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THINK-ISRAEL features essays and commentaries that provide context for current events in Israel. The war Islam is waging against Israel and the West is top priority. We report on global anti-Semitism, Islamism and creeping Sharia.We aim to make sense of what's going on.  

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   We are told that there is a difference between extremist Islam and peaceloving normal Islam.
   Judging by their behavior, Muslims are anti-West, anti-Democracy, anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-Buddhist, and anti-Hindu. Muslims are involved in 25 of some 30 conflicts going on in the world: in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Bosnia, Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, Cyprus, East Timor, India, Indonesia (2 provinces), Kashmir, Kazakastan, Kosovo, Kurdistan, Macedonia, the Middle East, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Somalia, Sudan, Russia-Chechnya, Tajikistan, Thailand, Uganda and Uzbekistan.
   Doesn't this mean that extremist Islam is the norm and normal Islam is extremely rare?
"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism.

"For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa. While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."   (PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein, March 31, 1977, interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw.) The Palestinian leadership, including Ahmed Shukar and Yasir Arafat, has openly admitted Palestinian "peoplehood" is a fraud; Read This
"It should be remembered that in 1918, with the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Britain and France were handed more than 5,000,000 square miles to divvy up and 99+% was given to the Arabs to create countries that did not exist previously. Less than 1% was given as a Mandate for the re-establishment of a state for the Jews on both banks of the Jordan River. In 1921, to appease the Arabs once again, another three quarters of that less than 1% was given to a fictitious state called Trans-Jordan." (Jack Berger, May 31, 2004.)
The total for all the 22 Arab League countries is 6,145,389 square miles (SM). By comparison, all 50 states of the United States have a total of 3,787,318 SM. Israel has 8,463 SM, about one-sixth of that of the State of Michigan. Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and Afghanistan are Muslim but not Arab and are not included.
     World Arab population: 300 million; World Jewish population: 13.6 million; Israel's Jewish population: 5.4 million.
"... during the late 1940s, more than 40 million refuges around the world were resettled, except for one people. They [Palestinian arabs] remain defined as refugees, wallowing 60 years later in 59 UNRWA refugee camps, financed by $400 million contributed annually by nations of the world to nurture the promise of the "right of return" to Arab neighborhoods and Arab villages from 1948 that no longer exist."
Some 900,000 Jews left behind $300 billion in assets when they were forced to flee for their lives from the Arab countries in the 1940s. They hold deeds for five times Israel's size.
Re Israel's irrevocable ownership of Israel, Golan, Samaria, Judea and Gaza: "Nothing that Israel's legal system says can change the facts that: (1) the legal binding document is the Mandate of the League of Nations and (2) the obligations of the Mandate are valid in perpetuity." (Professor Julius Stone)
"By 1920 the Ottoman Empire had exercised undisputed sovereignty over Palestine for 400 years. In Article 95 of the treaty of Sevres, that sovereignty was transferred to England in trust for a national homeland for the jews. The local Arabs had never exercised sovereignty over Palestine and so they lost nothing. Their rights were fully protected by a provisio in the grant: '...it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine...' The proviso has been fully observed by the Israelis. Since 1950 the Arabs have built some 261 new settlements in Judea and Samaria — more than twice as many as the Jews, but you never hear of them. They fill them with Arabs from Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan and by the grace of God they become Palestinians. Allahu Akbar! The Arabs call Judea "the West Bank' because they would look silly claiming that Jews are illegally living in Judea."
Read More Quotes Here

MARCH-APRIL, 2012
 

What we are talking about in the March-April, 2012 Issue

  1. Accommodating Genocide (Imani, Ahlert, Paul, Meir-Levi, Steyn)
  2. Europe is suffering from the plague--and the USA is infected (Bawer, Bostom, Ibrahim, Cline)
  3. The Arab as a Victim (Lipkin,Karsh, Hornik, Halper, Dann, Proudman)
  4. Actual Stories of ordinary Muslims (Adelman, Ahlert, Haivri)
  5. Alternative Solutions to the "Peace Process" (Ettinger, Haivri, Hausman, Kedar)
  6. Still Dithering about Iran (Joscelyn, Asculai, Goodman, Mckay)
  7. Practioners of Hate (Grobman, Rennert, Plosker, Steyn)
  8. History Section (Eydar, Berdichevsky, Sharpe, Honig, Levin,)
  9. March-April 2012 Blog-Eds

ACCOMMODATING GENOCIDE

We start this issue with a two-pronged question: What does Islam want to accomplish and how are we in Western culture helping them by self-censorship, complacency and appeasement?

In the 1930s, during the economic crisis before World War 2, the then American President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt said we had nothing to fear but fear itself -- but in those days, the whole country was involved. Nowadays, many don't seem to know Islam has declared an unending, multi-faceted uncompromising war against us -- we act as if this is a debating society and we can talk them to death. In truth, we may have lots to fear and nothing to gain by not fighting back.

Let's start by watching this video:
3 things about Islam

Fred Reifenberg, who sent it in, points out that parts of the text have been strongly inspired by the website: http://www.citizenwarrior.com

Material also came from these sources, which we encourage you to read:

Keep in mind that the adherents to Islam aren't allowed to pick and choose. They can't revise an outdated command by giving it a figurative or milder meaning. A good Muslim -- a pious Muslim -- follows the Koran without deviation. It is the word of Allah, as given voice by Muhammad, who is himself the best example Muslims have of how to think and behave as a Muslim.

Resurgent Islam's mission to rule the planet is neither haphazard nor short-lived. It has been well-planned. An early objective has been to kill off the growing power of a Jewish presence in the Middle East. When the modern State of Israel survived the onslaughts and invasions by her Arab neighbors, it became a subsidiary objective to cut the ties between Israel and the Jews in the West who contribute to its viability. After years where antisemitism was disapproved by the well-bred and thus pushed under the radar, Jews in the west are now themselves a target. The new antisemitism is mouthed not just by skin-head crazies but by respected academicians at major universities, by mainline churchmen and by minority groups that have been the beneficiaries of the unequaled participation by Jews in the fight for political and social equality.

We have reached the point where many in the West sing the Siren Song of accommodation with the terrorists. As Sarah Honig writes below: "The international community can’t wait to whitewash, exonerate, find extenuating excuses for and otherwise legitimize Arab terrorists, lessen their culpability, conceal their ideology, make light of their record, explain away their sins and gloss over their proven malice."

What is perhaps most disconcerting is that so many Jews -- particularly those in organizations designed to defend Judaism from its antisemitic enemies -- seem oblivious to what's happening. The well-funded and sustained campaign to demonize Israel and marginalize Jews in America is seldom rebutted by one of the major Jewish organizations. It is a benchmark of sorts that the Holocaust has become too controversial for the Jewish Federation. This is discussed by Ahlert's article in this set.

While we play our silly lets pretend that all-is-jolly games, Iran is building nuclear weapons to terrorize the Middle East and silence the West. Locally in Israel, Hamas and Fatah continue to act as they proclaimed in their charters.

"Goals: Complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military and cultural existence. Method: Armed struggle is a strategy and not a tactic… in uprooting the Zionist existence, and this struggle will not cease unless the Zionist state is demolished…. Opposing any political solution offered as an alternative to demolishing the Zionist occupation in Palestine"
– Fatah Constitution

This is not much different from Hamas's charter, which reads:

"Israel will exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it…. Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement…. The Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews, when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him."

Should the impossible occur and the Arab terrorists -- the pious Muslims of today who most clearly emulate Mohammad -- mellow their genocidal message, isn't it clear that the pious Arab populace would soon replace them with leaders from the smaller, less media-highlighted groups of devout terrorists, rabidly ready to carry on the Prophet's vision?

The brutal and the bloodiest prepare on the small stage of Israel to take their perfected mission to a larger audience. Yet the West sleeps.

TRUTH BE TOLD
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani has written an excellent summary of the Islamic threat throughout the world: "Islamists are hell-bent on imposing their Stone-Age system on everyone." They consider it -- including their master-slave model for a well-run society and their brutal tactics in achieving their goal -- a religious duty, which rids them of guilt and hesitancy. "Islam, by the nature of its very doctrine, appeals to man’s baser nature." This is so alien to other religions and to secular humanism, that there is a tendency to disbelieve the reality.
 READ MORE
 

WHAT'S THAT ABOUT DAUGHTERS?
by Sarah Honig

  Sarah Honig states bluntly what many in the West would like to ignore: "Hamas anchors its Jew-revulsion in the Koran." As the Hamas Charter asserts, "there is no solution to the Palestinian problem except by Jihad." Nevertheless, no matter how openly Hamas states its intent, Westerners, with all the evidence against them, continue to act as if Hamas can be gentled, that we can all reason together, if we but make the effort -- again. Honig suggests, using the Swiss as example, that either they "know what Hamas is but just [don't] really give a hoot" or ... "don't wish to burden their selective conscience with excess information — as per precedents from Third Reich days about other genocidal harangues"
 READ MORE

HOLOCAUST SPEAKER TOO CONTROVERSIAL FOR PURDUE CALUMET?
by Arnold Ahlert

  Self-censorship is an excellent way to deny the threat of resurgent Islam. If we never get into a confrontational situation, we don't have to think about the consequences of standing up -- or not standing up -- for our way of life against a group that places no limitations on what it will do to win. One excellent indicator that self-censorship is at work is when Muslims object to the Holocaust being taught, and the school or local school board accede to their demand. Or often, they cut the course or lecture series when no one has yet complained, but they are aware that Muslims objected to it somewhere else. This has become commonplace in Europe, especially England. But it is still fairly new in this country. In this essay, Arnold Ahlert chronicles a recent example that occurred at Purdue University. What makes it particularly appalling is that Jewish Federation, a major Jewish organization, went along with the action.
 READ MORE

THIS PASSOVER, FREE US FROM A FAILED JEWISH LEADERSHIP
by Stella Paul

  This being the season in which we celebrate the Passover and our deliverance from slavery into becoming a free people, we present Stella Paul's special prayer for deliverance from an American Jewish leadership which for many years has shown itself to be "A clueless bunch of mini-Pharaohs, strutting around proclaiming their moral superiority"... This being the season of the Passover, she frames her prayer in the format of dayena, "It would have been enough, O Lord." Actually, considering the tone of the essay, a better translation might be the Yiddish-English "genug, already." (Enough already!)
 READ MORE

JIHADIST INFILTRATION -- THEY ARE WINNING
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi provides us with is a detailed summary of how far the Islamists have come in softening us up so that we won't resist their next phase of attack on western civilization. They have effectively used a variety of procedures from lawfare to terrorism. Almost unnoticed is "the quiet, gradual and peaceful infiltration of Muslim operatives and their supporters into our social, legal, educational and political systems under the guise of legitimate democratic activism..." What makes all of this so depressing is that like lobsters slowly subjected to increasing heat, we seem to adapt and remain quiescent. We show no alarm.
 READ MORE

THE SPIRIT OF GEERT WILDERS
by Mark Steyn

Mark Steyn tells us how important Geert Wilders is in the fight for all of us in the West to retain our freedom of speech and thought. Wilders was put on trial for committing the sin of describing Islam accurately in its own words. Unfortunately, in Europe, "[t]hose who seek to analyze Islam outside the very narrow bounds of Eutopian political discourse wind up either banned (Belgium’s Vlaams Blok), forced into exile (Ayaan Hirsi Ali), or killed (Fortuyn, van Gogh)." "In 21st-century Amsterdam, you’re free to smoke marijuana and pick out a half-naked sex partner from the front window of her shop. But you can be put on trial for holding the wrong opinion about a bloke who died in the seventh century." Fear of Islamic intolerant reactions to what they call Islamophobia -- i.e., any criticism of Islam -- has made European officialdom intolerant of those of their citizens who question Islam's assessment of itself.
 READ MORE

EUROPE IS SUFFERING FROM THE PLAGUE -- AND THE USA IS INFECTED

Europe is suffering from a plague that has reached epidemic proportions. The plague is not accidental; it's been carefully planned to maximize its impact. The plague carriers are an unruly, contentious group, the Muslim immigrants, who do not wish to associate in a peaceable way with the natives. They wish to dominate and impose their values. The symptoms the natives exhibit are these: they suffer from a loss of nerves, a fear of confrontation, a tendency to appeasement and self-censorship and an inability to exert themselves to reverse the situation. The USA has been infected, and in America as in Europe, many an academician and politician has signed up to help transmit the disease to different target groups. We are beginning to watch our language so as not to offend Muslims; our courts are toying with the idea of accepting sharia law in a limited way; we bleach truthful statements about the ruthlessness of the Muslim conquests out of our textbooks. But the plague has not yet reached an epidemic -- and possibly irreversible -- level.

AU REVOIR LES ENFANTS
by Bruce Bawer

  Bruce Bawer writes of the Obin study of the impact of Islam on the educational system published in France in 2005. It contains a litany of refusals by Muslim children to participate in anything or eat anything or accept anything or study anything at odds with their religion -- this in a country that prides itself on its multicultural integration. Hand in hand with this, the Muslim children were thoroughly-indoctrinated Jew-haters. "Muslim students objected to anything having to do with Judaism. Holocaust denial was common." It noted that "...there is no school in France — not even a Jewish school! — where Jewish children are safe from the pernicious evil of Muslim Jew-hatred." If anything, the situation has worsened for Jews. France itself is unlikely to remain a democracy much longer, given that this Muslim population is rapidly increasing, they will not assimilate, and the French leadership shows no signs of takings measures to reverse the situation.
 READ MORE

MAINSTREAM AMERICAN MUSLIM JURISTS' BLUEPRINT FOR UNDERMINING AMERICA'S LEGAL SYSTEM
by Andrew Bostom

  Whoever is blueprinting the takeover of the West by resurgent Islam must think it is a powerful tool to say exactly what Islam plans to accomplish. Andy Bostom recounts the dream of that patriotic American, Salah al-Sawy, who is willing to live briefly under American law until he has sufficient resources to change things to their proper state, where everyone lives under Allah, and Muslims are in control. Eventually, the Islamic Umma expects to "supercede Western conceptions of human rights as enunciated, for example, in the US Bill of Rights, and the UN's 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights." If they don't succeed, it won't be for want of trying. For "Muslims serving as judges in non-Muslim (including US) legal systems: It is permissible to work as a judge in an infidel nation or a nation which rules by infidel law, even if that leads to ruling by their law, if by so doing one is able to increase the good and decrease the bad as much as possible." As it is said, "he judges by the rulings of the Shari'a as much as possible, even if by a ruse." So now we know.
 READ MORE

THE HISTORICAL REALITY OF THE MUSLIM CONQUESTS
by Raymond Ibrahim

  "Because it is now almost axiomatic for American school textbooks to whitewash all things Islamic", Raymond Ibrahim undertakes to gives us a more accurate picture of the Muslim Conquest of the vast land area from the Middle East and Spain to central Asia and India. The inhabitants were offered the usual Muslim choices: conversion, dhimmitude or a fight to the death. This is taught proudly in the Muslim world. But Western textbooks would have you believe the conquered people couldn't wait to accept Islam.
 READ MORE

ONLY WORDS
by Edward Cline

  A major objective of resurgent Islam is to criminalize any criticism of Islam that any Muslim might object to. Their campaign has been sufficiently successful that we have become infected with the fear of saying anything that can be considered Hate-Islam-speech. It easily overrides our supposedly-irrevocable and guaranteed-by-the Constitution free speech. It has indeed become dangerous to verbalize a whimsical or logical train of thought that might be politically distasteful. Muslims that aren't too squeamish to decapitate a human apparently are too sensitive, too delicate, to be subjected to hurtful words. In this essay Edward Cline describes the stigmata of the disease with which we are afflicted. If virtue still has power, this essay will become a classic.
 READ MORE

THE ARAB AS VICTIM

The bedrock of Muslim propaganda is that the po' defenseless Muslims have been victimized by just about everybody. In India, the Hindu is the victimizer, ignoring it's Muslims who commit all the acts of terrorism. In Europe, just by showing displeasure, the Muslims are succeeding in having Holocaust studies removed from the curriculum. In America, the loudly-voiced Muslim claim that they are the chief victim of hate crimes would seem to substantiate their claim that America is irrationally islamophobic. In actual fact, religion-based hate crimes against Jews are more than seven times as frequent as religion-based hate crimes against Muslims (70% versus 9%) -- and many of these crimes are committed by the po' defenseless muslims. In Israel and the Territories, the po' Palestinian Arab claim they are victimized by the Jewish government, though, case by case in the courts, Arabs are consistently favored over Jews in any property dispute. In this section we present cases where the Arab is actually the victim -- of other Arabs. It is ironic that Arab brutality to other Arabs is ignored, but the world's press calls Israel's killing a human shield a criminal act. It is ironic that Arabs do better in Israeli courts than Arab women in Sharia courts.

I'M BACK!
by Al Skudsi bin Hookah

  Mr. bin Hookah is foreign correspondent and roving reporter for The Gaza Gajeera. In this column, he recounts his experience as an unwilling resident in an Israeli jail these past few years.
 READ MORE

THE MIDDLE EAST'S REAL APARTHEID
by Efraim Karsh

  Israel has been accused of killing a handful of human shields in 2009 in Gaza. Syria has in fact murdered some 12000 of its own citizens within the past year, including some 400 children that were jailed and tortured. Yet the Anti-apartheidniks rage against Israel and ignore Syria's barbaric behavior. Efraim Karsh points out in this essay that Syria's human rights record is not atypical. Apartheidism is endemic in the Arab states -- as is religious intolerance, ethnic inequality, racism, gender discrimination, slavery and other practices that Western liberals condemn in theory but ignore when they are done by their proteges, the Muslims of the Middle East.
 READ MORE

THE PALESTINIAN HUMAN RIGHTS NIGHTMARE
by P. David Hornik

  When a culture is built on aggression and conquest, it's not surprising that the same lack of respect for others spills over into family relations and clan interactions, where brutality is also the norm. David Hornik tackles an important subset: Arab on Arab violence. Ignoring the phenomenon allows Arab propagandists to balloon out grievances against Israel that are likely the expression of the resentment Arabs feel against Jews being in control, when in their perfect world, Jews -- and everybody else -- should be dhimmis. Given their religion-based culture of violence, as Hornik notes, "...the idea that upgrading the West Bank and Gaza to statehood would be a step toward peace, let alone democracy, is surely in need of a reality check."
 READ MORE

PALESTINIAN SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR SELLING A HOME TO JEWS
by Daniel Halper

  In keeping with the discussions in the previous articles, a grave problem is that Palestinian Arabs are in danger from their own leaders, who consider it is a capital crime to sell property to a Jew. This has had consequences. Sales have been handled between Arab and Jew surreptitiously. They avoid filing papers and out of fear of their own leaders the Arab seller can't own up to the sale. Now the Israeli Supreme Court is jeopardizing the use of this outlet.
 READ MORE

WHO MAKES THE LAW?
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann writes of the highly discriminatory rulings against Jews in Israeli court cases when a Jew and an Arab have a property dispute, As he notes, "This ruling should send shivers down the spine of everyone who respects the rule of law. It means that Israel's Supreme Court has been compromised by a political agenda that discriminates against Jews. By abandoning the Ottoman rules, the High Court may well have undermined the rule of law, by changing the age-old principles of land occupancy in Judea and Samaria by sudden judicial fiat."
 READ MORE

SEX AND SHARIA: MUSLIM WOMEN PUNISHED FOR FAILED MARRIAGES
by Charlotte Rachael Proudman

  A reader of the original article, Michelle Brooks, wrote: "I am always absolutely incredulous to find instances where British laws are broken over and over again without penalty ... Well done Charlotte Proudman for shedding more light on such a dark corner of our judicial system - and for those who will say that Sharia councils are not courts -- we know! However, because thousands of vulnerable Muslim women don't know, these operations continue to bring in a steady flow of cash to a sinister bunch who have callous disregard for the welfare of women who are often sent back to their abusive husbands as they haven't been beaten enough to warrant a divorce."
 READ MORE

ACTUAL STORIES OF ORDINARY MUSLIMS

ACID ATTACKS: JUST A CULTURE THING OR JUST ISLAMIC?
by Gadi Adelman

  As Gadi Adelman points out, acid attacks are not unique to Islam, but they are commonly used in the Islamic culture as punishment or retaliation. In Jewish law, 'an eye for an eye' became the foundation for tort law, where an equivalent monetary recompense was substituted for retaliation. In Islamic countries, one can find recent court decisions where someone found guilty of blinding another has his own eye removed. Acid attacks are commonly used against women and children by husbands and fathers angry that they are not obeyed; and these are seldom punished. I was going to say it was a dog's life for women in Islam, but that's not true. Women don't get eaten. They are just brutalized and regarded as inferior creatures.
 READ MORE

FORCING WOMEN TO MARRY THEIR RAPISTS
by Arnold Ahlert

  Arnold Ahlert writes about a ruling under Sharia law that seems insane to Westerners. A young Muslim woman aged 16 was ordered by the court to marry the man who had raped her a year before. The important issue in that culture is not that a young girl suffered psychological and physical damage. What matters is that in losing her virginity before marriage, the victim causes her family to lose honor. So says Sharia. Since Sharia law blames the woman when there's a rape, the family often feels marriage to the rapist is the only way to restore the family's honor -- it's that or killing the woman that was raped. In this case, after suffering several months of beatings after marriage, she committed suicide. There is a stark difference between Western and Islamic law and attitudes; and stories such as this one cut through the nonsense that "all cultures are equally viable," all ideologies equally acceptable.
 READ MORE

WIFE BEATERS AND THEATER CRITICS IN BANGLADESH
by Mohshin Habib

  Not that long ago, Bangladesh, a Muslim country, was noted for being democratic, secular, tolerant and modern in outlook; the attitude was reinforced by its Constitution. But as in Turkey and in Egypt and Iran, the fundamentalists took over and the country has become conventionally Islamic. Mohshin Habib gives us a look at how the Muslim religion influences some every-day matters.
 READ MORE

ALTERNATIVE SOLUTIONS TO THE "PEACE PROCESS"

Advocates of the "Push Israel to allow a bunch of hostile Arabs live near, around, in and next to Israel" (AKA "2-state solution") present this as the only possibility outside of the suicidal 1-state solution, where the Arabs would control the state and the Jews -- if allowed to live -- would be dhimmis. But there are many other possibilities. Over the years, Think-Israel has presented many ideas that would allow the Israelis to build their remarkable country in peace and bring stability to at least a small part of the Middle East. Our own solution is among several suggestions presented in the September-October 2010 issue. Click here to read it inter alia

Below we present two other ideas. We start with factual article that provide context: (1) Who are the Palestinian-Arabs? and (2) How many of them are there in the Territories?

WHO ARE THE PALESTINIAN-ARABS?
by Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

  Yoram Ettinger provides definitive information on the origin of the name and region called Palestine and the quite-separate origin of those we now call "Palestinians. The article is noteworthy for using population statistics from various sources. They make it clear, in the words of Dr. Carl Hermann Voss, that "[t]he Arab population of Palestine was small and limited until Jewish resettlement restored the barren lands and drew to it Arabs from neighboring countries." When England was given the League of Nations Mandate to help the Jews develop the area into a Jewish state, she called it Palestine. She betrayed her trust, splitting off the 78% of the territory that was on the east side of the Jordan river to and giving it to the Hashemites to administer, then encouraging Arab immigration into the remainder of the land while making difficulties for Jewish immigrants, "until Arab demography was sufficiently enhanced". Palestinian is a recent name intended to lend support for the false claim that these Arabs are a separate people. But thanks to the multiplicity of cultures, nationalities and races that never assimilated -- the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica counted 51 -- and the chronic internecine warfare of a volatile and ever changing population in the region, no nation or people had crystallized in all the years since the Arab conquest. Nor had the population increased significantly. "In 1554, there were 205,000 Moslems Christian and Jews in Palestine. In 1800, the total population was 275,000." Then the Jews came. And the Arab population figures increased steeply.
 READ MORE

HOW MANY PALESTINIANS ARE THERE?
by David Ha'ivri

  The West invests so much media promotion, economic resources, and political capital on the Palestinian Arabs, one would suppose determining reliably how many Arabs actually live in the Territories would be a simple lookup. It isn't. David Ha'ivri lays out the problem and suggestions possible reasons why the data are sequestered. He refers to "reputable, independent studies" that use accurate statistics to estimate Arab population. We suggest googling articles by Yoram Ettinger on demographics to obtain these. To understand the implication of these data, we also include an article by Ettinger contrasting current fertility rates for Arabs and Jews in Israel and the Territories. Most surprising.
 READ MORE

THE DEATH OF OSLO AND THE REBIRTH OF JORDAN-IS-PALESTINE
by Matthew Hausman

  Matthew Hausman elegantly demolishes the notion that the Oslo Process was a vehicle for peace, and suggests an alternative procedure -- declaring Jordan, which already has a Palestinian Arab majority, as the Palestinian state.. He makes clear that the Jews have had a historic and religious attachment to their homeland for thousands of years and in point of fact never completely left it. The Palestinian Arabs, in contrast, "had no ancestral connection", nor were they a nation or a people. They were mostly immigrants from the neighboring countries, attracted by the economic opportunities created by the Jews and the British. That being the case, moving them to nearby Jordan does not sever them from their homeland. Just the opposite -- it gives a motley group of Arabs, the local Arabs and for the millions living in the refugee camps in the various Arab countries, land that could become their homeland.
 READ MORE

A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE FOR THE FUTURE OF ISRAEL
by Dr. Mordechai Kedar

  Dr. Kedar has written, “Tribalism, which may be understood as ‘loyalty of individuals and groups to a traditional framework, such as a clan, sect, ethnic or religious subgroup’, ... forms the basis of much of the social structure of the Arab and Islamic world. ... tribal or family alliances endure intact even after tribal territory has been incorporated into a state system." Building on this observation, Dr. Kedar suggests a novel suggestion for solving the Palestinian Arab problem and thus bringing peace and stability for at least a small part of the Middle East.
 READ MORE

STILL DITHERING ABOUT IRAN

This set of articles focus on Iran. Complicating a situation that is already in crisis, Prez Obama is playing Russian Roulette with the Middle East, where the blanks are endless sessions of talk and sanctions but no one is stopping Iran's development of nuclear weapons. This set of essays discusses some misleading data that encourages procrastinators to dither and why we should act before we have to confront a nuclear Iran. One of the essays reminds us that lack of resolution also characterizes how we are fighting resurgent Islam in other parts of the globe. Another points out that we won't stop a domestic attack by ignoring that our enemies are ceaselessly working at destroying our way of life.

A modest proposal: If Prez Obama is convinced we can wait and still act effectively when necessary, he has a simple way to convince us: let him allow his children to live incognito in Israel. Is he willing to put something in the pot besides high-falutin' words -- and the lives of thousands of Israeli Jews and Middle Eastern Arabs?

A FAULTY INTELLIGENCE REPORT LIVES ON
by Thomas Joscelyn

  Thomas Joscelyn writes that the 2007 NIE report was "flat wrong about Iran's covert work," in that it ignored Iran's ongoing work on "civilian" uranium conversion and enrichment. It did grave damage in that it supported the notion that Iran wasn't all that warlike in its nuclear ambitions, a conclusion many politicians and 'let's give negotiations and sanctions a chance' ideologues, including the present American administration, welcomed. When dealing with a group of fanatics who wasted some 100,000 to 500,000 of their own children, who were sent to blow-up land mines (and themselves), it would seem more intelligent to err on the side of suspicion of Iran's claims of innocence, particularly when it announces its intent to blow up Israel as soon as it has a bomb. Or maybe it will attack the USA directly. Or just cow its neighbors into political surrender. When the bomb goes off or is used as political blackmail, will Obama blame it on Bush?
 READ MORE

THE IRANIAN DECISION ON THE PRODUCTION OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS
by Ephraim Asculai

Ephraim Asculai provides the basic facts about Iran's ability to produce nuclear weaponry. We are certain of these facts or, at the very least, can make educated guesses about them. He concludes "Iran has the technical know-how and the facilities to enrich its LEU (3.5 and 20 percent uranium) to high enriched uranium (HEU) of about 90 percent enrichment." "the Iranians can, If the technicians receive the order to do so, quite quickly produce HEU for the first core of a nuclear explosive device."

Brett Stephens in a March 19, 2012 Wall Street Journal article entitled "The Bogus Iran Intelligence Debate" uses a less technical way to make the same point: given that the Iranians have the components, focusing on when they will be ready to produce bombs is bogus. He explains the actual core issue (no pun intended) this way: "You may not be able to divine whether a drinker, holding a bottle of Johnnie Walker in one hand and a glass tinkling with ice in the other, actually intends to pour himself a drink. And perhaps he doesn't. But the important thing, at least when it comes to intervention, is not to present him with the opportunity in the first place. [...] To have sufficient quantities of enriched uranium is, so to speak, the whiskey of a nuclear-weapons program. By contrast, 'weaponization'—the vessel into which you pour and through which you can deliver the enriched uranium cocktail—is merely the glass."


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HEZBOLLAH DONORS, AGENTS OPERATING IN U.S.
by Alana Goodman

  Alana Goodman makes a chilling but compelling observation that pierces the unstated belief of many an antisemite that Iran might take over the Middle East, even blast Israel, but they won't attack America. Based on the fact that Hezbollah agents -- tools of Iran -- are in the USA and have a sufficient network of donors to be effective, she asks, "the argument from the appease-Iran crowd is so counter-intuitive. If there's broad concern about the threat of Hezbollah operatives in the U.S. now, why would we expect them to be less of a threat if they were backed by mullahs with nukes? Or are we just supposed to that pray Israel and our other allies don’t do anything that might offend the regime once it obtains nuclear weapons, lest its Hezbollah allies retaliate against us domestically?"
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CUT AND RUN REDUX
by Karen Mckay

  Karen McKay reminds us that we are repeating the cut and run tactics we used in Vietnam, instead of staying the course and fighting effectively the war that radical Islam is waging against us. We need also to understand that the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War are not separate wars; they are components of the global war Islam is waging around the world. As McKay writes, "We are at war with an implacable enemy who intends to cleanse the world of Jews and destroy Western civilization. Mealy-mouthed speeches, attempts to excuse or “understand” those who are dedicated to destroying us, and limp-wristed responses to threats—such as negotiations and feel-good sanctions--will doom us. Our enemies respect only strength, decisiveness and fearlessness."
 READ MORE

PRACTIONERS OF HATE

Propaganda, public relations statements, harangues and debate arguments are not in themselves either good or bad. It depends on how they are used, when the text is supposed to be factual. It depends on how much -- or how little -- the writers feel the need to tell the truth. It would be nice if they were constrained to tell "the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," but that doesn't necessarily happen, not even in respected papers such as the New York Times. Often they will tell some of the truth, fudge some of it, distort some, confabulate, lie, generalize a minor incident, ignore significant data, and stretch out a small point to make it seem as the core issue. Some of this, of course, is due to sheer dullness -- how many media people were physics or math majors, or even took courses that required logical thinking? But much is deliberate obfuscation and inventive lying with malicious intent. There is one interesting subset: when the object of the media's attention is both guilty and a Muslim. The press utilizes its standard practices of distortion, but now the intent is to minimize the heinous crime. The media can actually sounds kind and understanding. They can make you feel vindictive and ungenerous if you disagree with them.

LICENSE TO MURDER: THE ENDURING THREAT OF THE PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION
by Alex Grobman

  Responding to a number of people have asked if they can use the introduction of his book License to Murder: The Enduring Threat of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Dr. Alex Grobman had made it available. Here below is a copy. As Kenneth Bialkin, Chairman of the America-Israel Friendship League, puts it, "Dr. Alex Grobman seeks to explore how and why a vicious lie, a warrant for genocide, first written in the early 1900s, aided endemic antisemitism and then morphed into anti-Zionism."
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WASH. POST'S PALESTINIAN PROPAGANDA FALSIFIES HISTORY AND THE BIBLE
by Leo Rennert

  One would think that the naming a square in memory of Dr. Dajani. "an Arab physician who treated both Arabs and Jews" before Israel became a state would be a heartwarming story. The Washington Post used it to vilify Israel, distort recent history and revise the Bible to suit Arab propaganda. As Leo Rennert writes, the Post's reporter, Joel Greenberg, "inject[ed] his piece with anti-Israel poison pills in an attempt to undermine the very legitimacy of Israel's nationhood." The Arab invasion of the new-born state is ignored and Israel is made to seem responsible for the Doctor's family leaving. "With Greenberg, the sad tale of the Dajani family is turned into Palestinian victimhood rather than the outcome of massive self-inflicted wounds by Arab leaders. The 1948 debacle was caused entirely by Arab rejectionism, not by Israel's creation." Rennert rightly concludes that its "journalistic selectivity ... tells worlds about the paper's anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian bias in its news columns."
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EXPOSED: UN MEDIA OFFICIAL RESPONSIBLE FOR FALSE PHOTO TWEET
by Simon Plosker

  We are familiar with lone wolf terrorists, imbued with the peaceful messages of Islam, massacring non-Muslims with no visible instruction from a central planning group. Now we hear of lone-wolf propagandists, who, apparently independently, set up a well-structured hoax, when, usually, a successful hoax requires coordination, planning, money and authority. The al-Dura construction, for example, required one group of Arabs to distract the IDF while another crew faked the death of a 12-year old boy, Muhamad al-Dura. The cameraman, standing near the Arab snipers, reassured the network that the posed shot was of a 12-year old boy hiding behind his father, caught in the crossfire between the IDF and Palestinians. The boy's father told lies that were later discovered. The French network and its anchorman broadcast that the Jews had shot an innocent Arab child. This brilliant hoax fueled a global hatred of Israel, which was immediately condemned as the killer of innocent Arab children. Only later did it become known the Palestinians had shot at al-Dura, and, even now, few know the real story. Simon Plosker writes of this new twist on how to libel Jews.


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LATHER, RINSE, AND REPEAT
by Mark Steyn

  There is one type of occasion that brings out a show of kindness and understanding in the media. When a Muslim slaughters an innocent, the press has a well-practiced, ritualistic procedure to wheedle us into believing the Muslim isn't a monster, just a good guy gone wrong because of social factors. He is another victim of society. If they had their druthers, they would keep it secret that the murderer was a Muslim. A man's religion is considered unimportant if he's a Muslim. Mark Steyn describes the steps in the procedure..
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HISTORY SECTION

THE PLACE WHERE IT ALL BEGAN
by Dror Eydar

  On Mount Ebal, where the Jews entered the Land of Canaan some three thousand years, Adam Zertal, an archaeologist, has been excavating what likely is Joshua's Altar, the first altar built in the Promised Land for service to HaShem, in accordance with the instructions recorded in the Bible. Dror Eydar tells an exciting story on two levels. There is the awesome story the excavation is disclosing. The specific objects found, the evidence provided by the debris, the topology of the area -- all these say that the rules for sacrifice and kashruth were in place at the beginning of Nationhood. The architecture of the altar, itself, amazingly enough, mirrors the structure of the altar of the Second Temple but precedes it by a thousand years. And there is the less salutory story -- this is yet another example where new data are denigrated because they don't support the belief system of the establishment, the established religion in this case being the belief by establishment archaeologists that the Bible isn't history.
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THE IRAQI JEWS – THE OLDEST DIASPORA, NOW SAFE IN ISRAEL
by Norman Berdichevsky

  Norman Berdichevsky writes of the history of the Iraqi Jews -- the Babylonian Jews of ancient times -- "Like the overwhelming majority of the large Jewish population of approximately 800,000 Jews living in the Middle East in 1948 outside of Palestine," they were "the casualties of modern Arab nationalism and religious extremism." "They are unequivocally the oldest diaspora community going back to the Babylonian captivity after the destruction of the Temple in 586 BCE. They can also claim to be the original Zionists, following the call of Ezra the Scribe to return to the land of their fathers in Judea." Berdichevsky describes their modern flight to Israel from persecution in Iraq and the period of adjustment in an Ashkenazi-dominated society. "It was particularly galling to the older generation that they "had been for many centuries the center of the Jewish world" and "in the course of just a few years [their dominance] was completely liquidated." But integration was helped by shared army experience and today Jews from the Arab countries are prominent in Israeli culture, in politics and in the military, while retaining their ancient traditions. As Berdichevsky observes, "Israelis have learned to live together and to rely less and less on simply being tagged with a label whether ethnic, racial or cultural." A fascinating story.
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HEROES AND UNSUNG HEROES - THOSE WHO MOVED THE WORLD
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe writes of two British men, both of whom loomed large in the days preceding the birth of Israel. T.E. Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, helped defeat the Turkish army fighting the twilight battles of the Ottoman Empire. He was a proponent of Arab Revolt against the Ottoman, although, given the Arab performance -- as in the taking of Beersheva -- it would seem the Arabs were after loot not nationalism. Richard Meinertzhagen was not flamboyant, but he was an excellent tactician and "an avowed Christian supporter of Jewish and Zionist aspirations working for the reconstitution of a Jewish state within the ancient, ancestral and biblical homeland." Intertwined with the activities of these men to destroy Ottoman rule was the NILI, a group of young Jews who operated in Turkish territory and acted as dedicated spies for the English. Sharpe writes, "The conquest of El Arish, Gaza, Beersheba and finally Jerusalem would have been almost impossible without the massive amount of information provided by the NILI Jewish underground."
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THE FIRST DAY
by Sarah Honig

  Sarah Honig writes of the events of the first full day after the modern state of Israel was declared at 4p.m., May the 14th, 1948, before the Sabbath began. The police, who just the day before were the Mandatory Police, charged their first thief -- he had stolen a book. A ship from Europe docked, filled with Jews who just the day before were considered illegal, and the passengers, were now declared legal immigrants. But the new state did not even have that single day to be at peace as it began meeting the demands of sovereignty. Contrary to the myth that Israel was born because of Holocaust guilt, as Honig writes, "The 'Great Arab Revolt' of 1936-39 – fomented by the still-revered Haj Amin al-Husseini and financed by Nazi Germany – merely delayed Jewish independence." Now, the Arab League, "avidly pro-Nazi", declared war, and the armies of seven Arab states invaded Israel, determined to destroy the newborn, which had, thanks to England's collusion with the Arabs, only a meager amount of military armament and a population that was combat-unready. The Jews survived the onslaught and went on to build up an impressive country. The Arabs remain mired in misery, fixated on destroying the Jewish State.
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VIETNAMESE BOAT PEOPLE IN THE PROMISED LAND
by Menucha Chana Levin

  When the U.S.A. abandoned Vietnam, for many of her Vietnamese allies "...hoping to escape Communist persecution and torture – there was no choice but to perilously attempt escape by sea." Many perished. Some came within sight of ships from different countries, which ignored their distress signals. One boat was lucky. The passengers were rescued by an Israeli vessel and eventually brought to Israel. 25 years have past. Menucha Chana Levin tells the story of the rescue and the aftermath.
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MARCH-APRIL, 2012 BLOG-EDS

March-April 2012 BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index.

To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

March 2012 BLOG-EDS

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April 2012 BLOG-EDS


JANUARY-FEBRUARY, 2012
 

What we are talking about in the January-February, 2012 Issue

  1. Themes In This Issue
  2. Changing People's Minds (Kaufman, Lipkin, Reilly, Solway, Julius, Bell)
  3. Reclaiming Jewish Land; Rejecting the two State Solution (Grief, CILR, Hausman, Weinberg, Shaw, Lerner, Abrams, Sherman)
  4. Insights Into Arab Behavior (Ibrahim, Greenfield, Ibrahim)
  5. Arab Internecine Wars (Ettinger, Glick, Burr, Jorisch, Rubin)
  6. Iran (Silverberg, Thornton, Glick, Lipkin)
  7. Muslim Brotherhood (Rubin, Mauro, Leibler)
  8. Where Are All The Moderate Muslims? (Sullivan, McCarthy, Habeeb)
  9. Infiltration Into Our Education System (Plaut, Thornton, Baehr, Tassel, Lappen)
  10. PR And Dirty Tricks (Visser, Chesler, Hinderaker, Stern, Silber, Lademain, Leiber, Haivri)
  11. History Section (Loewenberg, Klinger, Ginsburg, Salameh)
  12. January-February 2012 Blog-Eds



Themes In This Issue

We talk about some new misanthropic and misleading media attacks on Israel and we discuss ways of changing people's attitudes. We spend some time considering the fallout after Newt Gingrich startled everyone by saying what so many knew but wouldn't acknowledge: the Palestinian Arabs are not a people. Israel did not steal their land. We ask: what does it mean that so many in the media knew this, but didn't share their knowledge with their readers. On the contrary, many argued for concessions to the Arabs. Why the long-standing inhibition on bringing the truth to the foreground? Why was the Palestinian People invented?

Given that the Press will stay hostile but more people understand the pro-Palestinian pretense of being a People is just a pretext to justify killing Jews, we ask why doesn't Israel stop her "White-Knight" quest for peace with the Arabs? It's just as bizarre as anything out of Alice in Wonderland. But it's not just ineffective, it's dangerous. Israel owns Samaria and Judea and Gaza legally, as well as morally, by history, by Bible and by conquest. Why not annex them and be in a position to protect her population centers? She can then deal with the resident Arabs as a separate problem, which may require different strategies.

We examine some new insights into the Arab character and how Arabs/Muslims act out Islamic dictates among themselves. Iran is of particular concern in a region where there's little stability outside of Israel. We try again to solve that mystery: is there such a thing as a Moderate Muslim, that we define as one who is pious but doesn't -- and doesn't want to -- practice jihad against others.

We also has some essays on how Islam is doing stealth jihad-wise. We explore the relationship between what Harvard academics write and what school children are taught as facts about Islam.


CHANGING PEOPLE'S MINDS

What changes people's minds? The impact of authority figures -- favored professors, parents, religious leaders -- is a major factor in how opinions are formed. Clever and/or dramatic media presentation may work to set an attitude. Or to help change it. Occasionally, the change seems, paradoxically, both fated to be yet easily attributable to random factors. This segment examines some possibilities.

[1]  Having a well-known figure assert an obvious but ignored truth is especially effective when a once-popular, policy is defunct but no one wants to be the first to say so. Newt Gingrich spoke out forcefully and said what apparently everyone -- except those who only read Arab press releases -- knew; to wit, there is no authentic Palestinian people. It is a collection of Arabs who came into what is now Israel mostly in the 20th Century from all over the Middle East and was declared a people by Yassar Arafat in 1964. The curious fact is that the bubble didn't immediately burst. The varied reactions are themselves are interest. cbh We discuss the responses in the essay called "Israel's Existential Problems" (see above).

[2] Another way depends on what, initially, seems to be an unfocused need to do something different. An individual is dissatisfied. He is looking for something he feels he's missing. Often his journey is spiritual or takes the form of making contact with his roots. This is another theme explored below.

[3] A bold reframing of the structure of the debate will often work.

[4]  An open mind that pays attention to disparities can force a review of long-held attitudes and assumptions. The information that Middle Eastern wealth is aggressively used in ugly and annoying ways to promote Islam in America is not secret. As Ralph Peters has pointed out: "...right now, in 21st-century America, estimates project that at least 70% of mosques and madrassahs in the United States receive Saudi funds, directly or indirectly." "...the Saudis also spend extravagantly on building mosques at the extreme fringes of Muslim penetration — to mark the territory for Islam." (Emphasis added.) Nevertheless, the author of the last essay below ignored the evidence -- as do many on the Left. He assumed that the local opposition to the erection of a mega mosque in the heart of the Bible Belt was simple bigotry. How he came to a deeper understanding makes a fascinating story. When all is said and done, it is pretty chutzpadic of Saudi Arabia to bleat about tolerance when they won't allow someone of a different religion -- not even the American soldiers who protect them in their homeland -- to worship openly.

OF COURSE, THE PALESTINIANS ARE AN "INVENTED PEOPLE"
by Jerome S. Kaufman

 In this article, Jerry Kaufman sums up what Newt Gringrich said. In actuality, the Palestinians are a fake people. They had not developed into a people over the centuries. Those we called Palestinians have no identity distinct from the general Arab population. The 1911 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica lists half a hundred groups living in Mandated Palestine -- Beduins, Circassians, Jews, Christians, Arabs, etc. There was no group called Palestinian or one that called itself Palestinian. Michael Curtis of the BESA Center puts it this way:

"...no independent Palestinian state has ever existed, let alone one that manifested a "Palestinian identity."

"A few examples can illustrate this. The first Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations in the area met in February 1919 to consider the future of the territory formerly ruled by the Ottoman Empire, which dissolved after World War I. The Congress declared: "We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, moral, economic, and geographical bonds." The celebrated scholar Philip Hitti, testifying before the Anglo-American Committee in 1946, stated there was no such thing as Palestine in history, "absolutely not." The United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP), in its September 3, 1947 report, remarked that Palestinian nationalism, as distinct from Arab nationalism, was a relatively new phenomenon. It concluded that Palestinian identity was part of a rich tapestry of identities, mostly predicated on Arab and Islamic solidarity.

"The Palestinians themselves reached the same conclusion. Palestinian spokesperson Ahmad Shuqeiri told the UN Security Council in 1956 that Palestine was nothing more than southern Syria. The head of the Military Operations Department of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Zuheir Muhsein, declared on March 31, 1977, "Only for political reasons do we carefully underline our Palestinian identity. ...the existence of a separate Palestinian identity is there for tactical reasons." The PLO, in its own Charter or amended Basic Law (article 1), states that Palestine is part of the Arab nation. That "Arab nation" never included a state known as "Palestine." Indeed, the inhabitants of the general Palestinian area were not subjects of an Arab nation but of the Ottoman Empire, which ruled the area from 1516-1918. This was the last recognized sovereign power in the area. The area of Palestine was a district of the Empire, officially a vilayet (province), not a political entity. No independent Palestinian state has ever been established, nor was there a single administrative or cultural unit of Palestinians. Arabs in the area were not different in any way from other Arabs in the Middle East. Nor was Israel established on the ashes of any state other than the Ottoman Empire.

"On the other hand, a sovereign Jewish state existed prior to the rise of the Roman Empire. While the Romans destroyed the Second Temple, changed the name of the land to Syria Palestina, and banished the Jews from Jerusalem, this did not eradicate all Jewish presence in the area. Moreover, the Jews in the Diaspora maintained a strong consciousness of the historical connection of the Jewish people to Palestine — a connection that was acknowledged in the League of Nations mandate."

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NEWT GINGRICH, THE MEDIA TAILORS AND THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE
by Bernice Lipkin

Newt Gingrich said forthrightly that there was no such thing as a Palestinian people and they had never owned the land. Bernice Lipkin examines one aspect of the aftermath: the response of the media. In that most of the media have been more or less pro-Palestinian, one would expect they would be shocked and ask for proof. Instead the general response could be summed up as: we know but so what. Let's get on with the peace process. Now why is that?

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WHY "INVENT" THE PALESTINIANS?
by Robert R. Reilly

Robert Reilly asks a critical question: why were the Palestinian people invented? The short answer is they serve as a political ploy, as visual aids to keep us focused on the unfairness of a nascent Israel surviving invasion by her neighbors. Their suffering becomes justification for the Arab doing any loathsome deed to drive the Jews out. The assertions that the Arabs Palestinians own the land, that they were driven from their homes, that they are Cinderella and Israel is cruel step-mother are latter-day accretions. The basic issue is that by the rules of Islamic theology, Jews have lost their right to the Holy Land, therefore they should not be a sovereign power. They should not.

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THE RETURN OF THE PRODIGAL SON
by David Solway

  How do you return to what you hardly knew? David Solway recounts his all-of-a-sudden start of a journey to the religion of his birth, Judaism, when 9/11 shocked him out of the accretion of anti-Zionist hate propaganda that had coated him and cocooned him. He realized he had "acted out of mere rote behavior and fortuitous conjecture, out of an unexamined desire to think in accordance with the inferences and presuppositions of my friends and colleagues,..." He realized he'd made the Jew the repository of all he disliked; reacting against himself, he had expelled "himself from his own community." As he travels forward in time, he has shaken off opinions and attitudes he now sees as puerile and/or malignant. A fascinating odyssey.

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LETS REFRAME THE ISRAEL DEBATE
by Lyn Julius

Lyn Julius writes that Israel's pointing out its significant contributions to the advancement of humanity "in technology, science, agriculture, ecology, immigrant absorption" doesn't rebut the negative opinion of Israel held by "grassroots" Europeans. To achieve that, Israel needs to "explode the misconception, commonly held on the Left, that Israel is an outpost of western colonialism and imperialism. Jews were indigenous to the region 1,000 years before the Islamic conquest" in the 7th Century. They lived everywhere in the Middle East without interruption for over two millenia world until the Arabs "ethnically cleansed" the Jews from their ancestral homes in 1948. More Jews than Arabs were made refugees when the Arabs invaded Israel in their attempt to nullify Israel's rebirth. "Jews 'stealing Arab land' is an offensive inversion of reality." Ironically, the Liberal's disregard of Jewish rights while supporting Muslim rights will have the effect of reinstating the Muslims as dominant and the Jews and Christians as inferior dhimmi -- which was the relationship of the religious groups imposed by the Muslims when they conquered the Middle East.

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THE HIGH PRICE OF TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT ISLAM
by Eric Allen Bell

When this article appeared on Frontpage Magazine, the editor, Jamie Glazov, wrote that he'd invited the author, Eric Allen Bell, to tell his story. "Bell [is] a filmmaker who was recently banned from blogging at the Daily Kos because he wrote three articles that ran afoul of the mindset there, specifically naming 'Loonwatch.com' as a 'terrorist spin control network.'" It started innocently enough when Bell heard that the local folk in Murfreesboro Tennessee -- where he was living -- were attempting to deny Muslims the right to build a mosque. Anyone even vaguely aware of stealth jihad would know immediately that giving the few local Muslims a place to pray wasn't why the Muslims wanted to put up a huge mosque plonk in the heart of the Bible Belt. It was, in fact, a typical Muslim in-your-face challenge. It is putting up a command center. It is announcing that from now on the Muslims will be pushing for special privileges, intimidating the natives, restructuring the environment for their own convenience and expanding their control of the region. Bell had to find it out the hard way, from first seeing the drama simply as bigotry on the part of the Christians and then slowly discovering there was more to the story. Islam really does pose real life threats to our way of life. Their Koran-based attitude towards women, homosexuals, Jews and infidels -- actually, to the entire non-Muslim world -- simply can not be aligned with ours, no matter how glib the Muslim presentation, no matter how untrue the accusation that all critics are Islamophobic. Bell's simplistic view has crumpled. As he says, "I support human rights and oppose anything which I perceive to be in violation of human rights." It's been a painful journey, refusing the pablum and opting for strong meat. Discombobulating. And I doubt it is over.

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RECLAIM JEWISH LAND; REJECT THE TWO-STATE SOLUTION

The notion of a 2-state solution stays alive, first, because it is coercively presented as the only possible solution: "Give away Biblical Israel to those nice Palestinians OR the bogie man will make you accept a 1-state solution where those nasty Palestinians will outnumber you.." Secondly, the diplomats have put some effort into twisting Israel's arm to accept belligerent neighbors and they believe they are making headway. They haven't really considered alternatives. Bloggers and think-tankers have. Solutions proposed and available on Think-Israel have considered some sort of union with -- or transformation of -- Jordan; a return to the original Mandate formulation where everyone has human rights protection but only the Jews have voting rights; and a population transfer, where the first stage occurred in the 1940s and '50s when the Jews were driven out of the Arab countries where they had been living even before the Arab invasions in the 7th Century C.E. Think-Israel has formulated a 2-state solution where Israel takes possession of all of its land and the Palestinian state is placed where it belongs -- somewhere inside the enormously large Arab land holdings (See here.)

In the present set of essays, Barbara Lerner is convincing in her insight that the best way we have to fight specious Muslim proposals for stealing Jewish land is to begin by appreciating our own Jewish and Christian Biblical roots in Biblical Israel. Several article conclude that the best way to end the refugee problem is to get rid of UNRWA. Martin Sherman suggests helping the individual Arab families relocate.

Any viable solution must recognize that the so-called Palestinians have no valid claim on any part of the Land of Israel -- Howard Grief's essay provides the legal substructure that protects Jewish rights in the land -- and that Israel would be negligent if it didn't defend its borders and protect its citizens from Arab predators. The best way to do this, as Martin Hausman's article suggests, is to annex the Territories formally.

Thanks to the U.N., there exists a large -- and growing -- group of stateless Arabs, rejected by the Arab states, regarded as throwaways in the Arab War against the West and a constant source of budding terrorists and terrorist activity. The Palestinians are (not politically) correctly described in several essays below. It would benefit the West to rid the region of this constant irritant by (1) by urging that Arab states where the refugee camps are located to give the refugees citizenship status; or (2) by breaking up the collection of Arabs referred to as Palestinians/Arab refugees into family units, each individually supplied with the means to negotiate for immigrant status in countries that will accept them; or (3) declaring Jordan with its Palestinian arab majority the state of Palestine. Professor Mordechai Nisan of Hebrew University argued the case for this solution in Front Page Magazine. or (4) by giving the Arabs now living in the Territories and in refugee camps a fixed space in some part of the enormous Arab land holdings that is isolated from population centers and where they can determine their own future. They can decide to learn to develop the infrastructure for becoming a state or they can continue to kill each other. It's their choice, providing it doesn't involve harming other people. "An Alternative 2-State Solution" is such a proposal and is available here. These and variants should be considered singly and in possible combination.

THE RIGHTS OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE OVER THE LAND OF ISRAEL UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Howard Grief

Howard Grief sets forth the firm legal foundation of Israel being the exclusive owner of the land designated as Jewish by the League of Nations. The Land of Israel -- current Israel, Samaria and Judea (aka West Bank), the Golan and Gaza -- was given to the Jewish people as a perpetual trust and handed in that condition to the successor to the League of the Nations, the United Nations. This is a clear presentation of the documents that preceded the document of ownership and some of the history of the time. Any whittling away of this trust is illegal, whether it is attempted by a foreign country, the Israeli government or the U.N. itself. The question that remains is why have successive Israeli governments not asserted their claim. For that matter, why would a Jewish government allow control of the Temple Mount, its most holy site, by the Arabs?

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WHY IS THE SAN REMO CONFERENCE SO IMPORTANT?
by Canadians for Israel's Legal Rights

This a sister paper to Howard Grief's article on the San Remo conference. It was produced by the Canadians for Israel's Legal Rights (CILF) and summarizes the pertinents points.

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ANNEXATION WINS HANDS DOWN OVER A TWO-STATE SOLUTION
by Matthew H. Hausman

The case for annexing Samaria and Judea -- the parts of the Land of Israel that Jordan grabbed as soon as Modern Israel was born -- is brilliantly presented by Matthew Hausman. We have reached the point that Israel has this choice: "Either she can continue participating in a farcical 'peace process' that is heavily weighted against her national interests, or she can proactively seize the day and craft a solution that makes sense historically, geographically and legally." I can only add that in reading Hausman's essay I had this thought: when Israel regained control in 1967, she didn't annex Samaria and Judea, fearing the large number of resident Arabs that would be incorporated into Israel. Solving the problem by annexing the land and relocating the Arabs was rejected -- it wouldn't be a nice thing to do. Consequently, Israel is now confronted with pressure to give the land to the Arabs, the Arabs they call Palestinian. And should that happen, Jews will not be allowed to live there. Jews will not be allowed in Biblical Israel or in parts of Jerusalem! The Jews living there now will be forced out and will become refugees in what is left of Israel. As they say, be kind to the cruel and you'll end up being cruel to the kind. Your own kind.

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READY FOR STATEHOOD?
by David M. Weinberg

Are the Palestinian Arabs ready for statehood? David Weinberg points out they are on the dole and have almost no self-generated income. "Over the past 10 years, the Palestinians have received more than $25 billion in international assistance, and the PA itself pulled in more than $4 billion per year in 2009 and 2010." Yet "the PA has a billion dollar budget deficit." They squander water given them by Israel as if they were living in a rain forest and are polluting the common water supply by dumping their untreated waste. They have few organizational, administrative or governmental skills, nor are they eager to acquire them. They think in terms of death and destruction, not building and living in peace. Quel resumé!

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A TALE OF PALESTINIAN NONSENSE
by Barry Shaw

Barry Shaw paints a picture of the Palestinians that is right on the mark: their illogic, their viciousness, their skill at becoming the world's pet victims. As Shaw writes: "They are trapped in their negative stew of victimhood and brutality. It finds expression in the nonsensical statements of people like Zahar, or those who accuse Israel of being an Apartheid state. Their nonsense, to them, makes sense. Sad tales have their impact. The emotional tale of victimhood is their power."

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THE U.S. AND BIBLICAL ISRAEL
by Barbara Lerner

Barbara Lerner writes about the Muslim ambition to become top dog globally, with Islam the supreme religion and all other religions treated as inferior. Destroying Israel seems to be a necessary step. When invading Israel didn't work, Israel's Arab neighbors began waging a stealth war. Their weapons were oil money, taqqiya (creative lying, approved by the Koran, whereby a Muslim could do and say anything and not feel honor-bound to keep his word) and the newly-invented Palestinians would invert reality and become the quintessential victim. They are succeeding in discrediting Israel -- which was out of its league at playing their propaganda game -- and winning the overwhelming support of the Europeans. Lerner points out that our acceptance of Muslim's assertions and our denigration of our own Jewish and Christian Biblical values earn the West contempt and make the Muslims more confident they will win. "To change their minds, and our future, we need to reject the Palestinian Taqqiya and embrace Biblical Israel."

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ENDING UNRWA AND ADVANCING PEACE
by Elliott Abrams

  UNHCR, an agency of the United Nations, has helped millions of refugees since WW2 to find new homes in a timely fashion. Refugeehood isn't transferrable to the next generation. UNHRCR handles all refugees except the Arabs refugees, who have an agency, UNRWA, dedicated to them and their children and (great)grandchildren, with no termination point in sight. Unlike all other refugee groups, they have been preserved as refugees until they can return to their homes in Israel. UNRWA feeds them and provides them with education and medical services. It also allows them to be inculcated with hate toward Israel and trained as terrorists. Elliott Abrams makes the case that "Palestinian refugees should be handled by UNHCR with the intention of resettling them. That process should begin with a redefinition of who is a refugee entitled to benefits, so that benefits are based on need rather than on status." It would improve life for them. It might even improve the chances of peace in the Middle East. (For additional material on UNWRA and how it keeps the refugee problem from being resolved, see this.)

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PALESTINE: WHAT SHERLOCK HOLMES WOULD SAY
By Martin Sherman

Martin Sherman has long suggested (See his article here.) that the best way to eliminate the Arab refugee problem is to eliminate UNRWA as an intermediary between the refugees and the outside world. He would provide "doweries" directly to individual Arab families to give them the means to find new homes in Arab countries or elsewhere. His latest articles on this are:
"Note to Newt I: Univenting Palestinians"
and "Note to Newt II: Rethinking"
The present essay answers concerns that have been raised and put the features of the plan in sharper relief.

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Group TITLE: INSIGHTS INTO ARAB BEHAVIOR

Daniel Greenfield in "Islam Uber Alles" wrote: "The first law of human affairs is force. Before all other laws, the ballot box and appeals to reason is that primal law that enforces submission through violence. Islam is a religion built on that first law, forcing everyone to choose whether they will be the oppressors or the oppressed, whether they will be a Muslim or a Dhimmi." As in the Little Red Riding Hood story, the wolf is showing its teeth, but we in the West still persist in believing it is peaceable while -- in a stunning example of a disconnect between awareness and behavior -- modifying our styles of life so as not to arouse the volatile fury of the beast. Like parents who are afraid to slap down a screaming destructive child, we reassure ourselves that Islam 'will grow out of it' while the Muslim leaders are slowly but steadily stunting our growth, forcing us into conversion or servility. For us to survive, our lamb leaders will have to forgo their fantasy of us eventually lying down with hungry wolves. The real choice, as Greenfield puts it, is "... between being hated as a despised underclass, as pigs and dogs, by people who have the ability to harm us on a regular basis, or being hated as the cruel persecutors who kept the faithful from extending the Dar Al Islam by people who have to try very hard to be able to hurt us."

Not a sunny picture. And streams of nonsense about giving the Palestinian Arabs an incentive to settle down won't change it. Think of the conversion of Gaza to a terror manufactory since August 2005, when the Israeli government uprooted the Israeli Jews living in Gush Katif, Gaza from their homes and greenhouses and businesses and synagogues, making them refugees who -- seven years later -- are yet to be fully resettled in Israel.

For me, the story of how an Arab girl repaid free treatment in Israel for her ruined face is emblematic of what to expect from the Palestinian Arabs. Dr Arieh Eldad, a plastic surgeon and a member of the Knesset, told the story in an interview conducted by Jerry Gordon in New English Review in November, 2008:

"I was instrumental in establishing the Israeli National Skin Bank, which is the largest in the world. The National Skin Bank stores skin for every day needs as well as for war time or mass casualty situations. This skin bank is hosted at the Hadassah Ein Kerem University hospital in Jerusalem where I was the chairman of plastic surgery. This is how I was asked to supply skin for an Arab woman from Gaza, who was hospitalized in Soroka Hospital in Beersheba after her family burned her. Usually, such atrocities happen among Arab families when the women are suspected of having an affair.

"We supplied all the needed Homografts for her treatment. She was successfully treated by my friend and colleague Prof. Lior Rosenberg, and discharged to return to Gaza. She was invited for regular follow up visits to the outpatient clinic in Beersheba.

"One day she was caught at a border crossing wearing a suicide belt. She meant to explode herself in the outpatient clinic of the hospital where they saved her life. It seems that her family promised her that if she did that, they would forgive her."

"This is only one example of the war between Jews and Muslims in the Land of Israel. It is not a territorial conflict. This is a civilizational conflict, or rather a war between civilization and barbarism."

Wafa al-Biss was a member of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. She was imprisoned and then released in October 2011 in the first group of the thousand Arab prisoners who were swapped for the kidnapped IDF soldier, Galad Shalit. She has since become a speaker, telling Arab children, "I hope you will walk the same path we took and God willing, we will see some of you as martyrs," At one such rally, her audience carried Palestinian flags and chanted, "We will give souls and blood to redeem the prisoners. We will give souls and blood for you, Palestine."

As you can see from this photo, Israel did a good job repairing Wafa's face. Such a nice looking girl.

Wafa Al-Biss and her mother (AFP)

TAWRIYA: NEW ISLAMIC DOCTRINE PERMITS 'CREATIVE LYING'
by Raymond Ibrahim

Raymond Ibrahim has previously written classic papers on taqiyya, the lying to the infidel that is permitted by Koranic law (e.g., see here). In this essay, he writes about tawriya, a Muslim "doctrine that allows lying in virtually all circumstances — including to fellow Muslims and by swearing to Allah — provided the liar is creative enough to articulate his deceit in a way that is true to him." It needs also to be differentiated from concept words that mean one thing in Arabic and another in English. For example, as Andrew McCarthy writes in his essay on the Moderate Muslim, "hurriya, Arabic for 'freedom,' connotes "perfect slavery" or absolute submission to Allah, very nearly the opposite of the Western concept."

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THREE FUNDAMENTAL MISTAKES IN DEALING WITH ISLAM
by Daniel Greenfield

The Salafists are less well known than the Muslim Brotherhood,(MB) but share with them a mission to put Islam in control of the world. Roughly, the Salafists are more fundamentalist than the MB and less willing to cloak their ideology in a modern style in the political arena. They are more likely to speak openly of suppporting violent jihad. In this essay, Raymond Ibrahim writes about Sheikh al-Burhami, a Salafist leader who says clearly "that all notions of peace with non-Muslims are based on circumstance. When Muslims are weak, they should be peaceful; when strong, they should go on the offensive." The model for dealing with infidels is how Mohammad dealt with the Jews of Medina. Initially, when he was weak he spoke peace. When he was strong, he attacked them. Similarly, "Muslims may be tolerant of Egypt's Copts now, and not collect jizya and place them in dhimmitude, until they are more capable — just like Palestinians may make peace with Israel now, till they are more capable of waging an offensive." The Supremist goal in Islam doesn't change.

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PREACH PEACE WHEN WEAK, WAGE WAR WHEN STRONG
by Raymond Ibrahim

The Salafists are less well known than the Muslim Brotherhood,(MB) but share with them a mission to put Islam in control of the world. Roughly, the Salafists are more fundamentalist than the MB and less willing to cloak their ideology in a modern style in the political arena. They are more likely to speak openly of suppporting violent jihad. In this essay, Raymond Ibrahim writes about Sheikh al-Burhami, a Salafist leader who says clearly "that all notions of peace with non-Muslims are based on circumstance. When Muslims are weak, they should be peaceful; when strong, they should go on the offensive." The model for dealing with infidels is how Mohammad dealt with the Jews of Medina. Initially, when he was weak he spoke peace. When he was strong, he attacked them. Similarly, "Muslims may be tolerant of Egypt's Copts now, and not collect jizya and place them in dhimmitude, until they are more capable — just like Palestinians may make peace with Israel now, till they are more capable of waging an offensive." The Supremist goal in Islam doesn't change.

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ARAB INTERNECINE WARS

Now that the Arab spring is here, internal conflicts and external hostilities are breaking out all over the Middle East.

The move to theocratic governments goes hand in hand with the de facto decision of the Western governments to capitulate rather than fight Islamic jihad.

The rule of thumb to predict what the USA will do in any particular situation in the civil wars in the region is this: the present administration will side with the group that is the more theocratic, the more Islamic, the one that has the harsher practice of Islam, the one that most dislikes the USA. In Iran, it supported the mullahs, ignoring the Iranians who gave up their lives to protest a phony election. In Egypt, it helped eliminate a controllable dictator and supported the protesters, where the only well-organized group of rebels was the Muslim Brotherhood. In Libya, American soldiers helped kill off a pro-American dictator. Al-Qaeda is said to be waiting to take over the country. Even if this doesn't happen, the Libyan rebels are in the process of moving from a secular state to one that is strictly Islamic. In Syria, which is important as an expediter of Iranian policy, he does nothing to help the rebels. Turkey's prime minister is pressuring a once secular country to conform to strict Islam, and Prez Obama applauds. The U.N. is equally partial to condemning Israel for killing any Arab but ignores Syria when it mowed down thousands in the city of Hom.

The Arab Spring has done little to ameliorate the lives of the multitude living in dictatorships, many of which still practiced primeval Islam. It did however make obvious the absurdity of the carefully crafted assertion that the Arab-Israeli conflict was the lynch pin of problems in the Middle East. As Guy Bechor pointed out in NYET on February 10, 2012, "The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is marginal compared to the region's real conflicts and its actual influence is limited." It was useful to the Arab leaders who could deflect blame for their countries' problems by blaming Israel.

The articles in this set give us an excellent description of what's going on, including information on the Salafists, who are not well-known in the West. One group of Salafists, the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), once known as Salafi Group for Preaching and Combat, is based in north Africa and is an affiliate of Al-Qaeda. Active since 2002, it routinely kidnaps tourists and aid workers. AQIM is dedicated to overthrowing the Algerian government.

One of the authors was willing to predict outcomes along broader lines: the war between the Sunnis and the Shia. This is not easy to do, considering that alliances are made and broken, as if the participants were in a round-robin dating meet, with 5-minutes to convince another participant of its good intentions. This time it means what it says. Honest.

INTRAMUSLIM CONFLICTS
by Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

Gail Winston wrote about this article, "If the Western world could mentally and emotionally absorb the historical facts well catalogued by Yoram Ettinger, we might be able to understand why the Muslim world hates us in the West. Then, therefore, we might be able to live and thrive in our own countries by being strong enough to thwart the Muslim world's main goal and desire in their lives to create a Global Caliphate for and of Islam.

"They would require that we all follow their Shariah Law (strict Islam) or they would simply kill us. It says so very precisely in their Koran. Without this understanding of this basic bestial mode of death cult which they have literally "cultivated", we have little chance of surviving the storms caused by their conflicts which they intend to spread in order to conquer the Western way of life."

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HAMAS AND THE WASHINGTON ESTABLISHMENT
by Caroline Glick

Speaking about the "Peace Process", Caroline Glick notes that in recent speeches by Gingrich and Perry, "the Republicans have generated ... useful contributions to America's collective understanding of current events in the Middle East." The Democratic Admistration, however, continues policies that are not responsive to the turbulent restructurings in that region. Iran continues to be run by an extremely repressive set of strict interpreters of Islam. And under P.M. Erdogan, Turkey is rapidly regressing to fundamentalist Islam, and the anti-Americanism typical of strongly-Muslim countries. Yet Obama's administration continues to support Turkey, which has an indirect alliance with Iran in mutual sponsorship of Hamas. In effect, Washington is acting as Hamas's protector. So Hamas is reinforced in its determination to destroy the Jewish state. The Administration also continues to maintain its support of Fatah, which more and more openly refuses to accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. "Fatah has no reason to compromise since the US will blame Israel no matter what. And Israel has no reason to make concessions since the US will deem them insufficient." Glick concludes that "[f]or the US to secure its interests in the Middle East, it requires leaders who are willing to reassess what passes for common wisdom on both sides of the aisle."

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THE SALAFIST TENDENCY
by J. Millard Burr

In January 2012, the Muslim Brotherhood won two fifth of the seat in the Egypt Parliamentary election. This surprised the believers in the advent of an Arab springtime of democracy. This also surprised the pessimists who knew the MB would eventually take over, but expected it to take longer. The biggest surprise was the strong showing by the Salafists, who are as -- if not more -- devoted to implementing Sharia in all aspects of civil and political life as the MB. Together, the MB and the Salafists now control the Lower House of Parliament, making the notion of a democratic Egypt an impossibility, while they will see to it that Egypt joins the number of Muslim countries hostile to the West and Israel. We've been fairly well-educated about the Muslim Brotherhood and how it intends to overturn the West and establish a Caliphate. The Salafists groups are less known. J. Millard Burr brings us up to snuff on the Salafist groups: who they are and what we can expect.

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THE TERRORISTS IN EUROPE'S BACKYARD
By Avi Jorisch

Avi Jorisch writes about one of the smaller groups of loosely-affiliated terrorists that infest the Middle East and north Africa. The Salafist al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is an affiliate of al Qaeda, and is primarily to be found in Algeria and Mauritania. Its particular goal is to overthrow the Algerian government, but it is expanding its aims as well as the territory it covers.

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SUNNI VERSUS SHIA: THE MIDDLE EAST'S NEW STRATEGIC CONFLICT
By Barry Rubin

Barry Rubin lays the broad outlines of the Sunni and Shia conflict as it plays out in the various Arab states. As Rubin points out, the tension had been between religious states and more or less secular states. "Once there are Islamist regimes, theology becomes central again, as it was centuries ago." He points out the negative impact on the Palestinian Authority and predicts a possible alliance of Sunni states, independent of both Iran and Turkey.

What is to become of the Arab Spring towards democracy and a 'tolerate your neighbor' attitude? Rubin suspects "the hope for moderation is minimal. In a region when regimes and movements are competing to prove their militancy and loyalty to a radical interpretation of Islam, nobody is going to want to make peace with Israel." So what else is new?

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IRAN
iran.israel.war.gif

From Dry Bones, February 2012 Archive (http://drybonesblog.blogspot.com/2012_02_01_archive.html).

These essays suggest that our options for responding to Iran's almost completed development of nuclear weapons have become more limited, particularly because Iran is led by religious fanatics. Their determination to recreate the Caliphate globally trumps any rational deterrence scheme. The essays assume that our leadership is rational and, given the salient facts, will recognize that military action is now necessary . But what if they don't? Or don't have the will to do what's necessary?

THE POINT OF NO RETURN
by Mark Silverberg

With regard to Iran, "the only question is when can Iran produce a nuclear weapon, and the reality is, it is in a position to do so whenever it chooses." As Mark Silverberg notes, "... the policy of the Obama Administration continues to be based on the carrot and stick approach — diplomatic engagement with the mullahs coupled with international sanctions and the build-up of a large military and naval presence in and around the Persian Gulf all aimed at compelling the Iranians to abstain from building a nuclear weapon. ... "Israeli military strategists are concerned that the U.S. may be unwilling to undertake ... a [military] strike regardless of how many 'red lines' are crossed by Iran." Iran says it wants to destroy Israel. If Iran is bluffing, the bluff is not about using its bombs but what it targets first: the little Satan, Israel, or the Big Satan, the U.S.A. Even if Iran holds off on its genocidal intentions, it will have the means to control the Middle East. We may dismiss them as a bunch of religious fanatics, but Iran's leaders have a mission that they intend to fulfill, regardless of the cost in human lives, including the lives of a sizable part of Iran's citizenry. As Silverberg says, "We are confronted with a fanatical theological Islamist movement that will accept nothing less than the submission of Western civilization to Sharia law."

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THE CASE FOR MILITARY ACTION AGAINST IRAN
by Bruce Thornton

Bruce Thornton notes that "Iran has been killing Americans for 30 years with impunity, from the 241 military personnel killed in Beirut by a suicide bomber, to the hundreds more soldiers murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan by Iranian proxy terrorist outfits trained and armed by Tehran." The American President's weak responses to her growing nuclear capability doesn't signal a change in American's policy of appeasement and weak or empty threats. Moreover, Iran is led by fanatical believers so that ordinary deterrence techniques are not effective. Like it or not, we need to accept that military "force is the 'strong magic' that compels fanatical believers to abandon their murderous ideologies or keep them within their own borders."

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OBAMA MAKES THE CASE FOR AN ISRAELI STRIKE ON IRAN
by Caroline Glick

American spokespeople seem to believe it's a comfort for Israel to know that if Iran strikes, America will then strike Iran. Thatcartoon where the children are gathering sticks for a bonfire and reassure the girl that she can play Joan of Arc. American pyrotechnics after the fact of first strike would only add to the horror. In this essay, Caroline Glick makes clear that President Obama is unwilling to jeopardize his reelection whatever the future costs to Israel and to America. He has intimidated Israel, threatened her and spoken false reassurances to the assembled Jews and Christians at AIPAC. Israel with less resources must strike before Iran makes much more progress. Or sit and wait for whatever happens. America can afford to wait longer before acting. "When one recognizes Israel's short timeline for attacking, one realizes that when Obama demands that Israel give several more months for sanctions to work, what he is actually demanding is for Israel to place its survival in his hands." "Israel will be completely at h Brotherhood, Iran's proxy takeover of Lebanon and Iran's most effective gofer, the Syrian government, Obama "...has adopted policies and taken actions that have endangered Israel militarily on all fronts and in fundamental ways." Naturally, he'd expect Israel to take him on faith.

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THE AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION'S RESPONSE TO IRAN'S NUCLEAR THREAT
by Bernice Lipkin

Let's suppose that America really does have a workable plan to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power before it's too late. Suppose we muff the timing. Or suppose -- as is more likely -- we have no such plan but are hoping for the best. Bernice Lipkin pursues some of the possible scenarios that could be the consequences of ignoring the problem. And other implications.

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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD COMES INTO ITS OWN

In the early days of the Arab Spring, when all the romantics were sure the small group of idealistic youth who helped started the rebellion would win out, it was considered bad taste to suggest the Muslim Brotherhood would be the ultimate winner. Actually, they've taken control faster than most expected. In the recent critical parliamentary election, the Muslim Brotherhood won about 47% of the seats and the al-Nour party, part of the even more religiously conservative Salafi movement, won 20%. Between the two parties, Islamists are in control of the Lower house of Parliament.

When it seemed the MB would be sharing control with the military, we read honied tripe about how they'd balance each other (or trip each other up) and democracy would triumph. Now that the MB has a goodly hold on the Parliament, it is demanding the government be dissolved so that the MB can pick the Prime Minister. Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood wants government sacked, feb 9 2012.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/02/09/ egypts-muslim-brotherhood-wants-government-sacked

Egypt was one of the first countries in the Middle East to appreciate Western mores. Even under the Ottomans, it was becoming westernized, with an increasing secular life-style that encouraged secular higher education and alliances with Western countries. With the new theocratic administration that is actively hostile to the West, 100 years of moderation have gone down the tube. But we in the west don't seem to recognize the danger. We've ignored the problem of what will happen to the advanced weaponry the USA gave and is still giving Egypt. The Obama Administration's solution to a potentially dangerous situation has been to downgrade the virulence of the Muslim Brotherhood and declare it moderate.

Though Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt never succeeded in creating a pan-Arab union of the Arab states, in a twisted sense the Muslim Brotherhood can do so. Segments of the MB reside in different countries and may have differences of opinion but they have a common ambition: to resurrect the Caliphate. So there is no assurance that the 1.3 billion dollars worth of advanced weaponry we give Egypt yearly won't end up in other Muslim countries or on a ship carrying dirty bombs. There is even less assurance that Egypt will not abrogate its treaty with Israel. Already Hamas is using the Sinai Desert to develop more ways to attack Israel.

An Arab Spring may not have come to Egypt, but Yusaf al-Qaradawi, the spiritual head of MB, has.

yusuf-al-qaradawi
Egyptian Islamic scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi, returned to Cairo today to deliver a sermon to the crowd during Friday prayers in Tahrir Square, Friday, Feb. 18, 2011. (Khalil Hamra/AP)

In his first speech he said: "I have hope that Almighty Allah, as I have been pleased with the victory in Egypt, that He will also please me with the conquest of the al-Aqsa Mosque [i.e., Jerusalem], to prepare the way for me to preach in the al-Aqsa Mosque."

As another example of their moderation, note that the second flotilla to Gaza in jun 2011 was coordinated by Muhammad Sawalha, a senior UK-based Muslim Brotherhood figure connected to Hamas.

The King of Jordan is a reasonably accurate sensing device in that he's among the early kowtowers to whatever group of Arabs are likely to take control. He started honoring MB members back in 2010. In America, instead of acknowledging that the MB has straightforwardly declares it wants to destroy Western culture, the American administration is devoted to whitewashing it. We no longer have Islamic terrorists at least semantically, even as Sharia law infiltrates more of our institutions. Our security agencies worry about the possibility that returning American soldiers might be a danger, but give access to our security secrets to known Hamas sympathizers.

Under the guise that we need to come to terms with a "moderate" Islamic group, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns met in January 2012 with Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, the highest-level contact between the United States and the Egypt's largest Islamic group.

Upon receiving the blessings of the State Department, as Samara Greenberg writes, "Mohammed Mursi called on Washington to adopt a 'positive position concerning Arab and Muslim causes,' saying its policies in the past were 'biased' -- an apparent reference to the strong U.S.-Israel relationship."

ISRAEL'S OPTIONS AS MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD GAINS POWER
By Barry Rubin

The strife that was to usher in a flowering of democracy brought the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) into power "in Egypt, the Gaza Strip, Tunisia, and very probably Libya, where its branches will control the governments. In Jordan, the brotherhood leads the opposition; in Syria, it plays an important role in the revolutionary upheaval." The region is "now overwhelmingly controlled by radical Islamists." Despite the American President certifying to its moderation, the support of its members for violence, its open anti-Semitism and the speeches of this members say otherwise. Barry Rubin offers sensible suggestions on how Israel can best "respond to the brotherhood's new power and threat."

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THE ISLAMIST PLAN FOR VICTORY: "GRADUALISM"
Ryan Mauro

Ryan Mauro makes clear how misleading it is to assume that the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is moderate because it is cautious, does long-term planning and constant re-assessment. Its single-minded mission is to reestablish Muslim dominance. If we don't understand this, it is not because the MB has kept it secret. It is us who are deaf, dumb and blind. They keep telling us. They call it gradualism. Of course, they also describe it as their form of "democracy" and "freedom," which, even their spokesmen admit, is a tad different than our concepts. In the West, to those who listen, it's better known as 'stealth jihad.' The basic MB strategy, called The Project, was discovered back in 1982 (See Poole, "The Muslim Brotherhood Project" here for a complete description of The Project.) The MB now has the White House reassuring us that the MB is moderate, but all objective signs suggest it would be injurious to our health to believe in the MB's good will.

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GROVELING TO THE BROTHERHOOD
by Isi Leibler

How much plainer can it be said than how Isi Leibler phrases it: "What those attempting to embrace the Muslim Brotherhood fail to comprehend is that this organization represents one of the most fanatical and dangerous of the radical Islamist groups in the region, with a dark record of violence and terrorism imbedded in its DNA. It is rabidly anti-Western, anti-Christian and anti-Semitic, is committed to imposing sharia law and a global caliphate — and willing to employ any means to further its objectives." If this exaggerates, explain the pressures exerted against the West to accept Sharia law since 9/11. Explain the MB fronts that the MB has started. Consider its alliances with terrorists around the world. Explain the Muslim fingerprints that are everywhere: in insulting us by wanting to build a mosque where they destroyed our financial center; in infiltrating the FBI and Homeland Security and the White House, itself; in instructing our Military; in co-opting banks to make Sharia banking acceptable. Do you really think that the MB has abandoned its mission to conquer the West? Do you really think appeasement will stop them?

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WHERE ARE THE MODERATE MUSLIMS?

Andrew McCarthy has written a must-keep essay that really does explain how Islam wraps the Muslim and envelops him, dampening out all other influences. The other essays are contrasts. One is an example of supposedly moderate Arabs who, like Lewis Carroll's snark that turned out to be a boojum, are decidedly immoderate. The other seems actually to be an ordinary American of Arab origin.

ISLAM IS ISLAM, AND THAT'S IT
The Arab Spring was not hijacked.
Andrew C. McCarthy

Some months ago, Andrew McCarthy wrote that he wasn't sure that was such a thing as a moderate Muslim, but he gave them the benefit of the doubt and wrote as if there were such an animal. Many of us essayists were doing the same. In this essay, he is no longer ambiguous. Nor can we be. A pious Muslim can not be moderate. He can not follow the dictates of the Koran -- especially when they are backed and reiterated by respected Mullahs and Muslim theologicians -- and at the same time agree that everyone can peaceably practice whatever religion to which he adheres.

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THE BLEAK PROSPECTS OF OUR SEARCH FOR PALESTINIAN MODERATES
William Jackson Sullivan II

In the Hunting Of The Snark, Lewis Carroll wrote of the travails of a sea captain and his crew who hunted that hard-to-imagine and harder-to-capture beast, the Snark. In similar fashion, so many who purport to know the crags and crannies of the Middle Easterner's temperment believe there exists a subgenre of devout believers in the Koran who are pious yet who are 'just like us' -- involved in normal hopes and ambitions for themselves and their family. Unfortunately as the contours become clearer, we are beginning accurately to define the Moderate Muslim. He is simply an impious Muslim OR he is hibernating, easily incited to rioting and ravaging when his sheikh and/or mullah so commands. The captain discovered his "snark was a boojum", capable of making anyone who meets up with it "softly and suddenly vanish away." In this article, William Sullivan writes of two cases of Palestinian moderates who turned out to be boojums. Me thinks we best start reshaping our beamish response to sharia infiltration, lest we, like the unwary crew member, disappear into the maws of Middle East Islam.

(ADDENDUM: When I finished this introduction, somewhat uneasy that I had drifted too far from a peshat exegesis of Carroll's boojum, I googled snark boojun and to my delight chanced upon "The Snark was a Boojum" at http://jostamon.blogspot.com/2008/05/snark-was-boojum.html. Read it and enjoy.)

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ARAB LIKE ME
by Lee Habeeb

What can one say about this essay except maybe "Wow!" We've learned much about different genres of Arab in the U.S.A.: Arabs who are called moderate because they are indifferent to Islam; quiet-appearing Arabs who are easily made rabid by their leaders; lone-wolf Arab terrorists; organized Arab terrorists; Arabs with grievances; Arabs who push the envelop for special privileges; fanatic Arabs dedicated to destroying American culture and taking over our country; and moles who pretend to believe in democracy but who are actually Muhammad groupies. This essay is by a most unusual Arab. Lee Habeeb is unusual because he is a very ordinary American. He comes with his own baggage and a family history partially rooted in Arab mores but his identity is American. He's another amalgam in the American melting pot of diverse cultures. He suggests an simple test for determining where an Arab's basic loyalty lies: how does he feel about Jews -- the regular run-of-the-mill Jew? It doesn't count that he accepts the New York Times Jews who can justify any bad deed done by a minority, unless it was committed by a Jew. It is no test that he is friendly with the traitor Jews who loathe Israel because its very existence makes them aware of their identity problems. How does he feel about the ordinary Jew? And Israeli?

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INFILTRATION INTO OUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

In the last issue of Think-Israel, we talked about John Mearshiemer of the University of Chicago, who has used his academic credentials to make Jew-hate mainstream and acceptable. In early March, the Kennedy School of Government -- where Mearshiemer's buddy, Steve Walt, holds court -- is hosting a conference entitled, "One State Conference: Israel/Palestine and the One-State Solution". A institution once so sensitive that it fired its president for suggesting that girls and boys may have different aptitudes and maybe math wasn't really a girl-thing is holding the academic equivalent of a "Kill the Jews" rally, featuring shoddy academics, notorious for fabricating data and advancing dishonest arguments to delegitimatize Israel.

Harvard's propagandizing was encouraged by a hefty gift from the Saudis, who, as we know, respect the freedom to think independently and to come to heretical conclusions from data. As the World Jewish Daily says of the conference: "Ladies and gentlemen, you should be scared. When the nation's top university hosts a conference dedicated to discussing ways to wipe Israel off the map, well, Boston's Jews may be next."

Considering how weighty the brain power is reputed to be in Cambridge, it is surprising that the basic propaganda technique is so primitive. Essentially as Bruce Thornton's essay points out, the pretext that legitimizes all Palestinian terror is the supposed need to protect the defenseless Palestinians from the big brute Israel. Buy that and Arab terror -- its brutality, its blood lust, its preference for preying on women and children, slitting their throats, drinking their blood, shooting them at point blank range, throwing rocks -- become understandable, even justifiable.

Why am I spending so much time on these upper echelon schools? It's because they have a respected and influential place in the American educational system. Held in high regard, they can do much damage. As the Yiddish saying goes: A fish starts stinking from its head. It would be bad enough if the attacks on Israel were limited to a single prestigious university, but as the "Poison Ivy League" article points out about Ivy League schools in general: "You cannot slander gays, women or Muslims, but Israelis have become fair game."

To focus on Harvard once more, Harvard gives good value for their Saudi money. Their academic staff has spread fatuous pleasantries labeled as facts about Islam far and wide throughout the school system.

The other articles in the set examine how extensively Islamic propaganda has infiltrated our educational system.

Editor's Addendum, March 20, 2012:

Brigette Gabriel, President, Act for America Education (www.ACTforAmericaEducation.org), announced that the organization has released its textbook analysis report, "“Education or Indoctrination? The Treatment of Islam in 6th through 12th Grade American Textbooks."

She writes:

"This report shines a bright light on a pattern of errors, omissions and bias in the textbooks reviewed. Our children deserve better. Our children deserve facts and accuracy, not historical revisionism.

To give you just one example of the errors our research uncovered, in discussing the 9/11 attacks, the textbooks typically fail to mention the perpetrators were Muslims or that they acted in the cause of Islamic jihad. In one book the terrorists are portrayed as people fighting for a cause. In just a few years after September 11th, the history of what happened on that tragic day was rewritten in our school textbooks. Omitting this vital information, that jihad was the motivation for the attacks, makes it difficult, if not impossible, for today’s young teens, who don't remember 9/11, to really understand what happened that day —and why.

To access the report log on to www.ACTforAmericaEducation.org.

There's a video on anti-Israel academics speaking at California State universities. See here.

This is a video on students taken on a field trip to a mosque and urged to pray to Allah. Click here. Read also Stella Paul's article, "When Jewish Boys Bow to Allah" on the same page.

HARVARD'S ACADEMIC POGROM
by Steven Plaut


As Steven Plaut writes, "... in a few days it [Harvard] will be restoring a great Harvard tradition dating back to the 1930s: the tradition of hosting Nazis and violent anti-Semites on campus seeking the mass murder of Jews." The show will feature academics whose poorly-substantiated assertions (lies and Quasimodo-like distortions to us common folk) have been deservedly discredited. Unhappily for Harvard's reputation, Jew-hate rain dances are less acceptable than in the 1930's -- and this despite the huge sums of money the Muslims has spent to create a climate where Jew-Hate can thrive.

  READ MORE
 

HARVARD PROMOTES THE PALESTINIANS' SLOW-MOTION 'FINAL SOLUTION'
by Bruce Thornton

Bruce Thornton examines a basic tactic used to delegitimize Israel: the world is called on to help the poor Palestinian deprived of his land by the evil Jews. This inverts reality but it gets a good response, usually from the ignorant. Surprisingly, this theme will serve to structure a conference held at the Kennedy Center at Harvard. The Center is a feeder at the well-filled Saudi trough and apparently it takes its commitment to its patron seriously, seriously enough to ignore academic standards and a truthful exploration of the facts. The conference is billed as a look at Israel, Palestine and the One State. The thrust is to promote the One-State solution, which -- when the spin slows down -- will be seen to be an Arab state, with the Jews in dhimmi status -- if they are allowed to remain, at all. As Thornton concludes, "The Kennedy School conference, then, is a propaganda exercise the effect of which is to further the Palestinian Arab "phases" strategy for destroying Israel."

  READ MORE
 

POISON IVY LEAGUE
by Richard Baehr

Richard Baehr makes the point that the insidious anti-Israel poison coming from Harvard isn't unique. Unfortunately, Jew-hate in the form of anti-Israelism is showing up at many of the elite schools, to a greater or lesser degree. When asked why they allow these exercises in hate, the administrators at these schools fall back on the "free speech" defense, That would be fair, if it were applied in the same manner to all hate confabs. But it is hardly likely that "free speech" would be the important issue if the Klu Klux Klan wanted to hold a Day At The Racists.Or if a group of minorities held in fear and servitude in Muslim countries asked to have a Down with the Slave Masters powwow to examine conditions in Saudi Arabia. A cursory examination of the academics invited to speak at Harvard makes clear the organizers aren't aiming at a high level of academic quality. They just need to have the conference, so that later they can cite its findings as authority for anything they want believed by the hoi polloi. Do we really need to let this obscene show of hate run its course?

  READ MORE
 

TAQIYYA FOR KIDS
by Janet Tassel

Jew-hate lectures, some paid for by Arabs, some stemming from present-day Marxist theory, some the residual of centuries of hate preached by the Church, have been reported. At the Friends Seminary in New York, a day school established by the peace-seeking Quakers, the invited speaker to celebrate Martin Luther King day this year was Gilad Atzmon. Atzmon's reputation as a Jewish Jew-hater is so solid that when John Mearsheimer wrote an endorsement for Atzmon's new book, it was irrefutable evidence that John Mearscheimer is just another run of the mill anti-Semite. He's not the sincere seeker of the truth about the Jew's influence on American Policy he's claimed to be. Allen Dershowitz apparently doesn't know the Quakers have always favored those they see as underdogs -- from the Indians who collected scalps when raiding white-man villages to bomb-carrying Arabs, knifing Jewish babies. He was surprised that when he made the headmaster, Robert Lauder, aware of how unsavory Atzmon is, Lauder chose to do absolutely nothing. (January 18, 2012, http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2756/friends-seminary-anti-semitism). Dershowitz doesn't say if the student body or their parents complained.

Local Muslims often give free talks in schools about Islam. They paint a glowing picture of Islam, that owes little to history or to actual practices. They teach children to pray Muslim-style. They usually focus on promoting Islam, rather than making a inter-religious tolerance speil. [video jewish boy] Often parents are unaware that their children are being inculcated.

When parents learned the speaker at a public school in Tampa Florida was a man from CAIR, they were much annoyed and let the School Board know it. CAIR is an Islamic Association of Palestine (IAP) spinoff. The IAP is an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood and a fundraiser for Hamas, as is CAIR. The Board in its superior wisdom ignored the parents. But they aren't giving up or giving in. (See Jack Minor, "Parents won't quit fight over CAIR indoctrination," February 16, 2012
http://www.wnd.com/2012/02/parents-wont-quit-fight-over-cair-indoctrination/. Minor's article includes bios on over a dozen CAIR members who fundraise for Hamas, work in the Hamas organization and/or actively support Hamas.) Parents in other states have had similar experiences.

Students can be exposed to distorted views of the Arab-Israeli conflict by their regular teachers in school. History teachers who use the Arab World Notebook as source material quickly begin to sound like Arab propagandists, praising women terrorists and blaming Israel for everything. In this essay Janet Tassel reports such a situation in a Newton Mass high school. When a student's father confronted the teacher, she was surprised at his attitude. "After all, the head of the history department had gotten this material at an outreach workshop of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard!" It came from Harvard. How could it not be reliable?

If you thought suggesting that academics have become fancy foot soldiers for introducing Sharia law into this country was over-the-hill alarmist, consider this consequence of various divisions of Harvard University working to convince the country that it isn't the Muslims who are the enemy, it's the Jooz. Janet Tassel presents anecdotes that reveal the pernicious connection between groups at Harvard who are exploiting Harvard's prestigious reputation to promote their political ideology and the Islamic propaganda being mouthed by duped school marms. That they are even able to get away with this: "Muslims from Europe were the first to sail across the Atlantic and land in the New World, starting in 889... [and that]West African Muslims had not only spread throughout South and Central America, but had also reached Canada, intermarrying with the Iroquois and Algonquin nations so that, much later, early English explorers were to meet Iroquois and Algonquin chiefs with names like Abdul-Rahim and Abdallah Ibn Malik." says much of the level of education and gullibility of our teachers. It is also important to note that the Harvard Administration has done zilch to stop this tripe being distributed in their name. What will it take to make them start saying, "I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you."

  READ MORE
 

ADOPTING PRO-SHARIA TEXTBOOKS: WHEN STATES SHOULD STEP IN
by Alyssa Lappen

Alyssa Lappen provides us with a general survey of how Islam and sharia law are being taught in American schoolrooms. "In the last two decades, sanitized Islamic history and dogma [has] crept into broad use in U.S. public school books..." Fortunately, there has been some efforts at countering this misinformation. For example, a Texas Board of Education forced textbook publishers to rectify their half-truths and inaccurate portrayals of Islam. Lappen notes that "Islamic forces spent decades stealthily cultivating influence over our nation's public schools and curricula through 'minority' channels afforded by 'textbook adoption.' Other 'adoption state' authorities should perhaps now add teeth to their own Texas-like counter-efforts.'

  READ MORE
 

PR AND DIRTY TRICKS

When the power of the keystroke is abused

In this set of essays, we have a candidate for the most gratuitously nasty story about Israel and a couple on the ooze from the New York Times, the newspaper that holds the record for protecting the religion of peace. Other essays examine wording -- words are weapons in the fight to support Israel. Speaking about supporting Israel, when does Israel's hasbara establishment plan to open shop?

THE CHOSEN PEOPLE HAVE TO BE PERFECT: ANTI-SEMITISM IN THE PRESS IN HOLLAND
by Yochanan Visser

This article was written by Yochanan Visser and discusses an article written by a Dutch reporter, Lisa van Heusden, who was living in Israel during her pregnancy. Laura, who sent in this article, is obviously indignant about a mother who complained because she received excellent pre-natal care in Israel. Laura writes:

"This is unbelievable. So Israel's committment to providing the best medical care possible is spun to be some nazi-like desire to produce a master race. What's wrong with these people? Instead of this woman being grateful for the high quality prenatal care she received in Israel and writing a positive article about it, this is the sick way she twists her experience. Whatever Israel does is spun by the media to be something sinister. If it helps earthquake victims in Haiti, Israel is accused of stealing organs. If it provides high quality prenatal care for its citizens, it is attacked for wanting perfection for the chosen people rather than being seen as an example of a modern, progressive society. And "critics" of Israel feign surprise when they are accused of antisemitism, yet we are constantly bombarded by hostile, ugly trash about Israel such as this."

It does seem incredible that a mother -- especially one with a viral infection that can interfere with the development of a healthy baby -- wouldn't be grateful her child was born healthy. Instead, she complained her baby was born perfect, when he could have had problems from the virus she carried. She was delighted that her son was born with a toe that was too small. As she put it "His personal revenge on the Israeli health system." The mother is a media person. So it must be hard for her to break old habits. She's learned how to make Israel look bad no matter what the circumstances.

Until Lisa came along, there was an iconic joke that best described Israel's always receiving bad press. The joke goes like this:

An Israeli is on vacation and is visiting a zoo in England when he sees a little girl leaning on the lion's cage. Suddenly, the lion grabs her by the cuff of her jacket and tries to pull her inside to slaughter her, under the eyes of her screaming parents.

The Israeli runs to the cage and hits the lion square on the nose with a powerful punch.

Whimpering from the pain the lion jumps back letting go of the girl, and the Israeli brings her to her terrified parents, who thank him endlessly.

A reporter has watched the whole event. The reporter says to the Israeli: 'Sir, this was the most gallant and brave thing I've seen a man do in my whole life.'

The Israeli replies, 'Why, it was nothing, really. The lion was behind bars. I just saw this little kid in danger and acted as I felt right.'

The reporter says, 'Well, I'll make sure this won't go unnoticed. I'm a journalist, and tomorrow's paper will have this story on the front page. So, what do you do for a living and what political affiliation do you have?'

The Israeli replies, "I serve in the Israeli army and I vote for the Likud."

The journalist leaves.

The following morning the Israeli buys the paper to see news of his actions, and reads, on the front page:

RIGHT-WING ISRAELI ASSAULTS AFRICAN IMMIGRANT AND STEALS HIS LUNCH

I have to admit, Lisa's take on Israel wins by a mile.

  READ MORE
 

IS THE NEW YORK TIMES'S AGENDA TO NORMALIZE ISLAM IN THE WEST?
by Phyllis Chesler

As Phyllis Chesler writes, "On a single day, the New York Times has been known to publish anywhere from two to six anti-Israel articles, editorials, op-ed pieces, and letters. Today, I see a new danger arising in their pages... After spending a year proclaiming the triumph of democracy and the miracle of the Arab Spring and, as PM Netanyahu has just noted, refusing to document the existential danger in which Israel finds herself, the Newspaper of Record has now begun the process of normalizing Islam in North America and Europe. Its pro-Muslim "multicultural" agenda is, paradoxically, another form of racism." What can account for their obsessive concern with the protecting rights for Muslim religion. Perhaps the answer is: cherchez la moneé.

  READ MORE

 

WEIRDEST CORRECTION OF THE DAY
by John Hinderaker

This essay by John Hinderker makes an astute observation about a New York Times practice. It also provides us with yet another indicator to alert us when the Gray Lady speaketh false and/or ignores truth.

  READ MORE


 

HANNAH ARENDT AND THE ORIGINS OF ISRAELOPHOBIA
by Sol Stern

This is an impressive exploration by Sol Stern of the character and ideology of Hannah Arendt, perhaps best known for her exclaiming how banal evil was, when she saw the very ordinary looking Adolf Eichmann, who was responsible for the killing of thousands of Jews. She was raised as an assimilated German Jew and socialist. After the Nazis rose to power, she became a Zionist. Fleeing to the USA, she still considered herself a Zionist but was soon attacking outstanding heros such as Vladimir Jabotinsky, Peter Bergson and Ben Hecht, calling them fascists and charlatans. They saw clearly the coming Holocaust and were desperately trying to save the European Jews. She didn't help in the rescue effort. Stalin was her hero. She abhorred the idea of an independent Jewish state in Palestine and urged the Jews to establish a binational state controlled by the Arabs, ignoring that the Arabs wanted none of it. In sum, she behaved as a Marxist and a dhimmi, blaming the Jew for the Arab's recalcitrance. She became a confirmed anti-Zionist, supplying many of the criticisms that would become standard accusations for the next generations of Jewish haters of the Jewish state.

  READ MORE
 

THE JEW FLU: THE STRANGE ILLNESS OF JEWISH ANTI-SEMITISM
by Uzi Silber

Uzi Silber describes Jewish self-hatred as Jewish flu, implying it is so varied and involves so many germ types, it is impossible to wipe out entirely. But it can be kept as a low level. Currently, "its modern symptoms are a rejection of Israel's identity as a Jewish state and a dismissal of its right to defend itself militarily, while embracing the goals of its nihilistic Arab enemies." Its adherents, both on the Left and on the Right, broadcast their anti-Jewish messages openly. Read a 'blame the Jews' article which ignores appalling behavior by Arabs, and you can be sure you'd nailed another victim of the Jew Flu.

  READ MORE
 

BE YE THE ENEMY'S FOOL?
by Paul Lademain

Here be words of wisdom on how to designate areas, places and people, when labels are sensitized political statements. Paul Lademain provides us with simple rules that allow us to fight Israel's fight when we speak of events in the Middle East. Lademain's instructions have the added bonus that we will be speaking accurately and won't have adopted the meretricious language used by Israel's enemies. You will find ways to add to the list. I, for one, was alerted when a well-meaning supposed advocate for Israel said, "He is a Hamas activist." I corrected him, pointing out that the correct term is Hamas terrorist. As Lademain says, "Be ye not fools, O Israel." Master his examples. You'll be surprised how soon they become automatic, and other people repeat your language choices.

  READ MORE
 

LOSING THE WAR OF IDEAS DUE TO INCOMPETENCE
by Isi Leibler

Isi Leibler presents another horror story about Israel's incompetence in presenting its case. What is there about the management of ideas that attracts those least able to produce information in a timely and understandable fashion? If only Israel's information officers could handle truthful information as adeptly as the Arabs and their buddies manipulate lies! When they eventually do get around to responding, it's We did not or We did, too. How about going on the offense? It's still the best defense. We understand that the brainy guys are busy elsewhere, but can't they filter the bottom layer a bit better? And oh yes, for the sake of accuracy, stones in this article should be changed to rocks or sharpened stones, depending on which was used -- Arab children are well-versed in a variety of weapons.

  READ MORE
 

HOW CAN WE HELP WIN THE INFORMATION WAR?
by David Ha'ivri

David Ha'ivri writes in particular about distributing information about the Jewish citizens who live in Biblical Israel. But his advise is of general value to improve Israel's ability to communicate. As he says, "The problem is mainly that Israel's advocates are not addressing the particular issues for which Israel is under attack. By avoiding and not responding to the accusatory claims, it appears that Israel doesn't have a good answer." The comments in the original Ynet article serendipitously illustrate how to provide right answers. Someone pushes the incorrect but frequently-used "Israel is violating international law in occupying the West Bank." Knowledgeable readers respond appropriately. New points are raised and answered. A reader, "Gee" from Zikron Yaakov, puts Israel's ownership of Samaria and Judea succinctly this way:

"First under international law for it to be 'occupied' it needs to meet two conditions. The 'occupier' has to not have a legal claim to the land. The second part is the people claim need to have said legal claim.

Gaza, Judea and Samaria meet neither condition. Our claim to the land is enshrined in the UN Charter and the Covenant of the League of Nations - so we do have legal claim to the land. Whoops that means that it ain't 'occupied' by us.

Then there is the little fact that the Arabs do not have any legal claim to the land. Nobody on this planet has managed to date to produce said legal claim. So the Arabs are the illegal 'occupiers' of our lands, not the other way around. So much for the claim of international law."

  READ MORE
 

HISTORY SECTION

THE PERSIAN CONQUEST OF JERUSALEM
by Frank Meir Loewenberg

A Forgotten Chapter Of Jewish History

Frank Loewenberg writes of a little known story -- the conquest of Jerusalem by the Persian King Khosrau II in 614 C.E., with thousands of Jewish soldiers as part of his army. At the time, Jerusalem was the capital of the province of Palaestina Prima of the Byzantine Roman Empire, and its Jewish and Christian subjects were "the victims of heavy taxes, confiscation of property and even forced conversions." When Persia began its rule in Jerusalem, sacrificial service on the Temple Mount was reestablished and Nehemiah ben Hushiel became Jewish governor of Jerusalem. But some three years later, Nehemiah was removed from office and Jews were banned from the city. By 628 C.E., the Byzantine Emperor had regained his lost provinces of Syria, Egypt and Palestine and the Jews of Jerusalem were massacred. A decade later, the Muslims invaded. And began another chapter in Jerusalem's history.

  READ MORE
 

TOBRUK...THE STORY YOU DON'T KNOW
by Jerry Klinger

In the second World War, the German General Rommel was winning the War in the Middle East. He was stopped at Tobruk in Libya by a delaying action that gave the British Army time to revamp and re-equip, so that it was able later to win at El Alamein, which was "the beginning of the end for the Germans and their Italian allies in North Africa." As Jerry Klinger writes, a chief factor in holding the Germans from moving forward at Tobruk was the incredible fighting by the outnumbered soldiers of the Palestine Brigade, a group of some 400 Jews, "a battalion of mine layers, poorly armed and provisioned, without heavy weapons, or anti-aircraft equipment but with a grim, teeth clenched determination." They withstood the continous attacks by the Germans and in the end, battered and reduced to a quarter of their original number, they were victorious.

  READ MORE
 

THE REHABILITATION OF AN UNDERGROUND REVOLUTIONARY
by Mitch Ginsburg

Avraham 'Ya'ir' Stern was a most unusual terrorist. He was a poet, knowledgeable in Torah and a student of classic Greek and Latin. In the 1930s, he had persuaded the Polish government to help train Jews to wrench Palestine from the control of the British colonial government, but this ended when Poland was invaded by the Germans. He was a man desperate to save European Jewry in spite of the English Government's refusal to let more than a few Jews immigrate to Palestine. (It is bitter irony that the British were in Palestine because they had been entrusted by the League of Nations to help the Jews create a homeland.) On February 12, 1942, he was caught by the English and shot dead when found. During his life as commander of the Lehi, he was revered by a few and "widely detested by the majority of Jews in Palestine." As the years have passed, more and more people have come to his memorial service. Mitch Ginsburg describes Stern's 'rehabilitation.'

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SYRIAN RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE SABRA AND CHATILA MASSACRES
by Dr. Franck Salameh

In September 1982, Arabs living in the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian Arab refugee camps in Lebanon were massacred. The Lebanese Forces (LF), a Christian militia, was said to have avenged the assassination by the Muslim Lebanese of the Christian Lebanese leader, Bashir Gemayel. The LF and Israel were allies. In the aftermath of the massacre, much of the blame was levied on Israel, which was accused of not having the foresight to realize that allowing the LF to enter the camp hunting for terrorists hiding there would lead to a massacre. The massacre put an end to the possibility of reconciliation between the Lebanese Muslims and Christians. Franck Salameh suggests that Syria had most to gain from the massacre. "[I]t scuttled the prospects of peace with Israel, it extended the Lebanese war for another decade, it maintained Syria's occupation of the country for another twenty-three years, it tightened its grip over the functioning of the Lebanese state, it continued using Lebanon as a launching pad for Syria's regional settling of scores, and it provided the Alawites with a bottomless private piggy-bank bankrolling their wars-by-proxy."

  READ MORE
 

JANUARY-FEBRUARY, 2012 BLOG-EDS

JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2012 BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index.

To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

January 2012 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2012 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


NOVEMBER-DECEMBER, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the November-December 2011 issue:

Interwoven Themes In This Issue (Editor)
Fabricating Peoplehood (Meir-Levi, Greenfield, Glick)
Dealing with Muslim Assaults (Auerbach, Fjordman, Lappen, Steele, Hamid, Fawstin, Eidelberg)
A Homeland For The Palestinian Arabs (Lerner, Sherman, Faybyshenko)
It's Puzzling (Bawer, Phillips, Greenfield, Rose, Sennels, Sherman, Newell)
How Churches Reacted To The Revival Of The Jewish State (Merkley, Shapira, Lowe, Merkley)
Academia (Narvey, Lipkin, Frantzman)
Media Matters (DasMaBebi, Bawer, Maistrovoy)
History Section (Mirza, Isaac, Meotti)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (November-December)

Interwoven Themes In This Issue

(1) Our leaders in America, Europe and Israel have been perpetuating a hoax. They bought shares in the instant creation of a people, the Palestinians, who of course owned an Ozian country called Palestine, currently occupied by the Jooz, allies of the Wicked Witch of the West. The leaders and politicos and media knew it was a lie but they had a stake in it. How much of a share can be gauged from the aftermath of Newt Gingrich stating the obvious. Fellow politicians admitted it left-handedly but were annoyed that saying it out loud could drive a stake into the heart of the moribund peace process. And damage control has been vicious, varied and imaginative. The pent-up urge to examine the lives and motivation of our leaders, suppressed during Prez Obama's reign, has been released and every minute in Newt's life is under examination. In this issue we focus on facts. We'll spend more time on the aftermath next time.

(2) Given the voiced intent to destroy Israel and the imminent danger of Muslims taking over host nations such as England, it is puzzling that people seem so unconcerned about their self-interest. Being unselfish and protective of the enemy when he is shooting at you isn't noble, it's nutty. We haven't figured it all out. Is it conditioned political correctness? Is it a deficiency of common sense? Is it cowardice moonlighting as nobility? Is it over reliance on authority figures (night time comedians and daytime big mouths)? Don't know. But maybe we've made a dent.

(3) We add to our store of articles on how Muslims are promoting Sharia law and attempting to take over Western institutions. In the 1950s being called a Communist was in the same class of insult as being accused today of being a racist. And far more damaging to one's career. Senator Joseph McCarthy terrorized governmental and private agencies, accusing them -- usually falsely -- of being or harboring communists. At best he overstated the numbers and the danger; at worst he destroyed the lives of many who were no danger to the USA. It was observed that in his eagerness to squelch communism in America, McCarthy probably did more damage to the country than the communists. At the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954, the army's lawyer, Joseph Welch, focusing on McCarthy's scattershot reckless accusations, asked, "Have you no sense of decency"?

We ask the same of Islamic states such as Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, Muslim groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and ordinary Muslims who are diligently engaged in promoting anti-Semitism globally. Some of the Muslim clergy and many leaders of Muslim countries are quite open about killing Jews. Perhaps sensing that Judaism must be eliminated if Islam is to succeed in making America and the Western countries subservient to Islamic law, many, many others are willing to use any lie, any misrepresentation, any smokescreen. They declare themselves without bigotry, members of a peaceful religion. Yet they distribute scurrilous books about Judaism while denying the Holocaust happened and that the Jews built Temples on the Temple Mount. They take joy in co-opting ignorant Jewish college students into helping denounce Israel. We ask them and the Western churchmen and academics who aid and abet the Muslim attempt at conquest. "Is there no red line? Is there nothing you won't misrepresent or lie about? Have you no shame?"

FABRICATING PEOPLEHOOD

On December 9, 2011, Newt Gingrich did something very daring: he told the truth about the so-called Palestinian people. He said they were an invented people. The earnest idiots useful to the Pro-Palestinian cause may not have known that Palestinian people is a fabrication. The politicians and media people have likely known it all along. Their immediate response was not this is a shock. Let's look into this. but let's drown this information in silence or in scoffing or in bluster and get back to where we want to be: getting the Israelis to commit suicide by suing for peace.

The articles in this segment are on how the myth of a Palestinian people was started and why we should act on the knowledge that the region is Jewish, not Palestinian Arab. As Martin Sherman has said, "Gingrich is totally correct when he observes that '... there's a lot to think about in terms of how fundamentally you want to change the terms of debate in the region.' ... The Palestinians [are] an artificial construct, [so the] notion of a Palestinian state and the 'two-state solution' [is devoid] of any validity. ... Resolving the Palestinian issue requires a paradigm shift — from the political to the humanitarian; from the collective to the individual." Read Sherman's article here.

AN INVENTED PEOPLE
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi recounts some of the history of the region called Palestine, emphasizing a fact often overlooked: in Ottoman times, the area was part of the Syrian Province; there was no Syrian state. And even after the British began calling the area Palestine, the local Arabs considered themselves inhabitants of Syria; they were not Palestinian. After the Six-Day War, Yasir Arafat declared that the Arabs in Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank) as well as the Arabs who lived in Israel -- or who had lived in Israel -- were a people, and the machinery for creating a history for this "people" went into action. Now, some 40 years later, they have come to believe their own lies. And they've done an brilliant job selling this fiction to the world.
  READ MORE
 

A BADLY INVENTED PEOPLE
by Daniel Greenfield

  When Newt Gingrich said out loud what every political leader knows, namely, "Palestians are an invented people," there was immediate damage control by the dhimmi media. Has v halila the elaborate structure of lies supporting the Palestinian People Hoax should crack! Suppose people learned that most of the so-called Palestinians are ordinary Arabs, who didn't start coming into "Palestine" until the 20th Century? What would happen to the belief that Palestine belongs to an ancient people, the Palestinians -- the best weapon the Arabs have to attack Israel? Daniel Greenfield disposes of some of the myth of the Po' Palestinians.
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GINGRICH'S FRESH HOPE
by Caroline B. Glick

  Caroline Glick writes of the current types of damage control by those who have been using the claims of the pretended people as an excuse to kill off Israel or for their own purposes. Their doubletalk doesn't make for very compelling arguments, so I wonder: Will more politicians and opinion makers now come out of the woodwork and indicate that they knew all along the Palestinians were just a bunch of Arabs, much less entitled to their own state than an actual people such as the Kurds. If the trend continues, soon everyone will acknowledge that the Jews are occupying their own land, not someone else's; leaving only the brainwashed Arabs and a hardcore of Jew-haters to continue to believe nonsense.
  READ MORE
 

DEALING WITH MUSLIM ASSAULTS

The West seems to live comfortably with contradictory notions about Islam. On the one hand, Islam is the religion of peace. On the other, we live in fear of arousing its anger and violence. It is as if we've been psychologically lobotomized. We hold very different perceptions of Islam in our minds, but the images don't seem to have a way to confront each other. Or perhaps it's just less scary to pretend Islam is gentle and civilized than to recognize Islam's shackling of the human spirit and its contempt for human life. Meantime, Muslims are attacking us, using propaganda, rewriting history, distorting our textbooks, pressuring our courts to use sharia law, attempting to criminalize any criticism of Islam, corrupting the U.N., infiltrating governmental agencies responsible for our security and murdering people here and everywhere else. This set of essays examines some of the confrontations Islam has initiated and suggests what Israel and the West must do to stop the assault on western civilization.

PALESTINIAN IDENTITY THEFT
by Jerold S. Auerbach

  With the connivance of the United Nations, the Palestinian Arabs have had free reign to attempt "to rob Israel of its history, heritage, and homeland." As Jerold S. Auerbach points out, "Plundering Jewish history and claiming Israeli land is, of course, the raison d'être of Palestinian existence." They have claimed Abraham was a Muslim, as was Jesus and presumably all the Jews living in Israel at the time of the Second Temple. They have claimed they have been in Palestine for eons, ignoring that most of the "Palestinians" came to what is now Israel and the Territories after 1900. The latest outrage is claiming "the Dead Sea as Palestine's own 'heritage site.'" While attempting to steal Israel's identity and history, they go well beyond the usual identity theft. They also claim Israelis have no history; Jews never had a Temple; they never had sovereignty in Israel.
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DID ISLAM SAVE THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE CLASSICAL WORLD?
by Peder Jensen, a.k.a. Fjordman

  This article is a joining of two essays by Fjordman that reject the myth that the Muslims preserved Greek-Roman culture and that is what kindled the development of European science and technology. As he points out, "Muslims have spent 1400 years trying to eradicate Greek societies all over the Eastern Mediterranean. Now they want to take the credit for saving the Greek cultural heritage." As an interesting sideline, note that the first essay was refused publication by Norway's largest newspaper, VG. It is dangerous in Norway to be critical of Islam -- outraged Muslims will try to kill you and/or firebomb your offices. Norway, however, is a strong contender for being the most antisemitic country in the West. Norwegian newspapers are as fearless in publishing antisemitic cartoons and stories as they are fearful of publishing anything negative about Islam. Rather like our own New York Times.
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SILENCED: HOW APOSTASY AND BLASPHEMY LAWS ARE CHOKING FREEDOM WORLDWIDE
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  Alyssa A. Lappen reviews a book called Silenced. As she points out, had the authors written of the origins of the apostasy and blasphemy laws and how the requirement for punishment by death is permanently anchored in the immutable Koran, it could have been a "landmark study". Instead they leave the job to three Islamic clerics, who do a deft job of whitewashing the subject. But the book does serve to "catalog myriad effects of current legal codes for eight Muslim nations and regions, mostly penalties for allegedly criticizing or rejecting Islam." And it presents dozens of actual cases and the atrocious punishments that were imposed. Part 3 is important because it indicates how Islamic law could potentially affect non-Islamic countries. There have been "... efforts at the United Nations to globally bar 'defamation of religion,' a thinly veiled attempt to shield Islam alone from criticism." That gets close to home. It won't be just the FBI and Homeland Security that are barred from using negative descriptors when talking about the Religion of Peace.
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THE NARRATIVE OF PERPETUAL PALESTINIAN VICTIMHOOD
by Shelby Steele

  Shelby Steele discusses the Arab war against the Jews, in which the Arab aggressors have successfully persuaded themselves and others that they are "victims of colonialism, ... victims of white supremacy." What is so thought-provoking about this essay is that Steele homes in on the power of a "poetic truth", a fantasy powerful enough to counter factual reality. As he points out, "Poetic truths ... are marvelous because no facts and no reason can ever penetrate. Supporters of Israel are up against a poetic truth," one that is supported by the West, which "lacks the moral authority" to speak the truth. We must counter the Arab narrative and Steele indicates some procedures for restating the narrative.
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ARABS NEED A REVOLUTION IN THOUGHT, NOT POLITICS
by Tawfik Hamid

  Tawfik Hamid reminds us that democracy doesn't happen magically by throwing a paper ballot into a box. "Dreaming about democracy without first setting its foundations is similar to dreaming about having a fruit tree without even sowing the seed." In the Arab world starting to develop the infrastructure of a democracy would translate into respecting the rights of minorities and substituting productive activities for their customary self-destructive activities. A tall order.
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NON-MUSLIM MUSLIMS AND THE JIHAD AGAINST THE WEST
by Bosch Fawstin

  Bosch Fawstin was born a Muslim. He writes about the many Muslims that are indifferently religious. The non-Muslim Muslim isn't practicing a reformed version of Islam. He is not the moderate but genuinely religious Muslim that many Westerners assume exists. He's just not practicing his religion. But his ways can be imitated by the "stealth jihadists who have figured out how to say what we want to hear, while they scheme behind the scenes to further Islamize the West." The irony is that while Islam, being a religion, is assumed to be peaceful, in practice it is the jihadists who best express the values of Islam. In ten years of waging war, we haven't learned that to civilize Islam, we first will have to clobber its most dedicated practitioners. It doesn't help cultivate the right attitude toward our enemies that the American president says his role is to protect Islam. As Fawstin says, "This is war. We can't be on both sides."
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WINNING PEACE BY WINNING THE WAR
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  How does Israel create a peaceful environment in a unstable, violent area? How does Israel win the war her neighbors have been waging against the Jews since before modern Israel's inception? Professor Paul Eidelberg had some sensible advice. First, the Israeli government must start with a realistic assessment of Muslim theology, which means understanding "there are no empirical grounds to expect Muslims to renounce Jihadism," unless they are totally defeated. Eidelberg suggests some practical actions to calm the Territories. To win the war requires an understanding that "the circumstances confronting Israel are extreme — its very existence is at stake. Therefore, where each of the possible lines of action involves difficulty, the strongest line is the best." Or, as Eidelberg puts it, "Kill for Peace."
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A HOMELAND FOR THE PALESTINIAN ARABS

For many years, the Arabs living in the Territories and those living in Arab countries as refugees were passed off as the original inhabitants of the Land of Israel, but it's become known that most of them came into what is now Israel and its Territories starting in the 20th Century. They are not a people and they don't desire to live peacefully as neighbors of Israel. But there are practical considerations -- including the expense of maintaining millions of professional refugees -- to settling them in their own space. The first essay in the set points out that giving them a state in or next to Israel will change their tactics but not their mania for destroying Israel. They need to be transferred out of the region. The other essays suggests some solutions. Over the years, we have published different solutions that make the statement that "EITHER there is a 2-state solution OR there is a 1-state solution" a nonsensical assertion. Several solutions, including Think-Israel's article on Palestina were published here. Some other recent innovative suggestions are here. Google for others posted over the years.

A POST PALESTINIAN STATE SIMULATION
by Aaron Lerner

  To understand matter, computer modeling and simulation depend on what data we have on quarks and hadrons and such. In politics, predictions depend on a deep understanding of the character of the players. Despite the fact that Iran used its own children to find bombs in a field by stepping on them, it is difficult, perhaps impossible, for a westerner to believe that any human society would be willing to sacrifice a large part of its population to kill off another society, hence its predictions of Iran's future actions will suffer. Aaron Lerner asks whether the Palestinian Arabs want a state that incorporates Israel or one that exists next to it. We don't need sophisticated techniques to know the answer. The Arab street and the Arab leaders have always said they wish to eliminate the present Jewish state and there is nothing in their actions that alters their voiced intent. Lerner lays out the social engineering the Palestinian Arabs -- or their handlers -- might practice to destroy Israel after they have a state. Lerner incorporates into his analysis an assessment of the future activity of some other Arab countries, which -- in the face of reality -- were presumed stable. In sum, Lerner suggests that after acquiring a state neighboring Israel, the continuing plans to destroy Israel are likely to be brilliant and definitely not based on the comforting notions that everyone is civilized and everyone wants only to see their children have a good life.
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NOTE TO NEWT: RETHINKING PALESTINE
by Martin Sherman

  It follows that if the notion of an authentic Palestinian people is fallacious, then they are not the owners of "Palestine" and the thrust to deprive Israel of its rightfully-owned land becomes nonsensical, if not downright hostile. Nevertheless, there are the so-called Arab refugees, individuals from different clans and their descendants, who have been kept in a state of suspended animation for some 60 years. There are also the local Arabs, most of whom immigrated into the Territories in the 20th century. Martin Sherman does a masterful job in laying out a comprehensive plan to relocate these people to a suitable milieu in an Arab country or Arab countries, where they could live as citizens and be responsible for their own lives. The plan would also benefit the economy of the countries that would play host.
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PALESTINE STATE IN SAUDI ARABIA
by Gennadiy Baruch Faybyshenko

  There is no way that Israel can allow the return of the 1948 Arab refugees and their multiple descendents and camp followers and remain a viable state. Gennadiy Baruch Faybyshenko suggests an alternative way of giving the Palestinian Arabs their own place and at the same time letting Saudi Arabia express its concern for the Palestinian Arabs in a practical way. Saudi Arabia is wealthy, very large and sparsely populated. It is an ideal place to put a Palestinian state, a state that would be located in an environment that is Arab in religion, culture and lifestyle, a state where other countries, concerned with the welfare of the Palestinians, can come help develop. Concerned Jews could help by lobbying their congressmen to help implement a Palestinian state in Saudi Arabia.
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IT'S PUZZLING

1. How are communities of people manipulated to act against their own best interests?

2. And why do they go along with it?

In European cities, as soon as they have sufficient control, Muslims set up enclaves from which non-Muslims are excluded. Yet the Europeans, particularly in Britain and Norway, do not respond appropriately. Europeans have become submissive to their enemies, the Muslims, and actively hostile to their loyal Jewish citizens. They berate Israel and are strong partisans of the Palestine Arabs.

As another example: fearful of being labeled a bigot, many Jews help Muslims fight Islamophobia. But Muslims attack Jews everywhere, the more so when they have the power, so increasing Muslim control is hardly in the best interest of the Jews. Other essays suggests possible reasons for self-harming behavior.

NORWAY EMBRACES ISLAMIST TYRANNY
by Bruce Bawer

  From the point of view of self-interest, the surge in anti-semitism in Europe seems illogical. The Muslims are pushing forward to impose their culture over the native mores. Instead of resisting and making common cause with Jews, who are under Islamic attack worldwide, Europeans are allowing Muslims to encroach, while throwing their Jewish citizens to these present-day marauders. Bruce Bawer describes the situation in Norway; but he could be describing the prevailing conditions over much of Europe.
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BIGOTRY, REVISIONISM AND BARONESS WARSI
by Melanie Phillips

  Melanie Phillips clearly and factually rejects some assertions by Muslims about antisemitism; namely, that Muslims are not anti-Jewish, that factual criticism of Islam (Islamophobia) is the same as inventive fabrications against Judaism and that Jews and Muslim should be fighting Islamophobia together. She speaks specifically of these notions coming from Baroness Warsi, but many Muslim leaders say the same. The chutzpa of Muslims -- major distributors of antisemitic literature -- encouraging Jews to help Muslims demolish Israel and demote Jews to dhimmi status!
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WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR MUSLIM VIOLENCE?
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield notes that were Muslims told they were responsible for Muslim terrorism, "world opinion" would be in an uproar. Yet Jews are told they are responsible for the Muslim violence against them and the expectation is they will accept the rebuke -- they might even take it to heart. Greenfield points out that in one sense Israel is to blame for Muslim violence because Israel tolerates it. It threatens meaningless threats of retaliation. It eventually shoots up empty Arab houses. It is understanding of Arab justifications. Israelis act like saps so they're treated that way.
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TRAVERSING HISTORY -- A PRELUDE TO CONSIDERING THE ONLY ALTERNATIVE PEACE PLAN
by Alex Rose

  Governments are often portrayed as acting coolly and sensibly, backed by objective appraisals and in accordance with the country's best interests. But in this essay, Alex Rose demonstrates that Obsessional Anti-Semitism disproportionately governed the activities of Nazi Germany and its soulmates, the Arab countries, who should have been worrying how to escape out of medievalism into modern times. The Arabs were aided and abetted and in some cases incited by the the British, who had undertaken to help the Jews develop their homeland into a State, but who found undermining the eventual and then the newly-born Jewish state irresistible. From the 1930s on, England illegally declared Jewish immigration to Palestine illegal. The Brits then devoted much of their time and effort to make sure the Jews didn't escape from the Nazis. Rose shows us how often frank antisemitism, however irrational, is the real determinant of what nations do.
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PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPLANATIONS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS
by Nicolai Sennels

  The Muslims are trying on the UN and European Union level and on the Federal level in individual countries, to make it a crime to criticize Islam, where criticism is a crime whether the information is factual or not. In this essay, Nicolai Sennels elucidates some likely reasons why people deny the reality of Islamic infiltration into the West in order to remain politically correct. To his list, may I add one: for far too many "educated" people, a "heretical" opinion -- or even a conclusion easily derived from known facts -- is not accepted in polite society until it has been blessed by spilled coffee on the pages of the New York Times. This article is important in understanding how the Political Correctness Muzzle Effect can override reality. And why historians wonder years later, why people didn't see the obvious.
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A STUDY IN SELF-CANNIBALIZATION
by Martin Sherman

  In this essay, Martin Sherman makes the point that political liberalism, a major achievement of the West, is destroying itself by attempting to apply its values and expectations to societies that do not have the environment in which it can thrive. As a major inconsistency, one can not praise diversity and then act as if diverse cultures all have the same set of values. It would be more intelligent, when dealing with a totalitarian society based on Islamic teachings, if we factored in the belief system and acceptable practices of that alien society instead of assuming we are all reading from the same page in a book written in American English.
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YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION?
by Waller R. Newell

  This essay by Waller Newell gives a different twist to the examination of why people act against their own self-interest: different selves have different interests. He explores what happens when people make a extraordinary attempt at bettering their lives, increasing their choices and their freedom to make choices. Using the recent uprising in Egypt and the hopes by many for an 'Arab spring', he throws cold water on the belief that their revolution will lead to democratic reform. He also counters the bland assertions of the American administration that the Muslim Brotherhood -- which will eventually gain power -- is moderate. Revolutions for the most part follow a script: "The initial reformist phase ... focusing on individual rights and opportunity is swept aside by radicals who want an egalitarian and collectivist political order." Hope turns to dust; bright beginnings rust. And the objectives of the dictatorship that finally takes over negate the good intentions of the original "good guys".
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HOW CHURCHES REACTED TO THE REVIVAL OF THE JEWISH STATE

Many church groups have come to understand emotionally, not just factually, that Jesus was born a Jew and died a Jew and that Christianity came out of Judaism, which is why their fundamental belief system is what it is. Their attitude is based in Scripture. These Christian Zionists are accused of being brainwashed by theories such as dispensationalism. They have had to fend off various other suspicions. They are suspected of helping Israel in order to bring about the Rapture; this is true in some cases. How many is unknown. Real numbers are hard to come by. Anecdotes abound. They are accused of having a not-so-hidden agenda to convert the Jews to Christianity in a more kindly fashion than in the Middle Ages. Again, this is true for some. But many -- quite possibly the majority - of the Christian Zionists are sincere and dedicated to Israel's welfare as a family matter.

In contrast, other churches despise the Jewish state and are dedicated to destroying it. Activist Presbyterians and Episcopalians temper their language but their actions tell all. Senior American Presbyterian Church officials meet openly with Hezbollah. They enthusiastically endorse BDS (boycotts, divestiture and sanctions against Israel). In contrast, the various Middle Eastern churches make no secret of their animosity. They have the most to lose as Muslims gain the power to destroy Christianity completely in the Middle East, yet they are the most vocal in castigating Israel for any and all crimes. This set of essays examines the views of these antagonistic churches.

CHRISTIAN ZIONISM 101
by Paul Charles Merkley

  Christian Zionists -- some of Israel's staunchest and most dedicated friends -- are under attack from mainline Protestant churches and academic clerics. Paul Merkley's new book, entitled Those That Bless You I Will Bless: Christian Zionism in Historical Perspective (Mantua Books, December 5, 2011) counters their specious arguments. As David Parsons of the International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem says, "In recapturing core biblical truths, ordinary Christians also reawakened to the enduring Jewish hope for restoration in the Land of Israel. Out of British 'Restorationism' emerged the modern-day Christian Zionism movement with the explicit purpose of lending vital support to a reconstituted Jewish state." To provide context and a contrast to the church groups under examination, we are reprinting Merkley's 2007 paper, Christian Zionism, 101. Its introduction read:

Anti-Zionists assert that Christian Zionism derives from "dispensationalism," an off-center Biblical interpretation popular in the eighteen hundreds. Paul Merkley's essay is an effective antidote to anti-Zionist pseudo-theology. His is a very readable, very factual account of what characterizes Despisers of Zion and Defamers of Christian Zionists. These "...chatterers make no effort to get straight the facts about Christian faith. Indeed, it is considered a proof of one's qualification to speak about the biggest issues of life that one should betray no first-hand knowledge of the content of faith..." Countering their propaganda, Professor Merkley cogently explains the actual basis of Christian Zionism: it doesn't come from Dispensationism; it comes from mainstream Protestant theology and the literature of biblical commentary.
See also Victor Sharpe's article on Christian Zionism here. and an excellent overview by Edward Brotsky here.
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MAJOR UK CHURCHES ADOPT CHRISTIAN AID'S ANTI-ISRAEL BDS AGENDA
by Chanah Shapira

  Christian Aid, a well-endowed agency of the World Council of Churches (WCC), was established to alleviate poverty in Israel and the Territories. In actual fact, it is highly-politicized and a strong no-holds-barred promoter of the same anti-Israel ideology as the WCC, using half-truths, omission of critical facts, distortions and lies ad lib as needed. It is politically important because it "determines the actual Middle East policy line" for the leadership of several major UK churches. Christian Aid (CA) provides far-left anti-Israel PR and funds far-left Pro-Palestinian political activist organizations such as the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, which, like its patron, doesn't feel constrained to be truthful as it works to delegitimize Israel. In fact, as Dexter Van Zile wrote of Sabeel's founder, "In Ateek's writing Christian supersessionism merges with Islamic supersessionism in the Middle East to form a united front of contempt toward Jewish sovereignty." In this essay, Chanah Shapira systematically examines some of the churches in the UK whose attitude toward Israel reflect CA's strong anti-Israel bias: it's all Israel's fault. So say they all.
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"PALESTINIAN THEOLOGIAN" TRASHES "PALESTINIAN THEOLOGY"
by Malcolm Lowe

  Many of the "facts" that influence Western Protestant churches to support the Palestinian Arabs come from Christian Arab theologians. In dhimmi fashion they have promoted the Muslim Arab cause by asserting that the Jews are responsible for Christians fleeing the Middle East, without explaining why the Christian population is decreasing drastically in the Arab countries and increasing only in Israel. In this essay, Malcolm Lowe discusses the latest theological enterprise of Lutheran Pastor Mitri Raheb and Anglican Reverend Naim Ateek. Raheb asserts, despite all contrary evidence, that all of the Bible, including the Book of Persian Queen Esther, was written in Palestine and that Jesus wasn't Jewish but Palestinian. The Jews aren't native to Palestine but the hordes of Arabs that came into the region mostly after 1900 are descendents of an ancient people, and, mirabile dictu, it is the Palestinian Arab Christians who are God's Chosen People. Essentially, Raheb and Ateek are refining the theme that the Arabs are the owners of Israel and the Territories. They give the honor of being the original people of the land to the remaining Christian Arabs Palestinians. What will they think of next?
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AFTER SATURDAY COMES SUNDAY
by Paul C. Merkley

  Paul Merkley writes about the antisemitism of the non-Protestant churches which are by far the oldest and the largest churches in the Middle East: the Eastern Orthodox (Greek Orthodox, Church of Cyprus), the Oriental Orthodox (Armenian Apostolic, Coptic Orthodox and Syriac Orthodox) and the Catholic (Armenian Catholic, Chaldean Catholic, Coptic Catholic, Greek Melkite Catholic, Latin Patriarchate, Maronite Catholic and Syrian Catholic). While the Roman Catholic Church has repudiated demonizing the Jews and inventing blood libels, these Eastern churches remain theologically as much in the Middle Ages as the Muslim majority. Antisemitism is ingrained; contempt for the Jews is visceral. Unless the doer of an evil deed is immediately known and this knowledge can't be denied, the evil is attributed to the machinations of the Jews. The less likely that the Jews could possibly be involved, the more unshakably certain are they that it was somehow part of a Zionist conspiracy. As Merkley points out, this attitude persists at a time that "the Christian communities of the Arab world are being forced upon the path to extermination." And not by the Jews.
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ACADEMIA

Many a university campus has become a hostile environment for the Jewish students who have come for a liberal arts education. College administrators allow Muslim students to terrorize Jewish students and control who is allowed to speak on campus, while all the time proclaiming the need for freedom of speech for all. Organizations whose titles identify them as fighting prejudice against Jews have left Jewish students to fend for themselves. Leftist professors use their classrooms to inculcate students with their political ideology, not their specialized academic knowledge. Whatever happened to the notion that being at University was a time when one could indulge in intellectual pursuits in a serene environment?

U. OF CALIFORNIA NEGLIGENCE: IT DOESN'T PROTECT ITS JEWISH STUDENTS
Bill Narvey

  Antisemitism is on the increase. Some 70% of the anti-religion hate crimes in America are against Jews. And what are the Biggie Jewish organizations doing? They are busy, busy, busy. Abe Foxman of the ADL is defending the penetration of Muslim Sharia law into our academic and financial institutions and law courts. He is attacking Jews for worrying. Silly us, we must be suffering from Islamophobia. He suggests, as corrective action, we should help pay to build Mosques In America. MIA. An acryonym that also describes where his brain is -- it's Missing In Action. Hillel? Hillel at Penn State is helping the Muslims denounce Israelis who are defending themselves against Muslim rockets. AJC? It's encouraging the political parties to keep Israel out of their political agendas. We wouldn't want Jews to find out what Obama has in store for Israel -- that would be awful. They might not vote for him again. AIPAC? AIPAC is still out there with lighted lantern looking for an Arab who will accept a big chunk of Israel. The sign on the lantern reads: "Wanted: an Arab who can play peace partner for a limited engagement."

Private individuals have taken on themselves the jobs the Biggies have abdicated. Bill Narvey has compiled information on the situation at University of California. The Amcha Initiative has been doing the work the major Jewish organizations should be doing: attempting to get the U. of California to stop the Muslim harassment of Jewish students. The major item is a letter to Mark Yudof, President, University of California, from Tammi Rossman-Benjamin and Leila Beckwith of the Amcha Initiative.
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TIME FOR A RETREADED MEARSHEIMER TO RETIRE
Bernice Lipkin

  John Mearsheimer has done damage to Jews by putting a veneer of scholarship on the gutter lie that Jews control America's foreign policy. While not everyone saw this as evidence of anti-Semitism, he proved it was by endorsing a frank anti-semitic book. He has done damage to his profession by his sloppy scholarship. And most of all he has helped enable suppressed anti-Semitism to be voiced openly as it was prior to World War 2. Students at the U of Chicago, in a well-written and well-stated brief, call for his retirement.
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MISBEHAVING SCIENCES?
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth Frantzman examines the issue of academics who publically insult the ethnicity, politics or religion of others -- especially when the "others" may be students who can't answer back -- yet they enjoy "the presumption that their work with students remains unbiased and uninformed by their sometimes radical views." Should academics enjoy a special type of free speech that no other occupation enjoys? How do inappropriate remarks by faculty members impact the environment at their universities? Should they should be allowed to behave and to speak in a manner considered unacceptable in the general society? Considering the number of academics who preach rather than teach, these questions are seriously in need of resolution.
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MEDIA MATTERS

ARABESQUE LINGUISTICS AND POETRY FOR THE WESTERNER
by Dr. Yasser DasMaBebi

  That noted linguist, Dr Yasser DasMaBebi, has graciously offered to help us understand the meaning of words and phrases used in stories and news coming from the Middle East. He makes the meaning so clear he has inspired others to add to our understanding. He also provides us with memorable examples of exquisite Arab poetry.
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VERACITY, MENDACITY — AND ISLAM
by Bruce Bawer

  Using a recent book of essays on Islam as a political religion as anchor, Bruce Bawer notes that "while Islamic Studies professors have continued to whitewash the religion of peace, responsible-minded men and women outside of the Islamic Studies racket have taken up the job of truth-telling, publishing a number of substantial, and in some cases encyclopedic, volumes about Islam." Nevertheless, "ignorance and outright duplicity about the basic facts of Islam still reign supreme throughout the West." And too many of the next generation of leaders, now at college, are being inculcated with an inaccurate picture of Islam.
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THE SHIP OF FOOLS AND ADMIRAL HAYREDDIN BARBAROSSA
by Alex Maistrovoy

  As Alex Maistrovoy writes, "Political commentaries about the events in the Middle East resemble mythological plots written by an experienced censor." One is the narrative that it was all Israel's fault that she lost Turkey's support because she was too rigid, she was unaccepting of Arab demands for dignity, etc., etc., etc. Maistrovoy points out that Recep Erdogan began hostilities against Israel well before any incident that could be claimed to have contributed to a change of relations. In looking for the culprit that created friction between Turkey and Israel, it would be better to look at Erdogan's goals: "the creation of the Islamic state, rejection of Kemal Atatürk's secular heritage and revival of the Ottoman Empire." With the press fixating on what Israel did wrong, it will a big surprise to them when Erdogen's hostility toward Greece and Cyprus as well as to Israel become more obvious.
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HISTORY SECTION

WHY MUSLIMS HATE JEWS TO THE BONE
by Dr. Syed Kamran Mirza

  Syed Kamran Mirza explains the particular hatred Muslims have toward Jews. At the beginning of the establishment of Islam, Mohammad praised the Jews, hoping they would certify him as a legitimate Biblical prophet but the Jews rejected his claims. Hell hath no fury like a self-proclaimed prophet scorned. As his megalomania grew, he demonized the Jews and then massacred them. His hate of Judaism is accurately reflected in the later verses of the Koran and hadith. And that is what Muslim children are taught.
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A MATTER OF HONOR
by David Isaac

  David Isaac writes of two errors that should be rectified. Field Marshal Edmund Allenby has been honored by having a major thoroughfare named after him in Tel-Aviv. As Isaac points out, Allenby's hostility to Jews "set the precedent and the tone for all subsequent administrations..." Contrariwise, Israel's debt to Col. John Henry Patterson has not been acknowledged. Perhaps reversing the commission and the omission will help teach Israelis who their friends are and who are not their friends.
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HOW ITALY SOLD ITS JEWS
by Giulio Meotti

  Giulio Meotti writes about the circumstances surrounding the October 1982 terror attack on Rome's synagogue. "Qaddafi gave safe haven to the terrorist who bombed Rome's synagogue, killing a Jewish child. But Italy, as this article exposes, was a collaborator and tacit facilitator to terrorists and terrorism." "Now that Muammar Qaddafi (who protected Abu Nidal's terrorist group responsible for the massacre) has been killed in Lybia, many voices are asking Silvio Berlusconi's government to reveal the secrets of the Italian appeasement to anti-Jewish terrorism ..."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index. To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

November 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
December 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the September-October 2011 issue:

Islamophobia (DiscoverTheNetworks, Hornick, Glick)
Creeping Sharia (Zumwalt, Gordon, Shulman)
Western Pro-Palestinian Propagandists (Sherman, Murphy, Bell&Steinberg&Balanson, Poller)
Muslim Democracy Ain't Democracy (Greenfield, Helfont)
The Shifting Sands of the Middle East (Takeyh, Al-Tamimi, Gilboa)
The Proposed Palestinian Arab State Of Palestine (Meotti, Elder of Ziyon, Meotti, Klein, Plaut)
What the Arabs Really Want (Brand, Sherman)
The Legal Basis for the Creation of Israel and Its Annexation of the Territories (Duke, Hausman, Rabinowitz)
Attacking Israel's Indecisiveness: Leaving the Wrong Path (Kahane, Marlon, Glick)
History Section (Ramati, Sobel, FresnoZionism, Sobel, Bard)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (September,October)

ISLAMOPHOBIA

Creating a new scare-word is probably beginning to cost the Islamists almost as much as buying the presidency. But it might be worth it to them. They've come up with a beauty -- Islamophobic -- which means that you are irrationally afraid of Islam. It could be you soon will fear being labeled an Islamophobe almost as much as you avoid being called a racist. But don't worry. All you have to do is think positive about Islam.

Do you think it's ridiculous giving someone a driver's license photographed wearing a burqa? You might be an Islamophobe. Would you fire a Muslim clerk because he refuses to sell alcohol? Shame on you for interfering with him practicing his religion. Do you think it's irrational that world politicos fear a Jew building a house in Samaria more than Iran building an atomic bomb? You might be islamophobic. When you learn your children are taught how to pray like real-live Muslims by a real-live Muslim coming to their school, do you wonder why they can't pray as Jews or Christians in school? Looks like you need more positive thinking. When your kids come home from college preaching the Palestinian cause, do you remember reading about the millions the Arabs donate to our universities? Focus on other thoughts. Think cheerfully that your kid might find fame and martyrdom as a human shield in Gaza or Iran. When your church declares it is boycotting Israel because it is harming peace-loving Arabs, do you wonder why they aren't worried Christians are being murdered everywhere Muslims are dominant? You're being too cheeky. Get over it. Do you believe that Islam is a peaceful religion working for world peace? Good. Just keep thinking positive.

These next articles were written by people that Islamofools would call Islamophobes.

Submitted by Bill Levinson
to Israpundit
September 6, 2011.

See also: Pat Condell, "American Islamophobia," here.
 

POLITICS OF "ISLAMOPHOBIA"
Discover the Networks

  This article provides us with some of the history of the invention of the term Islamophobia and its usefulness as a club for frightening ordinary people as well as the news media into downplaying or ignoring Islamic terrorism. As the old joke goes, "who are you going to believe? Me or your lying eyes." If fear of being labeled an Islamophobe succeeds, Islamic terrorism won't be a crime; saying unkind things about Islam will.
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I'VE GOT...ISLAMOPHOBIA!
by P. David Hornik

  Muslims pressuring the U.N. to declare criticism of religion (i.e., Islam) a hate crime have a peculiar definition of what constitutes a hate crime: any slur on Islam made publicly. Since Islam is perfect and without flaw, then clearly any criticism is a slur and is completely unwarranted. To use a recent neologism that betrays an ignorance of root words, the critic is considered islamophobic, (irrationally afraid of Islam) though his actual emotions are anger and disgust at -- and loathing of -- Muslim behavior and these feelings are entirely rational and reality-based. P. David Hornik makes the point subtly and humorously in this essay.
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THE WAR AMERICA FIGHTS
by Caroline Glick

  An important strategy in war is to keep the enemy off balance and defensive and timid about reacting strongly. Islam is waging war against the USA and Israel and is using psychological tools effectively. This isn't a good time for us to be politically correct.

When you are fighting a war, knowing the identity of the enemy usually is not a problem. But, as Caroline Glick writes, we have identified the enemy only timidly and peripherally, not smack on. And even when, as in the case of Major Hasan, who murdered fourteen of his fellow soldiers, it was obvious he was a jihadist or a jihad-groupie, yet the army ignored the problem. It is a most unusual, and in many ways, ineffective war in that the American administration encourages friendly contact with the Muslim Brotherhood, a motherlode of terrorist activities, takes timid measures against Iran and ignores the terrorism emanating from much of the Muslim world, notably from the Arab sector of that world.
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CREEPING SHARIA

The Muslim Brotherhood and their front groups emphasize the importance of some pleasing or at least reasonable aspect of Sharia Law to encourage its entry into a host country. In the last issue Andrew McCarthy wrote about the slow but steady growth of Muslims-only enclaves in Western host countries, where Sharia law, Muslim customs and the Islamic educational system with its emphasis on mastering the Koran rather than acquiring a general education or a trade are practiced. The laws and practices of the host country were ignored. The leaders of the Muslim communities chose to practice "voluntary apartheid."

In this issue we discuss the push to permit Sharia courts to handle domestic disputes in civil law cases. It seems harmless enough until you realize, for example, that it entails Sharia restrictions on women. Moreover, from experience we know the Muslims will continue to push for more restructuring of society to suit Islamic requirements.

It is ironic that in the USA, Muslim leaders spend large amounts to underwrite posters, articles, conferences, academic chairs and hate-fests, all preaching Jew hate, yet a major argument used to make Sharia courts an alternative to our courts is to point out that the Jews have Beth Din, Jewish law courts that are empowered to decide civil law cases. So why not have Sharia courts for Muslims in the same way? It sounds reasonable until you examine the details. Jewish law by its own rabbinic rulings defers to the host country's laws; it works out ways to maintain Halachic standards within the strictures of the host country. Islamic law regards its own law as the one that should be adopted by everyone and aims at that happening. It may argue that a Sharia civil court is harmless to the social structure because it would handle only domestic issues. In practise that means that Muslim women will be treated as inferiors, and the environment will need to be modified to ensure Sharia practices can be practiced.

Westerners often aid and abet Creeping Sharia. It is with no pleasure that I tell you that some of them are Jews, charged by their organizations with the mission of protecting Judaism from poisonous Jew-hate propaganda such as the anti-Jewish hate mongering that emanates from Muslim sources.

The next articles deal with the demand for Sharia courts to handle civil litigation for Muslims.

SHARIAH LOBBY'S PLAY ACTION FAKE - "DANGER, DANGER, DANGER!"
Lt. Colonel James G. Zumwalt, USMC (ret.)

  James Zumwalt points out that Muslim organizations, "by playing the Islamophobia card" seek to shift the focus away from where it should be: on dangers to our freedoms. Instead they claim bias when concerns are raised about such dangers. Sharia law, which is already being cited to a sizable degree in ordinary courts and on the appellate level, reinforces practices that are alien to the West and unacceptable under our law system. In child custody cases Sharia law automatically favors the father. Multiple wives are allowed. Sex with minors is allowed. Judging from experience in other countries: as Sharia law becomes institutionalized, individual freedoms suffer, religions other than Islam suffer, groups such as homosexuals and all women end up with restricted rights or no rights. Countries that encourage the application of Islamic law to show they are tolerant, end up being intolerant to their own people and institutions.
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YALE'S STERN AND ADL'S FOXMAN: ARE THEY IGNORANT ABOUT JEWISH LAW VERSUS SHARIA ISLAMIC LAW
by Jerry Gordon

  Jerry Gordon writes about the differences between Sharia Law and Halacha. Superficially, Sharia Law sounds much like Halacha, Jewish Law. Both are prescriptive for how the individual is to behave in all aspects of his life. In practice they differ widely. A person is both himself and a member of his group. The Torah is ground and guide for shaping and sharpening a reasonable adjustment between the individual and the group, allowing the individual free will and the space in which to grow in morality and intellect, while ensuring group survival and functionality. This can take many forms and variations, subject to changing conditions and environments. Jewish Law will reformulate expressions of its way of life in accordance with the laws of the host country; it strives to maintain halachic integrity within the scope of the larger society. Muslim Law is static by design, being modeled on the behavior and commands of Muhammad; it sees no reason to adjust to any one else's set of laws, which by definition are inferior to its own. Strictures alien to the Muslim include the USA's Constitution and the laws that are given life by it.
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AMERICAN MUSLIMS CLAIM A RIGHT TO ISLAMIC LAW
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman analyzes point by point an essay by Professor Aziz Huq, who argued against a law that would prohibit courts from using foreign laws, including Sharia. The case for using Sharia law in American courts and as an alternative to American law is presented as a courtesy to and a sign of tolerance of the Muslim community. It is claimed there would be little impact on American society. Shulman suggests the proper context is this: Islam declared war on us. We need to ask how does the establishment of Sharia courts aid them in their war effort?

There would be little point in letting Sharia law have legal power and then not allow its decisions to be carried out. Thus, adherence to Sharia would contribute to the subjugation of Muslim women. Would we be forced to allow everything from wife beatings to honor killer? Or would Sharia-determined decisions require review -- creating a large burden on our courts. If Sharia were given status, the next push would be to make criticism of Islam a hate crime, even if the specific allegation was accurate and objective. Were that to happen, the impact would be huge. It would in practice deprive us of the freedom to voice any criticism of Islam.

Besides minimizing the importance of the request and acting as victim, there is the implied threat. The Professor warns that rejecting the installing of Sharia would chill Muslim cooperation against terrorism. It would be difficult to see how they could cooperate less than they do. Is he threatening overt terrorism if they don't get their way?
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WESTERN PRO-PALESTINIAN PROPAGANDISTS

INTO THE FRAY: ET TU, BILL...
by Martin Sherman

  As I start to write the intro to this article by Martin Sherman on Bill Clinton's Judeophobic attitude, the ticker tape reads: "3 rockets explode in Gan Yavne; morter shells fired from Gaza land in Ashdod, Gan Yavne; Egyptian Brotherhood makes first visit to Hamas-led Gaza; Islamic Jihad takes responsibility for grad rocket fire; female suicide bomber kills 3 wounds 20 in S.E. Turkey."<29oct11.> The Muslims of the Arab World continue to work at destroying Israel, when they are not killing their own countrymen. But according to our affable ex-prez, it's Netanyahu and the Jooz who are withholding peace from the world. Clinton's made a boodle speaking in the Democratic-party climate of many synagogues, but apparently the Saudis pay better.
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DID WESTERN LEFTISTS INVENT 'ISRAELI APARTHEID'?
by Paul Austin Murphy

  Israel is accused of apartheid because that worked so well to demonize South Africa. Never mind that the Arabs in Israel are a minority, not a majority. Never mind that Israeli Arabs have more freedom of expression than in any Arab state. Similarly Marxist Leftists call Israel 'racist' not because it's true but because it's been an effective way to shut up someone for a very long time. The need to destroy Israel is so strong, facts don't seem to matter. Paul Murphy uses a novel tactic to make this point -- he provides us with Leftist conspiracy-style retorts to actual facts, facts the Marxist Left has no problem ignoring.
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HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH DURING THE 2006 LEBANON WAR AND NOW
Part 1: by Abraham Bell and Gerald M. Steinberg; Part 2: by Gerald M. Steinberg and Naftali A. Balanson

  For HRW the more things change ... doesn't apply. They don't even seem to change. This article deals with HRW fixed focus on Israel in the Lebanon War in 2006 and, now, in 2011, when Syrian abuses against human rights are rightly labeled as atrocities, HRW's coverage is scanty. One reader suggested HRW change its name. "Maybe a name like Deny Jewish Human Rights would be more appropriate."
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THE MUHAMMAD AL-DURA HOAX AND OTHER MYTHS REVIVED
by Nidra Poller

  Nidra Poller writes on one of the most successful hoaxes ever perpetrated -- it's right up there with the fabricated bayoneting of Belgian babies in World War 1. At the start of the second Intifada, a 12-year old was supposedly killed by Israeli soldiers. The image of the boy, Muhammad al-Dura, cowering behind his father went around the world, creating sympathy for the Palestinian cause. It was later determined that the bullet that killed the boy couldn't have come from where the IDF was positioned. The boy was in direct line with an Arab sharpshooter, who was standing near the Arab cameraman who was paid by France 2, which refused to release the 44-minutes of film that was omitted from the film distributed to the public. We now know that even the supposed IDF attack was staged in that a distraction crew of Arabs "attacked the Israeli outpost with rocks, firebombs, and burning tires, [while] fake battle scenes were filmed in another part of the junction, out of range of the Israel Defence Forces outpost." It's not even certain that the boy was killed. The dramatic description of the scene by the French commentator, Charles Enderlin, was not eye-witness; it was dubbed in later. Enderlin has stonewalled, he has sued critics, he's written endless self-justifications; he's done everything but own up to having perpetrated a hoax, and not a very well-constructed hoax at that.

Poller then asks and answers a more significant question: what were the factors that made Al-Dura a media "success", while a real massacre of a Jewish family by Arabs -- where an infant was almost completely decapitated and the murderers readily confessed and were proud of what they did - is soft-pedaled by the media as just another news item. Why indeed are news people sometimes intelligently sceptical of planted stories and at other times why do they act like lobotomized sheep? Her answer has relevance to so much that we are fed by a supposedly neutral Mainstream Media.
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MUSLIM DEMOCRACY AIN'T DEMOCRACY

The first essay in this set asks whether democracy in the Muslim world is what a Westerner would call democratic. The second essay asks a more general question: does a democratic government stop terrorism by providing "an alternative outlet for the grievances of more moderate Islamists"? Can "democracy in the Middle East ... 'drain the swamps' of Islamic terrorism"?

THE TROUBLE WITH MUSLIM DEMOCRACY
Daniel Greenfield

  Westerners often mistakenly believe that democracy is democracy is democracy, so if the Arabs proclaim themselves democratic, they must be our kind of people. But, as Daniel Greenfield points out, "[t]he Muslim world is so enthusiastic about democracy because it allows the majority to slap around the minority -- at least more so than it's already doing." The people haven't changed. They haven't become kinder or more mature; they just have more freedom to be nasty. In consequence, minorities such as Egypt's Christian Copts are safer under a tyrannical dictator. "In the final analysis," Greenfield points out, "the trouble with Muslim democracy is the Muslims."
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IS DEMOCRACY THE CURE FOR ISLAMIC TERRORISM?
a book review by Samuel Helfont

  Samuel Helfont reviews a book by Katerina Dalacoura that casts doubt on the belief that "democracy is an 'antidote' to terrorism. From her studies, Dalacoura concluded that "there is no necessary causal link between authoritarianism in the Middle East and Islamist terrorism." This means that a democratized Egypt, should that ever occur, would no more stamp out terrorism than giving terrorists their own country to govern will dissolve their impulse towards waging jihad.
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THE SHIFTING SANDS OF THE MIDDLE EAST

THE MARCH TOWARD A NUCLEAR IRAN
by Ray Takeyh

  President Obama's way of playing Nero playing the fiddle while Rome burned is to focus our military might on Libya and our political ire on Israel for building homes in the Territories or even in Jerusalem. As Ray Takeyh points out, the real problem is Iran and it needs to be dealt with. Sanctions have not and will not work and we can't afford to just let things happen. "Neither the turbulent order of the Middle East nor the partisan politics of Washington can afford an Islamic Republic armed with nuclear weapons." If this reality doesn't make the politicians understand what actions are urgently needed, try this: "An Iranian bomb is likely to unleash the most divisive partisan discord in this country since the 1949 debate about who lost China."
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INSTABILITY SPREADING SOUTH FROM LIBYA THROUGH NIGERIA
by Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi

  Since President Obama and NATO picked Libya's Gaddafi as the Muslim dictator most urgently in need of downfall, there have been several disquieting and unintended results -- at least I hope they were unintended. As Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi writes, there has been an increase of instability that is spreading south. Several Libyan arms depots that we didn't strike were looted and arms and missiles are missing -- they could end up with an al Qaeda group, AQIM. The disgruntled Touareg "might forge ties with AQIM." Nigeria is already appeasing the Boko Haram, which wants Nigeria to become an Islamic state. And of course the new rulers of Libya are in favor of creating an Islamic state. Had we known that the Libyan caper would result in more hard line Islamic theocracies, we might have left bad enough alone.
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NEEDED: A LEADER IN THE WHITE HOUSE
by Eytan Gilboa

  A few short years ago, President Obama spoke of a new American policy in the Middle East based on diplomacy and cooperation with moderate regimes. Eytan Gilboa writes about the collapse of the two anchors of this policy. "Turkey, once an exemplar moderate Islamic democracy, and Egypt, once an exemplar stable and moderate Arab power, have become increasingly unreliable allies." "With all the whisperings over America's weakness, it is unsurprising that players like Iran and Turkey are looking to fill the vacuum left in its place — to become regional powers with global influence." Obama didn't understand the region then, and he doesn't know what to do now. Except to blame Israel, of course.
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THE PROPOSED PALESTINIAN ARAB STATE OF PALESTINE

At issue is a UN-enforced 2-state solution for peace between Israel and the local Arabs, who miraculously became the Palestinian people some 40 years ago. Mahmoud Abbas, well past-his-term-of-office as President of the Thuggery known as the Palestinian Authority, has stated that in the new state, there will be no Jews. There is every reason to believe him. In the 1940s and '50s, somewhere between 800,000 to 1 million Jews -- most of whom were descendants of Jews who had lived there for hundreds of years before the Arabs came into the area -- were either murdered or were driven from some ten Arab countries without their possessions because the modern state of Israel was coming into being. Only a few Jews still live in the Arab Middle East, mainly in Morocco, and in Iraq, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen No new Jewish immigration is allowed. No Jew is allowed to live in Jordan. Arabs who sell property to Jews are routinely assassinated by the PA and Hamas as collaborators. So there go all the fanciful notions that a 2-state solution can work without forcing anyone, Arab or Jew, from his home.

If the UN grants the Arabs a state gratis, it is likely that an Arab living on land retained by Israel will stay where he is if he wishes, able to choose citizenship in Israel or declare himself a non-citizen resident. His choice, not Israel's. But the more than half a million Jews living in Samaria, Judea and eastern Jerusalem living on land that is given to the Arabs will have no choice. They will be forced out of their homes to become refugees in Israel, wards of a government that has not yet permanently settled the 10,000 Jews who were forced out of Gaza by their own Government in 2005. There is no reason whatsoever to suppose the Arabs will change their minds and allow the Jews to remain. They will have gained a country by false claims and sheer chutzpah, supported by the UN, the EU and the US. What reason have they to act reasonably?

We can ask further, were the Jewish settlers to be removed from Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem, and the land given to the Arabs, would there be peace at last between Arab and Jew? Consider that the Arabs keep telling us and telling their children that their mission is to destroy Israel. Consider that they will have more area to manufacture their tools of war and train their shahids. Consider that they will be closer to Jewish population centers. Consider that they know from experience that they can massacre Israelis without serious repercussions. Churches, politicians and media people will use their influence to shield the Palestinians while blaming Israel. Israel is intimidated so she does little and stops too soon. It's obvious what we can expect. Bombings and massacres of Jewish families will increase, drive-by shootings and drive-alongside stone throwing will become routine. Arab demands will not stop. They never do. Israel will incrementally lose land, confidence and the creative productivity of some of its most outstanding citizens. We can say with confidence that what will not happen is a stable and peaceful region, with two societies living amicably side by side

A SCARLET LETTER - FOR JEWS
by Giulio Meotti

  Giulio Meotti explores the issue of the proposed Arab state that would be carved out from much of Biblical Israel (Samaria and Judea -- AKA the West Bank). Some of the land is held by Jews, dedicated, productive Jews, civilized people who have taken the brunt of the Arab attacks on Israeli civilians. Perhaps because they represent a key element in maintaining a country that is both strong and civilized, they have been demonized by the media, pro-Palestinian NGOs and groups such as Peace Now that are Jewish in name only. In striking contrast to their actual character, they are "portrayed by the media, by entertainment icons, by governmental advisers as blood-crazed zealots, 'parasites', as the single largest danger to Israel's well-being." These present-day Jewish settlers as well as every other Jew in the world would not be permitted to live in the projected Palestinian State. They would not be allowed on land where the Jewish people became a nation; where they shaped the moral code that is the foundation of Western morality; where the first Jewish settlers of Israel were able to practice their religion according to Torah.
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PALESTINIAN ARAB "REFUGEES" WOULDN'T BE CITIZENS OF "PALESTINE" - EVEN IF THEY LIVE THERE!
by Elder of Ziyon

  This is an amazing report by Elder of Ziyon. The State that the Palestinians Arabs are asking the U.N. to grant them -- the State that is to be carved out of the land that is Biblical Israel and which they claim is the Palestinian Homeland -- will not be granting citizenship to the Palestinian refugees, even those living right now in Gaza, Samaria and Judea. Yes, the very same refugees that roused the sympathy of the world to help them regain land they had left voluntarily at the behest of the Arab invaders of Israel in 1948. In effect, the Palestinian Authority will continue to collect millions of dollars from the USA and the European Union, but the UN will continue to feed, clothe, medicate and education the "refugees" and Israel will continue to supply them with electricity and water. The only difference will be that Jews will not be allowed to live in Biblical Israel. What a deal!
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THE FAMOUS STATE OF PALESTINE
by Giulio Meotti

  We know that yet another Arab state will not allow Jews to live in it. We've learned that Palestinian Arab refugees -- the root reason the "world" is anxious to set up the new state -- will not be allowed to become citizens of this state, not even if they are already living there. Giulio Meotti suggests what the new state will be like -- it will be just like what the old one was. We might add that if it moves steadily towards what a good Muslim state strives for, it will be a Sharia-driven theocracy that prides itself on family purity (but practices homosexuality quietly); a male-oriented society where women are chattel and slavery exists; a death-cult society that has the mentality of the 7th century culture of Mohammed and uses 21st century weaponry to ensure the world bows down to Islam and practices Sharia law.
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THE DURBAN PERVERSION
by Joseph Klein

  This essay says volumes about the character of the U.N. Where else would an invented people announce it wanted someone else's land and know it has a good chance of getting it?

Joseph Klein recounts the history of a disgraceful series of conference sponsored by the United Nations. The first of these in 2001, Durban 1, supposedly designed to examine racism worldwide, turned into a racist hatefest against the Jewish state, ignoring all actual racist states. "It was marked by vitriolic displays of anti-Semitism." Durban 2 didn't have the shock value of Durban 1, but again, UN members showed an unusually high degree of cooperation in ambushing and attacking Israel. Durban 3, this September, saw the same inversion of morality, where dictators and terrorists and wholesale murderers accused Israel of being evil. Klein also tells us about a counter-Durban 3 Conference, which showed real concern for human rights. One speakers had been a slave. "[He is] a living demonstration of the 'emerging forms of slavery such as human trafficking,' perpetrated within Sudan by the racist Arab government and population, which Sudan's undersecretary so piously condemned at the Durban III conference."
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LET'S VOTE FOR INDEPENDENCE!
by Steven Plaut

  In his own inimitable way, Steven Plaut points out that there are many separatist groups with better credentials for having a state of their own. The Kurds, for example, are a legitimate people yet they are split among several Arab countries, none of whom is willing to give them their own place. What makes the Palestinians so special? Plaut suggests that, should the UN Security Council vote for a Palestinian State, Israel should recognize the particular separatist groups plaguing the particular countries that voted for a Palestinian Arab state.
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WHAT THE ARABS REALLY WANT

WAS THERE A PALESTINIAN ARAB NATIONAL MOVEMENT AT THE END OF THE OTTOMAN PERIOD?
Wallace Edward Brand

  During the 400 years in which the Ottomans ruled what later was known as Mandated Palestine, there was no Palestinian state, no Palestinian people and no Palestinian Arab nationalist movement among the local Arabs and other Muslims and non-Muslims. Yet some 40 years later, Yasir Arafat proclaimed there was a Palestinian people and Palestine had always been their land. Wallace Edward Brand examines whether there is evidence of a nationalist movement in the period between the end of Ottoman rule after World War 1 and the artificial creation of Palestinian peoplehood, during the time that the Jews were building the infrastructure of a State and redeeming their ancient homeland.
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REASSESSING 'ROOT CAUSES' FROM 'RED HERRINGS'
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman provides evidence out of the mouths and writings of Arab leaders that their intent has always been to destroy Israel itself. Complaining about settlements and Israel's 'occupation' of the West Bank are red herrings -- diversionary tactics -- that should be ignored. For them 'Palestine' extends "from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea," mapping right on and over Israel. Israel needs to realize that the root cause of Arab enmity is "not about borders but about existence" and respond appropriately.
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THE LEGAL BASIS FOR THE CREATION OF ISRAEL AND ITS ANNEXATION OF THE TERRITORIES

JERUSALEM: OUR REDEEMABLE RIGHT: JEWS HOLD LEGAL SOVEREIGNTY OVER ISRAEL'S ENTIRE CAPITAL CITY
by Michael C. Duke

  Michael Duke writes about the legal foundation stone of Israel's right to Israel and the Territories -- including all of Jerusalem -- and about a lawyer who spent a quarter of a century determining precisely that the Jews are the legal owners of all of Jerusalem. The document is the San Remo Resolution of 1920; the lawyer is Jacques Gauthier, an expert in international law. San Remo did not just set the future for Mandated Palestine -- which the Jews have redeemed and partially reconstituted -- but it also mandated the future Arab states of Iraq, Lebanon and Syria. Later, other modern Arab states were carved out of the vast expanse of the Middle East by the same authority. That trust passed to the U.N. when the League of Nations was dissolved. The U.N. has not gained respect for its embarrassing embrace of the Arab attempt to delegitimize Israel but even the U.N. must realize it can not break an irrevocable trust with Israel as beneficiary by giving away Biblical Israel to the Palestinian Arabs without simultaneously destroying the basis for the Arab Middle East.
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ANNEXATION WINS HANDS DOWN OVER A TWO-STATE SOLUTION
by Matthew M. Hausman

  This is an excellent reference article. Matthew M. Hausman lays out the reasons why another Arab state in Israel's heartland would be a very bad idea. As he points out, "No amount of subterfuge can change the fact that Palestinian nationalism is an artificial construct or that Judea and Samaria were never lawfully part of any sovereign Arab nation." Were Israel to annex Samaria and Judea, she would be reclaiming land that is hers "historically, geographically and legally" by international law. "Israel can rely only on herself to craft a solution that makes legal, historical and moral sense, and which assures her security and continuity as a democratic, Jewish state."
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PEQUOTS, PEKI'IN AND PALESTINIANISM
by William Rabinowitz

  This essay points out that after the Jews were defeated by the Romans and through the thousands of years of the diaspora, there was always a Jewish presence in Israel.

William Rabinowitz seems to specialize in humor-coated history, wrapping little-known historic facts in whimsy. In this essay, he writes about the Jews of Pek'in, Israel, a community where Jews have been in continual residence for the last 2 and 1/2 millenia. It is a fact that has been obscured as attention is usually focused on the immigration of Jews starting in the 19th century to redeem their ancient homeland. He also paints an searing picture of a not-too-bright current-day Jewish college student, who has absorbed a pro-Palestinian attitude from his teachers, the local Muslim students and the TV and newspapers. Rabinowitz responds with very different answers to someone who had been indoctrinated to believe that the Palestinians are indigenous to Israel and own the land.
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ATTACKING ISRAEL'S INDECISIVENESS: LEAVING THE WRONG PATH.

The first two essays are particularly appropriate at this time of year. It is a time that we are encouraged to reflect on our actions over the past year and examine what went wrong. We resolve to make an effort to do better. The other essays are some of the small signs that there are stirrings of new ideas and the cracking of wrong old ones.

ON A MOUNTAIN, WITH A TRUMPET
by Rabbi Meir Kahane

  Rabbi Meir Kahane was dismissed by many as a radical, a racist, a bigot, an ultranationalist. When the fashion was to believe in the similarity and basic goodness of everyone's goals and aspirations, his diagnosis of an implacable enemy utterly at odds with Judaism was unsettling. We were angered by his message; so we threw stones at the messenger and ignored the message. Now, twenty-one years after his murder, as events catch up to his analyses and predictions, we are beginning to appreciate the clarity of his thoughts and are beginning to agree with his solutions. Yom Kippur is a good time to reflect on his essay on the consequences of ignoring the danger we are in.
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SPARING AGAG: HARD TRUTHS ABOUT ISRAEL'S INHIBITED WAR VS. TERROR
by Brandon Marlon

  As in the previous article, Brandon Marlon warns that Israeli's weak reactive responses to Arab aggression may be politically palatable, but eventually they will damage Israel. To make the point, he recounts the story of King Saul who was merciful to the Amalek when the situation dictated that he destroy them. Eventually this "almost resulted in the eradication of his own people." The bottom line is: "in dealing with an implacable, fanatical enemy - say, terrorists - the alternatives are neatly narrowed down to four: offer surrender, accept surrender, strike or be struck ... Harsh as it may seem, war is no time for mildness. One must be in it to win it."
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ISRAEL'S PATH TO VICTORY
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick asks why the Israeli Government doesn't change its course of action - hoary with age and covered with disappointments -- in dealing with the Palestinian Arabs, who promise to abide by mutually-agreed-upon rules and then do whatever they damn well please, secure in the knowledge that no matter what they do, they will suffer no permanent injury and will, almost certainly, gain new support and material benefits. A major overhaul would include redefining their connection to the Land of Israel. As Glick puts it, "[w]hile Israel has been defending its right to security, the Palestinians have been on the offensive arguing that all the land that Israel took control over from Jordan in 1967 belongs to them by ancestral right." Israel's emphasis on security needs is real and necessary but emotionally unappealing. Stupidly, her spokespeople neutrally refer to Samaria and Judea -- Biblical Israel -- as 'disputed territory.' The Arabs weep dramatically about their lost land -- that's much more appealing to an outsider. It's time Israel spoke out and told the truth: the land is hers and belongs only to her.
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History Section

Snapshots from the advent of Islam to the Munich Massacre.

THE WAR AGAINST ISLAM
by David Ramati

  David Ramati's essay is on perspective. We tend to think that our present problems with specific groups of Arab terrorists began on 9/11. Ramati points out that in actuality Islam as an ideology has been at war with Western civilization since Mohammad invented it; Muslims often complaining they are the victims of attack. In an amazingly short amount of time, Islam attacked and conquered the neighboring lands, attacked and conquered Christian Spain and immediately began a campaign against Europe. Meantime, they created various ways to denigrate Christians and Jews and other non-Muslims, so that they would always be conscious of the fact that they were dhimmi, beings inferior to Muslims. Dhimmis paid a poll tax; they were pressured to convert to Islam; they wore identification badges, a yellow badge for Jews, an image of a pig for Christians. Then as now, there were no limits to Muslim ruthlessness and deception in aid of Islam becoming the dominant religion in the world. It was in Europe that their conquest was stopped. But, again characteristic of Islam, they tried again, successfully, some 700 years later. Again they went into a decline. Or should we say hibernation. Now, they are at war with us again, strengthened by oil money, a strong belief in the value of their ideology and a blood-thirsty desire for revenge for defeats.
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SAFED: THE FORGOTTEN POGROM OF 1834
by Jerrold L. Sobel

  Jerrold Sobel writes about one of the pogroms against the Jews of Safad, Israel, then part of the Ottoman Empire. In 1834 the local Arabs revolted against Egyptian domination and were ruthlessly savaged. The rebels then scapegoated the Jews, and for 33 days devastated the Jewish community, dismembering children, raping men and women, beating them, plundering their money and slaughtering them. As Sobel writes, "...the fact that this pogrom occurred at all flies in the face of modern Arab propagandists and their sympathizers which claim, if not for Zionism and the re-creation of the state of Israel, native Jews and Palestinians existed in harmony for hundreds of years; a prevarication proven to be without merit." The Jews lived as dhimmis, "stateless in their own homeland ... easy prey to the whims of local populaces and their leaders."
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THE FAILURE OF THE LIBERAL JEWISH ESTABLISHMENT, THEN AND NOW
by FresnoZionism

  This article at FresnoZionism reviews how differently the establishment Jewish organizations and the newly-formed innovative Bergson group worked to save the lives of European Jews during the Holocaust. The established organizations headed by Rabbi Stephen S. Wise ignored that Roosevelt was part of the problem blocking rescue operations and were concerned about protecting Roosevelt's reputation. Even the news of the ongoing concentration camp extermination of Jews did not make them change their traditional ways of dealing with a crisis. FresnoZionism makes the point that these days too many Jews -- those who support J Street and/or New Israel Fund are an egregious example -- are more protective of their standing as good liberals than of Israel's urgent need for all-out support, not lip-service and not J-Street-style sabotage.
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LUBA TRYSZYNSKAS: "THE ANGEL OF BERGEN-BELSEN"
by Jerrold L. Sobel

  Jerrold Sobel writes about an inmate of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, who took upon herself the responsibility of keeping alive half a hundred children tossed outside the barracks into the freezing cold, their parents dead in the gas chamber. She kept them alive, scraping together food for them and stealing medicine until the war ended and rescue came.
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THE MUNICH MASSACRE - SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1972
by Mitchell Bard

  This is Mitchell Bard's account of the massacre of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics of 1972 by the PLO "Black September" terrorists sent on their mission by Yasir Arafat. My own recollection was driving the car while listening to Peter Jennings and some other newsmen reporting. The negotiations were finally over and the terrorists and their Israeli hostages were on their way to the airfield. Things had calmed down. The reporters could start treating Israel as they usually did. When talking about Israel and/or the Israeli team, Jennings' tone was supercilious, pseudo-analytic. In contrast, the terrorists were treated as human beings; in warmer tones, he absolved them, implying 'the debbil (Israel) made them do it.' Then came the news that when the German sharpshooters attacked, the terrorists killed the Jewish athletes. That silenced Peter Jennings. For a while.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index. To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

September 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
October 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


JULY-AUGUST, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the July-August 2011 issue:

The Three Themes In This Issue. (Editor)
Practicing Islam (Al Fadi, Ibrahim, Imani, McCarthy, Steyn, Butrick, Barron)
The Race to Clobber Israel (Lopez, Fleitz, Imani, Glick, Lerner)
The Consequences of Rewarding Terrorism (Poller, Rubin, Brand, Getz)
Keeping Israel Sovereign. Keeping Israel Alive (Plaut, Auerbach, Kruger, November, Jager, Hasten, Ettinger)
History Section (Hadar-Israel, Ceren)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (July, August)

In this issue we present articles that discuss three themes:

1. In Islam, the behavior of the pious Muslim in all aspects of his life is modeled on the words and actions of a 7th century prophet. Marrying a child is sanctioned because Mohammed married the child Aisha. This is very different from Judaism, where customs and life styles flow from the Law. King David was reprimanded for sending Uriah to his death so that David could marry his widow. If Mohammed had behaved as had David, I suspect that today a Moslem's desire for a woman would be considered an acceptable reason for destroying her husband. Basing Islamic law on specific behavior rather than on general laws makes change almost impossible. A law will generally encompass different modes of behavioral expression. Mimicking the behavior of an individual is more specific and thus more resistant to change.

