What we are talking about this issue: (1) MEDIA BIAS (McLaughlin, McCarthy, Golem, Feder, Malone, Phillips, Landes, Lipkin, Marquardt-Bigman) (2) SHARIA INFILTRATION INTO AMERICA    Promoting Sharia Law: (Dreyfus, Perazzo, Ibrahim)    Adopting The Right Mind Set: (Frantzman, Mandel, Imm, Lieberberg) (3) IS IT SMART TO WEAKEN ISRAEL, ESPECIALLY NOW?    Coexistence isn't possible. (Frantzman, Salzman, Rubin. Spyer)    Give the Arabs a state in Arab Land. This would also solve the refugee problem (Sharan, Rodban, Singer, Sherman, Grief) (4) DEALING WITH THE ARAB AND ISRAELI MIND SET.    Changing the Israeli Mind Set" (Celser, Kaplan, Lewin, Kedar, Shomron, Glick, Lademain)    Paying attention to the Muslim Mindset (Jayate, Ibrahim, Suseelan ) (5) HISTORY (Elder of Ziyon, Perry)

  Tom McLaughlin points out some specific instances of media bias in the presidential campaign. Sarah Palin was ridiculed while gaffes by the Democratic candidates for President and Vice-President were ignored. What makes Joe Biden's gaffe about where the duties of the vice-president are defined in the Constitution so telling is that it was barely reported, while the media insisted Palin didn't understand the role of the vice-president.
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THE LOS ANGELES TIMES SUPPRESSES OBAMA'S KHALIDI BASH TAPE
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Andrew McCarthy tells us about a tape destined to become as famous as Nixon's partially-wiped tape. The real horror of what he discusses is that we now live in a world when A Mad Jihad Man comes to the U.N. with the Good News that he plans to bomb Israel into oblivion, and some Jewish Democrats, leftists, are more concerned that Sarah Palin will attract a large crowd, politically a problem for them. A world where Rashid Khalidi spews insults at his Jewish students, and Columbia puts him on the Selection Committee to nominate an acting head for their Jewish Studies program. A world where Barack Obama participates in a hate-a-Jew fest thrown by AAAN, an activist organization founded by Khalidi and funded by Barack Obama and William Ayers using Woods money — and not one major newspaper is outraged.
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THE WAR AND PEACE REPORT...
by Rachel Golem

  This is broad satire — you might think you were watching Saturday Night Live (SNL), except, of course, SNL would never tackle this subject. Rachel Golem gives us interviews with some well-known figures on the Extreme Left, as they might be done by Amy Goodman, another well-known Marxist.
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OUR ENEMY THE MEDIA
by Don Feder

  The New York Times rightfully identified Sarah Palin as a danger to Barack Obama's campaign. It went after her and John McCain with ruthless determination, while airbrushing negative information about Obama. As Don Feder points out, "The Gray Lady set the tone for the rest of the press." It taught the wolf pack of newpapers — most of the Press was campaigning for Obama — how to attack the Republican candidates. In becoming a partisan, its tactics ranged from ruminating about Sarah Palin's clothes to promulgating rumors about her family inventive enough to make the National Inquirer proud. To get Barack Obama elected, the Times was willing to shed its integrity. What is ludicrous, it yelps that it knows about the separation of news and opinion. As Feder puts it, "For sheer hypocrisy, this is hard to beat. In the real world, The New York Times is to objectivity what Jack the Ripper was to women's rights."
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MEDIA'S PRESIDENTIAL BIAS AND DECLINE
by Michael S. Malone

  Michael Malone has observed that over the years, some of the country's major papers have let "opinion pieces creep into the news section, and from there onto the front page." The networks are no better. "But," he points out, "nothing I've seen has matched the media bias on display in the current presidential campaign." The media attack dogs are all on the side of the Democrats. Malone puts the blame on the news editors, the people who assign to the reporters and lay out the news and editorial pages. The reasons for their bias for Obama will surprise you.
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MOVING THE FORWARD BACKWARD
by Moshe Phillips

  The Forward started as a socialist paper, but with the intelligence to translate classics into Yiddish and in other ways teach immigrants how to live as participants in America. After it needed to be written in English to maintain a readership, thanks to poor leadership, it soon could rightfully be labelled as anti-Semitic. Moshe Phillips provides us with some essential information and suggests some changes that would put the Forward on the right track. Between the lines, we can also read the hostility of Leftist ideologues to Judaism.
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THE MUHAMMAD AL-DURA BLOOD LIBEL: A CASE ANALYSIS
An Interview with Richard Landes conducted by Manfred Gerstenfeld

  The Al-Dura Hoax has become the morality play of our time. For years, it was assumed that Israeli soldiers had killed the boy, Muhammad. His death instantly became justification for Arab violence. When it was finally demonstrated that the bullet couldn't have been fired by the soldiers — the geometry precluded such an explanation — the hoax began to fall apart. And became more complex. The photographer, his boss at the TV station, the newpaper managers stonewalled. The mainstream media mostly ignored the significance of the new evidence presented in the court. Richard Landes reviews the story and provides more information on those that started the lie and those who insisted that the lie was true and whose who used the lie to castigate the Jews for their own purposes.
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PAN-ARABISM'S RACISM AND WIKIPEDIA BIAS
compiled and edited by Bernice Lipkin

  By now, it's fairly common knowledge that Wikipedia is fine for some subjects — maybe 'some parts of a subject' would be more accurate — and not for others. As a rule of thumb, distortions will increase the more the subject is politicized. In this case an article in Wikipedia was challenged by an unknown reader and the Wikipedia Editor was taken to task. Another reader supplied reliable references that would counteract the initial Wiki assertions.
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THE WARPED MIRROR: NO PRETENSE OF SCHOLARSHIP
by Petra Marquardt-Bigman

  It is curious that papers like the New York Times practice self-censorship and won't say something nasty but true about Islam while a publisher of an encyclopedia publishes 3-volumes of sloppy and inaccurate anti-Jewish text. Could it be that the Muslims will riot at the slightest criticism and Jews politely request ... — even when the document is noxious? It is of course MacMillan's right to publish what it wishes; and it is our duty to alert the educational community that a once respectable publishing house is selling racist propaganda disguised as a scholarly reference work. Petra Marquardt-Bigman tells us the story.
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LEARNING ABOUT SHARIAH LAW IN THE BELLY OF THE A.B.A.
by Marion D.S. Dreyfus

  Marion Dreyfus provides us with an excellent picture of a training session on Shariah-compliant finance (SCF) given to non-Muslim lawyers by a panel of experts. The subject is complicated and Dreyfus made note of important areas that not covered or were sloughed off when the speaker was questioned. The number of deals involving SCF is increasing and she notes, "It was explained that the swelling numbers of deals would make NOT working with SCF 'almost impossible.'" The U.S. Treasury has also recently held a workshop to train U.S. government personnel in SCF.
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BLACK RACISTS RECRUITED TO GUIDE THE JIHAD
by John Perazzo

  In the '50s, we prefaced any not totally rightist opinion with "I'm not a communist BUT ..." In today's climate, dominated by the totally leftist, it's "I'm not a racist, BUT ..." But the spell of intimidation may be cracking. People are noticing that racism is equal-opportunity and some blacks — like some whites — are racist. Once we go past the surface, people like John Perazza, in this essay, are beginning to ask the important questions: WHY and HOW. Perazzo points out that many black racists are reborn Muslims just as black radicals used to be communist. Arafat was trained by the Russians and provided by them with techniques and talking points. Perhaps we will discover that the current generation of the radicalized is being manipulated the same way. After all, as the Muslim terrorists say by their actions: if it works, use it, again and again
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AMERICAN MUSLIMS' PRIORITY PROBLEMS
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Muslims are becoming more vocal in demanding that their environment and working conditions be reconstructed to suit their religious requirements. Raymond Ibrahim wonders why they voluntarily left Muslim countries very much in harmony with their lifestyle to "surround themselves with wine-imbibing, swine-eating libertines. Why?" He suggests they choose — either to stay in "sharia friendly" countries or "prepare to assimilate — that is, compromise — to some degree. It's a simple question of priorities."
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CAN ISLAM SAVE THE WHITE MAN?
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Call this essay by Seth Frantzman ironic. Call it sarcasm. But it expresses the great truth that what is denigrated by us in our society is admired in Other societies. We compare ourselves to Others and find ourselves lacking in .. (whatever is the fad of the moment). Frantzman uses as paradigm the redneck versus Muslim culture. We've allowed ourselves to be psyched out. It's time to rethink.
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OCCIDENTAL TRUTH
by Daniel Mandel

  Professor Rashid Khalidi of Columbia University has received recent media attention because of his association with President Elect Obama. His hatred of Jews has long been known on his home campus, where he is considered heir to the late Edward Said, the linguist. Said almost single-handedly set the assumptions and presumptions underlying Middle Eastern studies across the country. He was the giver of the received wisdom that the exploitative, racist West could not really understand the Middle East. His influence was strong and, for the most part, inhibited critical assessment of his proclamations. In this essay, Daniel Mandel reviews Ibn Warraq's critique of Said's influential book, Orientalism. As Mandel writes, "Said's theories laid the groundwork for 'post-colonial studies,' the academic discipline whose founding principle is the belief that the West — and everything identified with its intellectual and cultural traditions — is guilty of oppressing and exploiting those foreign cultures that came under its power and influence at one time or another."
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JIHAD AND THE RELATIVIST ENEMY WITHIN
by Jeffrey Imm

  As Jeffrey Imm writes, "In today's America, we now have those who call for relativism regarding the ideology of Islamic supremacy and those organizations supporting Islamic supremacism. Such relativists ask: who are we to challenge other ideas and values? They ask: why should Americans confront such an ideology, instead of engaging with it?" The answer is, of course, we have no choice, no choice that is, if we wish to preserve America's freedom. Resurgent Islam declared war on us, and unless we fight back they will win. That's why "...shrug-shoulder relativism towards the survival of America and defense of its values" is dangerous. "Relativism towards America's values goes from the decadence that such values aren't worth fighting over and ultimately leads to the nihilistic view that our very existence is not worth fighting over." We need to realize this is unacceptable behavior.
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REVOLUTIONARY SITUATION IN THE UNITED STATES
by Zack Lieberberg

