered.
A huge literature exists in British, Arab and Israeli archives to reveal
the multiple reasons for the flight of the Palestinians at the time,
ranging from a belief that invading Arab armies were about to rescue them,
and they should move out of harmb s way, to a cultural reflex that they
could not accept Jews in positions of authority, an escapism on the part
of some leaders and delusions of power on the part of others, and of
course fear. Savage things were certainly perpetrated by both sides - C la
guerre comme C la guerre - but Pappe will have none of that, completely
ignoring the context in all its complexity and local variation. His
technique is to list towns and villages as though their capture involved
always and only simple brutality and expulsion. No mention of the Jewish
need to survive in an existential struggle in the aftermath of the
Holocaust; no mention of the 6,000 Jews killed, which was 1 per cent of
the population; no mention of Azzam Pasha of the Arab League promising a
massacre of Jews on the scale of the Mongols; no mention of Arab radio
propaganda and disinformation; no proper account of Arab military
successes, brushing over Arab atrocities and the destruction of Jewish
settlements; no mention of the countervailing expulsion and expropriation
of a million Jews in Arab countries.
As history, the book is worthless. In interviews Pappe regularly explains:
b We do [historiography] because of ideological reasons, not because we
are truth seekers.b For him, as a Marxist and anti-nationalist, b there
is no such thing as truth, only a collection of narrativesb . To
substantiate his particular ideological narrative, Pappe puts the worst
possible interpretation on any Jewish deed or word, while validating
anything said or done by Palestinians. For evidence of Israeli
monstrosity, he relies on quotations from his own previous works or from
Palestinian polemicists, and above all on the oral testimonies of
Palestinian refugees. Over half a century of military and ideological
conflict has passed since their exodus, but Pappe declares his faith that
whatever they now say is true. This might all seem too pathological to
matter much, but Arab and Muslim extremists are making huge efforts to
contest the legitimacy of Israel, and many of their allies on the
international Left will lean on Pappe for purposes of b pilgeringb and b
fiskingb .
The final element contributing to Pappeb s mindset lies in the sphere of
psychology and fashion. Contemporary intellectuals have long been
accustomed to glorying in an adversarial stance towards their own society,
preening themselves as men of nobler spirits than the dull indifferent
masses around them, and isolated not because they are foolish but because
they are brave. It is a form of snobbery - moral snobbery - which is why
intellectuals of this kind are so widely resented.
There is a fatal contradiction at the heart of Pappeb s advocacy of the
immediate return of all Palestinian refugees as the necessary condition of
peace. If Israelis are really as vicious as Pappe presents them, then
Palestinians could not possibly want to live among them. Are Palestinians
to return only to wipe out Israelis or to be wiped out themselves? Poor
Palestinians, poor Israelis, to be mobilised for such fates. And should
Hamas, the PLO or President Ahmadinejad make good on threats to eliminate
Israel, there will not be time to rescue Pappe from the consequences of
his moral snobbery and his Marxism, or to discover whether he really
applauds his own Raus mit Uns demise.
David Pryce-Jones
David Pryce-Jones was educated at Eton College, and then read history at
Magdalen College, Oxford. He has published nine novels and nine books of
non-fiction, including The Closed Circle and The War that Never Was, about
the end of the Soviet empire. He is a senior editor of National Review in
New York.
2. These are the people George Soros wants to bankroll:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/levi9909/116296404359888766/#268531
Jewish pro-Palestinian in hot water for 'Satanic' Israel jibe
Simon Rocker,
Jewish Chronicle,
November 16, 2006
The head of Jews for Justice for Palestinians has dissociated the group
from claims by one of its activists that Israel is a "Satanic state."
Deborah Fink posted the comment on an anti-Zionist weblog, writing:
"Israel does not deserve to be called 'The Jewish state.' It should be
called 'The Satanic state.' I really don't see the point [of] doing
anything else other than boycott it in every possible way."
But Dan Judelson, elected last month as JfJfP chair, told the JC that
Ms Fink's remarks were "incompatible" with her responsibilities within
the group . which include the role of recruitment officer.