2. the outrageous bias of the U.N and the E.U. in lending their prestige and power to the attempt to destroy Israel has some unwelcome repercussions. The massacre by Anders Breivik may be an early harbinger of a new trend: disgruntled ethnic and national groups may be deciding that terrorizing people as the Palestinian Arabs do is more effective than writing letters. Also, allowing Iran to develop a nuclear bomb might set off a chain reaction of political readjustments in the area which can only contribute to its instability.

3. The U.N. is legally bound by the way the League of Nations divided the Ottoman Empire. The League created many of the current Arab states. With the same authority, it assigned a tiny portion of the Middle East -- what is now Israel, Samaria, Judea, Gaza and the Golan -- irrevocably to the Jewish people. The trust was transferred to the U.N., the successor to the League. Were the U.N. to decide to wipe out Israel by planting another Arab state in Biblical Israel, what does that do to the legality of the present-day Arab states? Such a move might finally shake Israel out of its passivity. A determined Israel would immediately annex Samaria and Judea. A long-term solution for separating Palestinian Arabs and Jews would be to create a homeland for the Arabs somewhere in the vast land holdings the Arabs own.

Read on!
 

PRACTICING ISLAM

In this section, we discuss the lock-and-key relationship of Islam and particular conditions that it needs in order to thrive. We start with Islam's insistence on treating women (and homosexuals, slaves and members of all other religions) as inferiors. As much as we Westerners would like to assume that Islam will outgrow its archaic ideas and come to adopt more tolerant attitudes, unfortunately, this can not happen. The core of Islam is Muhammad, that most perfect of men. His actions are to be emulated; his commands are irrevocable. So there is no way to modify attitudes and behavior yet stay within the tenets of the religion. Every other ethnic and religious group more or less modifies its behavior to conform to the laws and acceptable life styles of the host country. Muslims can not do that; they can not redefine concepts, attenuate some practices, abandon other practices, yet retain the essence of their religion. When Muslims move to non-Islamic countries, pious Muslims, bolstered by their mullahs and head men, will seek to modify their environment according to their religious requirements and the customs and practices that are the outgrowth of Islam. They will not stop their demands until they can live fully under sharia law. It is important we recognize this, because the environment under which Islam will thrive doesn't just inconvenience us; it means that we would need to surrender our way of life to it. We would then be living our lives to suit Islam, not ourselves.

WOMEN UNDER SHARIA LAW: THE DILEMMA OF "THE WIFE BEATING PROTOCOL"
by Al Fadi

  This essay discusses a subject ignored when Islam is declared a peaceful religion: the appalling way the ordinary Muslim -- even a Muslim living in modern countries -- is conditioned to treat women by the tenets of Islam. Declaring the man as the supreme arbiter of his household with unquestioned power to compel obedience may sound something between quaint and ludicrous, but it isn't funny when we finally understand this is how the Koran constructed and authorized fundamental relationships in the Muslim home. Muslim clerics continue to reinforce the idea that in a well-regulated household men are all-powerful and women totally subservient. Given that it is an integral part of Islam, "the position of women is fixed, and rulings, such as the beating of a wife, must remain in place as specified by the Quran", without hope of change within the confines of the religion.
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RATIONALIZING PEDOPHILIA IN ISLAM
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Thanks to Mohammad's example, child marriages to older, even elderly, men is not unusual in Moslem countries. More than half the girls in Afghanistan are married by 16, many of them as young as 9 or 10 and their husbands are old enough to be their grandfathers. In Nepal, 40% are married by age 15. Raymond Ibrahim provides us with an excellent example of how to try to turn a lemon into lemonade Muslim-style: rationalizing Muhammad's rape of a 9-year old child. The story still leaves a heavily sour taste. As Ibrahim writes, "... here we have a cleric straining to finding a positive aspect to Muhammad's pedophilia — that he was patient and indulgent of his child-bride — while ignoring the heart of it: that the man Islam is built around desired to have sex with a child in the first place." The more we learn, the less do we understand why modern-day Muslim clerics -- and we aren't talking fringe but respected authoritative mullahs and politicians -- would insist Muhammad was a perfect man and should be emulated in all respects.
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ISLAM DEMANDS UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER
by Amil Imani

  What's in a name? This essay by Amil Imani makes it clear that in this war that Islam is waging globally, words count very much and we need to know their meaning precisely. To start with, Islam does NOT mean peace; it means surrender. "When radical Muslims behave in violent barbaric ways, they are only doing so in obedience to the dictates of their creed. They are surrendering and sacrificing anything and everything in service to the will and pleasure of Allah..." Most are imperfect in their dedication most of the time, but the ideology is that "[i]f only the masses of Muslims arise and carry out the orders of Allah, then we would have the promised paradise of Islam on earth as exemplified by such rules as that of the Taliban, Saudi Arabia, the Sudan, and of course the Shiite nirvana of the Islamic Republic of Iran." It's not a mission the rest of us should want to encourage.
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STEALTH JIHAD
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Andrew McCarthy reminds us that the Islamic takeover of Europe has usually not been dramatic -- it has come on little cat feet, slowly but steadily. And when it has dug itself into a place, in what then seems but an instant it announces that the place is a Muslim enclave, even though it is in the middle of a European city. As we saw in Israel where Palestinian Arabs took pot shots at electrical workers come to fix the grid so they could have electricity, in Europe, police, fire and ambulance workers who come to rescue people aren't allowed into Muslim-controlled areas. McCarthy tracks for us the psychotic reasoning engaged in by European politicos and media that allows them to ignore what is happening to their countries by conjuring up a fantasy woven around the notion that Islam is peaceful, therefore the Muslim violence that they are actually seeing must be unreal. And so the Muslims continue to seal off areas that are, as Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi put it, "enclaves that will grow and spread and connect," cancerous enclaves that ignore the law of the land and live by sharia.
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HOW UNCLEAN WAS MY VALLEY
by Mark Steyn

  Lest you think the previous article by Andrew McCarthy applies only to Europe and a dominating Islam can't possibly skip across the Atlantic, read this essay by Mark Steyn on what goes on in a public school in Toronto Canada, a public school where Muslims hold prayer services during the school day and menstruating girls are segregated from the other students. The write-up could just as easily come from a scattering of public schools across the country in the U.S.A. More to the point, the article is a snapshot at a time after Muslims became a majority at a school and before they start dictating the curriculum without interference.
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THE FIVE STAGES OF ISLAM
by Richard Butrick

  Over the years several studies have correlated the growth of the number of Muslims in a foreign country and "the transition from conciliatory Islam to fascist Islam." See e.g. "Crossroads" in the January-February issue of Think-Israel; and it is a major theme of R.K. Ohri's book "The Long March of Islam" that we serialized from September-October 2009 to March-April 2011. This essay by Richard Butrick describes the changes in the behavior of Muslims as their numbers increase relative to the rest of the population in a non-Muslim country. While varying in some details, the general picture is the same: the Muslims don't want to 'fit in' or assimilate or just live quietly in their own way. They want to run the show and won't stop until they do.
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HOW ISLAM FASCINATES THE WEST
by Babs Barron

  The previous articles in this set chronicled how Muslims restructure alien environments to conform to a life style imposed on them by Islam. This article asks if the reaction of the host culture helps the process, and, if so, how. This is a fascinating article. I have often wondered why immigrant groups who are polite and conforming and benefit their new country find acceptance difficult while immigrant Muslims who are demanding and unreasonable and tarnished by the brutal terrorism practiced by their co-religionists have no trouble gaining a foothold. They may encounter some mumbling resentment but they soon acquire a multitude of friends in various places who help them gain control of their environment. Babs Barron suggests the Westerner no longer has a strong anchor in religion to guide him in making rational judgments. Moreover, the Westerner is conflicted because his conditioned belief that all life styles are good forces him to ignore the actuality of the Muslim's blatantly bad behavior. Extremist Muslim spokesmen are shamelessly insistent, repeating over and over again that Islam is a peaceful religion -- and this is said with an intimidating undercurrent: people must concede this point, or else... the Westerner feel guilty that he can't fully agree, yet his political philosophy won't let him disagree. Many deal with the conflict by disabling their knowledge of what is actually happening and like the members of any cult end up unconditionally accepting Muslim's dominant voice -- and values.
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THE RACE TO CLOBBER ISRAEL

It seems almost as if there's a race between the UN and Iran on which one can clobber Israel first. Iran is working industriously at developing a nuclear WID -- Weapon of Israeli Destruction. We have done little to counter Iran's promise of nuclear destruction effectively. We have imposed sanctions -- as Jerrold Sobel sarcastically wrote, "Persian rugs and teas can no longer be exported to the United States and word has it opium will soon be on this list." -- and we have debated among ourselves, quibbling about whether Iran can possibly be serious, even though she is spending her wealth and time and resources and proclaiming her evil intent at every opportunity. Letting Iran proceed has larger ramifications in that it encourages other medieval states to attempt to acquire nuclear weapons either because of fear of Iran or as a sign they too have reached technological puberty.

Meantime, calling it a peace plan, the U.N. plans to carve out an instant State, giving most of Biblical Israel to the hostile terrorist-controlled group of Arabs who became the Palestinian people in an instant some 50 years ago. Or as Daniel Greenfield writes: "a Palestinian state should be created the same way the Palestinian people were. By simply pretending it exists and then doing nothing to prove it. If it worked for manufacturing a Palestinian nationality, why not a state. Why not a planet or a galaxy. No one is using Mars are they?"

Ill-reasoned, inappropriate and unseemly hostility to Israel has characterized the U.N. -- controlled by a large bloc of Muslim states -- for decades. As Abba Eban put it years ago, "If Algeria introduced a UN resolution declaring that the Earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164-13 with 26 abstentions." No matter how they prettify their plan, rewarding the Arabs for their refusal to allow a Jewish state in what they regard as their territory won't lead to peace -- it will only make it easier to kill Jews.

IRAN: FROM ESCHATOLOGY TO 21ST-CENTURY FOREIGN POLICY
by Clare Lopez

  Clare Lopez provides us with a clear-eyed understanding of the medieval theological underpinnings of Iran's view of its mission in this world. Its objective is nothing less than "the establishment of an Islamic state worldwide and subjugation of all people on earth to Sharia, or Islamic law." She points out that Iran's alliances, her short-term goals and her foreign policy are derived from and guided by this mission, making Iran "a serious adversary that poses a grave threat to the democratic way of life everywhere." In consequence, "U.S. policy decisions about how to deal with this Iranian regime will be among the most crucial American leadership must make in the coming months." Unfortunately, the present Administration shows little appreciation of what's at stake.
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AMERICA'S INTELLIGENCE DENIAL ON IRAN
by Fred Fleitz

  Observing that the Intelligence Community has never corrected its 2007 estimate that Iran had no nuclear program, Fred Fleitz writes, "One can't underestimate the dangers posed to our country by a U.S. intelligence community that is unable to provide timely and objective analysis of such major threats to U.S. national security — or to make appropriate adjustments when it is proven wrong." Two images come to mind. One, the original Manchurian Candidate movie, which posited that a man likely to become President of the United States could be a Communist mole. As daring as this was, it was beyond imagining that the FBI would have an outreach program to the enemy or that the CIA would buy the enemy time to develop a deadly weapon. The second image is the Iraqi foreign minister, nicknamed Baghdad Bob, denying that Saddam Hussein was in trouble, even though the American troops were at the palace gate.
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WILL IRAN'S MULLAHS USE THE BOMB?
by Amil Imani

  The need to deal with Iran's working on a nuclear bomb has been enmeshed in denials by USA intelligence agencies, assertions that just another sanction will do the trick, trivialization, beating down straw men and blasting non-arguments. Amil Imani warns us that it is a "deadly miscalculation" to ignore what Iran continues to do in a steady and dedicated manner. As he says, "What sane person would want to take a chance to wait and see if the mad Mullahs, once they have the bomb, would use it or not?" In fact, can we be sure that only Israel is in danger? The rulers of Iran aren't exactly fond of the USA, either.
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UNMASKING THE 'INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY'
by Caroline B. Glick

  When some daft situation arose, people would say, "The loonies are running the insane asylum." Today, things are much worse as the undisciplined and corrupt U.N., aided and abetted by the European Union and the Obama administration, is moving to run the world. Last year, when Eye on the UN reported the new members of various humanitarian and human rights U.N. committees (click here), it sounded like a bad joke. Now, as Caroline Glick informs us, "... UN members elected Qatar President of the General Assembly and Iran one of the body's vice presidents," and Iran hosted its first "World Without Terrorism Conference." Dan Friedman who sent in this article notes that "no amount of 'reason' can excise the cancer of Jew-hatred from the body politic once it is allowed to spread. Jew-haters, too, always have powerful 'reasons' of their own. Today, with a big boost from Obama, we have passed the point of no return. The onslaught against the Jews will continue and intensify. That's why it's a privilege to be the first generation in history to live when the Jewish Nation has the military prowess to make the insanity of anti-Semitism an unproductive enterprise. We need to thank our Creator for that. But the drama in the coming years will be about whether or not Israel has the will to unleash its deterrence without obtaining anyone else's permission, save G-d's."
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ISRAEL, PALESTINE, AND THE PEACE PIETIES
by Barbara Lerner

  Barbara Lerner summarizes the outrageous demands made of Israel in the name of peace and in full knowledge that should Israel consent to them, she would not long survive as a state. Anyone who knows the history and geography of the region understands that the projected "peace" borders would be impossible to defend; that allowing others to share control of Judaism's holy city of Jerusalem is as absurd as demanding that other religions have partial control of Islam's holy city of Mecca; and that allowing the putative descendents of the 1948 Arab refugees into Israel would make the Jews a minority in their own country overnight. In similar fashion, amputating parts of Israel to create a Palestinian state would not lead to peace but to a weakened Israel, while her "peace partners" would -- as they have in Gaza -- acquire more space and less supervision so that they can more easily train terrorists and manufacture missiles and explosives.
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THE CONSEQUENCES OF REWARDING TERRORISM

THE PEACE PROCESS may be encouraging the spread of Palestinian Arab terrorism because the world "understands" the need for the Po' Palestinians to resort to terror. People flock to help them. The U.N. wants to give them a State with no strings attached and no effort on their part. They don't even have to give up their obsession of destroying Israel. Other groups with a grievance take note that these terrorists are not punished but rewarded and so terror tactics become attractive. Not every would-be terrorist realizes that Europeans who approve of terror when it is directed at Israel may be less understanding when they are the target.

There's a history of course of Irish Catholic bombings. But playing hide-the-bomb has gone down considerably since the IRA gave up all/many/some of their weapons, so the politicians can claim the peace treaty is still in effect. The Basque continue to explode very small bombs and haven't killed anyone -- that's too boring to make a splash in the newspapers. The ones making news the past few years are Muslim -- a Muslim bomber with bad timing in Stockholm last Christmas, rape terror in Sweden, tire burning and arson in France, as well as kidnapping, torturing and massacring a young Jewish man, Ilan Halimi. British Muslims have been active at home bombing the subway and figuratively raising the flag of Islam over what previously were ordinary English communities, as well as traveling to Israel, Pakistan and Mumbai pour le sport. Muslims are also implicated in major disturbances fronted by people with various (virtuous) causes. As Nidra Poller wrote in the August 28, 2011 American Thinker

"Forces working behind specious liberation movements to forge a united Muslim front against the West are weakening us from within by fostering specious protest movements. Citizens of our democracies are led to identify with enraged mobs -- anarchists, altermondialistes, ecologists, striking students and workers, pro-Hamas anti-Zionists, indignados in Athens and Madrid...the list is endless. Palestinian shahid-murderers of Israeli civilians, stampeding Muslims damning 'Mohammed cartoons,' and middle-class students protesting tuition hikes are linked by a chain of sympathy in this danse macabre. People-gathered-in-a-public-square has become the emblem of virtue, and never mind what motivates them or where they are headed. "

Recently in Norway a white European created enough carnage to hit the papers. Of course, given that he was native stock European and could be described as right-wing and a Christian -- which he disclaimed -- he might have gotten publicity even if he'd only nicked a couple of kids.

Muslims who commit mayhem are never called Christianphobes or Westernphobes or Foreignerphobes. Breivik was immediately called an Islamophobe although his discursive manuscript immortalizing his thoughts include text proclaiming his admiration for Al-Qaeda because of their concern for cultural purity, their ability to acquire weaponry and their dedication to their cause. He studied their training manual and acted on the realization that Arabs don't have an exclusive on using terror as a weapon of demoralization and political change. He despised the takeover of his country by Muslims and on the morning of July 22 he put a bomb outside the Prime Minister's office in a Norwegian government administration building complex, because, he asserted, Norwegian politicians have encouraged Muslim immigration. In the afternoon, he used a gun on the some young Norwegians likely to become the next generation of advocates of multiculturalism and unrestricted Muslim immigration.

Memorial service for terror victims -- at a mosque!
Among the participants were Crown Prince Haakon, Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Store, Equality Minister Audun Lysbakken (SV), Oslo mayor Fabian Stang (H), American ambassador Barry White and the Bishop of Oslo Ole Christian Kvarme. They were welcomed by Imam Najeeb Naz.

Boy holding toy gun is carried by his father as 3000 Gazan Arabs celebrate the shooting murder of Jews, August 31, 2010 (photo: ViciousBabushka)

Muslims are usually said to have become terrorists because they are frustrated or poor or picked upon. But the media immediately decided the Norwegian mass murderer had no environmental or personal reasons for what he did. It was all the fault of the anti-Muslim writers that he read. As Nidra Poller wrote:

"While the similarity among mobs in Clapham, Benghazi, Tahrir Square, Strasbourg, etc. goes unnoticed, a churlish campaign has been launched against authors whose writings were cut and pasted into the manifesto of mass murderer Anders Breivik. (But the same censors go berserk if you say that the words of the Koran, the hadith, and the Sunna, no less than sermons in everyone's corner mosque, promote and provoke violence!) ... Conscientious thinkers who warn against the dangers of jihad conquest are assaulted because the white jihadi Anders Breivik was just smart enough to appreciate their works...like millions of other readers...none of them murderers... and too evil to share their humanity."

Time will tell whether Anders Breivik was an aberration like Timothy McVeigh, a white Lone Wolf terrorist who chalked up a body count sufficient to compete with a lot of more or less competent Muslim terrorists and would-be terrorists. Or was Breivik the start of a new phenomenon: other ethnic and national groups acting like a bunch of Arabs, carrying out grotesque acts of violence, seeking to maximize damage, preferring easy targets like children to facing a soldier with a gun.

While we're on the subject, pro-Palestinian defenders using FBI data cleverly added apples and cockroaches and came out with the startling news that Muslims only committed 6% of the terror attacks in the USA from 1980-2005. Latinos, Jews, Communists, "Extreme Left Wing Groups" and "others" did all the rest. This is probably accurate. After all, burning the flag by Latinos counts as one incident. Destruction of the World Trade Center by suicide-murderers, all Muslims, counts as one incident.

The FBI Terrorism 1980-2005 Terrorism by Event Report actually compared the 318 incidents by type of terror -- 209 bombings, 43 arsons, 20 malicious destructions, 16 shootings, 10 hostile takeovers, 8 robberies, 4 assaults, 2 hijackings, 2 kidnappings, 2 rocket attacks, 1 assassination and 1 WMD. It understood that the fight against terrorists of the sort that destroyed the World Trade Center was a tad more significant than catching those who release animals from a research laboratory.

The propaganda that the Arabs own the Middle East because they invaded much of it in the 7th Century and controlled it for a time can even affect those Jews whose primary allegiance is to Liberalism, politically-correct free speech, and Underdoggery. They will dedicate themselves to any cause that claims to be Liberal and isn't Jewish or whines it is the underdog and needs protection. The last essay in this section talks about one such Jew.

MAYHEM IN NORWAY
by Nidra Poller

  Nidra Poller asks why Norwegians seem to have been mentally unprepared for a terrorist attack. The terrorist, Anders Breivik, managed to stalk and shoot victims for well over an hour before the police finally came. True, police were busy with the aftermath of his morning attack in the heart of Oslo. But distraction and confusion is what the terrorists we know most about -- Arab terrorists -- do. Shouldn't those responsible for public safety know that? None of the victims, engrossed in play acting that Israelis are terrorists and the Palestinian Arabs are innocent lambs, took the initiative in stopping him. Nor did they have security guards, who need to be prepared for a terrorist attack. Even though the Norwegians are embroiled in Middle East politics and favor unfettered Muslim immigration domestically, they acted as if they themselves were immune to attack from those unhappy with their policies. In this case, the irritant was Norway's policy of catering to Muslim immigrants, allowing them to take over neighborhoods and increasingly demanding their convenience be given consideration over the needs of Norway's native population. Breivek used the tools and techniques most used by Muslim terrorists. Will Norway be shocked into understanding they have been reassigned their role in a world-wide drama -- they have gone from the serene role of high level decision maker to that of ordinary victim -- and they can't opt out.
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THE "OSLO SYNDROME" AND THE TERROR ATTACK IN NORWAY
by Barry Rubin

  With the aid of European admirers, Arab terrorism had the best of all possible worlds. At the small cost of a few of their children, they inflicted monstrous and long-lasting physical and psychological damage on Israelis while their Western admirers rationalized their acts with the query, "How else can these defenseless people defend themselves? It's Israel that has the strong military. It's Israel that's in a position to do the right thing and make concessions." And best of all, the intellectual "neutrals" such as Norwegian politicos would sprout legalese, asserting that Israel's response must be proportional, thus neutralizing Israel's military strengths, while secure in the knowledge that Israel would never fight Arab-style - slitting throating and targeting Arab babies isn't their way. What they didn't forsee was that terrorism was made to seem a most attractive weapon, a weapon whose use was not restricted to Arabs. As Barry Rubin in this essay points out that "... terrorism is not an ideology or a movement but merely a strategy: to murder noncombatants systematically and deliberately for political ends in order to get your enemy to give up and your own side to cheer and join up." Monkey see, monkey do. The Norwegians are now in the unenviable position of seeing one of their own turn the terror weapon inward.
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A REPLY TO AMBASSADOR SEVJE
by Wallace Edward Brand

  The Norwegians seem to have no concept of the world-class proxy war taking place in the Middle East: the Palestinian Arabs, both those controlled by the Fatah Terror Group and those in Gaza under the thumb of the less polished Hamas, are the foot soldiers of resurgent Islam. The terrorist activities they practice in Israel are eventually emulated and exported. On the other side, Israel, not by its own choice, has been thrown into the front lines and given the role of defending Western values of fair play and 'live and let live.' Ironically, some of those who should be most grateful haven't a clue. One such is Norway's Ambassador to Israel, Svein Sevje, who condemns Norwegian terrorism against Norwegians but condones Arab terrorism against Jews. This is based, he claims, on Israel's occupation of Arab land. Wallace Brand responds in this essay with the actual facts about the so-called Israeli occupation.
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GETTING BIRTHRIGHT WRONG
by Philip Getz

  Philip Getz responds to an article called "The Romance of Birthright Israel", in which a young participant trashes the Birthright Israel program, suggesting all sorts of sinister motivations. Getz gets the response just right. He provides us with insight into the narrowed perspectives of pro-palestinian Jews and the preposterous conclusions their adopted ideology can impose. As Getz says, "the only interesting aspect of Feldman's article is how keenly it encapsulates, at its extreme, the syndrome that Birthright was created to combat." One can only hope that someday she will come out of her trance and start using her "Yiddishe kopf."
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KEEPING ISRAEL SOVEREIGN. KEEPING ISRAEL ALIVE

This set of articles suggest how Israel should handle the current crisis, where the U.N. plans soon to sanction the illegitimate birth of another Arab state. The terrorists who govern the Arabs in Gaza and in Samaria and Judea (what the media insists on calling the West Bank) have announced they will request the U.N. to grant them a state, carving it out of most of Biblical Israel. Inside Israel, Israeli Arabs and Jewish Marxists who would dismember their own State to satisfy a spurious Arab claim are also in favor of a Palestinian state.

An immediate solution to being besieged to give up land would be to annex Samaria and Judea. Israel has international law on its side, as well as Biblical promise, and an extraordinary history of devotion to the homeland: there were always Jews living in Israel despite having to endure dreadful hardships and Jews kept its memory alive for 2000 years when living in the Diaspora. In recent times, Israel created a modern state out of a malaria-infested, rock-strewn wasteland, a state that in a few short years has benefitted the entire world with innovative electronics and medical techniques. It has served as an instructive example of how to live civilized when barbarians want to reduce you to their level. Even demographic trends are in its favor. It also has the reality underlying the creation of most countries -- it conquered the land fair and square, regaining more of its own land each time the Arab countries invaded Israel to demolish it.

The problem is that Israel is still groggy from years of believing that it must cater to world opinion. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the luxury of deferring action. It must rid itself of Fifth-Column Arabs in Israel and curtail the growth of the Arab population so that it doesn't reach the "take-over" stage of Muslim control of a foreign host. (See Richard Butrick article above.)

Annexation is a short-term solution. A better solution and one that gives the Arabs that call themselves Palestinians their own land is to give them their own place within the vast land area the Arabs own. See e.g., Section 1 of the September-October 2010 Issue. This will require regional support -- but, after all, the Arab states were responsible for the local Arabs becoming refugees. In fact they created two sets of refugees: Arab and Jewish.

Israel solved the problem of the Jewish refugees from Arab lands -- it made them citizens and helped them reconstruct their lives as Israelis while keeping what they wanted of their old customs and traditions. They did this with no help from the U.N. The wealth and real property the Jews left behind when they were forced to flee is still in the hands of the Arab states.

The Arab countries have resources to solve the other refugee problem -- they are in position to give the Arabs who now call themselves Palestinians room to construct a state somewhere within the 99.99% of the Middle East the Arab own. It could be much larger than Israel and the Territories and still be a tiny portion of the land the Arabs have. At this point, someone is sure to say: but don't you understand, the Arab refugees want to return to their homeland, just as the Jews did over 2000 years of the Diaspora. The answer is that it is a publicist's dream but a complete lie to say that Israel belongs to the Palestinian people. There is no Palestinian People. There never was a Country or State that was called Palestine. There is no claim by the Palestinian Arabs to land that most of them came to after the Jewish Aliyah made the area economically attractive. The land was owned by the Ottomans for hundreds of years before the Europeans conquered it in WW1, not by Arabs.

It is ludicrous that so many local Arabs have kept their benefits-rich refugee status while living under Arab governance in Gaza, Samaria and Judea. It is pathetic that their pretending that their environment and culture is alien to what they had before their (great) grandparents left Israel -- a few miles down the road -- is accepted by their logic-deficient and history-ignorant sympathizers.

Admittedly, giving the "Palestinians" a state is allowing them to win the "I'm a nuisance" exploitation game, but there are practical reasons to do so. It would wipe out the UNRWA-run ponds where the malaria of terrorism is bred; it would save the ever-growing expense of keeping a large group on perpetual welfare; it would quarantine a group that is a menace not just to Israel but to any of the Arab states that have taken them in. It would eliminate a wild card in an already unstable area of the world. It would remove a distraction so Israel could deal with the very real threat coming from Iran.

For Israel, this is not the time to expel a sizable portion of the half million Jews living in the towns and villages of Samaria and Judea from their homes and businesses, forcing them to flee as refugees to what's left of Israel. It will be impossible to do so without bankrupting the country -- recall that most of the 10,000 Jews of Gaza who were expelled by the Sharon government in 2005 are not yet settled, even though it has already cost much more than even pessimistic projections estimated -- and the contributions the Gazan Jews made to the economy by the sale of their spectacular produce are no more. More to the point, we don't need demoralized Jews, refugees in their own country. Israel is in the forefront of those battling radical Islam. We should help her concentrate on that, not distract her while Iran develops a nuclear bomb.

This set of essays assumes it's o.k. that there be one Jewish state in the Middle East. The first essay is a logical projection of Israel's current conciliatory agreement to a 2-state solution. The other essays look at ways and means to avoiding death by accommodation. They look at two problems that Israel has: a growing Israeli Arabs population, many of whom are radicalized and starting to act as Muslims do in any host country as they become more numerous and see themselves soon reaching critical mass; and an appeasement mentality that is compromising Israel's ability to maintain its sovereignty. It has even infected the IDF.

PEACE AT LAST -- A HARBINGER OF THE IMMEDIATE FUTURE?
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut brilliantly describes how Israel can be diplomatically hounded to its own death by the combined actions of UN diplomats, the U.S. State Department, and the tutored and continued riotous demands of the Arabs, whose ranks are enlarged by useful idiots volunteering to help the Palestinians gain their rights. Their clamor is backed by support from "world" leaders and meets little resistance from the appeasement mentality of Israeli politicians. The essay is called satire. In point of fact, it is so close to how the Arabs under Arafat and Abbas have bargained -- accepting a final agreement one day, using it as starting point the next -- that the only thing Steven Plaut may have gotten wrong -- should the Israelis let themselves be snookered into giving up land -- is the date. He places it in 2013. It could happen in 2012.
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'PALESTINE' IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL?
by Jerold S. Auerbach

  Jerold Auerbach does what shouldn't be necessary -- he reminds the politicos of the U.N. that its creating a Palestinian State in what was Mandated Palestine would be illegal. It would violate the U.N.'s own role as guarantor that what was Mandated Palestine is held in an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people. Auerbach also explores why Israel has not made this information generally known. He writes, contrasting a secular government and more or less religious settlers: "At best ambivalent - and usually hostile - toward Jews in Judea and Samaria, government officials have resolutely maintained silence about the international guarantees for the 'close settlement' of Jews west of the Jordan River." But that doesn't do away with reality: Israeli settlements are legitimate because Samaria and Judea belong to Israel. They are legally Israel's by the same authority that gave the rest of the Ottoman Middle East to the Arabs. "The Palestinian claim, by contrast, is a contrived recent invention. ... Devised by Arabs who only recently identified themselves as 'Palestinians,' it is built on the foundation of perpetual victimization claims, the international determination to delegitimize Israel, and - perhaps most revealing - the pillaging of Jewish and Zionist history." Annexation by Israel of at least pieces of Samaria and Judea is a low-keyed but necessary solution.
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THE TWO-STATE "SOLUTION": AROUND THE WORLD AND IN HISTORY
by Steven Kruger

  Steven Kruger puts into perspective the bizarre notion that Jewish land can and should accommodate another state. Of interest is the emphasis given in the article to God's promise to the Jewish people, and how it is ignored by Israel's secular government. "Instead of declaring and enforcing the rights of Jews, the government of Israel continues the touchy-feely policy toward Arabs put in place by left-wing Jews in Mandatory Palestine after World War I." Conversely, Kruger puts little faith in promises made by secular organizations or in the integrity or fairness of what is euphemistically called 'the international community'. He points out that "[i]f implemented, the two-state 'solution' would find a vulnerable Land of Israel, hemmed by an irrational border, and surrounded by a post-Mubarak Egypt, a Hamas-controlled Aza, a post-Abbas 'Palestine,' an Assad-controlled Syria, and a Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon." He rejects this suicidal solution in favor of a 22-state solution, one Jewish, the others Arab.
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ARABS IN ISRAEL
by Zvi November

  If you visit Israel convinced that it keeps its Arabs fearful and oppressed, it will come as a shock to see Arabs walking with ease in all the parks and gardens and malls all over the country. The converse is not true. It is the Jews who are bullied. It is the Jews who are fearful of going into places they will be surrounded by an Arab crowd. Driving a car on a highway when 'prankish' Arab teenagers gather to pelt cars with rocks has become an unsolicited adventure. Jews have learned to stay out of Arab villages, where the inhabitants can suddenly become violent. Jews routinely have their cars stolen, their herds stolen, their orchards burned, their olive trees uprooted. When Israel reclaimed eastern Jerusalem in 1968 after Jordan and Egypt failed their second try at destroying Israel, Israel foolishly did not eject the Arabs who were squatting in the homes of Jews that Jordan had evicted in 1948. It now requires protracted legal battles to reclaim the Jewish houses one at a time, while the Arabs illegally take State land wholesale and built illegally without official protest. To add to the injury: the probability is that the police and the judiciary will ignore or minimize the damage that the Arabs do. Zvi November paints an accurate picture of Arabs in Israel, not forgetting to write about those -- number unknown -- who genuinely appreciate living in Israel. In general, however, the Arabs enjoy both the medical, educational and psychological benefits of living in Israel and the pleasure of playing victim to convince easily-gulled Westerners they are the suffering victims of Israeli inhumanity.
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THE JEWISH WAY IN WAR
by Elliot Jager

  For many years now, the IDF has not emphasized that its primary mission is to defend Israel. It has fought wars as if a major objective was to avoid raising the ire of hostile politicians and media. In Jenin when they hunted for terrorists, they were scrupulous about not injuring Arab women and children, at the cost of 23 soldiers dying, most of them lured into booby traps by the same children they were protecting from harm. In the Gaza campaign, they avoided wholesale shooting at groups that were shielding the terrorists. They have gone to absurd lengths, including announcing they were coming, so that the most that could be accomplished was the destruction of an empty building. Given the anti-Israel feeling the Arabs have successfully generated, their scruples have bought them nothing, not even a pat on the back from a hostile press. And isn't it immoral for the IDF to have valued the lives of an enemy that started the war and will not stop warring above the lives of its own people? Elliot Jager examines the question of morality when the enemy has no scruples. This is a thoughtful examination of the Jewish concepts of fighting a war. Jager cites the political philosopher Asa Kasher who "believes that Israel has a front-line role in helping the enlightened world develop the legal and moral tools to confront the scourge of terrorism."  

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BUILDING THE LAND OF ISRAEL ONE TREE AT A TIME
by Josh Hasten

  The previous essay described how well Israeli Arabs are treated in Israel and how they have responded. This essay looks at Arab behavior from the point of view of the Israeli, who sees the Arabs grabbing land and creating enclaves that keep out Jews. Josh Hasten's writes of an interview with Nadia Matar, a remarkable woman who heads Women in Green (WIG), a group that understands that if Israel is to be Jewish, Jews must be able to go anywheres in their own land, without fear and without restriction. Specifically, WIG works to keep a presence on land that is stealthily being taken over by Arabs (who of course instantly claim they've been in that place since ancient times). As a personal anecdote, on a trip to Samaria and Judea with the AFSI group, we drove to an army base that had been evacuated without notice and without concern that letting it be taken over by the local Arabs would put the surrounding Jewish villages in jeopardy. The army's advice to the Jews was: stay out of the way of the Arabs. Avoid trouble. WIG was there, saying by their actions: this is our country and we won't give up an inch. If Israel survives its current appeasement mentality, it will in large measure be due to patriots like Nadia and the Women in Green.
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HOW TO HANDLE THE PALESTINIAN ARAB PROBLEM
by Yoram Ettinger

  In this essay, Yoram Ettinger first lays out the problem. The problem is that the problem has been misstated as one of Arab concern for the Palestinian Arab, when in point of fact the Arab states make use the Palestinian Arabs as supposed victims, but care nothing about them. Were Israel to disappear tomorrow and the Palestinian Arabs take all the land they claim as theirs, it wouldn't make a dent in the disarray and potential disasters in the Middle East. That being said, Ettinger suggests how Israel should be reacting, specifically with subduing Palestinian Arab terrorism, and, more generally, how to do the necessary and not be inhibited by fear of foreign repercussions.
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History Section

JERUSALEM DAY: TODAY AND 1948
Hadar-Israel

  The Hadar-Israel Organization reminds us of the last time that Israel was divided. It happened just after Israel became a state in 1948. Her neighbors invaded the new-born state intent on destroying it. They didn't succeed but Jordan took over the eastern section of Jerusalem, kicked out or killed all the Jews, destroyed the synagogues and installed Arabs in the Jewish houses. It wasn't until 1967 that Israel reclaimed that part of Jerusalem the Arabs had started calling East Jerusalem and claiming they had lived there since time immemorial. The photographs speak for themselves.
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OBAMA'S EAST JERUSALEM STANCE REWARDS 1948 ETHNIC CLEANSING
by Omri Ceren

  The previous article recorded that the Jews were forced out of their homes in the Eastern part of Jerusalem in 1948. This article by Omri Ceren follows up on a major consequence. As he writes: "But because they [the Jordanians] succeeded in doing that [occupying Jerusalem] for almost 20 whole years — in contrast to 1,000 years of continuous Jewish life — the Obama administration insists that the Jewish State needs to cede portions of East Jerusalem to a future Palestinian entity on demographic grounds. Very even-handed!"
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index. To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

July 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
August 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


MAY-JUNE, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the May-June 2011 issue:

Osama Bin Laden Is Dead. Is Al-Qaeda? (Swami, Greenfield, Anbar, Solway, Plaut)
The Peaceful Religion Of Islam, Where Lies Are Truth And Brutality Is A Habit (Ibrahim, Imani, Bussel, Barnhardt)
The Arab Nakba/i> (Greenfield, Yemini, Hornik)
What's Happening With Israel's Previous Peace Partners? (Spengler, King)
Israel As Front Line Defense Against An Islamic Takeover. Israel As A Major Asset For The West (London, Eidelberg, Kemp)
What Will It Be? Two Distorted States In Chronic Tension Or A Single Sovereign Jewish State? (Honig, Dann, Hinderacker)
Hasbara And Public Relation (Davidson, Shulman, Eidelberg, Saperstein, Levinson)
History Section (Julius, Clifford, Loewenberg)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (May, June)

OSAMA BIN LADEN IS DEAD. IS AL-QAEDA?

This set of essays speculates on what the next phase of Islamic terror will look like. One thing is certain. It isn't going away. Not when it is so effective. Acts of terror are the stick. "Moderate" Muslims and the U.N. hold out the carrot of appeasement. And many a Westerner is all too willing to bite. Some seem to crave dhimmitude, both for themselves and for us.

AL-QAEDA: THE NEXT GENERATION
by Praveen Swami

  Osama bin Ladin was often portrayed as the linch pin of terrorism. Knock him out and his terror organization and his affiliates would crumble. So there was much joy when the Navy Seals assassinated him, as if all would soon be well. Unfortunately, Arab terrorism won't just disappear. Praveen Swami writes realistically about the next generation of jihadists ready and eager to perform acts of terror in Pakistan and Iraq and endanger other countries in the region.
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AL QAEDA'S NEXT WAVE OF TERROR
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield projects what we can expect next of al-Qaeda's in the U.S.A. He points out that "[w]hile Americans are still thinking in terms of 9/11, the terrorists themselves have already moved on to the next phase of terror." It might be another Twin-Tower size spectacular disaster but it is more likely to be "lone wolf" operations performed by insurgents bred locally. It is also likely that the strategy will be more subtle: "the 'Muslim extremists' carry out the violence, while the 'moderate Muslims'" encourage us to try harder to appease the terrorists.
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INTIMIDATION
by Michael Anbar

  Intimidation as a planned prelude to war, is not unique to Islam. But, as Michael Anbar points out, it is "an integral part of Islam" and an important technique in the continuing jihad against the infidel, no matter which political Muslim group, no matter how the groups differ in ideological nuances. In the USA, "while Muslims constitute about 1% of the American population, they contribute 80% of the Home Grown Terrorism." Anbar traces the de facto alliances between Islamic aggressors and Western appeasers that cut Kosovo out of Serbia and now threatens to amputate Israel and weaken America.
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AN UNHOLY MARRIAGE
by David Solway

  David Solway examines why young Westerns of the liberal persuasion dote on the Palestinian Arabs. He suggests that in addition "to ancestral hostility to Jews," it is "an explosive mixture of immaturity, ignorance, and surrender of the will, leavened by the illusion of noble self-sacrifice to a higher cause." Dedicated to the Palestinian cause, they blame Israel for all the ills that beset the Arabs. It says something that they are undeterred in their ardor even though Arabs frequently rape and kill their dedicated admirers, use them as shields in dangerous situations and have radically different ideas on how to treat homosexuals and women.
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HOW SUPPORTERS OF PALESTINIAN TERRORISM ARE MURDERED AND RAPED BY THEIR PALESTINIAN SPONSORS
by Steven Plaut

  The previous essay examined the Leftist-Muslim bonding. asking why the Leftists accept Muslim ideology, which negates their own belief system in many important ways. In this essay, Steven Plaut discusses the hazards of the relationship that the western participants willfully ignore when entering the blood-lust Arab culture, thus endangering themselves. How long can they keep blaming Israel to avoid viewing their Arab friends realistically? How long will it be before they understand they are being duped by the western Marxists such as the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), who are using them unscrupulously?
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THE PEACEFUL RELIGION OF ISLAM, WHERE LIES ARE TRUTH AND BRUTALITY IS A HABIT

The way of life it encourages also creates some serious physical problems for its adherents.

WERE CONQUERED CHRISTIANS REALLY LIBERATED MUSLIMS?
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim writes about Fadel Soliman, an expert who lectures non-Muslims -- churches, universities, the U.S. Dept of Defense -- about Islam. It is historical fact that the Egyptian Copts are descendents of the original Egyptians, but Soliman inverts the historical record and claims they are actually Muslims that Islam is now liberating. Soliman's reasoning is as fictitious as the Muslim claim that Jesus was a Palestinian because he was born in Judea, which the British -- centuries later, and imitating the Romans -- labeled 'Palestine' in pre-World War 1. A while later, the Arab immigrants began calling themselves Palestinian. We should heed Ibrahim's conclusion: "whether Muslims consciously deceive infidels or unconsciously deceive themselves, the goal has long been one: empowering Islam and its adherents — reality be damned."
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COMPASSION - ISLAMIC REPUBLIC STYLE
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani tells us about an Iranian woman, whose crime was that she was of the Baha'i religion and an agent of the Big Satan and Small Satan, the USA and Israel. Despite the seriousness of these charges, the Iranian government was compassionate. They "...didn't hang the severely-beaten incapacitated woman who was unable to walk to the gallows to be hanged. They simply dumped her in the streets to suffer a painful slow death for every day of her remaining life."
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PALESTINIANS SHOW CONCERN FOR THEIR LAND BY POLLUTING THE WATER SUPPLY
by Ari Bussel

  Ari Bussel writes about how the Palestinian arabs and their foreign friends continue to contrast Israel's water usage (as shown by their gorgeous produce) and the Arab's water deprivation. The pro-arab propagandists willfully ignore that the Jews conserve, reuse and innovate to get the most of each drop of water. They ignore that the Arabs pollute the water supply, dig illegal wells, sell the water and steal the cement used to reinforce the dams and wells. Relying on the typical reader's ignorance, they contrast the lush banana plantations and the pitiful village arabs, sluggish, dirty, and deprived of water.
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THE KEYSTONE OF THE ISLAMIC MILIEU: INBREEDING
by Ann Barnhardt

  I first heard of the high degree of inbreeding among Arabs from an Israeli nurse who mentioned that most of her hospital's child-care budget went on treatment for the Arab children. They required expensive treatment such as kidney dialysis. When I asked why, she said, "they marry cousins. We beg them not to, but they do anyways." But until the article by Anne Barnhardt, the societal costs hadn't occurred to me. Especially when religion, family and tribal custom encourage a high degree of sustained inbreeding over many generations. It also raises the question: why should Israel take on the costly burden of care for the hostile group of Arab immigrants who are now called "Palestinians", when the Arab countries have the money and the kinship, and bear the guilt of creating the refugee status of so many of the Palestinian Arabs.
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THE ARAB NAKBA

From the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center:
(http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/ English/eng_n/html/ipc_e191.htm)

"Events for Nakba Day, the 63rd anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel in 1948, climaxed on May 15, 2011. They included mass marches, rallies and propaganda demonstrations. In some locations there were also riots, stone-throwing, confrontations with IDF soldiers and a violent invasion of Israeli territory."

[...]

As far as Hamas and the others who reject the right of the State of Israel to exist were concerned, the Nakba Day events were successful. They were many and large, had a propaganda impact, and included the precedent of the forceful invasion of Palestinians into Israeli territory in the Druze village of Majdal Shams, who used it as a stage to proclaim the 'right of return.' In our assessment, such a 'success' is liable to inspire and encourage others in the territories, the Arab countries and around the world to promote similar tactics."

Brainwashing the younger generation with the "right of return:" Gazan children carrying signs reading "We will certainly return to...Acre" and "We will certainly return to...Ashdod." The key at the lower right symbolizes the so-called "right or return;" upper left, the Hamas emblem (Hamas' Palestine-info website, May 15, 2011).

NAKBACIDE
by Daniel Greenfield

  When it's the end of another Nakba day of mass mourning over fictitious pasts, when the posing is over and the screamed-out throats are hoarse and the scorched tires are cooling, what's been accomplished? Daniel Greenfield says that what "these Arabs really want is to rehash grievances and sullenly plot another genocide, instead of coming to terms with the consequences of their own actions." And so they continue to respond "with obstinate treachery and violence at every turn." Labile, malleable, enjoying a good slaughter, they are type-cast to riot when told and play victim to perfection. But these aren't the qualities that make good citizens in a democratic state.
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THE STORY OF ARAB APARTHEID
by Ben-Dror Yemini

  The official version of the relationship between the Arab countries and the local arabs that became refugees when the Arab countries invaded the new-born State of Israel is that the Arabs grieve so for their "Palestinian" cousins, they can't make peace with Israel until the Palestinian Arabs are settled. It is rarely mentioned that these self-same Arab countries have refused to assimilate the Arab refugees but, like picking on an infected sore, they keep the sore from healing. As one example, remember the Gaza Flotilla wanted to bring in cement that could be used to build bunkers but Israel only allows the import into Gaza of cement that is non-military. Some Arab countries don't allow the refugees to have any cement! Of course, all these restrictions by the Arab countries are intended to keep the refugees looking pathetic and oppressed. How do they do this? It's called apartheid -- you know, what they accuse Israel of doing. Israel, which gave the local Arabs their first schools of higher education, Israel, which keeps alive Arab children that would have previously died. Israel which gives jobs and hope to the Arabs, who are so appreciative, they celebrate whenever a Jew is massacred.
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THE NAKBA CONCENTRATES ISRAELI MINDS
by P. David Hornik

  The dead-serious theatrics of Nakba has one virtue. As does the announcement that Hamas and Fatah have patched up their differences and are loving brothers again, the twisted logic of blaming Israel for Arab homelessness and the increased audacity of Arab attacks on Nakba day are forcing Israelis to shed their illusion that they can buy peace if they just pay enough in land and keep pumping up the Arab economy in Samaria and Judea. The local arabs have been conditioned to believe the fiction that they are 'Palestinians' and that Israel is occupying 'Palestine', their land. So it is not surprising that their solution -- typically Arab -- is to destroy Israel.
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WHAT'S HAPPENING WITH ISRAEL'S PREVIOUS PEACE PARTNERS?

The Arab Spring seems headed for a cold winter. Israel invested a great deal in its initial peace negotiations with Arab countries, returning all of the Sinai that it had captured from Egypt after Egypt yet again invaded Israel. The peace with Egypt has always been a brittle one and now that Egypt has had a "regime change" from Mubarak's dictatorship, it might break up entirely. The new contenders for power in Egypt don't sound democratic. They spout Islamic ideas and threatens to repudiate the peace treaty. The other shiny example of a peaceful neighbor is Jordan. Though unacknowledged, Israel has been a mainstay, helping the Hashemites who rule over Jordan stay in power. The Jordanian king has shown his gratitude by trashing Israel verbally whenever he's had a chance. His survival on the throne now appears more precarious than ever.

THE HUNGER TO COME IN EGYPT
Spengler

  While most discussions of Egypt's future revolve around the question: will she or won't she be taken over by ..... (fill in the blank), Spengler asks: given that half of Egypt's million people live on less that $2 a day and given that half of her wheat is imported and given that prices will likely go up markedly, will Egypt be able to feed her populace and rein in discontent, whichever party is in power? As Spengler notes, famine kills. Big time.
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THE HASHEMITES IN PALESTINE: A ROYAL SCAM THAT KEEPS ON SCAMMING
by Ruth King

  Despite the ancient-sounding name, the Hashamite kingdom didn't come into being until 1922, when Great Britain pulled one of its own scams and gave most of the land that was to be held for a Jewish state to their Hashamite allies 'to administrate'. As time went on, the virtual government was accepted as real. When Jordan invaded Israel in 1948, "...east Jerusalem was restored to rubble. Jewish shrines and cemeteries were sacked, torched, and defiled." Jordan kicked out the Jews and gave their houses to Arabs, most of whom (or their descendants) still live in these house as "squatters", paying no rent, because the Israeli government made no attempt to reclaim Jewish property when it defeated Jordan yet again in 1967, when Jordan yet again invaded Israel. Whenever Jews try to reclaim their property, the sobsisterhood writes sadly how Jews are invading East Jerusalem and attempting to take over Arab property. Ruth King chronicles the fantasy history of (trans)Jordan, which ignores that "Jordan is a Palestinian Arab state, occupied and ruled by a Hashemite minority." There is no reason that the local Arabs need to steal Biblical Israel to have a state of their own. They already have one -- Jordan As for the current Jordanian King, the future doesn't look rosy.
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ISRAEL AS FRONT LINE DEFENSE AGAINST AN ISLAMIC TAKEOVER. ISRAEL AS A MAJOR ASSET FOR THE WEST.

THE UN VOTE ON A PALESTINIAN STATE
by Herbert London

  As Herbert London points out, the upcoming vote in the U.N. "to create a Palestinian state through political mandate" has little to do with concern about the Palestinian Arabs. It has much to do with Islam's ambition to conquer the West. Tiny Israel is rightly perceived as "the bulwark in the war with jihadists." Weakening Israel weakens the West. The Palestinian issue is best perceived as a "tactical instrument" in the long-range, long-term plan to spread Sharia law throughout the world.
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A CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE IN ISRAEL
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the conventional wisdom was that Israel was no longer of use to the United States. Given that the USA needed Arab oil and given the propensity of the US State Dept to favor Arabs anyway, the future looked gloomy. How wrong the prediction was. Putting aside that Israel is America's only reliable friend and ally in the entire Middle East and ignoring the contributions Israel makes in general to the betterment of humanity, Israel's intelligence gathering and technological brilliance are priceless assets for the U.S.A. Professor Paul Eidelberg summarizes some of them.
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THE IDF, BRITAIN AND AFGHANISTAN
by Colonel Richard Kemp

  Many remember Colonel Richard Kemp's courageous defense of Israel's fighting force during the Cast Lead operation, when they entered Gaza to weed out the terrorists that were shelling Israel's civilians. At the time, primed by the Goldstone Committee's vicious attack on the IDF, it seemed the entire media was vociferously accusing Israel of war crimes, while ignoring the real war criminals: the Arab terrorists and their state sponsors. Since then, Goldstone has admitted his assessment of the IDF was dead wrong, and Colonel Kemp's judgment is shown to be accurate. This is an amplification of his take on the IDF as a model on how to fight Islamic terrorism.
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WHAT WILL IT BE? TWO DISTORTED STATES IN CHRONIC TENSION OR A SINGLE SOVEREIGN JEWISH STATE?

Maybe Israel should stop trying to make the unworkable work. A Two-State Solution is no solution when the Arabs have stated their goal is to kill off Israel, not to create yet another Arab state. Why should Israel continue to invest effort in a two-state solution, which, at best, will leave her crippled and at the mercy of her terrorist neighbors? Israel should, instead, put her energy in developing herself as a sovereign state. That will allow her to grow and develop her uniqueness as a Jewish state chock full of talented people, who put their energy into enterprises that benefit everyone. What happens to the Arabs in Samaria and Judea and Gaza? The Arabs have 99.99% of the Middle East. There must be some spot they can deed to the "Palestinians" from the Territories and the refugee camps as a potential homeland.

THE BÖRNE IDENTIFICATION
by Sarah Honig

  Sarah Honig writes about the pervasive self-deception of too many Israelis -- that they could buy peace with their implacable enemies by giving them Jewish land. The final blow came when the terrorist Arab groups inhabiting Samaria-Judea and Gaza stopped playing good terrorists and bad terrorists and made it clear that they are cut from the same cloth. They have the same objective -- to wipe out Israel. They differ only in the thickness of the decorous veneer that covers their violence.
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THE IMPERATIVE OF JEWISH SOVEREIGNTY
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann points out that "Sovereignty, the ability of a government to act independently and in its own interests, is the essence of statehood." As he says, "Declaring JEWISH sovereignty clearly and unequivocally will correct the distortion and misunderstanding of those who ignore or deny Jewish history and international law grounded in the League of Nations and in its Mandate for Palestine." "It is a statement of affirmation, not apology — of commitment, not appeasement."
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TIME TO ANNEX JUDEA AND SAMARIA?
by John Hinderacker

  John Hinderaker points out that annexing Judea and Samaria would "entirely moot the idea of an independent Palestinian state, not just deter the U.N. from supporting one for the moment." An excellent reason for openly claiming land that actually belongs to Israel by international law. [google for "howard grief", "yoram shifftan," "wallace brand" and "san remo" on Think-Israel for the relevant information.] It is a propitious moment because the "Palestinians" are asking the U.N. to magically give them a state out of land that isn't theirs. In doing so, they acknowledge that Oslo is dead -- another experiment based on the wrong assumptions and propelled by hope rather than logic is over.
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HASBARA, PUBLIC RELATION AND EDUCATION

RULES AND GUIDELINES FOR WESTERNERS REPORTING ON THE MIDDLE EAST
by Edward Davidson

  This article should be required reading by anyone and everyone exposed to the Main Stream Media (MSM). Using the guise of instructing the MSM how to write a story about the Jews and Arabs in the Middle East (ME), Edgar Davidson brilliantly alerts us to almost every ratty trick the MSM uses in distorting events in the ME and attempting to engender sympathy for the Arabs, no matter how obscene their behavior.
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IS THE HISTORY OF JIHAD A MATTER OF INTERPRETATION?
by Richard H. Shulman

  Using the history of Jihad as the particular area of inquiry. Richard Shulman writes about a general issue: how factual is history? Data are often missing when most needed. Drawing conclusions from the available data is not a routine procedure; it is, to a degree, an art influenced by personal and institutional attitudes. The growing belief in the moral equivalence of all cultures does not counter the bias introduced by personal values. When the reality of evil is denied, implications that would stem from acknowledging that a particular society is fundamentally evil are also ignored. Historic Islamic Jihad, with its current emphasis on destroying Israel, is a rich lode, where we can mine material on how Islam imbues its followers with a insatiable desire to conquer the peoples of the world -- "by arms, diplomacy, deception, enslavement, rape, castration, propaganda, infiltration, intimidation, civil disobedience, abuse of Western law and tolerance, and elections." It is also a case study in how historians sympathizing with the Arab cause have dishonored their profession by distorting the facts, and, in some instances, inventing them. The Western notion that basically we're all fair-minded and tolerant is not only not true but shields the Westerner from clearly perceiving the horrors perpetrated by the Arab invaders, directly guided by the tenets of their religion. This is an important essay, both for it general applicability and its specific analysis of jihad.
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CHANGING THE LANGUAGE OF PUBLIC DISCOURSE
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Paul Eidelberg boldly starts this essay this way: "Israel is trapped in the defeatist and self-effacing rhetoric of contemporary public discourse." He goes on to prove his point, and suggests some ways and means for improving Israel's Hasbara. He beautifully sums up what Israel really needs: "The one thing lacking in Israel is a goal that systematically invigorates the nation's collective memory and political creativity, that enhances her identity as the world's one and only Jewish commonwealth — the nation that gave mankind the Book of Books, the Torah. Yes, it was the Torah that liberated men and nations from idolatry and paganism. It was the Torah, by its lapidary sentence in Genesis that man is created in the Image of God that elevated humanity and proclaimed the moral unity of the human race denied by Islam. This should be Israel's message, conveyed quietly, as on cat's paws."
  READ MORE
 

SWEET REVENGE; OHR'S BAT MITZVAH
by Rachel Saperstein

  What the previous essay by Professor Eidelberg proposes for public information and education, many Israelis are already practicing in their own lives: they are proudly living as Torah-observant Jews in their own Land, and have no intention of voluntarily giving up an inch of it. Some of them have weathered the trauma of being kicked out by their own government from their homes and businesses in Neve Dekalim, Gaza, and receiving inadequate support from their own government to rebuild their lives. But their Faith sustains them and many are rebuilding their lives now in Samaria and Judea mainly by their own efforts. Rachel Saperstein and her husband Moshe are two of these remarkable people. As she says, "we become stronger as we produce children who are clever, decent, happy and kind. What sweet revenge!"
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ADL AND NJDC: OBAMA'S ANTI-ISRAEL GARBAGE DOESN'T STINK
by Bill Levinson

  We're beginning to be able to spot a Jewish anti-Jew -- the one who uses his Jewish identity to help his real friends -- anyone who hates Israel. Professor Steven Plaut has been tracking the spoor of this creature for years, particularly in his academic lairs. In this essay, Bill Levinson describes a more subtle version of the species -- the polite member of an authentic Jewish organization, who -- were we to follow his mealy-mouth advice -- would lead us into catastrophe as quickly and thoroughly as if we followed the advice of the International Solidarity Movement. While we're at it, why does AIPAC work for yet another Arab state, this one inside/next to/around/splitting Israel? Doesn't it understand such a state, either controlled by Fatah or Hamas or directly by Iran, would be sitting on Israel's main supply of water? Shooting planes landing at Ben Gurion would be duck soup. And they wouldn't need long-range missiles to damage Israel's compact population centers. Whatever is AIPAC thinking?
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HISTORY SECTION

FARHUD: A SLAUGHTER IN IRAQ
by Lyn Julius

  Lyn Julius writes frequently of the violent expulsion in the 1940s-50s of Jews from Arab countries, where in many cases, the Jews had lived there long before the Arab invasion. In this essay, she writes of the farhud (violent dispossession), the pogrom against the Jews in Baghdad, Iraq, on June 1-2, 1941. The Farhad may have been for Sephardic Jews what Kristallnacht was for German and Europeans Jews -- a clear sign that Jews would be increasing targeted for expulsion and/or extinction. Both were the creation of Nazi anti-semitism. As Julius remarks, "The Farhud cemented a wartime Arab-Nazi alliance designed to rid Palestine, and the world, of the Jews." The aftermath in both cases was similar -- a Nazi pattern of victimisation - dismantlement, dispossession and expulsion. Nuremberg-style laws criminalised Zionism, freezing Jewish bank accounts, instituting quotas and restrictions on jobs and movement." Aside from the Jews killed during the years of unrest, nearly a million Jews were forced to flee from the Arab countries. Unlike the Arabs who fled Israel in 1948 and became permanent refugees, most of the Jews who fled the Arab countries were absorbed by Israel as full-fledged citizens.
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PRESIDENT TRUMAN'S DECISION TO RECOGNIZE ISRAEL
by Clark Clifford with Richard Holbrooke

  In 1948, when Israel became a State, the then American President, Harry Truman, recognized it despite the opposition of the U.S. State Dep't and the Secretary of State, George Marshall. Truman was helped in coming to this decision and holding steadfast by Clark Clifford, who has written this memoir of the events at the time.
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WE HAVE RETURNED TO THE TEMPLE MOUNT
Professor F.M. Loewenberg

  Professor F.M. Loewenberg provides us with a survey of the Jewish presence on the Jerusalem Temple Mount from the destruction of the Second Temple (70 CE) until the Six Day War (1967), when on June 7, 1967, Israel took possession as owner of this, its Holiest Site. It is widely believed that the Jews were driven from Jerusalem by Hadrian and didn't return until modern times. As Loewenberg shows, there was a Jewish presence throughout the centuries, no matter how brutally they were treated by whoever possessed the city at the time. It is ironic that, when in June 1967, the Jews reclaimed their inheritance, Moshe Dayan put the Arabs in charge of the Temple Mount, hence Jews still do not have free access to pray ON the Mount, as well as at the Western Wall.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

There is a separate file that is the index for the articles on the Blog-Ed page. You can access an article immediately from this index by clicking on the item in the index. To access the Index, click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

May 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
June 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


MARCH-APRIL, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the March-April 2011 issue:

The Core of Islam -- and its impact on its practitioners (Cline, Mannheimer, Imani, Ibrahim, Greenfield, Kerwick, Jessup, Chesler)
The Jewish Core -- how Judaism hands the same realities. (Roberts, Wilder, Saperstein)
It's Gang-Up On Israel Time At The O.K. Corral ( Baker, Hertz, Hausman, Ahlert, Rose)
How Israel Can Turn Things Around (Glick, Greenfield, Feiglin, Shavit, Spengler, Tobin, Ohri)
Public Relations, Hasbara And PR (Bussel, McQuillan. Stalinsky, Lipkin)
History Section (Kanigel, Itto)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (March, April)

THE CORE OF ISLAM -- and its impact on its practitioners. And on us.

BETWEEN CAESAR, GOD AND ALLAH
by Edward Cline

  Unlike Judaism, both Christianity and Islam theologically "denigrate life on earth as a mere transient form of existence on the way to an ethereal existence." Edward Cline observes that Christianity evolved over the centuries and life on earth became significant in its own right, allowing a concern for individual rights and earthly benefits to develop. In contrast, except in small heresies, Islam believes a complete and irrevocable system for living and a perfect model -- Mohammad -- for practicing the perfect system were concurrently revealed. Sharia law can not be reinterpreted. So it has no way to crack the shell or to evolve. This is too alien for the Westerner with his mental separation of Church and State for him fully to understand and therefore adequately rebut Islam's belief in its right to reign supreme.
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THE PRINCIPLE OF ABROGATION IN THE QURAN
by Michael Mannheimer

  This essay by Michael Mannheimer provides us with an excellent explanation why -- despite the systematic preaching of violence by scholarly imams who back up their harangues with deep and precise nowledge of the Koran -- many Westerners have been taught to believe Islam is a religion of peace. As a reader of the original article noted, "Islam is a form of Machiavellian schizophrenia that provides the maximum range of advantages for empowering its believers to dominate and rule the world in the name of their deity." Another reader summed it this way, "Islam is a rigged game that has no compunction about being immoral, unethical or entirely arbitrary just so long as it confers maximum advantage upon Muslims who perpetuate jihad."
  READ MORE

SLAVERY IN ISLAM
by Amil Imani

  As Amil Imani points out, "Islam incorporated slavery and much of the ethos of the culture of its birthplace," "the Arabian peninsula of the seventh century AD, known for its primitive beliefs and savage practices." Slavery was not unique to Islam when the Quran was written, but because each word of the Quran is considered immutable, Islam can not reform itself as other societies that once allowed slavery have done. Actual slavery exists. And lesser degrees of lack of freedom are institutionalized. As example, "[f]reedom of assembly, expression, and worship is either denied or severely restricted in every Islamic country." Jews and Christians are more or less tolerated as dhimmis, with sporadic pogroms and institutionalized humiliation; members of other religions are treated with a complete lack of respect for their human rights aand ordinary needs. Similarly, in keeping with the Quran, women can only be considered chattel. The dismal truth is there is no hope in expecting Islam to treat other religions and cultures with respect because Muslims who genuinely practice tolerance are violating the Quran.
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MUSLIM JIHAD IN CHRISTIAN ETHIOPIA: LESSONS FOR THE WEST
by Raymond Ibrahim

  The recent attacks by the Muslims in Ethiopia against the indigenous Christians has implications even --- or perhaps especially -- for secular countries where Islam is still a minority. Raymond Ibrahim writes that the rampage that destroyed Christian churches and homes started because the Koran was supposedly desecrated. Yet the continued desecration of the Bible that is sanctioned by Muslim clerics is ignored by the media and Western politicians. Ibrahim points out that Muslim violence increases when the Muslim population in the host country becomes significant, a point stressed by R.K. Ohri in his book, The Long March of Islam, which we have been serializing. The latest and last chapter is here. We might also note that Muslim rage doesn't just bring grief to the local Christians. It helps condition the leaders of the West to accept that the best way to get along with immigrant Muslims is to appease them and cater to their ever-growing list of whims, even at the cost of reducing the freedom of expression and speech guaranteed to Westerners in their own countries.
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THE MUSLIM TERRORIST WAR AGAINST ISRAELI FAMILIES
by Daniel Greenfield

  It gave Daniel Greenfield no pleasure to describe enough cases of dead Jews so that we would begin to have a glimmer of the extent of the Arab indulgence in brutality, the Arab joy in slaughtering Jewish families, the Arab love of their death cult and the Arab cowardice that makes them prefer stabbing Jewish woman and smashing in the heads of Jewish children to facing a soldier with a gun. Until recently, there have been few pictures showing the scene of a bomb explosion or the aftermath of snipers shooting at cars traveling on the highway. It wasn't respectful of the dead. It isn't. But we owe it to ourselves to begin to understand that Muslims steeped in the Koran and its teachings are not like us. They don't want what we want. They never will.
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TERRY JONES, HIS CRITICS, AND ISLAM
by Jack Kerwick

  So many people are angry at Terry Jones. The prevailing attitude is: had he not burned a Koran, the people who were killed by Muslims on a rampage would be alive today. Unfortunately, this ignores that desecrating a Bible leads to no retribution even though Muslim clerics encourage their flocks to use it as toilet paper. Why should we excuse Muslim violence because a Koran is burned? Isn't the burning just another pretext to increase the stranglehold of sharia law on non-Muslims? Almost certainly, Western apologists will suggest we try harder to be good neighbors, practice self-censorship, and curtail our own freedom of speech and expression so as not to rile up the Muslims. The problem with always worrying you might offend the Muslims is you become a virtual dhimmi and the Muslims are controlling your life as effectively as if you lived in a Muslim country under threat of losing a hand or your head for wrong thinking and non-Sharia-conforming behavior. Jack Kerwick explains the nuances ignored in the bald tale of an act by someone that caused death and destruction thousands of miles away. Additional material by Bill Warner and Richard Swier is also presented.
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THE SHARIAH THREAT
by Kathy Jessup

  Kathy Jessup provides us with various examples of how sharia law operates. What is nervous-making is that these incidences happened here in the States, not in a Muslim country. Yet our mental set that we could never be enveloped by an alien culture continues to impede our ability to take Sharia infiltration as seriously as we should. We think it too impossible. Perhaps Jessup's explanation of what sharia is and does will help dispel the illusion that we are safe from it. Perhaps we will finally acknowledge that like hungry termites, it is nibbling away at our institutions and infrastructure.
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AMERICA: BEWARE GIVING IN TO THE FALSE CONCEPT OF ISLAMOPHOBIA
by Phyllis Chesler

  A half century ago, if you had no real facts, you could always stop your opponent cold by calling him a Communist. Later you could effect the same result by calling your opponent a racist. Over the years it's become apparent that racism isn't restricted to the white redneck; it can come angry and vicious from any group. That is starting to take the magic out of the 'you're a racist' mantra. Islamophobia seems to be in the running for the new magic weapon -- utter it and your opponent turns to stone and is left without a suitable retort. Phyllis Chesler explains that it works this way: the assertion by the newly-created people, the Palestinians, that they own the ancient land of Israel "has morphed into a belief that all Muslims — who are, themselves, the largest practitioners of religious apartheid in the world, and who persecute all non-Muslims — are, as Muslims, being persecuted in the West." Given the fact that Jews are subjected to hate crimes 8 times as often as Muslims -- and often it is the Muslim committing the hate crime against the Jew -- the Muslims are not the ones that should realistically be fearing violence against them. But they do play victim well. They act the role so well that any interpretation except theirs is automatically discredited as further evidence of a phobia directed against Muslims.
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THE JEWISH CORE -- How Judaism handles the same realities.

A LETTER TO G-D
by Ted Roberts

  There are many facets to the Jewish view of God. He is Master, we are his Servants. We don't eat pig or shellfish not because they are risky disease-wise but because He said 'Don't'. In this essay Ted Roberts writes of another important relationship: we don't just have the ability to make requests of God. We find it just fine to talk to Him, even to argue with Him, and lecture Him on what He could have done better. So next time someone starts talking Theology, where all matters are reduced to the same multisyllabic sameness that concludes that all monotheistic religions are the same, tell them about this essay. What religion except Judaism makes it a virtue to argue with God? In fact, there's one Midrash where the Sages were arguing a point among themselves and God wanted to join in. The Rabbis told Him to butt out.
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SHALHEVET - 10 YEARS LATER: AN INTERVIEW WITH YITZHAK PASS
by David Wilder

  That most cowardly of acts -- putting a 10-month old infant in the crosshairs of a sniper's gun and deliberately pulling the trigger. An appalling yet routine act of Arab terrorism. Did the Jews of Hebron take up arms and avenge this ugly act? Maybe they should have. But they didn't. They made Shalhavet a living presence by writing a Torah scroll in memory of her life and opening a Torah study hall. She became part of their dedication to redeem Jewish Land. Shalhavet's parents picked themselves up and reconstructed a warm and loving family, one that is haunted by bittersweet memories. The family is clear-eyed about Arab hatred of Jews but not consumed by hate themselves. David Wilder interviews Shalhavet's father ten years later.
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RECAPTURING ROOTS; FLASHBACKS AND AFTER SHOCKS
by Rachel Saperstein

  Rachel Saperstein and her husband Moshe lived in Neve Dekalim, Gaza, until 2005, when they, together with thousands of other Jews were kicked out of their Paradise by Israeli politicos, who saw this destruction of an unique group of patriotic and productive citizens as a sure-fire way to realize peace with the Arabs. So it was that these talented Jews of Gaza, who created hothouses and grew organic vegetables that were eagerly bought in foreign markets and who invented ways to grow crops on land that had been dead for hundreds of years suddenly found themselves refugees in their own country. Many of them were traumatized, but many, like Rachel and Moshe, even though they lived in trashy trailers and suffered from the incompetence of the Government bureaucrats that were supposed to help them resettle, have taken charge of their lives and are rebuilding in the Terroritories. They may be bitter that the Government's folly has predictably brought sustained violence rather than peace, but they continue to condition their environment to make it again possible to live ordinary Jewish lives under continued wartime conditions.
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IT'S GANG-UP ON ISRAEL TIME AT THE O.K. CORRAL

In this Section, we focus on a new and upcoming piece of inventiveness by Israel's many enemies: The Palestinian Authority is crowing because, despite the fact that it has made no effort toward peaceful relations with Israel, it believes it will be given a State gratis. The U.N. is exploring tactics on how to do this. And looming over the horizon, the American administration has just dumped us into an irregular, unplanned and unnecessary war in Libya. To add to the bizarreness, we and Al-Qaeda will be fighting on the same side. Duh.

Meanwhile, the activities of the Arabs and their friends over the last years to delegitimize Israel are accelerating and in some areas are being coordinated. It's not just that Hizbollah, Hamas, Fatah, and dozens of splinter groups of terrorists have acquired huge amounts of weaponry. The years of demonizing Israel are also paying off. Here are some of the problems Israel faces.

1. Israel is condemned by the U.N. Israel is accused of being an apartheid state, despite the fact that Arab Israelis can buy housing anywhere and shop anywhere. They receive welfare and medical care well above their percent of the total Israeli population. They attend Israeli universities, often with less effort than required of Jewish children. One Arab Ph.D. candidate has the extracurricular hobby of coordinating boycotts against Israel for being apartheid. Israel is condemned for war crimes -- they unintentionally killed human shields that Hamas terrorists were using for cover, while Arab terrorists who specifically target Jewish children riding in a bus, walking to school, sleeping in their beds, are treated as heros and models for how to conduct oneself by the Arab community. Israel is condemned for invading Gaza and cautiously attempting to kill only the terrorist managers, while the U.S. bombs Libyan civilians wholesale. The U.N. appoints Iran, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and other such proponents of human rights and the rights of women to its councils. And it labels Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East, racist.

2. The Obama Administration reserves its wrath for Jews putting up housing and ignores what a sorry place the Middle East will be when Iran explodes a nuclear device. One global consequence is that oil production and distribution will become disorganized and erratic, if the oil fields are even accessible.

3. Politicians, mainstream churches, universities and their resident faculty particularly those in the soft sciences, Muslim student groups, newspaper and TV media and book publishers have shown themselves to be worth every penny Radical Islam has spent on them. See as a small slice of the larger problem the video by Dr. Richard Cravatts of Boston University: here. It is entitled "The War Against Israel on Campus".

4. The Wafq has been allowed to demolish Jewish artefacts of historic value on the Temple Mount. Israel is willing to barter away some of its holy sites and historic sites and places we read about in the Bible, indicating an indifference to its roots and religion, while the recently-created Palestinian people lay claim -- erroneously but passionately -- to Mandated Palestine. Israel doesn't loudly proclaim its irrevocable right to Mandated Palestine, a right guaranteed by international law, so naturally most everyone assumes the Jews are the occupiers. Why shouldn't they when Israeli politicians sound more enthusiastic about having a Palestinian state that do the Palestinians, who mostly want welfare and the fun of slaughtering their Jewish neighbors.

5. When Israel reclaimed Samaria and Judea and Gaza in 1968, it started building the local Arabs their first ever higher-level educational institutions, and providing them with medical care, gas, electricity and water. They continued to do this even after the Hamas terrorists took over Gaza and the Fatah terrorists Samaria and Judea. They did this though the Arabs took pot shots at them while they were repairing the electric grids. In one notable PA hoax, done with the cooperation of the foreign media, they simply closed the curtains to keep out the afternoon sun and lit candles. Their claim to be without electricity was heard around the world. Israel continued to provide water even though the Arabs were destroying the water supply by stealing the cement, by digging wells and by garbaging up the entrances to the desalination plants. The Jews thought the Arabs would be grateful and this would lead to peace. Everyone naturally assumed it meant the Jews were ashamed for stealing the land in the first place.

6. Jewish settlements in the Territories are legally on Jewish land. Given the unrest in all of the Middle East and the need to be alert to changes in the neighboring countries, this doesn't seem a good time for the Israeli Government to create havoc in Israel by uprooting Jews in the Territories. Nevertheless, the Netanyahu Administration is wrongheadedly acting as if it fully intends to give away Samaria and Judea, as soon as it can find a taker.

7. Marxist Israelis defend Arab illegality and condemn Israel defending itself. I wonder if they have second homes in the West and open airplane tickets. Or do they believe the grateful Arabs will let them live if ever they can finish off Israel? It didn't work for Juliano Mer-Khamis, a Jew who lived in Jenin among the Arabs and was devoted to their cause. They killed him anyway. For the sin of being a Jew? Because women were treated with respect in his productions? Because he produced Animal Farm, in which an actor played a pig? Who knows.

8. Some helpful folk suggest Israel preempt a decision by the U.N. on Palestinian statehood by coming out first with a declaration that what is Biblical Israel is now to become [drum roll here] Palestina. Wow, that's like advising someone to commit suicide to prevent the possibility that his enemy will manage to kill him. Wouldn't it be better -- and more Jewish -- to have a gun handy and be ready to use it first?
 

IT IS JUST POSSIBLE THAT ISRAEL WILL WAKE and understand they can't allow West Bank Arabs to control their water supply. They might have a stroke of understanding and admit that from the West Bank you can walk into Tel Aviv and Jerusalem -- you don't need a long-distance bomber. Maybe their ability to organize for defense in a hurry will kick in on time. I sure hope they haven't let it go too long.

THE PALESTINIAN UN GAMBLE - IRRESPONSIBLE AND ILL-ADVISED
by Alan Baker

  This is a succinct presentation of some consequences, should the Palestinian Arabs ask the U.N. to declare (some, much, all) of Samaria and Judea and possibly Gaza an Arab state, thus abrogating the Oslo Accords. Alan Baker notes that this action would void the Palestinian Authority's legal existence. (Does that matter if they shift to being the government of a state?) It would simultaneously release Israel of its contractual agreements. (But would Israel suddenly have the will and the resources to stand up to the global community in the person of the U.N.?) Baker is also concerned that this unilateral bid for statehood would do harm to the credibility of the U.N. (I wasn't aware it had any.) What makes this essay of particular interest is that Baker helped draft the contract agreements of the Oslo Accords, which was the start of the steep gradient on which Israel slid down into the mess it is in.
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THE U.N. CHARTER DOES NOT SUPPORT GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS
by Eli E. Hertz

  In keeping with its way of never getting together in a timely fashion information that will be needed to prove or contest some point likely to be raised by its enemies, Israel seems to have just discovered General Assembly (GA) Resolution 377. #377 might be the magic mantra the GA needs to bypass the Security Council (SC) and give the Palestinian Authority a State. Currently, the international community is obliged to support SC rulings and carry out SC sanctions; resolutions passed by the GA have no legal standing. Member states not on the Security Council would like to change that. They would like the status of GA resolutions to change so that they are not recommendations but enforceable commands. Eli Hertz provides us with an understanding of how U.N. members hope to make the SC subject to the GA by using the purported power and "interpretations" of the International Court of Justice, and why this is not within their authority. Of course, it hasn't been too hard in the past for the U.N. to ignore justice, fairness, decency and legal limits when it comes to dealing with Israel. They put rogue states on the Human Rights Council and spend much of their political capital demonizing Israel.
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THE PROGRESSIVE WEST SUPPORTS A JUDENREIN STATE OF PALESTINE
by Matthew M. Hausman

  The repudiation by the Obama Administration and the European Union of the "Jews' right to self-determination in their ancient homeland" is disguised as concern for the rights of the indigenous people of Palestine. Matthew Hausman suggests that were they really concerned with protecting indigenous rights, they would support the Jews, whose "rights as an indigenous people were recognized historically and under international law long before the term "Palestinian" was ever used to refer to an Arab population that accreted largely through immigration during the sunset years of the Ottoman Empire." Read this article for facts. Read it for clear-headed reasoning. Read it to dissipate the fumes of irrationality through which we have been encouraged to sympathize with squatters who believe they have the right to expropriate Jewish property contrary to legitimate Jewish claims. Hausman suggests some alternative solutions.
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ARMING THE ENEMY IN LIBYA
by Arnold Ahlert

  Are we in the U.S.A. totally daft? We ignore the Iranian monomaniac pushing the development of a nuclear bomb -- an accomplishment that will totally destabilize the region and do damage to the steady flow of oil that we need for a long time to come. Moreover, in Libya we will be comrades in arms of terrorist rebels, including Al-Qaeda. We have come a full Orwellian circle since 9/11; we will now be fighting together with Al-Qaeda, not against Al-Qaeda. As a reader, James F. Davis, notes: "There were more Eastern Libyans per capita that went to Iraq to kill US forces than any other country. We should not be helping these terrorists. Gaddafi has been neutralized and as such presents a lesser threat to US national security that these jihadists terrorists." Wise words. As additions, we include Ghaddafi's letter to Obama -- a PR masterpiece and an analysis of the letter by Stephen Brown.
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THE GATHERING STORM: REDUX or DÉJÀ VU?
by Alex Rose

  Are we at a time similar to the 1930s when a fanatic dictator had two ambitions: to make his country top dog and to kill the Jews. Are we at a time when the major powers won't come to grips with the problem but invent ineffective delaying actions? Are there major differences that nullify the similarity? Or maybe these differences make matters worse? In this initial essay, Alex Rose examines some of the parameters of the pre-World War 2 Gathering Storm that we will need for comparison to conditions today.
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HOW ISRAEL CAN TURN THINGS AROUND
Bottom Line: What Israel needs to do is to stop lying - to herself and to the world. No, she really doesn't want to sacrifice herself to give a bunch of death-dealers some additional space to construct explosives and launch missiles.

How to avoid the disasters that loom? How to win? The first task, Israel, is to stop lying to yourself. As Daniel Greenfield says (see below), "It is time to stop the lies and tell the truth. The call to peace is the call to death." This will free you up to admit that you can't barter your land for peace anymore than you can sell your child. Admit your passion for Israel. Realize the Jews of Samaria and Judea aren't the enemy; by securing the hilltops in Yesha, they safeguard the Jews living in Tel-Aviv. Stop trying to kick them out of their homes. Stop promoting an Arab state and start shoring up Israel.

Ari Bussel in "An Old-Fashioned Remedy" (April 3, 2011) writes:

"Israeli politicos are proud of all they are doing to improves the lives of the local Arabs. At best this might create good P.R. Actually it doesn't. What with the current milieu where demonizing Israel is acceptable, it doesn't create good-will. People assume Israel is doing it out of guilt -- so it just reinforces the Arab lie that Israel is occupying Arab land.

"[d]iverting enormous resources to the Arab minority and enabling Palestinian unprecedented growth — measured on a global scale — will prove very harmful to Israel."

"Israel has a variety of problems she faces, and she needs to prioritize them."

First: Military Preparedness

"Israel's security services and intelligence communities must seriously focus on the Iranian threat. That is the greatest long-term existential danger to the Jewish State.

"Israel's military must prepare for an eventuality similar to the 1947-1948 scenario when the Arabs converged en masse against the newly recognized Jewish State, except present day magnitudes are vastly greater in strength. It must be ready for an attack on multiple fronts, especially if the Jordanian regime falls and Israel finds herself surrounded.

"As happened not so many decades ago and throughout the last two millennia in the same neighborhood, Israel will be completely surrounded by Egyptian, Jordanian, American-trained Palestinian and Syrian forces on her borders, an Arab contingency from within and Hamas-Hezbollah snakes hissing and threatening from the North and the South. The names of the players may have changed, but the intentions from Amalek to the Palestinians remain as potent: Destroy the Jews!

"Preparations must take place quietly, internally, with constant diligence, re-evaluation and adjustments. Quite frankly, while we should be able to speculate on their scope (and hope our analysis reflects, at least in part, reality), none of these actions should be common knowledge. It is not deterrence Israel needs; it is preparedness and readiness for what the future assuredly holds."

Second: Public Diplomacy

To attend to the ongoing delegitimization and demonization attacks against her very being and to fight the currently forming country of Palestine,

"Israel must mobilize now rather than ex post facto — and seemingly might have started doing so during the past few weeks — all of its public relations bureaucracy. This must include the Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of Public Diplomacy and the Diaspora and every body in between that has some overlapping interest, as tangential as it may seem.

" Unquestionably, Israel has the people and the abilities to devise plans for her survival one cannot easily envision. The main question is — does she have the mindset to engage in so doing, right now and without delay?"

Bussel's TODO list is sensible. Israel politicos need to take it to heart. And soon.

THE SILVER LININGS OF THE CLOUDS OF GLOOM hanging over Israel are two:

First, despite the ingrained negativity of the media, it is becoming more difficult to blame Israel for unwillingly killing a human shield when Arab terrorists steal into Jewish homes and slaughter Jewish families. We can also expect that the increasing turbulence in the Middle East might unhinge the monomaniacal attention the media and the U.N. pay Israel and force them to attend to the Arab implosion.

Second, the single document that most helped demonize Israel around the world, the Goldstone report, has been declared erroneous -- by Goldstone himself. As Jeffrey Goldberg writes (The Atlantic, April 2, 2011):

"... the South African Jewish judge Richard Goldstone, who excoriated Israel for allegedly committing premeditated crimes against civilians in Gaza -- contributing, more than any other individual, to the delegitimization and demonization of the Jewish state -- now says, well, Israel didn't actually set out to target Palestinian civilians, unlike Hamas, whose plainly-apparent goal was to murder Israeli civilians... Unfortunately, it is somewhat difficult to retract a blood libel, once it has been broadcast across the world."

He's right, blood libels are hard to kill. But at least Israel has been handed some good ammunition. Let's hope she understands that she is still the one to load the gun and use it. Goldstone's admission by itself won't change attitudes.

This Section is sister to the previous segment outlining some major problems Israel must confront. The essays below address some necessary actions and attitudes.

PALESTINIAN STATEHOOD IS INCREASINGLY MORE LIKELY. THE LESSONS THAT CAN -- AND MUST -- BE LEARNED FROM THE GOLDSTONE AFFAIR
by Caroline B. Glick

  Caroline Glick draws some important lessons from Goldstone's blood libel of Israel and Israel's refusal to be intimidated or cowed by his lies. Her summation is important: "If the government remains faithful to the truth and to our rights, it will empower our supporters throughout the world to rally to our side. If we are good to our friends and bad to our enemies, we will know how to reward our friends and punish our enemies. And if we boldly assert our rights even in the face of international condemnation, we will see that in the fullness of time, the rightness of our position will carry the day."
  READ MORE
 

PALESTINE IS GENOCIDE
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield lays out the Arab strategy so plainly that maybe this time the high-IQ, low-comprehension community will understand: the Arabs don't want peace; they want Jews dead. Greenfield writes: "The call to peace is the call to death. To promote the creation of a Palestinian state is a violent act. The peacemakers are collaborators in genocide. Their charges are the murderers. Palestine is genocide. It is the cultivated work of an ideology that has successfully turned millions of people into born serial killers or their accomplices." This is obviously obvious but apparently not obvious to the media, politicos and presidents of major Jewish organizations. Like Goldstone doing damage control, will they bleat after the fact, "We didn't know."
  READ MORE
 

JEWISH RIGHTS ON THE TEMPLE MOUNT: THE ACID TEST
by Moshe Feiglin

  Moshe Feiglin writes, "The Temple Mount is the quintessence of the Land of Israel.... Without it, our presence in Israel loses its meaning." And with it, Israel's legitimacy. When Israel captured it in 1967, the Arabs hoped, but didn't expect, to be allowed to pray in the mosques they had built on the site of the Second Temple. Instead, in a stupendously stupid move, Moshe Dayan gave them control, which they used to destroy artifacts of the Temple period and to stop Jews from praying in their own land at this most holy of sites. It's time for Jews to redeem the Temple Mount and take a firm grip on the Land.
  READ MORE
 

ENOUGH ALREADY: ARE ISRAELI SETTLEMENTS ACTUALLY 'ILLEGAL'?
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann review some of the facts that make Israel and the Territories -- Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank), Golan and Gaza legally Jewish by international law. How can Jewish settlements that are on land that is legally Jewish be illegal? We also include several Readers' comments that discuss the critical point: Israel holds Mandated Palestine in irrevocable trust for the Jewish people by international law. The same authority that set aside a tiny piece of land for an eventual Jewish state from land previously ruled by the Ottomans (NOT by the Arabs and certainly not by the non-existent Palestinians) also carved out many of the present-day Arab countries from the remaining 99.99% of the area. Nullifying the existence of Israel will by the same stroke nullify each and every Arab state created after World War 2, will it not?
  READ MORE
 

ISRAEL'S LEFT NEEDS TO WISE UP TO MIDDLE EAST REALITY
by Avi Shavit

  As one reader said of this article: "A jewel of an article... lucid, transcendental... Something to save and reflect on." Avi Shavit writes of Juliano Mer-Khamis, a well-known actor, who was recently murdered. Mer-Khamis, a Jew, was profoundly involved in the Arab cause; he even lived in Jenin. Shavit contrasts how the Left would have made him into a saint if he'd been killed by Jews; they would have insisted religious Jews are ultimately to blame. They would have demanded revenge on the Orthodox community. But Mer-Khanis was killed by an Arab. And the Left has no way to cope with such a happening -- it doesn't fit the concepts through which they understand the world. In fact, the Left saw nothing to write about. Shavit concludes that "Western enlightenment and the Israeli left cannot continue to ignore the dark side of Middle Eastern reality."
  READ MORE
 

ISRAEL THE WINNER IN THE ARAB REVOLTS
by Spengler

  The newest Peace Process -- brought to life by Obama as the most urgent of priorities -- seems to be dying yet again, thanks to the turbulence in the Arab countries. In this essay, Spengler argues that the large number of civilian casualties occasioned by the multiple revolts has reduced the precious status of the individual Arab, so that it becomes more difficult to excoriate Israel for killing a few Arabs to stop missile attacks, when Arab governments and Arab rebels continue to kill thousands of their own people. Spengler suggests "Israel's best course of action is to dig in its heels through the November 2012 US presidential elections while its prospective adversaries descend into chaos, and await the right opportunity to settle accounts with Hamas and Hezbollah." Let us hope Netanyahu doesn't snatch defeat out of the jaws of a genuine diplomatic victory in the interim.
  READ MORE
 

SYRIAN UNREST THREATENS MYTHICAL PEACE PROCESS
by Jonathan S. Tobin

  In the political and military roilings in the Middle East, Syrian is almost unique in apparently being able to keep the waters calm at least on the surface. Still, many Syrians took to the streets to protest. Instead of this invoking elation in U.S. State Department breasts, it brought distress. The State Department is fixated on the notion that Bashar Assad is necessary for a Middle East peace. Syria is a very clever dissimulator but as Jonathan Tobin observes: "[t]he belief that a Syria run by one of the Assads would ever make peace with Israel was always a myth." The Assads need Israel as something to hate, not as a friend. Nevertheless, the notion that Syria can and should be involved in the peace process -- as full of holes as it is -- continues to be a much-loved comfort blanket for the Obama administration. And Assad remains attached -- to Iran.
  READ MORE
 

THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 10
by R. K. Ohri

  This is the last chapter of R.K. Ohri's book The Long March of Islam. Chapter 1 was in the September-October 2009 issue; subsequent chapters were posted one per issue. Ohri has pointed out that while initially a small immigrant community of Muslims was amiable and cooperative, it inevitably changed to a relentlessly demanding, unsatisfiable group as it grew in numbers. Although focusing on the conflict between Hindu and Muslim in India and Pakistan, he has emphasized that appeasement by host countries has not stopped the jihadists' announced ambition to be dominant everywhere in the world. As he puts it, "They have a highly bloated ego and a vain belief in the invincibility of radical Islam." In this final chapter, he concludes that civilized countries have no alternative but to fight back, especially now that there is a real possibility of Islamic terrorists obtaining nuclear weapons. With regard to India and Israel, who "have been on the 'hit list' of jihadi terror groups now for several decades," "[t]here is no other option available to India and Israel, except coming together for defending their people."
  READ MORE
 

PUBLIC RELATIONS, HASBARA AND PR

THE POWER OF THE WRITTEN WORD
by Ari Bussel

  Ari Bussel examines three recent op-ed pieces, each by a Jewish writer, two found libelous after-the-fact, the third -- by David Horowitz -- discovering data that Israeli should already have dealt with in depth. The first by Neve Gordon, a marxist academic at Ben Gurion University (BGU) was actually old-hat. He has been encouraging colleagues in the West to cold-shoulder Israelis for years. While the text was the same-old, publishing it in the La.Times got the attention of some donors to BGU, who were appalled -- by definition, donors tend to like the institutions they fund -- but BGU is yet to examine the roots of its unwarranted disdain of Israel. The other op-ed is the latest episode in the bizarre and unending flaying of Israel by the U.N. and its various agencies and NGOs. Judge Goldstone and his committee issued a well-advertised report condemning Israel's conduct in Gaza when it attempted to stop Hamas from lobbing missiles at Israeli civilians. The report has bolstered any and every misrepresentation and misinterpretation of Israel since then -- the U.N. seal of approval and Goldstone's self-identification as a Jew are sufficient to guarantee acceptance of anything derogatory. This op-ed by the Judge is as close to an admission as we're going to get that his committee was rigged, the report tendentious and the conclusions a malicious lie. Again, Bussel asks: why did Israel react only after the damage was done.
  READ MORE
 

NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO ON A BAD DAY
by Karin McQuillan

  National Public Radio suggests it is the outlet for programs of taste and subtlety and refinement -- and that's why it isn't supported by the redneckery who prefer low-life radio. What is closer to the truth is this comment by a reader, SteveinTampa: "I cringe when I listen to NPR,and only do so to hear what they are "reporting" as news. The smarmy, condescending, yet semi hypnotic delivery is more theatre than information distribution. It is truly a biased delivery with herding the mentally lazy to the left as its intent." It is indeed time the public understood that presenting a mealy-mouth version of the truth and clearly-stated bald lies isn't "balanced" programming. Try this image: Abbas lauding PA as a democracy to counter a guest telling the truth about PA brutality. Lest the listener is not be certain who to believe, the interviewer will coo at Abbas.
  READ MORE
 

ISSUE V OF INSPIRE, THE ENGLISH-LANGUAGE MAGAZINE OF AL-QAEDA IN THE ARABIAN PENINSULA — A GENERAL REVIEW
by Steven Stalinsky

  Ah, the versatility of Al-Qaeda. Not only did it show itself capable of destroying the World Trade Center, but now it's gone into publishing. And in both -- while it didn't mind spending the millions needed to set up big operations -- it has the common touch. The lowly box ripper on the planes. Now it's into publishing at minimal expense. Steven Stalinsky summarizes the fifth issue of Inspire, designed to inspire the young terrorist dedicated to the goal of making Islam supreme, and to teach him some useful tricks of the trade. Potentially, the magazine has a large audience, even if the percent of Muslim literates is small -- just so long as they stick to pictures and limited text. Will they soon have advertising? Nekkid women in burqas to spice up boring material? Tee shirts reading 'I'm just mad about Al-Qaeda' you can buy in toddler size on up? We should soon hear from the Arab-lovers that now the organization has to wrestle with the hard problems in publishing, they will soon reform and stop being the bad guys -- that's the political theory that insists terrorists should be given States to govern to cure them of their murderous tendencies.
  READ MORE
 

IS THIS THE FACE OF A TERRORIST?
by Bernice Lipkin

  This essay by Bernice Lipkin examines several items of propaganda centered around the attention given a Pro-Palestinian propaganda film called Miral, A Palestinian Girl. Part 1 examines the construction of a fairly typical hackneyed article sympathetic to the film and its makers. The one striking piece of propaganda is a poster that asks: Is this the face of a Terrorist? Part 2 is a complete essay from Elder of Ziyon that contains excellent pictorial rebuttal material. It says effectively: yes an innocent-looking Palestinian girl can be -- and has been -- a terrorist. Part 3 compares the counter-Miral posters to those used to counter the accusation that Israel is an apartheid state.
  READ MORE
 

HISTORY SECTION

THE JEWISH CONSPIRACY: A STRATEGIC WEAPON TO DEMONIZE JEWS AND DELEGITIMIZE ISRAEL
by Judge Hadassa Ben Itto

  Hadassa Ben Itto writes about the history of the fraudulent Protocols of Zion, from its start as a fictional plan suggested by Machiavelli to Montesquieu on how to take over France to its current revised version purporting to be a plan by Jewish leaders to take over the world. The supposed conspiracy of the Jews may be a lie, but it is being used effectively by Islam to delegitimize the Jewish people -- an early component of its mission to take over the world.
  READ MORE
 

THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES REVISITED: THE DOCTRINE OF DEFENSIBLE BORDERS
by Harry Kanigel

  The current ahistoric decree by the American administration that Israel must return to its 1967 borders makes information on the 1967 period and the cease fire lines (NOT borders) a necessity. Harry Kanigel points out, "The probability of a negotiated peace is vanishingly small given the philosophical moorings of Israel's neighbors; they will only temporize as they maneuver to eliminate the stain, the 'error which must be rectified.'" as "they advance Islam geopolitically." Given Kanigel's obvious knowledge of Islam's master plan and its encouragement of lying to gain a point, his is an excellent analysis of a minimalist plan for Israel's survival -- one that has become more impractical as time goes on. Perhaps, we should instead be promulgating the essential fact: that the area know as Mandated Palestine was given to the Jews in an irrevocable trust by the League of Nations (an obligation incurred by its successor organization, the U.N.) -- the same authority that gave the other 99.99% of the Ottoman Middle East to the Arabs, thus creating many of the Arab states now in existence.
  READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

March 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
April 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


 

INDEX FOR THE JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2011 ISSUE

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THINK-ISRAEL features essays, analyses and commentaries that provide context for current events in Israel. We try to make sense of what's going on. The war Islamists are waging against Israel and the West is a top priority.

This is what's in the January-February 2011 issue of the Think Israel website . You can access any article from the home page of http://www.Think-Israel.org by scrolling down to its introduction. This has the advantage of providing context for the article. Or you can go directly to the article by clicking its highlighted area in this email.

SECTION 1:

"Editorial: The Middle East in Revolt" by Editor, Think-Israel.org

Democracy and Revolution

Islam + Democracy = Islam by Edward Cline
The Great Middle Eastern Democracy Show Hits A Bump by Nidra Poller
Be Careful What We Wish For by Seth J. Frantzman
Is An Egyptian "Democracy" A Good Thing? by Raymond Ibrahim

How Revolution Is Played Out In Different Countries

The New Middle East At A Glance — Country By Country by Hillel Fendel
Anti-Semitism: The New Necessity For Arab Regimes by Mudar Zahran
Youth Uprising 2011 -- A Planetary 1968 by Andrew MacKillop
A Firsthand Account Of The Protests In Egypt by Joshua R. Goodman
Do The Protesters Want Democracy? by Andrew C. McCarthy
Evidence Of Anti-Semitism At The Egypt Protests by John Rosenthal
Sunni Wahhabism And Shiism In Saudi Arabia by Joshua Teitelbaum
Tunisia Meltdown by Marion DS Dreyfus
Jordan's Future Challenges by Juan José Escobar Stemmann
Qatar's Game by Elliot Jager

These Essays Investigate The Muslim Brotherhood

The Muslim Brotherhood Is The Enemy by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood: In Their Own Words by Jonathan D. Halevi
Qaradawi And The Treason Of The Intellectuals by Andrew G. Bostom

SECTION 2:

Loner Terrorists And Small-Boat Pirates

How Do We Deal With Terrorists That Have No Fixed Identification? by Bernice Lipkin
Somali Piracy Hits America: Some Questions In Need Of Answers by J. Peter Pham, Ph.D.
A Cruise To The Coast Of Pirate-Infested Somalia by To-The-Point Cruise Lines

Wishing For Islamic Moderation And Reform

Inside The Mind Of An Islamist by Phyllis Chesler
The Long March Of Islam: Chapter 9 by R. K. Ohri
Does Muslim Moderation Exist; Is Islamic Reform Likely? by Fjordman

Is Israel Going To Change Policy And Grow Or Grovel And Die?

In Memory Of Herbert Zweibon by Helen Freedman
Preemptive Surrender by David Isaac
Playing Israel's Good Hand by Caroline Glick

Hasbara, The War Front Where Israel Is Losing

Why Israel Loses PR War by Moshe Dann
Exposing Arab Falsehoods by Martin Sherman
Who Is Uri Avnery, And Why Does He Matter? by Aryeh Tepper
Narrative Isn't Everything by Jonathan Rosenblum
A Dozen Bad Ideas For The 21st Century by Mark Durie

History Section

The Wartime Diary Of Edmund Kessler reviewed by Omer Bartov
The Most Heinous Killers Of The Holocaust: The Muslim-Catholic Ustasha by Edwin Black
Opening Palestine's Doors by Rafael Medoff

The Reader' Blog-Eds page. The monthly Blog-Ed page is updated every few days. If you are on a Blog-Ed page, you can click on the Blog-Eds List (middle item, top Blue Banner), find any author/title posted, click and go directly to that blog-ed.
January Blog-Eds
February Blog-Eds

And we provide direct links to websites that supply accurate background information and news relating to Israel.

Do look at the web site.

And please, if you have a blog-ed piece or a comment or commentary, contact us. Write to comments@think-israel.org or to editor@think-israel.org

Pieces for THINK-ISRAEL should be informative and accurate. Fortunately, those of us who are pro-Israel can show our love of Israel without distorting the truth. We don't need to play by the rules laid down by the Arab-favoring media, which distort the news and omit important items of information.

Bernice Lipkin
Editor, Think-Israel




JANUARY-FEBRUARY, 2011
 

What we are talking about in the January-February 2011 issue:

SECTION 1:
Editorial: The Middle East in Revolt
Democracy and Revolution (Cline, Poller, Frantzman, Ibrahim)
How Revolution Is Played Out In Different Countries (Fendel, Zahran, MacKillop, Goodman, McCarthy, Rosenthal, Teitelbaum, Dreyfus. Stemmann, Jager)
The Muslim Brotherhood (Gaffney, Halevi, Bostom)

SECTION 2:
Loner Terrorists and Small-Boat Pirates (Lipkin, Pham, To-The-Point Cruise Line)
Wishing for islamic moderation and reform (Chesler, Ohri, Fjordman)
Is Israel Going To Change Policy And Grow Or Grovel And Die (Freedman, Glick, Isaac)
Hasbara, The War Front Where Israel Is Losing (Dann, Sherman, Tepper, Rosenblum, Durie)
History Section (Bartov, Black, Medoff)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (January, February)

SECTION 1:

EDITORIAL: THE MIDDLE EAST IN REVOLT

If, in your way of thinking, the opposite of dictatorship is democracy, then what's happening in the Middle East is wonderful. The ice floe didn't crack slowly; it all melted magically. To use imagery Al Gore would believe: it was as if a zillion people suddenly vented CO2-filled breaths in synchrony.

And vent they did. In Iran. In Tunisia. In Egypt. In Libya. In Lebanon. In Yemen. In Jordan. In Algeria, Bahrain, Djibouti. In Iraq. In Kuwait, Morocco and Sudan. Even in Saudi Arabia. Thanks to our media, we have learned that it is youth yearning for jobs and the poor yearning for bread and everybody yearning for democracy that caused it to happen.

It's true there are in Egypt and Iran and maybe in some of the other countries many young people who truly want to live under a western-style democracy. Considering how much Middle Eastern dictators oppress the people, everyone should be eager for democracy, freedom, tolerance and the ability to decide one's one lifestyle. We forget that in an organized Islamic political system based on sharia law, rulers and the majority of their subjects share in common certain values, similar hatreds and biases. Given the intense religious conditioning even in more secular Muslim countries, it is not surprising that as long as basic needs for food and shelter are met, dictators and mullahs can easily incite the populace against foreigners and people of other religions. But the same conditioning traps the rulers. Were they to declare they want to come to peaceful terms with those Islam sees as enemy, the people would likely shift their allegiance and the rulers would soon be replaced by an even more dedicated and brutal gang. In recent history, the people seem always to pick -- or end up with -- a government that is more wicked, more vile, most committed to monstrous acts of violence. The Iranians threw out the Shah and now we have Ahmadinejad. The Palestinian Arabs picked Hamas when given free choice. With the current imminent changes in regime in so many Middle Eastern countries, we might ask, in the immortal words of Tom Lehrer talking about countries wanting the bomb: "Who's next: Who's next?"
 

SOME VIEW the uprisings in the different countries as unrelated. Our current president, Barack Hussein Obama -- perhaps determined to wrench the title of "American President Most Damaging To The USA" from Jimmy Carter's jaws -- has been selective in which ones he supports. Doing a fast catch-up, he praised the Egyptian rioters whereas he sat on his hands when Iranians took to the streets desirous of regime change. He is most circumspect and hesitant about Libya but he was untroubled that Hizbollah was taking over Lebanon. He seems to believe that the source of global evil and upheaval is Israel and so his biggest worry is that a Jewish family might enlarge its living quarters to give the kiddies another bedroom.

Nevertheless, the uprisings and demonstrations happened so quickly and smoothly, there does seem to have been at least some coordination. One might think the labile hordes of the Middle East had been drummed into action by the Muslim Brotherhood's Yusuf al-Qaradawi just as he had orchestrated the riotous outrage at the Danish cartoons back in 2005. One could almost believe that the small surges and outrages these past few years have been fire drills to test how to pump up the response in different parts of the orchestra, where to send different factions to amplify the noise, how to select the soloists who would speak to the press, how to create the photo opportunities and reward trustworthy media people. And where to place the potties. Even true spontaneity can be put to use. Good ideas can come from anyone anywhere, but it takes intelligent social engineering to turn the idea to effective use.

As Joseph Farah of World Net Daily put it, "...there is a global Islamist revolution under way... "With revolts going on in Egypt, Tunisia, Pakistan, Yemen, Lebanon and Jordan, most of them clearly orchestrated from Iran, it's easy to believe these are unrelated, disconnected uprisings." [Actually,] "this is the work of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), with the aid and encouragement of Tehran. And the ripple effect of what we're seeing is hard to overstate. As the leader of Jordan's powerful Muslim Brotherhood, Hammam Saeed, warned over the weekend [29Jan2011], the unrest in Egypt will spread across the Mideast and Arabs will topple leaders allied with the United States."

Frank Salvato, Director of Terrorism Research for BasicsProject.org, has characterized the MB this way: "The Muslim Brotherhood is a world-wide Sunni Islamist movement, which has spawned several religious and political organizations in the Middle East, including al Qaeda, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, dedicated to the jihadi credo: 'Allah is our objective, the Quran is our Constitution, the Prophet is our leader, struggle is our way, and death for the sake of Allah is the highest of our aspirations.'"

Do I believe the unrest is being manipulated by the Muslim Brotherhood, that beloved and benevolent group favored by our State Dept and our Director of National Intelligence, by the academics who sit on Saudi-established academic chairs and the media who now doesn't have to worry about job security? Just because the terrorists sponsored by the MB say they are out to kill off Israel and America, do I feel the MB is a menace? Do I worry just because they have been major establishers of front groups in the West? Certainly not.

I don't think it's the whole MB. I think there's a small cadre of them -- in my mind I call them the MBC, the Muslim Brotherhood Cadre. They have spent the last 90 years establishing mosques, stocking them with clerics who preach the need for Islam to be supreme and who are skillful at igniting idealists and psychopaths with the desire to join in this most worthy mission. They are the teachers, the tacticians, the trainers, the script writers, the spine stiffeners. They believe in their way-of-life and their love-of-death. They believe that to live a proper Islamic life, they need only model themselves on the thoughts and actions of that perfect man, Mohammed.

Their unswerving dedication melts resistance in those of other religions who have less zeal and dedication. Mainstream Protestants and Reform Jewry have turned their organizations away from spiritual yearning and the contemplation of how to live in social harmony in a complex society to the simpler goal of social betterment for mankind, where implementation depends on the goal of the month -- multiculturalism, achieving parity in monetary distribution, even academic and job quotas to prove we have no quotas. Islam may have very different ideas on how to achieve the Glory of a UniThink society than its Western allies but it is very strong, clad in the armor of its original, rigid 7th-Century mentation.

Make no mistake about it. The MBC isn't looking to fit into other groups. It isn't interested in tolerating alien ways of thinking or alternative life styles. It wants the world run by Sharia law. And you simply can not have a robust sharia framework within western law, any more than the sun can shine in the middle of the night. If the sun is shining, it isn't night, no matter what the clock says. There really are binary situations. Not all matters are gray.

Sharia brings with it foul-mouthed anti-semitism, an expectation that women, children and servants will be politely subservient and that dhimmi politicians and academics will continue to restructure society to convenience Muslims. There will be no reciprocation. Putting foot baths in college bathrooms and closing traffic on busy streets to accommodate Muslim prayers will not be followed by Muslims spending money on tread mills and soccer balls for all high schoolers. In fact, the dhimmis will be expected to keep a low and respectful profile towards their betters, the followers of Mohammed.
 

THIS SECTION presents some analyses of what's happening in general and in specific countries.

We westerners are apt to see the dynamics in simple terms: are we witnessing the start of a process that will introduce democratic regimes into the Middle East? Or not? It is assumed that if they dissolve tyrannical regimes and vote democratically, they will become like us -- reasonably tolerant of other groups and willing to live in peace with non-Muslims.

Unfortunately, the situation is trinary, not binary. The role of the Islamists needs to be factored into the tug between dictatorial regimes and democratic rule. As Barry Rubin put it: (How Many Dictators Can Stand on the Head of a Policy? February 4, 2011) "What are we going to do -- watch friendly regimes fall to become anti-American, terror-sponsoring Islamist dictatorships for the rest of eternity because we don't want to protect allies and instead watch Islamists taking over every political system in the Middle East?"

The first essays below explore the concept of democracy as applied to the demonstrations and agitation. Later ones examine activity in context of several particular countries. The final segment examines the Muslim Brotherhood, the group most likely to take control in the long run.

To ask again: are we witnessing the start of a process that will introduce democracy into the Muslim Middle East? I can sum up the general conclusion of this section in the words of the then Ass't Sec-of-State Edward Djerejian in reference to an earlier Civil War: Algeria, 1991 -- 'One Man, One Vote, One Time.'

DEMOCRACY AND REVOLUTION

These essays examine the relationship of the ongoing chaos, revolution and violence to democracy. In fact, they ask, what is democracy? Some use the uprising in Egypt as a point of reference -- Egypt is an influential Arab state and was prominent in getting the protests established.

ISLAM + DEMOCRACY = ISLAM
by Edward Cline

  Edward Cline points out that democracy has a dark side even in the West. We rightly appreciate the freedom our political system gives us for exercising our individuality, and we ignore that democracy run wild has produced mob rule and the ghastly images of the French Revolution. Actually, the U.S.A. is a republic, with built-in checks against mob rule. When used to assess the political structures of the Arab states, the occasional "free election" is overrated as an indicator of freedom for the individual. The people of most Arab countries actually want Sharia law. So democratic elections mean the majority will not be thwarted in their wish to make their state sharia-abiding. They can then begin their inherently undemocratic mission of forcing others to accept the blessings of Sharia law, whether they want it or not.
  READ MORE
 

THE GREAT MIDDLE EASTERN DEMOCRACY SHOW HITS A BUMP
by Nidra Poller

  For those who believe that most Arabs ache for democracy, Nidra Poller points out that "we have, in Europe, a living laboratory of Arab-Muslim citizens living in a democratic system." Some avail themselves of the privileges of citizenship to lead productive lives. Others "despise the educational system, belittle alternate job training programs, blame their failures on the host country, perpetuate tribal attitudes and retrograde cultural practices like excision (FGM), polygamy, forced marriage. They wrap women in niqab, hate infidels, attack Jews, defy law and order... and express their discontent by looting, torching, smashing, shouting hysterically..." And that's how they behave "where democratic institutions are solidly established."
  READ MORE
 

BE CAREFUL WHAT WE WISH FOR
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth Frantzman wonders if people believe that the degree of Sturm und Drang is indicative of the degree Egyptians want democracy. He points out that "[j]ust because people riot or protest for something doesn't mean they are democracy-loving moderates." And even if they were, chaotic rebellion often leads to tyranny, not democracy.
  READ MORE
 

IS AN EGYPTIAN "DEMOCRACY" A GOOD THING?
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim makes the point that the end point of turmoil and revolution ought not to be democracy but what democracy can produce: "freedom and universal rights." In this way of thinking, the question should be: how do we achieve the desired end? Consequently, "[t]he U.S. should support whoever and whatever form of government is best positioned to provide for the overall good of a people," not necessarily the one that labels itself democratic.
  READ MORE
 

HOW REVOLUTION IS PLAYED OUT IN DIFFERENT COUNTRIES

The first essay in this section is a brief summary of the reactions in some of the countries in the second half of February 2011. The next two discuss some important commonalities between the separate uprisings. The rest examine some of the countries now reacting against their governments and demanding regime change. Differences in expression of dissatisfaction are often understood better when the country's history and/or degree of conformity to its interpretation of the Koran are taken into consideration.

THE NEW MIDDLE EAST AT A GLANCE-COUNTRY BY COUNTRY
Hillel Fendel

  As Hillel Fendel writes: "Arab countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa are experiencing unrest." Fendel briefly reviews "what's happening with the Arabs — and the Jews — in the various states."
  READ MORE
 

ANTI-SEMITISM: THE NEW NECESSITY FOR ARAB REGIMES
by Mudar Zahran

  Mudar Zahran asks why the traditional Jew-hatred in Jordan that was called anti-Zionism for the 60 years of Israel's existence is now openly anti-Jewish. The Jordanian government uses anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism to distract the Palestinian Arabs who are the majority of the population. More generally, Arab regimes find ranting against an American-Jewish alliance useful as a way to redirect the people's anger. "It also helps them convince their Western allies that there is a serious trend of fundamentalism" so they should support the current Arab government. I would guess that what is happening in the Middle East is that the masses have retained their traditional hatred of non-Muslims while disengaging from their current rulers and becoming enamored of Islamic supremicists such as bin Ladin and the Muslim Brotherhood.
  READ MORE
 

YOUTH UPRISING 2011 -- A PLANETARY 1968
Andrew MacKillop

  Andrew MacKillop provides us with an economic rather than political understanding of the current unrest in the Middle East. He points out there may be similarities in political idealism between today's youth-led protests in Arab countries and the 1968 student revolts in Europe and the USA. But today's world is very different, what with its integrated communications, its huge additional population, and its much increased demand for oil. In 1968, the green revolution could solve famine, at least temporarily. It wouldn't work today. "The world had an average of nearly 1 hectare of arable land per person in 1968, but today has less than 0.25 hectares per person." Connect this with the fact that "Egypt, Algeria, Saudi Arabia and Morocco ... import more than 45 percent of world total wheat export supply," you don't need political conspiracy theories to predict regional instability. In today's world, economics and food and job shortages will power anti-regime revolutions. But I suspect that political groups in the Islamic supremacist movement can be counted on to take advantage of the tumult.
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A FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF THE PROTESTS IN EGYPT
by Joshua R. Goodman

  Joshua Goodman was in Cairo when the protests/demonstrations/riots broke out this January. Early on, university-educated young men and women in western clothes were prominent as were the police that kept them contained. As tension grew, the dynamics changed -- the crowd became more turbulent, the police switched to hosing the crowd with water to disperse them. Both were uncoordinated. He records the arrival of the Muslim Brotherhood (according to other sources, they are identifiable by their trim beards), but doesn't credit them with organizing the activities. Nor did he hear the anti-Semitic chanting by the crowds others have reported. Over the next days, unrest spreads, Mubarak's promises aren't believed, the crowds become more determined, more unruly. Curfews are ignored, tires are burned, shops are looted, people are shot by the police. Gradually, things simmer down, at least on the surface; the universal panacea is applied -- as Goodman puts it, "[e]veryone is finding ways to blame Israel." His take on the happenings is his own, and it's an interesting one.
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DO THE PROTESTERS WANT DEMOCRACY?
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Counter to all the hype that street demonstrations mean the people are pushing to gain freedom, Andrew C. McCarthy asks the simple question: do the protesters want democracy? Or are they after something else. Or many something elses. McCarthy deals with the complexity of diverse groups of Egyptians with major differences in life style and attitude toward Mubarak. He also discusses the probability of the Muslim Brotherhood taking control. He sees them taking over by stealth, revealing their real agenda slowly -- much as the AKP did as it gained control in Turkey.
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EVIDENCE OF ANTI-SEMITISM AT THE EGYPT PROTESTS
by John Rosenthal

  John Rosenthal focuses on the large amount of visual and verbal anti-semitism expressed by Egyptian protesters. He notes wryly that "[s]uch images are to be found in video and photographic material from virtually every major Western news organization present in Egypt. This fact is all the more significant when one considers that the reports published or broadcast by these very same news organizations have as a rule outright ignored any anti-Semitic or anti-Israeli sentiment among the protesters." We include some additional information on the Latest Pew Poll on Egyptian attitudes on democracy, sharia law and terrorist groups.
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SUNNI WAHHABISM AND SHIISM IN SAUDI ARABIA
by Joshua Teitelbaum

  As Joshua Teitelbaum writes, in Saudi Arabia, differences in religious practices between the minority Shiite Muslim population and the majority Sunni Muslims translate into chronic tension that occasionally breaks out into violence. As Teitelbaum points out, "[t]he Shiites are not numerous enough to constitute a threat to the regime, but they do constitute an actual and potential arm of Iranian influence." The problem is exacerbated by Iran's increased prestige in the region and its challenging the Saudis' position as leader of world Islam.
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TUNISIA MELTDOWN
by Marion DS Dreyfus

  Marion Dreyfus recalls visiting Tunisia last year when Tunisia's longtime president, Ben Ali, seemed very popular with enlightened ideas about work for women and industrial privatization. "I was impressed in Tunisia by the level of education for even the middle class, and I was unaware of the apparent high rate of unemployment," Dreyfus writes. Now in the wake of the "Jasmine Revolution" Ben Ali has fled to Saudi Arabia, schools are closed and the tourists don't come. Modern trappings aside, Tunisia " is still just...an Arab country."
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JORDAN'S FUTURE CHALLENGES
by Juan José Escobar Stemmann

  This is a neutrally-worded examination by José Stemmann of the state of the state of Jordan, an Arab state created by Britain illegally from 78% of the land destined to be the Jewish state. Renamed the Hashemite Kingdom of (Trans)jordan, Jordan is a monarchy with a placebo parliament; a growing economy still dependent on handouts and services from U.S, the Gulf monarchies and Israel; high unemployment and unrest when subsidies are reduced; and restrictions on political openness. The Palestinian Arabs, many of who live in refugee camps, are officially some 30% of the population (50-60%, possibly even 70%, is the more likely figure). They are considered unreliable and have been excluded "from sensitive posts in the army and administration," but a younger group of Palestinians is beginning to be more active in the economy and politics. "... [T]he Islamist movement has played a key role in political life almost since independence," with Jordan's Muslim Brotherhood (IAF) having much influence and Al-Qaida associates becoming more and more active attempting to promote a radical uprising, often using food shortage and price as the issue.
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QATAR'S GAME
Elliot Jager

  Elliot Jager describes Qatar's survival policy. On the one hand, she throws Israel a bone or two, which Israel politicians inflate all out of proportion as meaning that Qatar is becoming democratic in its outlook. On the other, she plays footsies with what are politely called extremists. She mobilized support for Hamas, when Israel finally went into Gaza to stop Hamas lobbing missiles at Israeli civilians. She helped Hizballah take over Lebanon. She has reportedly pays protection money to al-Qaeda. She reportedly has funneled money to protest leaders in Egypt. She is the home of Al-Jazeera, the pro-Islamist TV network, which has "played a critical role in setting, or codifying, the notion of contemporary pan-Arab unrest." It broadcasts the words of wisdom of al-Qaeda and of Yussuf al-Qaradawi of the Muslim Brotherhood. One reader of the original article commented that "Those who light both ends of a candle will eventually get burnt." So far, Qatar's strategy as deep-pockets silent partner to terrorists seems to be working.
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THESE ESSAYS INVESTIGATE THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD.

Most analysis of what is happening in Egypt predict that sooner or later control of the country will be in the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). This set of essays look at the Muslim Brotherhood and one of its most prominent leaders, Qarawadi. When the MB is compared to Al-Qaeda, the Brotherhood is usually viewed as moderate and reasonable. But as Frank Gaffney says in the essay below, "Al Qaeda and the MB have the same objectives. They differ only in the timing and tactics involved in realizing them."

THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IS THE ENEMY
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Frank Gaffney, Jr. tells us why the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization actively promoting sharia law in countries around the globe, is our enemy. Their tactics differ according to the situation and prevailing issues, but their aim is unswerving: to establish Sharia law globally. They first develop a solid infrastructure and then they become more and more public, while establishing networks with important elements of the local society. When they feel strong enough, they become confrontational, and go all out to seize power.
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EGYPT'S MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD: IN THEIR OWN WORDS
Jonathan D. Halevi

  The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is likely to be part of the transitional government. Jonathan Halevi notes that the MB does "defend the democratic process." It hasn't "accepted the principles of Western democracy," but it can exploit the process "to establish an Islamic regime which will then render democracy unnecessary." For the Brotherhood, sharia is the only true democracy. Their platform states that "the rule in [Egypt] must be republican, parliamentary, constitutional and democratic in accordance with the Islamic Sharia," and that "the Sharia ensures liberty for all." The organization does not accept the principle of the separation of church and state, and the Islamic rule they aspire to is, for them, a realization of democracy.
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QARADAWI AND THE TREASON OF THE INTELLECTUALS
Andrew G. Bostom

  Andrew G. Bostom writes of the return to Cairo of Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the prestigious spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). "Images and actions during his appearance ... should have shattered the delusive view that the turmoil leading to President Mubarak's resignation augured the emergence of a modern, democratic Egyptian society devoted to Western conceptions of individual liberty and equality before the law." The opposite is true. If the MB has anything to say about it -- and they likely will in Egypt -- Egypt will regress to a state where women are chattel and everyone follows sharia law. Bostom asks why the media ignores what the MB itself says and why so many Western intellectuals have abandoned objective truth and won't "acknowledge the heinous consequences of the living, corollary Islamic institutions of jihad war, and Jew/infidel hatred."
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SECTION 2:

LONER TERRORISTS AND SMALL-BOAT PIRATES

How do we deal with the terrorists who have no fixed identification? The lack of rules of engagement between the lone terrorist and a regular army often make it possible for a few irregulars to win over a large and disciplined fighting force. It is even harder for an individual -- the potential victim -- who has to deal with hit-and-run guerillas on his own. These essays discuss the issue of self-help, which isn't classic vigilantism but which might in the future become more frequent if states don't or can't or choose not to protect their citizens.

HOW DO WE DEAL WITH TERRORISTS THAT HAVE NO FIXED IDENTIFICATION?
Bernice Lipkin

  Bernice Lipkin explores circumstances -- Somali piracy on the high seas and Arab terrorism in Israel -- where the potential victims are often forced to fend for themselves because the State can not, for one reason or another, fulfill its obligation to defend its citizens. This doesn't prevent the State from discouraging the potential victims from defending themselves effectively.
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SOMALI PIRACY HITS AMERICA: SOME QUESTIONS IN NEED OF ANSWERS
J. Peter Pham, Ph.D.

  Peter Pham writes that the Somali pirates "have become increasingly emboldened as they operate ever farther from their native littorals for longer periods, scoring greater successes and winning record ransoms." Just recently they murdered four Americans after hijacking their yacht. The countries that patrol the area are not able to do much to prevent this piracy and most of them prefer to pay large ransoms rather than become aggressive. At the same time, ship crews from many countries are restricted by various national and international laws from defending themselves properly.
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A CRUISE TO THE COAST OF PIRATE-INFESTED SOMALIA
To-The-Point Cruise Lines

  This article is satire -- it isn't a brochure for a real cruise. In the real world, we are still talking about allowing ships to 'fight back' and defend themselves from pirates on the high seas. We talk about allowing the crew to store adequate firepower but at the same time there is the urge to limit the use of the firepower by forcing the crew to observe all sorts of rules and regulations. This article is an exaggeration of a possibly effective method of wiping out piracy. We might call it "fight forward." in that it takes the fight to the pirates rather than waiting until attacked.
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WISHING FOR ISLAMIC MODERATION AND REFORM

This section deals with Muslim sustained determination to acclimatize their host society to fit their needs and desires. They must occasionally delay showing their true colors. Chesler's essay on Muzzammil Hassa, who beheaded his wife, reminds us he was the model moderate up-to-date Muslim until then. Ohri writes of the way the Muslims in India and Pakistan talk peace but continue to bomb and terrorize Hindus to back up their demands for Indian land. Fjordman's article is a superb summary of what moderate and reform actually mean. Is it wishful thinking on my part that it might wake up an ecumenically-minded rabbi and minister or two?

INSIDE THE MIND OF AN ISLAMIST
by Phyllis Chesler

  Two years ago, Muzzammil Hassan, an immigrant from Pakistan and a prominent businessman who was often touted as a model of the moderate, adaptable Muslim, protested his wife's demand for a divorce by murdering her and decapitating her. From the first, savvy observers of the Muslim community such as Dr. M. Zjudi Jasser (see here) noted that the media ignored what was an incredibly dramatic story, allowing apologists to whitewash the role Islam played in conditioning Hassan's behavior. In this essay, Phyllis Chesler also sees Hassan as a model -- of the distorted view that Islamic societies instill: that men should dominate women and women must have no will of their own. Hassan views himself not as a chronic wife-beater turned murderer, but as the victim of his wife's provocation. Similarly, suicide-murderers are only doing what they do because Israel won't give up what Arabs are sure is their property. Hassan has carried over the predominant view in his native land that a man's honor is defiled if his women don't behave properly, so she must be punished for "bringing food late, for talking back or for undertaking forbidden trips." Yet, thanks to Sharia law, the same man can have sex with women he marries by the hour as well as with his multiple wives. Hassan's behavior and his views are not acceptable in our society, no matter how much the media would like to excuse them by placing the blame on environmental factors.
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 9
by R. K. Ohri

  After examining the general economic and social consequences of rapid increase in the size of the Muslim community in host countries, in Chapter 8, R.K. Ohri explored the consequences of the Muslim attitude that the only acceptable laws are those conforming to the Koran and Sharia, which are themselves considered immutable. In Chapter 9, Ohri discusses the large number of terrorist attacks in India by Muslims -- many of them Indian Muslims; many trained in Pakistan. Peace talks between India and Pakistan occur but -- in a deal breaker reminiscent of the Arab unwillingness to accept that Israel exists and is a Jewish state -- they will continue to break down unless "Pakistan accepts the Line of Actual Control (the LOC) as the international border between the Indian Kashmir and the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir." As another point of similarity, just as the Arabs are obsessed with destroying Israel, "[t]he Pakistani establishment has a single point agenda: to destabilize, debilitate and balkanize India at any cost."
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DOES MUSLIM MODERATION EXIST; IS ISLAMIC REFORM LIKELY?
by Fjordman

  Westerners involved in ecumenism or true believers in multiculturalism will occasionally admit that when a Muslim community feels strong enough -- which often translates into having enough of them in one place -- they come on a bit strong and uncompromising. As example, they decided to pray on the streets. They didn't back down because the traffic is awful enough in NYC and Paris as it is. The streets were closed. Ecumenists suggest that doesn't mean Muslims are fanatics. it's a question of life style. It's the way they are accustomed to interacting in dictatorial regime. Just give them time. In this essay, Fjordman examines two articles of faith held by Western friends, colleagues, aiders, abetters, enablers and paid flunkies of Islam: (1) there are moderate Muslims and (2) reform of Islam is possible and will solve all the problems of blending a belligerent community into Western civilized ways. The first is yet to be experienced, despite all the opportunities "moderate" Muslims have had to speak up. And as a reader said about reform, "Islamic reformation is already underway -- and it's called things like 'Hamas', 'Islamic Jihad', 'Jamaat Islamiya', 'al Qaida', 'Hezbollah', or Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Iran for short."
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IS ISRAEL GOING TO CHANGE POLICY AND GROW OR GROVEL AND DIE?

We'd dedicate this section to the memory of Herb Zweibon, President of Americans for a Secure Israel (AFSI). He was always clear-eyed but willing to try to reason with Israeli officials, whose compass for steering the ship of Israel was the wishful conviction that the Arabs would respond to benevolence. This section urges corrective action to prevent the Ship of State from sinking.

The more Israel tries to appease the world by declaring she is willing to share her small land, the more the world believes the Arabs who assert forcefully they are the rightful owners of the Land of Israel. Because she is willing to compromise, she is harassed by the U.N., Western politicians and much of the global media. She is being encircled by extreme Islam and terrorists. Iran is building a bomb to destroy her. Too many Israeli Arab citizens have thrown in their lot with the Palestinian Arabs. How is the Israeli government handling it? It offers to amputate some of her land and it has redefined the enemy -- it is the patriotic Jewish pioneers, the Jewish citizens who live in Biblical Israel -- Samaria and Judea. (This area is called the West Bank by the ignorant or by those with a pro-Palestinian bias.)

Israel's real enemies are gathering but with the Middle East in flux, her local enemies will likely have their hands full with more personal matters tomorrow. This is certainly not the time for preemptive moves to surrender parts of Israel. If anything, now is the time to assert Israel's legitimate claim to Mandated Palestine and annex Samaria and Judea, the Golan and Gaza.

IN MEMORY OF HERBERT ZWEIBON
Helen Freedman

  Herb Zweibon was unique. He didn't cut his words to fit prevailing opinions or the op-eds in the New York Times. He didn't worry that he didn't fit the mold of most Presidents of American Jewish organizations. Thank God! He was polite and friendly but rock solid in his intuitions and his arguments. It is discouraging that he has been proven correct in rejecting the notion that tiny Israel would find peace by allowing parts of her to be cut away, and yet his is still not the attitude of the majority of American Jews, who feel uneasy if they stray too far from the teachings of what passes as liberalism in America. Helen Freedman provides us with a personal portrait of Herb.
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PREEMPTIVE SURRENDER
by David Isaac

  David Isaac describes precisely how Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is handling the corrosive attacks on Israel." "Netanyahu's answer to the difficult situation? Preemptive surrender." Reacting as a coward against Israel's enemies, as Isaac points out, "Perhaps because Netanyahu is not willing to fight against the erosion of Jewish sovereignty in Judea and Samaria he becomes cruel towards those who do."
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PLAYING ISRAEL'S GOOD HAND
by Caroline Glick

  Thanks to the American administration's ineptitude in the Middle East, we've recently seen a humiliation hierarchy among some of the major players, wherein the Palestinian Authority humiliates the Obama administration, which, in turn -- while ignoring the real problems of the region -- makes Israel cower. Caroline Glick suggests a simple way to relieve Israel's distress. Israel doesn't need American's yearly contribution. It's costing her too much politically and is inhibiting the development of some industries. I should think Israel would gain more respect and make much more money charging the USA for her intel and technological contributions to America's safety.
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HASBARA, THE WAR FRONT WHERE ISRAEL IS LOSING

The articles in this section point out some major problems with Israel's ability to make her case, even though she does have truth and the facts on her side. Recent events have underscored her right to her land. They have also shown that Israel is not the core problem in the Middle East. Arab countries are concerned about Iran's bomb building, not Jewish home building.

WHY ISRAEL LOSES PR WAR
by Moshe Dann

  This is an important article that describes Israel's flapdoodling attitude towards Judea and Samaria, flipping from encouraging Jewish development of their land, then flopping and encouraging the Arabs to create another Arab state in Biblical Israel. As Moshe Dann asks rhetorically -- in full knowledge that the Territories are Jewish legally by international law, by conquest, by history, by Bible, and by unswerving devotion over the centuries -- "If the areas of settlement in Judea and Samaria don't belong to us, what are we doing there?" Ironically, many of the readers' comments prove that Israel has not told the world in a forthright manner that the Land is hers. They accept without hesitation that only the nouveau people -- the Palestinian Arabs -- have claim to the land. They have no quarrel with a bald misstatement of the Balfour declaration.
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EXPOSING ARAB FALSEHOODS
Martin Sherman

  The previous essay focused on negating Arab false claims on owning Samaria and Judea. This essay by Martin Sherman addresses the larger issue: the Arabs have the ear of the majority of the press, which uncritically broadcasts the Arab lies and distortions. Moreover, they are protected by an egocentric use of political correctness -- it isn't polite to rebut the stories told by the Po' Palestinians, even if they are either total lies or just distortions and/or half-truths. Sherman rebuts a typical Hanan Ashrawi fantasy, and suggests that -- because Israel has historic and legal truth on its side -- it make the received wisdom authentic by rewriting it "on the basis of historical realities, not political distortions; on the basis of prevailing realities rather than fabricated fantasies; on the basis of events as they actually occurred, not as they are deceitfully contrived. "
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WHO IS URI AVNERY, AND WHY DOES HE MATTER?
by Aryeh Tepper

  Anchored in information in Amnon Lord's books, Aryeh Tepper has written a thoughtful essay about Uri Avnery, one of the leading lights of the extreme leftist Israeli Marxists, who are still influential in the media and in academia. Avnery helped convince Israelis to accept the Oslo Accords, because in doing so, they were supporting human rights. He is of course revered by Israel's enemies and is called a peace activist and humanitarian. In his case, as is common when Marxist praise other Marxists, being called a peace activist and humanitarian translates to being someone who tries with all his being to bring death to Israel, not peace.
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NARRATIVE ISN'T EVERYTHING
by Jonathan Rosenblum

  Jonathan Rosenblum writes that the Wikileaks State Dept emails and al-Jeezeera's release of alleged P.A. documents "have done much to buttress Israel's narrative of the Middle East." They are a windfall for Israel. They confirm that while Western leftists and the American Administration may be obsessed with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Middle East states are concerned about Iran and her increasing nuclear capability. What a wonderful opportunity to use this information to maybe make a dent in the Arab narrative --- i.e., that Israel is the core problem in the Middle East. And if she'd make peace -- on Arab terms, of course -- the Middle East would magically become stable and have no civil wars and no fights between neighbors. Israel didn't utilize this information.
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A DOZEN BAD IDEAS FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
by Mark Durie

  Mark Durie presents some beliefs and conditioned ways of thinking that make it difficult for us to analyze Islam's structure and objectives clearly. So many of them were designed to make us more tolerant, which is fine when we are trying to gain acceptance for groups that want to participate in our culture but haven't been allowed entry. They become dangerous when they prevent us from recognizing that Islam doesn't want in; it wants to take over.
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HISTORY SECTION

THE WARTIME DIARY OF EDMUND KESSLER
reviewed by Omer Bartov

  Omer Bartov reviews the published diary maintained by Edmund Kessler, a Polish Jewish attorney who survived the Holocaust. A lesson for our time is how little effort it took for the Nazi conquerors and the local clergy to encourage people to manifest barbaric behavior toward the Jews -- perhaps in part because the populace was already inculcated with a strong prejudice against the Jews. A few of the local gentiles behaved nobly. For the majority, as Bartov writes, "ugly and brutish behavior was triggered by the overwhelming presence of the German occupation and the growing realization that the new rulers were determined to use, abuse, and ultimately murder the Jews. ... the specifics of how, and how quickly, this awareness translates in mob violence are described succinctly and insightfully in Kessler's terrifying text."
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THE MOST HEINOUS KILLERS OF THE HOLOCAUST: THE MUSLIM-CATHOLIC USTASHA
by Edwin Black

  We usually think of European anti-Semitism and Islamic anti-Semitism as independent of each other. In recent years, the details of the close coordination between the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Amin al-Husseini and Hitler, who had the mutual desire to kill Jews, have become known. In this article Edwin Black traces the background and history of one of their creations: the Ustasha was a partnership of Bosnian Muslims and Catholic Croatians, who terrorized and murdered Jews and Gypsies in Yugoslavia. They became notorious for their brutality even among the Nazis.
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OPENING PALESTINE'S DOORS
by Rafael Medoff

  Rafael Medoff writes the recollections of three people now living in Jerusalem, who as students in the United States at the beginning of World War 2, participated in trying to fight Britain's disgraceful and illegal attempts to block Jewish refugees from entering Mandated Palestine. They were part of a larger effort by the Bergson group to make America aware of the Holocaust happening in Europe. Just as the media today soft pedals the extent of Islamic destructive infiltration into the U.S.A., Europe, the Middle East and India, so then they barely mentioned the growing number of reports of large scale Nazi murder of Jews. And many American Jews - just as today -- were silent. They reserved their anger for those sounding the alarm.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

January 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2011 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


NOVEMBER-DECEMBER, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the November-December 2010 issue:
Hoaxes (Lipkin, Glick, Bernstein, Lipkin, Dann, Ha'Ivri, Sharpe)
Steps on the road to adopting Islam's View of the World (Warner, Nirenstein, Phillips)
Anti-Semites from Church and State (Alexander, Bard, Hertz)
Islamic Intolerance is incompatible with Democracy (Ohri, Fjordman, Ibrahim, Greenfield, Simpson)
Prescription for Peace (Katz, Jacobs, Soloway, Isaac, Halevi, Bernstam)
History Section (Shragai, Joffe and Romirowsky)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (November, December)

HOAXES

In this Issue, we start by examining hoaxes -- the kind the Muslims play upon the rest of the world, and the ones they inflict on themselves.

There was a science fiction story a half century ago about a culture that worshipped a god-person, the Supreme Being named, if I remember rightly, Garoma -- well, something like that. As the story develops, we learn that his psychiatrist who knows everyone's secrets believes himself the real power behind the throne, while Garoma is just eye candy for the crowds. Shaggy dog past the number of people who believe they are the real power to the one who really does hold the world in his power. As the story ends, Garamo is being paraded down the street, and everyone screams enthusiastically, "Help us, Garoma." -- including the ultimate holder of power.

By analogy, the Arabs and their pro-peace marxist Pals are excellent at creating realistic hoaxes. With the help of the lackey-media, these hold up, at least until someone looks at them logically. Or until someone takes a photo of the directors setting up the hoax.

What is also becoming clear is that apparently it is as easy for the hoaxsters to fool themselves as it is to fool anyone else. They begin to believe their own lies. The world then can not be trusted. Whoever doesn't agree with them must be lying. Whoever denies Arab claims is conspiring against the Arab world. It can't possibly be that they themselves are not credible. This is not a mentality that is attuned to progress or new knowledge. It won't reject ideas that don't stand up to experience. Indeed, the opposite is true. The world and all within it must conform to the notions the Arab know to be true. There is no room for argument.

So it is that what starts out as a mild self-serving lie becomes a self-induced deception. For the lie to be maintained, the environment often needs to be restructured. The hoax is the natural medium to refit the environment to the proper shape, to provide the right context.
 

HOAXES, STUNTS, SETUPS, MISINTERPRETATIONS, COME IN ALL SIZES of believability. Some assertions have such shock value, their sheer impossibility is ignored. In August 2009, the Swedish journalist Donald Bostom created a blood libel against the Jews out of whole cloth. He claimed some Palestinian Arabs told him how their dead son was taken away by the IDF and returned with large stitches in his midsection. The implication was clear: the Jews were ripping the organs out of innocent terrorists for organ transfer. When you get past the shock value, this is giggle-making. Organs from bullet-riddled terrorists are not suitable for organ transfer. Extracting, preserving and inserting vital organs are tricky procedures; they aren't done under field conditions. What's interesting is that the dead terrorist's relatives initially denied that he was an involuntary organ donor. But after other families took up the charge, they came to claim it as the truth.

Way at the other end of the scale of taking a bizarre interpretation seriously has been the universal reaction to the announcement that the Saudis had captured a Mossad spy -- a vulture. The bird was equipped with a ring with "Tel Aviv University" written on it and a global positioning satellite (GPS) so the Israeli researchers could keep track of their subjects, the birds. Naturally, the Saudis suspected the bird of spying for Israel. Almost everyone treated the story with sarcasm. No one insisted that the Jews come up with evidence the vulture was not a spy. Nor did the Jews volunteer any evidence. It was a pleasant change from the pathetic way Jews explain that, gee whiz, the Temple Mount really does belong to us, honest. Don't ya read the Bible? Who but reactionary Marxists ever doubted it?

 READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE


 

WHEN ISRAELI LEFTISTS TURN AGAINST THEIR COUNTRY WITH HORRENDOUS LIES, THE WORLD MEDIA IS HAPPY TO DISSEMINATE THEM
by Caroline B. Glick

  In this essay, Caroline Glick describes three recent events where Arabs set up situations that libel Israeli Jews, and Israel's military. By actions such as stoning cars as they drive by, they trap Jews into needing to fight for their lives. Then they photograph just the moment the Jews fight back. Without context, it looks like the Jews are behaving with gratuitous nastiness. In Bil'im, they blamed the death of an on-looker, Jawaher abu Rahmeh, on the tear gas the IDF used on the rioters. It was later discovered the woman was not in the riot. According to her mother, she was some distance away watching it. (click here.) And even if she had been in the thick of things, tear gas is used precisely because it doesn't kill. While these particular accusations unraveled without doing much damage, more often than not, Israel suffers political injury because the rigged situations are certified as legitimate by respected NGOs, many of them Israeli, that will stop at nothing to delegitimize Israel.
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HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH IS BADLY DISTORTING THE ISSUES
by Robert L. Bernstein

  Established as a monitor for human rights around the planet, in the last few years Human Rights Watch (HRW) has focused almost exclusively on Israel, using subjective standards, making unsubstantiated assertions and depending on unreliable sources. Its change in mission became very clear when two facts became known: (1) much of the distorted material that Judge Goldstone used to libel Israel's conduct during the Gaza campaign came from Israeli NGOs such as HRW; and (2) its funding was now coming from foreign governments and the anti-Israel New Israel Fund. This article is an edited version of the lecture, Robert Bernstein, the founder of HRW, delivered as the University of Nebraska November 10, 2010. The Jerusalem Post wrote that Bernstein lacerated "... the organization he had established for moral failures in its treatment of Israel" while simultaneously ignoring virulent and continued violation of human rights by the Arab countries. We include excerpts from an article by Gerald Steinberg on HRW's history.
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THE SYMBOLISM OF THE OLIVE TREE
by Bernice Lipkin

  Practically speaking, the olive is a food, and its oil is used for cooking. But its value as symbol is so very much more. The olive. With the grape, the pomegranate, milk and honey. it constitutes part of the ancient image of Israel. The foods -- one almost needs to express the idea in the archaic form that lends dignity -- that restoreth our souls. The olive has these days become another sort of symbol. The Marxists of the Political Left have contrived to associate it with Arabs, as if only Arabs had olive trees. It helps to give them a historic identity they don't actually have. They claim Jews are stripping and destroying their olive trees -- thereby imparting an extra degree of evil to the Jew, who obviously doesn't have an ounce of sensitivity if he is so disrespectful of the olive tree. Because of its symbolism, the olive tree is a most popular prop in the Arab repetoire of hoaxes.

Israel is definitely Jewish. Even the non-Jewish Jews, when they rebel, they rebel against rabbis, not priests or mullahs. So the normal would be that the majority Jew would be favored over the minority Arab. It ain't so. Not in the courts. Not in the police stations. Not in most of the media. I know it's hard to believe. Ordinary intelligent people assume it is the other way round. They act almost as instinctively as the illiterate neo-Nazi who has never read the New York Times but is sure it is pro-Jewish because its owners are nominally Jewish.

Thanks to the unbridled Israeli court system and its police flunkies, the Arabs can literally get away with murder. And they do. They also exploit the olive tree. They hide behind Jewish olive trees to case out the Jewish town, so later they can sniper-slaughter Jewish women and children. They steal livestock from Jewish farmers, burn Jewish orchards, destroy Jewish crops. They hack olive trees and blame it on the Jews. And they get away with it. The courts, riddled with Marxist idiots, have ruled in their favor.

The pro-Palestinian media -- and this includes most of the media -- takes the word immediately and instinctively of any Arab to anything they assert. And these wily Arabs project their activities on the Jews. They destroy olive trees and claim the Jews have destroyed the trees. Wouldn't you think that when, after the fact, we find 99.9999% of the time that the Jews spoke truthfully and the Arabs lied, just once the outside NGOs and media would hesitate before believing the Arab yet again? Nope. Never happens.

I remember an AFSI trip some years back to Samaria and Judea and Gaza. Our gun-slinging guide said you can always tell the difference between a Jewish olive tree and an Arab one. The Jews coddle their trees and they flourish. The Arab don't succor theirs. They let them fend for themselves. They simply lift the olives from the sturdy but wizened tree, a tree that often doesn't belong to them, when the olives are ripe.

I remember on that same trip, we stopped to watch some arabs picking olives in a grove of trees. They felt no fear. We were Jews, after all. They were confident we wouldn't harm them or insult them or chase them away or demand they prove the trees were theirs to pick. Truthfully, I don't think I'd have the restraint of the Israeli Jews living in Samaria and Judea and the Negev and the Galilee, who are treated as second-class citizens in their own country. If -- and I'm not sure it is -- if it is the case that occasionally they lose their cool and attack their persecutors, I can only wonder: what took them so long.
 

IT'S THE OLIVE TREES, STUPID!
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann writes about the politics of planting olive trees in Israel to assert legal claim to land. He points out that Arabs "plant olive trees in disputed areas near Jewish communities, often with help from Peace Now and pro-Palestinian NGOs, to check the growth of settlements and provide cover for terrorists who seek to infiltrate and murder." Arab land take overs in the Territories may not be legal but they are upheld by the U.N., which is alway there to condemn any proprietary act by Israel it fears might strengthen Israel's sovereignty over its land. The placement of olive tree is a weapon they yield effectively.
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OLIVES OF WRATH
by David Ha'ivri

  Long age, the psalmist wrote of the relationship of Israel and God: "I [am] like a green olive tree in the house of God; I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever." Noah knew the flood was over, when the dove returned bearing an olive branch in its mouth. Much more recently, the pro-Arab non-governmental organizations have attempted to hitch the imagery of the olive tree -- deeply significant to Jews and Christians -- to the Palestinian cause. Aided by some creative grove theatre, they would have us believe that the true owners of the olive trees in Israel and the Territories are the Arabs and that the heartless Jews spend their time harassing the Arabs, who want only to tend to their crops in peace. David Ha'ivri exposes one of the cynical ways the NGOs contribute to the Arab grab of Jewish land.
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LIES, DAMNED LIES, AND ERAKAT
by Victor Sharpe

  Palestinian Authority chief negotiator Saeb Erakat became a celebrity back in 2002 when, almost singlehandedly, he convinced an admittedly gullible media that the Joos had killed -- maybe 250, maybe 500, possibly thousands of people -- in Jenin. They had buried them in a mass grave so their evil act would remain unknown. The hoax was sloppily created -- no graves were found, nobody was missing -- and the story soon collapsed, although it has became an article of faith with pro-Palestinians that the Jenin population was massacred by the Joos. Some good would have come from Erakat's lies if the Israeli leaders had understood that they needlessly sacrificed over 20 of their soldiers -- who were cautioned not to aim at a terrorist if there was a woman or child in the vicinity. But they seemed not to have learned that kindness to Arab terrorists isn't reciprocated. Victor Sharpe summarizes some of the stories this Sherazade of the Arab Union of Liars has concocted. Amazingly, each of his lies is amplified by the press and then quietly forgotten as facts become available, but he is never ignored. Most recently, a women from the village of Bi'lin is said to have been asphyxiated by tear gas hurled at the Friday afternoon rioters. Though the circumstances are yet to be determined, he was right there to indict Israel for war crimes. Would you negotiate an agreement with this man? The Israelis did -- the infamous Oslo Accords.
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DO WE STILL HAVE THE MENTAL FACULTIES TO REJECT ISLAM IMPOSING ITS VIEW OF THE WORLD ON US?

This section has three snapshots on the road to accepting Islam at its own assessment: from Warner's article where access to some actual and honest facts will dispel the fog onto an intermediate stage where, as Nirenstein writes, people behave as ostriches. The implications of facts are ignored or taken as amusing trivia -- like the fact that Muhammad is now the most popular name for a boy in many European countries. It's much less disturbing than examining what is happening to them. Melanie Phillips describes the terminal stage, where people in all walks of life have become resistant to reality because they are bonded to the Arab narrative, which portrays the Palestinian Arabs as the victims of the people they murder. And all events are interpreted through a rigid filter that justifies anything the Arabs do because the Jews are demons and their hold on the land of Israel is illegitimate.

OBJECTIVE ISLAM, SUBJECTIVE ISLAM
by Bill Warner

  Bill Warner cautions us against believing the expert who has been corrupted -- and the Saudis are spending billions to make just such friends. "Such apologists tend to quote a Muslim friend or establishment expert and attack those who criticize Islam." Not useful. Warner suggests going to the sources: to the Koran and Hadith, themselves. Use an translation that doesn't airbrush the original.
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THE INVENTION OF "PEACE" IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Fiamma Nirenstein

  Somewhere in the middle of the road between the ability to handle the claims of Islam as we do any other investigation to the end of the road, when people are afflicted with a condition where normal investigation is not possible because it is filtered out by the adopted ideology of Islam. there is a middle area when reality is denied or minimized. The facts are there. Their implications are ignored. We minimize the significance of Iran's push for nuclear arms; we obscure the significance of Mohammed being the most popular name for a boy in many countries in Europe. We keep waiting for Syria to do the sensible thing and leave Iran; meantime Syria extends its role as happy little gofer for Iran. Reality is too frightening to deal with. But it can be done; but we need to .look for "new ways to peace, as the old ways are blocked. "
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THE CHALLENGE OF PUBLIC DIPLOMACY VIS-A-VIS THE DELEGITIMISATION OF ISRAEL
by Melanie Phillips

  Melanie Phillips writes that when it comes to public diplomacy -- hasbara -- "Israel and its defenders have been outclassed and outmanoeuvred in a war of the mind being waged on a battleground it never even acknowledged it was on." By now, the belief that the Palestinians have a just cause --- they are the natives and Israel is illegally occupying their land -- is accepted on all the social, political, religious and economic levels of British society. Islam has been successful in trivializing Israel's concerns and, at the same time, adopting as their own, any parts of the Jewish experience that can be twisted into helping their case; e.g., the Jews didn't suffer a Holocaust, but they are causing one in Gaza. "... history is turned on its head; logic is suspended; and an entirely false narrative of the conflict is now widely accepted as unchallengeable fact, from which fundamental error has been spun a global web of potentially catastrophic false conclusions." As Phillips puts it, "we are dealing with a pathology — to which we nevertheless respond as if it were rational behaviour." Israel continues to appease, when she needs strategies against the various types of Israel bashers and haters -- and the courage to use them.
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ANTISEMITES FROM CHURCH AND STATE

This section discusses influential bodies that labor hard on behalf of the Arabs. It's long been known Archbishop Tutu is a rabid and vocal anti-Semite, reinforcing the Arab hostility to Israel and to Jews in general. Judging by its behavior, the permanent staff at the State Department is also strongly pro-Arab -- catering to Saudi Arabia and ignoring its support of jihad. This opinion has been bolstered by papers recently declassified. Given that Muslim immigration to Europe threatens to overwhelm the native populations, it is surprising that the European Union (EU) does not see Israel as a strong ally in attempting to keep the Muslims at bay. Instead, the EU is one of the strongest supporters of the Arabs' war on Israel. They provide the Palestinian Arabs with large amounts of money and construct towns for them; they run interference for them in the U.N. and echo their propaganda themes; and they lobby for them in Washington. They criticize every way Israel has sought to counter terrorism, no matter how finely targeted and limited to known terrorists. The EU has become a collegium of Judge Goldstones, whose opinions don't merit respect.

ARCHBISHOP TUTU, OBAMA'S OTHER ANTI-SEMITIC GURU
by Edward Alexander

  Israel holds an singular place in Archibishop Tutu's thinking: it sins against the Palestinian arab as once it sinned by helping apartheid in South Africa. In his mind, though not in reality, it was the country that helped the white minority oppress the black majority. Given his drive to boycott Israel, Edward Alexander's essay on Tutu's spiteful rants about Israel is worth pondering. It is clear Tutu is as intent on destroying Israel's economy as he is in showing his hatred of Jews. It is a fact that Israel doesn't practice apartheid but there definitely is a real problem -- the Arabs are trying hard to destroy the Jewish state. I suspect the Archbishop knows the facts but in his Marxist view they don't signify.
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THE ARAB LOBBY: THE AMERICAN COMPONENT
by Mitchell Bard

  We've become accustomed to hearing that the mighty USA is at the mercy of the Israel Lobby, but a more realistic assessment is that it is the Arab Lobby that influences governmental policy. It predates the Israel Lobby. It's not grass roots; its members are people of position and clout; they include oil company executives, career diplomats at the State Department, Christian missionaries and educators who from the beginning wanted to "build ties with the Arab world and, following the discovery of oil in the region, to secure access to that resource." [italics added] Their sympathies are a carryover from the days when Britain controlled "Palestine" and aided and abetted the Arabs while disarming the Jews. It will likely continue to be pro-Arab when the power of Arab oil wanes. Mitchell Bard points out that no matter what the views of the elected administration, the United States State Department has traditionally been in tune with the views of the Arabs, particular with the wishes of Saudi Arabia, which has a strong antipathy to a Jewish state in the Middle East. The U.S.A. may have a ideological commitment to promote democracy, but in practice, the State Department runs interference for the Saudis, and this is not necessarily in the best interests of the USA. Saudi Arabia, in addition to its dismal record on human rights is "one of the principal sponsors of jihadists." And the jihadists see the USA as their enemy -- and act on that perception.
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THE EUROPEAN UNION: NO INNOCENT BYSTANDER, NO HONEST BROKER
by Eli E. Hertz

  Eli E. Hertz demolishes the fancy that the European Union (EU) has taken the high road in the Middle East conflict. As he puts it, "Europe's claim that it can be an even-handed mediator does not hold water. Besides a poor record in solving problems as colonial powers, member states of the EU would make poor facilitators in the Middle East for several reasons, including their dependence on Arab trade and Arab oil." They also seem to believe that by sacrificing Israel, they will save Europe from Arab terrorism and the Arab demographic takeover of Europe. Their strategy is about as likely to work as Chamberlain's sellout of Czechoslovakia saved Europe from Hitler and World War 2.
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ISLAMIC INTOLERANCE IS INCOMPATIBLE WITH DEMOCRACY

For many of us, what started as amusing stories of how piggy banks were banned in an English town because Muslims don't eat pork or how Muslim taxi drivers have refused to transport passengers carrying liquor have become less and less amusing. Demanding that woman wear burqas when their pictures are taken for a driver's license was not funny. Muslims have progressed from getting time off every couple of hours for prayers to where they take over streets in major cities for prayers. In small matters and in large matters, there seems to be no stopping point, no time when they are content with the concessions won. And never any sense of shame -- can you image a Jew or a Hindu insisting on building a house of worship at the site demolished by their fellow religionists? They don't seem to get along even with each other. This set of essays ask whether the Islamic drive for supremacy is compatible with Western democracy.

THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 8
by R. K. Ohri

  In the previous two chapters, R.K. Ohri examined the socio-economic and cultural consequences of the rapid increase in the size of the Muslim community in host countries around the world. The immigrant Muslims invariably rapidly outbreed the natives and invariably demand changes that suit themselves, even if it damages or marginalizes the native population. In Chapter 8, he discourses on the unfortunate fact that unlike other religions, Islam has -- and wants -- no mechanisms to encourage better ways to govern and restructure society or to develop human rights for previously-deprived social groups. The only acceptable laws and social mores are those conforming to the Koran and Sharia, which are themselves considered immutable. Every aspect of a woman's life is controlled by the Koranic view that the male should dominate society and his household. Madrassas teach hatred of non-Muslims and encourages their students to wage war to promote the supremacy of Islam. Islam's goal is "converting every Muslim country into a rigid 'Sharia-based Islamic state'" and converting every non-Muslim country to Islam. And thanks to their oil-wealth, countries like Saudi Arabia have the resources as well as the commitment to carry out these aims.
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WHY ISLAM MUST BE EXPELLED FROM THE WEST
by Fjordman

  Recently, a suicide bomber, an Iraqi-born Muslim, struck at a shopping mall in downtown Stockholm. Fjordman points out that this contradicts all the reasons we've been given to explain what motivates these murderous acts. Sweden can hardly be accused of favoring Israel. And at home, Sweden favors the Muslim immigrant above its native stock. The best the bomber could come up with was that Sweden, as part of NATO, was in Afghanistan and that some cartoonist had mocked Muhammad -- hardly an explosive matter to a non-Muslim.. Fjordman concludes that Islamists may blame their violence on any handy excuse, but their real intent is to replace democracy with their totalitarian ideology, which preaches Islam uber alles. and believes the personal habits of a crude, ignorant, vicious, egotistical pedophile are the best guide to how we should conduct ourselves. Once we arrive at this summation: "As long as they remain in our countries, they will work to subvert and destroy us. It is quite literally a religious duty for them to do so," the solution becomes obvious.
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THE ART OF PROJECTING ONE'S VICES, MUSLIM-STYLE
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Muslim have made it an art form attributing their grotesque ways to those they persecute. As Raymond Ibrahim writes, they project their evil behavior on the Christian Copts of Egypt. He provides us with instructive examples. They are at their vituperative best claiming Israel is occupying Palestinians land, when, truth be known, it occupies land legally and morally and historically belonging to Israel. Inverting the truth, Muslims accuse minority groups in the Middle East of practicing what is well-known as basic Radical Islam.
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ISLAM WAS BORN OUT OF CHILD ABUSE AND RAPE
by Daniel Greenfield

  The title of this article is not hyperbole. As Daniel Greenfield points out it was the marriage of the child Aishe to Mohammed that gave him his first real power base. "In Islam, [child abuse] is an organic part of the religion itself." Given that Mohammed and his activities and behavior are considered the perfect model to be imitated, there doesn't seem to be any way to conform to Islam but disallow child marriage. Similarly, the suicide bombers and snipers who shoot children held in the arms of their parents are in conformity to Mohammed's instructions to his followers. As Greenfield puts it, "Mohammed had a vastly inflated ego completely out of proportion to his actual abilities. And like them, he knew that cunning and ruthlessness would take him further, than righteousness and hard work ever would. He saw his opponents as weak because they were unwilling to do what he did. And that made them easy prey." Our current unwillingness to fight back effectively continues to make the West easy prey.
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THE "PALESTINIAN" ARABS AND THE FORGOTTEN IRANIAN ARABS
by Steven Simpson

  When Persia, now known as Iran, was conquered by Muhammed's Arab hoard, many of these Arabs and some already in Persia settled in large part in the Iranian province of Khuzistan. Despite the fact that these Ahwazi Arabs are Arabs and certainly Muslim, they suffer the indignities and massacres inflicted on other Middle Eastern minorities such as the Copts. As Steven Simpson points out, the suffering of these minorities is ignored, while the world squanders its sympathy and good deeds on the "Palestinian" Arabs, who, compared to the poor of the Arab world, live well. The Arabs In Israel and the Territories are not subjected to massacres and terror; in point of fact, it is these Arabs that do the massacring and terrorizing. Why does the world scream when a Palestinian Arab is stopped at a checkpoint, but says nothing when an Ahwazi Arab or a Christian Copt has his throat slit?
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PRESCRIPTION FOR PEACE

It can be said in two words: get real. Stop pretending we can sweet talk into normal, peaceful behavior a bunch of people taught by their holy books and their holy men and scholars that they are destined to reign over the planet; and they must never stop working towards that goal. To change the odds, we first need to change ourselves. We need education, knowledge, new attitudes and firmness of purpose. And we need to figure out how to give up the intruders, not our land. Doesn't seem too much to do when the alternative is oblivion at the hands of a determined group of death cultists aided by Western friends with other reasons for eliminating the Jew.

THE JEWISH PRESENCE IN PALESTINE
by Shmuel Katz

  This essay -- a chapter from Shmuel Katz' Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine -- makes the point that the Jews didn't create a homeland in recent times. Israel has been their homeland for thousands of years. They needed to regain it and redeem it. And that too took thousands of years, though during that time, no matter how hard the local conditions and how oppressive the rulers, there were always some Jews living in the Jewish homeland. By the mid-1800s while still under Ottoman rule, the entire region that was to become Mandated Palestine after World War 1 was Darfur-poor, economically a derelict and practically empty of people. The total population -- Jews and non-Jews -- is reasonably estimated at 100,000 people. The millions of Arabs currently in Israel and the territories are mostly 20th century immigrants and their descendents. Katz makes it clear that the "historic ownership [of Palestine] by the Arab people or by a 'Palestinian entity' is a fiction fabricated in our own day." It is about time the Arab propaganda that claims the Palestinians/Arabs are the natives and/or a "Palestinian/Arab nation" who have been dispossessed by the invasion of the Jews is recognized to be the fantasy that it is.
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JEWISH MALWARE
by Charles Jacobs

  Charles Jacobs examines the Jewish reaction to an accusation. Perhaps it's the thousands of years of conditioning in the diaspora where the follow-up to being accused of something, rightly or wrongly, was almost always death or torture, expulsion or heavy taxation. It didn't matter how absurd the accusation. Jews who routinely soaked and salted meat to rid it of blood before they ate it were accused of killing Christian children to use their blood in matzo. And they were killed for it. Whatever the reason, it seems the more outrageous and libelous the accusation, the greater the Jewish need to explain, to justify, to become acutely defensive. As Jacobs reminds us, "Jabotinsky had it perfectly right. 'Every accusation causes among us such a commotion that people unwittingly think, 'why are they so afraid of everything? Apparently their conscience is not clear.'" I think Jacobs is on to something significant. What but our acute concern for being targeted by an accusation -- in this case dual loyalty -- has made most of us timid about insisting Jonathan Pollard is long overdue for release from an abnormally long jailing? Against all precedent, why do our enemies feel they could keep Pollard jailed for an eternity? Why do we always go on the defensive, not the offensive? Why don't we firmly point out that the Land of Israel is ours. Period. Why, instead, do our spokesmen pretend we can't wait for a bunch of murderers to set up house in Biblical Israel. Why don't we understand, as Melanie Phillips has put it, "the animus against Israel can only be understood if it is set in a far wider context. It is part of a wholesale denigration of and onslaught upon the West and its values by the media, progressive intelligentsia and political class." Why do we let a bunch of Marxists and Muslims with hate in their hearts deter us from defending our turf and the culture we share with the West? Why oh why don't we answer the Thomas Friedman-style fools with sarcasm as Prowisor does here. or with some great satire as Caroline Glick does here? Why, when UNESCO decides that the tomb of our ancestor Rachel, wife of Abraham, is really a Arab mosque, why doesn't we send UNESCO a bunch of bananas as we'd do for any ape, instead of attempting to reason with the knowingly unreasonable?
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THE "TWO-STATE DELUSION": WHO WANTS A "TWO-STATE SOLUTION"?
by Alan Soloway

  Dr Alan Soloway uses the controversery surrounding the Ground Zero mosque to provide insight into what's wrong with a 2-state solution that would carve a Palestinian state out of Biblical Israel. The Mosque must be build only at Ground Zero so that it will serve as a sign that the bombing of the World Trade Center was an important step on the road to Islam Triumphant. The same "Jihadist religious political mindset ... will not allow Israel to exist and is resolved to restore Arab Muslim influence, prestige, control and power to their glory of ages past." Dr. Soloway argues from history, international law and "Arab Muslim political theology" that a 2-state solution is not the way to peace but to the destruction of Israel, the destabilization of the Middle East and a weakening of the power of the USA to protect itself from Islamic Jihad.
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THE SETTLEMENTS AND THE MONSTROUS CHARGE OF ILLEGALITY
by David Isaac

  Jewish settlements in Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank) are legal by international law. How could they not be, when that entire area is Jewish by an irrevocable trust created by the same International Authority that created many of the Arab states? Yet, as David Isaac writes, a great deal of the anti-Israel propaganda by the European Union and the American administration inter alia has been focused on claiming that Jewish settlers are fanatics, their settlements illegal. On the other hand, Arab settlements, built on private land not their own -- or even on public land -- are never considered illegal. What's going on is that propagandists want to turn over the land to the Palestinian Arabs, without the problem of having to expel a lot of Jews. And why would the Jews have to leave, when, after all, Arabs are 20% of Israel's population? Well, except for the remnants of ancient Jewish communities, Jews aren't allowed to live in Arab countries. But that's another story.
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THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES ON THE DAY AFTER "INDEPENDENCE"
by Jonathan D. Halevi

  Hard statistics are hard to come by. But In 1948, what would become the new State of Israel (and not including Gaza, Judea and Samaria) had somewhat less or much less (depending on the estimate) than 690,000 to 736,000 permanent Arab residents. (See MidEastWeb.) After the Arab invasion of the new-born State of Israel in May 1948, subtracting the couple of hundred thousand Arabs that remained, and ignoring the artificial inflation due to double ration cards, not reporting the dead, registration of Arabs who'd never been in Israel, and poor Arabs in the Arab host countries -- there were at the very most -- 595,000 refugees, well below the number of Jews who were forced to flee the Arab lands. In August 1948, the U.N. estimated the number of Arab refugees needing help at 330,000. The U.N. now supports around 5 million people, the original refugees and their putative descendants. Jonathan D. Halevi points out the Arabs have locked themselves into a refusal to accept anything but an uncompromised right of return. The creation of a Palestinian state is envisioned as a way station in which to collect Palestinians -- including the refugees residing in the different Arab states -- and get them ready to go back to their old homes in Israel. For those that understand that letting in some or all of this hostile population is a way to destroy Israel -- and think this is a good thing -- give this a thought: After World War Two there were millions and millions of refugees [see above and Yemini, "Addendum."] and most of them were resettled in new places. What if these refugees and their children and their grandchildren and their great grandchildren began retroactively to demand the right of return?
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PALESTINIAN PROLETARIAT
by Michael S. Bernstam

  Michael Bernstam describes Gaza, with its eight UNRWA refugee camps as "a totalitarian paramilitary camp at war with its neighbors and other Palestinians." Typically, refugees are helped over an immediate crises and encouraged to resettle somewhere or other in a timely fashion. In contrast, UNRWA, the agency established in 1949 exclusively for the Arab refugees, has continued to provide generous handouts, medical care, education and social services to the children and grandchildren and great grandchildren of the original refugees. UNRWA, with its complete welfare program for an ever-expanding clientele living in 59 refugee camps scattered over several Arab countries and in the Territories, has thwarted economic development, destroyed opportunities for peace in the Middle East, and created, along the way — both metaphorically and literally — a breeding ground for international terrorism." Keeping these professional refugees on the dole has prevented them from developing a nation-state. It follows that the best way to improve their lot would be to abolish UNRWA.
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HISTORY SECTION

RACHEL'S TOMB, A JEWISH HOLY PLACE, WAS NEVER A MOSQUE
by Nadav Shragai

  Rachel, our Matriarch, died on the 11th of Heshvan 3,564 years ago and to commemorate her yahrzeit, Jews travel to her grave every year. Nadav Shragai recounts the history of the Kever. Over the centuries. Muslims recognized the tomb was Jewish -- which didn't prevent them from extorting money to allow Jews to visit the tomb and robbing the visitors. Jordan prevented Jewish access during the 19 years it was in control of eastern Jerusalem, Samaria and Judea. But it wasn't until 1996 that the Arabs began to claim the site wasn't Jewish but was a mosque named after a Muslim, Bilal ibn Rabah, who is buried in Damascus. And now they have the jokers at UNESCO agreeing with them.
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A TALE OF TWO GALLOWAYS: Notes on the Early History of UNRWA and Zionist Historiography
by Alexander H. Joffe and Asaf Romirowsky

  Structured as a biohistory of the career of a British military colonel during WW2, this essay by Alexander H. Joffe and Asaf Romirowsky is an insightful examination of the early days of UNRWA. This was well before the time that the local arabs who fled Israel when the Arab states invaded were transmogrified into the "Palestinian" people. The authors document the politics and interactions between UNRWA and its wards, during the time the Arab countries openly rejected the care and feeding of the refugees and before the Muslim gained sufficient power to corrupt the mission of the U.N., while creating such monstrosities as the UN Civil Rights Council. The article is particularly pertinent in that Galloway's remarks that UNRWA wasn't helping the Arab refugees was reiterated recently by Andrew Whitely, Director of the UNRWA New York office. He too suffered from an angry bureaucracy.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

November 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
December 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the September-October 2010 issue:

SECTION 1:
Positive Proposals To Resolve The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict (Lipkins, Shulman, Sherman, Meltzer, Lipkin )
International Acknowledgment of Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish people (Grief, Teitelbaum, Zebulon)
The Unworkable:The Last Four Decades of Peace Babble (Glick, Isaac, Sherman, Sharpe, Dann, Karsh, Silverberg)
SECTION 2:
 Muslims, Moderate and Immoderate (Editorial, McCarthy, Fjordman, Goldberg, Think-Israel Staff, Imani, Ibrahim)
The Muslim Brotherhood in the West (Dann, Emerson, Rubin, Dry Bones, Kilpatrick)
Assymetrical Warfare (Beres, Perdue, Norwitz, Ohri)
Academics and Media that Favor Arabs and Malign Jews (Murphy, Berdichevsky)
History Section (Laskin, Dykes)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (September, October)

SECTION 1:

POSITIVE PLANS FOR RESOLVING THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT

More and more people have come to realize that creating a Palestinian Arab state from Biblical Israel will go a long way towards destroying Israel. Creating a single state of Arabs and Jews would destroy the only Jewish state in the world even faster. What the three proposals in this section have in common is that they they go beyond simply rejecting the current solutions that are on the table. They make suggestions that may have a better chance of succeeding. Independent of each other, they examine different aspects of the problem.

The Lipkins suggest a 2-state solution, where the state housing the Arabs from the refugee camps and the Arabs from the Territories is located within the Arab land holdings. Seemingly drastic, it is actually an example of a routine 2-stage population transfer, where the first stage occurred in the 1940s and '50s when the Jews were forced to flee from the Arab countries. It suggests that given current political events, the time for establishing such a viable Palestinian State is propitious. It would solve many current and potential problems at one fell swoop. Martin Sherman's essay suggests working with individual Arab families rather than with their political leaders, gifting each family with a "dowry" that would make it attractive to some Muslim country. Richard Shulman takes a stepwise approach to attacking the problem and emphasizes that much of the solution lies in Israel's changing many of the ways it does things. He also identifies factors and concepts that have dominated the peace process but that are mostly irrelevent, immoral or just plain wrong. These should not be considered in a solution.

Any workable plan will need to factor in annexing the Territories as Yoel Meltzer observes. We also reprint "The Case for Population Exchange" of the Jewish and Arab populations, basic reading for a clear understanding of the issues involved. Additional thoughtful suggestions for solving the Palestinian arab problem can be found by searching in the Google box above. For a previous collection of ideas, see here.