  After Barack Obama said he supports laws that would allow illegal aliens to obtain drivers' licences, one group pointed out that there is one issue almost all Americans agree on: the 12 million illegal aliens in the U.S. should not get amnesty, should not get driver's licenses, should not get Social Security benefits, should not get automatic Medicaid healthcare cover and other government benefits. But as Zack Lieberberg writes, we're not willing to actually carry out actions we know we should. Where draconian measures are needed, we are not able to allow ourselves to use them, whether to fight the invasion by aliens, the drug war or the threat from resurgent Islam. The fear is that if strong measures are used, they will be turned against us, and it's not an irrational fear. Lieberberg suggests there is need for a new political party to do what is necessary.
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COEXISTENCE: THE MYTH
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth J. Frantzman asks whether coexistence is possible between two hostile groups. Setting aside movies that fantasize the possibilities, it's hard to come up with an example. As Frantzman puts it, "There has never been coexistence and there never will be. There is only individual coexistence. Communal coexistence does not exist." "Stories such as these usually involve some individual evidence of someone named Mahmud and some other person named Vikram and how they were friends and shopped at each others' stores and that their children played together." As I read this essay, I thought of the Seeds Of Peace program — Jewish-sponsored, of course — where Jewish and Arab children would learn to co-exist. In one sense, it succeeded beautifully — the Jewish Adam Shapiro from Seeds of Peace ran to Ramallah to protect Yasser Arafat, so he'd live to kill more Jews. But I don't think this is what people want, when they talk co-existence.
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SELF-INDUCED NAKBA
by Philip Carl Salzman

  Can two people coexist when A sees itself as the perpetual victim of B — while simultaneously looking forward to conquering B, for it is A's divine right established by Allah to rule over all other people? Not bloody likely! Philip Salzman writes that "Narratives of victimization, such as the Palestinian one, neglect to account for the active Arab response to the Jews and to Jewish immigration. Explaining all by Western imposition robs the Arabs of Palestine of their agency, and infantalizes them." The Arabs were much more active: "Arab opposition to the Jews [was] expressed in riots and pogroms..." Salzman sums Arab behavior this way: "They demanded all or nothing, and got nothing. But they have continued to hold to the rejectionist position, taking an annihilationist stance toward Israel and the Jews. So in reality the self-induced 'Nakba' is self-perpetuating."
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AP BLAMES ISRAEL FOR MAKING PALESTINIANS WANT TO DESTROY IT
by Barry Rubin

  The Associated Press (AP) is not noted for writing comedy. But Professor Rubin has identified a sthtick that would make an interesting situation comedy. The anti-hero, an Arab, keeps trying to kill the Jew. He keeps failing, the Jew not liking this part of the script much. The Arab blames the Jew for having forced him to want to kill the Jew and vows to try harder. Actually, it's not so funny in real life. It's also not funny that AP, a news agency, writes good fiction, when it should stick to fact. It might also translate for its readers Arabic circumlocutions in English; for example, that "Prominent Palestinians are lighting a fire under Israel's feet by proposing a peace in which there would be no separate Palestine and Israel, but a single state with equal rights for all." means terrorist violence, not a plea for coexistence.
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FORWARD TO THE PAST: THE FALL AND RISE OF THE 'ONE-STATE SOLUTION'
by Jonathan Spyer

  This is an important reference that clarifies the history and the intent of the Arabs, who have generally favored a one-state solution. As Jonathan Spyer writes, "Deeply embedded in Palestinian nationalism is the notion that Israeli Jewish identity is analogous to that of communities born of European colonialism, which are not seen as having legitimate claim to self-determination. No reconsidering of this characterization took place during the period of the peace process of the 1990s. Hence, the short period of acceptance of the "two-state solution," was a departure by Palestinian nationalism from its more natural stance, and the current trend of return to the "one-state" option is a return to a position more in keeping with the deep view of the conflict held throughout by this trend."
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ISRAEL AND THE PALESTINIANS: WHAT IS THE "REFUGEE" PROBLEM?
by Shlomo Sharan and collaborators

  This is an excellent analysis of the creation the Palestinian "refugees" and how they continue in refugee status decades after they should have and could have been settled into new homes. A secondary objective is to bring to light the "profound and far reaching distortions as well as sheer disregard for historical evidence" by those who use the "refugees" for political propaganda.
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THE ISRAEL RESETTLEMENT FUND
by Gregory Rodban

  This can be considered a minimalist plan for reducing some of the growing Arab population. It doesn't address the growing radicalism of Israeli Arabs, who receive welfare benefits, but don't serve in the Army and don't feel any loyalty to Israel.
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PALESTINE: BUY UP OR SELL OUT?
by David Singer

  The peace process has died many times and has been put back on artificial respirators whenever foreign politicians saw some advantage in it for them. David Singer takes a nibble out of the problem by suggesting Israel buy up the tract of land still designated as "no man's land." He points out that "Israel has now been given a very real window of opportunity to buy up tracts of West Bank land occupied by Arab residents; rather than being forced to sell out Israel's heritage by compensating 700,000 Jewish residents to vacate their West Bank homes to enable the creation of President Bush's new Arabs-only State in the West Bank.
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A NEW PARADIGM FOR THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT: FROM THE POLITICAL TO THE HUMANITARIAN
by Martin Sherman

  This is a reprint of Martin Sherman's December 2006 essay on how to solve the present hostilities. The introduction read "Conventional political plans that propose resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs by establishing a self-governing Palestinian entity in the territories have been short-lived because they ignore that the Palestinian leadership doesn't want a state; its focus is on destroying Israel. The Jerusalem Summit suggests a new approach — to provide "dowries" to the Palestinians themselves to set them up financially in the neighboring Arab countries. They would be affluent rather than poor refugees. Surprisingly, polls indicate that the majority of the Palestinian Arabs would be willing to emigrate. Martin Sherman of the Jerusalem Summit urges everyone to get involved and publicize the plan."
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SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTION 242: A VIOLATION OF LAW AND A PATHWAY TO DISASTER
by Howard Grief

  In 1948, Jordan, one of the Arab armies that invaded Israel, conquered the eastern part of Jerusalem, Samaria and Judea. Israel took these areas after the Arabs invaded Israel again in 1967. The U.N. passed a non-binding resolution, 242, when fighting stopped. The Arabs have often falsely claimed that according to Res. 242, Israel was to return to the pre-1967 borders. Howard Grief's comprehensive article explains exactly what Res 242 did and did not assert. And what it was wrong in asserting — i.e., "the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war" does not apply in that Israel was not the aggressor. It had been threatened by imminent aggression. "In this case it is certainly admissible under international law for the state under imminent attack to keep the territory that was captured from which the planned aggression emanated." More importantly, Grief makes the point that "the Security Council does not have and never had the authority or right to order Israel to withdraw from territories that constituted historical and legal areas of the Jewish National Home and Land of Israel that had been recognized implicitly or explicitly as belonging to the Jewish People in various acts of international law: the San Remo Resolution of April 25, 1920; the Franco-British Boundary Convention of December 23, 1920; and the Mandate for Palestine, confirmed by the League of Nations on July 24, 1922 and accepted by the United States in the Anglo-American Treaty on Palestine of December 3, 1924." This land is held in a perpetual trust for the Jewish people (Google Shifftan and Grief for 'trust jewish people' in Think-Israel for amplification.)
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I DON'T LIKE MOST OF YOU RIGHT NOW
by Boris Celser

  A reader that sent in this article wrote, "His awesome insight. I deem it as one of the most outstanding pieces of journalism that I've read lately. it's a deeply moving cry for Israel's survival. It's outstanding for its knowledge, perception of reality, the depth of his love for Israel that his well-known wry humour and harsh criticism may try to conceal. It moves me deeply because I see the situation as he sees it, and it's so painful that it nearly drive me to despair. Words fail me. Thank you Boris."
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POLI SCI LECTURER MENACHEM KLEIN NEVER SAYS DIE TO A "PEACE PROCESS"
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan tells us about "Professor Menachem Klein of the Bar-Ilan Political Studies Department, ....[who is] one of those Israelis who helped instigate the Oslo Accords and promoted the 'peace agreement' that led to so many dead Jews in its wake over the last fifteen years." Curiously, the deadly consequences of Oslo seem to have taught him nothing. Listening to the habitual lies the Arabs tell him has not persuaded him they don't really want peace. Instead, he's devoted himself to a monomaniacal pursuit of peace. To maintain his vision, he has to believe he sees what others can't. He has to believe every who doesn't think like him is just too stupid to understand. One clear-eyed view at Arab hostility would destroy his fantasy. So he has to believe that the Arab lust for murder, and their hatred of Jews are just superficial and will go away when there's peace. He does have a gift for explaining away embarrassing facts. It is a gift that is appreciated by a Who's Who of Jew haters, who aren't under a spell of peace — they just want the Arabs to win and they appreciate his help.
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PEACE NOW: A 30-YEAR FRAUD
by Kenneth Levin

  Kenneth Levin writes about Peace Now's history — its beginnings in 1978 with the slogan that "The security of Israel depends on peace, not on territories.", a curious notion, considering how tiny Israel is and how hostile the neighboring Arabs are. Levin tells us that "[t]hose attracted to the organization were people unwilling to reconcile themselves to the reality that Israel's Arab adversaries were in control of deciding whether there would be peace, and that, with few exceptions, their decision ... was against Israel's existence." They believed that only Israel could impose peace or withdraw and peace would enter the vacuum. The corollary was that if peace didn't blossom, it was Israel's fault; she hadn't done enough. From the beginning they were convinced that Jewish settlements — not Arab settlements — in the territories are the chief impediment to peace. One of their more pernicious ideas is that Israel should stop being a Jewish state because that would appease the Arabs."They must yield even their belief in the value of Jewish peoplehood." As events gave the lie to their convictions, they could change their position or hold tight to notions that had been disproven by the Arabs themselves. They chose to ignore reality and began to invent fraudulent claims and openly become propagandists for Arab claims. As Levin puts it, "it was and is a cult that worships at the altar of self-delusion and wishful thinking and that, intoxicated with its airy visions of "peace," was and is prepared to sacrifice anyone who challenges it, no matter what evidence, what realities, he or she invokes in that challenge."
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THE MYTH OF AL-AQSA: HOLINESS OF JERUSALEM TO ISLAM HAS ALWAYS BEEN POLITICALLY MOTIVATED
by Mordechai Kedar