The matter would be discussed at its monthly meeting on Sunday.
"Deborah Fink is not a member of the newly elected executive committee
of JfJfP," he stated. "As such, she speaks only for herself." He said
she had confirmed that she had posted the remarks online.
JfJfP organises and supports protests against Israeli policy towards
the Palestinians and was behind an advertisement in The Times signed by
more than 300 British Jews denouncing Israeli actions in Gaza.
3. The Kapo Elf:
http://www.paulbogdanor.com/elf.html
4. The Commonality of Totalitarians:
http://www.editrixoffice.com/ME_rich.htm
5. Baruch Dayan Ha-emet:
http://www.nysun.com/article/43688
6. Tony & Tacky
November 17, 2006; Page W15
MONSTER MASH: Idaho State University boasts that its faculty are
"committed to integrating diversity concepts into their individual
s initial reaction must bed tormenting questionsb one of pity. Poor man!
What a strain
it must be to belong to a nation whose members are so
overwhelmingly unbearable that he longs for them to be
overpowered by others. Yet there is more to it than that. Sad and
creepy though it is, Pappebcourses." Teachers seem less tolerant of
diverse views among their
colleagues, however. We refer to the shunning of Jeffrey Meldrum, a
tenured professor of anatomy who, AP reports, has trouble even getting
another scientist to have coffee with him. His sin? Mr. Meldrum believes
in Bigfoot, the folkloric ape-man of the back woods. This has gotten the
professor face time as an expert on the Discovery Channel. Even so, the
charge of "pseudo-academics" sounds fair. Would that it were heard more on
a thousand other campuses.
7. Affirmative Racism:
Racism by any other name
By Jonah Goldberg
http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/jonah111506.php3
8. Lying about Rachel Corrie:
http://www.israel-commentary.org/archives/2006_11.html#000760
Peace Plan:
The Israeli far Left is using something like above poster but without the mushroom. The green is supposed to be "Palestine", the blue is Israel, and the black is the nice fence between them, meaning that two states for two peoples, one a make-pretend people, will bring peace.
Hence my own slight alteration of the peace plan.
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
See? A professor need not be from Tel Aviv University in order to not recognize Israel!
1. Someone has kindly translated the interview with the two Nobelists from
which I quoted a few days ago. Go to
http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2006/11/studies-in-despair.html
2. Another moonbat "rebbe":
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25455
3. Norman Finkelstein's beer hall "university" and CAIR:
CAIR vs. DePaul
By Thomas Ciesielka
TC Public Relations November 14, 2006
Newly released evidence has revealed that the Council for American Islamic
Relations (CAIR) worked privately to pressure DePaul University to fire
adjunct professor Thomas Klocek for telling Muslim activist students that
their views on Middle-East issues were wrong. According to a letter to
DePaul.s President from CAIR.s executive director M. Yaser Tabbara, .In
light of .Mr. Klocek.s biased remarks, we are requesting that the
University.reprimand Mr. Klocek for his conduct by permanently dismissing
him from any teaching post at DePaul University.. (Exhibit # DPU 945).
At a student fair on September 15, 2004, during the same month that DePaul
launched its Islamic World Studies Program, Professor Klocek engaged
several Muslim students in a heated discussion about the Arab-Israeli
conflict. He strongly disputed their assertions that Israeli treatment of
Palestinians was equivalent to the Nazi treatment of the Jews. He also
cited a Chicago Sun-Times columnist who was quoting an Aljazeera writer to
the effect that although not all Muslims are terrorists, today most
terrorists are Muslim. Later, in another connection between DePaul and the
Muslim community, a DePaul Trustee, Michael Murad, wrote to DePaul.s
president asking, .What steps have been taken to ensure that DePaul
programs in the Middle East are not undermined by this incident?. (#DPU
003174)
According to documents furnished by DePaul in response to document
discovery in the lawsuit between Klocek and DePaul, less than a month
after the student fair incident, on October 12, 2004, CAIR.s Tabbara sent
an email to those who opposed Klocek, stating, ..we [CAIR] will be ready
to file a formal complaint with the Illinois State Board of Higher
Education. This will also be accompanied by a press release, a press
conference or both.. (DPU 003493)
Tabbara.s email also referred to a letter sent to DePaul.s president the
next day in which Tabbara made the following demands of DePaul, .In light
of the grave implications of Mr. Klocek.s biased remarks, we are
requesting that the University take appropriate and immediate responsive
action.including:
1. Provide a formal written apology to the students who experienced the
incident firsthand.