AN ALTERNATIVE 2-STATE SOLUTION
by Bernice Sacks Lipkin and Lewis Edward Lipkin;
appendix by Richard H. Shulman

  It would be suicidal for Israel to allow a Palestinian state to be carved out of Biblical Israel, particularly one that would control a major component of her water supply and is capable of shooting missiles everywhere in Israel. But there remains the festering problem of a growing Palestinian refugee population living on cradle-to-coffin debilitating welfare, taught to hate Israel and the West and used as pawns to make claim to Jewish land. The Editors of Think-Israel propose that the Palestinian Arabs -- those from the refugee camps and those residing in the Territories -- be helped to establish a viable state within the land given to the Arabs by the League of Nations when the Ottoman Empire was dissolved. The state would be physically well-separted from Arab population centers and legally independent of the Arab country that previously owned the land. Within their state, the Palestinian Arabs would have complete control of their politics, education, culture and living style. Given recent political developments in the Middle East where Israel's military and technological strength is a major asset, the strengthening of Israel's appreciation of its own religious roots and a growing disbelief in the reliability of supposedly impartial external organizations, this is a propitious time to create such a state.
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A NEW PLAN FOR RESOLVING THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman's plan for resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict takes into consideration Israeli Arabs as well as the Arabs living in the Territories. The plan lays down a sequence of feasible steps that are primarily Israel's responsibility: beginning with changing Israel's attitude and policy of doing anything and everything for a peace that can't come about under prevailing conditions. Israelis need to start thinking with their heads and start basing their actions on their own interests and their actual experience with the Arabs, not on the wishful thinking or the frank anti-Zionism of ignorant foreign diplomats, politicians and media. Some changes are obvious: favoring the Arabs no matter what the merits of their case in police actions and in the judiciary needs to stop; Arab sedition in Israel and in the Territories is no longer to be tolerated; the Oslo Accords are to be nullified and Jewish areas in the Territories are to be annexed. It is much less clear whether eventually expulsion will be required. Discussions before hand should consider that it would violate Israel's concept of civil rights as well as creating much opposition. On the other hand, "[e]xperience shows that a large Muslim minority is not compatible with majority survival." (See e.g. here and here.) It does not help resolve the conflict for the U.S.A. to pressure Israel to make peace while ignoring islam's goal of destroying Israel. In fact, America herself needs to make changes in how she reacts internally to Muslim demands and infiltration. She needs to recognize that the fight against global Islamic jihad must be fought globally.
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THE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM: A REAL SOLUTION
by Martin Sherman

  For political reasons, UNRWA has provided the Arab refugees of 1948 and their descendants with life-time welfare when the goal -- as it is for all other refugees -- should have been (re)settling them permanently as soon as possible. To rehabilitate the Arab refugees, Martin Sherman advocates (1) eliminating UNRWA and (2) removing the anti-refugee discrimination in citizenship, employment and housing practiced by the Arab states that currently host the refugee camps. For those Palestinian Arabs living in the Israeli Territories -- Samaria and Judea (the West Bank) and Gaza -- he recommends that Israel and such international donors that wish to participate give them generous financial help to relocate to Muslim countries as individuals, not under the control of their leaders. A 2004 poll indicated over 70% would take such a deal. It would also financially benefit the countries that accept them. It would be cheaper than the enormous military costs to Israel to defend itself from a neighboring Palestinian state and for the international community to relocate a large "refugee" population to this Palestinian state.
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ANNEXATION NOW!
by Yoel Meltzer

  Yoel Meltzer writes that most Israeli Jews understand that allowing "another Arab State west of the Jordan river is nothing short of national suicide." Transferring the Arabs would eliminate the effort expended in trying to cope with the security issues and the demographics of the current situation. But if that's not possible, Meltzer urges Israel at least "to take the bold and long-overdue step of formally annexing Judea and Samaria," thus acknowledging that "the land of Israel is a gift given by God to the Jewish people." Annexation will present Israel with a host of problems. Such problems are difficult but solvable. Allowing an Arab state to intrude into Israel is certain death.
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THE CASE FOR POPULATION EXCHANGE
by Lewis Lipkin

  This is a reprint of Lewis Lipkin's 2002 article. The introduction read: "Population exchange is not a new idea. Sometimes a complete separation is the only way that two groups unable to live together can get on with their lives. It might be time to complete the separation of the Jews and the Arabs. The Jews were evacuated from Arab countries when Israel was born. Maybe it's time to do the second half of the transfer: move the Palestinian Arabs to Arab countries"
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INTERNATIONAL ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF ISRAEL AS THE NATION-STATE OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE

LEGAL RIGHTS AND TITLE OF SOVEREIGNTY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO THE LAND OF ISRAEL AND PALESTINE UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Howard Grief

  We are reprinting the article from the July-August 2005 Issue. The introduction read: "In this essay, Howard Grief brilliantly fulfills his objective 'to set down in a brief, yet clear and precise manner the legal rights and title of sovereignty of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and Palestine under international law.' This paper should be part of your armamentarium for the next time you are told that Resolution XXX of the U.N. guarantees the rights of the Palestinian Arabs to YYY." You can read more about Israel's right to all of Jerusalem and Biblical Israel (AKA West Bank) by reading Howard Grief's articles such as this one. For other essays on international law that state that biblical Israel is a trust in perpetuity for the Jewish people and can not be given away, read Part I of Yoram Shifftan's "A Legal Challenge." and his essay on Gifting. Read Wallace Brand on Israeli Sovereignty over Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria here. Use the Google box at the top of this page to search on keywords such as Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, Ted Belman, legal, mandate and population transfer.
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ISRAEL AS THE NATION-STATE OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE: FROM SAN REMO TO THE NETANYAHU-ABBAS TALKS
by Joshua Teitelbaum

  Joshua Teitelbaum describes the San Remo Conference of 1920 and its importance in the legal infrastructure underlying the eventual international confirmation of the modern state of Israel as a Jewish state, as a state for the Jewish people. In assigning the area -- some 1% of the Middle East -- that had been part of the Syrian province for some 400 years during the Ottoman rule to the Jews, the participants of the Conference recognized the unbreakable bond between the Jewish people and its ancient roots in the land of Israel. Ironically, considering the present-day ill-considered slandering of Israel by calling it a colonial power, "Jewish self-determination was part of a process that ended up decolonizing the Middle East in an effort that led to Arab as well as Jewish independence.' [emphasis added]
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SETTLEMENTS, AGREEMENTS, LEGITIMACY
by Michael Zebulon

  Michael Zebulon provides us with a lively exposition of a serious topic: the legality of the Jewish settlements in Samaria and Judea. It is written in the form of a rebuttal to Pres. Obama who has questioned their legitimacy. Zebulon delves deeply into the concept of legitimacy and why the term is not twin to legality This essay provides a well-rounded description of the commitment in international law to the all-member ruling by the League of Nation that what was called Mandated Palestine is in an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people for all time. The trust was given over with no changes or exceptions to the U.N. Read this. It will sharpen your understanding of why settlements are legal. And legitimate.
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THE UNWORKABLE: THE LAST FOUR DECADES OF PEACE BABBLE

Has anyone scraped away the Arab fantasies to examine whether there is any substance at the core of their assertions? Has anyone asked why the Palestinians, whose "peoplehood" hasn't reached the half-century mark, are entitled to any land they claim, while the Kurds, a legitimate people, are given no opportunity to control their own lives? Has anyone thought through the consequences of the off-and-on peace offensive, should it -- has v'halila -- be put into motion? Has anyone examined the attitudes of the groups involved? Has anyone considered that maybe a new approach is needed?

DO JEWS HAVE CIVIL RIGHTS?
by Caroline B. Glick

  The emphasis on stopping Israel from building in Samaria and Judea -- while igoring the large amount of illegal building by the Palestinian arabs -- is motivated by the desire to make Biblical Israel so strongly arab, there will be no problem giving it over to the Arabs. This assumes ahead of time that Israel has no claim to the land. Israel has a strong, indeed indisputable, claim, but this apparently weighs nothing against the current politics dominating the E.U., the U.N., the U.S. Administration -- and the Israeli administration. That the Israeli government has allowed a moratorium on Jewish building is indicative of a general and frightening development. As Caroline Glick tells us, the Jews of Israel are losing their civil rights, not just in Samaria and Judea, but in the Negev, the Galilee, the Golan Heights and Jerusalem -- in any place in Israel that the Arabs assert a flimsy claim. The passive, non-punitive attitude to Arab marauders and arsonists by Israeli politicians, police and courts doesn't encourage the Arabs to adopt a peaceful attitude. It encourages them -- and this includes the Israeli Arabs -- to continue destroying Jewish property, crops, livestock and lives.
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THE OSTRICH ACCORDS
by David Isaac

  As if the dreadful consequences of the Oslo Accords weren't enough, David Isaac makes us aware of a little-known fact: that the instigators gave no thought to final outcomes or where such a momentous step would lead. It would seem that little has changed; worrying about ultimates isn't Israel's leadership's forte. Israel prefers to tread water, while its enemy grows stronger. Meantimes, the Arabs are selling the idea of the peace-less creation of a Palestinian arab state, with Jewish stooges such as Yossi Beilin assuring "Israelis that the Arabs, despite all evidence to the contrary, really want peace." David Isaac's website is called ShmuelKatz.com because, in each essay, he seamlessly stitches together a current concern with a telling analysis by the prescient Shmuel Katz, who lived through much of the early history of Modern Israel.
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THEATER OF THE ABSURD
by Martin Sherman

  Put together an Israeli Prime Minister who sings about his "commitment to implement a policy that he has [rightly] repeatedly repudiated and ridiculed," a grumpy Palestinian Arab Prime Minister whose term of office has expired but who continues to reject the internationally-authorized Jewish state, a chorus of Hamas terrorists doing their war thing, and an inexperienced, floundering American president who proclaims that things couldn't be sweller and who desperately needs something that can be portrayed as a successful achievement; and you have, as Martin Sherman calls it, theater of the absurd. To add to the humor noire, Abbas, the man with no authority or power, has been stage center, dictating the future characteristics of both the unborn Palestinian state and the flourishing Jewish state, neither one of which does he control. I can't wait for the world's critics to pontificate that it's a wonderful play, but the Israeli ruined it.
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WHOSE IS THE LAND?
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe devotes this essay to pointing out that Israel is both the ancient and the modern owner of Israel. It is time to assert herself instead of helping her enemies. He points out that labels count. Their clever choice of terms accounts for some of the success the Arabs and their friends have had swaying the opinion of the world that -- despite, what the Bible, history, geography, morality and international law say -- they have title to Jewish land. The Jewish settlers are cast as the evil embodiment of the rapacious Jews, who have taken so much of the land, leaving the poor victimized Arabs only 99.99% of the Middle East. We Include the text of an article by Stan Goodenough, that reinforces the take-home message: stop using labels that distort reality in favor of Arab claims.
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O, PALESTINE!
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann describes why the Palestinians -- a very recent people -- were invented. From the beginning, the Arab refugee was useful in putting a sympathy-grabbing face on the Arab grab of Jewish land and their intent to destroy the Jewish state. It was later realized that the refugees could do more. Arafat decreed the "Palestinian People" into instant existence in 1964. And it was in the refugee camps that the concept of Palestinian nationalism was developed. Thanks to the cooperation of the U.N. and much of the western media, the lack of a factual history and geography has not been a hindrance as the Palestinians evolved a "narrative" and inculcated their children that Jerusalem was theirs and the Jews were occupying their land. Now they have not only a cause but a political-military identity that Israel and the Arab countries have to deal with.
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JUSTICE FOR PALESTINE
by Efraim Karsh

  Professor Efraim Karsh points out that the majority of the Palestinian arabs are indifferent to the "Peace Process" and the majority of the Arabs are indifferent to the welfare of the "Palestinians". This runs counter to the assertion of Arab propagandists that Palestinian Arabs, all other Arabs and Muslims in general are passionately concerned about the "Israeli-Palestinian stalemate [so it] feeds regional anger and despair." Resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict, they claim, is the key to peace and stability in the Middle East, perhaps even for the entire planet. In this essay, Karsh again counters fantasy with fact. He provides us with an excellent summary of the modern history of internecine conflict in Middle East, pointing out that the rejection of Israel by the Arabs/Muslims has not been out of concern for the Palestinian arabs.
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NEGOTIATING IN THE MIDDLE EAST: HOW THE OTHER SIDE SEES IT
by Mark Silverberg

  With all their enthusiasm for promoting a peace accord by negotiations based on fair play and fairmindedness, few of the West's politicians have asked themselves whether their simplistic notions are helpful, given the mindset of the Arabs and other Muslims. A honor and shame culture understands murdering a virgin who is raped; it doesn't understand the Western notion of giving up land and power to gain consensus agreement. Concessions we see as contributing to the cause for peace, they view as a sign of weakness. This insightful essay by Mark Silverberg makes clear that attempting to deal with the Muslim on the basis of Judeo-Christian tenets won't work. We need to understand they have a very different way of interpreting what we do. How do we make them understand us? He suggests borrowing a working idea from our history: it is only by inflicting complete defeat on them will we get them to listen. Then we can introduce them to ideas of fairmindedness, equality for woman and the nice idea of dialogue.
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SECTION 2:

EDITORIAL: MUSLIMS, MODERATE AND IMMODERATE

Isn't it odd that almost a decade after 9/11 we don't have a specific term for the enemy that declared war on Israel and the West? We know them, even if we haven't yet settled on a name for them. Should we call them islamofascists? Islamocists? Islamic extremists? Muslim freedom fighters? Islamists? Are they a handful of criminals not in touch with their religion? Are they Muslims driven mad by western hostility? Are they Muslims driven to retaliation for something or other perpetrated by Israel and/or the West against Islam or against the founder of Islam or against some Muslims somewhere? Or are they simply ordinary run-of-the mill Muslims conforming to the tenets of their religion, living a life style sanctioned by their religion, with the attitudes instilled by their religion? Is the enemy Islam itself? If so, perhaps we should call it Resurgent Islam, now that Islam has the money to carry out a sustained and well-planned attack to make Islam become the dominant religion world-wide?

Then there's a category we can name readily -- we're just not sure it exists. Define for me, if you will, a moderate muslim? Is it your neighbor who grills hot dogs at his fancy backyard chef station? You don't discuss politics or religion with him -- it would be rude. Sometimes you wonder what would happen if you offend him -- and uneasily stifle that thought. Is it the girl wearing a head scarf and smart jeans, shopping at the mall? Is it, as is claimed, all but a very few, the criminal few we have a problem naming.

 READ THE ENTIRE EDITORIAL
 

WHO SAYS ISLAM IS TOTALITARIAN?
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  A notion promoted by many is that Islam is peaceful and there's a few extremists disconnected from their religion that cause all the trouble. At its most simplistic: 911 was caused by just a handful of bad Muslims -- as if it didn't take long-range planning, a huge organization and lots of money to make it happen. That Muslims are not trusted has somehow become our fault. They aren't the intolerant racists. We are. Even respected members of the media peddle this view. In this essay Andrew C. McCarthy rebuts this distortion with some hard facts and analyses. That Islam is indeed totalitarian and is the basis of Muslim violence is confirmed by none other than the grand daddy of Islamic mischief -- the Muslim Brotherhood.
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ON THE ILLUSION OF A MODERATE ISLAM
by Fjordman

  This is a tremendously signficant essay by Fjordman, driving home the message that moderate Muslims and immoderate Muslims are not members of two different species. They are more likely the different faces that Muslims don under different conditions. We see the immoderate face when they feel triumphant or at least on the ascendent; they act more temperate when times are against them. Some moderate Muslims may genuinely be decent, civilized and tolerant human beings, but to date there is no moderate Islam. Until the moderate Muslim lobbies his clerics to abrogate the commands to be violent in the Koran and ancillary sacred books, his impact on the thrust of Islam will be nil.
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THE NATURE OF THE BEAST
by Steven Goldberg

  We don't often have impressionistic articles -- first-hand subjective essays, carved out painstakingly and over time from personal experiences -- rather than conclusions gained from broad knowledge, quite often, from an examination of the primary sources of others. Steven Goldberg's essay is very much his own thinking, constructed from many personal experiences while working in Arab countries. He emphasizes the lack of symmetry: "Israel may desire peace, Palestine does not." He discusses the influence of Russia and China and the treachery of the Palestinian arabs in Kuwait during the Gulf War. His retort to Islamophobia -- which in practice refers even to the most minimal and/or the most documented complaint against islam -- is: "If Islam could stand on its own merit, it would not need extraordinary protection in order to survive." He has come to see Islam as the furthest thing from a religion of peace. What is most depressing in his analysis is: "The silent majority while they may disagree, because of their lack of objection, basically rubber stamp Islam's bad behavior. "
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THE RAMALLAH LYNCHING
Material from FreeRepublic Blog; revised by Think-Israel Staff

  As the Free Republic website recalls for us: October 12, 2010 marks the 10th anniversary of the butchering in Ramallah of two Israeli reservists who drove by mistake into Ramallah. Just as 9/11 — which occurred just 11 months later — shocked Americans out of their complacency and ignorance of what global jihad means, the lynching shocked Israelis into a recognition that they were dealing with a folk that had irreconciliable differences. Unfortunately, for too many Israelis, the message didn't sink in. Had it been seen as emblematic of the nature of the enemy, the Gaza expulsion might not have happened; the progressive appeasement policy by Israeli politicians might not have happened; and the minimalist response to terror that strengthened the confidence of Israel's enemies might not have happened. We recall this particular massacre, precisely because it is emblematic of the nature of those who confront Israel by violence.
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WHAT IS ISLAM?
by Amil Imani

  In a forthright and knowledgeable article from someone who has seen Islam as an insider and finally objectively, Amil Imani tells us precisely what Islam is: "Islam is a comprehensive totalitarian form of slavery. It is the opposite of freedom. Its very name, Islam means submission or surrender. True to its name, Islam strives for nothing short of enslavement of the body of humanity as well as the bondage of its mind. This non-negotiable surrender to Islam requires the individual, as well as the society, to disenfranchise themselves of many of the fundamental and deeply cherished human rights." Read this whenever the sirens of today -- politicians and media -- sing that "Islam is a religion of peace."
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OFFENSIVE JIHAD: THE ONE INCONTROVERTIBLE PROBLEM WITH ISLAM
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim points out that in the interest of peace perhaps we could accept that a culture may do what it will to its own people as long as it doesn't inflict its ideas on other cultures. The problem with this solution is that Islam, stripped of its many grievances that create so much of the friction between Islam and the West, nevertheless has a core issue that does not allow it to live in harmony with a non-Muslim culture. As Osama bin Laden put it, with reference to jihad: "Does Islam, or does it not, force people by the power of the sword to submit to its authority corporeally if not spiritually? Yes. There are only three choices in Islam ... . Either submit, or live under the suzerainty of Islam, or die." Definitely a deal breaker.
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IN THE WEST

THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD: ISLAM'S GLOBAL CHALLENGE TO THE WEST
by Moshe Dann

  The Muslim Brotherhood, which was founded in Egypt in 1928 is noted for long-term planning to inflict Sharia law globally. Using reliable sources, Moshe Dann has written an excellent summary of the machinations of the Muslim Brotherhood, particularly in the U.S.A. We stress reliable because there is currently an active campaign to paint the MB as a benign group of Muslims, just practicing their religion. Come to think of it, that just might be the case: the MB is carrying out the mission Muhammed imposed on his followers.
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WASHINGTON'S SCHIZOPHRENIC APPROACH TOWARD THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
by Steve Emerson

  The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has been in business for some 90 years, carefully developing various infrastructures for infiltrating different countries with one goal: to spread sharia law around the globe to make Islam dominant everywhere. As Steve Emerson points out, it collaborated with Nazi German; it gave rise to Hamas; and it calls for the destruction of Israel, America's ally. Given the information available on its tactics and ambitions, isn't it more than peculiar that the current administration in Washington has extended its outreach-to-the-Muslims to MB affiliates, lending legitimacy to organizations actively hostile to the U.S.A. Worse yet, our intelligence agencies such as the FBI haven't sounded the alarm but hide behind the "it's above my pay grade" excuse. Aren't they supposed to root out organizations that plot to subvert our country?
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MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD DECLARES WAR ON AMERICA; WILL AMERICA NOTICE?
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin does not exaggerate the importance of a recent sermon by the Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide, Muhammad Badi', in which he endorses an anti-American and anti-Zionist Jihad. As Rubin notes, this is a signal to the Muslim Brotherhood's hundreds of thousands of followers that "the Muslim Brotherhood is ready to move from the era of propaganda and base-building to one of revolutionary action." Badi' chides the Muslim and Arab regimes "for disregarding Allah's commandment to wage jihad." Because "America does not champion moral and human values," it "cannot lead humanity, and its wealth will not avail it once Allah has had His say." With Mohammad serving as role model and the Koran as guide book, Badi is certain "Islam is capable of confronting oppression and tyranny, and that the outcome of the confrontation has been predetermined by Allah." The outcome may not be predetermined but it does sound as if we can expect much bloody action in the near future from troops directed by the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization with excellent credentials in planning, organizing and implementing projects that further the imposition of sharia law everywhere.
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THE ROAD TO SHARIA
by William Kilpatrick

  Proponents of building the Ground Zero mosque tend to emphasize the importance of the Second Amendment right of religious freedom. But religious practices are but one aspect of Sharia law, which dictates all aspects of a Muslim's life: his religion, his politics, his friendships, his life style, his treatment of women. And, as William Kilpatrick points out, "U.S.A. law already prohibits the free exercise of Islam" -- in that much of Sharia law is in violation of USA law, which doesn't allow polygamy, child marriage, wife beating, killing people because they are homosexuals, amputating hands and other cruel punishments, killing people for leaving their birth religion, or favoring one group above all others. If, however, stealth jihad by groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood is able to persuade businesses and the educational institutions and the media and the law to make exceptions to allow Sharia practices and/or not to enforce USA law, Muslims could then freely observe their religion. But the rest of us would soon not be able to practice ours.
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ASSYMETRICAL WARFARE

These essays examine aspects of assymetrical warfare, which usually refers to methods by which a weak military force can control events and immobilize or at least weaken a more powerful but conventional military force. Less familiar is lawfare as practiced by Judge Goldstone and the U.N. Human RIghts Council (UNHRC), where a supposedly respectable group is both judge, jury and arbiter of what evidence is admissible. Goldstone and the UNHRC misused international law against a legitimate state to support terrorists, who played the role of weak innocents, but who do not see themselves as bound by international law. We also suggest that overpopulating a host country to hog the country's welfare resources is using the country's benevolence against itself.

FACING EXISTENTIAL HARM: RECOMMENDATIONS FOR ISRAEL'S STRATEGIC FUTURE
by Louis Reneé Beres

  Louis Beres ranks Iranian nuclearization and the creation of a Palestinian state as top "critical hazards on Israel's strategic horizon." Israel has begun using the modeling methodology known as "Correlation of forces" (COF) in non-traditional ways. But given the complexity of the forces it must consider, Israel will need "much higher levels of grand strategy," even sacrificing on occasion precision for intuitive understanding of critical measures hard to quantify; e.g., "the enemy's consuming dedication to certain presumed religious expectations, his utterly uncompromising strength of will." Israel's enemies may be psychologically stuck in the Seventh Century but it wll take a high order of planning to develop effective strategic solutions for dealing with them. As example, Israel will need both to settle on the image(s) it wishes to project and to develop methods for distinguishing "between authentic enemy irrationality, and pretended enemy irrationality." Beres details some features of a more holistic COF.
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PRECLUSIONARY ENGAGEMENT
by Jon B. Perdue

  We've become all too familiar with asymmetrical warfare where a conventional army is stymied by innocent "children" innocently slinging stones and the concomitant outcry of the media. Jon Perdue writes about other tactics used to trip a superior force, harassing them and blocking them from their supplies but avoiding direct confrontation. The trick is to maintain the annoyance at a level that weakens and distracts the enemy without arousing him to military reaction. Perdue calls this technique Preclusionary Engagement. Working through its proxies -- Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad et al -- Iran has skillfully used "hit and run" tactics in Iraq, Egypt, Afghanistan and Venezuela. Perdue includes advice on how to subvert the subversives.
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GOLDSTONE AND THE GUERILLA FLOTILLA: AN EMERGING PATTERN OF LAWFARE
by Trevor S. Norwitz

  This graceful essay by Trevor Norwitz is a brilliant description of Lawfare as practiced by the Human Rights Council of the United Nations, which recently determined to its own satisfaction that Israel's blockade of Gaza was inflicting disproportionate harm to the Gazan civilians. Hence it was illegal for Israel to stop the Gaza Flotilla from entering blockaded waters. Norwitz writes that "[t]he Flotilla Report is the 'Son of Goldstone.' Cut from the same cloth, it is a political manifesto masquerading as a fact-finding report." Personally, I think they have more chutzpah than did Goldstone -- they were willing to produce their laughable report, knowing that people would visualize the photos from the flotilla showing the Flotilla humanitarians armed with knifes and metal clubs attacking the IDF sailors, who came armed with paint guns. But what else can we could expect from a human rights council, whose membership includes China, Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Uganda and Zambia -- countries that are noted for their record of human rights violations. As they say, crocadile courts produce a croc of it.
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 7
by R. K. Ohri

  We are serializing R.K. Ohri's book entitled The Long March of Islam. In Chapter 6, he examined the socio-economic and cultural consequences of the rapid increase in the size of the Muslim community in host countries around the world; the immigrant Muslims invariably rapidly outbreed the natives and invariably demand changes that suit themselves, even if it damages or marginalizes the native population. In Chapter 7, he focusses on how these demographic changes play out in India, where Muslims outbreed the other religious groups. Patterns aren't obvious when individual countries are examined separately but they become obvious when Ohri highlights common factors in the civil-religious conflicts in Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Lebanon, Nigeria and India. His descriptions of the back-breaking burden of caring for the huge number of illegal aliens from Bangladesh is eerily similar to the drain on the U.S.A providing welfare benefits, health care and education for illegal aliens. Ohri should be read by anyone who believes that giving Muslims more welfare, more space or installing footbaths will satisfy their aggressive disruptions.
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ACADEMICS AND MEDIA THAT FAVOR ARABS AND MALIGN JEWS

ISLAM AS POLITICS: EDWARD SAID'S ACCOUNT OF ISLAM
by Paul Austin Murphy

  Edward Said proclaimed that the West had exploited the Middle East (ME) and was responsible for its problems but only a Middle Easterner could understand the ME. In doing so he set the tone for the majority of Middle East Studies departments at universities across the country. Paul Austin Murphy suggests Said was actually an old-fashioned Marxist, whose Marxist and Muslim prejudices were thinly based in reality and readily apparent. Nevertheless, he got away with his easily-refutable decrees. He dismissed anti-semitism in Hamas and Hezbollah, when they themselves said their mission was to detroy the Jewish state. Despite the extraordinary hard work the early Zionists themselves put into clearing the unused, dead and forsaken land of Israel and making it live again, he called them colonialists. But then, for Said, Jews could do little that was right. Muslims, who were by definition 'oppressed' were not racist, because an oppressed people can not be racist. Period. End of argument. Looking now at his ideas, stripped of academic jargon and no longer shielded by his power, one wonders how Said's wrong-headed views could be sustained as long as they were.
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THE NEW YORK TIMES AND BBC; JUST THE NEWS THEY SEE FIT TO PRINT
by Norman Berdichevsky

  Norman Berdichevsky recounts his growing disillusion with the New York Times and BBC, once regarded by many as "the final court of opinion on any subject under the sun." He found they were guilty of "callous omissions and violations of essential journalistic ethics." Berdichevsky recalls some appalling examples of shoddy journalism in Times' stories and attributes them to "the profound arrogance and blind narcissism that has seriously infected both the New York Times and the BBC." Then, too, the Times' fear of being thought "biased in favor of Jewish causes" led to their minimizing the Holocaust and other manifestations of anti-Semitism. (It is ironic that many anti-semitic websites continue to assume the Times is pro-Jewish because the Sulzberger family, its publishers, were nominally Jewish -- clearly, they don't read the paper.) Conversely, the Times argues for extreme tolerance for Muslims, "who may be suspected of either being illegal immigrants or sympathetic to terrorism and Muslim extremism." The BBC is, if anything, even more outlandish and has helped perpetuate the myth that during WW2, King Christian X of Denmark wore the Star of David in sympathy with the Jews of his country.
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HISTORY SECTION

VISITING RELATIVES
by David Laskin

  In 1924, 18-year old Chaim Kahanovich came to Israel from Poland. He worked on settlements, married Sonia, raised children, lost a child who was defending his country when Syria invaded Israel -- an ordinary Israeli living through historic events. Many years later David Laskin, the author of this essay, came to Israel, "tracking 25 years of Chaim's life." Laskin also met Chaim's living legacy -- Chaims children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, "all of them living in Israel, all of them living, because two starry-eyed halutzim had left Poland some 80 years before to make a new life in the Holy Land."
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BRITAIN BOMBED SHIPS THAT WERE TO TRANSPORT JEWS AFTER HOLOCAUST
by Brett Michael Dykes

  Brett Dykes reviews a new book by Keith Jeffery that includes a shameful episode in Britain's long history of abandonment of its legal obligation to help the Jews create a state from Mandated Palestine. This post-World War 2 plot was to rig bombs in five boats that were getting ready to bring Holocaust survivors from Europe to Israel. As Dykes writes, "One ship was destroyed, two damaged; the explosives were discovered on the other two ships before they were detonated." They also put effort into a campaign of lies, innuendo and misinformation to smear the effort of the Jews to resettle the land of Israel.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
October 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


JULY-AUGUST, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the July-August 2010 issue:

Editorial: Israel's Exceptionalism
Distorted Morality. Double Standards. Beinart-Style Lies
The Ubiquitous Muslim Brotherhood
The Ground Zero Mosque and Promoting Sharia (McCarthy, Kumar, Sharpe, Ramelah)
Fallout from the Flotilla (Gross, Meir-Levi, Ahmed)
Intellectuals, politicians and NGOs (Sherman, Adams, Beker, Fredman, Sieff,Gilligan, Landes, McQuaid, Suseelan, Rubin, Smith)
Media Anti-semitism (Greenfield, McQuillan)
Destabilzation of the Middle East (Greenwald, Phares, Lerner, Shapira, McKillop)
The Wrong Priority: A New Round of Peace Talks (FSM, Stern, Lademain, Aumann, Simpson, Belman, Grief)
The Right Priority: Countering Sharia and Resurgent Islam (Warner, Miller, Joe Settler, Greenfield, Ohri)
Israeli Society (Berdichevsky, Glick, Yemini)
5th Year Commeration of the Gush Katif Expulsion (Saperstein, Fendel, Vanunu, Dann)
History Section (Pollack, Price, Shragai )
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (July, August)

ISRAEL'S EXCEPTIONALISM

If this issue has a theme, it's Israel's exceptionalism. There's the double standard - for Israel, one standard; for all other countries, another.

Or perhaps it's that Israel is held to a higher standard. But, as in producing Hebrew National hotdogs, it's one thing if Israel itself sets its goals high; it's another when the gang-up of the EU and UN and American State Dept sets an unobtainable standard and faults Israel for not meeting it.

And there's the double talk. When triumphalist Muslims want to mark their 9/11 victory over the west, the bray is "Religous Freedom." When Israel want to build for its expanding population on land that is their own, the tune changes.

Pathological joy in death, murder for trivia, wholesale killing of civilians, subjugation of women and minorities, no protection of individualism are so common in Muslim countries, they are ignored. Genocidal Arabs deliberately target Jewish cars, babies held in their parent's arms, children walking to school in the early morning, and the moralists of the West defend these murderers. After all, the Po' Palestinians have so few ways of defending themselves; and no one asks: against what? Let Israelis be forced to defend themselves, as when the IDF sailors finally fought back against the Gaza flotilla's Turkish mercernaries, and it's deemed a war crime.

Why the hostility to Israel? A modern miracle. A celebration of life. An ancient people have redeemed their own land and in developing the modern reincarnation of their state, have made life better for everyone with their creative innovations in science, engineering, medicine and art. But -- putting aside the purchasing of hate propaganda by the Arabs against Israel -- Israel's exceptionalism does contribute to making people uneasy. Israel does things that are just too different. It makes folks suspicious. They start figuring there must be a really dark and nasty reason for what Israel is doing. Who else puts its own soldiers at risk to save the lives of enemy civilians who respond by juryrigging bombs and leading the soldiers to their deaths? What other court system won't allow the destruction of abandonned houses used by Arab snipers to shoot at Jewish cars?? Who else waits years to respond to missiles lobbed at its civilian population? To go from no response to even minimal response -- no wonder the U.N. called it a war crime. It was just too steep a gradient.

What other state wouldn't mention that it is the most legitimate of states -- and owns its land by Biblical promise, by history, by international law, by overcoming invaders in wars it didn't start. Israel knows that the only land it is occupying is its own. It knows that there never was a Arab Palestine. It knows that the "Palestinians" are immigrants; some 95% of them came after 1900. Yet it makes desperate attempts to share the land, as if by giving up what is most dear to it, it will win peace from monomaniacal neighbors whose goal is its destruction. Who else would supply the hostile Arabs in the Territories with food and medicine, water and electricity, especially when the Arabs take pop shots at the men who come to repair the electricity lines? Who else bolsters the throne of a neighboring monarch who shows his gratitude by trashing Israel whenever he can? Who else would continue to provide Jordan with water and security? Jordan is hosting an international conference on chemical sciences -- another area where Israelis are topnotch -- and didn't invite any Israeli speakers. Prominent chemists complained about this discrimination, but the President of the Israel Chemical Society subverted the protest by writing to some thousand chemical society members suggesting they still attend the conference.

Even Israeli Marxists are pecular. The universities are filled with Marxists who advocate that the academics of the world boycott Israeli universities and forgo collaborations with Israeli academics. If their international comrades act on their plea, they will be the ones that suffer.

Years ago during the horrors of the second intifada -- when after a bombing they were scraping exploded brain tissue off pavements and doctors were removing rusty nails coated in rat poison from little Jewish children -- I asked a waitress why Israel didn't just bomb the terrorists and their families. "Oh no, she said, 'we're not like them."

To paraphrase Hillel, if you don't stand up for yourself, who will stand up for you? If you have no self-respect, why shouldn't the world dump on you?


DISTORTED MORALITY. DOUBLE STANDARDS. BEINART-STYLE LIES

The contrast between the insistence that the Ground Zero Mosque is for peace and brotherhood and the images of Arabs celebrating murder -- from their joyous dancing on 9/11 and now as they celebrate their latest massacre, a drive-past shooting of Jews riding in an automobile -- has sharpened the disparity between the belief in the nobility of the "Palestinian" cause and the reality of their barbaric cult of murder. The pretentiousness of the Gaza flotilla's putative aims versus its cold-blood actual goals is also percolating through people's consciousness.

3,000 Hamas Supporters Celebrate the Cold-Blooded Murder of Four Jews and a Fetus (Additional photos available at VIciousBabushka.)

This set of articles examines some of the new questioning about the morality of not holding the Arabs to any standard of civilization while insisting that however careful Israel is, that's isn't good enough. The initial reference is to the Muslim Brotherhood, the glue that holds all these together: the Mosque promoters; the Flotilla; the Arab-aiders from academia, government, and the media. The many-tentacled Muslim Brotherhood wants to reestablish the supremacy of Islam globally. And it has the patience and resources to have a real chance.

The first set discusses the increasing understanding that the Mosque symbolizes Islamic triumphalism and will become a new center for introducing Sharia law. The next set points to some new thinking inspired by the flotilla fiasco. The next set examines attacks on Israel by those who purport to be objective academics, compassionate humanitarians or fair-minded politicians; and finally we look at routine attacks by the media.

 

THE UBIQUITOUS MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
From: Steven Merley, "The Muslim Brotherhood in the United States," Series No 2, Paper No 3, April, 2009, Hudson Institute.
To download the monograph, click here.
 

The Ground Zero Mosque and Promoting Sharia

IT'S ABOUT SHARIA: NEWT GINGRICH RESETS OUR NATIONAL-SECURITY DEBATE
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  This morning I listened to a vapid press sitcom on TV discussing why whitebread America has taken an aversion to Islam. Different reasons, none of them having much to do with Islam's own behavior, or with its single-minded mission to convert the whole world to Sharia. The Ft. Hood massacre was done by a crazy, we are told; not a word about Major Nidal Hasan's attendance at a mosque that preached hate or about a military too timid to confront obvious signs of treasonable behavior, All in all, the Press and this administration seem to be the last to know that Americans are concerned with each new manifestation of resurgent Islam because they don't want to be enveloped in sharia law. As Andrew McCarthy makes clear, the politicians have received a forceful push from Newt Gingrich toward having to take a position: are you for or against sharia? That is the question. The only important question. When or if the Press will wean themselves away from their 20th century concerns is anyone's guess.
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THE MUSLIM MOSQUE: A STATE WITHIN A STATE
by Vijay Kumar

  When resistence to the Ground Zero Mosque became vocal, damage control was instituted. The name of the mosque was changed. With no change in architecture the mosque became a cultural center. And the word went out that mosques were necessary for Muslims to practice their religion, just as every other religious group has its type of religious housing. That seems reasonable enough. But as Vijay Kumar demonstrates, the mosque isn't primarily for religious practice. it has had political significance ever since Mohammed, when he conquered Mecca, took over an ancient temple, the Kabah, which had been used by many faiths, and declared it exclusively Muslim. As Kumar points out, "A mosque in the United States is a command and control center of a foreign political and military state that seeks the overthrow of our government, and an Imam in a mosque is a political and military representative of a foreign state that calls for the overthrow of the United States." Islam demands tolerance for itself in host countries but will not tolerate other religions in countries it controls.
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THE MOSQUES OF WAR
by Victor Sharpe

  As Victor Sharpe notes in this essay, both of Judaism's theological children have much to answer for in how, over the centuries, they treated the mother religion. "When not slaughtering each other, they both often turned upon the hapless and stateless Jews, who, for the most part, had no allies and were unable to defend themselves." But today there are two facts of major importance: (1) "... many Christians — not all — have come to the realization that biblical Jewish roots are inextricable from their own and that their faith is fatefully incomplete without an acknowledgment of those roots." and (2) Both daughter religions strive to convert the non-believer but in Islam it is an integral part of the credo — the "Moslem is required to subdue the infidel." To mark a triumphal takeover, Islam inevitably converts what is significant to the infidel into a mosque. There is only one way to read the projected building of the Cordoba mosque. It is "a flagrant insult to the memory of the thousands of innocents who died at the hands of Moslem fanatics and believers"
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LOYALTY TO ISLAM IS PRIMARY. IT HAS NO BORDERS, NO EXCEPTIONS
by Ashraf Ramelah

  The word Copt means Egyptian. The Copts are the "real" Egyptians, the natives. They converted to Christianity sometime in the first century A.D. They predate the Arab invasion, tracing their ancestry back to the days of the pyramids. They are against intermarriage but their numbers have been reduced because of forced conversions to Islam. Today they constitute some 10% of the Egyptian population. Ashraf Ramelah is a Copt. He uses his experience as a Copt to make us understand the danger of allowing the erection of the Ground Zero mosque that is intended by its builders to be a symbol of Islamic triumph. It is not a symbol of shame or contrition; it is not intended to honor the victims or 9/11 or to show ecumenical brotherhood. In Egypt the Copts are subjected to active hostility and fear-inducing brutality by the Muslim clergy and the Egyptian government. Ramelah spells out some of the restrictions forced on the Copts living in Egypt, a relatively secular country as Arab countries go. To prevent Sharia tyranny in America, we should nip the initial attacks — such as the erection of the Ground Zero mosque — in the bud.
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Fallout from the Flotilla

GAZA SNAPSHOTS
by Tom Gross

  The pictures of Gazans living well have gone around the internet. The counter attack is to admit there are a couple of expensive places in Gaza but these say nothing about the acute starvation and wretched poverty in Gaza. So here are some photos from where the ordinary people of Gaza shop. These are notes and photos taken in Gaza this summer. Tom Gross makes the point that there are rich and poor in Gaza as there are everywhere -- but there is not Darfur-level starvation. The ordinary Gazan has teeming markets stock full of foods and the new shopping mall is filled with ordinary people shopping. And for those dedicating their lives to bring cement to Gaza, we hate to break it to you, but they already have a big supply. Just take a look at some of their many buildings. For those who think Gaza is starving, we include a pointer to an article on some undisputed cases of starvation.
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THE GAZA FLOTILLA CONFRONTATION: FACTS VERSUS THE ACADEMICIANS
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi provides us with an excellent summation of the facts about the Mavi Marmara, the Gaza flotilla ship that was outfitted with mercenaries and weaponry and prepped to do battle. In addition, as he points out, Hamas refused to take the rather cruddy "humanitarian" aid and out-of-date medication unless they had control of its distribution and non-distribution. Curiously, it is a bunch of pro-Palestinian academics who deny facts so obvious that even the U.N. has acknowledged them. As Meir-Levi says, "... it is reasonable to ask: why are these professors so obsessed with Israel even as they ignore egregious crimes of other states and non-state actors? This is an important question, because it seems clear that that obsession is what has driven their misleading assessment of the Mavi Marmara attack, and their consequent condemnation of Israel."
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ISRAEL AND THE FLOTILLA: ON THE DANGERS OF A BINARY VIEW
by Qanta Ahmed, MD

  Qanta Ahmed is a thoughtful Muslim who quietly contemplates moral issues and doesn't exude hate. This may not mean much when weighed against the number of Arabs who smash the skulls of Jewish babies or the mullahs who preach bizarre sex and approve massacres. She may be invisible among ordinary Muslims who applaud terrorism and hate everyone. But it is good to know that a mind such as Qanta Ahmed's exists. She describes a modern-day (im)morality play in which muslims and media rage at "Israel as monolithic villain devoid of conscience". This obsessive rage is misdirected; Muslims should be examining their own actions and the depravity in the Arab world. But in today's skewed visualization, a handful of deaths on the Gaza flotilla are reason enough to label Israel's blockade a war crime, while the massacre of Muslims by Muslims isn't worth newsprint. She suggests that the hate propelling the Muslims will eventually harm them. But I fear that before that happens, too many other people will suffer.
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The immoral lies of intellectuals, politicians and the NGOs who aid and abet the Muslim cause, either because they sympathize with it or because they hate Israel and Judaism.

WOEFULLY IGNORANT OR WILLFULLY MISLEADING?
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman examines Peter Beinart's assertion that "American Jews, especially the younger generation, is turning their backs on Israel." For Beinert, this is praiseworthy, for he sees Israel as "violent and inhuman." Since so many of Beinert's statements are contrary to fact, it is possible he is just ignorant and surprisingly shallow. As example, he portrays the expulsion of the Arab squatters living in Jewish houses and paying no rent as nasty — the Jews were kicked out or killed when Jordan invaded eastern Jerusalem in 1948. He ignores that the real victims — the Jews who want their houses back — have been forced to go through expensive and prolonged lawsuits in Israeli courts that — contrary to what you might assume — make a practice of favoring the Arabs. This is hardly the way to further the reader's understanding of what's going on. In the tradition of other anti-Israel writers, Jew and non-Jew, a pimple on Israel's face is viewed as much more ugly than a pus-filled carbuncle on the face of any other country and the prescription for removing the pimple is to slice off most of Israel's face. Perhaps, as Sherman suggests, Beinart's real problem is not ignorance but malevolence. And if American Jews accept evaluations of Israel such as Beinart's, it is no wonder they become unsympathetic to the Jewish state.
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FAILED ZIONISM — LIBERAL UTOPIANISM AND THE ABANDONMENT OF ISRAEL
by D.L. Adams

  Leftists Utopians condemn Israel's minimalist military responses while they excuse sustained and ugly aggression by the Arabs, the putative victims of the designated villain, the Jewish state. Topsy has become turvy, and turvy topsy. In this essay, D.L. Adams asks why this is so. Factual ignorance and emotional denial certainly play strong roles. The idealogues of the Left have cast their lot with the 'Palestinian underdog' and just don't hear what the jihadists plainly say, no matter how loudly and how often the Muslims reassure us they plan on destroying Israel as first stage in the conquest of the West in order that the Caliphate be reestablished. Hence. as Adams points out, "American liberalism in its present form is not compatible with Zionism." This has led to pretzelated reasoning to condemn Israel by the ordinary Leftist, which is bad enough. When it comes from Jews -- especially Jews who claim exemption from attack for maligning Israel because their grandparents were Holocaust survivers — it is obscene. To make his case, Adams examines Peter Beinert's distorted and confused bluster, deconstructions that rise above earthly facts and are not to be questioned. As such, they can serve — and this says much about today's academic intellectual — as a crib sheet chock full of authoritative arguments for Leftist anti-zionists, who, with no sense of irony, condemn Jews for supporting the Jewish state instead of giving all their devotion to liberalism's ideology, just as the early Marxists condemned Jews making aliyah to create a particularistic workers' paradise instead of concentrating on global revolution.
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EXPOSING HOW POST-ZIONISTS MANIPULATE HISTORY
by Avi Beker

  Ever read a book or a gang-up of books, proving something you know in your bones is wrong? The arguments dazzle and seem too weighty to push aside. It is only later that you have that 'hey-wait-a-minute' moment, when you notice a gap, an inconsistency, a puzzling omission. This is roughly what has happened to the history of newly-reborn Israel and its 1948 war of survival, when it was attacked by its arab neighbors, intent on destroying the non-Arab state. The story was told accurately at first. Then the New Historians revised the interpretation of these events and announced that the original version was a myth. The issue was not, they declared, Israel's remarkable accomplishment: redeeming Jewish land and constructing a free and democratic Jewish state in a relatively short amount of time. The issue was that through no fault of their own, the local Arabs suffered severely in 1948 and it was all because of what Israel did intentionally. Using the New Historian Benny Morris as both focus and foil, Avi Becker recounts distortions, misinterpretations and down-right lies told by the New Historians. What made these whoppers so pernicious is that Israel was cast as a figure of evil, which needed to atone for its sins. It was put on the defensive in political negotiations. These accusations were eventually used to try to delegitimize Israel. Benny Morris was a key figure in framing the features of the New History; he fashioned a strong base on which others constructed ever more-outlandish interpetations. It is ironic that it would be Morris who later put a stop to this nonsense by supplying the information the New Historians had omitted — namely, the unswerving hatred of the Arab toward other religions and that the Arabs saw the 1948 War as just another battle in their religious Jihad over the centuries to become top dog. Ironic. And tragic. For the truth is just beginning to crack the cement of lies cast around the historic events. It doesn't help that many readers, who were, for their own reasons, so eager to accept the New Historians' lies, will be just as motivated to ignore the truth.
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PRECISION-GUIDED OR INDISCRIMINATE? NGO REPORTING ON COMPLIANCE WITH THE LAWS OF ARMED CONFLICT
by Asher Fredman

  In this seminal investigation, Asher Fredman asks: how accurate are Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in their conclusions when judged by objective standards? The Daily Alert website (9Jul10) describes the study this way: "This monograph analyzes the factual and legal claims of two of the most powerful NGOs, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, regarding the 2009 conflict in Gaza, particularly relating to Israel's use of white phosphorus and UAVs. The analysis demonstrates that many of the factual claims made by the NGOs are contradicted by military sources, weapons experts, and media reports, and their presentation of key aspects of international law is inaccurate or incomplete." As Fredkin notes, "The NGOs may be engaged in 'standard setting' rather than in objective evaluations." Contrary to their public image, many NGOs are heavily politicized, promoting a particular agenda rather than doing the impartial monitoring they claim to do.
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DON'T TAKE HAMAS'S GOALS OUT OF THE EQUATION
by Michelle Sieff

  Michelle Sieff discusses another double standard. She notes that Human Rights groups and other pro-Palestinian groups focus solely on the Laws of War when judging Israel during battle. (Even here, they ignore Arab aggressive behavior or smear it over with pitiful stories of innocent civilians caught in the crossfire.) But this is too narrow a context. Israel's behavior is understandable when Hamas' announced goals are "[v]iewed through the lens of the Genocide Convention." For Human Rights groups to ignore Hamas's determined effort at genocide is to endanger their own credibility.
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HIZB UT TAHRIR IS NOT A GATEWAY TO TERRORISM, CLAIMS WHITEHALL REPORT
by Andrew Gilligan

  We knew England is half way into the crocodile's mouth. We knew that Hizb-ut-tahrir is a well-organized and formidable organization somewhere to the right of Hamas. It has a rapidly-growing membership in some 40 countries. Its mission is to restore the Caliphate. It advocates killing Jews (that's de rigueur) and any other infidels that thwart its mission. We knew that like the Tablighi Jamaat (See here). it is a start-into-terror organization -- inciting the excitable to brave deeds for Islam, while not, itself, committing terrorist acts. We didn't know that the British Government was pimping for them. Andrew Gilligan reports on Whitehall's defense of Hizb-ut-tahrir.
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THE HIDDEN COSTS OF JEW-BAITING IN ENGLAND
by Richard Landes

  As Muslims take over London, demanding special treatment, forcing the local communities to conform to their requirements, expanding territory that they alone control and where they determine "dress and behavior codes", it is curious that the English — journalists, academics, jurors — show little overt concern or protest. Instead, they displace their anger on the Jews, perhaps because there is no penalty for baiting Jews, no danger to themselves in demonizing Israel. Conversely they are careful how they behave towards the Muslims and rarely criticize them openly. There is both fear of physical harm and fear of being called islamaphobic by their peers. As Landes notes, "By failing to denounce toxic Muslim communitarianism and instead adopting its shrill discourse of demonization about Jews, Brits feed the monster that devours them." The Jews may be the first victims of the Muslim takeover; they won't be the last.
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ASSESSING ISLAM'S REACH: AN INTERVIEW WITH DANIEL PIPES
an interview by Elwood McQuaid

  In this interview, Daniel Pipes comments on several aspects of Muslim global activity: the large and aggressive immigration of Muslims into Europe; Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons; and Arab harrassment of Jews, Christians and non-conformist Muslims. A serious problem is that there is no common ground in interpreting Muslim behavior. Explanations range from the optimistic belief that terrorism is due a few bad guys who are atypical of Islam to the assertion that "Islam itself is the problem. ..., with jihad, honor killings, and the like. Islam is itself evil and problematic." It certainly doesn't encourage Muslims to conform to the mores of their host countries when academics and even governments ignore radical Muslim behavior and, instead, persecute those who fight for Western values.
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ISLAMIC COGNITIVE DISSONANCE AND LIBERAL INCENTIVES
by Babu Suseelan

  It's an odd couple. Islam with its dysfunctional belief system, its severe punishment of any behavior it considers deviant and its rigid control of all aspects of life has a political liason with Western far-left liberalism, which finds excuses for whatever the Muslims do, despite the fact that in theory liberal ideology espouses non-judgmental acceptance of all sorts of life styles. Babu Suseelan notes that to defend Islam, secular liberals ignore gruesome murders by Muslims, Islamic terrorism and the Koranic basis of that terrorism, even though they themselves would be at risk in an Islamic society. It's the wrong strategy for ensuring our society stays democratic.
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ALBERT THE ALLIGATOR AND THE BRITISH AMBASSADOR
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin makes a strong case that "... nowadays, the most common way of dealing with radicalism, repression, terrorism, and such things in the Third World is to blame it on democratic states so often victimized by such issues." Rubin points out this view ignores the reality: no matter how conciliatory Israel and the West are, "incitement and indoctrination will continue at the same level from those who hate Israel because it exists." To blame the West is actually to patronize the other side. It implies we believe the Muslim world "is merely a blank screen or mirror, reflecting back what we do." It implies that the other side is incapable of setting its own goals. Muslims are often brutally and viciously evil because of their culture and upbringing. They need to change their world view. We don't need to accept responsibility for it.
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HOLLOW MEN
by Lee Smith

  Lee Smith inquires why so many Western intellectuals admire terrorist organizations. The 'he loved his mother' defense is often used: Hezbollah and Hamas provide social services; Mullah Fadlalah was sort of pro-feminist, so let's forget he loved suicide-bombers and hated Israel. What is worrisome is not just that they despise Israel but that their ideas could go mainstream. As Smith notes, "all the massive and popular evil of the last century started among a small ideological elite." Their attitude is surprising given that intellectuals provided much of the manpower of the early settlers. Hebrew owes its ability to deal with the modern world because an intellectual created new labels and definitions from it. The miracle of rebirth of the Jewish nation-state has grandeur, even if it isn't the violent, gothic, irrational, swashbuckling sort the intellectuals appear to crave. Lee Smith suggests that what these Western intellectuals really hate isn't Israel; it's themselves.
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Media anti-semitism

THE MEDIA'S ANTI-SEMITIC HATE MACHINE
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield explains how the many in the media justify anti-semitism, despite the fact that the Arabs are the ones waging the war against Israel: "by linking Islamic terrorism to some form of Israeli provocation, and from there to the support for Israel by American Jews — the same media which would commit seppuku rather than blame Muslims for Islamic terrorism, instead blames Jews for Islamic terrorism." The amazing thing is that this brain-dead logic works, as it has in previous periods of anti-semitic media attack. We can't have the Arabs humiliated — the poor dears were terribly frustrated when they wanted to kill off the new-born state of Israel and couldn't hack it. Curious, the fact that the Jews had a kingdom in the ME in ancient time — that's too long ago. The fact that in the last 60 years, the Jews have fought back the Arab invaders and taken back land that was theirs anyways by international law is unacceptable because conquest in modern times is unacceptable. The Arabs came and conquered the land in the 7th Century A.D. — ah, that's just right. "The media's Anti-Semitic hate machine does for the far left, what Der Sturmer once did for the far right. It makes their hatred and bigotry mainstream."
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WIKIPEDIA'S JEWISH PROBLEM
by Karin McQuillan

  It's pointless urging the ignorant to get the facts when their resources are tainted from the getgo. We've discovered MacMillan's encyclopedia is er...er.. unreliable. Wikipedia is not actually acceptable as a certified source, but it has the advantage of being free, so it is popular. But, as the saying goes, there really aren't any free lunches. The cost is that the unscrupulous can as easily write the "facts" as the conscientous and unbiased. And civility isn't a requirement. This is fertile ground for pro-palestinians with a political agenda and little concern for accuracy. Karin McQuillan shares with us her personal experience attempting to insert her very accurate article recounting how the New York Times handled news of the Holocaust during World War 2 so badly that one can only call it willful negligance, if not outright cooperation with the Nazi killing machine. They knew about the camps, the killings, the horrors. They barely wrote of it as news or editorialized it. McQuillan discovered her article was not considered worthy of inclusion in Wiki by some very hostile editors. As one reader commented, "so basically Wikipedia functions like the UN."
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DESTABILIZATION OF THE MIDDLE EAST

It is the announced policy of the American administration to downplay independently promoting democracy and individualism by military means. In fact, in matters that affect the world, we are to become one among a group of equals, all involved in making global decisions. It apparently has not occured to President Obama that we are not just abdicating protecting democracy elsewhere, but that we are exposing ourselves to increased aggression by triumphant Islam. Speaking kind and peaceful words to a mentality that understands only a binary of topdog and underdog doesn't encouraging them to leave us alone. We encourage them to make us minor players in their new world order.

THE SOFT POWER FALLACY
by Abe Greenwald

  As Iran increases its power, reaping the rewards of years of physical and verbal attack, the American president advocates reducing use of military force and becoming one among many who in concert share power, make decisions and maintain order. Undaunted by the inadequacies shown whenever the U.N. has had political responsibilities such as monitoring Iran's nuclear power, he has become a proponent of what Abe Greenwald terms soft power, where we will fight brutal aggression with polite debate and sluggish response. Iran's use of its own children to explode mines in the Iraq-Iran war in the 1980s should give us some idea of how determined Iran is to gain power and promulgate its ideology, no matter what the cost. As Greenwald says: "The American idea has allowed the American people to build a nation of unparalleled military might and served as a beacon for those in far-off lands who 'want what we want.' For those who want something else, the idea is anathema. They will not be converted by soft power. Instead, they will take advantage of its softness for their own malignant ends."
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IRAN'S GLOBAL TERRORIST REACH
by Walid Phares

  Walid Phares presents us with a full and frightening picture of Iran's expanding global reach, a process that has been going on for many years by different means: weapons distribution, developing terrorist groups such as Hezbollah, and weaving a network of new political friendships. It's more deadly than al-Qaeda, yet the American administration, while correctly treating al-Qaeda as an enemy, is considering making friends with Iran. As Phares writes, "From a U.S. counterterrorism perspective, the threats posed by Iran, Hezbollah, and its global terrorist network are considerable. But the addition of nuclear weapons into this global network of Khomeinists may well prove as dangerous if not more so than nuclear weapons in the hands of al-Qaeda."
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LOSING TURKEY TO THE ISLAMISTS
by Barbara Lerner

  Since the Turkish P.M.Recep Tayyip Erdogan took power in 2002, his AKP party has been turning Turkey from a secular society into an anti-Western Islamic state, whose ambition is to become the leader of the Islamic world. Nevertheless, the EU and the American administration have the fantasy that the Turkish military — Turkey's strongest proponent of secularism — is the threat to the West, not the AKP. Western leadership considers the new Turkey neo-Ottoman. Barbara Lerner demolishes this notion, pointing out that the AKP has adopted the standard Islamic cliches for showing animosity to the West and Israel and is encouraging the Turks to adopt a more uniform Islamic way of life, one more in conformity with the general hate-filled Islamic ideology pervasive in the Middle East. In contrast, under the Ottomans, providing the subject people — Muslim, Christian, Jew -- paid the required tribute, they pretty much governed their own communities. This led to multiple patterns of governance, multiple ways to express the various cultures, different living conditions and some opportunity for upward mobility. Turkey was relatively open under the Ottomans and in this way the Ottomans served as a model for Atatürk, not Erdogan.
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LEBANON: AYATOLLAH FADLALLAH'S DEATH AND THE EXPANSION OF IRANIAN HEGEMONY
by Shimon Shapira

  Shimon Shapira provides us with an analytical perspective on the life of the recently-deceased Shiite religious leader, Sayyed Muhammed Hussein Fadlallah. He is praised in the West as a peaceful scholar, moral and progressive. In actuality, "[h]e played a leading role in the increasing Islamic radicalization of Lebanese Shiites and laid the foundations for Hizbullah's ideology of violent struggle against the West and Israel." True, he did speak out against wife-beating and rejected the authority of Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on religious grounds, but these hardly nullify his commitment to jihad against Israel and the West and his condonning the murder of Jewish youngsters massacred as they sat studying in their Yeshiva. He was both dedicated and persuasive doing psych-ops among the Shi'ites in Southern Lebanon on behalf of Iran-owned Hizbollah. Without irony, we can say he was as peaceful as his religion; the word "peaceful" no more fitted him than it fits his religion.
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RETHINKING SECURITY IN THE NEW NUCLEAR AGE
by Andrew McKillop

  There's little argument that it is important to find alternative sources of energy to reduce dependency on fossil fuel, particularly when the major suppliers are the unstable theocracies of the Middle East -- an unstable part of the world. From that point of view, nuclear energy has many advantages. And indeed non-military nuclear reactors are beginning to proliferate. Andrew McKillop explores some of the less pleasant possibilities that deserve serious thought before we commit to an extreme makeover. What happens if a reactor is attacked with conventional weapons during a convential war? How are nuclear products maintained and stored? What about the interdependence of civil and military nuclear installations? Given the finite amount of initial material, the solution is usually to advocate building Fast Breeder Reactors, which can create more fuel than is consumed in the process of making the fuel. But this creates another set of problems. As the waste plutonium accumulates, it becomes harder to keep it safe and out of the hands of terrorists; and it is increasingly susceptible to outside attack. How do we define national security under these new conditions?
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THE WRONG PRIORITY: A NEW ROUND OF PEACE TALKS

As the Arab Middle East grows increasingly divided by incompatible ideologies and civil wars, the solution by the American administration is to dredge up another peace conference on how to squeeze two incompatible groups on the same tiny bit of land. If it succeeds at all, it will be at the cost of compromising Israel's security, weakening American's only ally in the Middle East. This set of articles reminds us of some basic facts that are important for the negotiations.

WHAT CAN ISRAEL-PALESTINIAN PEACE TALKS ACHIEVE?
by Editor, Family Security Matters

  Washington is again taking another shot at peace between Arabs and Jews. The editor of Family Security Matters recalls previous attempts at brokering a deal and reminds us that it is hard to find reasonable solutions in a setting of religious or racial conflict. This is particularly true this round, given that the split between the more religious Hamas and the more secular Fatah has deepened, and their life styles have grown increasingly different. They both, however, continue to share the same objective: destroy Israel. The maps in the article are of additional interest. They show how the land that was allocated to a Jewish state has been nibbled away over the years while Israel vainly pursues peace with her neighbors.
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THE NAKBA OBSESSION: THE PALESTINIAN NATIONAL NARRATIVE IS THE BIGGEST OBSTACLE TO PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Sol Stern

  Why are the Arab refugees different from all other refugees? Why do all refugees have one U.N. agency (UNHCR) to help them survive the crisis and resettle them after a brief time — and these Arab refugees have their own dedicated U.N. agency (UNRWA) that has fed, educated and medicated them and their descendents and discouraged resettlement? Why have all other refugees fled from countries that include all the religions but Jewish — and the Arab refugees are the only ones that ran from the Jewish state? Is the explanation that these Arab refugees (now declared to be the Palestinian people) are the only weapon Islam has to try to deny the Jews their homeland? Is that why — compared to true refugees — they live high off the hog (oops, make that lamb) not just in the refugee camps scattered in the Arab countries but in Gaza and the West Bank, foot soldiers in a campaign conducted by a wide number of disparate groups that can not admit in their politically-correct milieu that they hate Jews. In this essay, Sol Stern discusses the Nakba — the Ur-legend that bolsters the fantasy that the innocent Palestinians were forceably cast out from their garden of Eden into wretchedness by that foreign force, (twirl the mustache, here) international Zionism.
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DIRECT TALK ABOUT DIRECT TALKS
by Paul Lademain

  This essay by Paul Lademain could have been entitled: how to grow a spine — advice for Israeli diplomats. In the next round of that interminable game called 'Let's make peace' OR 'Chop another piece out of Israel', he suggests putting Israel's interests first and worrying about Israelis instead of wanting to show an indifferent world how cooperative Israel can be. I find it hard to believe that Israel, which by international law holds Samaria and Judea in trust for all Jews, allows itself to be put into a position where it is negotiating the future of Biblical Israel (Samaria and Judea). And to make this a real farce, the term of office for their single peace partner, Abbas, expired early in 2009; he isn't legally in office any more. He doesn't speak for Hamas. He doesn't control Fatah, which runs the P.A. So who does he represent? Why are his demands taken seriously? Why are the demands of that phony people, the Palestinians, taken seriously?
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THE BLACKMAILER'S PARADOX: ARAB-ISRAEL NEGOTIATIONS ARE A GAME
by Prof. Yisrael Aumann

  Professor Yisrael Aumann applies game theory to how to negotiate with Arabs. In the Blackmailer's Paradox, it is the side that doesn't flinch, that makes unreasonable demands and doesn't compromise, that walks home with the goodies. To date the Arabs have played the game better, convincing Israel to be the one that must compromise. Aumann suggests some necessary changes in Israel's negotiating stance. Of course in real life, the problem is more complex. Negotiation implies a willingness to compromise. Unfortunately, the Arabs aren't just unreasonable — the goal of Islam's leaders is to destroy Israel, no matter what the costs. But Aumann is certainly right that the Israelis need some street smarts.
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THE TRUTH ABOUT "PALESTINE"
by Steven Simpson

  Nowadays many a propagandist talks about Palestine as if such a sovereign political entity exists anywhere except in the fancy-filled illogic of Jew-haters. It doesn't exist. What's more — it never did. The fallback position of these Jew-haters when forced to admit the facts is: but the land belongs to the natives that were driven out or marginalized when Israel became a state. Again, this is wrong. Some 90-95% of these natives started coming into the land after the Jews and the Brits started created economic opportunities. Steven Simpson provides us with an excellent history of the development of the "Palestine" myth, which has become one of the more important ways to attack the legitimacy of the Jewish state. Unlike Palestine, the legitimacy of Israel is warranted by history, morality, international law and the rules of conquest.
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THE TRUTH ABOUT THE OCCUPATION AND THE SETTLEMENTS
by Ted Belman

  As Ted Belman writes, "The pro-Palestinian propaganda machine has succeeded in stigmatizing the Israeli occupation and the settlements. Time and again we hear about the 'brutal occupation' and the 'illegal settlements'. We rarely hear the truth in opposition to these lies." He provides us with a clear statement of the facts. (Additional discussions can be found by googling for "Yoran Shifftan" "Howard Grief" "Wallace Brand" in Think-Israel.) To the fact that the land is Jewish by international law -- meaning that the U.N. is supposed to be helping the Jewish settlements to expand -- add the fact that some 95% of the supposed indigenous "Palestinians" came in after 1900, and it becomes Ph.D. thesis-level puzzlement how the Arabs and Arab-aiders have managed to make everyone believe lies that invert the truth.
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THE LEGAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE ISRAELI GOVERNMENT'S ABANDONMENT OF JUDEA AND SAMARIA
by Howard Grief

  Howard Grief asks "what would happen if, instead of incorporation or annexation, the Israeli Government decides to abandon or cede Judea, Samaria to the Arabs as indicated by the Road Map Peace Plan and the Two-State Solution." He concludes the Jewish residents would be well within their rights "to take the necessary steps to govern themselves in an independent State of Judea and Samaria."
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THE RIGHT PRIORITY: COUNTERING SHARIA AND RESURGENT ISLAM

Each issue we explore ways and means of counterattacking Islam on some of the many fronts on which it is advancing. In this issue, we collected some more information that is fundamental to understanding what we are up against.

SHARIA LAW FOR NON-MUSLIMS: CHAPTERS 4 AND 5
by Bill Warner

  In the May-June 2010 issue, we presented the first three chapters of Bill Warner's Sharia Law for Non-Muslims. The books is short, understandable, well-organized and clarifies important issues. It is good to have available to counter the incomplete information promulgated by many Islamic sources and sources that have accepted Arab money. For example, when you are told that sharia banking is fine because some of its profits go to charity, check with Warner's book. You will find that the statement is true, but a Muslim is forbidden to spend any of it on a Kafir. A Kafir is anyone who is not a Muslim. When the text speaks well of Jews or Christians, check whether it is a earlier verse or a later verse. Later verses nullify earlier verses. The entire book is now available.
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TERRORISM FOR DUMMIES -- A BEGINNERS' GUIDE
by John Miller

  The reduction of the traditional authority of the Church and the scientist, the attraction of western academia fo Marxism and environmentalism, the catering to the public's desire for simple and comforting slogans to understand a society that was increasingly complex, "the unintended consequences of well-meaning democratic policy" and Russia's continued desire even after the collapse of the Soviet Union for a place at the table of power — these all lay the groundwork in which Islamic fundamentalist terrorism could thrive. John Miller describes some early history — the fighting, the rise of the Taliban, the adherence to strict Sharia law and the changing loyalties in Afghanistan and Pakistan — which shaped the development of the current global jihad against the west. The 1980's war in Afghanistan helped mold the charismatic Osama Bin-Ladin and by the 1990s, "Al Qaeda had declared war on the US and Israel and by extension, Western society." The first bombing of the World Trade Center was in 1993. And there's no end in sight.
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WHO RULES IN PALESTINE?
by Joe Settler

  As Joe Settler asks. "With the exception of Iran (established 1935, but was previously Persia) and Egypt, what Arab state even existed as an identifiably unique entity 100 years ago? None. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, Kuwait, Syria, were all part of the Ottoman Empire, with local names but they were not sovereign entities. They were made states by the same authority -- the League of Nations -- that authorized the State of Israel. "Until then, they were just a bunch of different clans and tribes under the fist of ever-changing rulers, often external ones, with no real individually unique national identity beyond Islam and Arabia." Hamas and Fatah have the same desire to replace Israel by an Arab state. The battles between them are as battles have been in the Middle East for hundreds of years -- clan wars for control and loot.
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A TERRORIST'S GUIDE TO IMPROVING ISRAEL'S MEDIA COVERAGE
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield's essay advises Israel on improving its relations with a currently-hostile media. He suggests copying Arab terrorist tactics, such as banning all reporters who refuse to write favorably about them -- the reporters will figure out rationalizations when their own jobs are on the line. Currently, Israel suffers because it kills only when it can no longer avoid killing -- and damage is minimized. It forgets that man bites dog is news, dog bites man isn't. So if Israel were to make killing as commonplace as the Arabs do, their press would improve. Israel's publicity also suffers because Israelis don't look like victims should. They should take a lesson from the Arabs, who may have fancy houses and cars, but they wear smattahs, have picturesque garbage and lots of flies. Even worse, Israelis aren't inclined to blame the world for whatever goes wrong. How do they expect the press to like them? Come to think of it, when the Government mismanaged the resettlement of the Jews expelled from their homes in Gaza, why didn't they apply to the U.N. for refugee status and lots of cash? Greenfield calls this essay satire; I call it insightful.
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 6
by R.K. Ohri

  We are serializing R.K. Ohri's book entitled The Long March of Islam. In Chapter 6, he examines the importance of demography in promoting Islamic and jihadi ideology. The large growth of the Muslim population -- natural and by conversion -- has given Islam the power to force a high rate of population displacement, instability in many countries and marginalization of the native population, as in Lebanon. The Muslim birthrate is increasing while European, Russian and even Asian rates decrease. The decline of the indigenous populations has economic and defense consequences -- lowered production of goods and services; less defence preparedness; and mass migration of foreign groups into the sparely populated areas. The social consequences of the rapid change in the size of a Muslim community from minority to majority status by legal/illegal entry and natural growth are tremendous, with the indigenous population losing its ability to practice its own cultural values and life style, while sharia law is enforced. Eventually, "...a sizeable increase in the proportion of Muslims in any country or region leads to a loud clamour, often culminating in a violent struggle, for a separate homeland by dividing that nation, even before Muslims attain the near majority status."
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ISRAELI SOCIETY

These essays begin with Israel's current demographic structure. In terms of ideology, the left and far left, though reduced in size, still control the administration, news media, academia and the army. The other essays look at cracks in the power structure in the government and in academia.

ISRAELI DEMOGRAPHICS 101. E PLURIBUS UNUM
by Norman Berdichevsky

  This seemingly simple essay condenses a large amount of information on the demographic characteristics of Israeli society. Norman Berdichevsky provides a framework for the interactions and history of some of the major components of Israeli society. He tracks the ongoing integration of the groups — the "Zionist ideal of Kibbutz uMizug haGaluyot (Ingathering and Mixing of the Exiles)" He points out that much of the bad-mouthing of Israel comes from Marxists, "at a loss to explain the survival of the Jewish people and their reconstitution as a nation." According to Marxist doctrine, this wasn't supposed to happen. More generally, national differences everywhere were supposed to disappear, and a working class with solidly working-class concerns emerge. Israel's non-conformity to theory apparently is particularly galling.
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ISRAEL'S RULING CLASS
by Caroline Glick

  In a recent article Angelo Codevilla pointed out that America's elitist ruling class — politicians, bureaucrats and the policy establishment — thinks much the same despite surface differences in politics and is committed to gaining still more power. It doesn't much like the rest of America, which prefers smaller government and more individualism. In this essay Caroline Glick applies Codevilla's thesis to the ruling class in Israel, which perverts the will of the majority on behalf of "world opinion" and sometimes in actual collusion with foreign governments. Some have committed treason, as in the recent example where a trio of far left ex-IDF officers conspired with Obama's agent so that USA could know and have arguments ready to counter Netanyahu's arguments. They "and their leader Yossi Beilin are always working with the Americans and Europeans to force Israel to maintain allegiance to the failed land for peace paradigm." Israel has little margin for error. It is a small country surrounded by hostile neighbors that have the support of the U.N., the E.U. and the American administration. Hence, the mischief-making of this unpatriotic internal elite leadership could have dire consequences.
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ACADEMIC BRAINWASHING
by Ben Dror Yemini

  Several Israeli universities -- Ben Gurion U. is a particularly egregious example -- have been notorious for years for having a large number of professors who enforced Marxist ideology, allowed no dissenting opinions and encouraged no reading in alternative points of view. There was an obvious pattern that conforming to Marxist ideology was necessary for career advancement. Some of what was taught goes beyond even extremist criticism of the state into sedition, denying Israel's right to exist. Information they provided their classes was incomplete and designed to appear to confirm the professor's ideology --- advocating the elimination of Israel as a Jewish, democratic state. Recently, the matter came to a head. Conservative students revolted against this intimidation and enforced uniformity; they demanded intellectual pluralism and freedom of expression. Organizations that monitored dictatorial anti-Zionism in the universities were given a hearing. The upshot of course was that the professors that had muzzled criticism of their opinions started shouting that they were entitled to complete freedom of expression and were not to be criticized. Ben Dror Yemini provides a picture of the situation that still exists, particularly in the soft sciences.
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THE 5TH YEAR COMMEMORATION OF THE EXPULSION OF THE JEWS FROM GUSH KATIF, GAZA

The summer of 2005 was a disaster, when Israel shot itself in the head. It expelled the Jewish pioneers from Gaza. It left behind greenhouses, which the Arabs vandalized; it left behind buildings which the Arabs destroyed or used to train others in the art of terror. It left a group of Arabs who had made a living working for the Jews to the mercies of a thugocracy. It exposed more of Israel to more attacks by the arabs. It made the arabs more confident that they would prevail. It demoralized a productive group of Jews that had made innovations in growing organic crops and was turning a wasteland into a garden. It turned Israeli citizens into refugees in their own land. GIven the Government's incompetence and lack of resources for resettling these 10,000 citizens, one wonders at its blind optimism in even considering the insane idea of kicking out another 250,000 to 500,000 Jews from their established homes and businesses, schools and synagogues, in Samaria and Judea. How can they even consider giving control of Israel's drinking water to the Arabs, who have already mucked up the Gaza aquifer? The only bright spot is that the Gaza expulsion was so clearly stupid, it did convince some Israelis that parting with Jewish land is not the way to peace.

FIVE YEARS AFTER THE EXPULSION; RESPONSE TO A LEFTIST JEW
by Rachel Saperstein

  These two essays by Rachel Saperstein could have been entitled A Tragedy In Two Simultaneous Acts. Five years after the Government unilaterally took it upon itself to kick the Jews out of their homes in Gush Katif, Gaza, many of these once productive Israelis have been reduced to poverty. They have been traumatized. They are emotionally scarred; they have health problems and are depressed. But some, slowly, and with little help from a government that is more interested in the impression it makes "on the world", they are starting to rebuild permanent communities. The other essay points out the effect of the "Disengagement" on the Gazan arabs, once employed productively in the Jewish greenhouses and metal works, in the building trades and in factories. They are under Hamas' rule, used as human shields and deprived of human dignity.
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THE PRICE ISRAEL PAID FOR THE DISENGAGEMENT
by Hillel Fendel

  August 15, 2010 marks 5 years since the expulsion. In this article, Hillel Fendel presents us with an brief summary of the history of Gush Katif and the fate of the Jews of Gush Katif who were expelled from their homes and farms. The Government's stated reasons for the withdrawal were to pave the way to peace, to inprove the PA's economy, to not be responsible for the Gaza arab population and to gain international appreciation. Instead, Gaza has become a terrorist state. It does have an enormous budget, but most of this comes from outside charitable sources such as the EU and the American Administration. Israel is still saddled with supplying Gaza. It has demoralized some of its most patriotic and energetic citizens, lost the substantial income that came from the export of Gazan vegetables and flowers, spent a huge amount of money to uproot the Jews and done very little to resettle them permanently. In sum, this enterprise has been a disaster. Or as the recent Commission of Inquiry into the rehabilitation of the evacuees put it: "The state failed, and its failure was absolute and abysmal."
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5 YEARS AFTER DISENGAGEMENT AND ITS RESULTS
by Dror Vanunu

  This is the more detailed and original analysis of the consequences of the Gaza expulsion on the Jews who were expelled, and the impact the disengagement had on Israel itself.
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WHY GUSH KATIF STILL MATTERS
by Moshe Dann

  In this essay, Moshe Dann expresses the emotions that the expulsion from Gaza aroused and still arouses. As Dann writes, "It caused enormous physical, psychological, social, cultural, military and strategic damage to the entire nation — and it still does. Like an ecological disaster, its foulness still seeps through our foundations, and continues to poison us." Perhaps the most awful fact is that Israel did it to itself. As David Wilder of Hebron said of this destruction of Gush Katif: "...we experienced a Churban, a destruction, an expulsion. Not implemented by the Greeks or the Romans or any foreign power; rather by our own people; an act voted on in the Knesset, initiated by the Prime Minister of the State of Israel, approved by the national Supreme Court and carried out by Jewish soldiers and police."
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THE HISTORY SECTION

Two stories from the First World War and one about an ancient Jewish synagogue the Arabs covet.

THE LONE PALM TREE
by Shalom Pollack

  Avshalom Feinberg and Sarah Aaronsohn and their families were early settlers in the part of the Ottoman Empire that became the State of Israel. In World War 1, they were spies for the British against the Ottoman Turks. The work was important but dangerous. They died for their dedication to the future state of Israel. Shalom Pollack helps us visualize the times.
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BLOOD ON THE TRACKS
by Matthew Price

  This is a review by Matthew Price of a book by Sean McMeekin about the relationship of the Ottoman Empire and Germany before and during World War 1. The Ottomans were an ally of Germany in the first World War. McMeekin hangs his account of the events of the time on the decision by the German Kaiser, Wilhelm ii, to build a railway between Berlin, Germany and Baghdad, Iraq to link Germany and the Persian Gulf physically. He also hoped to use these Muslims as a weapon against the British, harnessing their religious fervour as jihadists. The British played a similar game, associating themselves with Muslims who were also itching to restore Muslim supremacy -- only they wooed the Saudis and Mecca. Then as now, a little knowledge of Islam went a long way, but, then as now, not far enough. As McMeekin explains, "Shia clerics were never going to fall in behind a Sunni Caliphate, whose authority they would never recognise. And, besides, the Caliphate was a nearly moribund institution in 1914."
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THE MOUNT OF OLIVES IN JERUSALEM: WHY CONTINUED ISRAELI CONTROL IS VITAL
by Nadav Shragai

  This is a very sad article. It is sad because the Jews don't automatically react with passion and fury at attempts to take away parts of their inheritance. There is no dramatic surge of anger -- the kind that politicians respond to -- when the Arabs demand control of Jewish historic sites. It is sad that Jews have so quickly forgotten how Arabs destroyed Joseph's Tomb right after they gained possession -- while Arab policemen stood by. It is sad because someone has to point out what should be obvious, but isn't to the Jews nurtured on globalism and secularism. It is sad that the Jewish owners of the land need to beg for access to their own shrines and holy places. It is sad that thanks to the laxness of the Jews -- and indeed to the pro-Palestinian propanda creatively designed by some Marxist Jews -- the Arabs has increased confidence to up their demands to lord it over the Jewish inhabitants of the Jewish state. Nadav Shragai writes the future consequences of Jewish ignorance and indifference in a specific case: the Mount of Olives, Jerusalem's ancient and historic burial ground. Have we forgotten that Jordan used the gravestones as stepping stones to the latrines when they invaded Jerusalem right after Israel was established?
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

July 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
August 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


MAY-JUNE, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the May-June 2010 issue:

In-Your-Face "Activism" (Sarke, Ceren, Spengler, Choudhury, AllahPundit, Ibrahim, Emerson, Joscelyn)
Global Jihad (Brand, Ohri, Swamy, Suseelan, Blankley, Murinson, Smith, Shapira, Smith)
Anti-Israel Institutions Based in USA (Eye on the UN, Muravchik, Van Zile, Spotts, Burchell)
Israel's Daunting Task (Greenfield, Glick, Haetzni, Saperstein, Glick)
Language and the Media (Murphy, Ibrahim, Miller)
Sharia in High Places in Government and in the Universities (Warner, Rothstein and Seid, Levy and Poller)
History Section (Fishman-Duker, Rose)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (May, June)

IN-YOUR-FACE "ACTIVISM"

This issue we look first at a feast of in-your-face activism.

  1. The appetizer: The Witch from the Middle East, Helen Thomas, who had successfully hopped away from so many outrageous statements, was felled by a fellow liberal, an amateur with a video camera, asking friendly conversational questions.

  2. The entrée: two independent but compatible groups of political humanitarians using floating floats for a carnival-like show on water. The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) — in its new guise as the Free Gaza Movement (FGM) — acted as 'humanitarian' shields for a large group of Turkish terrorists, whose objective was to get to Gaza or die trying. Or do some of each. Praise be to Allah, much of their year-long planning and work was rewarded — some of the wannabe Shaheeds (martyrs) got their wish. And Israel was made to look bad. Unfortunately, the supplies they were bringing to the starving Armenians Arabs of Gaza will get there a bit late — Hamas didn't accept them. But what the heck. The medicines had expired anyways even before they left. And the bunkers concrete they brought might not be appetizing but it won't spoil.

  3. The dessert: This comes closer to home. In the guise of honoring the 911 victims of Arab terrorism, some well-funded Arabs are building a mosque — or is it two mosques? — as close as they can get to Ground Zero. An interesting fact is that the main man in the Mosque project, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, is a member of the Perdana Global Peace Organization, the biggest funder (on record, anyways) of the Gaza Flotilla. Now that's a real linkage, not like the wet noodling that believes the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the key arch of the wall of political instability in the Middle East.
Maybe you thought humanitarianism and peace were ideas resistant to being distorted by evil-doers. Thanks to the many NGOs and organizations and institutions professing peace and humanitarian ideals while doing all they can to destroy Israel and Western civilization, peace and humanitarian are fast becoming dirty words.
 

GET THE HELL OUT OF...MY FACE
by Sarke

  As Naomi Ragen put it: "If you've been thinking about a response to Helen Thomas tell-the-Jews-to-get-the Hell-out-of Palestine-and-go-back to -Germany and Poland-, think no more! The best rant on the subject can be found on Jewlicious by Sara K Eisen, who signs herself Sarke." This is it.
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ISRAEL PUBLISHES GAZA TRAVEL GUIDEBOOK FOR PRO-HAMAS FREEDOM FLOTILLA
by Omri Ceren

 

A non-violent Gaza flotilla activist:
Sheikh Mohammed al-Hazimi, a member of the Yemeni Parliament and of Al-Islah, aboard the Mavi Marmara.

In this article Omri Ceren publishes a "Guide to Gaza" — the real Gaza is very different than what's painted by our "reliable" news sources. There was, as CNN noted, violence. They forgot to mention the violence was coming from the humanitarians, who assaulted the Israelis -- even throwing them overboard. The Israelis, of course, were forbidden by their politicians from doing bodily harm, if at all avoidable. The only questionable item in Ceren's article is the notion that the people Israel hires to do its hasbara would be effective. And so it is, because Israel's responses were weak and delayed and thanks to the major TV and newspaper media stretching the truth till it broke, the world now knows that the brutal Jews wouldn't allow some brave humanitarians to bring in food to the starving Gazans. If they were serious, why didn't they send the material by truck? That's how the Gazans get their freebies week by week. Come to think of it, if they were serious, why didn't they go to Darfur, where the people really are starving?
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NO ISRAELI GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED
by Spengler

  Did you know that just this week, in mid-June, Muslims from Kyrgzstan killed a couple hundred Muslims from Uzbekistan? Tortured hundreds of others? Caused some 200,000 resident Uzbeks to flee the country? Did you know that Yemen was blockading South Yemen? It's a real blockade — no supplies are let in — no water, no food, no medicine. Did you know that Hamas won't let the "Humanitarian suppplies" in anyways unless they take charge of the goodies? With regard to the Gaza flotilla story, it is true that the Jews were in the right in international law, showed saintly forbearance before they were forced either to fight back intelligently or lose their lives. It is true that this was a stunt cooked up by terror groups to show Israel as either weak or heartless. But the main point is that when Jewish Israel kills a Muslim that is news worthy — it will even be declared a war crime when managed by a Goldstone-cur hired by the U.N. But when a multitude of Muslims are killed by other muslims, it doesn't make the news. Moral of the story: if Israel is to be castigated even for minimal killings, she might as well do what needs doing. The decibel level can't get any higher than it is. As Spengler points out in this essay, "The Gaza flotilla affair should teach Jerusalem that no matter how gingerly it approaches the threats on its borders, and how gently it responds, it ends up holding the bag for the region's problems. It might as well get down to the business of war."
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STARTER GROUPS FOR ISLAMISM: THE TABLIGHI JAMAAT; ASMA'S IMAN RAUF AND THE MOSQUE AT GROUND ZERO
by Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury

  We have been forced to become frighteningly familiar with some Islamic groups directly involved in terrorism. Starter groups that introduce Islamic ideology into new territory appear less menacing. Salah Choudhury writes of the jihadist organization, Tablighi Jamaat (TJ), which works out of mosques in some 80 countries. preaching "a creed that is hardly distinguishable from the radical Wahhabi-Salafi jihadist ideology that so many terrorists share." TJ has become "a major recruiting agency for terrorist causes worldwide." High-profile terrorists such as John Lindh, the Lackawanna Six, the Oregon cell, "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, etc., were members of TJ at one time or another. Members that "outgrow" TJ are quickly and expertly picked up by more overtly virulent 'activist' groups. (See also Chapter 5 of RK Ohri's book.) Choudhury also writes of Feisal Rauf of the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA), which has bought the land next to the site of the 9/11 terror attack to erect a mosque supposedly to honor the victims of 9/11. Rauf's ideology, network and connections to the Muslim Brotherhood are summarized by Choudhury, who has himself experienced what happens to freedom of expression when Islam feels itself in the ascendency. Would that the New York Times had his courage! In addition, we publish an appeal by Salah Choudhury for funds to continue the publishing of his newspaper, the Weekly Blitz. It is indeed a brave effort, worthy of our support.
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A REVEALING SKETCH OF IMAM RAUF: FOUNDED GROUND ZERO MOSQUE PROJECT HELPED FUND THE GAZA FLOTILLA
by AllahPundit

  Imam Rauf is truly a renaissance man. Unfortunately, his idea of renaissance appears to be recreating the medieval Caliphate. AllahPundit makes some connections the Main Stream Media has largely chosen to ignore. Rauf is, for example, a member of the Perdana Global Peace Organization. Perdana, which is based in Malaysia, is the largest contributor to the Gaza Flotilla on record. Rauf is a man that can win Westerns with his charming manner and intellectual discourse. But as Walid Shoebat inter alia has often pointed out, it's what they say to their own people in their own language that counts. And Muslims don't hear ecumenism and tolerance from him.
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THE TWO FACES OF THE GROUND ZERO MOSQUE
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim starts this essay by informing us that justice in western terms conveys a very different meaning than it does for a Muslim. Muslims can often take advantage of this, knowing a western audience will, for example, interpret "We seek Justice" in a benign way, whereas the speaker is extolling conquest of the infidel West. As another example, a Muslim group has bought land close to Ground Zero and proposes to build a Mosque/Center there, claiming they wish to honor the victims of 9/11. Their true intent may be gleamed from the fact they are calling this the Cordoba Initiative. Raymond Ibrahim explains why ecumenical tolerance and peace are not their intent. Included are links to several videos about the mosque.
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INTELLECTUAL DOUBLE STANDARDS ON ISLAMISTS
by Steven Emerson

  The Muslim Brotherhood is back in the spotlight. It is implicated in the Ground Zero mosque grotesquerie. And the Gaza Flotilla. In the usual news item, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is whitewashed so effectively that people can be forgiven for thinking it's somewhat like the Elks or the Lions Club — doing good deeds, giving charity, just nice decent folk. The reality is that the Brotherhood is in business to foster Sharia Law globally. Founded almost a century ago, they are patient and plan well. Hamas is one of their creations but they prefer to emphasize their "moderate" intellectual side, downplaying that their chief intellectual, Yousef Al-Qaradawi, was behind the riots and demonstrations that belatedly protested the Muhammed cartoons around the world. (See Danish Cartoons.) Qaradawi "has made statements praising Hitler, defending organizations like Hamas, and supporting suicide attacks." Another of their intellectuals, Tariq Ramadan, grandson of the founder of the MB, is an admirer of Qaradawi. The grandfather admired Hitler, and worked with the notorious Mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseini. The grandson is no better ideologically than his grandfather but on the surface he sounds open-minded and is touted as a moderate by a media that refuses to probe beneath the surface. (See also Murphy's article below or here.) Steven Emerson provides us with information about the Brotherhood over the generations, using Paul Berman's book Flight of the Intellectuals as a major reference.
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD'S FLOTILLA
by Thomas Joscelyn

  Thomas Joscelyn writes of the ubiquitous Muslim Brotherhood (MB), which seems increasingly to be stripping off its mask of moderation and showing its true face. Were the Flotilla structured like Facebook, the MB could claim to have the mostest friends and relations both on board the flagship Marmara and behind the scene among the workers that ensured the flotilla's success. The show was a benefit performance for Hamas, one of the MB's creations. The Turkish contingent was honchoed by the IHH, which paid for the mercenaries, after it had generously contributed ships. The IHH is part of a Saudi-sponsored group called The Union of Good (UG), which has been designated a terror group. Sheik Qaradawi, who triggered the Danish cartoon riots and is a top man in the MB just happens to be a UG leader. These are just some of the best-known linkages. More connections of the MB to top terror players are likely to emerge.
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GLOBAL JIHAD

Israel does get an inordinate amount of attention over minor matters and necessary security matters, when major matters in other countries with global implications are underreported. Aside from routine terror attacks by Muslims on Christians, Jews and Hindus, more than 100 muslims were murdered May 28th in Pakistan by Islamic terrorists in two Achmedi mosques. In the same month, 82 Muslim Kurds were murdered in Turkey and Iran. Russia continues to press Kyrgyzstan, an important American ally in Central Asia, to close the American air base we keep there in readiness. Unsurprisingly, in mid-June, Kyrzgyzstan "civilians" "spontaneously" attacked Uzbek civilians living in Kyrzgyzstan, leaving hundreds dead and hundreds of thousands fleeing as refugees. Even these murders don't get much attention, because it's only one muslim sectarian faction killing another — it's not as horrible, has v' halila, as the Jewish IDF killing 9 blockade runners with their terror-affiliated handlers on board, This section looks at some important political happenings in some other countries. In the first article of the set, Wallace Brand points out that the Islamists have again begun a religious war around the world, aiming at world dominance. "Terror in the West is not caused by US support for Israel; terror all over the world is the result of Islamist imperialism."

THE THIRD WAVE
by Wallace Edward Brand

  Muslim leaders have persuaded the current American administration that their jihad against the West is America's fault because it supports Israel. The Arab jihad against Israel is Israel's fault because it inhibits Arab nationalism. Blaming Islamist violence in Afghanistan and Iraq and the nuclear threat in Iran on Israel's supposed occupation of Arab land conveniently forgets that the Arabs were massacring Jews in the Holy Land well before Israel was a state -- "Palestine" was never a state — during the time when Jew and Arab lived equally in squalid conditions under the Ottoman rule. As Wallace Brand makes clear in this essay, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is just another manifestation of the Third Wave of jihad by a resurgent Islam. The Islamists have again begun a religious war around the world, aiming at world dominance. "Terror in the West is not caused by US support for Israel; terror all over the world is the result of Islamist imperialism."
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 5
by R. K. Ohri

  We are serializing R.K. Ohri's book entitled The Long March of Islam. In Chapter 5, Ohri writes about the revival of militant Islam in the first half of the 20th Century. It had a large jolt forward in 1947 with the creation of Muslim Pakistan, which was supposed to end religious conflict in India. Instead, almost immediately, the Pakistani invaded Jammu and Kashmir. The matter was taken to the U.N. This resulted — as it did when Israel fought back Arab aggression around the same time — in making a relatively simple situation almost unsolvable. Ohri also expands on the role a government with strong resources and determined Muslims — in this case, Pakistan — can have in promoting jihad, especially when Saudi Arabia is willing to pay for the madrassas that "become factories for producing terrorists and suicide bombers." The goal of the Muslim jihadists — whether they be Arab or Pakistani — may be to pull the world down into their medieval notions of an ideal social structure, but they don't hesitate to make use of Western communication technology and Western freedom of speech to rouse the troops to slaughter.
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HOW TO WIPE OUT ISLAMIC TERROR: THE MOMENT OF TRUTH HAS ARRIVED
by Subramanian Swamy

  RK Ohri's article (see above) was a general review, including how India split off Muslim-majority Pakistan in an effort to create peaceful relations between Hindus and Muslims. Instead, it led to renewed aggression, with Pakistan claiming Kashmir. In this essay, Subramanian Swamy writes out a specific plan to fight the terrorism emanating from Pakistan. A major consideration is the potential 5th column of muslims resident in India. Caroline Glick has written of similar radicalization and treasonable activity among Israeli Arabs, with Arab towns in Israel storing weaponry to be used in a future insurrection. ("Hizbullah on the homefront" click here.) As does Glick, Swammy recommends a crackdown -- action, not words. It is eerie how similar terrorism is in both countries and how pusillanimous the response of both Governments. Swarmy recommends some specific measures to stop terrorism. It is a recipe Israel should also consider.
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RIDDING PAKISTAN OF ITS JIHADI TERRORISTS
by Babu Suseelan

  Babu Suseelan's essay on Pakistan deals primarily with Pakistan's global impact. Terrorists live there. Terrorists are conditioned there. Terrorists train there. Terrorists travel from there to commit acts of terror all over the world. They kill people indiscriminately, because of the "collective guilt" of their victims or because of some recent events of which they disapprove. This is done with active outside financial support from Islamic governments. There is no world institution acting to stop them. The U.N. doesn't condemn them — the U.N. saves its condemnations for Israel engaged in a legitimate fight against terrorism. America needs to monitor the huge amount of money it gives Pakistan to ensure money is not diverted to the terrorists. We need to act firmly with a strong will to remove a clear and present evil from the world.
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AFGHAN WAR BECOMING A BLOODY FARCE
by Tony Blankley

  As Tony Blankley writes, "President Obama has publicly doubted whether Afghan President Hamid Karzai's corruption and incompetence make him a fit partner for our policy goals in Afghanistan." Obama's public condemnation has not improved relations with President Karzai, who, on his part, has lost confidence in America's ability to make a difference in Afghanistan. Blankley suggests that since we aren't going to do anything effective in Afghanistan — and the present American administration has no such intention — we might as well leave. All we are doing is allowing the Afghan struggle to kill off the soldiers of America and its allies needlessly. He might also have said that Afghanistan is a distraction, when our resources would be put to better use stabilizing the Middle East and dampening down the nuclear arms race that Iran's nuclear ambitions has set off among the Arab countries. Bowing to the Saudis, appeasing Iran and stomping on Israel is on Jimmy Carter's level of ineptitude.
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IRAN TARGETS AZERBAIJAN
by Alexander Murinson

  Aside from pointing out that Israel is developing a strong alliance with a Muslim country, this article is a case study in how hidebound Islam infiltrates a relatively open state. As Alexander Murinson writes, Azerbaijan was one of the Central Asian states where Iran "launched a comprehensive program for the export of its 'Islamic Revolution'." aimed at an "Islamic revival." To this end, it attempted to staff mosques in Azerbaijan with its own mullahs — a technique the Saudis practice in the U.S.A. It is praiseworthy that they helped feed and house many of the poor. What is less advertised is that they trained rioters and organized riots. It is equally educational to read how Azerbaijan is rebuffing the Iranian efforts at ideological takeover.
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THE RETURN OF THE OTTOMANS
by Lee Smith

  While we fritter away our diplomatic resources in the Middle East counting how many houses Israel builds in eastern Jerusalem, alliances between the neighboring states are being reconstructed, and seldom to America's benefit. Lee Smith explains the changing dynamics of this volatile region in response to Iran's bid for domination of the region, followed by Turkey's apparent decision to challenge her. Turkey has become cold, even hostile, to her one-time friend, Israel, while she pleases the Arabs — as in the Gaza flotilla venture — by dramatically taking up their purported cause: Palestinian nationalism. This in itself is curious, because, as Smith notes, "Long before Arab nationalism identified Israel and the United States (and before that the European powers) as the enemy, it was the Ottomans who were called to account for everything that was wrong in the Arabic-speaking regions."
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THE FANTASY OF HIZBULLAH MODERATION
by Brig.-Gen. (ret.) Dr. Shimon Shapira

  John Brennan speaking for the Obama administration wants to strengthen the "moderate element" within Hizbullah, Shimon Shapira in this essay explains why this is most unrealistic. Hizbullah isn't a Lebanese nationalist movement. It began as a way for Iran to export the Islamic Revolution and it remains subservient to Iran, even though it has become "the real ruler of Lebanon." Washington's hopes and wishes won't change matters.
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THE LOOSE ENDS OF MIDDLE EAST LINKAGE
by Lee Smith

  It is conventional wisdom among our politicians, diplomats and many of our military that, in Lee Smith's words, "the Arab-Israeli arena is the region's defining issue." Were the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to be settled and were the Arabs to see we weren't favoring Israel, the Arabs would support us in Iraq and Afghanistan. The diplomat's corollary of course is since we can't make the Arabs listen to reason, we should pressure Israel. Like much conventional wisdom, the proposition that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is linked to the major problems in the Middle East is dead wrong. The civil war between Hamas and Fatah, Hezbollah's taking over Lebanon, the conflicts between the Sunni and the Shi'ites, the proxy war in Yemen, Turkey's regression to Muslim orthodoxy and the potential race to acquire nuclear devices won't go away. In this fascinating article, Lee Smith explores where the idea of linkage comes from, why the myth was invented and why it persists. And why it will begin to work against the Arabs.
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ANTI-ISRAEL INSTITUTIONS BASED IN USA

For an institution conceived as a safe haven in which squabbling states could come together to patch up differences in a polite, non-threatening way, the United Nations has suffered profound deterioration. Its monolithic Arab-Muslim bloc — backed by oil-needy countries — has turned the U.N. into an instrument to amplify and implement Islam's hatred of Israel, even as the countries that side with the Muslims recognize that after Israel, the Muslims are intent on conquering the West. We also witness grotesque behavior from the leaders of some major Protestant churches, who manifest moral shallowness in chastizing Israel for inconveniencing Arabs living in the Territories by delaying them at checkpoints while ignoring the barbarous behavior of these same Palestinians, who venerate as heroes Arabs who murder Jewish toddlers sleeping in their beds and Jewish babies held in the arms of their parents. Church leaders have so often asserted — with no valid evidence, usually just vague generalities — that the Palestinians are suffering from Israel's treatment of them, it has become an article of faith, mouthed even by some pro-Israel Christians. The false notion that Israel is occupying Arab land allows some churchmen to excuse anything the Palestinian arabs do — shoot Jews, shoot rockets at Jews, knife Jews, run Jews over with bulldozers, stone Jews, steal their animals, burn their orchards. All is excused.

THE MEMBERSHIP OF SEVERAL UNITED NATIONS COMMITTEES
by Eye on the UN

  This is not a hoax. This is not a spoof. The basic information comes from official documents of the United Nations. So it is straight from the horse's — well, from some part of the horse. Who wouldn't want Iran on a committee devoted to the status of women? And sending its own children out to the fields to identify hidden explosives by stepping on them is Iran's unique qualification for UNICEF, one that few other countries can better. Who knows more about economic development than the Saudis, who happened to land on a pile of oil and never had to do anything themselves to extract it and distribute it? If anyone knows how to create refugees, certainly Sudan and Somalia are qualified to be on the Commission for Refugees. And bully for China on the Human Rights Council. It knows exactly how to handle a desire for Human Rights. Yessir. And who is better for Social Development than Egypt, which continues to treat its Copt minority to such fun activities as murder, torture and enforced conversions. Eye on the UN provides us with additional information on the membership composition of several of the U.N. committees.
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THE U.N. IS TERMINALLY ILL
by Joshua Muravchik

  The previous article by Eye on the U.N. showed that the composition of many U.N. committees is part of what has made the U.N. a sick joke. Using the Human Rights Commission as example, this essay by Joshua Muravchik provides context in how the U.N. has failed as an institution. Bowing to pressure, the Commission changed its name but not its practice of rigging the voting procedure for committee membership so that those nominated will be elected. When the various countries, often en bloc, make their complicated deals on who will be nominated, considerations of merit and suitability are not allowed to muddy the process. The end result is what we get. And should get rid of.
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THE U.S. PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH'S RENEWED ATTACK ON ISRAEL
by Dexter Van Zile

  In this well-documented yet readable article, Dexter Van Zile reviews the sorry history of the Presbyterian Church's efforts to divest itself and others from investments in Israel, using attacks on Israel, partial withdrawal, and then renewed attacks. The point of view of the activists who control official reports is solidly in sympathy with the Palestinians, who are visualized as the suffering victims of a harsh and illegal occupation by Israel. As VanZile writes, "Leveling chimerical accusations at Israel in the name of peace, these activists seek to enlist their fellow Presbyterians — and the church's bureaucracy — into their efforts to banish the modern state of Israel from the community of civilized nations and portray it as uniquely worthy of criticism and condemnation." With each swing of the pendulum, the Church — by backing these activists — makes more obvious a more basic agenda: the delegimization of the State of Israel. How long will it be before crude anti-Jewish statements -- not clothed in pseudo theology or in a view of Middle East history that ignores most of the facts — become acceptable?
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THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH HAS ATTITUDE TOWARDS ISRAEL
An Interview with Will Spotts by Bernice Lipkin

  Anticipatory stories of the 2010 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church were filled with reports that there were to be motions for divestiture/boycott of Israel that would position the Presbyterian Church more strongly and intemperately in the ranks of the Palestinian sympathizers. I had some specific questions. I asked Will Spotts for clarification. We also include an addendum: Spotts's analysis after the ball was over, the General Assembly ended.
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FLOTILLA RALLIES TERROR CHEER SQUAD
by David Burchell

  In this account, David Burchell goes well beyond the facts of the gaza flotilla into a more profound explanation of why the P and H (Peaceniker and Humanitarian) squad has the compulsive need to demonize Israel. Burchell suggests that the early Christian activists couldn't get far with a turn-the-other-cheek approach. Their politics did better chastizing the sinner. In the 1960s, the image of the Palestinian as the innocent injured was in place but was somewhat tarnished by the behavior of the more radical PLO terrorists. "It followed that Israel's motivations had to be made even blacker, as if in moral compensation." Viewing "Israel as a kind of devil-state, the spirit of evil made incarnate in the world" excused any behavior by their Palestinian 'victims', no matter how outrageous. What still needs explaining is why the PLO became the victim to be succoured in the first place. Surely, it wasn't Arafat's blubbery lips, ugly face and unattractive smile. Could it be that the Terror Cheer Leaders deep down don't like Jews any more than the Arabs do?
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ISRAEL'S DAUNTING TASK

Israel is beset on all sides by active terrorists and their supporters in the media, and by emboldened hostile neighbors, the U.N., mainline churches, and now the American administration. Her appeasement policies have endangered her. To maintain the pretense that there's an ongoing peace process, she has not asserted her legal, moral and historic rights to her land, so that propagandists are free to create fictions about the rights of the "Palestinians", knowing these won't be challenged. In Caroline Glick's words, Israel has a "daunting task" ahead of her. These next papers essentially argue that appeasement must stop. Israel must apply effective counterpressure to her enemy's actions. Israel must proclaim its intent to remain and grow as a Jewish state. It must proclaim its ownership of Jewish land and give up pointless and self-defeating attempts to share with Muslims, who don't want the land — they want Israel dead. The required changes are no longer 'wouldn't it be nice if ..'. They are necessary if Israel is to survive the well-designed machinations of her enemies.

THE NOOSE AROUND ISRAEL'S NECK
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield makes the point that Israel's international enemies are tightening the noose around Israel's neck, while Israel tries to live up to the promises she made for the "peace process" called the Oslo Agreement. The Arabs have felt no such compunction. They've never gotten to step 1: to cease violence. Every one of Israel's concessions has brought her closer to the gallows. Israel is now faced with stark options: continue her suicidal course of accomodation to "world opinion" or do what she must: resist the pressure to cave in piecewise and start fighting to survive.
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ISRAEL'S DAUNTING TASK
by Caroline B. Glick

  The non-Arab states of Iran, Pakistan and Turkey — Israel's one time major Muslim friend — are competing with the Arabs for leadership of the Muslim world. To show its qualifications for the job, Turkey has even taken the lead in attacking Israel — the Gaza flotilla the most recent example. Simultaneously, the U.S.A. administration is abandonning its allies, ignoring man-made disasters (aka Islamic terrorism) and cuddling up to the Muslims. Because Obama believes the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the root of all evil in the Arab world (or maybe in the whole world) he is particularly hard on Israel, Israel justifiably feels she is under siege from all sides. Caroline Glick points out Israel can "do nothing to change American behavior," (which would imply that it is pointless for Israel to make life threatening concessions.) It is time for an internal examination of Israel's diplomatic and tactical blunders. It is time for Israel to put the U.N. on the defensive. It is time for Israel to fight back. Intelligently.
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CALLING THE PA BLUFF
by Boaz Haetzni

  The Palestinians arabs are in the odd position of demanding a state — which they never had and were never part of and never really wanted — and have people like Prez Obama take them seriously. Their demand for Israeli land was a ploy to further their mission of destroying Israel in stages. To date, any land where they've gained control has been used to develop military capability, store war material and train fighters and terrorists. Would they be different in Judea and Samaria than they are in Gaza? Boaz Haetzni points out that if Israel withdraws and eliminates the Jewish settlement towns, Hamas would soon take over Judea-Samaria — they have more popular support than Abu Maazen — and they would settle down in expanded quarters to carry out their mission of destruction, not to form a state. "They are a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is against individual Arab states." They believe in what Arafat said, "our real nation is the Arab nation which ranges from the Atlantic to the Red Sea and beyond..." This is why "Hamas did not declare a state in Gaza although it is the only force in charge there and could do so."
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HAIRCUT AND HISTORY; BIRTHDAY AND THE BIBLE; IN THE BEGINNING
by Rachel Saperstein

  Rachel Saperstein writes three essays: her 3-year old grandchild has his first haircut near the tomb of Samson; Her husband celebrates a birthday, surrounded by family; she confers with the other families — Ashkenazim, Sephardim, Yemenites, Ethiopians, Bnai Menashe from India — who are founding a new town: Bnai Dekalim in Lachish. From these snapshots, would you guess she was one of the Jews traumatized by being forced out of her home in Gaza by her own government? Her husband Moshe and she survived the trauma and the depression that followed and now they are again rebuilding their lives.
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MAKING ISRAEL'S CASE
by Caroline B. Glick

  A major reason for Israel's poor showing in the propaganda wars is that the Arabs come across as passionate about their land, Israel and the territories. Arab leaders. Arab clerics. Arab academics. And the Arab schlub in the street. All of them are passionate as they claim land that is not theirs. In contrast, Israeli spokesmen and consular representatives are rightly perceived as lukewarm about Jewish ownership — if not actively delighted at the prospect of another Arab state in Biblical Israel, with its capitol in Jerusalem. Caroline Glick insists "[t]he government must stop trying to play both sides of the aisle. Instead it should follow the lead of its extraordinary citizens and of Jews throughout the world in asserting the rights of the Jewish people to our capital and our country."
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LANGUAGE AND THE MEDIA

Media people are often content to use the dictionary translation of a word and ignore its actual meaning. Use an English-arabic dictionary, and you immediately have the word for justice in arabic. The differing meanings of justice in the West and in Muslim countries are harder to discover because language is filtered through cultural concepts. Thus, as Raymond Ibrahim writes in his essay on the Ground Zero mosque (see above or click here) a speaker can use justice in English to suggest one idea and the exact translation of the word in Arabic to mean something very different. This section looks at other examples of the effect the differences in Western versus Islamic cultures have on understanding the meaning of some common words. It also looks at how the media distorts the meaning of events by how they present them.

THE UK'S THE NEW STATESMAN DEFENDS SHARIA LAW
by Paul Austin Murphy

  Defending sharia law usually involves some variant of the civic value of diversity, but it can be a hard sell, because some major brutalities — chopping heads and hands for minor crimes and treating women as chattel — are a non-negotiable part of sharia. In this essay, Paul Murphy equips us with ways to read obfuscating pro-Islam propaganda as he points out the fallacies in a recent defense of Sharia. He also examines some ends-justify-the-means lies and misdirection spun by Tariq Ramadan, grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. Murphy makes the major point that once Sharia drives out civil law, all of it becomes law, not just its laws and customs that seem to fit into modern practices.
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WHAT DID YOU SAY ABOUT MUHAMMAD?!
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Though it is contrary to commonsense, Raymond Ibrahim points out that apparently Muslims found the South Park cartoons of Muhammad more infuriating than very ugly statements about Muhammed broadcast to millions of Muslims on Life T.V. Life T.V. stood its ground, ignoring initial threats, continuing to discuss Muhammad in unflattering terms — and doing so safely. The South Park producers reacted by appeasement. Ibrahim suggests that it may well have been this appeasement that acted as the stimulus to increase Muslim ire. As he notes, "if you voluntarily act like a dhimmi — a subjugated non-Muslim who must live in debased humility — you will be treated like a dhimmi."
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THE ART OF MISLEADING
by Yvette Alt Miller

  Short, direct, informative. This essay by Yvette Alt Miller lays out common ways the media avoid telling the truth. Presenting it in such a way that is easily dismissed. Or telling it partially. Her examples are actual instances of bias against Israel. Miller suggests readers practice finding instances of these tricks, to better understand what they are being fed by the media. My prime example would be the New York Times, which managed to downplay the ongoing Holocaust in World War 2. Most newspapers may not be as clever hiding such a big story but the omission and trivialization of Prez Obama's close friendships with a slew of Marxists before he was nominated come close. This is a very useful reference.
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SHARIA IN HIGH PLACES IN GOVERNMENT AND IN THE UNIVERSITIES

We have previously examined various areas where Sharia Law is being accepted. Sharia banking, which is based on sharia law, is being incorporated by banking groups. Government agencies teach Sharia law procedures. Textbooks used in our schools tell our children how benign Islam and its basic laws are. In this issue, we describe student shock troops promoting hate of Jews on campuses and the invasion of Muslim consultants into the higher eschelons of the military, We include the first chapters of a forthcominhg book that defines Sharia Law for the non-Muslim.

SHARIA LAW FOR NON-MUSLIMS
by Bill Warner

  Bill Warner has written a book that compactly explains sharia law to the non-muslim. It offers a compact summary of Sharia Law. It is useful as a starting pointer for the ignorant, to start exploring. It is a summarization for those who have acquired a good understanding of Sharia law. Mark this in your reference directory.
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FACING HATRED ON CAMPUS: YOU CAN'T FIGHT FIRE WITH FLOWERS
by Roz Rothstein and Roberta R. Seid

  The campuses are infested by student hate groups, whose leaders make their efforts at demonizing Israel their main job, one that takes priority over classes and ordinary school activities. They are dedicated, single-mindeded, possessed of religious fervor and will stop at nothing. Their activities suggest their handlers have a big budget, clever scenario writers and have spent considerable time and effort making longterm plans before this attack was launched. Group leaders have learned how to create dramatic props and creative events, inveigle and indoctrinate other students, flummox the administration and paralyze the Jewish groups on campus so they don't fight back. Roz Rothstein and Roberta Seid have observed that these groups maintain continuity, groom replacement leaders; develop networks with other like-minded campus groups; and orchestrate demonstrations, cheering crowds and disruptive hecklers. They don't miss opportunities to promote their ideas and they are good at creating opportunities. Lucky for them, the Jewish students, faculty and groups haven't adjusted to the fact that they are under sustained attack and have to fight back. The Jews are hamstrung by their belief that freedom of speech is always a good thing and that everyone has built-in limits to incivility.
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SELF-INFLICTED DEFEAT
by Janet Levy and Nidra Poller

  Some Muslim encroachment in America — such as the projected mosque at Ground Zero — is high profile, but most of their activities are not well known. Nevertheless, they are successfully buying friends and chairs at universities; buying some in the media and frightening others into self-censorship; and subsidizing books friendly to Islam. Now with a Commander-in-Chief who sees making friends with the Muslims as a noble undertaking, they have reached into high levels of Homeland Security and the military, where they have the clout to get hostile patriots fired. Janet Levy and Nidra Poller describe how different this is from the way we behaved in World War 2. "Placing a Nazi in a high-level Pentagon position with access to top-secret war data and giving him the ability to control military strategists and censor vital information would have been punishable by death for treason." I wonder what good our expensive war equipment will do us, if, as Levy and Poller note, "Our citizens at home and our troops on the battlefield are disarmed by a narrative that imposes respect for a political-religious system that seeks their subjugation and death."
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HISTORY SECTION

There seems no end to the misinformation coming from pro-Palestinian sources claiming that Jews have no history in Jerusalem. One essay in this section makes a useful source for rebuttal arguments. It presents a superb summary of references to Jews in Jerusalem in ancient Greek and Roman sources. The other essay looks at the 1920 San Remo Conference and the 1958 speech by Abba Eban from the viewpoint of their consequences.

JERUSALEM, CAPITAL OF THE JEWS: THE JEWISH IDENTITY OF JERUSALEM IN GREEK AND ROMAN SOURCES
by Rivkah Fishman-Duker

  As Rivkah Fishman-Duker writes, by the early second century CE, when Tacitus wrote his history, it is clear that the narrative of the circumstances of Jerusalem's foundation had become standardized among Greeks and Roman writers. Descriptions of the Temple are always part of the accounts of Jerusalem and Judaism. In addition to physical descriptions, Fishman-Duker describes the religious aspect of the Temple, which differed radically from Greek and Roman paganism. Their accounts range from the factual to the libelous and bizarre. As Fishman-Duker writes, "The references to Jerusalem in these classical texts not only demonstrate the historical attachment of the Jewish people to Jerusalem, but also contribute to our knowledge of Jews and Judaism in the ancient world."
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TWO NOTABLE EVENTS RECALLED THROUGH THE PRISM OF HISTORY
by Alex Rose

  Alex Rose writes about two notable events of of historical importance. The first was the San Remo Conference of 1920. "It recognized the exclusive national Jewish rights to the Land of Israel under international law, on the strength of the historical connection of the Jewish people to the territory previously known as Palestine." The San Remo Resolution "remains irrevocable, legally binding and valid to this day." The second was Abba Eban's speech to the UN General Assembly's Special Political Committee in 1958 suggesting transfer of the Arab refugees to the states responsible for the problem — the Arab states that had invaded Israel in 1948 and 1967. Actually, these states were responsible for two sets of refugees: the Arabs from Israel and the Jews from the different Arab countries. Israel, with few resources, took in the Jews. The Arabs had huge resources but have reneged. It's time they faced up to their responsibility.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
June 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


MARCH-APRIL, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the March-April 2010 issue:

Myths Can Kill You (Brand, Chweidan, Rubin, Salvato, Sheridan)
A Religious War (Eidelberg, Wilder, Simmons, Maistrovoy, Ohri)
How Friendly is the Current American Administration? (Haselkorn, Prelutsky, Poller, Sharpe)
Europe's Treatment of Muslims and Jews (Gur, Alexander, Landen, Legger, Glick, Bat Ye'or)
Solutions For A Genuine Arab-Israeli Peace. Cutting The Gordian Knot. (Mansdorf, Bialkin, Sharpe, Think-Israel Staff, Kogan, November, Bussel)
Is There A Linkage Between Islam And Terror? (Stakelbeck, Poole, Spencer, Emerson, Greenfield, Imani)
Anti-Semitism, Anti-Zionism And Muslim-Purchased Propaganda (Cravetts, Plaut, Rubin, Frantzman, Erlich)
History Section (Raizman, Rigler)
Readers' Blog-Ed Pages (March, April)

MYTHS CAN KILL YOU

Melanie Phillips in "A Revolutionary Proposal" (Spectator, 19Mar10) suggested that "it is time for Israel to stop going along with the diplomatic lies told for so long by Britain, America and the west about the Arab war against Israel. Lies that have twisted so many people's minds into the belief that Israel is the historic usurper and aggressor in the Middle East, whereas in fact the Jews and the Jews alone are the rightful heirs to the land, in historical, legal and moral terms, and a monstrous injustice has been and is still being done to them." Excellent advise. Myths can be real killers. Like the ones that persuade that Israel is a rogue nation and Iran a rational one.

ISRAELI SOVEREIGNTY OVER JERUSALEM, JUDEA AND SAMARIA.
by Wallace Edward Brand

  Wallace Brand discusses the diplomatic foundation documents underlying the creation of the modern state of Israel. It is also very readable. Store this with your stack of reference material to use when Arab propagandists assert that Israel is occupying Palestinian/Arab land. The State of Israel was carved out with international approval from a sliver of the Middle East holding of the Ottoman Empire. If it is not legitimate, then what happens to the legality of the modern Arab states of Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, Yemen and United Arab Emirates? (Iran, Egypt and modern Turkey were also part of the Ottoman Empire but Iran and Turkey aren't Arab, and Egypt had been under de facto British rule for many years by the time the Ottomans lost out.) These constructed states were given more than 99% of the Middle East segment of the Ottoman Empire by the same international authority that established Israel.
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HISTORY OF JEWISH SOVEREIGNTY OVER ISRAEL OVER 3000 YEARS
by Roy Chweidan

  This was written to counter the pernicious and widespread myth that the Arabs pre-date the Jews in Israel. Depending on the gullibility of the audience they claim to be the early Canaanites; or Philistines; or they claim that in Temple times it was a Palestinian state filled with Palestinians like Jesus and his mother Mary; or they claim they intermarried with the natives when they conquered the land in Mohammed's time, and this is the next best thing to being native themselves. They ignore that 90-95% of them came after 1900 into what is now Israel and the Territories. Roy Chweidan presents a short summary of the actual history of Israel starting in the period of the Judges. The appendices contain additional useful information.
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PARDON ME, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, BUT ISN'T YOUR POLICY ON FIRE?
by Barry Rubin

  We don't have to go the National Inquirer to find weird and unreal. It's right there in the Oval Office in the Big White Building in the District of Columbia. Barry Rubin writes how Obama is sticking like velcro to the notion that au fond Iran is reasonable and can be persuaded to be nice, no matter what it does and what it says and how many of its own citizens it tortures because they don't agree with the Mullahs. And Iran, filled with confidence by how well everyone is treating her, is seeking a seat on the Human Rights Council.
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DENYING REALITY BRINGS US CLOSER TO NUCLEAR MIDNIGHT
by Frank Salvato

  Like a child learning to play pick-up sticks, tangling them, ignoring the good moves, fixated on poor choices, ignoring gravity, ignoring his lack of coordination, President Obama deals with situations with a child's knowledge of foreign policy. Frank Salvato recounts some of his moves. Obama pulls together a bunch of nations to deal with the problem of nuclear weapons falling into terrorist hands, and they flip up with a non-binding "agreement." which is meaningless. He weaves and waves his hand around Iran but, of course, nothing happens. He spends times picking on Israel — and that's an easy move. But it won't change the fact that to get at the terrorists means also, and perhaps first, dealing with the clump of terror states that shield them and support them. As Salvato points out: he needs to "accept the truth that should Iran become a nuclear capable nation, so, too, would terrorist organizations become nuclear capable."
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U.S. ALLOWS IRAN ITS NUCLEAR VISION
by Greg Sheridan

  Greg Sheridan has written a sensible article integrating the facts including Obama's manufactured irritation with Israel and drawn the obvious conclusion: that Obama is willing to live with an Iran that has nuclear power. Maintaining a steady supply of oil has for long controlled much of our foreign policy. Yet Obama seems indifferent to Iran's obtaining nuclear power that, at best, will destabilize the Middle East, making our oil supply uncertain. At worst, Iran could destroy vital connections in the stream or make the area radioactive, use the bomb to blackmail the region and/or share their supply with peripatetic terrorists. What is nervous making, when dealing with "world opinion," is how successful anti-Israeli propaganda has been. History, geography and international law are disregarded and too many are sure Israel is sitting on Arab Palestinian land. Most of the readers' comments to this article see Iran as a sovereign state that can do what it wants and, inconsistently, it isn't near to a nuclear bomb anyways, so why worry. Nor do they differentiate between a trustworthy nuclear power and one controlled — by our standards — by a bunch of fanatics with a mission to aggrandize Islam.
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A RELIGIOUS WAR

Cal Thomas has written, "What part of annihilation does the State Department not understand? What State is blind to is that the 'Israeli-Palestinian conflict,' as it is erroneously labeled, is part of a worldwide religious war against all things Jewish, Christian, secular, modern and Western" (March 18, 2010). These essays examine how Judaism and Islam differ and how Islam fuels the Arab hostility towards Judaism. The final ones look at Islam's global hostility towards all other religions.

TO WIN WE MUST KNOW OUR ENEMIES AND KNOW OURSELVES
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Muslim leaders have bragged how Muslims love death and this gives them the edge in fighting the "infidel" who is attached to life. Paul Eidelberg makes the surprising suggestion that this love of death is rooted in a fear of life that started in pre-Islamic times when inter-tribal warfare was chronic and brutal. Survival depended on tribal loyalty, engendering a herd mentality, rather than the development of the individual, as in Western culture. Eidelberg credits Judaic monotheism for making possible the Western trust in a meaningful universe. In Part I, he develops implications of the idea that in the Arab culture, paganism was "never fully transcended." In Part 2, he writes about Israel's repetitive retreats from land that is hers, noting that Israel will "continue to shrink so long as its government betrays the God of Israel."
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PAST THE SEVENTH STEP
by David Wilder

  The Ma'arat HaMachpela (the Machpela cave) in the city of Hebron is a Jewish holy site; it is Judaism's second most holy site. It is where the Patriachs and Matriachs are buried: Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah. Nevertheless, for hundreds of years when the site was under Muslim control, Jews were not allowed to enter the cave. They were allowed to climb as far as the seventh step, while Muslims were permitted to climb past and enter the caves. The Arabs deny that the Machpela is a Jewish legacy. To do so would mean acknowledging the profound relationship of the Jews of Israel to the Land of Israel.
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A FASCINATING STORY: 7 QUESTIONS FOR A NOACHIDE
by Rabbi Shraga Simmons

  There is a growing world-wide group called Noachides. They aren't Christian; but they aren't Jewish either. As individuals they more or less follow Torah law, but they are all follow the Seven Laws of Noah. — Judaism considers that the basic civilizing ideas from the Torah — the laws of Noah — are for everyone. This essay is Rabbi Shraga Simmons interview with one of these Noachides. In the context of our examining difference resulting from basic differences between Judaism and Islam, it should be noted that Judaism doesn't feel compelled to convert everyone to Judaism. Islam does. Unless, you'd rather live as a dhimmi; or be beheaded.
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JEWS IN THE HOLY LAND? WHAT JEWS?
by Alex Maistrovoy

  Alex Maistrovoy puts in context the Arab strategy of denying that Israel has any historic connection to the Land of Israel. Theirs is "...simply the genocidal approach that is characteristic of Islam. Power and possession are inherent parts of religious attitude in Islam. This approach extends to all other religions, not only to Judaism. The idea consists in depriving other cultures of their spiritual base to achieve total physical domination over them." Given that Islam is intrinsically hostile to all other religions. Judaism's fight against Islam's brutal hostility may be unwilling but it has become a major player in what eventually may be a global response to Islam — if the world wakes up in time. Meantime, Israel needs to protect its holy places from the Muslim ambition to eradicate a Jewish presence in Israel.
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 4.
by R.K. Ohri

  We are serializing R.K. Ohri's book entitled The Long March of Islam. Previously, Ohri first laid out Islam's structure and its major directive to wage jihad against the infidal. In Chapter 4, he reviews some of Islam's early history to explain how it is that Islam acquired both its dedication to the Islamic ummah (nation) and its appetite for conquering and looting non-Islamic communities. Within a 100 year after Muhammad, the Arabs had "destroyed almost all old civilizations of the [Middle East] region" and invaded Christian Europe for booty, slaves and involuntary converts and where they suffered their first defeat by a coalition of Christian countries. But now again "the contagion of militant Islam has already spread to scores of Muslim countries"; they are obsessed with regaining Islam's lost grandeur.
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HOW FRIENDLY IS THE CURRENT AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION?

America has been gifting the P.A. with multimillions for this and megabucks for that. Add to this that Israel's purchases of military equipment has been blocked while America trains and equips Egypt with the latest missiles, sells Saudi Arabia sophisticated arms well beyond its capacity to handle and significantly increases missile defense in the Gulf States. Add to it the fact that the U.S. is training PLO "policemen", in theory to fight Hamas. Add to it that the American President has been effective in trampling on Israel's right as a sovereign nation to build houses for its people while doing squat nothing to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons. Add to it — this one is likely fallout rather than nefarious intent — American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan limit Israel's maneuverability. This is all in addition to Iran's equipping Hamas, Hezbollah, the Taliban and itself with weaponry and ammunition. Makes you wonder who President Obama views as his major enemy that must be destroyed. David Pryce-Jones in the Wall Street Journal put it this way: "Mr. Obama's foreign policy pattern to date: Our enemies get courted; our friends get the squeeze." Obams seems to be doing more openly what Israel's supposedly friendly neighbor, the Jordanian king, with less power, does in a sneaky way.

RELATIONS OF MUTUAL LIABILITY
by Avigdor Haselkorn

  The obama administration appears to believe that the long arm of Israel-Arab discord reaches Iran and Afghanistan, to the detriment of American goals. In this bizarre view, if only Israel would make the Arabs happy, the Muslim world would fall all over itself to be friendly to us Americans. Israel, in a word, is a liability. Judging from Muslim behavior over the centuries, this proposition is nonsense. Rephrasing the sentence as America is a liability to Israel is, on the other hand, a legitimate observation, based on evidence. Avigdor Haselkorn makes the case that the America's presence limits Israel's freedom of action. In brief, American enemies do what they want and ignore overtures and shows of force. "By threatening to target [American] regional bases, Iran is in effect keeping these contingents hostage and acting to dissuade any military undertaking against its nuclear facilities." "...The U.S. deployment has become a handicap for Israel," denying it "the strategic initiative that is vital for preserving its national security."
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OBAMA AND THE JEWS
by Burt Prelutsky

  E.W. Jackson Sr. wrote about the source of Obama's anti-Israel policy this way: "Obama clearly has Muslim sensibilities. He sees the world and Israel from a Muslim perspective. His construct of "The Muslim World" is unique in modern diplomacy. It is said that only The Muslim Brotherhood and other radical elements of the religion use that concept. It is a call to unify Muslims around the world. It is rather odd to hear an American President use it. In doing so he reveals more about his thinking than he intends. The dramatic policy reversal of joining the unrelentingly anti-Semitic, anti-Israel and pro-Islamic UN Human Rights Council is in keeping with the President's truest — albeit undeclared — sensibilities." Certainly, once elected, Obama discarded the ambiguity that surrounded the question of whether he is Muslim. He confirmed he was born Muslim (which in Islam is for life — if you expect to live long) and has Muslim sympathies. As Burt Prelusky notes in this essay, his recent behavior to Netanyahu and Israel is convincing evidence "that in his heart, at least, Obama is an Islamic." Prelutsky's bottom line: "there must be something terribly wrong with a man who seems to be far more concerned with a Jew building a house in Israel than with Muslims building a nuclear bomb in Iran."
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ISRAEL IS THE HEART OF OUR CIVILIZATION, NOT THE APPENDIX
by Nidra Poller

  We are used to being told — and it is true — how important Jerusalem is to the Jews. Nidra Poller points out another important truth about the relationship of Jerusalem and the Jews: Jerusalem is important to the West because of the Jews. There would be little interest in the chief city of the Jews were it not that Christianity is based in large part on Judaism and because Judaism created the moral foundation of Western civilization. Because of that and because Israel is a democracy — the only one in the Middle East -- there is a closeness between America and Israel. It is ironic, therefore, that Obama is taking advantage of that closeness to pressure Israel to a peace that would not resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict. Instead, if carried out, it would replace Judaism with Islam in Judaism's birthplace.
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ABDULLAH IN WONDERLAND
by Victor Sharpe

  Israel needs to watch its back not just from the Arab countries obviously out to destroy her, but even from Jordan, her peace partner, which is kept secure by Israel, is given water by Israel and whose economy has been helped to develop by Israel. Victor Sharpe writes about Jordan's King Abdullah, who shows his gratitude by undermining Israel whenever and whereever he can, with straight-faced disregard of facts. His father killed off thousands of "Palestinians" for threatening his throne; Abdullah is outraged by the IDF killing some people who were acting as human shields for terrorists. Abdullah is appalled that Israel has jurisdiction over Jerusalem and its Muslim holy places. How easily he ignores that when Jordan conquered eastern Jerusalem in 1948, it destroyed Jewish synagogues in Jerusalem and wouldn't allow Jews access to their holy sites. The king of inversion. Truly a Lewis Carroll character.
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EUROPE'S TREATMENT OF MUSLIMS AND JEWS

We commemorate Yom Hashoah and discuss the profound changes in the social and political structure of Europe since World War 2. Despite the wishes of a large part of its citizenry, Europe slides to an accomodation with Islam and plays out the end game of multiculturalism — a strong socialism that bankrupts the country and resurrects feudalism — with the people in hock to the government that can regulate them and tax them into powerlessness. Logically, one would expect that a country under siege by a rising Muslim population would side with Israel, one of the few countries effectively opposing Islamic domination. Instead, as Islam gains control with the apparent cooperation of a country's academic and business elites, anti-Semitism rises. This set of essays contrasts the treatment of Muslims versus the treatment of Jews in England, Holland and Germany.

TO COMMEMORATE YOM HASHOAH
by Jacob Gur

  Europe destroyed Jewish culture and six million Jews. The space has been filling with muslim immigrants, impatient to inflict their laws and customs over the subjugated natives. And ironically, while the Jews tried so hard to fit in and were, for the most part, rejected, the Muslims don't give a damn and ignore what resistance there is to their take-over. Jacob Gur writes of a particular victim of the Holocaust of the Jews: Pninah. She was twelve. She was murdered. He asks that Israel not forget her and the other victims of the Shoah but that it strengthen its Judaism and rebuild.
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BRITANNIA WAIVES THE RULES. A HISTORY OF ANTISEMITISM IN ENGLAND
by Edward Alexander

  Edward Alexander reviews Anthony Julius' recent book that addresses the literary roots of English antisemitism from Chaucer to Dickens, connecting the historic blood libel against the Jews that is embedded in English culture to the modern-day anti-semitic rants by academics and dramatists, which also are not weighted down by facts. Julius writes also of Jewish anti-semitism. As Jewish converts to Christianity in the Middle Ages were glad to confirm Christian theological allegations against Jews, no matter how false and/or absurd, so modern-day Jewish anti-semites loathe Israel and can see only evil in her every motive and action.
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IN GERMANY IT IS BETTER TO BE A MUSLIM THAN A BAPTIST
by Thomas Landen

  Baptist immigrants to Germany from the Soviet Union, where they had been persecuted for their religious beliefs, were subjected to vicious attacks by the German authorities when they wished to homeschool their children. Germany's Supreme Court ruled that German tradition trumped Baptist desires. The State was in charge of children's education, not their parents. In contrast, schools cater to Muslim eating and clothing requirements, even when these infringe or nullify German traditions and practices. As Thomas Landen writes, "While Christians are prosecuted and fined, Muslims are appeased." There are other differences that explain the behavior of the German establishment: "Saying 'No' to Baptist demands is not a security risk for a school; saying 'No' to Muslim demands is." Baptists don't become violent when their requests aren't granted; Muslims do.
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WHY SPINOZA WAS NOT MURDERED
by Artur Legger

  Holland has such a reputation for liberal drug laws and a nonchalant attitude for outre activity that it is puzzling that it has put Geert Wilders on trial for producing a documentary that is scrupulously factual — if not flattering — about Islam (see below.) In this essay, Artur Legger clears up the inconsistency. Fearing reprisal, Government officials and the media tried to block the documentary from being shown. Unable to censure the film beforehand, they resorted to slandering Wilders and withholding protection — despite the fact that there's a history in Holland of Muslims killing off 'offenders'. Holland's attitude is not new. Throughout the centuries, the goal has been on preventing social disruption and maintaining control by the governing elites by whatever means were needed, not ensuring freedom — not even in the time of Spinoza.
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WHEN RHETORIC RULES THE ROOST
by Caroline Glick

  The initial hysterical reaction by European diplomats to the assassination of the terrorist, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai, was to blame Israel. This didn't abate until it was learned the assassins went from Dubai to Iran, not exactly a Jew-friendly haven. Using this as example, Caroline Glick points out that "blaming Israel has become Europe's default foreign policy," dictated by the European Union (EU). The Lisbon Treaty which gave power to the EU "...effectively bars EU member states from adopting independent foreign policies..." so they focus on rhetoric and don't act to safeguard their best interests. In part to placate Europe — and the present American administration -- Israel has not been pursuing her own best interests either. At the moment what is important is to disarm Iran and to exert its legitimate claim to Samaria and Judea. Urgently.
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EUROPE'S ANTI-ISRAEL STRATEGY WILL RESULT IN THE DESTRUCTION OF EUROPE ITSELF
by Bat Ye'or

  Robert Spencer presents some highlights from Bat Yeor's speech at the recent Conference on Antisemitism, Multiculturalism and Ethnic Identity at Hebrew University. Bat Yeor coined the term Eurabia to describe the ideological alliance since the 1970's of European leaders and Arabs. It promotes anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism, while catering to Muslim concerns under the guise of multiculturalism. To the Europeans, supporting Arab politics and ideology seemed a clever way to ensure an uninterupted supply of oil while avoiding Arab terrorism. "The countries of the Arab League and the Islamic Conference saw in this alliance with Europe the means to separate Europe from America; to divide and weaken the Western camp; to destroy Israel; to achieve technological parity with Europe; and, through the Mediterranean Partnership, to set up a vast Euro-Arab demographic, political, economic and cultural zone. In this way, with multiculturalism and immigration, Islam and Arab culture could be introduced as a force toward the Islamization on the European continent."
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SOLUTIONS FOR A GENUINE ARAB-ISRAELI PEACE. CUTTING THE GORDIAN KNOT.

The first step, obviously, would be to remove the noose of the belief that the Arabs and the Jews can somehow share the tiny space allocated to Israel by international mandate — space that has already been largely nibbled away. Discard the unworkable notion of sharing space and more reasonable possibilities can be explored. A sensible one would be to give the Arabs who go by the name "Palestinian" a portion of the Ottoman Land gifted to the Arabs. This set of articles presents some steps — some ideological, some practical — that can be taken in preparation to that task.

IS ISRAEL A COLONIAL STATE? THE POLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY OF PALESTINIAN NOMENCLATURE
by Irwin J. Mansdorf

  Irwin Mansdorf suggests that the negative and misleading and often false language used to describe Israel's motives and activities be abandoned and replaced by descriptions that conform to actual history and applicable international law. He delves into the modern history of Arab-Jewish relations, and points out the surprising fact -- surprising only because of the wide subcription to the constantly-repeated myth that the Arabs had always ruled the Middle East and the Jews are occupying some of this Arab land illegally -- that the Balfour Declaration, a foundation document in the establishment of the Jewish State, was of great benefit in also "advancing Arab independence and nationalist goals." During the first part of the 20th century, while the land still belonged to the Ottomans, before there was a modern state of Israel, or states called Jordan or Syria or Yemen or Kuwait or Oman or the United Arab Emirates — before the time that the Arabs were gifted with 99.9% of the Middle East — the Arab leader, Emir Feisel, recognized this fact. It was later that Arab leaders and academics, in order to defend their assertion that Israel was colonialist, began denying Jewish roots in Mandated Palestine, forcing them into the ludicrous position of denying Israel's ancient connection to its holy sites such as the Machpela Cave and the Temple Mount and its holy cities of Hebron and Jerusalem. In promoting this canard, they blithely ignored that "[m]any of the Arab states, in contrast, were modern fabrications of the British and the French," with no historic roots.
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THE PREREQUISITE FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST: ARAB RECOGNITION OF THE LEGITIMACY OF ISRAEL
by Kenneth J. Bialkin

  THE 'peace process' — it seems always to apply only to the Arab Israeli conflict — certainly hasn't lacked high-level presidential involvement, from the Elder Bush to Obama, plus the presence of the U.N., the E.U. and their cohort of diplomats and politicians. Nevertheless, as Kenneth J. Bialkin puts it: "A peace process which rests upon Israel's unilateral concessions is doomed to fail — unless and until the world also demands that the Arab states (including the Palestinians) recognize Israel's legitimacy and sovereignty, explicitly and openly. ... This is the most important prerequisite for peace."
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NEXT YEAR IN WEST JERUSALEM
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe points out that the fatal flaw in the succession of peace plans is that "[f]or Muslims, no non-Muslim state or nation that is on land once conquered by Muslim armies in the name of Allah will ever be tolerated." This cuts down the number of intelligent options for Israel to 1. "Unpalatable as it must be, the only solution for Israel is to make not one additional concession but resolve to face the entire world if need be rather than deny Jewish history, Jewish faith, and the Zionist cause." It must ignore "the siren calls of a fraudulent, beguiling and deceptive peace."
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GUSH KATIFERS. THE FIFTH YEAR AND STILL NOT SETTLED
by Staff, Think-Israel

  The Israeli government appears to be revving up to gift the Palestinian Arabs land in Samaria and Judea. To diplomats, politicians and sundry pro-Palestinians who have been nibbling away at Israeli land, this is a good start to eating up all of Israel. It would of course be a disaster, should Israel give up the land where the Jews first took root and where they developed the way of life that eventually became the basis of Western morality. It would also mean making some half-million or more citizens homeless, jobless and demoralized. In this essay, we examine how well the government did resettling the 10 thousand Jews they expelled from their homes and synagogues and orchards and businesses in Gaza in 2005 in a cockamamie bid for "peace" with Arabs lusting after Jewish blood. The only good that has come out of this stupid action is that many people are reconsidering their attitudes and questioning whether giving up land can bring peace. They really don't have that much more with which to experiment.
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THE REHABILITATION OF THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES FIRST
by Shulamit Kogan

  The Arab refugees — hold-overs from the 1948 invasion of Israel by the neighboring Arab countries — continue to be a festering sore, a major factor guaranteeing there will not be a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Arab leaders of the countries where the refugee camps are located never actually help their Arab Palestinian cousins; in fact, they deny them citizenship. Nevertheless, they claim they can't make peace with Israel until the refugee problem is resolved by Israel letting in a group of Arabs that could be almost as large as the number of Jews currently living in Israel to return to what they claim as their homes. In this way, the Arab refugees act as a piteous mask for the real intent of these Arab leaders — to wipe out Israel, which has had the temerity to defeat Muslim countries and won't accept dhimmi status. Shulmit Kogan examines why it would be foolhardy to make concessions for peace until the Arab refugees are rehabilitated and not allowed to become another ploy for land concessions by Israel. She also suggests that it's time Israel talked about the other group of refugees: the Jewish refugees from Arab countries. Many of these families had lived in the Arab countries longer than the Arabs. These Jewish refugees did not voluntarily leave. They fled for their lives. Those who came to Israel were given a new start as ordinary citizens. They were not left to fester in refugee camps.
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A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE REGARDING THE CURRENT CRISIS IN US-ISRAEL RELATIONS
by Tzvi November

  Tzvi November's has a number of recommendations for improving Israel's standing in world opinion. His essay reminds us once again that Israel should not put its trust in princes — this time on American administrations, Democrats or Republicans. What Israel should do is proclaim its own stance, its own ideology, its rejection of an Arab state in Israel's heartland. And stick to it. Calling Judea, Samaria and Gaza "disputed territories" as Shimon Peres does is plain stupid. The Arabs are savvy and "always refer to these areas as Arab land or Palestinian land but never as disputed land." It makes a better claim and is better PR. That it isn't Arab land doesn't bother them at all. So they are more effective than Israel, which does own the land, but is too timid to say so directly.
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INSPIRED
by Ari Bussel and Norma Zager

  Ari Bussel and Norma Zager write of activist projects in public diplomacy developed by individuals, projects that should be done by the Government but aren't. So people follow the injunction: where there are no men, strive to be a man (pirkei-avos/chapter2- 6.html). The Muslims have long since recognized that America is a battleground and have fought to win support with whatever weapons work -- lectures, bribes, raucous demonstrations, breaking up meetings, ecumenical sing-alongs with gullible Jews, convincing mainstream Churches that the Muslim arabs that drove the Christian arabs out of Bethleham are the good guys and it was all Israel's fault, working with Marxists because they and the Muslims have a common hatred of Judaism, rewriting K12 textbooks with puff pieces about the Religion of Peace, persuading the government they must reach out to the Muslims, introducing shari'a banking with only a few strings attached. Israelis, on the other hand, are just beginning to recognize the necessity of fighting the propaganda war effectively. For example, IDF officers — authentic ones — have come to explain the IDF to Americans. One of them bemoans the fact that "Muslims speak in one voice, with one narrative, and are therefore more powerful. We, on the other hand, are fragmented to the point where our position suffers." The joke about the 3-Jew town that needed 2 synagogues isn't always funny.
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IS THERE A LINKAGE BETWEEN ISLAM AND TERROR?

It became fashionable almost immediately after 9/11 to blame America's attitude towards Islam for the bombing. Fareed Zakaria, an early proponent of 'it's America's fault' wrote a book reassuring us that terror and islam were not intrinsically linked. As people examined the Quran more carefully instead of citing a couple of nice-sounding suras and as we followed the careers of known terrorists and would-be murderers who were converts to Islam, that explanation grew thin. This set of articles paints a more accurate picture of the linkage.

NEW DETAILS ABOUT OHIO MUSLIM'S ARREST
by Erick Stakelbeck

  Erick Stakelbeck frequently reports on home-grown terrorists -- Americans who convert to Islam and then turn to terror activities against America. Many are recruited where there is active and sustained proselytizing: in prison or at a neighboring mosque. Now that the Obama administration is removing such alarmist words as Islamic terrorism and jihad from its vocabulary, it is easier to ignore what might otherwise be an obvious connection: someone goes off to Pakistan or another terrorist training area, illegally keeps an extensive arsenal at home, and is a new recruit for Islam. Given the present Administration's reluctance to see a pattern -- and to use this knowledge to stop terrorists before they do harm -- it may be some time before the larger issue is addressed: do violent people seek out Islam, or does converting to Islam encourage one to become violent? And, in either case, isn't labeling Islam 'the religion of peace' way off the mark?
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TERRORISM WITHIN THE UNITED STATES: THE MIDDLE EAST CONNECTION
by Patrick S. Poole

  The previous article was an instantiation of what is likely a wide-spread phenomenon. Muslim terrorists operating in America are trained directly in the Middle East or by dedicated Islamisists in the West. And the number of attacks on American soil has begun to increase markedly — 2009 was a banner year. Patrick S. Poole points out that even when the convert terrorist appears to have been self-radicalized, he was usually exposed to foreign recruitment videos and often was trained abroad. By noting that the same Middle Eastern mechanisms are operative in Africa, Canada and Britain as in the U.S.A., we can conclude that there are active, well-funded, well-organized, wide-spread and effective programs that convince new and born-again Muslim converts that Allah wants them to commit obscene violence. It is not a case of, as Daniel Pipes put it, 'sudden jihad syndrome.' Poole provides us with convincing details about many plots that have been uncovered. Now all we have to worry about are those that are still unidentified.
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SEPARATING ISLAM FROM TERRORISM
by Robert Spencer

  The Obama administration has separated the connection between Islam and terrorism — at least in National Security documents, Robert Spencer provides us with examples from the Qur'an, as well as quotes from Muslim leaders and scholars that indicate that Islam and Islamic terrorism are justifiably linked. He discusses the New Mardin Declaration, composed by Muslim scholars, which superficially seems to promote peaceful behavior towards non-Muslims; but it doesn't really warrant optimism. As Spencer points out, "the conceptual apparatus establishing a peaceful Islam has never been presented." Hence, "[t]he intersection of Islam and Terrorism is not coincidental or the result of specific political moves made by non-Muslim nations, as the conventional narrative claims. It is the inevitable result of Islamic theology which is supremacist and materialist, which when combined with the honor-shame code of a tribal culture, drives it compulsively toward war and conquest."
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THE GROWING THREAT OF FEMALE SUICIDE BOMBERS
by Steve Emerson

  Practice may not make perfect, but most tasks can be bettered, given experience and practice. This apparently even holds for improvements in delivering and aiming terrorist weapons. As Steve Emerson writes, delivery has been made more reliable as terrorists have begun using women. Women have carried their share of the burden, so to speak, for years — most have good education and they can use loose, concealing clothes as handy props. But only recently has it been recognized how well they avoid detection, being a group that is not profiled as terrorist. Which may acount for their popularity. Steve Emerson notes they have been used by Shi'ite and Sunni, Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, secular Fatah and religious Hamas. Now that they have hit the big times — bombing the Moscow metro — they should get the respect they deserve.
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WHAT DRIVES ISLAM TO BE THE RELIGION OF WAR
by Daniel Greenfield

  In this essay, Daniel Greenfield points out that Islam is "constantly a source of war, violence and discord" "[because]Islam is a religion of physical supremacy, and anything that challenges that supremacy is a direct attack on their beliefs." He concludes that "[t]he intersection of Islam and Terrorism is not coincidental or the result of specific political moves made by non-Muslim nations, as the conventional narrative claims. It is the inevitable result of Islamic theology which is supremacist and materialist, which when combined with the honor-shame code of a tribal culture, drives it compulsively toward war and conquest."
  READ MORE
 

WILL AMERICA SURVIVE ISLAMOFASCISM?
by Amil Imani

  Mohammed conquered Persia — modern-day Iran — some 1400 years ago. As usual, this was accompanied by looting, enslavement and enforced conversion. In our time, by analogy, because of its Constitution, America is tolerant as was ancient Persia, and the Islamists are still the Islamists. Amil Imani points out that longstanding Islamic practice is to be meek while weak and assume despotic intolerant power as it gains strength." "Mild Islamism" is already in America -- special facilities and perks for Muslims only; appeasement by American leaders, who ignore Iran's increased power to build a nuclear weapon; and "for-purchase politicians who keep endlessly broadcasting the false mantra that Islam is a religion of peace." "The barbarians have made it inside our fortress." We need to fight them.
  READ MORE
 

ANTI-SEMITISM, ANTI-ZIONISM AND MUSLIM-PURCHASED PROPAGANDA

Islam's long arm reaches into our educational institutions and our media. Muslims pay for some of the PR; but some propaganda is generated by Marxist sources that recognize Sharia law will destroy the American way of life. Some media self-censor thus distorting the news to avoid Muslim retaliation. Some stories are intended to counter the negative images of women as chattel and honor killings, endemic in Islam. Much of both the visual and text propaganda is anti-Jewish. It was initially phrased as anti-Zionism but, increasing, it has become frank anti-Semitism.

"THE OCCUPATION MADE ME BEAT MY WIFE:" BIASED SCHOLARSHIP IN THE PROPAGANDA WAR AGAINST ISRAEL
by Richard L. Cravatts, Ph.D.

  The insistence that Israel is the evil witch of the West is acquiring a coating of academic scholarship of poor quality but strong conviction. Richard Cravatts writes about the findings of a Italian group that the health of Gaza children was jeopardized by the Israeli invasion last year — the group found high concentrations of metal in the hair of the study's subjects. As indication of the quality of the experimental design, Cravatts reports an earlier study by NIEHS that also found high lead levels in Gazan children — they lived near a battery factory. The wall Israel erected to keep out terrorists has of course been blamed for a variety of psychological symptoms by various 'scientists.' Other pseudo-scientists attribute the abusive treatment by Palestinian husbands of their wives to the emotional stress engendered by the Israeli occupation. If we add the poor quality of articles that once prestigious journals such as Lancet will accept providing they tar Israel [see here and here.], these degraded journals will soon need to sport a label: read with caution.
  READ MORE
 

THE BUTLER DID IT!
by Steven Plaut

  It is common to see a Marxist take up the cause of Muslims, though ideologically they don't have much in common, except in identifying Israel and America as the enemy. Judith Butler of UC Berkeley is a Jew, an anti-Zionist and a Marxist, involved in doing her bit to destroy Israel, America and capitalism. She knows Israel is an oppressor country, just as she is certain that Hamas and Hizbullah don't deserve their bad reputation. To hear her talk, you'd think homosexuals and women are much better off in Arab countries than in Israel.We have Steven Plaut to thank for peeling away some of her incomprehensible prose to expose her vacuous ideas.
  READ MORE
 

HOW NY TIMES COVERAGE BURIES MIDDLE EAST REALITY; FIND THE FOUR GIGANTIC ERRORS
by Barry Rubin

  In examining a particular article in the New York Times, Barry Rubin provides us with an excellent analysis of the distortions in an article whose subject matter, one would think, was 'human interest' rather than politics, hence more likely to be reported without major distortions. It wasn't. In reporting on the restoration of a Cairo synagogue — Jews were in Egypt much earlier and longer than Muslims, as the Haggadah would attest — the Times whitewashes the Egyptian government's hostility towards Jews and ignores the hate-filled statements issued by Egyptian officials. As on any hate-spewing anti-semitic website, the aura around the Times article affirms that 'it's all the fault of the Jooz.'
  READ MORE
 

SAUDI ARABIA'S 'REFORM' OFFENSIVE
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Saudi Arabia (SA) can pay for the best. And when she sets out to show how modern, how reformed, the country is becoming, she can afford the best. Seth J. Frantzman writes how SA has recruited Westerns, particularly western woman, to handle the campaign. Maureen Dowd of the New York Times have made her mark in clobbering Israel. Now she is using her talent for whole-cloth imagery to paint a picture of the Saudi King as a "social revolutionary" and a kingdom hell-bent on modernization. Other Times columnists have also celebrated each micrometer of progress and ignored the continuation of slavery and beheadings, crippling social customs and harsh punishments for attempts to gain a modicum of independence. SA is betting that rhetoric will top reality — it has, after all, worked in the Arab world.
  READ MORE
 

THE POWER OF MONEY
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  While the Saudi reform offense is aimed at Westerners (see above), much of the Arab media for Muslims is "a venue for blatant anti-Semitism." Reuven Erlich writes of the Al-Jazeera March 15 TV show starring Muhammad Yussuf al-Qardawi, an influential and respected scholar of Islam, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood (the parent organization of Hamas and al Qaeda) and the man who ignited the Muhammed cartoon riots — what he called "a day for worldwide Muslim protests over the insulting campaigns against Allah and His Prophet Mohammed." Erlich points out that al-Qardawi is "a dominant figure in shaping the anti-Israeli worldview in the Muslim and Arab world." Al-Jazeera broadcast his authoritative opinion to a receptive audience of millions: "the war against the Jews was not only for the Palestinians to fight, but rather a war of all the Muslims."
  READ MORE
 

HISTORY SECTION

THE "PHONEY WAR" AND THE NEXT WAR
by Dmeetry Raizman

  Dmeetry Raizman describes some cogent similarities between the Peace Process just preceding World War 2 and the current Israeli appeasement policy. In 1939, while the Germans were gaining strength and confidence to attack and when France's army was one of the strongest in the world, she disengaged from Saarland, "a location of strategic importance, unilaterally, without a fight, without a shot, and then for months the French forces sat in idleness..." on the front facing Germany. French leadership had been persuaded by Marshal Pétain that their objective should be defensive — 'to minimize losses', and to strive for peace — a policy enthusiastically seconded by the French Left and foreign peace groups. The consequences of this policy were seen when World War 2 began in earnest.
  READ MORE
 

RESTORING THE HURVA SYNAGOGUE
by Sara Yoheved Rigler

  Considering how touchy Muslims are about anyone even drawing an image of Mohammed, one wouldn't think they'd be so unfeeling about sites important to other people. But they are. They have a dismal record for not respecting other people's religions. In 1973, they attacked Israel on Yom Kippur. Given control of Joseph's tomb, they vandelized it, ripped up the Torah scrolls and defecated everywhere. They used the Avraham Avinu Synagogue in Hebron as a goat sty. Constant sniper fire forces visitors to Rachel's tomb to arrive in armored trucks that park behind concrete road blocks. When Jordan invaded and conquered the eastern part of Jerusalem, it destroyed the synagogues and used headstones from the Mount of Olives cemetary as stepping stones to the latrines. One of these was the Hurva Shul. Sara Yoheved Rigler recounts the history of the Hurva Synagogue, which has just been rebuilt.
  READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

March 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
April 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


JANUARY-FEBRUARY, 2010
 

What we are talking about in the January-February 2010 issue:
EDITORIAL: CROSSROADS
SECTION 1: IF IT WADDLES LIKE A TERRORIST
 (Ohri, Ibrahim, Rubin, Warner, Sidman, Frantzman, Glazov, Averick, Suseelan, Adams)
SECTION 2: CROSSROADS IN EUROPE: DEMOCRACY OR ISLAM
 GEERT WILDERS' TRIAL (Fjordman, Wilders, NRO Symposium)
EUROPE: MUSLIM IMMIGRATION AND RISING ANTI-SEMITISM (Murphy, Phillips, Erlich, Bawer, Fjordman)
SECTION 3: ISRAEL AND ITS VIRULENT NEIGHBORS
 GUSH KATIF REMEMBERED (Saperstein, Ronen and Kempinski, Wilder)
DIDDLING IN IRAN (Imani, Glassman and Doran, Timmerman)
ISRAELI PROBLEMS AND HOW SOME OF THEM BEGAN (Rose, Gordon, Kaplan, Greenfield, Glick)
THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE — PART OF THE ARAB UMMAH (Brand, Wohl, Julian, Toameh)
U.N. AND UNRWA — KEEPING THE ARAB REFUGEE PROBLEM ALIVE (Steyn, Sorek, Delmar)
SECTION 4: AMERICAN JEWS — HASBARA, ACTIVISM AND PASSIVITY
 (Darwish, Schwartz, Ashery, IDF Soldier, Tossavainen, Rosenbluth, Jacobs, Marano)
HISTORY SECTION (Sharpe, Duke, Ostroff)
READERS' BLOG-ED PAGES (January, February)


CROSSROADS

It's the start of another year and a traditional time for stock-taking. In the January-February 2009 issue, we presented the Stages of Global Muslim Takeover. We would like to repeat them now.

  1. Infiltrate quietly, settling in small numbers near or among the locals' towns and villages.

  2. Establish friendly relations, and convince others of the virtues of Islam.

  3. Participate in community activities and provide charity for the poor and generosity to all, while encouraging the immigration of other Muslims.

  4. Get converts and supporters from the rank and file of the local population, particularly from the poor and disenfranchised of the host society, via the multiple mosques and madrasas and charitable and human rights groups. (Today, in the case of the US and EU, converts come in great numbers from the ranks of criminals, especially imprisoned African-Americans.)

  5. Agitate for greater and broader rights and considerations for Muslims, and for protection against real or imagined "Islamophobia".

  6. Organize a political party to push for changes in law to permit Muslim-only enclaves and for laws that formalize the host society's accommodation of Muslim religious needs.

  7. Institute the divide-and-conquer strategy of making pacts with some anti-establishment or minority government groups, legal (as has been done in the USA with Green Party, National Lawyers Guild) or illegal (KKK, Aryan Nation) so they will help in the following stages.

  8. Once you have the power base (some 10-15 percent of the population), then use violence, strikes, street riots, assassination, intimidation and bribery of government officials to destabilize the government.

  9. If the host country's government response to the violence is not effective, then there is a de facto green light to start full-blown terrorism which will topple the government and allow Muslim leaders to move up the power ladder with the help of the anti-establishment groups. Once in power, Muslim leaders can use their influence over the agitating Muslim population to quell the violence, thus pretending that they are helping restore order even as they themselves orchestrate the violence.

  10. Abandon the erstwhile anti-establishment allies and reign supreme; establish Shari'a, and declare the state to be a new Muslim nation where Shari'a is law and non-Moslems are dhimmi.

Terrorizing the populace is a much-used technique of global jihad. As the Strategy Page blog of January 11, 2010 writes: "In the last few months, Moslems have attacked Buddhists in Thailand, Jews everywhere, Baha'is in Iran and Christians in Egypt, Iraq, the Philippines, Pakistan, Malaysia and elsewhere. This is not a sudden and unexpected outburst of Moslem violence against non-Moslems. It is normal, and at the root of Islamic terrorism." Below we examine some features of Islamic terrorism and suggestions for fighting the terrorists.

This issue contains essays on what's happening in Europe, Israel and the U.S.A. The driving force in all cases is — depending on your views — Islam itself or an aberrant and marginal bunch of Muslims, variously called Fascist Islamists, Islamofascists, Islamists, Radical Islamists or extremists.

Judge for yourself how much more — or less — safe the world has become in this past year.

SECTION 1: IF IT WADDLES LIKE A TERRORIST ...

We start with characterizing the Islamic terrorist. We ask: How do you tell when you are dealing with a terrorist — i.e., someone who genuinely hungers to kill you. His reasons change. His aim doesn't.

This set of essays explore some of the features to look for. And what to do about it.

THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 3
by R.K. Ohri

  We are serializing R.K. Ohri's book entitled The Long March of Islam. Previously, Ohri first laid out Islam's grand ideas for its global future and then discussed Islam's foundation tenets. In Chapter 3, he examines in detail a directive that towers above all others: to wage jihad against the infidel until he accepts "Allah as his Lord, Islam as his religion and Muhammad as his Apostle." Jihad is not an occasional act. "It is a holy war to be waged throughout the ages till the Day of Judgment." Current apologists of Islam make jihad sound like a fuzzy finding oneself spiritually. In reality, jihad calls for slaughter in the land; i.e., putting infidels to the slaughter. Which may be why jihad — better described as terrorism — has become so soul-satisfying in recent years with the Muslim youth and clergy. It is interesting that in India, jihad is justified because the British supposedly abolished the Caliphate; in the Middle East, the reason given is that the Jews are "occupying" Arab land; Osama bin Ladin cited the insult that westerners were in Saudi Arabia as the reason to destroy the World Trade Center and try to knock out the White House and Pentagon. The reasons vary; jihad slaughter is a constant.
  READ MORE
 

HOW TAQIYYA ALTERS ISLAM'S RULES OF WAR
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim has previously written about taqiyya (unabashed lying to the infidel), a practice highly praised in Islam as a superior way to win a battle or an argument. Feigning apostasy — and not just under threat of death — is another aspect of taqiyya that is encouraged. The Qu'ran may itself be viewed as a study in taqiyya. Admonitions for peace in the earlier verses — written when Islam was still weak and outnumbered — are later replaced by calls for sustained jihad to convert the infidels. It is the later verses that are to be obeyed. In another context, a peace treaty can be made only for a fixed period of time, ten years at most; open-ended truces are illegitimate. Lies that further the spread of Islam are legitimate. "Yet", Ibrahim notes, "most Westerners continue to think that Muslim mores, laws, and ethical constraints are near identical to those of the Judeo-Christian tradition." For us in the West to continue to believe the Muslim is programmed in the same way as a Christian or Jew is dangerous folly.
  READ MORE
 

RADICAL ISLAMISM: AN INTRODUCTORY PRIMER
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin makes an important distinction. Jihadism and Terrorism are not equivalent; "Revolutionary Islamism is the main strategic problem in the world today. Terrorism is the main tactical problem." This suggests we stop limiting ourselves to the notion that we are fighting — or we were, pre-Obama — terrorism and acknowledge the enemy is the jihadist who uses terror. The Jihadist is fighting to inflict the rule of Islam everywhere in the world. As do many, Rubin takes comfort in separating political-theological Islamism from theological Islam. As he points out, "Islamism is an interpretation of Islam and not the only one possible. Indeed, for centuries there have been different interpretations." True, but from the start Islam was political as well as theological; jihad spread the word more efficiently than persuasion. We need to identify our enemies before we see the whites of their eyes. It will be too late, then.
  READ MORE
 

IS A NICE MUSLIM A GOOD MUSLIM?
by Bill Warner

  Bill Warner starts with the proposition that it a binary situation: one is either a muslim OR a kafir (a non-believer). There are no religious gradations in degree of belief in the fundamental Muslim credo. If an individual follows Muslim doctrine, he is a Muslim. Otherwise he is a kafir. And the two are treated differently. As Warner notes, "The Koran says that kafirs may be hated, plotted against, deceived, murdered, raped, enslaved, mocked and tortured. All of those actions are Islam and perfect doctrine." "So how do you tell if a nice Muslim is good or bad? From the kafir point-of-view, there is only the fact that a Muslim is following Mohammed's example. And that is bad, very bad."
  READ MORE
 

A GOD WHO HATES
by Fern Sidman

  One view of Islam asserts it is a warm religion of peace. Asked why almost all terrorists are Muslims, the response is: Well, a few marginal people — deprived, uneducated, frustrated — are terrorists, but they aren't authentic Muslims. The other view of Islam makes do with the facts: in practice, Islam is violent. Its practitioners are taught that violence and dishonesty as well as beheading and sneak attacks are acceptable weapons in fighting the infidel. Considering that the Muslim global population is estimated at 1.6 to 1.8 billion, even if only 15% of Muslims are pro-terror in that they will at least riot and burn tires to bolster suicide-bombers and snipers, we are talking about more than 250 million people, (which is getting mighty close to the population of the U.S.A.) Fern Sidman reviews a book by Wafa Sultan, an ex-Muslim, who has seen the religion from the inside and the outside and who has the training to assess it analytically — an ability few of its propagandists have.
  READ MORE
 

FALSE PROGRESSIVES IN THE MUSLIM WORLD
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth Frantzman suggests a practical test of how advanced a Muslim country is. Ignore what it says it is. Look at the way women are treated in the country. Look specifically how the Muslim male treats the women in his own family. Nothing dramatic. Just the ordinary things. How much freedom of action does she have? How much control does she have over choosing her friends? How is she allowed to dress in public? Forget the official PR. It is a sad fact that most Muslim countries, including the Arab ones, have become ever more regressive.
  READ MORE
 

THE ISLAMIC ROOTS OF ABDULMUTALLAB'S SUICIDAL ODYSSEY
by Jamie Glazov

  The new morality is that jihadists aren't responsible for their crimes for they are the victims of society, poverty, neglect and other social causes. So the attempted destruction of a planeload of people by a rich, nice, educated Muslim is puzzling to those who won't believe "what Islamic terrorists like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab themselves insist motivated them: ... following Islam and reading the Koran." Jamie Glazov argues that the causes of Umar's hate aren't to be found in Marxist economics and politics but in the "life-hating teaching of a religion that demonizes earthly happiness, joy, and pleasure." As Ayatollah Khomeini said, "there is no fun in Islam." There is too much hate — more than too many Muslims can cope with in a rational way.
  READ MORE
 

MADE IN AMERICA MUSLIM TERRORISTS
by Lori Averick

  Hostile activity by Arabs and other Muslims often takes the form of maligning non-Muslims, writing poorly-spelled but brutally ugly comments on the internet, disrupting public meetings organized by non-Muslims, and randomly attacking Jews physically on the street. There are also intra-Muslim hate crimes, such as the honor killings by even "moderate" Arabs — Muzammil H. Hassan beheaded his wife because she was uppity — and these are feebly reported by the press. What is becoming more frequent, as Lori Averick reports, is the western or westernized born-Muslim or convert, who wakes up one day and takes it upon himself suddenly to shoot up a Jewish community center, a group of fellow soldiers or — trying for the brass ring — to explode a planeful of people. An early example was Sayyid Nosair, Rabbi Meir Kahane's murderer, who came from Egypt and became a member of the notorious al-Farouq Mosque in Brooklyn. Whenever we have a single-person attack, the sob sisters of the FBI immediately reassure us that there is no conspiracy; the murderers were not radicalized by their religious leaders. It was simply that they were hurt, harrassed, insulted, ignored, picked upon, slighted, scorned, forced to this, forced into that, etc., etc., by the insensitive majority society. Yah, right.
  READ MORE
 

DEFEATING JIHADI TERRORISM
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Dr. Babu Suseelen writes about the impact of random terrorism on the lives of the citizens where the attack occurred. Security officers and political leaders warn against attack, but are silent about the jihad ideology that motivates the jihadists. In time, "citizens have become inoculated against the terrorists. And these habituated citizens who are inoculated and who are hiding behind a thick wall of denial no longer react." We need to fight back to preserve our future — for example, to demand that "hatred from the Koran be expunged." "Commonsense suggests that citizens have the right to identify people trying to ferment violence, spread hatred and terror in our country."
  READ MORE
 

A CONFLUENCE OF FOLLY
by D. L. Adams

  This comes as close as any article I know to articulating that we are at a crossroads — "a crossroads where denial and ignorance meet rationality and common sense." A reader, Christopher Ward, commented: "D.L. Adams lays out for us the dangers of fundamentalist Islam and the way we are reacting or rather not reacting."

We are currently militarily engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. Both these countries and both sides in both countries are ideologically governed by Sharia law. Sharia law with its lack of tolerance to any other religion and its refusal to allow woman freedom of action is intrinsically "contrary to our concepts of justice and human rights." As Adams points out, "We fight against jihad at the same time we create states that will mandate it and support it — we will always be its victims; this is folly." More recently, in Iran, we've again sided with an ideological Islamic regime, not with those who want lessened state control.

Adams asks, "What is our purpose in supporting the creation and growth of societies and governments that are fundamentally opposed to our existence." How do we define victory? Whatever the outcome, it can hardly be called democracy?

Aside from the larger issues that need examination, we need to rethink some of our prejudices. We have rejecting profiling in airports, though profiling is a sensible way to pick out potential terrorists. We fear giving offense to Islam to the point that we have weakened our security. It is ludicrous but significant that the Dep't of Homeland Security has eliminated the word terrorist from its vocabulary. We need to understand that those who think of us as the Great Satan will not love us, no matter what we do. "The adherents of Islamic doctrine attack us because they hate us; they hate us simply because we exist."
  READ MORE
 

SECTION 2: AT THE CROSSROADS IN EUROPE: DEMOCRACY OR ISLAM?

If democracy is defined as freedom for the individual within a context of a single language and single sense of "countryhood", then Great Britain — indeed most of Europe — continues to fritter away its freedom under the seductive sway of multiculturalism. The current trial of Geert Wilders, a member of the Dutch parliament, is on. It is clearly emblematic of the struggle between democracy, which provides freedom for all groups, and a form of multiculturalism that favors Islam. It eventually leads to the most determined group taking control.

THE TRIAL IN HOLLAND OF A MEMBER OF ITS PARLIAMENT

Geert Wilders, a Dutch parlimentarian, made a documentary, Fitna. He showed actual footage of Muslims behaving in their own interpretation of "peaceful" with voice-overs reading relevent portions of the Koran condoning this behavior. This infuriated Muslims and the Muslims so frightened the usually 'anything-is-OK' Dutch authorities, that Wilders was treated as a criminal. He was not even allowed into England a year ago. He was put on trial by the Dutch in early 2010, in the words of Pat Condell ( a must read. click here. ) for the "crime of embarrassing them with the truth." The judges have rejected all but 3 of Wilders' 18 witnesses — experts in Islam, social cohesion, and practioners such as Mohammed Bouyen, the Koran-believer who slaughtered Theo van Gogh in 2004, and Sheikh al-Qaradawi, enthusiast of the healing power of camel urine. The trial has been postponed until at least next summer. It's still a cliff-hanger.

GALILEO AND GEERT WILDERS
by Fjordman

  It is trite to say that many a time we don't recognize when our civilization is at a major crossroad at the time when it happens. Bringing that strong advocate of freedom for the individual, Member of the Dutch Parliament Geert Wilders, to trial on January 20, 2010, for insulting Islam, may be one of those epochal events. Fjordman makes us understand this by comparing Wilders' persecution to that of Galileo, who was forced to recant his conclusion that the earth traveled around the sun, and not, as was commonly believed and enforced by the Catholic Church, that the sun traveled around the earth.
  READ MORE
 

AMERICA, THE LAST MAN STANDING
by Geert Wilders

  This was the Address given by Geert Wilders, Chairman of the Party for Freedom (Netherlands), at the Four Seasons, New York City, September 25, 2008, introducing an Alliance of Patriots and announcing the Facing Jihad Conference in Jerusalem.
  READ MORE
 

WESTERN CIVILIZATION ON TRIAL
by National Review Online (NRO) Symposium

  NRO asks a group of experts about the start of Geert Wilders trial: (1) Is there any legitimate reason he's in court? (2) What are the implications of such a trial being held, nevermind its outcome? These are the thoughtful and analytic responses by Bat Ye'or, a leading authority on the islamization of Europe, Paul Marshall and Nina Shea of the Hudson Institute Center for Religious Freedom, Robert Spencer, Director of Jihad Watch, and Daniel Pipes, Director of the Middle East Forum.
  READ MORE
 

EUROPE: MUSLIM IMMIGRATION AND RISING ANTI--SEMITISM. GREAT BRITAIN AS A CASE STUDY.

SALMA YAQOOB OF THE BRITISH RESPECT PARTY
by Paul Austin Murphy

  As in America, the left ideologues and the Muslim fundamentalists in Britain find common cause in anti-war and anti-zionism activities. Paul Austin Murphy writes about Salma Yaqoob, a leader of the Respect Party, whose membership comes from Socialists and Communists on the left and Muslims on the right. Ideologic differences on gay and women's rights have caused the Party problems, but there is one area of perfect harmony among the members — they all hate Zionists (pronounced: Jews) and are for Palestinian rights. Murphy challenges some of Yaqoob's arguments, including her downplaying terror in Britain and complaining that Muslims are demonized. He also questions her claim to be of the "working class". He points out that her type of defamation of Judaism is responsible for much of the recent rise of anti-Semitism in England.
  READ MORE
 

THE SECRET PLOT TO DESTROY BRITAIN'S IDENTITY
by Melanie Phillips

  Christian churchmen, such as Lord Carey, former Archbishop of Canterbury, are warning against uncontrolled Islamic immigration that threatens Britain's "very ethos or DNA." As Muslim immigration has increased, rather than leading to a multifaceted but integrated community anchored in a single language and democratic goals, it has led to increased outlay in welfare expenses, demands that England give way to Muslim culture by adopting sharia law and a radicalization of the younger generation of Muslims. In this article, Melanie Phillips points out that Muslim immigration didn't just happen — it was encouraged in the name of "multiculturalism." Ironically, Muslim immigration is leading to a bizarre monolithic society where Islam is topdog and the other groups subservient.
  READ MORE
 

BRITAIN AS A FOCUS FOR HAMAS' POLITICAL, PROPAGANDA AND LEGAL ACTIVITIES IN EUROPE
by Reuven Erlich

  Britain has shown great concern for Muslim sensitivities. It has been extremely accomodating to what Muslims claim they need to perform their religious duties — to the point of stamping on the religious and social sensitivities of everyone else: not allowing non-Muslim employees to eat in the lunch room during Ramadan; not allowing Christian religious icons to be displayed publically, not allowing mixed bathing in swimming pools, not teaching the Holocaust, etc. One result has been that Muslims dedicated to violence have made London the base of their political, propaganda and lawfare activities. Hamas is on the European Union's list of terrorist organizations. Yet, camouflaged as a supporter of the Palestinian cause, it has turned "Britain into a center for extensive anti-Israeli activity." Hamas and its ideology has infiltrated "British politics, media and universities." Reuven Erlich provides us examples of their activities.
  READ MORE
 

WHILE EUROPE SNEERED
by Bruce Bawer

  When a believer in the basic goodness and fair-mindedness of mankind come up against guys who seem to be maniacally driven to kill people, something has to give. When the disparity is in the mind of a politicized intellectual expert, he often will sneer away the hard facts to preserve his political integrity. As Bruce Bawer describes so vividly, using Justin Vaïsse, as a case in point, he will ignore "the draining of European welfare systems by Muslim families, the explosion in rapes and gay-bashings and Jew-baitings, the proliferation of honor killings and forced marriages and no-go zones..." Curiously, the supercilious know-it-all is often not even concerned about fellow experts and professionals, who haven't denied reality but forthrightly fight against the ugliness and brutality that the entry of a large number of colonizing Muslims has brought to Europe. Calling those who fight to preserve European culture Islamophobes won't make the problems go away.
  READ MORE
 

REVIEW OF CHRISTOPHER CALDWELL'S REFLECTIONS ON THE REVOLUTION IN EUROPE
by Fjordman

  Fjordman comments on a book by Christopher Caldwell emphasize that while it is a lucid presentation of the major problem confronting Europe — namely, that Europeis being inundated by colonizing Muslims — the book does not come to grips with the likely consequence that Europe may soon lose its identity and be absorbed into the world of Islam. As example of the tenor of the book, Caldwell states that "Europeans can only hope that newcomers, especially Muslim newcomers, will assimilate peaceably." Fjordman points out that "Muslims have never 'assimilated peaceably' anywhere." He is justifiably annoyed that by downplaying the problem now, Caldwell contributes to a bloody future when and if Europe wakes up.
  READ MORE
 

SECTION 3. ISRAEL AND ITS VIRULENT NEIGHBORS.

Isaac Asimov, in writing his Foundation series talked about a Seldon crisis, where problems that had perhaps been building for years suddenly come to a boil and there is no escape from dealing with them. Israel may be at that point.

Most urgent is Iran, which is run by Mullahs whose ambition is to build a spectacular nuclear device to act as a silver bullet to kill off Israel, a major obstacle in their pursuit of dominion over the Middle East.

The real issue is: will the region — not just Israel — survive? If Iran is allowed to carry out its nuclear program, an Iranian strike would devastate the entire Middle East. Some of it will be demolished; the rest will be too crippled to maintain delivery of the oil on which much of our transportation and manufacturing industries depend.

The Obama administration's response to this possibility is to ignore it. Instead, it treats Israel as a pesky dependent that needs taming and downsizing. The Administration has finally found an enemy it is prepared to fight. Israel. Not Iran. It seems to be doing all it can to paralyze Israel (or at least distract it from concentrating on how to handle Iran) without arousing the ire of the American people, the majority of which favor Israel, not the Arabs. Other countries treat Iran's threats as Israel's headache. The U.N. and the E.U. are useless.

As a second component in the crisis, terrorist gangs that have harassed Israel for years are consolidating. And the U.N. has declared -- using the Goldstone Report as certification — that attempts by Israel to fight the terrorists are war crimes. To prepare to face this combined hostility, Israel must not only prepare militarily but it must also become less lackadaisical about her internal enemies, the Jewish Marxist ideologues who fight for the Palestinian cause.

In addition, there is the long-standing factor that the Palestinian arabs ignore history, geography and international law by claiming that they are a people and that the Land of Israel belongs to them. Appeasement by Israel has proven a failure, and the mistake continues to paid for in Jewish dead bodies.

By not asserting her rights to her land, Israel has lost the propaganda war by default. The American Administration acts as if the way to peace in the Middle East — even with a belligerent Iran, an aggressive assortment of terror groups controlled by resurgent Islam and a regional war taking place by proxy in Yemen — is to give the Palestinian arabs a good chunk of Israel. It refuses to allow normal and quite legal growth of the Jewish towns in Samaria and Judea as part of its irrational push for a Palestinian state. It is more committed to this goal than are the Arabs who are to become the citizens of this new state.