  Mordechai Kedar notes that when "the Prophet Mohammad established Islam, he introduced a minimum of innovations. He employed the hallowed personages, historic legends and sacred sites of Judaism and Christianity." The importance of Islamizing Jerusalem was "to undermine the legitimacy of the older religions, Judaism and Christianity, which consider Jerusalem to be a holy city. Islam is presented as the only legitimate religion, destined to replace the other two, because they had changed and distorted the Word of God, each in its turn." In more recent years "Yasser Arafat, himself a secular person (ask Hamas!), did exactly what the Califs of the Umayyad dynasty did 1300 years ago: He marshaled the holiness of Jerusalem to serve his political ends." Kedar asks, "Must Judaism and Christianity defer to myths related in Islamic texts or envisioned in Mohammad's dreams, long after Jerusalem was established as the ancient, true center of these two religions, which preceded Islam? Should Israel give up on its capital just because some Muslims decided to recycle the political problems of the Umayyads 1250 years after the curtain came down on their role in history?"
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SUKKOT: WHEN TEMPORARY IS GOOD
by Sara Layah Shomron

  The Olmert Gov't has been talking about giving Samaria and Judea to a single person — Abbas — who will soon be replaced by Hamas, UNLESS Israel wants to spill its blood to save this aging terrorist. We were horrified at that idea. Did the Israeli Government not understand that some 500,000 OR MORE (estimates go to 700,000) Jews would be become homeless — refugees in their own country? We wondered why even math-deficient politicians couldn't understand the unbearable overload it would place on their Gov't. Didn't they understand the chaos it would create? Didn't they realize it would give the Arabs a perfect time to attack? While we were thinking about this, the Gov't was making plans to add the Golan to its list of give-aways. Mind you, this is a government that still — 3 and a half years after kicking some 10,000 productive and patriotic Jews out of their homes in Gush Katif — has still not settled them in permanent housing. One of these refugees, Sarah Layah Shomron, writes of the one time of the year that Temporary is good. At Sukkot.
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OLMERT'S PARTING BLOWS
by Caroline Glick

  Perhaps the most egregious of Israel's problems is her political leadership. Caroline Glick discusses Olmert's latest strikes at Israel's security in context. "Why is it, she asks, "that for the past 15 years, at a certain point in their tenures every prime minister aside from Netanyahu has come to the conclusion that Israel must turn over its land to those sworn to its destruction?" It isn't just that they are self-serving, arrogant and often incompetent. They do seem to be acting in the best interests of the Arabs, a stance that wins the approval of Israeli's Leftists. They have seconded Arab claims while harassing those citizens who want to keep Israel intact. They have received nothing in return from their "peace partners" except missiles aimed at their civilian population, yet, optimistically, they continue to forge ahead into disaster. They have never explained the logic of the give-aways; what reasons they have given have been contrary-to-fact. Perhaps there is no rational reason that isn't criminal or self-protective.
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EXPEL THE ARAB INTERLOPERS AND THE ACID THROWERS
by Paul Lademain

  Paul Lademain says in a short essay what this Section has been about. How should the Jews change their ways of thinking and acting? What do the Jews of Israel need to do to become again a proud people in their own land? What should they stop doing? What should they start doing? Read this.
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MOHAMMAD: PROPHET OF TERROR
by Zulfikar Khan

  Zulfikar Khan does a masterful job of presenting Mohammad as he was in the early days of his prophethood, when he was creating the ideals of Islam and the code of behavior that Muslims would ever after follow. He paints a realist portrait of the man, by recounting his actual deeds and the convenient messages from Allah that came just when they were needed to allow Mohammed and his fellow Muslims to mutilate, rape, massacre, kidnap and loot. His early victims were the Jews of Medina, who had befriended him when he was forced to flee Mecca.
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STUDYING THE ISLAMIC WAY OF WAR
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim elaborates on the fact that Islamic war doctrine — unlike those developed by Clausewitz, Sun Tsu, Machiavelli ... — has not been studied. "As a consequence, we still do not have an in-depth understanding of the war-fighting doctrine laid down by Muhammad, how it might be applied today by an increasing number of Islamic groups, or how it might be countered." We ignore that in war Islamic doctrine says shooting catapaults (today, missiles) where there's non-combatants, deceiving the enemy and breaking peace treaties are all legitimate activities. They are all moral and need not trouble one's conscience. This article should be read together with Suseelan's essay (next item down) on Islamic morality. They explain Islamic concepts we need to understand. We need to know the strong connection between terror activities and Islam's moral code.
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CAN MUSLIM FUNDAMENTALISTS BE MORAL?
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Dr. Suseelan points out that "Islam rejects differing world views, ethical philosophy and refuses to recognizes changes in moral perspectives which emphasize the interrelatedness of individuals and community and their mutual responsibility for one another." Not only does this limit their perspective but it contributes significantly to their attitude to the non-Muslim. They know "... that non-Muslims are unethical, immoral and inferior and should be oppressed and forced to assume an Islamic identity" for their own good. Therefore, terrorism, criminality or heinous behavior — "forcefully converting infidels or issuing a fatwa against a kafir writing a book critical of Islam. " — can not be immoral. So the answer to the question is: only in their own terms. And there is little chance they will see any other point of view as worthy of consideration.
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THE RICHEST JEW IN DAMASCUS, 1816
by Elder of Ziyon

  A page out of the diary kept by James Silk Buckingham on his travels. He was entertained in Damascus by the local prime minister. The guests included a Jew, described by Buckingham "as the wealthiest and the most powerful of all present", a personage who managed the machinery of government. Yet as a Jew, he was dhimmi. The other guest sat or stood; the Jew sat on the ground.
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BALFOUR DECLARATION!
by Ashley Perry

  Balfour Day on November 2 recognizes the dedication of Lord Balfour to the return of the Israelites to their ancient homeland. He helped lay the diplomatic and legal foundations that led to the League of Nations declaring Mandated Palestine in perpetual trust for the Jews. Thanks to Jews who were made uneasy at the thought of Jews being their own boss and to British treachery, the original vision was diluted. But it was a start for the most remarkable nationalist movement in history. Ashley Perry tells us some of the history of the Balfour Declaration and makes clear that the intent of the document was to pave the way to a Jewish State (a homeland was Max Nordau's term for state).
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  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. The Blog-Eds page for the month is updated every few days.

A Blog-Ed page has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. To go to the list, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

September 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
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What we are talking about this issue: MUSLIM GLOBAL WAR The 4 Stages of Appeasement(Sultan Knish) SECTION 1. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE FAR EAST:    The Muslim Jihad in India (Swamy, Sherman, Klinghoffer, Guitta) SECTION 2. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE MIDDLE EAST:    Gush Katif (Fendel, Tucker, Saperstein)    Gaza — Al-Qaeda's new base(Glick, Guitta, Halevi)    Yet Another State In Mandated Palestine?(Kasnett, Ibrahim, Benzimra, Beres)    Israel's "Good" Neighbors(Rubin, Spyer, Brown, Imani)    Iran(Bostom, Sharpe, Eidelberg, Sharon, Peters)    Israel's Other Problems(Plaut, Winston, Sherman, Eshel, Weiner, Kaplan, Dobrin) SECTION 3. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE WEST:    The New Jews, And How We Must Defend Them(Fitzgerald)    Sharia Inroads into Government and Banking(Imm, Gaffney)    Islamic Inroads into the Media and Education Sectors(Cravetts, Glick, Oboler, Van Zile, Emerson, Romirowsky)    Essays On Survival(Kedar, Margetta) HISTORY(MacEoin, Karsh, Grobman, Baker)

KASHMIR IS THE DEFINING ISSUE OF INDIAN IDENTITY
by Subramanian Swamy

  For those of us who worry about Israel's reluctance to take sufficiently strong measures to protect its citizens from the predations of an enemy that recognizes no red line, this essay is eerie. Substitute Israel for India, Palestinians for Hurriyat and the pack of Arab states for Pakistanis. Both Israel and India know that a sharp response now will save much blood later. But both are reluctant. Both hope for an easy way out. But there is none. Professor Subramanian Swamy spells out the inevitable consequences of not taking action now.
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THE INDIA-ISRAEL IMPERATIVE: INDO-JUDEO COMMONALITIES: THE SYMBOLIC AND THE SUBSTANTIVE
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman presents an analysis of the commonalities between the very large India and the very small Israel, commonalities that encourage their strategic cooperation. Both are democracies in regions that are mainly totalitarian. Both have a common enemy — resurgent Islam. Both would prefer peaceful solutions but are forced continuously to update their military supplies. Sherman records major areas where cooperation benefits both countries.
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INDIAN MUJAHIDEEN: RISE OF JIHAD
by Judith Apter Klinghoffer

  Judith Apter Klinghoffer brings us the text of the prideful boasts and taunts of the Indian Mujahideen who are currently bombing, killing and otherwise terrorizing India. With delight, they promise more of the same.
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INDIA UNDER ISLAMIST THREAT
by Olivier Guitta

  India was partitioned in 1947 and Muslims of India were given their own independent state, Pakistan. The fatal flaw was that Muslims continued to live in India and many of the Muslim youth have been radicalized by Pakistani and Saudi Arabian terror missionaries and trainers. The previous essay chronicled the Song of the Muslim terrorists, the Indian Mujahedeen, that are attacking India. Olivier Guitta presents some of the "exploits" in which they take pride. All for the love of Allah.
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THREE YEARS OF HARDSHIP FOR GUSH KATIF EXPELLEES
by Hillel Fendel

  When the Jews were expelled by the Israeli Government from Gush Katif, Gaza three years, many were housed in paper-based trailers that are said to be bio-degradable in that that they would last only some 3 years. The three years are almost up. And 81% of the Jews made refugees by their own government still do not have permanent housing. The good news is — despite heckling by Peace Now — the "government has once again approved construction of new housing for the Jordan Valley community of Maskiot, where Gush Katif expellees from Shirat HaYam are living in temporary quarters." The rest of the picture is not rosy. 50% of the expellees have no jobs, they have had to use their compensation money for everyday expenses and are supported by relatives and friends.
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PRIVILEGE TO YEARN AND LONG FOR A HOME AND HOMELAND
by Anita Tucker

  Anita Tucker is one of the indomitables of the world. Supported by her faith in Torah Judaism, starting with land that was sand, dunes and sand dunes, she saw her sweat equity as a farmer in Gaza come to fruition, provide her family much happiness, and be destroyed by her own government. She longs for her old home and, by the same token, is girding up to rebuild.
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BEHIND THE LOVELY FACE
by Rachel Saperstein