2. Reprimand Mr. Klocek for his conduct by permanently dismissing him
from any teaching post at DePaul University..
CAIR continued its campaign against Klocek when, according to another just
released document (DPU 000763), on December 16, 2004 CAIR wrote Prof.
Klocek.s Dean, Suzanne Dumbleton, and said, .The gravity of Mr. Klocek.s
actions towards the students should result in his permanent dismissal as a
matter of policy. Any alternative action will set a dangerous precedent..
John W. Mauck, attorney for Thomas Klocek, said, .These documents confirm
our suspicions. Rather than protect academic freedom or even treat Thomas
Klocek, a professor with a 14 year spotless track record at DePaul, the
university surrendered to behind-the-scenes Muslim activist pressure. At
DePaul academic freedom has been subjugated to Sharia..
To see copies of documents cited in this press release, please visit
http://freedepaul.blogspot.com or contact TC Public Relations at
312-422-1333.
4. Andover High - almost as bad as Ben Gurion University:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25475
5. Defeating Affirmative Apartheid:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110009235
See also http://www.michigancivilrights.org/index.htm
6. The latest SLAPP suit against a Zionist:
http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk
US journalists show British how to win at libel
See you in court ? in London
A US author has declared war on Britain.s .libel imperialism.. brendan
o.neill reports
This is about defending my First Amendment rights." Rachel Ehrenfeld, a
New York author, has declared war on England's 'libel imperialism'.
This week she will argue before the Federal Court of Appeals in Manhattan
that a libel ruling made against her at the High Court in London in 2005
should be struck off as an infringement of her right to free speech.
Ehrenfeld is a tough-talking anti-terrorist commentator, an American
Melanie Phillips. After 9/11, which she witnessed from her flat, she wrote
a book called Funding Evil. In the book, she made allegations about a
Saudi billionaire, whom she accused of funding terrorism. He sued her - in
London.
"I'm an American citizen. My book was published in America. If he has any
qualms with me, he should sue me here," she says. The Saudi sued her in
London on the basis that 23 copies of her book were bought by
.I.m an American citizen. My book was published in America. If he has any
qualms, about me, he should sue me here.
Britons via internet booksellers, and thus the libel was "repeated in
Britain".
Ehrenfeld points out that, in America, claimants must prove not only that
the accusations made against them are false, but also that they were made
"with actual malice". No wonder, she says, many of the rich and powerful
around the world prefer to use England's "claimant-friendly laws".
Ehrenfeld says the London ruling has had a "chilling effect on free
speech". Some US publishing houses are considering restricting the
availability of their books in Britain. "We all suffer under your libel
imperialism," she says. Her appeal is supported by the American Society of
Newspaper Editors, Forbes Inc and Amazon.com. Other US outlets have been
hit by our 'libel imperialism'. Last year, Roman Polanski sued American
magazine Vanity Fair in London, and won 50,000 damages. Earlier this year
Britney Spears sued the Florida-based National Enquirer in Belfast.
"It's more than 200 years since America won independence from Britain, yet
we're still being punished by your archaic laws", says Ehrenfeld.
7. So now it is not ONLY Tel Aviv University professors who refuse to
recognize Israel:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=115474
Professors New Hamas Govt Wont Recognize Israel
16:14 Nov 14, '06 / 23 Cheshvan 5767
by Hillel Fendel
The Hamas Authority is trying to put on a new front by installing a
professor as prime minister, but Hamas officials admit that the new gov't
will continue not to recognize Israel's right to exist.
Mohammed Shbair, a former head of the terrorist-hotbed Islamic University
of Gaza,
has been all but chosen to succeed his former assistant, Ismail Haniye, as
prime minister in the Hamas Authority. An independent legislator in the PA
legislature, Shbair is ideologically close to Hamas, but is not an active
member.