Israel might continue to give aways pieces of her tiny land, hoping to appease the local Arabs and foreign powers who are intent on destroying Israel. Or she will stiffen her spine and use her brain to solve the Palestinian problem by (1) annexing Samaria and Judea and Gaza, which are rightfully hers; and (2) urging regional and world groups to grant the "Palestinians" — including the Arab refugees -- an area carved out of the enormous amount of the Middle East land the League of Nations allocated to the Arabs. That will be the real beginning of peace.

GUSH KATIF REMEMBERED

THREE CHANUKAH MIRACLES; MY STONES... WHICH WERE NEVER MINE
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein relieves himself of his opinon of a Chanukah obscenity -- inviting an enemy of Israel to light the Chanukah menorah in Washington, D.C. But he also writes of three small miracles, all of which happened at Chanukah time. Rachel posts an essay by Paula R. Stern, a moving story of how she salvaged stones from the synagogues that were left behind by the Jews forced out of Gaza. They were desecrated by the new Arab inhabitants.
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GUSH KATIF REMEMBERED THROUGH ART
by Gil Ronen and Yoni Kempinski

  As a reader commented, "just too bad that a tragedy such as this one at Gush Katif was the spark that ignited their tremendous creative spirits. Here's hoping that these talented women continue to bring beauty in to the world. Theirs is a great example of tikun olum."
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A 'NATIONAL HEROES' LAW
by David Wilder

  Ugly punishments were meted out to teenagers who stood and protested — without stones or guns or any weapons — that expelling the Jews from Gush Katif was dreadfully wrong. They were treated much more harshly than Arab prisoners in Israel who have been found guilty of killing Israelis. The Arab prisoners even study for degrees while in jail; the teenagers were locked up "pre-trial" for indefinite amounts of time. That has now been judged by the courts to be excessive. The expulsion from Gaza has also been judged wrong. David Wilder is perhaps looking at a possible future when the Israeli leadership fearful of 'them' — America, the media, "world opinion" — might commit the crime of expelling some 200,000 to 300,000 Jews from Biblical Israel. This would be so outrageous as to make the suffering and demoralization caused by the Gush Katif expulsion seem mild in comparison. So he suggests that now that the Judiciary has come to its senses, it pass a law recognizing all the expellees as national heroes and making the leaders promise that this will Never Again Happen. It follows, for the law to have teeth, that the leaders responsible of the Gush Katif evil pay for their crime.
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DIDDLING IN IRAN

Undeniably, the best way to stop the development of Iran's doomsday bomb would be to let the Iranian people handle it themselves. Two of this set of articles discuss how angry the Iranian populace is at the government and ways we could assist them to bring about regime change. Unfortunately, as Timmerman's article shows, the American administration is — looking at its actions and lack of action — pro-Mullah. The U.N. is unworried — it's too busy calling Israel's scrupulous military action in Gaza a year ago a war crime and the EU doesn't seem to understand that any disruption of the fragile stability of the Middle East will affect them in many unpleasant ways. Given that none of the major groups that could possibly rein in Iran are doing anything, it is unlikely that the best way to stop bomb building in the Middle East will have time to succeed.

For those who are convinced Iran doesn't mean what it says about nuclear-bombing Israel, we suggest you read Joshua Teitelbaum's monograph, "What Iranian Leaders Really Say about Doing Away with Israel," available from JCPA.

EMPOWERING IRANIANS TO DISLODGE THE MULLAHS
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani suggests that "all signs point to an early demise of the Islamic Republic — and the establishment of a secular democracy." In response to the public's unrest, the Iranian government has become more repressive and brutal, and in doing so, it becomes yet more unpopular. Imani estimates it has at best the support of some 10-15% of the population. "[T]he opposition movement is massive and determined, capable of exploiting any opportunity to disempower the regime." It includes labor and teacher unions, student groups, religious and ethnic minorities and journalists. They should be backed up by the world's nations imposing immediate sanctions. Whether the revolution or the bomb will come in first is still to be answered.
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THE SOFT POWER SOLUTION IN IRAN
by James K. Glassman and Michael Doran

  James K. Glassman and Michael Doran provide us with ABB — All But the Bomb --- ideas on dealing with Iran's as yet unstopped program to build nuclear bombs. They suggest ideas for a regime change in Iran, following up on the obvious dissatisfaction among the Iranians due to the fraudulent reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad last summer. Should Iran be allowed to continue her nuclear plans, even if she doesn't immediately blast Israel, she becomes the more powerful state in the Middle East, or, as more likely, starts a race among the group of equally-unstable barely-civilized Arab states of the region to secure their own nuclear weapons.
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U.S. ACTING IN IRAN'S INTEREST, OPPOSITION LEADER SAYS
by Kenneth Timmerman

  Kenneth Timmerman describes his interview with Rahman Haj Ahmadi, leader of the outlawed Free Life Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PJAK) in Europe. As Timmerman writes, "Far from being a terrorist group, PJAK is dedicated to the overthrow of the Islamic Republic regime in Iran and its replacement by a pro-Western, secular, united Iran that recognizes the rights of all its citizens." Instead of encouraging this dissident group, the American Administration has, under the media radar, labeled the group as terrorist and frozen its assets, thus ensuring that other groups would avoid working with it.
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ISRAELI PROBLEMS AND HOW SOME OF THEM BEGAN

Let's first consider some bad political decisions Israel has made. It has sacrificed its own needs and damaged its image and its self-respect in the vain hope of gaining peaceful accomodation with its Arab neighbors. As Evelyn Gordon points out below, "The Oslo process [instituted in 1993] led Israel to sideline its own claim to the West Bank and Gaza, which all Israeli governments (and international Jewish leaders) had stressed to some extent before 1993. The argument in favor of Israel's right to sovereignty there was simple: these territories are the historic Jewish homeland, the heart of the biblical Jewish kingdom. They were explicitly allotted to the future Jewish state by the 1922 League of Nations Mandate, which was never legally superseded." Instead of leading to peace, the concessions made to the local arabs increased their appetites for further encroachment and renewed terrorism, not for peace.

HISTORICAL ERRORS AND CONSEQUENCES
by Alex Rose

  Alex Rose describes some bad decisions Israel has made in its short lifetime, sometimes for noble reasons, sometimes from timidity and fear of asserting its legitimate rights. These decisions have led to some almost insolvable present-day problems. Moreover, her continued concessionary attitude and preoccupation with peace and peace partners and the peace process are giving her enemies a better shot at her destruction. She has not, however, been responsible for one of the most stupid decisions in the recent history of the Middle East, namely, Jimmy Carter's undermining the Shah of Iran. We can thank him for Iran's present-day rulers, the tyrannical Mullahs.
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THE DEADLY PRICE OF PURSUING PEACE
by Evelyn Gordon

  The conventional wisdom is that Israel's international standing depends on its willingness to advance the "peace process." If so, why, Evelyn Gordon asks, "has Israel's reputation fallen so low despite its numerous concessions for peace since 1993?" She points out that "among anti-Israel radicals, Israel's increasingly frantic pursuit of peace has aroused not admiration but rather the instincts of a predator scenting blood." To the terrorists, a concessionary Israel signals that Israel is in panic, so it's a good time to step up terror. Israel should attend to some truisms. First: Diplomats pressure the pressurable. Second: Terrorists expand their terror activities whenever possible. The Arabs in control of the Territories are terrorists. As Gordon points out, "the desperate pursuit of peace is not the solution but the problem."
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CHARLIE MCCARTHYISM
by Lee Kaplan

  The term McCarthyism — describing unfair accusations reminiscent of the pronouncements of the late unlamented Senator Joseph McCarthy — is a favorite retort of Marxist academics, especially when they are accused of disloyalty. They proclaim loudly and angrily that they are being deprived of their right to free speech, no matter how sloppy or non-factual or treasonous their speech. They never call it McCarthyism when they don't allow their students or colleagues the same right to free speech. Lee Kaplan explains the origin of the term McCarthyism, and suggests that the spectacle of Israeli Marxists becoming offended when their pseudo-scholarship, inaccuracies and political ideology are called into question is more Charlie McCarthy than Joseph.
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ISRAEL, STATE AND NATION
by Daniel Greenfield

  A particularly damaging action by the Israeli left has been to insert "appeasement [touted as peace] into the culture and the educational system of the State of Israel." This is while the government knows Arab kiddies are inculcated from the time they can crawl to celebrate murder of Jews. One consequence has been a fall in IDF recruitment from the Israeli Left — when once almost all Israelis aspired to join the army — while more Arab youth are recruited as suicide-murderers. An unforeseen paradox has been that Israel must rely on the religious Jew in the army, but the religious soldiers are put into the position of being commanded to crush their own religious Zionist communities at the behest of the Leftist politicians. How long can Israel function while violating the deepest patriotic values of the majority of its citizenry?
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THE NEW ISRAEL FUND AND THE NEXT WAR
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick points out that Israel is being hemmed in by different groups of Muslim terrorists, which suggests that a regional war is imminent. To prepare for it, Israel of course needs to examine the potential military aspects. It also needs to neutralize the political-social items that would prevent Israel from responding effectively: the 5th column some Israeli arabs have shown themselves to be; "the ideological dependence on the far left and its central contention that it is Israel's presence in contested areas rather than our enemies' commitment to Israel's destruction that causes wars"; and the support given by a single source — the New Israel Fund — to all of the 16 anti-Zionist NGOs which wrote the war crimes charges made official by the Goldstone Committee in its attempt to prevent the IDF from fighting effectively in future engagements. NIF's motto might as well be: 'we'll do anything to undermine Israel: we support riots, terrorize Israeli officials, and amplify the voices of radicalized Islam.' Israel needs to make it clear that "the political open season on Israel is over." Israel must never again sue for peace after winning the war.
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THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE — PART OF THE ARAB UMMAH

Why the Palestinian people was invented and the corruption of their handlers.

SOVIET RUSSIA, THE CREATORS OF THE PLO AND THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE
by Wallace Edward Brand

  If Yasser Arafat was the father of the Palestinian People, Russia was its mother. Wallace Edward Brand writes about the role Soviet Russia played in literally creating the Palestinian People in 1964 and in establishing Yassir Arafat as its leader. He bases much of this on the revelations of Major General Ion Mihai Pacepa, who has been vetted and certified as a credible source. Creating the "Palestinian" people as a propaganda weapon to counter Israel's ownership of Mandated Palestine has also been confirmed by many Arab sources (cf. here.)
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HISTORY LESSON FOR ARAB SPOKESMEN
by Assaf Wohl

  This essay by Assaf Wohl is written as replies to assertions by prominent Arabs who insist the Land of Israel belongs to them, past, present and future. That they say so would ordinarily be their own business — and error — but unfortunately, their words have incited Arabs to riot. Would that Assaf Wohl's essay motivates them to substitute Israel's real history for their fantasy version. As he has pointed out, "in every Arab village where you dig a little, you will find a synagogue."
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THE TWO FACES AND ZERO AUTHORITY OF MAHMOUD ABBAS
by Hana Levi Julian

  Mahmoud Abbas is quite a guy. He has two faces — the smiley one he turns toward Westerners when he asserts that he abjures violence and the dedicated look of the good Muslim when he honors Arabs terrorists. Two faces and no elected position — his term of office as President expired January 9, 2009. So they just extended it — with new elections sometime in 2010. Maybe. And yet, the American administration spends more effort worrying about how to get Israel to gift him with Samaria and Judea than it does worrying about the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah-Hamas alliance. I'm guessing the USA administration figures it would complicate things if Hamas wins in Samaria and Judea in a new election before the U.S.A. can "peace-process" Israel into giving its land away.
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PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY: STILL STEALING "HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS." HAMAS TAKING OVER
by Khaled Abu Toameh

  Abbas may not be as colorful a murderer as Arafat, but his heart is in the right place: he too believes in the Arab version of the work ethic: take home whatever you can steal. The longer he stays in office, the more likely it is that he and his buddies will live like Arafat's widow does. Arafat died in 2004, but widowlady Sufa still keeps dress boutiques and fancy food stores in business, all by her little self. Wot a benefactress. Of course, Hamas also takes big chunks of the money coming in to welfare the po' Palestinians in Gaza. No difference.
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THE UNITED NATIONS AND UNRWA — KEEPING THE ARAB REFUGEE PROBLEM ALIVE

WHEN IN ROME, DO AS THE VISIGOTHS DO
by Mark Steyn

  In writing this article about the U.N. Mark Steyn is as usually witty, incisive and right on the mark. It is a bit depressing to ponder that this description of the U.N.'s corruption is five years old. And it is still accurate.
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HOW TO SOLVE THE ARAB REFUGEE PROBLEM
by Yoav Sorek

  Yoav Sorek presents a brief synopsis of the Israeli Initiative for solving the Palestinian refugee problem. He argues that "the Palestinian refugee issue [is] the key to real change in the Middle East. Contrary to popular understanding, this issue could be solved in a relatively simple way: treating the Palestinian refugees like all other refugees. A fair humanitarian solution to this problem is of interest to all who seek stability and peace — Israel, the US, moderate Arab regimes, and of course, the Palestinian refugees themselves. The main obstacle for rehabilitation of the Palestinian refugees has always been the Palestinian National Movement, which takes advantage of the refugee issue, and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the body responsible for the perpetuation of the refugee situation over six decades. The fact that UNRWA is financed by western countries with the US as its largest sole donor, gives us an opportunity to make a change." Something needs to be done soon. After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the U.N estimated the number of Arab refugees at 472,000, of which 360,000 needed help. The number has grown so that UNRWA, whose only clients are these Arab refugees, feeds, houses, educates, provides health care and propagandizes for more than 4.5 million people who claim to be the original refugees and/or their descendants. And the number continues to grow.
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THE PALESTINIAN ARAB'S RIGHT OF RETURN — TO THEIR HOMELAND, ARABIA
by Mark Delmar

  Mark Delmar supplies references for facts that have been submerged by the fraudulent claim of the "Palestinians" that they are the original occupants of the Land of Israel and that the Jews invaded their land and are occupying it. There never was a country or state called Palestine. It is a fantasy that owes little to history and geography. Quite the reverse is true. When the Jews returned in numbers to their ancient land of Israel at the end of the 19th Century, the land was a poverty-striken, unfertile, unsanitary part of the Ottoman Empire. The Jews revitalized the land and the Arabs came in because of the renewed economic opportunities. The truth has often been told. It is time it was accepted.
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SECTION 4: AMERICAN JEWISH GROUPS — HASBARA, ACTIVISM AND PASSIVITY

The Obama administration, whether through design or ignorance, appears to be operating consistently to aid the growth of Islam in America and abroad. In this country, terrorist acts that can't be attributed to al-Qaeda are seen as random and individual. Islam continues to infiltrate our educational and political systems. A growing network of mosques manufactures the manpower to promote sharia law by terror and by persuasion — whichever works in the particular situation. The Jewish community has unwillingly become a major target for Islamic activism.

Many have forgotten that not that long ago American Jews were subjected to restrictions and quotas, some crude, others more low-keyed, but all hurtful and damaging. Too many American Jews are too young to realize how important Israel is for them personally, if only as an escape hatch, should the rising anti-semitism — compliments of Arab money and influence working with Marxists and religious anti-semites — reach the heights it has in Britain and France. Unlike the old prejudice that seldom spoke loudly — except for the neo-nazis and Father Coughlins — the new anti-semitism announces itself openly.

On campuses, while Jewish students march and chant for peace and ecumenism, arab students hang posters showing Jews dripping blood as they eat arab babies. They boldly disrupt meetings they don't like. College administrators may prefer that these vulgar demonstrations didn't happen, but too often they do exactly nothing to stop them,

It is easy for Jews to take quiet pride in Israel's accomplishments in medicine, in computers, in technology. But most Jews are not equipped to handle bad press in the media and condemnations from their fellow students and coworkers. The political manipulations in the U.N. are way beyond them.

Jewish hasbara is poor. The U.N.-staged Goldstone report and malicious blood-libel stories in the media have been countered intelligently and decidedly by thoughtful and analytic articles. But the defamation of Israel is not a topic the majority of Jews are passionate about. It isn't something they bring up with coworkers at lunch. The typical reaction to accusations against Israel is embarrassment; Jews too often blame Israel for causing them distress. They are light years away from even thinking of refuting the libel effectively.

Things are not getting any better. Thanks to Saudi money and an organized network of hate-spewing mosques, Arabs have cornered the market on profiling the players in the Middle East: Islam is peaceful, Israel is evil. Somali muslims have killed hundreds of thousands of blacks who are their co-religionists in Darfur; Sunnis kill Shi'ites and Shi'ites kill Sunnis; Iran crushes its election protesters; Fatah shoots Hamas and Hamas throws Fatah off roof tops; Rwanda, Bosnia, Sri Lanka have seen indiscriminate massacres. But the only 'crime' that excites the media and the leftist humanitarian peacenikers is Israel's tempered attempt to stop Arab terrorists from aiming missiles at Israel.

Calls for academic boycotts of Israel began in 2002 and continue. Jewish academics do rebuff such calls. Sadly, their response is often a whine that there's lots of Israelis that care about human rights for the arab. How pathetic. They haven't the guts to say that if the punishment for inconveniencing Arabs at a checkpoint is an academic boycott, the punishment for the same group of arabs killing Jews should be death or, at the very least, a complete quarantine.

Why are defenders of Israel apologizing? Geert Wilders (see above) has pointed out that "the war against Israel is not a war against Israel. It is a war against the West. It is jihad. Israel is simply receiving the blows that are meant for all of us." Why aren't we educating European academics that it is daft to undermine Israel when it is one of the few places not willing to commit suicide so that Islam can take over the world?

A cheery note. American Jews are beginning to ask: why aren't our leaders out there in the front lines yelling at the Arab propagandists? Why is Bnai Brith helping Muslims condemn Israel? Why is JNF letting the Arabs take over Jewish land? Why is AIPAC promoting an Arab state in Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank), Judaism's birthplace? Why are they so eager to give the Arabs the Biblical land of Israel, with its many towns whose names are obviously from Biblical times, including Seilun (Shiloh), where Joshua brought the Ark of the Covenant, and Hebron, where Abraham and Sarah are buried and David was crowned King? Jews aren't happy to discover that most prestigious Jewish organizations are doing very little to fight Arab bigotry and hate. Or, like the ADL, they are actually going in the wrong direction. We'd be better off without the ADL defaming our Christian friends and preaching tolerance for those who hate us.

Most of the articles in this set examine our weak leadership and ineffective hasbara. Even when Israel behaves magnificently, moving an entire area — aid after a natural disaster — to a new and higher standard of care, we can still expect people will decide Israel is doing it for ugly motives. On the other hand, there's nothing easier to sell than a story that Israel is doing something nefarious — like cutting up Arabs for their bullet-shattered organs. With the help of a cooperative media and a compliant educational system, the Muslims are making great strides in getting their bizarre version of reality out to the public. They are using our openness and respect for other people's points of view to convince us to take on their medieval ideas.

Like it or not, Jews in America and Jews in Israel are bonded. We need to support each other without equivocation. Israel has had to take the brunt of Islamic hate for America as well as for the insult she inflicted on Arab sensibilities by staying alive when her Arab neighbors tried to kill off the brand new modern state. Jews in America have to learn to defend Israel as if it is for themselves. For it is.

CIVILIZATION VERSUS BARBARISM
by Nonie Darwish

  Nonie Darwish describes yet another way that Islamic attitudes and values are infiltrating our educational system and affecting the values of young students. They send around speakers to schools, who, under the guise of explaining Islam, mispresent Islam, excusing its violence and spouting misinformation. These tactics are also designed to create an attitude of hate against Israel and America in the next generation. As Yuval Zaliouf has said of this essay, "Here is a clear example of the infestation of barbarism into our civilization." The unfortunate fact is that so many in the "civilized" world, particularly in academia and in the media, side with those barbarians. See for example the uncivilized tactics at UC Irvine here.
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WAHHABISM AND THE FIRST AMENDMENT
by Michael W. Schwartz

  Michael W. Schwartz makes a novel distinction between American religious institutions and foreign ones, specifically, Saudi-funded and staffed mosques in America. The reason is that the political aspects of what is taught in Wahhabi mosques have been implicated in several massacres by American Muslim terrorists. As one reader of the original article wrote: "The Constitution is not a suicide pact. Citizens have not only rights but responsibilities ..." Another reader noted that if Islam is a religion and not a political invasion, then we should go by the principle of mutuality: "They get as many mosques [here in America] as we get Churches/synagogues — Houses of Worship [in Saudi Arabia.]."
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HASBARA: TELLING THE ISRAEL STORY TO THE MANY WHO JUST DON'T KNOW
by Avrum I. Ashery

  Avrum I. Ashery reminds us that there are many effective and creative ways of letting people know about "Israel's exciting accomplishments in health, science technology and agriculture." And Israel's fast and brilliant response when disaster strikes. And its religious tolerance despite the fact that it lives in a region of widespread religious intolerance. Use the included list of some of Israel's accomplishments to start you off.
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IN THE IDF MEDICAL CORPS DELEGATION TO HAITI WHICH IS HOUSED IN TENTS....
An IDF Soldier

  Israel's immediate response to the earthquake in Haiti was dazzling; it set a new standard for dealing with a disaster by integrating high-tech and well-trained and dedicated professionals. As Emanuel Winston put it: "Israel's contribution became the focal point for other doctors from all over the world. Regrettably, the International Media worked very hard to insure that Israel's contribution was either not mentioned or only minimally, at best." And many internet crazies were sure Israel was there to harvest organs. The article is an IDF soldier's eyewitness account of the Israeli field hospital personnel and the reaction of the Haitians whose lives were saved.
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THE AFTONBLADET ORGAN-TRAFFICKING ACCUSATIONS AGAINST ISRAEL: A CASE STUDY
by Mikael Tossavainen

  Not long before the totally unwarrented and monstrous attack on Israel by the United Nation's Goldstone Report, Israel suffered another undeserved kick in the ribs. A Swedish paper, the Aftonbladet, skillfully mixed rumors, distortions, suggestions, lies and irrelevent information to accuse Israel of harvesting organs from dead Palestinians. Tossavainen does an excellent wrap-up of the story and its aftermath. Or some of the aftermath. It takes but a moment to realize that organs for transplant need meticulous handling and the organs of a bullet-riddled terrorist are hardly likely to be suitable. Nevertheless, such malicious and blatently dishonest stories about Israel are readily believed by those happy to accept any negative story about Jews.
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ASSESSING FOXMAN OF THE ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE (ADL)
by Susan L. Rosenbluth

  Abe Foxman and the ADL are long-time institutions in the American Jewish community. Politically, like Merlin in the King Arthur legend, Foxman seems to be traveling backward in time. Half a century out of date, he thinks his enemies are right winger who love Israel like Rush Limbaugh and Christian evangelicals. He rants against right wing Nazis, whose impact is somewhere around minus zero but he pursues ecumenical ties with the Muslims, who spend time, money and human resources in promoting antisemitism in America. Foxman continues to use his position to side with the political Left, apparently believing the Left is still philo-semitic and the Right anti-semitic. What is most disturbing is that Foxman doesn't seem to recognize the extent that Arab targetting of Jews has influenced American campuses and churches. In this essay, Susan L. Rosenbluth examines Foxman's record, particularly his protection of those, like Bishop Tutu, who defame Israel. It's not clear we can any longer afford an ADL that defames our friends and ignores the danger posed by Arabs suffering from Judeophobia.
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PERHAPS WE NEED A REPLACEMENT FOR ADL
by Charles Jacobs

  The ADL is an outstanding example of an important Jewish organization that is inadequately responding "to the threats posed by Islamist antisemitism." Unfortunately, it isn't the only one that is passive in the face of Muslim in-your-face hostility. Other major Jewish organizations have not forthrightly warned their membership about the extent of Muslim planning and infiltration into America's educational, religious and political institutions. These groups certainly know that the Muslims have geared up to isolate Jews and demonize them in the U.S.A, Canada and several South American states. Charles Jacobs may have figured out the main reason why they haven't — they just don't know how to explain it to the Jewish community. I have news for them. All they have to do is say it. Plainly. In plain English. The facts. The unvarnished facts. The worst that can happen is some ostriches will resign from the groups. But that's better than being accused later of knowing what was going on and pretending that things would get better. To put it another way, NOT to shout in a theatre when there's a fire is criminal.
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ISRAEL IN YOUR HANDS — U.S. VOTERS HAVE A SAY ON WHAT HAPPENS IN THE HOLY LAND
by Lou Marano

  As Lou Marano writes, "Contrary to the received wisdom and official U.S. policy, a Palestinian state is not necessary, desirable or inevitable." For those committed to a Jewish State in the otherwise monopolistic Muslim Middle East, he argues it is time for proactive support. Why? Because there is evidence that the military means used to impose the current Washington-requested 10-month freeze on new Jewish construction in Samaria and Judea may portend an expulsion of these same Israeli Jews from their homes and businesses. A government that hasn't yet resettled the 8000 to 10,000 Jews it hounded out of their homes in Gaza in 2005 may be about to repeat this act of terror against another 200,000 to 300,000 of its citizens. If eastern Jerusalem is included, the number would go up to 500-600,000 Jews made refugees by their own government in their own country.
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THE HISTORY SECTION

The articles range from the First Liberation — the Great Liberation of the land destined to be our homeland — to the Crusades and to the more recent massacre of Deir Yassin, which — like so many Arab tales — turned out to be a hoax.

THE GREAT LIBERATION
by Victor Janice Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe says of his article, "At this time when the international community, including the Obama Administration and the State Department, is applying unbearable pressure upon the Jewish state to give away its Biblical and ancestral heartland of Judea and Samaria to the Arabs, who call themselves Palestinians, it is vital to return to the biblical passages in the Book of Joshua. Joshua was the great military leader of the Jewish people. It was he who first freed the Promised Land in what I call the Great Liberation. The article/essay is replete with biblical passages that list the liberated territories on both banks of the River Jordan and which we ignore today at our peril." How foolish it would be to give away our patrimony for a bowl of promises that the Arabs have no intention of honoring.
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THE CRUSADES: WHEN CHRISTENDOM PUSHED BACK
by Selwyn Duke

  Selwyn Duke asks: "Were the Crusades really expansionist ventures by an imperialist Europe? Or were they something else entirely?" He reminds us that by 732 A.D, when Islam was little more than 100 years old, Muslims had already taken over many of the Christian countries of the Middle East and North Africa, Iberia (Spain and Portugal) and were nearing Paris before they were stopped. But Islam didn't stop trying to take over Europe. The Crusades, begun some four centuries later, were attempts by Christianity to take back territory once theirs and to stop further encroachment. Duke suggests we need to understand the Crusaders in the context of their time. Muslims were relentlessly invading and occupying large swatches of Europe, The Crusaders fought back — perhaps not brilliantly and with dark episodes. But they fought for the survival of their lands and religion.
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THE BIG LIE ABOUT DEIR YASSIN REVEALED
by Maurice Ostroff

  History sometimes has a way of repeating the same elements of the same story over and over again. In Jenin and again in Gaza last year, Israel put its own soldiers at risk to prevent the killing of Arab women and children, whose own families callously put them at risk to shield the terrorists that Israel was targetting. The same thing happened when the new state of Israel was just born and immediately invaded. Deir Yassin was not a peaceful village; it was fortified and well-equipped with a large supply of arms being used by a large number of native and foreign fighters, shooting down into Jewish areas. Strategically placed high up in the hills, it was blocking the road to Jerusalem. Rather than a surprise attack — which would have saved Jewish lives — the Jews, using a loudspeaker, offered the town the opportunity to send away the women and children before they attacked. What the Jews got for their scrupulous behavior was the Deir Yassin myth, which asserted the Jews had raped the women and massacred the town. And this was years before Judge Goldstone with solemn face falsely certified that Jews committed war crimes in Gaza.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

January 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2010 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


NOVEMBER-DECEMBER, 2009

What we are talking about in the November-December 2009 issue:
LET'S START WITH SOME FOUNDATION PAPERS (Belman, Hertz, Sherman)
JEWISH OUTPOSTS AND SETTLEMENTS, REFUGEES AND CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE (Julius, Saperstein, Tucker, Ratzlav-Katz, Fendel)
WHAT ISRAEL IS DOING RIGHT RIGHT NOW (Senor and Singer, Gilder)
TO BRING ISRAELI POLITICS UP TO THE QUALITY OF ITS TECHNOLOGY (Schecter, November, Lademain, Sharpe, Freund, Belman, Shapiro)
CHRISTIANS IN BIBLICAL ISRAEL (Grobman, VanZile)
OTHER MIDDLE EAST CONFLICTS (Erlich, Rubin, Spyer, Silverberg)
HOW ISLAM TREATS FELLOW MUSLIMS AND INFIDELS (Ohri, Roberts, Alexiev, Rubin)
ANTI-SEMITISM IN AMERICAN BLOGS AND SYRIAN RADIO AND EARLIER INFLUENCE (Kesler, Levick, Erlich, Herf)
ACADEMIC ANTISEMITES (Shifftan and Lipkin, Plaut, Waltzer, Plaut)
EUROPE ON THE WAY TO DISSOLUTION (Bawer, Fjordman, O'Neill)
AMERICAN PERCEPTION OF TERRORISM (Spengler, Lerner, Emerson and Himelfarb, Jonas, Dzubow)
BLOG-ED PAGES (November, December)

LET'S START WITH SOME FOUNDATION PAPERS

We discuss the one and only really salient point. It is International Law and yet no one seems to know about it, including the U.N. and U.S.A. administrations: namely, Israel is the sole owner of Israel and the territories. That is international law. That is irrevocable. It means that Israel isn't occupying Arab land; the reverse is true. It means that every time the U.S.A. wheedles more of Israel's land for the "Palestinians", it is breaking its own law. So why doesn't Israel blare this from every media source? Beats me. Aside from the fact that Israel would be giving over its holy places and birthplace to the Arabs, the major reasons for not allowing an Arab state in Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank) are (1) the Arabs would be sitting on the mountain tops looking down at Israeli cities in the plain; and (2) they would have control of Israel's major water supply. A Palestinian state in, on, around, through or next to Israel is a very bad idea.

SUMMARY OF ISRAEL'S LEGAL RIGHTS TO JUDEA AND SAMARIA
by Ted Belman

  Ted Belman summarizes the unbroken series of treaties and resolutions, laid out by the San Remo Resolution, the League of Nations and the United Nations, that give the Jewish People title to Mandatory Palestine and the city of Jerusalem. Ownership of the Land went from the defunct Ottoman Empire to the present State of Israel. The Arabs were never involved. The "Palestinians" had never owned the land; they had never had a state on the land. Considering that during the same period and by the same mechanisms, the Arabs acquired title to over 99% of the Middle East, the Arabs can hardly be considered to be deprived of land.
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UN SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTIONS 181 AND 242
by Eli E. Hertz

  Eli Hertz presents the pertinent information about two U.N. Resolutions — 181 and 242 — that are often used inaccurately to 'prove' that Israel needs to give up yet more of its tiny country to the Arabs. Resolution 187 was adopted by the General Assembly in 1947 and would have partitioned mandated Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. It was never adopted by the Security Council, so it was never a binding resolution. In any event, the Arabs rejected it. It became null and void when the Arab states invaded the new-born state of Israel in 1948. U.N. Resolution 242 was adopted after the 6-day war by the Security Council. It said that Israel was to return some of the land it conquered when the Arab states formally agreed to allow Israel to live in peace with secure and recognized borders. It did not mention Palestinian arabs.
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BARGHOUTI, AMNESTY AND TRAVESTY
by Martin Sherman

  Palestinian Arabs should have a contest on who can invent the most awful thing to blame on Israel, especially when they have highly partial NGOs like Amnesty International to help them. Water is so basic, everyone can sympathize with the po' Palestinians being deprived of water by the evil Israel. Unfortunately, the figures don't support their claim. Their problems — as usual — are self-inflicted: their leaders are not the most ept in maintaining distribution and they have allowed "untreated effluents to endanger 'downstream' Israeli supplies." Martin Sherman is discussing the Mountain Aquifer in Samaria and Judea (the West Bank). Imagine the disaster if they plonk an Arab state there — the aquifer would go the way of the Coastal Aquifer that the Gaza arabs have ruined.
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JEWISH OUTPOSTS AND SETTLEMENTS, REFUGEES AND CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

The 2005 expulsion of the Jews of Gaza from their homes and businesses was made possible by a government that was ruthless against its own people and craven before "world opinion." The Sharon-Olmert Government acted as if the "settlers" were the enemy, not the Arab terrorists. (Kind of reminds us of the Obama government worrying about "rightwing" soldiers and refusing even to call Muslim terrorists terrorists.) In preparing for the expulsion, it practiced psychological warfare and made solemn promises of resettling the Gush Katif communities as communities, and not scattering them around. The Government coopted some Jewish settlement leaders who helped to psychologically disarm the settlers as well as encouraging them to engage in pointless and exhausting marches rather than in preparing for resistance. Soldiers were actually hardened ("brainwashed") so they would act against innocent fellow-Jews instead of the confirmed enemies of Israel. Moreover, many Jews, not just those in Gush Katif, Gaza, deep down didn't believe Jews would do such harm to other Jews. The Jewish farmers of Gaza were hard-working, innovative, productive and patriotic citizens of Israel, whose very presence helped protect the rest of Israel from surprise attacks by terrorists.

Given that experience, the Jews who oppose giving up their land now are much less sanguine. They see the current settlement freeze in Samaria and Judea (aka West Bank) and part of Jerusalem as preparatory to expelling Jews again and giving land to the Arabs again and to increased terrorism against Israel again. They understand that the Government and the Judiciary favor Arabs because they fear Arabs might riot and they are not at all worried by how Jews typically complain: letters to Government officials and polite protest marches and demonstrations. The current resistance to the housing freeze in Sameria and Judea and parts of Jerusalem is starting to take a more effective approach.

The Government took no action when some soldiers refused to serve in the West Bank to carry out military action against what they saw as innocent Arabs, even though these innocents were shielding in their midst friends and relatives who had murdered innocent Israelis and planned to continue to murder Jews. Now, when religious Jews are 40% of the army and eagerly request the most dangerous jobs, the Government has chosen to be stupidly confrontational against rabbis who have trained these soldiers to be patriotic Israelis, because defending Jewish land is part of being strong in devotion to Torah Judaism.

In this section, we present an essay about famous Jewish musicians forced to flee their Arab homeland in 1950; stories of rebuilding by Jews made into refugees in 2005 by their own government, which expelled them from their homes and farms in Gaza; and a story about a young couple whose farm was recently destroyed by a capricious government that hired Arabs to carry out the job.

THE AL-KUWAITY BROTHERS ARE BACK!
by Lyn Julius

  Lyn Julius tells the story of the al-Kuwaity brothers, Saleh and Daoud, who became famous in the Arab world as composers and performers. They were born in Kuwait of Iraqi Jewish parents a century ago. When Iraq and the other Arab countries began terrorizing their Jewish communities, the brothers fled to Israel along with most of the other Iraqi Jews. As is usual in totalitarian countries, they became unpersons in the Arab countries that had acclaimed their compositions. Their music was still played, but "attributed to Muslim musicians or labeled 'of folk origin'". Julius writes, "The Arab world needs to acknowledge its debt and to accept that uprooting their Jews exacted a heavy price. The day that a street in Baghdad is named after the al-Kuwaity brothers would be a day for celebration, indeed."
 READ MORE
 

NIGHTMARE ON CHELM STREET. CATS ALL, FOLKS. BUILD OR FREEZE. 3 DUFFLE BAGS.
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  This issue, we learn from Moshe Saperstein the reality on the ground while little-boy politicians play Real Politiks with people's lives. And Rachel Saperstein gives us the grown-up version of the story for children about the little red hen that grew the wheat and eventually baked the bread. Her neighbors came around when the bread was baked, not before. In the grown-up version, some of the Jews expelled from Gush Katif, Gaza, shook off despair and set down a new community in Lachish. The bureaucrats that have mucked up their resettlement of the Gaza Jews came to the opening ceremonies to take the credit.
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HANUKAH AND A HOME
by Anita Tucker

  Over the years, we've posted letters from Anita Tucker, starting from when she was a farmer in Gaza. Like the Sapersteins (see above), she and her family were expelled from Gush Katif, Gaza, in August 2005, by a government that put a lot of effort in destroying the lives of some of their best citizens and then all but abandonned them. Like the Sapersteins, she found the courage to build again, a community they will call Netzer Hazani, named after the community destroyed in Gaza, She writes how the Obama-inspired 'building freeze' is affecting the community.
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'A LIFE'S WORK' DESTROYED IN SAMARIA
by Nissan Ratzlav-Katz

  Standard English Slander for Jewish villages and towns in the territories and parts of Jerusalem: an outpost is a few trailers, usually on a hilltop and preventing Arab settlers seizing the land illegally; a settlement is any Jewish village, town or city smaller than Tel-Aviv.

Just a few months after Defense Minister Ehud Barak approved new housing in Samaria and Judea, he's back destroying "illegal" Jewish homes and farms such as the Botzer farm in Mevo Dotan West. These acts are barely reported in the media. I don't know what is more horrifying about this latest — that the Israeli government destroyed the home of a young industrious couple that is part of a community dedicated to keeping Israel Jewish or that the Israeli government hired neighboring Arabs, many of whom are themselves living in illegal housing, to carry out the destruction. How would we feel if men like the would-be airplane bomber were hired to smash up the home of a family of a soldier on duty in Iraq? As Ellie Katz (http://elyakatz.wordpress.com/) wrote, "This farm was dismantled with the assistance of local Arabs! What is the Israeli government doing? This is giving the Arabs an appetite for this sort of thing."
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'ANTI-FREEZE' ACTION PLAN RELEASED
by Hillel Fendel

  The settlers have a deserved reputation of taking a lot of insult and physical abuse from the Israeli authorities, with minimal response. The police, judiciary and government have been blatently supportive of Arab settlers and hostile to Jewish settlers. Some of the settlers experienced being expelled from their homes in Gush Katif in 2005 only to find their Government had made a pointless gesture that had no impact on the world except that it demanded further concessions. They understand that a settlement freeze is likely to become permanent and be the start of yet another expulsion. This time they know from experience the government will act against patriotic Jews instead of the Arabs that want to destroy Israel. As Hillel Fendel shows us, the Jews are planning with more perspicacity.
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WHAT ISRAEL IS DOING RIGHT RIGHT NOW

Israel's politicians are generally not outstanding, but its technical and scientific people are world-class. And they put their innovative skills to practical use. It is a sad irony that while Israel in the last few years has proven the wisdom of rejecting its socialist past and going to market capitalism, America appears to be going in the opposite direction — it is starting to adopt a socialist leveling philosophy, to our economy's detriment.

ISRAEL'S LIVELY START-UP CULTURE KEEPS ECONOMY THRIVING
by Dan Senor and Saul Singer

  "Israel has more companies on the tech-oriented NASDAQ than any country outside the United States — more than all of Europe, Japan, Korea, India, and China combined." Dan Senor and Saul Singer suggest that the U.S. could learn lessons from Israel's vital economy and high concentration of innovation and entrepreneurship. They attribute Israel's success in part to the experience young people gain in the army taking responsibility and making vital decisions on the basis of incomplete information and inadequate resources. Other factors are important. Israel is open to new immigrants — dynamic capitalists from America, engineers and scientists from Russia — and has sensible banking practices. And it was a major boost when they abandoned their socialist-based financial structure.
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SILICON ISRAEL: HOW MARKET CAPITALISM SAVED THE JEWISH STATE
by George Gilder

  Israel blossomed as a powerhouse of technological developments when it rejected its early socialist economic philosophy and adopted market capitalism. George Gilder points out that in a very short time, Israel has "become a center of innovation, second in absolute achievement only to the United States, and on a per-capita basis dwarfing the contributions of all other nations, America included." It is a world leader "in launching new companies and technologies." Some of Israel's technology achievements have millitary application, which "makes Israel one of America's most important economic allies."
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TO BRING ISRAELI POLITICS UP TO THE QUALITY OF ITS TECHNOLOGY

Israel must take control of the land that is its by Bible, by history, by international law and by conquest. And she can't possibly allow the Arabs to control Israel's water supply. Without a strong stance, she is always kept off balance, defending herself from blood libels by the media and the U.N. For example, she was accused of war crimes in Gaza when she killed some 1200 — the majority of whom were terrorists and their human shields. In Yemen, they haven't counted the many thousands that have been killed and/or displaced in the Saudi-Iran proxy war, and the U.N. says nothing. This section looks at what Israel needs to do to inprove its political position -- from casting off its 'court Jew' persona to taking control of land that it owns legally, morally, and by right of conquest.

WHITHER ISRAEL?
by Stephen Schecter

  Stephen Schechter speaks bluntly of the unremitting hatred of the Arabs to Israel — a hatred that makes them insist, ignoring both history and law, that Jews have no connection with the land; a hatred they satisfy "by Jew hatred, terror, violence and blood lust." Jews, in contrast, continue to believe (oh so unrealistically) that there has to be a peaceful solution, even though every Israeli concession — including stripping itself of bits of its tiny land — inspires the Arab world to greater monstrosity. Shechter, ever the realist, argues that the Jews need to forsake the Court Jew mentality, defeat the Palestinians "militarily, a goal perfectly within Israel's capability" and reassert "sovereignty over the land promised to the Jews by God and the Balfour Declaration." From his lips to Israel's ears.
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GEORGE ORWELL IS ALIVE AND WELL IN ISRAEL
by Tsvi November

  In Orwellian Newspeak, doublethink is the ability to believe wholeheartedly and simultaneously in two contradictory statements or in a conclusion that flies in the face of the plain known facts. Tsvi November describes Israel's own version of Newspeak: the media and the leadership praise appeasement and abasement as furthering peace, when experience continues to demonstrate that catering to the Arabs make them ever more violent and demanding. Israel grows more prosperous and self-sufficient while the social, economic, political and demographic problems in the Arab countries worsen, yet the appeasers insist time is working against Israel. Some Israelis believe there will be real peace if only the "Palestinians" sign an agreement even though when they themselves shop in a souk, they don't believe anything the Arab owner says without verifying it for themselves. In Newspeak, "disputed territories" meant land not held permanently by one of the Superstates; "disputed territories" is how Israel's diplomats describe land they own by international law but are afraid to say so. It's time the media stopped feeding the public "the peace in our time' fantasy" and let common sense come to the fore.
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ISRAEL'S LEADERSHIP IS IGNORANT OF LAW
by Paul Lademain

  It is Paul Lademain's contention that Israel's leaders — he doesn't think highly of them — are not dealing correctly with the Arabs encroaching on Jewish land. Israel makes stupid gestures of goodwill "bargaining away its right to assert control over lands in its possession," whereas the Arabs understand — as Israel's leadership apparently does not — that, practically speaking, possession is 90% of the law. "Nations who agree to relinquish their land or their power in exchange for air-kisses are correctly perceived as 'losers.'" He recommends that "[t]o perfect control over YOUR land you must first resolve that the land is YOURS--and shall always be yours--and to do so without any qualms and with absolutely no guilt." Sensible advice.
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ARABS TO ISRAEL: JUDEN RAUS
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe points out that Israel jeopardizes its future by not asserting its rights. Even if it were foolish enough to allow a Palestinian State in Biblical Israel, the Palestinians would still attempt to grab more land. The Arabs would yell for Israel to move to the 1949 Armistice Lines as now they yell for Israel to withdraw to the 1968 lines. And in whatever territory they take over, they allow no Jews. So there is actually a very stark option. Either Israel take control of its land or the Arabs will. Sharing is not in the cards.
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IT'S ANNEXATION TIME
by Michael Freund

  Since Oslo — or perhaps since 1968 when Israel regained Biblical Israel — Israel has kept the future of the thriving Jewish communities of Samaria and Judea ambiguous, hoping to use them as a bargaining token, where many of them would be swapped for peace with Israel's Arab neighbors. Over the years, Israel's ambition shrunk to a hope for peace with the local Arabs, who had started to call themselves "Palestinians"; and now even the putative head of some of these arabs mocks them. It has been a foolish policy that has destroyed the lives of some of her best citizens and gained Israel nothing except condemnation, whatever it does or doesn't do. Michael Freund suggests a different course, one based on Israel's legal ownership of the land, when he writes, "For far too long, Israel has been overly vulnerable to Palestinian machinations and games by leaving the status of the settlements unresolved. Now is the time to send a clear message to our foes, and there is no better place to start than with our own unilateral measures, chief among them the annexation of all the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria." An Addendum from The Israeli Initiative suggests a somewhat different way to regain what belongs to Israel. A good start to doing what Israel should have done in 1968.
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UNILATERALISM IS OUR ONLY OPTION
by Ted Belman

  Many arabs were settled into Biblical Israel — eastern Jerusalem, Samaria and Judea — by Jordan after 1967 when she occupied the area and many have come in legally and illegally since then. Ted Belman reviews his way of regaining Biblical Israel and also variations suggested by others. As does Michael Freund (see above), these plans deal with the human rights of the Arab population in the Territories; they were not granted political rights (voting) in Mandated Palestine. The ultimate objective is to do what should have been done in 1968 — take back control of Samaria and Judea, land that legally belongs to the State of Israel in the name of the Jewish people.
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WE NEED HEROES TODAY. LET US BE LIKE MACCABEES
by Bernard J. Shapiro

  The Maccabees had to fight both their Greek rulers and Hellenized Jews, whose goal was for Israel to reject Judaism and be like everyone else — assimilated into the Greek culture of their time. Bernard J. Shapiro suggests that Israel can strengthen its "political and strategic situation" by annexing land that is rightfully theirs "from the Mediterranean to the Jordan, from the Golan to Gaza" and otherwise focus on making Israel Jewish instead of favoring the Arab. He advocates a "loyalty oath and national service for all citizens of Israel, including Arabs" and letting the IDF stop terrorists, even when they use their civilian population as shields.
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CHRISTIANS IN BIBLICAL ISRAEL

These essays discuss the plight of the Christian minority living in the Territories under Muslim Arab rule. The facts are not hidden, so it is curious that so many theologians in the West and locally in Biblical Israel ignore the violence that Palestinian Arabs display to the Christians in Gaza and Samaria/Judea (West Bank) and blame Israel for everything. The attitude of the local Christians is understandable -- there isn't much distance between their throats and the knives the Muslims hold close by. But why do Western clerics blame Israel?

CHURCH LEADERS REMAIN SILENT WHILE PALESTINIAN CHRISTIAN ARABS SUFFER AT THE HANDS OF MUSLIMS
by Alex Grobman

  Christian Arabs are molested, sexually harassed, raped, murdered, terrorized, forceably converted to Islam, forced to pay extortion money and have their cemeteries desecrated in areas controlled by Muslim Arabs. Yet some of their church leaders "[a]gainst all evidence claim that the Christians Arabs are living comfortable and prosperous lives." Out of fear and intimidation by the Muslims in control, Christians are leaving cities where they used to be in the majority and Muslims are taking over. In 1990, Christians were 60% of Bethleham's population; by 2001, they were down to 20%. Yet prominent Christian clerics blame Israel for Christian flight. Alex Grobman provides us with some accurate information.
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MAINLINE AMERICAN CHRISTIAN "PEACEMAKERS" AGAINST ISRAEL
by Dexter Van Zile

  This is a well-documented and thorough study of five prestigious Protestant churches that have taken a hard anti-Israel stance and are unswervingly pro-Palestinian. They portray Israel as almost solely responsible for Arab hostility and violence towards Israel and for not trying hard enough to achieve a peaceful resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Actual facts — e.g., the Arabs speak proudly of their genocidal acts against innocent civilians because they have the seal of Islamic approval — are waved aside. The leaders of these churches promulgate anti-Israel propaganda and engage in boycott and divestment activity against Israel, with the hope they will "help transform bipartisan American support for Israel into an artifact of the hard Right." Resistance to this myopic view has been growing within the Church membership, but there are still unanswered questions: why the initial instinct of the Protestant leadership to blame just Jewish Israel? What motivates a bishop such as Rev. Margaret Payne to lie blatantly about easily-checked facts when propagandizing for the Palestinian arabs? What makes a Christian Arab like Naim Ateek whitewash the Muslims who are destroying his community? What makes an ordained minister like Gary Burge distort the plain meaning of the Torah to flay modern Zionism? What makes him insist that Jews don't own Israel because they have rejected Jesus as the Messiah? Is it that being anti-Israel is really a way to express Jew-hate, an attitude that is not exactly politically correct?
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OTHER MIDDLE EAST CONFLICTS

There is a widely-held belief, a widely-held hallucinatory belief, that yet another Palestinian state — in addition to Jordan and Israel that are already states carved out of Mandatory Palestine -- would bring peace to the Middle East. This ignores that the Middle East is an unstable area where Sunni fights Shi'ite and Iran fights Saudi Arabia and the latest splinter terror group fights the previously most rabid terrorist group. These quarrels have little or nothing to do with Israel; they have much to do with competing versions of Islam and competition for which country will be top dog in the Arab Middle East.

YEMEN SEIZES IRANIAN ARMS SHIP CARRYING WEAPONS FOR THE SHI'ITE REBELS IN THE COUNTRY'S NORTH
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  Iran and Saudi Arabia are fighting a proxy war in Yemen, with Saudi Arabia aiding the Yemen government, Iran sending supplies and men to the Houthi Shi'ite rebels fighting the Yemini army in the north. The rebels are trying to bring down a government they say is too pro-Western. Thousands have died on both sides and some 150,000 people have been displaced. All this has taken place with little media attention and no action by the U.N. except to help create a refugee camp. This article by Dr. Reuven Erlich is about the capture of an Iranian arms shipment on its way to Yemen. Iran has similarly shipped weaponry by sea to Hezbollah to fight Israel.
 READ MORE
  THE ENDURING IRAN-SYRIA-HEZBOLLAH AXIS
by Michael Rubin

  Syria isn't strong enough to be a major power but it does well for itself acting as a major node in the distribution of weaponry from Iran to Hezbollah. Over the years, Hezbollah has conducted suicide attacks against Israel as the active arm of Iran and Syria — states that are not in a position to wage war openly. Hezbollah has its own power base — it controls Lebanon. When Syria was forced out of the Bekaa Valley, which is noted for its opium poppy fields and marijuana production, Hezbollah took control. Michael Rubin points out that Iran (operating from its embassy in Damascus) and Syria have bonded; they work well together and have common goals and outlook. They have unified the Shia in the region — in Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and even Bahrain — and are a steady source of support for other regional terrorist groups, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad. This network would be united in a confrontation with Sunni Saudi Arabia. The U.S. State Department continues to believe it can woo Syria from its power-conferring relationship with Iran.
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HEZBOLLAH'S DELUSIONS
by Jonathan Spyer

  Jonathan Spyer makes the point that Hezbollah's victories in Lebanon are a miniature version of "larger regional developments." After its election victory, Hezbollah is now pushing to force Shi'ite rule on everyone. A similar push to a more orthodox Islam can be seen in Turkey, Iran and Gaza. As part of this, of course, the United States is demonized and Israel is targetted for destruction. "But at the core of the strategic thinking of Hezbollah and its patrons lie a series of delusions, which are likely to bring about the defeat of the movement over time." Especially if the West starts to understand that this political ideology can not be ignored or accomodated.
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AS THE ISLAMIC CURTAIN DESCENDS
by Mark Silverberg

  Mark Silverberg chronicles the gradual evolution of an Islamic mini-state in Gaza under Hamas rule and Shari'a law. A dress code for women is enforced "on the street, in schools and in the courts"; mixed-gender classes in schools are discouraged; gender separation in public is encouraged; religious studies have been expanded; and more mosques and madrasses and Shari'a courts are being constructed. Nevertheless, Hamas has not satisfied some still more religiously stringent groups, who now consider Hamas offices legitimate targets to attack. On the other hand, other Gazans may find increased conformity to Shari'a law too restrictive.
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HOW ISLAM TREATS FELLOW MUSLIMS AND INFIDELS

Chapter 2 of R.K. Ohri's book on the tenets of Islam sets the stage for the other articles in this set on how muslims treat fellow muslims and infidels, anybody and everybody, as prescribed by the Muslim religion.

THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: CHAPTER 2
by R. K. Ohri

  In the previous issue, R.K. Ohri discussed the "geo-political implications of the long reach of radical Islam and the consequences of their global designs for the civil society of 'tomorrow and the day after.'" In the current essay, Ohri describes Islam's foundation tenets: the 'Shahada', its declaration of faith; namaz (prayers); zakat, (giving charity); roza (fasting, as used in India); and Haj (pilgramage to Mecca). These are unexceptionable in a religion. However, a Muslim's life is prescribed by Sharia, "the collectivity of laws that govern the lives of Muslims"; sharia allows for no individual interpretation. In addition, there is "'Ummah' ... a grand idea that binds Muslims all over the world into a common brotherhood or one single fraternity." In practice it means that allegiance to Islam comes before loyalty to country — as we saw recently when Major Hasan massacred his fellow soldiers at Fort Hood. If there is a fight between foreign Muslims and the Muslim's country, a Muslim has no choice but to fight for the foreigner. This is continously preached from mosques around the world and confirmed by Islamic scholars.
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FITNA AND THE KAFIR
by Kenneth Roberts

  It is the crime of fitna if one says something publically that would "cause controversy, testing, fragmentation, scandal, chaos, or discord, disturbing social peace and order within the Muslim community,.." The punishment is death, which any Muslim can administer to the perpetrator, his family or his whole community. Kenneth Roberts points out that violence against critics of Islam applies to everyone, Muslim and infidel. Even "[t]o analyze Mohammed's ethical inconsistencies is fitna." Official dogma of mainstream Sunni Islam, who number almost a billion, it is an effective technique for controlling public information sources and inducing self-censorship. The Danish cartoon riots were to teach infidels not to disagree with Mohammed in public. Even five years later, a Somali man was caught breaking into the cartoonist's home, armed with a knife and hatchet. It is easy nowadays to spot newspapers that snipe and sneer at Jewish and Christian practices but are mealy-mouthed about Muslims; they are practicing self-censorship to avoid trouble.
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JIHAD, INC.
by Alex Alexiev

  The FBI has arrested some 20 homegrown Muslims planning terrorist attacks in just the last 6 months alone. They were radicalized in mosques in America by imams preaching an ideology that demonizes "the West as a subhuman civilization that must be destroyed if Islam is to survive and triumph," starting with America. As Alex Alexiev explains, "[P]eaceful coexistence between Islam and any other religion or ideology is rejected." Their enemy is anyone, Muslim and non-Muslim, that doesn't accept sharia law. They began building infrastructure back in 1960s — a well-funded, active and growing network of student and professional associations, publishing houses, schools, mosques and charities. The Fort Hood massacre was dramatic, but their preferred methods are those that arouse less antagonism: "taking over moderate Muslim institutions, radicalizing mainstream believers, indoctrinating the young, aggressively proselytizing among the infidels, infiltrating government institutions and the political establishment, and organizing support for extremist causes and jihad overseas." The U.S. Government needs to start connecting the dots.
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WHY I MURDERED 13 AMERICAN SOLDIERS AT FORT HOOD: NIDAL HASSAN EXPLAINS IT ALL TO YOU
by Barry Rubin

  Before he massacred army personnel at Fort Hood, Major Hasan had given a Power Point lecture explaining how the Koran framed his view of how a Muslim in the U.S. Army should behave when forced into a situation where he might have to kill brother Muslims in Afghanistan and Iran. He concluded he couldn't fight in an infidel army — the army of his own country, America — against other Muslims. Barry Rubin points out that, having examined alternative ways of handling the situation, Hasan "clearly did see himself as a Jihad warrior" with limited options of what to do.
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ANTI-SEMITISM IN AMERICAN BLOGS AND SYRIAN RADIO AND EARLIER INFLUENCE

The number of the polite and respectable sources of attack on Jews — the ones that mask their agenda — have increased over the years; and they add new areas and inventive arguments all the time. Moreover, they make possible the advent of American blogs that openly spout anti-semitic hate and assert the truth of nonsensical non-facts. The more openly hateful opinions are becoming more prevalent on blogs and comments to blog articles. They are not as virulent as Arab propaganda but they are closer than they were after World War 2, when shock as the details of the Holocaust came out had a temporary paralyzing effect on the customary anti-jew statements.

RULES OF ETIQUETTE FOR MODERN ANTI-SEMITISM
by Bruce Kesler

  Bruce Kesler provides us with an superb summary of how much of anti-semitic propaganda is spread in America using a variety of smoke screens to mask the hate-the-Jews message. The number of attacks from polite and respectable sources have increased over the years. Modern anti-semitism "wraps up old canards in purposely cute circumlocutions, to deceive and forward its deadly goal, the death of the civilized West so that backwardness, tyranny and barbarities can continue or prevail in greater safety from exposure, comparison or challenge. "
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ANTI-ISRAELISM AND ANTI-SEMITISM IN PROGRESSIVE U.S. BLOGS/NEWS WEBSITES: INFLUENTIAL AND POORLY MONITORED
by Adam Levick

  For years even after World War 2, hate was expected from the Right, not from the liberals, the democrats, the "good guys." Since then, it is the Left that has become the major home of anti-semitism and anti-zionism. Adam Levick chronicles the temperment of some on the "respectable" Left, where anti-semitism, pro-Palestinian, globalism and share-the-wealth live comfortably together.
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THE HATE INDUSTRY: THE PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION IN A RADIO BROADCAST FROM DAMASCUS
by Reuven Erlich

  The Arab media maintains a steady stream of anti-Jewish T.V. and radio shows. Unlike in the West, there is nothing to inhibit the Religion of Peace from spouting hate.
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HATE RADIO: THE LONG, TOXIC AFTERLIFE OF NAZI PROPAGANDA IN THE ARAB WORLD
by Jeffrey Herf

  In this essay, Jeffrey Herf deals with the contribution Nazi anti-semitism made to the Muslim's religious obligation to be globally superior to all other groups. He writes, "The founding charter of Hamas, the militant Palestinian group, recapitulates conspiracy theories about Jews that were popular in Europe in the 20th century. Al Qaeda's war against 'the Zionist-Crusader Alliance' and the anti-Zionist rants of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran also display a blend of anti-Semitic themes rooted in Nazi and fascist, as well as Islamist, traditions. To be sure, each of these movements and ideologies have non-European, local, and regional causes and inspirations. But the formulation of Nazi propaganda during World War II and its dissemination stand as a decisive episode in the development of radical Islamism."
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ACADEMIC ANTISEMITES

In a recent paper in Front Page Magazine entitled "Auto-Genocide, Jewish Style," Kenneth Levin wrote that many Jews "support those openly calling for the Jews' annihilation, and still more ...downplay the threat and caricature concerned voices. Hardly less unsavory are the myriad Jews who attack Israel's policies as the source of all the nation's difficulties, insist that 'peace' can be had if only Israel would reform itself and make sufficient concessions, militantly advocate such a course and say nothing of the genocidal agenda of the nation's enemies or of their aggressive indoctrinating of additional cadres dedicated to enacting that agenda."

Levin notes that many are children of Holocaust survivors. "In their twisted thinking, they trumpet their parents' history as though it somehow confers on them a special right to back forces that aspire to another Holocaust."

Auto-genociders ignore significant facts. The illogic of their 'if-thens' is particularly blatent when manifested in Jewish academics. With the exception of Allison Weir, everyone on the group discussed below is Jewish. Sad to say, they are not unique — they are just part of a large herd of academic Jewish Jew haters in the West and in Israel.

SHLOMO SAND AND THE ORIGIN OF JUDAISM
by Yoram Shifftan and Bernice Lipkin

  Shlomo Sand has written a book denying that present day Jews are connected to the ancient Land of Israel; instead, they are descended from relatively recent converts to Judaism. It is a popular book, already translated into several languages. If nothing else, it is a testament to how many people are delighted by the idea that Jews may be neither authentic nor ancient. There is a lovely bit of sleight-of-hand associated with written reviews — the emphasis is on the outrage the orthodox Jewish community must be feeling because the book destroys some of its "myths." This helps to authenticate Sand's arguments; it frames the issue as a joust between two points of view. In this essay, Yoram Shifftan and Bernice Lipkin suggest that the problems with the book are intrinsic. It's not just the what and where. It's the impossibility of the how.
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RICHARD FALK: A COLLABORATORS IN THE WAR AGAINST THE JEWS
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut labels Richard Falk "America's leading practitioner of the Orwellian inversion. "For Falk, "America is a fascist monstrosity, while the world's fascist and totalitarian monstrosities are democratic enclaves of freedom. For him, Israel is a terrorist aggressor, while the Arab terrorist aggressors are innocent victims and peace-loving progressives. For him, Israel is a Nazi-like country seeking genocide, while the genocidal Islamofascists of the Hamas and their backers are merely protesters against social inequality inside Israel. For him, terrorist aggression against Jews is really the pursuit of peace, while self-defense by Israel is criminal, terrorist aggression and genocide." So it is not at all surprising that the U.N. appointed him as "Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories."
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INTRODUCING ALISON WEIR
by Ken Waltzer

  Alison Weir is representative of the latest model journalists that wave academic credentials to support their virulent chants of hate against Israel. They make no bones about their desire to erase the Jewish state and countenance any violence that will make this possible. They are not at all uneasy that their claims have no factual basis. They assert — ignoring factual history — that the land really belongs to the Arabs calling themselves Palestinians, and the Jews are occupying it illegally. No libel is too outré for them to mouth. The latest lurid assertion by Weir and her fellow Jew-haters — that Israelis harvest Palestinian organs for transplant — is just too juicy to be squashed by the fact that conditions during a military operation — or in any situation that impedes the complex procedure for a successful transfer — make it impossible to salvage usable organs.
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HARVARD'S HAMAS DUMPLING: SARA ROY
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut writes about Sara Roy, a foot soldier in the War Against the Jews. In most ways, she is a very ordinary Jew-hating Jew. She is an academic who claims expertise in areas where she has no credentials. She is the child of Holocaust survivors who preaches about the evils of the Jewish state. Billed as an intellectual, her publications are heavy with anger but light on facts. She stands out in the crowd of Jew-haters only in that she specializes in whitewashing Hamas, painting them as seekers of peace and chock full of concern for the Palestinian Arabs. She has argued that Fatah has probably killed more Israells than Hamas. In that, she may be right.
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EUROPE ON THE WAY TO DISSOLUTION

What a difference a few million Muslims make! In 60 years, the number of European Muslims went from some two hundred thousand to over 50 million and is climbing rapidly. This set of articles estimate where we are on the graph charting Islam's take over of the Christian nations of Europe. Jews in Europe are particularly hard-hit. Together with insisting on universalizing Shari'a, Muslims are openly and viciously anti-Jewish -- there are hundreds of incidents of Muslim youth attacking Jews in France, Sweden, etc. — making it easier for the more politically correct natives to join the choir.

WHO'S SLEEPING MORE DEEPLY — EUROPE OR AMERICA?
by Bruce Bawer

  In this benchmark article written a year ago, Bruce Bawer argues that Europe is in a more parlous state than the USA, when it comes to denying the inroads Islam has made into cracking up Western culture. A year later, Europe has had two bits of good luck: the Swiss referendum against minarets and the revelation that the CRU group in England so manipulated its weather station data, it might as well have started with random numbers — and in some cases, did. Meantimes, in America, Prez Obama won't let these revelations prevent him from trying to make a cap and trade deal in Copenhagen that will further improvish America. Clearly, there are opposing trends — globalization versus concern for the individual's freedom of action. Which will dominate?
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SURVIVING THE COMING CRASH
by Fjordman

  In this essay Fjordman points out a reality most of the media ignore; e.g., that "European Union (EU) has forced through the EU Constitution/Lisbon Treaty and in essence ... [has] dissolved dozens of nation states, while making "legal opposition to their rule" impossible. Meantime, the staggering debt the USA has incurred has so weakened the dollar that it is unlikely the USA will long keep its leadership position. If the breakdown of western democracies was planned and staged, Fjordman is inclined to blame groups advocating a global oligarchy. Factor in that there are documented plans to include Muslim North Africa and Middle East in the EU. Factor in that it is de rigeur for teachers and the media to disparage or minimize the contributions of white culture. Factor in that, as the Muslim population in Europe expands, some European leaders seem comfortable with the idea that the natives in white majority Western countries will soon be a minority in their own countries. Fjordman is clear that Europe's external problems will never be solved unless Marxists are stopped from destroying the European structure and character of the Western countries. As he puts it, "We must switch from a 'save the world' to a 'save ourselves' mode."
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NAZI EURABIA AND AMERICA'S FATE
by Jim O'Neill

  Jim O'Neil writes a clear summary of some of the changes in Europe since Muslims started to arrive in sufficient numbers to make a difference. They didn't just soak up welfare funds and have babies. The Left promoting globalization and share-the-wealth and Islam promoting Islam have made common cause — at least for the while — which ensures that Muslim violence is mostly ignored. In France, Muslims initiated a marked increase in anti-Jewish crimes — beatings, harassment, vandalism — without government action. Only when a young Jew was kidnapped and slaughtered were the Muslim murderers put on trial. In England, Sharia law is now the law for Muslims and people are becoming used to having their values and feelings take second place while sensitivity to Muslim concerns is emphasized. Resistance against Muslim rule has started to grow in Switzerland and Denmark, and poll after poll indicates the people approve curtailing Islamic growth, even if their leaders don't. In America, Islamic activity has todate been mostly operating under the radar, and the administration tamps down calls for awareness and alertness between the periods of so-called lone wolf terror acts.
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AMERICAN PERCEPTION OF TERRORISM

In America, perhaps because terrorist acts have been isolated and minimized both by the press and the government, there is not the understanding how the sustained work of the Islamists is slowly changing America. Previous issues have dealt with Muslim infiltration into mainline churches, law courts, the media, text book publishing and education, with Marxist professors openly hostile to democracy. This set of articles suggest that America needs to face the fact that the Islamists are fighting us in many ways. Many of these attacks create dry rot termite-style and do not confront us with a locust swarm of devastation. We don't even seem to recognize friend from foe. We don't comprehend how fear of terrorist retaliation has already created self-censorship in the media. We ignore that Islamic preaching of hatred of America may prefigure Mumbai-style attacks in the U.S.A. And pro-Palestinian 'grass roots' groups continue to promote boycotts of Israeli products — not, of course, the cell phone and computer and medical equipment developed in Israel, but the stuff they personally don't need. Given that the major Jewish organizations are ineffective in seriously fighting the multi-front attack on Judaism and Jews, we end with a story how one organization is fighting the boycott with a buycott of Israeli goods.

THE IDIOT TWINS OF AMERICAN IDEALISM
by Spengler

  Trust Spengler to come up with the perfect telegraph-length assessment of a morass of wrongheaded opinions. He notes that "[a] widely shared fantasy ... doesn't qualify as reality" and proceeds to demolish opinions that sound "realistic" but are based on facts that are not significant. Thus, a multitude of friends of Islam think Mearsheimer and Walt are realists because they want America to break its alliance with Israel, which has only 7 million population, when the Muslims number well over a billion. All that proves is that they can compare two numbers and pick out the larger one. Spengler highlights the significant information: given Israel's advanced technological skills, its "contribution might be decisive in a number of fields, for example avionics and especially drone technology." America needs that edge.
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THE WAR FOR 21ST-CENTURY FREEDOM
by Barbara Lerner

  "Islamists are fighting for control of the world." Their power increases; their alliances multiply; Iran serves as their model — "the world's first Islamist nuclear power." We are at war, Barbara Lerner writes, "a long-dormant, 14-century-old religious war against the Christian West," a war we must win, if we are to retain our religious freedom, our fundamental freedoms, including "the right to disbelieve." Yet here it is 8 years after 9/11. Neither Bush and now Obama faced the fact that we are at war with resurgent Islamists, a war we didn't chose and still try to deny. Iran has been on the offensive since 1979, and our leadership still ignores its attacks, believing we can work things out by negotiation and friendliness. Fortunately, Lerner points out, we "have two great trump cards: the fundamental honesty and good sense of the American people, and the back-against-the wall courage of the Israeli people." Given the right leadership, that might do.
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WOULD IRAN PROVIDE A NUCLEAR WEAPON TO TERRORISTS?
by Steven Emerson and Joel Himelfarb

  Given the number of supposedly lone-wolf terrorists attacking army bases, air planes, synagogues and Jewish community centers, there is growing concern that an Iran with nuclear weapons might decide to share these weapons with terror organizations. Steven Emerson and Joel Himelfarb ask whether such a concern is reasonable. We know there has been informal cooperation between al-Qaeda, al-Jihad, Iran and Hezbollah, including supplying weapons and training in explosives. Moreover, attacking the United States is a publically stated ambition of these groups. We know al-Qaeda continues to seek nuclear weapons, components and information in Europe and Pakistan. There is evidence that Iran is "uncomfortable at the prospect of terrorists acquiring such weapons" because our retaliation would include Iran. But conditions might change. And meantime, while some supplies from Iran have been seized, it is also likely that other shipments have succeeded in making it to Middle East terror organizations.
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THE BOMB IS JUST THE BEGINNING
by George Jonas

  An amazing story that will make you understand the real scariness of terrorism. As George Jonas writes, "The bomb is just the beginning." The act of terrorism causes you to distort your thinking to keep yourself from recognizing that you are terrified. You feel like a coward for feeling that way. The real awfulness is that you then1 not fear. It makes understandable the behavior of newspapers like the New York Times that worry about injuring the "sensitivity" of Moslems — who show their anger violently — but will print nasties about Christian and Jews — who politely complain.
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BUYCOTT ISRAEL. DON'T LET THE BOYCOTT BITE
by Roberta E. Dzubow

  Roberta Dzubow suggests a way the ordinary citizen can fight the Islamic campaign to lash out at Israel in as many ways as possible. A major tactic is to boycott Israeli products in the grocery. Or to attempt to destroy them. The Buy Israel Steering Committee has organized to counter their efforts by buying Israeli products. The basic strategy can be supplemented by having a camera handy and making a movie to post on You Tube. Talk to the other shoppers about the unfairness of the boycott campaign. Buy some of the products and hand out samples to people walking by. Just start. You'll figure out what to do next. Don't be shy.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

November 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
December 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


My aunt, Elaine Cutler, made aliyah yesterday, Thursday, November 12, 2009. She is excited about beginning this new adventure.

She was born between 1908 and 1910. So if she isn't already 100, she likely will be on her birthday, come next month.

Here she is being greeted by two of her grandchildren, Natan and Liat, at the airport.

SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER, 2009


What we are talking about in the September-October 2009 issue:
EDITORIAL: JUDGING JUDGE GOLDSTONE
THE GOLDSTONE AFFAIR (Altman, Carl of Jerusalem, Landes, NGO Monitor, Phillips, Cotler, Halevi, Warren)
OTHER WAYS THE UN GANGS UP AGAINST ISRAEL (Honig, Hertz, Grobman, Glick, Posner)
MEANTIME, THESE ARE BEING IGNORED (Huessy, Glick, Washington Times Editorial, Erlich, Stakelbeck, Phillips)
THE PEACE PROCESS AND THE 2-STATE SOLUTION (Pipes, Kaplan, Mehlman, Ettinger, Isseroff, Silverberg, Grobman, Alrabaa, Pritzker)
GUSH KATIF (Saperstein, Fendel, Miskin)
ENDING THE STALEMATE: THE TRANSFER SOLUTION (Leibler, Mandel, Greenfield, Dann, Elon, Samson Blinded)
JEWISH SELF-HATERS (Plaut, Kaplan, Stotsky)
AN INVENTIVE HISTORY FOR AN INVENTED PEOPLE (Dann, Yemini, Plaut, Chemla, Feferman)
ISLAM AS IT ACTUALLY IS (O'Neill, Warner, Ohri, Warner, Erlich, Greenfield, Imani, Greenfield, Suseelan)
MUSLIM INFILTRATION INTO THE U.S.A. (Williams, Gaffney, Shulman, Shulman, Chesler, Jasser)
HISTORY SECTION (Stein)
BLOG-ED PAGES (September, October)

EDITORIAL: JUDGING JUDGE GOLDSTONE

The Goldstone report is fast becoming the Goldstone Affair.

When we first heard of the oncoming report by a committee headed by Judge Richard Goldstone, it was because of a series of letters written by Maurice Ostroff to Judge Goldstone back in May 2009, when the fact-finding mission was first announced. We wondered why the fuss. There was no way a country as meticulous as Israel could be accused of war crimes. Arab terrorists know they are safe from IDF couterattack if they shoot from within a group of woman and children. True, even though Israel had sacrificed her soldiers in Jenin to spare civilians, still the Arabs accused them of killing some 5000 civilians. (The final count — when the propaganda smog cleared — was around 50, almost all of whom were terrorists or who had aided the terrorists by luring the IDF troops to their deaths). Notwithstanding, we still thought this was plain silly. If unintentially killing an actually innocent occasional civilian was a war crime, was there a democratic country that could not be so tarnished? And as for the arab and other totalitarian countries, had anyone even bothered making a count of their crimes against civilians?

The founders of the United Nations envisioned an environment where its members would behave in a gentlemanly fashion to argue out and negotiate differences in a peaceful manner. But times have changed.

We ignored that the Goldstone Commission was put in place by UNHRC, the Human Rights Council of the U.N. UNHRC had a long history of unsubstantiated attacks on particular countries, while it ignores what other particular countries do, no matter what they do.

But we naturally assumed there would be a red-line drawn at some point on outrageous accusations.

 READ THE ENTIRE EDITORIAL
 

THE GOLDSTONE AFFAIR
 

A LETTER TO JUSTICE RICHARD GOLDSTONE
by Professor David Altman

  There have been many articles which accurately point out the airbrushed terminology and misleading statements and bald lies in the UN Goldstone singularly biased report on Israel's conduct when it invaded Gaza in December, 2008, to put an end to eight years of Hamas' shooting missiles into Israel that targetted civilians. This letter by Daniel Altman deals with another aspect: his horror and loathing of the Cain-like behavior shown by Richard Goldstone, a Jew who has used false witness and his prestigious position to destroy his own brethren and his own country. As Altman writes, "What was in your mind, Justice Goldstone, when you became the emissary of the world's most intractable states? What were you thinking of when you became the representative of Sudan, Syria and Libya?" It is a plausible guess that Goldstone was delighted to be furthering the work of Human Rights Watch an organization — his organization — which, judging by its activities, is unduly devoted to the Palestinian cause.
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HOWARD BERMAN FISKS GOLDSTONE
by Carl of Jerusalem

  The Goldstone Report itself has fared badly in the real world. In fact, except in institutions dominated by Muslims and/or Marxists, articles are moving from condemning the report — it's so obviously biased and error-ridden, it's almost too easy a target. Now the interesting question is: why would anyone, especially a Jew, take on a task knowing from its initial mandate that it could only end by condemning what should have been praised — the care that Israel took in Gaza to avoid civilian injury while attempting to destroy the missiles Hamas was deliberately shooting at Israeli civilians. Goldstone himself wrote a disengenuous and distorted defense in the New York Times — where else? But all it showed was that he was now on the defensive. On November 3, 2009, The US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly 344 (36 voting against and 22 voting present) for a resolution that strongly rejected the Goldstone report. When the Resolution was first mentioned, Goldstone submitted a condemnation of the proposed Resolution. It was brilliantly demolished by Representative Howard Berman, (D-Cal). Carl of Jerusalem provides us with the details.
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FISKING GOLDSTONE: WHAT'S HAPPENED TO THIS MAN?
by Richard Landes

  As Representative Howard Berman (above) critiqued Judge Goldstone's rebuttal to the Congressional resolution, here Richard Landes takes apart Goldstone's New York Times essay in self-justification. Unfortunately for him, his actions don't map well onto his attitude that he is the injured party and his puzzled wonderment that his conclusions are being questioned. As more of the Committee's foolish acceptance of obvious distortions and bald lies comes to light, Judge Goldstone appears to be reacting by reinventing himself, painting a false picture of a hero trying to make sure both Israel and Hamas were treated fairly and objectively. Israel was not. And much of the reason is Goldstone's lack of objectivity and his inability to conduct a professional examination.
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HOUSE OF CARDS: NGOS AND THE GOLDSTONE REPORT
by NGO Monitor

  NGOs — Non-governmental agencies — have acquired credibility by their informal linkage to the United Nations. Some NGOs have acquired notoriety by their flagrant politicization, sacrificing truth for will-say-anything in support of the Palestinian cause. The current essay makes the point that the already notorious Goldstone report did not — as it was chartered — directly examine much actual evidence. The Goldstone group relied heavily on available reports from prejudiced NGOs that had an anti-Israel agenda; whose personnel were almost always one-sided and anti-Israel; and who in arguing were prone to illiterate and imaginative "interpretations" of International Law.
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HOW 'HUMAN RIGHTS' HAVE TURNED INTO INHUMAN WRONGS
by Melanie Phillips

  OUT of the many NGO's that supplied the Goldstone's commission with flagrantly dishonest information, Melanie Phillips deals specifically with the irresponsible behavior of one particular NGO — Human Rights Watch (HRW). What makes HRW of particular interest is, first, that Judge Goldstone was an active member until very recently. Second, HRW's behavior was so egregiously biased that its chairman for many years found it necessary to write that HRW has lost its ability to distinguish "between open and closed societies." It "has lost critical perspective on [this] conflict." The end notes include links to some pertinent videos.
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THE GOLDSTONE MISSION — TAINTED TO THE CORE
by Irwin Cotler

  The abstract in the Jerusalem Post reads that In Part I, "Professor Irwin Cotler explain[s] how the Goldstone Commission was tainted by the UN Human Rights Council resolution creating its mandate, as well as the predisposed views of some of its personnel. In the second part of his piece, he elaborates the systemic and systematic bias of the UN council itself, and the implications this bias has on the fact-finding mission and on the integrity of international law generally." [emphasis added] To put it bluntly, you can't make anything resembling a silk scarf if you start a bunch of boars with coarse hair.
 READ MORE
 

BLOCKING THE TRUTH OF THE GAZA WAR: HOW THE GOLDSTONE COMMISSION UNDERSTATED THE HAMAS THREAT TO PALESTINIAN CIVILIANS
by Col. (res.) Jonathan D. Halevi

  Goldstone and his cohorts have aided and abetted anti-Israel forces by making Israel the villain of the Gaza operation last winter. That is not the same as saying they were actually interested in making life better for the ordinary Arab in Gaza. They operated with the same motives as the UNRWA staffers that force Palestinian arabs to live in refugee camps in the Arab states and refuse to let them be absorbed as citizens in these Arab countries. The goal is to turn public opinion against Israel; it is not to help the arab populace. Colonel Halevi makes the point that offensive acts by Hamas against Gazan civilians were ignored, while negative statements against Israel were eagerly accepted as factual. The Goldstone gang played the trivia game, asking many questions about such matters as when evening prayers took place in the Ibrahim al-Maqadma mosque but asking no questions about the terrorists operating from the mosque. Their questioning "proved to be superficial and was ill-suited to elicit the truth about events in Gaza."
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THE LATEST ANTI-ISRAEL STUNT
by David Warren

  David Warren's article starts with essential context, "The significance of Israel is that she stands proxy for America and the West in the minds of our most lethal enemies." The UN Human Rights Council (HRC) is loaded with countries that — themselves human rights violators — use preaching about human rights as weapon to weaken the West. Their latest missilehead is a nominal Jew, who has changed political sides much more often than Ahmadinejad has changed suits. By refusing to withdraw from the Council, [the American administration joined HRC around the time of Durban 2 in the spring of 2009] the U.S. government is again signalling its willingness to seek favour from its own worst enemies, by throwing Israel to the wolves."
 READ MORE
 

OTHER WAYS THE UN GANGS UP AGAINST ISRAEL.

Various groups in the U.N. continuously press Israel to give up land to the Palestinians. In doing so, they ignore that the land that is Israel, Samaria, Judea, the Golan, and yes, Gaza, is held in irrevocable trust for the Jewish people. Who is responsible for maintaining this unbreakable trust? It's the U.N., who took it over from the League of Nations. Ignoring their responsibility, the Arab bloc and its allies want to destroy Israel, which sits on land they consider Arab. So they revise history, ignore mandates and continuously pressure the Jews to give up land to that invented people, the Palestinians.

IT'S NOT THE SETTLEMENTS, STUPID
by Sarah Honig

  Sarah Honig argues that it's distortion to ignore historical context, particularly, as in this case, where false premises about root causes have continued to lead to solutions that don't solve and that are continuously being dissolved and reconstructed into yet another pseudo solution. She clears up one aspect of the puzzling fact that the non-Jewish population of the Palestine Mandate, dormant for hundreds of years, jumped up dramatically in the 20th Century. It wasn't just the economic opportunities created by the Jewish Aliyah. It was specific anti-Jewish tactics by the British caretakers to reduce the Jewish population of what was destined to be Israel that gave unhindered Arab immigration a boost up.
 READ MORE
 

WORLD LEADERS IGNORE INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Eli E. Hertz

  Eli Hertz talks about the international law that pertains to the Middle East. The territory the Ottoman Empire had owned for hundreds of years was taken over by England and France after World War I. The area labeled Mandated Palestine was to be Jewish. The rest — 99.9% of the Middle East — was carved into present-day Arab states; this was never challenged. Only the peaceable Jewish state must show cause for existing, despite its title to the land. In addition to the citations in this paper, you can read other relevant legal opinions by googling Yoram Shifftan and Howard Grief.
 READ MORE
 

A DAY OF INFAMY: NOVEMBER 10, 1975
by Alex Grobman

  November 10, 1975 was one of the United Nation's most memorable days in its mission to increase harmony and civility in the world by creating an environment conducive to the peaceful resolution of differences between member countries. It was on that day that the General Assembly declared that Zionism Equals Racism. As Alex Grobman points out, this was the first time the UN condemned the intrinsic ideology that formed the bedrock of the culture and religion of a member state. It made any and all spurious charges against Israel — unthinkable in the atmosphere envisioned when the United Nations was created — acceptable. It encouraged "the campaign of disinformation orchestrated by the Arabs and their collaboraters." How else does one explain why a country that has made extraordinary advances for human betterment is treated as more evil than antiquated regimes that treat their own women and all infidels as an underclass and hate democratic ideas almost as much as they do Israel.
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THE RIGGED GAME
by Caroline Glick

  The mentality that produced the Zionism is Racism U.N. resolution and the consequent demonization of Israel is the same that encourages Europe to view Israel as evil, while overlooking Iran's ambition to create destruction nuclear power. Israel is always to blame for Iran's behavior. "So too, Arab terrorism is explained away while every act — small and large — that in any way asserts Israel's right to defend itself is pounced upon as proof of Israel's criminality and brutality." Fortunately, most Americans are more clear-eyed and assign the blame for unsuccessful peace overtures to Iran on Iran. Unfortunately, the present administration is not among this group.
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HUMAN RIGHTS LEADERS GET THEIR PRIORITIES IN ORDER
by Michael Posner

  Sarcasm is hard to get right — to make the point and not sound bitter or sour. In this essay, Michael Posner gets it just right. He envisions a meeting of the heads of important human rights groups gathered together to determine which country is the most heinous practitioner of crimes against human rights. No, it's not Darfur, or Somalia, or Sri Lanka, or Iran, or those states that mutilate the genitals of women and murder the victims of rape, or the muslims will be muslims Shi'ites and Sunnis engaged in mutual destruction. I think we know who they picked as the worst of all.
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MEANTIME, THESE ARE BEING IGNORED

While the U.N. fiddles with pasting a false label on Israel, using the Goldstone Report as glue, real problems are ignored. The UN Security Council Resolution 1701 is ignored and Hezbollah fires rockets into northern Israel from Lebanon — see this. But then #1701 never did have teeth; nor would the U.N ever suggest that Arabs firing missiles at Jewish civilians were committing a war crime. Some events, however, threaten to upset the Middle East as a whole. The increasing competence of Iran in nuclear atomics. The proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia in Yemen. The Al-Qaeda network. The effective attack against Europe. All ignored. Until when?

A 20-YEAR-OLD PUZZLE: HAVE WE DISCOVERED WHAT IRAN IS REALLY UP TO?
by Peter Huessy

  "Iran's constitution calls on the country to export its brand of murderous Islam" and it has single-mindedly sought power and regional control, using terror, kidnapping, murder, lying, bribing, arming and training terrorists, etc. In this context, Peter Huessy asks: what do we know and/or can surmise about the Iranian nuclear facilities, so we can predict future developments? We know Iran, aided by Russia, China, North Korea and Syria, is building nuclear warheads. We know her ballistic missiles can be launched quickly and will soon be able to reach Europe. We know the West, joined by Third-World countries, has not built a superior defensive shield; it has not taken military action; it has instead wasted its time lambasting "unilateral" action by U.S.A. and — including us — negotiating with the mullahs. Heussey projects what this means for interactions and actions in the near future.
 READ MORE
 

WAGING DIPLOMATIC WAR
by Caroline Glick

  A reader of the original article writes "Ms Glick is spot on. Goldstone set up Israel with his report & now his vultures are springing the trap with this talk about 'inquiry'". As Caroline Glick writes, the Goldstone report has been approved by the General Assembly. It is expected that it will eventually bring home the gold — acknowledgment by the World Court in the Hague that Israeli's entrance into Gaza was indeed a criminal act and Israeli leaders should be tried as criminals. It also sets a precedent for prosecuting Western countries for fighting terrorists. Concomitantly, the major powers announced they would be enriching Iran's uranian, thus helping Iran's nuclear program move forward faster. Iran, in characteric Muslim fashion, didn't think this good enough — and why ever would she let the enriched fuel out of the country? The American administration thinks this is all swell. Oh well, there's one silver lining. Obama has performed a miracle — Jimmy Carter will not win the prize as the worst president America ever had.
 READ MORE
 

GETTING READY FOR THE ISLAMIC BOMB
by Washington Times Editorial

I freely admit that I believed that Prez. Obama's quisling acquiescence to all things Muslim was, in a way, America's best protection against a Muslim mass murderer of the sort that has killed hundreds of Israelis and wounded thousands in the last decade alone. Why would they bother when they were successfully infiltrating and termite-gnawing at our educational and political infrastructure? Major Hasan proved me wrong. In similar fashion, this Editorial from the Washington Times points out the devastation we — not just Israel and the Arab countries of the Middle East — will suffer, should Iran be allowed to achieve nuclear capability. It points out that Iran currently supplies Hamas and Hezbollah weapons; "it is chilling to consider how much more bold Iran will be with an atomic arsenal." And, I may add, helpful to future Hasans.
 READ MORE
 

IRANIAN SUBVERSION IN YEMEN
by Reuven Erlich

  Reuven Erlich writes about how Iran is attempting to subvert the Sunni government in Yemen by aiding the Shi'ite Houthi rebels in north Yemen by providing them ideological, religious and material support. The addendum notes that Saudi Arabia is similarly aiding the Yemen government. It adds up to a proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia for control of the region.
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AL QAEDA IN NORTH AFRICA THREATENS THE WEST
by Erick Stakelbeck

  Al Qaeda certainly keeps up with the times. Al Qaeda is securely situated in Pakistan and anxious to obtain Pakastan's nuclear bombs. As Erick Stakelbeck writes, al Qaeda is not isolated. It has extended tentacles across the globe, essentially delegating regional franchises to like-minded groups. A leader of one of these groups, AQIM — Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb — has said, "We will not hesitate in targeting (the United States) whenever we can and wherever it is on this planet." AQIM pays its expenses by drug trafficing and kidnapping. It is alive and well; it shares the "goals of al Qaeda's hierarchy in Pakistan"; it has a network and a mission — to carry out jihad against the West.
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THE UNCOVERED CONSPIRACY TO TRANSFORM BRITAIN
by Melanie Phillips

  Citing a recent article by Andrew Neather, "speech writer for Tony Blair, Jack Straw and David Blunkett," Melanie Phillips concludes that the extreme increase in Muslim population in Britain didn't just happen. "It was a deliberate policy of mass immigration ... to change the very makeup of this country without telling the electorate." Immigration controls were loosened, effectively reversing a stated policy limiting the entry of foreign workers, so that "some 2.3 million migrants have been added to the population since 2001." The Labour government continue to see it as a praiseworthy way to create a multicultural England. Many a voter sees it as destructive of English culture. Moreover, if allowed to continue, it will introduce a huge number of immigrants — many of whom are iliterate and without skills — into an already overcrowded country. No wonder that the white working class is voting for the British National Party, that strongly objects to unrestricted immigration. The article mirrors what is happening in much of Europe.
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THE PEACE PROCESS AND THE 2-STATE SOLUTION

Again, the world powers are pushing for a two-state solution, whereby the Arabs gain Samaria and Judea to attach to Gaza. Whatever its form of administration — one state or two or a bunch of fiefdoms controlled by the various terrorists splinter groups — it will be called a state, just as the process whereby this occurs is called the peace-process. This is traditional ritual engaged in by Western governments, even our own — Obama is the current enthusiast. All it ever seems to do is to exacerbate Arab hostility and make the region more unstable. What has spoiled this plan each and every time is that the peace process is not a solution; it just becomes part of the problem. The so-called Palestinians aren't interested in creating yet another Arab state. If they gain this land, they will just expand their facilities for attacking what's left of Israel. But that doesn't stop Israel's "friends" from calling on Israel to stay quiet while the they chop away land that is hers by international law, by history, by bible and by conquest, when Israel fended off invasions by her Arab neighbors.

When the Ottoman Empire was dissolved, Britain was entrusted with the job of developing a tiny piece of the former Empire — labeled Mandated Palestine — as a homeland for the Jewish people. This was put in the form of an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people. Attempting to revoke this opens up a nasty can of worms — many of the current Arab states were created out of the rest of the Middle Eastern section of the Ottoman Empire. It isn't clear that they have the same standing in international law and as strong a claim to legitimacy that Israel has. (To learn more, start with the Mehlman and Mark Kaplan articles in this Section. And the Hertz article above.)

PEACE PROCESS OR WAR PROCESS?
by Daniel Pipes

  The Oslo Accord, once proclaimed as a brilliantly successful peace process and the start of a new Middle East, was a bust. Daniel Pipes examines how it was that Israel made such a profound mistake and how the Arab response to the Israeli effort shaped the Israeli rejectionist attitude towards more recent attempts at fantasy "peace processes". At the heart of the Israeli delusion was Rabin's belief that one made peace with one's enemy. "Rather," is Pipes' wise assessment, "one makes peace with one's former enemy" — after he has been defeated and given up his goals.
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THE MIDDLE EAST MATRIX
by Mark B. Kaplan

  Mark Kaplan suggests we stop listening to invented facts designed to facilitate an Arab takeover and start examining the actual facts, namely, that Israel is not occupying Palestinian land. She is occupying Jewish land, and so says international law. He may be too idealistic when he asserts that "[b]ringing the Jewish People's rights before the legal system, where propaganda will lose to factual evidence, will end the illusion of illegal occupation and firmly establish the Jewish Nation's legal rights to all of Israel." But it beats letting the Arab fantasy provide the basis for political action.
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A LANDMARK WORK
by William Mehlman

  William Mehlman begins his review of Howard Grief's recent book, "The Legal Foundation and Borders of Israel under International Law: A Treatise on Jewish Sovereignty over the Land of Israel this way: "With The Legal Foundation and Borders of Israel under International Law (Mazo Publishers, Jerusalem) Canadian-born Israeli constitutional scholar and lawyer Howard Grief has given us a book that shatters every myth, lie, misrepresentation and distortion employed over the 61 years of Israel's existence to negate the sovereign rights of the Jewish People to their national home." This is exactly right. It should be required reading for every self-styled maven, journalist, politician, ethicist and humanist — including the Jewish leaders of Israel — who thinks he knows Middle Eastern political history, when his information is, more often than not, anectodal and received from dubious sources.
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A PALESTINIAN STATE: FUEL TO THE FIRE OF A BURNING MIDDLE EAST
by Yoram Ettinger

  Yoram Ettinger reminds us that US administrations have been a major factor in the (re)(re)(re)resurrection of the insistence on creating a Palestinian state. When it comes to the Middle East, they have had many such bad ideas, beginning in 1948 when US agencies "were convinced that establishment of the Jewish State would trigger a war [it did], producing a second Jewish Holocaust in less than a decade [it didn't, but the Arabs sure tried], that a Jewish State would be a strategic burden upon the US [we have only fought wars for the Arabs, not the Jews], that Arab oil producers would boycott the US [and forfeit their stretch limos?] and that Israel would join the Communist Bloc [they got that wrong, too]." What they don't seem to recognize is that a Palestinian state isn't just a threat to Israel. It "would doom the Hashemite regime to oblivion, would constitute a tailwind to pro-Saddam terrorists in Iraq and to Islamic terrorists in Egypt, Lebanon and the Persian Gulf and would provide a foothold in the eastern flank of the Mediterranean to Iran, Russia, China and North Korea."
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GHETTO ISRAEL AND THE CREATION OF AN ARAB TERROR STATE
by Raanan Shalom Isseroff

  Raanan Isseroff illustrates his theme that Israel's leaders are colluding in the death of Israel with American agencies that produce the official U.S. maps of the Middle East. Borders and territory that are said to be not-finalized (optimistically not even negotiated) appear to be a dead certainty according to recent U.S. administrations — at least in the minds of the CIA and State Department. Israel is to be hacked and nibbled, piece by "peace process". When the new Palestinian State is created — or perhaps the new Palestinian states of Gaza and West Bank — then the Arabs will consider it an equal playing field in which to finally destroy what is left of Israel.
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OBAMA'S TWO-STATE FANTASY
by Mark Silverberg

  Pressuring Israel for concessions to the intransigent Arabs is again the wrong medicine for a misdiagnosed situation. More to the point, the peace process can be put on the back burner, with no damage. But "...if the Iranian regime continues to advance its nuclear program, it risks Iranian domination of the oil-rich Persian Gulf, threats to U.S.-allied Arab regimes, the emboldening of Muslim jihadists in the region, the creation of an existential threat to Israel, the destabilization of Iraq, the shutdown of the Israel-Palestinian peace process, and a regional nuclear-arms race." Mark Silverberg warns that "President Obama's whole Middle East strategy is in the process of imploding. He had best re-evaluate his policies rather than advise the Israelis to re-evaluate theirs." An addendum lists Steven Plaut's "The 14 Lies Blocking Peace in the Middle East."
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IS ANYONE LISTENING TO WHAT THE ARABS ARE SAYING ABOUT ISRAEL?
by Alex Grobman

  Alex Grobman provides us with some history of the Arab monomaniacal resistance to sharing any part of land they regard as their own with Jews. (How quickly they forgot that it was the Ottomans, not the Arabs, that had ruled the Middle East for hundreds of years!) It reinforces his statement that "[e]ven if the Obama administration were to succeed in compelling Israel to accept a two-state solution and stop building settlements in Judea and Samaria, this would not placate the Arabs or ensure peace in the region." Considering their history of protracting the conflict, this is an understatement.
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ARABS ARE NOT READY FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Dr. Sami Alrabaa

  Professor Alrabaa rounds out the ideas in the previous paper with cogent insights into current-day Arab thinking. To ready the Arabs for peace would require extirpating their universally undemocratic systems of government and dismissing the demagogues that rule the area, It would require a formidable change in Arab attitudes towards themselves and towards everyone else, who, at present, they either look down on or resent. If the West is serious about peace in the region, it will tell the Arab regimes: change or perish! Only then peace will prevail in the Middle East.
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HEVRON : A MICROCOSM IN THE NEW YEAR
by Yonina Pritzker

  Yonina Pritzker describes her visit to Hebron, viewing it both as an ancient Jewish city in which Judaism's early history is rooted and as a small-scale model of the players and the pressures Israel needs to confront to protect her heritage. She writes, "Hevron is a microcosm. Hevron represents the duplicity and grave injustice that is being perpetrated against Jews today, against Jewish history and heritage. If something so clear, so straightforward, so indisputable as Hevron, if something as unmistakable as the Jewish connection to Hevron can be so rewritten, so misrepresented; if those around the world can literally turn history on its head and accuse Jews of being occupiers in Hevron, then the absolute, dire necessity to stand up and fight against this attempt to subvert the truth and rob Jews of their history, heritage, and homeland has never been made more clear."
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GUSH KATIF

As we know, there has been a trial run of ceding land to the Palestinian Arabs to develop infrastructure to run themselves as a civilized state. It failed miserably, despite the good wishes of most of the world, an abundance of funds contributed by the EU, the UN, the USA and private individuals. Aside from enriching some of the Arab thugs running Gaza, it caused a catastrophic disruption in the lives of some 10,000 Israeli Jews. The results should not encourage anyone to repeat the disaster on a larger scale, when up to some half a million or more Jews would become homeless refugees in their own country, dependent on a services of a bureaucracy that has convincingly proven itself inept.

MOSHE: BETRAYED BY OUR OWN; RACHEL: FLASHBACKS
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  These are some recent essays from the Sapersteins, who were as traumatized as one is when forced out of what Moshe has described as Paradise — their community in Gush Katif, Gaza. But they've picked themselves up. Being Jews, they didn't feel gunning down people was the way to ease their heartache; instead they started rebuilding their community in a different location. An amazing couple.
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IMMEDIATE GUSH KATIF ASSISTANCE ADVISED
by Hillel Fendel

  There was a period of demonizing the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza before they were expelled from their homes and greenhouses and farms in August 2005. Many believed that as soon as Gaza was turned over to the Arabs, peace would descend. What descended was the large number of rockets the Arabs lobbed into Israel, deliberately targetting the civilian population. Most people wised up and since then, appeasement has been a hard sell. Still, the people who suffered most were the families who were forced to leave thriving enterprises, where they had grown bug-free vegetables that were sold all over the world; their plight was not made easier by the inept governmental bureaucracy responsible for resettling them. Many have still not recovered. What is also interesting about the article is that there are still people like Nechemiah Strassler, a columnist for Haaretz, who seems to have learned nothing from the expulsion and retained much of the government-induced belief that the Jewish settlers of Gaza were demons who were preventing peace from happening.
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MAZUZ OKAYS HOUSING FOR KFAR DAROM EXPELLEES
by Maayana Miskin

  The Kfar Darom community had developed innovative agricultural techniques and grown bug-free vegetables that were sold all over the world. Four years after the expulsion, their greenhouses have long since been vandalized by the Arabs and plans for permanent housing for them are just now being made. And the settlers themselves have suffered unemployment that has forced them to use up the compensation money that was to pay for building new homes.
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ENDING THE STALEMATE: THE TRANSFER SOLUTION

These essays deal with procedures that have a chance of succeeding because they are not built on fantasy and wishful thinking. First, Israel must stop blustering and being defensive and start standing tall. Then Israel's legal and moral right to its land has to be strongly asserted. And the Palestinian Arabs have to be moved where they can not just walk down the road to carry out an act of terrorism.

ISRAEL HAS TO STOP APOLOGIZING AND TAKE THE OFFENSIVE
by Isi Leibler

  Isi Leibler makes the case that the best defense for Israel is an effective offense. Applied to responding to the Goldstone report, this would mean that Israel would not be focussed on responding to the findings in the report. Instead, as Leibler writes, "these past few months we should have been concentrating on exposing the evil nature and crude bias of the Human Rights Council before it released its 'findings.' We should have more vigorously exposed the prejudice and double standards of the despicable NGO human rights bodies that have adopted Israel-bashing as a vocation." It's not too late to begin to be effective.
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THE ONLY FEASIBLE BASIS FOR ARAB-ISRAELI PEACE
by Daniel Mandel

  Daniel Mandel writes that peace-process diplomacy is ultimately worthless. "In the current round, Fatah, which controls the PA, can hold a conference reasserting its refusal to accept Israel's existence as a Jewish state while glorifying terrorists and rejecting an end of claims in any future peace agreement with Israel and yet the Obama Administration acts as though the key to the problem is to stop Jews moving into eastern Jerusalem and the West Bank." But long term it would be better if "Israeli and Western leaders would ... declare candidly that Palestinians do not accept Israel and support terrorism against her and that they will not deal with or support the PA under these conditions." That would put the onus on the Arabs, and after all only the terrorists can stop their own terror acts voluntarily. Israel can't stop terror by giving the Arabs concessions that just whet their appetites for more Israeli concessions.
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THE INHUMANITY OF BEING HUMANE TO TERRORISTS
by Daniel Greenfield

  Daniel Greenfield in answer to a reader's comment wrote: "I don't admire Patton, I'm pointing out that he was correct about the priorities of wartime." The objective was to win. And to win, "you must kill the enemy." Today we need to fight a war that was started by Islamic terrorists. And we won't win by ascribing to them our high-minded views. The choice is binary. "We can coddle the terrorists, or we can push them. We coddled them for years until 9/11 happened. Now we have gone back to coddling them again. But there will be more than only a moral price to pay for that, but a bill presented written in the blood of Americans."
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ANNEXING JUDEA AND SAMARIA: THE ONLY VIABLE ROAD MAP TO PEACE, STABILITY
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann articulates what must be done to prevent Israel losing land that legitimately belongs to it. He writes, "The State of Israel can and should change its archaic and ambiguous position and extend full sovereignty to all Jewish communities throughout Judea and Samaria, including State Land and areas necessary for defense and security." Obviously, Israel should acknowledge that Samaria and Judea belong to Israel. If she doesn't, why should anyone else?
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SOLVING THE REFUGEE ISSUE
by Rabbi Benny Elon

  Of the millions of refugees around the globe, the Palestinian refugees are the only ones that continue to be refugees for more than a few years. In fact, generations of their descendants have been added to the refugee list, and no one has been removed. The Palestinian arabs are kept from resettling for political reasons. Rabbi Elon points out that the Palestinian refugee problem can be solved by taking the refugees and the money expended for their care away from UNRWA. "This money can be put to better use when it will be invested in full and generous rehabilitation of the refugees, funded by the US, Europe, and Israel, together with the Arab oil-producing countries."
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TRANSFER MADE EASY
by Samson Blinded

  The majority of international organizations are still trying to square the circle — how to get Palestinian Arabs and Jews to live together or next to each other as friendly neighbors. This experiment has been ongoing for a hundred years and it doesn't work — the Arabs want to kill off Israel, not live peacefully in it or next to it. And the romantics — the Jews who thought the Arabs would be delighted because the Jews were reawakening a sluggish, poverty-stricken area, by introducing a viable economy — well, they seem to have all died out. What you have now in Israel is a majority opinion that wants to separate from the Arabs and a minority Marxist opinion that wants to bolster the Palestinians even if it means destroying Israel. The Land of Israel belongs to Israel by international law. There is no reason Israel should not transfer the Arabs from its territory a few miles into the immense domain that is Arab land. Samson Blinded discusses how this can be done.
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JEWISH SELF-HATERS

This group of self-haters may not have done as much damage to Israel's good name as Judge Goldstone, but they are in there, trying their best.

JOEL BEININ'S JIHAD
by Steven Plaut

  Front Page Magazine has been running a series on Jewish Leftists — Collaborators, Quislings against the West and its strongest ally, Israel. In this essay, Steven Plaut examines what makes Joel Beinin of Stanford Univeristy tick. It is bizarre that living on an egalitarian kibbutz made him a believer in Israel as evil while living in Egypt with its "open racial and religious discrimination" made him a believer in the Arab desire to destroy Israel. Today, he has graduated to admiration to that murderer par excellence, Chairman Mao of China. What still needs examination is why a poor excuse for a scholar holds a prestigious position in an elite university.
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SALARIED BY ISRAELI TAXPAYERS, HISTORY PROFESSOR SHLOMO SAND DENIES THE EXISTENCE OF A JEWISH PEOPLE
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan writes about Shlomo Sand, who is strikingly audacious, even among the many Israeli Marxist academics, who devote themselves to delegitimizing Israel in new and outrageous ways. He doesn't just think Jews are living on Arab land — he denies the entire history of the attachment of Jews to the Land of Israel. Admittedly, his revisionism isn't quite up to the level of Columbia's Arab professor, Nadia Abu El-Haj, who is capable of denying the tangible evidence of archeology. Sand merely distorted historical fact and minimized Israel's anguished history in the diaspora. In his version there is a disconnect between today's Jews and the Jews of the Bible. And while his history might be defective, his assertions have certainly pleased many an anti-semite.
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CHOMSKY LITE: ANNA BALTZER JOINS ANTI-ISRAEL CAMPAIGNS
by Steven Stotsky

  Steven Stotsky writes about Anne Baltzer, who "tours US campuses, churches and community venues denigrating Israel with baseless and propagandistic allegations." She invokes her "Jewish roots and grandparents lost to the Holocaust to establish her supposed moral authenticity," but her "ideological roots are firmly planted in the anti-Zionist movement. ... She is affiliated with the International Women's Peace Service (IWPS), a group closely associated with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). Her political message closely reflects the official Palestinian line claiming Israel is a foreign occupier guilty of ethnic cleansing and that the wrongs done to the Arabs can only be righted by reverting back to a mythological pre-Zionist Palestinian land." The narrative relies on historic falsehoods and extravagant fantasies, well beyond what even Amnesty International and HRW will swallow.
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AN INVENTIVE HISTORY FOR AN INVENTED PEOPLE

The first articles in this set discuss how the Palestinian people were invented. How group cohension is perpetuated is no mystery: education, food, housing and health care for anyone declaring himself a refugee are subsidized by the monies given to UNRWA, the U.N. agency responsible for keeping them in perpetual homelessness. In Gaza, huge amounts of funds poured in to pump up the economy artificially and in short spurts. The early history of Palestine is never discussed — maybe because there never was a state or country of Palestine. But ancient myths persist. The myth of peaceful coexistence between Muslim, Jews and Christian in medieval times — with Muslims in the driver's seat, of course — should by now have gone the way of ex-Prez Bush's pronouncement right after 9/11 that Islam is a peaceful religion. Instead, it is still being shamelessly asserted.

A DIRTY LITTLE SECRET
by Moshe Dann

  Crafty Yasser Arafat is the one credited with deciding that the Arabs weren't going to destroy Israel by fighting the Jews head on. So he invented the Palestinian people, who, he claimed, were native to Palestine (a state that had never existed). Ignoring that this "people" were mostly natives of the neighboring Arab countries, he declared Israel was occupying Palestinian land. Ergo, they were justified — and here the media and many a mainline church agreed with him — in doing anything and everything to regain their land. As Moshe Dann points out, "the fraud worked!" "The success of 'Palestinianism' is a tribute to what money, influence and Jew-hatred will buy and attract." It's time this hoax was exposed.
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INCITEMENT WINS OVER THE ECONOMY AMONG THE PALESTINIANS AT THE END OF THE DAY
by Ben-Dror Yemini

  The major theme of the Palestinian People Myth is that there exists a people that once owned a country called Palestine and this land was invaded and occupied by foreigners, Jews. A subsidiary myth dear to the hearts of foreigners, Westerners, is that if you give a guy a home and a job, he won't want to vandalize and destroy and terrorize his neighbors. Unfortunately, that doesn't work in Gaza. Money has poured in. But the spiritual and secular leaders keep the people in shape for rapid explosion. The Arab people have been emotionally prepped for violence by skillful conditioners.
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OUT WITH THE OCCUPIERS!
by Steven Plaut

  The belief that the Arabs own the Land that is Israel and the Jews do not is a political version of Goldilocks and the three bears. The Jews owned it too long ago and too short a time ago. But the Arabs who conquered the area at the rise of Islam — well, that's just the right time ago. A popular pro-Arab argument is that it has "been nearly 1,900 years since Jews exercised sovereignty there — and it is absurd to argue that any group still has rights to land they last governed such a long time ago." Steven Plaut turns the argument on its fez with a few home truths. For one, If recency wins, then the birth of modern Israel trumps because the last time the Arabs held the land was much earlier. And even then, it was Arabs, not Palestinian Arabs, in charge. It's a pleasure to watch a logical mind spell out the implications of the fanciful nonsense the Arabs dish out.
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AN "ISLAMICALLY CORRECT" CONFERENCE
by Véronique Chemla

  The myth of Islam's benevolent rule over its minority citizens, Christians and Jews, in medieval Spain, has been exploded. Being a dhimmi was ego-crushing, at best. Nevertheless, as Véronique Chemla informs us, the fiction of peaceful coexistence is apparently still serviceable. At the recent Aladdin Project conference at UNESCO, it was promoted by Jewish and Christian diplomats, educators and clerics and other culture gatekeepers, all anxious to develop better relations with Islam. The myth suggested that it would be wonderful to reinstate the good old days and it spread a feeling of bonhomie within the group. Under such circumstances, it would be boorish to complain about the brutal treatment of dhimmis in countries currently under Sharia law. But West-bashing and Israel-bashing were acceptable. All in all, the Conference contributed to the advancement of the long-term Muslim agenda.
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THE MYTH THAT FUELS MIDEAST CONFLICT
by Bob Feferman

  Bob Feferman points out that when UNSCOP visited Mandated Palestine in 1947, it was clear that the Jews — who already numbered some 450,000 before World War 2 — had developed the infra structure of statehood: agriculture, industry, schools, health-care, newspapers, theatre. They were ready. Nevertheless, Arab propaganda blast forward with one theme. "... the Jewish state was created at the expense of the Arabs of Palestine in order to ease the conscience of the world over the tragedy of the Nazi Holocaust." This distorted history makes it seem the Jews had a free ride to statehood, so the local Arabs could — and still do — ignore their own lackluster efforts toward developing a modern state.
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ISLAM AS IT ACTUALLY IS

Arabs, by and large, are Muslim. As such, their lives are determined by the Koran, the Islamic holy book, the Hadith (Mohammed's traditions) and the Sunna (a compilation of Mohammed's words and actions). This group of essays examines aspects of Islam, not as fantasizers describe it, but as it actually is. Some of these essays deal directly with misleading but politically correct notions that are foisted on the public by pro-Palestinian propaganda in the media.

ISLAM AND THE DARK AGE OF BYZANTIUM
by John J. O'Neill

  The received wisdom is that Islam salvaged the textual fruits and scientific findings of the classic civilizations of Greece and Rome when the western part of Charlesmagne's empire, Europe, went into a decline in the 7th century. In the 1930's a Belgium historian, Henri Pirenne, argued Islam was itself responsible for the Dark Ages in Europe by blockading the Mediterranean. The counter argument to Pirenne was that the emergence of Islam didn't destroy Byzantium, the Eastern part of the Empire — by all accounts it continued to thrive. In this essay and in his book, John O'Neill suggests that if we discount the Byzantine propaganda, recent archeological evidence supports Pirenne — civilization fell in both the East and the West with the advent of Islam.
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FACTS, FALLACIES AND BIGOTS
by Bill Warner

  Bill Warner presents us, in his words, with "an exercise in fact-based rational thought." He quotes a fairly typical, politically correct, fair-minded Rabbi committed to ecumenicism and determined to think well of everyone. Warner quotes the letter that embodies that point of view, then proceeds to demonstrate that this image of Islam doesn't conform to reality. Defusing the hatred in the Koran because the Jewish and Christian Scriptures also — in the Rabbi's words — contain "bad material" doesn't anwer why Jews and Christians have moved on, but Muslims still stone people and behead them and cut off hands for trivial offenses.
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THE LONG MARCH OF ISLAM: INTRODUCTION AND CHAPTER 1
by R.K. Ohri

  This essay is the Introduction and Chapter 1 of R.K. Ohri's book "Long March Of Islam: The Future Imperfect. As K.P.S. Gill — who served as Director General of Police in Punjab and is currently a consultant on counter-terrorism — writes in the book's Foreword, "Political Islam has gone broadly unchallenged, ... The disastrous consequences of this neglect are now manifested in the increasing radicalisation of this ideology, and its assertion through an assortment of Islamist terrorist movements projected by their principals as jehads. [...] The global response has, however, centred overwhelmingly on neutralizing these manifestations alone — the terrorist groups that constitute immediate and direct threats to individual and state security. An ideological response to the rising tide of Islamist terrorism is yet to emerge in significant measure." Ohri's book is an serious but very readable examination of the ideological underpinnings of terrorism within the context of group relationships, affiliations and population size — factors that affect actual events, now and in the future.
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LOSING ISRAEL
by Bill Warner

  Bill Warner asserts that "Israel is losing the propaganda war, hasbarah, and for a very good reason." Israelis are not inclined to deal with propaganda because they would have to examine Islam. They would have to "face the facts that the Koran and the Sunna (the actions and words of Mohammed) are filled with invectives against the Jews." They would have to grasp that "... when the Jews of Medina rejected Mohammed as a prophet they were all enslaved, exiled, murdered and robbed — all acts of jihad. These were not historical acts, but perfect examples of Islamic action towards Jews models prescribed for Muslims to follow up to the present time." Jews also need to understand that resurgent Islam isn't just targetting them. "[T]he Israel/Palestinian conflict is no different than the jihad in Kashmir, India, the Philippines, or in dozens of fronts in Africa" but global jihad does target Jews, and this has to be acknowledged before intelligent and incisive action can be taken. Praying for some flabby peace won't work. People don't fight effectively against a threat until they acknowledge the threat is real.
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ISRAEL IN THE IRANIAN MEDIA
by Reuven Erlich (Colonel, Ret.)

  Iran is on a roll. The nastier she sounds, the nicer the West is towards her. And the West did nothing to encourage the election protesters. As Reuven Erlich writes, "This past month Iranian defiance of Israel and the West reached new heights.." Basically, Iran's leadership feels ready to take on the leadership of those who are anti-West in the Middle East. It is "of the opinion that it has the military and ideological-religious capabilities to breathe new life into the original sentiments of the Muslim-Arab peoples: hatred for Zionism, the establishment of the State of Israel (the 'cancerous growth') and the West which supported it after the Holocaust ('an imaginary event'). "Using what's written in the press as a mirror of government thinking, Iran feels its a winner and its first target is Israel. It has every intention of pursuing "a defiant, revolutionary agenda, where emphasis will be placed on support for the terrorist and Islamic networks around the world, especially the Middle East." This article is loaded with insights into the thinking of the leaders of a country that has made itself a major threat to world peace.
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IS ISLAMIC TERRORISM REACTIVE OR PROACTIVE?
by Daniel Greenfield

  This essay by Daniel Greenfield deals with the politically correct notion that terrorism is "a kind of desperate activism taken in reaction to oppression." It treats the terrorist as a victim of X, where X depends on the writer's own attitudes. X is capitalism for the Marxist, Zionism for the anti-Semite, US foreign policy for the hater of America, etc. But the reactive model breaks down when subjected to inquiry into who the terrorists are, where did they come from and what was their ideological education. A statement from the Muslim Brotherhood makes clear that jihad "is an obligation on every Muslim in order to spread Islam to the infidels and subjugate Jews and Christians who refuse to live under Islamic law." And millions of Muslims subscribe to this belief. [Addendum: the media ascribed the massacre at Fort Hood to Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome until it was pointed out that Major Hasan had never been to a war zone. Then some suggested he caught it from returning soldiers — like it was a virus.]
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ISLAM IS MISUNDERSTOOD
by Amil Imani

  To believe the ubiquitous ads and media puff pieces about peaceful, tolerant Islam, you'd have to conclude that Islam is being undeservedly maligned. People just haven't understood how well Islam fits into a multicultural country. It is curious, Amil Imani notes, that the multicultural euphemism is not ever "even mentioned by any Islamic leader, ever printed in the Islamic press, or ever appears in any form anywhere in Muslim countries." To put it bluntly but accurately, the purpose of the "multiculturalism gambit is Islam manufactured wool to pull over the eyes of the non-Muslims while the Muslims carry on with their unrelenting campaign of eradicating anything or anyone non-Islamic anywhere in the world."
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THE MUSLIM WOLF AT FEMINISM'S DOOR
by Daniel Greenfield

  The spread of Islamic customs and practices to Europe, North America and Australia means that immigrant Muslim women continue to be treated as they are in Islamic countries. Moreover, because any women is regarded as subject to punishment if they are not completely covered, rapes of non-Muslim women are becoming common. Daniel Greenfield deals with one aspect of this: the non-response, the lack of indignation, by feminists. He notes that "[r]ather than confront the threat to women posed by Islamic law, feminist authors like Naomi Wolf are instead claiming that the wolf is really a misunderstood poodle." They do not support their sisters who try to fight back in Muslim countries; they side with Islam law, ducking the issue by insisting that the wearing of a head schmatta will make women free. How very curious.
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THE MAKING OF ISLAMIC TERRORISTS
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  The world has come a long way towards civilized behavior by suppressing destructive instincts. Islam is different. "Islam was started by predators and spread by predators. It has lived off the decaying corpses of the civilizations it has destroyed." Babu Suseelan notes that "[s]ince 1973, there have been 179 armed conflict around the world 169 were involved with Muslims." Their goal is to replace democracy with Sharia law, with the suicide/bombing a major tool. To understand this, Suseelan examines the psychology of the jihadist homicide bomber, starting with his early indoctrination from his Islamic religious education, and proceeding, state by stage, to more ideologically-driven conscienceless behavior. Suseelan points out this will not stop as long as our only response is attempting to punish the jihadist in a criminal justice system, which has proven ineffective in handling this type of situation.
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MUSLIM INFILTRATION INTO THE U.S.A.

The beltway sniper, who terrorized Washington, D.C. and its environs in 2002, is finally going to be executed this November. This news occasioned essays on loner terrorists and why the media and law agencies continue to deny that they were inspired by a similar ideology, even if the gunmen didn't conspire as a group. Mearsheimer and Walt and terrorist fronts like Cair and the major media continue to blame the Jooz for whatever ails us, It is a distraction from what we should be attending to — preventing the spread of Sharia law. An immediate problem is preventing the return of a Muslim girl who converted to Christianity to her parents, because that would increase the chances that she will not live to see her next birthday.

BELTWAY SNIPERS EXPOSED AS MUSLIM TERRORISTS
by Paul L. Williams

  Most building invasions and drive-by killings by single Muslims have been single-time events and dismissable as random. In this essay, Paul L. Williams follows up on the 2002 series of terror killings by John Muhammad and his 17-year old side-kick, Malvo. Muhammad's previous army experience was stressed, as if that was responsible for his behavior. It was just a year after 9/11, yet the duo's affiliation to terror groups, their dedication to Islam and their anti-semitism were heatedly denied or just ignored by the media, until courtroom exhibits made denial impossible. In 2009, the mainstream media are again ignoring the role the Islamic religion played in his terror spree when announcing that Muhammad's execution date has been set.
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TERROR SUSPECTS CONNECTION: SHARIAH
by Frank Gaffney Jr.

  There are individuals and small groups that — even if they have never met — are bonded in that they have the same commitment: to inflict sharia law on the West. At the very least, the success of one encourages others to work towards their common goal. The West seems to have no way to cope, except to treat each episode of terror as a separate event, unrelated to other such events. We focus on the terrorists who invades our airports and community centers, while ignoring their ideology. Frank Gaffney points out that dealing with the root cause of jihad by denial and accomodation has encouraged terrorism, not stopped it. [Update: This article was published before the Fort Hood massacre.]
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11 MEARSHEIMER-WALT ERRORS ON THE ISRAEL LOBBY
by Richard H. Shulman

  Mearsheimer and Walt's articles and books serve to popularize and make respectable the pro-Palestinian anti-Israel rhethoric in current use. They are professors in respectable universities — surely one can assume that they have carefully examined the facts and speak truth. Unfortunately, the only truth is that they nicely rephrase the raw anti-semitism heard from cruder tongues. They are very successful at this and are cited on all the sleezoid sites. Richard H. Shulman has done a masterful job in summarizing the major areas they cover and in uncovering their errors.
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HOW THE MEDIA REPORTS TEMPLE MOUNT CLASHES IN JERUSALEM
by Richard H. Shulman

  Think of this article as a teaching experience. Richard Shulman describes how two major newspapers reported a news story on clashes. Same data were available to both; both contributed political slants to a "news story." Considering the respect given The New York Times, it is surprising — except we've learned from experience this happens all the time — that its headline was misleading and important facts are omitted. Moreover, "the Times, as is its custom, writes that Israel is in "contested territory that Israel took from Jordan in the 1967 war. Without explanation, its seizure sounds improper. Actually, Jordan had no right to it, having seized it by aggression." The Wall St. Journal labeled the Jews that wanted to pray at their own temple "extremists" and "hard-line". Why? "Neither paper mentioned that the Muslim Arabs believe that they alone have rights to the Temple Mount and to the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron." As usual, Arab violence is not the result of incitement by Arab leaders; "it is due to frustration with the stalled negotiations." Of course. What else could it possibly be?
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MUSLIM MAFIA EXPOSED
by Phyllis Chesler

  P. David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry have written a well-documented account of CAIR and its tactics in carrying out its mission, which is to islamize America, using a variety of tactics that include labelling anyone who criticizes them as an Islamophobe. CAIR — Council for American Islamic Relations — was founded by members of a Hamas-support network and its major funding is not U.S.A. "grass roots" but comes from Sunni Gulf States donors. In this essay, Phyllis Chesler focusses on how CAIR trivializes abuse of women and financially aids men who have committed honor code murders in the U.S.A. and Canada.
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RIFQA BARY, ISLAM, MUSLIMS, SHAR'IAH, AND APOSTASY
by M. Zuhdi Jasser

  Rifqa Bary converted from Islam to Christianity and fled her home, saying she feared for her life. Dr. Jasser, himself a devout Muslim, believes "the preponderance of the intellectual evidence shows a systemic intolerance and, in fact, there is strong evidence for legal (Shar'iah-based) underpinnings for the intolerance, abuse, discrimination, and even at its worst, direct countenance of murder of apostates." He believes this isn't acceptable to the majority of lay Muslims, but the ulemaa (theocratic scholars) do have their influence, even in the West. And there are enough cases of Muslims killing their children to protect the honor of the family to take Rifqa's fears seriously. There is also the larger question for the Muslim community: will they circle the wagons and play the put-upon victim as does CAIR or will they venture at reform. As Jasser writes, American Muslims "can either hold blindly onto tradition, victimization, tribalism, and obfuscation or they can use these cases as teaching moments to highlight the reform necessary within our communities..."
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HISTORY SECTION

THE EXECUTIONER
by Rachel Ginsberg

  For all the horrors of the Holocaust, Israel actually has only executed one man, Adolph Eichman. And that needed a special act, because Israel does not have the death penalty as punishment, no matter what the crime. Rachel Ginsberg recounts the history of the execution. It had two important consequences. It broke the silence and numbness that for some 15 years had surrounded the Holocaust and survivors began speaking up. Also, this is the precedent for revising the law so that Israel could deal appropriately with terrorists whose goal is to destroy the Jewish state.
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THE SCOURGE OF ARAB INFILTRATION
by Leslie Stein

  Arab terror strikes against Jews in Israel began long before the recent claim that Arabs are merely reacting to Israel "occupying" the West Bank. From the late 1800's on, the Jews were reviving the economy in an area that had been rock-bottom stagnant for hundreds of years, but the controlling Arab sentiment was anger and resentment that any group other than Arab should dominate land — no matter how small and undeveloped — that Arabs claimed as their own. Leslie Stein writes about the Arab guerilla warfare soon after Israel became a state in 1948. It cost Israel hundreds of slaughtered lives before Israel began responding effectively. Sensibly, the "severity of Israeli retaliations had not been calibrated" on proportional retaliation but to the "potential impact on the behaviour of Israel's adversaries." It encouraged the Jordanian and Egyptian governments (temporarily) to curb some infiltration into Israel. Unfortunately, Israel was intimidated by the international outcry at Israel defending itself, a hostility mislabeled as the "moral" view. Sound familiar?
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
October 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


JULY-AUGUST, 2009


What we are talking about in the July-August 2009 issue:
THE IRANIAN NUCLEAR THREAT (Bayefsky, Beres, Wald, Gilder)
A PALESTINIAN STATE INSIDE ISRAEL (Plaut, Sultan Knish, Ettinger)
NEW PALESTINA IN ARAB LAND (King, Al-Shiryan, Spengler, Honig, Faybyshenko, Shane, Kossoff)
WITHDRAWALS: PREVIOUS AND PROPOSED (YidWithLid, Greenwald, Issar, Saperstein, Dann, Ettinger)
HAMAS PR IN GAZA; FOREIGN PR COMES TO THE WEST BANK (Erlich, Schanzer, Frantzman)
JIHAD IN THE WEST (Gordon, Landen, Prelutsky, Jochnowitz, Fulford, Stillwell, Dann, Wasserman, Dunleavy, Ginsberg, Gorin)
CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN THE WEST (Van Zile, Sharpe)
JEWISH SELF-HATERS (Frantzman, Kaplan, Hausman)
The MEDIA (Shepherd, Kramer, Rubin, Levin)
HISTORY SECTION: Islamic Colonizers, Rescuing Jews (Fjordman, Rigler)
BLOG-ED PAGES (July)

This issue, we emphasize two critical threats to Israel: Iran's continuing to build a nuclear bomb and the Obama Administration's insistence on creating a Palestinian state in Biblical Israel (the "West Bank"). As our readers know, Think-Israel has argued that either a 1-state solution or a 2-state solution was a prescription for a 0-state of Israel. The retort usually is: don't you think the Palestinians deserve their own State? To which we reply: If you want them to have another state to add to the existing 20 Arab states and the 57 Muslim states, there are large amounts of underpopulated regions in the 99.9% of the Middle East that the Arabs control. A tiny fraction of that land would provide space for a Palestinian state 10 times the size of Israel. This way, you still have a viable and productive Israel continuing to benefit mankind. And you just might have a functional Palestinian state: "New Palestina."

THE IRANIAN NUCLEAR THREAT

While Obama fiddles around hoping to play a soothing tune that will please the Iranian ear, Iran continues its development of the nuclear bomb to destroy Israel. It considers "collateral damage" to local Arabs and to oil pipes at Haifa worth it. Nor is it reassuring that the now Secr.-of-State Clinton promised last year that America will attack Iran if she launches a nuclear attack against Israel. Should a nuclear attack by Iran be allowed to happen by negligence or miscalculation by the policy makers, afterwards, along with the recriminations of why didn't the world act, we can expect stepped-up global terrorism from a jubilant Islam and strident demands for instituting sharia law. Israel? She will be barely viable. So, together with oil delivery disruptions and horror stories on the nightly news, the world will discover it has lost the powerhouse of modern inventiveness in technology, engineering and medicine that Israel has become.

HOW WE KNOW OBAMA WON'T STOP IRAN AND HOW HE GOES ABOUT DOING NOTHING
by Anne Batefsky

  Anne Bayefsky lists the reasons that make it obvious that President Obama — if it's left up to him — has no intention of stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear arms. Obama "... is refusing to back strong, immediate sanctions in response to Iran's umpteen violations of the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and human rights." His "only concrete plan ... is more talk" despite Iran's lack of response and there are no plans for a reassessment of what is a failed policy based on false premises. This places Israel in the untenable position of risking potential annihilation by doing nothing or doing something and risking "the ire of a deeply hostile president." And all the while, Iran is certainly doing much of a something to develop her nuclear capability.
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MR. OBAMA'S CONTRADICTIONS AND ISRAELI SURVIVAL
by Louis René Beres

  Iran announces that it was developing a nuclear bomb — for peaceful uses, of course. Its first job has been announced: destroy Israel. And the world sits as quiet and uninvolved as the brain-washed captives in the Manchurian Candidate. Professor Beres paints a graphic and frightening and — worst of all — accurate picture of the physical and medical consequences of a nuclear attack on Israel. As he writes, "[n]o country can be expected to cooperate in its own annihilation."
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THERE IS A MILITARY OPTION ON IRAN
by Chuck Wald

  This is a sober assessment of how the U.S. military could confront Iran, before it succeeds in developing nuclear armament. General Wald points out that "[i]f the Iranian regime continues to advance its nuclear program despite the best efforts of Mr. Obama and other world leaders, we risk Iranian domination of the oil-rich Persian Gulf, threats to U.S.-allied Arab regimes, the emboldening of radicals in the region, the creation of an existential threat to Israel, the destabilization of Iraq, the shutdown of the Israel-Palestinian peace process, and a regional nuclear-arms race." The future consequences of Prez Obama's insouciance will likely make Jimmy Carter's gross error in forcing the Shah of Iran off the throne seem small potatoes.
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CAPITALISM, JEWISH ACHIEVEMENT, AND THE ISRAEL TEST
by George Gilder

  This article by George Gilder is based on his most recent book. David Pryce-Jones wrote about it this way: "Israel of course has its defenders, but they use arguments based on nationalism, territory, ethnicity, defence of minorities, rights, historicism, and so on. Gilder sees Jews since their emancipation as the vanguard of human achievement. They may be few in numbers, but their creativity has brought prosperity to themselves and those around them, and that prosperity in turn has brought freedom." Relating his thesis to the Arab-Israeli conflict, Gilder asks, "Are you for civilization or barbarism, life or death, wealth or envy? Are you an exponent of excellence and accomplishment or of a leveling creed of troglodytic frenzy and hatred?"
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A PALESTINIAN STATE INSIDE ISRAEL

Israel is faced with another threat to its survival, one just as pressing as the threat of nuclear annihilation — the creation of a Palestinian Arab state in Biblical Israel. Obama's CEO in charge of thuggery and threats, Rahm Emanuel, has told Israel it MUST make concessions to the arabs "for peace" — starting by throttling Jewish towns in the "West Bank" — else America will thwart any attempt by Israel to defang Iran. Sounds like a old third-rate movie: swallow the poison or I will shoot you. This section explains why we can't have a 2-state solution with an Arab state inside and/or next to Israel.

TWO-STATE SOLUTION — OR POTEMKIN PEACE
by Steven Plaut

  A one-state solution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict or a two-state solution would have the same predictable outcome: the destruction of the Jewish State. A one-state binational state would have the Jews pay for a preponderance of Arab births, which has only one objective: democractically crushing the Jewish state. The two-state solution sounds, in comparison, like a sober solution. It isn't. Steven Plaut points out it is paper-thin, with no substance. Trim away the nonsense and political babble and bombast and there is — as there has always been — one simple reason why there is no peace: "the refusal of the Arab world to come to terms with Israel's existence within any set of borders whatsoever." Israel continues to attempt to accomodate Arab 'sensitivities' and acts as if the Palestinian claim that Israel is occupying Arab land had historic substance. But it all continues to crash against the often-repeated reality that "any Palestinian state, regardless of who rules it, will produce nothing but escalated violence, terror and warfare in the Middle East, certainly not stability or peaceful relations."
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WHAT IS THE TWO STATE SOLUTION SUPPOSED TO SOLVE ANYWAY?
by Sultan Knish

  Sultan Knish describes what we can expect from a Palestinian State. Essentially, it's more of the same, but more so. More terrorism. More regional instability. More internecine conflicts between the different Palestinian groups. More unemployment because there aren't any major employers except UNWRA and the Palestinian Authority, which is a way of saying they are living on the dole. Having demonstrated that such a mix can not be shaped into a workable political entity, Sultan Knish concludes, "...if the Two State Solution can't even create a Palestinian state, what can it solve? Absolutely nothing."
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JUDEA AND SAMARIA — A WAKE UP CALL
by Yoram Ettinger

  Yoram Ettinger devotes this article to a recap of some important historical facts about Samaria and Judea — Biblical Israel — and to explaning the region's importance to Israel's security needs. As he pointed out in a previous paper that to talk about: "[d]efensible borders for the Jewish State on the one hand, and a giveaway of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria on the other hand, constitutes a deadly oxymoron." The current paper adds substance to that conclusion.
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NEW PALESTINA IN ARAB LAND

There is however a win-win situation. Israel has space to grow and develop innovations for all of us, instead of devoting its time to fending off Arabs obsessed with a self-imposed mission of destroying the Jewish state. The Palestinian Arabs have a munificent plot of land in which to create a state — if that's what they want. The former U.S. presidential candidate Mike Huckabee put it well: "The question is: should the Palestinians have a place to call their own? Yes, I have no problem with that. Should it be in the middle of the Jewish homeland? That's what I think has to be honestly assessed as virtually unrealistic." These are different takes on where a viable Palestinian State could be located.

PUTTING FIRST THINGS FIRST — SOLVING THE ARAB REFUGEE PROBLEM
by Ruth King and Rael Jean Isaac

  Ruth King and Rael Isaac write that "the issue of 'refugees' remains the defining obstacle to any reconciliation in the region." The Arabs remain adamant that the Arabs that fled when the Arab states invaded Israel in 1948 must be allowed to return to their villages in Israel. Allowing in the millions who claim to be these refugees or descendants of these refugees would demographically overwhelm Israel. Resettling them in Arab countries would give the refugees the opportunity to live normal lives in a familiar milieu, instead of serving as the excuse for Arab leaders to continue their hostility and aggression against Israel. And a major obstruction to stabilizing the region would be eliminated.
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A CALL FOR RESETTLEMENT OF PALESTINIAN REFUGEES
by Daoud Al-Shiryan (translated and organized by MEMRI)

  The myth of Israel creating the Arab refugee problem has been discredited in recent years as Palestinian Arabs have begun speaking out and putting the blame where it belongs — on the Arab leadership, which directed the local arabs to leave their homes in 1948, when the arab countries that neighbor israel attacked the brand-new state. (See PMW's "Arab responsibility for refugees" at
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=567.) Now a few voices — such a Daoud Al-Shiryan in this article — are speaking out that the Arabs who created the refugee problem be the ones to fix it. As noted by MEMRI, "Daoud Al-Shiryan, Al-Hayat columnist and deputy secretary-general of Al-Arabiya TV, recently published several articles criticizing how the Palestinian refugees have been treated by the Arab countries in which they live. He called on these countries to integrate the refugees into their societies and to resettle them before they are forced to do so by the international community." He pointed out that: "Objecting to resettlement is no different than objecting to peace. It is nothing but an unrealistic slogan."
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PALESTINE PROBLEM HOPELESS, BUT NOT SERIOUS
by Spengler

  Considering how our economy is going, we might consider asking the Po' Palestinians for a handout. Spengler provides us a clear picture of just how how well off the Palestinian Arabs are financially, especially as compared to the neighboring Arabs. (And that's just the acknowledged contributions from UNRWA, EU and us, the taxpayers of U.S.A.) They have free health care and receive better education than most other arabs. Given all that funding, "why," he asks, "should any Palestinian refugee resettle in a neighboring Arab country? This is particularly so because they haven't developed industries to support themselves. Moreover, because their subsidies depends in part on the Western belief that paying the Palestinians off will contain their violence, they have a disincentive to become peaceful. Given these facts, Spengler comes to conclusion that may be surprising but is obvious — once you look at the facts.
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(TRANS)JORDAN IS PALESTINE
by Sarah Honig

  The British were given the administration of the Palestine Mandate to aid the Jews settle Palestine as a homeland. Instead, the Brits gave the administration of the portion of Palestine east of Jordan River to the Hashemite clan, which today rules a state made up largely of what are called Palestinians. It is now withdrawing citizenship from many of these arabs. Sarah Honig writes about Jordan, pointing out some home truths.
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A PALESTINIAN STATE IN SAUDI ARABIA
by Gennadiy Baruch Faybyshenko

  Gennadiy Faybyshenko notes that the Saudi Arabian Initiative — which provides for the creation of a a Palestinian state inside Samaria and Judea and the return of enough Arabs to almost double Israel's Jewish population — would mean the end of Israel. That won't do. But given the Saudi concern for their Palestinian brethren and given that Saudi Arabia is huge but sparsely-settled, a comfortably-sized state for the Palestinian refugees could be set up in some small portion of Saudi Arabia. Refugee problem: solved! A state for the Palestinians: created! And, that, according to the Obama administration, is the key to peace and harmony in the Middle East.
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THE PERFECT PEACE-PLAN
by Brother Shane

  Brother Shane proposes a bold yet traditional peace-plan to stabilize the Middle East: First, the Arab terrorist thugs need to be eliminated, not rewarded. Then the Palestinian Arabs in the territories are to be moved to Jordan, where Palestinian arabs are already living. A novel part of the plan is to create borders for Israel in accordance with the ancient patrimonies of the original 12 tribes of Israel, erasing some modern divisions. Pagan and totalitarian practices are not to be tolerated; the United Nations — a puppet of Islamo-Fascists — will be designated a terrorist organization. This plan certainly beats Israel giving up some of its tiny bit of land to people with a much larger amount of land and a very large amount of hatred toward Jews.
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MID EAST PEACE? LET PALESTINIANS BE JEWISH
by Julian Kossoff

  I don't know if this is tongue-in-cheek but it certainly is thinking outside the box. Julian Kossoff suggests a novel way to solve the Israel-Palestinian Arab conflict. Convert the Arabs to Judaism. Let them become Jews. He reminds us that "[h]istorically, the key to the Jewish reluctance to convert non-Jews was an unwillingness to provoke the host Christian/Muslim community. But as a survival strategy that's now backfiring; in a post-Christian world that fear is no longer relevant, while the demographics aren't looking good." The Jews were indeed heavy into proselytizing Gentiles — some 10% of the Roman Empire in the 1st century C.E. was Jewish. They were told point-blank when the Church gained power that if they continued proselytizing, the Church would destroy Judaism. Unfortunately the Jews incorporated this negative attitude and have forgotten their strong commitment to converting the Gentile. Perhaps Kossoff will write another article on reclaiming all the Jews forced over the centuries into becoming Muslim at the point of the sword.
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WITHDRAWALS: PREVIOUS AND PROPOSED

This next articles reinforce the idea that Israel should not give up any more of Israell's patrimony. They deal with the involuntary withdrawal from Hebron after the 1929 Massacre and with Kadima's expulsion of all the Jews from Gaza in August 2005. The last article in the set reminds us that as Israel gives up land, people are waiting in the wings with demands on further land give-aways — all in the pursuit of a peace that becomes all the more unattainable the more Israel gifts to an enemy determined to destroy the Jewish state.

HOW HEBRON BECAME OCCUPIED TERRITORY
by Yid-With-Lid

  The 4000-year old city of Hebron, Judaism's second most holy city, is the site of the Machpelah, the Cave of the Patriachs, where Abraham and Sarah are buried. The Jews lived there no matter what the political climate throughout the centuries. In 1929, when rumors started to spread that the Arabs were planning to attack the Jews, many Jews refused to believe it. Sammy Benoit (Yid with Lid) writes of the massacre in August, 1929. Arabs, who for years had been friendly neighbors, turned vicious and, encouraged by the mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, slaughtered the Jewish population. The British removed the Jews from the city, not the Arabs — an early example of rewarding terrorism. The Jews were denied permission to return to Hebron. After 1967, when Israel regained the city and against the opposition of the local Arabs and their own government, Jews began to resettle in Hebron. This article appeared on the Yid-With-Lid website in December 2007. Since then, the Jews continue to be harassed by the Arabs and by the Israeli government, which make no secret of the fact that it favors the Arab population of Hebron in any dispute.
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THE HEBRON MASSACRE, AUGUST 23, 1929
by Toby Klein Greenwald

  This article by Toby Klein Greenwald provides additional history and eye-witness accounts of the 1929 Hebron Massacre, which we commemerate on August 23rd.
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PALESTINE NAKBA: LETTER TO THE CHILDREN OF THE MOUKHTAR OF COLONIA
by Arie Issar

  This is Arie Issar's account of his experiences at the time of the Hebron massacre. In August 1929, because he came down with a case of mumps, he and his family were unable to travel to Hebron to friends the day the Hebron massacre occurred. He learned later "that the Sheikh of Colonia (most probably the Moukhtar) came on the day before the massacre to the Makleffs [the friends] and vowed by Almighty Allah and the Holy Koran that they are safe and should stay at home." As Ami Isseroff says in the foreword, "the 1948 war was preceded by decades of Arab violence and bad faith, such as [this] incident. Issar draws this moral from the Sheikh's lies, "If you do not want your grandchildren to live in a refugee camp, do not betray your neighbor who trusted you and your vows."
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MOSHE: WHEN THE SPINELESS LEAD THE BRAINLESS; RACHEL: TO STRENGTHEN A PEOPLE
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  This issue we have an essay by Moshe Saperstein who is in superb sardonic form. Listen to this: "Had my ancestors swung on the trees of Britain rather than Bialystok,... we would likely have a family crest. On that crest would be crossed salamis under a pickled herring. And the engraved motto would be — in Yiddish, of course — 'No Moment Spent Sleeping is Ever Wasted'." Rachel Saperstein, whose vision is more outward, talks about the Fourth Anniversary of Israel's sobering attempt at government-sponsored ethnic cleansing: the expulsion by the Israeli Government of the Jews from Gaza. It is a sobering thought for us that the Israeli Government has done such an inadequate job at resettling the 10,000 Jewish Refugees from Gaza that private citizens like Rachel are doing the Government's work. With its I-flunk record, how can the Government be contemplating another expulsion — this time of up to some 600,000 Jews from Samaria and Judea and Eastern Jerusalem? It boggles the mind.
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THE COSTS OF EVACUATION
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann writes about some of the costs of ejecting the productive and patriotic Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza from their homes and business in August 2005. As he writes, "Biilions were wasted for nothing; military advantages were squandered and economic benefits to both Jews and Arabs were destroyed. The sheer human tragedy on all sides is difficult to evaluate." To rub salt into the wounds, most of these refugees have still not been fully compensated or permanently settled — and much of what has been achieved has been done by the expellees themselves or with private help. It is particularly important to consider the aftermath of the Gaza folly now that "the world" is demanding a Palestinian state be built in Gaza and Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem. If Israel accedes to this demand, eventually it will necessitate expelling up to 500,000 to 600,000 Jews. How will a bureaucracy that couldn't competently deal with 10,000 refugees deal with this?
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THE GOLAN HEIGHTS, SYRIA AND WATER
by Yoram Ettinger

  The importance of Samaria and Judea to Israel's water needs has been discussed in sister articles, here. and here. This essay by Yoram Ettinger summarizes important facts about the Golan and its contribution to Israel's water supply. The Golan has again become an issue now that retards in the Israeli government are wistfully planning dialoguing with Syria. The Addition, Guy Bechor's article entitled, "Syria is drying up", explains why Syria is interested.
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HAMAS PROPAGANDA IN GAZA; FOREIGNER PR COMES TO THE WEST BANK

As Ethan Bronner put it: "Hamas has suspended its use of rockets and shifted focus to winning support at home and abroad through cultural initiatives and public relations.." In reality, Hamas does not accept Israel as a Jewish state and is still committed to violence. Domestically, Gaza is being 'talibanized' in that Hamas is increasingly imposing shari'a law enforced by religious police. Human rights violations are extensive and as Jonathan Schanzer writes, "Hamas maintain[s] control of Gaza's predominantly Sunni population through a combination of violence, authoritarian rule, and Islamism." In the area controlled by Fatah, it has become obligatory for foreign human righters and peacenikers to come and violently show their disapproval of what Israel is doing — whatever Israel is or is not doing.

HAMAS IS CONDUCTING A "SMILE SPIN" FOR THE WEST, PARTICULARLY THE UNITED STATES
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  Hamas is trying something new. Instead of turnoffs like beheading the enemy or blowing up babies — Jewish babies, true, so it's really OK, but some oddballs seem to object — it is trying something new. The rhetoric has softened. They are reaching out to the West, using the non-stop media as conveyor of these new smile-ridden assertions. You understand, of course, that nothing has changed back at the ranch. But the ratings West-wise should be considerably inproved.
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THE TALIBANIZATION OF GAZA: A LIABILITY FOR THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
by Jonathan Schanzer

  Hamas rightfully claims it is more popular than is the P.A. with the Palestinian Arabs, who appear to prefer unsullied, undisguised violence against Israel. Many in the American administration have suggested that American start dealing with Hamas directly as de facto and de jure rulers of Gaza and, more than likely, also Samaria and Judea, should Israel give up these areas. Such appeasement of a totalitarian government might make life simpler for the State Department, but other consequences are dire and should be considered. Jonathan Schanzer describes what life is like in Gaza, where Hamas is now unopposed.
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THE COLONIZATION OF THE CONFLICT
by Seth J. Frantzman

  We've progressed from the radical chic in the sixties to what Seth Frantzman calls protest tourism, where foreign and domestic visitors show their commitment to peace in the Middle East by making an obligatory stop in Arab Bilin where they harass Israeli soldiers until, if the gods be with them, the troops stop the rock throwing with rubber bullets and tear gas. As Frantzman notes, "That isn't peace, it is a manufacturing of the conflict, manipulation of the conflict for the cameras."
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JIHAD IN THE WEST

The initial essays benchmark the current highwater levels of the Islamic invasion of Europe and the U.S.A. The others suggest that one of the major activities of Islamic Jihad — preaching and promoting anti-semitism — has and is gaining adherents in several unrelated professional areas, government agencies and private institutions, even in prisons, as sympathy for — or fear of — radical Islam increases. The main reaction of the public to increased Muslim demands and sporadic violence by Muslims continues to be almost total indifference.

THE STEALTH JIHAD OF HIJRA: MUSLIM IMMIGRATION EXPOSED
by Jerry Gordon

  David Meir-Levi listed the ten stages of how Muslims take over a country "peacefully" and provided an estimate of far various countries are in the takeover process here. In this article, Jerry Gordon comments on a book review by Janet Levy of "Modern Day Trojan Horse" by Sam Solomon and Elias Al Maqdisi. The book describes more fully the Muslim strategy of peaceful conquest starting with Muslims migrating into the Dar-al-Harb, the Land of War, where they strive to consolidate their power and soften up the population for imposition of Sharia law and Muslim domination. In the U.S.A., we are really coming along, especially now that we have a Muslim president in place to smooth the way.
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EURABIAN SAFARI
by Thomas Landen

  It seems only yesterday that Malmö was pointed out because even though it was a western city, some of it was western-frei and controlled by Muslims. Now, as Thomas Landen indicates, it is one of many European areas — in Brussels, Sweden, France — where entry by a Westerner may be hazardous to his health. In fact, entry is usually by stealth, a safari entailing high risk. Landen notes that the Ramadan period is particularly dangerous, because the nightly "feasts easily spill over into nightly spasms of mayhem, vandalism, and violence. Europe's Ramadan riots often go on for days or weeks, during which hundreds of cars, shops and public buildings are set on fire" with little response from the authorities, who also "fail to impose the existing laws of the land on Islamic immigrants" and provide polygamous Muslims with welfare benefits. Landen predicts the next step with be "the imposition of Sharia law on everyone, non-Muslims as well as Muslims."
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THE STRAIGHT POOP ON RADICAL ISLAM
by Burt Prelutsky

  Burt Prelutsky asks why our leaders "pay lip service to these people[Muslims} in a way we never did with Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan or the Soviet Union. Is it because the Muslims commit sadism and murder in the name of religion and not country? If anything, I would think that would make their evil acts all the more contemptible." Their code of honor isn't much of a recommendation, either.
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THE UNIVERSALITY OF ANTI-SEMITISM
by George Jochnowitz

  George Jochnowitz has written on the pervasiveness of Anti-Semitism over time and often in areas that seldom, if ever, see a Jew. Nowadays, its universality owes much to a bizarre and illogical alliance of Muslims and Communists, both obsessed with a virulent and ferocious hatred of Jews. In other matters, they hold opposing views and are sworn enemies of each other. David Nathan wrote of this essay: "I have read much on the subject but never so fine and profound and succinct a piece as this." Read it. Perhaps, it will make you stop adducing all the variants of 'blame the victim' and ask instead: What accounts for the current manifestation of an attitude that, in Jochnowitz's words, "makes no sense" and "is pointless."
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WHEN CRITICIZING ISRAEL BECOMES RITUAL
by Robert Fulford

  Robert Fulford writes of the many ways that have evolved to show hate towards Israel. "Opposing Israel has become an institutionalized ritual" performed in "the universities, churches and unions," with activities that repetition has turned into traditions — such as" Israel Apartheid Week, celebrated every spring in universities." Muslims claiming they are oppressed by the Chinese are ignored; El-Fatah Palestinians killed by Hamas are not memorialized; nor are Hamas soldiers killed by the P.A. Israel is the exclusive target of this venom. This isn't criticism of Israel. It is simple, old-fashioned hate of the Jew that is being manifested.
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TERRORIST IN THE IVORY TOWER?
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  Academia has become a welcoming habitat for Marxists and Muslims. Anti-American preaching is common and is usually protected by University administrators and fellow academics, who — for all their virtuous defense of freedom of speech — are usually not as conscientious at protecting free speech by rightwingers. Cinnamon Stillwell writes of a new twist: professors who don't just accept Islamic terror but practice it. She writes about U of Ottawa's professor Hassan Diab, who stands accused of leading a PLO commando team that bombed a Paris synagogue in 1980. If true, he will join others such as William Ayres of the University of Chicago, who once practiced what they now preach.
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THE INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS' WAR AGAINST ISRAEL
by Moshe Dann

  Remembering that the International Red Cross had no problem accepting the Arab's Red Crescent (which has often taxied terrorists into Israel) but refused to allow the entry of the Jewish Magen David until it agreed to not display the Magen David symbol, it comes as no surprise to learn that the International Red Cross is a politicized anti-Israel participant in demonizing Israel. In this essay, Moshe Dann focusses on how they misuse the provisions of the Geneva Convention, specifically Article 49.
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THE AIPAC CASE AND PREJUDICE
by Gary Wasserman

  The spy case against AIPAC staffers has frittered out. Charges have been dropped. Two critical pieces of information suggest we're just beginning to see the outlines of the real story. First, the AIPAC men were at no point suspected of dealing with enemy foreign governments. As Gary Wasserman informs us, "they were targets of a bizarre sting in which they were fed false information suggesting that the lives of U.S. and Israeli operatives in Iraq were at risk"; they were told no one was doing anything. They tried openly to get different agencies to do something, to save lives. Second, the Iago in this sting operation, Larry Franklin, said he'd tried hooking other prominent Jews in government, using the same bait and he'd been asked by the FBI about other of his Jewish contacts. So why a sting operation against American Jews sympathetic to Israel, who weren't at any point suspected of being spies? Why Jews? Expand this a bit. Why is the FBI using Arabs in sensitive spots but won't hire Jews who are fluent in idiomatic Arabic too translate Arabic tapes? Why is the FBI giving classes in Sharia law? Why are meaningful words like terrorist dropped from Homeland Security's vocabulary? Why are CIA operatives threatened with law suits for doing their job effectively? What is going on?
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THE ROOTS OF RADICAL ISLAM IN PRISON
by Patrick Dunleavy

  Islam has found the prison system an excellent source for actively recruiting converts and candidates for acts of terror. It is a particularly hard group to infiltrate because the prisoners know each other and don't accept strangers. This article deals with such a network. When members of a Newburgh NY mosque were exposed before they could attack a Jewish community center, Warith Deen Umar, a muslim convert, who was both a prisoner and then a prison chaplain converting others to Islam, briefly became a topic for conversation. What is not recognized is that the wahabbist chaplains and their clerks have been creating a successful organization for converting prisoners to radical Islam for some 30 years. In this article, Patrick Dunleavy writes of five other Muslims affiliates of Umar, who have promulgated radical Islam and planned terror activity while in prison as prisoners or as prison chaplains or clerks.
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KING DAVID'S PALACE UNEARTHED IN JERUSALEM
by Rachel Ginsberg

  Some four years ago Israeli archeologist Eilat Mazar discovered a stepped stone structure in the City of David in Jerusalem that she believes is the remains of King David's palace. This is an exciting discovery in its own right, whether palace or not, yet It has been only meagerly publicized. Thanks are due Rachel Ginsberg not only for this excellent article on the find but for inquiring into why it is that it has been ignored by secularists, both archeologists and laymen, who claim greater objectivity. Their sneer campaign revolves around the fact that the dig has received financial support from a Jewish millionaire who believes in the Bible and their secular certainty that Judaism can not possibly have a rock-solid foundation (pardon the pun).
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MUSLIM TERRORIST'S NEIGHBORS STILL "LOOKING FOR REASONS"
by Julia Gorin

  Julia Gorin focusses on what is one of the more puzzling facts about America's general reaction to resurgent Islam — there seems to be a general indifference to the threat of Islamic Jihad. We are no longer concerned that Muslims that look to the resurrection of the Caliphate declared war on us September 11, 2001. Muslims who look to the return of the Mahdi declare they will bomb Israel — a true friend — into oblivion and we warn them that if they don't stop ... we will warn them again. We elect a self-declared Muslim as president while we are supposedly fighting Islamic terrorism and we excuse violent Muslim behavior — beheadings, massacres, bombings, drive-by shooting, tractor killings — as understandable. Gorin asks "[h]ow many more terror plots have to be uncovered before everyone realizes that Islam is a threat?"
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CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN THE WEST

There is a sharp divide between the Christian churches in the West: the mainstream groups led by liberals are pro-palestinian while the more traditional and less trendy churches with closer contact to the Bible are pro-Israel. An anomaly is the Mennonite Church, which itself suffered torture and violence. Yet it is so dedicated to peace it doesn't recognize that it doesn't really understand the monomanical evil practiced by resurgent Islam.

KEY MENNONITE INSTITUTIONS AGAINST ISRAEL
by Dexter Van Zile

  Dexter Van Zile writes about the One-State Solution activists of the Mennonite church who equate peace in the Middle East with abolishing the sovereign state of Israel, while they "provide aid and comfort to those who ... seek Israel's destruction." Van Zile suggests that, despite the torture and persecution suffered by the Mennonites in post-Reformation Europe, they have "an inability to deal with the reality of evil and the power needed to confront it." Denying reality, they routinely portray Hamas and Islamism as either victim or "as idealistic religious movements" while the Jews are the bullies. This may be because the pacifist Mennonites can rely on others to keep them safe. Israel can not.
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CHRISTIAN ZIONISTS, PAST AND PRESENT
by Victor Sharpe

  Zionism, as Victor Sharpe reminds us, is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people. "In Biblical terms, it is the return from exile of the Jews to Zion — to that very special land promised by God to the first Jew, Abraham. And it is through reading his Bible that many a Christian has become a zionist, and consequently a friend to Israelis working to reconstitute their ancestral homeland. In this essay, Sharpe writes of some Christian zionists who helped further what at the time seemed an impossible dream — the reconstruction of their nation state by Jews after 2,000 years in the diaspora.
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JEWISH SELF-HATERS

We start with an essay on the general phenomenon, which describes the anger and denial of reality that marks the self-hating Jew. We then provide two specific examples, one an individual, the other a group. As Seth Frantzman says, "Jewish self hate is one of the most fascinating of phenomena." It is also mystifying.

THE PEOPLE OF ILLOGIC: NOTES ON JEWISH SELF HATE
by Seth J. Frantzman

  This is a continuation of Seth Frantzman's examination of Jewish self-hatred. He writes, "Jewish self hate is one of the most fascinating of phenomena. While many nations now produce intellectuals who have self-hate, the Jews seem especially adept at it. It is worth examining a few cases to understand that self-hate is primarily based on illogical concepts."
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MARXIST PROFESSOR ALALUF SUPPORTS EUROPEAN ANTI-SEMITES
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan presents us with the case study of a Jewish sociologist, a professor in a European university, who in his devotion to the Arab cause distorts reality and ignores factual information. For him, Jewish nationalism is racism. He ignores the Socialist ideology of the early kibbutzniks and flays Israel as a "colonial enterprise of the capitalist west." More generally, his stance is always predictable: Israel is always the bad guy, no matter what the circumstances. If the Arabs act badly, it is always justified.
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THE MISREPRESENTATION OF J STREET
by Matthew M. Hausman

  J Street was created to counter Aipac, the major pro-Israel advocacy group in America. It proclaims itself as supporting Israel, but its actions don't match its words — unless, of course, you subscribe to the Arab story about its "historic" rights and believe that capitulating to Arab demands is good for Israel. It is not clear how many Jews it fools, but, certainly, some Muslims and pro-Palestinian activists recognize it for what it is and have given J Street both personal and financial support. If you are looking to support an active activist group devoted to Israel, put your money into AFSI.org, or ZOA.org or the newly-formed Z (for Zionist) Street. (18ZSTREET@gmail.com, http://ziostreet.wordpress.com/)
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THE MEDIA

Since it was started in July 2002, Think-Israel has chronicled media-created lies about israel and how easily the media accept Arab-generated lies. A particularly outrageous example is the story circulated out of Sweden accusing the IDF of harvesting Arab organs for transplant. What next?

SWEDEN'S NEWSPAPER BLOOD LIBEL OF THE IDF
by Robin Shepherd

  Using Arab sources, Sweden's largest-circulation newspaper, Aftonbladet, ran a ghoulish screed claiming the IDF killed Palestinians arabs and harvested their organs. Robin Shepherd examines the shameful events that happened afterwards. Aftonbladet's editor admitted the paper had no proof but refused to retract its assertion; in fact, he published it again. The Swedish government did not see this blood libel of Israel as important enough to contradict, portraying itself as the virtuous defender of free speech. It even refused to back up its ambassador to Israel who condemned the article. Contrast this to how news about Muslims is treated: many of the newspapers self-censor themselves, fearing violent repercussions by Muslims to even mild criticism of Islam or Muslim practices. Recall that the Swedish government reacted in panic to Muslim anger at a cartoon featuring Mohammad, even shutting down a website that showed the cartoon.
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PROPAGANDA'S VICTORY: THE TWO BIG LIES
by Rita Kramer

  This essay is about some home truths. Rita Kramer succintly describes two big lies that have emerged since Nazi times, when the world accepted that Germany was entitled to a population that was purely aryan and that the Jews were responsible for German's economic collapse. One is the retooling the educational system so that its function no longer is to teach Western values and culture. It has become an instrument to inculcate "diversity". The other big lie is that the world accepts the Arab myth that the Palestinian Arabs, through no fault of their own, are under Israeli occupation, a fantasy that justifies all savage behavior by the Arabs as necessary in their struggle to liberate their land.
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WHY IS ISRAEL DEMONIZED WHILE REAL RIGHTS' VIOLATORS AND WAR CRIMINALS ARE SANITIZED, EVEN LIONIZED?
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin asks a fundamental question: why do the media single out Israel for human rights violations, most of which are eventually shown to be false, while Arab human rights violations — real, brutal and of long-standing — are excused? He offers a group of possibilities that include: Arab money/oil, Western guilt, Arab money/oil, physical intimidation, Arab money/oil, psychological intimidation and Arab money/oil [repetitions added.]
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GENOCIDAL LINKAGE
by Kenneth Levin

  Kenneth Levin makes an interesting association on how "The world's media have given scant coverage lately to the ongoing genocide in Darfur, and — despite extensive reporting on Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict — they have likewise offered little on the continuing campaign of genocidal incitement against Israel by her enemies." Levin develops the theme that the connecting link is the Arab non-acceptance of non-Muslims on what they see as Muslim land. And when the conflict is Muslim against Muslim, they will side with the Arabs. Their lead is followed by many in the media and politics and even in anti-Israel Jewish organizations.
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THE HISTORY SEGMENT.

The history of Muslim colonizers who enslaved Europeans and a successful rescue of Jews from a British detention center

EUROPEANS AS VICTIMS OF COLONIALISM
by Fjordman

  In this well-documented essay, Fjordman writes of the long-term colonization and enslavement of Europeans by Muslims. As a reader of the original article wrote: "Mohammedans are not 'ashamed' of their 1300 plus years of violent colonizing and conquest of the infidels, unlike the Europeans (who have come, through their political and social development, and philosophies, to regard all people as deserving of human rights and basic decency and respect), because the Muslim colonial movement is the sanctified dogma of the imperialistic, expansionistic Koran." Another reader noted, "We'd have far less tolerance of the 'Moslems as victims' pose if the appalling cruelties of Islamic imperialism were better known by the Western public."
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ESCAPE FROM ATLIT
by Sara Yoheved Rigler

  Starting in the 1930's the British 'forgot' that they were given the administration of the Palestinian Mandate to help the Jews create the infrastructure for a state, They curtailed Jewish immigration into Palestine, Just when Jews desperately needed to escape from Europe. Jewish immigration was declared illegal. The British didn't just close the borders; they intercepted ships "and sent their hapless Jewish passengers back to a certain death in Europe." Those who made it to Palestine before they were caught were interned in a military camp south of Haifa in Atlit. Sara Rigler tells the story of a daring rescue of prisoners from Atlit engineered by the Hagana and aided by Jew living in Haifa. "For once, the Jews united and won."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

July 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

NOTE: Because of various website reconstructions, we did not have a Blog-Ed page for August, 2009.


May-June, 2009


What we are talking about in the May-June 2009 issue:
EDITORIAL: ANOTHER FACET OF GLOBAL JIHAD: CREATE A PALESTINIAN STATE TO DESTROY ISRAEL
LINKAGES, OBAMA'S CAIRO SPEECH(Peters, Spencer, Yid with Lid, Ettinger, Kirchick, Kedar)
THE SETTLEMENTS (Auerbach, Sultan Knish, Krauthammer, Peck, Dann, Frantzman)
THE OTHER REFUGEES (Julius, Yemini, Saperstein)
PALESTINIANS AND PALESTINE (Mandelbaum, Shusteff, Eidelberg)
PEACE COMPLETE WITH TERROR (Mauro, Rose, Plaut, Prowisor, McCarthy, Reisman, Ehrenfeld)
PROBLEMS WITH ANOTHER PALESTINIAN STATE (Even, Arens, Hertz, Miller)
SOLVING THE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM (Bonner, Teich, Bussel, Sharpe, Eldad, Dann)
HOW ISLAM IS IMPACTING THE USA (Dreyfus, Glazov interviewing Gaubatz, Reyto)
ISLAM IN EUROPE (Landen, Steyn, Fjordman, No Sharia)
JEW HATE (Finch, Ravid, Schanzer, Gerson, Marquardt-Bigman, Franzman)
HISTORY SECTION (Medoff, Whartman, Zamir)
BLOG-ED PAGES (May, June)

EDITORIAL: ANOTHER FACET OF GLOBAL JIHAD: CREATE A PALESTINIAN STATE TO DESTROY ISRAEL

Barack Obama's Cairo Cuddle speech in June was in some ways a projective test. Areas in which he sought to praise the Arabs are those that count with Westerners, and may have been designed not just to flatter his Muslim listeners, but to tell us how close culturally Middle Easterners are to the West. The West is proud of its achievements in science and technology and medicine. Obama ignored Jewish prizewinners — relative to their percentage of the global population, their share of Nobel awards has been hugely disproportionate — and attributed such accomplishments to the Arabs. He wasn't completely wrong — a handful of Nobel science and medicine awards has gone to Arabs. Admittedly, saints such as Yassir Arafat have walked off with the Nobel Peace Prize, but, thanks to him and his fellow Arabs, no one takes the Peace Prize seriously any more. Obama plunged back into history to credit Arabs with technological achievements. As Robert Spencer points out, "much of this has been exaggerated" and misattributed. We care about defending democracy and so he claimed Morocco was the first nation to recognize the new United States of America. He must hope that Americans are as ignorant of history as they are reputed to be; otherwise, they might know that our major interaction with Tangiers was in fending off the Tripoli pirates that preyed on our ships. Shades of Somalia!

How far Prez Obama had to stray from the truth to make nice to Islam is a measure of how unproductive Islam really is except in terror and violence and other man-made evil.
 READ THE ENTIRE EDITORIAL
 

LINKAGES TO OBAMA'S CAIRO SPEECH:

In his Cairo speech, except for a few teaspoons of soothing oil for the Jews, President Obama's made it clear that he would be hitting on Israel and making nice to the Muslims. Shamefully, as do the Arabs, he linked the Holocaust and how the Israelis purportedly treat the Palestinian arabs. What was surprising in the Cairo speech was the number of factual howlers and mistatements. Obama promised he would "speak the truth..." Misinformation, disinformation, partial truths, lies dressed up as truths are not Truth Speak.

The Palestinian-Israeli hostilities took up much of the speech. Obama's miracle treatment to stabilize the Middle East is based on the proposition that there is a linkage between reducing the Iranian threat to nuke Israel and the Peace Process, where Israel "voluntarily" gives away Biblical Israel to create another Palestinian state. This set of essays discuss the speech and the Iran-Peace Process Linkage.

WHAT OBAMA TAUGHT ME
by Ralph Peters

  What did I learn from President Obama's Cairo speech, asks Ralph Peters. Let me count the ways. As example, terrorism? The President never mentioned the subject. It must have stopped. The Israelis who are routinely subjected to missiles from Gaza and sniping as they drive the highways will be thrilled to know this. Another example? Tolerance must have come to Saudi Arabia — why else did he not mention the Saudi fondness for torture and for not allowing churches and synagogues. He was quick enough to apologize for America's bad behavior.
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PLATITUDES AND NAIVETE: OBAMA'S CAIRO SPEECH
by Robert Spencer

  This is a transcript of President Obama's speech with glosses by Robert Spencer. In the main, the glosses point out factual errors, stuck like porcupine quills into a mass of gooey flattery. Whatever else one can say about it, it was an excellent piece of dhimmi writing, with patches where he scolds the Muslims. Is this the proper way for the President of the United States to act?
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HOW OBAMA'S CAIRO SPEECH THREW ISRAEL UNDER THE BUS
by Yid with Lid

  In his Cairo speech, Obama made clear he has accepted the Arab narrative — i.e., he has bought into the Arabs' view of history. All events are tethered to their rock belief that Islam is on the rise and will soon take its rightful place as dominant group, to which all others ethnic and religious groups must pay homage. Any hinderance towards their dominance — such as the Jews avoiding extermination when the Arabs invaded their country in 1948, 1967 and 1972 — is regarded as a tragedy. In their view, the Jews "got" Arab Palestine because of the Holocaust. This ignores of course Judaism's ancient ties to Israel. It ignores that in modern times, the Arabs are in Israel because the Jewish aliyas beginning in the late 19th century created economic opportunities so the people from the neighboring areas flooded into what was to become Israel, including Samaria and Judea. As Winston Churchill pointed out, 95% of the Arabs in "Palestine" came after 1905. Recall they were not declared a people until 1964, when the world conveniently forgot there had never been a Palestinian State. There had been "Palestinians" when England was given control of mandated Palestine to help the Jews make a state. These Palestinians were otherwise called Jews.
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A SELF-DESTRUCTIVE IRAN-PALESTINIAN LINKAGE
by Yoram Ettinger

  In no uncertain terms, Yoram Ettinger meticulously details that is wrong with linking the Arab-Israeli conflict with stopping Iran from producing a nuclear weapon. He points out that "[t]he attempt to link the battle against megalomaniac Iran and the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is detached from Middle East reality. It plays into the hands of Iran, exacerbates Arab radicalism, undermines critical US national security interests and causes a setback to peace." It will have no impact on the quarrel between Sunnis and the Shites. Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Dubai and Oman will still "consider Iran a clear and present lethal threat." Nor will giving Judea and Samaria to the Palestinians "facilitate a broad anti-Iran coalition." The Arab countries have "shower[ed] Palestinians with rhetoric," not resources. In sum, "[t]he linkage concept creates an unwarranted US-Israel tension, thus adrenalizing the veins of Arab radicals and Palestinian terrorists, erodes Israel's posture of deterrence, pours cold water on the prospects of peace and adds fuel to the fire of terrorism, dealing a blow to vital US and Israeli interests."
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ISRAEL BETRAYED
by James Kirchick

  Obama has suggested that key to peace in the Middle East and the friendship of hostile Muslims is to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict. And the key to doing that, judging by his actions, is to put all the blame for a stalled peace process on Israel. One consequence of the American administration's war against Israel is that this message amplified by the media has resulted both in Israel's reduced popularity and in Jews being blamed for America's financial crisis. Another likely consequence is that an unchecked Iran might frighten its neighbors sufficiently to "set off a regional arms race, with Saudi Arabia and Egypt as the next likely proliferators. Yet the Obama administration does not seem to realize that stopping an Iranian nuclear bomb ought take precedence over the stalled 'peace process.'"
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OBAMA THE ROOKIE
by Mordechai Kedar

  Mordechai Kedar points out that Barack Obama is as naive about the Middle East as Jimmy Carter, and is likely to do major damage to American interests, just as Carter did. Carter helped unleash the Iranian mullahs, and that lead to the present Iranian regime, with its nuclear ambitions. Obama believes he and the ayatollahs can reason together. He ignores that Iran "even before it has turned nuclear, quickly changes the face of the Middle East. Iran's long arms are already tightly grasping Lebanon, Iraq, and Gaza, and are also decisively and powerfully directed at other states such as Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, Oman, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia." Were Israel to disappear, it would solve none of the Middle East's problems. Iran will still try to take over its neighbors, which could ignite a nuclear arms race. The Sunnis and Shi'ites will still battle it out. And the end result will be that thousands will die because of Obama's foolish notions, just as thousands died because of Carter's misapplication of his "humanitarian" ideals.
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THE SETTLEMENTS

While sympathy is more or less extended to the Po' Palestinians and their terrorism excused, everyone is sure that the villains, the obstacles to peace, are the settlers (a sneer is obligatory when you say settlers). The settlers are the Jews who returned to live in Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem ever since the Jews fought off the Arab invasion in 1968. The settlements are their towns and villages and cities and trailer camps and compounds. Why are these patriotic Jews demonized? Perhaps because they can't be persuaded by Arab-aiding nonsense. They know that this land is Jewish: by God's will, by the Bible, by history, by devotion, by never completely leaving the land over the centuries, by international law that established an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people, and by conquest after fighting off the invading Arabs. With all the facts on Israel's side, how does one promote the claims of a non-people, the Palestinians? Simple. Demonize the "settlers". Then no one will complain when you steal Jewish land.

This section is on the bravest of the brave: the settlers, Israel's staunch nationalists. They know it's their land and they plan to live there, despite the dangers and the hardships, during the times their government encourages them and during the times the government, at the bidding of foreigners, harasses them.

ARE SETTLEMENTS ILLEGAL?
by Jerold Auerbach

  Like holding up a cross to ward off the devil, "Geneva Convention!" is heard whenever the legality of the Israeli settlements in Samaria and Judea is asserted. The settlements are supposedly against the Geneva Convention which declares that an "occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies." As Jerold Auerbach lucidly explains in this article, the Geneva Convention does not apply in this situation and the settlements are not only legal, they are protected as Jewish land by international law that is applicable and binding. If I have one quibble, it is that it should be made clear that the Zionist Max Nordau used homeland as a non-confrontational term for State. It did not mean that the Jews were to have only a portion of the Land for a State.
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OBAMA, ISRAEL AND THE SETTLEMENTS
by Sultan Knish

  Another superb article by Sultan Knish dedemonizing the settlements and describing what they really are. In U.S.A. terms, they are towns and villages and cities that are suburbs of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, many of which were inhabited by Jews for thousands of years. Given Israel's friendly neighbors, they are also early alert systems to monitor the local Arabs. As Sultan Knish writes, "What Obama really wants is for Israel to put its own center of government in shelling range from a terrorist group ensconced in its own capital. No rational person should need an explanation for why Netanyahu has said, no." Israelis — especially the patriotic settlers — have no intention of cooperating with the terrorists.
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THE SETTLEMENTS MYTH
by Charles Krauthammer

  President Obama has applied his mantra of 'speak softly and carry no stick' everywhere except with America's only friend in the Middle East: Israel. There, he behaves like the medievel rulers in Europe who set absolute limits on how many Jews could live in a town, or even in the state. Obama, Charles Krauthammer writes, has ordered Israel to cease all ordinary population growth in the Territories — and this includes eastern Jerusalem. If a baby is born, Israel is forbidden to provide him with new shelter. This Obamian pharonic decree amounts to: thou shalt have NO new babies. As Krauthammer writes, "No 'natural growth' means strangling to death the thriving towns close to the 1949 armistice line, many of them suburbs of Jerusalem, that every negotiation over the past decade has envisioned Israel retaining." It also means that the Arabs will understand they need make no changes in their mission to destroy Israel. "Blaming Israel and picking a fight over 'natural growth' may curry favor with the Muslim 'street.' But it will only induce the Arab states to do like Abbas: sit and wait for America to deliver Israel on a platter. Which makes the Obama strategy not just dishonorable but self-defeating."
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TEAR DOWN? NAW...NOW, MORE THAN EVER, IS THE TIME TO BUILD!
by Arlene Peck

  In her inimitable style, Arlene Peck reminds us that the Palestinians have used American money to bring in arms for terrorist attacks; they teach their children to hate Jews; they desire to annihilate the Jewish state. But what Prez Obama and Sec.of State Clinton consider as the major obstacles to peace are the Jewish settlements. Peck writes: "[what] All Israel should be listening to is the Bible and following Jewish history. All of Israel is entitled to 'natural growth.' Hey, if the love of Israel is racist, then call me one too, as I am definitely a Zionist and Zionist I shall remain!"
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OUTPOSTS: RULE OF LAW, OR LAW WITHOUT RULES?
by Moshe Dann

  Thanks to the groundwork laid by Peace Now and others like them, descendants of Jewish settlers of European stetlach and Christian descendants of settlers of the Wild West are convinced that Israeli settlers of the Territories are in violation of the Law. The lowly outpost is perceived as particularly evil, perhaps because it is easier to demolish than Ariel, a settlement city of some 20,000. So the outpost — often a single trailer or two — has come to stand as a symbol of all Israeli building on supposedly Arab land. Moshe Dann points out that when the State shows bias to Jewish Israelis, "when government officials don't apply the law equitably, the authority of the state is undermined." His examination is particularly appropriate when one realizes that Arabs are taking over land and building illegally with enormous help from the European Union and without a murmur of disapproval from a cowed Israeli government.
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WHY DO PEOPLE CONDEMN HINDU NATIONALISM? THE ANSWER MAY BE CONNECTED TO A DISDAIN FOR ZIONISM
by Seth J. Frantzman

  We are accustomed to essays that emphasize the importance of an Israeli and India connection based on their both being democracies surrounded by Moslem countries, many of them virulent. Then too, they both have bent over backwards — to the detriment of their majority population — to cater to the minorities. And in both cases, yielding land to appease the Moslems has failed. In this essay, Seth Frantzman makes a novel connection: both are by nature nationalist — Israel is the only Jewish country in the world; India is the only Hindu country in the world. And both are condemned as nationalist Muslim countries are not.
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THE OTHER REFUGEES

In an article in the Wall Street Journal, André Aciman, himself a Jew born in Egypt and one of the 800,000 Jews forced to flee the Arab countries, leaving behind their houses, factories, books, art and religious artefacts, said in reference to President Obama's Cairo speech, "... for him to speak in Cairo of a shared effort 'to find common ground ... and to respect the dignity of all human beings' without mentioning people in my position would be like his speaking to the residents of Berlin about the future of Germany and forgetting to mention a small detail called World War II." This set of essays focusses on two sets of Jews refugees in Israel: the Jews who fled from Arab countries, when the Arabs made it clear they planned their own Holocaust for the Jews because Israel was born. The other refugees are the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza, patriotic and productive citizens of Israel, who were made refugees in their own land when they were thrown out of their homes and businesses by Government decree in 2005. They are slowly reconstructing their lives largely by their own initiative, because the Government had carefully planned how to expel them but had little in place after the expulsion. We keep up by posting essays by some of these refugees.