  In this issue, Rachel Saperstein formerly of Gush Katif, Gaza, currently a refugee in her own country, has written two essays. With a couple of strokes, the first profiles Tzippi Livni, gofer for Olmert and flunky for American Sec-State Rice. The second is a tale about two Shlomo's, one her father, the other a cousin and how their lives connected.
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IGNORING FAILURE IN GAZA
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick writes of the expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif, Gaza, a mistake that was realized almost instantly when the Palestinian Arabs torched the synagogues, vandelized the greenhouses, shot missiles from Gaza and Hamas took control — it was a mistake that still has not been rectified. Glick points out — comparing "good" Fatah and "bad" Hamas — that (1) "[t]here is little to distinguish between the groups' embrace of terrorism as a means of achieving their aim of destroying Israel. Fatah forces have carried out more attacks against Israel than Hamas has;" and (2) "Israeli society has managed not to discuss why it failed or to learn the lessons stemming from its failure." Three years later, there is still governmental bungling, and no introspection about the "mistakes that led to the withdrawal."
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AL QAEDA'S OPPORTUNISTIC STRATEGY
by Olivier Guitta

  Israel and its local terrorists, Hamas, Fatah, Islamic Jihad, etc., did not receive much attention from Al-Qaeda, when, on 9/11, Osama Bin Laden reclaimed Saudi Arabia's honor — it had been besmirched by American feet standing on sacred Saudi soil. But, as he became aware that "Palestine" made a good talking point, bin Laden became a Palestinian supporter. Now, as Olivier Guitta points out, al-Qaeda waits for an eruption in the Iran-Israel confrontation, when it will make a major move to reestablish an Islamic Caliphate. Meantime, it has been moving into land areas that surround Israel, particularly in Gaza. So while Israeli's leaders don't seem capable of thinking a day ahead, Al-Qaeda is patiently building bases around Israel. It plans to be very strong and very ready when the time comes.
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AL-QAEDA AFFILIATE - JAISH AL-ISLAM - RECEIVES FORMAL SANCTUARY IN HAMAS-RULED GAZA
by Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan Dahoah Halevi

  As the previous essay pointed out, terror groups that are al-Qaeda subsidiaries and terrorists who share al-Qaeda goals are infiltrating Gaza. Jonathan Dahoah Halevi writes about one of these groups, Jaish al-islam, now living in Gaza under Hamas jurisdiction. He concludes, "Hamas has established a terror hothouse in Gaza designed to continue the jihad against apostates, pursue the struggle against Israel, secure the overthrow of the Abbas regime in the West Bank, and assist the efforts of the parent movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, in overthrowing the moderate regimes in the Middle East headed by Jordan and Egypt."
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THE MYTH OF STOLEN ARAB LAND
by Israel Kasnett

  With this essay by Israel Kasnett, we add to our store of articles on Israel's irrevocable right to Mandated Palestine with information on the view of the Peel Commission of 1937 on the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate. The Commission confirmed the large increase in Arab population in Palestine since 1920. It states: "Jewish immigration and subsequent economic growth in Palestine led to increased Arab immigration from other countries by those seeking economic opportunity."
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SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT IN CONTEXT
by Raymond Ibrahim

  In this essay, Raymond Ibrahim explores the irony of Arabs, when all of today's Muslim countries were taken by bloody conquest, arguing 'humanitarian' justice to regain them Palestine — land the Jews are said to have stolen from them. "Historically," he points out, "the land of Palestine has been conquered, and conquered, and conquered again — by a myriad of peoples, including Hebrews, Babylonians and Persians, Greeks and Romans, Arabs, Crusaders, Turks, and now finally, modern-day Jews." "Even Arabia, home of Islam, was militarily conquered by that religion." Moreover, the Arab concept of justice isn't humanitarian: "Islamic law says it's just, indeed, compulsory, for Muslims to seize the infidels' lands by the sword."
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NO, MR. KOUCHNER, MIDEAST REALITY IS NOT WHAT YOU THINK
by Salomon Benzimra

  Salomon Benzimra wrote this article to provide a factual rebuttal to ignorance-based outrageous statements made by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs during a TV interview, who insisted that a "viable Palestinian state" must be created. The article also serves as a summary of the official position of the French government towards the "peace process" — it is a needed corrective to the feel-good interpretation of some conciliatory statements made to Israel by President Sarkozy. Benzimra recommends that an intelligent beginning to solving the Arab-Israeli conflict would be "to have the courage to face reality." And a good place to start facing reality would be to use semantics that actually reflect the facts, not invented fantasies.
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THE RAMIFICATIONS OF A PALESTINIAN STATE
by Professor Louis René Beres

  Professor Beres points out that a Palestinian state would have no proper authority under international law. (Under binding international law, Mandated Palestine is held as an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people.) Nor does it conform to the four specific requirements of the 1934 Montevideo Treaty for statehood. Ironically, Arab violence is not a bar to statehood. "In law, all that matters in establishing statehood are certain identifiable demographic, geographic and political facts." Which the projected Palestinian state flunks.
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A MIDDLE EAST STRATEGY FOR THE WEST
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin points out some ineluctable facts that Israel and the West must face if they are to understand Israel's Muslim neighbors. (1) The current jousting is between Arab Nationalism and Islamism — democracy isn't a player. (2) All the various Islamist groups are dangerous. (3) The forces are local in the Middle East; the West is an outsider. He makes sensible recommendations for dealing with the situation.
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DIPLOMACY AND TERROR — SYRIAN-STYLE
by Jonathan Spyer

  The Syrian-Lebanese apparent rapproachment is hailed by many, such as French President Sarkozy, as "historic progress." More accurately, as Jonathan Spyer puts it, "it will represent not the normalization of Syrian-Lebanese relations, but rather the enveloping of Lebanon into the regional alliance led by Iran, of which Syria is a senior member." "The Iranian-Syrian-Hizbullah alliance has known how to combine brutal military tactics on the ground with subtle and determined diplomacy." On the other hand, Syrian's diplomatic interactions with Israel has little to do with Israel, much to do with the Syrian desire to appear to offer the West reconciliation. As Spyer says, "When it comes to negotiating with Israel, Assad is keen to take the dowry, while showing little enthusiasm for embracing the bride."
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JORDAN'S LEGAL JIHAD
by Stephen Brown

  In England and America, Muslims have sued writers and publishers for libel, thus interfering de facto and de jure with their freedom of speech. Their vast money resources have forced writers to withdraw well-researched factual anti-jihad essays; leaving the field vacant to be filled with puff pieces and pleasant fantasies about Islam. Stephen Brown describes another version of how Islam tries to stifle debate about Islam. He writes, "a Jordanian court recently summoned twelve European citizens to answer criminal charges of blasphemy and inciting hatred." Critics of Islam face the imposition of a death sentence, "if the charge is blasphemy and it is being tried by a sharia court." This isn't a joke. It isn't sufficient to avoid travelling to Jordan. It means the condemned "libeler" needs to be careful to avoid travelling to any third country — even just a stopover at its airport — that has an extradition treaty with Jordan. It also indicates that Jordan — which is lauded as western-oriented — expects Muslim law to be obeyed by Europeans.
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IS TELLING THE TRUTH ISLAM BASHING?
by Amil Imani

  Islam has a new slick talking point: it asserts that anyone who says anything — anything — against Islam must be suffering from an awful neurosis: islamophobia. Amil Imani doesn't tremble at the thought that he will be called an Islam basher. "If telling the truth about Islam is Islam bashing, then mea culpa." He then calmly points how badly Islam treats everyone that is of a different religion. This isn't just true in "fanatic" Muslim countries. It exists in Egypt, a supposedly civilized state, where children of the Baha'i faith are denied education, where women are denied employment opportunities. It is curious that Islam, so respected by multiculturalists, is itself monoculturalist, respecting no other religion. "Why is it, Imani asks, "that these self-righteous Islamist villains don't bother to prove me wrong? Why don't they document what I say as being false?" Why, indeed.
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SHI'ITE IRAN'S GENOCIDAL JEW HATRED
by Andrew Bostom

  The often-repeated passionately-voiced intent of Shi'ite Iran to destroy Israel in particular and Jews in general is not superficial or recent or "just talk". Tracing the origins of Shi'ite Iran's animosity towards Jews, Andrew Bostom concludes that "[t]he pillars of this continuous modern campaign of annihilationist antisemitism are the motifs from traditional Islamic Jew hatred, including, most significantly, Islamic eschatology. These deep-seated Islamic theological motifs are further conjoined to Holocaust denial, and the development of a nuclear weapons program intended expressly for Israel's eradication."
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THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS MAKING PEACE
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe cogitates about peace and says many wise things. "There is no such thing as making peace. If a nation desires peace with its neighbor, but that neighbor implacably rejects peace, then any imposed peace process from outside is nothing more than a handmaiden to futility or worse." Applying this to Israel, he observes, "Israel's leaders have sought peace above all else and considered its attainment with hostile neighbors as the great panacea. But making peace must never be the goal of a nation when confronted by enemies who look upon peace with contempt." And as Islam gains confidence in its bid to rule the world, it becomes more and more true that "Deterrence, unwavering strength and deterrence, is the only salvation for Israel against the Islamic onslaught just as it is for an equally blinded West increasingly confronted with Islamic terrorism."
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WAR MODELS
by Prof. Paul Eidelberg

  America has aggressively fought wars, not stopping until the adversary's complete surrender — as in World War 2 — and has fought wars with minimalist objectives — as in Vietnam. A democracy with limited war objectives ultimately must fail when the adversary is not accountable to its populace, doesn't mind losing a lot of people and and can outwait the democracy. The democracy has signalled that the war isn't all that important by not going all out, so it is hard to resist calls to stop the war that come from citizens anxious to get onto other matters. Ironically, this means, as Professor Paul Eidelberg writes, that limited wars can end up taking longer and/or resulting in a greater number of deaths. He suggests "If any model is appropriate in dealing with Israel's implacable enemies, it is the model used by the United States against Nazi Germany."
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WE ONLY GET ONE STRIKE
by Moshe Sharon