Shbair, who has a doctorate in microbiology from West Virginia University,
would be expected to head a government of technocrats that would deal less
with Israel and more with internal domestic problems.
Monday, November 13, 2006
In-Classroom anti-Israel Political Indoctrination at Ben Gurion University
In-Classroom One-Sided Political Indoctrination at Ben Gurion University
At Ben Gurion University, the Department of Politics and Government offers
a course entitled "Critical Aspects of the Occupation," taught by Neve
Gordon. The syllabus (Hebrew only) can be viewed on the departmental web
site: http://w3.bgu.ac.il/politics/new_pages/index.htm
The course is a perfect illustration of one-sided in-classroom anti-Israel
political indoctrination. Taught be one of Israel's worst anti-Israel
extremists, the course is little more than a semesterlong exercise in North
Korean-style re-education of students who may not be sufficiently
anti-Israel upon registration. To understand the title of the course, you
need to bear in mind that in leftist NewSpeak "critical" means
Marxist. Critical analyses of literature are mind-numbing tracts that
explain literary works as exercises in class struggle. Critical legal
studies are where criminality is celebrated as a moral revolt against the
ruling class. You get the picture.
The reading list for the Gordon propaganda course consists almost entirely
of anti-Israel or pro-Marxist diatribes. There are of course Gordon's own
screeds about how Israel is a terrorist state and engages in
torture. There is Gordon's buddy Lisa Hajjar, from the University of
California at Santa Barbara, a sociologist claiming to understand legal
institutions who has made a career out of bashing Israel (see
http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=18236 ).
There are also long-winded fatuities written by the late Marxist
"philosopher" Michel Foucault. There are oodles of Arab writers who do not
think Israel has the right to protect itself. There are ultra-haters of
Israel like Sara Roy or Azmi Bishara (the Arab Knesset Member who has been
running to Syria to call for Israel's annihilation). There is far-leftist
Israeli lawyer (Avigdor Feldman), alongside several articles and reports by
the anti-Israel NGO "Betselem" (see report on the group in NGO-Monitor at
http://ngo-monitor.org/archives/infofile.htm ). Israel-hating film-maker
Joan Mandell offers her expert scholarly opinions to Gordon's students in
the course, as does Haaretz extremist columnist Akiva Eldar. There is
political wisdom from the anti-Israel architectural display of two
anti-Zionist architects
(http://www.versobooks.com/books/nopqrs/s-titles/segal_weizman_occupation.shtml
). And on and on it goes.
The closest thing the reading list for the course ever gets to letting
students hear the point of view of a Zionist writer is with a 25-year old
piece by Menachem Milson, and some chapters from a book by Labor Party
historian Shabtai Shevet.
There is not a single article there about Palestinian terrorism or about
Israel's rights to defend itself. You will never learn that Israel's
"occupation" of "Palestinian lands" was caused by Arab aggression and
violence and not the other way around. You will never hear that the main
cause of escalated Palestinian terrorism in the past decade or so was not
occupation at all but rather the REMOVAL of occupation.
Concerned about the merciless brainwashing of hapless students at Ben
Gurion University? Why not drop a note to the President of BGU, Prof.
Rivka Carmi, at Ben Gurion University, P.O. Box 653, Beer-Sheva 84105
Israel (e-mail: rcarmi@bgumail.bgu.ac.il.) and tell her what you think.
Sunday, November 12, 2006
The Rude Awakening of Professor Aaron Ciechanover
1. Everyone knows that Prof. Robert Aumann, the Nobel Prize
wininng Israeli economist who leans to the starboard side (mean, the
right), strongly opposed the abandonment of Gush Katif and the Olmert
capitulation last summer.
Now another Nobel Prize winner has spoken out. Only this time, it is
in some ways more significant. That is because Prof. Aaron Ciechanover, a
Technion chemist, in the past paid lip-service to touchy-feely peace
making and "converting swords into Technion labs" and things of that sort
and has long been well left of center. But on Oct 27, 06, the professor
was interviewed in Yediot Ahronot, together with Aumann. The
interview is not available on line, but as part of the interview, this
other Nobel Prize winning Israeli said the following:
" Until a few months ago I would not have agreed with Prof. Robert Aumann.