THE MYTH OF THE MIZRAHIM
by Lyn Julius

  "Six hundred thousand Jews flooded into the struggling Jewish state in the 1950s: penniless Jewish refugees housed in leaky tents with insufficient food." They were Sephardic Jews, forced to flee Arab countries, where some of them had lived well before the Arabs came into the area. Lyn Julius brings us up to date on the integration of Ashkenazi and Mizrahi in Israel — intermarriage is running at 25%. Thousands are using their knowledge of Arabic by working in Israeli media and universities, But they retain memories of their unhappy history: "the oppression of the Jews by Arabs" over the centuries followwed by the "the destruction of their ancient, pre-Islamic communities" when they were expelled.
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THE JEWISH NAKBA: EXPULSIONS, MASSACRES AND FORCED CONVERSIONS
by Ben-Dror Yemini

  Everyone knows about the Arab refugees, victims of the Arab-Israeli war in 1948. Few know about the Jewish refugees, a much greater number, who fled the Arab states in realistic fear of their lives as Israel became a state. They left behind large amounts of real estate and personal property. Ben-Dror Yemini details how "...the massacres, the pogroms and the great expulsion of the Jews was a continuation of their suffering under Muslim rule." Contrary to the rosy picture painted of Muslim and Jewish amity through the ages, from Mohammad's time, the Jews were second-class citizens, dhimmis who were expected to show they understood they were inferior to the Muslim. Included as an addendum is a precis of Yemini's 2-part article on (1) Arab genocidal attacks on Arabs and other Muslims compared to Jewish killing of Arabs and other Muslims and (2) the number of refugees and population transfer this past century globally.
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BRENDEL; MISERY HATES COMPANY
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein comes out with more astute political observations as asides than most political observers can manage in endless columns. He is right on target when he describes the self-hating destructive Israeli intellectual who provides the justification to hate and destroy Israel for the less verbally talented. And the cats are back. Saperstein includes a tale he wrote in 1974, when he was still in Rehab, learning to live with one arm. He has a chance to go to a concert that he knows he will enjoy, but he isn't quite up to a large crowd of strangers. He decides to go. The evening turns into a nightmare — but Moshe's description of his misery is magnificant.
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PALESTINIANS AND PALESTINE

We are reassured that the PA state is a dazzling solution that needs no examination. Create it and as sure as the day follows the night, peace will come. We owe it to this suffering people, who have lived under Jewish rule for nigh onto 60 years. Yet if one examines factually who the Palestinians are and the (non)history of Palestine, it is surprising that so many people have been persuaded that there ever was a Palestine and that Israel is occupying Palestinian land. But the Arabs, using a simple, compelling message, the image of suffering Arab refugees, lots of money, a supportive media and the fertile soil of anti-Semitism have done an excellent job of creating a worldwide urgency to help the po' Palestinian regain his homeland. So, while the foundation for creating another Arab state is non-existent, the demand is real. This section examines who the Palestinians are and what their "homeland" is.

THE ARABS IN THE HOLY LAND — NATIVES OR ALIENS?
by Dr. Harry Mandelbaum

  This is a much-amplified version of an essay first posted in March 2003. Using information from various sources, many of them Arab, this essay makes clear that the Palestinians are not native to Palestine. They are not an ancient people. They are not a people. Advertised as the original natives of a (never-existant) state of Palestine, they are the most successful scam the Arabs have ever run in their obsession to destroy Israel.
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THE MYTH OF "OCCUPIED" TERRITORIES
by Boris Shusteff

  Boycotters and all those who sympathize with the po' Palestinians because Israel is "occupying" Palestine should read this essay by Boris Shusteff. In simple terms, he makes clear that the Land of Israel belongs to the Jews. It never was Palestine because there never was a Palestine. And lest you are about to say that it doesn't matter what the area was called, this was the ancient home of the natives now called Palestinians, don't. The vast majority of them — or their (grand)fathers and (grand)mothers — never entered into Israel or the Territories until the 20th century. The League of Nations "gave" the Jews the part of the Ottoman empire that encompassed ancient Israel, just as they "gave" the different Arab States all the rest of the part of the Ottoman Empire that we call the Middle East.
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JEW-HATRED OR STUPIDITY OR BOTH?
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  This essay by Paul Eidelberg is a gem. Written in crib-sheet style, it says it all. The Arabs don't want a separate state. Even if they did, it is geostrategically impossible — it would dissolve into a dozen rival clans reinstating their murderous medieval culture. Whatever keeps the idea of a Palestinian state going? Is it plain stupidity or a generalized disease called Jew hate?
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PEACE COMPLETE WITH TERROR

Have we forgotten that the "Peace Partners" are a group of terrorists, proud of what they do, who teach their children to hate Jews (and Christians and Buddhists and Hindus and all Westerners) and expect with good reason that their children will carry on their tradition when they themselves explode into Paradise.

THE THREE TYPES OF JIHADISTS
by Ryan Mauro

  As the title indicates, Ryan Mauro distinguishes between three kinds of jihadist, differing in style and technique and area of operation. But their goals are the same. Mauro suggest that the Al-Qaeda model is the most flamboyant and best known. It advocates global jihad, but it is probably the least of a threat. The second group focuses on local jihad rather than world-wide terror — Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah are examples. The third type, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, "favors cultural jihad, infiltrating and hijacking institutions, and bringing about Sharia law and Islamization from the bottom up and inside out." The Muslim Brotherhood's methods are more insidious and less flamboyant, but that doesn't make them moderates, even if that's how they like to present themselves.
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FORGOTTEN COVENANTS
by Alex Rose

  Western Middle East "experts" urge us to start "dialoguing" with Hamas. With more boldness than brains, such political luminaries as Jimmy Carter, Paul Volker and Brent Scowcroft urge that we recognize Hamas. More circumspectly, the Obama administration flipflops on identifying Hamas as a terror group. At stake is whether Hamas will openly acquire the windfall money the USA is giving the Palestinian arabs. Hamas has acted as the spoiler, refusing to recognize Israel as legitimate, while offering a truce with a 10-year expiration date, providing that Israel first settles the millions of Arabs who claim descent from the original 420,000 Arab refugees. The PLO appears to be more accomodating to Western views, but basically it is just as vicious as Hamas. In this essay, Alex Rose reviews two fundamental Palestinian documents: the charters of Hamas and the PLO. Hamas's Charter, which says that its mission is to eradicate Israel, is phrased as a religious compulsion, and hence can not be revoked. The PLO charter is a political document, which has often been said to have been revoked — but never has. Both make clear that the Palestinian arabs regard the destruction of Israel as their mission, and they continue to steadfastly affirm this intent both in word and deed. This will not change, no matter how much the West denies reality or trivializes their core value.
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HAMAS: THE TERROR ELITE
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut puts Hamas in perspective with his opening sentence, "It is one of the oddities of the global war on terrorism that while al-Qaeda is almost universally condemned, its Sunni terrorist counterparts in Hamas continue to attract a devoted following." An offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas controls Gaza and treats its residents as brutally as does Fatah in Samaria and Judea. Both are dedicated to destroying Israel. This is a valuable reference work.
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LAWRENCE OF PALESTINE
by Marc Prowisor

  Back in 1995, the Palestinian Authority (PA) already had 4 times the number of policemen per 1000 residents than did Israel. The PA no longer is in Gaza. Yet, as we write, Americans are engaged in training Fatah personal to shoot better and attack more efficiently. And we are doing this at our own expense. Marc Prowisor raises a point few seem to think about. They are to be used, it is said, in the forthcoming PA state. "The simple fact is," says Prowisor, "that this force is charged at keeping Abbas in power." Such is America's plan. But is it realistic in the unstable Palestinian environment? A few questions? Who will run the planned State when things shake down? Fatah terrorists or Hamas terrorists, especially when the people favor Hamas? Or a still-hungry splinter group, beholden to Iran or to establishing a Caliphate or just out to feed their own Swiss bank accounts. Who will these "police" be law-and-ordering? The local Arabs? Rival gangs? Hamas? Israel? Westerns? Are we creating the next generation's Osama bin Ladins? Perhaps the only saving grace: if they continue to perform as they have been — a 10-hour standoff by 3,000 PA troops against a handful of Hamas fighter and the suspicion is that it was the American trainers that finally knocked off the Hamas (May 31, 2009) — then in the words of Carl of Jerusalem, they will be more of a farce than a force. More likely, they will revert to type and kill Jews however they can.
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NEGOTIATING WITH TERRORISTS
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Andrew McCarthy writes about how America is dealing with Iran, a major threat to the stability of the entire Middle East. By saying nothing to help the election protesters, President Obama is throwing away "the best chance in 30 years of dislodging an implacable American enemy." Even worse, ignoring a longstanding policy of not exchanging prisoners for hostages, "Obama is neck-deep in terrorist-for-hostages negotiations with Iran-backed killers who have American blood on their hands." These terrorist prisoners had brutally murdered five American soldiers in 2007. "Where," McCarthy asks, "where is Congress?" Where are the media?
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THE JEW, AS SEEN IN ISLAMIC RELIGIOUS LITERATURE
by Harold B. Reisman

  It is possible that Barack Hussein Obama is an accurate interpreter of Islamic thought. He did attend Muslim (religious) school during his childhood. But I suspect Harold Reisman has compiled a more accurate picture of how Islam sees the Jew as revealed by Muslim clerics and mullahs and the bedrock of the Muslim belief system — the Koran.
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A RECESSION IN TERRORISM FINANCE?
by Rachel Ehrenfeld

  Saudi income has decreased because of the downturn of the global economies, but, as Rachel Ehrenfeld notes wryly, the present crises has provided the Saudis "with an opportunity to practice da'wa (Islamic missionary outreach) through donations in the name of Islam. Such donations, including financial bailouts of cash-strapped Western institutions and businesses, have helped directly and indirectly to spread Islamism globally." Hamas is a major benefiary. Terrorist groups also benefitted from drug trafficking, smuggling, and other criminal activities. The financial crises has eased the way for more reliance on sharia'a banking — its available cash making it particularly attractive these days. Ehrenfeld points out that Sharia'a banking can easily launder terrorists' criminal gains and transfer them to the terrorists.
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THE PROBLEMS WITH ANOTHER PALESTINIAN STATE CREATED BY CARVING UP ISRAEL AND ITS UNILATERAL WITHDRAWAL

In previous issues, we considered the impact on Israel of giving up Samaria and Judea. It would need to take in some 300,000 to 600,000 Jews, made homeless and dependent on a State that has not been able in 4 years to settle the 10,000 Jews it expelled from Gaza. It would allow another State to sit on a major aquifer, knowing how the Arabs destroyed the Gaza aquifer when they were given it to control. It would see more of the Jewish Holy Places treated like Joseph's Tomb — the Arabs promised to care for it but vandalized it, ripped up Torah scrolls, and decorated it with feces and graffiti.

Here we ask, if it weren't the Jews who were being pressured, would the world be pushing for a Palestinian state? Are they ready for statehood? What are the benchmarks for readiness?

ISRAEL'S STRATEGY OF UNILATERAL WITHDRAWAL
by Shmuel Even

  This essay by Shmuel Even — based on the analysis of Israel's actual previous experience with unilateral withdrawal and their outcomes — puts to rest the excuses and rationalizations for unilateral withdrawal from the Territories. The thinking now is that any evacuation would need to be on "the basis of a stable agreement." That would clearly preclude giving up land to a non-functional group like the Fatah run by an ineffective leader who has no power to lead. Giving it up directly or indirectly to Hamas is a non-starter.
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SO WHAT'S YOUR SOLUTION?
by Moshe Arens

  Moshe Arens examines the two-state solution by setting down some reasonable axioms that should underlie any reasonable way of implementing a two-state solution. But before any plan can be pursued with any hope of success, there is a necessary precondition: an end to Palestinian Arab terrorism. It can not be bypassed.
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PALESTINIAN ARABS READINESS FOR STATEHOOD: FOLLOW THE EU BENCHMARK
by Eli E. Hertz

  The surge is on for Palestinian statehood, despite the facts that the Palestinian arabs have since Oslo become adept at creating terror and havoc, not the tools of government. Even though there is no peaceful and legitimate "Peace Partner" in the lot, Israel is pressured to sign on to creating a Palestinian state with unseemly haste. Eli Hertz makes an excellent suggestion. Let's slow down and pace ourselves, testing the degree of progress the arabs make toward peaceful coexistence and self-government according to the set of benchmarks the Europeans are using before they accept Turkey into the European Union (EU). No timeframe. No foregone conclusion. To qualify for membership in the EU, "the candidate country must have achieved stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, rule of law, human rights, and respect for and protection of minorities." And that's just the first step. Moreover, this pattern must be convincingly stable and sufficiently long-term to insure the candidate has internalized these important principles. Given the example how the arabs behaved when they gained full control of Gaza, "the yardsticks of judging readiness should be at least equal, if not more stringent for Palestinians."
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LAND FOR PEACE, AMERICAN STYLE
by Rob Miller

  Rob Miller has written a parody of what America is urging on Israel. In this version, America has given California, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, to the Aztlan organization. Still to be done: the freeing of the Aztlan prisoners and ceding historic US sites such as the Grand Canyon, the Alamo and Yosemite. Of course, other groups are waiting in the wings with further demands. This is a parody, not a fantasy; there really are groups seriously advocating splitting up the U.S.A and returning the land to Mexico. Groups such as MEChA, the Brown Berets of Aztlan and La Raza and others are growing and attracting new members. Judge Sonia Sotomayor is — or was until recently — on the National Council of La Raza.
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SOLVING THE PALESTINIAN PROBLEM

The first essays in this set encourage Israel to take hold of its own destiny. The others suggest transferring the Arab refugees to Jordon or distributing them among the Arab countries in the region.

LAMENT IN OSLO
by Elena Bonner

  Elena Bonner, wife of Andre Sakhorov, both strong advocates of human rights, is an amazing woman, with an indomitable spirit, and, a reader put it, "a clearly articulated moral clarity." She and Sakhorov have insisted on Israel's "right to existence within safe borders." She asks why human rights advocates actively protest the treatment of the Guatanamo prisoners, but are unconcerned about Gilad Schalit. She quotes Sakhorov saying "All wars that Israel has waged have been just, forced upon it by the irresponsibility of Arab leaders"; "With all the money that has been invested in the problem of Palestinians, it would have been possible long ago to resettle them and provide them with good lives in Arab countries." As one reader remarked, "How eloquent she remains, and her end quote should be clipped and posted by all who care about the world retaining its essential proclivity toward decency, respect for Life and Freedoms. Both she and her husband were — are — beacons of light and courage for freedoms of conscience. They belong to the rare breed who retain their human dignity regardless of circumstances and through their actions and words dignify the Human Race."
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DRIVING OUR OWN DESTINY
by Howard Teich

  Like an unhealthy ghost that won't stop flapping, the "peace process" is back. Its backers, perhaps suffering from the affliction so many politicians have — a loss of long-term memory — again see negotiation for a 2-state solution as the magic nutrient for force feeding peace to a reluctant Israel. That Oslo and giving away Hebron as well as the aquifer in Gaza — and indeed, all of Gaza — almost killed the patient is ignored. Pressure is again applied and Israel's choking gasps are taken as signs that the treatment must be working. It isn't. The "peace" treatment is the problem. Howard Teich suggests we ignore Obama's rhetoric — it won't be his children who suffer and die if he is wrong. "[I]t's time, he states, "for American Jewish leaders to take their heads out of the sand and forcefully and loudly support a strong and effective future for Israel on its own terms." It's time for Jews to put aside fashionable ideologies and commit to their own survival.
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THE BLIND ISRAEL
by Ari Bussel

  Ari Bussel makes the point that Obama's America no longer sees Israel as an asset. "Moreover, we [Israelis] have blundered in our pursuit of 'peace' to completely misinterpret what peace means to our enemies." Meantime, the enemy grows louder and more confident — "The intention is to bring the final harm to the patient, all in the name of some convoluted, 'all merciful and benevolent moon god.'" To stop further damage to the Jewish state, Bussel insists "[i]t is time for Israel to disengage from all the rhetoric, act and assign a steep cost for failure to comply. Jerusalem is as divisible as Israel itself — remove a vital organ, be it the liver, the heart or the brain, will the body continue to exist?" But just reacting to hostility is insufficient. Israel must act boldly to save itself. It can not continue to rely on Arab outright expressions of hate and hostility to deter Israel's "friends" from chopping it up immediately.
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A TWO STATE SOLUTION — ON BOTH SIDES OF THE RIVER JORDAN
by Victor Sharpe

  In this essay Victor Sharpe reviews the history of how the small piece of land intended as a Jewish state was twice reduced in size. Now, the shouting is for a third cut that would remove Biblical Israel from the Jewish state. This so-called 2-state solution is not a recipe for peace. Sharpe suggests that Jordan, which is already a Palestinian state — it is in Mandated Palestine and the majority of its population considers themselves Palestinian — become the homeland of those who call themselves Palestinian.
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THE SUN ORBITS THE PALESTINIAN STATE
by Arieh Eldad

  Dr Arieh Eldad states very clearly that there can only be one state on the land of Israel: either the only Jewish state on earth or yet another Arab state. Two-states won't work, even with the proviso that the Arab state be demilitarized because there'd be no way to control the Palestinians readying for more war any more than the West could stop Germany, demilitarized after WW1, from preparing for war. The reality is that "Moslems are enjoined from recognizing rule by heretics — Jews or Christians" — in what is Israel. He recommends settling the arab refugees in Jordan, which is already largely filled with Palestinians. This won't solve what is fundamentally a religious conflict, but it is a humanitarian thing to do and perhaps the Palestinians can over time be weaned away from teaching hatred and terror.
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A MULTI-STATE SOLUTION: AN ALTERNATIVE TO FAILURE
by Moshe Dann

  In Part I, Moshe Dann examines the "occupation of the Territories, land associated with Judaism from Biblical times on". In Part II, he points out that given Palestinian Arab culture, religion and what they consider acceptable behavior, imposing an Arab state on Israel is doomed to failure, no matter how hard Israel works to make it a success. "An alternative involves freedom from the obsession of Palestinian statehood and sovereignty. A new regional approach to resolving the conflict anchors national identity and political rights in already existing Arab, Muslim states. This would ensure a humanitarian solution to the 'Palestinian problem.'"
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HOW ISLAM IS IMPACTING THE USA

THE "ETHICS" OF OFF-SHORING OUR COLLEGES OVERSEAS: Sovereign Wealth Funds, And The Lessons Of Shariah-Compliant Investments
by Marion DS Dreyfus

  In the educational field, outsourcing — bringing the teacher to the foreign student — seem a reasonable way to make money especially during this period where so many areas suffer from financial meltdown. Marion Dreyfus points out some of the problems of assuming the generality of our ways of interacting when the locale is the Middle East, which has with different rules and gender bias. She provides us with examples where the disparity between normal-for-us behavior and what is tolerated in the host country was almost fatal to the teachers. More pernicious is the constant censorship by sharia "scholars", who hamper "meaningful intellectual inquiry." To go along with these restrictions ultimately will compromise our own educational standards. She also raises the problem of the impact of the far-left professor, who is assumed to be a voice for American values.
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IN AMERICA
Jamie Glazov interviews Dave Gaubatz

  The Muslim Brotherhood has invested a great deal of effort and money to convince us they are centrist, moderate and reasonable. Jamie Glazov interviewed Dave Gaubatz who discusses how their material promoting Islamic terrorism is widely distributed to mosques. A Brotherhood manual "is very specific on how the youth are to become martyrs through physical Jihad in order to meet the objectives of the Muslim Brotherhood, specifically how to implement an Islamic Ummah (Nation) under Sharia Law worldwide." Far from being moderate, the Brotherhood teachings are violent and anti-American, encouraging "lone Muslims to carry out single and seemingly isolated murders across America which will seldom make the headlines of any news organization."
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PERILOUS EUPHEMISMS
by Susanne M. Reyto

  In the previous issue, Daniel Pipes discussed the difficulty the West was having in deciding what to call the Muslims that declared war against it. The terms acceptable to Governmental agencies seem deliberately neutered and imprecise. In this essay, Susanne M. Reyto expands on the significance of downgrading terminology and thereby destroying meaning. As she points out: "Language is critical. It shapes our thinking and determines our action. The enemy's perilous intensions cannot be blurred. If we do not name them, we cannot confront them."
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ISLAM IN EUROPE

Islam accomodation in Europe has reached the point where not just individuals but entire countries have adopted a dhimmi attitude, even if they themselves see their accomodation to Islam as just being reasonable, just being fairminded, just avoiding trouble... In Mark Steyn's words, "Long before Muslims are a statistical majority, there will be three permanent members of the Security Council — Britain, France, Russia — for whom the accommodation of Islam is a domestic political imperative."

A DHIMMI, JOANIE DE RIJKE, EXHIBITS PRE-CAPTIVITY STOCKHOLM SYNDROME
by Thomas Landen

  This article by Thomas Landen describes the circumstances surrounding the capture and ransom of a Dutch journalist. It is of interest in its own right. It also illustrates the mind set of the upper class Western dhimmis. They are politically correct, forgiving to those who put them in danger and treat them like toilet paper. They vent their anger at those who see Islamism as a growing danger to the host country.
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ISRAEL TODAY, THE WEST TOMORROW
by Mark Steyn

  As Europe becomes more accomodating to Muslim whims, wants, needs, preferences and demands, anti-Semitism increases and is manifested in physical violence while European nationalism and national icons are devaluated. Condemning Jews and Israel as the reason for Muslim emnity will not save Europe. As Mark Steyn writes, "It may be some consolation to an ever-lonelier Israel that, in one of history's bleaker jests, in the coming Europe the Europeans will be the new Jews."
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WHY MUSLIMS LIKE HITLER, BUT NOT MOZART
by Fjordman

  We could argue minutiae of religious differences between the West and Islam forever without ever seeing the enormous gap between us. We could ecumenically ignore differences and accentuate our religious communality with Islam — we are all monotheists — and still never see what separates us. Because it isn't just a religious difference. It is a difference in big things and small: how we expect other people to behave and why our musical tastes differ. In this essay, Fjordman explores why Islam doesn't take kindly to Western music. It isn't because our music is forbidden in the Koran. It is because the Koran fostered a mindset that is unresponsive to it.
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ISLAMIZATION OF EUROPE AND POLICIES TO PREVENT IT, PART 11
by No Sharia

  No Sharia is the nom de plume of an ex-Muslim living in Europe. To date, in a series of articles, he has been evolving a detailed plan to fight Sharia in Europe. Usually moderate applied to the muslim is a binary term — the muslim is regarded either as a moderate or an extremist. This latest essay is particularly important for formulating policy in that it grades moderate muslim by degree of adherence to the traditional interpretation of Islamic doctrine, thus helping to predict how the various categories of "moderate" will behave in the host country. It is the beginning of his treatment of national identitites and cultures.
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JEW HATE

These are some sources. Jew hate is propagated by the media, by academics and by Marxist Jews.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC STOOPS TO JEW-HATE
by Mike Finch

  Mike Finch documents National Geographic (NG) joining the "It's all the fault of the Jooz" club, no matter what it is. Their latest issue featured a story on the Christians leaving the Middle East, and if NG is to be believed, it is mostly Israel's fault. Oh sure, regional violence and bad economic conditions contribute a tad, BUT, using a Palestinian Christian family living in the outskirts of Jerusalem as example, the main problem is the "horrible life they are forced to live. Israeli law, checkpoints, the 'Wall', permit papers, have made their life unbearable." It's just too too claustrophic. In Lebanon, "[t]he fall of the Lebanese Christians has nothing to do with Syria and Iran and their proxy, Hezbollah..." No, siree, it was the Jooz. And in Syria, the NG is about as informative as the State Department, which wrote that "Christians are influential in the cities, professions, politics and the armed forces, but their percentage of the population is shrinking due to a high rate of emigration to the Americas and Africa." (State Dept Religious Freedom Report, 2007). The State Department doesn't tell us why such a successful group is leaving the country, although it does mention that the government watches meetings held by religious groups and monitors sermons. I can't wait for NG to do another number on Israel, showing how they are responsible for the miserable lives the Egyptian Copts lead.
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PREJUDICE AND DEMONIZATION IN THE SWEDISH MIDDLE EAST DEBATE DURING THE 2006 LEBANON WAR
by Mathan Ravid

  In the July-August 2007 Issue, talking of his experiences as Israeli ambassador to Sweden from 2004-2004, Zvi Mazel concludes that "Sweden remains the most anti-Israeli country in the European Union and also the most pro-Muslim one." In this issue, Mathan Ravid examines in detail how Swedish newspapers reported the second Lebanese War. It appears that, despite the degree to which Sweden has been taken over by Sharia law, or perhaps because Sweden has been taken over by Sharia law, Sweden's nasty attitude towards Israel has not improved. Ravid analyzes the subtle differences in how Swedish newspapers expressed their hostility to the Jewish State.
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ISLAMIC SPEAKERS BUREAU BACKED BY RADICAL PROFS
by Jonathan Schanzer

  The California-based Islamic Networks Group (ING) "dedicated to 'teaching about Islam & Muslims' at U.S. high schools and college campuses features a board of advisors that is stacked with some of the most controversial activist professors in the field of Middle Eastern studies today." As Jonathan Schanzer points out, "The imprimatur of these scholars may signal a troubling shift toward the support of [Islamic] proselytizing efforts and the further unraveling of Middle East Studies in America." ING makes classroom visits — at no cost to the host — and distributes written material for grade schoolers. ING's professors are not objective; they are apologists and proselytizers for Islam. Let the listerners beware.
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CLARITY FOR THE DENIERS
by Michael Gerson

  Holocaust denial isn't just a bizarre aberration — totally illogical in light of the open and available facts available in the newspapers of the time, the recollections of the survivors even today, and, perhaps just as important, the proof of non-existence of relatives and friends who had never left the Old Country. It is most heard today from the mouths of those who hate Jews enough to hope for, and in many cases actively work towards, a second Holocaust. To them, Israel's statehood rests on the "lie" of the Holocaust. When they deny the Holocaust, they simultaneously deny the legitimacy of Israel's statehood. As Michael Gerson notes, President Obama made one incisive point in his flawed and foggy Cairo speech: Holocaust denial was baseless, ignorant and hateful. He didn't, however, seem to recognize that the deep anger which accompanies Holocaust denial in the Arab world may be resistant to his brand of diplomacy. As Gerson puts it, "Perhaps some don't merely wish to deny the Holocaust but to finish it."
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THE "FACTS-DON'T-MATTER" CAMP
by Petra Marquardt-Bigman

  This is a portrayal of the Jewish anti-Jew, the intellectual who can float above the facts, consistently and constantly blaming Israel no matter what the details, and become indignant when he is accused of being anti-Israel. Specifically, Petra Marquardt-Bigman writes about the antics of Antony Lerman, who is certain that "whatever the Palestinians do is legitimate resistance against a cruel and inhuman occupation." Whatever happens is Israel's fault. As Marquardt-Bigman observes: what interests intellectuals like Lerman are not the boring facts but the (s)weeping drama of victim turned victimizer. Unfortunately Lerman is not a rarity. As watchdog groups such as the Israel Academia Monitor have demonstrated, there exists a large group of intellectuals and academics who have strong anti-Zionist convictions firmly planted in fantasy.
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FROM AMOS ELON TO URI AVNERY: ODYSSEY OF SELF-HATE
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth Frantzman writes about the intellectual leftist Israeli elite, which by now has produced four generations of elitists, who actively work at destroying the Jewish state. Most of them or their parents were born in Europe and are wealthy, They "spend their lives supporting the terrorism that murders the poor among them. They seek to colonize Israel with European and foreign ideas." It is ironic that coming to Israel from countries with non-Jewish majorities, they now work to transform Israel into a state without a Jewish majority. They hate the Jews from Arab countries, who they consider useful only as grunt labor to be dumped in development towns, but they love the Bedouin and elite Muslims, imitating their 'exotic' style of furnishing, architecture and music. The symptoms are observable; the reason for their hate of Israel is puzzling. And troubling.
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HISTORY

Going counter to their Mandate, England cut off the free immigration of European Jews in the mid 1930s. Jabotinsky's son helped smuggle them in until World War 2 began. In 1948, the Arab states immediately invaded the brand new state of Israel. Egypt conquered Gaza and held it to 1968. Playing local politics, Ben-Gurion had a ship bringing arms to Israel destroyed.

ERI JABOTINSKY'S RACE AGAINST DEATH
by Rafael Medoff

  Eri Jabotinsky was a Betar leader, Irgun activist and son of Vladimir Ze'ev Jabotinsky, the founder of Revisionist Zionism. In 1937, the Irgun sucessfully smuggled Jews from Europe to Palestine. To appease the Arab leaders, England had started denying Jews the right to immigrate to Palestine, despite the fact that England was given the Mandate to Palestine to help Jews settle there in anticipation of developing the Jewish state. It was the start of an operation that, as Rafael Medoff tells us, "would bring tens of thousands of Jews to safety during 1938-1940, just as the Nazi inferno was starting to engulf Europe." Altogether, some 20,000 were saved during this period. During the War, Jabotinsky's efforts to save Jews were thwarted by the Nazis, the British and even American "mainstream Jewish leaders, who were reluctant to anger America's ally Great Britain." The more things change ...
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WHEN EGYPT WAS IN GAZA
by Eliezer Whartman

  Eliazer Whartman was eye witness to how Egypt governed the Gaza Strip, when it was under Egyptian control, from the first Arab invasion of Israel in 1948 up to the second Arab invasion of Israel in 1967. Conditions for the local Arabs were brutal; they were impressed into the Egyptian army, unemployment was high, education consisted mostly of indoctrinating hate of Israel, and the refugees were forcibly kept in vile condition "as an open sore, as a weapon against Israel." Interestingly enough, it was only when Israel captured the territory in 1967 and started providing the local Arabs with medical care, jobs and real education that the Arabs began complaining and demanding autonomy.
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A BURNING SHIP ON JERUSALEM BEACH
by Meir Zamir

  When Israel became a state May 14, 1948, it did not have a unified military; it had several volunteer armies that differed in politics and how much they would compromise on Jerusalem. On June 22, 1948, five weeks after the Arab invasion of the new state of Israel, while the several Israeli armies were still in the process of integrating, the acting Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, ordered Colonel Yitzhak Rabin and his Palmach troops to fire at the Altalena, anchored off the beach in Tel-Aviv. The ship was carrying 940 passengers and an assortment of arms from the French to the Irgun, led by Menachem Begin, Ben-Gurion's political rival. In this essay, Meir Zamir focuses on the shadow war between England and France to control Jerusalem and how that impacted on the actions of the Israeli political rivals. [Note: this article was updated 27April2010. Three appendices were added.]
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
June 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


March-April, 2009

What we are talking about in the March-April 2009 issue:
EDITORIAL: A THIRD WAY
THE PEACE PROCESS, 2-STATE SOLUTION AND ISRAEL'S IRREVOCABLE RIGHT TO THE LAND (Sultan Knish, Belman, Grief, Beres, Sharpe, Singer, Kedar, Beres)
ISRAELI PROBLEMS (Faitelson, Frantzman, Sapersteins, Sugarman, Thornton, Sherman, Berlyn)
CHARACTER STUDIES OF MUSLIMS (Phares, Zubry, Rubin, Erlich, Hamid)
SHARI'A IS GAINING GROUND GLOBALLY (Plaut, Gaffney, Samson, Guitta, Bawer, Bensman, Rubin, Ibrahim, Pipes, Scruton)
USEFUL IDIOTS, FELLOW TRAVELLORS (Barron, Honest Reporting, Doron, Mossad, Eidelberg, Williams, Rabinowitz and Mayer, Frantzman)
HISTORY SECTION (Kramer, Zamir, Grobman)
BLOG-ED PAGES (March, April)

EDITORIAL: A THIRD WAY

For years there has been a strong though unexamined belief that the Arab refugees who came to be called Palestinians could not live anywhere except in Palestine. And not even in all of Mandated Palestine, which includes the hefty chunk the Brits "gave" to the Jordanian Hashimite King. (Please don't tell me 80% of the Jordanians are "Palestinian." It isn't part of the mythology.) No, they can only live as a people in the small part called Israel. Like the rare orchid that can only be pollinated by a particular type of bee or the snaildarter fish that can only live in the Paint Rock River in East Tennessee, the Po' Palestinians are kept in refugee camps in several Arab countries — fed, educated and medicated as charity cases — because UNRWA, their U.N. nanny, asserts they could only take root in their homeland, now called Israel.

Total bullshit, of course. Every other refugee group this century has been resettled and within a few years is well into starting a new life. This group was not allowed to do so. They were sequestered into camps and exploited as victims of Israel. Supposedly Israel was occupying their land — and that includes the state of Israel. With the help of a sympathetic media they have sold this belief to the world.

To make this work, the actual facts were ignored. Here's one: 95% of them and/or their daddies never came into Palestine until after 1900. Their ranks were swollen by Arabs living near the refugee camps whose standard of living took a big step upward when they declared that they too were refugees. But for many people, especially Bumstead Westerners, it was a Fact that the Palestinian could only thrive in his Homeland and this fact was the foundation of the demand that all the Palestinian refugees, now swollen from a few hundred thousand to several million, must be allowed to live in Israel.

The fact that the Palestinian is not different than the generic Arab in language, religion, taste in food, or social mores hasn't discomforted the Arab and U.N. propagandists. In fact, it is part of the argument that it is important that they be returned to Israel. The tautology is: they are in the refugee camps because they can only live real lives in Israel. It is proof that Israel is their only habitat, because in no other way are they different from other Arabs.

Because they are never examined simultaneously, the single-niche habitable environment "fact" lives comfortably next to some real facts that are totally incompatible. According to their own story, the Arab refugee and the others who call themselves Palestinian are kith and kin. So the same rules of appropriate environment apply to them — that is, they, too, can only take root in Israel. But except for the display Arabs languishing in the camps, it seems Palestinian arabs can make good lives for themselves elsewhere.

Some of this made the news quite accidently. When Kuwait was liberated in the Gulf War, the Kuwaitis kicked out some 400,000 Palestinians, who had been working in Kuwait and had sided with the invader, Saddam Hussain, to make the Kuwaitis lives miserable. We learned the surprising fact that they constituted some 40% of the people living in Kuwait, owned many of the businesses and had been living there comfortably for well over a decade .

When Jordan took in Arafat and his people years before the Gulf War, they busily began shooting at neighboring Israel, acting as a quasi-government in the areas where they lived, and plotting King Hussein's overthrow. He killed some 10,000 of them to retain his monarchy, and no one thought less of him for doing so.

They massacred Christians during Lebanon's civil war, and set up a state within a state — they collected 'taxes' and 'protected' businesses; they left garbage collection to others.

Where ever they go in bulk, they become violent and thuggish when the opportunity arises. But the point we are making here is that they can live and thrive outside of Israel.

Other facts have begun filtering out. When the Gazans broke through the barriers to Egypt, many tried to escape and make their way into Egypt. Polls made it clear to those who would hear that a very large number of Palestinians were eager to leave and go live elsewhere. Any elsewhere. Palestinian Arabs have taken available money and happily took off for Europe and America.
 

OVER THE YEARS, THOSE WHO CONTROL THE DOMAIN OF ARGUMENT asserted that it was an either-or. Either there would be a single state of Israel that was no longer Jewish. Or there would be two states, one Jewish which — thanks to the Jewish State's medical and welfare benefits — contained a burgeoning Arab minority. The other state (or statelets) — that was next to, inside of, cutting through and wedged against Israel — would be totally Arab, with no Jews allowed.

Even so, more and more people began to wonder why apartheid Jordan couldn't be declared as the Palestinian state — the local Arabs (AKA "Palestinians") were already some 70-80% of the population. Or, considering that the Arabs owned 99.9% of the Middle East, why destroy the single Jewish state that contributes so mightily to advancement in medicine, science and technology, when there's enormous amounts of land where the Palestinians could be relocated? And these thoughts came out, whenever the subject of a Onesie or a Twosie state came up, as shown by unrestricted readers comments to articles in the Jerusalem Post, and even in Haaretz. The Inquiring Mind wanted to know: Why couldn't the Palestinians be transferred to land owned by their oh-so-sympathetic Arab cousins?

Of course, they are sympathetic. Haven't they been telling us that the Arab states can't make peace with Israel, while their po' afflicted Palestinian cousins languished in refugee camps?

Most all of the media weigh in on the side of the "2-state solution." Operationally, the 2-state solution will disSOLVE Israel slowly, long enough for the diplos to declare a victory and get the hell out. The one state solution is more like the instantly-acting Jonestown CoolAid poison. It is hard for the Third Way to be heard, when the No 1 and 2 solutions clog the airwaves.

The third way? Why give up land that belonged to Israel by right of Bible, by history, by devotion, by living there through bad times and worse times throughout the centuries, by international law, by irrevocable trust and by conquest when Israel was attacked by the Arab countries? Why give up the Land and, if Sec-State Rice's doctrine is still doctrine, still need to feed and medicate the Arabs. The Third Way? Keep the land and give up the Arabs

A sensible solution. The Palestinian is capable of viability outside of Israel. He can be transferred to another spot in Arab Land. It would be like moving from Boston to New York. The set-aside land could be 5 times the size of Israel, 10 times its size and it still would be a drop in the bucket of the available land the Arabs control.

But admittedly, there wasn't sufficient mass to congeal such an idea into a SHOUT-IT-OUT fact. Until now. Now, there is a new voice that says loud and clear that a Palestinian can thrive outside of Israel. This new voice is even willing to put his money — actually, your money, but not let's quibble — where his mouth is. Who is this man? His name is Barak Hussein Obama, and he has set aside some 20 Million dollars to be used for the "purpose of meeting unexpected and urgent refugee and migration needs" of the Palestinian arabs of Gaza. So, unlike UNRWA, he doesn't think they are hot-house fleurs that can only thrive on land that belongs to Israel. Admittedly, he hasn't come right out and said that Palestinians are omnihabitable (new word. And, listen up, Mr. Webster, I want the credit for it.) but obviously he wouldn't be wasting our money if the Palestinians couldn't root themselves outside of Israel, or as they quaintly call it, Palestine. Well, they would call it Palestine, if they could pronounce the P.
 

THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE WAS FABRICATED AS A MISSHAPEN GARGOYLE whose only purpose was and is to smash Israel. But why would any Westerner want to destroy the current first-line of defense to protect us from becoming dhimmis?

So, let's all become adherents of the third-way: give the Palestinians a large tract of Land in Arab Land. Fence it in. Help them farm if they wish. Help them set up colleges, if they wish. Spend the money that now goes on wasted business startups and fences in Israel and UNRWA salaries and terrorist training camps on helping the Palestinians truly learn how to run a state. And if they prefer terror and murder and adding nails dipped in rat-poison to their explosives, let them do it to themselves. Their choice.


The Peace Process. Dissolving Israel in a 2-State Solution.

The peace process is back. It's the same old plan from the brain of the State Dep't and the mouth of the Saudis: give up historic and strategic parts of your land, Israel. Let us flood your land with Arabs, and we will normalize relations. It's the same old, except that it has solved one knotty problem. As the diplomats so quaintly put it, Israel has no peace partner. Years ago, she was negotiating with the Arab countries, then with the "Palestinians", and finally with one man: Mahmoud Abbas, who is unlikely to win the next election — should the Palestine Authority decide on having one. Moreover, he has already repudiated the idea of agreeing to Israel's continued existence. If they don't have elections, Hamas will take over, anyways. So the new catchy phrase is: concentrate on establishing a Palestinian State in Biblical Israel with a land bridge to Gaza and the Arab States will normalize relations. It's not clear if they will "normalize relations" as most of the world understands the term — be friendly to your neighbors, exchange ambassadors, trade, visit each other's countries — or do they mean what seems to be normal for Islam — take over the other country as soon as you can. However it is phrased, splitting off any of Samaria and Judea and Gaza is a violation of Israel's irrevocable right to Mandated Palestine in international law.

 

WHO NEEDS A PALESTINIAN STATE?
by Sultan Knish

  Who needs a Palestinian State, Sultan Knish asks and answers it this way: aside from the Administration in Washington and the European Union, it's "the dictators of a dozen Arab states who agree that the only thing that will fix the region is adding another Arab dictatorship to the place, and subtracting the area's one democracy." That's it in a nutshell. As it is, the diplomats are pressing harder for a state than are the Palestinians themselves. A state doesn't particularly appeal to those Cultists of Death — the fabricated Palestinian people — whose unity derives from their common source of support, charity from various world governments, and the pride they take in their talent for killing.
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WHITHER THE "PEACE PROCESS"?
by Ted Belman

  Ted Belman summarizes the latest thinking on the Peace Process — creating a Palestinian state in Biblical Israel. Israel believes she can hold firm until the Palestinians do what they've committed themselves to but have never honored: stopping their violence. The American Administration believes it can make magic happen: two states in the Middle East, one of them Muslim, "living side by side in peace and security." The Arabs believe they can force Israel to accept the Saudi peace plan that will destroy Israel by flooding it with Palestinians; a Palestinian state is unimportant to them. All ignore that by international resolution, there is "the irrevocable right of Jews to settle in the area of Palestine..."anywhere between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. The land is Jewish — all of it including the West Bank — by irrevocable legal trust conferred by the League of Nations and continued by the United Nations. In 1922 it was also confirmed by a unanimous endorsorsement by both Houses of Congress, So, as Belman writes, "... it lies ill in the mouth for the U.S. to now deny Jews the right to settle the lands. It is the settlement freeze that's illegal, not the settlements."
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THE QUESTION OF THE APPLICABILITY OF THE FOURTH GENEVA CONVENTION ON OCCUPATION TO JUDEA, SAMARIA AND GAZA
by Howard Grief

  Howard Grief makes clear why applying rules from the Fourth Geneva Convention (FGC) to Israel's ownership of Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") and Gaza rests on dubious and incomplete interpretions of FGC. Briefly, the IDF can not be considered a "hostile army" occupying Judea, Samaria and Gaza because these areas did not belong to Jordan or Egypt. By irrevocable trust, the land belonged to Israel. He also overturns the myth that Israel is an occupier of Arab land, because Mandated Palestine was never Arab land. This is an important paper. We have included appendices on some basic documents that indicate that the Peace Process and the Two-State solution violate Israel's irrevocable right to Mandated Palestine.
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ON TWISTED HIGHWAYS TO "PALESTINE" WHY "OCCUPATION" IS STILL A LIE
by Louis Rene Beres

  Louis Beres provides clearly-stated facts and long-term contextual history that makes it clear that "the so-called 'Palestinian Territories' are not occupied by Israel." They are Israeli. The context enriches the legal discussion on Israeli's right to Mandated Palestine by Howard Grief (see above).
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FORCED TO CONCEDE A BIRTHRIGHT?
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe points out in this essay that tearing off pieces of Israeli land supposedly for peace is not new. And the result has been greater Arab hostility, not peace. The objective now is to hack Biblical Israel out of tiny Israel. It has begun by Arabs creating facts on the ground — building illegally in Samaria and Judea — while the Israeli government devotes its time to harassing the Jews in Samaria and Judea who understand it isn't enough to own the land legally; Jews have to hold the land physically. Sharpe asks, "How long before the majority of politicians in the Knesset finally accept that Jews have returned to their ancestral and Biblical land, a land which presently stretches from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River." Until they themselves are persuaded, how can they communicate the facts to outsiders?
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WHY TIME IS ON ISRAEL'S SIDE: A LONG-TERM PERSPECTIVE ON ISRAEL'S SECURITY CHALLENGES
by Max Singer

  Max Singer succinctly summarizes Israel's major political and security problem: "... the Palestinians are determined to destroy Israel, and no concessions or improvements in our treatment of them will induce them to give up their goal." He argues that democracy is globally on the rise, and so long as Israel can continue to keep terror attacks at what he calls "tolerable levels", then within a decade, Israel can count on America to stifle the jihadist threat to the West. I wish he had given voice to how to handle related problems: as long as Israel continues a defensive minimalist policy, the morale of her citizens will continue to drop, while foreign diplomats, seeing Israel as an easy mark, will likely demand more and more concessions from her. Then too, what if, while Israel waits, Iran does just what she says she will. There is also the nightmare possibility that America will become a much weaker country, a weak reed to rely on.
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THE ROLE OF RADICAL ISLAMIC GROUPS IN ISRAEL: IMPLICATIONS FOR ISRAELI-ARAB COEXISTENCE
by Lt.-Col. (res.) Dr. Mordechai Kedar

  As Mordechai Kedar writes, "The core question is to whom does this country belong? According to the Arab narrative, this has been an Arab Islamic state since the days of Omar, the caliph who conquered the country in the seventh century. According to the Islamic approach, since Islam began in 622 CE, all of history before that time has no meaning or significance." Nor do they accept that modern Israel holds the land because it overcame Arab invasions of Israel. Nevertheless, many of the names of the resident Arabs reflect the fact that they are not native to Israel but came originally from Egypt or Syria or Jordan or Lebanon or Iraq. And not that long ago. It is true that Islam insists that "land can only go one way, to become Islamic, and it can never go the other way," but why ever should we sane Westerners accept this Islam-centric view?
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BASIC THOUGHTS FOR THE NEW PRIME MINISTER
by Louis René Beres

  In this essay, Louse René Beres astutely advices the new prime minister of Israel to move cautiously. Some fundamental questions need to be answered: for example, for Israel's viability, is any form of diplomacy indicated? He notes that in its eagerness for peace, Israel has been too quick to follow directives from the "civilized world." As a result, it has yielded up Israeli land in return for nothing. Yet the Jews continue to hope for a negotiated peace while the Arabs speak plainly and truthfully that it is their "irremediable intention to annihilate the Jewish state." "For both Palestinian insurgents and Iran's president, conflict with Israel is always an all or nothing proposition [...] On the Palestinian and Iranian side, Oslo and 'Road Map' expectations have never been seen as anything more than a cost-effective method of dismantling Israel." If Israel is to survive, it must cast off some of its deepest-held fantasies, peace-seeking strategies and fallacious assumptions because it is dealing with Arab realists who know just what they want. They may on occasion need to slow down and may occasionally agree to negotiate, but they are never deviated from their goal — the destruction of Israel as a prerequisite to attacking the West. There is no middle ground and Israel should not be frittering away valuable time trying for measures — like a demilitarized Palestinian state — that look good but that have no substance. Beres' advice is both obvious and sensible: abrogate the Oslo Accord. It was a terrible and deadly mistake.
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As the previous set of essays report, Israel has a poor record in defending its political integrity. Even though the facts favor Israel, it has maintained a minimalist position. It responds to Arab distortions well past the time the Arab lies have gained ground. This set of essays discuss some additional Israeli problems: some of them internal, some the consequence of not being pro-active, some the result of poor judgment, some the consequence of a Marxist secular elite running many of the country's institutions.

POLITICS OF PALESTINIAN DEMOGRAPHY
by Yakov Faitelson

  Yoram Ettinger, who writes on the assesment of demographic data for Jews and Arabs, says about this essay by Yakov Faitelson: "Faitelson refutes Demographic Fatalism and documents Demographic Optimism. Faitelson highlights critical errors committed by demographic fatalism: understating Jewish fertility rate; overstating Arab fertility rate; ignoring the potency of annual Jewish Aliya (immigration) since 1882; overlooking the high Arab emigration; attributing to Jews West normative European demographic patterns, while Jewish demographics — and Jews in general — have been non-normative; accepting Palestinian Bureau of Statistics numbers without scrutiny, while these numbers have been inflated dramatically." Faitelson's essay is an excellent summary of actual demographic trends in Israel and the Territories.
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USING THE PRESENT TO FABRICATE HISTORY; USING HISTORY TO FABRICATE THE PRESENT
by Seth J. Frantzman

  A major reason Israel has communication problems is that the Arabs do so well fictionalizing history. This goes over well with an ignorant media. It is a truism that we see the present in terms of our history. Seth Frantzman makes the case for the converse: we see historical events in terms of our present biases. "... western slavery is seen as the greatest evil while Muslim slavery, which began earlier and murdered more people, is seen as positive and tolerant, all because we have a common view of the Old South as evil and Modern Islam as tolerant and diverse." Similarly, the PLO's new image as "moderate" is projected backwards. "People forget its role in Lebanon and Jordan, its mass murder of Olympic Athletes or its bombing of synagogues in Europe. People even forget that it was founded long before 1967, along with Fatah, and that its original goal was not the liberation of Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, but the opposite, only the destruction of Israel inside the Green Line." Part I presents a grotesque example of how the past is imagined as a doppelganger of the present in a book by a Holocaust survivor, who loathes Israel and blames America for the botchup in the Middle East. Part II describes the reality of life in Iraq in the 1920s. Despite our projected-backwards belief bolstering the assertion that modern-day Islam is tolerant, minorities in Muslim countries — Egypt's treatment of the Copts is an egregious example — were and are actively discouraged from maintaining their identities, until in many cases, they dwindle away. Part III gives us insight into at least one reason why Muslim countries are said to be tolerant and benign — their treatment by journalists as amplified in the Main Stream Press.
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PESSACH COMES
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein is in top form, his black humor at split-second timing as he records what he sees as his deteriorating body — which, all things considered, doesn't bother him as much as the soupy-headed ideas of much of the Israeli administration. in one essay, Rachel Saperstein writes of Aryeh Eldad — surgeon, politician and defender of the Jews of Gush Katif, when they were senselessly ripped out of their homes in Gaza — and his father, who she never met. She makes us wish that we too knew both father and son.
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THERE'S ROOM AT THE 'TREE' FOR YOU
by Catriel Sugarman

  Catriel Sugarman provides us with a brief but clear history of the Christian need to convert Jews. In modern times, this urgency has spawned Messianic Judaism. Initially conceived as a ruse to entice Jews into Christianity, it has — as do all social engineeering projects — had unintended consequences. It has mostly attracted Christians, some of whom try to live more or less "Jewish" while they acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah, some of whom see themselves as the real Jews and are increasingly hostile to Judaism and some of whom have used it as a half way house to Judaism or Noahidism. It has also helped galvinize Jewish groups such as Jews for Judaism, Chabad and Aish HaTorah to work to stem the tide of Jews moving out of Judaism out of indifference, ignorance or amorphous spiritual longings. To date, missionaries of whatever stripe have been more of a problem in America, but Israel is also being targetted. A fascinating essay.
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THE SYRIAN FOOL'S ERRAND
by Bruce Thornton

  A major problem for the new Israeli administration is an American president who has not shown good instinctive judgment. He appears to have no familiarity with the major problem besetting the globe — if anything, he has ignored the global Islamic insurgency and put all his eggs in the 'let's reason together' diplomacy basket. In this essay Bruce Thornton points out that Washington's last attempt at engaging Syria in diplomatic talks is but the latest of a long sequence of fool's errands. We've been there, done that. Again and again. It doesn't work. Why? The basic reason is simple but always ignored by diplomats and other fantasists: the Arab countries refuse to have a non-Muslim state in the Middle East. As a result, as Thornton writes, "We in the West assume that the Arab countries really want peace and coexistence with Israel, if only the Palestinian Arabs get their own state and the 'occupation' is ended. So ... we pressure Israel into making concessions and offers, the offers are turned down ..., and then the whole process ends with Israel excoriated on the world stage for her stubborn recalcitrance, and the U.S. condemned for not putting enough pressure on Israel to make a deal." Can diplomacy work? It depends on the objectives. Hitler and Ahmadinejad of Iran have found diplomacy an excellent delaying tactic while building a war machine. It works particularly well when the other side is a western fantasist.
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A REALITY CHECK ABOUT GAZA
by Martin Sherman

  The IDF fought in a disciplined fashion in Gaza, but they were hamstrung by the politicians, who feared a bad press. The IDF wasn't allowed to finish the job — to destroy the sources and resources that continue to enable the Gazan terrorists to lob missiles at Israeli cities. In consequence, Hamas can, and does, claim victory. As Martin Sherman writes, Israel suffered a "calamitous diplomatic defeat" and "its international standing and image suffered." Sherman suggests the root cause of the poor showing in 2007 in Lebanon and now in Gaza is "a loss of faith in 'Victory' both as valid cognitive concept and as an attainable military objective... the real victor in both campaigns was in fact the myth of the 'The Impossibility of Victory.'" Israel needs to understand it will continue to be harassed by foreign politicians and local arabs until it is willing to "inflict a degrading defeat" on the radical Arabs and by military means make them understand that their "path can — and will — only lead to disgrace and dishonor."
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THE FAITHFUL CHILDREN
by Patricia Berlyn

  In the previous article, Martin Sherman indicated that convincing the politicians to change their belief structure is a major Israeli problem. In this essay, Patricia Berlyn writes of the IDF soldiers, who are disciplined and moral and more than willing to fight for their country. She writes about three of these soldiers and how they behaved during the Gaza campaign. Despite their discipline and compassion, the world press still managed to demonize them. And their politicians made sure they will have to fight again to finish Hamas' war from Gaza.
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These are studies of some Muslims and how they live. Pirates. The ordinary folk that were transformed into a Palestinian people. Moderate terrorists. Islamic clerics and their unusual ideas of how to utilize mosques. And oh yes, a suggestion that the clerics might consider leading the Muslim masses into the modern world.

JIHADI PIRATES ON HIGH SEAS: WHAT'S THE DRIVING FORCE BEHIND THEM?
by Walid Phares

  An American ship was recently hijacked by Somali pirates. The captain, Richard Phillips, acted heroically in protecting his crew as did the Navy snipers who took out the pirates. As reported in the Main Stream Media (MSM), Prez Obama got the credit. Actually the initiative came from the on-the-scene commander (see here.) while an indecisive Obama was still averaging out the advice from his multiple advisors. Further, the MSM ignored the fact that the pirates were Muslim and Jihadist. Walid Phares explains the significance of the episode thus: "[The pirates are] in fact part of a regional Jihadi apparatus ... [that] is not limited to the pirates but involves hostile forces from the mid Red Sea to East Africa. The Somali pirates are merely one facet of this grand circle."
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BARAKA
by Boris Zubry

  Boris Zubry has drawn on his experiences working in Saudi Arabia in several previous stories. In this one, he writes about a man named Baraka, an illiterate Muslim, a good observer, a philosopher of sorts. In our society he'd be called a homeless person. In his environment, he blends in. In this soliloquy he muses on a life filled with ugliness, abuse and death. Orphaned in Turkey he is routed to Gaza, where he and other immigrants from the Ottoman Empire "the refuse of the great empire, would" he writes, "claim this territory as our own. Who could say back then that they would teach us to hate the Jews more than the Turks?" He has been transformed into a "Palestinian." He has become member of a welfare group supported by the world and a useful weapon to club the Jews, but he is never allowed to be his own person.
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PALESTINIAN MODERATES WANT PEACE — WITH HAMAS, NOT ISRAEL
by Barry Rubin

  Months, if not years, of western and Israeli propaganda went out the window when Smiling Abbas — the Good Terrorist, Israel's 'peace partner' — announced he doesn't accept the Jewish state. Another assertion — that the PLO-PA moderates want to live in peace with Israel — was also punctured, as Barry Rubin demonstrates, when a leader of the moderates, Muhammad Dahlan, made it clear he seeks peace with Hamas, not with Israel. And the two are mutually exclusive.
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THE USE OF MOSQUES FOR MILITARY AND POLITICAL PURPOSES BY HAMAS AND OTHER TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS AND ISLAMIC GROUPS
by Reuven Erlich

  The Western mind doesn't see churches or synagogues as places to store and launch weaponry so it has difficulty believing Muslims have a different attitude towards mosques. Reuven Erlich provides us with detailed evidence that terror groups and their clerics find it acceptable to use the mosque for military purposes. Interestingly enough, this is not a recent innovation. As Erlich notes, "A commonly held view by Muslim religious scholars is that a mosque is more than just a place of worship and can have military and political uses, because in Muslim tradition Muhammad himself used the mosque for such purposes." What needs to be emphasized is that when a mosque is used to store explosives, launch missiles and train terrorists, it can not claim "the special protection afforded houses of worship [by international law] and may become legitimate targets for attack."
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ISLAM SHOULD PROVE IT'S A RELIGION OF PEACE
by Tawfik Hamid

  Geert Wilders' film FITNA links actual footage of violence committed by Islamists to quotes from the Koran. In consequence, Wilders has been accused of hate crime, and disrespect to Islam. Tawfik Hamid cut through the nonsense and asks the right question: "[is the] blame with Mr. Wilders, who simply exposed Islamic radicalism, or with those who promote and engage in this religious extremism." Phased thus, the answer is obvious. Hamid suggests it's time that Muslim scholars reinterpret the Koran to eliminate barbaric practices and the denigrating of other religions. These practices have no place in modern civilization. A fine idea but I'm not holding my breath.
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Sharia is gaining ground. Globally. Making alliances that are non-intuitive — like hooking up with Marxism and extreme Leftists. Making inroads into Europe by playing the downtrodden victim — although there's some hope that some people have had enough. Making inroads into America by frightening us into redesigning our terror vocabulary Orwell-style. The last essay of the set suggests why it is that Islam is gaining in the West and what we need to do to regain our sense of nationhood.

WHAT IS MARXISM?
by Steven Plaut

  Nowadays, Communism seldom commands front-page headlines and "You're a Communist" has ceased to be a dreaded exclamation of disapprobation, So many a younger American haven't a clue to what Communism is. Marxism, the parent of Communism, unfortunately, is still very much with us and nicely sums up the ideology common to extreme left-wingers, socialists, communists, power-to-the-peoplers, wealth-distributors, welfare-staters, nanny-staters, radical judicial activists, illiberal liberals, identity-politicians and radical theologians. Steven Plaut defines Marxism for us in clear terms. It is particularly necessary, now that the new administration in Washington seems to have embarked on yet another version of Marxism.
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SHARIAH'S BROTHERHOOD
by Frank Gaffney, Jr.

  Given Pres. Obama's new policy of showing Islam unreserved (and perhaps undeserved) respect, the command centers of current-day Islamism are having an easier time in attempting to make Sharia law universal. In the latest scheme, the United Nations is urged to criminalize Islamophobia. Islamophobia is an odd term — it doesn't mean an irrational fear of Islam. It means in practice any word or deed that will upset a Muslim. "The demand that no criticism of Islam be permitted is the preeminent feature of the Muslim Brotherhood's efforts in the West." As Frank Gaffney, Jr. points out "the 1990 Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam ... concludes with the caveat that, 'All the rights and freedoms stipulated in this Declaration are subject to the Islamic Shariah.' Translation: Liberties enshrined in the UN's foundational Universal Declaration of Human Rights are largely rendered null and void." You are urged to contact the White House and speak against this threat to American freedom of speech.
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WARFARE THROUGH MISUSE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Elizabeth Samson

  Previous articles on Lawfare — waging war by using the muscle of the legal system — have focussed on specific cases and countries. In this article, Elizabeth Samson points out lawfare has acquired a global reach, using three legal manipulations: involving the International courts; "misus[ing] legal terminology to manipulate international institutions and the public"; and the "prosecution of foreign nationals in domestic courts for military and civilian action." Consequently, as she points out, "...the rule of law, a weapon designed to subdue dictators and tyrants is now being misused to empower the very same, and being manipulated to subvert real justice and indisputable truth. That is not the purpose the law is designed to serve." Lawfare is a particularly effective tool for Islamists to use because as Samson writes, "Lawfare is exponentially effective because one lawsuit can silence thousands who have neither the time nor the financial resources to challenge well-funded terror financiers or the vast machine of the international judicial system."
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SHARIA'S INROADS AROUND THE WORLD
by Olivier Guitta

  Olivier Guitta reviews the latest inroads Sharia law is making globally. In Pakistan, Sharia law has been imposed in the Swat valley. In Europe, it has made significant advances in the judiciary of several countries — Italy, France and Denmark — where the courts have ignored the laws of the land and have ruled in accordance with Islamic law. In England, many Englishmen are enthusiastically in favor of adopting portions of Sharia law. They may eventually find that just as it's impossible to be a little pregnant, it is impossible to adopt a portion of sharia law.
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EUROPE'S RIGHT TURN
by Bruce Bawer

  Bruce Bawer, an American who has lived in Europe for many years, is an astute observer of western Europe's changing political and social mores. Once proud of putting their socialist idealism into welfare practice, Europeans are finding that they can no longer afford the huge influx of Muslims living on their benevolence while attempting to subvert them to Sharia law. As one consequence, their socialized health and education systems are broken. As another, political alliances are in turmoil: while many voters are reacting to the deterioration of their countries by turning politically to the right, the entrenched political establishments are reacting by ignoring the Muslim threat and focussing on demonizing right-wing politicians. The U.S.A. should take warning.
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IRAN SETTING UP SHOP SOUTH OF THE BORDER
by Todd Bensman

  Iran doesn't just rant and polish her nuclear skills. It looks like she's taking advantage of a naive administration in Washington to infiltrate into Mexico. It's possible, of course, that Iran is lonely and just wants to chat with a fellow oil-producer. But we know that Muslims — Hezbollah included — come in from Mexico, blending in with the Mexican illegals, and occasionally leaving prayer mats at the border. It will certainly be nice for the Iranians to have America ignore them while they explore business opportunities with Mexican politicos and maybe even important Mexicans like the ones that run the drug cartels.
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NAIVETE KILLS
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin writes of the arrogance and self-delusion of the ignorant reporter. He writes, "It never ceases to amaze me that people who know nothing about the Middle East, in this case Roger Cohen but many other names come to mind, can suddenly proclaim themselves experts and make the most elementary errors involving the lives of other people. It also never ceases to amaze me that people can visit a country, especially a dictatorship, be wined and dined, handed a line and believe it so thoroughly that their mind is closed ever after." They return and praise dictators, explain how justified the terrorists are and whitewash the Muslim Brotherhood. Unfortunately, too often, they write for influential newspapers that help certify they are to be taken seriously. They act in this generation as the notorious Walter Duranty did in the 1920-30s when he assured New York Times readers the Soviet dictatorship — which was busy starving millions of Kulaks — wa benevolent, doing a fine job and was just right for the Russian people. Rubin suggests reasons why "the gap between reality and perception [is] so much wider on the Middle East than on other subjects or areas of the world."
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TEXTBOOK LIES ABOUT ISLAM
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim discusses the treatment of Islam and Muslims in textbooks used to educate our children, noting that "key subjects like jihad, Islamic law, [and] the status of women are whitewashed." Textbooks mislead "by projecting Western interpretations onto Islam." As Ibrahim writes, "... necessary knowledge is not merely ignored, but not even acknowledged as real in the first place. When American universities [or high schools] fail to teach Islamic doctrine and history accurately, a flawed epistemology permeates society at large. And since new students and new professors come from this already conditioned — towards — Islam society, not only do they not question the lack of accurate knowledge and education; they perpetuate it." So it is that while textbooks in Muslim countries openly teach hatred and hostility for non-Muslims, or infidels,..." in this country, "the government is now pushing to ban Arabic words connotative of Islamic ideology from formal analysis..." Ibrahim asks, "if children are sheltered from ugly truths today, how can they ever be expected to confront them as adults tomorrow?"
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THE VOICE OF AMERICA SILENCED ON RADICAL ISLAM
by Daniel Pipes

  It is a telling point that almost 8 years after 9/11 we still don't have agreed-upon terminology to label the Muslims who declared war against the West, America and Israel in particular. In fact, as Daniel Pipes makes frighteningly clear, the situation has deteriorated from an inability to decide whether all Islam was resurgent or only a small percentage — say 150 to 200 million Muslims — was on the rampage. Now, in both England and U.S.A., the trend among our leaders is never to use terrorist and Muslim or Islamist and fundamentalist in the same breathe. In Orwellian fashion, we will soon have no vocabulary or only a neutered vocabulary to name the enemy. This is the thinking in the Administration in Washington, the State Department, Homeland Security, the National Counter Terrorism Center, and many in the media. Islamic terrorism is now considered as 'anti-Islamic activity', as if the ones suffering are the Muslims, not us.
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ISLAM AND THE WEST: LINES OF DEMARCATION
by Roger Scruton

  In this thoughtful essay, Roger Scruton asks why radical Islam is so successful in the war they initiated against the west. True, they are dedicated to jihad, and confident they will succeed, but a major reason for their gain is that, unfortunately, the West is not confident. Scruton fears we may be at a point "in which the legitimate claims of our own culture and inheritance will be ignored or downplayed in an attempt to prove our peaceful intentions." Scuton undertakes to "spell out some of the critical features of the Western inheritance which must be understood and defended in our current confrontation." He stresses that we can not succumb to the debilitating belief that we are to blame for Islam's behavior. "... our enemies' hatred of us is entirely unjustified; and ... their implacable enmity cannot be defused by our breast-beating." An important essay. Read it carefully.
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What shall we call the people who help resurgent Islam, sometimes unknowingly, but more often out of some conviction that makes them think their activities are the right thing to do? Fellow travellors? Useful idiots? Lobotimized peaceniks? They are overrepresented in the universities and the media. But they also pop up in American Jewish organizations and synagogues.

FOLLOWING THE HERD
by Barbara Barron

  In the last issue of Think-Israel, Steven Plaut discussed the politicization of the Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal. In this essay, Barbara Barron writes of other professional journals in England that have succumbed to one-sided politics, publishing inaccurate and unprofessional pro-Palestinian articles that indulge in attributing all Palestinian ills to the machinations of the Zionist entity. As Barron points out: "The deliberate use of a professional body's publication to promulgate personal political views, especially when many of these are based upon lies and misconceptions, is unethical as well as immoral. Any professional body which actively encourages this by publishing it is in gross dereliction of its duty."
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EXPOSED: HOW PALESTINIAN FIXERS MANIPULATE THEIR MEDIA BOSSES
by Honest Reporting Staff

  There's a problem when foreign journalists need to depend on locals to translate and smooth the way, especially when the locals have a third-world political agenda and no sense of fairness or professional ethics. The locals "can be selective with the information they feed the journalist or, at worst, mistranslate the words of the interview subjects." In Israel and the Territories, far too often the Arab fixers and translators "encourage journalists to report exclusively on the 'evils' of the Israeli occupation, rather than on the lack of democratic freedoms or human rights abuses in the West Bank and Gaza." This becomes the 'news' fed to the newpaper's readers. This essay by Honest Reporting Staff presents a case study of one such betweener — Nidal Rafa, who is both committed to the Palestinian 'cause' and a presumably-impartial employee of CNN and NPR. She was often the gatekeeper for what got through to the final reader; and she didn't let professional standards and ethics stand in the way of obscuring the facts in favor of the image she wanted to project. She was finally outed when she indulged in an unprofessional tirade during a talk given by Danny Ayalon, Israel's ex-ambassador to the United States — and this was caught on tape..
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POISONING THE AMERICAN MIND
by Daniel Doron

  This is an interesting case study on NPR's anti-Israel stance by Daniel Doron. NPR promotes the notion that Palestinian Arabs are a noble folk with a noble mission — to win back their homeland, occupied by Israel, who has no business being in the Middle East. They aren't indoctrinated with hate; no, of course not. The Palestinians resort to terrorism because they are weak and poor and have few resources. Israel is excoriated if — despite trying to avoid the human shields the terrorists cynically use — they hit one child. The Arabs, of course, are given a free pass, no matter how many Jewish children they deliberately kill. A noble mission is a powerful excuse. Just as interesting is the indignation shown by those who deny NPR's obvious bias. Doron records one such letter and his response.
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WHO WAS IT THAT DEMOLISHED THE WORLD TRADE CENTER (WTC)?
by Ron Mossad

  Ron Mossad takes on the conspiracy theorists who are sure it was the Jooz that attacked the World Trade Center. This time it's a chemistry teacher that's sure nano-thermite was the method used to ignite the buildings to a high enough heat to destroy the structure. What remains a mystery is how, when the culprits are known — the Saudis who learned to fly a plane but not how to land it — and the planes crashing into the building were witnessed by anyone owning a TV set, it is still the Jews who are blamed. But why stop there? In conspiracy-think, there was no Holocaust. Or it was greatly exaggerated. And the recent stock market and housing market crash? Maybe you think it was the politicians who forced the banks to lend to people who couldn't afford the homes they bought. Maybe you think it's groups like ACORN that used "the people" to persuade the politicians to insist the banks make risky loans. Maybe you think it was the bankers who saw a way to make a lot of money. The conspiracy theorists know better — they know it's the Jews.
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A METAPOLITICAL VIEW OF USEFUL IDIOTS
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  For the last 30-35 years, Israel's leaders have pursued a monomaniacal policy of "land for peace," despite the fact that the Arabs continue to say openly — and demonstrate — that they wish to destroy Israel, not make peace. When Israel showed the Arab countries she could rebuff direct attack, they started following a phased peace-and-war strategy — taking over in stages. Unfortunately, Israel's wrongheaded policy is reinforced by useful idiots in the Administration in Washington, who believe that, unlike all who have previously tried their hand at a two-state solution, they will succeed. They won't.
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OBAMA AS MUSLIM APOLOGIST: AMERICA "ENRICHED" BY ISLAM
by PauL L. Williams with Michael Travis

  Dr. Paul Williams takes issue with Pres. Obama's attempt to rewrite history when he said that over the centuries "the United States has been enriched by Muslim Americans." In fact, no Muslim was in the army as late as World War 1 and less than 5000 lived here as late as 1975. His assertion that America "is not and never will be at war with Islam" ignores that even in Washington's time, American ships were harassed by the Barbary pirates, an earlier version of today's Somali pirates. The larger issue, of course, is whether Americans "must deny their heritage as a people for the sake of globalism, multiculturalism, and a New World Order."
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U. PENN HILLEL WORKING WITH HAMAS-SUPPORTING MUSLIM STUDENT ASSOCIATION (MSA)
by Beila Rabinowitz and William Mayer

  Arab student venomous hostility to Jewish students became a front-page issue in 2002 when, at San Francisco State University, they physicaly attacked a group of Jewish students from Hillel, which, ironically, was marching around singing about the joys of peace. But apparently many Jews still refuse to accept that they have been selected as attackable objects of hate by the Muslims. Beila Rabinowitz and William Mayer chronicle a recent example at U Penn, where Hillel has partnered with Muslim Student Association (MSA), a Muslim Brotherhood offshoot, to promote Shari'a law. They should look at Muslim websites, which make it clear that living with Jews in love and peace is not a Muslim goal. By participating in these "sham dialogues" the Jews don't persuade the Arabs to become peaceful. They do lose their self-respect.
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IS SELF-HATE A GOD OF THE JEWS?
by Seth J. Frantzman

  After reading so many books and articles by self-effacing Jews whose hearts go out to the Palestinians, never to the Jews, Seth Frantzman wonders if there aren't really two Judaisms, "one of Jews and the other of 'the Jews'." The first group practices the Jewish religion; the second talks about "being Jewish" and "what Jews should do." They distort the meaning of Jewish symbols and Jewish holidays to gain sympathy for the Palestinians and other causes, always for a group other than the Jews. Frantzman prefers actual, authentic Judaism, where one is instructed to kill one's intractable enemies, to the practise of the Jews in name only, who define "every cause as a 'duty' of Jews and who ceaselessly heap scorn and hate on other Jews because they believe those Jews reflect badly on them."
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History. These events took place after World War II and are part of the story of the creation of Israel.

WAVES OF FREEDOM
by Steve Kramer

  Steve Kramer writes of the years just after World War 2 when the survivors of the Holocaust were still languishing in temporary quarters in camps in Europe. The drive was on to bring these survivors to Palestine, despite the illegal and immoral ban the British had placed on Jewish immigration. The English had received the Mandate for Palestine to help Jews build their homeland. They did not honor their mandate, even when Hitler's policy of exterminating Jews made Palestine a desperately-needed haven. They encouraged Arab immigration and made bringing in Jews a hanging offense. After the War, ten American boats were retrofitted to transport civilians to Palestine. Kramer tells the story of one of these ships, HaTikvah. and the American volunteers, Jews and non-Jews, who manned it.
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ESPIONAGE AND THE ZIONIST ENDEAVOR
by Meir Zamir

  What a Eric Ambler plot for a novel! It is 1948 and a secret and very large arms deal between a Swiss company and Egyptian and Jordanian envoys is finalized in the office of the British minister of state for foreign affairs, with Ethopia acting as beard for arms that will actually be shipped to various Arab states. If all goes well, there'd be no chance of survival for the soon-to-be-born state of Israel. Fortunately, French intelligence and the Swiss Government learn of the "Swiss-Ethiopian" arms sale, and it falls through. This isn't fiction; it happened. Meir Zamir traces the ramifications of the transaction for us, with the Hagana and France pitted against England and the Arab states. Subplots include England engineering a crisis in Syria to oust France, France planting a mole in the British Legation in Beirut and the Hagana seizing British diplomatic mail en route to the port of Haifa. It is a fascinating detailed look at a real-life spy thriller with duped diplomats, blackmailable leaders, spies, moles and duplicitous British politicians who schemed to divide Palestine among the Arab countries, not help it become a Jewish state. The underlying theme is the contrast between the actual manipulations by the colonial powers and their official position of neutrality in the Arab-Israel confllict. Scene 1 was soon followed by the invasion of the fledgling state of Israel by the neighboring Arab countries.
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REMEMBERING THE MASSACRE OF THE HADASSAH CONVOY APRIL 13, 1948
by Dr. Alex Grobman

  Alex Grobman recalls the last days of the Mandate period. Jews fought against the British to take the land already granted them and fought side by side with the British against the Germans. They also provided experts in fighting local medical problems — blood diseases, jaundice, dysentery, exotic fevers and an abundance of disease-carrying insects and poisonous snakes. The local Arabs, led by the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin el-Husseini, an associate of Adolph Hitler, violently attacked both Jew and Brit. Grobman focuses on the day they ambushed a convoy of non-combatant Jews and massacred most of them, while the Brits, who had promised safe passage, watched and did nothing.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

March 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
April 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


January-February, 2009

What we are talking about in the January-February 2009 issue:

PART I: STAGES OF THE GLOBAL MUSLIM TAKEOVER
WHAT THE END-POINT OF A MUSLIM TAKE-OVER LOOKS LIKE (Sultan Knish, Fighel, Guitta, Tibi, Inbar and Kedar, Khalaji, Rubin)
MUSLIM SOCIETY (Ibrahim, jasser, Emerson, Hertz, PeoplesCube, Mirza )
ENGLAND ON THE TAKEOVER SCALE (Fjordman, Silverberg, Hove, Plaut, Ceren, Bat Yeor, Wilders)
FOISTING MUSLIM IDEOLOGY ON AMERICA (Shorrosh, Shaidle, McLaughlin, Stillwell, Emerson, Pearl, Shulman, Sacks, Merkley)  
PART II: ISRAEL BEARS THE BRUNT
INSTITUTIONAL ANTI-SEMITISM (Levin, Berlyn, Cotler, Eye on the UN, Tossavainen, Ross, Steinberg, Cravatts, Gerstenfeld, MacEoin, Spiegel Staff)
GAZA, HAMAS AND THE GAZA INVASION (Frantzman, Surbeck, McCarthy, Eastman, Harari, Rosett, McLeod, Cohen, Carmon et al, Feder)
THE START OF THE CURRENT GAZA PROBLEM: EXPELLING THE GAZA JEWS (Saperstein, Lerner, Shulman)
WE NEED NEW THINKING: TIRED NON-SOLUTIONS AND SOME NEW POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS (Grief, Eidelberg, Bingham, Dann, Leder and Greenfield, No Sharia, Sigmund, Carl and Alfred, Sultan Knish, Basch, Shoher, Warren, Freund)
HISTORY SECTION (Sharpe, Hertz, Krakow)
BLOG-ED PAGES (January, February)
PART I: STAGES OF THE GLOBAL MUSLIM TAKEOVER:

We are encouraged to view the various terrorist groups as independents — each with its own set of grievances. But maybe the cartoon riots served an unintended purpose — showing us a commonality. As the essays suggest, the goal is the same. The differences are a function of how far the Islamists have succeeded in infiltrating and overcoming a particular country.

David Meir-Levi lists the 10 stages in how to take over a country "peacefully." He considers Bangladesh at Stage 9, the EU and UK at stage 7 ready to move into 8, the USA at around Stages 4 or 5.
— (www.FrontPageMag.com, April 26, 2006). Considering how far along once-Great Britain has come, perhaps its ranking should be upgraded.

  1. Infiltrate quietly, settling in small numbers near or among the locals' towns and villages.

  2. Establish friendly relations, and convince others of the virtues of Islam.

  3. Participate in community activities and provide charity for the poor and generosity to all, while encouraging the immigration of other Muslims.

  4. Get converts and supporters from the rank and file of the local population, particularly from the poor and disenfranchised of the host society, via the multiple mosques and madrasas and charitable and human rights groups. (Today, in the case of the US and EU, converts come in great numbers from the ranks of criminals, especially imprisoned African-Americans.)

  5. Agitate for greater and broader rights and considerations for Muslims, and for protection against real or imagined "Islamophobia".

  6. Organize a political party to push for changes in law to permit Muslim-only enclaves and for laws that formalize the host society's accommodation of Muslim religious needs.

  7. Institute the divide-and-conquer strategy of making pacts with some anti-establishment or minority government groups, legal (as has been done in the USA with Green Party, National Lawyers Guild) or illegal (KKK, Aryan Nation) so they will help in the following stages.

  8. Once you have the power base (some 10-15 percent of the population), then use violence, strikes, street riots, assassination, intimidation and bribery of government officials to destabilize the government.

  9. If the host country's government response to the violence is not effective, then there is a de facto green light to start full-blown terrorism which will topple the government and allow Muslim leaders to move up the power ladder with the help of the anti-establishment groups. Once in power, Muslim leaders can use their influence over the agitating Muslim population to quell the violence, thus pretending that they are helping restore order even as they themselves orchestrate the violence.

  10. Abandon the erstwhile anti-establishment allies and reign supreme; establish Shari'a, and declare the state to be a new Muslim nation where Shari'a is law and non-Moslems are dhimmi.
 

The first article in this set explains why the attempt to co-exist with Islam is never static. The other articles examine what the end-point of a Muslim Take-Over looks like — the Muslim countries of the Middle East provide us with excellent examples. Use a big enough magnifying glass and there are many inter-state differences. But there's a sameness that overrides the differences: a lack of democracy, a lack of human and civil rights, a lack of respect for women, an intolerance for differing points of view, ugly treatment of non-Muslims and barbaric punishments for what the rest of the world would regard as non-crimes or crimes worthy only of minimal punishment. In sum, whether voiced openly or when actions do the speaking, there's a willingness to be guided by Mohammad's unrevised teachings.
     Perhaps most shocking is Saudi Arabia's godfather role in maintaining terrorist groups. Most disheartening — Turkey has a long history of secularization at least in its government and judiciary but with the election of a strong Islamist party, it seems to be sliding back into the orthodoxy practiced by all the other Muslim countries.

 

LIVING WITH CANCER, LIVING WITH ISLAM
by Sultan Knish

  A corollary to seeking accommodation with Islam is the belief that if we fulfill their current demands, Muslim demands for furthering Islam will stop. The situation will become static. It will have reached equilibrium. This is never true. It can't be true, because the thrust of resurgent Islam is what it has always been when not kept down — to become our overlords. Sultan Knish compares this ambition to the growth of a cancer — you can only stop it by drastic measures.
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THE SAUDI CONNECTION TO THE MUMBAI MASSACRES: STRATEGIC IMPLICATIONS FOR ISRAEL
by Col. (res.) Jonathan Fighel

  Our friends the Saudis don't get the credit they deserve for playing both ends against the middle and paying off everybody. This essay by Jonathan Fighel examines one of their recent spectacular successes — the slaughter in Mumbai of non-Muslims staying at well-known tourist hotels and Jews staying at the out-of-the-way Chabad house. The deed was done by a local Muslim terrorist group in Mumbai. But the money for the months of training it took to carry out the task faultlessly came largely from the Saudis; their sense of righteousness came from the Saudi-promoted reading of the Koran; and their group coherence (http://knol.google.com/k/-/-/1mpto2qu8knp0/j6k9gj/muslim-prayer.jpg) came from Saudi techniques of social engineering, which develop social networks for group solidarity and responsiveness to Saudi ideology. As Fighel points out, "The bottom line is that we are seeing the same pattern of global jihad-oriented groups starting to be active in Gaza." Global jihad takes advantage of local hostilities and emotions, but its motive power comes from a well-financed promotion of Islamic ideology.
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HOMEGROWN THREAT AGAINST SAUDI ARABIA
by Olivier Guitta

  Olivier Guitta writes how Wahhabi teachings about hate have come home to Saudi Arabia to roost and kill. This should have been clear right after 9/11. All but a couple of the terrorists were Saudis. They grew up in Saudi Arabia. They got their early education in Wahhabi mosques in Saudi Arabia. Now they wish to rid their homeland of foreign influences. To visualize their brainwashing a couple of decades ago, look at the pictures of young Palestinian Arabs blowing themselves up because they can kill a few Jews that way. Look at the toddlers being taught to hate the Jews and how to murder them. Conversely, we can project what the newer generation will do when they are older. England is already seeing what Wahhabi mosque education can teach in designing a successful bombing. Maybe we in America should start paying more attention to what the kiddies are learning from the Wahhabi mullahs in American mosques.
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ISLAMISTS APPROACH EUROPE: TURKEY'S ISLAMIST DANGER
by Bassam Tibi

  Bassam Tibi talks about the changes in Turkish society and in its attitude towards Europe since the Adalet ve Kalknma Partisi (AKP) came into power. Tibi points out that AKP aims at "... a creeping Islamization that culminates in a Shari'a (Islamic law) state not compatible with a secular, democratic order." And it favors Islamization of Europe. Ironically, AKP is backed by both the U.S.A. and the European Union. Consequently, "in Turkey, the West loses its true friends: liberal Muslims."
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EGYPT IS NOT GOING TO STOP THE SMUGGLING INTO GAZA
by Efraim Inbar and Mordechai Kedar

  It is only in contrast to blatantly anti-semitic, totally off-the-wall countries like Iran that Egypt can be considered a moderate country. It has a veneer of modernity and civility and secularism — if you discount the barbarism with which it treats its religious minorities such as the Christian Copts. And, despite a peace treaty with Israel whereby it regained all the land it lost when it invaded Israel, Egypt can not be considered a good neighbor. Instead, it plays a two-faced game that is overtly helpful or neutral or statemanlike but in actuality is hostile towards Israel. Smuggling by the Gaza arabs through tunnels that exit in Egypt is a case in point. As Efraim Inbar tells us, "Egyptian behavior is intriguing and cunning," designed to keep Israel off-balance and engaged in conflict with Hamas.
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EGYPT'S MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD AND IRAN
by Mehdi Khalaji

  Viewing the Muslim world as engaging in a bitter contest between Shi'ites and Sunnis may be a reasonable generalization for the long run but it's is a poor predictor of local and special-purpose political ties. Shi'ite Iran has long supported Sunni Hamas, which was established by the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood (MB), an organization that has a strong base in Egypt. And Iran helped shape Islamist revivalism in Egypt. Conversely, the fundamentalist MB has helped structure Iran's rigid Islamic ideology, making it the glue in which all of Iran's political, economic and social institutions are set. Mehdi Khalaji examines the ambivalent relationship between MB and Iran, both of which see the West as the enemy they are determined to conquer. Add to the mix the fact that MB has a good chance of governing Egypt when Mubarak dies; add in Iran's bonding with Hamas; add that both Iran and MB are successfully expanding. It could be an explosive mix.
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AN OPENING TO IRAN? THEY'VE SOLD US THIS RUG BEFORE
by Michael Rubin

  Michael Rubin traces the history of how we have tried over the years to reduce Iran's hostility by diplomatic means. He points out that Obama's announced willingness to talk without preconditions with Iran is not new. "Washington and Tehran have never stopped talking; indeed, many of Obama's supposedly bold initiatives have been tried before, often with disastrous results." As example, when the Iranians held our men hostage, Carter's pleas to the Iranians to sit and talk encouraged Iran to make ever more outrageous demands. "In fact, Obama's inattention to timing and target replicates Carter's failure. His outreach to Ahmadinejad" might well make Ahmadinejad a hero and winner of the forthcoming election. Hardly a wish come true.
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The previous set of essays looked at examples of states deeply steeped in the compleat Islamic view of how the world should behave in all aspects of life. The essays in the next set of essays look at Muslim society generically: how it is anchored in Koranic teachings and how it functions today, whether it be in control of the government or embedded in a larger society.

ISLAM, WAR, AND DECEIT: A SYNTHESIS
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim has previously written about the Islamic view that waging war against infidels is a continuous process, with only a single acceptable endpoint. He was distressed that the connection between Koranic doctrine and the deceitfulness with which Islam wages war is ignored in the West. (See here.) In this essay, he explores in detail the importance the Koran itself bestows on the use of deceit in war and how seriously modern-day Islamic practioners of war and apologists for Islam take this instruction. As Ibrahim concludes: "...any Muslim who closely observes Sharia law — the definition of a Muslim — ... will always have a 'divinely sanctioned' right to deceive, until 'all chaos ceases, and all religion belongs to Allah.'"
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THE PLIGHT OF WOMEN UNDER ISLAMISM: TIME FOR MUSLIMS TO SHED THE DENIAL
by M. Zuhdi Jasser

  "Wife seeks divorce. Husband beheads her." We'd expect this to be a sensational, long-running news story, with reporters obsessively exploring every facet. Did the husband's religion really gave him permission to murder his wife? Was he was the "moderate Muslim" he claimed to be? It didn't happen. M. Zuhdi Jasser explores an important issue this 'non-story' highlights: denial in both the Main Street Media and in the American Muslim community. As a reader of the story sarcastically commented, "There we go again, wanting to impose our culture on someone else."
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'MODERATE' MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD CLERIC IS ANYTHING BUT
by Steve Emerson

  Steve Emerson writes of Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, a man who can speedily organize mobs when they are needed, a man noted for his organizational and leadership abilities, a man with a ferocious hatred of Jews. Despite his connections to terrorist financing and his fatwas that encourage using women suicide-murderers and murdering homosexuals and apostates, he has a cadre of prominent apologists who insist he's a moderate Muslim — and this lie is often repeated as fact in the Main Stream Media. Of course, within the Muslim milieu, his extremist statements may be moderate. (For additional information on his position in the Muslim Brotherhood, read this, this ) and this.)
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PALESTINIAN ARAB CHILDREN DYING TO KILL: PURPOSELY SACRIFICING CHILDREN
by Eli E. Hertz

  Brainwashing is retooling someone's belief system. In a recent example, it's been found the Israelis had to brainwash their soldiers in order to get them to expel fellow Jews from their homes in Gush Katif, Gaza in the summer of 2005. It doesn't seem the right way to describe what the Palestinian Arabs are doing to their children. As Eli Hertz writes, the children are taught from toddler-age to hate and to desire to kill fellow human beings. Maybe we need a new word: the Arabs braindirty their children, so they grow from little monsters to big monsters, with little sense of humanity or decency. This is truly child abuse.
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OMS — OFFENDED MUSLIM SYNDROME AND SELF-HELP SUPPORT GROUPS
by Red Square of People's Cube

  The People's Cube is a very funny website that makes some very serious points. This article highlights the Islamists' talent for playing victim while making pests of themselves. The ability of the Muslim to be offended by almost anything is also noted and cures are thoughtfully provided.
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WALKING AWAY FROM ISLAM
Front Page Magazine interviews Dr. Syed Kamran Mirza

  Dr. Mirza was born into a family of devout Muslims in Bangladesh and received a religious education, which didn't include a translation from the Arabic. In this interview, he talks about the events that initially shook his faith but it wasn't until he began studying the Qur'an that he rejected Islam. Speaking about the many terror groups and their ever-changing names, he says, "... their ultimate connection is of course their giant umbrella organization of modern day Islamic Jihad called Al-Qaeda — which is well connected to Islam and Qur'anic teachings." We should take seriously his assertion that Islamic terrorism "...is a more dangerous and deadlier phenomenon than communism." He makes the point that it is not a winning strategy to appease the Muslims or to babble that "[t]errorists are not real Muslims, Islam is a religion of peace." "Remember," he reminds us, "Muslims do believe strongly that Allah is working behind their ulterior plan of converting the entire earth under the fold of Islam; they call it peace or surrender."
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England is one of the many countries in Europe that are excellent examples of countries coming very close to the brink. People such as Aude Signoles — a political scientist, an expert on Palestinian communities and decidedly pro-Palestinian — fear that Europe is growing less sympathetic to the Arabs. "Europe fears an Islamist threat, whether internal or external, and this has begun to change the overall views on the Israel-Palestine conflict." Most observers, however, believe that Europe must make a strong assertion of its own identity and very soon, or it will be overwhelmed by Islam within a few years. These essays explore the theme. Several focus on what's happening to Geert Wilders. Is this the start of a reaction to the Muslim takeover or just another indicator that it's happening?

MULTICULTURALISM, SELF-INFLICTED DEFEAT OF THE WEST AND THE TRIUMPH OF ISLAM
by Fjordman

  Fjordman is one of the great essayists of our time, providing us with reasoned analyses of trends others do not perceive until long after he has discussed them. This essay is somewhat different. Oh, he definitely makes the case that Britain is fast being Islamicized, perhaps irretrivably, by the Muslims — and America may not be far behind. But the tone is clearly not dispassionate. He mourns for the England that was and regrets what England — as well as all of Europe — is allowing itself to become.
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THE BANALITY OF EVIL
by Mark Silverberg

  In this essay, Mark Silverberg gives us a good sense of the ominous anti-semitic environment in which English Jews now live. David Dastych, who sent Think-Israel this article wrote, "This is an excellent article showing how dangerous is an anti-Semitism of today and how indulgent are the media and societies of Europe towards islamist radicalism and terrorism. Euroarabia is more and more a reality than a theoretical notion. The anti-Semitic excesses in Europe are nothing but a prognostic of a great danger the Western civilisation is facing now and will be facing in the years to come."
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THE CUT-AND-OMIT TV NEWS
by Odd Sverre Hove

  This essay is a case study of the biased pro-Arab news coverage in Middle East reporting by a particular Norwegian T.V. station, Dagsrevyen. Odd Sverre Hove describes how Dagsrevyen presented the start of the second Intifada in 2000 and the lynching of Israeli reservists in Ramallah, and how, because essential facts were omitted, both accounts differed from the reality. Sad to say, Hove is accurately describing the "normal" state of TV coverage of the

Arab-Israeli conflict not only by Dagsrevyen but by most TV news stations in Europe — and for any time period.
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THE LANCET'S MISDIAGNOSIS OF GAZA
by Steven Plaut

  In England, the increase in both insensitive anti-semitism and "sensitivity" to Muslim desires go hand in hand with a corruption in standards of many of England's institutions. Medical journals would seem unlikely candidates for politicizing issues but they, too, have been affected. The leading British medical journal, the Lancet has disregarded scholarly standards for several years now and happily pimps for the Arab cause against both Israel and America. They recently issued a defective monograph on Gaza and Arab health. It has reminded Steven Plaut of some earlier excesses by the Lancet.
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I'M GOING TO MISS WESTMINSTER ABBEY
by Omri Ceren

  Fjordman's essay provided us with a keen summary of how sharia law is gaining power in England and Mark Silverberg focused on the concomitant rise of anti-semitism. This essay by Omri Ceren recounts some significant details that highlight how rapidly England is changing. the Muslims are demanding special treatment almost as fast as officials in the police, the church, the schools and in parliament are picking up the pace in satisfying their demands. The situation is well beyond the amusing bits we've heard about: abolishing piggy banks because Muslims don't eat pork; not allowing Brits to eat lunch openly during Ramadan because their Muslims coworkers are fasting; and changing educational standards to accomodate Muslim students. The much diminished pride in England's Christian and democratic roots is too weak to withstand a resurgent and often violent Islam. The English are responding by adopting practices that arise from Islamic ideology, including a rapidly-growing overt and even violent hatred of the Jews.
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GEERT WILDERS AND THE FIGHT FOR EUROPE
by Bat Yeor

  We should all take to heart Bat Yeor's right-on-target analysis of what the persecution of Geert Wilders really signifies: "In its efforts to defend the 'true image' of Islam and combat its defamation, the Organization [of the Islamic Conference (OIC) ] has requested the UN and the Western countries to punish "Islamophobia" and blasphemy. Among the manifestations of Islamophobia, in the OIC's view, are European opposition to illegal immigration, anti-terrorist measures, criticism of multiculturalism, and indeed any efforts to defend Western cultural and national identities. The OIC has massive funding from oil sources, which it lavishly spends on the Western media and academia and in countless 'dialogues.' It influences Western policy, laws, and even textbooks through pressures brought by Muslim immigrants and by the Western nations' own leftist parties."
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WHAT I PLANNED TO SAY IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS
by Geert Wilders

  What is happening to Geert Wilders, a film maker and a member of the Dutch parliament — Holland is a country traditionally tolerant of deviant life styles — epitomizes the Orwellian world we seem to be living in. Wilders mades a film that is billed as "controversial." It may be distasteful, impolitic, impolite, but how controversial can it be when it is mostly citations from the Koran appropriate to film strips of actual (not reconstructed) events? (See the film here.) He was chastized because he — not the Koran, not Muslim terrorists — is committing a hate crime! What happened to him is a smaller-scale version of what the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is pushing through the UN — namely that any criticism of Islam is to be treated as a hate crime, while Muslims and their friends will be allowed to continue to foam at the mouth vilifying all other religions. Wilders was then not allowed entry into England. This is the speech he would have given there.
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These next essays chronicle some institutions and groups that provide a home for foisting Muslim ideology onto America. The pressure is more subtle than in countries where Islamic ideology has sway. In his new book, Robert Spencer calls it Stealth Jihad, an apt term, which, as he writes, is subverting America without guns or bombs. Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood are sources of money, ideology and organizational tools; and the Saudis, in particular, can pay for a lot of help. We look now at Middle East Studies programs and the media, churches and disaffected Jews. To add to our problems, governmental organizations help introduce Islamic ideology — the Treasury Department giving courses in Sharia banking, as an example (see previous issues). The essay on the U.S. Army War College and Hamas is about another infiltration. And the prisons have for years proven to be a ever-renewable source of converts to Islam.

Some oddities about the associations that Islamists have formed are hard to explain. The joining together of white Marxists, black liberation theologists and Islamists, who still view slavery as acceptable, is real but not explicable in strict ideological terms. Homosexuals march for Palestinians and feminists excuse the treatment of women in Arab countries, but neither of these groups thrive in Koran-dominated countries.

 

TWENTY-YEAR PLAN FOR USA: ISLAM TARGETS AMERICA
by Dr. Anis Shorrosh

  This is a reposting of an article that first appeared in the May-June 2004 issue. This was the introduction: "It is commonly believed that at the moment, Islamists are focused on ridding the Middle East of Jews and other 'foreigners'. The battle for America is to come later. Dr Anis Shorrosh disagrees. He believes Islamists have already begun an intensive attack on America. This is his checklist of what they have already begun to do."
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MUSLIMS IN AMERICA
by Kathy Shaidle

  This is the start of a series of articles on how far and on how many fronts radical Islam has infiltrated America. It is interesting to compare Kathy Shaidle's Overview to Shorrosh's steps in an Islamic takeover (see above). Viewed as separate events, the trend is easy to ignore. It is only when the various encroachments are put in context does a pattern begin to emerge. In this issue, Shaidle examines the American prisons, where so many prisoners have been recruited into Islam.
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SCARY COURT CASES
by Tom McLaughlin

  Tom Mclauglin discusses two impossible-to-believe current court cases: one against the American, Roger Barnett; the other against the Dutchman, Geert Wilders. In the National Review, Bat Yeor writes that Wilders persecution was an instant of a ever-growing problem — in criminalizing "Islamophobia," Europe is trashing its own culture to appease Islamists (see Bat Yeor's article above). The Barnett case is equally outrageous — illegals running the border are suing Barnett for stopping them. (I wonder how they knew what lawyer to hire and where did they get the money to do so?) Are we playing catch-up with Europe in succumbing to Islamist coercion?
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HAMAS'S ACADEMIC CHEERLEADERS
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  Wouldn't you think that all the Middle Eastern Studies departments still led by the ghost of Edward Said would make some sheepish apology because their wise words and predictions about the Middle East became part of the 9/11 meltdown? Or why don't they just shut up. But judging from Cinnamon Stillwell's citations, they are still out there making bizarre assertions, demonizing Israel, making saints of the Arab murderers. As she says, "The next time one of these 'experts' purports to educate the masses on this most crucial of conflicts, consider the source."
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U.S. ARMY WAR COLLEGE PUBLISHES APOLOGIA FOR HAMAS
by Steve Emerson

  Ever since George Bush declared Islam was a peaceful religion soon after 9/11, we've been in the nightmarish position of promoting the ideas of the enemy who declared war on us. Steve Emerson writes about a particularly bizarre example: our Army War College — those are the people that educate the people in charge of making major decisions in fighting our wars — has just issued a monograph that "is more accurately described as an apologia for Hamas" and that "consistently demonizes Israel and its legitimate defense of national sovereignty under international law." What a far cry from World War 1, when Americans renamed sauerkraut — with its German association — Liberty cabbage.
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DUST OVER CAMPUS LIFE: UCLA AT A CROSSROAD
by Judea Pearl

  A recent "symposium, organized by UCLA's Center for Near East Studies (CNES), was billed as a discussion of human rights in Gaza." It of course was nothing of the sort — it was a prolonged one-sided mendacious rant against Israel. What made it particularly poisonous is, as Judea Pearl notes, that it was written up in the campus newspaper as "Scholars Say Attack on Gaza an Abuse of Human Rights," to which the good name of the University of California was attached..."[emphasis added] This trend of appropriating the power of a passive University will continue to happen as long as Jewish academics are too timid or too imbued with a "live and let live" mentality when they are confronted by a group of agressive pro-Arab academics, who are determined to demonize Israel, Zionism and Judaism. Aside from the tarnished name of the University, which preaches 'free speech' but doesn't make sure it isn't suppressed by intimidation, the other victims were the Jewish students, who saw that their elders were too timid to create a unified front to defend academic freedom — and them. Judea Pearl believes things may be going to change. Let's hope this isn't wishful thinking.
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ANTI-ZIONIST PROPAGANDA TECHNIQUES: TWO JOURNALISTS AND AN ACADEMIC
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman examines several prop-ed pieces, two from major newspapers and one by an academic in an internet group. The reputation of the newpapers and the academic standing of the writer do much to persuade the reader he is receiving impartial, in-depth information about the particular story. There is some background information, there are the details that make the story interesting and there is a sizing up of the alleged "important issues", all in an easy-to-swallow capsule. There is also, unfortunately, intemperate bias, distortions, omissions and misinformation, which may condition the reader to come to a particular conclusion but, unfortunately, they prevent him from acquiring an understanding of what is really going on.
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THE PREDICTABLE PALESTINIAN PROPAGANDA PLOY
by Leslie Sacks

  Fox News is constantly being demonized by the more leftist press because it doesn't automatically condemn Israel. Yet it too has its staunch pro-Muslim advocates, the dramatic though seldom accurate Geraldo Rivera, and its guru when there's a crisis, Hanan Ashwari. As Leslie Sacks writes, "[Ashwari] harangues the audience with emotional and outrageous untruths, with nary a criticism. The interviewers, it seems, go mute in the face of such passionate, well-spoken English from the West Bank." Surely, there are better ways for Fox to be fair and balanced in its reporting.
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JIMMY CARTER, ISRAEL, THE CHURCH, AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
by Paul Charles Merkley

  Paul Merkley writes that "[a]s an evangelical Christian, Jimmy Carter knows that most fellow-evangelicals regard the coming-into-existence of Israel ... as a proof of the validity of the Word of God..." But over time he has moved away from his stated commitment to this view to a "Palestinian counter-historical narrative — how the Canaanites became the Arabs." "To enter into argument with this counter-history is a hopeless task, as it stands entirely on re-iterated fantasy." Merkley points out that "Carter attributes his reformed perspective" to the urgings of Anwar Sadat, who has written "The assassination of Arab brethren like Goliath, by Jewish sheep-herders like David, is the sort of shameful ignominy that we must yet set aright in the domain of the occupied Palestinian homeland." By now, Carter has gone "...beyond classic replacement theology [God has shifted his promises to the Jews to the Church] to also include the Muslims. He could be considered just another hard-working apologist for the Palestinian Arabs, defaming both Jews and fellow-evangelicals who disagree with him, but given his stature, he has opened up yet "another front of intra-Church conflict."
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PART II: ISRAEL BEARS THE BRUNT

Through no fault of its own, Israel has been thrust into the front lines of fighting back Islamism. It couldn't have happened at a worse time. Her Marxist citizens — who control the media — are so intent on pleading the claims of the Palestinian Arabs to the Land of Israel, they ignore the predictable endpoint: if they are successful, they will be massacred. While the American administration was ambivalent, Israel frittered away the opportunity to solidify her irrevocable claim to all of Israel — including the Territories — and reduce the strength of her enemy's proxies — Hezbollah, Hamas, Fatah and friendly Egypt. Now she confronts an American administration which is starting to act as if ideologically committed to a Muslim/Marxist view of the world.

The outline is clear. Israel is not willing to be submerged into Islam. Despite its weak leadership and Marxist media, it hasn't knuckled under. So big non-military guns are trained on it by respectable institutions within the United Nation and/or affiliated with it. The Catholic Church, which never deviated from its fight against Communism, has shown an uncharacteristic timidity in confronting Islam. Europe, which has few allies to help it resist being taken over by Islam, has manifested bizarre behavior. Instead of fighting Islam, it fights a proven ally — Israel. Moreover, Israel has an internal enemy: Marxist Jews embedded in its universities are so cocooned in their ideology, they also fight Jews, not Arabs.

We also discuss the recent war in Gaza and Gaza's overlords, Hamas. We remind the reader that many of the problems are directly traceable to the unfathomable decision to herd the Gaza Jews out of Gaza in the summer of 2005, leaving a unmonitored area for the Palestinian Arabs to do what they wanted. What they did was to toss missiles, lob bombs and do their suicide-murder shtick.

The final sections are on why it's time the Jews asserted what is true: they own the Land of Israel. And that includes the Territories. We discuss some non-solutions and present some solutions that are currently being tossed around in the media and think-tanks.

 

The essays in this set mostly deal with non-Islamic (or putative non-Islamic) institutions that display in-your-face anti-semitism. Institution-sponsored anti-semitism comes from the U.N. and its affiliates. The media and academics are active players as are a minority of the Protestant Evangelicals. And we are hearing again from unmuzzled bishops of the Catholic Church. Shades of Father Coughlin! But, as Kenneth Levin points out, Israel's major problems stem from poor decisions it has made — i.e., accepting the Oslo Accord and sticking to it long after it was obviously not working and then making Gaza judenfrei — to accomodate its enemy at the expense of its own citizens.


 

IS ISRAEL DOOMED
by Kenneth Levin

  Kenneth Levin writes that "[i]n addition to the animosity of the Arab world, Israel is faced with much hostile sentiment in Europe, fed by traditional anti-Semitism, by leftist anti-Americanism and association of Israel with America, by perverse, ahistorical leftist twisting of the Israeli-Arab conflict into Israeli colonialists brutalizing the supposedly indigenous population, and by the European media being house organs for anti-Israel bigotry of all these pedigrees." Add in the hate exhibited by various organs of the United Nations, peace-at-any-price Israelis, radicalized Israeli Arabs, estranged diapora Jews, the threat of nuclear annihilation and the constant barrage of rocket fire. That's a lot of ill-will directed against a tiny country. Yet its major problems seem of its own making: suffering Hezbollah attacks for years and then attacking without real preparation; expelling the Jewish residents of Gaza; and most stupidly, its pretending it had peace partners, when all these partners wanted was to destroy Israel. It needs to get over its "desire to propitiate its enemies, to see salvation in concessions and self-reform and to ignore the nature and the dimensions of the threat." This is a very wise assessment.
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PERVERSE CHILDREN
by Patricia Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn provides us an insightful look at the "self-hating" Jew. She points out that for these perverse children, "[i]t is not enough for them to cast off a Jewish identity and merge into the mainstream; they must take on the identity of the most Judeophobic elements of that mainstream." Their talent for inventing reasonable-sounding but spurious arguments have provided the Judeophobes and the recently-invented people, the "Palestinians", some of their best material.
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MAKING THE WORLD JUDENSTAATREIN
by Irwin Cotler

  Irwin Cotler describes the rise of a new type of anti-semitism. "... classical or traditional anti-Semitism is the discrimination against, denial of or assault upon the rights of Jews to live as equal members of whatever host society they inhabit. The new anti-Semitism involves the discrimination against the right of the Jewish people to live as an equal member of the family of nations — the denial of and assault upon the Jewish people's right even to live — with Israel as the 'collective Jew among the nations.' Judenstaatrein applies to the Jewish state as judenrein does to jews. Cotler describes some characteristics of Judenstaatrein anti-semitism: it is overtly proposed by states; it is unabashedly proclaimed in terror-state proxies: the terror organizations of Hamas, PLO, Hizbullah, etc.; it has the weight of Islamic clerics and media behind it. Classic anti-semitism used the language of racism; this brand uses the benign words of humanism and civil rights. This article suggests that we can no longer pretend that those who want to destroy Israel are not gunning for Jews everywhere. This article needs to be taken seriously.
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PLANNING FOR DURBAN II — A CONFERENCE ON RACISM SCRIPTED BY RACISTS
by Eye on the U.N.

  We present excerpts from Eye on the U.N. Reports on the Planning Committee as recorded by Anne Bayefsky. The President of the Planning Committee is Libya; Iran is a Vice-President and non-countries like the Palestinian Delegation can help set the agenda. The Arab Bloc dominated the discussions, while the delegates from European Union bobbled their heads in agreement. What is disheartening is that the American Administration sat silent while the 'Zionism is Racism', the 'Arabs are victims of islamophobia', 'the Palestinians need protection', and 'the Holocaust might have happened, maybe' themes were locked in so that there can be no discussion about them at Durban II — the media can already write the pronouncements that will be coming out of the April Durban II Conference. It is also disappointing that the American Jewish Committee didn't kick up a storm, just a polite rejoinder. Yeah, that will work.
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THE HOLOCAUST IN ARAB PUBLIC DISCOURSE: HISTORICIZED POLITICS AND POLITICIZED HISTORY
by Mikael Tossavainen

  The Planning Committee for Durban (see above) is dominated by the Arab/Muslim countries that are imposing their views concerning the Holocaust, Zionism and the Arab-Israeli conflict on the documents that will be issued as the opinion of the United Nations. Mikael Tossavainen examines attitudes towards the Holocaust as expressed in the Arab media by Arab scholars, clerics and politicians. The Iranian leadership has frequently issued statements denying the historicity of the Holocaust and/or believing the Jews were responsible for the evil done. This is, of course, well-known. What is not usually recognized is that most of the Arab world, thanks to their leaders, has the same opinion. The result is the paradox that the Arabs and Iranians both deny and praise the Holocaust; they allege that the Zionists created the Holocaust "myth" while asserting that the Holocaust happened but it was a collusion between the Nazis and Zionists. They are sure the Holocaust wasn't as bad as the Jews paint it but the Jews are behaving like Nazis to the Palestinian Arabs. Gifted in fantasy, many of the Arab "thinkers" have created elaborate stories out of whole cloth, such as the theory that the Nazis moved to Israel — which nicely ignores that some Nazis did indeed move to Arab countries. Unlike the Europeans, who are reexamining their history, they seem eons away from examining their complicity in the Holocaust — how the Grand Mufti Haj Amin al-Hussein actively encouraged Hitler to murder Jews as the only solution and how he recruited men to fight with the Nazis against the Allies.
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IT'S ALL THE ZIONISTS' FAULT
by Doug Ross

  If you believe the theme of the Doug Ross's photo essay below — that it's all the fault of the Zionists, the JOOZ — you're in good company. People who read the Times (almost any large-sized Times will do) or listen to BBC or CNN do, if they believe their news media. The Mainstream Media are terrified of calling a terrorist a terrorist; and seldom are the words Muslim or Islam written or spoken within 50 words of even the unkindest cut the wordsmiths can think to use — militant. The Media aren't about to put themselves in jeopardy by stating the obvious fact that most of the terror in the world today is created by Muslims. But you gotta blame someone. The Jews are a good choice. They aren't into beheading people who insult them.
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RIGHT OF REPLY: WAR, HUMAN RIGHTS AND DEMOCRACY
by Gerald M. Steinberg

  The New Israel Fund NIF) purports to have Israel's interest in mind. In practice, as Gerald Steinberg points out, much of their funding goes "to the leaders of anti-Israel campaigns in the media, the United Nations and other venues" — and to an active program of covering up some of this questionable support. Supporting Arab minority rights, in practice, has meant funding places such as Adalah, which joins other Arab groups that loudly deny Israel's right to defend itself — to do so is considered bloodthirsty — but they have never condemned Arab missile attacks against Israeli civilians. Steinberg doubts that "this is what most NIF donors expect — particularly those who give through their local Jewish federations."
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'LAWFARE:' ANOTHER WEAPON IN THE JIHAD AGAINST ISRAEL
by Richard L. Cravatts

  Winning in the courtroom isn't exactly like playing poker, where the guy with the most money has a huge advantage — but it doesn't hurt to have the money to sue anyone you want to, however flimsy the grounds. After a while, people will not criticize you for fear of a possible lawsuit. This tactic has been used by Muslims in English and American courts against western media and academic critics and has come to be called Lawfare. As used by U.N.-affiliated non-governmental agencies (NGOs), it is used mostly against Israel. As Richard Cravatts concludes, "In an inverted moral universe where enemies of the Middle East's only democratic state regularly seek its destruction, the tactic of lawfare — with its once-meaningful language of genocide, international human rights, and war crimes — is now being used, by state and non-state actors alike, as an alternate, but equally dangerous, weapon in the unrelenting jihad against Israel."
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CHRISTIAN FRIENDS AND FOES OF ISRAEL
Interview by Manfred Gerstenfeld of David R. Parsons

  In an essay above, Paul Merkley wrote about Jimmy Carter and his changed position from a Christian Evangelical who supported Israel to one who adheres strictly to the Arab position. In this article, David Parson generalizes the concepts and describes both the impact of the Holocaust on theological thinking and the major differences between the binary split between points of view. Parsons says, "As adherents of biblical Zionism, we support political Zionism, as the Jewish people need a homeland and safe haven, but we add the element of divine purpose. This sets us entirely apart from the anti-Israeli camp that believes the election of the Jewish people no longer stands. In their theology the Jews are now fair game for criticism and worse. This is the key distinguishing factor between Christian friends and foes of Israel — whether or not you believe the Jews still have an enduring covenantal relationship with God."
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THE BISHOP AND THE HOLOCAUST
by Denis MacEoin

  Richard Williamson, a bishop of the Catholic Church, who was excommunicated two decades ago, was recently brought back into the fold. Denis MacEoin writes, "As an unbeliever who respects the Church as a bearer of moral values, it shocks me, not only that Williamson has been restored to communion with the Church with the sins of racism and the concealment of genocide on his hands, but that representatives of the Church have tried to put blue sea between the bishop's views and his reinstatement." Judging from the Bishop's recent statements, he isn't rehabilitated; and genocidal assaults against Jews aren't ready to be relegated to the past tense.
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LOSING TOUCH
by SPIEGEL Staff: Stefan Berg, Christoph Schult, Alexander Smoltczyk, Michael Sontheimer and Peter Wensierski

  This article by members of the Spiegel Staff is an excellent summary of the strained relations between the Vatican and Jewry following the Pope's revoking the excommunication of a notorious Holocaust denier. His action compounded the damage done by statement such as the one he issued in January just as the IDF entered the Gaza strip. "War and hatred are not the solution to any problem." He had ignored that Arab terrorists routinely seek out Jewish women and children to murder. He had not spoken out during the years Hamas bombed Israel without retaliation. See here for Rabbi Gerald Skolnik's view of the controversy: "I just Don't Understand... Pope Benedict and Holocaust Denial."
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This set of articles is about Gaza, Hamas in Gaza and the Gaza Invasion. Andrew McCarthy makes the reasonable proposal that what is necessary is that Israel be allowed to finish off the terrorists — the U.N. or the U.S.A or the E.U. routinely stop her before the job can be completed. The hands-on testimony of a soldier who fought in Gaza suggests that there is also the problem that the Israeli leadership forces the IDF to pull its punches, signal its moves and allow Hamas leaders escape paths. The politicians are more interested in good press than in protecting Israel's citizenry by letting the IDF fight to win. Other essays detail the interaction between Hamas and governmental bodies such as UNRWA; between Hamas and other Gaza terror groups; between Hamas and Iran; and between Hamas and the media, which accepts each new lie from Hamas as truth.

THE GAZA WAR 2009: HISTORY AND PERSPECTIVES
by Seth J. Frantzman

  Seth J. Frantzman first presents the background to the recent invasion of Gaza by the IDF. He then discusses the logic and illogic of concepts important in the discourse about the invasion. There is first the difference between the European view that humanity prefers peace to war and the Islamic view that there is to be constant turmoil until the entire world belongs to Islam — this had consequences in the inappropriate solutions the interfering Europeans proposed. Israel's supposed disproportionate force received a lot of media censure; and it is true that relatively few Israelis died from the rocket attacks, but that was not for lack of trying on the part of Hamas. Then there is the media's disproportionate fixation on Israel and its disregard for "more bloody conflicts, rage elsewhere in places such as Kashmir, Sri Lanka and Sudan." As Frantzman writes, "The question should not be why the international community, which is to say western people, care so much about what happens in Gaza, but why they have so rarely cared about what happens to other people in the world."
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ISRAEL, GAZA AND INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Jean-Jacques Surbeck

  This article was occasioned by a newpaper op-ed piece that falsely asserted that Israel was legally at fault when it invaded Gaza. The article also flaunted a flaming red herring that implied that Israel was reckless in its military action: "Defenders of Israel's military actions sometimes counter that Israel cannot afford to abide by international humanitarian law when it is endangered by a ruthless enemy" is a poor description of Israel's meticulous avoidance of civilian casualties, a difficult job considering that the terrorists waged war from ordinary civilian houses, hospitals and schools. Jean-Jacques Surbeck, an attorney specializing in International Humanitarian Law provides us with the actual legal facts. War crimes there were. Hamas committed them.
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BREAKING THE WILL OF THE PALESTINIANS: NO POLITICAL OR LEGAL PROTECTION FOR HAMAS
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Andrew McCarthy argues that what Israel needs from America in its fight against Hamas is to be allowed to finish the job of destroying their ability — and even their desire — to terrorize Israel. For America, this means recognizing that the "Palestinians" aren't inflicted with Hamas — they chose Hamas. Hamas doesn't just represent them politically. Hamas represents their aspirations and their ideology. America needs to give up on the "fantasy that the Palestinians are legitimate actors worthy of statehood and its privileges." Neither Hamas or Fatah or any other group seeking power is willing to seek "peaceful coexistence with Israel." Were they to do so, they'd lose the support of the populace. We can also help Israel by making sure the U.S.A. doesn't join the 1977 Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions, which were "designed for the benefit of terrorist organizations, national-liberation movements, and third-world tyrannies." We need to understand McCarthy's clear definition of Protocol I and its implications — it attempts to subordinate military actions to inapplicable legal standards. "On the matter of who is a civilian, Protocol I is a humanitarian disaster." Like Lawfare, it can do much harm to Israel, and to us.
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HOW ONE SOLDIER SURVIVED THE WAR IN GAZA
by Joshua Eastman

  Joshua Eastman is a young American who made aliyah, a religious Jew, and, for more than a year, a soldier in the IDF. In this essay, he shares with us his experience participating in the Gaza invasion, his observations and his emotions, from the first tense, rumor-filled days before the invasion through the time he saw action. He writes about the bravery and the pain, the strength he drew from his faith in God and the cold bodily fear he endured every time he "squeezed the trigger, every time a missile landed nearby." He wasn't allowed to fire on civilians but, as he writes, "I saw the twelve year olds with missiles and RPGs strapped to their backs. I saw that it was with sadness and great anger Israeli troops recognized the need to fire on people who crossed the red line, the danger zone which meant they saw us, and knew where we were. Old people mined with bombs, children armed with detonators, tunnels that opened in the ground to swallow our soldiers." This is an awesome essay.
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A VIEW FROM THE TARGET ZONE
by Haim Harari

  Doctor Haim Harari is a trained observer. In this essay he enlarges on the details — the level at which most reporters stop — so we understand what has been happening in Gaza. He makes some important points. While Israel is scourged for every civilian it kills inadvertedly, no one complains that Hamas terrorists routinely target Jewish civilians, especially children. The rockets shoot randomly — so "they could not possibly be aimed at military or strategic targets." At home, Hamas — and Fatah is no different — uses women and children as shields. It's win-win. The world will complain should Israel hits a shield to get at a terrorist and Hamas gains sympathy; and, as is more likely, if Israel doesn't shoot because of the shields, the terrorists are safe. Since 2005, when Hamas took over the Gaza strip completely, it has had the option of constructing a functioning pre-state entity or waging war on Israel. It chose war. ".... rockets were now stored in mosques, schools, hospitals and normal apartment buildings. ... Schools financed by the UN were used in order to launch mortar shells and missiles." Harari also writes of UNRWA, which, almost single-handedly, has perpetuated the Arab refugee problem since 1948. Commenting on the various lies and hoaxes in which Hamas indulges, he says, "That the Hamas murderers use these tactics, lies and methods, is not at all surprising. That the international community, with all its investigative reporters, swallows these lies so eagerly, without exposing them, is something which demands an explanation."
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GAZA BEDFELLOWS: UNRWA AND HAMAS
by Claudia Rosett

  Claudia Rosett puts the essential facts about the Gaza populace bluntly, "In the current violence of Gaza, we are seeing the fruition of one of the most bizarre creations of modern diplomacy: a UN-supported welfare enclave for terrorists." and "Hamas has been running Gaza as a territory reduced to basically two industries: aid and terrorism." Strip out the fantasy that Hamas is mostly a beneficent social services agency. Strip the cunning propaganda that there's something so unique about the "Palestinian" Arabs that, unlike any other group of refugees in the world, they are never to be resettled anywheres but in the land they claim as their own and until then they are entitled to the services of an entire U.N. agency just for them. Strip out diplomat language that tries to hide that the United Nations has been corrupted. And you are left with the essentials Rosett states so well. Instead of being a force to encourage civility and human rights, the U.N. has become another forum for promulgating Arab propaganda and bankrolling terror.
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QANA'S GREEN HELMET GUY NOW WORKING FOR HAMAS?
by Judi McLeod

  The Arabs have acquired a well-deserved reputation for inventing or wildly exaggerating damage they suffer. For months Hamas's leaders were photographed sitting in chambers lit only with candles to prove that Israel was chintzy with supplying Gaza with electricity. It would have been more effective if sunlight hadn't peaked through gaps in the closed curtains. A more complex hoax in Qana in the 2006 Lebanese War was exposed by internet bloggers: in an Arab version of street theatre, Hezbollah personnel rushed from one photographer to the next while holding long-dead children as if they were rushing them to medical care. These photos received extensive exposure on the internet. So it is surprising that one of the more notorious photos from Qana has resurfaced with a new caption — this time the child is said to be a Gazan and its death is attributed to IDF action. Judi McLeod tells us how the latest hoax was discovered and some of the aftermath.
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JIHADIST GROUPS IN GAZA: A DEVELOPING THREAT
by Yoram Cohen

  Just to add another level of complexity, Hamas isn't the only terror group engaging the loyalty of the Palestinian Arabs in Gaza and even in the West Bank. Just as we were sure we knew the players — good terrorists (Fatah), bad terrorists (Hamas) — along come newer, maybe even nastier, splinter groups — who share Al-Qaeda's ideology and imitate their style. Yoram Cohen writes about several of the newer groups operating in Gaza. They are all dedicated to restoring the Caliphate and imposing sharia law universally. They regard Hamas "as insufficiently aggressive in conducting terrorist attacks" and target not only Israel but foreigners, Christians and anything that smacks of unIslamish western influence. Once, Hamas was willing to work with them, but now they are winning recruits from Hamas and gaining the loyalty of the locals. So much for the myth of the po' Palestinians, who want peace but have an evil government.
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AN ESCALATING REGIONAL COLD WAR: THE 2009 GAZA WAR
by Yigal Carmon, Yael Yehoshua, Ayelet Savyon and H. Migron

  Yigal Carmon et al put the Gaza Invasion into a larger context: the regional rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia, with Hamas acting as proxy for Iran. They suggest that the Iran-Saudi conflict is key to understanding the Middle East in the 21st century. The "conflict is rooted in Iran's aspirations to regional hegemony — both geostrategic and religious — which pose a threat to Saudi Arabia" and has been sustained with more or less tension since the Iranian Revolution 30 years ago. "Iran's attempt to position itself as a regional military superpower," and its attempts to extend its power into the Arab world after Saddam Hussein's regime fell are additional irritants. The Iran-Syria-Qatar-Hizbullah Axis is mainly Shi'ite but includes Sunni groups that oppose the Saudis. and it is trying to win over Turkey. The Sunni Saudi-Egypt group is trying to win over some of Iran's Sunni allies. Saudi Arabia complains that Iran is interfering in internal Arab affairs and causing dissension; Iran rebuts that Saudi Arabia and Egypt collaborate with America (AKA The Great Satan). The Gaza War "ended with Hamas defeated on the ground" and thus should count as a victory for the non-Iranian camp; i.e., the Saudi-Egyptian side. But Iran boasts of its help to a victorious Hamas and the pro-Saudi camp "accuses Hamas of serving Iranian and Syrian interests rather than those of the Palestinians." Carmon et al suggest the way the two sides are reacting to Israel is moored in the Iran-Saudi struggle, with Iran denouncing any sort of accomodation with Israel as collaboration, while Saudi Arabia wants to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (on its own terms), to take it off the table.
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GAZA IS THE FACE OF A PALESTINIAN STATE
by Don Feder

  Don Feder in his own inimitable way sums up the facts we know about the Gazan Arabs and their Hamas overlords and the West Bank Arabs and their Fatah/Hamas overlords and draws the right conclusion. This is not a group of people that is ready to set up a state, especially not in Israel's heartland. Not now. Not in the forseeable future. And maybe never.
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Lest we forget, we have essays on the Settlers, those driven from their homes in Gaza by their disaster-wreaking government and those who live in Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem — the Territories — who are threatened with the same fate suffered by the Jews of Gaza.

What we call the Territories is where Abraham and Sarah lived and were buried, where David was crowned King, where the Jews lived in Biblical times. There was no Tel-Aviv.

To briefly review recent history, Jews began settling in the Territories — Gaza, Judea and Samaria (what Jordan called the "West Bank") — after 1967 when Israel was invaded by her Arab neighbors for the second time, fought them back successfully and took back the Territories. Within a few years, the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza, had developed innovative agricultural techniques and were contributing significantly to Israel's prosperity. By their very presence, they acted as an early warning of impending Arab terrorism. Palestinian Arab terrorism was given a tremendous boost when, in August 2005, the Israeli government exiled the Gazan Jews. Since their expulsion, Gaza has become a safe haven for the Arabs to train various local and foreign terror groups, teach their own children to kill Jews and to manufacture and store huge supplies of deadly armaments.

The Sharon-Olmert Kadima continued to harrass the Jewish settlers, in the unswerving belief that it would be able to give this Land to the Arabs in return for peace. Given the history of gross bureaucratic incompetence — most of the 10,000 Jews from Gaza are yet to be resettled in permanent housing (see Fendel, here) — an Israeli government that booted out some of the more than half-million Jewish "settlers" of Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, is unlikely to be able to cope with additional Jewish political refugees in what is left of Israel. Nevertheless, the war against the settlers continues, by stealth, by harassment, by cutting water and electricity from farmers who keep sheep and goats and grow plants, by treating them unfairly in the courts and in the press. This policy is pursued almost as strongly as the Arabs continue to insist by word and by nasty deed that their objective is to destroy the Jewish State. I for one believe them.

THE GAZA WAR REACHES US
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  Moshe and Rachel Saperstein are essayists who have recorded their experience from the time they lived in Neve Dekalim, Gush Katif, Gaza and since they, with all the other Jews who lived in Gaza, were expelled and given still-temporary housing. Moshe views this war as a pre-election ploy by the Kadima candidates, Barak and Livni, "to erase their wimpish images and be seen as Tough Protectors of the People." The Gaza excursion has no point if Israel leaves without disarming the terrorists, thus allowing them to rebuilt. The Sapersteins live through the sirens, the explosions of missiles and bombs from Gaza, the fear, the overeating of comfort food, the rumors, the interviews with closed-mind reporters, But there's also the miraculous escapes from death and friends. They had felt particularly vulnerable because their temp home is without air raid shelter. Moshe has developed grudging respect for the Government's on-the-fly use of concrete sewer pipes as shelters — which can, at least, withstand shrapnel. Included is the speech Rachel gave at this year's Jerusalem Conference.
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DEMONIZED ISRAELI SETTLERS
by Barbara Lerner

  The inhuman Mumbai terrorists who brutally tortured and massacred foreigners and resident Jews and whose agenda includes imposing Islamic law on the whole world get a better press that the law-abiding, patriotic and gifted citizens of Israel who live in Biblical Israel (the West Bank), who are collectively known as "the Settlers." (pronounced with a sneer in the mainstream media.) In Israel, as Barbara Lerner points out, the government turns "an increasingly blind eye to growing Arab violence against Jews" while routinely taking "... a hyperaggressive, hyperpunitive stance, then responding to nonviolent settler protests with the kind of brutality that would outrage most Americans if the victims were members of any other group anywhere." The settlers do indeed support ideas that the successive suicidal Israeli governments and the pro-Arab "Jewish" groups such as Peace Now do not appreciate. "Settlers claim a right to buy land and live and work on it, anywhere in the Biblical triangle between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean, and between the Red Sea and the Golan Heights, and they act on that right by building and living in communities in places like Hebron, East Jerusalem, Gaza, and Amona." How shocking! They wish to live in the Jewish State as Jews! Lerner also reminds the reader that the "Palestinians" are not the natives, the Jews are not the invaders. Anyone who knows his history and geography knows it is the other way around. But it does make sense for Islam and its adherents to attempt to destroy the Settlers — they are a powerful defense against the Islam's war against Israel — and the West.
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A PERSONAL VISIT TO JUDEA
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman's visit to Israel included a tour of Judea, where some of the "Settlers" make their home. He describes accurately the discrimination the Settlers encounter from their own government, which favors the Arab in the law courts and in encounters between Arab and Jew. It hardly seems credible that in the Jewish state, the Jews can be intimidated by the local Arabs. But the Arabs have learned that the Israeli government literally lets them get away with murder and, instead, punishes the Jews who fight back. Some of the bigger happenings make the papers — when police came unexpectedly in the middle of the night and destroyed the home of a Jewish activist in Hebron; or when Jewish girls in their teens were thrown in jail to await trial months away for legally protesting the Gaza expulsion. But Arabs hassle Jews, shoot at/stone/beat up Jews and steal their crops, animals and cars all the time and these "incidents" seldom make the news. Shulman describes examples of "Israeli government complicity with terrorism." And of Arab contempt at Jewish attempts of appeasement.
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The Arab states invaded Israel for a second time in 1967. Israel turned the tables and reclaimed Samaria and Judea (Jordan named them the West Bank when it held them from 1948 to 1967) and Gaza. Reclaimed is accurate. The land is Jewish by international law. The Israeli government fears the Jewish state being overwhelmed by a Arab population in the Territories, which has grown, thanks to legal and illegal immigration from the Arab states and generous internal welfare and medical benefits. So the problem is usually stated as an either-or: (1) take over the Territories and become a single state that is likely eventually to lose its Jewish character, given the impressive ability of the Arabs to breed when someone else is footing the bill; or (2) create an (almost certainly hostile) Arab state in the Territories that wedges Israel on both sides and is intertwined with it in Jerusalem. Actually, neither option will bring peace, because the Palestinian Arab leaders, proxies of Iran and Saudi Arabia, continue to plot to destroy Israel, not live in a Jewish State or next to it.

In recent years, more and more people realize there is another solution. Why give up Biblical Israel and still be saddled with and/or surrounded by hostile Arabs? Why not transfer the Palestinian Arabs to some part of the vast domain the Arabs own — and keep the Jewish land?

The essays in this set make the point that new thinking is essential. The first essay is foundation: the Jews own what was Mandated Palestine and no amount of distortion in the media can change that fact. The next essays make clear that mouthing nonsense that peace depends on creating another Palestinian state makes no sense and could lead to a disaster that would have global impact. They examine essential flaws in the argument that the Arab war against the Jews can be swayed by concessionary negotiations and analyze the misrepresentations made about the Jewish settlements. The rest explore solutions that may be unfamiliar and may be incomplete. But they show promise and stimulate thinking. (See also Martin Sherman's proposal here.)

LEGAL RIGHTS AND TITLE OF SOVEREIGNTY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO THE LAND OF ISRAEL AND PALESTINE UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Howard Grief

  We are reprinting the article from the July-August 2005 Issue. The introduction read: "In this essay, Howard Grief brilliantly fulfills his objective 'to set down in a brief, yet clear and precise manner the legal rights and title of sovereignty of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and Palestine under international law.' This paper should be part of your armamentarium for the next time you are told that Resolution XXX of the U.N. guarantees the rights of the Palestinian Arabs to YYY." You can read more about Israel's right to all of Jerusalem and Biblical Israel (AKA West Bank) by reading Howard Grief's articles such as this one. For other essays on international law that states that biblical Israel is a trust in perpetuity for the Jewish people and can not be given away, read Part I of Yoram Shifftan's "A Legal Challenge." and his essay on Gifting. Use the Google box at the top of this page to search on Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, legal, mandate and population transfer.
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MONOTHEISTIC PAGANISM AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  A fairytale of our times is that any two groups can come reason together and work out their differences in civility. In this set of essays, Paul Eidelberg explores differences in attitude toward life, living and religion between Jew and Arab that are irreconcilable. Muslims do not see free-will and striving for human development as coming from God — as part of what it means to be made in His image. As Fackenheim has it, the Muslim God — the underpinning of their approach to life — demands "absolute idolatry." It isn't two views of the same God at all.

Differences in fundamentals lead to differences in life style. Eidelberg points out that we practice democratic diplomacy, "[which] regards negotiation between adversaries as a means of conciliation requiring mutual concessions leading to lasting agreement and peace," whereas the Arab regards diplomacy as warfare that might be disguised with a veneer of friendliness and an apparent willingness to compromise, but it can end only when he gains his objective.

The peace process is a type of negotiation where it is mistakenly assumed the quarrel is over land. It follows that reconciliation can come about if the Jew give up some of his Land for the Arab's promise to discontinue waging war. But, as Eidelberg reminds us, the "21 Arab League countries have 500 times more land than Israel" — they are larger than the U.S.A. Adding all of Israel and the territories won't increase the Arab holdings by a single percentage point. Nor are the Arab leaders interested in the diversified economic prosperity Israel can offer them. "Whereas these bellicose Arabs have no peace of their own to give Israel, peace-loving Jews have no land they can safely and rightly give Arabs." The peace process is a fraudulent ploy to deprive Israel of the small amount of land she has.
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A NEW BROOM
by Walter Bingham

  President Obama has appointed George Mitchell as Middle East envoy to resurrect the dead "peace-process." Mitchell has a reputation for seeming even-handed. In his first hop into the Arab-Israeli arena in 2001, he issued blanded down statements on Arab terrorism while reacting with horror at perfectly legal Israeli settlements. He had faith in the notion that if the Palestinians were given a state, they would become responsible citizens, ensuring Israel's security — a fantasy Hamas in Gaza has securely laid to rest. Walter Bingham is pessimistic that Mitchell's acumen has improved. His activities are unlikely to support Israel's viability, considering the blinkered emphasis his boss places on good relations with Muslims.
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REVIEW OF LORDS OF THE LAND: THE WAR OVER ISRAEL'S SETTLEMENTS IN THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES, 1967-2007
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann reviews a recent book on the settlements, which expands on the notion — also promoted by Peace Now — that Jewish settlements are the primary cause of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The authors argue the settlements "have undermined the rule of law, have subverted the democratic decision-making process in Israel..." and are illegal in that the land belongs to the Palestinians. The first two arguments are easily refuted: "All Israeli governments have supported settlements — which were permitted by the Oslo Accords, the only negotiated agreement — because they have been a national, bipartisan effort reflecting Israeli consensus and, at least initially, backed by UN and US resolutions." The notion that the Jews stole Palestinian land has been applied to the current settlements but also to the settlements starting in the late 19th century that led to the rebirth of the Jewish state. The Arabs have certainly charged that Israel itself is illegal. Unfortunately for the Arab claim, there never was a Palestine, or for that matter, a Palestinian people.

Historically, from the 1500's, the entire Middle East belonged to the Ottomans. The area that is now Israel, Jordan and the Territories was underpopulated, unsanitary, dirt poor, with no economic resources. It was as neglected — in David Gelernter's words (Weekly Standard, 19Jan09) — "as a rat-ridden empty lot in a burnt-out neighborhood in the middle of nowhere, in the suburbs of nothing. The Jews gradually got possession of an arid stony wasteland ... complete with the odd picturesque, crumbling, dirty town; and they loved it. They turned it into a gleaming, thriving modern nation, not only a military but an intellectual powerhouse." During the Mandate period it was assigned to become a Jewish state, just as the rest of the Middle East was to become an Arab state. Immigrants who had poured in from nearby places and with various ethnic backgrounds were declared to be a people — the Palestinian people — by Arafat in 1964. Their sole purpose was to serve as claimants to Jewish land. I am always amazed when Israeli leftists such as the authors of the book under review are willing to distort the facts to support the Arabs' attempt to destroy Israel. Do they believe they are immune from rampaging Arabs, should the Arabs succeed?
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IS A TWO-STATE SOLUTION A ROADMAP TO DISASTER?
by Frederic Leder and Ricky Greenfield

  Frederic Leder and Richy Greenfield warn Israeli Jews they need to shed some habits learned over two thousand years living in various hostile environments as the underdog and powerless. Jews survived by "using compromise to buy another day or postpone imminent destruction." The environment may still be hostile, but their knee-jerk defensive posture of accomodation has to go, if they wish to survive. The two-state solution which will give Israel's heartland to a noxious, angry people desirous of destroying Israel, is deadly. Israel has first to secure its borders boldly by itself — and that means holding the land from the Mediterranian Sea to the Jordan River. When this is established, she can deal with the secondary problem of how to handle the Arabs within.
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A LIKELY SCENARIO FOR THE MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT
by No Sharia

  In a series of articles, No Sharia has been evolving a detailed plan to fight Sharia in Europe. In this essay, he asks the unthinkable: under what circumstances would Israel be forced into a strategy that could be called Mutual Assured Destruction In The Middle East. He makes the case that given the indifference — if not downright hostility — of so many countries, Israel may be forced into a position where the unthinkable becomes a possibility.
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ZIONISM AND WHY BILL MOYERS IS RIGHT ABOUT THE JEWS
by Sigmund, Carl and Alfred

  This is an updated version of the Sigmund, Carl and Alfred 2006 article entitled "Idiots Guide to Zionism" and was in part "inspired" by Bill Moyers' risible preaching that Jewish violence is a genetic affliction. Click here and here for background on Moyers' remarks.) Zionism has always been about redeeming the Jewish homeland and is part of the daily prayers. This essay talks about the concept as formulated by the Zionists who started coming back to Eretz Yisrael in the late 1800's. As one of the authors' citations point out: "In creating the modern State of Israel, the refugees from a smoldering Europe went on to build a modern, democratic state, with world class educational facilities, institutions and a vibrant economy. The Israelis did in 50 years what the obscenely oil rich Arab nations could not do in 2,000 — make the desert bloom."
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HOUSEBREAKING ISLAM
by Sultan Knish

As a reader of this article by Sultan Knish wrote: "An outstanding take on how the West needs to deal with the Islamic invasion by blogger Sultan Knish. His clear and unambiguous analogy of training a dog with a newspaper and teaching Muslims their limits in Western society is a gem." Yes, indeed.
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MORE ACCURACY AND DEPTH NEEDED
by David Basch

  David Basch proposes that any scheme that means Jews withdrawing from its land is wrong. It may seem necessary in order to separate from the Arabs. But it also "creates Jewish refugees and enable the Arab enemy to transform Israel's eastern territories into Gaza platforms for rocketing Israel's nearby cities." A better strategy is the one advocated by Meir Kahane. Basch suggests that, rather than reflexively labeling Kahane a racist, we should acknowledge that Kahane "recognized early the since proven implacable nature of the Arab enemy and advocated their relocation while retaining the strategic Jewish territories..." In sum, "Israel's survival depend[s] wholly on Israel's strength rather than on insane reeducation programs for these enemies of Israel ... Reeducation is no more a doable program with the Arabs than it would have been for the Nazis. The latter required total defeat to accomplish and no one should imagine the reality is different for Israel's enemies."
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THE CASE FOR JUDEA
by Obediah Shoher

  Obediah Shoher's book Samson Blinded: A Machievellian Perspective On the Middle East Conflict is as claimed: machievellian. His ideas most certainly are not conventional. But considering that conventional political thinkers continue to waste time promoting nice-sounding but disasterous ideas — like creating a bloodthirsty Palestinian State in Israel's heartland — this book is worth exploring for new ideas. In each segment, Shoher's astute observations become the basis for non-dithering procedures to solve some currently sticky problem confronting Israel. In one section of his book, he suggests making Jordan, where Palestinian Arabs are 75% of the population, the Palestinian Arab state. In the segment we present here, Shoher has observed that a religious state can make politically incorrect laws that would be frowned on in a democratic or socialist or dictatorial secular state. From this he argues that the split between the religious Jews and the secularists could be eased by creating a religious state named Judea in Judea and Samaria.
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WHEN DEALING WITH PUNKS, THERE'S NO TIME TO BE A LIBERAL
by David Warren

  When Rudy Giuliani became mayor of New York City, he decreed that ignoring graffiti, small vandalism and petty theft would hence not be ignored by the police. It seemed initially a silly focus, given the city's very large problems. But it worked wonders. In this essay David Warren makes much the same point in reference to Gaza: "...the leading cause of anti-social behaviour is permission. People, and young punks especially, will do things that even they know are malicious because no one will stop them." He writes of the synergy between Hamas, the punks who control Gaza, and UNRWA staff, local Arabs, often Hamas members, who aid Hamas and enable terrorism by generously lending them UNRWA facilities and equipment. UNRWA controls a network of camps in the Territories and in the neighboring Arab countries where successive generation of refugees are provided with an education, medical care, room and board but no jobs. It is no wonder that in Gaza alone, the population is 7 times as large as it was 60 years ago — although it is likely some of the growth is because local Arabs signed up as refugees because the benefits are so good. The "refugees" are raised to believe that they can not live permanently anywhere but in Palestine, which Israel is occupying — so becoming a murderer for the cause is an easy step.
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REBUILD GUSH KATIF
by Michael Freund

  Michael Freund writes, "With Israeli forces back in Gaza, now is the time to right the historical wrong of Ariel Sharon's 2005 Disengagement plan and to reconstitute the exiled Jewish communities of Gush Katif." This would say to the Jihadists: — "... The more you try to kill us, the more we will rebuild. For every Palestinian act of destruction, Israel will undertake an act of reconstruction. For every rocket that has been fired against us, let another Jew return to Gaza to rebuild." For the Arabs who are fed on the beauty of death, seeing their actions result in more Jews thriving in Gaza may be a greater threat than just killing them.
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HISTORY SECTION

GAZA'S RICH JEWISH HISTORY
by Victor Sharpe

  Victor Sharpe provides us with some little-advertised facts about Gaza and its role in Jewish history. The association didn't end with Samson's getting his hair and strength clipped. Jewish communities in Gaza were periodically destroyed but Jews came back there over the centuries, during which a succession of foreign powers captured and ruled over Gaza — the latest takeover by Hamas was only made possible because of the folly of the Sharon-Olmert government. Contrariwise, there is no historic association between modern-day Palestinian arabs and the ancient Philistines. The Philistines had disappeared well before Islam came to the area the Arabs who call themselves Palestinians claim as their homeland.
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PALESTINE IS A GEOGRAPHICAL AREA, NOT A NATIONALITY
by Eli E. Hertz

  Eli Hertz points out that Palestine is the name applied from time to time to a geographic area. There is not now and there never was a Palestinian nation. There is not now and there never was a Palestinian country. There is not now and there never was a Palestinian state. The Palestinians are Arabs, 95% of whom — or their great-granddaddies — entered "Palestine" after 1900 for economic opportunities. Hertz recounts some recent history of Philistia.
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THE BLOCKADE: HOW THE BRITISH PREVENTED RESCUE
by David Krakow

  The anniversary of the sinking of the Struma is the 24th of February. David Krakow writes about the attempt by Jews to flee the Holocaust by setting out in a boat, the Struma, to try to run the British blockade and reach Palestine. "British obstruction of rescue ranged from the official level — pressures exerted on the governments of countries through which the Jews had to pass — to an army of intelligence agents who pointed out the 'fugitives' to RAF and Royal Navy reconnaissance and interdiction, even in international waters." Krakow concludes, "It was a long time ago, but some of us can recall that we then quoted Giuseppe Mazzini: 'Without a country of your own you have neither name, voice, nor rights, nor admission as brothers in the fellowship of peoples. You are the bastards of humanity.'"
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

January 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2009 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


November-December, 2008


What we are talking about this issue:

WE DEDICATE THIS ISSUE TO THE NEW ADMINISTRATION
THE MUSLIM WORLD VIEW (Ibrahim, Plaut, Rubin, Shapiro, Sharpe, Johnson, Glazov, Salih, Memri, Imani)
THOUGHTS ON A NUCLEAR IRAN AND AN ENUCLEATED ISRAEL (Phillips and Brookes, Epstein, Rosett, Imani)
GAZA AND GUSH KATIF (Mark, Elders of Ziyon, Eidelberg, Weiner and Bell, Plaut, Eidelberg, Glick, Tucker, Sapersteins)
ISLAM AT THE U.N. (Sprayregen, Jacoby, Zaidi, Loconte, Bayefsky)
ISLAM IN EUROPE (Coughlan, Fjordman)
ISLAM IN AMERICA (Imm, Lappen, Ehrenfeld and Abady, Goldstein)
HELPING THE MUSLIM CAUSE VOLUNTARILY OR UNWITTINGLY (Shulman, Merkley, Berlyn, Pipes, Shafran, Glick, Rubin)
HISTORY (Green, Gannon, Tsiddon-Chatto)

WE DEDICATE THIS ISSUE

TO the new administration in Washington, which is coming in all shiny and convinced they can do what has never been done before: talk radical Islam out of its mission: global jihad. It is odd they feel that way, seeing that so many of them — Hillary included — have been round the block with the administrations that failed to convince the Arabs that regional peace was more important than destroying Israel and conquering the West. It's scary that the new guys are listening to some uneducatable anti-Semites like Zbigniew Brzezinski and Jimmy Carter, the talking-book versions of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Like the White Knight in Alice In Wonderland Prez-Elect Obama has a mission: to "reboot America's image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular." It's not one many American's would see as top priority — the economy, their jobs, unchecked illegal immigration, their shrinking retirement money and the rapidly developing list of unstable countries seeking to develop nuclear weapons would likely top their list. Nevertheless, as part of this campaign, he is out to find the Moderate Muslim Majority, the Reasonable Muslims, the Muslims who are interested in mutual respect and a partnership of peace and goodwill. He is undeterred by evidence as old as Mohammad's exploits and as new as yesterday when Arabs rallied for the po' Palestinians in Gaza but never raised one poster against the missiles the Gazan Arabs have fired on the Jews or even against the inhuman behavior of the Muslim terrorists in Mumbai.

The new guys kinda sound like Warren Austin, American Ambassador to the U.N. during the 1948 debates on creating a Jewish state. Listening to the Arab and Jewish representatives disagree, he plaintively moaned, "Gentlemen, can't we settle this in a true Christian spirit."

We hope the information in this issue will penetrate the thick layer of optimistic ignorance — and dogma — with which the new guys and the refurbished old guys are entering the fray.

The essays in this first set discuss some facets of the Muslim world view and why Islam is resistant to notions of equality among nations and between individuals. They make clear why a return to the hopes and assumptions at the time when the Oslo Accord had just started to bud and before its poisonous fruit had blossomed is a bad idea: experience has taught us concessions by Israel is not the way to peace because the argument isn't over land. It's a religious quarrel started and maintained by resurgent Islam. the Arabs want complete possession of the Middle East — for starters.

AN ANALYSIS OF AL-QA'IDA'S WORLDVIEW: RECIPROCAL TREATMENT OR RELIGIOUS OBLIGATION?
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim asks whether al-Qaeda hates America for intrinsic religious reasons or because America has injured Islam in some fashion. Osama bin Ladin is consistent when speaking to the West in always blaming the West for inflicting some injury that he must repay. "The West attacks Muslims — for oil, Israel, land, or 'Crusader' hatred — and al-Qa'ida retaliates on behalf of Muslims." It is doubtful, however, that the West could ever pay its debt, especially because the religion of Islam insists its members have the obligation to make Shari'a law supreme everywhere in the world — and this is the message al-Qaeda always preaches to Muslims. As an example of his double talk, in offering the West a long-term truce, Bin Ladin claimed, "For we are the umma that Allah has forbidden from double-crossing and lying." There is no such fair-minded concept in Islam; in fact, it preaches "the need for deception in warfare." In other words, to the West al-Qaeda preaches that it practices defensive Jihad; to the Muslims, it preaches offensive Jihad. As Ibrahim makes clear in conclusion, the core problem isn't really Al-Qaeda; it is the insatiable demand of the religion to which Al-Qaeda is loyal that all non-Muslims must subjugate themselves to Islam. Ironing out small wrinkles between the West and Islam can not affect Islam's foundation doctrines.
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THE RETURN OF THE BAD OLD MIDDLE EAST
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut argues it is time to "abandon the campaign of peace through make-believe that has governed efforts at resolving the conflict since late 1992." It is time to drop the earnest but erroneous assertions that ignited Arab bellicosity. It is time to accept the truth: conciliatory gestures by Israel are seen by the Arabs as weakness to be exploited. Giving Israeli land to the Arabs — who already have 99.9% of the Middle East — encourages war, not peace. The usual tools of reconciliation — education, improved economics, a "let's reason together" spirit — just don't work, however much we wish they would. Putting an Arab state in the heart of Israel is a prescription for genocide, not peace.
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DON'T FLATTER YOUR ENEMIES, PROTECT YOUR FRIEND
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin has some sage advice for the Washington neophytes on how to succeed in the Muslim world. It's where "Harvard Law School meets the law of the jungle." Striving for popularity is not a winning strategy. Obama may be starting from scratch but the entire Middle East is deeply scarred from previous attempts at accord that were fueled by hope but that ignored a basic reality: "there are no concessions that will make an American president popular in a meaningful way among Middle Easterners." Just ask the Israelis. They've been trying the concessions route for years. It doesn't work.
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ENOUGH OF RADICAL ISLAM
by Ben Shapiro

  Ben Shapiro makes an important point. We are not fighting terrorism. We are fighting terrorists, specifically, Islamic terrorists. We should start treating them as the enemy, rather than a recalcitrant client who, sooner or later, will recognize how much he could benefit from our social services. Islam is NOT a religion of peace. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are NOT our allies. "Appealing to the United Nations, run by thugs and dictators ranging from Putin to Chavez to Ahmadinejad, is an exercise in pathetic futility. Evil countries don't suddenly decide to abandon their evil goals — they are forced to do so by pressure and circumstance."
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DHIMMITUDE FOR DUMMIES
by Victor Sharpe

  As the title promises, this essay gives us insight into who and what a dhimmi is. Dhimmi, Victor Sharpe writes, "is the word that describes the parlous state of those who refused to convert to Islam and became the subjugated, non-Muslims who were forced to accept a restrictive and humiliating subordination to a superior Islamic power and live as second class citizens in order to avoid enslavement or death." Sharpe clarifies the connection between dhimmitude and jihad. In discussing the Islamist striving for global dominance, he makes clear why Muslims are immune to "Western notions of peaceful co-existence.between states, human rights and liberal democracy."
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AN INTERVIEW WITH ANDREW BOSTOM
by Alan Johnson

  Andrew Bostom has become a major proponent of the view that Islamic anti-Semitism is not new but is part of the Islamic belief that the Muslim is just naturally superior to all other people and the infidal must be made conscious of his inferiority at all times. More to the point, "there was a specific anti-Jewish animus, which comes from the foundational texts". This article is the record of an interview conducted by Alan Johnson, in which Bostom discusses some of the anti-Semitic themes from early Islam, diatribes that are still in use. "...general anti non-Muslim motifs ... are complemented by, or in some cases superseded by, specific antisemitic motifs." Bostom also points out that jihad is, and has always been, persistent open-ended religious warfare and there is no canonical basis for the apologetic proposition that jihad is an inner spiritual battle. Considering how much effort has gone into marketing the notion that Islam is a religion of peace, it is ironic that "the violent extremists have the sacred texts on their side, and that the very idea of a pluralist democratic mainstream Islam, while greatly to be desired, is something of a myth."
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ALLAH'S WHITE FACES
Interview with Abul Kasem by Jamie Glazov

  Muslims are quick to accuse Israel of practicing apartheid — even though this is easily disproven — but ignore the blatent racism prevalent in their own countries. Abul Kasem cites sources indicating that this racism goes back to Mohammad's concept of Allah. "It is clear from the exegesis of these verses that Allah likes white people and dislikes the black people, so much so, in fact, that even when a Black Muslim is entitled to enter Islamic Paradise, he will not enter it until Allah has turned him into a white person." Muslims rank above non-Muslims. Of the Muslims, the white Arab is considered to have the best pedigree. Kasem concludes, "Islamic racism is endemic. It emanates straight from the Qur'an, Sunna, and Sharia. The Muslims of black complexion will never be equal with the white Arabs. The concept of Islamic ummah, regardless of color and ethnic origin, is simply not true."
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THE RACIST, ARAB-SUPREMACIST NATURE OF ISLAM AND NON-ARAB MUSLIMS
by Mumin Salih

  Mumin Salih writes how non-Arab converts to Islam become more devoted to an Arab lifestyle than to their own culture. He suggests that "the claims of the non-Arab Muslims to be convinced of Islam are false claims that hide the uncomfortable reality that they believe in Islam because they take the Arabs' word for it." Many of the comments to the original article would confirm this conclusion — e.g., "To the convert, the arabic language and the sands of Arabia becomes sacred. He develops a contempt for his own culture which he starts regarding as inferior. Though the arabs call the shots and are biased towards the non arab muslims, the non arab muslim's slavery and devotion to Islam indeed defies logic..."
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SYRIAN JIHADIST SCHOLAR ABU BASIR AL-TARTUSI: SHEIKH YOUSEF AL-QARADHAWI IS AN APOSTATE
a Memri report

  Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi is a major leader in the Muslim Brotherhood (e.g., see Fjordman's February 2008 article.). In reading this essay, note that the Syrian scholar abu Basir Al-Tartusi is not upset that Al-Qaradhawi has, for may years, plotted — with great success — to overthrow law and religion in Western countries, replacing them with Shari'a law and Muslim ideas of 'proper' behavior. As this Memri Report makes clear: Al-Qaradhawi's crime — or it sin? — is that he is willing to nuance his actions to fit the situation instead of confronting the situation head on. But both Al-Tartusi and Al-Qaradhawi share the same goals. In a larger sense, this essay illustrates the fundamental error in the assertion that if a Muslim terrorist group becomes the government, it will become more involved in running its country than in killing off Israel and/or infiltrating Western countries. What really happens is that some more adamant, more virile terrorist group, which refuses to mask intent with fine phrases, will win popularity and gain support.
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ISLAMISM IS TO RELIGION AS SADISM IS TO HUMAN
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani writes with love of his native land, Iran, and with anger at what it has become since radical Islam gained control. In this essay, he points out that "[i]n free democracies, governments are accountable to the people and serve at the people's pleasure. In Islamic theocracy, governments are accountable only to Allah and the people must serve at the pleasure of the government. And one can see the result of Islamic total or partial rule in eighteen or so countries which rank among the highest nations of the world on every index of misery." Islamic propagandists proclaim that Islam is a peaceful religion, when, in actuality, "Islam is violent, oppressive, racist, and irrational at its very core." Imani sounds the alarm that Islam is has grown rapidly in Europe, where Muslims form de facto states within states. It can happen here.
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THOUGHTS ON A NUCLEAR IRAN AND AN ENUCLEATED ISRAEL

No one is happy Iran is becoming nuclear — except Iran and North Korea and maybe the countries that are selling components to Iran like China and Russia and maybe .... Meantime it's all talk and nada is happening.

Before the election, we were told Obama would behave differently than Bush — which made for an inconsistency: Bush policy is often characterized as a catastrophe: bludgeoning and blundering about negotiating with Iran. To be different does Obama have to whisper sweet nothings? On the other hand, Obama wants to sit and talk but plans to stand firm on his objectives — which implies Bush was a kitten and his problem was he didn't stand firm. So what advice is President Obama getting from his experts?

After 18 months of cogitation, the Brookings Institute came up with this bit of philosophy as stated by Richard Haass "Terrorism is not something you eradicate. Like disease, it is a part of our lives." [and here I thought we are steadily doing very well eradicating diseases.] Martin Indyk, Director of their Saban Center had this sage advice, "... the most important balance that needs to be restored is between the use of force and the use of diplomacy. ...there needs to be greater emphasis on diplomatic tools." [Since diplomacy has previously been successful in gaining Israeli concessions — and squeezing Israel is a large part of the new plan to handle Iran — it should do splendidly when talking to Iran, no?] Even the New York Times didn't give them a rousing cheer; their Ethan Bronner concluded, "The Middle East is rich in awkward realities. Still, whether or not this plan will succeed, much of it will probably be attempted." If true, with the backing of these worthies, Obama's policy will call for hacking the Golan Heights from Israel while bringing Hamas into the Palestinian Authority [or is "bringing into" diplomatese for "taking control of"?]

George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace advices us to set a deadline on negotiations, and if Iran refuses to talk [nothing here about doing, just talking], then "we seek tougher sanctions." We don't threaten military action UNLESS we have proof Iran is developing nuclear weapons [what would that be? A registered letter invitation from the Mad Iranian announcing he's throwing a bomb-coming-out party? Wow, if this doesn't scare Iran, wot will? See Martin Sieff for a summary of the Brookings/CFR Mideast Strategy.] Sad to say, even Israeli experts don't come to grips with the question: If Iran keeps stalling for time while working towards a bomb, do we have a cut-off point? Ephraim Asculai and Emily Landau of the Institute for National Security Studies suggest "Engaging Iran is the Means, Not the Solution". They believe negotiations "must be preceded by strong economic measures and military threats." Even assuming that mild statements about using the military will work, Brookings has already ruled out military pressure. More to the point, what negotiation model works with an announced enemy that wants Israel dead and the West subservient and believes it is winning? Iran knows that increasing its nuclear strength increases its diplomatic strength, and talking prolongs the time it has in which to accomplish its mission.

"More diplomacy", "Stiffer sanctions?" . "More concessions from Israel" To Abbas? To Hamas? To Iran? It looks like Prez Obama and the State Department establishment will talk and squack. But who will do? We don't even plan to talk to groups in Iran who are anti-government. Just face to face, head honcho to head honcho, without preconditions. Meantime, of course, Iran's power in the region expands. She has a firm grip on Syria. She supports Hezbullah, Hamas and other terrorist groups willing to do and die. Moreover, we plan to leave Iraq, which gives it over to Iranian control — at best, they'll rule through a puppet Iraqi government. It is a no-brainer that Iran's influence will fill the vacuum created by the vacuous talk about the power of talking. But hey, 'Let us sit and reason together' is such an uplifting phrase, it should keep America passive, until events overtake diplomacy.

Most people understand Iran would send bombs to wipe out Israel even if it means wiping out a few million Arabs. The mullahs wouldn't wince. The local Arabs who we call Palestinians are useful as an excuse for demonizing Israel but they really aren't regarded with much affection, even in the Arab countries. And Iran is not an Arab country.

As things stand, it is likely that the only Middle East country that America plans to take on is Israel, its only friend in the entire region. The major plan is to force Israel to give up land that is hers by international law.[Google Think-Israel for articles by Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, etc., for the legal basis of Israel's ownership of Israel and the territories.] Making Israel concede land and benefits to the Arabs have traditionally provided us with our greatest diplomatic success stories. Of course, it never lasts long because the Arabs keep pushing for more.

Given the foreign policy advisors Obama has raised up from under the bus, we probably can predict what will become the bottom line for the new Administration. It probably goes something like this: Never mind that the International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran will have enough for a single bomb by the end of 2009, Brookings says Iran is 2-3 years away from the bomb, so there's no urgency. Anyways, we can keep America safe even if we do nothing to prevent the development of the bomb. What's the worst that can happen? Suppose Iran actually bumps off Israel. No problem. We will destroy her the next day. Of course we'll have to do without a steady flow of oil from the region for a bit. No pipes. No workers. No engineers. No managers. Well, we'll tap our reserves. We'll drill. We'll ethenolize our gas. We'll do something. What about the worry that the winds will blow irradiated particles into the neighboring Arab countries and into Europe? Ah well, that would be nasty. But don't worry. It won't come to that. Iran will see reason. She'll have a revolution. She'll blow herself up. We'll give her some bribes she won't be able to refuse.

HOW MUCH CAN ISRAEL RELY ON THE GOOD JUDGMENT OF THE WESTERN DIPLOMATS? In fact, how much are Western diplomats willing to stake on their being right about the best policy to have toward Iran? That's the crux of the problem. Like a bunch of Alzheimers' patients, the various administrators/diplomats/government officials keep forgetting that they've been negotiating fruitlesslessly for years. And the only outcome has been that Iran is getting closer to the bomb.

Right now their only risk is that while Obama and Amad the Jihad Man are scarfing down felafels, Iran might shoot off a deadly missile at Israel. Remember in 1941 Japan was allied with Germany and they bombed Pearl Harbor while the Japanese diplomats were in America. Japan wanted to take over Dutch East Indies and they were in America trying to soften America's position — while reassuring us of the goodwill of the Japanese emperor.

So let's ensure this isn't a chess game, where the worst that can happen — for them — is to forgo the accolades because they guessed wrong. So to ensure they are really serious, let's give them a real stake.

Remember what they said about the Peace Process? Israelis were eager for peace, but not sure this was the way to achieve it. Rabin insisted Israel would have to make painful sacrifices for peace. Only the Israelis seemed to be the ones to make the sacrifice. Well, let's democratize it. This time, let's let the reassuring advocates join the fun.

It is time the new players in power showed they truly understand the possible outcomes of what they will propose. It is time that they show that they are willing to risk something besides more Jewish lives. This is a Reader's Comment from the Daisy Stern website, December 31, 2008 that says it well. Jack wrote:

Does Obama think there will be peace if Israel capitulates to Arab demands and returns to the 1949 Armistice lines and allows millions of "refugees'" descendants into Israel. Let him give us his wife and daughters as hostages, not to do anything heroic, of course, just to live quietly in a luxury apartment in a pleasant town on a peaceful border, someplace like Kfar Sava, Modiin or Jerusalem. Let them attend our schools and ride the buses with us and eat in pizza parlors and restaurants with us and sit in outdoor cafes with us. Let us see them every day to assure us that he is sincere in his conviction that we will have peace. And if Dhimmi Carter believes also that we can have peace if we give up "Apartheid," let him send us his grandchildren as hostages also. Same goes for James "F----the-Jews" Baker and Martin Indyk and all the others who want to "save Israel from itself." Same goes for "Rabbi" Eric Yoffe, who excoriates Israel for causing the Arabs to hate us (Jews) by not making sufficient concessions and then opposes sending Reform youth to Israel because it's too dangerous. "I'm sure it will work. You try it." That doesn't make it. Whoever wants to impose a "solution" on us, send us your children and grandchildren.

YES, A NUCLEAR IRAN IS UNACCEPTABLE: A MEMO TO PRESIDENT-ELECT OBAMA
by James Phillips and Peter Brookes

  James Phillips and Peter Brookes go well beyond the Brookings Report in taking into account that the U.N. is ineffectual if not downright supportive of Iran; that attempts to negotiate a diplomatic deal with Iran represent the triumph of wishful thinking over past experience; that there exist Iranian opposition groups and they should all be encouraged; and that a military force stands ready. They make the important point that letting Iran proceed will set off nuclear arms race throughout the "already volatile" Middle East. They suggest no meetings until the Iranians agree "to end their nuclear weapons efforts in a verifiable manner based on intrusive international inspections." The essay stops short of answering: what if Iran refuses?
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IRAN AND THE BOMB: THE CIA WAS WRONG (AGAIN)
by Edward Jay Epstein

  Edward Jay Epstein reviews the recent sorry history of America's intelligence agencies. Relying in large measure on CIA estimates, in 2007, the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) strongly denied Iran's nuclear capability. NIE said: "We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program." Unfortunately, the CIA had ignored some important aspects of what it takes to make a nuclear bomb and how Iran was doing. In 2008, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had accumulated evidence that Iran's nuclear program had never stopped and was quietly proceeding. Unfortunately, too many people prefer to continue to want to believe we have lots of time in which to handle Iran.
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IRAN'S BOMB AND AMERICA'S IMPLODING FOREIGN POLICY
by Claudia Rosett

  The U.N. is often cited as the way to handle Iran. After all, it initiated sanctions against Iran some time ago (sanctions that Iran has todate disregarded). Claudia Rosett spells out the reality: far from being treated as a pariah, Iran has a great deal of power at the U.N. and is slated to get more. The United States is also purportedly mulling how best to stop Iran. Again there is the reality that Israel "was willing last year to take the risk of striking Iran's bomb program," and this was vetoed by President Bush. Rosett writes, "Iran has paid no serious penalty for sponsoring the killing of American troops in Iraq, for taking British sailors hostage, for mocking United Nations demands to stop enriching uranium, for backing terrorist groups in Gaza and Lebanon, or for setting up a menacing bridgehead to Venezuela's Hugo Chavez in America's own backyard. No measures to date have sufficed to overthrow the mullahs, or even forced them to shut down their uranium centrifuges." Will things change in the future?
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THIRTY YEARS OF LIVING HELL
by Amil Imani

  "For years, U.S. officials say the Islamic Republic of Iran has continued to provide funding, weapons, training, and sanctuary to numerous terrorist groups based in the Middle East and elsewhere, posing a security concern to the international community." As Amil Imani points out, they have for thirty years also conducted a reign of terror in Iran. In this essay, he makes a strong case for us negotiating with the Iranian people "directly with the Iranian people or their legitimate representatives, not its current enemies, the Mullahs, their quisling-like lobbyists and mercenaries in the United States or elsewhere."
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GAZA and GUSH KATIF

The IDF finally went into Gaza to stop the missiles that have been shot at southern Israeli cities for some years now. As would be expected, the media's portrayal of Hamas as innocent victim of Israeli aggression was aided by stories of Arab starvation and Israeli brutality. The facts are that IDF used expensive technology to pinpoint terrorist targets rather than shell the area indiscriminately. This policy was often ignored by the media, but not by the Arabs, who used their women and children to shield the terrorist leaders who were the targets of the Israeli invasion.

While the Israeli government is overly protective of civilian Arabs, it continues to harrass Israeli Jews who rightly see Biblical Israel (Ancient Samaria and Judea, or, as the news media call them, the West Bank) as Jewish and see no reason why it should be turned over to those pseudo-people, the Palestinians. The Government is in the minority that still believes — or acts as if it believes — that Palestinian Arabs and Israeli Jews can live peacefully in two states, side by side and intertwined. To bring this about, they need to push the half millions Jews now living in Samaria and Judea and the eastern part of Jerusalem out of their homes and businesses. It doesn't seem to faze them that they haven't yet settled the 10,000 Jews they expelled from Gaza in 2005 — Jews like the Sapersteins and Anita Tucker, whose essays appear below.

ISRAEL'S RESPONSE IS DISPROPORTIONATE
by Jonathan Mark

  This is such a satisfactory article. Jonathan Mark agrees with the those who claim that Israel's response to the Arabs shelling Israeli cities over the years has been disproportionate. It's been unbelievably mild. It has been totally insufficient. As one example of what would be a proportionate response, Mark writes, "A proportionate response will begin to remind Jews that there is no peace process like victory, just as Israel's decade of disproportionate restraint and self-doubt has convinced young Palestinians that their victory is inevitable, like Aryan youth in 1933 singing 'Tomorrow Belongs To Me.'"
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FPC REPORT EXPOSES MASSIVE CONTRADICTIONS IN EUROPEAN AID TO PALESTINIANS
Summary by Elders of Ziyon

  There are serious contradictions between the sporadic reports of the large sums the Europeans are giving the Arabs in the territories and the piteous stories of starvation, especially in Gaza. Given the number of Arabs in Gaza and the size of the contributions from EU, UN and America, they should be living high off the hog lamb. Stories of Hamas stealing medicine and food shipments probably help account for the discrepancy. Nor does the enormous amount of housing built by the European Union for the Arabs receive much attention. The last time there was an attempt at a full accounting of the monies to the Arabs in the Territories was in 1994, when the Funding for Peace Coalition (FPC) issued its report. The report can be downloaded from: http://eufunding.org.uk/FPC2004Report.pdf. This is the Summary of the report that appeared on the Elders of Ziyion website at that time.
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TO HAVE PEACE, WIN BIG
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  This is a compilation of several of Professor Eidelberg's essays on generals and the conduct of war. He quotes General Patton's comment, "The object of war is not to die for your country. It is to make the other poor dumb bastard die for his." What would Patton have thought of a country whose leaders are intimidated by the enemy routinely plocking its "soldiers" among civilians? Would he believe that Israel politicos regularly stopped the war for several hours so that Gaza could be supplied with food and other necessities?
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INTERNATIONAL LAW AND THE FIGHTING IN GAZA
by Justus Reid Weiner and Avi Bell

  This monograph explores the many international legal issues raised by the Palestinian-Israeli conflict along Gaza's borders, examining both Palestinian Arab behavior and Israel's conduct. Justus Reid Weiner and Avi Bell show that the Palestinian attacks are terrorist attacks under international law and illegal under the Genocide Convention. "In contrast to the illegal Palestinian attacks from Gaza and the international silence that has greeted them, Israeli counter-measures have been both legal and, paradoxically, widely condemned." Weiner and Bell devote space to demolishing the inaccurate and biased criticism that has been levied against Israel, particularly by Richard Falk of the U.N., and define the accurate and legal context for viewing Israel's entry into Gaza. The coverage is extensive, with attention paid to issues such as proportionality, collective punishment, and occupied territory, terms often bandied about by the media in ignorance of their actual definitions. They conclude that "International law requires Israel and other states to take measures to bring Palestinian war criminals and terrorists to justice, to prevent and punish Palestinian genocidal efforts, and to block the funding of Palestinian terrorist groups and those complicit with them."
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THE CURRENT WAR HAS ORIGIN IN GUSH KATIF EXPULSION
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut argues that the current foray into Gaza was one of the tragic consequences of the "catastrophically stupid" expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif, Gaza in 2005. Turning the area over to Hamas gave them the opportunity to convert the territory to bomb factories and terror training grounds. Unfortunately, from the gingerly way the government is conducting the war, it still shows more concern about potential international indignation should the IDF hit a human shield than about the Israeli people. He notes cynically that "[t]he only lesson learned by the Olmert people is that the same arrangements that produced the hundreds of rockets on the Israeli south this week must be repeated in the West Bank."
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FIVE BASIC ARGUMENTS ADDRESSING THE CONCEPT OF A PALESTINIAN STATE
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  In almost telegraphic style, Professor Eidelberg states important arguments againt creating a third state in Mandated Palestine and a 23rd Arab state in the Middle East. He presents economic, demographic, political, strategic and democratic arguments. Each point can be substantiated and enriched by many of the articles in Think-Israel. Find them by googling terms at the top of the Home page. The legal arguments — not discussed here — are also available. He concludes by asserting that the Arab-Israel conflict can be solved, but not by continuing to attempt to establish a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria.
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INEQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW
by Caroline Glick

  It hardly seems credible that Jews suffer severe discrimination in Israeli law courts. But such is indeed the case. In any legal disagreement involving a Jew and an Arab, the reality is that the Arab has the advantage, even when the evidence supports the Jew. This may be because of Israeli "affirmative action," or because so many of the Courts are manned by Leftists or because of government pressure or because the Government fears Arab riots, but whatever the reason, it is wrong. In addition, the government has given out harsh prison sentences to Right-wing Jews peacefully protesting land give-aways, while ignoring illegal acts by Jewish Leftists. What is true in individual cases is true when large groups are involved. The Beduins are stealing larges tracts of State land in the Negev and this is excused. The Jews of Hebron have legal right to a house they bought — the House of Peace — and they are expelled from it. In this essay, Caroline Glick writes that "Israel has become a society ruled by politicized law enforcement bodies that selectively enforce the law based on an individual's political affiliation and ethnic origin." This is not the way to maintain Israel as a democratic society.
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THE WAR — THE VIEW FROM GUSHKATIFERS NOW IN NETZER HAZANI IN EIN TZURIM
by Anita Tucker

  Many of the expelled Jews from Gush Katif, Gaza settled in the area that the Palestinian Arabs are now attacking with missiles. In Gush Katif, they had concrete homes safe from attack from the Arabs. Now in their new still-temporary homes, they don't have that security of closeby sturdy shelters — another detail the government forget when they gave Gaza over to the Palestinian Arabs. Anita Tucker, once a farmer in Gush Katif, writes how her group of ex-Kush Gatifers, now settled near Kibbutz Ein Tzurim, is coping. They worry about missile attacks and their children missing school. And they battle the intractable bureaucracies of the government, who are good at making poor decisions.
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SEWER PIPES AND THE GAZA WAR
by Moshe and Rachel Saperstein

  Moshe and Rachel Saperstein are essayists who have recorded their experience from the time they lived in Neve Dekalim, Gush Katif, Gaza and since they, with all the other Jews who lived in Gaza, were expelled and given still-temporary housing. In this article, they write of the Gaza War and the inadequate shelters — sewer pipes — to guard them from Arab rockets. As Rachel writes, "Those who flee from Gaza will find Gaza coming to them."
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ISLAM AT THE U.N.

Thanks to their voting as a bloc, the Muslim countries have a strong — and corrupting — influence at the U.N. What started as an organization devoted to humanitarian needs has changed. Many of the member nations have been sucked into the Arab/Muslim obsession. The "world" now agrees that Zionism is racism and a large proportion of General Assembly resolutions are anti-Israel, while real apartheid and terror are ignored. The bloc is now pushing through resolutions that benefit Islam directly, such as the one that will criminalize Islamophobia. Islamophobia translates roughly as anything — word or deed — that a Muslim feels disses Mohammed and Islam.