  Iran intends to annihilate Israel. It is serious. As a Shi'ite Muslim country, it believes the destruction of the Jews will herald in "the dawning of messianic times." It must be stopped. If Israel has to go it alone, she can not farble, fumble or fizz out before the job is completed — as she did in the Second Lebanon War. Moshe Sharon points out why Israel has to get it right in its first strike. Otherwise, it won't be just Iran that retaliates. It will be Iran aided by all the groups that are at the moment stocking up weaponry and training foot soldiers. This includes not only Hizbullah and Syria and Hamas and the PLO but also the many Israeli Arabs, full-fledged citizens of Israel, who have no loyalty to the Jewish state.
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WHAT 'BOMB IRAN' REALLY TAKES
by Ralph Peters

  Moshe Sharon warned in the previous article that an Israeli strike on Iran couldn't be haphazard. Ralph Peters looks at striking Iran should America need to stop Iran's nuclear threat by using a military strike. Like Sharon, he emphasizes the need to be decisive. He lists the specific targets that will need to be taken out to eliminate an Iranian nuclear threat.
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THE PEACE SNAKE
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut writes a delightful story about the Peace Snake — how the Peres's of this world feed on our hunger for peace. Simon Peres, Israel's sneakest practitioner of snake-oil peace, together with his talk-alikes, is now vigorously promoting the division of Jerusalem AND giving Samaria and Judea to the Arabs. How else can we have peace with our Arab neighboring countries?    the Palestinians?    Fatah?    Abbas, maybe?    It worked in Gaza, didn't it? Perhaps Plaut's parable will teach some reality.
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IS THE GOVERNMENT THE ENEMY?
by Emanuel A. Winston

  If Israel survives, there's one thing we'll be able to say good about this period — the current Israeli government has established absolute zero. The ultimate low point in politicians. The benchmark that serves as the standard of pathetic, the dev/null of governance, the administration named zilcho. No government can get worse than this and still pretend to function. They used to say in England that the smart son went to University, the active son went into the army, and the nebish went into the ministry. In Israel, the technical and business types go into industry, the logical types go into science; the dedicated go into kollel; and the total misfits become political hacks. Emanuel Winston traces how the Left has used its political power since the Oslo negotiations began. He asks whether the degree of appeasement and secret concessions Israel makes to its enemies together with how much it has reconstituted the police and army as political tools is not treason?
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OUR TERMINAL STUPIDITY
by Martin Sherman

  If the government's actions are not treason, Martin Sherman argues, they have terminal stupidity, and might easily end in ending Israel. With the use of a smattering of common-sense, the consequences of the Oslo Agreement were predictable. What is appalling is that now that Oslo's terrible consequences are glaringly obvious — and it is even more obvious that Israel has not got an Arab peace partner (if ever it did) — the government continues to pursue a 2-state "peace process", aided by Marxist academics and media. It is oblivious to security risks, to the demoralization of its citizens and to the build-up time it has given Israel's enemies. It also hasn't figured out that if the Jews are expelled from Samaria and Judea (known to Jews as Biblical Israel and to Arabs since 1948 as the West Bank), the Arabs will control Israel's water supply, be able to target its airport and control the high ground that looks down on large population centers.
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THE MENTAL PREPARATION FOR THE DISENGAGEMENT AND ITS AFTERMATH IN THE IDF
by Gadi Eshel

  We all recognize how excruciating an experience it was for the Jews of Gaza to be expelled from their homes by other Jews. It is now becoming obvious that the government had another destructive task to perform to make the expulsion happen. It had to prepare the IDF, hitherto regarded as an agency for protecting Jews, to carry out this evil ejection, to go against its natural instincts. That the Olmert-Sharon government succeeded brilliantly in reducing a highly-motivated fighting force into a political tool can be seen from the IDF's lackadaisical performance in the Second Lebanon War.
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HIZBULLAH'S TRIUMPH: THE LONG-TERM IMPLICATIONS OF PRISONER EXCHANGES
by Justus Reid Weiner and Diane Morrison

  It's hard not to react with disgust at Israel's willingness to release a large group of Hizbullah terrorists including Samir Kuntar, a monster who cracked open a child's head by smashing her against a rock — in exchange for two dead bodies. Justus Reid Weiner and Diane Morrison go beyond emotion and tell us why this act is harmful to Israel's future health. They point out that a rogue group of terrorists now has the status afforded lawful soldiers. The exchange creates an appalling precedent that encourages further kidnappings, increases the possibility that Israeli captured soldiers will be mistreated or even murdered in custody, and rewards imprisoned terrorists by releasing them early to claim new victims. There is no virtue in Israelis telling themselves they have a higher morality; they have put more Jews in greater jeopardy, including Gilad Shalit, who is still a prisoner of Arab terrorists.
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TEL AVIV U'S CHOMSKY DISCIPLES IN LINGUISTICS LEAVE US SPEECHLESS
by Lee Kaplan

  It's amazing how much damage one man can do — and this a man engaged presumably in peaceful pursuits. A single man, Edward Said corrupted Middle East Studies for decades, enshrining the wrong assumptions about the Middle East and, as we learned on 9/11, leading everyone to the wrong conclusions. Said was a linguist, as is the subject of this essay by Lee Kaplan — Noam Chomsky. His anarchic hate-Israel politics — and maybe even his discredited linguistics — are in full play at Tel-Aviv University, where professors encourage their students to avoid serving in the IDF and otherwise strengthen the Arabs and their fantasy that Israel belongs to them. As one organization has asked: donors, do you know what your money is doing?
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THE SHAME OF DISLOYALTY
by Ralph Dobrin

  "Each military flare-up produces pictures of devastation and dead Arabs — often children — on the television screens of the world ..." Many people, Jews included, are ignorant of the context of these pictures. They aren't aware that the dead were used as human shields by their own relatives. They won't learn from their news sources that many of the awful-looking scenes are hoaxes staged with media collusion. But academics, particularly Jewish academics, don't have the excuse of ignorance. Are they acting this way because of their ideology or some twist in their personality or out of sheer wrongheadedness? Ralph Dobrin suggests it doesn't much matter why they are what they are. What is important is that we all learn to counter their spurious claims with the actual facts. He suggests some reliable sources of information.
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PERFECTION DEMANDED ONLY FROM LITTLE ISRAEL
by Chris Powell

  Starting in the late 1800s there was a surge of settlers into Israel, who, added to the Jews who had never left, slowly reclaimed their homeland. Around the time Israel was granted statehood, it needed to bring in refugees from Arabland and survivers of the European Holocaust. Israel took in people almost guaranteed to hold back development — the elderly, the traumatized, the weak, the demoralized, the unskilled. If that wasn't enough of a handicap, Israel was a poor country with no natural resources — no oil, few minerals, young forests, a poor water supply. And fending off Arab neighbors was a constant distraction. Yet, sixty years later, Israel is in the first-rank in advancing the quality of life for humankind. It has Nobel prize winners, engineers and computer scientists developing and improving global communications; physicians and biologists crafting medical innovations; agriculturalists growing wonderful fruits and vegetables with a scant water supply. During this time, the Arab states have become bloated with spending money but they have scarely moved forward towards modern times. So how is it the miracle of Israel is not appreciated? Chris Powell provides an interesting answer.
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1948, ISRAEL, AND THE PALESTINIANS — THE TRUE STORY
by Efraim Karsh

  Efraim Karsh writes of the beginning of the Arab refugee extravaganza. During the 1948 invasion of Israel by the Arab states, the local Arabs fled. Arab propaganda claimed that they fled because the Jews forced them out. Using newly declassified documents to determine what happened in what is now the State of Israel between 1920 and 1948, Karsh shows that the flight of the Arabs and their consequent resettlement as unwanted refugees in the Arab countries was the result of the Arab leadership instructing their people to leave their homes so the Arab armies could destroy the new state of Israel.
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SELF-MADE NAKBA
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin adduces four reasons why the Arabs rejected partition and attacked the fledgling state of Israel: namely, 1) the Mufti of Jerusalem, Hitler's buddy, wanted to destroy the Jews, not live next to them; 2) the Arab laity wanted war; 3) the Arab countries envisioned looting and grabbing land; 4) they foresaw an easy victory. They haven't changed much, have they?
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UNRWA: REFUGE OF REJECTIONISM
by Barry Rubin, Asaf Romirowsky and Jonathan Spyer

  This report, recently released by the GLORIA Center, details how UNRWA, nominally a humanitarian effort to help Palestinian refugees, uses its huge budget to hamper resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and blocks the resettlement of its ever-growing number of charges. Oh, and it also furnishes finances, facilities, and recruits for terrorist groups — but that it does for free.
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THIS IS AN ONEROUS LIFE?
by Steven Shamrak

  Aside from the fact that many of the Arab refugees were locals living near the refugee camps (they actually improved their lives signing up as refugees), their lives are pretty good. It might be boring but they won't starve and they are better educated than Arabs in most of the Arab countries. And for excitement, the various terrorist organizations are there — as UNRWA staff — to inculcate them with an exciting mission: KILL THE JEWS.
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US CONGRESSMEN DEMAND UNRWA REFORM
by Etgar Lefkovits

  Israel Zwick of CN.net gathered these interesting facts from UN official sources: UNHCR handles all the UN-supported refugees and stateless people in the world except the Palestinian arabs; in 2007, UNHCR cared for 32.9 million people in 110 countries. UNHCR requested a total of 1.673 billion — regular budget and supplemental funds — for 2008. Of their clients, the vast majority returned home or were resettled within 5 years. UNRWA's clientele is exclusively Palestinian arab; in 2007, UNRWA cared for 4.5 million people in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank. They requested 1.09 billion for 2008. To sum up: to cater to 14% of the number of people that UNHCR cares for, UNRWA's non-supplemental 2008 budget is almost 2/3 of what UNHCR spends for all other UN-supported refugees in the world. UNRWA has resisted resettling clients for some 60 years, insisting that — unlike other refugees — these arabs can not go anywheres except to Israel.