Today, even though I have not altered my basic position within the Israeli
political spectrum, I must agree with him. Last year I was all in favor
of the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, which seemed to me an act of
unilateral goodwill and generosity towards the Palestinians. I hoped they
would respond in kind, but I was wrong.
"After the unilateral withdrawal (by Israel) all we got was terror and
more terror. The whole idea of unilateral concessions has gone completely
bankrupt and along with it the entire soap bubble of a party that was
established on its basis has gone bankrupt (he means Kadima -- SP). True,
it is still in power but what message does it have for today? This party
and the entire government do not have so much as a shred of an agenda...."
While we are discussing errors in judgment, let me add my own. I had been
under the impression that Haifa academics were unaffected by the 4000
katyushas that landed on northern Israel and so the naifs and
pipedreamers among them were no smarter than before the war. But at
least one important academic has been woken up by the booms of the
katyushas.
The English web site of Yediot runs an abridged version of the article
in question here http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3320959,00.html
but it cuts out the offending passage in which Professor Aaron Ciechanover
describes his entrance into the real world.
2. I have purposely stayed out of the ruckus over the "gay pride parade",
mainly because there were so many other hundreds of articles and
commentaries on it in the media. I think little was left that needed to
be said.
Just one aspect that should be mentioned. Last summer, when the Olmert
regime was conducting the Gush Katif capitulation and the ethnic cleansing
of the Jews from Gaza, a number of mass protests were prohibited by the
government lest they trigger violence, or result in large expenses for
police protection, etc.
Then there is the little matter of those Jews who want to pray near or on
the Temple Mount. For decades the Israeli government has prohibited THAT,
lest such a demonstration offend the feelings of people, Moslem people.
And of course because of the danger that it could trigger violence and
cost money to pay for police presence.
Suddenly, the "Gay Pride" parade is Holy of Holies for the Israeli
government. It HAS to be held in Jerusalem, no matter what the population
of Jerusalem (and of the rest of the country) think. No Gay Pride March
has ever taken place in Mecca, the Vatican, or in the temple of the Dalai
Lama, but Jerusalem is not entitled to any similar consideration.
3. Telling off Yellow-Wind Grossman:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3325213,00.html
4. Judge coddles ISM terrorhoids:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/article.php3?id=6688
5. Spoof News:
LATEST LANCET JOURNAL STUDY ESTIMATES U.S. POPULATION AT 57 TRILLION
LONDON -- Following their groundbreaking study which found that more than
650,000 Iraqis have needlessly died since the US-led invasion, the Lancet
Medical Journal has published a new study that estimates the current U.S.
population at 57 trillion.
"As of Thursday, October 12th, 2006, at 4:47 a.m.," the study reports,
"the 57 trillionth American was born."
Other demographics experts and population researchers have estimated the
U.S. population at 300 million. But Lancet, according to a spokesman, used
a radical new method by employing what they call, "expert guestimators,"
who "chose a random densely populated neighbourhood in a random big city,"
and stopped people in the street "at rush hour, asking them how many
Americans they thought there were, just judging from taking a look
around."
A Lancet spokesman called the method "utterly reliable," and added that
should current U.S. obesity rates continue to also grow, "the whole planet
will turn on its axis, and we will all fall off. And it will all be the
fault of the United States, per usual."
Marni Malarkey for Iconoclast
KIM JONG-IL SORRY FOR NUKE TEST, MOLESTED AS CHILD
BEIJING -- North Korean President Kim Jong-Il today reportedly told
Chinese diplomats that he regrets his government.s recent detonation of a
nuclear device, and he revealed that he had been molested as a child.
.President Kim is sorry, and he takes full responsibility for the atomic
bomb test,. said an unnamed Chinese source, .but in the spirit of
transparency and vulnerability, he wants people to know about the
childhood molestation incident..
The North Korean leader has reportedly checked himself into a rehab center
to .heal his inner child and boost his self-esteem,. but a spokesman said
he is not ashamed to come out of the closet as a fascist dictator.