THE 'ISLAMOPHOBIA' CANARD AFTER MUMBAI
by Joel J. Sprayregen

  Under Arab pressure, the United Nations is in the process of passing a law criminalizing "defamation of religion." In practice, as Joel J. Sprayregen writes, this amounts to rooting out Islamophobia. Islamophobia is not, as you might think, an irrational fear of Islam. It is, as the Muslims see it, anything verbal or written that links Islam to "9/11, terror attacks, honor killings, suicide bombings, beheadings, executions by stoning, persecution of homosexuals, fatwas against authors, death threats to cartoonists, etc. The Organization of the Islamic Conference has decreed that even 'hostile glances' are Islamophobic." It should have little impact on how some of the major news and TV media do business. They have long refused to call an Islamic terrorist a terrorist and routinely omit material that might raise Muslim ire. This self-censorship was highlighted in Mumbai, where the New York Times, was the last to recognize that the massacre was committed by Muslims and that the slaughter at the Chabad House was deliberate, not random.
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UN'S OBSESSION IS GROTESQUE AND ORWELLIAN
by Jeff Jacoby

  Jeff Jacoby describes the U.N.'s obscene preoccupation with demonizing Israel while blithely ignoring the blatently immoral behavior of Israel's Arab neighbors. The U.N. is where Libya once chaired its Commission on Human Rights and Syria, China and Sudan served as members. The membership of the new Human Rights Council includes Cuba, China, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Zambia. and the General Assembly is chock full of human rights violators. It would seem that Israel must be doing something right to earn the U.N.'s condemnation. "By aligning with Islamists, the U.N. would be supporting the stifling of free speech and the suppression of human rights, and crushing the goal of building tolerant democratic societies."
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THE UNITED ISLAMIST NATIONS
by Supna Zaidi

  In this essay, Supna Zaidi aptly describes the United Nation He notes that "[i]nstead of figuring out how to combat Islamic extremists, the United Nations is worried about offending them." "The OIC nations charge critics of Islamic extremism with 'racism' and 'Islamophobia' to deflect attention from the fact that such violence originates at the hand of Muslim clerics born and bred in their lands. This is because they realize they can't control Islamism, or they tacitly agree with its message." Muslim clerics also export this ideology to the West to radicalize Muslim immigrants abroad, and reform-minded Muslims are usually the first victims." "By aligning with Islamists, the U.N. would be supporting the stifling of free speech and the suppression of human rights, and crushing the goal of building tolerant democratic societies." What a perversion of the lofty goals it was hoped the U.N. would attain!
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HUMAN RIGHTS AT 60: THEY AREN'T WHAT THEY USED TO BE
by Joseph Loconte

  It's 60 years since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted. Sad to say, "More than half of the 47 members of the Human Rights Council, the principal U.N. body charged with promoting human rights, fail to uphold basic democratic freedoms in their own countries." Yet they routinely denounce Israel and America for supposed human rights failures. "The bitter irony is that another form of contempt for human dignity has appeared — and found safe harbor in the multicultural halls of New York and Geneva."
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DANGEROUS UN REVISIONISM AND DEFENSE OF DURBAN II FROM THE UN HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
by Anne Bayefsky

  Meticulously planned to create the belief that Israel was a dreadful — if not the worst — example of a racist country, Durban I has instead come to stand as a prime example of Orwellian inversion, where a conference called to examine racism in general became a willing "platform for hatemongers and a cover for human-rights abusers," whose only goal was to demonize Israel. In preparing for the upcoming Durban 2, its supporters are downplaying Durbin 1's targetted viciousness and blaming a couple of NGOs. As Anne Bayefsky writes, "A boycott denies legitimacy to a platform for hatemongers and a cover for human-rights abusers. For states to show leadership against racism and intolerance, they must join Canada and Israel and stay away."
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ISLAM IN EUROPE

The European Union (EU) is the superstructure binding together 27 member states. The Lisbon Treaty is intended to "streamline" EU institutions so that the EU can function more efficiently. The Treaty was signed in Lisbon in December 2007 but needs to be unanimously ratified before it can come into effect. The main holdout is Ireland, whose voters rejected it in a June 2007 referendum. The EU hopes to mollify Ireland's concerns so that the voters will approve the Treaty when the Irish again hold a referendum on it at the end of 2009. As background we reprint Professor Anthony Coughlan's December 2007 article on the Lisbon Treaty below.

Interestingly enough, the Charter of Fundamental Rights is declared to be legally binding but is not presented in the document. On the other hand, the code of Civil Rights will extend EU jurisdiction into areas previously decided by the individual countries.

The Lisbon Treaty would effectively subordinate the national Parliaments of the member countries and put decision making in the hands of the small cohort running the EU.

In Europe, radical Islam is not taking a nibble but all but the dessert. England for justified reasons is already called Englandistan. It's become a major locus of sharia banking. Its politicians are very sensitive — that's the new word for total fear of doing anything that will make Muslims angry — to Muslim concerns, from forcing non-Muslim coworkers to abstain from eating lunch in full view during Ramadan, to eliminating teaching about the Holocaust.

Now, as Fjordman explains, the EU seems ready to hook up with the Arab hegemony. It is drafting legislation that will make Islamophobia a crime. It would appear that Eurobia is closer to becoming a reality.

Having observed the sticky hand of Arab manipulation of the United Nations, it is hard to ignore how easy it will be for Arab paymasters to exert control on the small homogeneous group running the EU. They've been successful at the U.N. — a much larger group with conflicting ideas on most subjects.

THESE BOOTS ARE GONNA WALK ALL OVER YOU
by Professor Anthony Coughlan

  Caligula wished that all the Rome had but one head, the easier to behead everyone. Despite the overwhelming hostility of ordinary Europeans for elitist-controlled unification, the European countries are on the way to becoming a United Europe, making it easier for radical Islam to take over.

Professor Coughlan explains what the Lisbon Treaty does: essentially it recreates the European Union (EU) "in the constitutional form of a supranational European State." It allows a small group of politicians "to act as a State vis-a-vis other States and its own citizens." The major thing that won't change is the name; it will still be called the EU. How comfy!
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THE EURABIA CODE — 2008 UPDATES
by Fjordman

  Fjordman is a major analyst of how Islam is taking over Europe, how the formation of Eurobia — an amalgam of Europe and Arabian countries — is well underway. In this essay, he writes: "What has happened since 2006 is that European leaders are increasingly open about the idea of enlarging the EU to include the Arab world,.." This includes the acceptance of sharia law and making islamophobia a criminal offense. "In essence, the EU is formally surrendering an entire continent to Islam while destroying established national cultures, and is prepared to harass those who disagree with this policy. This constitutes the greatest organized betrayal in Western history, perhaps in human history, yet is hailed as a victory for 'tolerance'"
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ISLAM IN AMERICA

Sharia Banking is making inroads into our Banks with the approval of Governmental agencies. And Sharia Banking can not be separated from Sharia Law. Its proponents now have new platforms from which to proselytize their religion. And Muslims use the law courts to overturn the law — Constitutional Law — hoping to substitute shari'a law in its place.

AIG DEFIES U.S. TAXPAYERS BY PROMOTING SHARIA IN AMERICA
by Jeffrey Imm

  Jeffrey Imm carefully explains what Sharia law is and what is wrong with American International Group (AIG)'s taking USA money to power the substitution of sharia law, which derives its authority from the Quoran, for our system of law, which derives its authority from the U.S. Constitution.
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HUGGING SHARI'A FINANCE AT THE FED
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  Alyssa A. Lappen focuses on the encouragement given Shari'a banking at the Fed. Tim Geithner, current head of the Federal Reserve Bank and Obama's choice for Secretary of the Treasury, has continued the practice of letting "dangerous new Islamic and shari'a-based securities, markets and financial institutions gain business currency." The dangers of terrorist-associations by shari'a banks and shari'a advisors have been ignored. For example, "Shari'a finance advisor Muslim Brother Yusuf Talal DeLorenzo advised Pakistan's tyrannical Zia ul-Haq from 1981 to 1984, and ran the Virginia Islamic Saudi Academy educational program cited in 2008 for using hateful Islamic texts." And together with infiltration of Shari'a banking into the banking community comes hefty propaganda by its proponents at bank-sponsored events for the adoption of Shari'a law — and submission to Allah as "owner" of all material things — as an alternative to individual ownership rights, which is fundamental to our banking system.
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ISLAMIC BANKING. IS TREASURY COMPLICIT?
by Rachel Ehrenfeld and Samuel A. Abady

  Shari'a banking is not ancient practice, but was concocted by the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1920s; its "stated goal was to penetrate the Western finance system, corrupting it from within in hopes of creating a parallel system to re-establish a global Islamic empire governed by Islamic law (Shariah)." A feature of Shari'a banking is the required tithing, which often ends up funding terror groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood's creation, Hamas. Another feature of Shari'a financing is that it forbids loans to proscribed entities that include "industries that use alcohol, and to all Israeli businesses." Currrently, the banking industry is hungry for petrodollars and is encouraging Islamic banking, though as, Rachel Ehrenfeld and Samuel Abady write, it "corrupts our financial system, enables the illegal Arab economic boycott of Israel and entangles government with Islam in violation of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause."
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"LEGAL JIHAD": HOW ISLAMIST "LAWFARE" IS STIFLING WESTERN FREE SPEECH ON RADICAL ISLAM
by Brooke Goldstein

Lawfare is using the law courts to harass people who write or speak negatively about Islam. It is another technique of intimidation used by Islamists in countries where they are not yet strong enough to be boldly assertive. They use a necessary component of democracy to suppress democracy. It is one aspect of what has been termed creeping sharia. Using an unlimited supply of money and taking advantage of Western tolerance, Muslims and their agents are stealthily attempting to replace western law and culture with Islamic sharia law. Brooke Goldstein provides us with both details and conclusions. It is not a pretty picture but it is important you be aware of how Islamists are using democratic institutions to suppress democracy.
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HELPING THE MUSLIM CAUSE VOLUNTARILY OR UNWITTINGLY

Many institutions do so unwittingly, simply by fuzzing the facts about Islam, some deliberately deny them or leave out significant facts. This is true for much of the media. And it is also in effect when, for example, an institution such as the Holocaust Museum skims overs aspects of Jewish History that would make clear how the Arabs gained a strong foothold in Mandated Palestine.

MUSLIM IN TOLERANT DISGUISE
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman takes the Washington D.C. Holocaust Museum to task for not sharply and clearly presenting important aspects of Jewish history during and just after the Nazi period. It slides over the injustice done the Jews by the British, who ignored their obligation to support strongly Jewish settlement in the future Jewish homeland. Britain clamped down on Jewish immigration while encouraging Arab influx. "The Museum should have explained that Britain's immigration policy for western Palestine made it an accomplice to Nazi Germany's policy to exterminate the Jews that Britain forced to stay in Europe." The sorry performance of prominent American and Israeli Jews also needs to be aired. What is particularly heinous is that Muslims who softsoap and misinterpret Muslim behavior and intentions are sanctioned as speakers at the Museum and their words are not challenged. As Shulman says, "Punches pulled, truth withheld."
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APPEASEMENT OF WICKEDNESS: THE WORLD COUNCIL OF CHURCHES AND MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD
by Paul C. Merkley

  Paul Merkley writes of various leaders in the World Council of Churches who have been pleased to meet with Hezbollah and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Churchmen find them easy to talk to and are not put off by their terrorist activities against Jews or intimidation of Lebanese Christians. WCC leaders pre World War 2 had equally bad judgment. They thought well of Hitler, Mussolini and Chamberlain. And in the Cold War, they never spoke up for Christians suffering in Communist countries. Since 1967 they have been standing "with the Palestinian people in their struggle ..." Hostile towards Israel, they saw nothing wrong in giving Ahmadinejad a dinner and a platform. With each such stunt, the gap between Church leaders and their membership grows. More in keeping with the attitude towards Israel of the majority of the Christian laity was the statement by Malcolm Hedding, director of International Christian Embassy Jerusalem. He said, "We are outraged," he said, "that [Ahmadinejad] was on American soil in the first place, and that Christians met with him at all. We fear that it's an appeasement of wickedness ....After the failure of the churches to speak out in the face of Nazi Germany's anti-Semitism in the 1930s, we dare not be silent again."
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BLOOD LIBEL — PART II
by Patricia Berlyn

  In Part I, Patricia Berlyn wrote about the historic blood libel, where Judeophobics believed Jews killed people to drink their blood or for their matzoh, an odd accusation, considering that the Kashruth laws forbid Jews to imbibe blood. In Part 2, she surveys "contemporary purveyors of the Blood Libel" — some European countries that enable the dissemination of Judeophic lies; Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that are "Noxiously obsessed with pressing false charges against Israel, but show little if any concern about Arab aggressions and terrorism..."; and brings us up to date on some individual libelers. If ever there's a prize for libeler of the year, it might go to Clare Short, a member of the British House of Commons. She complained that "Israel undermines the international community's reaction to global warming."
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STILL ASLEEP AFTER MUMBAI
by Daniel Pipes

  Daniel Pipes observes that after highly publicized attacks by Islamists "a twofold pattern emerges: Muslim exultation and Western denial. The "world-wide acceptance of terror among many Muslims" in different groups of Muslims is well-documented by different polls and no longer surprises. Western denial also follows a pattern. "When a sole jihadist strikes, politicians, law enforcement, and media join forces to deny even the fact of terrorism; and when all must concede the terrorist nature of an attack, as in Mumbai, a pedantic establishment twists itself into knots to avoid blaming terrorists." Pipes wonders how big a terrorist attack it will take to "rouse Westerners from their stupor, to name the enemy and fight the war to victory?"
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TERRORIZED TIMES
by Rabbi Avi Shafran

  Rabbi Avi Shafran writes about the New York Times' refusal to use the word terrorist even about the terrorists who attacked Mumbai. The reasons given by the Times to justify their lack of accurate name calling are multiple but seem wide of the mark. So Rabbi Shafran supplies them with a definition. "A terrorist group is a terrorist group, even if it runs a hospital, wins elections, operates a soup kitchen, recycles its plastics and cares for abandoned kittens. And all who choose to support such a group or, by working under its auspices, to empower it are members of a terrorist group and, thereby, accessories to terrorism." And so are the media who misname evil.
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THE 'REALIST' FANTASY
by Caroline Glick

  Britain Channel 4 marked Christmas Day this year by providing Iran's Ahmadinejad a televised opportunity to urge Christians to convert to Islam. Channel 4 saw this as a public service because they felt people didn't get much of a chance to hear him speak for himself. Caroline Glick makes sense of the puzzlement that the network felt this way — Ahmadinejad certainly doesn't seem to suffer from media underexposure. She writes, "As far as the West's leaders are concerned, Iran and its allies are unimportant. They are not actors, but objects. As far as the West's leading foreign policy 'experts' and decision-makers are concerned, the only true actors on the global stage are Western powers. They alone have the power to shape reality and the world." Truly a fantasy. But one that has the power to do much harm.
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WHAT THEY SAY ISN'T WHAT YOU HEAR
by Barry Rubin

  Why are so many of us not appalled when the Arabs spew hatred at the Western countries and threaten Israel with annihilation? One reason is that we never get to hear an accurate translation of their actual words. Thanks to self-selected filters such as the New York Times and paid lobbyists such Edward Abington, the virulence is toned down, the words neutered. Then too, the news media often allows their fantasies to interfere with their reporting. Barry Rubin provides us with some trenchant examples of the art of whitewashing Arab hostility.
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HISTORY SECTION.

This set includes an article on the Arab treatment of Jews in Arab lands. The other articles are about England and the nascent Jewish State; specifically, on Britain's pledge to help create a Jewish state on land uniquely connected to the Jewish people, land that became available in World War 1, when the Ottomans lost ownership by being on the losing side. Then, after it received the Mandate in 1922 to help make a Jewish state, England broke her pledge.

It should be pointed out that the Arabs did not "own" the Middle East. (And the Palestinian people had not yet been invented.) The Ottomans had owned it — for some 400 years. Britain "gave" 99.9% of this region of the Ottoman Empire to the Arabs. Then, perhaps feeling this was insufficient, they chopped away the area east of the Jordan river (which was 78% of the land intended as a Jewish Homeland) and "gave" it to its wartime Hashemite ally to administer. This became Transjordan and is now known as Jordan. Jewish National Home was the term introduced by Max Nordau for Jewish State; it was not so in-your-face.

THE FORGOTTEN OPPRESSION OF JEWS UNDER ISLAM AND IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL
by Elliott A. Green

  Elliott Green writes, "Contrary to what many Jews and other people have believed, conditions in Muslim lands were often worse for Jews than in Christendom". They were subject to the extortion tax levied on all infidels, but they were singled out as the enemy and as inferior beings in the Quran and ever after were ranked at the bottom of the social structure, living in fear and humiliation over the centuries. It was particularly poignant to see this in Jerusalem, where, as Chateaubriand wrote, "these legitimate owners of Judea [are] slaves and strangers in their own land." Ignoring history, or perhaps banking on the general ignorance of their readers, writers such as Professors Walt and Mearsheimer speak of the innocent Arabs hounded by the Jews, a neat inversion of reality.
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ISRAEL'S RIGHT TO THE LAND
by Sean Gannon

  November 2 marks the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the letter that laid out Britain's intent to help establish a Jewish State. Sean Gannon writes about the Declaration in context of the Arab argument that the Jewish claims have no legitimacy. Its language was later incorporated into the League of Nations' Mandate, which put the land irrevocably in trust for the Jewish people. The Trust was passed on to the League's successor, the United Nations. Googling the search box at the top of Think-Israel's home page for "Howard Grief" and Yoram Shifftan" will provide you with in-depth articles on Israel's ownership of Mandated Palestine.
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BRITAIN IN THE MIDDLE EAST: A BAD CASE OF AMNESIA
by Colonel Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto

  The previous article points out that the Balfour Declaration was Britain's pledge to help establish a Jewish state and its language was incorporated into the League of Nations as a irrevokable trust in 1922. It was in that same year — as Colonel Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto writes — that Britain broke its pledge and adopted a pro-Arab policy, encouraging Arab immigration into mandated Palestine and discouraging Jewish immigration.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

November 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
December 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


September-October, 2008


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)

SECTION 1.  MEDIA BIAS

The historic news is that Barack Obama will be our next president. The news media played a large part in his victory and John McCain's defeat. Some incidents were amplified, repeated everywhere again and again and/or given importance. Often the "meat" was removed, leaving a bland report, as when Rashid Khalidi was described as a professor in a prestigious university — which he is — without mentioning that he continues to be an open and vicious anti-semite. Other incidents were distorted, trivialized or simply not reported. What became obvious is that media reporting has, in large measure, evolved from a 'commentaries on the Op-Ed page, news otherwise' to a commentary-news mush.

If nothing else is certain, at least this election has answered one intriguing philosophical question. The best-known version of the conundrum posed by Bishop Berkeley is: if a tree falls in the forest [and no one hears it], does it make a sound? Or in an updated version: if the newpapers/TV stations ignore a tree, will it ever reach the pulp market? The media can also give an experience-based course on how to grow a twig into a redwood in the time between two commercials.

The articles in this set discuss media bias and publishers of reference material that tamper with the accuracy of the information that we receive.

OBJECTIVE PRETENSE — MEDIA BIAS AND THE ELECTORATE
by Tom McLaughlin

  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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SECTION 2. PROMOTING SHARIA; TIME TO RETHINK OURSELVES

(1) The Infiltration of Sharia Law into America by committed groups and by the increased number of financial institutions that want to engage in in Sharia Banking. A banking system that, on the surface, offers loans without interest seems too good to be true. It is candy few in the financial community can resist, because the no-interest-loan allows for an impressive variety of service charges. The real problem is that Sharia Banking demands an increased "sensitivity" to Sharia Law, which applies to all aspects of life. (There is some basic information on Sharia Banking here. The Sharia Finance Watch Section of The Center for Security Policy issues articles on a regular basis at
www.shariahfinancewatch.org/blog/category/center-for-security-policy/)

(2) Over time, Americans have listened while we were told what was wrong with our family structure, our way of looking at the world, our commitment to a set of values that were disregarded in more dictatorial countries. We were taught to substitute shame for pride in many of our institutions. These essays examine several of these notions and suggest we need to get back on the track that promotes freedom of action and freedom of thought and freedom of speech.

This set of essays is about several ways Sharia Law is infiltrating America. Banking institutions, lawyers and even the governmental agencies are eager to train people in Sharia banking. Blacks have been aggressively targetted for recruitment by jihadists. Converts to Islam work to establish an Islamic state. And Muslim immigrants show strong support for the Sharia law that governed every aspect of their lives in the "old country," the one they came here to get away from.

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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We have been told for a very long time that anybody's values are just as good as ours, yet only a Muslim can understand the Middle East, that you are free to say anything — if it's politically correct and won't offend the sensitive. People with induced low self-esteem are more likely to believe anyone who is completely convinced his is the Way ... And Muslim missionaries don't suffer from uncertainty. Maybe we need to work on strengthening our own beliefs and attitudes.

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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SECTION 3. IS IT SMART TO WEAKEN ISRAEL, ESPECIALLY NOW?

Israel has much the same problems as we do — invasion by aliens; in Israel they are called Palestinians. The nuclear threat hangs over Israel with even more immediacy than it does over us in America. The media, major mainstream churches, "human rights" groups and many of their own intellectuals have preached that whatever Israel does is wrong and whatever the Arabs do is justified. And the Palestinians have used Israel as a training ground to test explosives and try out new hate literature and propaganda for longer than they waged lihad against us. In addition, major figures in its government seem to be working for the Arabs, even though they draw paychecks from Israel's treasury. And they, like us, are about to deal with a new American president, who promises Change. Israel's level of confidence is not high.

We've been told America policy will shift to a "come let us reason together" approach, where we sit down with the Iranians, the Syrians, Hamas and whatever splinter groups command respect by blowing up people. Simultaneously, the Palestinian-Israeli so-called peace process will be resurrected to try to create a viable Palestinian State in Biblical Israel, whatever the cost to Israel. We ask: is this really the time to weaken Israel, America's only reliable friend in the Middle East? Israel, that has improved or invented or engineered items that improve not only our daily lives but the ability of the West to fight aggression? Is this really the time to weaken the only democracy in the Middle East? Why, when Israel needs to be strong to contribute to the fight against global Jihad, is there pressure on her to give up land? The Palestinians are now demanding not just Samaria and Judea (the West Bank) but significant parts of Jerusalem. Actually the latest trend is for a one-state solution, Arab style. Since the Arabs have told us time and again they want to destroy Israel, this shouldn't come as a surprise.

Perhaps we should consider a one-state solution in Israel: a Jewish one-State. The Palestinians can have their state in some part of the vast lands that were given over to the Arabs when the Ottoman Empire collapsed. They can have much more land than is available in Israel. And they'd be among mispocha, literally. Asking the Palestinian Arabs to live in peace with Israel goes against their grain. There's more chance of a successful peace by giving them a state well outside of Israel, where they might find other things to do besides obsessing on their hate of Israel. Evacuating the Arab refugee camps and setting up the refugees in this new country would simultaneously solve the very expensive Arab refugee problem, money that can be used for genuine refugees. Several of the essays consider how to implement this.

Let's get real. Everyone know "peace process" means "force land concessions from Israel." There is no chance that it will lead even to a temporary illusion of peace. It makes no sense to pressure Israel to give up more of its tiny country to appease a group of Arab countries that don't need more land. What they want is for Israel to disappear, so all of the Middle East will be Muslim. Which kind of Muslim and who will be in control are questions they will settle afterwards among themselves, probably in the traditional way — warfare, bloodshed, coercion and enslavement. The so-called Palestinians do not enter into the equation. They will have no more control than they had when Egypt administered Gaza and Jordan controlled Samaria and Judea.

The essays in this Section are in two categories:

(1) In the Palestinian Arab-Israeli conflict, is coexistence — of two states side by side or of the two people in a single state — possible?

(2) An alternative solution. Transfer the Arabs to their own place in some part of Arab-controlled land. These countries claim they can't think of recognition of Israel while their Palestinian cousins suffer. Think how happy they can make their cousins! This will also solve the Arab refugee problem. It likely won't cost more than the current costs of maintaining a large and expanding group of people on the dole. Giving Arabs their own state in some part of the vast land area the Arabs control is simple, doable, and effective. Moreover, it is legal by international law. Taking land from Israel is not legal by international law.

There have been long debates about whether Israel should be cut into two separate states or left as one. The 2-state solution would make Israel the meat in a sandwich where the Palestinians are the bread, say, Hamas pumpernickels in Gaza and the goodguy terrorists in Samaria and Judea. The Palestinian State would need, of course, a wide bridge between its parts, which, incidently, would cut Israel into two separated sections. The alternative visualizes a single state with Israelis and Palestinian Arabs sharing power and responsibilities. The Arabs would greet visiting VIP's from Europe; the Israelis would figure out how to collect the garbage without getting killed.

Few advocates of either case asked whether co-existence was possible? If the question was raised, usually a hitherto unknown mystic streak would emerge and we'd hear about the lions and lambs lying down together. Lunch would be served before anyone could ask: 'who got up?'. Or we'd be reassured that the Palestinians would be so busy building their state, they wouldn't have time for target practice.

These essays ask about coexistence, starting with a fundamental question: Is Coexistence Possible? And — is there any evidence that the Arabs would consider coexistence, except in the trivial case of existing in the same location until they could wipe out the Jews?

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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There is an alternative solution. It has the advantages of 2-states for two people, without sacrifing one for the other. Give the Arabs their own state in some part of the land the Arabs own. The argument that the Arabs have been in Israel since time immemorial is untenable. There is no such thing as a Palestinian people, nor was there ever a State of Palestine. The vast majority of the Arabs now living in Israel and the territories entered into the area after 1900. They came from various places in the region, attracted by the economic opportunities the Jews and the English made possible. There is no tragedy moving them the distance from say New York to Miami, which will still contain them in their own culture, language and religion. The money now spent on sustaining a welfare cult could be better spent on a dowry for them to get a fresh start in their own culture.

It would solve the separation problem without separating the Jews from their ancient holy sites. And it would solve the festering refugee problem that has been perpetuated to create sympathy for the Arab cause. This solution is more realistic than the 1- vs 2-state solutions that occupy the diplomats. it is doable. It would work. And it is legal. (Google Think-Israel for articles by Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, etc for the legal basis of Israel's ownership of Israel and the territories.) Taking land from Israel is not legal by international law, because the land is held as an irrevocable trust for the Jewish people. In brief, we should not be trying to turn Samaria and Judea into a state for a group of Arabs who never owned this land, even if they have started calling themselves Palestinians.

Only Israel has ownership of the land.

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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SECTION 4. DEALING WITH THE ARAB AND ISRAELI MINDSETS

In this Section, we examine two other aspects important in bringing Israel up to strength: how to change the Israeli mindset; and why we should start paying attention to the Muslim mind set.

(1) Israel has been under physical and psychological attack for so long that she needs a mental overhaul. These essays point out some of her attitudes and behavior patterns that need changing. She could do with a lot less tolerance for the radical left academics that have detached themselves from a sense of loyalty to Israel. She could recognize that if she gives up the physical remains of her coalescence as a people — the Temple Mount and Hebron — as she gave up the Tomb of Joseph, she is destroying her roots. She could stop going along with the Government's persecution of Rightists in Samaria and Judea — their crime is that they don't want to give up their land to Arabs that will destroy the Jews and once again ruin the land. She could stop being proud that her soldiers are careful of the lives of Arab women and children and start demanding that Israelis who defend the State by living in dangerous areas get support. What's a dangerous area? Anywhere within a 10 mile radius of a group of hostile Arabs. She could stop blaming the settlers for everything that went wrong when the Sharon-Olmert government gave up Gaza. The sentiment seems much like our blaming the Vietnam vets for not winning the war, when they weren't allowed to fight. She could start making restitution for the hell her government put the Gush Katif people through instead of being proud of caring for the Gazan Arabs, who show their thanks by shooting live bullets.

(2) Maybe we should all start seeing Muslims as they see themselves, not as the peaceful critters we pretend they are. We need to connect the dots of Islamic doctrine and Islamic practices.

Changing the Israeli Mind Set

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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Paying Attention to Arab Mindset.

The suggestion has often been made that the Israelis as well as other western countries pay attention to the actual Muslim mindset, instead of treating it as a Rorschach test onto which we project our own ideas. To be sure, each Muslim country and region has its own characteristics, just as New Yorkers and Georgians differ in accent, walking speed and maybe charm. But there is a unity we call American. The prototypic Muslim is very much a product of his religion and its doctrines and demands, as set down by Mohammed. Islamic doctrine impacts all aspects of his life, including how he thinks about acts of terror and deceptions.

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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SECTION 5. HISTORY

We present two articles, one on the treatment of the Jews in Damascus in 1816, the other about the Balfour Declaration.

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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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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
October 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

SPECIAL ISSUE: OCTOBER 2008

Dear Readers

Think-Israel doesn't usually get into US politics. But, frankly, I don't think Obama bodes well for Israel. So we've put out this edition outside of our regular schedule.

I've talked to neighbors, friends, acquaintances, who say they are going to vote for Obama. The reasons they give sum up to 'he is friendly and he seems one of us.' But some would frown thoughtfully as they said it.

I asked: do you know how his economic plan would affect you? do you know about his very far left associates? Do you know his political views before he became a candidate? Do you know about ACORN? Answer: not really.

Thanks to the mainstream media, while most Americans can tell you all about Sarah Palin's clothes budget, they don't know much about Obama except in bits and pieces.

It may be late in the game, but one thing is becoming clear. He isn't just an empty suit. Obama does have a point a view. He is, to speak plainly, on the team that unites the Far Left, the Radical Left, Socialists, Marxists, Communists, Black Liberation theologists, Israel haters and resurgent Islamists. They all preach replacement theology, though they have different ideas of the replacement. But they all want to replace how America works and thinks. They want to replace Israel with a state to be called Palestine. With them in power, we Americans will be free to say anything we want — providing it isn't hateful. And guess who will decide what is hateful?

Obama preaches openness but he hasn't been open about his intentions or his ideology. So we on the Think-Israel staff have composed several essays with information you should have to vote intelligently.

Obama and his Economic Plan

Obama and the Constitution

Obama and Odinga

Obama's Birth Certificate

If you agree these issues are important, please don't delay. Use the next few hours to educate your friends and family. Feel free to send these articles to your email lists. You will find much aditional information on the Think-Israel Blog-Ed pages for recent months.

Thank you

Bernice Lipkin
Managing Editor

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.

You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.

You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.

You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.

You cannot build character and courage by taking away men's initiative and independence.

You cannot help men permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves.

— by Reverend William Boetcker, in a 1916 pamphlet entitled Lincoln on Limitations


July-August, 2008

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)

This issue we discuss some separate but connected themes. We present different facets of the war Islam is waging globally — the major difference being that Islam is more circumspect where it doesn't have the power, and more brutal where it does. Against the West, Islam has made no secret that its first task is to destroy Israel; then it will move on to concentrate on the West. As yet — except for the brutal drama of 9/11 — Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood nibble away at America, at our educational system, at our financial institutions, at our freedom of speech. They work inside a fog of benignity, sprayed by professionals, diplomats and academics working directly or indirectly for Middle East money. In England and Europe, a large influx of Muslim immigrants demand that their way of life become the way of life for their host countries. In the Middle East, "friendly-neutral" Arab/Muslim states and frankly hostile ones see Israel as the only obstacle to their version of Peace Islamica. And in the far East, murder, brutality, and a complete lack of respect for human life predominate the Muslim attack on the East.

Throughout the topics below, there is one note that is repeated, sometimes loudly by overt threat, sometimes softly by implication: Islam has no brakes. It has no peaceful endpoint. It often acts as if it is ready to deal — or the opposite side pretends that accomodation will work. On the contrary, the common experience of all who negotiate has been this: appease it and it will demand more. Diplomatic hacks like Dennis Ross discovered, with feelings of disbelief, that when he thought by being generous (with Israel's land) at Camp David, Arafat was agreeing to peace, Arafat disillusioned him almost immediately by demanding more, never accepting the "final" compromise.

The Blogger Sultan Knish wrote this perspicacious essay of the "Four Stages of Appeasement"

For some nations and individuals, appeasement is a station at the end of the line that they reach right away, after some traumatic cultural or national event, for others it is a journey of stages along the line, stop after stop marking a point at which values and morals are surrendered for ephemeral things until they reach the end of this dark journey and the end of their national existence.

This is the express train of appeasement we now find ourselves riding, wherever we live, we are but another stop on the line, from dusk to darkest night.

Stage 1 — Washington D.C. — Washington D.C. is a relevant present day example, but London in the 30's is just as good of an example. At this stage the appeasement is being carried out by a nation fairly confident in its own power but believing itself overextended and seeking to safeguard its commercial interests is listening to those domestic diplomatic and business interests eager to avoid a fight.

While a world power and perhaps even an empire, at Stage 1 the nation's diplomatic and even business interests have gone native abroad and are no longer protecting its interests, but their own. These forces combined with the lassitude that has taken hold in the nation during its age of prosperity have convinced it that there is more to be gained by transforming its enemies into allies through appeasement. At the heart of this belief is the mistaken idea that these enemies are not genuinely hostile, but are pawns or simply misled. And the participation of these enemies is seemingly needed to maintain the nation's economic power.

This form of appeasement seemingly proceeds from strength, but is in truth a weakness that slowly eats away at the nation revealing the rot within.

Stage 2 — London — While the nation still holds to an illusion of strength and self-sufficiency, it is an illusion that few at home or abroad believe anymore. The nation still has some of its former renown, but less of its capability and virtually none of its former confidence. The international trade empire that once sustained it has become a dependency, a crutch and soon a drain. While its enemies immigrate, a slow trickle of its citizens are beginning to emigrate.

Appeasement here proceeds from the need to save face. While on the surface the nation practices appeasement from strength, in private it practices it from weakness. While the nation is far stronger than it appears, the rot has become so pervasive that this is buried and forgotten. Rule over foreigners has become foreign rule, and there is very little confidence to be had except among its newest immigrants. At this stage you will actually find immigrants more willing to battle for the country, than its native population.

Appeasement here has become a reflex, because its leadership no longer thinks of its strength, but only of maintaining an international trade empire by any means necessary. Strength at this stage is primarily used as a bluff and as a diplomatic counter behind which stands raw naked fear. It is a fear that its enemies can smell and with guile feed upon. At Stage 2 the nation is not quite willing to sacrifice itself yet, but is eager to throw any allies it has into the flames to protect itself for the loss of a nation's faith in itself is accompanied always by acts of faithlessness.

Stage 3 — Jerusalem — The formerly confident nation has had its confidence eroded to the point of engaging in increasingly erratic behavior. Appeasement began on the D.C. and the London track and by the time it reaches the Jerusalem station, it combines the foreign agenda of the business and political elites with a country that has lost the ability to depend on itself.

Appeasement rather than bringing peace, erodes the confidence of a nation, until at each stage it comes to feel helpless and is incapable of a consistent policy toward its enemies. Like a dog that has been promised a treat too often and yet is repeatedly beaten, it whines, begs, lashes out and then begs again. This is the process by which men are made into slaves and nations into ruins.

At this station on the appeasement track, the nation which began by defining terms for its enemies now obsessively watches its enemies for any signs of legitimacy, constantly bemoans their unfaithfulness and rather than acting against them, proceeds to another round of negotiations in the futile certainty that there is no other option.

At Stage 3 on the appeasement track the nation has lost what little self-worth it had in Stage 2 and is floundering and repeating the same insane pattern of appeasement it has become fixated on as the only solution. Meanwhile its business and diplomatic elites are in full fire sale mode as the nation's people cast adrift question their own right to exist.

Stage 4 — Stockholm — By Stage 3 the nation had lost faith in itself and is seriously questioning its right to exist. By Stage 4 the question has already been decided in the negative. The nation now feels that it has no right to exist. Its appeasement is no longer defensive, but a moral act of atonement for its own existence. While such sentiments have existed in the nation's culture even at Stage 1, they were part of the aforementioned rot, they are now the absolute dominant voice.

The nation has come to be convinced of its utter worthlessness and now identifies with its attackers. When it is attacked, it can do nothing but bow its head and ask for more. Its lack of confidence and faith in itself has instead lead it to project its identity on the one source of strength it beholds, its enemies. Taking on the identity of its enemies, the nation at Stage 4 is the city openly wishing to be conquered.

International trade may be good and prosperity may be sufficient, but the nation lives in shame of itself and is only waiting for someone to get around to officially asking it to surrender. This is the terminus of the Appeasement Express, the stop at the end of the line when the passengers get off in darkness. Beyond it lies only the moans of the conquered and the newly fortified walls of the conquerors. There is a reason why Stockholm Syndrome is another name of appeasement's endgame and this is it.

MUSLIM GLOBAL WAR

SECTION 1. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE FAR EAST: The Muslim Jihad In India

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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SECTION 2. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE MIDDLE EAST:

The effects of Israel's unbelievable stupidity in expelling Jews and walking away from Gaza continue to widen, not diminish. Muslim terrorists have gained a worry-free expanse in which to train foot soldiers — many of them women and children — and manufacture and store war goods. Pro-Hamas propaganda insists the Palestinians are starving and are without water and electricity. It's not clear why, when Israel presumably cut Gaza loose in August, 2005, it is severely criticized for not supporting Gaza even more than it is. The once productive Jews of Gaza, proud contributors to the Israeli economy and agricultural innovators, are now jobless and still not settled in permanent housing. The government that is supposed to attend to them is too busy working on how to make another half million Jews — the Jews of Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem — homeless and rootless. The soon-to-be-replaced American adminstration has obsessively fixated on cutting Israel in half and placing another Palestinian state inside of Biblical Israel — apparently they see this as Prez Bush's contribution to the world making peace with the Peaceful Religion, Islam. Meantime, the world has not stomped on Iran for baldly stating it plans to nuke Israel, no matter what that does to the people of the region and the region's major commodity: oil. Israel's neighbors, seeing how the wind is blowing, have started cozying up to Muslim terrorist groups. And the erosion of Israeli morale since the Oslo Accords has accentuated Israel's other problems.

Gush Katif. On August 10, 2008, some 3000 expelled Jewish residents of Gush Katif, Gaza, marked the 3rd year of their "disengagement" from their homes and businesses, from their synagogues and youth centers. In all this time, their lives have been marked by governmental ineptitude and viciousness. The Olmert Kadima government — which is now engaged in creating the infrastructure for ejecting up to some half million Jews from Samaria, Judea and Jerusalem — has yet to resettle the initial 10,000 refugees. See the video of their protest at Kisufim:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/exp.aspx/e123365 See also
GushKatifBook, a website that documents the current status of the Gaza refugees.

The Major American Jewish organizations, stubbornly sticking to their initial mistake of approving the Gaza withdrawal, are distinguished only by their absense in helping these displaced Jews. The good news is that the Gush Katif community — noting that the land has gone back to the sand dunes it was before the Jews developed Gaza — is determined to return and rebuild.

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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Gaza — Al-Qaeda's new base

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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Hello, out there. When will the die-hards admit (1) the world is round; and (2) The Land of Israel belongs ONLY to the Jews. As Eli E. Hertz writes in his latest article on Mandated Palestine: Click here.)

The "Mandate for Palestine," an historical League of Nations document, laid down the Jewish legal right to settle anywhere in western Palestine, between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea... an entitlement that remains unaltered. "Any attempt to negate the Jewish people's right to Palestine. Eretz-Israel, and to deny them access and control in the area designated as the Jewish National Home by the League of Nations is a serious infringement of international law.

Those claiming that Jewish settlements in the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea are illegally occupied, should answer just one simple question: In 1922 Jewish settlements were perfectly legal — What has changed?

Should there be yet another State in Mandated Palestine? No. These essays restate what should be known to all.

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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Israel's "good" neighbors

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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IRAN is a special case. It has mouthed the most menacing threats against Israel. It has put its money where its mouth is and is trying to develop a nuclear weapon to strike Israel. The global response has been sanctions, threats to use sanctions, new sanctions, new threats... Iran has cleverly used money shifts and threats of money withdrawal from foreign banks to circumvent sanctions.

Negotiation with Iran only appears to be going on forever. It has an end point: the minute Iran nukes Israel. And/or its proxy, Hezbullah, brings in dirty bombs that do the job. Or it gifts Hamas with a radioactive suitcase.

Some take comfort in believing that if Iran doesn't verbally threaten Israel daily, it doesn't mean it. It does. Many believe we can reason together — when Iran's leaders believe their divine mission is to bring back the Mahdi, the 12th Iman, just as the Sunni Muslims work towards the reestablishment of the Caliphate. Many believe that Iran is rational as we Westerners understand "rational", ergo, they are not going to risk their civilian population and/or their Palestinian Arab correligionists. They forget that Iran cleared mine fields when it fought Iraq from 1980-88 by sending thousands of children into the field to act as human shields and mine triggers. Swapping the lives of their own children to explode land mines was acceptable. Why would they balk at killing off a couple of million Arabs — who aren't even their kin and kith — to make sure Israel is effectively destroyed?

We know there are many dissident groups in Iran who would be happy if if mullah rule was weakened. The groups include dissidents who mostly live outside of Iran and many ordinary people inside Iran — students, cab drivers — as well as groups such as the Jaff Sassani that have kept their identity over the centuries. We've published articles on them and from them through the years. But to recruit them, organize them, moralize them, time-wise, we might as well go back to negotiating. Regime change from the inside is important as an adjunct strategy, but it isn't going to crack open the problem.

So mainly we focus on the military options. Why the military? Because — as even the NIE admits — Iran continues to develop ways to satisfy its nuclear ambitions. (People crowed over the fact that they faked one missile out of 4 fired — but what about the other 3?) Hezbollah grows in power. Hamas becomes better trained by the day. America is training Fatah and giving Egypt sophisticated weaponry. Jordan can be counted on — not to join the Muslim pack until it looks like the Muslims are winning. And Israel hasn't thrown off its inept government and shows signs of simply substituting another set of corrupt and ineffectual politicians at the next election. So it is well past the time when the growing threats all aimed at Israel can be nipped in the bud. All we can do is hope Israel acts before Arab and Iranian strength is fullgrown and ready to be used.

Military action is not a happy choice. But as time passes, thanks to Iranian belligerancy and Israeli government's ineptitude, it may very soon be the only choice. That, or sit in a fog of indecision and denial, waiting to be destroyed.

Let's hope Israel doesn't have to go-it-alone.

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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Israel has other problems. The main one seems to be a government run by people who intent on giving away the land to everyone but Jews, while harassing those Jews who object to this policy. This general policy has highly specific consequences. Fighting Israel's enemies eventually will be a lot harder, now that Israel has allowed terrorist organizations in Gaza, Samaria, Judea and Lebanon to build large and efficient bases. Carrying out the demoralizing ejection of patriotic Jews from Gaza was implemented by training the IDF to see the "settlers" as the enemy and the families of Arab terrorists as more worthy of protection than Jews. This made for a psychically weakened IDF when it was called on to fight in Lebanon the next summer. One would think that Israel's media people and academics would see the danger of allowing Israel to be painted as a genocidal occupier and would speak out and tell the world how tolerant and compassionate Israel has been towards her enemies — a veritable suffering Job among nations. Instead it is the same people in the media and universities who amplify the pro-Arab lies and distortions.

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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SECTION 3. MUSLIMS WAGE WAR IN THE WEST:

More so in America, less so in Europe, Islamists don granny masks to hide their wolfishness. They have infiltrated our banking institutions offering the monetary rewards of sharia banking and not emphasizing its anchorage in basic sharia law. They have managed to sanitize K12 textbooks so that, despite all evidence to the contrary, future generations will have the conditioned conviction that Islam is a peaceful religion. They have encouraged self-censorship from the press, who won't criticize Muslim activities, because they are aware the Saudis have sufficient money to eventually win any legal battle. They have infiltrated academia and, curiously, have become chummy with leftist multicultural faculty, who ignore that Islam does not approve of any culture but its own. And what is so often ignored, the current surge in anti-semitism isn't a mystery happening ex nihilo — it is a planned achievement, made possible by the liberal use of Middle East oil money. Denying respect to the Jews is but one aspect of Muslim denial of respect to Western democracy and their determination to supplant our system of governance with their complete answer to everything — Sharia law.

The first essay in this section lays out the general problem. The other sections explore various infiltrations.

THE NEW JEWS, AND HOW WE MUST DEFEND THEM
by Hugh Fitzgerald

  Hugh Fitzgerald has written a factual analysis on how Muslims differ from other immigrant groups in Western countries. Other groups strive to participate, to enjoy their new freedom; or they withdraw into their own community structure, with little contact to the larger society. Only the Muslims nibble away at the structure of the host society, often announcing openly that it is inevitable that their law — sharia — supercede the laws of the host country. Increasingly, they demand the larger society accomodate itself to Islam. They are unique in other ways. There is among them a group of unknown size — the silent minority that perhaps does not have supremicist intentions — but they do not protest when the extremists claim to speak for all muslims. They are less likely than other immigrant groups to become more American in later generations; in fact, a goodly number of the younger generations become more militant. Then too, they have taken a major role in fomenting hate and dissension. They benefit from the nonjudgmental attitude of the multicultural Westerner, but they themselves do not see the infidel as praiseworthy or equal. In fact, they are a major source of the recent increase in open, poisonous anti-semitism. Muslim students put up grotesque anti-semitic posters; Muslim professors deny the connection of Jews to Israel. They shamelessly distort, misinterpret and openly lie to blacken Israel's name. Fitzgerald lays out the extent of the problem and makes intelligent suggestions on how to counter the Muslim hostile takeover.
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Sharia Inroads into Government and Banking

JIHAD AND OUTREACH TO ISLAMIC SUPREMACIST GROUPS
by Jeffrey Imm

  How the mighty have fallen! In days of old when local police were often in league with powerful local criminals, the FBI was a shiny example of incorruptibility. Nowadays, their outreach program to the very Islamic groups they need to investigate is, at the very least, bizarre. As Jeffrey Imm writes, "Why would any federal government agency defend outreach to a group whose leaders support Islamic supremacist organizations?" When they fought white supremacists, they "...sought no guidance from white supremacist non-violent organizations in that war." Under the guise of concern forms ideology of the groups it courts. The focus on training FBI agents in sensitivity to Muslim concerns will not make for effective probing investigations — especially not when it is these very same Islamic groups that are training the FBI in how to behave in the presence of a Muslim.
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THE PERILS OF SHARIAH-COMPLIANT FINANCE
by Center for Security Policy

  Sharia banking is based on Islamic law. No interest may be charged but the come-on ignores hefty fees that are charged. More seriously, sharia banking is the string that pulls in the rest of Islamic law — including donating to Islamic charities that end up funding violent jihad. The Center for Security Policy has initiated a campaign to make us aware of the real costs of Sharia Banking. (See also articles by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr, Helena Christofi, and Patrick M. Wood in the November-December 2007 issue.)
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Islamic Inroads into the Education Sector. These essays examine some of the agencies and institutions involved in branding Israel as an illegitimate country while portraying the "Po' Palestinians" as innocent victims. The unquestioning media acceptance of whatever Palestinian proponents say has contributed much to this anti-Israel campaign. It has reached the point that they don't so much report the news as propagandize it, spreading Jew hate globally. Fact suppression also has become common in the publishing business, as publishers refuse to publish books that can get them sued for libel by Arabs. And it's getting hard to get an unpoliticized education in more departments at more universities.

HOW TO GET THE WORLD TO HATE ISRAEL
by Richard L. Cravatts

  When an event or a process defies logic — it couldn't happen but it has — it is often helpful to ask: were this a planned manipulation, how could it have come about. Richard Cravetts sequences a set of propaganda procedures that would explain how Israel came to be seen as an apartheid occupier of another people's land — a statement that is contrary to fact. He does all but ask who might be pushing the buttons. I'd vote for Muslim Brother and/or Saudi Arabia.
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THE MEDIA AND ENDURING NARRATIVE
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick makes clear that pro-Arab media such as BBC consistently mimimizes the grotesque behavior of the Palestinians Arabs, to the point that there are only two known clips taken at the exact moment of the terror attack. And in both cases, the media apologized to the terrorists for showing them. The Arabs, themselves, unlike the Jews, dramatize their "victimhood" by showing their dead, preferably young, chopped up, and bloody. Glick states bluntly that BBC apologized ".. not because the film's images were too gruesome, but because it strayed from the accepted narratives of the Palestinian war against Israel." She highlights the problem inherent in the media-Arab connection: by showing one-sided images and ignoring underlying causes, the media's reinforces the Arab interpretation of events.
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GOOGLE EARTH: A NEW PLATFORM FOR ANTI-ISRAEL PROPAGANDA AND REPLACEMENT GEOGRAPHY
by Andre Oboler

  Andre Oboler writes on Google Earth, which allows pro-Palestinians to post glaringly incorrect "information" on putative Arab pre-ownership of current Israeli towns (they call it "user-generated content"), yet Google claims to "provide critical tools for understanding a story." They are saying "trust me" but they knowing let users post falsehoods under their imprimatur — they don't withdraw the patently false information. It is true that they allow separate user-created overlays from many different sources; it is equally true that the default overlay is Arab propaganda. Moreover, if it continues to take time and legal effort to force Google to make individual changes in an error-riddled map, how can we ever feel secure in what is still displayed? What a shame it is to lose confidence in a once well-regarded information-gathering resource!
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WALKING WITH ANGELS AT THE NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER
by Dexter Van Zile

  Dexter Van Zile writes, "NCR, the National Catholic Reporter (which has no official ties to the Roman Catholic Church) offers its readers an ideologically-driven narrative of the Middle East conflict that demonizes Israel and excuses and minimizes the behavior of those who seek its destruction. It portrays the state of Israel's history as a trail of blood, bereft of any efforts to make peace with its adversaries. And yes, in the process of offering this distorted narrative, NCR uses Jewish 'self-criticism' as an important source for its remorseless denunciation of Israel..." Van Zile does a masterful job of profiling some of NCR columnists, writers and editors: Robert Fisk, Rosemary Ruether, Neve Gordon and Margot Patterson.
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THE HECKLER'S VETO
by Steve Emerson

  Can the self-censorship in the publishing industry seen in Europe in the wake of the Muslim riots protesting cartoons of Mohammad come to America? Would publishers sacrifice their and their authors' right to free speech for fear of stirring up a "hyper-sensitive Muslim community"? Steve Emerson provides us with a recent example which gives us cause for concern. Random House has virtuously stopped its publication of a novel about Mohammed's 9-year old wife, out of concern for the safety of those involved in the book's publication. (For additional information, see here.) Their concern for Muslim retribution may be realistic, but is contracting our freedom of speech the way to go?
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IN ACADEMIA, HIRING TOKEN JEWS
by Asaf Romirowsky

  Columbia University has taken the lead in showing contempt for Jews while pretending to fair-minded listening to their concerns about Columbia's unscholarly, anti-Jewish Arab professors that continue to receive tenure. In reviewing Rashid Khalidi's taunting of pro-Israel students, it stacked the committee with members well-known to be strongly critical of Israel. To add balance in its Jewish Studies program — Rashid Khalidi was a member of the Search Committee — they selected Yinon Cohen, a Jew in name only. In this essay Asaf Romirowsky writes about other such academic Jews. As he so ably puts it, "[h]iring token Israeli Jews who share their views eliminates debate while providing the illusion of balance."
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We end this Section on a positive note. Here are two essays on survival — they suggest some ways that we in America and in Israel can fight back in the war resurgent Islam has been waging against us.

MIDEAST SURVIVAL GUIDE
by Mordechai Kedar

  Mordechai Kedar has a prescription on how to survive in the Middle East: The patience to outwait and outwit resurgent Islam; an ideology that bolsters our faith in what we need to do and makes us confident as we struggle; and endurance — staying in for the long haul, not quitting at the first sign of trouble. Is it any different for us in America?
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FORMER TERRORIST'S ADVICE FOR FIGHTING JIHAD: THINK GLOBALLY, ACT LOCALLY
by Rob Margetta

  The first rule of warfare is: know your enemy. We don't. Seven years after 9/11 and we still haven't settled on who or what we're fighting. Is it the blight of poverty, despair, political disenfranchisement? If that's true, all we have to do is cure the ills of the world and terrorism will stop. Put another way, because we can never cure all the world's problems, the anarchistic forms of terror we now are seeing will never stop. We know we aren't fighting terror per se. The term Terror is descriptive of procedures and tactics used by terrorists. Even as we begin to identify that our troubles are caused by Middle Eastern terrorists, we haven't settled on a name that subsumes the local manifestions: Hamas, Hezbullah, Al Fatah, etc. Should we call them Islamists? radical Islam? resurgent Islam? Rob Margetta writes about a recent Senate attempt to come to grips with the nature of the terrorists who have declared us their enemy and how to deal with them.
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HISTORY SECTION: The first essay traces the historical context of what seems a simple word and reaches important conclusions. Of the other essays, two recall the early days of the Jewish State and the origin of the antagonism Israel still confronts. The third is a historical document for the future — it is one of the rare essays by a member of the media not enamoured of Barak Obama.

TACTICAL HUDNA AND ISLAMIST INTOLERANCE
by Denis MacEoin

  In analyzing the historic context that anchors the meaning of the term hudna — whose surface meaning is cease fire during a jihad — Denis MacEoin makes us understand that jihad itself must be continuous because it is designed to spread Islam, which "... holds that a set of rules exists, eternal, divinely ordained, and independent of the will of man, which defines the proper ordering of society. ..." These rules are intended to apply to all governments in the world and they are of course to be defined and controlled by Muslims. All Muslims can agree that Muslims must rule over infidels and this has given motive power for yet another jihad. History also demonstrates the instability and chronic internal war in Muslim governance. The various factions waged war against each other one. Generally the more barbaric ones would take power, only to lose it as another group grew strong and nasty enough to win the people's admiration.
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THE FIGHT OVER '1948'
by Efraim Karsh

  This is a fascinating essay by Efraim Karsh about the long-held assertion by Israeli revisionist historian, Benny Morris, that, well before Israel became a state, Israeli leaders wanted to drive out the Arabs. Examining Morris's documentation, Karsh became aware of "the systematic falsification of evidence aimed at casting Zionism as 'a colonizing and expansionist ideology and movement'...." It is only recently that Morris has acknowledged that it is the Arabs who deny the legitimacy of Jewish nationalism, not the reverse. Amusingly, this has "won Mr. Morris the ire of former allies and admirers — such as the notorious duo Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer — who continued to use his academic writings in their Israel-bashing endeavors." But revisionist historians have never needed a close connection between evidence and their politically-charged conclusions.
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INTRODUCTION TO NATIONS UNITED: HOW THE UNITED NATIONS IS UNDERMINING ISRAEL
by Alex Grobman

  Dr. Alex Grobman is a historian who writes on contemporary issues affecting the Jewish community. In his latest book, he focuses on the gross hostility the U.N. has shown toward Israel. This essay is the Introduction to the book. It lays out the context — the centuries-long Jewish attachment to Israel and the Jewish return to reclaim and restore its land, the mission we call Zionism. And it characterizes Anti-Zionism, which, promulgated by obsessive Arab bloc voting in the U.N., became international in scope. As in the rest of the book, the writing is direct and the ideas comprehensive.
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HE VENTURED FORTH TO BRING LIGHT TO THE WORLD
by Gerard Baker

  In this presidential campaign, Obama has generated chuckles flip-flopping and making a fool of himself. To paraphrase Him: Jerusalem is to be undivided (to AIPAC cheers) ... well, actually it should be the capital of Palestine (to Palestinian Arab cheering in Ramallah) ... well of course Jerusalem should remain undivided. We don't want barbed wire running through it, no sirrey. But that's more scary than funny. We have, however, seen two serious humor items. The New Yorker cartoon is farcical and encourages you to flip 180 degree but stay in the box. It says: you got him wrong. He isn't a skinny Marxist-Muslim combo. Au fond he's a ... (you fill in the blanks). This article by Gerard Baker is brilliant satire because it mirrors Obama's view of Himself. Who else, barely out of law school, would devote himself to writing his memoirs a la Jack Kennedy and Profiles of Courage. As ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, an embryonic politico imitated an established pro.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

July 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
August 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


May-June, 2008

We celebrate Israel's 60th! Except for the first essay, we examine the Arabs' take on the founding of the Jewish state. They see it as the disaster in which they were forced to flee for their lives. A pathos-filled story. But a phony one. A highly-creative myth. These essays provide us with the truth about the birth of the "Palestinian refugee".

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
 

Thanks to the Sharon-Olmert government, Israel also has refugees. In August 2005, the Jews of Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip were made refugees by their own government. They are forced to rely on each other and on Jews with a conscience in Israel and the Diaspora. To date, UNHCR has not contributed a cent to their welfare. Nor has their own government provided them with adequate compensation for the houses and greenhouses and businesses they were forced to leave. They live in shoddy trailers due to disintegrate in the near future and are unemployed or underemployed. This is shameful!

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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Jewish leftists academics and professional "humanitarians" seem particularly prone to self-hate. They blame Jews, in particular Israeli Jews, for anything and everything. Arguments defending the Jewish state are never strong enough; arguments defending Arab terrorism can be ridiculously weak but they are solemnly accepted. The last article in this set discusses what may be the root cause of this Jewish self-hate.

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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These essays provide us with the history and character of the Palestinian Arab and make clear that the vision of two people living side by side in peace will never happen — not while one of them is the Palestinian Arab, a fabricated people designed to usurp Jewish land.

Why shouldn't there be yet another Arab state carved out of land belonging to Israel? Because the West Bank is Biblical Israel. It belongs to the Jews by way of the Bible, by history, by the Palestine Mandate, by international law, by decency and morality. If you insist that land can only be acquired by conquest — because that's how most countries became states — then, OK, Israel conquered the area in 1968, taking it from Jordan, who took it in 1948, when she, together with Israel's other neighbors, invaded the newly-created state of Israel. Before that? It belonged to the Ottomans for some 400 years. Then when the Ottomans had the misfortune to back the wrong side in World War 1, England was entrusted with the territory to help the Jews turn it into a state.

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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The diplomats and much of the media continue to try to square the circle, to put a hostile group of Arabs plonk inside of Biblical Israel and label it an independent state, but a dependent state — an independent dependent state (now that's an Obamaism), where Israel continues to be their nanny, providing them with water, electricity, food, jobs and medicine and they continue to do what they do best: murder Jews. In the longer version, this is to continue until enough Arabs pour into Israel to wipe out its Jewish character and probably its Jews. In the fast-forward version, Israel and the Arabs start off by sharing a single state, including any Arab from all over Arab land that claims he's a Palestinian and any Jew that survives. The Jewish character of the State is immediately wiped out.

These essays suggest a third way. Tiny Israel is too small for two states, especially when the Arab group takes joy in massacring Jews. The Arabs own 99.9% of the Middle East. They have the space to place ALL the Arabs who claim to be Palestinian — without cramping. They have the money to settle the Palestinians, especially if the money now spent on the Arab "refugees" is added in. And why should there not be room in the Middle East with its 20 Arab states for a single Jewish State? In fact, when you think about it, the major question is: where should the Palestinian arabs be resettled? That's what this group of essays mostly discusses — that and the need for Israel to stand firm and look out for its own interests for a change.
[See also: Martin Sherman's "A New Paradigm For The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: From The Political To The Humanitarian," here.]

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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It is a common — though incorrect — belief that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the linchpin of all the conflicts in the Middle East (ME). Solve it, it is claimed, and all turbulance in the region will evaporate. Not so. At most, the argument provides an excuse for Israel's neighbors so they don't have to come to cordial terms with the Jewish state. The first essay addresses the issue of linkages and lists some nine conflicts that are simultaneously taking place in the region. They may intersect dynamically and to different degrees over time. But they are separate operations. The other essays demonstrate features of the instability and shifting alliances in the ME. For example, even putative friends of Israel and the West, whether they be Moslem secular or Moslem religious, see nothing bizarre in spewing out hate statements against the West, particularly against Jews. Jordan publishes articles and cartoons specializing in Jew-hate. And as Turkey becomes more illiberal politically, the more it views the Koran as the only authority and guide in all matters. Iran has designs on Lebanon, controls Syria and dreams of destroying Israel. Similarly, Al-Qaeda, a "non-state actor" in Martin Kramer's terms, berates Saudi Arabia, has discovered sympathy for the Palestinians and makes plans to nuke America.

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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The Muslims who see a chance of conquering the world are active in England and Europe. Except for the occasional bombing and the now-routine tire and car burnings, their tactics are gentler than in the Middle East, but just as persistent. Their aim, as always, is to install shari'a law and replace the law of the land. As their numbers grow, they inspire and/or actively help revive Europe's traditional anti-semitism, which, after World War 2, was beginning to wane.

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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These next essays discuss the growing anti-semitism in the world

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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In America, the under-the-radar battle to impose sharia law continues. Muslims have made massive inroads on the American campus, and are just beginning to use the lower grade classrooms for tutorial sessions on Islam appreciation. They bank on the greed of the bankers to accept Shari'a banking without examining what societal committments shari'a banking demands of us. And we revisit a long ago prominent assassination that is just being reexamined to see if it should have been linked to Muslim terrorists.

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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In this issue of Think-Israel, the media section features articles on some specific bizarre behavior in the news and entertainment fields. One of the essays explains why truth in news presentation is important to keep us safe in a world where Jihadists have vowed to conquer us and have explosively shown they are serious. There is also an article that will teach by example how to analyze a speech objectively.

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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The History Section this issue has a biography of a remarkable historian and remarkable man. And some events during the time Britain held Mandated Palestine...

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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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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


March-April, 2008
Next month Israel will be 60 — a youngster as countries go. An anomaly in so many ways. A young country with an ancient history. A Jewish state where many of its elite long only to be "like every other country." A state with a firmer right to its real estate than most others but the only state where people continue to question its right to exist. The tiniest state in the Middle East but the only one with Nobel prize winners in anything but "Peace". The tiniest state in the Middle East but the only one that is a world leader in medicine, scientific innovation, engineering development, agriculture, managing water resources, etc., etc., etc. The only state in the Middle East that allows its academics to advocate its demise in favor of erecting another Arab terror state. The only one that manages to live joyously while worrying that its monomaniac neighbors will again erupt with malice and this time cause devastation. These next essays look at the new state's beginning in 1948 and how it's been harassed by internal enemies — the revisionist historians.

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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This month we celebrated Passover. The first essay reminds us of some real bitter herbs that have historically accompanied the festival. In the second, the Passover seder serves as an allegory for how Jews should be living their lives in Israel today.

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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There is the story of the man watching to make sure the workmen didn't steal. He watched them leaving and made sure their wheelbarrows were empty. They were stealing the wheelbarrows. So it is, we worry about dirty bombs and mass explosions — and so we should — but meantime, in the West, we have "isolated" killings of Jewish groups by crazies that just happen to be Muslim, and manipulation of our workplaces, banks, libraries, schools and universities by Sharia-activists. Some stories are dramatic, but many are just small items, Islamic creepage that stays pretty much below the radar.

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 years show, has been to opt for the Williams model of modifying democracy, rather than the Carey model of consolidating democracy, to flee the Islamist challenge rather than confront it."
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These essays write about another dysfunctional country: Israel. Israel's government — trying to stave off corruption charges — is actively working for another Arab state to be located in the heart of the Jewish state. It is aided by an inadequate electoral system, an unrestricted judiciary and a politicized media.

ISRAEL'S ELECTORAL COMPLEX
by Amotz Asa-El

  The Israeli government has shown itself to be both corrupt and inept — a combination unlikely to win respect from the voters. In this important article, Amotz Asa-El argues that the problem is more complex and unlikely to be solved by a change in leadership. He discusses the structure of the Israeli electoral system itself. It is based rigidly on proportional representation of the parties, with no local representation. It has encouraged talented people to avoid politics, leaving the field to the self-serving, to the mediocre, to people who are the least competent to deal intelligently with Israel's most important matters. He argues convincingly for the need for electoral reform.
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HOW I DEFEATED ISRAEL'S DUAL JUSTICE SYSTEM
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut has the distinction of being slapped with a frivolous libel lawsuit in an Israeli court, having the presiding Arab judge rule against him — she based her opinion on her own prejudices — and finally winning out, thus striking a blow for democratic free speech. A harrowing experience but a blow for fairness that will benefit all who are tried by a judiciary system that creates rules on the fly. This is his fascinating account.
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CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE SUICIDAL KIND: CRIMES AGAINST JEWISH HUMANITY
by Boris Celser

  Boris Celser writes about the Israeli media and academics who protect Israel's wrong-way politicians. As a case in point, he writes of the Israeli newspapers that protect Israel's recycled politicians, thus helping to perpetuate government by the incompetent and to encourage Israel's policy of appeasement. He points out that "the game ends when one side runs out of land" — a real possibility given official Israel's suicidal policy of giving up real land for paper peace. The tone of the article is cynical but the words are sober and wise. As Celser write, "can anyone deny that since Oslo the politics of yesterday and today have not worked, are getting worse by the day, and are not going to work tomorrow?" And in acceding to dememberment, Israel harms not only herself but all of Jewish humanity.
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LIES BEGGING TO BE EXPOSED
by Evelyn Gordon

  Evelyn Gordon identifies one element in Israel's poor public relations — "Israel's persistent failure to refute Palestinian lies." As example, a recent poll was misinterpreted as proof that the Palestinian arabs shows increased support for violence because of the Israeli offensive in Gaza. "Far from being unprecedented, however, that figure is almost identical to what it was 18 months ago..." But the Arab lies are not refuted and so they stand, unchallenged. As Gordon points out, "It would be nice if journalists, world leaders and international human rights organizations consistently noticed such lies on their own, but the reality is that they rarely have the time, energy or interest to do the necessary research. For Israel, however, exposing Palestinian lies is a vital interest." But, thanks to her defeatist Government, Israel doesn't.
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EX-GUSH KATIF RESIDENTS MARK 1,000 DAYS OF WANDERING
by Hillel Fendel

  With Iran, Hamas, Fatah and Hezbollah making serious preparations for another attack on Israel and with the American administration preparing to plant an Arab terror state in Biblical Israel, the Olmert government is focusing on what it does best — trying to kick the religious Jews of Sameria and Judea out of their homes. This would be farce if it weren't tragic. The same administration that hasn't been able in 1000 days to resettle some 10,000 Israeli citizens is working to uproot another 250,000 to 500,000 Israeli Jews. The Jewish refugees from Gaza in this article by Hillel Fendel warn the potential refugees: don't let the Government do to you what they did to us.
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These next articles are about Jewish refugees — old and new. The first group fleeing from Arab countries was welcomed by Israel; the second was destroyed by the Israeli government.

These are some You-Tube clips about the Gazan Jewish refugees.
You Tube: The Expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif Part 1.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8goaeVJNxQ
You Tube: The Expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif Part 2.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kv5VGXl0In8&feature=related
You Tube: "Palestinians" are burning synagogues in Gush Katif
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydtJqFcRtGc&feature=related

THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEE ISSUE: RHETORIC VS. REALITY
by Sidney Zabludoff

  Curious, isn't it, that according to received wisdom, the attack of the Arab States in 1967 resulted in hundreds of thousands of Arab refugees and not a single Jewish refugee. In reality, as Sidney Zabludoff writes, there were many more Jewish refugees — they fled for their lives from the Arab countries, many of them to Israel. Despite the Arab countries crying crocodile tears for their Palestinian brethren, the Arab refugees are still with us. And there really are no Jewish refugees — they have become full-fledged citizens of Israel and the western countries to which they fled.
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THE CAROB TREE IS WAITING FOR US
by Nadav Shragai

  We know that the Jews who were expelled from their homes and farms and orchards in Gush Katif, Gaza in August 2005 by their own government are still in refugee status. We know they live in paper trailers and temporary shacks. We know that they are demoralized and many are unemployed. We know they don't have the resources to recreate the innovative agricultural techniques that made their vegetables and flowers world-renowned. We know that the government has probably spent more money pretending that all is A-Ok than in resettling these people. Nadav Shragai writes of their emotional response — of their longing for their old homes and the sense of community they once had.
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OF CONCERTS AND CRIMINALS
by Rachel Saperstein

  Rachel Saperstein writes of the irony that the Gush Katif orchestra gave a concert at towns that were indifferent when the Gush Katifers were kicked out of Gaza. Now that these towns are being constantly struck by missiles from Gaza, they sing another tune. And she writes of a wonderful man, a rabbi who founded AMISHAV (My People Return) to help returnees to Judaism. His grandchild was murdered in the Yeshivat Merkaz Harav massacre "because he was a Jew.".
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GLOOM, DOOM — AND YET...
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein writes a frighteningly honest account of his bitterness at all the phonies who contributed to the people of Gush Katif becoming dispirited refugees in their own country. And he's none too pleased with the gullibility of the general public, which is so easily duped by the anti-Jewish Israeli government.. And yet, there are the everyday chores to do, there's family, there're the cats to worry about, and there's the dream of returning to his personal paradise — Gush Katif — to make it as it was before the Arabs uglified it.
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TO BE OR NOT TO BE — THIS YEARS PASSOVER QUESTION?!
by Anita Tucker

  Anita Tucker was a successful farmer in Gush Katif, Gaza. She was one of the many Jews that made that desert bloom. Now she is a refugee, made homeless by her own government. It is the Passover. And she asks: why? why? why did this happen? It is the Passover. She vows, with the help of caring Jews, to rebuild, and to preserve "the community and the values we have held onto for dear life for the sake of the People of Israel, the Land of Israel, the Torah — for us." What a remarkable woman!
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These next essays compare Jewish and Arab cultures, and how this affects Israel's ability to fight its self-labeled enemies effectively. Jews rationalize and some look for a non-existent symmetry between Arab and Jew. Arabs riot. Jews fight libel with sarcasm and ironic humor. Arabs riot. Jews try to avoid injuring the Arab civilians who shield the terrorists. The Arabs consider it a virtue that their own people die so long as Jews die with them. And that ain't funny.

MERCAZ HARAV AND THE G-WORD
by Richard Landes

  This is a brilliant essay — it is as if we are allowed to examine the essayist's thoughts as he thinks them while he engages in mental conversation with people who objected to SPME (Scholars for Peace in the Middle East) characterizing the murder of the young students at the Mercaz Harav as genocidal. Richard Landes cogitates on the massacre and makes us understand why others who object to this characterization as too strong have missed the mark — they don't yet understand that the attack wasn't a random act of violence but was part of the concerted genocidal assault by Jihadist Islam on Judaism.
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MAYBE IT'S TIME TO FESS UP
by Jeff Dunetz

  Jeff Dunetz takes hold of a lively canard — Jews own/run/control the WORLD — and, metaphorically speaking, he beats it to a well-deserved death. Admittedly, he has his work cut out for him, given that tenured academics and even an ex-president have pickled, smoked, salted and marinated this duck, preserving it in fancy lies. Next time some stupido sounds off that the Israel Lobby sent us to make war against Iraq or that the anti-Semitic New York Times is Israel-friendly because its founders were Joowish, remember this essay.
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THE HEARTBREAKING REALITIES OF TODAY'S ISRAEL
by David Pryce-Jones

  Israel no longer has the luxury of taking the moral high ground yet maintaining her edge against the Arab hordes. Unfortunately, she seems stymied by her own moral sense, a failing the Islamic countries do not have. David Pryce-Jones quotes a military strategist who argues Israel needs to exterminate the terrorists in Gaza before they become even more capable. But her unwillingness to harm the Arab civilians who shield the terrorists prevents her from doing what is necessary. Iran, run by deeply religious Muslim mullahs, on the other hand, is perfectly willing to sacrifice millions of Muslims in destroying Israel. Willing or not, "[i]n the new Cold War shaping up between Islamism and the democratic West, Israel holds the front line." To hold that line, she needs to stop denying the reality the Muslims have created.
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ISRAEL'S FEAR OF WORLD OPINION
by Edward Bernard Glick

  Edward Glick points out bluntly that Israel's virtues work against her. Her pride in her noble restraint awake no respect in "world opinion" and especially not in her enemies — they have a different set of values. As Glick puts it, "Those who wish and work for Israel's destruction do not shrink from killing innocent civilians. So they are unimpressed by Israel's failed policy of limiting and apologizing for such casualties, and then begging for forgiveness from a world that masks its politically incorect anti-Semitism with politically correct anti-Zionism." He suggests a more realistic approach to winning the war the Arabs have been waging for a very long time.
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Characterizing Islamic Culture

REFLECTIONS ON HAMAS JIHADI DEPRAVITY — THE BRUTAL TRUTH
by Tom Carew

  Tom Carew reflects on depravity — as manifested, for example, in the massacre of the eight young Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva students — and provides us with a useful list of the features that characterize depravity. Unlike TV shows of depraved criminals, it isn't just the individual Arab murderer who is depraved but his entire culture, which finds joy in depriving others of life. An obscene death lust has permeated all of Palestinian Arab culture. "All those who celebrate such Depraved Crime are also morally corrupting and gravely abusing their own children, and as such not fit to have or retain or influence or teach any children." As front-line people "in the struggle for humanity," Israel has an obligation to stop the depraved behavior of their depraved neighbors — for all our sakes.
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SHAYKH YUSUF AL-QARADAWI: PORTRAIT OF A LEADING ISLAMIST CLERIC
by Ana Belén Soage

  In his article on the Muslim Brotherhood's infiltration of the West (January-February 2008 Issue), Fjordman described Yusuf al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Brotherhood, as one who "exploits democracy as a Trojan horse." In this article Ana Belén Soage rounds out the picture of Qaradawi as a prolific writer who can find Koranic justification for whatever innovative position he wants to take. He is a persuasive ideolog respected by Islamic theologists; yet he is a man of action — he is credited for creating the riots over the Danish cartoons of Muhammed (See Danish Cartoons.) All he wants from the West is for it to convert to a higher truth — Islam — and he has the financial, theological and people resources to put his ideas into action.
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PATHWAYS TO JIHADI TERRORISM
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Over the years, Dr. Babu Suseelan has explored various components of the Jihardi Muslim value system and how Muslims conceptualize the world. In this article he rejects the comforting but wrong notion that jihadi terrorism is the result of "unjust social forces" — that terror acts are the "frustrated responses to political injustices". Instead, he identifies the roots of Muslim terrorism: "religious, psychological, educational, and historical factors", which evolve into terrorism because of the faulty thinking Islam encourages. This thinking is hard to correct because, as he points out, "Islam is a closed dogma and Muslims are forbidden to test its validity or utility..."
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WHY A TERRORIST STRATEGY?
by Barry Rubin

  It's almost seven years after the Islamists declared war on us — the 911 unprovoked attack by Muslims on American government and financial centers — yet most of the media are still too finicky to call people who commit acts of terror terrorists. They describe terrorists as militants or freedom fights and immediately find excuses for their vile behavior. The problem with this tactic, Barry Rubin points out, is that "[while] honest grievances can be resolved by mutual concessions... [w]ith determined, ideologically clear, mass-based revolutionary movements you can only defeated them or surrender." Maybe we should start calling a terrorist a terrorist.
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REASSESSING OSLO

Have you noticed how Israel's peace negotiations keep shrinking in concept and in ground covered. First, Israel was trying to make peace with her Arab neighbors. Then she was persuaded with the Oslo Accords to make peace with just the PLO, reeincarnated as the P.A. Now Hamas's Gaza is out of range and she is being pressured to make peace with Arafat's one-time crony and now putative head of the P.A., Mahmoud Abbas, who continues to bleat he'll accept nothing less that everything. And yet the Olmert government keeps spending money and energy making peace noise and making miserable the lives of the patriotic religious Jewish citizens who live in Samaria and Judea. I could have taught a mouse to go for the food and not the electric shock in less time that it is taking Olmert to learn that striving for peace isn't going to give Israel peace. Striving to trounce Israel's enemies strongly will. More and more Israelis understand this. Unfortunately, while Olmert fiddles around with "peace" and bribes, the Arabs grow stronger and more confident.

The Oslo Accords have proven to be the Jewish state's biggest mistake. These next essays look at different aspects and consequences of the Oslo Accords — when Israel officially adopted blindness, stupidity and appeasement as official objectives. Their message to Israel: Forget peace; go for victory.

HOW ISRAEL GOT TRASHED
by Isi Leibler

  Isi Leibler notes that the change from passionately repudiating Arab falsehoods to diffidence and appeasement came with the Oslo Accords. Diplomats were directed to plead the Arab case, not their own. Many of Israel's newspapers followed suit. One reader pointed out that "[c]oncepts like eternal refugees, blatant revisionism and even the concept of 'Palestine' are symptoms of the denial of reality." Yet these became constant staples in the diet Israeli newspapers such as Haaretz have fed their readers. "Haaretz effectively provided the mainstream Western media with a kosher certification to incorporate the most extreme anti-Israeli content. 'If Israeli papers can publish this, why should we be less inhibited?' became the standard response of numerous editors when accused of anti-Israeli bias and double standards."
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SHELVE THE SHELF AGREEMENT
by David M. Weinberg

  The latest magic trick for making peace between Jews and Arabs Palestinians Fatah Mr. Mahmoud Abbas is to write out a "if you're good, you get this for Ramadan" document, which spells out the goodies the Arabs get should they learn to contain their hostility long enough to claim the prize. David Weinberg tells us why even this mild request for some commitment to peace on the part of the Arabs won't work. "Israel is negotiating against itself in a vacuum with a phantom Palestinian partner." And as American negotiators with the Palestinian Arabs have painfully discovered, "Experience attests that with the Palestinians, negotiations are never over..." The Arabs never stop bargaining for yet another concession, without fulfilling any of their commitments. In sum, the Shelf agreement is a shell game in which only the Arabs win and the Jews lose bigtime.
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IMAGINED PARTNERS
by Jonathan Spyer

  "Given the title of this article, it is not surprising that Jonathan Spyer argues that "the emergent reality of regional cold war necessitates sober strategic thinking. One of the results of this — in reality if not immediately on paper — is likely to be the reversal of the 16-year-old Israeli wrong turn of seeking peace with an opponent that neither sought nor was able to accept coexistence with the Jewish state." A very sensible assessment.
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NEW IDEAS

FORGING A MODERN VIABLE ECONOMIC UNION IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Jaff Sassani

  This is an unusual offering — Jaff Sassanian is the nom de plume of a spokesman for the Sassanians who live in Iran. His essay is a reminder that it isn't just Jews that dislike the notion of living as second-class citizens under Islam. The Sassanians are an ancient people who were conquered by the Arabs. Like the Jews they have held onto their culture and traditions. Read what Jaff Sassanian has to say. If he's right, perhaps the debate about going into Iran or not isn't the issue. Perhaps we should be giving more support to Iranian dissidents. If — of course — if there's enough time and the Iranian leaders haven't jumped ahead in developing their nuclear power while our "intelligence" services lulled us into complacency.
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THE THREE REVOLUTIONS
by Henry A. Kissinger

  Henry Kissinger points out that there are several different revolutionary forces at work today globally. [The] "three simultaneous revolutions occurring around the globe [are]: (a) the transformation of the traditional state system of Europe; (b) the radical Islamist challenge to historic notions of sovereignty; and (c) the drift of the center of gravity of international affairs from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Indian Oceans." Kissinger writes that "Today it is radical Islam that threatens the already brittle state structure via a fundamentalist interpretation of the Koran as the basis of a universal political organization. Jihadist Islam rejects national sovereignty based on secular state models; it seeks to extend its reach to wherever significant populations profess the Muslim faith." The lesson here is that the Islamist reach is global. We won't reduce its virulence by believing that sacrificing Israel's integrity by planting a Palestinian Arab state in Biblical Israel addresses the problem of resurgent Islam in any meaningful way.
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THE GOLAN HEIGHTS PEACE PLAN
by Moshe Feiglin

  Moshe Feiglin takes what happened in the Golan in the Yom Kippur War as a model for how to achieve peace in the Territories — Gaza, Samaria and Judea. There are five essential elements: 1. Encourage Arab emigration; 2. Conquest; 3. Israeli sovereignty; 4. Settlement; and 5. No peace accords! He writes, "Israel declared sovereignty over the entire Golan, settled it and most important of all — never signed a peace treaty with Syria. This is how we have prevented the war under the guise of peace that we suffer on our border with Egypt from repeating itself on our border with Syria." It's hard to argue with success, particularly when every concession for negotiated "peace" with the Arabs has led to a weakened Israel and a more hostile Arab response.
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THE HISTORY SECTION

Several of the articles here center on the size of the Palestinian population. The Muslim population in Palestine west of the Jordan river in 1691 is estimated at 219,000, the Muslims having gained 74,000 in population between 1539 to 1691; and another gain of 27,000 from 1691 to 1800, indicating a very low population growth. From 1800 to 1890 — during which time the Jewish aliyah had seriously begun — they gained 186,000 people, suggesting an influx from the neighboring countries. It fits with what is known about the people living in that desolate region of the Ottoman Empire that was to become the western portion of Mandated Palestine: most of the Arabs in Palestine were dirt poor, with poor nutrition, a high infant mortality and a short life span, made shorter by untreated diseases and constant fighting between tribes. Yet according to Arab mythology, this group of people grew to 6-9 million (different estimates) "Palestinians" — in Israel, Jordan, in refugee camps in the Arab countries and abroad in Europe and America — by natural growth of the original indigenous population in around 100 years.

"A LAND WITHOUT A PEOPLE FOR A PEOPLE WITHOUT A LAND"
by Diana Muir

  In 1890 there were some 500,000 people (some 50 ethnic groups, including Jews, Christians, Arabs and other Muslims) in the desolated Ottoman territory that would become the portion of mandated Palestine west of the Jordan river and that included today's Gaza, the Golan, Israel, Samaria and Judea. A staple in the Arab list of grievances is that the early Zionist immigrants were shocked to find that the land wasn't empty — implying there was a thriving Palestinian population, a "Palestinian people", that Israel subjugated. Diana Muir concludes that certainly it was known there were some people on the land. A land without people means the territory "was without a national character". The notion of a Palestinian national identity "only developed in reaction to Zionist immigration." She tracks the origin of the phrase and its use as anti-Zionist propaganda.
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ON THE RIGHTS OF 'SETTLERS'
by Shmuel Katz

  When Shmuel Katz writes history, he writes from his own knowledge and experience — he's been there, done that. Here he cuts through the claims by the Arabs and their sympathizers that the major obstacles to peace are the Jewish settlements in the Territories. Very simply and very accurately, Katz explains that these settlements are indeed legitimate: "the Mandate remained the defining document for governing Palestine." As he puts it, "From the point of view of international law these settlers are as legal as any resident of Manhattan or of Shreveport, Louisiana."
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THE PALESTINIANS: A PEOPLEHOOD BASED ON A BIG LIE
by Eli E. Hertz

  This is a very excellent review of the facts about the "Palestinian People" and their short but violent history. Eli E. Hertz notes that "[m]ost so-called Palestinians are relative newcomers to the Land of Israel." How true. If they were indigenous, their huge jump in population in a relatively short time under poor environmental conditions would be the biggest demographic miracle in history. So why the recent creation of an indigenous "Palestinian people" when Israel conquered the Territories after it was invaded by the neighboring Arab countries? As Hertz writes, "Suddenly a separate Palestinian peoplehood appeared and claimed it deserved nationhood — and 21 other Arab states went along with it."
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COLUMBIA, AHMADINEJAD, AND NAZI GERMANY: ROUND TWO
by Rafael Medoff

  Some Columbia University faculty are planning to accept Iranian president Ahmadinejad's invitation to visit his country. Rafael Medoff reminds us of a historical parallel — in the 1930's, "Columbia was among the U.S. universities that sought to forge warm relations with Nazi-controlled German universities." In what Medoff calls "Totalitarian Tourism', the Nazis made elaborate preparations for foreign visitors from universities, the press and the Red Cross, providing them with selected, camouflaged and prettified views of what was actually happening in Germany. These efforts paid off — the visitors went home to broadcast how pleased they were with what they saw. After visiting some of Iran's sanitized universities, will the present-day Columbians come back with similar enthusiasm?
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

March 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
April 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

January-February, 2008

The Peace Process — briefly resurrected in Annapolis — is dead. Well, at least it's back on the respirators, even if Condaleezza Rice is chalking up enough fly miles to last her the rest of her life. All that survives of it in Israel is a government that still wants to give away the store to the Arabs to win favor with "the world", while harassing some of its very loyal citizens — could Olmert's timing be worse? In many ways, things are grim for Israel. She looks weak. She acts weak. Her enemies are enboldened.

But thats not the whole story. We may actually be in a time of transition — when people drop the Land For Peace mantra and more realistically assess what's going on in the world. Initially, the predation of violent Islam on a western world was met with little resistance — our opinion makers had benevolently adopted moral relativity and multiculturalism as their equivalent of the Ten Commandments and it was — and is — important to them to defend this image.

But more and more people in Israel and Europe and America are recognizing that their tolerance has allowed in a large number of Muslims intent on making shari'a law substitute for the laws of the host country; and if this continues, it will lead to the death of the native culture. Moreover, there is a — still minimal — awareness that without oil, the implementation of the war Islam is waging will dry up, so we need to find alternative sources of energy.

So backlash has started, both in the growing anti-Islamist media and in technological advances.

The real question is: can we of the West fight back soon enough and strong enough before the monomaniac Islamists overwhelm us with their usual tactics: suing and harassment of officials; terrorism; high birth rate, overwhelming the social services of the host country; an uncompromising certainty that they know best, which usually makes diplomats urge the less fanatical other side to do all the compromising; murder of targetted Jews and Christians and anti-Islamic Muslims; bribery and intimidation of news media people; bribery and intimidation of politicians and diplomats; rioting; blackmail that they will riot if their demands aren't met; bribery and intimidation of academics, etc, etc, etc.

SECTION 1. This issue of Think-Israel starts with an assessment of the condition of Jews, especially in Israel. Israel seems to have been chosen — without its consent — to be among the first countries to do sustained battle with Muslims intent on taking over the world.

MEMO FROM GULFISTAN
by Martin Kramer

  Martin Kramer provides us with a realistic assessment of where the Peace Process stands. Bottom Line: it's out of steam. Posturing maybe, but no real pressure. And even among themselves, the Arabs are not doing kissy-kiss and make-up. Saudi Arabia may from time to time support both Sunni and Shiites, but there's no united front against Iran. What is puzzling then: what — or who — is fueling Olmert's monomania to destroy the Jewish communities of Samaria and Judea?
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WINOGKATIF
by David Wilder

  David Wilder puts the current appeasement of the Arabs in historic context, pointing out that Israel's first crumbling was after the 1967 Six Day War, when in their hunger for peace with their Arab neighbors, Israel acted as if it were the defeated side and destroyed Jewish settlements that had been started in the Sinai. The attitude that Israel must make all the concessions for peace plus a Marxist educational system that teaches the lie that Israel really doesn't belong to the Jews plus an IDF that is taught it isn't nice to win have all contributed to the parlous state in which Israel now finds itself. It is an excellent summary not only of what is going on in Israel but it points out: "the aim of Islam is not only the end of Israel; rather it is the Islamization of the entire western world and culture, including a takeover of Europe and North America."
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ON THE PRESENT DANGER FACING ISRAEL AND ALL JEWS
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Rachel Neuwirth does a masterful job summerizing the dangers Jews face around the world. Terorism, particularly in Israel, has not abated since the 1993 Oslo Accords; instead it has increased and the terrorists are stronger than ever. Terrorism against Jews in the diaspora is still minimal — which means this is the time to stop it — but the FBI refuses to connect the dots. The diplomats find it more rewarding to pressure Israel, which has been willing to make concessions, that to deal with the Arabs, who won't budge from their position. The propaganda attacks against the Jews continue. And what really drains our strength is that "[t]housands of Jewish journalists, academics, filmmakers, artists and 'intellectuals' in the United States, Canada, Europe, and within Israel itself have actively participated in the campaign of vilification and lies against Israel. Neuwirth's essay is not happiness-making. But it is impossible to improve a situation until you understand it.
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These next essays are about Israel's legal rights in Gaza and an assessment of Mahmoud Abbas, their "peace partner"

INTERNATIONAL LAW AND GAZA: THE ASSAULT ON ISRAEL'S RIGHT TO SELF-DEFENSE
by Abraham Bell

  One of the Dr. Seuss books chronicles the ever more disasterous results of trying to correct what started as a single stupid mistake. As analog, we have Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in the mistaken belief that Israel could thus separate itself from the nasties who live in the Territories. The Government has been generally indifferent to its own displaced Gazan Jews, a demoralized group of once proud and productive citizens. But their plight has received little attention. On the other hand Israel is held responsible for the welfare of the Gazan Arabs, and there is much media indignation if she cuts back on services. The new owners of Gaza are too busy to worry about their own infrastructure — they are occupied making bombs and distributing them for free to as many Israeli cities as they can reach. They've also mucked up the water supply and — now that they've broken the barrier with Egypt — are bringing diseased animals in from Egypt. As Israel tries to deal with the worsening situation in Gaza, the pro-Arab press has taken up a new version of an old mantra: it's all Israel's fault. Abraham Bell explains the legality of what Israel is doing. I wonder if it will have any impact on those who want Israel dead.
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PALESTINIAN CONDITIONAL NON-VIOLENCE — DENYING THE FUNDAMENTAL BASIS OF THE GAME
by Dr. Aaron Lerner, with translation from the Arabic by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Cook

  America trains Arab terrorists to fight; Israel gives them guns and Abbas smiles — all of them, it is claimed, are determined to defeat Hamas and establish a peaceful Palestinian state inside Israel. The reality: Abbas turns over the weaponry to Hamas, sometimes willingly; Israel releases prisoners who return to killing Jews; and Abbas announces that peace with Israel is not really what he is after. Extermination is a closer fit to his plans. Dr. Aaron Lerner succinctly summarizes Abbas' actual plans, not the misty nonsense American and Israeli politicians spout. The article includes some direct quotes from Abbas' latest interview from the PMW website. The reality is: (1) we help Abbas and he gets strong, then joins Hamas to fight Israel openly; or (2) we don't help Abbas and in high dudgeon he joins Hamas to fight Israel openly. Why is Israel waiting while its enemies gather strength?
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FATAH AS MODERATE. A HARD LOOK POST-ANNAPOLIS
by Arlene Kushner

  Arlene Kushner asks whether Mahmoud Abbas and his party are moderate and whether they are legitimate peace negotiation partners. This divides into several subquestions, starting with: (1) are they able to control Samaria and Judea? The answer is NO. Is Abbas corrupt? The answer is YES. Is he a strong leader. The answer is NO. (2) Does Abbas intend to be a Peace Partner? All the signs say NO. This is a fact-filled logically-presented discussion on whether the Palestinian state Olmert is so intent on creating has any chance of being a viable structure and a peaceful neighbor.
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By his own words, P.M. Olmert is dedicated to creating another Palestinian state — which means expelling up to half-million Jews from Samaria and Judea and Jerusalem. Ignoring for the moment the brain-damaged notion of giving up Biblical Israel, it is time to examine how well the Government was able to accomplish a much smaller task — relocating the 9000 Jews they expelled from Gush Katif, Gaza, rehousing them in permanent homes and getting them the resources to live as a community and farm their marvelous organic vegetables. The government and its horde of incompetent petty bureaucrats completely flunked the small task. How in the world will they be able to handle something this size? The next essays are about the Jewish refugees of Gaza.

THE WILL TO SURVIVE; SURVIVING WITH HOPE
by Rachel Saperstein

  The latest from the journal of that remarkable couple, the Sapersteins, previously part of the proud, productive and patriotic community of Neve Dekalim, Gush Katif, Gaza and now part of a demoralized, underemployed community living in paper caravans, a community struggling to survive the afflictions inflicted on them by an uncaring government. This reads like a HOW-TO survive as menchen.
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GUSH KATIF REFUGEES CONFRONT RAIN, RATS AND A RIDICULOUS BUREAUCRACY
articles by Gil Ronen, Hillel Fendel and Michael G. Bard

  This is a compilation of recent items on the plight of the people of Gush Katif, Gaza that were converted from a productive and thriving community into a bunch of unemployed refugees. And this by their own government, which had spent time training the army and police to oust the people but had not bothered to plan how and where to relocate them and provide them adequate housing, jobs and schools. As we've read over the years from the Sapersteins (google "saperstein" Think-Israel, top of home page), the temporary paper caravans that serve as their new homes were badly set into position. The latest rains have helped the rats; but they haven't pushed the do-nothing bureaucracy into doing anything except maybe moving their jaws a bit more vigorously.
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People automatically assume the Israeli Arabs are treated as second-class citizens — after all, BBC and CNN have told them so, over and over again. The truth is there is discrimination — Arabs tend to receive preference in the law courts and universities; the Government releases Arab terrorists from prison but holds a Jewish teenager — a peaceful protester — in jail for months; the Government proudly sends supplies to Hamas Gaza instead of feeding its own poor; the IDF worries about the safety of Arab women and children, but lets its own families suffer Arab terrorist attack. What these next essays have in common is they all detail the way the Olmert government and the Israeli left cater to the Arabs, at the cost of risking the destruction of Israel. This one-sidedness has consequences that further undermine the land of Israel. Israel's catering to the Arabs is destroying Jewish morale.

DAN BAR-ON'S DEFAMATORY PSYCHOBABBLE
by Joel Amitai

  Usually the Israel Academia Monitor lets leftist ideologues expose themselves and the ideas they inculcate in Israeli youth simply by presenting us with articles they have written. In this essay, Joel Amitai draws us a character sketch of Dan Bar-On of Ben-Gurion University (BGU), one of the most egregious of Israel's "psycho babblers." I wonder if BGU will award him a research prize as did Hebrew U, in acclaiming a study that claimed that the IDF was racist because the soldiers didn't rape Arab women (see here.)
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A GLIMPSE INTO THE MINDSET OF A JUDICIAL OLIGARCH
by Rabbi Steven Pruzansky

  What is practicised by Israel's leftist judiciary is described politely as "judicial activism" and, more accurately, as "judicial tyranny". It has become one of Israel's major problems, severely crippling her ability to defend herself against Arab terrorists. As Rabbi Steven Pruzansky puts it, "The dangers of subjectivity in law — by a self-perpetuating judicial oligarchy answerable to no one, composed exclusively of like-minded liberals who are charged with appointing their successors — became apparent. It was now easy to understand how Jewish teenagers who had blocked a highway to protest the Gaza expulsion could be sentenced to two years in prison." And why terrorists are afforded more protection than Israel's Jewish citizenry.
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LIP THE LIAR AND HARDLY HA HA
by Boris Celser

  Boris Celser presents us with a bitter satire on Bush and Olmert, puppeteer and totally compliant puppet, who together preside over a sick Israeli administration — an administration that kowtows to the Arab and disdains the Jew. It is a country that has deviated so far from its moral core that Jews are not allowed to pray openly on the Temple Mount. When they are permitted access, they may pray to their God but they mustn't move their lips. And the Arabs keep a sharp watch. Back in 1967, the local Arabs were — casually and with no public discussion — given control of Judaism's holy site. And the people has allowed this distorted state of affairs to continue for some 40 years. It's time this stopped.
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THE LATEST DAMAGE TO ANTIQUITIES ON THE TEMPLE MOUNT
by Nadav Shragai

  When Israel conquered the eastern part of Jerusalem in 1968, the Arabs came, hoping they'd be allowed to worship quietly on the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Moshe Dayan made the grand gesture of giving effective control of the Temple Mount to the Waqf. Over the years, the Arabs have become bolder and have shown how little respect they have for Jewish worship. They have increasingly violated the laws governing new construction and preserving antiquities. Nadav Shragai tells us about the most recent Arab violations: endangering the structure by illegal construction and destroying artefacts that point to an ancient Jewish presence. What is appalling is that the Israeli government, initially fearful of calling attention to Arab non-compliance with the Oslo Accords, never called a halt to this flagrant destruction. The government doesn't act because it fears the Arabs will riot; they are not ashamed of allowing the desecration of Judaism's most sacred site. Nor are they swayed by polite protest.
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NO PLACE FOR A SON OF ZIONISM
by Michelle Nevada

  Israel is proud of doing its upmost not to injure Arabs that are not obviously terrorists, even though the Arabs take advantage by hiding among civilians and using their children as couriers, even sending them in to collect the guns from dead terrorists, secure in the knowledge that the IDF will not shoot. But Israel's foolish protection of the lives of "innocent" Arabs to the point of jeopardizing the lives of her own children and soldiers has consequences. Israel's using her soldiers to throw Jews out of their homes as in Gaza and Amona also has consequences. Michelle Nevada spells out one of them — it has soured diaspora Jews who are strongly Zionistic from encouraging their sons to join the IDF. As Nevada puts it, "It is a place where those who are religious are held back from the best positions in the service, a place where they are interrogated about whether their loyalty is to the IDF or to the Torah, and a place where they must be forced to chose between the two. If you choose to keep your religious ideals, you go to jail." The consequences may be unintended but they are real.
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SECTION 2. Using several Palestinian Arab hoaxes as anchor, the articles examine the three components that contribute to an Arab hoax: 1) The Arab fakers playing victim; 2) Israel cast as villain and allowing the hoaxers to control the play; and 3) the media, which confirm that the Arabs speak truth.

Arabs are pretty good at creating a story out of whole cloth. Their hoaxes have become classics in the art of swaying public opinion by sheer invention or by ballooning some small incidents. The 52 dead in Jenin became, according to Palestinian Arab diplomats, 5000 and was only much later discredited. The Qana hoax was brilliantly executed by Hezbollah but failed because bloggers — not the main stream media (MSM) — found discrepancies and inconsistencies and squelched the hoax before it could be firmly established — no thanks to Israel's PR people. (Read "Bloggers Take On The Qana 'Massacre,'" here.)

Recently, Hamas tried a Hezbollah-like stunt, holding Israel responsible for death by starvation and curtailed electrical power in Gaza rather than, as in the Lebanon War, death by bombing.

Israel hasn't gotten much swifter at countering these theatrical stunts. But, to play theater critic for a moment, Hamas simply doesn't have Hezbollah's verve and boldness and technique in hoaxery.

The third component — the media — they haven't changed much, either. At Qana, they knew that the Hezbollah point man was running around from photographer to photographer carrying a dead child with no danger to himself. But they wrote it up as if the actor was fearlessly running for medical help to save the baby's life and they implied Israel was bombing the area. The media does what it can to malign Israel, but they don't have much to work with — Hamas is much too amateurish. More generally, the media practices self-censorship when dealing with Arab misdeeds and can be relied on to find fault with Israel no matter what the circumstances.

INDEPENDENT EXPERT: IDF BULLETS DIDN'T KILL MOHAMMED AL-DURA
by Adi Schwartz

  At the beginning of the second intifada in 2000, a photograph of a man and his son unsuccessfully trying to avoid Israeli gunfire won the sympathy of the world. Among the Palestinians, the child, Mohammed al-Dura, was commemorated as a martyr and became a role model for the Arab youth. France 2 claimed his death had been caught on tape, but it later became clear the shooting was a hoax. Positioned where they were, the IDF could not have shot him. What still isn't clear is whether the hoax was perpetrated independently by the Arab camera man, or by him and his boss, Charles Enderlin, with collusion by France 2, the TV station that broadcast the scene. In fact, it isn't clear that Al-Dura is dead. Adi Schwartz writes that an independent investigator has cleared the IDF of responsibility. And in time, the hoax will unravel — but the damage it has done is not as easily undone.
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HOW RACHEL CORRIE REALLY DIED (HINT: NOT PROTECTING A HOUSE)
by Carl of Jerusalem

  Rachel Corrie, a member of the Marxist International Solidarity Movement (ISM) and a strong supporter of the Palestinians was killed in March 2003. The world was told she was run over — twice — by an Israeli tractor. Rachel Corrie won fame as did Mohammad al-Dura. Both served the Arab cause against Israel. Both had deaths that shocked and sorrowed the world. In both cases, eye witnesses confirmed that their deaths were caused by the IDF. Both were treated as martyrs and memorialized in various ways. After the initial shock, both deaths were seen as puzzling and suspicion increased that they were staged. Years later, we learn that the IDF was not responsible in either death. In fact, there is strong evidence in al-Dura's case and circumstantial evidence in Corrie's that they were done in by the Palestinians.
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THE BLACKOUT – A HAMAS-ALJAZEERA CO-PRODUCTION/STAGED GAZA BLACKOUT PICTURES
by Martin Solomon

  These pictures of the Gaza blackout are instructive. There is no way that the pathos-filled pictures could have made their way to print without the collusion of Arab photographers, who took them at angles that hid the light and the truth. The news editors are equally culpable. They presumably knew that the Gazans were not in an electricity blackout. They knew that creating hoaxes is an often-used tool in Arab propaganda. Why did they print the Israel-demonizing pictures without verification?
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LIGHTS [OFF]. CAMERA. ACTION
by Amir Mizroch

  Israel has often needlessly taken the blame for Arab death — e.g., Mohammed al-Dura and the family that set off an explosive while having a Gaza beach picnic. It was later — much later — discovered Israel wasn't responsible. Even when they do respond to Arab hoaxes and ordinary mistatements, exaggerations and just plain lies, Israeli counter information most often comes too little and too late — long after the damage has been done.. Amir Mizroch writes about the Gaza blackout story, focusing on the mistakes made by the Israelis. As is often the case in Israeli botch-ups, the culprit was poor communication within a bureaucracy that may fear bad press but hasn't mastered how to produce timely counter responses.
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ARAB BELLIGERENCE, ISRAELI SELF-ABASEMENT
by Kenneth Levin

  Dr. Kenneth Levin points out that despite the many opportunities Israel has had to "to unmask the murderous hypocrisy of Palestinian leaders talking 'two-state solution' and 'mutual recognition' in speeches to Western audiences while militating for a single, Arab, state in all the land when talking in Arabic...," Israeli leaders do not. Nor do they object publicly to how its peace partner Egypt continues to demonize the Jews, producing vile propaganda that inculcates hate through the Arab world. They ignore both Arab words and Arab hostile deeds. But this will not bring peace. Israel longs to be a normal nation. Then it should explain to the world the "true challenges posed by its enemies — challenges that preclude for the present any possibility of genuine peace." That is what a normal nation would do.
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ISRAEL'S SELVES AND HER USE OF HASBARA (ADVOCACY)
by Babs Barron

  Barbara Barron utilizes Jungian concepts to sketch out an analysis of what is wrong with Israeli hasbara. She suggests that Israel's "...persona of hardiness and resilience has become more and more rigid and inflexible, perhaps as a reaction to her realisation of the shadow, in the shape of her growing sense of unease about how she is perceived and often, it seems, willfully misunderstood, by the rest of the world ...[which] is in turn exacerbated by the way in which her government spokespeople fail to represent her fully in the international arena, and, worse, often seem publicly to undermine their country's ethos." The result is she shows all the signs of the "emotionally bullied" individual. A remedy is to be found if Israel would repeat what she knows is the truth to counter Arab lies, no matter how often it takes "for the message to be got across." Perhaps in doing the obviously necessary, she will heal herself.
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PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A DHIMMIFIED MAN
by David J. Rusin

  Many news media, book publishers, museums, art galleries, movie houses and culture centers in Europe fear that Muslims will react with violence to any article or work of art that might be considered insulting to their religion. After all, documented reaction has included everything from rioting to murder. So they have taken to self-censorship, refusing to publish or produce items in a pre-appeasement ritual to potential Muslim disapproval. Or they remove a long-established item because it might offend Muslims. A feature of this self-censorship is that it often takes place with no threatening input from Muslims, whereas the same culture gatekeepers loftily dismiss Jewish and Christian protests against their religions as an affront to free speech.
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NOT EVEN PRETENDING TO BE FAIR: THE NEW YORK TIMES ON GAZA
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin dissects a recent article on Gaza from the New York Times and demonstrates how the Times carelessly ignores facts and how they insert sly suggestions that Israel is responsible for the distress of the Gaza Arabs. Perhaps the Paper of Record is after a Guinness Book record on how much slander and distortion can be written about Israel in the smallest amount of space. If so, they have competition from several other main stream papers that claim to be more truthful than the National Inquirer.
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SECTION 3: The next group of essays deal with the structure of Arab and Muslim societies and how their culture and religion contribute to their resurgence as a belligerent group aiming at global domination. This includes their revived clashes not just with Judaism but with Christianity and Hinduism in different parts of the global. What is curious in these conflicts is that the U.S. government has favored the Muslims in Bosnia and in Kosova; we have been less than vigorous in preventing African Muslims from enslaving and slaughtering African Christians; we fought a war to protect Kuwait from Saddam Hussein's invasion; and we continue to weaken Israel both by preventing her from thrashing the terrorists and by arming Arab countries and terrorist groups.

THE MIDDLE EAST'S TRIBAL AFFLICTION
by Daniel Pipes

  Daniel Pipes reviews a new book by Philip Carl Salzman, which discusses the importance of the tribal social structure to the understanding of Arab society. The family-clan-tribal structure, common to many Islamic societies, coupled with "tyrannical centralism", would account for key aspects of "Middle Eastern family life", including cousin marriage — which increases the number of children with genetic abnormalities — polygyny and honor killings. Pipes also makes the point that Arab tribal structure, by its very nature, is highly resistant to a quick fix.
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ISLAM AND THE JEWS: THE STATUS OF JEWS AND CHRISTIANS IN MUSLIM LANDS, 1772ce
by Jacob Marcus

  "In 1772," Jacob Marcus wrote, "a Muslim scholar in Cairo was asked how Jews and Christians should be treated." This text is his reply. It is in keeping with earlier Muslim practices (see, e.g., Andrew G. Bostom (ed.), The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism: From Sacred Texts to Solemn History) and indicates a continuity in discrimination against Christians and Jews throughout Islamic history. It certainly calls into question modern spins on Muslim intolerance — that it is due to their unhappiness with what Israel and America are doing; that it is due to a few irrational fanatics on the fringe of the religion; that it is due to Muslim shame at being left behind by western technology and science; and that it is due to modern dictatorships and would disappear if democracy — usually defined as the right to vote, which many Muslim dictatorships already have — was adopted in Muslim countries.
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THWARTING SCIENCE AND MEDICINE: WHAT PART DOES FOREIGN FUND-UNDERWRITING PLAY?
by Marion D.S. Dreyfus

  If any field is immune to sharia takeover, you'd think long-term investigation in medicine would be. Marion D.S. Dreyfus describes what a sharia invasion would do to such research — it would dry it up. Israel would go from being a major contributor to scientific and medical journals to the current level of research from the Arab countries, which is close to zero. More generally, this essay asks: what happens when politics and ideology invade science?
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The next group of essays deal with the Islamic attempts at takeover in Europe and India.

THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD'S INFILTRATION OF THE WEST
by Fjordman

  The Muslim Brotherhood spawned the terrorist group, Hamas, but it also spreads its influence in ways that are less violent but just as dangerous. It controls mosques and it has paid for and successfully infiltrated political, social, academic and banking institutions and organizations in the Middle East, Europe and increasingly in America. Since its beginning in the 1920s, it has planned big and well in advance and it has sufficient oil money to implement its plans. It has been remarkably successful. Frightenly so. Fjordman gives us a picture of the Brotherhood's reach and reviews some of the pertinent articles about it. In America, judging from puff pieces written about them, they have coopted a goodly number of academics and media people. And their spiritual leader, Yusif al-Qaradawi, has been directly implicated in the Danish cartoon riots.
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SLEEPING WITH DEADLY JIHADI TERRORISTS
by Babu Suseelan

  Babu Suseelan provides us with a terrifying but accurate picture of what Muslim terrorists are doing in India against Hindus: "... homicide bombing, killing of innocent Hindus, destruction of temples, research institutions, burning passenger trains, hijacking airplanes and assassination..." Sound familiar? I'm surprised Condoleeza Rice hasn't yet blamed it all on Israeli intransigence.
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Strife Between Islam And Christianity

THE CLASH OF IDEOLOGIES IN AFRICA: KENYA
by David J. Jonsson

  Kenya has become a news-worthy place, thanks to its association with the Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama, who was raised there as a Muslim and now declares himself a Christian. Kenya is also, as David J. Jonsson writes, a place where Islam and Christianity have been in ideological conflict, and where Islam is projected the winner. As Jonsson reminds us, Islam brings with it its violence, its all-encompassing shari'a law and its triumphalist ambition to spread its ideology globally.
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KOSOVO: ISLAMISM'S NEW BEACHHEAD?
by Julia Gorin

 Julia Gorin raises concerns about America's sanctioning Kosovo's breakaway from Serbia to become another Muslim state. She points out that post-9/11, is it "... the free world's business to spread Shari'a law, as is always the upshot of any Islamicizing region?" It will more than likely serve as an al-Qaida base, because of the al-Qaida links to the KLA. Moreover, approving Kosovo's breakaway sets a bad precedence for how to handle belligerent minorities around the globe, Muslim and non-Muslim.
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THE KOSOVO PRECEDENT
by Arieh Eldad

  This article by Arieh Eldad focuses on what the implications of a Kosovo breakaway are to Israel. If Israel accepts the Kosovo separation, then it has cut itself off at the knees, having no reason to reject, say, the Arabs in the Galilee demanding the area become theirs. For that matter, taking it a step further, what will America do as the Azlatans — a group advocating the return of the American southwest to Mexico — grow more vociferous and begin to "liberate" California on the grounds that the whites are an unwelcome minority?
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SECTION 4. This area examines some of Islam's inroads into America — non-violent influence on educational curricula and the policy of some mainline churches. The Saudis are also actively promoting wahhabism via the preachers they select to run their mosques. And murder to achieve an objective is acceptable — the murder of Rabbi Kahane some 17 years ago is a case in point.

The first set of articles looks at activism in some mainline churches. After several decades of internal propagandizing — Arab Christians in particular were effective proselytizers of the church decision-makers — in July 2005 the Presbyterian church became the first Christian denomination in America to vote to divest from companies that do business with Israel. Caterpillar, Motorola, ITT, inter alia were targetted. Membership backlash following Presbyterian-Hezbollah meetings caused the Church to profess some reassuring words. Nevertheless, the anti-Israel activists continue to operate with a free hand, becoming more obviously anti-Jewish, no longer justifying their animosity on supposed "sins" committed by Israel. These next essays probe the Presbyterian attitude and some bizarre behavior among pro-Palestinian Methodists.

CHURCH ANTI-ISRAEL ACTIVISM AND ANTISEMITISM
by Will Spotts

  This is a remarkable examination of anti-semitism in the Presbyterian Church by an Elder of the Church, who has divested himself of slogans and superficial explanations for the phenomenon of the current and growing hostility to Jews by mainline churches. He looks at the problem from several viewpoints, and trashes many of the usual reasons to justify the Church's hostility.
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THE METHODIST CHILD INDOCTRINATION LEAGUE
by Mark Tooley

  If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, the Methodists are now actively imitating the earlier drive by the Presbyterians to divest themselves of stock in companies doing business with Israel. But they have gone well beyond their mentors. Mark Tooley writes how The United Methodist Women's Division is even targetting the Methodist young with hate-Israel messages gussied up as instructional stories on how to empathize with the Po' Palestinians. Oh those evil Jews Israelis!
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Curious it is that while the Harvard Prez was hounded out of job for hinting girls is different from boys and anti-Black discussions are taboo, yet anti-Jewish remarks are acceptable. We hear them from Church groups, an ex-president and academics — some of whom are from first-rank universities. Mostly, these remarks are still labeled "anti-Zionist" or "anti-Israeli", as if that made them acceptable. The essays below examine the book by two scholars, Walt and Mearsheimer, on two levels: its specific inaccuracies and its genealogy — it is a product of the coupling of realist theory in international relations and profound ignorance of the Middle East.

THE FRAUDULENT SCHOLARSHIP OF PROFESSORS WALT AND MEARSHEIMER
by Alex Safian

  Professor's Walt and Mearsheimer's book has become a foundation text for many a nutter's article on anti-Jewish websites. Now that Jimmy Carter has been discredited — partially by his own statements — the anti-Jew lobby has little but sleezoid writings to give them accreditation except for the study by real professors from fancy schools — Walt and Mearsheimer, from U of Chicago and Harvard yet. Alex Safian takes a look at how academically sound their work is. He focuses specifically on some of the book's factually incorrect statements, significant omissions and unsubstantiated conclusions. If their universities reflected the level of their scholarship, they'd be teaching at "Get-yr-phd-in-2-mos University.
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IGNORANCE CANNOT BE REALISTIC: A CRITIQUE OF THE MEARSHEIMER-WALT THESIS
by Ofira Seliktar

  Ofira Seliktar examines Walt and Mearsheimer's book, which is written from the point of view of realist theory applied to international relations, and provides us with an excellent understanding of why the book fails so badly as an informed analysis: the authors have little real knowledge of the Middle East. They assume the Arabs have Western-rational goals. Casting Israel as Middle Eastern bogeyman of the Western world is actually their bizarre attempt to salvage their school of thought, which had totally failed to explain 9/11 and does not comprehend the mindset of the Arab leaders. As Seliktar writes of their invalid conclusions: "They were trying to solve an imaginary problem, since their puzzlement arose from their mistake of recasting the region into a tight realist mold that did not fit its realities." The paper also provides an excellent summary of why the Peace Process hasn't worked and can not work – it runs counter to the Arab goal of destroying Israel; they have no intention of living with Israel in neighborly peace.
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Islamic Violence In America

WHEN JIHAD CAME TO AMERICA
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Want to know how our grandchildren will date when Islam brought its jihad against the U.S.A directly to America? Not on 9/11. No. It was earlier. It was in 1990, when they assassinated Rabbi Meir Kahane, a Jew who couldn't be intimidated and who promulgated the then radical idea that the Arabs be transferred out of Biblical Israel. Against all the evidence to the contrary, the killing was declared a lone act of violence by the FBI, which — just like these days — took its time translating much of the Arabic handwritten notes found in the assassin's apartment. Three years later, other members of his cell made the first attempt to destroy the World Trade Center. It was only partially successful, but it was a morale-booster and gave the jihadists valuable information for a more dramatic future attack. Andrew C. McCarthy provides us with a vivid account of the killing of Rabbi Kahane by an Arab from Egypt who was part of a jihadist cell training for various acts of terror under the guidance of the "Blind Sheik," Omar Abdel Rahman.
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RAV MEIR KAHANE'S 2007 YAHRZEIT
by Meir Jolowitz

  This is a companion piece to McCarthy's article (see above). In his time Rabbi Kahane was reviled as a racist for baldly saying it's them or us vis a vis the Arabs and the Jews. He frightened people by telling them the obvious: there really are some binary events with no in-between. The sun shining in the middle of the night is impossible. If the sun is shining, it isn't night. He was one of the first victims of the newest Arab war against the West, the first certainly on American soil. Now the secular Jews advocate what he preached — separation between Arabs and Jews. They want it so much, they are willing to give up Biblical Israel and much more. This is the speech Meir Jolowitz gave at the Rememberance Service 17 years after Rabbi Kahane was — do we call it murder or assassination?.
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GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY'S WAHHABI FRONT
by Patrick Poole

  I don't know what the going rate is for full control of a American university but as Patrick Poole demonstrates, the Saudis are getting their money's worth from a paltry 20 meg donation to Georgetown University that endowed a Center dedicated to Muslim-Christian understanding. "The Center's director, John Esposito, has been known for his vigorous apologetics for Islamic extremism, ... and the Center has affiliated with institutions and people that front for and speak for Hamas and Hamas' parent organization, the Muslim Brotherhood. And they have hired staff such as Susan Douglass, who once taught at the Islamic Saudi Academy, which graduated several students who went on to commit acts of terrorism; she now turns out propagandizing textbooks on the K-12 level. In short, the Center has become an effective conduit for promoting the acceptance of wahhabi-style Islam and infiltrating it into the larger community.
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SECTION 5. FIGHTING BACK: This issue started with an assessment of the unwilling fighters of Islam. It ends with some hopeful signs that people are beginning to understand that Islam is waging a war against us and ignoring it won't make it go away. Several of the articles make suggestions on how to fight back.

ISRAEL'S FOLLY
by Hugh Fitzgerald

  This is an impassioned yet sensible essay by Hugh Fitzgerald summarizing how far the world has progressed in comprehending that Muslim aggressiveness can not be appeased but must be repelled. Unfortunately, the politicians and the diplomats and the so-called leadership in Israel and this country seem the least enlightened, still believing they can sway Islam to civilized neighborliness. "But," Fitzgerald writes, "[t]he logic of events, the inevitability of Muslim aggressive demands and Muslim violence within the countries of Western Europe, and nothing else, will make that reassessment [of what Islam is really after] happen. All Israel has to do is to hold on, not give in, do nothing to whet, by further surrenders to the sly Slow Jihadists of Fatah." The problem reduces then to: how to keep Israel from foolishly divesting itself of its land until the tide of global public opinion turns against the Muslims.
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THE ZIONIST REVOLUTION
by Yehuda HaKohen

  Most people have only a vague idea about what the Zionist revolution entails. Nevertheless, it is fashionable — especially for those who do their meditation sitting on Tel-Aviv bar stools — to insist that Zionism is dead. Yehuda HaCohen makes the point that, on the contrary, the Revolution is still in its infancy and is just beginning — as Israel's achievements in science and technology indicate — to blossom for the benefit of mankind. As the Jews slough off the European-Marxist ideologies of the first generation kibbutzim and go back to their own roots, that's when the Zionist revolution will really begin in earnest.
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THE FALLACY OF GRIEVANCE-BASED TERRORISM
by Melvin E. Lee

  Melvin E. Lee's thesis is that we labor under "[t]he fundamental premise .. that grievances with U.S. policies in the Middle East motivate Islamist terrorism." He makes clear that "[s]uch assumptions ... misunderstand the enemy and its nature. In reality, the conflict is sparked not by grievance but rather by incompatibility between Islamist ideology and the natural rights ... incorporated into U.S. political culture." Accepting that Islam has genuine grievances against us — they blame their economic, technological and social stagnation on the West — leads us to a policy of appeasement, which only encourages the Jihadists to increased hostility. To understand the roots of Islamic terrorism, we need to look not at their long list of grievances but at their culture and religion. This will take a major overhaul of our attitude of moral relativity, whereby we accept most groups at their own evaluation. It's a big part of our multicultural view of the world, but it won't help us develop useful ways to deal with adherents of a religion that blames us and never themselves for their misery. Lee suggests some major changes in our tactics.
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HOW DO I KNOW? (ABOUT ISLAM)
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Dr. Babu Suseelan counters the pernicious and paralyzing argument that only a Muslim can understand the Muslim religious experience — and by implication — interfere with or condemn the actions of a Muslim. Dr. Suseelan replies that experience can be a starting point but not a terminator of outside examination. "One can gain knowledge and insight about Islamic theocracy without believing in Koranic concepts...most people acquire the view that Jihadi terrorism and suicide bombing are wrong on no experience of terrorism or bombing..." Consistency and coherence "with other common views and historical facts" serve us as guides to what we accept. It is important that we be able to question the Islamic belief system, especially when their adherents are attempting to inflict their values on the rest of us.
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THE ROOTS OF THE MUSLIM VICTIM MENTALITY AND HOW TO FIGHT ISLAM
by Amil Imani

  Iranians are Muslim, but not Arabic. Amil Imani views himself as a descendent of ancient Persia and shrugs off the Islam superimposed on the populace when the Arabs conquered Persia — now Iran — in the mid 7th Century. In this essay he describes the Muslim character as shaped by Muhammed's personality and notions. He then suggests general principles to fight the threat that Islam has become to the West.
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PAY NOW, GET NOTHING LATER
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin explains how the Arabs easily overwhelm the West and Israel by a simple con game that cleverly plays on the Western feeling of responsibility and desire for fairness and its willingness to negotiate: Oh pity us, we've been victimized by you, so pay attention to our grievances. If you want us to trust you, you must build up our confidence in you by giving us gifts. "But," Rubin points out, "the real problem is the Arabic-speaking world's political structure and prevalent ideology. Nothing outsiders can do will change this very much, or at all." So it's time we stop making concessions and start expecting responsible behavior from the Arabs.
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ISLAMIZATION OF EUROPE AND POLICIES TO PREVENT IT, POLICY AREA 8
by No Sharia

  No Sharia has now finished writing about the 8th Policy Area in his model. It concerns the best policy regarding immigration, visas and citizenship. He starts with defining our most dangerous enemy — it is not the terrorists but the moderate muslims (moderate in the Muslim meaning of the word). He then formulates the main goals for an immigration policy of an European country, before specifying the rules and principles concerning tourist visas, temporary residence permits, permanent residence permits and citizenships. The intent, as always, is to develop ways of preventing further Islamization of Europe.
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HISTORY SECTION

WHO'S ZOOMIN' WHOM?
by Michael Zebulon

  Michael Zebulon has the gift of making it fun to learn some necessary information we should all know about "Palestine" and the "Palestinian people". The Arabs have another kind of gift — they have been able to invent a people — the Palestinians — and a country called Palestine, where this people is said to have dwelt from ancient times. Never mind that there is no P in Arabic, so ironically, having a suspected terrorist say Palestine is an effective shibboleth. But we have the facts of geography and history available and they are an excellent way to counter the Arab fantasy. We simply need to speak up whenever we hear the fantasy.
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BRITAIN'S TREACHERY, FRANCE'S REVENGE
by Meir Zamir

  This is an article by Meir Zamir from Ha'Aretz about British plotting against Israel/Zionism and against France circa 1944-1948, and in favor of Arab nationalism. One reader of the original article commented, "I hope Professor Zamir is frantically writing it up as a book. This will be a major contribution to our understanding of the real dynamics in the Middle East after WWII."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

January 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2008 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


November-December, 2007

Given the scary consequences in store for Israel at the rigged game about to take place in Annapolis, prior to the Summit we reprinted two articles on peace from the July-August 2007 issue of Think-Israel: Moshe Sharon's cautionary tale of bargaining with Arabs and Michelle Nevada's essay on that often-uttered sound 'peace' — as well as a prediction by Elyakim Haetzni and some links to articles written by different bloggers.

NO PEACE, NO PEACE PLANS, NO PRICE FOR PEACE — A SHORT GUIDE TO THOSE OBSESSED WITH PEACE
by Moshe Sharon

  Moshe Sharon has personal experience of how wily and manipulative Arabs can be in what Westerners regard as straight-forward diplomatic negotiations. As he puts it, "...in the bazaar of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the two sides are not discussing the same merchandise." and "...if you are clever enough you can sell nothing at a price." In this essay he provides us with some useful guidelines in bargaining with Arabs. And the Arabs won't be ready to bargain seriously until they "... have lost all hope of annihilating the Jewish state.."
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A NEW DEFINITION OF 'PEACE'
by Michelle Nevada

  Michelle Nevada, the essayist, speaks for many of us in noting that the word peace is content-free. It is all things to diplomats and nothing of any real use to the rest of us. To be of use, peace should bear some relationship to "life, as we know it, ... a potpourri of conflict, struggle, noise and dissonance." As it is for the person, it is for the country. "To exist, people and nations must fight to survive. If we fail, we die — and only in death do we have 'peace'." Truly, a liberating concept.
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THE SCIENTIFIC PRELUDE TO AN ODE TO ANNAPOLIS
by Elyakim Haetzni

  Elyakim Haetzni makes a habit of predicting the next stupid capitulation of Israel's leaders to Arab and American demands and their next pre-programmed hostile action aimed at Israel's religious and patriotic "settlers". He warned that P.M. Olmert would try to divide Jerusalem and cede Biblical Israel as starters to total abject surrender of national pride and national land. The implementation of these idiotic and dangerous actions seems to have started — Olmert and Abbas are "negotiating" — Olmert is ready to give all and Abbas to take all and give nothing.
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BLOGGERS ON THE UPCOMING ANNAPOLIS SUMMIT
collected by Bernice Lipkin

  These are articles from various blogsites before the Annapolis Summit/Conference/Meeting and General Give-Away. They make points downplayed in the mainstream media about the upcoming Annapolis Conference. These are just some of the many sites on the internet that care about Israel's future. They are more representative of the actual feeling of both Americans and Israelis than the mouthings of the American State Department and a few traitor Jews in both countries.
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The Annapolis shindig is over — at least for the mainstream media. They're on to other things. Nevertheless, suppressed facts are coming out via blogs and emails. As Janet Lehr reports, "Israeli delegates were literally treated as Dhimmis: 1-Forced to enter by a service entrance; 2-Arabs would not shake their hands; 3-Arab delegates refused to wear the earphones provided for translations, thereby rudely ignoring PM Olmert's speech."  Yet despite these and other clear indications that the Arabs aren't looking for peace with Israel, Israeli leaders are still suicidally acquiescing in the American administration's compulsion to create another Arab state, no matter what the cost to Israel. These next essays present information on — as Frank Gaffney put it — the "Annapolis gang rape" and post-confab events such as the State Department's illegal attempt to get the U.N. to sanctify its wishes; as well as reflections on what Annapolis represents and thoughts on what Israel needs to do to survive her current role as world-class patsy.

GANG-RAPE IN ANNAPOLIS,  SAUDI STYLE
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Picture this: a large number of Arab countries, their current "friends" — Russia, Europeans and the anti-Israel NGOs — and, shame, shame, the U.S.A. ganged up on one side. And Israel all alone on the other. It's a mockup of the U.N. General Assembly (GA), and like the GA, makes a mockery of fairness to Israel. As Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. notes, "The bigger problem is that the government of Ehud Olmert seems disposed to go along with the emerging 'international consensus.'" Bad news for Israel.
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UN MACHINATIONS  AGAINST ISRAEL
by Ed Lasky

  The aftermath to Annapolis: a dash to the U.N. to get a Security Council endorsement of the Annapolis 'we've agreed to talk about thinking about when ...' This would reposition Annapolis — Israel would now be pitted against the Security Council. This wasn't sanctioned by the White House. The State Dept seems to have tried to do an end-around around Bush and get the U.N. to certify to its version of what was agreed upon — rather like the Intelligence Community trying to make policy with their Iran N.E.I., which is certainly so much more fun that doing dull assessments. Ed Lasky provides us with a surprising linkage — namely, the Lebanese anti-semitic USA Ambassador to the UN; a Jew of the Democratic Party persuasion, who has sworn to destroy Bush and, oh yes, make Israel secular and multicultural; and an ex-Annan flunkie, whose job it was to make the UN oil scandal go away.
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CULTURE OF KVETCH
by Sarah Honig

  Sarah Honig writes about an earlier Arab-Israeli peace meeting and the Israeli negotiators who were so intent on making a peace deal with Yassir Arafat — Abbas' old crony and boss — they never noticed he had no set of demands that, fulfilled, would get him to agree to a peace treaty with Israel. It took a disgracefully long time for the Israeli negotiating team to realize that they were making so many unrequited concessions for peace that pretty soon there'd be no Israel to enjoy the peace they were hoping for. A pathetic bunch. And Olmert has learned nothing from their stupidity.
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THE LOOMING DANGER OF ANNAPOLIS
by Shmuel Katz

  Shmuel Katz reminds us of the important matter: the Arabs had not and have no intention now to carry out their responsibilities under the previous peace plan — the Road Map — and here they were at Annapolis, primed to demand another Palestinian state, with all their unfulfilled contractual promises ignored.  Yet Israel in the person of Ehud Olmert was and is eager to strip itself of land and of self-respect, willing to make concessions that endanger its existence.
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THE CONDOLEEZZA STORY
by Emmanuel Sivan

  A way of viewing the Annapolis sitcom is to see it as a structure designed for and by its initiator, major promoter and arbiter of protocol, Condoleezza Rice. Professor Emmanuel Sivan suggests her performance is rooted in her mediocrity, her "intellectual frailty and character weakness". Fortunately, she'll be history soon — running some girl's college into the ground, perhaps. But, unfortunately, she can do a lot of damage in the short time left, especially when she is dealing with a compliant Israeli government.
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FARCE.  BURYING THE BUSH DOCTRINE IN ANNAPOLIS
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  In September, 2001, just after 911, speaking to the uncommitted and to jihadists everywhere, George Bush said, "You are either with us or against us." There was a clear differentiation between the problem — terrorism — and the solution — terrorists had made us their enemy and we would fight them. Then we began backtracking. The final shattering of the Bush doctrine came with the Annapolis meeting. As Andrew C. McCarthy puts it, "Seduced by the fantasy of peace-loving Palestinians, the president and his top diplomats have made creation of a sovereign state for these blood-soaked jihadists the bedrock of our Middle East policy — thus undercutting any credibility the Bush Doctrine may have had."... "This administration is hellbent on granting statehood to savages who worship 'martyrdom,' who have bombed their way to the table, and whose non-negotiable demand — a 'right of return' to Israel for millions of migrant Palestinians — would sound the death-knell for a civilized democracy that is our only true friend in the region." What a terrible way to treat a friend; what a foolish way to treat an enemy.
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BUT TO DO AND DIE
by Sarah Honig

  Annapolis may be over but it reeinforced the traditional aftermath of a Arab-Israeli "peace conference" — Arabs will need to do nothing and Israel is to make land giveaways. If there's a change, it's that the America is giving up its "honest broker" pretense and has appointed a monitor to ensure Israel's compliance to do and die for a Palestinian state. Sarah Honig's excellent essay makes us understand Israel's demoralizing future, thanks to policy (re)set in Annapolis.
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NO LASTING PEACE — THE ILLUSIONS OF ANNAPOLIS
by Ralph Peters

  Ralph Peters has concluded that "[s]hort of intolerable carnage, there's no durable solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem. None. " The Arabs don't want peace; it would throw things out of kilter. There'd be a large group of unemployed men, whose only job skill is killing people. Moreover, Arab leaders wouldn't have Israel to blame for their incompetence. No, that would never do. And there is the elephant-sized fact that Israel is tiny. There is simply no room for two states in it.
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AFTER ANNAPOLIS, WHAT?
by Edward Bernard Glick

  What a sensible article this is! Edward Bernard Glick strips away the blarney about how Israel should, all by itself, carry the morality torch for all of the Middle East and talks about the critical issue — survival. He points out, "In the zero-sum-game Middle East, if you don't win, you lose." For Israel that means she must worry less about inflicting civilian casualties and more about winning big.
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Allowing Israel to go to the Annapolis meeting and suffer humiliation and potential loss of Biblical Israel isn't the only major example of poor judgment by Israeli leaders in the recent past. The Gaza expulsion of 2005 has been a complete failure. Israel's ability to take care of its citizens has diminished. Contrary to what the Israeli government expected from this 'noble' deed, Israel's image worsened after the Disengagement (click here.) Leaving Gaza gave the Arabs an expanded, unsupervised area they have used to create weapons of war and aim them at Israelis.

What is most unforgivable is the agony and suffering Israel inflicted on some of its most loyal and productive citizens, turning them from proud contributors to Israel's economy to demoralized, jobless dependents of the state.

Residents at the former Gaza Strip settlement of Elei Sinai before the disengagement in 2005. (Limor Edrey/Archives)

This quote is from Guysen International News, December 19, 2007: "28 months after the disengagement, 85% of the evacuated families are still living in temporary housing. The delay by the government to find permanent accommodation for the expelled from Gush Katif and northern Samaria has already cost the state 1 billion shekels and will cost another 140 million shekels yearly if it continues. This information was presented in a new study carried out by the Sadan-Lowenthal center led by Professor Ezra Sadan, former head of the Treasury."

We wonder where Olmert plans to resettle the up to half-million Jews living in Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem he and the Bush Administration are planning to kick out of their homes, farms, businesses and synagogues. As we pointed out in the September 2007 editorial , "In a bizarre way, Israel will become the homeland of homeless Jews. If the treatment of the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza is an indication, and it is, the Jews of Samaria, Judea, some of Jerusalem and maybe the Golan will become street wanderers, living in dilapitated hotels and pressed-paper trailers, a drain on the economy, a clump of dispirited citizens and an easy mark for the next wave of Arab terrorism."

GOODBYE TO ALL THAT
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe and Rachel Saperstein together with 9000 other Israeli Jews were expelled from their homes in Gush Katif, Gaza in August 2005. They have written essays about their (mis)adventures dealing with a government that was competent only in harassing them and driving them from their homes — a government that had made almost no preparation for handling this mass evacuation and has still not made amends. In this latest of their essays, Moshe recalls when the expelled Jews were allowed back to their former homes for the day to pack their things.
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THIRTY YEARS IN THIRTY MINUTES
by Anita Tucker

  This is a powerful essay expressing the emotions Anita Tucker has felt since being pointlessly expelled from her home and the farm she and family had created in Gush Katif, Gaza. They have left. The Arabs have it all. And the land has returned to the bleakness, rocks and sand it was when the Jews took back Gaza in 1968. The Jews made it flourish and contributed to Israel's economy. Under Arab control, it is unproductive — unless you count the weapons of destructions the Arabs have been putting together there and using against Israel.
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The next set of essays start with some important facts Israel has to accept if it is to come out of its mum-mum state of denying the obvious, and work out ways to regain its confidence and do what is necessary to retain viability in a hostile neighborhood. Because Israel has never been allowed a clean victory every time the Arabs started a war, Arab aggression was never followed by forced democratic education of the kind given Germany and Japan after WW2. Now the Arabs are again psych-ing themselves up for another go at destroying Israel, the pearl that sticks in their craw. Iran, acting as mouth, announces she will destroy Israel as soon as she has the means, even at the cost of a nuclear war in the Middle East. Egypt works against Israel in the periphery. Saudi Arabia funds the terrorists. America announces the most important matter is ensuring the po' Palestinians have their own state. The more Israel signals she is willing to sacrifice for peace, the more confident her would-be-destroyers become.

Clearly, Israel has to overcome the conditioning of years that taught — to put it more baldly than did their peace conditioning — that it was better to have her own children murdered than kill an Arab child. She must resolve to act in her own interest, even if this means suffering sustained international condemnation, without the occasional pat on the head when she makes another "concession."

Say "transfer out the Arabs" or "population transfer" and conditioning kicks in — the weapon of choice is the epithet: "racist", "ethnic cleansing", immoral." But this ignores what the Muslim Arabs are doing. While Israel tries different appeasement schemes — or maybe because Israel caters to them — Israeli Arabs have increasingly become radicalized and see themselves as Palestinian or as part of the larger Arab Muslim community, and not as Israelis. As far back as 2000, fewer than 15% of the Israeli Arabs said they'd support their country against the Palestinians. And they have often been implicated in helping the Arabs in the territories commit suicide-murder. More and more, they reject the notion that they are a minority group in a Jewish state. Eliminating Israel as a Jewish entity has become an attractive goal — and they aren't agonizing about how to resettle the Jews peacefully elsewhere. (They have successfully forced out most of the Christian Arabs from once-Christian cities such as Bethlehem without concern about their future.) All the Arab leaders including supposed moderates like Sari Nusseibeh (see here) have said straight out that Jews are not — and will not be — allowed to reside in Arab countries. (What a great way to avoid being accused of apartheid!) Besides keeping their countries clean of Jews, they want a form of ethnic dirtying — they are dead serious about moving any Arab who claims to be a refugee into Israel.

By now, the Jews have abandonned their onetime dream that they and the Arabs would together build a splendid culture in the Middle East. Most Israelis want to be separated from the Arabs. Here, too, conditioning kicks in. The demographic argument that the Arabs in the territories will swamp the country has been demolished. Yet many Israelis — as do people everywhere in the world — assume that separation must mean Israel gives up Biblical land that legally, morally, historically and by conquest belongs to it. This is a self-defeating notion that does not address the problem of the untrustworthy Arabs living in Israel. Clearly, Israel can not allow a large treasonous population inside Israel while fending off external invaders.

If there's any good that can come from the Gaza expulsion, it is that Sharon legitimitized expulsion when he 'disengaged' the Gazan Jews from their land. More and more Jews have come to see they should keep their land and transfer out the Arabs physically or politically. Making the Arabs who live in the territories citizens of Jordan has become a popular solution. Alternatively, they could be given "dowries" and moved out of Israel. The latter has the advantage that these Arabs will have a decent-sized state somewhere in the 99.9% of the Middle East that the Arabs control without the Jews committing suicide for it to happen. In fact, when you think about it, this could solve a major problem without the American administration losing face. Bush and his cohorts put high priority on the Palestinian Arabs having a state, but why does it have to be inside Israel?

JERUSALEM IS A JEWISH ISSUE
by Ted Belman

  One indication that Jerusalem is on the cutting board is P.M. Olmert's clearly expressed annoyance that diaspora Jews believe they have a stake in and a say about Jerusalem. Olmert claims Jerusalem is solely an Israeli issue. Ted Belman summarizes the arguments that acknowledge the legality of world Jewry's claim to Jerusalem. You can read more about Israel's right to all of Jerusalem and Biblical Israel (AKA West Bank) by reading Howard Grief's articles such as this one. For other essays on international law that states that biblical Israel is a trust in perpetuity for the Jewish people and can not be given away, read Part I of Yoram Shifftan's "A Legal Challenge." and his essay on Gifting. Use the Google box at the top of this page to search on Howard Grief, Yoram Shifftan, legal, mandate and population transfer.
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SMASHING THE DEMOGRAPHIC DEMON
by Emanuel Shilo

  The spectre of the Arabs overwhelming the Jewish state by producing more babies (this actually shows signs of happening in several European countries) has been the major argument for Israel's giving up Biblical Israel (known as the West Bank by the ignorati), land that is legally hers. The argument, as Emanuel Shilo puts it, is that Israel must "choose between a state with a solid Jewish majority without Judea and Samaria, and a bi-national state in the entire west-of-Jordan area." The data that supported the supposed overwhelming Arab growth has been discredited. (See this article by Bennett Zimmerman) and Google for Yoram Ettinger's articles. Shilo's essay goes beyond statistical proof. He points out ethical, moral and political questions — which warrant the extensive consideration now given primarily to the demographic factor
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THE TRIUMPH OF LEGAL DEFEATISM
by Caroline Glick

  The Israeli judiciary is crippling the Israeli Defense Force. It views asserting "dominance over Israel's political and military leadership" as what's important, not winning wars. As Caroline Glick writes, the IDF has begun to restrict their behavior "to conform with perceived legal restrictions" — to avoid criminal indictments. The left-leaning judiciary is defining the rules of the game. And that is very dangerous for the country.
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TIME TO END THE CHARADE
by Salim Mansur

  Salim Mansur notes that every American president since Nixon has liked the idea of an international conference to end the "conflict between Arabs and Jews."... "But the truth of the matter is that there is nothing to broker when one party, the Palestinians and their Arab-Muslim financiers and supporters, remains committed to the destruction of the other party, the Israelis." Mansur suggests, "It is time for Americans to politely tell the truth and end the charade of demanding Israeli concessions for Arab-Muslim doublespeak where 'peace' means, as Arafat explained to his people, temporary truce in the war for 'liberating' all of Palestine which includes Israel." Now why is it so hard for the politicians to see the obvious?
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THE CONSPIRACY TO DIVIDE JERUSALEM
by Michael Evans

  Michael Evans reviews the dismal history of previous peace plans, which led not to peace. He reminds us that in 2003 "[w]hen Abbas refused to implement the very first clause of the plan — to disarm the terrorist organizations — the plan died in utero." He suggests we stop these pointless exercises and try other ways to resolve the crisis, namely, dismantle the refugee camps and resettle the people in the Arab countries now housing them; and let the kingdom of Jordan serve as their representative body. This is similar to Benny Elon's plan which would give the Palestinian Arabs citizenship with voting rights in Jordan. To read about the Elon plan, click here.
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THE CASE FOR POPULATION EXCHANGE
by Lewis Lipkin

  This is a reprint of Lewis Lipkin's 2002 article. The introduction read: "Population exchange is not a new idea. Sometimes a complete separation is the only way that two groups unable to live together can get on with their lives. It might be time to complete the separation of the Jews and the Arabs. The Jews were evacuated from Arab countries when Israel was born. Maybe it's time to do the second half of the transfer: move the Palestinian Arabs to Arab countries."
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A WIN-WIN SOLUTION TO THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
by Rachel Neuwirth

  This is a reprint of Rachel Neuwirth's 2004 article. Scraping away false facts that serve as base for unworkable peace proposals to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, Rachel Neuwirth uses significant factual data on land availability to propose a resolution that would benefit the Palestinian Arabs as well as the Israelis; namely, transfer the Palestinian Arabs to their own place in a sparsely inhabited part of an Arab country such as Saudi Arabia.
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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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For Islamists, jihad is to be pursued where ever Islam doesn't prevail and is to be implemented by warfare, sabotage, suicide bombings, shootings, law suits, propaganda, baby production, destroying the social fiber of the community, bankrupting a community by its demands for welfare and special treatment, implicit threats, explicit threats, coopting the media, etc., etc., etc. They also have no compunction about asserting that words that mean very different things in Arabic and English are exact translations. These next essays speak to these global ambitions and various subterfuges.

KNOWING THE ENEMY
by Ariel Cohen

  In a calm and sober fashion, Ariel Cohen articulates some unpleasant home truths about the global war Islam is waging, facts that too many are reluctant to examine. It's not an easy war for us to fight — it's certainly not a clash of warriors, with both sides abiding by the same rules. It involves confrontation on multiple fronts, including managing how events are perceived, how and from whom the irregulars get their intelligence information and support infrastructure, and understanding how the political, historical and religious dynamics function as tools. We should be implementing innovative techniques, not denying reality.
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THESE BOOTS ARE GONNA WALK ALL OVER YOU
by Professor Anthony Coughlan

  Caligula wished that all the Rome had but one head, the easier to behead everyone. Despite the overwhelming hostility of ordinary Europeans for elitist-controlled unification, the European countries are on the way to becoming a United Europe, making it easier for radical Islam to take over.

Professor Coughlan explains what the Lisbon Treaty does: essentially it recreates the European Union (EU) "in the constitutional form of a supranational European State." It allows a small group of politicians "to act as a State vis-a-vis other States and its own citizens." The major thing that won't change is the name; it will still be called the EU. How comfy!
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THE PARISIAN INTIFADA AND "THE PROJECT"
by Patrick Poole

  Muslim rioting in Paris slowed down after the major rioting in 2005, but never really stopped and now it's heating up again — youngsters are again on the rampage, burning cars, throwing rocks and, even, fighting the police. Patrick Poole points out that the systematic violence by Muslim immigrants in major cities in Europe is "in accord with the strategic planning documents drafted by the Muslim Brotherhood in recent decades in their hopes to establish a global caliphate through jihad." One of these documents, The Project, calls for "the utilization of various tactics, ranging from immigration, infiltration, surveillance, propaganda, protest, deception, political legitimacy and terrorism." The Muslim footsoldiers continue to follow the blueprint successfully, and we ignore the threat.
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'RADICAL ISLAM' IS ISLAM
by Steven Zak

  Thanks to our being told so often that Islam is a peaceful religion, it is de rigueur to assume the majority of Muslims are peaceable and there's only a fringe group of nasties — the ones we call radicalized Muslims or Islamists or fanatics or freedom fighters. It says something about our mindset that we haven't been able to settle on a name when we've been in a war with Islam for now seven years ever since 911. Steven Zak's article straightforwardly states the obvious: "You can't fight an enemy you're afraid to offend."
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HUDNAH AND SULH DO NOT MEAN "PEACE"
by Moshe Sharon

  In this essay Moshe Sharon provides us with terms that are critically important in any "peace" negotiation with Muslims; more specifically, with the connotations and usage of hudnah, and sulh, terms that loosely — very loosely — mean "peace." He cautions us that "[t]he Arabs, as Moslems, and of course Arafat, build on the ignorance of the Israelis, on the one hand and on their dreams of peace on the other in order to sell them the poison of death in the wrapping of 'peaceful jihad', 'sulh peace' and 'hudnah ceasefire'. Sulh is not peace and hudnah is no unconditional armistice."
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ISLAM AND CNN'S SUPERSTAR CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR
by Lev Navrozov

  Lev Navrozov weaves together history, grammar and theology as he examines how academics — particularly Moslem professors of Islam – Moslem clerics, and non-Muslims who use their credentials to disseminate Islamic propaganda have made excellent use of the phrase "Islam is peace." He centers on Christine Amanpour, a superb practioner of the art of deception, and explains her methodology, using some of her more outlandish statements. He also provides a thorough explanation of the term salaam — which is Arabic for a kind of peace, but not the peace Westerns assume it to be. Published in 2002, the article is pertinent, except that the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran, who died in 1989, is no longer the Iranian with the most atrocious opinions that the media love to quote.
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Islam is expanding its hold on Western countries, taking over important pieces of our superstructure and remodeling them to suit themselves. Among the latest takeover startups is our banking system. Banking in conformance to sharia law allows no interest to be charged, so it isn't, but somehow, the banks manage — still in accordance with sharia law — to charge interest, often at higher than normal rates. The problem for the West is that the believers in Sharia law work towards ensuring it will eventually be the law of every land.

SHARIAH'S TROJAN HORSE
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  The fear that the Arabs are in process of buying us out, bank by bank, port by port, has increased markedly now that the Arabs are putting their money to work promoting what is called "Shariah finance" – banking that conforms to the strict limits of Islamic law. Frank Gaffney, Jr. points out that it might satisfy Islamic religious law, but it is unfortunately another "beachhead in the Islamofascists' patient, determined and ultimately seditious campaign to subvert and supplant Western free societies." Read also the referenced paper by Alex Alexiev entitled "Islamic Finance or Financing Islamism?".
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ISLAMIC BANKING IN BRITAIN
by Helena Christofi

  Helena Christofi describes for us how "Islamist clerics with terrorist connections and a mission to Islamize Europe are infiltrating the United Kingdom through its banking system" and she explains how Shari'a banking works operationally. Britain may well become the center of global banking, but will it be British?
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GLOBAL BANKS ADOPTING ISLAM
by Patrick M. Wood

  Shari'a law is a package deal — wife beating, banking, charity, beheading — you don't pick and choose. Western bankers have become active seekers out of moneyed Muslims, and they are not at all fazed at having to conform to shari'a banking and loan practices. The down side is, as Patrick Wood points out, that "global banks are doing for Islam what it could never do on its own: give legitimacy to Shari'a and infiltrate it into the fabric of Western society." All of it.
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The UN has become notorious in its single-minded hostility to a single country — Israel. As single-minded as Nazi Germany, which was willing to sacrifice resources she needed to fight the war to exterminate the Jews. Similarly, Kristallnacht in 1935 was a watershed event — the Nazis had softened Germany and were now ready for strong-arm physical repression of the Jews. Similarly, at Durbin in 2001, the Islam-supporting NGOs that live in symbiosis with the U.N. were well-trained to attack the Jews by turning a Conference against Racism into what was an unanticipated, direct, vicious and well-organized hatefest against Jews. Now there's another Durbin Conference coming up.

UN PLANS ANOTHER DURBAN RACISM CONFERENCE FOR 2009
by Rebecca Tobin

  There's another UN-sponsered Durbin Conference scheduled for 2009. As Rebecca Tobin points out, if anything it should top the first in targetted hate toward Jews and the Jewish state. Surprise. Surprise. Of course, the designers of Durbin 1 are ready to move on to the next stage: to make defamation of Islam a no-no. And the Muslims will decide what activities are defamatory.
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RIGHTING RIGHTS WRONGS
by Gerald Steinberg

  It is a macabre fact that the countries that have the least respect for life and human rights are in control of Human Rights at the UN. They are reinforced by Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that wear the prestigious mantle of the UN and dress themselves in noble humanitarian motives, but in practice they are rabidly anti-Semitic with a hate-Jews agenda. Gerald Steinberg tells us about some of the recent shenanigans that we are graciously permitted to fund.
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THE UN LAUNCHES DURBAN II
by Anne Bayefsky

  Anne Bayefsky examines the deeper significance of Durban 1's labeling Zionism as racism" and demonizing Israel. She points out that "[t]he forces behind Durban I ... understood the UN to be the ideal vehicle to defeat America and Israel on a different, but no less crucial, kind of battlefield." As usual, the European Union (EU) lost control to the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which has announced that, like Alice in Wonderland, human rights issues will be whatever the OIC says they are. With a parliamentary veneer and a hate-driven agenda, Durban 2 promises to outdo Durban 1. As usual, the Western countries will have some input — they will be the ones contributing the funding for this obscene show. How long will we stand for this?
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Here are some more examples of the Islamist grip on the media, the universities and Jewish groups that act for the Arabs. Sad to say, the far left Marxist Israelis are among the ablest of the aiders and abetters of Islamism. Of course, their motives are pure: to protect free speech and free activities, providing this speech and these activities aren't anti-Arab.

REWRITING HISTORY
by Noah Pollak

  In this essay, Noah Pollak demonstrates how insidious anti-Israel propaganda can be — especially when it is targetted at people with little knowledge about the Arab-Israeli conflict. He dissects the comments of Daniel Levy and demonstrates how they are both truth-sounding and very wrong, because they leave out much conditioning information. As Richard Shulman has pointed out (December 2007 Blog-Eds, 27dec07), "Levy bolsters his case with digression and irrelevant points, facts out of sequence, and fabricated facts."
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A REACTION TO THE REMOVAL OF A MEZUZAH IN HEBRON
by David Wilder

  An example of propaganda by omission: a news item in an Israeli newspaper sounds like the Rabbinate was imposing its will upon the IDF and exacerbating a tense situation. David Wilder supplies context for the incident. It reminds me of a trip where as usual, single women were doubled up as room mates. I came across some of the group sitting in the lobby, indignant because Alpha had been unreasonable and had forbidden Beta to open the window when Beta just wanted to do her morning (vigorous) exercises. Finally, I asked, "Did Beta tell you she was opening the window at 4 in the morning? Did Beta tell you Alpha was getting very little sleep for days before she complained?" The ladies got up and left the lobby. Without a word.
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IDEOLOGY OVER INTEGRITY IN ACADEME
by James R. Russell

  Columbia University is an egregious example of what happens to a university where far left academics — who had looked for an ideology when communism petered out — are sheltered by an administration benefitting from Arab money. The result, as Russell ably illustrates has been a loss of scholarly integrity. Russell suggests some ways to deal with the problem — including the suggestion that students planning to major in Middle Eastern (ME) studies take their brainpower to ME departments that haven't acquired a reputation "for Jew-baiting; apologia for terrorism, and unscholarly  chicanery..." And donations now going to Columbia could be diverted to build up strong ME departments in uncorrupted universities.
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THESE RECORDS ARE FROM ANCIENT TIMES
by Patricia Berlyn

  It would seem impossible that anyone would assert that there was never a thriving Jewish nation in Israel in ancient times. But as James Russell pointed out in the previous essay, Columbia's recently tenured Nadia Abu El-Haj makes exactly this claim, dismissing archeological evidence as unconvincing. Those who propagandize that it's the Arabs that are the natives of what they call Palestine have the same bottom line as a school of biblical "scholars" who deny any history in the Bible that isn't supported by archeological evidence. Patricia Berlyn's essay examines biblical and non-biblical sources that make it obvious that ancient Israel was and is the Jewish homeland and the physical center of Judaism was the Temple in Jerusalem. The Arabs have been feverishly destroying Jewish artefacts on the Temple Mount and the Tomb of Joseph. Will they now start destroying their ancient books and non-Jewish ancient artefacts?
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This Issue's history section centers around the second illegal splitting of the land set aside to become a Jewish State by international law inbedded in the U.N. charter. The Arab countries found even an emasculated Jewish state intolerable and immediately invaded Israel in 1947. Israel fought them to a standstill. And survived.

As David Meir-Levi's article points out, it is ironic that the Arabs argued against creating a Jewish state because, they said, the region was really a part of southern Syria. They pointed out that no such people as "Palestinians" had ever existed, so it would be an injustice to Syria to create a state ex nihilo at the expense of Syrian sovereign territory. (This, of course, was before the Palestinian "people" was invented.) They ignored that the same League of Nations that enabled the Colonial Powers to create the State of Syria gave them the duty to set aside Mandated Palestine for the Jews. Syria had not been an independent state but was part of the Ottoman Empire. And, if — as the Arabs now assert — the U.N. as inheritor of the League of Nations didn't have the authority to proclaim that Israel was the only legal owner of Mandated Palestine, then why are the other states the League created –– all of them Arab –– legal?

AN UNASSUMING PATRIARCH
by Steve Kramer

  Steve Kramer wrote of this essay, "Here's a biography of a wonderful Israeli." And it is. Yassi Margalit had fought in WW2, helped liberate a concentration camp and landed in Israel as the Arabs invaded the newly-declared State of Israel in 1948. How remarkable "ordinary" people can be! If only we had leaders of their caliber.
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IS NOVEMBER 29 A DAY TO CELEBRATE?
by Caroline Glick

  This is a wonderful amalgam of history and analysis. Caroline Glick makes clear why it was self-defeating for Israel to continue to base her existence — e.g., the Annapolis malignancy — on the General Assembly resolution of 1948. This is a great corrective to the 'everybody knows' belief that the 1948 Resolution was a great victory for the Jews that a magnanimous Britain inflicted on the poor suffering 'Palestinians'. Read this in conjunction with Ted Belman's article above, which details the actual international law underpinning Israel's ownership of "Palestine".
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THE COMMUNIST ROOTS OF PALESTINIAN TERRORISM
by David Meir-Levi

  This is a chapter from David Meir-Levi's new book History Upside Down: The Roots of Palestinian Fascism and the Myth of Israeli Aggression. It makes the point that Islamofascism is a political force, not just a religious force. It is the offspring of totalitarian ideologies of the past. "The PLO was conceived at a time when the KGB was creating 'liberation front' organizations throughout the Third world." This chapter discusses how the Soviets "not only armed and trained Palestinian terrorists but also used them to arm and train other professional terrorists by the thousands." They tutored and suppported Arafat, as he consolidated his control of the PLO. "His adjutants, including Mahmoud Abbas, were being trained by the KGB in guerrilla warfare, espionage, and demolition." The Soviet creation – Palestinian nationalism — "would be the only national movement for political self-determination in the entire world, and across all of world history, to have the destruction of a sovereign state and the genocide of a people as its only raison d'être."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

November 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
December 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


September-October, 2007


EDITORIAL: THE ANNAPOLIS SUMMIT

My father's favorite joke was about futility, how some things could never be because they were based on a wrong premise. The country hick came into the big city and went to the movies. He sat through showing after showing until finally the manager asked him why. "You know that scene?" he answered, "The one where the girls start to get undressed? But just then the train comes by. And by the time it leaves, the girls are in the water. Well, by cracky, I figure that one of these times, the train will be late."

By cracky, that's just how the diplomats treat the "peace process." Someday, they solemnly assert, peace diplomacy will work. Arabs and Jews won't fight. And automatically, peace will descend upon the entire world, because after all, aren't all our problems rooted in the Arab-Israeli hostilities?

Has "Land for Peace" worked? Ever? The Israelis surrender what could become a normal government, were the Arabs to develop an infrastructure. The Arabs use the territory to stockpile weaponry and make better missiles and explosives.

The Peace Diplomacy has, of course, nothing to do with peace because that isn't what the Arabs want. It has nothing to do with making the Arabs masters in their own land, because land for expanded terrorist factories and explosives storehouses is only a part of what they want. The first thing they want — and they haven't been at all shy telling us so — is the end of the Jewish State. But that's just the beginning. They've learned a lot about how to fight undercover and underhanded by trying out new terror techniques in Israel. Israel has never really been allowed to squash them and like a partially-damaged bacteria, they have gone from strength to strength. Now they are champing at the bit, desirous to try their skills on more of the Western World.

MAJOR ISSUES FOR ISRAEL.    For Israel, the major issues are that a Palestinian State will a) remove Biblical Israel from Israel; b) remove that part of Jerusalem that houses some of Israel's holiest religious sites from Israel; c) remove the source of much of Israel's water from Israel; and, oh yes, position a Terror State smack up against Israel: the West Bank together with Gaza will flank Israel. It will also force the inhabitants of Samaria and Judea and a portion of Jerusalem (the West Bank) to vacate their homes and businesses. That means anywhere from a quarter of a million to a half million people will becomes homeless refugees, dependent on an incompetent government that has still not properly absorbed the Jews from Gush Katif, Gaza, who became refugees in 2005, back into the economy.

If the November Annapolis conference comes about, it will do what all Arab-Jewish Peace Conferences have done. The Arabs will agree reluctantly and minimally to some conditions that they will not keep; and no one will really pressure them to keep. Heck, they haven't even disavowed that they are determined to end the Jewish State — an ambition they were supposed have rejected in Clinton's time. The Jews will, however, agree to give up real land, specifically, their Biblical inheritance, eastern Jerusalem and much of the Biblical land of Samaria and Judea, — what the pro-Arab press cleverly calls the West Bank. And all the "neutral" peace brokers will be there to make sure the Israelis keep every concession they promised.

Will this satisfy the Arabs? If they follow their usual form, of course not. Remember how shocked Dennis Ross was when he offered Arafat more than he asked for, and assumed the Camp David negotiations were now concluded. Arafat came back the next day with the "final" settlement as a starting point and demanded more. The Arabs will take what they can get in land but the next day, the next week, the next year, they will demand that the Arab professional "refugees," well-supported for these 60 years by the U.N., be allowed back to their "homes" in Israel — never mind that a large part of this group of refugees was recruited from the local Arab population near the refugee camps. If Israel agrees, it is dead. If Israel doesn't agree, it will be hounded and accused of destroying the peace treaty. And the forthcoming kiss-and-make-up between Hamas and Fatah — already in the works — will be blamed on Israel's intransigence.

WHY NOW?   Why is this happening now? The Arabs who run the show have patience and perseverance and fanatical resoluteness for decades. (See Sharon, "A Short Guide To Those Obsessed With Peace" here. ) Every so often, they insist that if America doesn't push harder for peace (read: twist Israel's arm), the final opportunity for democracy in the area will have been missed. But that's also fairly routine.

The Israeli secularists who control its news media and much of its economy fear the growing religious Jewish population much more than they worry about the Arabs. The small group of politicos in control — some Marxist ideologues, some paid directly from Europe and indirectly by the Arabs, some just going along, mouthing ideas promoted by their mentors — say that all they what they want for Ramadan is a spanking new Arab state, as if the 20-odd Arab states aren't enough. Moreover, they are dedicated to placing this alien state on land that by international law is held in trust for the Jewish people. If this means cutting Israel in half, to make sure that Arabs have a unified State, so be it. If this means that Israel will no longer control its own water supply, well, surely the nice Hadassah ladies from Brooklyn will send bottled water, and maybe even some diet sodas. The secularists do have some cause for concern. The Orthodox are already an important part of the army and the economy, though not yet in the top echelon and they are having more babies than the secularists. Give them another five years and they may be able to seize power from those now running the show. So now's a good time to demoralize the religious.

But it's the Bush administration that's really under pressure; they need a foreign policy win. So they are doing what American presidents since Johnson have done. They push on an obliging Israeli administration to give them a foreign policy victory that they can use to try to bedazzle the public and make it ignore the shambles they've made in some other part of the world. This has been going on ever since we fought a restrained war in Vietnam through Carter's losing Iran to the mullahs to the ongoing drain of the current war in Iraq. Would Bush cripple Israel so America can leave Iraq "victorious"? Well, except for the blitzkreig the first few weeks of the war, we've emphasized good-will P.R. We've put our own grandkids in hock because we are too noble to make the Iraqis pay for their freedom and we've yapped about democracy and other concepts foreign to the Muslim religion. But I don't see us fighting the enemy all out, not while our leader Bush shills for them, proclaiming Islam a kind and gentle religion, and ignoring that the motive power for terrorism comes from the dictates of this gentle religion. And if Iran takes over Iraq after the next American election, well, at least the politicians have had time to figure out the next propaganda ploy. Maybe that's why the Bush administration is willing to take the chance that its only real friend in the Middle East will be destroyed by those who have vowed to establish a New Caliphate, with America as one of its conquered vassals.

To read the entire editorial and find out how you can personally help   click here.
 

Larry, Curley and Moe — The Three Stooges

This issue of Think-Israel concentrates on the upcoming November "conference" in Annapolis. It's a David and Goliath battle, with a weak and eager-to-sellout-Israel Olmert miscast as David and the European Union, the Arab League and its individual members, and the American administration as Goliath. The next essays tell us about the major players.

THE MAJOR ACTORS AT THE UPCOMING ANNAPOLIS CONFERENCE
by David Bedein, with additional material compiled by Think-Israel Staff

  This article talks about the major actors in the Annapolis Conference, Mahmoud Abbas, Ehud Olmert and Condoleezza Rice. Abu Mazen, in his Mahmoud Abbas persona, has already announced his strategy — it doesn't look any different than Arafat's. He has a list of non-negotiable demands: he will graciously accept a Palestinian State, whose capitol is Jerusalem, lots of money, the return of the Arabs refugees, lots of money, The Temple Mount, lots of money and less openly, he has started to reconcile with Hamas. And that's just the beginning. Ehud Olmert is just as weak as Abbas and just as unpopular. He complements Abbas in that Abbas is perfectly willing to take land that the Palestinians know they don't own and Olmert is perfectly willing to give away land he knows the Jews do own. This essay is, in part, a companion piece to Fishman's essay on Secretary Rice's appalling view of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Unhappily, Rice's view — which has no basis in the reality of the Arab war on Israel — appears based on a nonsensical analogy in which the Arabs are her childhood black heroes and Israel is what? the KKK? This is hard to believe, but the report of Rice's attitude is straight from the mare's mouth.
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THE PERSONAL BECOMES POLITICAL:
THE ATTITUDINAL PRISM OF CONDOLEEZZA RICE
by Joel Fishman

  The forthcoming Annapolis Conference will try to revive "peace" by pretending the Arabs in charge want something as much as Israel's destruction. Abandonning the pretence that America is an "honest broker" and ensuring that Israel will be odd-man out and on the defensive, Condoleeza Rice has already foregone any pretense at objectivity. As View From The Right writes: "Condoleeza Rice looks at the Holocaust-denying, Arafat-following Mahmoud Abbas and sees Martin Luther King." (http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/009093.html) When this article appeared on the Conservative Voice website (www.theconservativevoice.com/), The Iconoclast at New English Review, characterized it beautifully, "Joel Fishman explores the fatuous self-absorption of our Secretary of State."
(http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_display.cfm/blog_id/10958)
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WHAT DO BUSH AND RICE EXPECT TO GAIN OUT OF DISMEMBERING ISRAEL?
by Emanuel A. Winston

  In the short term President Bush needs help in getting out of Iraq, and is gambling "Israel's existence on the off chance" he'll get this help from Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia. For his "legacy" he and his Secretary of State Rice need a positive foreign policy achievement – and who else can they "persuade" in the Middle East but the cooperative Israelis? As usual, the Arabs will take the concessions they rejected in the previous peace bout as the starting point for new concessions. The Road Map didn't work? Well, just ignore that the Arabs were supposed to stop being terrorists and were supposed to state clearly that Israel was a Jewish State; just remember that the Palies were promised their own state. Similarly, we can now expect that pro-Arab propaganda will makes it appear that Israel is committed to the Taba concessions, which, of course, the Arabs rejected at the time.
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BUSH AND RICE: PALESTINIAN PEACE PLAN
by Jeff Emanuel

  Jeff Emanuel explores the "legacy" motive for convening yet another peace conference, i.e., President Bush and his loyal gofer Rice are hoping a Palestinian-Israeli peace will finally give them a foreign policy success — their first. Discussing the concessions the Israelis are expected to make, he points out that "every one of these proposed concessions is problematic for reasons of security and sovereignty." And he notes that Rice's blunder — pretending the "Palestinian people hold the same values that Americans do, and desire peaceful, prosperous lives just as much." — doesn't instill confidence in her depth of understanding, any more than does her asking advice from previous presidents — Carter, who has become an (un)paid propagandist for the Arabs and Clinton, who failed at brokering a previous "peace" attempt.
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A BANANA REPUBLIC IN THE MAKING
by Isi Leibler

  How is it possible that P.M. Olmert who has support only from the handful of politicos who see their perks as primary can believe he can the authority to give away the country? It's because Israel has no local representation. In most democracies, the voter can threaten or appeal to his county, state or national representatives. In Israel, the voter votes for the party, not specific individuals — those who make up the party slate owe it all to the party. Olmert can act as he does because these politicos back him up and members of the opposing parties do nothing.
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The next essays explain why Israel should treat Peace Conferences like the plague.

NOVEMBER HARVEST
by Elyakim Haetzni

  Over the years, we have presented many of Elyakim Haetzni's clear-eyed analyses of Israel's wrong-headed policy — it gives primacy to the secularists, who would drain Israel of its distinctiveness, caters to the Arabs and humiliates its large and strongly patriotic religious component. Unfortuntely. his predictions of the consequences of Israel's allowing its inheritance to be nibbled away in the vain pursuit of a content-free "peace" have been ignored but the consequences have been just as dire as he has predicted. In this essay, he writes of Israel's continued suicidal plunge as it creates indefensible borders and what we can expect in November, when that hoary heart-lung specimen — the renewed Oslo Peace Accords — will be activated just long enough to bless the advent of the new terror state of Palestine. See also his brilliant analysis of why Israel must not surrender its nation-making territories here.
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ABU ALAA AND THE TIGHTENING OF THE SCREWS...
by Gerald A. Honigman

  Gerald Honigman tells an amusing story but it is serious history and directly applicable to what will happen to Israel in Annapolis. Unlike the Arabian Night tales, this essay, unfortunately, isn't fantasy.
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LET'S MAKE A DEAL
by Barry Rubin

  In Think-Israel's previous issue, Moshe Sharon made clear why bargaining with Arabs was a stupid idea — except maybe for another Arab. (And when things go badly, even they resort to violence.) In this essay Barry Rubin expands our understanding why the West will always get screwed dealing with the Arabs, even, when by all objective criteria, they seem to be the losers. The Arabs usually end up blowing the deal, but we can't keep counting on that. A very instructive article. My only quibble is that Rubin didn't elaborate on an important matter: even if no one wins, Israel loses big. With each peace squeeze, Israel is weakened and is less able to defend herself.
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SELLING OUT ISRAEL ON THE INSTALLMENT PLAN
by Cal Thomas

  Cal Thomas doesn't hesitate to call what America is doing in Annapolis a sell-out. As he points out, "the real intentions of Israel's enemies can be summed up in the 'phased plan' for the destruction of Israel expressed in 2000 by Palestinian Minister of Supply, Abd El Aziz Shahian: 'The Palestinian people accepted the Oslo agreements as a first step and not as a permanent arrangement, based on the premise that the war and struggle on the ground is more efficient than a struggle from a distant land ... for the Palestinian people will continue the revolution until they achieve the goals of the '65 revolution.'" The '65 revolution? That's when the pseudopeople, the Palestinians, was formed and simultaneously the PLO vowed to destroy Israel — a vow never disavowed by the PLO, by its incarnation as the Palestinian Authority or by its President, Mahmoud Abbas.
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Little has been said in print about what Israel will lose in the creation of a Palestinian state, carved out of territory that legitimately — by international law — belongs to Israel. The first essay in this segment lists some of Israel's possible losses. Perhaps because the issue hasn't been openly argued by the Israeli Government – it is too busy worrying that Israel will be blamed if the Summit fails when it should be worrying that the Summit might succeed – several major consequences have received little attention. For example, we are told many Arabs are said to be willing to allow two states in Palestine. But this does not mean one state exclusively for Jews, one for Arabs. The Arab demand that their state be off-limits to Jews but that millions of Arabs "refugees" be allowed into Israel. This is reasonable — if you want to destroy Israel. Secondly, what is to become of the Jews living in Samaria, Judea and eastern Jerusalem? By committing to a Palestinian State — which will be emptied of Jews like the other Arab states — the Olmert government is apparently prepared to toss from 200,000 to 500,000 Jews out of their homes and businesses. The Olmert government has yet to settle the 10,000 Jews expelled from Gaza in 2005. Have they even thought about what to do with about an enormous influx of new Jewish refugees?

The second major issue, partitioning Jerusalem, is an emotional button-pusher, so much so that analysts like Emanuel Winston believe it is intended as a distraction while Israel gives away Samaria and Judea. On the other hand, the Arabs may have come to believe their own propaganda that Jerusalem is significant to Islam. The other essays discuss Jerusalem.

BLIND TO THE DANGER
by Martin Sherman

  Is Israel so inpoverished it needs to reuse discredited politicos to take this latest mockery of a Peace Negotiation on the road? There's Olmert, Sharon's second in command, who seems to want to prove that even in a democracy a handful of people can give away a country against the will of its people. He acts as if maybe this time he can turn a lemon into a matzo ball. And Dov Weisglass is still around, still out of jail. Weisglass was Sharon's mouthpiece for how beneficial it would be for Israel to evacuate Gaza, leaving it to Abbas and his merry band of terrorists. Expelling the Jewish citizens of Gush Katif, Gaza was an unmitigated disaster, but Weisglass has retained his unrelenting, empty optimism. In this essay, Martin Sherman tells us what's wrong with Weisglass' happy vision of the November conference.
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JERUSALEM IN PERIL
by Michael Anbar

  In a spirit of peace and goodwill, what's wrong with declaring east Jerusalem the capital of the Palestinian Arabs? What's wrong with creating an "internation border ntertwine[d] within the residential neighborhood of Jerusalem, Israel's national capital"? What's wrong with sharing Jerusalem? After all, many Jewish secularists don't see Jerusalem as symbol, as Jewish history, as a living link with Torah. They regard it as just so much real estate, and are more than willing to trade it to feed their belief that peace with the Arabs is possible. In clear terms Michael Anbar tells us what's wrong: everything.
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JERUSALEM — ON THE BRINK OF PARTITION?
by Judy Lash Balint

  Arabs have continued to squat in Jewish houses in eastern Jerusalem – taken by Jordon in 1948 and not under Jewish control until 1967. With money from Saudi Arabia and Jordan, they build legally and illegally, attempting to enlarge and merge the Arab areas. Jews attempting to reclaim their property have much less financial resources and are bucking a government that generally ignores Arab violations and a press that simplistically thinks eastern Jerusalem has been Arab since time immemorial, ignoring, of course, that the major historic sites are Jewish. Judy Balint provides us with details of what Olmert is preparing to squander for another "peace process".
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JERUSALEM
by Eli E. Hertz

  Eli E. Hertz demolishes the propaganda piously sprouted by those who want to break the indivisible connection of Jews and Jerusalem. How does he do this? By stating the facts of history, contrasting the age-old and ageless connection of Jews to Jerusalem to the meager and politically-motivated connection of Muslims to Jerusalem. This essay is both readable and worth reading.
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HOW JERUSALEM BECAME SACRED TO THE MUSLIMS
by Mordechai Keidar

  It is not surprising that a bunch of Arabs that declared themselves a people some 40 years ago now make exclusive claim to a city that was Jewish thousands of years before Mohammad. What is surprising is how many people take their claim seriously. Mordechai Keidar recounts how Jerusalem became sacred to the Muslims — several times over, with long intervals of indifference when Jerusalem was politically unimportant.
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Suppose a miracle happened and Fatah agreed to recognize the Jewish State of Israel (and don't that make you feel gooood that a sovereign nation thinks she needs a bunch of terrorists to OK her existence). Even so, peace would not break out. George Bush may be fighting Al-Qaeda and terrorism, but the reality is that there's a loose conglomeration of terrorist groups, many of which splinter from one well-known gang and eventually coalesce with another. As Liat Collins writes (Jerusalem Post, October 6, 2007): "...perhaps we should wait and see if the Palestinians are able to agree to live in peace with each other before we make what Olmert has already said will be 'painful concessions.' After all, the Saudi-brokered Mecca Accord between Hamas and Fatah in February has failed miserably." And each gang that comes to power has no problem repudiating previous agreements.

These next essays discuss the rise of yet another bunch of "extremists", Hizb Ut-Tahrir, which is gaining membership rapidly in some 40 countries, including the West Bank. Its mission is to restore the Caliphate. It advocates killing Jews and any infidel that stands in its way but to date it hasn't taken credit for any terror acts. As Spyer points out, if Hamas falls, Palestinians won't necessarily become secular.