The United States is a major UNRWA sugar daddy. So it is appropriate that it be the one to say: Enough's enough. As Etgar Lefkovits writes, several U.S. Congressmen are demanding reform, pointing out that "UNRWA was actually designed to perpetuate the festering sore of the refugee problem."  READ MORE
 

IT'S NOT GUSH KATIF
by Ann Goldberg

  Ann Goldberg describes a trip taken to visit some expellees from Gush Katif, who are now living in a section of Kibbutz Ein Zurim. The refugees have renamed the area Nezer Hazani, the name of their hometown in Gush Katif in the Gaza strip. If there was a compelling reason for the eviction, the Olmert government never made it clear. What is clear is that the major tangible return Israel got for the expulsion is the constant barrage of missiles coming from the Arab terror community that now inhabits Gush Katif.
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1000 DAYS WITHOUT A HOME
by Dror Vanunu

  The exiled Gush Katif communities has created superb graphics that will in short order fill you in with what's happened to the productive, patriotic and proud Jews that lived in Gush Katif, Gaza. Dror Vanunu reminds us that they need your help now to recover from the trauma inflicted on them by the Sharon-Olmert government. They need your financial and moral support. You need their conviction that the all of Land of Israel belongs to the Children of Israel. You need their spiritual strength. Help them for their sake. Help them for your sake.
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GOODBYE 12, UPWARD AND ONWARD
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein in his sardonic fashion continues to explore recovering from a trauma inflicted by the petty bureaucrats and gross ideologues that were supposed have his interest at heart. These administrators destroyed his beloved community in Gush Katif, Gaza, and they continue to destroy the country he loves. He began his current set of essays — the Goodbye series — in March 2008. Goodbye 1-4 and 8-10 are to be found in "Gloom, Doom — And Yet..." in the Think-Israel's March-April 2008 issue. Goodbye 11 is on the April 2008 Blog-Ed page. This issue we present essay "Goodbye 12 and onward."
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RAPTORS IN LACHISH; WEDDING IN SUSSIYAH
by Rachel Saperstein

  Two short essays, deceptively simple. Raptors make a stopover in Israel on the way to Europe. On land needed by people who need housing. How do you prioritize? Rephrase the question and the answer changes. In the second essay, we learn how some of the Israeli young are connecting themselves to their people's history. Rachel Saperstein always leaves us with much to think about.
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THE MISTAKES THAT LAUNCHED 3,000 ROCKETS
by Richard A. Baehr

  Richard A. Baehr reminds us that not so long ago Israeli leadership made a disasterous error — forcing all the Jewish Israelis out of the Gaza strip. He recalls all the supposedly sound reasons for vacating the land — demographics, not having to worry about protecting the Gazan Jewish civilians. public relations, peace, and letting the Arabs run their own show. As we know, the actual result was a rain of missiles from Gaza. So why are they dredging up the same old arguments to leave Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank)?
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THE TWO-PRONGED ASSAULT ON RELIGIOUS ZIONISM
by Caroline B. Glick

  Caroline Glick makes clear what many have long suspected — driving Jews from their homes in Gaza had little to do with peace or security and much to do with the hostility the far-left Israeli secularists feels toward religious Zionist Jews because they want to be Jews, not Marxists. The expulsion "...wasn't about peace with the Arabs. It was about cultural supremacy within Israel." In doing so, the secularists demoralized some of Israel's most productive and patriotic citizens; gave the Arab terrorists now in control of Gaza more confidence as well as more unmonitored space in which to assemble and hurl their missiles; and weakened the state of Israel to further military and diplomatic attacks. The irony is that the Left strives to be like everyone but picks wrong and/or inadequate implementations. It is religious Zionism that is revolutionary, nationalistic and above all, normal in its desire to hold onto its own land and live its own version of the good life. Unfortunately, it has acquired another opponent — the non-Zionist Jewish religious establishment, which is comfortable in the attitudes and habits of powerlessness that it developed to survive hostility in the diaspora. Yet, as Glick concludes, "Israel and the Jewish people need Religious Zionism more than anyone will ever admit." [For another facet of the consequences of the Jewish incorporation of the need to keep a low profile, to be politically powerless, see Seth J. Frantzman, "Jews, Power And The Creation Of The Palestinians" below.]
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THE LIZARD NAMED OZ
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan draws us a character sketch of Avraham Oz, a professor of theatre and drama studies and a darling of the Israel-hating press, both at home in Israel and abroad. He can always be counted on to see Jews as bad, their terrorist neighbors as good, or at least as justified in their despicable behavior. "The Arabs keep claiming they are being ethnically cleansed as their population in Gaza and Yesha increases almost exponentially." The Arab choir has a stock set of derogatory phrases to condition people to despise Israel, its army and its citizens. And Oz is one of their lead singers, mouthing their words and specializing in demoralizing his own country.
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HRW'S POLITICIZED CHARACTERIZATION OF THE BEDOUIN ISSUE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by NGO Monitor

  Human Rights Watch (HRW) is a non-governmental organization (NGO) that routinely accuses Israel of war crimes. It can be counted on to overstate, exaggerate, distort and invent atrocities Israel is supposed have committed against the Arabs. When their spokesmen are caught out — as they were in Jenin and Qana — far from being embarrassed, they shrug it off and move on to their next bout of indignation. This essay from the NGO Monitor carefully analyzes the distortions in their report on their latest cause — the "plight" of the Bedouins in the Negev. Clearly, their cause may have changed, but their shoddy research and muddled writeups haven't. What makes HRW different from other vicious anti-Jewish NGOs? Its executive director is a Jew, whose father is a holocaust survivor. It seems to be the only difference.
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JEWS, POWER AND THE CREATION OF THE PALESTINIANS
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth Frantzman has written a singular and brilliant essay. He sums up the components and evaluates the essentials of the Jewish attitude against taking political responsibility — an attitude initially conditioned by the need to maintain a non-threatening profile in order to survive in a hostile diaspora. Unfortunately, the Jews internalized the need not to challenge the prevailing political and religious powers. They developed ways of surviving, but achieving independent political power was not one of them. Before Israel became a state, this attitude took the form of denying the virtue of having a Jewish state. In recent years, this has translated into a moral stance by Jewish leftist intellectuals, who created the notion of the indigenous Palestinian and want to give away Israel's birthright, its very identity, to these Palestinians. This would put the Jews right back in the role of an impotent minority group. The leftist Jews see this rootlessness as good; disembodied, so to speak, Jews could concentrate on being a "light unto the world." Unfortunately, it would also put them at the mercy of an irrational majority group intent on destroying Jews — but that doesn't appear to concern the Jewish leftist intellectual.
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THE INVENTION OF PALESTINE
by Tsafrir Ronen

  Tsafrir Ronen bluntly provides us with some historic facts that are usually ignored by diplomats formulating a fantasy of two people living side by side in peace, when the reality is that one of these people — the Palestinian Arabs — is not an authentic people. They were invented as a way to challenge the Jewish people's return to their land. As Ronen writes, "[t]his is the essence of the Arab propaganda war, which is intended to steal the identity of Eretz Yisrael and to transform it into Palestine, and by such means to turn the Jewish people into occupiers of Eretz Yisrael. That's the whole story." Who says so? The Palestinian Arabs. Their very own leadership says so. Openly. And in print. Read some of their statements in this article.
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CAN WE PLEASE CUT THE QUACKERY?
by Jack Engelhard

  We are often told that Palestinian Arabs really want peace — they are being misled by some of their leaders. It isn't true. The motive force for the Palestinian Arab psychopathy comes from the Arab laity. It comes from the mothers who jump for joy when they learn their children have massacred Jews while blowing themselves up. Jack Engelhard points out they voted for Hamas, they wanted Hamas. Unfortunately, the Israeli Jews aren't stopping their Prime Minister from giving away Jewish land. And, as Engelhard says, "[t]hose of us (like AFSI) who favor a strong Israel, unconditionally, are finding ourselves outnumbered by our own Jewish brothers and sisters who, along with our politicians and media elites, have bought the jihadist narrative."
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DEATH OF A VISION
by Uri Elitzur

  Uri Elitzur asks why the Israelis continue to cling to the two-state solution, especially, when one of the groups, the Palestinian arabs, desires to obliterate the other group, the Jews. "Why, he asks, "do logical people cling to such an unrealistic vision, which has crashed time and again against reality, and always with bloodshed and suffering? The answer is fear and despair. Fear of the Arab population about to drown us in a dark demographic sea, and despair over the State of Israel's ability to rule and control its own fate." He advices Israel to stop being afraid. Recent demographic figures show the Arabs aren't going to become a majority in Israel and the territories now or in the future. What Israel needs to do is to put its own interests first, not try to represent both us and them [the Arabs], both the UN and the International Court of Justice."
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WHAT IS AN IRRECONCILABLE ENEMY? EXAMINING HAMAS AND HEZBOLLAH
by Nicholas Guariglia

  The Jihadists of the Middle East have declared us of the West their enemy, and no softsoaping, no bribes, no diplomacy, no appeasement will deter them. Their if-thens are not our if-thens. They aren't just talking nasty. They mean to take over the West, starting with Israel and then going big time. Using a personal experience, Nicholas Guariglia makes us understand what it is to have a group make themselves your irreconcilable enemy "... even if you are unaware of their lethal intent. You are their enemy, and thus they yours, and they, not you, have made it so." Why in the world would we give Hamas, created by the Muslim Brotherhood and which now rules directly or indirectly over the Palestinian Arabs, or Hezbollah, which controls much of Lebanon for the Iranians, more land to use to develop more ways to murder people?
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REB HOROWITZ AND A TICKING CLOCK
by Dov Kahn

  We are always being told Israel has to make some new painful decision for peace. They can all be summarized as: share Jewish land or give it away; risk your future and the future of your children. And they have all have the same result: no peace and less security. In this essay, Dov Kahn suggests an agonizing decision that differs from the previous peace plans in that it actually could lead to peace. It would at the least make Israel a safer place to live.
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THE SOLUTION: DUBAI
by Moshe Feiglin

  Moshe Feiglin outlines why Dubai would make a good place to resettle the "80% of Gazans [who] are now begging to leave. In Judea and Samaria 60% of the Arabs would prefer to live elsewhere." Dubai is thriving and has a booming economy and gigantic construction projects. It could use the help of the Palestinians. He points out that "all that we need to do to solve the Kassam problem is to allow the Gazans to leave and then to annex Gaza to Israel. It is that simple."
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THE LAST FANATIC
by Rabbi Benny Elon

  Rabbi Benny Elon's Israeli Initiative plan has several components: (1) the refugee camps will be dismantled and the refugees will be absorbed as citizens in various countries; (2) Jordon will replace the PA as the representative of the Palestinian arabs; and (3) Israel will extend its sovereignty over Samaria and Judea (the West Bank). He has advocated this plan for several years and is winning support from both Israelis and Americans. In this essay he encourages you to view some explanatory videos and download software that will aid you in promoting the Israeli Initiative.
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IT'S TIME TO RECONSIDER A FEDERAL ARRANGEMENT
by Israel Zwick