.A lot people are going to trot out the old myths that fascist dictators
are dangerous to society,. said the spokesman. .But short of a few
isolated genocides and unprovoked invasions, there.s little evidence to
substantiate that claim. It.s time to move past recriminations over the
nuclear test, and let bygones be bygones..
Scott Ott, courtesy Scrappleface, Copyright 2006 Scrappleface. All rights
reserved.
BIN LADEN AND SOROS FORM POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEE
(Undisclosed Location, Pakistan) -- Osama Bin Laden and Hungarian
billionaire George Soros have announced the merger of MoveOn.org and
Al-Qaeda into a 527 political action committee to be called The Fund for a
Democracy-Free America.
Speaking at a joint press conference yesterday at Bin Laden's rustic
mountaintop retreat in western Pakistan, Soros praised the Al-Qaeda
leader's commitment to defeating the Republican Party in next month's
elections. Soros also stressed the shared values that unite MoveOn.org and
Al-Qaeda. "We both hate America and Israel and all agents of the
International Zionist Conspiracy, such as George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, the
Duke of Wellington, Grandma Moses and Dwight Eisenhower," said Soros. "So
it made sense to merge our operations and eliminate duplication of effort.
From now on the Democrat Party, Islamofascists and anti-Semites will speak
with one, united voice."
Bin Laden added his agreement with Soros' comments. "Right now, terrorist
branding is the name of the game. It's a win-win situation for all
involved and allows us to leverage our terrorist quotient by a factor of
four. We're currently at a place we want to be synergy-wise."
Details of the Al-Qaeda/MoveOn.org merger have not been completely
revealed. The Iconoclast has learned, however, that all members of
Al-Qaeda will receive 1.85 shares of stock in Soros' "Death to the Zionist
Entity and Her American Lapdogs" hedge fund for each year of membership in
Al-Qaeda. Members of MoveOn.org will receive three wives, two cows and an
option on a camel in exchange for MoveOn.org junk bonds.
William Grim for Iconoclast
Funny photos:
http://www.iconoclast.ca/databases/images/aPointlessFamilyPhotooftheYear.jpg
and
http://www.iconoclast.ca/databases/images/aLIB-Dangeroustoyourcountryshealth-NEW.jpg
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Dershowitz vs. Gordon: The Sequel
1. Dershowitz vs. Gordon: The Sequel
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378376003&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Who's playing fast and...
Sir, - Neve Gordon's "Anti-Israeli? You just don't like what I say"
(November 8) was a cut-and-paste of an earlier letter he wrote to the
National Catholic Reporter. It was full of lies, as was his op-ed.
Instead of answering why he seeks to stifle the free speech of Prof.
Steven Plaut, Gordon turns around again - as he always does - and says I
tried to stifle Norman Finkelstein's free speech. I didn't, and, as I
explained in my original op-ed, I've released all the letters I wrote to
the University of California Press. I even quoted myself from them: "I
have no interest in censoring or suppressing Finkelstein's freedom of
expression."
Gordon again parrots Finkelstein's claim that I plagiarized The Case for
Israel. The origins of the slander: Finkelstein first said I "almost
certainly didn't write" The Case for Israel "and perhaps didn't even read
it prior to publication."
He even suggested all my books were written for me by the Israeli Mossad:
"[I]t's sort of like a Hallmark line for Nazis... [T]hey churn them out so
fast that he has now reached a point where he doesn't even read them."
When I produced my handwritten manuscript as proof, Finkelstein changed
his story, claiming that I had plagiarized the book. I immediately
demanded that Harvard conduct an independent investigation, and they
cleared me of all wrongdoing, as have numbers of distinguished scholars, a
former president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, The New
York Times and the head legal librarian at the Harvard Law School.
Yet Finkelstein and Gordon persist in making this charge - part of a long
pattern of leveling personal attacks against those who support Israel or
justice for Holocaust survivors, rather than engaging them on the merits
of their views.
ALAN DERSHOWITZ
Cambridge, Massachusetts
...loose with free speech?