THE RISE AND RISE OF HIZB UT-TAHRIR
by Jonathan Spyer

  Jonathan Spyer writes of how he heard of a new political group called Hizb ut Tahrir (the Party of Liberation). Intent on reestablishing the Caliphate worldwide, in Israel they are chiefly concentrated around the Jewish Holy cities of Jerusalem and Hebron. As Spyer points out, their emergence puts the lie to "... the optimistic scenario recently raised in some quarters, according to which once Islamist movements such as Hamas are tested in office and fail, previous, predominantly secular patterns of politics will re-emerge."
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THE BAD GUYS YOU DON'T KNOW: MEET HIZB UT-TAHRIR
by Olivier Guitta

  Olivier Guitta writes of the Sunni Islamists group that calls itself Hizb ut-Tahrir and is actively recruiting members to help reestablish the caliphate — this time, world wide. As Guitta writes, "Even without an explicit summons to terrorism, the relentless violence of the images is incendiary, and suggestive messages such as 'Oh armies of the Muslims, we wait for your help' abound." Using modern techniques of communication, their uncompromising goal is to take us all back to medieval times, or maybe even further back.
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Another reason we can't expect a peaceful resolution at Annapolis or at later conferences in the foreseeable future is that Arabs simply hate us too much. There is no agreement among the scholars as to why the Arabs are consumed with Jew Hate. One point of view attributes it to the Jewish aliyah in modern times, when the Jews came into Palestine in large numbers and made a dormant area live again. This implies the Jews brought it upon themselves by succeeding and/or arousing the sleeping dogs. Others argue that Jew Hate is bred in Muslims from birth and reinforced whenever they read the Koran. A third viewpoint sees Arab hostility in modern times as inspired by Nazi Germany, or, more accurately, that it is a mutual creation between Hitler and the Arab Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al-Husseini. (Key Husseini and Hitler in the Google Box at the top of this page.) Or maybe, as Mason and Felder argue, we get no respect because we let people disrespect us.

THE FIRST AND LAST ENEMY
by Andrew G. Bostom

  In this well-documented analysis, Andrew Bostom argues the Muslims didn't catch Jew Hatred from some virus transmitted by Europeans, especially the Nazis, in modern times. They've been anti-Jew throughout their history. Religious bigotry has been inculcated in Muslim education from childhood on ever since Mohammad's time and it owes much to the Jew hatred expressed in the Koran. The Muslim opportunistic rationalizations for their attitude and behavior and expressed grievances — they blame the Jews, not themselves — of course vary with circumstances and with the political objective. But the core belief is constant: the Jew is malevolent and when not to be killed must be content to be dhimmi under Islam.
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JEW-HATRED AND JIHAD
by Matthias Küntzel

  Matthias Küntzel argues that Arab hostility towards the Jews and even their ideation and imagery derive primarily from their contact with the Nazis. Hitler's desire to kill all Jews everywhere and Mohamed Atta's belief that Jews are striving to dominate the world are linked by Nazi convictions transmitted over time by organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood. Küntzel argues that "this [Islamist] blindness to the international impact of the Holocaust, continue to affect the course of the Arab-Jewish conflict today." in that "Hitler's Islamic heirs" need to resort to conspiracy theory rather than acknowledge the horror of the Holocaust. Küntzel also discusses the ignorant Western belief — as embodied in the 9/11 Commission Report — that Arab Jew-hatred and Arab terrorism "arose in response to recent American and Western policies" with the implication that America could stop Arab terrorism by becoming strongly pro-Arab.
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THE INCURABLE DISEASE
by Jackie Mason and Raoul Felder

  Jackie Mason and Raoul Felder ask, "[w]hy is anti-Semitism so popular and pleasurable as a persistent behavior pattern all over the world?" Their answer is simple and elegant: The Jews let it happen. "Unlike the Jews of England, who spend all their time pleading just to be accepted in this country, the Muslims spend much of the time making demands and warning the people that they better be careful to respect them, be concerned how loud they talk to them, and not to criticize them." I think Mason and Felder are on to something.
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And finally, no matter what the outcome at Annapolis or subsequent meetings, the media will make the Arabs look good and the Jews look bad. However magnanimous the concessions (read: stupid and against her own best interests) Israel makes, they will be deemed trivial and inadequate. Anything the Arabs do that they shouldn't do or don't do that they should do will be blamed on Israel. The majority of the main stream media in the West, all the Arab media and much of Israel's media — which is well left-of-center — purport to believe Israel is occupying Palestinian land and sympathizes with the "po Palestinian", no matter how atrocious his behavior. In America, the Arabs has a firm grip on multiple communication outlets and are strongly vocal at the universities, once considered a safe haven for Jews. They have even figured out how to minimize the fact that Arab women are treated as chattel.

THE TWO FACES OF AL QAEDA
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim reports on this century's split-brain phenomena: Arab propagandists in general talk about peace and their putative grievances to the West but in Arabic they remind the Arabs of the Koranic injunction to fight the infidel and urge them to war against the West. Seldom are the two connected. Ibrahim's specific example is the material issued by Al Qaeda. Read this article carefully — it will immunize you against the claims that Islam is the religion of peace and tolerance.
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HA'ARETZ, THE LIE OF THE LAND
by Andrea Levin

  Andrea Levin points out the consequences when a news source misinforms by omission, "factual sloppiness and twisted interpretation." She writes, "The ultimate political effects of prestigious Israeli media disseminating continuous and often inflammatory anti-Israel misinformation in English in the era of the Internet should not be underestimated." The English-language Israeli newspaper Haaretz is a notorious case in point. It has, with justification, been called the Voice of the Palestinians.
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THE HAMAS PR MACHINE IN AMERICA
by Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen

  The Hamas PR machine in America is well-oiled by Arab oil money and managed with American efficiency. Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen convincingly make the case that "U.S. companies continue to knowingly or unwittingly facilitate Hamas Internet and television services. Moreover, professors, media outlets, and even a former U.S. president, help Hamas broadcast its messages throughout America, even as Washington attempts to weaken the terror group following the violent takeover of Gaza." What is most frightening is that the Hamas PR machine cleverly "exploits the American democratic system to spread hatred and incitement through America's communications infrastructure, thereby assisting Hamas fundraising and recruitment activities."
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MUSLIM WOMEN
by Phyllis Chesler

  This article by Phyllis Chesler connects two ideas: the subjugation of women in the Muslim world, and how by using obfuscation and harassment a coalition of Islamists and leftists on the American campus are counteracting the notion that women are an underclass. It starts with an instantiation of campus activity and follows it with what the Muslims want suppressed. Curiously, Western feminist groups do not speak out against the curtailment of Muslim women's rights. The final essay — a plausible psychoanalytic explanation of the Muslim male attitude toward women — may also explain why much of Muslim PR is targetted at convincing the unwary that the Christian Jesus is the Muslim Jesus, whose mother is revered in Islam.
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How is Israel to confront this push to annihilate her? Her choices seem stark and unambiguous:.

1.) commit suicide or have Olmert, Abbas and Rice midwife Israel's demise.. (See above)

2.) keep fiddling while the terrorists build up their weaponry and hone their skills. (see Mandel below)

3.) fight a serious war against the terrorists and their infrastructure. Given previous experience of meaningless peace accords, followed by new terrorist violence, war is likely to occur sooner or later. Sooner, if the ramping up to war is rapid; later, but with more casualties, if the Jews wait until the Arabs feel ready. (see Celser, Yaalon and Glick below)

4.) Annex Samaria and Judea and transfer out the Palestinian Arabs politically and/or physically. This policy takes a new direction. It differs dramatically from the various peace proposals foisted on Israel over the years that have been of no benefit to her or to those Arabs not fixated on promoting Israel's death.. Transfer has several advantages. It actually has a chance of succeeding, particularly if, as in Sherman's proposal, the Palestinian Arabs have a dowry to start fresh among their own people. It is realistic, whereas any plan to plonk another State inside tiny Israel is not. It doesn't deprive the "Palestinians" of their land, because it never has been their land. And, it can be looked at as the completion of the process of separating Jews and Arabs. In the first stage, in the 1940s-1950s the Jews were forced out of Arab countries. This completes the process. (See Elon, Sherman, Lipkin, Lacey and Grief below)

PREEMPTIVE APPEASEMENT: EUROPE'S NEW STRATEGY FOR THE WAR ON TERROR
by Daniel Mandel

  Daniel Mandel writes about how Europe is handling the war started by the Islamists — by self-censorship. It is "sensitive" to a vocal and labile Muslim minority with connections that can cause global riots to be staged in a newsman's minute. Before we congratulate ourselves that it can't happen here, may I remind you The New York Times, often nasty to Jews and Christians, is most humbly respectful of Muslim sensitivities. They'll write of the beauties of hate-Christianity art but they didn't publish the Danish cartoon because, virtuously, they didn't want to hurt Muslim feelings. Yeah, right.
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FRIEDEN MACHT FREI — PEACE MAKES YOU FREE
by Boris Celser

  It's curious isn't it that Israel's leaders — politicians all — talk peace but probably know they will gain nothing but violence and death if they give away Biblical Israel. In this closet drama by Boris Celser, the characters are military men, but they are clearly more insightful than the current batch of Israeli politicians about how political leaders must act to protect their people and maintain a viable state. To underline the play's satiric "Peace will make you free", a leader's role most certainly should not be to lead his people into oblivion by preaching the virtues of a phony peace.
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ISLAMISTS CAN BE DEFEATED
by Moshe Ya'alon

  Moshe Ya'alon has been critical about many of the decisions the Sharon-Olmert Government has made, including the retreat from Gaza. That disagreement cost him his job in the army. He has remained an outspoken critic of the wrong-headed governmental policy of abandoning land, in the hopes it would bring stability. All it did in Gaza was to encourage more violence against Israel. In this essay, he argues that "...if the countries of the free world have enough resolve, Islamist Jihad will be defeated."
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THE IMPERATIVES OF WAR
by Caroline Glick

  Thanks to the steady rocket attacks by the Palestinian Arabs, "Israeli society ... is demoralized and its demoralization induces a sense of lost sovereignty and powerlessness that legitimates and prolongs the paralysis of the IDF and the government." But Israeli politicians, desiring to avoid confrontations where Arab civilians might be injured and the subsequent "world" condemnation, have been unwilling to take over and control Gaza. Caroline Glick rebuts the notion that "concentrating forces in one place with the aim of destroying enemy forces is antiquated" when you can keep the enemy people off-balance by simultaneous precision hit-and-run bombings in different places. She points out that the two tactics are not really either-or. This doesn't alter the fact that sustained, on-the-ground control of Gaza is essential to safeguard Israel.
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THE RIGHT ROAD TO PEACE: A REGIONAL SOLUTION TO THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
by Benny Elon

  This is a reprint of Benny Elon's plan. The introduction read: "Israeli Cabinet Minister Binyamin Elon proposes a regional peace plan: give the Arabs on the West Bank full citizenship in Jordan, resettle the Arab refugees in Arab countries and annex the West Bank and Gaza to Israel. This would make for two stable and viable Palestinian States, one Arab, one Jewish, in what was Mandated Palestine. His plan takes into account critical factors the Road Map ignores: a role for the Arab countries that neighbor Israel, the solution to the Arab refugee problem, Israel's security, a natural border and Israel's historic and biblical claim to the Land. "
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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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THE CASE FOR POPULATION EXCHANGE
by Lewis Lipkin

  This is a reprint of Lewis Lipkin's 2002 article. The introduction read: "Population exchange is not a new idea. Sometimes a complete separation is the only way that two groups unable to live together can get on with their lives. It might be time to complete the separation of the Jews and the Arabs. The Jews were evacuated from Arab countries when Israel was born. Maybe it's time to do the second half of the transfer: move the Palestinian Arabs to Arab countries"
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INTERNATIONAL LAW AND THE ARAB-ISRAEL CONFLICT
by Ian Lacey

  Israel and Palestine by the renowned Professor of International Law, Julius Stone, "presented a detailed analysis of the central principles of international law governing the issues raised by the Arab-Israel conflict." His student. Ian Lacey, has provided us a summary of the main points, using the text of the original. Lacey's entire summary can be downloaded from Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council. We present here Part I, entitled "The Legal Status of the Territories."
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APPLYING CONSTITUTIONAL LAW TO THE 1967 LIBERATION OF JUDEA, SAMARIA AND GAZA (BIBLICAL ISRAEL)
by Howard Grief

  In the July-August 2007 issue, we presented Attorney Howard Grief's elegant summary why Justice Meir Shamgar was incorrect when he ruled that Israel's reestablishing itself in Biblical Israel was illegal occupation. In this issue we get at the nuts and bolts. One can trace almost all — if not all — the difficulties that Israel has had in the last 40 years defending its irrevocable right to Samaria, Judea and Gaza to Justice Shamgar's incorrect legal advice. Had the appropriate law been applied, we wouldn't be needing to rebut the "pernicious Occupation Myth." Shamgar's original ruling "provided our enemies with an enormous propaganda victory in the eyes of the world, for the term 'occupation' implied that Israel had taken over by war the land of another people to which it had no right under international law, an absolutely false implication." For other essays on international law that states that biblical Israel is a trust in perpetuity for the Jewish people and can not be given away, read Part I of Yoram Shifftan's "A Legal Challenge." and his essay on Gifting.
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This is such a time of stress and uncertainty. It's obvious what needs to be done to strengthen Israel's morale and her security — she needs to take control of her own destiny. What's uncertain is whether there's an Israeli politician with both the courage and a large enough political base to act in Israel's interest. We end this issue's feature articles with Sara Yoheved Rigler's wonderful essay on challah and God's love. Read it.

DR. LAURA, GOD LOVES YOU
by Sara Yoheved Rigler

  In the upcoming "Peace Conference", Jews will need to ignore the siren song of the "World Community": commit suicide and we'll love you. But the Jewish leadership, in Israel and America, is weak, obliging, always ready to turn the other cheek. With all the stress, maybe we need to take a moment to reflect on what it's all about. On one plane, this essay by Sara Yoheved Rigler is about baking challah. On another, it is a recipe for doing what Maimonides tells us we must do before saying the daily prayers: "one is obligated to stop and reflect on the greatness of God." This essay is a pleasure to read.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
OCTOBER 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


July-August, 2007

PART 1: EUROPE. AND THE WESTERN MEDIA

On the face of it, Switzerland and Sweden rank high as shining examples of what democracy should be: tolerant, accepting of differences, live-and-let-live. The first two articles discuss two symptoms of serious problems in Europe: Islam-appeasment and Jew-hatred. In Switzerland, as example, there's growing Muslim visibility, volubility and influence. In Sweden, anti-Israel hate is more established and doesn't come just from the mosques. It is pervasive within the upper classes, the churches, and, in particular, the Swedish media. Simultaneously, the Swedes are more fearful than almost any other European country of irritating the Muslims, while the media — so aggressively hostile to Jews — are careful to downplay Muslim violence. The final article in the set presents us with a must-read analysis of what's going on in Europe, by asking why, when Europeans are confronted by an Islamic takeover, is their response so far off the mark: a cringing lack of courage, rejection of Judeo-Christian beliefs, appeasement of their Muslim population and anti-Americanism.

WHAT SWITZERLAND IS NOW PRODUCING: CUCKOO CLOCKS AND JIHADISTS
by Olivier Guitta

  Switzerland has seeing the growth of grandiose Islamic centers such as the Geneva Islamic Center, affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, which taken "upon itself to assess the conformity of European laws to Islam." But some Swiss are putting on the brakes, attempting to ban Al Jazeera from the cableways and block Islamic extremists from entering the country. They understand "Geneva's growing importance as a transit point for volunteers from French-speaking Switzerland and France going to join the jihad in Iraq" and that these "volunteers" could return "as experienced fighters, linked to a network with the same ideology... capable of organizing terrorist attacks." closer to home.
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ANTI-ISRAELISM AND ANTI-SEMITISM IN SWEDEN — An interview with Zvi Mazel
an interview with Zvi Mazel by Manfred Gerstenfeld

  Zvi Mazel, former Israeli ambassador to Sweden, said that "... he encountered ... hostility to Israel as well as pseudomorality and arrogance," from the country's ruling classes, the major political parties, diplomats, churchmen and the media, which is largely left wing. At the same time that these groups are openly and unfairly hostile to Israel, they go the dhimmitude mile to avoid arousing anger and violence from the Muslim population. What is not often mentioned is that Swedish anti-semitism "has a substantial Muslim component" and the mosques preach blatant anti-semitism with little hinderance. Mazel concludes that "Sweden remains the most anti-Israeli country in the European Union and also the most pro-Muslim one."
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THE STORKS ARE LANDING
by Daniel Johnson

  This is an important analyses of the current thinking in Europe. It is one of a series of articles under the general title, "The Pursuit of Liberty: Can the Ideals That Made America Great Provide a Model for the World?" The present essay by Daniel Johnson deals with Europe's bizarre attitudes, considering that its liberty is threatened by a resurgent Islam. It no longer shows the courage it showed in dealing with earlier threats to its freedom. It had become strongly negative towards America; it ignores, denies and misrepresents the Muslim threat; and it is unwilling to defend its own identity. Johnson makes the analogy to the behavior of frogs as the Islamic storks land on their soil.
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What's a temporarily satisfactory way to come to grips with Islamic Terrorism? Simple. Just deny it. The Brits are a prime example of a country that has been trying hard to accommodate itself to its Muslim population. The nastier the Muslims became, the more sensitive was the English response. After they were bombed by non-desperate, well-educated, seemingly-assimilated Muslim doctors, many British leaders saw it as their own fault — they needed to try harder to reach the Muslim community. Curiously, this oozing tolerance doesn't extend to Jews. The British way of stopping Muslim terrorism has been to demonize Israel, boycott them, sanction them, shun them. Yup, that'll stop the muslims from taking over. We in America shouldn't snicker. The Muslims are forcing us to make some not-so-welcome changes in our way of life.

CALL IT LIKE IT IS
by Diana West

  England has an Islamic population that is increasingly radicalized and is supplying an increasing number of recruits for terror acts in England and abroad. The response of many of the English political and intellectual leadership has unfortunately been the one populized by George Orwell in 1984 — to vocabularize it out of the language. Linkage between the religion of Islam and adherents of Islam who are terrorists are verbally suppressed. This might sound amusing to us in the States, but as Diana West points out, it is disturbing that business companies, and even the Federal government in America, are blocking websites such as Jihad Watch that do not shy away from informing us about how our new lexicon encourages a slide into dhimmitude.
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WHAT ACADEMIC VALUES DOES THE BRITISH BOYCOTT PROTECT?
by Richard L. Cravatts

  Like the periodic return of the locusts, the mainline churches and the British academics keep trying every few years to divest Israel of its life by attempting to cut off its involvement with academic and scientific colleagues, and by attempting to create havoc in Israel's economic life. They even refuse to eat its very wonderful produce. In this article Richard L. Cravatts examines what academic values exactly would the British boycott protect? As you might suppose, the proposed boycott has little to do with upholding academic values.
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TERRORISM AND AN OPEN SOCIETY
by Tony Blankley

  Tony Blankley no long believes "that we are currently winning; and, more importantly I am not yet convinced that our open, liberal democratic culture is necessarily an unalloyed competitive advantage in the struggle against culturally aggressive and violent radical Islam." As he points out "We all cherish the openness of our society. But what is the value of a once open, but eventually vanquished society?"
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This set of essays deal with Israeli and American newspaper media and with British book publishers. The press too often arrogantly thinks its mission is to control what news is presented to the public and how the public should understand the news — even if they have to force a conclusion by fabricating the "facts". This de facto advocacy press contributes to the excellent job the Arabs are doing promoting their point of view while blocking other views.

THE REAL ISSUE WASN'T REFUSAL
by Paula R. Stern

  Paula Stern writes of the arrogance of much of the Israeli media, who don't even pretend just to report the news. Too often they feel proud that they can control how a story or a set of events is viewed. They consciously attempt to control interpretation by emphasizing the wrong issue. They try to control the degree of public interest in an event by either minimally reporting the happening or by proclaiming its importance. Stern contrasts how the press handled the refusal by IDF soldiers to follow orders recently in Hebron and in Yesha back in 2002. And they ignored the real issues.
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IT'S NOT JUST SCOTT BEAUCHAMP
by Randall Hoven

  The news and TV media think of themselves as the arbiter and social conscience of our society. They are quick to condemn others for anything from hypocrisy to downright lying but they themselves have a sorry record. Usually, we are encouraged to concentrate on the specific wrongdoing when it surfaces, so the extent to which the news media have shown themselves to be unreliable is usually obscured. Simply by itemizing recent press outrages, Randall Hoven makes us aware that they are not necessarily the "professionals" they claim to be — the only ones with the expertise to disseminate reliable information. I hope he does another article on a more subtle sin: claiming objectivity when they are actually promoting a political agenda.
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THE VANISHING JIHAD EXPOSÉS
by Mark Steyn

  Mark Steyn stresses two points: (1) that winning the war against radical Muslim Terrorism will partially depend on which side determines what facts the public will learn; and (2) we're losing that war. The Muslims are adroit at removing from public view books that "malign" them, not matter how factual these books are.
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THE TYRANNY OF THE WEAK
an interview with Joel Fishman by Ruthie Blum

  Joel Fishman provides us with a true understanding of a major difference in how Israel and the PLO perceived their conflict — Israel sees it in military terms, the Arabs see it as both a military and a political struggle, with the political the more important. Thanks to Israeli leaders such as Shimon Peres who forbade rebuttal PR, the Arabs have had a clear field to pursue political aggression. They have been able to frame the terms and language of the conflict, win adherents who have seen no rebuttal by Israel, and paralyze Israel so that it doesn't deal from strength yet it won't fight guerilla-style like the Arabs. At the same time, the Arabs have been building up their military resources. A reader, Shalom Freedman, wrote: "His tracing the origins of the terms 'peace camp' and 'two-states for two-peoples' exposes the nefarious intentions of those who use such slogans to undermine Israel."
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A SMALL DICTIONARY OF MIDDLE-EAST STEREOTYPES
by Laurent Murawiec

  What with so many members of the media obscuring the facts rather than presenting them clearly, Laurent Murawiec thoughtfully provides us with a usage dictionary to help us interpret pro-Arab newspeople and commentators speaking and writing on the Middle East. He offers us the actual meaning of what appear on the surface to be common ordinary words.
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EVENHANDED? NO. ACCURATE? NO. MALICIOUS AND JUST PLAIN WRONG? YES, DEFINITELY!
by Zionist Organization of America

  Occasionally, some media item comes along that is head and shoulders above anything others have done in the way of claiming objectivity while promoting a pernicious political agenda. This year, Christiane Amanpour gets the — what? The Oscar? The Tony? Actually, there isn't yet an award for the year's most blatent and outrageous knife job masquerading as non-fiction or as a documentary. But there should be. It will of course be known as the Amanpour Award. This is a ZOA article that tidily points out many of the distortions in the CNN Series. Other analyses and commentaries can be found on our August Blog-Ed page.
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PART 2: ISRAEL

It's been two years since the expulsion of the Jews of Gaza and the wound has barely started to heal — maybe because it hasn't been treated. The government seems to have spent more money to convince the media that the GushKatifers have been well-taken care of and, simultaneously and inconsistently, that like spoiled brats they've turned their noses up at all the wonderful goodies offered. So here they are two years later, living marginally, no longer secure in their communities, their work and their daily lives. No longer do they have a purpose and a charted future. Maybe they had it better when all they had to worry about were explosives, bullets and missiles from Arab terrorists.

GUSH KATIF DIARY
by Galit Yitzchaki

  This is heartbreaking. It is a simply told tale, told by someone who lived through an experience Jews have had for thousands of years – being expelled from their homes and farms and businesses and forced to flee to an uncertain future. What makes this particularly awful is that for the first time in history (save the expulsion from Yamit when Israel gave over the Sinai to Egypt) the progromists were their co-religionists, their own government and the expellees were living in their own country, not as aliens in some foreign country. Hillel Fendel of Arutz-Sheva has published selections from the diary kept by Galit Yitzchaki of Ganei Tal, Gush Katif, Gaza, Israel, just before and at the start of the expulsion.
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TWO YEARS LATER
by Rachel Saperstein

  Just a year ago August, William Mehlman, in AFSI's Outpost, described the American Jewish Establishment's response to the misery of the Jews expelled from Gush Katif as a "dry-well response to the suffering of 10,000 of its co-religionists, rendered homeless, penniless, futureless by Israeli bulldozers in Gaza and northern Samaria ten months ago. [...] Despite a 51 percent unemployment rate among their residents (compared to 1 percent prior to the August 2005 dispossession), despite the lack of permanent housing for all but 2 percent of the dispossessed, despite the non-provision of compensation for 72 percent of the businesses lost as a result of the evacuation (including 95 percent of the farms), despite the cutoff since March of funding for expellee youth programs, petition after petition to Jewish philanthropic organizations in America for help in coping with a humanitarian crisis have gone unanswered. Compounding its 10-month silence — informed and directed by the Sharon-Olmert government's vilification of Gush Katif and its inhabitants as 'obstacles to peace,' fully worthy of the condign punishment visited upon them – was American mainline Jewry's eagerness to embrace the Israeli government-inspired fiction that the benighted evacuees were receiving the tenderest of loving care." Read the latest episode in Rachel Saperstein's saga. It's clear that in the last year very little more has been done to alleviate the horrors inflicted on the Jews of Gush Katif.
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TWO THOUSAND YEARS; TWO YEARS
by Anita Tucker

  When people realize how significant the expulsion of the Jews BY THEIR OWN GOVERNMENT was, this will be a primary document. It is an account by one of those expelled on what she's been doing in the last two years since she was forced out of her home and out of the high-tech greenhouses, where she raised vegetables that won praise everywhere. But she does still sound like one who is not just a survivor, but one who is unconquerable. I love how she describes what keeps her and her fellow expellees smiling: "we are flowing with Hashem."
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These next essays deal with how the educational system can help promote pro-Arab propaganda. In Israel over the last 40-60 years, the Marxists in charge of education have by omission and commission taught that Israel is really Arab land and that Israel is acting as a colonial power. In America, Muslim-veneration is just beginning – although it grows in ground made fertile by leftist rejection of the Jewish and Christian ethos.

ISRAEL'S REEDUCATION MINISTER
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick writes of the Israeli minister of education, who is imposing her radical anti-Zionist prejudice on school curricula. Her plans run counter to what all countries require of their school system, namely, that the schools instill patriotic pride in their country. Paradoxically, while she seeks to stifle Jewish patriotism, she approves of the idea that Israeli Arab children be taught Muslim culture and religion, as formulated by an Arab who talks openly of destroying the State of Israel. The addendum contains interviews with Israelis, who were asked what they were taught about their recent history, including their unassailable right to the Land of Israel by international law.
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THE "NAQBA" OFFENSIVE
by Steven Plaut

  In this companion piece to Glick's "Israel's Reeducation Minister," Steven Plaut makes clear why accepting Naqba is absurd and destructive to Israel's sense of self. Naqba denial asserts that the Arabs are right in claiming that their inability to destroy Israel in 1948 – when the neighboring Arab countries invaded the newly-born State of Israel — was naqba, a tragedy, and that anyone who denies this – a Naqba denier — is denying truth and history. It may be useful propaganda to reinforce the lie that Israel is occupying "Palestinian" land. So it makes sense that anti-Zionists would wish to disseminate the notion that Israel was at fault defending itself from the invading Arab armies, who had the cooperation of the local Arabs. But why would someone in charge of Israeli schoolchildren's education want to teach that we should regard Israel's birth as a tragedy instead of an occasion for rejoining that a venerable people, who have contributed so much to humanity, had performed a miracle by redeeming its national homeland?
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SAUDI IN THE CLASSROOM: A FUNDAMENTAL FRONT IN THE WAR
by Stanley Kurtz

  Stanley Kurtz describes "the system of federal subsidies to university programs of Middle East Studies" as "serving as a kind of Trojan horse for Saudi influence over American K-12 education. ... Harvard's Center for Middle Eastern Studies' outreach program delivers seminars that virtually promoted Islam as a religion, while sharply criticizing alleged American prejudice against the Muslim world — all at American taxpayer expense."
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The peace disaster. The UN Non-governmental organizations — the NGOS – gave charity and human rights a bad name. Actually, so has the U.N. And now peace, too, has a bad odor. Maybe because peace iniatives are rightly perceived as doing as much good for Israel as recurring bouts of malaria. Like malaria, each peace accord has left Israel weakened with a lack of energy and it seemed to have affected the brains of their political leaders.

REINFORCING FAILURE
by Jonathan Spyer

  The latest person up at bat to hit a peace homerun between the Arabs and Israel is Tony Blair. His formula for success is to provide economic incentives to the Arabs and use a lot of money to develop "a climate of law and order for the Palestinian people", and he expects "the result will be a responsible political entity, ready to do business in a rational manner with its neighbour." Jonathan Spyer points out that this policy, "is also, at least in the Middle Eastern context, demonstrably wrong." For one — to continue the metaphor – their chosen set of players, Fatah, is more criminal than political. And their batting average in the game of peace is a flat zero.
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THE PEACE (STUDIES) RACKET
by Bruce Bawer

  Bruce Bawer explains how peace-speak is perpetuated. As practiced by a large group of Marxist-oriented institutes and centers, the Peace Racket trains the young that China, Russia and suicide bombers are commendable while America is bad. "The Peace Racket maintains that the Western world's profound moral culpability, arising from its history of colonialism and economic exploitation, deprives it of any right to judge non-Western countries or individuals." In other words, it's an aging retread of Edward Said's Orientalism and just as likely to provide a decent basis for achieving peace in international relations. Unfortunately, "the Peace Racket's influence will spread. And as it does, it will weaken freedom's foundations."
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A NEW DEFINITION OF 'PEACE'
by Michelle Nevada

  Michelle Nevada, the essayist, speaks for many of us in noting that the word peace is content-free. It is all things to diplomats and nothing of any real use to the rest of us. To be of use, peace should bear some relationship to "life, as we know it, ... a potpourri of conflict, struggle, noise and dissonance." As it is for the person, it is for the country. "To exist, people and nations must fight to survive. If we fail, we die — and only in death do we have 'peace'." Truly, a liberating concept.
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NO PEACE, NO PEACE PLANS, NO PRICE FOR PEACE – A SHORT GUIDE TO THOSE OBSESSED WITH PEACE
by Moshe Sharon

  Moshe Sharon has personal experience of how wily and manipulative Arabs can be in what Westerners regard as straight-forward diplomatic negotiations. As he puts it, "...in the bazaar of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the two sides are not discussing the same merchandise." and "...if you are clever enough you can sell nothing at a price." In this essay he provides us with some useful guidelines in bargaining with Arabs. And the Arabs won't be ready to bargain seriously until they "... have lost all hope of annihilating the Jewish state.."
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Many believe the internal conflict in Israel between the Secularists against the religious is as serious if not more worrisome than the war surge of its enemies. This is particularly so because the Left, which is predominantly secular, is politically in control. The hypothesis that the secularists destroyed the Gazan Jewish community to demoralize the religious is one of the few 'makes sense' reasons adduced for the expulsion disaster. These essays tackle the issue of secularist war against the religious. The issue can as well be framed as the split between the Left and the Right, a problem not just in Israel but in America as well.

THE ISRAELI  LEFT UNMASKED
by Aaron Klein

  Avraham Burg, an Israeli who held important positions and comes from a prominent family, could serve as a poster child of what's wrong with Israeli's Leftist leadership. His — and their — arrogant belief that Israel must give up its Jewish character and model itself on a multinational European Union, has led the Left to advocate actions that harm Israel. They advocate pro-Arab measures, hoping thereby to destroy the religious Right, but they forget that the Arabs are likely to take advantage of a weakened Israel and unlikely to make fine distinctions among the Jewish groups. Aaron Klein chronicles Burg's career, and shows us how the secularism that the Left sees as the solution to Israel's problems could easily become the recipe for her demise.
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THE ISRAELI LEFT REMAINS THE GREATEST THREAT
by David Shalom

  David Shalom bluntly makes the case that the Israeli left is a major – if not the main — danger to the State of Israel. They were the ones to import a dying PLO to lord it over the local Arabs in the territories. They were the ones to promote appeasement policies, and when forced to fight, did not fight to defeat the terrorist enemy, leaving the enemy more confident and stronger. He conclude that "[o]nly by initiating a de-programming of the nation from the Oslo myths can we move forward."
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A HOUSE DIVIDED
by Mark Silverberg

  Israel isn't the only one to confront the danger of a marked split between Leftists and Rightists. In America, because of the unsatisfactory state of the war in Iraq, the domestic and foreign policy issues have become a single issue: do we fight Islam or appease it? Mark Silverberg does an excellent job of presenting the two points of view. He points out that "[n]ations at war must be supported by the people on whose behalf they fight." But 9/11 is no longer sharp and the Islamist tactics are to use intimidation and bullying in the media and universities rather than engage in dramatic terrorism that would push the debate towards fighting Islam.
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These essays provide insight into the Palestinian Arab character, and what blinds the West from seeing this group clearly. Perhaps if we understood them better, we wouldn't waste so much energy skidding on hope rather than walking on reality.

SUICIDE REVERSAL?
a National Review Online Symposium

  Break out the champagne. Whoopie Doo. The Arabs have graciously decided they were less in favor of suicidally murdering Israelis than before. Or so the headlines blared. The NRO symposium participants fill in what the sketchy headlines omit. The actuality appears to be less than a superficial scanning of the results might indicate. As Robert Spencer points out: "We haven't seen ... in the Islamic world any large-scale initiative to refute the jihad ideology, or to counter jihadist claims to represent true and pure Islam."
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HATRED OF THE JEWS AS A PSYCHOLOGICAL PHENOMENON IN PALESTINIAN SOCIETY
by Daphne Burdman

  Successful indoctrination depends on hooking the current promotion object to (1) a basic source of group/individual identity; (2) a set of dedicated promoters; and (3) malleable indoctrinees. The Palestinian Arabs have had all three — the Koran, "militant" Muslims and children who are veterans of Arab child-rearing practices — and have been successful in promoting Jew hatred in their society. Daphne Burdman carefully dissects these threads and points out that given the "monolithic ideology and practice of Islam," the technique is not unique to the Palestinians. Jew-hate is characteristic of the general Arab-Muslim world. Jew hate isn't a passive emotion; it is a necessity for shaping Jew killers, who will act without guilt or remorse.
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EIGHTEEN YEARS OF STOLEN CHILDHOODS
by Angela Bertz

  Arab terrorists see Jewish children in Israel as prime targets and have shot them, knifed them, mutilated them and bombed them. The main stream media and the "moral" main stream churches make excuses for the terrorists; some wax indignant that more Arabs are killed than Jews – as if the number dead between the terrorist gangs/families and the terror victims should be equal, despite the disparity in population numbers and in motivation. We've become callous about the snuffing out of the lives of these Jewish children. In this evocative article, Angela Bertz makes us feel the pain of what we've lost at the hands of jubilant monsters, who care little about human life.
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THE FLANAGAN METHOD
by Barry Rubin

  The prevailing view in much of the Western media is that Hamas has disavowed Islamic extremism but it's tough for them what with the international economic embargo. The attitude of the media, Barry Rubin points out, is much like the idealism preached by Father Flanagan: blame the environment but not the boy. Unfortunately, the Flanagan method is the wrong tack to take "for those facing radical Islamists determined to establish tyrannies no matter how much it costs their two sets of victims: their enemies and their own people."
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HAMAS IMPOSES AN ISLAMIC SOCIAL CODE IN GAZA
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  There's been several balloons raised recently urging us to talk to Hamas, implying we can reason them into a more reasonable position – after all they are now Management — they control Gaza and likely will soon take over the West Bank — so they should welcome our help. Reuven Erlich of the Terrorist Information Center gives a summary of a major Hamas concern in Gaza — they are a makeover group. They want to islamize the populace. Training them for terrorism will not be a problem — it's what's been happening all along under the PLO and PA.
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The Bush Administration continues to flog the necrotic Peace Process – midwife to another Palestinian State — as a viable entity. It apparently doesn't take much to manipulate Israel's current weak leadership. The American administration and its Israeli puppets pretend the putative head of the P.A., Mahmoud Abbas, is strong. He isn't. They pretend that calling a recidivist terrorist group like the P.A. responsible and reliable will work in the long term. It won't. They pretend that sacrificing Israel for some greater good in the Middle East will work. It won't. The Middle East is a lava-hot bed of ancient rivalries, with most of these Muslim groups ambitious to restore Islam's long gone dominance. Most stupidly, the two leaderships forget that we are in the early stages of the war Islam has declared against the West.

EVIL'S INITIAL TRIUMPH OVER GOOD
by Richard H. Shulman

  As we approach another 9/11 memorial day, we present this powerful essay by Richard Shulman on a very basic problem: the current imbalance between good and evil. We are still in the early stages of what looks like a long war with the Islamists. And as is usual when the aggressor seems to come out of nowhere, they were organized from the getgo, while we are still debating the terms of warfare. We haven't even agreed on a name to call the enemy. And until we recognize that they are evil and want to make our future a return to the Dark Ages, we won't be very effective.
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APPEARANCE IS EVERYTHING
by Jonathan Spyer

  The American adminstration is still fixated on the notion that creating a Palestinian state will miraculously fix all their problems in the Middle East. Unfortunately, when you need a quick fix, it's easy to disregard the many realities that advise against pursuing such a policy, or even pretending to pursue such a policy. Since this article was written, it appears that Olmert, at least, is working hard to make a Palestinian state a reality. At least he's poised to carry out the first task — to kick some 100,000-200,000 Jews out of Biblical Israel, when his administration hasn't yet resettled the Jews expelled from Gaza two years ago. Can you imagine the nightmare of hundreds of thousands of Jews wandering around, haphazardly housed, and not at peaceful as the previous bunch of expellees? What terrorist group will be able to resist blasting such easy marks, while making major inroads into Israel's defenses.
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WHAT IS GOING ON IN ISRAEL?
by Morris J. Amitay

  Jews are accustomed to the long range — to examining a biblical concept in today's terms, in judging a modern idea by biblical injunctions. Morris J. Amitay contrasts a shorter time span. He looks at how Israel's leadership has deteriorated from 1976 when Israel rescued the Jewish hostages imprisoned in Entebbe and now, when the leadership doesn't just ignore Arab terrorists preying on Jews, it supplies Israel's enemies with resources that rejuvenate them. As Amitay puts it, "...[it] makes one long for the good old days when Israel confronted challenges instead of wishing them away."
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  BACK TO OSLO ILLUSION
by Guy Bechor

  Guy Bechor reinforces the theme of the previous article by Morris Amitay. He stresses that considering Fatah as "good" terrorists is a mistake. They are as mission-driven as Hamas — and their mission is to destroy Israel. Speaking of the released terrorists that Israel suddenly finds trustworthy, Bechor writes, "For released prisoners, terror is livelihood, a way of life, their honor and self determination." Tipping the scales in favor of one terrorist group against another gains Israel no increase in security and doesn't have the desired effect within the Arab community.
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THE JOKE'S ON US
by Caroline Glick

  I don't envy future historians trying to rationalize recent Israeli leadership behavior from 2005 when they destroyed a productive and patriotic community — the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza — to now when their preferential mode for dealing with Arab terrorism is to kowtow to their enemies. They continue to provide the Gazan Arabs with gas, water and material for making explosives. They jail Jewish young for standing on sidewalks during an anti-expulsion demonstration but release known Arab murderers. Caroline Glick documents one such piece of madness: Arab murderers agreed to hand in their weapons and stop being terrorists. The brain-dead Israeli leadership took them at their word.
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PART 3: CAN I DO ANYTHING?

To paraphrase Rabbi Hillel, in the absence of leaders, do it yourself. First, familiarize yourself with the facts — we modestly recommend our background.html page as aid. Add these two articles to the general survey of background resources These essays enlighten. They can serve as the basic black of your linguistic wardrobe. Use the google box above to access other Think-Israel articles on the Balfour Declaration and international law including those by Yoram Shifftan and Howard Grief. Explore. Learn. Know your facts.

IS ISRAEL OCCUPYING THE WEST BANK?
by Howard Grief

  The myth that Israel is occupying land owned by the Palestinians is so ingrained, it seems to be received truth. A large part of this belief is due to Arab propaganda, reinforced and amplified by cooperative news and TV media. Some of the blame goes to Shimon Peres and the Israeli leadership who decided that the Oslo Accords would be strengthened if the Jews allowed Arab lies to go unchallenged. But now Howard Grief writes of another source of the belief that Israel is illegally sitting on Arab land. He writes of the shocking fact that it was an Israeli judge, Meir Shamgar, who ignored international law and applied the wrong concepts when Israel successfully fought back the invasion by the neighboring Arab States. She did more than fight back. She regained land that was rightfully hers by international law. But over the years, rather than reinforcing Israel's claim, sloppy thinking by some of the Israeli judiciary has given the cotton-candy narrative spun by the Arabs a seemingly solid foundation. In this and in his other writings on Israel's ownership of the land, Grief provides us with the facts and a broad understanding of what these facts mean.
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FALSE PREMISES
by Patricia Berlyn

  It isn't enough to know the facts. You need to know what pseudo-reality the facts demolish. Patricia Berlyn provides us with both: the non-facts that too many believe and the actual facts. If you are so used to the fantasy that has been created about the Arab-Israeli conflict that your first reaction is to deny Beryln's "Reality" remarks, may I suggest you check the facts out before rejecting them. Preferably in an authorative source.
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Can an individual do something to fight back? We present two possibilities — supporting groups that counter the Edward Said philosophy that a Western can't understand the Middle East. And using the internet as a research resource to gather information about terrorists.

HOW DONORS CAN INCREASE UNDERSTANDING OF THE MIDDLE EAST
by John J. Miller

  Edward Said and his pro-Arab flunkies dominated academic Middle East studies in America for years, making predictions that never materialized, doing analyzes that didn't hit the target, suppressing views that differed from theirs. He's dead and 9/11 put the quietus on his reign, but there's still much inertia in the academic system. John J. Miller suggests an interesting way to get Middle East studies to explore new ideas, and make them independent of the Middle East countries that are the subject of academic inquiry. He suggests philanthropists get involved in funding programs in universities and think tanks. He makes some sensible suggestions.
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MY CYBER COUNTER-JIHAD
by Shannen Rossmiller

  This is a remarkable account of one person's fight against the Jihadists. Rather like investigators trapping internet pedophiles, Shannen Rossmiller hunted jihadists — her evidence helped convict Ryan Anderson, a national guardman who was defecting to al-qaeda. The jihadists may be ideologically backward, but there isn't much lacking in their cyber sophistication. Rossmiller recounts how she trained herself to uncover them, also by using the internet.
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PART 4: TRAVELERS IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND HISTORY

People have always liked to travel and many of them went to the Holy Land, and many of these wrote down their impressions. These next essays are about some of the travelers who visited the land from the 17th century until just yesterday. The first essay is an independent source of information about the land after the Muslim conquest in the 7th C. and before the Jews came back to build another State in the 19th C. It's useful to have in this day and age, when the Arabs are busy destroying physical evidence of the Jewish Temple and other Jewish antiquities to erase the Jewish connection with the Land of Israel The second essaay alerts us to some constants in Arab behavior.

A TOUR OF PALESTINE; THE YEAR IS 1695
by Avi Goldreich

  When you read this, you might — as I did — hear a pin popping an over-inflated balloon. The global main stream media, the leftists of Israel, including some who govern the country, and the (un)paid Arab-aiders have hidden the facts under reams of false information. And here comes irrefutable evidence from the very long period which started whe the Muslims conquered the Land of Israel in the 7th Century C.E. until the Jews in the late 19th century returned in droves to redeem the Land, joining the Jews who had never left Israel. During this period, the Arabs had taken a thriving and productive land and turned it into an unproductive rock-strewn wilderness (rather like what they are doing in Gaza today). Avi Goldreich writes of a 17th century book which, simply by describing the reality of the time makes us aware that the Land of Israel was then unfruitful and had few inhabitants. And of those inhabitants, the Muslims were a minority, a small minority. As Winston Churchill noted many years later, some 95% of the Arabs in Israel and the Territories migrated into Palestine in the 20th century to coattail on the Jewish enterprise.
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ENCOUNTERING ISLAM
by Algis Valiunas

  Algis Valiunas is interested in the impressions of the Western traveler when he came to the Middle East, when Christian encountered Muslim, when a technologically advanced group met a group that was much more primitive, certainly in science, but even in their archaic agricultural implements. Some of what was highlighted depended on the visitor's orientation — some travelers wanted to preserve Muslim customs as is; others loathe the religion on sight. Some wanted to help the Arab acquire political freedom, others found his superstitions appalling. But there are some constants over time, inherent in Muslim culture. The Muslim attitude of intolerance to other religions was on show. Their fatalism. Their genetic anomalies, likely the result of inbreeding within the clan. Their treatment of women doesn't seem to have changed — they let their women die rather than let a male doctor treat them. Rule was and is usually by a brutal strong man, sometimes an old-fashioned royal, sometimes a more modern-appearing revolutionary. They really are not just like you and I.
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Some history. One article is on the mythic connection of the "Palestinians" and the ancient Jebusites; the other is an actual event – the massacre of Jews in Hebron long before the local Arabs asserted that the Land belonged to them. They knew it belonged to the Ottomans.

PALESTINIANS, JEBUSITES, AND EVANGELICALS
by David Wenkel

  One of the myths that recently-invented people the "Palestinians" try to sell is that they are descendents of the Jebusites, a Canaanite tribe; i.e., that they predate the Jews in the Land of Israel. David Wenkel points out that "[t]he claim to Jebusite heritage within the Palestinian community is a recent construct," asserted by Palestinian arab nationalists to bolster their claims to the land. It is understandable that a non-people like the "Palestinians" has less trouble capriciously claiming kinship to any and all historic and biblical figures than does a people with actual roots like the Jews – the imagination of the non-people is not contrained by reality. And many western proponents of Palestinian nationalism will of course need no evidence to accept the myth. Wenkel sees a possible impact on one particular group — Christian evangelicals — where both acceptance/rejection and consequent interpretations may depend on existing attitudes in the community.
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AMERICAN VICTIMS OF THE 1929 HEBRON MASSACRE
by Dr. Yitzchok Levine

  Accustomed as we are to accept the myth that Arabs react violently because they are provoked by some aggressive act done to them by Israelis shortly preceding their outburst, it should be realized that the first massacre of Jews in modern times in what would become the modern state of Israel occurred way back in August, 1929. Yitzchok Levine tells the stories of eight of the victims, eight young Americans who were quietly studying Torah in the sacred city of Hebron. The slaughter was organized by Haj Amin al Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem. Haj Amin had previously been an officer in the Ottoman army that murdered over a million Christian Armenians. He went on to become Hitler's good friend, and successful at encouraging Hitler to kill Jews, instead of allowing them to leave to other countries.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

July 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
August 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


May-June, 2007

These first essays focus on Hamas, a somewhat brasher version of its creator, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). Both have in common emphasizing charity, helping people with social services to gain adherents and making important alliances. Their fundimental viciousness does not become apparent until they are in complete control — as the Moslem Brotherhood is in Darfur. Currently, Hamas has triumphantly asserted its control over Gaza and it is in the alliance-making stage with Iran and with Al-Qaeda while the MB has made headway in gaining acceptance by the American government.

COMPARING THREE MUSLIM BROTHERHOODS: SYRIA, JORDAN, EGYPT
by Barry Rubin

  The Muslim Brotherhood is a quiet malignancy that has inserted itself into the body politic of both Arab and non-Arab countries. Even the U.S.A. is now considering talking as a friend to the Brotherhood, even though its underlying mission is to restore Muslim rule globally. They use methods appropriate to conditions in the different countries. Barry Rubin compares how the Brotherhood operates in several Middle Eastern regimes and assesses effectiveness.
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD'S DUPING OF AMERICA
by Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen

  Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa Lappen discuss how the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has succeeded in convincing many key people in politics and government that the Brotherhood is a democratic alternative to dictatorial Arab governments. Their actual agenda — the MB leadership encourages "Arabs and Muslims to continue terrorist attacks against the U.S. and Israel..." — is unreported in the mainstream press.
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THE ISLAMIC RECONQUEST OF PALESTINE
by David Hornik

  Although it is underreported in the mainstream media, the Arabs have continued striking at Israeli cities, while Israel's response has been pitifully weak. It isn't that Israel doesn't have the weaponry to strike back effectively. As David Hornik points out, it is that its leadership has been paralyzed by fear of a global condemnation, should "innocent" Palestinian civilians suffer injury. They have irresponsibly permitted unnecessary injury to their own population, rather than suffer world reproach. In consequence, "Israel ... is on the verge of becoming a failed state part of whose territory is no longer under its control, unable to provide security to citizens there who are helplessly under attack and fleeing."
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A BAD WEEK FOR THE GOOD GUYS: HAMAS, FATAH, AND THE NEW PALESTINIAN REALITY
by Tom Rose

  Hamas has taken over Gaza and is making inroads into the West Bank, which is still theoretically controlled by Fatah. Tom Rose notes that Abbas, head of Fatah, is currently successfully playing "good cop" and is backed by Israel and America, both of whom are pretending Abbas is capable of running a country and negotiating with other countries. If there's a difference between the two terror organizations, it's that Hamas has been more efficient in developing Gaza into a terrorist stronghold — and has effectively killed off Fatah.
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THE IRAN-HAMAS ALLIANCE: THREAT AND FOLLY
by Hillel Frisch

  We have been trained to think of the different terror groups in the Middle East as deadly rivals — almost like competing football teams. So it is hard for westerners to realize how often supposedly incompatible groups of terrorists can come together for specific, if temporary, advantages. In this essay Hillel Frisch discusses the stages that have led to the current alliance between the leaders of the rogue state, Iran, and Hamas, the leaders of the pseudo state, the Palestinian Authority.
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THE GROWING HAMAS-AL QAEDA CONNECTION
by Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi

  Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi notes that "Al-Qaeda generally thrives wherever central authority of governments is collapsing ..." a condition that describes the internecine fighting among the Arabs in Gaza. Al-Qaeda started moving into Gaza when Israel foolishly expelled the Gazan Jews in 2005 and it is now accelerating its advance into Gaza, which has become a full-blown international training camp for terrorists. With the connivance of Hamas, "al-Qaeda related groups in Gaza appeared to have become involved in military operations and were not just propagating their religious worldview alone."
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UNRAVELING AL-QA`IDA'S TARGET SELECTION CALCULUS
by Sammy Salama and David Wheeler

  This is a very scary article, made the more so by the calm and systematic way that Sammy Salama and David Wheeler produce evidence for their thesis: "In sum, al-Qa`ida's target selection is neither arbitrary nor impulsive. Continuing examination of al-Qa`ida's primary literature and operational manuals reveals that their target selection calculus is governed by a sinister desire to bring down the economy of the United States and other western powers."
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As in the Passover seder, we could exclaim, "it is enough!" .. it is enough that the tiny country of Israel is set in a sea of actively hostile Arabs, Arabs with money and no respect for human life. But Israel has other problems, many of them internal. This set of essays presents a general picture of what else Israel is up against — from Israeli anti-Israel ideologs to global Arab-sponsored anti-semitism. The mishmash of denying the Arab threat and bombastic meaningless proclamations of strength do not bode well for the Jewish state.

CRY HAVOC
by Patricia Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn writes of the difficulties Israel now faces, in addition to its vacuous leadership. Externally, there is hostility from the mainstream media, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the United Nations and university academics. Add to this the pretend support, the watered down support and the non-support by America in contrast to the unwavering partisanship of the European Union for the Palestinian Arabs. Internally, "[f]or the first time since 1948, Israeli territory is the site of battle, and civilians the victims..."; and "Arab citizens of Israel are openly on the side of the enemy." As Berlyn's final quotations put it, it is not a time for Israelis to be tired as Olmert declares it to be; it is a time to be strong and of good courage, as Joshua urged.
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DEMOCRACY AND MEDIA MANIPULATION
by Jonathan Rosenblum

  Jonathan Rosenblum discusses a specific example of a problem that has serious implications not just for Israel but for any democracy: what happens if the members of its press choose not to be impartial but allow their own prejudices to monopolize not just the opinion columns but ordinary news items? He points out that because the Israeli press played down Hizbullah's missile build-up in southern Lebanon "the quality of national decision-making has been profoundly affected for the worse by our mobilized press." The Israeli press corps, rather than being embarrassed, was urged "to show courage in exercising their power to 'determine the daily agenda.'" Rosenblum extends the analysis to members of the Israeli judiciary, an activist group, that "view their positions as granting them the right to determine all public norms."
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DELUSION OF DESALINATION
by Martin Sherman

  This is the latest in the important series of articles Martin Sherman has been writing on how important it is that Israel's water supply not be dependent on Arab goodwill — which it would be should the Olmert government succeed in giving the Arabs control of Samaria and Judea (The West Bank) and the Golan. The Government has claimed that Israel's water problems have been solved by desalination, disregarding that desalination does not extract some serious impurities and that the Palestinian Arabs have mucked up any water supply they've controlled. Moreover, the sole desalination plant in Ashkelon is within range of Arab missiles and, even fully functional, is inadequate without the water sources the Israeli government is trying to relinquish to the Arabs. (To read a companion article, "Water in Israel: the Dry Facts", click here). To read a sister article by Aubrey Wulfsohn — click here.)
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JEWISH DIVIDE OVER ISRAEL
by Steven Plaut

  You'd think that by now it'd be a commonplace fact that yes there are such things as self-hating Jews, and they project their loathing on all things Jewish. Steven Plaut has spent much of his time battling those self-haters in academia who do so much harm by warping the thinking of the young and impressionable. But it looks like he still has his work cut out for him. Here his context is the superb book by Edward Alexander and Paul Bogdanor that deals with the problem of Jewish self-hatred which manifests itself in an excessive if not pathological hatred of Israel and/or as a striving for acceptance in the outside community.
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HOW ISRAEL BUNGLED THE SECOND LEBANON WAR
by Efraim Inbar

  Time and again, we come back to the importance of the Second Lebanon War. It destroyed Israel's enemies belief in Israel's invincibility. It solved no regional problems. It encouraged the American government to believe Israel didn't need to be treated with respect. And all these effects need not have happened. Efraim Inbar suggests the mistakes may be correctable. He writes, "With adequate preparation, Jerusalem might attain a clear victory in the next round, which, however unfortunate, the outcome of the 2006 war makes inevitable."
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THE ART OF DYING THROUGH WORDS
by Emanuel A. Winston

  War once meant each side fought to win, to destroy the resources and the capability of the other side to strike back. War now, Emanuel Winston says, too often means the strong are talked out of using their strength. "Israel, under her current corrupt, inept leadership, was going to show the world how dedicated it was to multi-culturalism and humanity by surgically targeting enemies and thus gain the admiration of Jew-haters the world over. As usual, it didn't work and the terrorists were encouraged to greater acts of terror." "'Peace' is a non-word among Muslims — except for the confusion it brings to their more civilized enemies." Winston reaches the grim conclusion that "[w]hen Israel next goes to war against Islamists, there should be NO self-restraint!" Israel will have to "follow the rules of war as conducted by the Muslim Arabs."
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HOW THE EUROPEAN UNION'S ATTITUDE TOWARD ISRAEL EVOLVED
by Efraim Halevy

  Efraim Halevy provides us with an excellent summary of the persistence of the European Union's attitude of blaming Israel first, last and always. He recalls "... the Europeans — the parliament and the commission — ... applied double standards to Israel. Toward us they were moralizing. When it came to the Palestinians as far as finance and politics were concerned, they were 'very understanding...'"
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SAUDI ARABIA'S EXPORT OF RADICAL ISLAM
by Adrian Morgan

  The recent surge of anti-semitism didn't just happen. It isn't an epidemic that cyclically recurs. Jew hate is a major weapon in instilling hate in a growing cadre of terrorists dedicated to inflicting a severe form of Islam on the world. Their recruitment and training has been paid for by Saudi Arabia, which has built mosques and schools in many foreign countries to develop disciples of Wahhabism. Their ambition is to put the world under shari'a law, with Muslims dominant, all other groups subservient.
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JEWS OF DENIAL
by Saul Goldman

  Jews, especially Israeli Jews, suffer from the intensification of anti-Semitism from various sources including the local terror organizations, Iran and foreign terror front organizations such as CAIR. However, as Saul Goldman points out, Israelis, like Americans, have grown soft and comfortable, "...unwilling to endure the hardships and sacrifice of maintaining the kind of vigil that secures their liberty." Instead they have reacted to the genuine threat to their state and their own lives by using all sorts of psychological maneuvers to lessen the fear and the pain of a possible future. To add to the problem, diapora Jews are repeating their pre-Holocaust behavior — they are silent.
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These next articles examine what Israel must do to confront its problems. Seeing the Palestinians as terrorists and not as a "peace partners" or as friendly neighbors is a start. It must also stop surrending its land — giving up its ancestral land creates consequences that make problems that arise from holding on to the land under any circumstance seem trivial. And most assuredly, Israel needs a leader, and not a recycled hack that has already done Israel harm by surrendering its integrity for the sake of a meaningless and very temporary peace.

NO MORE LAND FOR WAR IN ISRAEL
by Richard Baehr

  Money to Gaza for humanitarian reasons ends up being used for weapons and aiding terrorist activities by "all the radical groups housed there — Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas." Moreover, as Richard Baehr suggests, "There is much more risk of the West Bank eventually succumbing to Hamas, than of Gaza being restored to Fatah." And that would bring Hamas into range of Israel's major cities. That being the case, both "... the so-called two state solution of Israel and Palestine (living side by side in peace and security, a phrase that always goes with this formulation); and the single bi-national state of Israel/Palestine (the post-apartheid South African reconciliation solution) pushed by many pro-Palestinian advocates," "... have suffered probably fatal blows .." Different approaches are necessary.
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THE SHOCK OF SURRENDER
by Elyakim Haetzni

  This is a thoughtful article by Elyakim Haetzni that examines Israel's post-Oslo rush to surrender the land at the core of Judaism, the land manifestly Jewish since Biblical times. He explores the new ideology that "calls for retreat from the heart of Zion." He asks, "Once the ideological spark embodied in 'the hope of 2,000 years to be a free nation, in the land of Zion, Jerusalem' is extinguished, what importance or relevance will remain to security, economy, demography, or even morality towards the Arabs?" He explores whether the state of Israel can give up the land of Israel. This is an important document.
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THE NATURE OF A LEADER: THE NATURAL IS AS ASTOUNDING AS THE SUPERNATURAL
by Rabbi Lazer Gurkow

  These days we are witnessing Israel recycle leaders and administrators as if they hoped this time things will be different and these men will really lead and show backbone — even if they never have before. In contrast, Rabbi Lazer Gurkow has written a remarkable essay on the characteristics of a leader, a Jewish leader ...
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A major problem in confronting reality are the false illusions of peace and hope that help people ignore the frightening truth. Israel has been a sucker for anything that pretends to be peace. Israelis have tried believing there was something they could do that would turn the Arabs towards a real peace. They even gave the Saudi peace plan consideration. And worst of all, they are letting America persuade them that peace with Palestinian Arabs having a civil war to decide who gets to run the war against Israel is still possible. Actually, 'when all else fails squeeze Israel' has been a reliable recipe to avoid embarrassment for American presidents since Israel was created. Your foreign policy is failing? Not to worry. Apply a little pressure and you can rely on Israel's cooperation to help you show at least one success, temporary though it may be. Right now, the Iraq war is in deep trouble, so the Bush Administration, together with many otherwise sensible politicians, ignores reality and hopes to spin Abbas straw into an Arab-Israeli peace process. It has no chance of working but think what photo opportunities it offers.

THE "THEN MAYBE THEY WILL" DOCTRINE
by Steven Plaut

  Whether this be doctrine or brilliant description, Steven Plaut has in a few telling phrases identified the nonsensical "reasoning" – actually delusional hope — that has sapped Israel's strength and weakened her resolve to fight those who would destroy her.
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LIES OF THE LEFT
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman points out that the Israeli Left has had no unease about putting out contradictory spins as one after another of their political ideas has proven wrong. As an example, first they argued Israel could withdraw from the Territories because it was strong enough to risk it. When events demonstrated that Israel gained no benefit from taking this risk, they then said Israel should continue withdrawing because she was too weak to take the risk of keeping the land. "However in spite of the manifest bankruptcy of the Left's political prescription," the Right has never called them on these errors. "... the jury is still out on what it will condemn more severely: The inexcusable sins of commission of the Left, or the inexplicable sins of omission of the Right."
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ARABIAN DELUSIONS
by Zalman Shoval

  One would think it was election time in the Middle East, what with the ballyhoo about the peace plan the Saudis and sundry other Arab leaders claimed to be offering Israel. Zalman Shoval points out that it was nothing of the sort. The Saudi plan gave Israel an ultimatum that would wipe out Israel — and Israel was to comply before discussions can begin. As Shoval says, "The Arab plan is not about negotiations at all, but about forcing Israel to pay in advance for the privilege of conducting sham negotiations." Nevertheless, so eager was Israel for peace and America to jumpstart the "peace process" that even this "plan" got a serious hearing in Israel and in America.
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DANGEROUS ILLUSIONS:  peace-processing our way to disaster
by Reuel Marc Gerecht

  Reuel Marc Gerecht makes the point that the Washington politcos need to get beyond their conditioning that an Arab-Israeli peace is the keystone to a stable and peaceful Middle East. What they should be doing instead is figuring out how to "deal with rising Islamic radicalism in the Middle East and the threat it poses to the West." Pretending we can negotiate with Iran's mullahs over Iraq and about their nuclear program is equally unrealistic.
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Thanks to some industrial strength propaganda, there is also the problem that the whole world seems to believe the illusion of the moderate Muslim leader. This increases the pressure on Israel to pretend there are reasonable Arabs out there to talk to. Sari Nusseibeh has been acclaimed as a moderate. And, despite his role in the Munich massacre, Mahmoud Abbas has been touted as a moderate from the day he took over the Palestine Authority — maybe taking no action against Arab terrorists unless they threaten him personally is a sign of moderation. But he's been forced to show more of his real nature as the Hamas and Fatah battle. And it isn't moderate.

A PALESTINIAN TWO-STEP
by Efraim Karsh

  In a refreshingly blunt essay, Efraim Karsh takes apart Sari Nusseibeh's pretensions of being a moderate Muslim dedicated to peace between Arabs and Jews and/or a reliable — or even factual — guide to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But best of all, Karsh exposes the unwarrented admiration of Nusseibeh by Jews such as Leon Wieseltier and Amos Oz. They occasionally take note of Nusseibeh's outrageous language in his unrelenting attempts to delegitimize Israel, but that doesn't temper their praise of the man.
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OUR TERRORISTS ARE BETTER THAN YOUR TERRORISTS
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  Like Diogenes looking for an honest man, President Bush and his gofer Condoleezza Rice, continue to look for a Palestinian group they can trust to maintain a low terror profile long enough to put them in charge of a newly minted Palestinian state. It appears they have pinned their hopes on Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Fatah terrorists and Yasser Arafat's heir. As Andrew C. McCarthy points out, however, Abbas and Fatah are no more desirous of peace than is Hamas; they are not secular moderates; and they are better at running terrorist forays into Israel than governing the local Arabs.
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AMERICA'S MIDDLE EAST DELUSIONS
by Mark Silverberg

  The administration is backing the terrorist Abbas, head of Fatah in Gaza, believing him to be the lesser of two evils — the good terrorist, a man reasonable enough to accept a Palestinian state, even if it means he has to stop harassing Israel for a bit of time. Mark Silverberg argues that "[t]he problem with the concept of the lesser of two evils is that, in the end, evil still triumphs."
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A subject that doesn't receive its fair share of concern is the subjugation of Arab women. Given their ideology, western feminist groups should be demanding reforms to alleviate the condition of women in the Arab world. Instead, they avoid the subject or pretend that Arab women are content with their lives. Perhaps they believe that making suicide bombing a unisex activity is liberating.

STILL TRUE: ARAB MEN TREAT THEIR FARM ANIMALS BETTER THAN THEIR WOMEN
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck reviews the condition of women in Muslim countries to determine whether there's been major changes over the last few years. Her conclusion? Women are still humiliated and mistreated. The superiority of the male is still dogma. She puts it so well — "we laugh and talk about living a 'dog's life.' Women complain that they can't get their husbands to carry out the garbage. I think the majority of Arab women would trade places in a heartbeat with an American poodle. Over there, they are the garbage."
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THE SUBJECTION OF ISLAMIC WOMEN AND THE FECKLESSNESS OF AMERICAN FEMINISM
by Christina Hoff Sommers

  Christina Hoff Sommers points out that the indignities suffered by Arab women – lashings, stonings, honor killings — are public knowledge. Why then have American feminists not made the treatment of Arab women a cause? Why haven't they, with few exceptions, organized protests? Aside from the facts the article presents, it serves as a cameo of what happens when an institution sacrifices its ideology for the sake of politics. As Sommers explains, "The reasons are rooted in the worldview of the women who shape the concerns and activities of contemporary American feminism. That worldview is — by tendency and sometimes emphatically — antagonistic toward the United States, agnostic about marriage and family, hostile to traditional religion, and wary of femininity. The contrast with Islamic feminism could hardly be greater."
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GENDER, PALESTINIAN WOMEN, AND TERRORISM: WOMEN'S LIBERATION OR OPPRESSION?
by Anat Berko and Edna Erez

  One of the best indicators that we don't yet have a vocabulary and a framework to describe this odd war the Islamists are waging against Israel and the west is that we don't even know how to describe the relatively recent emergence of the woman terrorist. As Anat Berko and Edna Erez write: is this a sign of women's liberation or oppression? They conducted in-depth interviews with Arab women in Israeli prisons for terrorist activities. Several women felt it was liberating (and women suiciders have been officially memorialized), but usually the women were not praised. On the contrary, they were condemned for violating their traditional role — woman are not supposed to participate in the public domain.
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Another false belief that is propagated is that Islam is a peaceful and tolerant religion. These next essays discuss basic Islamic beliefs and attitudes.

THE GRAND DELUSION: ISLAM
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani provides us insight into the character of Islam as it was formed during Mohammed's lifetime. "Islam is rooted in the primitive tribal mentality of "We against Them, ... a non-Muslim is a combatant against Allah and he is fair game to be subjugated and killed." It is not surprising that so many Muslims are willing to sacrifice themselves to the fight against evil, given that they firmly believe that "the troubles of the world are due to the evil-doings of the non-Muslims who war against Allah." A delusion, true, but one that is easy to instill, given the Muslim belief system. Imani suggests that "[m]any non-Muslims are also victims of a different, yet just as deadly, delusion. They believe that Islam is a religion of peace, that only a small minority of Muslims are jihadists, and Muslims can be reasoned with to abandon the Quran-mandated elimination of the non-believers."
 READ MORE
 

RADICAL ISLAM'S "END-GAME"
by Frank Salvato

  Superficially, the situations in Iraq and Gaza appear different, and the justifications for terrorist activity in the two areas are indeed different. But actually they are instantiations of the original conflict between Sunni and Shi'ite about the succession to the Caliph after Mohammed's death. What both sides have in common is the aspiration to establish a "global Islamic state ... ruled under Sharia Law." Their quarrel is about which side will dominate in the wished-for Islamic state, not the end goal.
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THE MUSLIM MAINSTREAM AND THE NEW CALIPHATE
by Andrew G. Bostom

  >From the time of the earliest Caliphate, Islam's goal has been global conquest, with everyone subject to Muslim law. This goal has never been renounced. It is accepted by "mainstream Muslims from Morocco to Indonesia..." according to a recent reputable poll. More to the point, it continues to determine how Muslims treat Christians and other minorities where they are in power. The "... consequence of this guiding principle [is] a legacy of harsh inequality, intolerance, and injustice ...," not the benign tolerance Muslims claim Islam extends to other religions. Andrew Bostom makes us understand how deeply rooted is the Muslim attitude of superiority by providing examples from the different caliphates and from today's Islamic societies. He concludes, "The openly expressed desire for the restoration of a Caliphate from two-thirds of an important Muslim sample of Arab and non-Arab Islamic nations, representative of Muslims worldwide, should serve as a chilling wake-up call to those still in denial about the existential threat posed by the living, uniquely Islamic institution of jihad."
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THE ANATOMY OF ISLAMIC ESPIONAGE AND SABOTAGE
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Dr. Babu Suseelan writes, "The most prominent characteristic of Islam is its eternal Jihad war." And that has been the case since Islam began. To further jihad, lying and deceit are encouraged. "Muslims blandly assert that Islam is peace, despite the fact that "[d]uring the past 1,200 years, Islam has slaughtered over 100 million infidels." While their goal of imposing Muslim rule is fixed, their methods of infiltrating democratic countries are often subtle, and they will characterize Islam in whatever terms the listener group values. Suseelan concludes that "[t]he time has come for a decisive action. It is time to abandon for good all illusions about Islam."
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Considering how brilliantly the Arabs and their supporters have peddled the story that they are the indigenous people of Palestine – with no rebuttal from Peres-controlled official Israel — it is understandable that so many people believe an ahistoric account of a Palestinian people whose land is occupied by foreigners and their sacred city, Jerusalem, desecrated by these Jews.

QUESTIONS REASONABLE PEOPLE ASK ABOUT ISRAEL AND YESHA
by Yechiel Leiter

  Yechial Leiter does an excellent job explaining why Israel and Yesha (Samaria, Judea, Gaza and the Golan) belong to the Jewish people by history, by religion, by unbroken affiliation, by international law and by conquest. By the same token, he explains why this land does not belong to the Palestinian people. Part of the explanation is that there is no Palestinian people, there never was a Palestinian nation and there never was a state of Palestine. Among the errors he corrects is the notion that the correct name for the land on the western bank of the Jordan is the West Bank, suggesting that the Jews who call it Samaria and Judea recently invented these names. The opposite is true — the area was called Samaria and Judea from biblical times until Jordan named it the West Bank when it invaded Israel in 1948.
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FABRICATING AN EMOTION
by Shmuel Katz

  Shmuel Katz has been — and is — both actor in and observer of the development of the state of Israel. He has a deep understanding of the Jewish character and the Arab character. In this essay, he writes how the Arab ability to create facts effortlessly out of whole cloth and then to synthesize a deep passion because he believes these "facts" explains the current surge of devotion to Jerusalem in the Arab world, an attachment unknown in previous centuries.
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Not surprisingly, it is people directly in the war zone — such as the people of S'derot, who must constantly run from Kassam missiles – that see the problem realistically. We in America are also living in a war zone, but the attacks have been widely spaced and, with the exception of 911, haven't really registered.

SDEROT: GRANDCHILDREN UNDER FIRE
by Rachel Saperstein

  When the Jews were in Gaza, they were the ones that took the major brunt of Arab missiles, lobbed by their not-so-friendly neighbors. And they took the major brunt of Arab missiles. When the Arab terrorists were given free rein in Gaza, Sderot became the war front. In this issue, we follow the intrepid Sapersteins as they involve themselves in the destiny of the Jews of Sderot.
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HOW KASSAM ROCKETS WORK
by Marshall Brain

  In the previous article, Rachel Saperstein describes how the Kassam rockets have terrorized the citizens of S'derot. They are lobbed from Gaza; they are made in Gaza. Qassam rocket manufacture is the type of product the Palestinians do best — it requires little skill and simple materials. Labor costs are low — the Gaza Arabs are a dedicated labor force — and their time doesn't count. Marshall Brain describes what goes into assembling a rocket. As Saperstein wrote, what is horrible and ironic is that Israel continues to supply electricity to Gaza, and the cylinders for the rockets are the pipes stripped from the Gush Katif hothouses that American Jews gave as a gift to the Arabs when the Jews were expelled.
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ISLAMISTS THREATS IN THE U.S.
by Amil Imani

  Amil Imani describes some of the opening shots of the war Muslims are beginning to wage in and against America in a campaign some call "mild islamism". We have Muslim cab drivers who won't transport passengers carrying alcohol while Muslim workers in the factories, muslim students in the universities and Muslim prisoners in jail demand special treatment. Muslims feel free to "defend Islam" in disruptive fashion and they, not America's legal system, decide what is offensive. Imani points out that "[e]scalation of demands, intolerance of differences, and contempt for the non-Muslims are hallmarks of Islam. The deluded leftists as well as the publishers of the left are destined to be among the very first victims of the mild Islamism as it gathers power."
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JIHADIS ENCOURAGE LONE ACTS OF TERRORISM
by Abdul Hameed Bakier

  Abdul Hammed Bakier writes about an internet website that encourages people to carry out acts of terror around the globe. Many of the terror events cited were carried out by individuals or small groups. The blogger encourages others to get involved, to target Iraqi nationals and government representatives in particular. He favors "asassinations and attacking congregations of people in hotels, embassies and conference gatherings." We note that America has already had a series of such attacks. The FBI has treated each such incident as an isolated hate crime. What sort of picture would they construct were they to connect the dots?
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These essays examine whether Islam and democracy are compatible.

AMERICA'S NEO-TURCOPHILES: DANGEROUS ILLUSIONS ABOUT TURKEY, ISLAM, AND THE EUROPEAN UNION
by Barbara Lerner

  Barbara Lerner writes of a group hacking away specifically at Turkey, a Muslim country that has spent more capital in coming into the 21st century than in trying to push the rest of us into the 7th century. Now their secular society is at risk because the AKP, an Islamist party, might well win the next election. What is pathetic is that the AKP — which is said to be modeled on "the Muslim equivalent of a socially conservative Christian Democrat party in Western Europe" – is supported by the neo-turcophiles, a group of Americans, "foreigners who claim to believe that by supporting the AKP, they are supporting Turkish democracy." They are very mistaken. Lerner spells out why very simply, very clearly.
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CAN THERE BE AN ISLAMIC DEMOCRACY?
by David Bukay

  For whatever reasons, there have been wild and unsupported claims that Islam and democracy are compatible; some even argue that Islam encourages democracy. David Bukay points out that the scholars such as John Esposito — he is to Islam what Walter Duranty was to the Soviets – who make these claims must either twist the definition of democracy or airbrush life in Muslim countries. Ironically, Islamists are the one group that firmly dismisses this dishonest claim of compatibility. Unfortunately, that doesn't deter the westerners who promote the notion that normative Islam is democratic.
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IS ISLAM COMPATIBLE WITH DEMOCRACY?
by Fjordman

  Fjordman is a thoughtful and original examiner of Islam and its impact on other cultures. His masterful essays are clear and understandable. This essay is a basic document that is an extensive exploration of both Islam and Western democracy. It examines both critically and says much about both. Fjordman discusses why Islamic Sharia law is fundamentally incompatible with "Western ideas of freedom of conscience and of speech." But, as he points out, neither is the European Union democratic.
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These next articles discuss some groups that are usually to be found in the pro-Arab corner. These are civilian groups — theoretically independent of Arab affiliation — that exhibit strong hostility towards Israel.

A CALL FOR DIVESTMENT
by Steven Plaut

  The perfect spoof? It feels so right you don't even question it. And it fits with what you know. Just because this essay by Steven Plaut came out a short while after the Brits found the perfect weapon to fight off takeover by the Muslims — to wit, shunning Israeli academics — is no reason to think this isn't authentic. Is it?
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BRITISH ANTI-ZIONISM THEN AND NOW
by Rory Miller

  Dame Ruth Deech, then principal of an Oxford college, said of an academic boycott of Israel in 2003, "Sadly, it's almost as if anti-Semitism has been repressed and not respectable for the last 50 years and that effect has worn off. Israel has provided a pretext for people with that sort of feeling." Rory Miller tells us how anti-Semitism manifested itself in England before awareness of the Holocaust silenced tongues — and how similar it is now.
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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL (AI) REPORT FOR 2006
by NGO Monitor

  The NGO Monitor group did a careful statistical examination of AI's publications and showed conclusively that AI had an almost morbid fascination with Israel. As this report demonstrates, "Amnesty singled out Israel for condemnation to a far greater extent than Iran, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Syria, Egypt, and other chronic abusers of human rights. This evidence of a clear political agenda is consistent with other studies and examples of Amnesty International's bias and lack of credibility." Does this affect how we will view AI's publications in the future? Yes, it will. Knowing that AI has been convicted of prejudice in one area, we will find it hard to trust them in areas where they might actually be neutral. There's no way to know.
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HOW TO RATIONALIZE AN ISLAMIST DICTATORSHIP
by Barry Rubin

  Many of articles written by the mainstream media are anti-Israel. Others devote themselves to whitewashing the Arab terrorists, excusing the reprehensible, making the grotesque behavior of the terrorists appear almost benign. In this essay, Barry Rubin dissects one such article. What makes this essay of particular interest are his glosses. Professor Rubin's remarks help us recognize just how inane, how superficial and off-the-point, the AP article is.
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Alternative solutions to Palestinian-Israeli hostility.

OSLO-GENEVA ROADMAP ALTERNATIVES: THE RIGHT APPROACH
by Shmuel Neumann, Ph.D. and Professor Ya'akov Peretz Golbert, J.D.

  A half century ago, the notion of maintaining a Jewish state by transferring out Arabs who had no loyalty or desire to live under Jews was taboo. Jews and Christians are supposed to be dhimmis (2nd class citizenship, not Muslims. Even though the Jews were chased out of Arab countries in the 1940s, the idea of completing the population exchange was tainted by association with the demonized Rabbi Meir Kahane. The idea picked up acceptability when the Sharon-Olmert government expelled Jews from their homes. Transfer gained acceptance as it became increasingly clear that the Arabs under the Palestinian Authority were working to develop missiles and explosives, not the infrastructure for a state. Right now, we appear to be in the stage where almost all Israelis want separation with the Arabs. But only a few are brave enough to voice the obvious — Israel is too tiny to have another Palestinian state on its land, particularly when the Arabs own 99.9% of the Middle East. Some have begun to speak out that Transfer of the Arabs to someplace in the vastness of ArabLand is the only logical and humane solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Many more are in agreement but too timid to voice this publically. Yet this is what needs to be done: we should be asking openly how to implement transfer, not moaning that they won't like it. This article by Dr. Shmuel Neumann and Professor Ya'akov Peretz Golbert is the latest of a series of articles we have presented on how to implement transfer.
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MK BENNY ELON: 'WE MUST COMBINE ACTIVISM WITH FAITH'
interview conducted by Ruthie Blum

  Mr Elon's vocabulary doesn't seem to contain any weasel words. In this interview, he explains his peace plan, which is different than the usual ones proposed by the diplomats and politicians in that it may actually have a chance of succeeding. He suggests both for Israel's security and for humanitarian reasons that Arab refugees be released from the refugee camps and given 'dowries' to set them up in a new life. He also suggests that there be "regional cooperation with Egypt and Jordan, with the latter becoming the state that has functional sovereignty over the Palestinians."
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History — The Six Day War

PRELUDE TO THE SIX DAYS
by Charles Krauthammer

  Charles Krauthammer's article on the events just before the beginning of the 6-day war gives us insight into why Israel is reluctant to jump into yet another "peace plan". As he says, "They remember the terror of that unbearable May when, with Israel possessing no occupied territories whatsoever, the entire Arab world was furiously preparing Israel's imminent extinction. And the world did nothing." (Sort of like the situation we've in now with Iran.)
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ISRAEL'S TRIUMPH
by Fouad Ajami

  On the 40th anniversary of the 1967 Six-Day War, Fouad Ajami reviews events that led to the war and some of the war's major consequences. Taken-for-granted institutions and ideas would need reassessment by both Arabs and Jews. In the Arab world, "[w]hat lay mortally wounded was the myth of secular Arab nationalism." The Jews, in avoiding destruction and winning the war, had acquired Biblical Israel. As Ajami puts it, "Israel's secularism would now have to duel with the religious pull of these new territories." What stayed the same was the Arab refusal to accept Israel as a state and as a people in the Middle East.
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THE SIX DAY WAR — AMERICAN JEWISH PERSPECTIVE: Jewry Transformed
by Judith Apter Klinghoffer

  Judith Apter Klinghoffer's essay is double-edged. It is history written with immediacy. It is also a wonderful description of how American Jewish leaders behaved at a time that Israel had immediate need of American equipment and American moral support. Egypt had belligerently closed the Straits of Tiran; President Eisenhower had promised that should this happen, America would quickly respond. But now America was itself embroiled in a war with North Vietnam — and the Vietnam war became part of the filter through which the Middle East conflict was viewed. Some Jewish leaders were self-conscious, diffident, fearful of being accused of dual loyalty; some put their own politics and prestige first; some put Presidential politics well ahead of Israel's needs. With the concurrence/initiative of some of these leaders, Israel was prevented from preemptive action and that would cost her dearly. In short, the Jewish leadership behaved as it usually does. It was the ordinary Jews that rallied and showed the passion and dedication that was needed.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
June 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


March-April, 2007

Let's begin with what's hard to come by in the Main Stream Media – some simple geographical and historical truths. The American government — or maybe it's just the State Department pretending it has a mandate from the elected officials — is cooperating in staging a gigantic farce. To please the Middle East kinglets, sheiklets and secular psychopaths, it is pretending that the Palestinians want a state of their own. Their dream is that if they can persuade Israel to make bricks from the pile of straw that is the Palestinian admistrative structure, there will be a Palestinian state of sorts, there will be a short period of peace, and — they're not really so dumb — during the quiet time, with Arab help, the Americans can leave the Iraqi morass with dignity. Of course, Israel might be destroyed in the interim — but they figure you can't have everything. Therefore, we believe the facts of importance at the moment are those that negate the nonsense the Arabs have been peddling: that there exists a Palestinian people, who have always inhabited a land called Palestine. In the recent past, their land was invaded by some foreigner Jews; and if only the Jews would leave, all would be well in the Middle East.

How many of these statements are true? Zero. What is more interesting, while more and more people understand there's no such thing as a Palestinian people, almost no one doubts that the Arabs are the primitive owners of the Middle East. Read the next two articles.

FOGBOUND
by Patricia Berlyn

  Using the effects of fog on visibility as metaphor, Patricia Berlyn writes how smudging reality has affected political perceptions "about Israel, its Arab foes, 'Palestine,' the Middle East, and Islamist Jihad." The sprayers of mist include those rewarded financially by the Saudis as well as ambitious careerists such as Sec-of-State Rice. The result is a set of foggy delusions stemming from the assertion that the Palestine-Israel conflict is at the heart of the troubles in the Middle East. It follows that the region would magically become civilized, if Israel vacates the territories, but continues to supply the local Arabs with food, utilities and medical services — while ignoring their continued terrorist attacks on her, of course. In other words, in this damp fog, the politicians can claim that a Palestinian State carved out of a chopped-up Israel will solve everything, while acknowledging that Arab terrorism will continue both in Israel and elsewhere — a sign that nothing has been solved. Friends of Israel can help clear the fog by disseminating a cold hard fact: the "Palestinians" don't want their own state; they want to loot a defeated Israel.
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THE ORIGIN AND IDENTITY OF THE ARABS
by Avraham Sándor

  Have you ever wondered how Arabs can consider themselves children of Abraham, when Ishmael was the son of a Jew and an Egyptian and he married an Egyptian, while the Arabs were still stuck in the Arabian desert? Have you ever suspected the angel Gabriel may have had Alzheimer's Disease, given that, while instructing Mohammed in sacred history, he confounded Miriam, sister of Moses, and Miriam, mother of Jesus? In this essay, Avraham Sándor carefully teases out the family threads that weave together the people of the Middle East and presents us with some facts on which we can rely and some current myths we should ignore.
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The next set of essays are about the problems Israel faces as a Jewish state set in the midst of hostile Arab neighbors. But the emphasis is on what it might take for Israel to show mature responsibility for its own destiny.

SYMPOSIUM: ISRAEL'S TEST
by Jamie Glazov

  Jamie Glazov asked a group of knowledgeable experts: what threats is Israel currently facing? Will Israel be able to handle them? She faces an integrated military buildup by the neighboring Arab countries acting through trans-national terrorist groups as well as an announced nuclear threat from Iran. In addition to these external threats, the Israeli Arab community has become increasingly radicalized. David Hornik and Kenneth Levin point out another major problem. As Hornik puts it, Israel has "dangerous tendencies to delusion, wishful thinking, and appeasement that have been encouraged by its mostly incompetent leaders since 1992." Rael Isaac speaks of a delusion and its consequences: "In Israel it was long thought that the pursuit of peace was a stroke of tactical brilliance... Israel proved to the world that it was the 'good guy,' willing to make major sacrifices while the Arabs refused all compromise ... the pursuit of peace has been catastrophic for Israel." Caroline Glick notes that like it or not, "Israel is a central front — if not the central front — in the global jihad," yet the Israeli elite continues to see the war against Israel as separate from Islam's global jihad. Clearly, strong leadership is needed, yet, as David Keyes notes, "It is nearly axiomatic that anyone elected Prime Minister of Israel will go on to break many of his or her most ardent election promises...What ... Israel needs is a Prime Minister who will return to the basics." Amen.
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DO THE JEWS WANT A STATE?
by Devin Sper and Sivan Raine

  Israelis have worked tirelessly and have created an outstanding state. But they haven't yet acquired the confidence to handle power and the responsibility that comes with power. Despite their rights to their land, they are afraid to assert these rights to avoid external criticism. Israel projects uncertainty about her borders and her capital; she has allowed her citizens to be slaughtered. Devin Sper and Sivan Raine asks the critical question: "Are we ready for a Jewish state together with all the responsibilities that come with it, or do we prefer to return to the absolute moral purity of powerlessness?"
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AS OSLO PLAYS OUT
by Eliyakim Haetzni

  Israel has not taken charge of its own destiny. In these two essays Eliyakim Haetzni discusses the consequences of Israel's leaders willfully ignoring the beginnings of the first local intifada and sloughing off later necessary but increasingly difficult action. The first essay is the leadup to Oslo and the consequent deterioration in Israel's position — because Israeli officials were not willing to deal properly with the increasing ominous situation or were playing politics. The second essay points out that the Israeli leadership, buttressed by Jewish media and academics, is mortgaging Israel's future with their still incompetent approach to their now critical position. As Elyakim Haetzni writes, "Should the current decline continue, Israel will cease to exist."
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A PASSOVER STORY
by Steven Plaut

  Steve Plaut makes some important points, using the parable of a hobo, who, unfamiliar with the Passover seder, didn't appreciate the meager bits of food that are the props for the ritual reenactment of the Passover story. He left before the real feasting began. By the early 1990s, Israel had suppressed the first intifada, and "was on the verge of entering the most wonderful, prosperous and liberated period of its existence". But it didn't have the patience to wait just a little longer. Instead, the Israeli government, aided by academics and the media, was willing to do almost anything to persuade the enemy to make peace. It put the hope of a peace treaty above the safety of its citizenry and the integrity of the state. It was a bad choice.
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WHO IS THE REAL CRIMINAL? An Open Letter To An Israeli Friend
by Ehud Tokatly

  In the hope of dampening foreign antagonism, Israel revamped the IDF's mission to the point that the family of a terrorist who helps him in his 'work' can expect to receive much more protection from the IDF than the Geneva Conventions afford them. Israel has shown itself to be a patsy. So it's not surprising that so many anti-Israeli elements are taking advantage of Israel's perceived weakness — they are having a lively time accusing the IDF of all sorts of war crimes. This is ironic, given how moral and law-abiding the IDF actually is. But it is not surprising. When the Israeli government gave appeasement of its enemies its highest priority, it inadvertently showed the radical Islamist leaders a weakness they could exploit. Ehud Tokatly suggests that what we are seeing in all these accusations against the army is an attempt to "defeat the Jewish State through spiritual persecution," by besmirching important Jewish institutions. "Criminalizing the Jewish State is the only way of achieving a truly final solution of the Jewish problem."
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THE COMING WAR WITH ISLAM
by Solly Ganor

  Solly Ganor urges us to stop Islamic aggression before it becomes strong. He recounts a conversation he had with an Israeli Christian Arab, whose family had lived in Bethleham since Crusader times and had recently been forced out by the Moslems. Francis, the Christian Arab, blamed Israel's not defeating Hezbollah last summer and the Americans for bungling the war in Iraq for the resurgence of Moslem confidence that they can defeat not just Israel but the West. He pointed out that the Moslems use the internet and madrasses to educate hundreds of thousands of children to become martyrs for Allah and are themselves ready to die in the thousands for their convictions. "Now is the time to stop them, not only because they are developing nuclear bombs, but because Iran has become the base for all Islamic terrorists." Ganor concludes "that Israel may be on the forefront for the coming war of the West against Islam, unless we ... assassinate the heads of the snake, rather than going to war with Islam."
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UNWORTHY OF TURKEY: Lessons from Iran's Easter parade of British hostages
by Barbara Lerner

  Oded Eran, Israel's ambassador to the European Union (EU), has suggested (Ynet, March 22, 2007) that EU give Turkey limited membership status, circumventing the difficulties in granting full membership. Israel could then push for a similar relationship. Implicit is the belief that even limited membership in the EU is desirable. In this article Barbara Lerner takes a different tack: would membership in the EU be to Turkey's benefit? And, we can ask, by extension, would seeking membership benefit Israel? As a reader of Eran's article succintly put it: "If Israel joined EU it would also join Eurabia."
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CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE OR BLIND COMPLIANCE WITH IMMORAL LAWS?
by Walter Bingham

  Walter Bingham provides an analysis of the Israeli Government, which acted criminally in expelling the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza, from their homes and now jails dissenters who protest future deportation from Samaria and Judea. Peaceful civil disobedience in Amona was countered by police brutality. For want of a legal mechanism to persuade local politicians — in Israel, you vote for the party, not the person — it is now up to the people to continue protest in the streets to change governmental policy.
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Israel's failure to take mature responsibility is taking its toll. At best, Israel wobbles, waffles, and wonders what to do about its incompetent leadership and other internal problems. It certainly isn't taking a hard factual look at what's happening in the local Muslim countries. They, however, have not taken a respite on an issue important to them — do they now have a chance to beat Israel militarily? These next essays discuss some developments inside some Middle East countries — Egypt, Syria and Iran — that suggest Israel must face reality sooner rather than later.

COLD PEACE OR COLD WAR?
by Dr. Steve Carol

  Dr. Steve Carol writes about Egypt's longterm hostility towards Israel, an attitude that the 1979 "peace treaty" between Egypt and Israel did nothing to temper. It brought no change in Egypt's rejectionist attitude towards Israel and it fostered the instability-producing notion that Israel should withdraw "from all other areas claimed by the Arab-Muslim side." Today, Egypt has become a major producer of fanciful anti-Semitic hate literature and it covertly and overtly supports the Arab terrorists. It has been well-equipped by America with sophisticated heavy weaponry; and it makes no secret that it still seeks Israel's destruction. "The situation between Egypt and Israel has been often described by many as a "cold peace." "Cold War" would be a more apt description."
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FROM COLD PEACE TO COLD WAR? THE SIGNIFICANCE OF EGYPT'S MILITARY BUILDUP
by Jeffrey Azarva

  This essay by Jeffrey Azarva continues the theme of the previous essay that the Cold Peace with Egypt is turning into a Cold War. It suggests further that there is evidence — Egypt's overkill in weaponry and military manpower buildup, and its complicity in building weapon transport tunnels into Gaza — that the Cold War may be heating up into a hot one. And if there is a regime change — Mubarak is after all in his late seventies and the Muslim Brotherhood and its offspring gain in strength — Israel may not be able to count on Egypt continuing to weigh soberly the billions it gets from the U.S. against its chances of winning a war against Israel.
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FIGHTING THE NEXT WAR
by Caroline Glick

  Israel's government has ignored Syria's announced plans for waging war on Israel, should Israel refuse to commit suicide by opening her borders to millions of Palestinian "refugees." Some Israelis have proposed negotiation, but negotiating with Syria — as with other Arab countries that don't regard agreements as binding — is pointless. Caroline Glick takes a different tack. She writes, "There is an Israeli strategy for victory. If we conduct a military strike that degrades Syria's ability to harm us while economically weakening the regime still further and politically supporting an oppressed, large, pro-Israel minority, perhaps we could avert war altogether." From her lips...
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WHAT WAS ONCE A REVOLUTIONARY GUARD IS NOW JUST A MAFIA
by Mohsen Sazegara

  The Revolutionary Guard is a mainstay of Mullah power in Iran. Mohsen Sazegara was with the Revolutionary Guard at its inception. He gives us a picture of its development and its current philosophy and structure. This should be useful in assessing the role of the Guard in current Iranian politics.
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THE MYTH OF MODERATE MULLAHS: IT'S STILL KHOMEINI'S IRAN
by Reuel Marc Gerecht

  We — America and Europe — seem to have adapted to Iran's growing nuclear competence. It certainly isn't alarming us enough to take preemptive action, unless perhaps you define ineffectual U.N. resolutions as action. In this well-written and thoughtful article, Reuel Gerecht demolishes the optimistic view that the Mullahs are mellowing, and, if we but show restraint, we might be able to woo them. Iran doesn't want to build bombs to show technical superiority. The ruling Mullahs want to bolster their hold on Iran, so that they can wage holy war. Against us. Moreover, as Gerecht point out, "... a clerical Iran sensing victory in Iraq — victory defined by the withdrawal of U.S. forces — would have no incentive to negotiate on its nuclear-weapons program."
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The initiative for the military buildup in Egypt, Syria and Iran can't be attributed to Israel. Iran and Egypt entertain hopes of becoming kingpin of the region. But Israel can certainly be blamed for the situation in Gaza — this is a problem she brought onto herself. It was clear before she expelled the Jews from Gush Katif that the Arabs would now have an unmonitored and unsupervised area to build an infrastructure for waging war against Israel. And so they have.

To add to Israel's disappointment, she hasn't even achieved separation from the local Arabs. The American Administration has openly said Israel must support the nascent Palestinian State with jobs and medical care, and so forth and so forth. But Israel must do nothing to stop the democratic process in the territories. If the majority of "Palestinian" Arabs want to destroy Israel, it would be wrong for Israel to destroy the democractic process by destroying the terrorists. Put another way: a 4000 year old people must emasculate themselves to make way for a just-invented people. Why must Israel be the brains for the defective Arabs? Because these Arabs do not want to do the hard work of developing the infrastructure that will support a new state. They believe in the old-fashioned way of getting ahead: invade a land, loot it and use the inhabitants as slaves. When the supplies get too low, find another land to invade.

THE PLATFORM OF THE PALESTINIAN NATIONAL UNITY GOVERNMENT
by Reuven Erlich

  The world — and this includes Israel — plays good terrorists (Fatah) and bad terrorists (Hamas). Having a unity government between Hamas and Fatah lets everyone deal with Fatah while pretending Hamas isn't running the show and setting the agenda. The platform of the unity government of Hamas and Fatah is perforce ignored. Read it yourself. Dr Reuven Erlich provides us with an overview and with a reliable translation of the platform.
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THE STRATEGIC CHALLENGE OF GAZA
by Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant

  The Israeli evacuation from Gaza has allowed it to become a major terrorist center. The terrorist government no longer has to be circumspect in obtaining equipment through Egypt. Moreover, they can now truck rockets and other weaponry overland "from Gaza to Sinai and then into Israel's Negev" to carry out suicide bombings, as in Eilat. "Cooperation among Hamas, Iran, Hizballah, and other global terror organizations" means high morale and the ability to utilize outside experts "with military and operational exerience." Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant points out that the Gazan Arabs "were left with natural gas, greenhouses, and fields." "They chose to follow Hamas." "The Palestinians in Gaza are well organized in four brigades: the northern brigade, the Gaza City brigade, the central brigade, and the southern brigade, each with its own commander. They have battalions, companies, and platoons, as well as special forces dealing with sniping, infantry, explosives, and anti-tank weapons." This paper does not make clear why Israel has done nothing to stop the growth and training of an army that has only one objective.
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BROTHERS IN ARMS: FATAH AND PALESTINIAN ISLAMIC JIHAD
by Pinhas Inbari

  The three major terror groups in Gaza — Hamas, Fatah and the Islamic Jihad — are much more united that the West would like to acknowledge. Pinhas Inbari destroys the myth that Fatah is secular and, by implication, moderate and not subject to the need to wage a jihad based in Islam's belief system as are the Islamic Jihadists and Hamas. Inbari points out that "[b]oth Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah were established with deep Fatah involvement." Nothing has changed from the longtime plan of Fatah and Hizbullah "to surround Israel with terror rocket power from all sides." The only modification is that Hamas — which didn't exist when the plan was formed — is now in charge of the plan and Fatah appears to be concentrating on persuading the West to supply the terrorists with money on the grounds that it goes to humanitarian needs.
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IRAN IS BUILDING "HAMASTAN" IN GAZA
by Brig.-Gen. (res.) Shalom Harari

  And it came to pass what so many had feared. Only more so. Israel's leaving Gaza didn't reduce tensions or give the Arabs expanded space to learn self-government. Instead, the people of Gaza democratically voted in Hamas, a terrorist group that doesn't have the grace to pretend it wants peace. The people themselves are perfecting their old skills in bomb making, missile throwing, sniping and kidnapping. And, as Brig-Gen. Shalom Harari tells us, what is worse, Iran is now helping Hamas to develop new skills — anti-tank and anti-aircraft systems to neutralize Israel's ability to enter Gaza, and, while Israel respects the ceasefire, build a Hezbollah-style state in Gaza.
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THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE, GAZA STYLE
by Yuval Hyman

  This article and the next are probably more typical of life in Gaza than the carefully selected bits and pieces of individualized suffering the BBC chooses to show us. The Arabs are organized in extended family units, which take precedence over loyalty to national enterprises — except, apparently, when it comes to killing Israelis and other Westerners. Yuval Hyman writes of one such family, whose successful business enterprise is kidnapping foreign journalists for ransom. Hyman writes, "The Durmoush family, implicated in the abduction of Gilad Shalit, has monopolized the trend in Gaza, with the help of local photographers who assist in the kidnapping of their foreign colleagues who encroach on their territory." Aside from monetary gain, they achieve local prestige and territorial control. Of course, spending time this way isn't the kind of activity that will be useful to a future state — or perhaps kidnapping, murder and terror mayhem are exactly what the Gazan Arabs have in mind for their future.
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GAZA SEWAGE NIGHTMARE
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman has written previously on the danger were Israel to entrust control of its mountain water aquifer by giving up Samaria and Judea to the Palestinian Arabs (To read "Water in Israel: the Dry Facts", click here). A sister article by Aubrey Wulfsohn — click here – noted that the Gazan Arabs had done wildcat drilling of the local wells and had contaminated the drinking water. In this article, Sherman writes of a recent incident where some village Arabs in Gaza sold off the embankment causing a sewage dam to collapse, allowing raw sewage to run into the sea. He notes that "... whether we are talking about malevolent design or malignant neglect, the matter of sewage may turn out to be what one seasoned commentator termed 'The Palestinian Doomsday Weapon.'"
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'YOUR MONEY AND YOUR LIFE'
by Caroline Glick

  What does one do when there is a lot of prestige riding on a course of action that depends on certain conditions being met? And they aren't. Caroline Glick writes about the recent swearing into power of the unity government in the Palestine Authority (PA), consisting of the openly terrorist group, Hamas, and the more underhanded terrorist group, Fatah. The new government's leaders were supposed to sound peaceable. Instead, they asserted that they did not intend to renounce violence and terror. And they insisted that Israel take in anyone and everyone who claimed to be an Arab refugee. What to do? The foreign supporters of the PA — the European Union, the Israeli Left (this includes the current Israeli government), and the American State Department — did the only thing they could do: they ignored what the PA said and substituted their own scripts. How else, I ask you, could they justify pressuring Israel for concessions and funding a terrorist group? After all, given all the PA intends to do contra Israel, it certainly doesn't have the time to develop an economy or built the infrastructure of a state.
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Some of the Middle East countries have linked into unofficial larger entities. The states discussed above — Egypt, Syria, and Iran — are some of the Middle Eastern countries that have joined with other states depending on whether they are Sunni or Shi'ite. These two Middle East groupings are based on a split in interpretation that occured soon after Mohammed died. This description isn't complete. Terrorists groups with supposedly vastly different political philosophies have also banded together in loose confederacies or as a "government" — Hamas and El Fatah are a case in point. To complicate the analysis, states have linkages with terror groups. And sometimes a state such as the Sunni Saudi Arabia will support terror groups that had major adherence to Shi'ite ideology. And Shi'ite Iran has on occasion supported Sunni terror groups, such as Hamas in the Gaza strip.

The next two articles sum up the basic Shi'ite grouping versus the Sunni states amalgam. They were adapted from lectures presented at a GLORIA Center conference entitled "After Lebanon: A New Middle East?"

THE RISING SHI'A CHALLENGE: The Hizballah-Syria-Iran Triangle
by Yaakov Amidror

  Yaakov Amidror examines the physical and ideological linkages between two countries and a terror group, all with loyalty to Shi'ite Islam. The ambition of the Iran-Syria axis isn't just to destroy Israel, or even to end "American influence in the Middle East. Its true purpose is not only to exist within Shi'a society but also to gain power in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and finally ... in Cairo and in Amman." This is more likely to happen if Iran can make use of a nuclear threat to supplement Iran and Syria's terrorist resources. Iran and Syria cooperated in creating and training Hizballah, which has made it possible for them to control Lebanon. Moreover, they have cooperated in running Hamas and the Islamic Jihad inside the Palestinian Authority. Amidror deems it a tragedy that Israel did not hack apart the axis by destroying Hezbollah in the Lebanon war last summer. Iran-Syria's prestige was raised even in Sunni countries — e.g., Saudi Arabia is now holding negotiations with Hizballah. And Israel will pay significantly in the future for not winning decisively in the Lebanon war.
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THE ANTI-IRANIAN FRONT: Egypt, Saudi Arabia, And Jordan
by Ayellet Yehiav

  What the Sunni group has in common is the need to react to Iran's potential power. Their bond has none of the Shi'a strong cohesiveness, they have no strong leadership, they don't trust each other and they have fundamentally different interests. Ayellet Yehiav points out that these defects make it unclear how much longer the alliance will last. To gin up some positive activity to lend credibility to their group identity, they are promoting the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process." It is also a way to try to cut Syria away from Iran. If it works.
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The next articles are on the Muslim Brotherhood, a super-organization that patiently and effectively has worked since 1928 to bring Shari'a — Islamic law — to the wider world. It has built a strong network by making excellent use of its resources, which include strong Middle East financial support, the Hamas terror organization (which they created) and the large pool of poor Muslims who migrate to Europe, where they have two missions: to have babies and to promote the reconstruction of the Muslim society they left behind.

It might seem excessive concentration on a single topic, when so many are pressing. But consider. The Muslim Brotherhood has quietly been spinning a web to entangle different countries for many, many years (Read a comprehensive background article here.) Now on the heels of the Baker Iran Study Group report that recommends respectful attention to the Arab position — including talking to Iran and Syria — the prestigious Foreign Affairs journal specifically recommends cozying up to the Muslim Brotherhood. These articles point out what's wrong with that idea.

THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IN HOLLAND
by Lorenzo Vidino

  The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has a single objective — for Islam to rule the world. But, as Lorenzo Vidino points out, it tailors its methods to the particular circumstances. It believes al Qaeda's confrontational style is premature. The Brotherhood uses a softer approach to create closed Muslim communities within the host countries, so there is opportunity to radicalize Muslim youth as well as to incite the community to civil disobedience, when necessary. They invite the outside community to see MB as the representatives of these communities. In Holland they control "two of the country's largest mosques." They appear cooperative and willing to live in peace with the larger community. Nevertheless, the disparity between their connection to a Dutch terrorist group and their bland reassurances has made for debates in Holland on which persona is the "real" MB.
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THE NOT-SO-MODERATE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
by M. Zuhdi Jasser

  Foreign Afairs (FA) has taken on the task of persuading the public that there is a difference between radical Islam and the Moslem Brotherhood (MB) and, in consequence, we should start talking to the Brotherhood. Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser is both a devout Muslim and anti-Islamist American. He doesn't buy FA's whitewash, and in this finely detailed article, he tells us why. He points out that the issue is not deciding to work with the lesser of two evils, supposedly the MB. In actuality, "Qaradawi [the spiritual leader of MB] and the Brotherhood are actually far more dangerous ideologically to the West." [It] "is based upon a strictly Islamist approach to governance and law. At the very core of their approach to the branches of government is a toxic mixture of politics and theology." Our goal should be to defeat the ideology of Islamism, not play ball with it. He emphasizes his adherence to Islam as a personal faith — it should stay out of politics.
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MAINSTREAMING THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
by Patrick Poole

  In a recently published article by Robert Leikin and Steven Brooke, Foreign Affairs paints the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) as a moderate force and claims it is "rejecting jihad and embracing democracy." To do so, the authors of the Foreign Affairs article ignore "[t]he Muslim Brotherhood's past use of violence and terrorism as a means of accomplishing the organization's stated mission of installing 'Islamic' governments in the Muslim world through the establishment of shari'a as the legal system of these new governments. This mission has been repeated and restated by Brotherhood officials up to the present day." Patrick Poole's very excellent article provides proof that MB has not rejected jihad; it has not become democratic. The only question Poole's article didn't answer is why a presumably reputable journal such as Foreign Affairs would publish such contrary-to-fact silliness.
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MODERATE" PATH IS JUST ANOTHER ROAD TO DISASTER
by Youssef M. Ibrahim

  In the March-April 2007 issue of Foreign Affairs, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is described as "moderate." In this wise article, Youssef Ibrahim notes that "[i]nvariably, these reports [of MB moderation] reflect an eagerness to make a finding based on logic rather than on the facts at hand. In a twisted way, they are deeply condescending of Muslim terrorists who are declared acceptable just because ... they resemble some of their Western interlocutors." Ibraham looks at the facts, which don't support the supposition that MB is moderate. He concludes that "[u]nfortunately, those conducting such flimsy reporting and superficial scholarship can always turn back and say, 'Oops, sorry.' But 'sorry' will not do for the thousands, maybe millions, of secularists, moderate Muslims, Christians, Kurds, Shiites, and other minorities who will pay the price if Brotherhood-affiliated groups get to rule Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Algeria, and Syria in the next decades with an American green light."
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HOMETOWN JIHAD: THE RETURN OF SALAH SULTAN
by Patrick Poole

  In this fascinating mix of anecdote and current events and items of worldwide importance, Patrick Poole brings home that the Muslim Brotherhood operates right in our own backyard. Poole discovered a Muslim Brotherhood (MB) operative, Dr. Salah Sultan, "...living right around the corner from me and teaching out of the Islamic school..." When he exposed him in an article, the local newspaper, the Dispatch, defended Sultan as a moderate. "... in a strange turn of events, that Dispatch article ... was published just days before Sultan appeared on Saudi Arabian Al-Risala TV, where he informed viewers that the US government was behind the 9/11 attacks,..." These and other public remarks should have made it very clear to everyone that Sultan is a racist radical Islamist. But it didn't. Sultan is still defended by the local newspaper and T.V. station and a local interfaith group. Poole feels his hometown "is on the frontlines of the Global War on Terror, as are hundreds and thousands of cities and towns all across America." We need to understand that.
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To date, Israel has been the major target of sustained terrorist attack. Europe and America have also undergone terrorist attacks. A major difference is that Europe and America haven't been under attack as consistently as Israel has. Or as intensively. The attacks have been sporadic and more widely distributed. These next essays consider Western vulnerability.

DETERRENCE AND MODERN AGGRESSORS
by Louis Rene Beres

  Clearly, we are in a time of transition in the war Islamists have declared against the West. Many people continue to refuse to see a pattern in the incidents and events of this new kind of warfare; many refuse to believe there is a war. The legal system has only rigid boxes to try terror masters for their crimes — the legal system or military law — neither one of which suits the situation. And now Louis Beres warns us we need to modernize our ideas on how to fight a war, when one side is not readily identifiable, not dressed in uniform and not located in defined areas. Consequently, the home front is vulnerable in new ways. In particular, it is no longer axiomatic that the homefront is not attacked until after the country's army is defeated. Beres points out that "...we might now be perfectly capable of warding off any tangible defeat of our military forces and perhaps even of winning identifiable victories, but we still may have to face extraordinary harms." These days, our "...enemies can wreak havoc upon us without first firing a shot." This calls for new concepts in "both active and passive defenses."
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THE PALESTINIANIZATION OF EUROPE
by Jamie Glazov

  Jamie Glazov interviewed Bat Ye'or, who has written extensively on dhimmitude — the state of subjugation reserved for non-Muslims in Muslim countries. There are strong reciprocal financial investments between Europe and the Arab countries. "Europe now is chained to the Arab-Muslim world and cannot disengage or change direction." She points out that the Muslims have been colonizing Europe for over 30 years, changing its demographics, and fostering anti-Israel and anti-American attitudes and activities, encouraging Europeans to adopt attitudes that in effect, replicate their own attitudes towards the Jews. Christianity is also under attack. Because so much of Christian culture is based on the Jewish religion, "joining the jihadist camp involves the suppression of those links that structure and support Christianity..." Instead, they preach that "Christianity was born from Islam, from a Jesus who was a Muslim prophet — the Koranic Isa — and very different from the Jewish Jesus described by the four evangelists.." She believes that "[t]he only hope for the West lies in its perception of the global jihad's aim and dangers. This is not a military war only, it is even more a spiritual, intellectual and political debate."
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EUROPE'S STARK OPTIONS
by Daniel Pipes

  Daniel Pipes suggests plausible longterm relationships between Europe and its Muslim minority. The first possibility is a Muslim takeover. Europe is profoundly secular. This gives hope to many Muslims that their own strong faith will sway many lapsed Christians to convert. They may be right. A surge in number of conversions plus Muslim high fertility could put the Muslims in control. However, the increase in popularity of nationalist parties and the growing irritation with Muslim demands lend support to a second possibility: that Europeans will lash out and reclaim their patrimony. This could in turn lead to civil war or outright ethnic cleansing. Or maybe — the third possibility — the Europeans and Muslim immigrants will find a way to live in harmony. But this is the least likely.
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RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE WEST
by Fjordman

  Fjordman writes that "Muslim Jihadists... quite correctly view our creed of Multiculturalism and our acceptance of Muslim immigration as signs of weakness and that the West has lost contact with its civilizational roots." All cultures are not equal, despite multiculturalism's assertions. Similarly, "[u]pholding national borders has become more important in the age of globalization, terrorism and mass-migration, not less. No nation regardless of political system can survive the loss of its territorial integrity, but democratic states especially so." Fjordman recommends the West stop massive immigration for at least a generation, deport those that preach shari'a and Jihad, and, in general, strive to limit Islamic practices, rather than encouraging them. "At the very least, we must be prepared to back up our ideological defenses with force on certain occasions. Holding a higher moral standard isn't going to defeat an Iranian President with nukes, threatening another Holocaust.... We should stop trying to 'win the hearts and minds' of Muslims and start reaching out to non-Muslims."
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Great Britain and its Muslims

THE WEAKEST LINK
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick writes that "it is more than inderstandable for the British to wonder why they are being targeted by the likes of the Iranians and Palestinians, whose interests they have done so much to advance." "...Since the 1920s, the Palestinian Arabs have had no friend more stalwart than the British." And by stalling action against the Iranian mullahs, they have helped give Iran the time to perfect nuclear weapons. Their response to the Muslim kidnapping of English sailors and a journalists has been to bash Israel even harder – proposing boycotts and isolating Israeli academics. And in England, they've become more conciliatory to how Muslims want the English to live, while ignoring violence against the Jews. In the global resistance to Islamic attack, they are not a reliable ally.
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BRITISH MINISTER FAILS THE WAR OF IDEAS
by Walid Phares

  Walid Phares identifies one reason England is so unresponsive to the Muslim threat — its leadership. He takes as evidence speeches made by Hilary Benn, a candidate for deputy leader of the Labor Party. Mr. Benn blames terrorist strength on George Bush inflating their egos by preaching a war on terror. He believes terrorists are terrorists because they have been economically deprived. He decribes the terrorists as "small number of loose, shifting and disparate groups who have relatively little in common." And we are nasty enough to be pushing against them. With leaders like this, England is indeed in trouble.
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12 STEP RECOVERY PROCESS FOR THE UNITED KINGDOM
by Ronin

  Just like the simple steps that lead members of Alcoholics Anonymous to full recovery, Ronin suggests some simple steps that will allow England to recover its own culture and take back its country from the Muslim extremists.
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This set of essays is about Jewish contributors to the Arab War against the West. There are, of course, some Jewish groups that are ardently pro-Arab and intentionally work for an Arab takeover of Israel. Peace Now is such an organization. There are many more Jewish organizations, however, that see themselves as Jewish — and do good works in many areas. But their leaders and administrators have first allegiance to what they see as liberalism or multiculturalism. These Jews, with their weak or neutral response to Jewish crises — such as the horrible expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif by their own government — provide no strength in Israel's current fight for survival. As Morris Amitay writes, these leaders show a lack of courage "... when life and death issues affecting Israel and world Jewry call for action which might be controversial."

PEACE NOW: BOTH TRUTH- AND MATHEMATICS-CHALLENGED
by Bernice Lipkin

  Peace Now recently attempted to flay Israel with the accusation that the Jewish towns in Samaria and Judea were built on Arab land. In their eagerness to broadcast the unverified figures, they overstated the amount by a whopping 15,900%. Moreover, while they gloated at the possibility of discomforting the Jews, they never said word one about Arab illegal building, even though an organization devoted to moving the peace process forward should not want either side creating facts on the ground that would compromise negotiations. It is also disturbing how readily the major news media accepted Peace Now's figures without confirmation. And without checking the actual legal status of the land.
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MY NOT-SO-PEACEFUL ENCOUNTER WITH THE "PEACE CAMP"
by Rachel Neuwirth

  It's amazing how violent some peaceniks can be. Rachel Neuwirth was attacked by an angry pro-Arab Hillel rabbi, when she disagreed with his favorable opinion of an Arab who'd helped direct missile attacks into Israel (See http://www.think-israel.org/hes.hillel.html). Rabbi Seidler-Feller was both physically and verbally abusive. What is most disturbing is that so many in the Jewish media wrote stories and editorials biased against Neuwirth, using inaccurate descriptions of the incident. Some 50 UCLA professors, most with Jewish names, signed on to condemn her. Some three years later, after Rabbi Seidler-Feller had publically apologized to Neuwirth for his appalling behavior, the newpapers and the professors who'd rushed to judgment have not retracted their statements or apologized. Without knowing the facts, they had sided with the Rabbi, because he shared their liberal politics.
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IGNORING A REAL "JEWISH" ISSUE
by Morris J. Amitay

  Emanuel Winston wrote of this essay: "Morris Amitay has an extra-ordinary grasp of Jewish issues and mind-set. Most Jews still run from their own shadows, especially those who anoint themselves as 'organizational leaders'. ... The status of their leadership seems to actually hamper their real courage when life-and-death issues affecting Israel and world Jewry call for action which might be 'controversial' especially when they need to defend Israel and world Jewry. Regrettably, we see that both in America and Israel." In this essay Morris Amitay takes issue with the Jewish Council for Public Affairs for avoiding controversial (but nevertheless critical) subjects. Specifically, they have shown a regrettable silence and/or poor choices on Iran and Iraq.
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The next set of essays are about the media and PR. They provide examples of the silly and the sinister; how PR can distract us from spotting illegalities; and how we can break the hold that somehow it isn't nice to confront Islamism.

FILM ON "RADICAL ISLAM" TIED TO PRO-ISRAEL GROUPS! I'M SHOCKED! SHOCKED!
by Think-Israel Staff

  A recent negative story on Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West made it sound as if the Elders of Zion were involved in the conspiracy to distribute the documentary. We had fun ripping apart the fatuous writeup.
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THE PALESTINIANS UPROOT TREES, DON'T THEY?
by Ran Farhi

  When the Jews came back in large numbers to their homeland in the late 1800's, the land was barren. They created the green landscape, planted trees, grew flowers, developed ways to irrigate the land while conserving water. More recently, the Jews repeated this miracle in Gaza, where they started orchards and grew gorgeous vegetables. Now they've been expelled and under Arab caretaking the land has lost its color and is reverting to stone and rock and sand. So it isn't logical that the world would believe that the Arabs cultivate trees — the olive tree has become the symbol — and the Jews uproot trees. Mark it down to great Arab propaganda that the world does. Ran Farhi writes about the larger implications in what seems a small incident: the Arabs uprooted trees planted by Jews on Jewish land with impunity and the Jews, thanks to the Israeli government, were not allowed to assert their property rights.
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WHEN PR FIRMS REPLACE ISRAEL'S DEMOCRATIC PROCESS
by David Bedein

  David Bedein writes about how, since the 1993 Oslo Accord, successive Israeli governments have hired PR firms to cover up that the government was acting illegally and/or immorally. They covered up that the PLO was ignoring the "peace process" stipulations to stop anti-semitic incitement. They sold Disengagement dishonestly and in violation of their own laws. "A case in point: Clause seven of the disengagement law forbids Israel from handing over assets to terror organizations, at a time when terror groups were announcing that they were taking over the settlements and that they would use them as terror bases." After the expulsion, the Government then asserted that the Jews expelled from Gush Katif had received compensation and were moving to permanent homes. It wasn't true. I have a thought: given that the Sharon-Olmert has followed the U.S. State Department party line slavishly, did the U.S. Government help them find just the right firms? And pay for them?
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WHY CONFRONT ISLAMISM?
by Imil Imani

  Raise a problem with Islam and the immediate response is you are islamophobic. It conditions us to avoid criticizing Muslim practices. Amil Imani in this quiet essay lays out the reasons we must resist wincing when called islamophobes and confront the problems it causes us. As he writes, "A phobia is a baseless irrational fear. Detestation of Islamism, the violent form of Islam, is based on irrefutable facts and it is not only rational, it is ethically imperative."
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These essays speak of historical events. The first, "The Everlasting Libel" is about classic anti-semitism. The other two are more modern manifestations.

THE EVERLASTING LIBEL
by Ari Greenspan and Ari Zivotofsky

  If you were out to malign the Jews, accusing them of mixing blood in their food would seem a bad choice. Jews, after all, salt their meat to rid it of blood so that it will be kosher to eat. Matzo is a flour and water cracker, baked before it has the chance to rise. Any addition makes it invalid for the Passover seder. Yet the libel has thrived from pagan times on, throughout medievel Christendom and today it is firmly established in the Muslim Middle East. It is the reason, the libel sponsors assert(ed), Jews kill people, particularly children — to obtain blood for their rituals. Ari Greenspan and Ari Zivotofsky provide us with some fascinating examples of the blood libel. They suggest that "[i]t is simply such a wild, unbelievable yarn that it became believable."
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THE FRIENDLY FIRES OF HELL
by Robert J. White-Harvey

  Just when you think you are numb from reading the current global horrors, along comes a story that shakes you to the roots. Robert J. White-Harvey writes of a friendly-fire incident in the very last days of World War 2, when hope was stirred that some of the victims of the Nazis might be saved. Some 10,000 inmates of the German concentration camps had been herded on board 3 ships by the Germans — no one knew why. The British were still bombing enemy shipping. It is not known what the British knew about the ships, but they strafed them from the air in several separate attacks. And the few prisoners that made it to the water were shot by the German guards standing on shore. As Harvey-White writes, "... the 7,500 Cap Arcona victims deserve to be remembered."
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FRIENDLY RESTRAINT: U.S.-ISRAEL RELATIONS DURING THE GULF CRISIS OF 1990-1991
by Scott B. Lasensky

  Scott Lasensky writes about fairly recent history with current implications: how America tied Israel's hands during the Gulf War of 1991. Retrospectively, one has to ask why it was important to pretend Egypt was of any use to the war effort — the Egyptians did little, strutted a great deal and gained much. In contrast, by being cooperative with the US Administration and not responding to Iraqi SCUDS attacks, Israel showed it could be controlled — and thus it was set up for the disasterous Oslo Accords.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

March 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
April 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


January-February, 2007

No peace process directed towards the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state is going to work. With each concession, Israel will lose some more of its tiny slice of Palestine; the Arabs will continue to create more havoc. More and more of the Israeli public is ready to accept a new approach. To date the theme has been: give up the land keep the Arabs. More Jews now see it would be better to keep the land — it is after all legally and by conquest Israel's – and give up the Arabs.

These next essays have this in common: There is danger in accepting spurious peace plans. Israel must take the first tiny step to a sane solution. It's time Israel's leaders stopped lying to themselves and the world. The Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict is solvable, but not by pretending the two-state solution will hack it.

END THE DELUSION
by Efraim Inbar

  Thanks to the Palestinian Arab high achievement in terrorism/vandalism/violence and ineptitude in most other areas, faith in their ability to organize and maintain an independent state is crumbling. Efraim Inbar points out that now is an opportunistic time to call a halt to this enterprise. And start thinking of other — very different — approaches.
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WELCOME TO PALESTINE
by Caroline Glick

  There's been a de facto Palestinian Arab state since 2005, when the Gaza Strip was put completely under Arab control. Caroline Glick puts together the tiny bits of information we've gleaned from the mainline media — it's chaotic, violent, ruled by thugs and gangs and fanatic clerics. It terrorizes its inhabitants. It's unstable, ineffective and totally dependent on outside funding. As in Arafat's time, the "leaders" reap the massive money rewards given them by the International community; everyone else suffers. And there is no real separation for Israel — she still contributes to Palestinian Arab upkeep.
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THE ID PEOPLE
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Israeli politicos and academics and journalists still talk about the advantages of creating a Palestinian state, as part of a "peace process". This is ID — Intellectual Dishonesty. "They know you can't make peace with people committed to your destruction. They know you can't make peace with people who do not recognize the sanctity of human life." There will never be peace until the pundits and politicos "transcend the misleading and mendacious language of public discourse," and start thinking of realistic ways to maintain Israel's vitality and keep her people safe from terrorist attack. They should start by describing the situation truthfully.
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THE LONGEST-RUNNING BIG LIE
by Caroline Glick

  Yasir Arafat bilked the Palestinian Arabs and the organizations that supported him of billions of dollars; he was a pedophile, a vicious terrorist and a planner of innovative ways to create mass havoc. Yet most of the media and a long slew of U.S. and European government administrators chose to see him as the father of his people and ignored the actions of Fatah, the terrorist organization he founded and directed. They believed, despite all evidence to the contrary, that he had a sincere desire for peace with Israel, if only ... As Caroline Glick writes, thanks to a recently-released U.S. State Department cable, he has finally been completely discredited. What is impossible to understand is why, when Arafat's successor, Mahmoud Abbas, is as committed to destroying Israel as Arafat ever was, why do we still walk the same useless route? Why do we pretend that Abbas is a moderate Arab, a peace-loving man?
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WHAT IS  "PALESTINIAN LAND"  AND WHO ARE THE  "PALESTINIANS"?
by Dafna Yee

  People casually use the terms "Palestinian" and "Palestinian Lands" without realizing they are adopting a lie conceived by the P.L.O. and perpetuated by a pro-Arab media. They are subscribing to the notion that Israel exists on Palestinian land. In this essay Dafna Yee untangles some of the history of how some local Arabs became the "Palestinians." And why historically and geographically there is no such thing as Palestinian land.
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11 PALESTINIAN PLAGUES
by Elyakim Haetzni

  Elyakim Haetzni succintly describes the devasting effects of a Palestinian state carved out of Israel. One reader commented, "So, why Israeli Public elected such government which knowing "price tag" continues to lead the country to disaster? Is it (public) stupid, irresponsible?" It does seem hard to explain why the Israeli public would allow its suicidal government to cripple Israel. Patricia Berlyn (click here) and Israel Zwick (click here.) have also drawn up lists of excellent reasons for us to stop our misguided hankering for a 2-state solution. We could then start thinking more realistically. As a start, look at Lipkin's "Population Exchange", Simons' "Population Exchange", King's "Third Rail", Sherman's "New Paradigm" and Neuwirth's "win-win". Then google for "transfer arabs" in the search box at the top of this page for additional articles. Do you have a solution? Send it to solution@think-israel.org
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THE CASE FOR A LARGER ISRAEL
by David Naggar

  Think-Israel is pleased to present an excerpt from David Naggar book called The Case for a Larger Israel, in which he makes the case for a viable Israel, where the Jews can not only survive but thrive. "... a [Jewish] population of less than 0.2% of the world's population has produced 22% of all Nobel laureates. In the fields of philanthropy, the humanities, science, the arts, medicine, internet connectivity, global communications, coming water shortage issues, energy issues, and more, a self sufficient, prosperous, and free Israel benefits humanity." The area simply isn't large enough to support both a Jewish and a Palestinian state. Establishing the proposed 23rd Arab state state will not lead to peace but to a failure of both states. Naggar suggests we rethink the problem.
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WORLD HYPOCRISY WITH ISRAEL AT CENTER STAGE
by Alex Rose

  Peace is a major diplomatic goal. It is said to be particularly important to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict, because, it is claimed, peace in the Middle East, peace around the world — maybe even global warming — all hinge on it. "But, alas, as the Prophet Jeremiah observed in biblical times: 'peace, peace, but there is no peace.'" Alex Rose examines the concept peace and suggests that Richard Nixon's definition of peace would seem to be a way to live with Islam: "We must not vainly search for perfect peace but turn our efforts to creating real peace. Perfect peace assumes the end of conflict. Real peace is a means of living with unending conflict." But it isn't likely Islam would subscribe even to this minimalist state of peace. So Rose makes some practical suggestion for achieving separation – and thus minimizing friction points — between Jews and Arabs: Jews fled the Arab countries in the 1940s and 50s. It's time to complete the second half of this population transfer, by moving the Arabs from Israel to some place(s) in the vast Arab land holdings.
 READ MORE
 

ACCEPTING A PEACE "KNOCK OFF"
by Daryl Temkin

  It is not surprising that Israeli Jews, after 100 years of a tempestous relationship with their murder-oriented neighbors, yearn for peace. Several generations of politicians and diplomats, conditioned to believe that all the world's problems will be solved if there is peace between the Arabs and the Jews, are easily seduced into eagerly chasing every new whisper of a possible peace. At this very moment, Condoleezza Rice is using up a lot of gasoline (gasoline is the argument the Arabs use to convince the world to accept whatever they say) flying from one Middle East capitol to another. But, as Daryl Temkin warms us, to want peace doesn't guarantee achieving it — and having bought so many rip-offs, the Jews should be cautious about buying yet another peace "knock-off," that will deteriorate almost before it begins. Unfortunately, before the false "peace" is reluctantly abandonned, Israel can suffer harm and compromise its very existence.
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These next essays suggest some new ideas for achieving peace. Just as Mrs. Beeton's recipe for rabbit stew began: "first catch the hare," so the first essay suggests that before you can cook up a dish of peace, you need to catch the attention of the Islamists. The best way to do that is to defeat their ideology, by whatever means it takes.

"NO SUBSTITUTE FOR VICTORY": THE DEFEAT OF ISLAMIC TOTALITARIANISM
by John Lewis

  This is a condensation of an essay by John Lewis. He has written a brilliant analysis of the human elements — the "moral and psychological factors" that condition one group to constant aggression while a different set of values deters the target group from doing its best in fighting that aggression. Convinced that it is for the good of our souls, Islamic totalitarianism declared an unswerving all-out, multi-faceted war against us infidels. In response, for years we treated each terror attack as unique and unrelated to any other attack; and after 9/11, we pretended the enemy was a small group of extremists and we believed we could persuade the Muslim masses. We've tried altruism and constantly shifting pragmatism, engaging in 'dialogue', attenuating our firepower because we don't want to make our enemy angry, and offering them economic incentives. They haven't worked. What would work — and what we haven't tried — is to aim at unconditional surrender of the large network that attacked us, as we did in World War 2. Our leaders have willfully ignored that all the Muslim leaders are convinced that Islam is the supreme religion and everyone must submit to it. When we weaken one ruling thug, we strengthen his rival, but we don't make a dent in their religious ideology, an ideology that is shared by the people they rule. As Lewis writes, we need to realize that using an "all-out force against fanatical killers is both practical and moral." We haven't grasped how serious and relentless the Islamic totalitarian network is. And if we don't do so soon, we will lose.
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WHY ISRAEL SHOULD DEMOLISH THE  'AL-AKSA MOSQUE
by Stephen Schecter

  What if we stopped trying yet another version of the Oslo-Appeasement-Roadmap-Appeasement-Disengagment-Appeasement Process that goes nowhere. What if we started thinking along other lines entirely — lines that take into account the pivotal fact that the Palestinian Arabs, in conjunction with Israel's neighbors, want to destroy Israel, not live next to her. This essay by Stephen Schecter may be just the thing to move your thinking to a new track. He points out that "[n]o compromise by Israel is going to bring peace any closer because its enemy is not interested in compromise." Therefore, "Israel must persevere in fighting this war by any and all means, with unrelenting purpose and persistence." By blowing up the 'Al-Aksa mosque and then without hesitation rebuilding the Temple, Israel reasserts its right to exist in the only language understood by those poised to destroy it. It sends this message: We are now finally taking everything you do and say literally. You rocket our cities, murder our children and openly long for our destruction chanting 'death to the Jews'. We hear you! We recognize you as the totalitarian enemy you are and so we must wage war against you to survive. Indeed, in the face of such aggression we have but one response: Your unconditional surrender." Think about that.
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Aside from having an inept government and being the target of an announced nuclear bombing, Israel has other major problems: a bumbling leadership that shows more concern for the welfare of the Palestinian Arabs than it does of its own citizens and a judiciary that makes the law instead of making sure the courts and police adhere to the law. Then too the Jews of Gush Katif, Gaza, who were expelled from their homes in August 2005 still do not have permanent homes and many do not have jobs. Some of the Marxist Left like the Peace Now organization can without exaggeration be called traitors to their country but their activities are not curtailed; the government only punishes activists on the political right. And the Leftist secular Israelis who dominate the government and the military continue to believe in being just like everyone else. To that end, they accept the valuation of the outside comunity and spend their energy fighting religous Jews rather than the Arab enemy.

BUSH AIN'T NO FRIEND; AND OLMERT?
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck takes a look at the leadership in the two democracies – U.S.A. and Israel. It's not a pretty picture. Bush blocks weapons transfer to Israel while giving Egypt weapons and ammunition to send to the PLO. Olmert, not to be outdone, is directly sending the PLO millions of dollars and guns and bullets. Should diplomacy aimed at chopping up Israel to create another Palestinian State (Jordan and Israel are both carved out of mandated Palestine) fail, the weaponry will help the Arabs do the trick. Especially when Olmert is going to release experienced terrorists, who won't need training in killing Jews.
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BEYOND CHUTZPAH: A TALE OF SLANDER, PLAGIARISM, AND HOLOCAUST REVISIONISM
by Susan L. Rosenbluth

  This is a tale of four Jews. Two of them, Neve Gordon and Norman Finkelstein, are anti-Israel Holocaust revisionists and admirers of Yasir Arafat; the other two, Steven Plaut and Alan Dershowitz, spoke up and told the truth about the Gordon and Finkelstein lies. Mr. Gordon, who demands freedom of speech for himself sued Dr. Plaut for slander. The case came before an Israeli Arab judge, Reem Naddaf. "In her written opinion, Judge Naddaf praised Mr. Arafat as the 'legitimate leader of his people' and defended Dr. Gordon's entry into his compound and service as a 'human shield,' (which was in violation of Israeli law), as 'legitimate protest.'" As Susan Rosenbluth writes, "Many legal analysts point out that while Judge Naddaf granted freedom of speech to Holocaust revisionists, she denied that freedom to those, such as Dr. Plaut, who would challenge them." The case is now under appeal.
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JEWS EMBRACING THE INDICTMENTS OF THEIR ENEMIES
by Kenneth Levin

  Kenneth Levin has written of how Israelis, chronically besieged by the hostility of their Arab neighbors, endowed the Oslo accords with unreal power, and then continued to delude themselves long after the Arabs made it clear they were not in accord with the Jewish yearning for peace. In this essay, he suggests the same long history of being chronically in a state of siege has conditioned both Israeli and Diaspora Jews — particularly Jews that have no strong religious or community counterforce — to accept what Jew-haters say about Jews, no matter how absurd the charge. The group hopes that by accepting their enemy's indictment "and reforming accordingly they can assuage the hostility of their tormentors and win relief." As does the abused child, the victims "blame themselves for their suffering." This tendency "is dangerous when it diverts the ... community's gaze from genuine external peril, and from essential defensive measures, to focus instead on self-reform."
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EVERYTHING IS SWELL WITH THE GUSH KATIF EXPELLEES — IF YOU READ ONLY THE HEADLINES
compiled by Bernice Lipkin

  This is a composite essay, part a chronicle of promises, part an exposition on how the expellees are coping, now that the problems stemming from being wrenched from home, business and community are exacerbated by substandard housing, lack of work and unkept promises. You'd never know about their misery if you just read the headlines.
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YESHA COUNCIL SLAMS PEACE NOW'S "LIES NOW" REPORT
by Hillel Fendel

  Peace Now has been waging a relentless war against its own people since its inception. It seems to take particular delight in harassing the Jewish settlers of Samaria, Judea and Gaza (collectively known as Yesha). Usually this means pouncing on any Jewish activity that could be interpreted as an infringement of the law, while ignoring gross violations committed by Arabs. This time they came out with a widely-circulated assertion that most Yesha Jews were living on Arab lands. This time, Yesha Council responded and exposed Peace Now's lies. Hillel Fendel tells us about it.
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With all their wealth, Islamic countries are far behind the Western and Asian countries. Much of this has to do with baggage they've carried since Mohammad's time — keeping slaves, beheading people and forcing people to convert are no longer seen as acceptable behavior. They continue to believe all their problems are due to Israel — and they have persuaded others to think like them — but it just isn't so.

RELIGION OF PEACE?
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  In this essay Andrew C. McCarthy reviews Robert Spencer's book, The Truth about Muhammad — Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion. The book gives us a good understanding of important aspects of Muhammad's life, based on "the authentic Muslim Sunnah — the Koran" and the collections of commentary on the Koran and the accepted biographies of Muhammad. The problem with Islam, as this essay and the book so cogently point out, is that the religion of Islam has never liberated itself from its bloody beginnings and insufferable attitude of superiority over the rest of mankind.
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SYMPOSIUM: CONVERT OR DIE
by Jamie Glazov

  In response to the kidnapping and forced conversion of two western journalists a couple of months ago, with Jamie Glazov serving as moderator, Mustafa Akyol, David Aikman, Robert Spencer and Andrew Bostom discussed the issue of forced conversions to Islam. In a time when a superficial but snappy judgements pass for wisdom, the symposium is remarkable in that the participants 'dug in', attempting to provide the exact meaning of the concept and how it relates to Islam over the centuries.
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SLAVERY IN ISLAM
by Amil Imani

  Slavery is barbaric, and many of us believe the practice has long since been discarded in human society. Actually, it is thriving in some parts of the Middle East and in Islamic Africa. It is hard to extirpate it because slavery was sanctioned by Muhammad and has never been rejected or revised by Islam's religious authorities. Even where slavery is not acceptable in the larger culture, the attitude that justifies slavery in Saudi Arabia may be engrained. It may manifest itself in keeping a slave as did the Muslim couple who kept a woman in slavery in America. More often, as Amil Imani points out, it bolsters an attitude of regarding Muslim women and all infidels as inferiors. It encourages a lack of respect for freedom of thought as well as freedom of action. Because of Islam's fundimental belief structure, Amani doesn't believe coexistence with Islam is possible. "All one needs to know is to see what is happening in Islamic countries. That is exactly what is in store for the presently free people of the world if Islam is not held in check."
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WHO'S YOUR FIRST?
by Youssef Ibrahim

  It is firmly held by many politicians, diplomats and media people that the Arab-Israeli conflict can't be resolved until the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is settled. Youssef Ibrahim points out that the catastrophes in the Middle East are internecine conflicts; non-representative government; wide differences in the distribution of wealth; societal disfunction: illiteracy, poverty and illness; and the disenfranchisement of women. He asks, "Why does resolving any of these depend on good will in the Palestinian Arab areas?"
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THE LONGEST-RUNNING REALITY SHOW
by Sarah Kass

  Sarah Kass describes the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as a theatrical distraction produced by Middle East oil interests to avoid the need to change their economies, which depend solely on extraction, not production. "The so-called Israeli-Palestinian conflict — what the oil despots sponsor and what glues us to the screen — should finally be given its true name: 'Extraction Distraction.'"
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Activist Muslims use different techniques and exhibit different behaviors in different countries, depending on context and how far the Muslims have infiltrated.

THE REACTION OF MUSLIMS TO THE SUICIDE BOMBINGS IN LONDON AND ELSEWHERE
by Sue Vogel

  As Christians and Jews, we know how we feel if someone of our group does something hideous. We denounce his behavior or we feel shame or we are appalled and in anger we cast him out — he becomes an outsider. This doesn't hold true for Muslims, as for example, when confronted with the fact that other Muslims terrorized London and killed innocent people in July 2005. The Muslim leadership did not condemn the bombing; instead they deflected blame to external events or to the indifference/hostility of the local community/country/international community. Observant Muslims — as well as many less orthodox Muslims — appear to perceive themselves as belonging "to the worldwide Islamic 'nation,' rather than to any particular state on the map..." Sue Vogel discusses some factors that may explain "this lack of identification with the host community."
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THE REDEKER AFFAIR
by Christian Delacampagne

  Last September, Robert Redeker, a philosophy teacher in a French high-school and writer of scholarly books, commented on the furor over Pope Benedict XVI, and concluded that "Islam is a religion that ... exalts violence and hatred." Muslims proved the truth of his statement by subjecting him to vilification and threats of death so severe that Redeker and his family were forced to make their own hegira. They fled from their home and are now in hiding. The media tended to scold him for riling the Muslims. The intellectual community berated him for his lack of sympathy to Islam. Christian Delacampagne makes the case that the pro-Muslim attitude of the intellectuals stems from their antipathy to France's colonial history. In the same vein, they view Zionism as "just a form of Western colonialism" — and this underlies and 'justifies' their anti-semitism.
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DISCOVER THE ARAB LOBBY "NETWORK"
by John Perazzo

  Using information from www.DiscoverTheNetwork.org inter alia, John Perazzo has written a valuable reference article identifying many of the pro-arab activist and advocacy groups that nibble away at Western values and promote Islamic law. Many of them have specific targets — Israel is a popular bugaboo, even attracting the wrath of some Jewish Marxist groups. Others concentrate on what they see as defects in the American character. They see themselves both as victims and as the guardians of human rights and social justice. By linking with the ACLU — using lawsuits as their weapon — they have infringed on our freedom of speech and they have protected people supporting and recruiting for Middle East terrorists. Many work on the local level, deciding what books our libraries stock, setting the curricula in our schools, demanding workplace accomodations for prayer time, getting unsympathetic media people fired. Thanks to the Middle East oil revenues, many groups are the beneficiaries of large chunks of cash to pay for multiple ways of "persuasion" and "education." And then there are the many lobbyists, who don't need to dress up their pro-Arab anti-Israel program.
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Signs of spring. There's some effective fighting back against Muslim aggression. Olmert/Peres have used the dread of an Arab majority to try to scare Israelis out of the West Bank, but reputable demographic data indicate Muslims aren't jackrabbiting that fast (See, e.g., http://www.think-israel.org/glick.demographics.html) In the U.S.A., people are taking a hard look at how many Muslims actually live here, legally, that is. Sure, even a few have done a lot of harm; but the point of this exercise is political. Democrats and Republicans go where the votes are, so it is good to prick the inflated Muslim-provided figures. At the universities, native habitat of anti-Americanism and anti-Israelism, people are trying more effective fight-back techniques. Go, team!

NUMBERS DON'T LIE
by Patrick Poole

  Muslim sources apparently regard facts as elastic; they can be blown up into fantasy figures without being questioned. In Jenin, the Arabs claimed the Israelis had massacred 5000 or more Arabs — it turned out the figure was around 50, and most of these were terrorists. In America, CAIR, the Hamas-front group that claims to speak for American Muslims, claims 8 million Muslims. The figure seem to double every few months. Patrick Poole helps us determine the actual number.
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BRAVING CAMPUS RADICALS AT UC DAVIS
by Lee Kaplan

  One of the first Muslim students' forays against free speech was at a California school — San Francisco State U — in May 2002, when a pro-Palestinian mob attacked a group of Hillel students bleating for peace. Since then, Muslim students have become accustomed to a feeble response from university administrators, while they have the freedom to deny free speech to groups that don't flatter Islam or that are pro-Israel. At last a student group invited Walid Shoebat, an ex-terrorist and a forceful anti-terrorist, and made sure he was heard. It is fitting that it occurred at a California school.
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It hasn't escaped the attention of those who wish to destroy Israel that so many of Israel's most ardent supporters are Christian. They are as concerned as are Jews that Israel stay strong and vibrant. The campaign to sever the connection — to 'sour' Christians on Israel – is cleverly coached in pseudo-religious tones and purports to reduce the basis for Christian support to the writings of a few 'misguided' souls. This academic 'explanation' has been adopted by some mainline churches and, more recently, has been promulgated by some who call themselves Evangelical.

CHRISTIAN ZIONISM 101
by Paul C. Merkley

  Anti-Zionists assert that Christian Zionism derives from "dispensationalism," an off-center Biblical interpretation popular in the eighteen hundreds. Paul Merkley's essay is an effective antidote to anti-Zionist pseudo-theology. His is a very readable, very factual account of what characterizes Despisers of Zion and Defamers of Christian Zionists. These "...chatterers make no effort to get straight the facts about Christian faith. Indeed, it is considered a proof of one's qualification to speak about the biggest issues of life that one should betray no first-hand knowledge of the content of faith..." Countering their propaganda, Professor Merkley cogently explains the actual basis of Christian Zionism: it doesn't come from Dispensationism; it comes from mainstream Protestant theology and the literature of biblical commentary.
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These essays provides some much-needed accurate information on how clever propaganda and media support have demonized Israel and Serbia. In both cases, the media have sided with the Muslim terrorists and misrepresented the actual events. These articles also provide links to additional reading material. You will be surprised when you learn how you've been snookered.

SERBIA AND ISRAEL: BOTH PLAYED LIKE A FIDDLE
by Ted Belman

  There are some remarkable similarities between Israel and Serbia. Ted Belman writes about them. Both are called evil. Both are demonized. The news media have aided in turning truth on its head: they ignore or disbelieve the legitimate claim of Israel to mandated Palestine but they happily echo the false claims to the land of Israel coming from that ersatz people, the "Palestinians." In similar fashion, they support separating Kosovo — which is historically and culturally Serbian — from Serbia and letting it be ruled by Islamic terrorists from Albania.
 READ MORE
 

HOLOCAUST DENIAL ON DISPLAY
by Jared Israel

  As Jared Israel writes, "Croatia was set up by the Germans and the Italians on April 10, 1941, as part of their plan for the dismemberment of Yugoslavia." In what is a bitter example of black humor at its worst, the Muslims responsible for slaughtering Jews in WW2 and expelling/murdering Serbs now claim they were the victims and are soliciting Jewish help to project an image of a new and cleansed Croatia.
 READ MORE
 

GOOD READS

CODE NAME: ESTHER
by Saul Goldman

  Saul Goldman treats the story of Purim as a "tightly-knit story of political intrigue" that takes place in ancient Persia — today's Iran. Except for Esther and her uncle Mordechai, the cast of villains and knaves hasn't changed much. Nor has the need for action "based upon certain historically validated principles."
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THE TIME TRAVELER
by Dan Simmons

  Using a format familiar to readers of science fiction, Dan Simmons writes a cautionary tale about letting Islam take over the world. Unlike many a science fiction tale, this "if we don't change the way we act" motif projects a plausible future based on historical experience: a world of dhimmis subject to Sharia – Muslim law. It didn't pay the ancient Athenians to fight like gentlemen; it won't help us to focus on our own flaws and to work for democracy in the Middle East instead of our own survival.
 READ MORE
 

Some History

ANTI-SEMITISM AND ISLAM
by Timothy R. Furnish

  Timothy Furnish looks at Mohammed's abysmal treatment the Jews of Medina at the start of the Muslim conquest of Arabia in the Seventh Century C.E. The Muslim attitude towards the Jews derived from actual history was later compounded by linking the Jews with the Dajjal, a figure of evil who, in Islamic eschatology, is a major figure at the End of Days. The Dajjal and his Jewish troops are to be pitted against a Muslim messianic deliverer, the Mahdi and the returned Jesus, who together will "defeat the evil forces of unbelief and usher in a global Islamic caliphate." Furnish points out that "Islamic eschatology has seen a resurgence in recent years, owing to ... the inability of the Islamic world to deal effectively with modernity and the perception among many Muslims that the ummah, the Islamic "nation," ... is under attack from the West in general and the U.S. in particular."
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HITLER'S LEGACY: ISLAMIC ANTISEMITISM IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Matthias Küntzel

  Matthias Küntzel writes of the most recent deliberate and sustained fomenting of Judeophobia in the Arab world, starting in the 1920-1930s. He weaves four major historical strands, concluding that with the active support of the nazis, the Mufti of Jerusalem created an emotionally-satisfying concoction that combined Koran-based disdain of Jews as inferior to Muslims with Christian-based Nazi-promoted revulsion against the Jews because of their diabolical control of media, economy and government. This something-for-everyone propaganda set to Arab music was broadcast from Germany to a large and appreciative audience across the Middle East. This induced hate has been kept at a boil by later Islamic scholars, teachers and politicians, giving "rise to the escalation of the Middle East conflict — again and again."
 READ MORE
 

INDIANS WITH BIBLICAL ROOTS
by Dr. Navras Jaat Aafreedi

  An early mention of India in Jewish history is in the Book of Esther: the empire of the King of Persia (now Iran) stretched "from India even unto Ethiopia." With Purim coming and another Iranian ruler planning to kill the Jews, we bring you an appetite-wetting summary by Navras Jaat Aafreed about the history of three Jewish communities currently resident in India (the Bene Israel, Cochini and Baghdadi) and several non-Jewish groups that claim Israelite descent.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

January 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
February 2007 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


November-December, 2006

As Bret Stephens wrote in The Wall Street Journal "The Iraq Study Group (ISG) report suggests that the U.S. seek the cooperation of Syria and Iran, its two principal enemies in the region, on the theory that neither country wants chaos on its border. It's an interesting idea, given that sowing chaos on their borders is precisely what both countries have been doing in Iraq, and elsewhere, for years. The Bush administration overthrew the regime of Saddam Hussein largely as a way of "signaling" that it was no longer prepared to countenance a Middle East of terrorism-sponsoring regimes. Now the ISG announces that not only is the U.S. prepared to deal with those regimes, but that it will do the bidding of one of them, Syria, by again putting maximum pressure on Israel to abandon the Golan Heights." (December 12, 2006) This set of essays examine the ISG report.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH TALKING AND NEGOTIATING?
by Andrew C. McCarthy

  This is a major critique of what is wrong with our approach in Iraq, namely, our belief "that democracy, not decisive force, is the key" to subduing our "implacable, insatiable enemies." Andrew McCarthy says very wisely that "[s]itting down with evil legitimizes evil...all it accomplishes is convey weakness." He makes clear what the present administration has ignored: Islamic countries must reject democracy because it isn't consonant with the Muslim religious/ideological belief system. Our wrongheaded approach is echoed by the proposals recently suggested by Jim Baker and the Iraq Study Group (ISG) that we negotiate with Iran and Syria. They are unlikely to work because they are based on false premises about the nature of Islam; they are poorly reasoned; and they ignore our previous experiences trying to negotiate with Arab terrorists and their Muslim state backers. They will be rejected not just by the Muslims but by the American people who aren't interested in "... democratizing the Muslim world... They want Islamic terrorists and their state sponsors crushed."
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OLD-THINK RIDES AGAIN
by Jonathan Spyer

  The Iraq Study Group would be perfectly willing to sacrifice Israel were Iran and Syria to help America shovel itself out of Iraq. To make this action plausible, Tony Blair and others have promulgated the notion that Iran and Syria care enough about the Palestinian Arabs that they'd be willing to help extricate America in exchange for preferential treatment for the Palestinian Arabs. (As if these Arabs would be willing to pick up a shovel to do anything but dig America's grave.) Jonathan Spyer squelches this idea. "For the revivalist ideologues in Iran, and the Alawi junta in Syria, things are currently going rather well... Why on earth would this be the time for compromise? Why stop when you're winning?"
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SLICK? DO YOU WANT REAL SLICK? HOW ABOUT SLICK JAMES BAKER?
by Barbara Lerner

  Jim Baker is definitely a "can-do" guy. He's the one that crawls out of the woodwork to boost ratings by manipulating the press when things look bad for the Bush family. Unfortunately, he has his own agenda to promote, one at odds with the present President Bush's brave words about fighting Islamofascists. We are reprinting this article written by Barbara Lerner back in 1992, when President Bush's daddy was way down in the polls. Clearly Baker hasn't changed much. Has Bush?
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IRAN: THE ISLAMOFASCIST TERRORMASTERS
by Christopher Holton

  Currently there are rumors that Saudi Arabia is so afraid of an Iranian nuclear strike on Israel — it would affect them, they being so close (geographically, that is) — it's been talking to Olmert about Israel's nuclear umbrella. Maybe. Or maybe that's dis-, mis- and/or just-plain-wrong information. And just as there's the optimistic belief that Saudi Arabia would consort with Israel, similarly there's the optimistic belief, held by the Baker group and their State Department cohort, that Iran would turn on its effective and efficient allies in the same manner that America continues to attempt to weaken Israel, her major — and perhaps only — Middle East ally, forcing Israel to make real and permanent concessions to her enemies. Turning Iran ain't gonna happen. Christopher Holton tells us why Iran is the premier terror master and why it's very unlikely it would pressure its terrorist buddies and clients.
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THE GOLAN HEIGHTS: A VITAL STRATEGIC ISRAELI ASSET
by Mordechai Ben-Menachem

  To secure Syria's cooperation to extricate the USA from Iraq, the ISG proposes Israel hand Syria the Golan Heights. Any such patched-together peace is likely to be very short-term, given Syria's territorial ambitions, while the effects on Israel would be long-lasting and disastrous. Israel would be losing one of her few sources of fresh-water. She would also need to relocate some 36,000 people, when she has not yet permanently settled the 1700 families expelled from Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip in August 2005. Israel would be giving up assets that are strategically important for Israel's security for a mess of cold pottage.
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READING THE BAKER REPORT
by Bernice Lipkin

  Bernice Lipkin has compiled a set of quotes from various columnists about the ISG report that deal specifically with the Report's recommendations that involve Israel. Reading the Report with the eyes of a realist, it would seem Baker wants to pay our exit fare from Iraq in Israeli coin. Syria gets the Golan Heights and the Arab refugees come into Israel. I'm not sure how long any of them will live there, considering that Iran will be allowed to continue its nuclear program, which Iran's president has assured us is aimed at bombing Israel.
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These next talk about what the Baker group should have understood and recommended. The Report favors appeasement, which will only amplify the suicidal tendencies already in play in the West. It does not encourage a determined striving against the religious ideology that is inflaming Muslims to war against us. For the most part, Middle East countries don't want stability (except on their own turf); they want to destroy Western civilization. The essays talk about the Muslim world view and suggest we stop treating them in our own image.

THE INEVITABILITY OF GENOCIDE
by Yashiko Sagamori

  This is an article that clarifies. Yashiko Sagamori separates out the non-essential similarities and differences between us and Muslims. Instead, she focuses on the only important reason for fighting the war the Muslim leaders started: "...if we want freedom and democracy to survive in this country, we must fight Islam and destroy it everywhere it has established roots, which means everywhere, period." If you aren't convinced by her parable and by sheer logic, it may be that you aren't ready to face reality.
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SUICIDAL TENDENCIES OF THE WEST
by Bruce S. Thornton

  This is a brilliant essay. It concludes, "This supremely bad idea – that the modern West and its defining cultural cargo of free market capitalism, individualism, rationalism, and liberal democracy are the engines of global evil, and that Jews and Israel are the most dangerous embodiments of this evil — continues to fuel the jihadists rage and to weaken the West's resolve. The stakes are too high for this suicidal notion to arouse in us anything but disgust."
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NATIONAL ISLAMISM, THE MIDDLE EAST'S NEW IDEOLOGY
by Barry Rubin

  We've more or less come to realize that in the Muslim world the Sunnis and the Shi'ites hate each other as much if not more than they do the rest of the world — and they've been acting on this hatred. Barry Rubin discusses an important counter trend — national islamism – which could persuade these groups and even non-Muslims to ignore their differences and focus on jihad, currently defined largely as the mission to kill off Israel and Western culture. For Iran, this amalgam "...constitutes a bridge into the Arab world" which would allow Iran to lead the fight "against the evil Western-Crusader-American-Jewish-Zionist-imperialistic-satanic conspiracy."
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ISLAM AND VIOLENCE
by Daniel Allott

  It won't come as a surprise to Think-Israel's readers to read that Muslims are the biggies when it comes to violent aggression against neigbors. Daniel Allott ties this chronic large-scale warfare and Muslim short-term rioting and dramatic outbursts together for us by pointing out that "...the glaring reality [is] that violence is a fact of life in many Muslim nations." "The West must recognize these violent outbursts for what they are: calculated acts of outrage meant not to refute but to intimidate non-Muslims into not speaking up at all."
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GEORGE W. BUSH: CLUELESS IN ISLAM (REVISITED)
by Norman Liebmann

  This is a very funny essay. This is a very sensible essay. It makes much more sense than the drool issuing from Jim Baker's mouth.
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ON COUNTER TERRORISM
by Dr. TS Girishkumar

  Dr Girishkumar reflects on his experience with the Muslim Jihad in India. He suggests a revolutionary idea — that advocates of Jihad be disenfranchised, isolated and handled under separate laws. "Since they themselves are inhuman, they do not deserve any human rights." It is worthwhile reading this article in conjunction with his article on the history of Jihadi terrorism in India — Click here.
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Understanding Islam At Its Source

FROM THE QUR'AN: "THE COW" AND "THE FAMILY OF IMRAN"
by Larry Hall

  Larry Hall does a masterful job in going to the Qu'ran to get the real meanings of such terms as salaam, jihad, and taqiyya. The linguistics are straight from the horse's mouth — make that... cow's utterances. Hall makes clear how the words of the Qu'ran "... animate the Muslim who truly believes." We should not trivialize or whitewash the intent.
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ISLAM GETS CONCESSIONS; INFIDELS GET CONQUERED
by Raymond Ibrahim

  Raymond Ibrahim contrasts the tolerance given the Moslems, who were allowed to retain control of the Al Asqa Mosque when Israel conquered eastern Jerusalem, to the defacing and desecration of the Christian churches whenever and wherever Islam conquered territory. It leads him to speculate on this conundrum: Moslems expect to keep permanently what they win by war. If that's their viewpoint, why then, will they not concede that mandated Palestine belongs to the Jews, by right of conquest? He suggests part of the reason the Muslims are unreasonable is that we in the West don't challenge them. "For whenever and wherever the West concedes ideologically, politically and especially spiritually, Islam will be sure to conquer. If might does not make right, zeal apparently does."
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  Related Articles from the New York Sun

RELIGION OF WHAT?
by Yashiko Sagamori

  This essay by Yashiko Sagamori is in response to a letter whose author suggests that Sagamori read the Koran to discover the meaning of jihad and to understand that 'Islam is all about peace.' Sagamori points out some real-life contradictions to this assertion. Islam is not about peace or, for that matter, truth or love or high moral standards. It wants "domination over the 'infidel'". It has encouraged disrespect for women and a life style that people from other cultures find stifling, not uplifting, not fulfilling. Islam after all "does not mean peace; it means submission."
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These next discuss some tributaries that contribute to the raging stream of anti-Semitism.

HATRED OF ISRAEL AND JEWS IMPERILS US ALL
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  As Cinnamon Stillwell warns, "what befalls the Jewish people has a nasty habit of spreading outward." This was true during the Nazi period. And now, again, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories have begun to flow in "from the Muslim world to American shores," thanks to available sinkholes — "Islamists, leftists, conspiracists, Jewish anti-Semites, Neo-Nazis and certain Paleoconservatives." She notes that "[i]t is not Israel that is causing Islamists to embark on a genocidal mission to kill the world's 'infidels,' along with any Muslims who stand in their way." As the Islamists grow more confident, they more and more expose their "... supremacist ideology that refuses to tolerate non-Muslims living as equals in their midst." And that affects all of us.
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CARTER'S CALUMNY
by Mitchell G. Bard

  David Meir-Levi says of this review by Mitchell Bard, "This is the best, most comprehensive, most detailed, and most accurate critique of Carter's book that I have seen so far." Carter does seem to be on the way to becoming a superstar in the anti-Semite's galaxy. If it happens, this will be his second 'best in class'. The first? The worst president America has ever had.
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BASHING POLLARD DOES NOT COMPORT WITH THE FACTS
by Nissan GanOr

  November 21, 2006 marked the 21st anniversary of Jonathan Pollard's incarceration for providing classified information to Israel. It is a fact that he handed over to Israel only information that Israel was supposed to get anyways. It is a fact that he did no harm to America. It is a fact "that the information Pollard passed to Israel concerned Syrian, Iraqi, Libyan and Iranian nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare capabilities — all being developed for use against Israel," American's most loyal ally in the Middle East. It is a fact that he has been kept in jail longer than notorious spies who did actual damage to American security and endangered the lives of many Americans. Why then, Nissan GanOr asks, is Pollard still in jail? Why the excessively long punishment? Why haven't the major Jewish Community leaders here in America and the Israeli Government taken up his cause — why haven't they at least remonstrated with the latest false literary concoction about him. (A fanciful retelling seems always to show up whenever there is any public movement to be fair and to release Pollard.)
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THE ROSEN/WEISMAN PROSECUTION: A NATIONAL DISGRACE
by Rachel Neuwirth

  In a set of events reminiscent of the Pollard case (see above), the U.S. Government has chosen to prosecute two former AIPAC executives for a "crime" that is "committed" by many others, who have suffered no or only minimal punishment. In this case, if they are convicted, we may all — and this includes the news media — suffer restrictions on our freedom of speech. As Rachel Neuwirth writes, "They are accused of having passed on information that they had heard by word of mouth that their informants allegedly learned from such documents. In effect, they are charged with gossiping and trading in rumors!" They were certainly part of the Washington politicians/ newspeople/ think-tankers/ government officials/ diplomats information network, which routinely swaps insider stories and runs a "leaks" service for the higher echelon of government. Like Pollard, they have not harmed the United States. Like Pollard, they are accused of passing on the information to Israel. Like Pollard, they are Jewish. It is nervous-making that they have been singled out, if not set up.
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A MAJOR EGYPTIAN INDUSTRY: GENERATING ANTI-ISRAEL AND ANTI-JEWISH HATE LITERATURE
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  When the Egyptians aren't busy learning to use American-supplied advanced rockets or doing a Sufi trance while the terrorists move weapon systems from Egypt into Gaza, they are producing some of the vilest anti-Semitic hate literature to come from our "allies" in the Middle East. Dr Reuven Erlich provides us with a representative sampling. So nu? Why aren't the Jews rioting?
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TYPICAL ANTISEMITIC INTERNET OUTPUT: NOT FACTUAL, NOT LOGICAL, AND NOT RATIONAL
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman points out some of the nasty and untruthful stuff about Israel and Jews posted on antisemitic internet websites. He takes an ordinary headline found on one such site and makes us understand just how insidious it is. As well as being dead wrong. His example anti-semite is someone who litters hateful and bizarre ideas all over the internet.
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INDOCTRINATION PARADING AS HISTORY AT ANDOVER HIGH
by Richard L. Cravatts, Ph.D.

  We know about the successful efforts in many colleges and universities that demonize Israel without being reproached by the administrators while pro-Israel speakers are blocked from presenting their arguments. But you don't expect it in the high schools, especially not in prestigious private high schools. But at Andover there is a group of teachers spearheaded by a physics instructor that do the whole repetoire of the "I-hate-Jews-and-Israel"ers: they call for divestment from Israel and they sponsor speakers who don't just plead the Palestinian case but demonize Israel, mouthing slogans in preference to facts. So Andover students learn that the Jews control America's media, money and government — oi, from their mouths — and that Israel is an apartheid state and should not exist.
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THE MYTH OF THE ARYAN RACE
by Dr. TS Girishkumar

  Back in the 1930s and 40s, Hitler and the Nazis made capital of the concept they were Aryan and hence superior to other races, particularly to the Jews. It may seem a small point in that "Aryan race" isn't a "hot" argument anymore. But the concept is still at work — there is, for example, a sizable group of neo-Nazis that calls itself Aryan Nations and there are many other white Christian supremacist groups with the same belief that the Zionists and Jews are to be prevented from gaining social control over America — the more pessimistic or battle-itchy believe the Jews already have all the power. They happily bond with that major source of anti-Semitism: organized Islam. Dr. TS Girishkumar wrote, "You [The Jews] are the most affected people in the world due the cooked up story of an Aryan race science. I shall have to start from the Rg Veda itself, and this I had been doing for last five years, and have found considerable materials."
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Israel has multiple internal problems. It doesn't bother answering Arab lies with the facts, so Arab propaganda wins by default. Its population is unevenly split between the larger group of Israelis that wants to defend Israel from being nibbled away in "peace" treaties and a smaller but powerful leftist group whose sympathies are primarily pro-Arab. The patriotic group has begun to see they need to change their tactics if they are to succeed in defending Israel. Meantime, the government continues to have no fear of clamping down on these loyal citizens, while it ignores the increasing number of radicalized Arabs who are Israeli citizens but who cooperate with the terrorists. And the judiciary — which has run wild encouraged by an incompetent government and an ineffective Knesset — has allied itself with a government that seems determined to give Israel away. In the judiciary, that translates into treating Israelis that protest the Government's actions as second-class citizens.

WHY ISRAEL'S IMAGE KEEPS DETERIORATING
by Yoram Shifftan

  Yoram Shifftan has written significant articles exploring both Israel's ineffective hasbara and her legal right to Biblical Israel. In this essay, he asks why Israel's image continues to deteriorate. He delves and uncovers a major reason: Israel does not rebut Arab lies with the historical and geographical facts that are both accurate and that support her claims. Unfortunately, this lack of resolution is part and parcel of a larger problem — Israel is still dominated by a small but influential group that puts liberal secularism above patriotism.
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THE ENEMY WITHIN
by Moshe Sharon

  Moshe Sharon writes, "[The Intifada] and the Israeli reaction ... represent the main problem of the State of Israel in a nutshell: Since its establishment it has hidden its head in the sand, refusing to face the fact that a mighty enemy has been growing within it, threatening its very existence." Ignoring the problem doesn't stop it – estimates of the number of radicalized Israeli Arabs who identify with the terrorists in wishing to destroy Israel has been variously estimated from a few percent to 95%.
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WE COULD HAVE SAVED GUSH KATIF AND NORTHERN SAMARIA
by Nadia Matar

  File this article under "unintended consequences." Last August, Israelis opposed to expelling Jews from Gush Katif in Gaza — and how right they were — demonstrated politely, walked in broil-level heat to Gush Katif, and believed that the soldiers of the IDF would never follow such a wicked order. As Nadia Matar points out, one year later, they are reacting differently to the Gay Parade scheduled to take place in Jerusalem. They are totally united and willing to be aggressive and go to jail. Given the Israeli government's inclination to fight Jews not Arabs, it's good training for the future.
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CHAYA IN ISRAEL'S LEGAL WONDERLAND
by Moshe Belogorodsky

  Moshe Belogorodsky from Shiloh, Israel, writes about his 14-year old daughter, Chaya, who was arrested in July 2005 and spent 40 days in jail before her trial when adult hardened criminals are not incarcerated pretrial anywhere near that long. So what was her heinous crime that made her such a danger to the State? "She [was] accused of standing on a sidewalk while her friends proceeded to block traffic. After her friends were arrested, a policewoman asked Chaya to leave the area. Chaya refused, saying that she wasn't doing anything illegal, that she had every right to stand on 'every inch of the Land of Israel.'" She has since been put on trial and found guilty of one of the charges. It is reassuring to know that the Olmert government and the out-of-control Israeli judiciary have finally found someone they are brave enough to fight.
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The repercussions from the quixotic expulsion of the Jews from Gush Katif last August are increasing rather than subsiding. There are increased missile attacks from Gaza and increased political and emotional stress on the Israeli public in general as they wonder what the Gaza potlatch ceremony gained them. And the innocent victims of the Government's expulsion policy are still victims. As one expellee, Oreet, commented (Jerusalem Post December 28, 2006) "If this were done anywhere else in the 'real world' the courts would have put a stop to it immediately — instead we had our businesses destroyed, our homes taken away, our lives ruined, we sit in 'modular homes' — try cardboard boxes that leak when it rains and are freezing in the winter and roasting in the summer, we have not received even 20% of our compensation and being over 50 have no hope of employment. We're not looking to rip off the country — we just want what is fair."

'WE STILL DON'T SEE THE LIGHT IN OUR FUTURE'
by Daniel Ben Simon

  In August 2005 the Sharon-Olmert government uprooted the 8-9000 Jews living in Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip. Daniel BenSimon interviewed several of them in Nitzan, the dismal temporary camp where many of the refugees live, while waiting for permanent quarters. Yet, "[s]ome 15 months after the disengagement, construction has not yet begun on the homes of some 500 evacuees who want to establish new communities." Once a highly productive group, now most are unemployed or underemployed. One man pointed out that they were trying to preserve what they once had: "... an outstanding human society, with a tremendous feeling of solidarity at its heart." They feel betrayed both by the government and by the lack of concern shown by the politicized left-wing human-rights organizations.
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LIVING IN A REFUGEE CAMP
by Rachel Saperstein

  The saga of Moshe and Rachel Saperstein is one of courage and staying human in the midst of adversity. They lived happily as part of the Neve Dekalim, Gush Katif community in the Gaza Strip until the Sharon-Olmert government decided for reasons that never made sense to transfer all the Jews out to (promised) new communities. Promises. Promises. Since then the government can claim high marks only in incompetency. Living quarters are temporary, shoddy and unattractive and it is hard to maintain the integrated community life they once had. But theirs is also an example of how magnificant the human spirit can be. Maintaining standards. Keeping busy so as to ward off depression. Helping each other to survive. Living like menschen.
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GUSH KATIF REPORT: NO HOUSING SOLUTIONS IN SIGHT
by Hillel Fendel

  It is amazing how heartbreaking a bunch of dry statistics can be when you realize they are describing an incredible group of people who lived productive lives, developed integrated communities, created innovative farming techniques and were major contributors to Israel's economy. Through no fault of their own, they were made refugees in their own country and the same government that created this catastrophe has only minimally rectified their situation.
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U.S. JEWISH GROUPS REFUSE AID TO GUSH KATIF REFUGEES
by Aaron Klein

  This article by Aaron Klein reports some of the same facts as those found in the Gush Katif Report (see above). But its focus is on the lack of financial support by the major American Jewish groups. This is in sharp contrast to the large sums raised by them for the Jews and Arabs who fled from northern Israel during the Lebanon War.
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Some New Ideas

PRIVATIZING THE WAR OF IDEAS
by Caroline Glick

  It is an understatement to say that Olmert has been ineffective fighting the Arab enemies of Israel. If anything, he has expended his resources fighting religious Jews, not religious and/or secular Arabs. And in America, Jim Baker is pushing retrograde ideas on how to fight islamofascists — he wants to try to talk Syria and Iran into becoming good little governments. Caroline Glick has a novel idea. Stop trying to choose between Hamas and Al-Fatah, as if this were a ballgame, when both are waging jihad and both need to be destroyed. The governments of the free world are hesitant when they should be stomping down hard on jihadist ideology. Well, then, why not encourage private citizens in the free world to do the job? She suggests several approaches.
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MANIFESTO FOR SURVIVAL
by Phyllis Chesler

  Phyllis Chesler describes some of the new manifestations of anti-semitism on the American campus. "Our intelligentsia do not view Jew-hatred or Israel-bashing as racism." America- and Israel-haters are welcome while those trying to be factual and truthful are prevented from speaking. They are blocked by a "silent boycott". Or the college administrators sequester the meeting so as not to rile the Muslim students. And when the truth-tellers do get an opportunity to speak, they are subjected to raucous jeers and boos by the Muslims and their allies. Chesler suggests some general ways to combat the Muslim "lethal propaganda" that has taken root in America — and not just on campus.
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WHY WE NEED SETTLEMENTS — NOW!
by Elyakim Haetzni

  The necrophilics among us are always eager to resurrect the "Peace Process" — a better name is the "appeasement process" — whereby Israel gives away more of its tiny land and the Arabs yawn, and a moment later, demand more. There is no peace but with each step of the ghoulish peace process Israel becomes more open to Arab terrorism and invasion. So what is the solution? Elyakim Haetzni advices us to strengthen Israel's security by civilian resettlement of the areas that safeguard her security. And peace? That will have to wait until the Arabs accept not just that Israel exists, but that she has the right, as does any country, to continue to exist.
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A NEW PARADIGM FOR THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT: FROM THE POLITICAL TO THE HUMANITARIAN
by Martin Sherman

  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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KNOWING WHY ISRAEL IS DISINTEGRATING IS THE FIRST STEP TOWARD ITS SALVATION
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Paul Eidelberg has a rather novel idea for stopping Israel's disintegration. He suggests the Jewish state take a new direction and become Jewish Israel. Take the "two basic principles of democracy, freedom and equality, from the Torah's conception of man's creation in the image of God — [it's] the only way to provide freedom and equality with ethical and rational constraints."
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The Christians in the Middle East and the liberal American and English churches might as well be on separate planets that don't communicate. Ignoring that the Christian population is growing only in Israel but dramatically decreasing in land controlled by the Palestinian Authority or Hezbollah or Iran, the liberal churches believe that these Christians are emigrating because of Israeli persecution. The Christians are terrorized by Arab Muslims but Israel is blamed. These essays show us both sides of the picture.

DIVESTMENT FROM ISRAEL, THE LIBERAL CHURCHES, AND JEWISH RESPONSES: A STRATEGIC ANALYSIS
by Eugene Korn

  Eugene Korn points out that much of the active hostility to Israel demonstrated by the liberal churches has been carefully cultivated by a small group of Middle East (ME) church clerics, who act as propagandists for the Muslim Palestinian Authority. They convey a fairly accurate picture of the distress suffered by the local Christian community but they attribute it to Israeli persecution. In this country, Church officers don't reflect the pro-Israel sentiments of most of their congregants, which causes dissonance in many churches. In the ME, the Christian clerics won't alleviate the suffering of the Christian Arabs by blaming Israel, because it is not Israel that is to blame. The solution, Korn says, is to recognize that "Jews and Christians have common strategic interests in the Middle East against Islamic intolerance and should forge alliances."
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THE GRINCH THAT STOLE CHRISTMAS
by Avi Hein

  Native Christians are fleeing the PA-controlled areas because, as Avi Hein tells us, "With the radical Islamic Hamas' ascent to power, their desire for a fundamentalist Muslim state ruled by Islamic law seems closer than ever to being realized. Christians under the PA are reduced to dhimmis, second class citizens. Muslim Palestinians threaten their Christian neighbors with violence on a daily basis because, as one Christian Palestinian noted, the Christians 'want to live in peace.'" What is happening in the territories is mirrored in Lebanon, Egypt,Syria and Iraq. Some 2 million Christians have left the Middle East in the last 30 years, as resurgent fundamentalist Islam has taken over.
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We present the biographies of two righteous people, one a Muslim who is speaking out against Islamofascism and against Jew-hate; the other an English military man, who taught the leaders of the first army fielded by the new Israeli state how to fight. Both understood what they saw with their own eyes and did what was right.

NONIE DARWISH USES FREEDOM TO CONFRONT A LOST CULTURE
by Nurit Greenger

  Nurit Greenger talks about her meeting with Nonie Darwish, who grew up in Egypt, the daughter of a military man whose job it was to train Arab terrorists in Gaza to infiltrate Israel. She has rejected her Islamic indoctrination in Jew-hate and now devotes herself to fighting Islamo-fascism.
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ORDE WINGATE AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SPECIAL NIGHT SQUADS: Major General Orde Charles Wingate — Hayedid
by Doron Geller

  Without its embryo army, Israel would have been destroyed in its infancy when Arab armies invaded Israel in 1948, just hours after the State was declared. Without Orde Wingate, a devout believer in the return of the Jewish people to their land, it is doubtful whether the leaders of this young army would have had sufficient training to withstand the Arab invasion. Doron Geller writes about Major General Orde Charles Wingate, who did so much to ensure Israel's survival.
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History

CHANUKAH CORROBORATIONS
by Gerald A. Honigman

  The Arabs arrived in Israel in the 7th Century C.E. Gerald Honigman refutes the Arab lie that they were in Israel before the Jews by pointing us to historic texts from ancient Egypt, Iran, Babylon, Rome and Greece that corroborate events in Jewish history over the last several thousands of years. Was Jesus a Palestinian? No, he was a Jew living in Jewland — Judea. Want to know the history of ancient Israel? Read the Torah.
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MOSES IN MECCA
by Dr. Jack Wheeler

  This essay by Dr. Jack Wheeler is entertaining but it is also a serious retelling of the story of how Jerusalem got to be sacred to the Muslims. Listen and you shall hear ... It all started in Mohammed's time... Well... maybe not. To highlight the irrationality of the Arabs claiming Jerusalem, Dr Wheeler asks: what if it were discovered that Mecca was associated with Moses? Would the Muslims be willing to give up their claim to Mecca? It's not likely. Why then do they deny the Jewish claim to Jerusalem — especially there is no real association between Mohammed and Jerusalem.
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ARAB LEADERS CAUSED THE ARAB REFUGEE PROBLEM
by Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook

  Ever since 1968, the Arabs have made rash claims that the Jews chased them out of Israel when the Arab armies attacked the newly-declared State of Israel. Israel has patiently accumulated the facts — it was the Arab leaders that directed the Arabs to flee. Those that stayed and their descendants are Israeli citizens, with the same rights and privileges as any other citizen; those that fled and their descendants have ever since been UNRWA-protected refugees, grudgingly allowed to live in refugee camps in various Arab countries. Here is corroboration from Arab sources that it was the Arab leaders who drove out the Arabs.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

NOVEMBER 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
DECEMBER 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


September-October, 2006

We start with some major analyses of the second Lebanese War and what went wrong. Much of the problem was that the Israeli government had a sloppy understanding of what it needed to do to win. Nor did it appreciate how much Israelis were willing to sacrifice for the war effort. The fourth and last essay of the group discusses how the war compounded the damage done by Israel's disastrous decision to leave Gaza — the Gazan Arabs now model themselves on Hezbollah and are optimistic that they can destroy Israel. What is also dangerous is that America continues to base its policies in the Middle East on the unrealistic belief that the Arabs crave peace and democracy.