  Israel Zwick bases his plan in part on the minority opinion of the 1947 U.N. Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) which pointed out the area was too small for two independent states. They recommended a Federal State, with Arabs and Jews having "full powers of local self-government". Zwick suggests there be a Federal State that includes Israel, Judea, Samaria, Gaza and the Golan Heights. Arabs in the Territories would be offered financial incentives to relocate. The Arabs within Israel's borders would have a choice: they could become part of their own semi-autonomous government, rather like Puerto Rico vis-à-vis the U.S.A. Or they could choose to be Israeli citizens "with full personal rights, but not national rights" — exactly what was proposed in the original Mandate.
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THE MYTH OF LINKAGE
by Martin Kramer

  Martin Kramer disassembles the insidious and incorrect notion that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the cause/root/essential condition that keeps the Middle East turbulent. As Walter Reich wrote in a comment to this article: "Martin Kramer's post is a superbly-executed and much-needed act of intellectual hygiene about "linkage" and the "Middle East conflict." It's a corrective — to use a phrase that others, alas, have invented — to "stinkin' thinkin'" about one of the most important dimensions of international affairs.
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THE HATE INDUSTRY: THE JORDANIAN PRESS CONTINUES TO PUBLISH ANTI-SEMITIC ARTICLES
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  Dr. Reuven Erlich provides us with examples of Jordanian hate publications and cartoons. They are blatently anti-Jewish, with the usual equation of Zionism and Nazism. The same swill is served up in secular Marxist publications as in fundamentalist publications associated with the Muslim Brotherhood. A curious occupation for a country that wouldn't last long were it not propped up by Israel and America.
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TURKEY TURNS BACK TO THE BOOK
by John David Lewis

  Turkey, the most secular of the Muslim countries, is becoming more religious. This is being hailed as "reform." John David Lewis sets us straight. "This is not reform," he writes. "It is a call for a new fundamentalism on the authority of a thirteen-hundred-year-old vicious fairytale, and for a ceaseless struggle against those who would criticize it. Indeed, the use of terror in fighting the enemies of Islam is directly sanctioned by the Koran. ... Any 'interpretation' of Islam that is consistent with the Koran as a revealed, unquestioned authority will end in a reversion to its brute, fundamental meaning: the subordination of women and non-Muslims to dictatorial rule by a clerical elite." Wise words.
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THE IRANIAN ROOTS OF HIZBULLAH
by Dr. Nimrod Raphaeli

  Just as the Muslim Brotherhood created Hamas, so did Iran create Hizbullah. Both are characterized by adherence to fundamentalist Islam. Both are barbaric, with no scruples about jeopardizing their own women and children to protect their soldiers. In this essay Dr. Nimrod Raphaeli describes some of the early history of Hizbullah. He concludes that with Iranian financing, Hezbullah was able to build an educational, political, social welfare and military network and "now serves as an extension of Iran's strategic expansion into the Mediterranean." Moreover, Iran would not have been able to gain entrance into Lebanon "without the collusion or approval of the Syrian regime. Syria is also the main conduit of arms from Iran to Hizbullah."
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AHMADINEJAD'S PAST TELLS IT ALL
by Olivier Guitta

  Olivier Guitta recounts the early history of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's current president. He was — and is — a very pious Muslim. He was — and is — a brutal murderer, one who, like so many nazis, thoroughly enjoyed work when torturing people. Would he be repelled at the idea of killing millions of Jews and Arabs in an atomic blast? Unlikely.
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AMERICA IN ASHES?
by Christopher S. Carson

  While Ahmadinejad is set on erasing Israel no matter what it takes, Osama bin Laden is said to be planning a "nuclear hell storm" in America. Christopher Carson uses information obtained from "Khalid Sheik Mohammed, (KSM), mastermind of 9/11 and chief operating officer of al-Qaeda," to describe how al-Qaeda plans to develop the means to build a nuclear device and bring it to a target. He develops a plausible sequence of events that can, sooner or later, bring the threat of nuclear attack to America. "The question confronting American policy makers is: Are we prepared to stop this threat before it becomes a terrible reality?" Are we?
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EUROPE SHALL BLEED, ONCE AGAIN
by Amil Imani

  Europeans are generally devoted to the idea of multiculturalism and try to accomodate the alien Muslims, who reciprocate by scheming to impose Islam and control the lives of their unsuspicious hosts. Amil Imani provides us with a list of cities where the percentage of Muslims is disturbingly large. It is a truism that when their numbers grow, Muslims begin demanding that the natives start doing thing the Muslim way. Amin Imani has seen freedom repressed in his native Iran, and is alert to the early warning signs of danger. He believes the longer Europe ignores the danger, the bloodier it will be should Europe decide to fight the sharia takeover in the future.
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EUROPE AND ISRAEL: WORLDS APART?
by Robin Shepherd

  This is a thoughtful article. As Robin Shepherd points out, "Europe's relationship — perhaps relationships might be a more appropriate term — with Israel is multi-layered." And rocky. Trade and technology are blossoming but traditional anti-semitism remains, reinforced by new hostility from a Europe that increasingly has become pacifist, secular and disapproving of nationalism. Leftists, despising Western capitalism, can sympathize with Islam's rejection of western power. For rightists, "[t]he quasi-feudalistic, traditionalist character of much of the Arab world resonates with old right values in a way that 'upstart' Israel never could. There is certainly a sense in which anti-Israelism unites people and ideological viewpoints which feel that they have lost out in the modern world." But nationalism seems to be making a comeback. Shepherd concludes, "It remains to be seen how Israel will fare when one or other of the continent's various potential futures finally comes out on top."
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HOW SECURE ARE JEWS IN THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD?
by Dr. Irving Kett

  Irving Kett writes that we Jews must face up to an unpleasant reality about our situation in the world; there is "... a serious worldwide recrudescence of anti-Semitism, the likes of which has not existed since the 1940's." In Europe, which is fast becoming judenfrei, Arab funding and "large scale immigration of fanatic Jew-hating Moslems" have fueled a surge of life-threatening anti-semitism. If that weren't enough, we have rejectionist Jews, "... Israeli academics who are in the forefront of international anti-Zionist, anti-Israel propaganda." It is important that Israel be encouraged to reject foreign aid, so that she is not under obligation to appease the arab terrorists at the cost of her own security.
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ISLAM'S HISTORY OF ANTI-SEMITISM
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim uses data from Andrew Boston's new book The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism to decide whether Islam was itself anti-Semitic or did it just take Jew-hate over from European, particularly German, sources. He concludes that "[t]he historical documents make clear that, from day one, Jews and Christians have been systematically treated as second-class citizens, dhimmis, in the regions conquered by Islam." "...far from being a by-product of Western anti-Semitism or the creation of Israel, animosity toward the Jews has a firm doctrinal base tracing back to Islam's most authoritative texts." What makes this hate source [the Koran] particularly troubling is that "... it is not just history, but immutable theology, which transcends time and space and needs to apply today no less than yesterday." In other words, there is no polite way to modulate or change Islamic anti-semitism.
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HOLOCAUST HYPOCRISY
by Brad Macdonald

  Brad Macdonald observes that there is a certain irony in that while Western governments pay lip service and honor the victims of the Nazi Holocaust, they "actively, to one degree or another, condone, even promote, the demise of Jewish statehood", which can surely lead to another holocaust. "...Hitler attempted to destroy the Jews as a race: Today that same anti-Semitic spirit is being directed, subtly, at the Jewish state." The U.N. spends much of its energy and most of its indignation in scolding the State of Israel. The Roman circus it sponsored at Durban in 2001 was advertised as promoting tolerance among nations; instead the only important item on the agenda was throwing Israel to the lions. Bemoaning the previous holocaust and creating conditions for another is hypocrisy and many western countries are guilt of it.
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THE FIFTH GENERATION WARFARE
by Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen

  Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa Lappen give us the very good advice that winning the war against radical Islam requires more than a winning military strategy; it "requires understanding the role of shari'a and the Muslim Brotherhood in developing a global ideological and political movement supported by a parallel 'Islamic' financial system to exploit and undermine Western economies and markets." They set about to educate us on what we need to know about what they rightfully call "financial jihad" so that we can protect ourselves from this insidious route Muslims use to infiltrate our social structure in order to overide our financial system with theirs and to win acceptance for the strings attached to shari'a — their ideas on the status of women; their ideas on how to treat minor infractions of the law; their ideas on which religous group should dominate; ideas that would restrict our political independence and lose us our freedom of action.
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DISTORTED HISTORY LESSONS
by Robert Holland

  There have been sporadic attempts to persuade schoolchildren of the beauty and superiority of Islam by having them role-play being a Muslim, dressing Muslim, praying Muslim, eating food politely according to Muslim etiquette. Now we are discovering that a one-sided flattering view of Islam is being promoted in the classroom by way of common ordinary textbooks. Robert Holland points out that "[m]odern textbooks shy away from presenting a positive picture of Christianity and Judaism as important influences ..." but the same censorship apparently doesn't hold when discussing Islam. The American Textbook Council examined some 10 textbooks and concluded that they "present an incomplete and confected view of Islam that misrepresents its foundations and challenges to international security." Islam is portrayed as tolerant, Christianity as aggressive. Holland suggests that the ideology of multiculturalism contributes to this distorted view of reality. "Its most ardent proponents in academe depict the European-rooted common culture as evil and oppressive and Third World cultures as universally heroic."
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SLAYING GAVE US A FIRST TASTE OF MIDEAST TERROR
by Sasha Issenberg

  In the last issue we presented an article by Andrew McCarthy entitled "When Jihad Came to America" that suggested that the assassination of Rabbi Meir Kahane in 1990 was an early example of Islamic Jihad operating in America. Rabbi Kahane was killed by an Arab who was part of a jihadist cell training for various acts of terror. In this issue, Sasha Issenberg recounts the assassination of Bobby Kennedy in 1968. The Arab who shot the then presidential candidate said he did so because Kennedy favored Israel over the Arabs. At the time, the shooting was seen as the act of a loner; it seemed part of the "civil turmoil" of the time. We now understand there was a pattern of well-planned Arab political terrorism outside of the Middle East even before 9/11. It included the killing of the Israeli athletes in the Munich Olympics; the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro, when an elderly man in a wheelchair was thrown overboard; and the first attack on the World Trade Center. If the assassination had happened today, the various Arab terrorist groups would be on the top of the list of suspects.
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WHERE HAVE ALL THE SMART MEDIA MOGULS GONE
by Burt Prelutsky