Sir, - Watching Neve Gordon attack Prof. Alan Dershowitz's academic record
reminded me of the fable about the flea calling the elephant "shorty."
While challenging Dershowitz's record, Gordon (whose degree is from Notre
Dame University) accuses the Harvard don of playing fast and loose with
the facts, while Gordon denies Dershowitz's claim that he often compares
Israel to Nazi Germany. So who is playing fast and loose here?
Read, on: weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/664/op41.htm - Gordon comparing
Israel's behavior to that of Nazi Germany on Kristallnacht, in a piece
that appeared in Al-Ahram and a dozen other anti-Semitic journals; and -
on
www.counterpunch.org/gordon0602.html - Gordon comparing Israeli behavior
to Adolf Eichmann's. Gordon regularly compares Israel's defense fence to
the walls built by Nazi Germany around concentration camps and ghettos.
The media has already widely compared Gordon's malicious misuse of the
courts to attempt to suppress the freedom of speech of his critics to the
tactics adopted by David Irving against Deborah Lipstadt.
While whining about his "reputation," Gordon led a venomous and dishonest
campaign of vilification against Israeli Gen. Aviv Kochavi for "war
crimes," which resulted in attempts to prosecute Kochavi overseas under
phony charges.
Meanwhile Gordon continues to teach courses at Ben-Gurion University that
consist of little more than anti-Israel political indoctrination, such as
his notorious "Critical Aspects of the Occupation," in which no Zionist
opinion dare be expressed.
That says volumes about the academic standards of the political science
department at BGU.
PROF. STEVEN PLAUT
University of Haifa
Haifa
2. Hip hop against anti-Semites:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378377054&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
3. Frog hunt, anyone?
https://israel.indymedia.org/newswire/display/5553/index.php
4. The Hookers in Black against the Israel Philharmonic:
http://peoplesgeography.com/2006/11/02/women-in-black-petition-members-of-the-israel-philharmonic-orchestra/
5. Poison Ivy League:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25304
and
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25310
6. There are many different kinds of Avoda Zara:
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2006/11/tzom-rabin-reform-judaism-adds-new.html
7. The gross stupidity of David Grossman:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1162378356160&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
8. Dersh bashes the anti-Semites at UCLA:
http://dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=38872
9. That match:
http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/30832/format/html/displaystory.html
10. Borat:
http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/30855/format/html/displaystory.html
11. Heart and soul:
MCRI
[Anthony Paletta 11/09 03:24 PM]
Mary Sue Coleman, president of the University of Michigan, has been making
defiant statements in the wake of MCRI. Most recently: "I will not stand
by while the very heart and soul of this great university is threatened."
So remember: Racial diversity, not quality scholarship, is the heart and
soul of this university.
12. Outrage Works
[Carol Iannone 11/08 03:15 PM]
The idea of a student's having a "right" to wear the costume of a suicide
bomber seems the wrong point to be making. To me it's like saying someone
has the "right" to make a film ridiculing people with handicaps. I guess
there's no law, but it's not a matter of law; it's a matter of the tenor
of a society in which civilized people wish to live. I don't understand
turning everything into a "right." It goes with the way our society is
increasingly defined by laws and politics rather than by an understanding
of the pre-political, sub-legal morals and mores that promote virtuous
behavior and good citizenship. And I like Anthony's formulation,
"Society clearly needs the moral stewardship of its citizens."
Also, Anthony makes the point that it is better that "public ostracism"
should do the job rather than censorship, by which I think he means some
kind of official censorship. Ok, but public ostracism is a form of
censorship. The student has apologized and it is unlikely that he will
publicly express himself in that fashion again, or find so many of his
dopey fellows willing to participate in his charades.
Furthermore, Gutmann has issued a second statement in which she does not
reiterate the student's "right," but calls the costume offensive and
horrific and the photograph with her an embarrassment to the university.
Some are evidently calling the statement another non-apology apology, but
I think it represents progress. The offensive speech was met with more
and better speech and the point has been won (except evidently in some
"conservative" libertarian circles). Civilization 1; Savagery 0.
(from http://phibetacons.nationalreview.com/)