  In this essay the witty Burt Prelutsky bemoans the of absence of the old time Hollywood moguls and newspaper publishers whose bottom line was making a profit. Crass? Uncouth? True. But it saved having producers who insisted on producing ideologically-motivated bummers that the public — with good and sensible reasons — rejects. And as far as newspapers go, it doesn't make sense to so slant the news leftward that you lose all objectivity. No wonder so many people have tossed their newspapers in the garbage for the last time and get their news from more reliable sources.
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THE FORWARD TAKES ISRAEL BACKWARD
by P. David Hornik

  The Forward newspaper has the same set of beliefs as Peace Now and other groups that are certain that removing Israeli settlements in Samaria and Judea will hasten their version of the Messiah: the coming of an yet another Arab state in Biblical Israel. Discrediting Jewish settlements is so important to them that they don't mind substituting belief for fact. In this essay David Hornik answers each of their allegations.
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DO LIBERALS KNOW THERE IS EVIL?
by Richard H. Shulman

  Newspapers such as the New York Times don't so much report the news about Israel as act as advocate for the Palestinian Arabs. "... false statements, misleading figures, or omissions that survive readers' correction and are one-sided in favor of the Arabs, in headlines, photographs, news items, and editorials. Too much one way for coincidence." Richard Shulman analyzes the Times' propaganda techniques, how they mislead readers who look to them for objective assessments and for facts set in context. What the Times is doing goes well beyond michief-making when it helps determine foreign policy. Worse, when it keeps us passive while our enemies grow in strength; or, as Shulman puts it, "They turn us into sitting ducks for an Islamist death cult."
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BREAKING DOWN OBAMA'S AIPAC SPEECH
by Sultan Knish

  Sultan Knish doesn't waste his time trying to decide whether Barak Obama meant it when he said blah, blah or when he said aha-ah-blah, blah, the two being completely contradictory. Instead he shows us how to boil down some typical political speeches to extract the meager supply of actual information they contain.
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JAMES PARKES: A FINAL RECKONING
by Haim Chertok

  James Parkes was an Anglican clergyman and a historian of Jewish history, both ancient and modern. Haim Chertok paints a portrait of his life and provides an assessment of his writings. James Parkes was an unusually gifted historian, who was capable of true love and appreciation of the Jewish people without allowing that to veer him from scrupulous accuracy. He was able, too, to look with clear eyes on Christian treatment of Jews throughout Church history. Chertok writes of Parkes, "For over fifty years, promoting what he had the wit and courage to recognize as the main thing, the overriding purpose of his life — his Christian duty ... to render justice to the Jewish people — he never lost focus or faltered in determination. In the process he became one of the authentic intellectual and ethical heroes of our time."
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TRIPLE CROSS: HOW BRITAIN CREATED THE ARAB-ISRAEL CONFLICT
by Rachel Neuwirth

  In 1917, Britain was entrusted by the League of Nations to strive to "secure the establishment of the Jewish national home," (national home was Nordau-talk for state.) When the authority of the League was transferred to the U.N., Mandated Palestine continued to be in perpetual trust for the Jewish people and was so written into the the U.N. Charter. [See here and here. ] But it is also true that England, perhaps having senior moments, promised the area to both the local Arabs and the Syrians. Rachel Neuwirth writes of this triple-cross. Under the guise of having the Hashemite Abdullah ibn Hussein administer much of the area, the Brits also helped the Kingdom of (Trans)Jordan eventually come into being. But that's another story.
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  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. The Blog-Eds page for the month is updated every few days.

A Blog-Ed page has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. To go to the list, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

May 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
June 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

LETTERS FROM JERUSALEM, 1947
by Chedva Margolit; foreword by Steve Kramer

  As Steve Kramer writes in his foreword: "Nothing is more appropriate on the 60th anniversary of Israel's Declaration of Independence than reading the words of a young Jewish wife who left America and came to Israel for love of Eretz Yisrael." This essay is to be treasured.
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WHO DID WHAT FOR ISRAEL IN 1948?
by Norman Berdichevsky

  It is appropriate as we celebrate Israel's 60th to examine some of the received wisdom about those days. Norman Berdichevsky demolishes the myth that the USA was Israel's only friend and made Jewish statehood possible, supplying "money, manpower and arms". While the U.S.A voted for partition, it was primarily Czech arms, East European and Soviet manpower and East Bloc political support that enabled Israel to decisively win the military and diplomatic battles. If you think this reads like the novel 1984 — with flip flopping alliances — you may be right.
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THE 60-YEAR WAR FOR ISRAEL'S HISTORY
by Efraim Karsh

  One sometimes wonders if Israel's Arab enemies aren't overkill — her internal haters do such a good job denigrating Israel's accomplishments, rewriting her history and denying her right to exist as a Jewish state. Efraim Karsh writes of the "new historians ... who systematically rewrote the history of Zionism, warping the saga for Israel's survival." They didn't just reevaluate the facts; in many cases, they invented them or distorted their meaning by omitting key information. Unfortunately, though their tactics have been exposed, the new historians are not yet history.
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BLOOD LIBEL — PART I
by Patricia Berlyn

  We look forward to Passover but it brings with it some baggage we'd like to think was left behind in the Dark Ages — the Blood Libel, the accusation that the Jews killed Christian children for blood for their matzohs. The Jews. Of all people! A people whose religion forbids ingesting blood! As Patricia Berlyn writes, the Libel hasn't died; it lives on in Muslim mythology — the Arabs have taken it up and, as authentic modern-day medievalists, they need no evidence to propagate the lie as literal truth. Abetted by a friendly media, they have concocted other libels centered around the conviction that Jews target children for killing. It seems that the more the Jews attempt to minimize loss of Arab lives, the more grotesque the lies the Arabs invent.
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A PASSOVER STORY FOR ISRAEL TODAY
by Steven Plaut

  Using as parable a tale about a Pesach guest too impatient to wait past the symbolic seder food for the later feast, Steven Plaut makes an important point: Israel had just about defeated the first Arab intifada and there was little sympathy for PLO barbarism, when, in the early 1990s, the Israeli leadership was foolish enough to step onto the slippery slope of the Oslo "Peace" Accords. This commitment has not led to peace or even to an increase of tranquillity. "The Oslo era was accompanied by a massive assault upon Israel's pride, morale and confidence by its own leaders and intellectual elites." Is it too late to bring back "an understanding of Jewish heritage" and the pre-Oslo achievements?
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These essays examine a dysfunctional government: the U.S.A. In the twilight of its power, the Bush administration is pushing Israel to make concessions that will severely weaken — if not destroy — America's only friend in the Middle East.

BUSH-RICE BIRTHDAY PRESENT TO THE JEWISH NATION
by Emanuel A. Winston

  The reasons given for Bush's sudden rush to establish a Palestinian state are (1) to establish a legacy for Bush and (2) to sacrifice Israel for Arab cooperation in extricating the U.S.A. from Iraq. Neither makes sense — in that it is unlikely the Palestinian Arabs will maintain a facade of civility long enough for either to happen. Realistically, you can't make a viable and peacable state from a bunch of hate-filled savages eager to kill and loot, savages led by a bunch of thugs who make a profit from promising peace while collecting the weaponry for another try at eliminating Israel. Emanuel Winston speculates on how the Bush administration proposes to start dismantling Israel.
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YOUR FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AT WORK ... FOR PALESTINIANS
by Anne Lieberman

  The Arab population in Gaza, Judea and Samaria is reportedly going hungry, with only a trickle of electricity and no clean water. Yet, when it comes to getting foreign funding, the PLO — and its more recent incarnation as the P.A. and Hamas — has been outstandingly successful. It has received billions of dollars from the European Union, the United Nations, Arab and non-Arab countries, non-governmental organizations, church groups and private "charities." And — as Anne Lieberman shows us — the United States government.
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MURDEROUS MOTHERS: THE HIDDEN FEMALE FACE OF HONOR KILLING
by Phyllis Chesler

  This is the story about an honor killing. It isn't really novel that it happened in America. It isn't even unique that it happened in the U.S.A. and the mother helped slaughter her own daughters. But it is an absorbing story that Phyllis Chesler tells us. As she concludes, the victims "... were American citizens. America was their culture. Their desire to live as Americans, and not as Arab Muslims in Egypt is precisely what doomed them."
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"SHARIA CREEP" AROUND THE WORLD
by Kathy Shaidle

  Kathy Shaidle writes about some small nibbles Sharia-activists are taking out of our democratic structures. They're small, they push the envelop, they encourage our universities and workplaces to be "sensitive" to what are claimed to be Islamic requirements — even if every one else is discomforted. More to the point, they soften us up — each concession we make makes us more compliant, more likely to agree with the next demand request.
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SHILLING FOR SHARIA AT HARVARD
by Hillel Stavis

  Noah Feldman is a respected member of the Harvard Law School Faculty and an adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Who better to flog Muslim Sharia law, claiming it represents the highest state of "the rule of law"? Hillel Stavis describes Feldman's conclusion this way: "In Feldman's revisionist account, the evolution of Islamic law echoes the Western experience and is compatible with it. To Feldman, Sharia evolves from 'higher law' to 'the rule of law' in a neat conflation of the secular with the holy that places the Islamic code alongside the West's rigorously evolved concept of secular justice." Stavis concludes, "And it can only be a matter of time before the professor, having asserted that Sharia law is desirable, will assure us that its introduction in the United States is inevitable."
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A TALE OF TWO ARCHBISHOPS
by Daniel Mandel

  In Great Britain, the Sharia banking system is courted by the banking community and "sensitivity" to Muslim needs is a top priority in the educational system. Too often, Christian national and religious symbols are banned while Muslim "requests" are respected. Giving legal status to sharia courts means allowing Muslim women to be treated as chattel — not exactly a feature of democracy. Daniel Mandel contrasts the statements of the past and current archbishops of Canterbury to illustrate how high the tide of sharia compliance has reached. "[The previous Archbishop] Carey sees democracy as tender and in need of consolidation; [the current Archbishop] Williams sees it as something rigid and in need of modification." As Mandel points out, "the prevalent reaction, as the events of recent