STRATEGIC FOLLIES: ISRAEL'S MISTAKES IN THE SECOND LEBANESE WAR
by Efraim Inbar

  Efraim Inbar discusses several mistakes that "squandered an important opportunity to destroy the majority of Hizbullah's military presence in southern Lebanon." Israel's people strongly supported the war yet the government acted as if it believed that Israel was tired of the long-ongoing conflict and wasn't prepared to pay the price of prolonged warfare. Israel's leaders were just as wrong in their expectations about the capabilities and cooperation of the Lebanese government and the U.N.'s willingness to implement the lofty resolutions it so expertly crafts.
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EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT THE RECENT MIDEAST WAR IS WRONG
by Emanuele Ottolenghi

  Emanuele Ottolenghi's article emphasizes the factual as against how people perceive the events of the war. His thesis is that after the recent Lebanese War Israel dwelled on why it lost, while Hezbollah viewed events as instantiating victory. In reality, Hezbollah was not the huge winner it believed it was and Israel was not the huge loser it feared it was — though neither side attained its objectives.
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SYMPOSIUM: DEADLY ERROR
conducted by Jamie Glazov

  Just after the Lebanon War, when Jamie Glazov asked a panel of Middle East experts about Israel's performance in the war, they pointed to some major deficiencies: (1)Israel underestimated Hezbollah's communications sophistication and the difficulty of dislodging them from their well-prepared positions; (2) Israel's political leadership took "a piece-meal approach and lacks the strategic vision or moral courage to do what is necessary;" and (3) that over the prior six years, they looked away as Hezbollah "steadily amassed incredible amounts of fire-power and enjoyed total freedom of movement." Asked about the "ceasefire" agreement, they felt "the UN will do more harm than good" — Hezbollah will remain and rebuild. The war underscored that Israel should NOT have withdrawn unilaterally from Gaza and that Israel could no longer ignore dangerous developments for the sake of a wished-for "peace".
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A GLORIOUS VISION: MISCONCEPTIONS AND THE MIDDLE EAST
by Gamaliel Isaac

  Gamaliel Isaac's bottom line is that "George W. Bush's glorious vision of the Middle East is based on his flawed assumption that Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian people are genuinely interested in peace." Particularly noteworthy is his portrait of our Secretary of State, assembled from her own bizarre words and actions. When she forced Israel to give up control of the Rafah crossing, she called it "an opportunity for peace, for a new kind of peace. We saw, in the Gaza, the beginning of coming to life of economic life there." The only large scale movement of goods was the huge unimpeded influx of weapons into Gaza. George Orwell could not improve on her wording.
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We recently memorialized the fifth anniversary of 9/11 when President Bush vowed to fight terrorism and then could not say that we were fighting Islamic terrorists because he'd been foolish enough to label Islam a religion of peace. Have we made headway in more precisely defining those who chose to go to war with us? Do we understand them better? These next essays address the strong link between Islamic terrorism and the religion of Islam.

THE TERRORISTS' MOTIVATION: ISLAM
by Edwin A. Locke and Alex Epstein

  Often the connection between terrorism committed by Muslims and the Muslim religion is ignored or denied. Or it's all blamed on a handful of baddies that simply don't understand their own religion as well as the New York Times does. In this essay, Edwin Locke and Alex Epstein make clear, that there is indeed a relationship between Islamic terrorists and Islam — the terrorists behave as they do because they are practicing their religion. Islam is the motive power; terrorism is the result.
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THE REAL ISLAM
by Mark Alexander

  If Mark Alexander is right, we are making headway. President Bush described our enemy as 'Islamic fascists" — decidely a big step up from fighting "terrorism," which, after all, is only a tactic, not an entity. Of course, it's 5 years after 9/11 and the US State Dept is hardly dancing to the new tune. The Muslim protective associations call it a slur — but what don't the peaceloving Muslims consider a slur? Moreover, as Alexander points out, "Mohammed and his followers forged an inextricable merger of politics and religion." But it is a step forward.
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THE TOP 10 REASONS WHY IT'S QUITE POSSIBLE THAT ISLAM ISN'T EXACTLY A RELIGION OF PEACE
by Don Feder

  The tone may be light but Don Feder makes some serious points on the absurdity of continuing to call Islam a peaceful religion. He makes some telling points: "Jesus said turn the other cheek. Muhammed said cut off the other guy's cheek. The Torah says show kindness to strangers. The Koran says: If you can't convert them, kill them."
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THE RELIGIOUS FOUNDATIONS OF SUICIDE BOMBINGS: Islamist Ideology
by David Bukay

  This is an important article for understanding what motivates suicide terrorism. David Bukay proves by masterful arguments and relevent background material that "[w]hile Western scholars of late argue that jihad refers primarily to internal struggle, Islamic writings feature jihad as physical warfare." He writes that "Suicide bombing in the Muslim world cannot be separated from religion. Its perpetrators believe jihad to be synonymous with war and mandate Muslims to strike not only at non-Muslims but also at co-religionists deemed insufficiently loyal to their radical cause. The ideological basis of such an interpretation has deep roots in Islamic theology, but it came to prominence with the twentieth-century rise of Muslim Brotherhood theorists such as Banna and Qutb and was further developed by their successors."
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However future historians label this period, right now some deny we are fighting a war at all. Others suggest the enemy is just Osama Bin Laden or just Iran and Korea, the nuclear wannabees. But more and more people see that these are connected: Muslims are overwhelming Europe with a high birthrate, massacring Christians in Africa and Asia, vandalizing synagogues in England and France, making friends with heads of state in South America, terrorizing citizens in Asian states such as Bangladesh, numbing the opposition in America by suing it into quiescence, and radicalizing the younger generation of Muslims, so that it lives and breathes hate for their enemies. Who are their enemies? Non-Muslims — Westerners, Israel for sure, India and any other group that objects to becoming Muslim — and even Muslims who aren't ideologically trustworthy.

And let's not forget the StateDepies — a group that is capable of examining all sorts of data and ignoring it all. In their latest moronic foray into Middle East politics, they have decided — as voiced by their Lady-in-Chief, Madame Rice — that to induce Europeans and Arab moderates [Hamas and Fatah] to cooperate on the "Arab-Israeli dispute" [sic sick sic], America must be committed to "free [the Palestinians] from the humiliation of occupation" in a state of their own. [Translation: split up Israel to give the Arab terrorists more space from which to attack Israel.] As Rael Jean Isaac said in Outposts, "... Feed Israel to the Terrorists to Win the War on Terror." Yah, that will make Iran give up its nuclear bomb program.

So maybe we all need to bone up on the obvious. These next essays start at the beginning and aim to precisely define our enemy and what the issues are.

DEFINING THE ISSUE AND THE ENEMY
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  In this deceptively simple essay, Professor Eidelberg emphasizes the importance of taking Islamic threats seriously. Although many do not realize it, "[t]oday we find ourselves in a Third World War whose overriding issue is 'Islamism' versus liberal democracy. Today, however, the United States is alone, the enemy has yet to be clearly defined, and it is by no means certain that the U.S. will triumph over this enemy."
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THE AGENDA OF ISLAM — A WAR BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS
by Professor Moshe Sharon

  This is a clear-eyed rational presentation what is meant by the war of civilizations and what we can expect from Muslims in the future. As Moshe Sharon writes, "The war has started a long time ago between two civilizations — between the civilization based on the Bible and between the civilization based on the Koran." He concludes that "Islam was born with the idea that it should rule the world" and "the world will continue to be in the house of war until it comes under Islamic rule" — open war, war by infiltration, and very temporary cease-fires. So the dreams of those who still believe in negotiating towards a common goal of peace have no chance of materializing. We are reprinting Sharon's article plus some updated information.
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FAILURE AND LONGEVITY: THE DOMINANT POLITICAL ORDER OF THE MIDDLE EAST
by Jonathan Spyer

  Most of the attention on the Middle East is on Iran and Iraq. But there are several other major players we need to consider. Jonathan Spyer makes the point that while around the world authoritarian regimes are giving way to economic and political reform, this isn't true in the Middle East. Using the political regimes in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia/Gulf Monarchies as case studies, he notes that the regimes in these countries have longevity thanks to their identifying themselves with Islam, scapegoating Israel and controlling a loyal military capable of suppressing dissidents. But they have failed to advance their societies — "the free flow of information and criticism that are essential to the building of successful modern economies and societies are absent." Nonetheless, they appear likely to continue to survive.
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PAN-MUSLIM FICTION
by Efraim Karsh

  Naomi Ragen wrote of Efraim Karsh's essay: "[It] debunks the wide-spread and anti-Semitic propaganda that getting rid of Israel would serve peace in the Middle East. It's good to know the facts." The facts being that violence, terrorism and subversion are endemic in the Arab states and have been well before the Jews reclaimed their land. As for the putative Arab sympathy for the "Palestinians", "[i]t is not out of concern for a Palestinian right to national self-determination but as part of a holy war to prevent the loss of a part of the 'House of Islam' that Islamists inveigh against the Jewish state of Israel."
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WHY DO MUSLIMS EXECUTE INNOCENT PEOPLE? Islamist Ideology
by Denis MacEoin

  Denis MacEoin reviews human rights abuses in the Islamic world from the historic and theological points of view. He deals with the fundamental incompatibility between Western and Islamic notions of justice, particularly when penalties are meted out in accordance with the ideology adopted by modern-day strict Sharia adherents; i.e., "Islam cannot adapt to the changes imposed by history but must remain rigidly faithful to the existing interpretations of scripture..." He suggests ways to encourage bringing "...Islam into closer harmony with universal standards of justice, tolerance, pluralism, and human rights."
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AHMADINEJAD'S WORLD
by Matthias Küntzel

  Jerome du Bois (www.thetearsofthings.net) wrote this about "Matthias Küntzel's stunning and comprehensive article," on Ahmadinejad and the Iranian Basiji: they "invented suicide bombing; .. shaped Hezbollah and inspired Sunni Hamas and the 9/11 murderers; ... monitor and repress Westernization in Iran (Taliban-style); and ... are now being trained in Iranian nuclear laboratories. They would not hesitate to invite the vaporization of millions of Iranians (and anyone else) if it meant the destruction of Israel. In fact, they would welcome such 'martyrdom,' even their own. Especially their own." This is the reality, and it is very different from the portrait of Ahmadinejad as a punk nutter who can be tamed by the Western media.
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FIGHTING BATTLES...IGNORING WARS
by Philip V. Brennan

  This essay points out that "[w]e are engaged in a war, in a struggle where the enemy can be counted in the tens of millions, located in every corner of the globe." Unfortunately, we treat battles – "whether it be in Iraq or Lebanon or in the Gaza Strip or the rugged wastelands of Afghanistan" — as descrete events and ignore that they are part of the global conflict. As Philip Brennan puts it, "It's a case of treating the symptoms while ignoring the disease that causes them."
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WHAT SHOULD OUR WAR AIMS BE IN WORLD WAR 4?
by Tom Carew

  Tom Carew uses the recent Lebanon War as a starting point on how we need to restructure our thinking about what our objectives are in fighting our Jihadist enemies. Instead of praising the IDF goal of saving enemy civilians at the cost of sacrificing Israeli citizens, he suggests rational war aims aimed at winning, not posturing. He then, succintly, provides the context in which these objectives will be applied — the Fanatical Jihadi Fringe (FJF) war against everyone else. As he points out, there's "no possible scope for any negotiation or compromise with the FJF, because... for the FJF, there is simply nothing to negotiate."
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PROJECTING FUTURE JIHADI TERRORISM FIVE YEARS AFTER 9/11
by Walid Phares

  Walid Phares provides us with an excellent summary of the two major Muslim jihadist groups that promulgate and promote terrorism — the Sunni Salafists and the Shi'ite Khomeinists — and what we can expect from them in the near future.
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CAN THE WEST DEFEAT THE ISLAMIST THREAT? HERE ARE TEN REASONS WHY NOT
by David Selbourne

  Instead of assuming that the West can win the war waged against us by the Islamists whenever we decide to make a serious effort to do so, David Selbourne points out Islam's strong points — its moral certainty and willingness to sacrifice bigtime versus our fractured morality and lack of unified purpose — that make our winning problematic. A frightening essay, but one worth pondering.
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It has become a tenet of our modern political belief system that there exist Moderate Muslims that are reasonable and sincerely desire to conform to the rules of the Western political systems in which they reside. These essays question whether that is true and if it matters, given that the influential Islamic leaders, clerics and intellectuals expect the world to accommodate to Islam, not the reverse.

WHY WE CANNOT RELY ON MODERATE MUSLIMS
by Fjordman

  Using examples from various parts of the world, Fjordman illustrates his thesis that that it a betrayal "...to sacrifice centuries of advances in human freedom as well as the future of our children and grandchildren to appease Muslims who contribute virtually nothing to our societies and are hostile to their very foundations." "At the end of the day, what counts isn't the difference, if any, between moderate Muslims and radical Muslims, but between Muslims and non-Muslims, and between Muslims and ex-Muslims. Ibn Warraq says that there may be moderate Muslims, but Islam itself is not moderate."
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MODERATE ISLAM AND SECULARIZATION
by Jason Pappas

  Jason Pappas writes that "[i]n an attempt to encourage a 'moderate' Islam we have embarked on a 'self-esteem' inducing regimen where we continually praise the 'true' Islam that's been 'hijacked' by the 'evil ones.'" Implicit in the belief in a moderate Islim is the supposition that Islam can be secularized — so that its adherents are willing to live and let live, sharing in some generic set of neutered beliefs, untainted by particularism. After pointing out the differences between Islam and Christianity, he concludes that it is not clear that a moderate version of Islam is possible.
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PALESTINIAN SUICIDE STRATEGY
by Barry Rubin

  A corollary of the belief in the Moderate Muslim is the Western conviction that everyone has the same desire to optimize his life. So Western governments try to impose normative Western interests on Palestinian Arabs. As Barry Rubin writes, "Every day Western governments, media and academics try to impose this model on Palestinian behavior, politics and ideology. Yet it just doesn't work. The things many in the West think motivates Palestinians — getting a state, ending the occupation — are of no interest in their own right."
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These essays discuss two groups that contribute strongly to Islam's goal of imposing Islam on the entire world. CAIR makes Americans feel guilty about disrespecting Muslims — even if they have to ignore the facts and/or invent the story themselves. And many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) obsessively devote much of their resources and efforts to demonizing Israel and encouraging anti-Semitism. CAIR and these NGOs have in common the ability to reverse reality and portray Muslim terrorists and arsonists as victims and Israelis and Americans as their attackers.

KAFIR-PHOBIA: AMERICANS AS VIOLENT ANTI-MUSLIM BIGOTS
by Patrick Poole

  Patrick Poole writes about a common trick Muslim groups such as CAIR that front for the terrorists use — they portray the Arab as victim and garnish much sympathy and publicity. Unfortunately for them, it often turns out that the Arab "victim" of arson was the instigator of the arson — but that isn't as well-publicized as the original "victim" story. Nor does CAIR apologize for the "error".
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THE CENTRALITY OF NGOS IN THE DURBAN STRATEGY
by Gerald M. Steinberg

  Gerald M. Steinberg tells the fascinating story of how many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that purport to be neutral and altruistic adopted an anti-Israel agenda when the end of the Cold War left them missionless and began to use much of their resources to promote one-sided and distorted propaganda "in international frameworks". The 2001 UN Conference against Racism held in Durban was particularly important in that "[t]he text adopted ... at Durban provided a battle plan, to be executed by the NGO network, for the political war against Israel that has been waged since then." As Steinberg notes, "NGOs that claim to promote human rights and international law are an effective vehicle for gaining influence and promoting the radical political objectives while avoiding democratic processes and accountability."
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These essays highlight three different historical periods: the so-called Golden Age of Islamic mathematics and science; the legal and illegal immigration of Arabs into Israel in the 20th Century and Syria's current effort to "regain" the Golan Heights.

LESS THAN ZERO
by Zack Lieberberg

  The Arabs — maybe Muslims in general — hold the world's record in producing low-tech cost-effective havoc and bizarre violence — a behavioral repetoire that is not intellectually challenging. But the myth persists that, not so long ago, they once were intellectually and creatively at the pinnacle. A good case can be made that they preserved the intellectual insights of the ancient Greeks and Romans but they, themselves, were not innovators, as Zack Lieberberg points out. Arabic numbers and the use of zero were developed in India. Historic figures in transmitting intellectual material to the West were usually people the Arabs had conquered. As Lieberberg writes, "To be Arab means to conquer every nation that can be conquered and claim its historic achievements as if they belonged to Arabs from the beginning of time."
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THE SMOKING GUN: ARAB IMMIGRATION INTO PALESTINE, 1922-1931
by Fred M. Gottheil

  Palestinian Arabs base their claim to Israeli land on "deep and timeless roots in that geography and that their own immigration into that geography has at no time been consequential. To challenge that contention, then, is to challenge their self-selected criterion for sovereignty." Fred Gottheil not only challenges that belief but demonstrates the likelihood that many of the Palestinian Arabs migrated — or are descendants of those who migrated — to Mandated Palestine and continue to this day to migrate to Israel to take advantage of economic conditions made available by the British Mandatory Government and the Jews. His facts and figures are in line with what Winston Churchill — well-informed about the British Mandate – said about the Arab influx into Israel: "far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied."
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RETURN GOLAN?
by Dr. Steve Carol

  Syria continues to demand the return of the Golan Heights, but, as Steve Carol writes, "there is some legal question as to the status of the Golan Heights belonging to Syria in the first place." But that hasn't deterred Syria from trying to acquire it by attacking Israel and, when that failed, manufacturing "the bogus issue of the Shebaa Farms... Hezbollah claims it is part of Lebanon, in order to give Hezbollah an excuse to keep fighting against Israel." As Carol writes, "For Israel to retreat from, let alone return the Golan Heights to Syrian control would be the height of geopolitical folly."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
OCTOBER 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


July-August, 2006

This issue of Think-Israel concentrates heavily on the war in Lebanon. Many of the articles in this section intersect in that each one examines in detail a different facet of a single subject: how do we destroy the local "landless" terrorists — Hamas and Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda — and discourage the countries that keep them in business. Why so many essays? Because the future of both Israel and America are riding on what we do in the very near future. And we won't understand what we need to understand from silly CNN soundbites.

The Israelis were united as they haven't been in years; the IDF was strongly supported; and yet, the left-wing Kadima government refused to fight. It purposefully bombed empty buildings and — unlike Hezbollah — it made avoiding injury to Lebanese civilians as its primary goal. The War, where acting noble was more important than protecting Israeli lives, was the fruition of the intellectual notions taught to generations of Israelis. In a few short weeks, these ideas have become overripe and doomed for the garbage pail. What is necessary now is to rid the body politic of those few who still maintain these quaint suicidal ideas. Unfortunately, they are as yet still in power. These essays provide background, assess what went wrong and discuss what needs to be done in the future.


Background

LESSONS FROM KATYUSHAS
by Steven Plaut

  In this essay, Steven Plaut provides us with a brief but insightful history of the Lebanese-Israeli war, intermittently ongoing since the early 1980s. He concludes with a collection of lessons the Katyusha war should teach Israel.
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THE LIMITS OF LEBANON'S "DEMOCRACY"
by J. Peter Pham, Ph.D.

  As Family Security Matters pointed out, "One of the major refrains heard from the Bush administration and the international community about the war in the Middle East is that Israel should respect the fragile democratic government in Lebanon." J. Peter Pham points out that democracy in Lebanon was never a robust political system. At best it focused on protecting an individual's freedom from religous and political power groups other than his own. Politically, Lebanon was until recently openly under Syria's thumb. Now Hezbollah is effectively in charge of some parts of the country and is even part of the government. "Lebanese Democracy" is a pretty sound and is a useful myth around which politicians and the media can weave fantasies but it has no substance. Believing it exists only adds noise to a confused situation.
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TEXT AND ANALYSIS OF UN SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTION 1701 TO END THE WAR
by Reuven Erlich

  This article provides the text and an astute if somewhat optimistic analysis of the terms of U.N. Resolution 1701. The peacekeepers aren't armed; there are no definitions of what constitutes a violation; and there are no penalties. Essentially this puts the war between the Hezbollah terrorists and Israel into phase 2: a propaganda war. And Israel is yet to win such a war. (See an additional analysis by Think-Israel staff at the end of the article.)
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WE LOST THE WAR

Maybe not on points. Israel accomplished much — it destroyed much of Hezbollah's store of materials and its supply of foot soldiers. Moreover, Hezbollah's superb propaganda machine has been dented if not cracked by website bloggers. Some prominent Shi'ites aren't happy that Iran is so blatantly in control of Hezbollah. And in general, more people are willing to admit that what is preventing peace in the Middle East is the Arab fixation on destroying Israel.

On the other hand, Hezbollah accomplished what much larger Arab armies were not able to do — it was still standing when the UN demanded a ceasefire. That it owed this to its hiding among the civilian populace says much about Hezbollah's morals, but it has clearly been a winning tactic. The diplomats have come to the forefront and will try and talk the problems created by the badly-designed ceasefire to death while Hezbollah rearms itself. And Hezbollah's victory has inspired the other local terrorist gangs in Gaza with increased confidence; they are more willing to say openly that they are fixated on destroying Israel.

THE MIDEAST'S MUNICH
by Arthur Herman

  Arthur Herman compares the current "ceasefire" in Lebanon to the 1938 Munich agreement between England and Adolph Hitler. Because Hitler was not stopped early, the war, when it came, exacted a much larger price in blood and misery. For the European Jews, it was near fatal.
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THE IMPENDING HOLOCAUST OF THE NEW JEW
by Oz Almog

  Oz Almog compares the present with the period just before the second World War, when, instead of preparing to fight the growing Nazi determination to conquer Europe, countries and individuals trivialized the situation or denied how serious it was. Or believed they could come to an accomodation with Hitler. Similarly now, diplomacy is in the ascendancy and no one does anything to curtail Ahmedinajab — or indeed any of the hate-spewing leaders of the Muslims — while the costs are still small.
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ESSAYS ON THE WAR
by Ari Shavit

  In these two outstanding essays, Ari Shavit analyzes what went wrong. Israel is a Western-normal country living "in a region of fanaticism and despotism." Therefore "Israel must ... protect its internal environment from the external environment surrounding it. Life in defiance of the environment is an essential part of Israeli existence." The Israeli elites who have for the past 20 years preached post-Zionism and weakened the spirit of nationalism have caused Israel "to make a navigational error and to lose its way." Israel "must find the spirit and we must find the language that we lost in the years preceding the war" by denigrating power and our own identity. Now, after the ceasefire, Israel must not pretend it won — for that will permit her to bypass the hard thinking she needs to do about her lack of preparedness for this particular type of war. She is strong at her core. She needs to be prepared to fight "WAR-real war" the next time.
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AN UNMITIGATED DISASTER
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick said in another recent article, "Diplomatically, in the space of five weeks the government managed to undermine Israel's alliance with America; to hand Syria, Hezbollah and Iran the greatest diplomatic achievements they have ever experienced; and to flush down the toilet the unprecedented international support that US President Bush handed to Israel on a silver platter at the G-8 summit. (See "Olmert Must Go".) In this article, she analyzes the problems with the ceasefire resolution — Resolution 1701 — that Israel hastily accepted.
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HEZBOLLAH 3, ISRAEL 0!
by Ralph Peters

  Ralph Peters sums up the war this way: "Israel's abysmally incompetent government start[ed] a war impulsively and prosecute[d] it half-heartedly..." "The rank and file of the IDF would have done what needed to be done. And their leaders failed them." "While Israel couldn't plan or execute a winning campaign, it also failed to think beyond the inevitable cease-fire. But Hezbollah did. The terrorists had mapped out precisely what they had to do the moment the shooting stopped: Hand out Iranian money, promise they'll rebuild what Israel destroyed — and simply refuse to honor the terms of the U.N. resolution." He concludes, "Get ready for Round Two."
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THE NEW REFUGEES
by Rachel Saperstein

It's almost a year since the Jews of Gush Katif were expelled from their homes by the Sharon-Olmert government. Their misery was met with indifference by so many Israelis. In an ironic twist, these still-unsettled Jews have been comforting some recently-arrived neighbors, the Jews fleeing northern Israel to avoid the constant rocket bombardment by Hezbollah. To jump from irony to total weirdness, Ehud Olmert may be timid about pursuing the war Hezbollah provoked, but he makes no bones about hoping soon to start kicking Jews out of Sameria and Judea. Someone is living in cloud cuckoo land.
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What now? How does Israel handle the next round? These are some of the ideas advanced — get rid of the those who bankrupted Israel intellectually, depopulate southern Lebanon, get the Arabs out of Israel, fight hard and defeat the terrorists. And don't forget Gaza.

ENLIGHTENED OR UNHINGED?
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman puts his finger on what went wrong in the Israeli-Lebanese war starting well before the war, "Left-wing intellectual bankruptcy has left us unwilling to truly fight the enemy." As one reader commented, "The weapons, etc. are important, but the soul, the willingness to win is the key." We can expect to see major realignments in Israel as a result of the botched war.
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THE LESSONS OF 2006
by David Wilder

  David Wilder writes that Israel has made disasterous mistakes – getting into Oslo and getting out of Gaza. And now it has failed in its latest confrontation with Hezbollah, because its government was not willing to read the situation realistically and do what needed doing militarily and diplomatically. "If," he concludes, "we are truthful with ourselves, reach the necessary conclusions and implement them, then maybe, maybe, it will all have been worth it."
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LESSONS SO FAR:
Hard Truths To Learn From Israel's War On Hezbollah
by Ralph Peters

  Ralph Peters points out that "... our civilization has been forced into a defensive war to the death with fanatical strains of Islam – both Shi'a and Sunni." He recounts some of the lessons we've from the war on Hezbollah, including that we can't "win 'Eastern' wars with Western values." Especially when Hezbollah can fight either as a well-trained army or as a guerilla outfit, hiding among civilians. He concludes that "[w]e are going to have to learn to fight by the enemy's rules. And we aren't going to like it."
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PREMATURE CEASE FIRES ARE BAD FOR ISRAEL: TIME WE LEARNED A DIFFICULT LESSON
by David Bogner

  David Bogner writes of a bar fight he witnessed and how a bully kept provoking and picking a fight until, finally, he was properly handled. He wasn't just hit hard; he was hit until he cried, "I give up," and admitted defeat. And no one interfered. Why, oh why, didn't Israel do it right?
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WHAT ISRAEL SHOULD REALLY DO IN LEBANON
by Robert Locke

  Robert Locke points out the essential reason for the Hezbollah-Lebanese physical entanglement — it is a way for Hezbollah to exert sovereignty while avoiding the responsibility of a sovereign power. Locke suggests a novel way to fight this terrorist sovereignty: depopulating the areas of Hezbollah's control by moving out the civilians from southern Lebanon as leverage to force an end to the attacks. (See this also.)
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ISRAEL'S SHATTERED DREAM OF PEACE
by James Lewis

  Lawrence Auster of View from the Right (VFR) noted (www.amnation.com, August 17, 2006) that "VFR has been ... saying that either Israel [transfers the Arabs out of Israel], or Israel dies. Robert Locke ... in 2003 worked out a detailed, sensible, civilized strategy for carrying it out (www.vdare.com/locke/palestinian_problem.htm)." And now James Lewis writes in a mainstream website that Israel's long-held dream of peace has been shattered, and the time may come "... when Israel will feel compelled to move enemy populations out of the neighboring territories."
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THE DISPROPORTIONATE PEOPLE
by Yashiko Sagamori

  In this essay Yashiko Sagamori reflects on what the term "disproportionate" means applied to the Jewish people, which doesn't seem to be average in anything — overrepresented in Nobel awards, disproportionately unreactive in responding to attack. To abide by proportionality, given the ratio of Jews to Arabs, each attack on a Jew should result in an actual attack against 100 Arabs, not a pretend retaliation where the Jews shoot up a couple of empty buildings. A strong response would end the Arab war against Israel and would actually save lives.
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LEARNING FROM OUR MISTAKES
by Boris Shusteff

  Boris Shusteff points out that "both Hamas and Hezbollah grabbed the territories voluntarily relinquished by Israel, stockpiled tons of weapons there and transformed the land into a bridgehead in their war against Israel." Yet Olmert appears to have learned nothing from the Oslo disaster and Barak's flight from Lebanon — he plans to continue vacating land, which various terrorist gangs will immediately occupy. Israel's paternalism towards the backward Arabs has not worked; they may be medieval, but they have learned to operate modern weapons in pursuit of their monomanical dream of exterminating Israel. As Shusteff points out, for Israel to continue to provide the Arabs with easy access to Israel would be suicidal.
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THE IMPOSSIBLE PEACE
by Bruce Thornton

  Bruce Thornton tells us that diplomacy is bound to fail in solving the Arab-Israeli conflict because it is "founded on false assumptions." The core issue in Middle East friction is "not the 'occupation,' not 'Palestinian national aspirations,' but the century-long violent assault against Jews and Israel on the part of Muslims whose religion justifies their attempt to destroy the 'infidel' divinely destined to live under Islamic hegemony. All the other issues the world obsesses over are meaningless unless the survival of Israel is first guaranteed and Muslims prove that they are willing to coexist peacefully with Israel." "The true 'occupation' is the Muslim continuing occupation of lands that were Jewish and Christian for centuries."
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EXPLAINING ISRAEL'S MILITARY ACTION TO AN OFFICE WORKER IN THE MIDWEST
by Michelle Nevada

  Have you noticed how often in defending Israel, you have to talk of what should have been obvious in the first place. Everyone understands that defending home and family is primary, right? Except, apparently, when it's the Jews defending their families and homes in a fight they didn't start and didn't want and did much to avoid. Michelle Nevada makes the analogy to how to handle a nasty and vindictive co-worker whose idea of fun is to trash your workspace.
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WHAT PLAN SHOULD ISRAEL FOLLOW IN GAZA?
by Dr. Steven Carol

  Dr. Steve Carol reminds us that Gaza hasn't gone away. Attempting to crush the spirit of the Gush Katif Jews by expelling them and leaving the territory in Arab hands "did not bring more security or more defensible lines." In fact, "Gaza today is a strategic threat to Israel. It has become a mini-version of the Al-Qaeda-Taliban-controlled Afghan state." Israel will need to deal with this.
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Hezbollah functions as an agent of and as a placeholder for Iran and Syria. This war was but a warm-up event for the main event — Islam against the West. In effect this means Islam against America, with most countries sitting it out — except in countries where Islam has frightened enough of the people but hasn't yet taken control of the country. These essays deal with the larger issues.

WAKE UP AMERICA — WE'RE UNDER ATTACK
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Rachel Neuwirth points out that America has few friends and none as loyal as Israel. Yet "Israel has been deliberately kept at arm's length so America could posture as 'honest broker' between Israel and the Arabs." America fears offending the so-called Arab street, which can be rapidly mobilized by its mullahs and chieftans to demonstrate and/or riot. By not standing up strongly for its ally, America teaches the arabs that it isn't a supportive friend — and they had best look to other superpowers, such as up-and-coming Iran. We need to change our posture and develop a straight-out alliance between America and Israel.
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CHANGING THE RULES IN THE LEBANESE ARENA
by Boaz Ganor

  Because the Israeli public had no stomach for taking on Hezbollah, in the past few years Hezbollah has been able to block Israel from responding to its sporadic acts of terrorism by threatening strong military reprisals. Simultaneously, they were successful in convincing many in the West that they weren't terrorists, they were a social and political group, and they kept Israel on the defensive diplomatically. Boaz Ganor explains what Israel's reasoning was, when it finally decided to change the rules of engagement with Hezbollah. The more it can disarm Hezbollah now, the less will Hezbollah be able to act as a diversion when Israel confronts Syria for a real ceasefire.
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TIME TO TAME SYRIA
by Efraim Inbar

  Professor Efraim Inbar suggests a strategy that could actually accomplish what Israel must do, and is justified in doing, i.e., destroy Hizballah's military infrastructure. He asserts that "Israel should be targeting Damascus. Subduing Syria is the key to resolving the Lebanese crisis, to rolling-back Hizballah, and to weakening Iran and its radical Islamist influence in the Middle East." His arguments make sense.
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WE'RE LOSING WORLD WAR IV: HOW TO GET BACK TO THE ROAD TO VICTORY
by Barbara Lerner

  Barbara Lerner is not prone to hyperbole, yet she writes that the Iran's Shiite mullahs, the leaders of the "Islamofascist war against us, are as dangerous an enemy as America has ever faced." For the last 25 years, they have worked to create a global Islamic caliphate — a task that includes humiliating America by showing her as unable to withstand their jihad. They created Hezbollah to assist them, first using them effectively to kill Americans in Lebanon, and now sending them as self-contained terror cells to the USA. But "we have yet to admit that Iran is at war with us, or to seriously consider striking back at her..." Instead we pretend diplomacy (a prestigious word for appeasement) will make them more reasonable. It won't. We need to act militarily now.
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A STRATEGIC ASSESSMENT OF THE HIZBALLAH WAR: DEFEATING THE IRANIAN-SYRIAN AXIS IN LEBANON
by Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror and Dan Diker

  Major-General Yaakov Amidror lucidly and accurately predicted the problems that would result is Israel retreated from Gaza. In this article he points out that Israel must destroy Hizballah, while keeping in mind that the fight is actually with the power behind Hizballah: Iran. This time the stakes are higher than in Gaza. Let us hope that this time Israelis will listen to him.
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CASUS BELLI
by Moshe Yaalon

  For many years, the Arabs and pro-Arab media have reassured us that the root cause of the problems of the Middle East (ME) — and perhaps even of the entire world — is Israel's occupation of Arab land. If Moshe Yaalon is right, this current crisis may have laid that theory belatedly to rest. As he points out, "[t]he present crisis was initiated — in Gaza by Hamas and in southern Lebanon by Hizballah – from lands that are not under Israeli occupation." The root cause of ME unrest has become more obvious: radical Islamists, particularly Iran, "see the destruction of Israel as a means of neutering — or even as a prelude to destroying — the United States. "
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Studies in Muslim Character. One of the essayists writes about Muslim behavior in India, where the Muslims act, well, like Muslims do in Israeli territory. One of the items is a story, and therefore, by definition fictional. But insightful, nonetheless.

ZAHIR
by Boris Zubry

  We present another story by Boris Zubry. This is again set in Saudi Arabia and chronicles the life of a Pakastani, who eventually comes to Saudi Arabia to seek his fortune. He is bilked by the people who arrange his passage; he works for a pittance for years; he makes friends and gradually comes to terms with living a lesser dream.
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THE GLOBAL GOMORRAH
by Yashiko Sagamori

  To call Yashiko Sagamori thought provoking is to call the would-be-world-conquering Islamists a bunch of energetic enthusiasts. It doesn't begin to cover her ability to make us examine matters in a more analytic manner. In this essay the author asks: why does the world ignore the horrible excesses that are considered normal and reasonable in a Muslim society, and, instead, spend its time condemning Israel for defending itself. "To a naïve person, this may look like most people on Earth have suddenly lost their God-given ability to tell good from evil." In fact, the world acts as if it doesn't know that Jihad is intrinsic to Islam.
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A LOOK AT THE MUSLIM MINDSET
by Amil Imani

  To win a war, know your enemy. It becomes more necessary and more difficult, if your enemy has different attitudes and values than you do. Amil Imani explains some of these Muslim characteristics, features that make their mindset so difficult for a Western to comprehend.
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JIHADI TERRORISM AND ISRAEL'S LEBANON ATTACK
by Dr. TS Girishkumar

  Dr TS Girishkumar writes about the hostility, sedition and secession by the Muslims in India. In an uncanny parallel to the problems Israel has with its Muslim neighbors, Dr. Girishkumar explores the techniques the Muslims have used and use to get their own way in India – ultimately, they seek control of the entire country.
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In this section we talk about media anti-semitism and media propaganda hoaxes.

THE NEW YORK TIMES AND THE JEWS
by Ed Lasky

  Ed Lasky points out that the New York Times is decidedly sympathetic to minorities, with one major exception — the Jews. While the newspaper usually finds some reason to criticize Israel's interactions with its hostile neighbors, it has a benign attitude towards those who hate Israel and would destroy it. To the Times, what makes Hamas and Hezbollah noteworthy are their social welfare activities. And it is just as happy whitewashing domestic anti-Semites and alerting terrorist fronts about possible government actions against them. Considering the Times' negative distortions about Jews and Israel, Lasky is rightly puzzled that so many Jews stick loyally to a paper that can fairly be called anti-Semitic.
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ISRAEL AND THE PALESTINIANS: Why the Palestinians Are Winning the Media War
by David Bedein

  David Bedein wrote this article some four years ago. We are reprinting it for two reasons. First, it unfortunately remains true even today that the Palestinian Arabs, whether the "secular" Al-Fatah or the religious Hamas can spin believable media tales, that the media are happy to retell. And second, substitute Hezbollah for Al Fatah and Nasrallah for Arafat, and the article is still right on target.
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THE BLOGGERS TAKE ON THE QANA "MASSACRE"
by Bernice Lipkin

  On July 30th, Israel returned fire against Hezbollah rockets launched from Qana in Lebanon. Civilians were killed, including children. Hezbollah declared it a massacre; the pitiful pictures of dead children were shown around the world; and Israel was once again castigated. But within hours, people began suspecting what happened at Qana was a hoax, not a "massacre." Some bloggers examined the photos of the massacre carefully; others noticed other bloopers and inconsistencies. And the careful plot to discredit Israel began to unravel.
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A TAXONOMY OF FRAUD: THE REUTERS' PHOTO SCANDAL
by zombie

  This is a compilation of doctored and fraudulent pictures taken recently in Lebanon by different cameramen and utilized as anti-Israel propaganda. They have been classified and analyzed by zombie of the zombietime website. This article is both fascinating and instructive.
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These next essays are about anti-semitic Jews and other useful idiots that aid those who would destroy Israel.

INTRODUCTION TO THE JEWISH DIVIDE OVER ISRAEL
by Edward Alexander and Paul Bogdanor

  Think-Israel is proud to present the Introduction to The Jewish Divide Over Israel, a new book on some prominent Jewish anti-semites. It is a must have for every library — public and private — to counteract the lazy belief that if a Jew speaks against Israel he must be in agony but is forced by conscience to speak the truth. The opposite is more likely true — because his ideologically liberal friends reject Israel, he is embarrassed that Israel exists. Becoming a very vocal critic of Israel and Zionism is his way to hold on to an insecure membership in the club.
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USEFUL IDIOTS: ISLAM'S BEST SOLDIERS
by Amil Imani

  Amin Imani describes today's generation of useful idiots — it "lives in liberal democracies but serves the cause of Islamofascism." Like the previous generation of communist fellow-travelers, it serves a "virulent form of totalitarian ideology." The useful idiots disseminate the benign notion that Islam is moderate and non-political, when as Imani writes, in reality, "Islam is political to the core. In Islam the mosque and state are one and the same — the mosque is the state." And it has been this way since Mohammed's time.
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WATCH — HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
by Eli E. Hertz

  Kenneth Roth, Director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) announced 54 people had been killed in Qana, because he didn't question Hezbollah sources. He put the imprimatur of the supposedly neutral HRW on it — so even though the figure was later downsized to 28, the inflated figure is still in use. As Eli Hertz writes, "When HRW turns its attention to Israel, it consistently loses all semblance of objectivity." In HRW's eyes and writings, Hezbollah is a legitimate combatant — never, never is it described as a terrorist organization — and its launching of rockets into Israeli civilian areas is excused because, according to HRW, "Hezbollah was actually aiming at military targets," it wasn't really trying to terrorize civilians. According to HRW, only Israel "deliberately targeted civilians". So much for HRW's objectivity.
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OPEN RESPONSE TO KENNETH ROTH OF HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
by Boris Celser

  Ken Roth does have a talent for writing pompous letters. Here, as usual, he defends Hezbollah. What makes this somewhat unusual is that he is less hateful to Israel than usual. What makes this one particularly entertaining is Boris Celser's gloss — in blue.
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Some history and some linguistic misuse.

THE HISTORY AND MEANING OF "PALESTINE" AND "PALESTINIAN"
by Patricia Berlyn

  A modern myth has it that there was once a country or a state called Palestine. Its history is vague, in fact, non-existent — which is a suitable condition for a never-existent non-entity. In the early 1960s, some Arabs reinvented themselves as citizens of this state. What is still more bizarre is that so much of the world pretends to agree with this fiction. And so we reprint Patricia Berlyn's excellent review of the badly-misused terms: Palestine and Palestinians.
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ARABS ARE NOT SEMITES!
by Sha'i Bentekoa

  Sha'i Bentekoa points out that Semite and semitic are linguistic terms, not racial identifications. They refer to a particular language group that includes Arabic, Aramaic, Ugaritic, Akkadian, Amharic, etc. If you are discussing biblical ancestors and taking due regard of matrilineal descent, then Jews are descended from Shem and Arabs from Ham, making them Hamites, not Semites.
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A "DISPROPORTIONATE RESPONSE"
by Rachel Neuwirth

  In every major event, the media comes up with some moral principle that Israel should adhere to. For some reason, the Arabs are never hampered by similar ethical boundaries. This time, Israel was admonished to respond proportionately ... it wasn't clear how this was to be measured. In practice Israel's supposed lack of proportionality was used to chastise Israel whenever she fought effectively. Should this be in effect the next round of fighting, Rachel Neuwirth reminds us of the history of World War 2, a war fought to excess and to victory by the Allies.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

JULY 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
AUGUST 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


May-June, 2006

We start with some of the latest reports on the expellees from Gush Katif.

ALL JEWS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR ONE ANOTHER
by Debbie Berliner

  Debbie Berliner writes about two women that she met while traveling in Israel. Maayan and Sarah were among the thousands of Jews expelled from their homes in Gush Katif last August. Their husbands, farmers who once helped make Gaza renowned for its fruits and vegetables, are now without jobs. The government has stonewalled the refugees while spinning fanciful stories about how great things are. Clearly, getting these people back into productive lives will depend on private people helping out. Read how you can help.
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MY DAYS AT THE REFUGEE CAMP
by Rachel Saperstein

  Rachel Saperstein is part of a group that has been betrayed by their own people — the Israeli government — thrown out of their homes and farms and orchards, shown no sympathy or respect, housed in slum trailers, harassed by petty officials, and ignored by much of the country. Their children are bewildered and traumatized, the adults are underemployed or not employed at all. And here it is, a few months after the trauma, they are organizing themselves to reconstruct their lives. Just amazing!
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TAKING RESPONSIBILITY: THEN AND NOW
by Judy Lash Balint

  Before the Gazan Jews were kicked off of their land, there were many who believed that Israel would be easier to defend if she retreated from Gaza. Many others, including military and intelligence people, believed that militarily and morale-wise, Israel would be in a worse position — and they have been proven right. So now people are asking why a savvy military man like Ariel Sharon bulldozed through this stupid retreat. Judy Lash Balint is among those who have come to suspect that the ugly exercise was mostly intended to disrupt the increasing political power of the religious Jews. The Jews of Gush Katif are "forced to endure a degrading limbo existence akin to that of the immigrants of the 1950s," while the secularists, now led by Olmert, continue to demonstrate they fear Judaism more than Arab terrorism.
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VOICE TO THE VOICELESS
by Professor Eugene Narrett

  Eugene Narrett takes the argument that the Gush Katif expulsion was engineered by the secularists to humble the religious Jews a step further. He focusses not so much on the horrible circumstance in which the refugees still find themselves as on their strength of character. He writes that "[t]he voices and stories of these people are poignant, illuminating and inspiring because ... they have not been broken..." He introduces us to some of these people. They have been traumatized by the vicious betrayal by their own government, but they have survived and are striving to heal themselves and their country, because they understand that their task is to participate in the redemption of the Land of Israel.
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Almost a year later, Israel has not yet completed the resettlement of the citizens it forced out of Gaza — and that was a tenth of the people of Samaria and Judea, whose lives are now to be destroyed. Considering that the Gush Katif expulsion has been a disaster, it's amazing that the Government is still fanatically determined to kick out more Jews. But they are. These essays assess disengagement .. convergence ... realignment — or whatever they are calling the retreat from Biblical Israel these days.

WEST BANK TERRORIST STATE
by R. James Woolsey

  James Woolsey explains succintly why Israel's planned retreat from Biblical Gaza is a bad idea. Hillel Fendel summarizes Woolsey's five points this way: "disengagement" failed in Gaza; it would leave all of Israel wide open to Arab shelling and rockets; Jordan would also be under the gun; it makes the US look weak; and accommodation (read: appeasement) with the Arabs has always failed. We should also realize that this gifting of Arab terrorists with Jewish land will cause unnecessary damage to thousands of Israeli Jews, who will suddenly find themselves homeless and jobless and their children traumatized.
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WHEN BOLDNESS IS APPEASEMENT:
Charles De Gaulle In Algeria, Olmert In Israel
by Samuel L. Blumenfeld

  In Olmert's PR, the retreat from Samaria and Judea is portrayed as a bold move with Israel being proactive in taking responsibility for its own future betterment. This is hardly a description for a military and financial disaster that Israel can ill afford. Samuel Blumenfeld compares the situation to what happened to France when Charles DeGaulle, in what was acclaimed as a bold move, took the French out of Algeria. He points out that "[i]t was a surrender of Western Christian civilization to the Muslims and set the stage for the slow takeover of France itself by Islam."
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OLMERT'S FOLLY
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Abandonning the West Bank (Samaria and Judea) is of no benefit to the patriotic Israelis who live there and contribute to Israel's economy. And it will destabilize not just Israel but its neighbor, Jordan. So who does benefit? Frank J. Gaffney tells us: "... the beneficiary of Israel's proposed surrender of territory will be her Islamofascist enemies... If the experience with Gaza is any guide, ... Hamas will turn the West Bank into a Taliban-style safe-haven for other terrorists including: al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard." As Gaffney says of Olmert's folly, "Friends don't let friends commit suicide."
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So what is driving Olmert? US won't support his proposed retreat financially. EU wants it done with Arab participation — Olmert's gotten zero actual commitments from his European tour. The King of Jordan doesn't need Hamas staring at him from across the Jordan River. The refugees from Gush Katif are not yet settled. This newest plan is liable to break the Israeli economy — a huge number of people once productive and innovative will become welfare cases. As this group of essays demonstrate, Olmert's optimism is misplaced and the "reasons" for retreat don't hold water. Yet Olmert seems determined to throw as many Jews as possible into the street as rapidly as possible. Why? I'm beginning to think he's really an alien in disguise.

THE MILLION PERSON GAP: A CRITICAL LOOK AT PALESTINIAN DEMOGRAPHY
by Bennett Zimmerman, Roberta Seid and Michael L. Wise

  A major — if not the major — reason for leaving the territories is said to be because Israel will soon be swamped with a rapidly growing Arab population. And yet, as a critical examination of the demographic data has indicated, the figures show no such thing. It is also curious that as far back as January 2005, Caroline Glick wrote that the demography bomb was a dud, yet Olmert continues to employ it as justification for expelling the Jews who live in Biblical Israel from their homes and businesses.
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THE DELUSION OF U.S. FINANCING ISRAELI RETREATS
by Yoram Ettinger

  The title says it all. Yoram Ettinger provides us with some earlier examples when the Israeli Government reassured its citizens that America would help Israel retreat from land it held. America didn't. Nor will it.
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ISRAEL'S OUT-OF-CONTROL JUDICIARY
by Caroline Glick

  No matter how committed he is to his policy of chopping away significant parts of land that legally belongs to Israel, it would be hard for Olmert to maintain momentum without both a threat — George Bush's administration is handling that — and a support system. Caroline Glick writes about Israel's secularist court system, which in the absence of a defined job description has taken it upon itself to make laws and then act on them, in keeping with political ideology and with no regard to a balance between individual liberties and state security in wartime. Actually, they "apply anti-democratic laws in a prejudicial fashion" — they have incarcerated teen-aged girls for protesting the expulsion and indicted Ruth Matar for insulting Yonatan Bassi, the man in charge of the Gaza expulsion; but Olmert's extreme leftwing activist daughter has maligned the IDF publically and openly and has suffered no rebuke. As Glick says, "Everyone who holds liberal values and Israeli democracy dear should be on their feet shouting for our justices to be brought to order."
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NOT QUITE CRICKET
by Sarah Honig

  A factor that appears to be gluing both Olmert and Bush to an obviously bad idea — i.e., giving up Israeli land to the point where Israel may no longer be viable in order to create a viable Palestinian Arab state — seems to be the fear of acknowledging failure. As Sarah Honig points out, "Once reputations are staked on policies, no matter how misconstrued, it's not easy to acknowledge error." She reminds us of a similar situation in the 1930s, just before World War 2, when so many of England's policy makers "... stolidly kept proclaiming unwavering faith in Hitler's professions of peace." But appeasement didn't work with Hitler. And it won't work with Hamas or any of the other "handlers" of the Palestinian Arabs. Actually, there is an important difference between the English of WW2 and the Israelis today – even though the more deluded of England's politicians were willing to kill off Czechoslovakia, they didn't propose to destroy their own country.
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An unintended consequence of the Gaza expulsion was the need for new thinking on the part of the Israeli Orthodox. No, they haven't decided Marx was the true god. But they are being forced to question their leaders and to consider what to do next — aside from recovering from the trauma of the expulsion. The expulsion has also made some Jews in America refocus their energies.

THE BAR MITZVAH OF ISRAEL'S RIGHT-WING
by Moshe Dann

  Moshe Dann describes the rightwing in Israel as a group that has regarded the State as the fulfillment of the millennia-long dream to return to Zion. "The policy of abandoning Judea, Samaria and Gaza that began with the Oslo Accords,... has begun to awaken a new awareness in Israeli society, and among the Right in particular, about the nature of the State. There is, however, no practical mechanism to change it." While the Israeli Left works to crush the "settlement movement" so as to implement its vision of Israel as a secular state, few in the religious communities are yet willing to shed their illusions about the structure of the State and to begin to think about overhauling the system. Moshe Dann asserts that this is exactly what is necessary — to "move towards serious, meaningful reform to change the system." He forsees much hard work ahead.
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A PUBLIC DEBATE. RESOLVED: THERE BE CREATED A SECOND JEWISH STATE
by Dr Yoram Shifftan

  Dr. Yoram Shifftan has often written on the solid legal basis for all of mandated Israel being Jewish land. As a corollary, he has examined why Israeli Marxists have contributed to propaganda designed to cover up this critically important fact. In this article, he takes a radical departure. Given that the present Israeli government is planning to gift the Arabs with Jewish land, even though this is illegal in international law, he proposes a public debate about establishing a second Jewish state in Samaria and Judea. Readers are invited to send their ideas to statedebate@think-israel.org
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THE GOAL OF A FUTURE JEWISH GOVERNMENT: EXPANSION AND POWER
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  In recent years, Israel has pursued a policy of "territory for peace," a policy Professor Paul Eidelberg calls defeatism. He points out it wins no respect from the nations of the world. "So long as Israeli prime ministers think small (and act smaller) Israel will be despised. Despite its military strength and its technological and innovative economy, "[a]lmost every Israeli government has been led by intellectual and moral pygmies. None has sought to make Israel a world power." Professor Eidelberg advises that the correct policy for Israel is not contraction but expansion, both for Israel's sake and for the sake of Western civilization, in that "[a] Jewish democracy will have a global agenda to counter the Islamism now conquering Britain and Europe."
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NEUTRALIZE THE ARAB OIL WEAPON
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Rachel Neuwirth writes of this plan to make America independent of Middle East Oil, "An unusual window of opportunity may be opening up to allow a major advance towards achieving energy independence. She is writing about the H-Prize, a new initiative recently created by Congress. Help her publicize it.
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MR. RIEGER, I RESIGN!
by Buddy Macy

  This is a compelling article in that it lets us examine a turning point. It records an interchange between Buddy Macy, who was for many years a dedicated worker for UJC, a mainline Jewish organization, and Howard Rieger, President of UJC. Why did Buddy resign? What changed him? Read the letter from Mr. Rieger and all will become clear.
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Mistreating Holy Sites — Israel out of disregard; Arabs out of hate.

THE DESTRUCTION OF HOLY SITES IN MECCA AND MEDINA
by Irfan Ahmed

  Perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that men who casually destroy objects belonging to other religions will destroy religious sites important to those who practice the same religion but with a different intepretation. The Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia strongly disapproves of ornaments and shrines. In the early 1800s, the Wahhabis destroyed almost all Islamic historic sites both in Mecca and Medina. More shrines, some of them shrines that were rebuilt after the first demolition, have again been recently destroyed. And the religious authorities have plans to continue the destruction.
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NO WAY TO TREAT OUR FOUNDING FATHERS
by Michael Freund

  Michael Freund talks about the decaying state of over 120 Jewish historical and holy sites, and the need for Israel's government to do more to maintain and protect them. Considering that the secularists in control of the government have done nothing to stop Arab destruction of Jewish artefacts on the Temple Mount, this doesn't seem likely.
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MUSLIM ZIONISM
by Daniel Pipes

  Many articles on Jerusalem correctly point out that the Muslim claim to Jerusalem certainly doesn't precede the Jewish one — the Arabs didn't even come to the Land of Israel for thousands of years after the Jews had established sovereignty there. Daniel Pipes asks why they assert a claim? Why do the Muslims stoop to lies, fraud and the destruction of Jewish artefacts from antiquity to bolster their claim? He points out that historically, Muslims have only valued Jerusalem when it was politically useful to do so. What is currently distressing is that the cynical myth that Jerusalem is significant to Islam itself has been naïvely incorporated as part of their identity by many Muslims, while, at the same time, too many secular Jews regard the Temple Mount as just so much real estate.
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Myths by Muslims And Myths about Muslims

THREE MYTHS ABOUT ISLAM
by Edward N. Luttwak

  This is an elegant essay that pins down several ideas people have about Islam without really knowing why they think so. Edward Luttwak demolishes these myths: "Islam is especially tolerant of other religions"; "Muslim extremists are not attacking us, but only counterattacking, so that if non-Muslims would only stop provoking them, all would be well."; and "Islam is a religion of peace." And he supplies us with the actual facts.
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MYTHS ABOUT THE GOLDEN AGE OF ISLAM
by Yasser Latif Hamdani

  The Golden Age of Islam is usually defined as time between the beginning of Islam and the 16th Century. And many myths had arisen about the Golden Age. Yasser Latif Hamdani writes about some of them: " Muslim Rulers of the golden age were pious and adhered strictly to tenets of Islam..."; The Muslims of the classical age lived under the Islamic system of government called the Khilafah."; and "Muslims of the Golden Age were united under one Caliphate."
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PEOPLE THAT NEVER EXISTED IN HISTORY NEEDS A USEFUL PAST
by Elliott A. Green

  Elliot Green's observation that "those who purport to scorn old myths go on to make up and promote new myths" nicely describes what Baruch Kimmerling and Joel Migdal have done in their book on the Palestinians. Elliott Green explores and explodes some of the book's historical misconceptions, mistakes and lies as well as clarifying whether the Palestinians are a people in any way, other than by providing a human face to justify Arab hostility. He concludes that much of the information Kimmerling and Migdal present "actually contradicts their claim of a 'Palestinian people' (much less a 'Palestinian nation') ever existing, or even that the Palestinian Arabs had any traditional, historical sense of being different from the Arab Muslims in neighboring countries...".
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THE ARAB PROPAGANDA WAR AGAINST HISTORY
by David Meir-Levi

  Arab propaganda is simple but effective. It makes easy-to-digest assertions in a convinced and convincing manner and then repeats them ad nauseum until they become generally accepted. David Meir-Levi has prepared a list of these lies — lies that have been exposed as lies time and again. Yet the Arabs and the pro-Arab media continue to promulgate these lies, despite the fact that they should know better. Maybe they do. Certainly, we should be wary about accepting the word of any Middle-East "expert" who talks about Israeli "occupation" of "Palestinian" land.
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Iran and Israel: major actors in the war Islam is waging against the West

AS ISLAMISTS GROW CONFIDENT, IT'S TIME FOR THE WEST TO STAND FIRM
by Moshe Yaalon

  The Hamas leader, Khaled Mashal, in his "victory speech" last February, declared that Islam would defeat the West — this is a much broader goal than just destroying Israel. Moshe Yaalon points out that this "revealed the growing confidence of Islamists in pursuing more ambitious and previously unmentionable goals." Every successful attack by Al-Qaeda and Hezbollah and others in the Terror Confederacy has increased confidence in all the terror groups and fueled their growing boldness. The weak response of the West to Iran's threat to use nuclear weapons has also had been confidence-bolstering. Yaalon makes both short-term and long-term suggestions to reduce the effectiveness of these Islamists.
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ISRAEL IN THE CROSSHAIRS
by Charles Krauthammer

  Charles Krauthammer points out that the Israeli Jewish population is reaching the point that will make it the largest center of Jewish life in the world. A remarkable achievement. Jews have come back to their ancient homeland and are flourishing. A nice thumbing of its nose at Hitler, who had killed off some six million Jews, a third of the Jews in the world. And just at this moment, we get "Ahmadinejad's declaration that Israel must be destroyed... by a single storm" It's beginning to look like 1938 all over again.
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The Islamist expansion into Africa and Sudan's genocidal attacks on Darfur are supported by the hateful attitude of the Arab countries towards non-Muslims. The New York Times has ignored this sustained Arab hate of the Jews and of non-Arab ethnic minorities and continues to ignore it in Darfur.

AFRICA: THE GOLD MINE OF AL-QAEDA  AND GLOBAL JIHAD
by Reuven Paz and Moshe Terdman

  A recent magazine article by a supporter of global Jihad examines the advantages "of Africa as a battlefield and greenhouse for global Jihad." The jihadists "enjoy in Africa easier operational abilities than in other countries, which have effective security, intelligence, and military capacities." Africa is poor so the Islamist tactic of providing the locals with money and social welfare will work well. In return, Africa can provide men, weapons and raw material, and it has geographic advantages — it is close enough to help the fight against Israel. Reuven Paz and Moshe Terdman suggest that what is planned in not a single central command in Africa, but the emergence of many groups with the same ideology who can adjust their strategy to local conditions.
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BIN LADEN'S RADICAL ISLAM: GLOBALIZATION FOR LOSERS
by Jonah Goldberg

  Jonah Goldberg discusses bin Laden's call to the Islamists in Sudan and the Arabian Pennisula "to prepare all that is necessary to wage a long-term war against the crusaders [U.N. peacekeepers] in Western Sudan..." Radical Islam is also pressuring Muslims in areas it dominates into behaving in accordance with what it considers the "one true Islam." Muslims that don't conform to the Islamist concepts of how Muslims must behave are slaughtered.
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ARAB GENOCIDE AND THE NEW YORK TIMES
by Kenneth Levin

  Kenneth Levin takes the New York Times to task. It "prides itself in being a 'liberal' newspaper, but it has also consistently ignored liberal voices in the Arab world that have sought to address that world's genocidal attitudes toward religious and ethnic minorities in its midst." And, "despite the Times's extensive coverage... of Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict, the newspaper is virtually silent on the voluminous and systematic anti-Semitic hate literature published by the Arabs." Ignoring this institutionalized hatred distorts the Times' "coverage of other conflicts in the Arab world. More particularly, it taints the Times's reporting and editorializing on the genocide in Darfur, including Nicholas Kristof's Pulitzer-winning coverage."
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More on the Islamic Confederacy — the loose but genuine linkages between the different terrorist groups

THE POPULAR RESISTANCE COMMITTEES: HAMAS' NEW PARTNERS?
by Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan D. Halevi

  Jonathan Halevi points out that "[t]he Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) is a terror organization that has carried out hundreds of attacks against Israeli targets in the Gaza Strip and within Israel, and was apparently responsible for the roadside bomb attack in which three American security guards were killed in Gaza in October 2003." "[It] has formed a strategic alliance with Hamas and Hizballah, which help finance its activities and train its operatives. According to Israeli intelligence, the PRC also maintains contact with al-Qaeda, which over the past year has created a presence in Gaza and the West Bank." "PRC have become a kind of sub-contractor for Hamas, enabling it to encourage attacks against Israel and its internal Palestinian rivals without leaving fingerprints."
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD PROJECT
by Patrick Poole

  Patrick Poole writes about a document found at the home of a Muslim Brotherhood leader, Youssef Nada, who has been called a "terrorist financier" by the U.S. and the U.N. It is said to be a roadmap for achieving the installation of Islamic regimes in the West mainly by propaganda, preaching and the use of innocuous front groups. What lends credibility to the document's authenticity is that it echoes the Brotherhood's Sheikh Yusuf Al Qaradawi's assertion back in 1995 that Islam would conquer the West chiefly by proselytizing. Moreover, the Muslim Brotherhood — which sired Hamas — is characterized by patient, long-term, piece-wise planning (read for example Lorenzo Vidino, "The Muslim Brotherhood's Conquest of Europe".).
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Islam's Buddies

THE U.N.-NGO CADRE: SPREADING HATE, DESTRUCTION & TERRORISM
by Anne Bayefsky

  Anne Bayefsky writes about the many non-governmental organizations (NGOS) associated with the U.N. "that have been empowered by U.N.-accreditation to spread anti-Semitism, hate, and encourage terrorism from a U.N. platform." "The job of disseminating and amplifying the message that U.N. insiders can't always convey conspicuously, is conveniently taken up by NGOs such as those on the U.N. 'NGO Network on the Question of Palestine.'" The quotes she cites from these NGO websites more than underscore her point. Not only are these NGOs guilty of violating U.N. regulations, they are guilty of working against the U.N.'s mission as written into its charter.
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THE ANTI-ZIONIST PROPAGANDA MACHINE
by Richard H. Shulman

  CAMERA and Honest Reporting have done excellent jobs taking on the big TV and newspaper media when they distort the news or put forth downright lies about Israel as truth. Richard Shulman ruminates about the Internet. "It serves to unite like-minded people. It serves as an outlet to get out information that the other media censure as not being to their liking. On the other hand, it has few of the controls that have evolved to made the other media conform to some (minimal) standards. We need a new model."
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How should Europe deal with the ever growing Islamic terrorism?

EUROPE'S RESPONSE TO THE THREAT OF GLOBAL TERROR
by Jose Maria Aznar

  Jose Maria Aznar, former prime minister of Spain, writes about reforming NATO to make it more capable of fighting Islamic extremism, which he views as an existential threat to Western values. He believes "[t]he new mission of NATO should be clear: to combat jihadism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." "NATO should invite Japan, Australia, and Israel to become full members. Recognizing that Israel is on the cutting edge of the battle against Islamic terror, he concludes, "Treating Israel as if it were not an integral part of the Western world is a big mistake that will affect our ability to prevail... The West cannot fight this radical tide without Israel."
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WHY THE EU NEEDS TO BE DESTROYED AND SOON
by Fjordman

  Europe is being overwhelmed by Islam, because of "massive Muslim immigration and [European] multiculturalism." The process is aided by the European Union (EU), "which has transferred power away from the people and the democratic process to behind-the-scenes deals made by corrupt, Eurabian officials and bureaucrats." The multicultural ideology EU is fostering in its effort to create a new people, the "European" people, is killing off European democracy. Countering it requires the complete and utter destruction of the European Union. "The EU must die, or Europe will die. It's that simple." He draws the analogy of what the EU is doing to what happened in Communist Russia – "the Soviet state became a very powerful state, but the nationalities were obliterated."
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Londonistan — Is there a connection between the growing Islam problem in London and the growing popularity of the BNP?

LONDONISTAN: HOW BRITAIN'S HABITUAL APPEASEMENT OF ISLAMISM REAPS TERROR
by Melanie Phillips

  In her new book, Londonistan, Melanie Phillips provides us an excellent analyses of how the governing class in England has lost its own values and has allowed radical Islam to set the agenda. She points out that "During the 1990s, Britain allowed its capital to be turned into the principal hub of Islamist radicalism and terrorism outside of Saudi Arabia." Simultaneously, "Britain has been consumed by a loss of cultural nerve that has all but destroyed its belief in itself..." "Instead of fighting radical Islamism, virtually the entire British political, intellectual and security establishment can't even bring themselves to name the threat." This is cause for consternation for us in America, because as she points out, "[t]he Londonistan mindset is being replicated in America: on campus, in the media and in official circles. If Britain goes down under this assault, the forces in America now holding back the tide of cultural immolation will be immeasurably weakened."
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NICK GRIFFIN'S LONG MARCH
by Srdja Trifkovic

  Under Nick Griffin's leadership, the British National Party (BNP) can no longer be described as anti-Semitic and anti-American. Their concern is to preserve British nationalism and they worry about the large influx of Muslims into England, which, aided by politicians who believe in multiculturalism and who are afraid of arousing Muslim anger, is transforming England into its own image. The BNP's position on immigration is beginning to resonate with many voters.
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Islam In America

HOW HAS ISLAM ENRICHED YOUR LIFE?
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck writes of her distress that Islam has invaded so much of our lives. On TV "Muslim savages [are] celebrating in front of burning embassies, a school, a restaurant or those stupid tires they seem to think are so impressive to burn." Movies like Munich... give Muslims a platform for justification of their terrorism. Our vocabulary is bloated with words such as "fatwa, Mufti, Imam, jihad, burqah, Koran." Peck's sensible solution for ridding Israel of terrorism is: "transfer the enemy out of Israel, NOW." The threat is world-wide and, as usual, Israel is the canary in the mine.
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EXPOSING THE MUSLIM LOBBY
by Ilana Mercer

  Ilana Mercer reviews Paul Sperry's new book, Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington, His book is based on internal government documents and on interviews with officials from the FBI, Homeland Security, Immigration, Customs and Boarder Protection. He exposes so-called moderate Muslim leaders and academic groupies who run interference for the terrorists. He concludes that "sadly, much of Western terrorism is simply Islam in practice, the text of the Quran in action."
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ISLAM IN THE BIG HOUSE: How radical Muslims took over the American prison system
by Stephen Schwartz

  Stephen Schwartz presents the problem this way: "Radical Muslim chaplains, trained in a foreign ideology, certified in foreign-financed schools, and acting in coordination to impose an extremist agenda have gained a monopoly over Islamic religious activities in American state, federal, and city prisons and jails." His solution? "[I]dentify those chaplains who follow and preach Wahhabism and remove them."
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THE PERSPECTIVE OF AMERICAN JEWS ON ANTI-SEMITISM MUST CHANGE
by Michael Anbar

  The stream of antisemitic venom now polluting American media is not, – with the minor exception of wooly-brained WASPS — coming from the America's Christians. As Michael Anbar points out, it comes from a very odd mix — the alliance of the extreme Marxist left, fascist white skinheads and black Muslims.
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RAZABLANCA
by Julie Gorin

  I don't know if this is masking logic as comedy or using irony to teach logic, but Julie Gorin asks a good question: given "our earnest, ongoing dialoguing with representatives of a religion that seeks to establish a worldwide caliphate in which everyone is either Muslim or dead, isn't it about time we reached out to the other supremacists in our midst, whom society has shunted aside — the white supremacists, skinheads, neo-Nazis, KKK and other affiliates? She proposes the whites rename themselves Raza Blanca (The White Race") — it sounds so much less offensive in Spanish. When you get down to it, the skinheads "cherish their children — a fundamental value they share with us normal folk." And they are patriotic. So, she asks, "why do we find white racism to be so much more unsettling than racism" by other minorities?
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Caving In

GOOGLE CENSORS CRITIC OF ISLAMOFASCISM
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck is known for her wise and witty essays and interviews. She's traightforward and, as she says, "a tad politically incorrect." So, nu? What's wrong with that? Nothing, except that she made the Muslim Muzzle-the-Media people unhappy. And in a twitch, Google labeled her writing "hate speech," and dropped her publisher from Google listings. Islamic groups have effectively flooded the campus with protests to prevent Jewish and pro-Israeli speakers from speaking. They have effectively bullied the media against publishing the Danish cartoons. And now, apparently, they are effectively targetting a major gateway for accessing information. It's not Arlene Peck who is the menace to free speech. It is not Arlene Peck who is preaching hate.
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ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT or MESSIAH WITHOUT DIVINITY
by Yashiko Sagamori

  The party line is that our fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan has made us safe from terror, but Yashiko Sagamori points out the "[t]he terrible truth is that all is calm on the Western front simply because we have already capitulated," beginning right after 9/11, when Bush announced Islam was a peaceful religion, although "...the Muslims and the rest of humanity knew that it was precisely Islam that we had to fight against if we wanted to survive." And it's not just us Americans. Israel has caved in, as has Europe. We all are cowardly and praise unspecified Islamic virtues and accomodate more and more to whatever makes the Muslims happy. And now the Muslims are educating our Congressmen and educators about Islam so that they can lead us along the path of islamic rectitude!
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DHIMMITUDE IN ISRAEL
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Eidelberg writes that "The Arabization of Israel started some thirty years ago with the government's policy of Arab 'autonomy' in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza. It progressed with the policy of 'territory for peace.' Arabization made a quantum jump with the policy of 'unilateral disengagement,' now hyped as 'realignment.'" And "while Jewish land is being Arabized, Jewish mentality is being dhimmified," as exemplified by Jewish leaders begging Hamas to recognize Israel." "The dhimmi in Arab-Islamic culture is a servile and shrunken creature. He has no rights; he makes no demands; indeed, he must exercise self-restraint." Unfortunately, "[t]his describes the modus operandi of Israel's ruling elites vis-à-vis the enemy. The thought of conquering the enemy is beyond their intellectual or moral horizon."
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Iran actively promises the Jews, just beginning to recover from the Holocaust, a second round. The Israeli government continues to fight its Jewish citizens and not its Arab enemies. It's time to Wake Up!

TO WIN OR TO BELLY-ACHE? THAT IS THE QUESTION
by Walid Shoebat

  Born a Moslem in Bethlehem, Walid Shoebat is a former PLO terrorist who became an ardent Zionist and evangelical Christian. He frequently tours the country, lecturing on the Israel-Arab conflict, often to resistant audiences who have been taught that everyone in the world wants to live in peace if given the chance. At one such lecture, I heard him remonstrate with a well-dressed articulate woman who was sincerely insisting that if Israel were only nicer to the Palestinian Arabs, they would respond in kind. "Lady!" he shouted, "they are out to kill you Jews. Wake up!" She was shocked. Apparently no one in her experience had ever talked that way.
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TAKING A STROLL DOWN HIMMLERSTRASSE (ROAD TO PARADISE)
by Jack Berger

  Like the Jews "who denied the organized extermination of the six million Jews of Europe," since the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993, many Jews seem willing to overlook "that perhaps our Palestinian Arab 'partners' are not as interested in peace as they are in victory." Sadly, this includes successive Israeli governments, whose suicidal policy has strengthened "... the resolve of Israel's enemies." The Israeli government seems to have thrown in the towel, saying they have no ideology, or they are tired of fighting (as if they had a choice) or professing to believe retreating from Jewish land will bring security. Meantime, the Palestinian Arabs voted for Hamas as having more resolve to destroy Israel than Al Fatah, and are upbeat about destroying Israel in the near future, while giving nothing in return – not even their signatures on a worthless piece of paper promising peace.
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These essays re-examine some fundamental concepts

DRAWING THE LINE
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori asks rhetorically whether the self-evident truth that all men are created equal is actually that self-evident. She restates "self-evident" more accurately: "every civilization is based on a set of truths its members hold to be self-evident and irrefutable, and that more often than not any two sets of those self-evident, irrefutable truths prove to be mutually exclusive." What is self-evident to Arab society is not the equality of man but that "all men are created Muslim, even if they are born to infidel parents." Actually, we practice the politically-correct notion that America should cater to Muslims at home and abroad, and they practice their inalienable right to convert the world to Islam.
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DETERRING THOSE WHO ARE ALREADY DEAD?
by Laurent Murawiec

  Despite our faith in mutual deterrence, as Laurent Murawiec points out "deterrence only works if the enemy is able and willing to enter the same calculus. If the enemy plays by other rules and calculates by other means, he will not be deterred." "Contemporary jihad is not a matter of politics at all (of 'occupation, of 'grievances,' of colonialism, neocolonialism, imperialism and Zionism), but a matter of Gnostic faith. Consequently, attempts at dealing with the problem politically will not even touch it." So how do we stop the jihadists? Answer: by killing them, "[b]y applying high-tempo attrition and nodal targeting to the jihadi apparatus worldwide." It will work because "[u]nextraordinary, unromantic, trivial deaths shatter the glory of the jihadi's death... The recipe is not pretty nor is it easy."
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ISRAEL'S IMAGE — WHY THE ALL-TIME LOW?
by Evelyn Gordon

  "Conventional wisdom holds that Israel's international standing is directly related to its willingness to move toward peace with the Palestinians. Yet in recent years," Evelyn Gordon points out, "despite previously unimaginable concessions, its international standing, far from improving, has hit an all-time low." It has become commonplace to call Israel an apartheid state, to call for boycotts and divestitures, to question Israel's very existence. "...the growing view of Israel as a pariah would be impossible had Israeli (and international Jewish) leaders not abandoned one simple tenet that all of them maintained prior to the 1993 Oslo Accords: that Israel has a valid claim to the West Bank and Gaza." Consequently, to reverse its negative image, Israel must clearly state that Biblical Israel is Jewish land historically, legally by League of Nations mandate, and by acquisition in a defensive war. The only change since the Jordan and Egypt claimed the West Bank by right of conquest is that the Palestinian Arabs replaced Jordon and Egypt as Arab claimants.
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SAYING "PEACE"
by Patricia Berlyn

  Peace is an addictive word, a compelling word — people, particularly Israelis, seem conditioned to abandon normal logic and caution when told something will promote "peace". Patricia Berlyn points out that "shalom and 'peace' are beautiful words. They are also words often misused in causes inimical to genuine and just peace." In this essay, she writes about the Oslo Accords, a pernicious "peace" agreement that worked against a real peace. And she tells us about the "peace activists" — such as Peace Now and the Peace Bloc — who, in the name of peace, work to destroy Israel. As Berlyn makes clear, peace doesn't depend on negotiable details or even on Israeli concessions. The problem is that the Arabs/Palestinians aren't satisfied "with any terms on which Israel continues to exist."
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THE ARAB WAR ON ISRAEL: THE MORASS OF MIDDLE EAST DIPLOMACY
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Despite years of trying and the efforts of diplomats, political leaders, analysts and media people to solve the "Israeli-Palestinian" conflict, the result has been a failure. Their focus was "on the mechanics of implementation," while fundamental information was ignored. They never investigated the basis of the claims of the newly-minted Palestinian people. Nor did they seem to know about Israeli's irrevocable legal claim to Mandated Palestine. Rachel Neuwirth suggests that the "fallacy of the ongoing political dogma [the creation of a Palestinian state] should be recognized" and an approach based on historical/legal truths should be substituted.
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UNLEASHING THE DOGS OF WAR
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman wrote this remarkable essay in January 2003. He pointed out that "[t]he Jewish people have taken their peace-making efforts to irrational extremes." What he said then is true now: "The time has come for Israel to assert its fundamental right to self-defense and for the Jews to remind the world that they can be fearsome warriors when pushed to the wall. It is time to convey to the public at home and abroad that Jewish patience is at an end, that Jewish lives are not cheap and the letting of Jewish blood will no longer be acceptable. It is time for this embattled nation to arise, to cry "havoc" and let slip the dogs of war. Only then will it be clear that the present policy of restraint was indeed a noble gesture of benign strength and not of ignoble faintheartedness."
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History

ISRAEL YESTERDAY AND TODAY
by Alex Rose

  Alex Rose compares the confidence expressed by world leaders in the development of Jewish state at its inception in the Mandate period and the doubt and uncertainty spread by the current Jewish leaders, who seem ready to give up land that is not theirs to give away. He reviews the anticipated structure of a Jewish State where all inhabitants had human and civil rights but only the Jews had political rights to the current situation, where the non-binding resolutions of the U.N. are proclaimed to be valid by the Arabs and the pro-Arab media. And the Jewish leadership does not challenge these lies.
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REMEMBERING THE FARHUD
by Abraham H. Miller

  Abraham Miller tells us of what happened to the Jews of Iraq, who became some of the million Jewish refugees that fled from Arab harassment and hostility in the 1940s-50s. Jew had lived in Baghdad thousand of years before the Arabs came into Iraq. The Farhud – Arabic for "violent dispossession" — occurred in 1941, on Shavout. A mob, incited by Hitler's ally, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, "murdered, burned and raped its way through the Jewish community. Jewish infants were special targets, killed as helpless parents looked on. The superintendent of police refused to stop the riots. He was not about to kill or injure Muslims to save Jews." The Jews fled, mostly to Israel, where, unlike the Palestinian refugees, "within a few years they became both contributing members and citizens of Israel and Western societies."
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TERRORISM WITHOUT "OCCUPATION": SOME LESSONS FROM THE EARLY ARAB POGROMS
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut points out that, contrary to Arab propaganda, Palestinian Arab terrorism isn't the result of Israeli "occupation. It began long before Israel was even created. "The worst anti-Jewish atrocities in Palestine were part of a wave of Arab pogroms lasting from 1936 to 1939 ... They were designed to stop immigration to the Land of Israel by Jewish refugees ..." fleeing Europe. The English, who were in control of Palestine, responded by restricting Jewish immigration – contrary to their legal duty to aid the Jews to settle Palestine. The atrocities were organized by Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. Plaut tells the story of Araf al-Asli, who denounced the mufti and the pogroms. For his efforts, al-Asli was incarcerated. As Plaut says, "The incident shows clearly why so few voices of moderation have ever been heard among the Palestinian Arabs."
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The Media

PALESTINIAN MEDICAL PRACTICES AND MARK GARLASCO'S BEGGARED IMAGINATION
by Augean Stables

  Much has been written about the latest Israeli "atrocity" — killing a family picnicking on a shell-strewn Gaza beach. It has been since been definitely shown that, true, the family was killed, but — just as true — it wasn't the fault of the Israelis. Some Arab-laid mines exploded or it was, as they say, a "work-related" accident that happened as the explosives were being prepared. What makes this article of compelling interest is that it links the aftermath — how the killing was handled by "neutrals" such as the Human Rights Watch organization and how much the self-flagellating Israeli press contributed to tarring Israel.
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OPRAH DISCOVERS THE HOLOCAUST
by Debbie Schlussel

  Debbie Schlussel reviews another Oprah Winfrey media event: Oprah discovers the Holocaust, guided by Elie Wiesel and sponsored by AT&T. Two thumbs down.
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READ THE NEWS, GO TO JAIL
by David Wise

  David Wise ties together the hounding of AIPAC staffers for receiving information from a Pentagon official, the jailing of Judith Miller for refusing to name a source and other incidents where the government has attempted to prosecute leaking classified information or receiving classified information. But there is no law that prohibits leaking classified information unless it specifically concerns national defense. Yet, if the trend towards criminalizing the exchange of classified information continues, the end result could be, as the title of this essay says, "Read the News, Go to Jail."
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

JUNE 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


March-April, 2006

Like ugly forecasts of the future, there were two firsts on Israel's March 28th election day: the recently-munched-together Kadima party was voted in and the Arabs launched Iranian manufactured Kassam missiles at Ashkelon, at the Negev, from Gaza. And Israel's response? Gar nichts. Maybe Olmert only fights women and children. Amona-style.

This is some of what Ruth Matar of the Women in Green organization wrote before the elections, when she urged people not to vote for Ehud Olmert and the Kadima Party.

Ehud Olmert boasts that he is the one who convinced Ariel Sharon to disengage from the Jewish Land of Gaza, and to make Gaza "judenrein." >From Olmert's point of view the disengagement was a great success. There is not a single Jew left in Gaza! Even dead Jews had to be removed from their graves and buried elsewhere, to satisfy the Arab enemy.

Half-a-year after the Gaza pullout, there is no avoiding the decisive conclusion that disengagement was a tragic, pre-ordained failure. This is true with respect to every possible issue:

Politically: The terror group HAMAS won the election! "More than 80% of the Palestinians view the pullout as a victory for the armed struggle," said Palestinian pollster Khalil Shikaki.

Economically: The costs associated with implementing Disengagement, and dealing with the repercussions, are massive. Residents in communities near Gaza, who are now the new victims of Qassam rocket attacks, are demanding reinforced homes. Also, previously productive and independent people, who have been expelled from their homes and have no jobs, are not able to provide for their families. They now require that food and shelter be furnished by the State.

Renewed Terror Threats: Defense Minister Mofaz admitted to the Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that Al-Qaida cells were operating in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and were planning attacks against Israel. Iran transferred $1.8 million to Islamic Jihad. On Tuesday a suicide bombing in the center of the country was narrowly avoided, after a high-speed chase by the police on the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway.

Security: Qassam rocket attacks from evacuated areas have escalated. The rain of rockets on Israeli cities and population centers have increased, reaching the outskirts of Ashkelon, with its wide range of essential strategic installations.

National infrastructures in Ashkelon include:

1. The Rotenberg Power Plant in southern Ashkelon is Israel's second-largest electric station, and supplies about a quarter of the country's electricity.

2. The Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline company (EAPC) in Ashkelon operates three oil pipelines linking Ashkelon with Eilat, Ashdod and Haifa.

3. The Ashkelon seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plant, the largest desalination plant of its kind in the world, is set to ultimately provide an annual 100 million cubic meters of water, or some 15% of the country's domestic consumer demand. It commenced initial production in August 2005, and began operations at a third of its full capacity.

Shouldn't the Olmert Interim Government be held accountable for failing to protect Ashkelon, Sderot, and Negev settlements and kibbutzim?

[Ehud Olmert's] statements imply turning most of Judea and Samaria over to Hamas, and thus bringing Arab terrorism that much closer to Israel's population centers. But, incredibly, Olmert plans to leave a continual Israeli military presence in the area that has been cleared of all Jews!

According to Olmert, therefore, Jews will not be allowed to live in their Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria. However, Olmert plans that the Israel Defense Forces will remain to continue Israel's military rule of the Arabs who live there!

Has the man taken leave of his senses? Is the IDF staying there to protect the Arabs in Judea and Samaria? What is the function of the IDF, in a judenrein Judea and Samaria? And won't our Army be exposed to terror attacks from Hamas And Islamic Jihad?

Unless we Jews are able to prevent Olmert's holding on to power, he might soon be making life and death decisions affecting ordinary Israelis. He will demand sacrifices, but he sure won't demand sacrifices from himself and his own family.

PBS ran a puff piece on Olmert just after the election, where these facts about Olmert's family life were given — but in a context that blurred their importance. Olmert was portrayed as a wrong-headed Right-winger who was shown the light by his Leftist family, whose opinion were clearly influenced by their Leftist mother, not by their father. Ruth Matar put these aspects of Olmert's personal life into meaningful context.

Both of his sons reside abroad. Shaul, an adherent of Yesh Gvul (an organization which refuses to serve in Judea and Samaria) was charged with desertion and now lives in New York. Ariel who never did any army service resides in Paris. Olmert, if elected, might soon be exposing other youth in uniform to perils to which his own sons are spared! His daughter, a Machsom Watch activist, will meanwhile interfere with the duties of soldiers manning checkpoints to prevent terrorists from carrying out their plans.

And she pointed out why Olmert should not have been appointed acting Prime Minister and allowed to make decisions like his sending police into Amona to bash heads and crush testicles. She asked if Ehud Olmert was a legitimate candidate for Prime Minister?

In Israel the vote is for the party, not the person. That is the system. Therefore Olmert should not have been allowed to be the acting Prime Minister, since his Party, Kadima, is not the one which won the previous election. Actually, it did not even exist at that time. The Acting Prime Minister should have been selected from the Likud Party.

Following the massive stroke of Sharon in January, Attorney General Mazuz defined his condition as "temporary incapacity of a permanent character."

Mazuz had good reason to act as he did. If he had simply declared that Sharon was permanently incapacitated, (which he definitely is) then a complicated, multi-step procedure for selecting and approving a new Prime Minister and Government would have been set in motion. So Mazuz invented a new legal category, which, of course, us simple folks are not able to understand! In so doing, he seized the power to select the Prime Minister from Israel's elected officials, effectively anointing himself the Prime Minister's sole elector.

In the aftermath of these twin hits — the Arabs determinedly pursuing the death of the Jews and the Jews glubbering in denial that the danger is so severe — we can only shake our head in wonderment that we Jews have lasted this long. Fortunately, our essayists are made of sterner stuff.

There's some sun coming out despite the clouds. Despite the pollyanna-ishness of much of the mainstream media, more and more of the people of the world are beginning to understand we have a global problem: the leaders of Islam have declared war on us all. And even some in the media are beginning to think.

So read these essays.

We start with some recent information about the Jews of Gush Katif, turned into refugees by their own government, which expended much effort in tossing these Jews out of their homes and farms, but is now indifferent to them. The Israeli government is so eager to help victims of man-made and natural catastrophies around the world – except when the catastrophe is one they caused at home.

COMPTROLLER'S REPORT SCATHES DISENGAGEMENT EXECUTORS
by Hillel Fendel

  The Comptroller's report makes official what's been known and denied for months: the Government bungled the Gush Katif evacuation badly. Denied compensation, the refugees did not have the means to handle finding homes and jobs by themselves. Nor were professional resources – the scaffolding that should have been in place to expedite reabsorption — in place. The result? Some eight months after their enforced evacuation, some of the expellees are still homeless, unemployed and without funds and most are still demoralized and dispirited. One silver lining: now that the Report is published, the Government can stop wasting money assuring everyone that all the settlers are happily settled. One major unanswered question: why the haste to uproot the Gush Katif Jews?
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LIVING ON A PRAYER: EVACUEES FEEL PRESSED TO LEAVE HOTELS BY PESSAH
by Tamar Wisemon

  Being evicted from their homes was not the final assault suffered by the Gush Katif Jews. They suffer from chronic uncertainty, thanks to the sloppy and inadequate arrangements made by the Israeli Government. Their humiliation and the resistance of the Government to their reestablishing normal community living continues. Some eight months after they were made homeless refugees, there are long delays and then inappropriate demands for them to act immediately. Tamar Wisemon describes one of the latest ploys.
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ANOTHER DAY IN DOGPATCH
by Moshe Saperstein and an addendum by Rachel Saperstein

  Some 8 months after they were kicked out of their home in Gush Katif, the Sapersteins are permanently settled temporarily — they are in Israel's version of a trailer park, chock full of caravillas — poorly constructed caravans for which the government paid big bucks. As Moshe Saperstein describes it, "It's Dogpatch, without the stills." The trauma is still deep, as is the rift between those who left early and those who stayed to the bitter end, but life goes on. He does laundry, he visits his bank, he sees friends and relatives. The community starts to make decisions about where they will settle permanently. And Rachel describes celebrating Pesach in their new digs.
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Lest you think normal living is hard to come by in Israel, read these next essays. Of course, normal living for Israelis includes tending to the scars left by the expulsions last summer.
A SEED IS PLANTED IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL
by Moshe Dann

  This is a charming essay by Moshe Dann about ordinary life in Israel – children growing up, children getting married, having their own children. But this is a family in Israel, which makes them larger than life to begin with. They must contend with violent neighbors whose major goal in life is to destroy — to take life and property from Jews. The Jews can't ignore their enemy, but at the same time, this Jewish family has taken on the burden of reviving the Biblical Land of Israel, a very positive ambition.
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DREADLOCK PAYOS AND TYE-DYED TZITZIT AT BOOMBAMELA FESTIVAL
by Benyamin Bresky

  Each year, the Passover Boombamela festival — exchanging hospitality and just hanging out — grows more popular in Israel. Benjamin Bresky describes this year's event at Nitzanim Beach, where a melange of people were hosted by several Chassidic groups. It was in Bresky's words, "[t]hree days of music, matzah and spirituality..."
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THE KNIGHT AND THE PAWN
by Paula R. Stern

  Paula Stern writes of what was once an unsullied love affair between Israelis and the IDF. It isn't over but it suffered a body blow, when Sharon's government used Israeli soldiers to expel Jews from their homes.
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Over the years, the term Zionism has often been subjected to vicious distortions by those who prefer Arab to Jewish nationalism; and sometimes the Jewish enterprise has been trivialized by those who genuinely care for Israel. Salomon Benzimra does an uncommonly good job of telling us about the uniqueness of the Jewish state.

ISRAELI AND JEWISH USEFUL IDIOTS
by Jack Berger

  We are so used to blatant distortions and outrageous statements by anti-Israel Jews such as Noam Chomsky or Norman Finkelstein or Ilan Pappe, we have ignored the damage that can be done by Jews that Jack Berger calls "useful idiots" — Jews that appear mild in manner and sound reasonable but damage Israel by omissions and by slanting the truth. And there are those that do Israel a disservice by sugar-coating the truth about Israel's neighbors so that the audience is left feeling good, though unenlightened. "'Useful idiots' are those who try to deny the obvious. Armed with excuses and rationalizations, they have created an art form of telling people what they wanted them to hear rather than what was actually happening."
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THE JEWS: A PEOPLE, A NATION, A STATE
by Salomon Benzimra

  Considering how often Zionism is used as a derogatory epithet by bigots, it is sad how little these people actually know about "Zionism, its origins and its natural achievement in the birth of the State of Israel." In this excellent essay, Salomon Benzimra explains the multi-faceted nature of Zionism and its centrality for Jewish peoplehood.
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The new party Kadima has renamed disengagement "convergence". I have to admit that convergence is a much better description of what the Olmert administration is proposing than disengagement — if they have their way, some half-million Jews will be kicked out of Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem and converge onto what's left of Israel. This will probably be a short respite, while the Arabs rev up to take over the rest of Israel. I wonder what Olmert sees as the end point of this convergence?
FORWARD ALONG CROOKED PATHS
by Patricia Berlyn

  In this issue of A Time to Speak, Patricia Berlyn talks about the Kadima party — who its leaders are and what their political philosophy is. The Kadima Government provides insufficient resources to protect the people against the stepped-up terror attacks from Gaza. But the Jews aren't caving in. As Yehuda Poch has written, "... for the Jewish nation as a whole ... Israel represents for us the only place in the world we can really call home, the only place in the world where Jewish life and Jewish blood are to be protected above all else. Israel represents our destiny." But, as at Amona, the Kadima Government has de facto taken on the goals of Israel's enemies and is ruthlessly betraying these powerful Jewish ideals. Kadima moves forward along crooked paths.
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"CONVERGENCE" = EVICTION/ EVACUATION/ ETHNIC CLEANSING
by Emanuel A. Winston

  The IDF Staff told Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert that a retreat from Gaza would be a terrible blunder. They were right. The level of terror that the communities outside the Gaza Strip now have to contend with has markedly increased. The new plan to drive out the Jews from Samaria and Judea would increase the number of Jewish refugees 10-fold and the level of violence will go up astronomically. So why do it? Emanuel A. Winston speculates on Olmert's real reasons. And, more importantly, how this stupidity will encourage Israel's neighbors to drive more nails into Israel's coffin.
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A STUDY IN FANATICISM
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman points out that "Olmert regime is providing a definitive example of blind, obsessive fanaticism." Israel has followed a policy of withdrawal from the territories since the early 90s and it has been a failure. But instead of reexamining the Gaza retreat blunder — particularly in the wake of the increased sophistication and bloodiness of the terrorist enterprise in Gaza and a heightened eagerness by the Arabs to demolish Israel — the Israeli government has renamed disengagement convergence and steadfastly continues to forge ahead on the road to disaster.
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DISENGAGEMENT'S MILITARY LESSON FOR THE WEST BANK
by Nadav Morag

  Israel's disengagement strategy is turtle strategy — the Israeli government has pulled inside a shell and is hiding in what it believes is a safe zone. Nadav Morag points out that "[t]he first rule of policymaking is that it needs to be firmly grounded in reality..." and the turtle strategy is not. Israel can not withdraw behind a wall and effectively fight the terrorists residing in the territories. She must stay in control of the area. We've taken the liberty of also reprinting some of the comments that the article elicited.
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'OCCUPATION' IS THE SOLUTION, NOT THE PROBLEM
by Ted Belman

  Israel seems not to have done some basic studies to compare the different strategies to contain Arab terror — e.g., is it more or less effective maintaining a Jewish population in the Territories (instead of paying the astronomical costs of resettling them) than keeping an enlarged IDF force there? Ted Belman argues that, given the increase in truculence of the various terror groups, what is needed is reoccupation of Gaza and no retreat from the West Bank. Along the same lines, former Defense Minister Moshe Arens has bluntly said (Arutz-Sheva, April 25, 2006) that Northern Gaza must be recaptured: "I fear that the government is refraining from sending IDF troops into Gaza to stop the Kassam rockets because it doesn't want to admit its mistake in withdrawing from Gaza in the first place." A military ground operation is necessary because the "IDF's artillery barrage on northern Gaza is totally futile, as the terrorists fire the rockets from densely populated areas while Israel shells empty areas."
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Kadima has made expulsion plans for Samaria, Judea and eastern Jerusalem. Should they come to fruition, they would turn some half a million Jews — some 10% of the Jewish population of Israel! — into refugees in their own country. The fly in Kadima's ointment? The trout in the State Department's milk? The fact that explodes the European Union's fantasy? The Arabs are not satisfied with taking over Biblical Israel and turning it into a State. They wish, instead, to make this territory into the finest terror enclave in the Middle East.

GREEN TIDE RISING
by Philip B. Haney

  Philip B. Haney points out that Hamas winning the election to head the Palestinian Authority is not surprising. Contrary to what we'd like to believe, they've been much admired in the Arab world for some twenty years. They represent the global Jihadist movement and "at least four generations of Middle Eastern Arab Muslims ... have all been saturated from birth on the liberation theology of Jihad." Using democratic means to gain power, the Middle East Jihadist groups — Hamas, Hezbollah, the Muslim Brotherhood, the clerics in Iran and Saudi Arabia — have a single objective: to impose Islamic Sharia'ah law on whatever country they control. The similarity between resurgent Islam and Nazi Germany — their local popularity, their ability to sway crowds and intimidate their neighbors as well as their unabashed desire to conquer the world — is both frightening and real.
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HAMAS GOVERNS
by Barry Rubin

  Now that Hamas has control of the Palestine Authority, will they change their ways? Will they take on the job of governing a large group of people? Will they — as so many are hoping — behave less brutally, so that the world can claim they have become moderates? To sum up Barry Rubin's excellent analysis: not bloody likely.
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UNDERSTANDING THE DIRECTION OF THE NEW HAMAS GOVERNMENT: Between Tactical Pragmatism and Al-Qaeda Jihadism
by Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan D. Halevi

  Much pro-Arab propaganda is devoted to reassuring us that, despite their common interests, Islamic terrorist groups are not confederated and that terrorism in one country is not linked to Islamic terrorism elsewhere. We are supposed to believe that Hamas, the latest terror gang to gain power, can be enticed away from its evil ways by the need to run a pseudo-country. Lt. Col Jonathan Halevi demolishes these notions. True, in the short term, Hamas' goal is to establish itself securely and gain international legitimacy. But its longterm goal is immune to the world's approval or disapproval. "Hamas views its political mission as the vanguard of the worldwide Islamic revolution led by its parent-movement, the Muslim Brotherhood," and, as such, it acts as an admired role model of militant activism to Islamic terrorist groups around the world, encouraging them to participate in the glorious task of introducing Sharia law everywhere.
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AL QAEDA'S MASTER PLAN
by Olivier Guitta

  We tend to treat Al-Qaeda as embodied in a single entity, Osama Bin Laden playing an evil Batman or Battyman. Olivier Guitta writes that al-Qaeda has shifted its immediate focus. Where once it concentrated exclusively on Saudi Arabia for allowing infidels on its sacred soil, now it is moving into the Israeli territories — Gaza and the West Bank — Jordan and Lebanon. Israel's retreat from the territories and Lebanon's instability will make it easier for al-Qaeda to establish several new bases of operation. And Jordan has been under Al-Qaeda attack for some time.
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ISRAEL'S NEW WAR
by Caroline Glick

  While so many politicians keep denying there is a loose confederacy among the multiple terror groups, their unification has reached the point that Caroline Glick suggests the new Israeli Kadima government rethink its plan to retreat from most of Samaria and Judea. We should take seriously the fact that Hamas is making Gaza into a wall-to-wall terror stronghold and bomb manufactory and the fact that Al Qaeda is sizing up the area as a base from which to attack both Israel and Jordan.
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We are usually presented with a binary choice to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict: two states — Israel and "Palestine" — living side by side OR a single binational state with eventually an Arab majority. Neither of these options will work because the Arabs want to destroy Israel, not live peacefully next to or among the Jews. Given the new realignment of terror groups, does Israel have an alternative to these alternatives? Sure. A single uni-national Jewish state. More and more people are suggesting that Israel should keep the Land which legally, morally, historically and by war belongs to her and move out the Arabs. In these next essays, the authors encourage the Jordanian solution for solving the Arab-Israeli conflict. It has, among its other excellent features, the virtue that the Arabs can feel they screwed Israel. Jordan, after all, was created out of 78% of the land area that was solemnly promised to the Jews in Mandate times.

THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE
by Robert S. Barnes

  Decisions about giving up land that actually belongs to Israel have been based on false assumptions about demographics and the belief that West Bank Arabs feel strongly about the land. Robert Barnes suggests that a realistic alternative strategy should be explored, i.e., encouraging Arabs to emigrate. He discusses some practical considerations that would make this plan feasible.
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TRANSFER THE ARABS, NOT THE JEWS
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck remembers when Ariel Sharon became "the lap dog for American and European governments, just as everyone preceding him had done." They were responsive to the whims of the American administration in power, and didn't act in Israel's best interests. Under Ehud Olmert "dubious leadership, ... the 'powers that be' in Israel are aiming for a new low." They want separation from the Arabs, but are going about it in the wrong way. "'Transfer' is not the dirty word it once was. Particularly since Jews are now applying that principle to other Jews." She suggests that a workable solution is to transfer the Palestinian Arabs to Jordan, using as model the way the Brazilians built a city from scratch in a previously undeveloped area.
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Is the new alignment of terror gangs and the expansion of terrorist activity an aberration? Can Islam still be described as a religion of Peace?

  IF YOU'RE SMART, YOU'LL THANK ME FOR BEING POLITICALLY INCORRECT
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck report that on talk and talk-back radio shows, listeners are more than aware that Islam is hardly a religion of peace. Israel has been pressured into concessions time and again for "peace" only to find it is never enough to satify the Arabs — because their objective is not peace. "the current leaders make no secret of their intent: Destroy Israel and subjugate the entire world."
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ALLAH BE APPRAISED!
by Burt Prelutsky

  Considering that so many people — including President Bush — claim Islam is a peaceful religion, Burt Prelutsky finds it remarkable that "... wherever Islam gains a stranglehold, you will find the nightmare of slavery, genocide and female stoning and mutilation, the norm." Of course, the Muslim cult of death may have other causes — the climate, "... too much sand in one's diet ... sharing one's life with camels, a notoriously nasty beast..."
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What runs consistently through Islamic history is the desire to create a world-wide single Caliphate. Current Muslim activists – the terrorists and clerics in the foreground and the actual leaders and strategists in the background — appear to have a single ambition: to take over territory and impose Shari'a (Islamic law) on it. And if polls and ballot boxes are any indication, they have won the hearts and minds of much of the Muslim world.

ISLAM'S IMPERIAL DREAMS: Muslim political ambitions aren't a reaction to Western encroachments.
by Efraim Karsh

Efraim Karsh explains that Islam's hostility to the West is not a new phenomenon engendered by legimate grievances. To the contrary, he points out that "[t]he last great Muslim empire may have been destroyed and the caliphate left vacant, but the dream of regional and world domination has remained very much alive" and has now been adapted by various radical Islamic groups. He also reminds us about historical inaccuracies about past Caliphates that are still current. You'll be glad you read this article the next time someone tells you that some horrible killing by the Arabs was only in response to (an event within the previous week).
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ISLAM'S COMING CRUSADE
by Martin Kramer

  The theory is that only a few misguided souls are interested in terror and in conducting a jihad to install shari'a throughout the world. This is given the lie by polls that show "that 60 percent of Jordanians, Egyptians and Palestinians want Islamic shari'a law to be the sole source of legislation." There really is a clash of civilizations. ... The clash goes beyond differing interests. Hundreds of millions of Muslims who live alongside us and among us inhabit another mental world."
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WAR AND PEACE
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori suggests that over much of the world, the choice, vis a vis the Muslims "is not between war and peace, because the war, whose name is jihad, is upon us, whether we are willing to admit it or prefer suicidal denial. Our choice is between fighting it and surrendering." Yet in many cases, people are ignoring the enemy and focusing on Israel as the easy-to-tackle bad guy. England would eliminate Iranian nuclear power, but it also wants to disarm Israel. Blaming Israel can only increase as Muslims take over more of Europe. And "with every passing year, the Europe of an overseas vacationer acquires more and more of the unreal quality of an amusement park. Its attractions are still running, but the place is now under new management." Israel is another place where Islam could be defeated. "The government of Israel has all the means necessary to defeat the enemy, but, along with a large percentage of the population, lacks the will to do so. Trying to avoid displeasing the world at all costs, they prefer to surrender their land and sacrifice their lives to a weak, inhumane enemy." And America will soon have its own struggle with a resident population of Muslims promoting shari'a.
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TakeOverStages: We are encouraged to view the various terrorist groups as independents — each with its own set of grievances. But maybe the cartoon riots served an unintended purpose — showing us a commonality. As the essays suggest, the goal is the same. The differences are a function of how far the Islamists have succeeded in infiltrating and overcoming a particular country. David Meir-Levi lists the 10 stages in how to take over a country "peacefully." He considers Bangladesh at Stage #9, the EU and UK at stage #7 ready to move into #8, the USA at around Stages #4 or #5.
— (www.FrontPageMag.com, April 26, 2006).

1. Infiltrate quietly, settling in small numbers near or among the locals' towns and villages.

2. Establish friendly relations, and convince others of the virtues of Islam.

3. Participate in community activities and provide charity for the poor and generosity to all, while encouraging the immigration of other Muslims.

4. Get converts and supporters from the rank and file of the local population, particularly from the poor and disenfranchised of the host society, via the multiple mosques and madrasas and charitable and human rights groups. (Today, in the case of the US and EU, converts come in great numbers from the ranks of criminals, especially imprisoned African-Americans.)

5. Agitate for greater and broader rights and considerations for Muslims, and for protection against real or imagined "Islamophobia".

6. Organize a political party to push for changes in law to permit Muslim-only enclaves and for laws that formalize the host society's accommodation of Muslim religious needs.

7. Institute the divide-and-conquer strategy of making pacts with some anti-establishment or minority government groups, legal (as has been done in the USA with Green Party, National Lawyers Guild) or illegal (KKK, Aryan Nation) so they will help in the following stages.

8. Once you have the power base (some 10-15 percent of the population), then use violence, strikes, street riots, assassination, intimidation and bribery of government officials to destabilize the government.

9. If the host country's government response to the violence is not effective, then there is a de facto green light to start full-blown terrorism which will topple the government and allow Muslim leaders to move up the power ladder with the help of the anti-establishment groups. Once in power, Muslim leaders can use their influence over the agitating Muslim population to quell the violence, thus pretending that they are helping restore order even as they themselves orchestrate the violence.

10. Abandon the erstwhile anti-establishment allies and reign supreme; establish Shari'a, and declare the state to be a new Muslim nation where Shari'a is law and non-Moslems are dhimmi.

These next essays are about Muslim activity in several countries. When we buy into the Party line — that it's all because of Israel – whatever IT is, it is good to be reminded that Israel is merely the current scapegoat. The problem is a lot bigger.

SPREADING SHARIA IN ASIA/AFRICA

ISLAM'S UNCERTAIN FUTURE
An interview with Paul Marshall by Stan Guthrie

David Meir-Levi says of this article, "It offers us a brief birds-eye view of the very intentional, well-planned and well-funded spread of Shari'a — Moslem religious jurisprudence — in Africa and Asia; and the impact of that spread upon the indigenous Christian communities. It also offers us a rather horrifying summary of the intent of the Islamofascist terrorists and the degree of their success so far."
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MADRASSAS AND MOSQUES IN BANGLADESH
by Salah Choudhury

  Salah Choudhury is a very special person. He is editor of the Bangladesh newspaper, the Weekly Blitz, and was jailed without trial for 17 months for writing about Islamist extremist teachings at madrassas — he was arrested at the Bangladesh airport on his way to a Writer's Conference in Israel. His trial is just now coming up. Bangladesh is Moslem but was fairly tolerant of other groups until fear of the extremists drove the government to repressive measures. Here, Choudhury talks of how hate is fostered in the mosques and madrassas run by religious extremist Muslims. These educational and religious facilities are also used to recruit and train guerrilla fighters.
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ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM IN IRAN

FACING DOWN IRAN: Our Lives Depend On It
by Mark Steyn

  Iran has been able to defy "world" opinion, yet has suffered few consequences — the UN seems ready to debate Iran's nuclear program until events make the UN even more irrelevant than it is right now. Mark Steyn tells us we must take Iran seriously and end the present regime in Tehren. How? With a "... swift, massive, devastating force that decapitates the regime — but no occupation." Otherwise, "Iran with nukes will be a suicide bomber with a radioactive waist."
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DO WE TAKE HIS WORDS SERIOUSLY REDUX?
by Dr. Steve Carol

  In this companion article to Mark Steyn's essay, Steve Carol reminds us — using some cogent historical examples from not so long ago – that we had better take a firm military stance in dealing with Iran. "Any delay means greater cost to the West in dealing with the threat."
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MUSLIMS IN EUROPE

THE FALL OF FRANCE AND THE MULTICULTURAL WORLD WAR
by Fjordman

  Fjordman is a Norwegian essayist who writes on Scandanavian affairs and Islam. In this essay, he expects that continued unrestrained Muslim immigration and their easily-sparked riots may end in a complete breakdown of French society, with France dominated by the Muslims or becoming an Islamic state, either with or without protracted protest from the natives. He suggests possible scenarios on what this process might mean for the rest of Europe.
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FANTASIES ABOUT JIHAD
by Robert Spencer

  Robert Spencer recounts a talk he had with a Dutch official. If she is typical, many Dutch people are still in that optimistic stage where they believe that they can charm the Muslims out of their obsession to establish Sharia law in Holland for all to follow. Yeah, right.
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CRISIS IN EUROPE
by Bruce Bawer

  Bruce Bawer writes that most of the countries in Western Europe now have two very separate communities — secular, liberal populations with a low birthrate and "self-segregating enclaves whose autocratic leaders despised democracy and whose population (thanks to high birth and immigration rates) was climbing rapidly." But few people talk about this division openly or have examined it critically. Bawer brilliantly summarizes the major analyses. Europeans contributed to the problem, because, ironically, out of respect for Muslim traditions, they didn't promote integration or force the Muslim immigrants to work but romantically "pursued ... an approach they saw as humane and multicultural." The Muslims responded with contempt. Conversely, practices sanctioned by the Koran and therefore intrinsic to Muslim society — slavery, polygamy, oppressive attitudes toward women and infidels — are antithetic to integration into the greater society. This is an excellent introduction to material on what is a serious problem in Europe.
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MUSLIMS IN USA

THE ISLAMIZATION OF AMERICA
by Phyllis Chesler

  Phyllis Chesler focusses on how Muslims bent on islamization use America's tolerance and its freedom of expression against us. We feel virtuous when we admit admitted Jihadists into this country; we defend the right of imams to indoctrinate others with poisonous messages of hate; we welcome rabid hate groups to the campus. But there's no reciprocity. Newspapers are afraid to run cartoons of Mohammad; bookstores are afraid to stock anti-Muslim books; talk shows are afraid to say that all of the terrorists of 911 were Arab; and tracking the funding of the terrorists is a suable offense. Chesler suggests some remedies.
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THE ISLAMIST CHALLENGE TO THE U.S. CONSTITUTION
by David Kennedy Houck

  David Kennedy Houck takes up the question: can a Muslim group establish an enclave in which they enforce Muslim law, even if it is contrary to the laws of the State? "Such enclaves raise the fundamental questions of when, how, and to what extent religious practice may supersede the U.S. Constitution." As a simple example, enclaves are generally allowed, providing they don't supersede constitutionally-protected citizen rights. But applying Shari'a law to family disputes — which would allow forced marriages and child marriage — would conflict with state law. Many imams and jihadists and ordinary muslims have proclaimed Shari'a superior to democracy. It remains to be seen how actively they will promote this belief.
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CAIR: ISLAMISTS FOOLING THE ESTABLISHMENT
by Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha

  This is an important article. It is an excellent analysis of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Purportedly, CAIR's objective is simply to protect Muslim civil rights. But as Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha carefully demonstrate, CAIR is part of the "Wahhabi lobby" and has a more sinister agenda: it aggressively acts to hamper anti-terrorist activities and it contributes financially and propagandistically to terrorist groups — particularly Hamas. CAIR disseminates radical Islamic ideology and recruits and trains terrorists. It uses intimidation, threats and misinformation; and "[it] has a long record of unreliability and deceit..." The authors ask, "How long will it be until the establishment finally recognizes CAIR for what it is and denies it mainstream legitimacy?"
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Putting aside Condoleezza Rice's ignorant insistence that Israel open the Rafah Crossing — making it much easier for terrorists to travel between Gaza and Egypt — it is still obvious there's a big difference in how much respect the U.S. Government shows to Israel vis a vis the Arab states.

DATING-GAME DIPLOMACY: GETTING TO KNOW U(AE)
by Barbara Lerner

  The Dubai Ports deal may be dead, but relations between the US Administration and the Arab states in the Persian Gulf don't seem to have changed. Just a few days ago, when people had calmed down about foreigners running some of our strategic ports, newpaper headlines (CNN, 4/28/06) informed us that "Bush approves Dubai takeover of defense plants." Dubai isn't at our door; it's inside our house. It's become a defense contractor, sole supplier of turbine fan parts for our Abrams tanks, and with permission to buddy up with other contractors and sit in on defense strategy meetings." To put this in perspective, we present two of Barbara Lerner's articles on the Dubai Ports deal.
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GEORGE BUSH'S DIPLOMATIC AMBIGUITIES
by Rachel Neuwirth

  This is a forthright examination of George Bush's administration's two-faced diplomacy. It has taken a strong verbal stand against Islamic extremists — except when Islamic extremists waged war on Israel. Arafat and the PLO received continuous U.S.A. financial support and Bush's Secretary of State used threats to force Israel to let Hamas, another Islamic extremist group, run in the Palestine Authority (PA) elections, where, as expected, it gained control of the PA. It appears that what drives the administration is fear of Arab reaction. What is particularly galling is that Jewish "leaders" are more inclined towards self-debasement and appeasement than towards standing for principle.
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The Media section contains an examination of two recent New York Times articles, both imbued with the newspaper's generally anti-Israel attitude. And we present some thoughts about the internet, which has some features that markedly differentiate it from the newspaper and TV media.

THE NEW YORK TIMES REFUSES TO GET IT RIGHT
by Lawrence Uniglicht

  The New York Times has become less and less the newpaper of record and more and more the newpaper of rancor and unremitting prejudice, most blatantly against Israel. Lawrence Uniglicht takes two recent New York Times articles to task, pointing out how meretricious are their arguments and how weak their "facts".
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Whatever is happening at Harvard? A professor — Stephen Walt, Dean of Harvard's Kennedy School — issues a sloppy report that could serve as an updated "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" and Harvard gives it its seal of approval. Conversely, the President of Harvard, Lawrence Summers, opens up subjects that needs examination and he is hounded into resigning. In the final essay of this section, Orientalism, which dominated — some say tyrannized — the approach to Middle Eastern studies for many years is finally receiving critical analysis.

STEPHEN WALT'S WAR WITH ISRAEL
by Richard Baehr and Ed Lasky

  The people at http://wizbangblog.com wrote of this article, "Last week, two professors released a report on what they considered the source of all our problems in the Middle East. Not surprisingly, it's all the fault of Israel. Richard Baehr and Ed Lasky took a hard look this so-called 'scholarly work,' and to say they found it 'lacking' would be a miracle of understatement... [it] made me truly envious for not having written [their article]."
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SPEAKING (AND NOT SPEAKING) ABOUT POLITICS, GENDER, AND RACE AT HARVARD
by Richard L. Cravatts, Ph.D.

  Richard Cravetts tells us about the events that led up to Lawrence Summers' resigning his post as president of Harvard University. Harvard has had a long-standing ban on ROTC on campus, even after 911. "Patriotism," Summers said at the Kennedy School of Government, "might actually be a positive and virtuous emotion for a wounded nation..." Bloing! He tackled a black racist. He rejected a petition to divest Harvard of funds invested in Israel from the "campus Left's obsession with the Palestinian cause — and its contemporaneous and subsequent demonization of Israel ..." Bloing! Bloing! Bloing! And he was finally shafted for daring to suggest that men and women might have built-in differences in mathematical ability. His real crime? Advocating diversity of opinion in an environment that believes in a restricted set of opinions that should not be questioned.
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STUDENTS, TEACHERS, AND EDWARD SAID: TAKING STOCK OF ORIENTALISM
by Joshua Teitelbaum and Meir Litvak

  Dr. Joshua Teitelbaum and Dr. Meir Litvak discuss the incredibly long and extraordinary influence of one man, Edward Said, on almost every academic department that taught about Islam and the Middle East. They bought his concepts and they bought his political agenda. Beginning with his book, Orientalism, Said asserted that (a) it was impossible for a Westerner to comprehend the Middle Eastern mind and (b) the West's political imperialism was responsible for all that was bad in the Middle East. A critical reassessment of Said's ideas began fairly recently, thanks to the work of brave people like Martin Kramer and to the fact that so much of the Said Orientalism approach has proven a poor predictor of new happenings in the Islamic world.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

MARCH 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
APRIL 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE


January-February, 2006

The money that the Gush Katif orchards and farms contributed to the Israeli economy is no more. Nor can the farmers any longer contribute fruits and vegetables to the charities that feed the 27% of Israel that lives below the poverty line. They themselves have become an involuntary burden. As between people on a seesaw, the confidence of the Arabs has surged — the blood lust to eliminate the Jewish state has increased. Palestinian Arab military capabilities and their weapon resources increase daily. Arab leaders do not bicker about the shape of a future Palestine state — that isn't what they are after. Instead, they are filled with anticipatory joy. As the Jews of Israel flounder and debate and waste energy on inter-ideological fighting, the Arabs perceive themselves as ever more close to their goal of destroying Israel.

The morale of many Jews has been cast down — especially because they see that their own Government might just as well be paid by the Arabs. They certainly aren't protecting the Jews. The police use metal bats on Jews, even those making the most polite and civil of protests. They arrest Jews for attacking Arabs, when the Arabs themselves — before being prompted by their elders — say the Jews did not attack them. Jewish children, relatives of activists, are thrown in jail, sometimes for just standing on a sidewalk, minimally utilizing their right to civil disobedience. The law courts are pathetic. And with few exceptions, the Israeli media people don't report — they act as groupies for police brutality against Jews, something they would not tolerate if it were Arab heads being smashed.

The major reason for kicking out the Jews from Gush Katif is beginning to emerge. Sure the American State Dept and the Saudis have always urged it. But why did the Israeli Jews push for an idiot idea that had no economic, military or morale benefit? No, let's be precise – it was positively negative. It was the end of the heady love affair of the Israelis and the IDF. It placed the soldiers in a position of internal conflict and guilt about uprooting Jews, when they should focus on fighting external enemies. It satisfied those whose mentality focussed mostly on the fact that, pre-expulsion, so many soldiers were required to guard the Jews of Gaza.

But there is a huge cost to the retreat from Gaza. The Jews of Gush Katif no longer serve as a cheap and alert early alarm system to spot Arab terror; the IDF is no longer around to prevent land and sea shipments of weapons and explosives to the Gazan Arabs; and the Arab terrorists are no longer contained in a small area but have come closer, much closer, to some major Israeli cities, power plants and Israel's water supply. And even though we were reassured that withdrawal would increase security, it has been quite the opposite: the IDF is even more hamstrung by the politicians and prevented from defending the country. As Caroline Glick wrote, (Jerusalem Post, February 16, 2006) "... rather than do its job or admit that in the absence of ground forces in Gaza it cannot do its job, the IDF excuses its failure to protect the country with hollow and pathetic political slogans. Most depressingly, the IDF does this with the full expectation that the Israeli public will not notice..."

It is becoming obvious that expelling the Jews from Gush Katif was perhaps the last hurrah of the Marxist Secularist Leftist ideologues. It was an organized attempt to break the spirit of the religious and centrist Jews of Israel, who want the Jewish state to be more-or-less Jewish. This group of Marxists-Secularists — and their small numbers continue to shrink — appear to be the last Israelis to believe in the possibility of peace with those Arabs who, within living memory, began to term themselves Palestinians. They favor the Arab and respect Islam; they denigrate the Jewish orthodox and don't respect Judaism. And too many ordinary Israelis are reacting to the lawlessness of the police and courts by shrinking their window of reality — if it isn't happening in their backyard, why care. Do the police really have to crack Jewish heads in Jerusalem before Israelis wake up and start caring that what has happening to the settlers can — and will – happen to them?

Israel may have shot herself in the foot in Gaza but Ehud Olmert proposes to follow his "success" by targetting more parts of Israel. We in America may wonder how a man who officially resigned from the Party that won the election — and in Israel, it is the party not the candidate which is elected — can make momentous decisions. What is more appalling, these decisions are not stopped by the clowns in the judiciary, who make up laws ad lib.

In sum, the courts are corrupt, the government is fighting Jews not Arabs, the media are happy to score off the religious settlers and the public acts too lobotomized to respond intelligently in its own defense.

There's been some major restructuring within and between some of the major player groups in the Arab war against Israel

The PA has a new face, or, more accurately, an old face, Abbas, with Hamas in actual charge. And Al-Qaeda is looking over the Gazan real estate with interest.

Sharon is dead — though technically he's still, like the dead Arafat was for a long time, a heart-lung speciman maintained on a respirator. Hamas, the religious face of Islam in the territories, has triumphed over the Fatah, the secular face of Islam — but there is no change in ideology. The only difference may be that their talk of their intention to kill Israel is more blunt, which makes life a little harder for their spin doctors, the US State Dep't and media such as the New York Times. In fact, these worthy propagandists have begun to sound downright wistful, sure that having to collect the garbage and worry about paying the 70,000 "police" on the payroll (the PLO has more police than there are in all of Israel) will civilize these bloodthirsty terrorists. Yeah, right.

Some groups — Olmert and those in the pay of foreign governments – are working overtime, as if they know their time is running out.

The (more or less religious) are taking over. The army is 40% orthodox and there's even a haredi unit (click here). The size of the extremist secularist group has shrunken – but unfortunately, they still control the army, the media and the judiciary — so they are in position to do maximal harm. I am concerned that Olmert or one of many Sharon robots — in the time before the elections or has v'halilah after the election — may succeed in casting out many of the quarter of a million Jews from Samaria and Judea and the 200,000 Jews who live in the eastern part of Jerusalem. Or perhaps I should say "casting in". Suppose they succeed in forcing maybe 450,000 Jews into Lesser Israel? We know their degree of ineptitute — they couldn't competently even handle 8-9000 people displaced from Gaza. What gives me nightmares is this: what if, when 10% of the Jewish population of Israel is being kicked out into the streets and when much of the IDF is preoccupied in kicking them out, what if that's when the Israeli Arabs riot and the Gazan Arabs start shooting. And Israeli's friendly neighbors come along to give them a hand.

In the wider world, the Muslims have been infiltrating America and Europe so quietly that we haven't reacted. The bombings in London were a shocker. The burning of cars and tires in France — controlled by cellphone among the instigators — woke people up for a brief moment. Now that car burning is down to manageable amounts — only around 100 per night — the French have gone back to sleep. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the world-wide rioting against the Danish cartoons was a test by Muslim leadership to see if it could be done. (Of course, you might prefer to believe that Muslims in Afganistan get Danish newspapers and Arabs in Damascus just happen to have Danish flags around in readiness for the next burning.) It might just have been scary enough to wake up the world. But I suspect that thanks to the news media that are solemnly training us to apologize for "dissing" Islam, it isn't going to happen. Like lobsters who are boiled so slowly they don't react as the temperature of the water is slowly raised to the point that will kill them, we'll soon forget our alarm and go back to sleep, mouthing nonsense about how we need to be nicer and more considerate.

So in this issue we first examine what's happened to the displaced Jews of Gaza since they were uprooted from their homes a half year ago. Are they settled? Have they knuckled under? Has their spirit been ground down into the dirt? Do they still love the IDF? We will look at the war of the Secularists against the religious Jew.

And we will ask: what can we expect from the cast of this drama?

What can we expect from Israel?

What can we expect from the Palestinian Authority (PLO) and their ties to other terrorist groups — all are major source of terrorism in the world?

What can we expect from America? What can we expect from dhimmi Christians? What can we expect from the world's politicos?

And we ask if there is a strategy that doesn't entail cutting off pieces of the tiny land of Israel, so that the Arabs can return it to desolation? Of course there is. The more the Arabs and other Muslims boldly and openly declare their first order of business is to destroy the Jewish state — before moving to take over the rest of the world – the more binary the options become. EITHER Israel gives up its tiny space to the Arabs and brings in its Jews to ever more constricted space, nibble by nibble, until it has no more land to give OR it gives up its Arabs and keeps the land, which, by any criterion — biblical, historic, by international law and UN Trust, and by winning wars they didn't start — THEY OWN. As time goes by, the notion of quarantining the "Palestinian" Arabs in some part of the vastness of Arab Land looks better and better.

And finally, we have some regular features — the media, the campuses, historical essays for perspective and the Readers' Blog-Ed pages for January and February.


This first group of essays starts with a personal memoir of a woman recalling what it was like to be driven from her home last August. The other essays are more recent accounts of what's happened to the first Jews to be made refugees by the government of the Jewish state. They update "So how are the Evacuees from Katif Doing?" (November-December 2005 issue of Think-Israel), which was a time-slice series of essays depicting what happened to the settlers after the expulsion.

PERSONAL RECOLLECTION OF THE EXPULSION FROM GUSH KATIF
by Zimra Seidman-Schlessinger

  When Ariel Sharon forced through the expulsion of the Jews from their homes in Gaza, Zimra Seidman-Schlessinger and her family were among the many who refused to cooperate with this immoral decree. This is her story of what happened — being dragged out by soldiers, having her children terrorized and her property vandelized, being "ripped off" by the moving company and humiliated by the puffed-up petty bureaucrats put in charge. The details of her story are harrowing. What makes it appalling is that it was done by Jews against Jews — to no sensible purpose and with long-term damage not just to the refugees but to the security of the State of Israel.
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THE TREATMENT OF GAZA DEPORTEES IS A NATIONAL DISGRACE
by Israel (Robert) J. Aumann

  When Dr. Israel Aumann addressed the Herzliya Conference, he protested the shabby way deportees from Gaza are being treated, calling it a "national disgrace." Naomi Ragen has commented that his remarks are "some of the most intelligent thinking that we have had the privilege of enjoying at a time when intelligence is hard to come by in Israeli public forums. His remarks on the true way to peace are also notable, and not at all politically correct, i.e., 'The very act of running crazedly after the longed-for peace is precisely what distances it from us.' Truer words were never spoken."
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BETRAYAL, BROKEN HEARTS, PAIN REMAIN LEGACY OF EX-GAZANS
by Toby Klein Greenwald

  Toby Greenwald writes of her recent interview with Debby Rosen of Neve Dekalim. Like the other Gazan refugees, she and her family are struggling to put their lives back in order. They have been helped by the few private people who haven't put the plight of the Gazans on the back burner and they have been actively hindered by the Israeli government. Unemployment is rampant, housing is inadequate, schooling is in makeshift schools, the compensation checks are "on the way" – but they don't arrive. The one thing the Gazan Jews insisted on was that the communities remain together, yet, operationally, the Government has acted to destroy community life — "It forces us to ask the question," Debby says, "Is that what the government wanted to happen?"
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FIVE MONTHS AFTER THE "DISENGAGEMENT" — A STATUS REPORT
by Dror Vanunu

  What stands out in this summary on the statue of the expellees is the desire of the Government to spend as little as possible on the Gazan refugees (other than buying some overpriced slum caravans), the obnoxious behavior of the petty bureaucracy that carries out the orders of the Government and the sad signs of deterioration in family and community life among a once productive people, who contributed more than their share to the Jewish identity and economy of the country. One encouraging sign is that many from the community have banded together to help each other and to maintain community identity.
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ADVENTURES IN CARAVILLA LAND
by Rachel and Moshe Saperstein

  Rachel and Moshe Saperstein have been writing diaries and activist material well before the time they were transferred from their home in Neve Dekalim, Gaza, in August 2005 to temporary living quarters. When we last heard from them (see 'So How Are The Evacuees From Katif Doing?' or do a Google search on this website for "saperstein"), they had finally received a key to a caravilla. But, although it was brand-new, it was defective. They couldn't move in until the damage was repaired. The saga continues.
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In Gaza, the Jews defending their homes and livelihoods relied on sweet reason and the power of love to persuade the army not to expel them. But times, they are a'changing, especially among the young. We can but hope that Israel will wake up to its peril before Ehud Olmert has the time to inflict more damage by creating more refugees, more disorder, more demoralization and more opportunity for the terrorists to strike during the confusion. Gush Etzion, Hebron and Amona — the New Gaza.

WE'VE STOPPED BEING WIMPS!
by Nadia Matar

  During a recent soccer match, the police did nothing to "to defend the Jews against the Arab pogromists" — fearing they themselves would be up for charges if they injured Arabs," but "in the operation to destroy a house in Neveh Daniel North [Gush Etzion], Israel's police used gas against peaceful Jews who were closed within a building..." Nadia Matar believes this pattern of police behavior won't stop until Jews stop being wimps. They should try to deter police brutality by demonstrating, going to court, and flooding the authorities with protests. What will make these paper protests more effective, of course, is that so many young people are beginning to band together physically to resist police attack.
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TENSE QUIET IN HEVRON, NOW THE STORIES COME OUT
by Hillel Fendel

  As part of its "let's help Hamas clobber us" program, the Government has expended a great deal of time and effort being nasty to the Jewish residents of Hebron, hoping to demoralize them to the point where they leave Israel's second most holy city, thus abandoning it to the Arabs, who have a sorry record when it comes to taking care of Jewish holy sites. The irony is that there are thousands of illegal Arab homes throught the area but almost none of the illegals are bothered. Contrariwise, the police are working to kick out 11 Jewish families, who very legally own their homes. (Do a google search for other – many other — stories of harassment in Hebron, these past few months.
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POLICE USE EXCESSIVE VIOLENCE TO DESTROY AMONA HOMES
by Hillel Fendel

  Eyewitness Ari Abromovitz: "The soldiers came in on horses swinging batons. They came swinging. This is exactly what I saw. It seems clear to me they received orders to provoke this whole thing." Apparently, Olmert is trying to show the country he can be as much a bulldozer as Sharon. He's certainly succeeded in demonstrating that he has as little functioning brain as Sharon.
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AT PEACE IN ISRAEL
by Carol Iannone

  Shiloh, north of Jerusalem, is another town destined to be given as a free gift to the Arab terrorists, should Ehud Olmert have his way in the next few weeks. Carol Iannone writes of a chance visit she made to Shiloh some years back. She captures its atmosphere perfectly. Of her first sight of the town, she writes, ".. there was something extraordinary about its placement against the emptiness of the landscape, something dreamlike about the way it stood shimmering in the open, sun-filled air." She describes her visit to the young settler couple thus, "... there was just a pervasive contentment. So far from being belligerent fanatics hysterically claiming their entitlements, this couple possessed modesty and humility, and conveyed a sense of quietness and assuredness and peace." "I felt strangely at home there as well. The land of the Bible is my country too, I felt. There is even a Shiloh in America, where men also staked their lives on their vision of nationhood."
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One reason the Gaza expulsion was so important is that it was a severe break with the search for intra-group unity among the Jews; it was a bald demonization of one particular group of Jews. Several of these essays suggest a major reason for the Gaza expulsion was to break up the growing power of the religious community. The war of the secularists against the Jews — and the response of the Jewish citizenry — continues on several fronts.

THE BLEEDING WOUND OF GUSH KATIF/GAZA
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanuel Winston points out that expelling the Jews from Gaza was not a one-time injury, from which Israel could readily recover. It was a major wound, which has not healed; nor has it cured the abuse of Israel at the hands of the Arabs. Instead, the Sharon-Olmert government, with the connivance of the Bush Administration, has prescribed further leeching of Israel's land and of Israeli confidence as the cure to Arab hostility. The treatment has weakened Israel, while affording the Arab terrorists in Gaza the opportunity to become more effective.
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A SPLENDID LITTLE WAR
by Sarah Honig

  What's wrong with Israel right now? For one, Ehud Olmert, who is favored in current polls (their reliability may be gauged here) has shown himself to not be prime-minister material. For another, much of the Israeli media — "agenda resonators" — won't condemn the wrong-headed gratuituous aggressiveness against right-wing protesters, even though they would find the brutality of the police heinous were it Arab heads being bashed. Ehud won't tackle important problems like the illegal Arab construction throughout Israel. To look strong – like Teddy Roosevelt parleying grandstanding at a small battle to the presidency — he relied on "club-swinging, skull-bashing horseback bravura" at Amona. Thanks to the actions of the government and the selective indignation of the press and the judiciary, freedom of expression is allowed for Jewish and Arab anti-Zionists even when it becomes sedition, but civil disobedience is not allowed for loyal patriots.
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ORTHODOX AND ISRAELI: WHEN THE TWO DON'T MIX
by Avraham Shmuel Lewin

  Avraham Shmuel Lewin, an orthodox credentialed journalist, talks about the hostility confronting a journalist who wears a kippa in Israel. When traveling to where the action is — whether it is a bombing or an expulsion — secular journalists, even those well-known to be hostile to Israel, are not hassled; orthodox Jewish journalists are, by the police and army. Aaron Klein, another orthodox journalist, has suggested that the reason for these "institutionalized anti-religious practices" is that "the mask is coming off and the real battle is starting to be waged openly — religious nationalism versus anti-religious post-Zionism."
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THE IDF: AN UNCOMFORTABLE ANALYSIS
by Moshe Feiglin

  Moshe Feiglin writes that the current strategic threat to Israel is certainly not conventional warfare by Israel's neighbors. And Israel has shown that, when she chooses to act, she is capable of dealing with their indirect aggression: terror tactics and nuclear weapons. The problem is internal. Since Oslo, "[w]e have lost our sense of righteousness ... Israel is being led by a small oligarchy that doesn't believe in the justness of its cause." The role of the IDF has been twisted into defending this ruling elite, not Israel. The Jewishness of the settlers conflicts with the elite's secular values and so the settlers need to be destroyed as a functioning community. And the strongly patriotic IDF — many of whom are the children of these settlers — serve as instrument. This is an important essay in that it suggests that Israel's top echelon in its need for dominance shifts and balances between two approaches — when it can, it destroys its particular "enemy", the Jewish settler, and when security is jeopardized, it makes a less than adequate response to the real enemy, the Arabs.
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Other problems confronting Israel: weaning it from the "strong man as savior" mentality; restructuring the political and economic systems to make them amenable to the will of the people, cleaning up the mess left by Sharon — and that includes regaining Israel's determination to survive joyously — and making sure the Arabs don't take over large swatches of Jerusalem.

THE FICTITIOUS 'THIRD WAY'
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick puts Sharon's politics in context. Contrary to current claims that mesh well with the Kadima party's slogans, he did not blaze a centrist trail between the right and the left. He was elected to carry out the rightwing desire to fight terror effectively and, once elected, carried out the policy of the defeated Labor government to unilaterally leave Gaza. This policy has already failed and soon "will no longer be deniable. When this occurs, Israeli voters will elect a rightist government. Hopefully when that happens, the Right will not be induced to repeat Sharon's mistakes."
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THE METAMORPHOSIS AND APOTHEOSIS OF LEADERS
by Daniel Doron

  Daniel Doron asks why leaders such as Sharon, even when no longer in a position to lead, are venerated, even "worshipped" as their country's only hope, even when such beliefs are contra reality and are damaging to the future of the state. Reliance on a few strong players had done Israelis no good economically, and this impoverishment has contributed to their political passivity.
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HOW TO EMPOWER THE PEOPLE
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Paul Eidelberg points out that "... the citizen has no representative in the Knesset to uphold his interests and convictions vis-á-vis the Government. Once the Government is formed, a Prime Minister can ignore his most solemn campaign pledges with impunity — as Ariel Sharon did when he adopted Labor's Disengagement policy." Moreover, under the socialist Histadrut, the worker "can no more influence the decisions of the economic elite than of the political elite (which interlock when the Labor Party is in power). Professor Eidelberg suggests that true "democratization in Israel requires a diffusion of both political and economic power."
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IS ISRAEL FORGETTING JERUSALEM?
by Dr. Steve Carol

  Steve Carol points out that by allowing Israeli Arabs to vote for the legislature of a foreign group, the current Israeli government has bolstered the Arab belief that Jerusalem belongs to them. This is but one of the many concessions Israel has made over the years, hoping for an end to Arab hostility, even though these "concessions have NOT brought peace or anything approaching peace." He concludes that "[t]here should be no more concessions, and certainly no retreat from Jerusalem. Jerusalem, all of it, is Israel's capital. "
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WHERE OLMERT LEADS, ISRAEL MUSTN'T FOLLOW
by Caroline Glick

  Ehud Olmert is acting as Ariel Sharon's deputy while the Government maintains the fiction that Sharon might yet recover from his massive stroke and take charge. In these few weeks, both the Right and Left have taken Olmert's measure. He pledges to establish permanent borders and that Ma'aleh Adumim and Gush Etzion will remain under Israeli sovereignty but, in actuality, "the government's policies are cutting both Gush Etzion and Ma'aleh Adumim off from Jerusalem and bringing about the partition of Jerusalem." His actual plans will give away strategically important land to the Arabs that will allow them to carry out the 1995 Beilin-Abbas plan to choke off Jerusalem's Jewish population and prevent it from expanding by connecting up currently-separated Arab-controlled areas.
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THE RISE OF HAMAS AND THE DECLINE OF ISRAELI DETERMINATION
by Steven Plaut

  For Israel, the difference between life as a nation and death at the hands of the Arabs is not just superior weaponry but the determination to fight the aggressors. But, thanks to the Oslo peace process and to the concomitant "doctrine of "appeasement and capitulation" the Israeli leadership adopted in order to pretend the peace process was alive and well, the current generation of Israelis became "infected with defeatism and cowardice; increasingly, it lost its willingness to resist and even to survive as a nation." "With each failure of the 'Oslo approach,' with each manifestation that Israel's appeasement was resulting in inflated Palestinian expectations from armed conflict with Israel and escalating Palestinian intransigence, Oslo defeatism metastasized further throughout the political system of Israel." Steven Plaut precisely lays out the elements of this critical problem, and advises us not to leave its solution to Israel's leaders.
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What can we expect from the Palestinian Authority (PLO) and their ties to other terrorist groups. Other linkages exist: Hamas is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Brotherhood has ties to Al-Qaeda. All these groups are major sources of terrorism in the world. In the P.A.-run areas, Hamas has come out of the wings and taken over center stage. We present some assessments of what to expect and two essays on how to rid Israel of the terrorists.

AL-QAEDA INFILTRATION OF GAZA: A POST-DISENGAGEMENT ASSESSMENT
by David Keyes

  Over a year ago, David Keyes and Israeli Major-General Amidror noted that an Israeli pullout from Gaza would establish conditions in which Al-Qaeda thrived — a security vacuum and the presence of groups such as Hamas which "invoke the same religious authorities to legitimize suicide bombing." Thanks to the precipitous withdrawal by the Sharon-Olmert government and the concurrence of the American administration, there is growing evidence that it has and is happening. As David Keyes points out, "The arrival of al-Qaeda operatives in Gaza has the potential to worsen an already problematic security situation. Even before Israeli disengagement, there were signs of al-Qaeda's cooperation with the local radical Islamist organization, Hamas." "If there is one thing the already combustible Arab-Israeli arena does not need, it is the addition of a strong al-Qaeda operating from the Palestinian territories."
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD, THE NAZIS AND AL-QA'IDA
by John Loftus

  This is a fascinating view into John Loftus' experiences researching Nazi criminals and pursuing Arab terrorists. Of particular interest is his discussion of the linkage between Al-Qa'ida and the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that was founded in the 1920s, funded early on by Adolf Hitler and more recently by Saudi Arabia. He has also been active in the attempt to get some of the information out of government vaults to where it can do some good in helping in the fight against terrorists.

[Editor's Note: To date, Think-Israel has printed a significant article on the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe ("The Muslim Brotherhood's Conquest Of Europe") and a Blog-ed on "A Rare Look At Secretive Brotherhood in America".)

The "Rare Look" article includes some information on a Muslim Brother — Yusuf Qaradawi, whose name also crops up in articles on the riled and indignant Arabs who demonstrate against the Danish cartoons of Mohammed (See Danish Cartoons.) What interesting linkages!]
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WILL THE NEXT GENERATION OF (ARAB) PALESTINIANS MAKE PEACE WITH ISRAEL?
by Justus Reid Weiner and Michael Sussman

  Justus Reid Weiner and Michael Sussman note that "[a] peace agreement can only successfully end a conflict if it enjoys underlying, wide-ranging support from its respective populations." This article points out that the Palestinian Arab population under the Palestinian Authority is supportive of terror suiciders. They have indoctrinated their children to desire to become a shahid — "over half the Palestinian population aged 6 to 11 dream of becoming suicide bombers". This child abuse means that Arab ingrained hostility to Israel is unlikely to change for generations, even if indoctrination were to end soon.
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JERUSALEM: A PREFERRED TARGET FOR PALESTINIAN TERRORISM IN THE LAST FIVE YEARS
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  Reuven Erlich chronicles the terrorist attacks in Jerusalem since 2000. He points out that Jerusalem is a preferred target because it is Israel's capital and because it is an easy city to infiltrate. (He could perhaps have added that the Arabs tend to target all places religiously important to the Jews — Jerusalem, Hebron, Joseph's Tomb.) The majority of the deaths have been due to suicide bombers – most of whom are from Fatah and Hamas — who tend to pick places where people congregate to do maximum damage. What is of growing concern is that many of Israel's citizens — Arabs who live in East Jerusalem – help the terrorists.
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"PRAGMATIC HAMAS" — NOT VERY LIKELY
by Gerald M. Steinberg

  The theory that a violence-oriented group will settle down to domesticity once they've gained their objective and are "forced to deal with the realities of the governing process" is again being dusted off to whitewash Hamas' take over of the Palestine Authority. Gerald Steinberg regards this as unlikely. The Taliban didn't turn into pussycats in Afghanistan; the Hizbullah didn't start to focus on "internal Lebanese issues." They became more violent and extreme. In the face of repeated failures," he asks, "what accounts for the persistence of diplomacy based on wishful thinking, and the artificial dichotomy between political power and the use of terror?" He provides some thought-provoking answers.
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THE MYTH OF A MODERATE HAMAS
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin puts paid to the notion that Hamas will moderate its rhetoric and/or its terrorism, once it's in power. With admirable restraint, he shows us the absurdity of believing power tames the violent, a position wistfully espoused by the New York Times. He points out that "...contrary to such expectations, rulers have used guns and ideology to keep their welcome from wearing thin, as substitutes for high living standards and broad civil rights. This combination has long worked in the Middle East and continues to do so despite spectacular failures and rampant corruption."
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WOOING THE HAMAS
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut examines what the Hamas victory will mean to Israel. Starkly put: "[t]he chance that the Hamas will now suddenly abandon its genocidal agenda is exactly the same as the chance of bin Laden embracing Buddhism or Quakerism and running in the Massachusetts Senate race." What does this mean for Israel? Plaut's expectations are grim. "Now that Israel and the West have collaborated to empower the Hamas and turn the reins of power in the suburbs of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem over to the genocidal maniacs of the Hamas, the unavoidable result is that Israel has in effect agreed to place its own right of existence on the international table, to be debated and reconsidered, this 58 years after Israel was created."
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THE SOLUTION TO TERRORISM
by Yoram Ettinger

  This is a terse but well-thought out plan, with much more likelihood of succeeding than the Roadmap proposed by the Quartet, because it is based on reality. It does not build a house of cards on assumptions that are contrary to fact. As Yoram Ettinger put it in another essay, "What Israel needs is long term conviction-driven — rather than short term convenience-driven — strategy and planning."
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ISRAELI VICTORY WITHIN GRASP
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman argues that when Hamas won, Israel should have taken the lead in dealing with the terrorist organization. It could "have pointed out that it made several peace agreements with the P.A., in which the P.A. undertook to eradicate terrorism and the bigotry that motivates it. The P.A. broke the agreements and pursued religious war. Now the people there endorsed Hamas, which is more truculent." That being the case, the Palestinian Arabs "deserve no state, no territory, and no subsidy." He discusses several ways to defeat the PA, were Israel willing to go on the offensive. "'No alternative' to appeasement? Of course there is."
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The shine is off the Iraq adventure, but the current administration in Washington expects great things from Israel's friendly neighbors and America's allies. What can we expect from them?

DEMOCRACY IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by Barbara Lerner

  President Bush sees the need to democratize the whole Middle East (ME) to ensure our safety while the neocons, the realists, see democracy in the ME "as a fool's dream". Barbara Lerner asserts they are both wrong. She makes the novel suggestion that in the ME the degree of population heterogeneity in a country needs to be considered: the greater the homogeneity the less likely the possibility of democratizing the country. If we define democracy "as a balance of forces in which no group's rights may be trampled with impunity," she suggests that "[i]n three — "Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinian state that President Bush and Secretary Rice are trying to create — democracy in this decade is not possible." "In three other states — Iraq, Lebanon, and Iran — democracy in the sense defined above has a chance, if we recognize past mistakes, and act to correct them. Read this article. It will set you thinking.
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AND THE OSCAR GOES TO... JORDAN'S KING ABDULLAH
by Michael Freund

  King Abdullah of Jordan talks a good line against religious bigotry and he's the darling of the U.S. media — his Daddy was too, especially with those of the female persuasion — and he has even enchanted Christian evangelicals. But back home in Jordan, a Jew can not buy or even rent land. And, like good Muslims around the world, Jordan is against depicting Mohammad, but they have no problem publishing "anti-Semitic editorial cartoons, articles and opinion pieces" — like good Muslims around the world. And then there's the matter of "significant restrictions on freedom of speech, press, assembly and association. ... But thanks to Abdullah's theatrical skills his country's numerous flaws remain consistently overlooked, even as it receives nearly half a billion dollars in US aid this year."
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IN THE EGYPTIAN PEOPLE'S ASSEMBLY
by Magdi Khalil

  Magdi Khalil writes that the Muslim Brotherhood's success in recent elections in Egypt is largely due to a protest vote against the current Government. But as the Brotherhood's power increases, it becomes clear that their interest is not in ameliorating some of Egypt's major problems. "[T]hey have failed to touch on real life challenges or to acknowledge the citizen's rights in a modern state." Instead, they continue "their relentless pursuit of a fascist religious state..." As one of their leaders said, "our goals and values remain the same, (unchanged) since 1928 and till the present time."
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What can we expect from dhimmi Christians

THE NEW MUSLIM ANTI-SEMITISM: Exploring Novel Avenues of Hatred
by Raphael Israeli

  Professor Raphael Israeli discusses the current ways Muslim hatred of the Jews is manifested. Some of these are old and borrowed, such as the libel that Jews poison children and/or use their blood. There is the continued publication of the long-discredited Protocols of the Elders of Zion; and much effort goes into holocaust denial. More recently, they have expanded the "range of hate-mongers from obscurantist clerics to large strata of mainstream intellectuals and professionals." They continue to encourage extreme violence and acts of terror. And, what is of particular interest, they have coopted subservient Christians in their campaign against Jews and the Jewish state.
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THE SABEEL CENTER'S ONE-STATE AGENDA
by Dexter Van Zile

  In the September-October 2005 issue, Dexter Van Zile examined how Naim Ateek and the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Center use Christian symbolism and outright lies to delegitimize Israel. Ateek, an Arab and an Anglican Canon, is a prime mover in inducing mainline Protestant churches to aggressively help the Palestinians Arabs in their war on Israel. In this study, Van Zile points out that the Sabeel Center promotes a one-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, where Jews would soon be a minority and in the same subservient position as Christian Arabs now are in Muslim-controlled towns in Israel and the territories.
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These essays examine the Arab character — as molded by his religion, culture, the media he watches and reads and the clerics and scholars he respects. Acknowledging salient features that determine Arab behavior should be a major factor in determining Israel's strategy to maintain its Jewish character, land and security.

A FLAW IN ISRAEL'S STRATEGY
by Dr. Alex Grobman

  Alex Grobman suggests that Israel's policy is flawed because it doesn't understand that the Arab has developed a self-congratulatory mind-set, which "filters out objective reality." Thus, even though most Islamic countries are centuries behind the modern world, he can believe he's part of the "great Arab nation." Israel's continuous policy of appeasement, contrary to what Israel expects to gain in reciprocal generosity, merely confirms the Arab's feeling of power and importance. The Arabs continue to wage an economic, propaganda and terrorist war against Israel. It's a no-win-for-Israel strategy, but unfortunately, they seem to have bought into it.
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THE PHANTOM ARAB MODERATE
by Shmuel Katz

  Some otherwise sensible writers when writing on aspects of the war Islam is waging against the West seem to have the need to reassure their readers that they are not talking about the "good Arabs," the "moderate" Arabs. Shmuel Katz may be politically impolite, but he is accurate when he points out that "the most 'moderate' of the Arabs who have a hand in setting the policies of their people do not differ in their view of what Israel's future should be from the manifestly immoderate mainstream Arabs. They differ only on the method or process by which the elimination of the Jewish state is to be accomplished."
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THE PERILS OF ISLAMIC OBSCURANTISM
by Babu Suseelan

  Babu Suseelan says that Muslims have a vital need to break out of their current rigid, dogmatic frame of reference, which is intolerant of non-Islamic people and uncompromising. This value system is a problem for the rest of the world because it only leads to conflict — to violence and jihad. Muslims may shine in the art of slaughter but they lack the flexibility to integrate successfully into the modern world. "For the last fifty years, Arab Muslims have made no notable inventions or discoveries in science, medicine, and technology or in humanities." To gain respect in the world, they need to reinvent themselves. They can start the process by embracing "change, democracy, pluralism, coexistence, religious tolerance and freedom of expression."
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PSALM 137
by Zack Lieberberg

  The essence of sovereignty in a state is meeting the responsibility of providing for the safety of its citizens. Zack Lieberberg uses an early experience in the then Soviet Azerbaijan to lead us into a consideration of the world wide challenge to that essential function. Moslem law permits the expression of blood lust towards unbelievers both as a right and as a sacred duty. The western response to recent conflagrations in Denmark and France has been some weak-kneed excuses for the lack of assimilation, coupled with inadequate punitive measures. Lieberberg ends this remarkable overview with a note on the dangers to the polity of the United States engendered by the flood of Moslem immigrants. Abroad in Iraq and Iran as well as at home, our response to threats, attempted blackmail and "test runs" such as those in Europe, must be met by forceful and appropriately punitive action. We must have the courage to save our children at the risk of injuring theirs.
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Some modern garbs of Anti-Semitism

JEW, FIGHT FAIR
by Shmuel Neumann and the Masada2000 Staff

  This is a satirical essay that sums up the observation that while the world does nothing to stop Arab nations from attacking Israel and Arab snipers and stoners and bombers from massacring Israelis, it is not alright for Israel to fight back to the point of actually winning decisively. The UN steps in or the "humanitarian" NGOs write lengthy tomes, complaining about the results and demanding a recount.
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PEACE CRIMINALS
by Jack Berger

  Jack Berger writes of the peace criminal — Dennis Ross, Henry Siegman are examples — a particularly pernicious version of the self-hating Jew. Unlike the Chomskys and Pappes, they do not rant against Israel. They talk very differently — they paint wonderful pictures of a Middle East at peace and seem only to desire equitable peaceful solutions. So isn't it curious that, just like the ranters, the peace singers always seem to end up justifying Arab atrocities, respecting Arab nationalism while finding Jewish nationalism embarrassing, bypassing any serious consideration of Arab terrorism and expecting only the Jews to make "painful concessions" for peace.
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What do we need to do in America?

TELLING IT LIKE IT IS
by Ted Belman

  If you willfully refuse to define the problem, how do you solve it? Ted Belman argues that "[t]he problem with American policy is that America has been unwilling to identify and vilify the enemy. Although the rhetoric has changed somewhat from fighting the "war on terror" to fighting "radical Islam" or "militant Islam" or the "Islamofascists", it has not gone far enough." And so, to date, "Islam is waging both a cold war and a hot war. The west is losing both." He proposes ways to turn the tables.
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"MUSLIM OPINION" BE DAMNED
by Alex Epstein

  I read this just after listening to Bob Simon on "60 minutes" (TV, February 20, 2006) act the part of the dhimmi Jew. He snarled at a Dane he was interviewing who was strongly supportive of freedom of the press; he was respecful when the interviewee was Muslim. The source reason for the recent worldwide cartoon riots, we were told by someone picked for having the right attitude, is because the Muslims are marginalized in Denmark and feel neglected and .. (why repeat the psychobabble, we all have heard it time and again.) So it is refreshing to read this essay by Alex Epstein, who says quite bluntly, "America 's attempts to appease 'Muslim opinion' are depraved and suicidal." "Every attempt ... promotes, and emboldens our enemies."
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A Meaningful Solution: Transfer the Arabs Out. Here are several variations of the plan. Over the years, beginning with the first issue in July 2002, Think-Israel has carried various ways to implement the plan. Do a google on the search box at the top of this page for "arabs transfer" and another search on "population exchange" to find them.

IS ISRAEL TOO "TIRED" TO SURVIVE?
by Dr. Steve Carol

  Yearning for peace hasn't worked for Israel. Making concessions for peace has been a dreadful mistake. Why? Because what the Arabs say and what the Arabs do are consistent. They do not want peace. They want to kill off the Jewish state. Defining a border won't stop aggression. What Israel needs to decide is whether it is going to remain Jewish. Any other course — and that includes including Arabs in the political determination of the future of the state — will ultimately lead to its annihilation. Dr. Carol spells out a solution dependent on the Arabs behaving themselves. But "[i]f the choice is between the expulsion of Jews and eventually watching Israel vanish or the expulsion of Arabs then I choose the survival of Israel and the expulsion of Arabs."
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THE SINAI OPTION — THE ROAD TO PERMANENT PEACE!
by Steven Shamrak

  Steven Shamrak envisions giving the Palestinian Arabs a larger land area than what they have now by relocating them in the Sinai Desert. The separation between them and Israel would be beneficial to both groups.
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The media are expected to have dogmatic points of view. And we've developed ways of responding to unfair coverage. (Although, the recent Muslim cartoon rage was above and beyond normal interchange.) More recently the flicks have begun to show a fondness for the kind of one-sided propaganda not seen perhaps since World War 2. But these new movies are not intended to promote democracy in the world. Their producers are like the groupies who are attracted to mass murderers – they are fondly fascinated by Arab terrorists.

SYMPATHY FOR THOSE WHO DRAW ANNE FRANK IN BED WITH HITLER?
by Tom Gross

  Tom Gross makes a strong point that the Muslims who rioted because some cartoonists were "disrespectful" to Islam by depicting Mohammed would have a stronger case if they didn't systematically publish vile cartoons of Jews. And the virtuous protests of mainstream papers such as the Guardian and the Independent that they would never publish cartoons offensive to Muslims would be more impressive if they didn't publish nasty cartoon definitely offensive to Jews. The double standard is also at work at the New York Times which praised a "Broadway play showing Jesus having gay sex with Judas, yet hasn't dared to reproduce a Danish cartoon making a serious point about the misuse of the teachings of the prophet Mohamed by Islamist terrorists."
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HOW TO RECOGNIZE UNFAIR REPORTING ABOUT ISRAEL
by Lee Green

  There's the old saw that if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is a duck. Which doesn't solve the problem of objectively describing what a duck looks like. It's even harder to describe media bias towards Israel. We usually know it when we read it, but how can we gather objective evidence? In this essay, Lee Green shares the benefits of her experience and provides us with ways of recognizing newspaper bias and tells us what we can do about it.
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THE LION THAT ROARS FOR PEACE
by Kate Wright

  In our previous issue, Kate Wright contrasted the sick fantasy of the movie Munich against the reality of the Munich massacre and its aftermath. In this essay, she probes deeper into why this movie is so pernicious by contrasting it with another movie, The Chronicles of Narnia, about "a splendid and virtuous lion [who] inspires his down-trodden people to rise up and destroy the evil forces that have devastated all that is loving and beautiful about Narnia..." In contrast, Spielberg has ignored the ugliness of the Arab jihad against the Jewish state and rejected the dramatic beauty of the return to their homeland and to independence by an ancient people, the Jews.
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THE RED CARPET
by Angela Bertz

  As Angela Bertz comments, "In a world that is already weeping wasted buckets for Palestinians plighthood the last thing it needs is a movie that attempts to show the human side of suicide bombers." Yet, in an environment of glitz that went well with the slickness of the film, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association awarded this year's Golden Globe to "Paradise Now," an imaginative tale about a couple of lovable terrorists as they prepare for an upcoming suicide mission. Angela Bertz also tells us about a terrorist — he blew up a busy pizza parlor in Jerusalem. Hers is a more sober story.
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Too many departments in too many universities are sick, valuing a political ideology above a scholarly approach to their subject matter. Sometimes this is due to the ideological bent of the professors in the department, sometimes it is due to the more ordinary vehicle of corruption — a large dollop of money from an Arab country.

THE LAMENTABLE CASE OF JOAN SCOTT
by Phyllis Chesler, Judith S. Jacobson and Richard Landes

  For too many years, most Middle Eastern studies departments were totally committed to an Arab slant, locking out those with an alternative viewpoint and paying more attention to politics than scholarship. When, more recently, other academics began to demand a more scholarly approach to the Middle East and chastized the politicized professors, they fell back on their right to "academic freedom," a concept they had not previously respected. One such academic is Joan Wallach Scott, a historian at a distinguished university, Princeton, and prominent in the American Association of University Professors. So it is shocking that she chose the "conspiracy theory" card to rebut those who publicize that experts like her are wrong-headed and doesn't supply us with an understanding of "Islamic terrorism, the history of Jihad and its apocalyptic world-view, the dynamics of radicalization in Western mosques, or the oppression of minorities and gender apartheid in the Islamic world."
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FIGHTING SHEIKH ZAYED'S FUNDING OF ISLAMIC STUDIES AT HARVARD DIVINITY SCHOOL: A Case Study
by Jonathan Jaffit

  Jonathan Jaffit chronicles what happened when Rachel Fish successfully challenged Harvard Divinity School's (HDS) taking money from Sheikh Zayed of the UAE, because it would be immoral to do so, given the Sheikh's abuse of human rights, including his callous use of two to seven-year old boy slaves as jockeys in camel races and "his indulgence in anti-Semitic propaganda." With rare exceptions, she received little support from HDS faculty, and/or the Jewish students, Jewish faculty and organizations such as Hillel at Harvard. But she persevered, and against all odds, built sufficient media pressure so that the Sheikh eventually withdrew his gift. [Sad to say, Harvard has since happily accepted $20 million from Saudi prince Alwaleed Bin Talal — that's the man whose money was rejected by Mayor Guiliani after 9/11 because the money had a string — the prince blamed everything on the Jews and wanted the USA to "adopt a more balanced stand toward the Palestinian cause."]
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History

A JEWISH MAJORITY IN JERUSALEM IN 1853, WROTE CONTEMPORARY FRENCH DIPLOMAT
by Eliyahu m'Tsiyon

  Well before the Jews started to come in large numbers to revive their ancient homeland, the Jews were a majority in Jerusalem. Eliyahu m'Tsiyon takes a time slice — mid 19th century — using figures from a book by a French diplomat and historian, Cesar Famin. The end notes will direct you to population statistics in Jerusalem in other periods. The essay also has an informative essay on dhimma – Muslim law which decreed how inferior peoples (and anyone not a muslim is considered inferior) were to behave.
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AM I MY BROTHER'S KEEPER?
by Maurice Cohen

  Eliahu Cohen spied for Israel, posing as a Syrian during the 50's and 60's, critical years for Israel's future. In this essay, his brother Maurice talks about how he discovered Eliahu was on a risky mission – as a member of the upper echelon in Damascus, Eliahu was in constant danger as he sent home information that helped protect his country from Arab aggression. Elihau Cohen was hung by the Syrians and his body was never returned to Israel for a proper Jewish burial. His family still waits.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

JANUARY 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
FEBRUARY 2006 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

November-December, 2005

THE GAZA AFTERMATH. The fate of the Gazan Jews and the takeover of Gaza by terrorist groups.

THE PHILADELPHI STORY
essays by Aaron Bashani and commentary

  This is a before and after set of essays about Israel's withdrawal from Gaza, where the after is much, much worse than the before. Once upon a time, not so long ago, the Jews controlled the Gaza strip and grumbled at the cost of defending the "settlers". After, the Arabs took control and are turning the area into a training camp for terrorists.
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THE JEWISH REFUGEES
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick reminds us of the exodus, which was described back in August as a simple operation, competently handled by the government, and the macabre way things have turned out. As example, some American Jews bought the greenhouses from the Jewish farmers as a gift for the Arabs who would take over; the Arabs trashed and looted the greenhouses; the value of the ruined property was deducted from the payment to the Jews. Even more appalling, six months later, communities are shattered, and families are still living 'temporary' in hotel rooms or in overpriced, slum-quality caravans. She describes the disintegration of a group that was relocated to Nitzim. It isn't a complete disaster only because "[o]nce again, the vacuum created by government negligence, incompetence and vindictiveness is being filled by private citizens."
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SO HOW ARE THE EVACUEES FROM KATIF DOING?
A compilation of sequential reports on the state of the refugees

  The Israeli Goverment may be showing itself to be both cruel and incompetent in dealing with the relocation of the Jews of Gaza — but you would not know that if you listen to the (dis)information presented by the Foreign Ministry. So in this article, we present a sequence of reports from reputable sources. Some are statistical. Some summarize the major areas of concern. And some are stories of and by the settlers themselves.
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JUST US
by Michelle Nevada

  The Sharon government has behaved shamefully towards the Gazan Jews expelled from their homes. The Jewish refugees were given short shrift while the Government rushed food to Arabs celebrating the end of Ramadan. The Government magnanimously offering university places to American students made refugees by Katrina while ignoring the problems of the Jewish children who also needed to go to school right after their lives were disrupted. And they have been incredibly vindictive toward those who tried to thwart the expulsion. Michelle Nevada writes about Daniel Pinner, falsely accused of shooting an Arab. What is nervous-making is that the Government is aided in their unjust and undemocratic behavior by what passes as the Justice system in Israel today.
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THE SAND LILY
by Paula Stern

  Sometimes it's easier to see big events in small things. In this essay Paula Stern writes of a sand lily she saw in Slav, Gush Katif, Gaza, at the end of August 2005, when the inhabitants of Slav were being expelled, their homes rubble, the town destroyed by decree of their own government. She rescued a sand lily, which has since thrived in a new environment. That could have been symbolic of the uprooted people of Gaza. But it hasn't been. We have since learned that the Israeli Government, having destroying Gush Katif with unseemly haste and cast out some of Israel's best and most productive and patriotic citizens, has left them to fend for themselves — with no homes, no jobs, their belongings in storage or destroyed.
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GAZA FALLOUT
by Al Skudsi bin Hookah

  Mr. bin Hookah is foreign correspondent and roving reporter for The Gaza Gajeera. In this column, he ponders some problems generated by the Palestinian responses to the expulsion of the Jews from Gaza. And although he isn't privy to the long-range plans of the Arab leadership, he wonders how the latest violence in France fits in.
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MUSINGS ON AN ERSTWHILE GUSH KATIF
by Lawrence Uniglicht

  This is an evocative essay about how much Israel lost when it gave up Gush Katif. But Lawrence Uniglicht doesn't just meditate about what we lost. He considers the future — and writes "the State of Israel must never again be this planet's patsy! Let the so-called Palestinian waifs set up shop in Jordan, their true native land. Israel must not cede another inch!"
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KNOW YOUR ENEMY AND WHAT MAKES HIM TICK

ABU MUSAB AL-ZARQAWI: HIS BIOGRAPHY, WORLD-VIEW AND CONTRIBUTION TO THE ONGOING JIHAD IN IRAQ
by Dr. Yoram Kahati

  Dr. Yoram Kahati has composed a text picture of Abu Musal Al-Zarqawi, who uses brutal shootings, bombings and beheadings to express his belief that Islamic religious law should be all powerful and obeyed by everyone everywhere. His latest "success" is the bombing of three hotels in Jordan, but Iraq is the main show. Bin Laden considers Al-Zarqawi his number one agent in Iraq, where Al-Zarqawi's Al Qaeda group — its members are mostly non-Iraqi Sunni Arab jihadists from the Muslim countries and Europe — has been causing havoc, especially in Falluja and Ramadi. The short-term objective is to foment civil war. Long term, he plans to use the area as staging ground for a more global jihad against all infidels — Christians, Jews and Muslims who disagree with his ideology. There is a real danger that many of the younger generation "may identify with what he says (anchored as it is in well-known, authorized Sunni Muslim sources) and take it upon themselves to put them into practice in a way preferred by the heads of Al-Qaeda, especially Osama bin Laden."
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YASSER ABBAS
by Tom Gross

  Abu Abbas, the successor to Yasser Arafat as head of the Palestinian Authority, talks a good line about peace, and is certainly more attractive than Arafat. But, like Arafat, he treats terrorists like superstars, encouraging the young to view them as role models. He continues to use much of his budget on weapons and manpower to kill Jews. He pays the families of suicide bombers hefty amounts, so that it is financially rewarding for them to encourage their young to commit mass murder. As Tom Gross points out, "No amount of wishful thinking ... can obscure the fact that the true 'root cause' of Palestinian terrorism is the leadership of the Palestinian Authority."
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TERRORISM: THE ROOT CAUSES
by David Meir-Levi

  Contradicting the present U.S. Administrations' belief in the peacefulness of Islam, the facts speak otherwise. As David Meir-Levi writes "Moslems make up only about 20 percent of the world's population. Yet we see that Moslem countries contribute to the majority of the violence in the world today. Moreover, Arabs make up only about 5 percent of the world's population, yet we witness the phenomenon of Arabs in leadership roles in many, if not most, of the Moslem conflicts... Even Saudi and Pakistani commentators have pointed out that while not all Moslems are terrorists, almost all terrorists are Moslems... and most of these are Arabs." Why the hatred? Meir-Levi persuasively argues that it is due to the "..Islamofascist leaders worldwide who are confronted with our success, threatened by our freedom, humiliated to the point of fury and violence due to their culture's emphasis upon shame versus honor. Rather than learn from us or work with us, they seek to destroy us."
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JIHADI TERRORISM: RIDICULOUS EXPLANATIONS, COMPLEX SOLUTIONS
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Dr Babu Suseelan notes that in the terrorist attacks around the world since the end of the cold war, with few exceptions, the terrorists have been Muslim, "with hard-core, rigid, dogmatic Islamic ideology..." Dealing with the problem is not helped by introducing phony root cause theories, which excuse away the behavior. "The root cause of jihad terrorism is to be found in the defective, dangerous dogma that binds Jihad Muslims around the world together." They have a closed thought system, reinforced by their religious leaders, which doesn't tolerate dialogue or religious tolerance. "Islamic societies maintain their equilibrium through control, force, punishment and power." It is a hard nut to crack and to do so, we need coordinated programs for information collection, intelligence sharing, a variety of strategies including psychological warfare and serious commitment.
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SIX DAY WARS
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Surely one major problem in understanding our enemy is our own fault – our self-inflicted sense of impropriety which prevents us from labeling situations properly. Yashiko Sagamori draws comparisions between two historic periods — our own and the time of the Roman Empire. Back then, when Jewish zealots fought to defend their religion, they hamstrung themselves by refusing to fight on the Sabbath. Today... Few people put it as clearly and effectively as Sagamori, who writes, "This country became great because it was founded by people who cherished freedom above everything else. It is now being invaded by people who don't even have the equivalent of the word freedom in their vocabulary. This country was founded by people escaping religious persecution in Europe. By settling in America, perfectly peaceful Muslims are gradually turning the United States into a Muslim country, just like they have already turned Western Europe into a province of the Caliphate." And we've allowed this to happen because we have hamstrung ourselves by our need to be "politically correct."
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THE ORIGIN OF THE OCCUPATION MYTH
by Howard Grief

  The notion that Israel is occupying Arab land has been used to condone the barbaric behavior of the Arab terrorists and condemn whatever Israel does to defend itself. Yet, as Howard Grief demonstrates, it is a fundamental egregious error. He examines the origins of this myth in meticulous detail. Surprisingly, it was the fault of Jews — the jurist Meir Shamgar, in particular — who applied the wrong laws when the Jews overcame the Arab invasion of 1967 and came into control of Gaza, Sameria, Judea, Golan and the Sinai. Only later were these inappropriate concepts picked up and used so effectively by the Arabs.
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ARAB MUSLIM SOCIETY

IMPERFECTIONS
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Dropping a piece of paper into a ballot box doth not a democracy make. It does not even characterize an "imperfect democracy," — which is how we've begun to describe the mess in Iraq. Yashiko Sagamori asks two questions: (1) how imperfect can a democracy be "and still retain its right to the title"; and (2) why should we assume — contrary to our experience in Europe — that a democratic country will automatically be our ally?
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HOW AFGHAN CAPTIVITY SHAPED MY FEMINISM
by Phyllis Chesler

  Drawing on her own experience as a young bride, Phyllis Chesler provides us with insight into "just how badly women are treated in the Muslim world." She was Orthodox Jewish-American, her husband a Muslim from Afghanistan, a disparity that hadn't seemed to matter in America but which became impossible to live with when they returned to his homeland and he began to "fit" into his pre-modern society, where polygamy is common, where women live in purdah and where men believe they own their wives and punish rebellion harshly. Her experience has made her an activist for a single standard of human rights, not a multicultural one that accepts the servitude of women in Muslim societies.
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WHAT'S WRONG: THE ARAB LIBERAL CRITIQUE OF ARAB SOCIETY
by Barry Rubin

  Blaming other for their own misfortune is common in the Arab world. And Arab groups such as CAIR tend to consider any criticism — no matter how mild or how justified — as a lie or as hate speech. So it is a pleasure to read Professor Barry Rubin's essay on some new voices that want to take an honest look at the self-inflicted problems in the Arab countries. It is also true, that by indirection, the information in the article confirms that criticism of Arab culture is a matter of fact, not malign opinion.
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MUSLIMS IN EUROPE, IRAN, BANGLADESH AND BOSTON MASSACHUSETTS. Different Strokes for Different Victims.

AL-QAEDA IN EUROPE
by Jamie Glazov

  In the May-June 2005 issue, we published Lorenzo Vidino's important study of the Muslim Brothers' infiltration of Europe and their development of the infrastructure for indoctrinating and recruiting more and more followers "to extend Islamic law throughout Europe". In this article Jamie Glazov of Frontpage Magazine interviews Lorenzo Vidino on his new book on militant Islamic activities in Europe. They identify with the aspirations of the Muslim leadership that preaches that Islam's takeover of Europe is inevitable, but as "Europeans" they can enter the U.S. without screening and they can move freely and so carry out Al Qaedia terror attacks such as those against Madrid and London.
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FOR JEWS, THERE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN TWO IRANS
by Abbas Milani

  Two people — the Jews and the Persians — with long and occasionally intersecting histories. The Jews remember the Persian king Cyrus who encouraged the building of the Temple in Jerusalem and contrariwise, Haman, who was a genocidal early Hitler. In modern times, the contrasts continue. Persians, now Muslim and called Iran, saved Jews from the Nazis while the present president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, like Haman, calls for Israel's extermination. To round off the picture, Iran's economy is in shambles, factional infighting has increased and Iran boasts of her nuclear capability. Abbas Milani believes the people of Iran are captive to this ruling cabal. "[W]e must try to find ways to help the Iranian people achieve their hundred-year-old dream of democracy. Only in a genuine democracy can the spirit of Cyrus be truly celebrated and the shadow of Haman expunged."
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THE BANGLADESH GOVERNMENT AND THE AHMADIAS SECT
by Salah Choudhury

  The attack by Arab terrorists on Arabs in Jordan shook the common notion that Muslims only attack Christians, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists. Salah Choudhury presents us with another example of Muslim-Muslim friction. The Ahmadias are a minority Muslim sect that believes their founder was a latter-day prophet, a belief that flies in the face of the conventional Muslim belief that Mohammed was the last prophet. In consequence, they have been under attack by members of the majority Muslim community. This article speaks of the interaction of the Bangladesh government, which is Muslim, and the Ahmadia.
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A MOSQUE GROWS IN BOSTON
by Dean Barnett

  Mr Abdurahman Alamoudi's a fund raiser for Al Queda in America. Mr. Alamoudi is in a Federal pokey. Mr. Alamoudi is a founder of the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB). Boston' Redevelopment Authority gave the ISB land to build a classy mosque at Filene's basement prices. Then they had second thoughts and reneged. Did the ISB go crawl in a corner? Hell no. They're suing everyone — litigation is their preferred weapon of intimidation. It used to be that if your book was banned in Boston, it was sure to sell. Now, it's getting to be that if you are sued by an Islamic terrorist front group, you must be a good guy. As Dean Barnett says, this story is "... a case study in how the leadership of a large American Islamic group woos and works with politicians, attempts to intimidate its adversaries, and claims to champion moderation — all while keeping company with prominent proponents of hatred and violence." He gives us the unsavory details.
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FRANCE AND ISRAEL

FRANCE AND THE JEWISH HERITAGE IN JERUSALEM
by Elliott A. Green

  The Arabs have politicized the archeology of Jerusalem, blatently destroying all artefacts around the Temple Mount showing Jewish origin. Less dramatically but just as ruthlessly, they ignore any Jewish association with Jewish antiquities anywhere in the city and have damaged sites by careless use. In this they are helped by the French, who own several sites of historic and archeological importance. Elliott Green notes that France, which prides itself on saving "international cultural heritage, material or immaterial, and in particular, neglected, even forgotten, buildings, objects, skills, [and] sites," has catered to the Arabs and allowed them to abuse important sites in Jerusalem that are under France's control.
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FRENCH HISTORY AND CURRENT ATTITUDES TO ISRAEL: An Interview with Freddy Eytan
by Manfred Gerstenfeld

  In recent decades, as a way to (re)gain Arab friendship — and oil – France has consistently sided with the Arabs, often acting as an enthusiastic frontrunner in developing ways to increase Arab political power and PLO influence. This has created some major problems for Jews in general and Israel in particular, though it has yielded France little advantage in its dealings with the Arabs. Moreover, France bears a major responsibilities for the development of radical Islam in the world. The jihad is still mostly focussed on Israel and America, but the homegrown variety of Islam has already begun to sting its friend and host, France.
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ARAB PROPAGANDISTS AND THEIR SHILLS

PRINCE CHARLES: ISLAM'S NEW AMBASSADOR
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  In the past few years, Prince Charles of England has taken to lecturing people around the world about the goodness of Islam. He believes that President Bush's administration is too confrontational towards Islam — even though Bush also believes that Islam is a religion of peace. Perhaps the prince was out to lunch when Arab terrorists bombed the London subway and buses. Unfortunely, few people in England appear to be any more willing to fight to keep from being Islamized than is the Prince.
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"MUNICH" STANDS FOR "APPEASEMENT"
by Kate Wright

  Kate Wright speaks with authority about screenwriting — she's taught it since 1995. In this essay, she concludes that Steven Spielberg's new movie Munich is a distorted fancy of a real event. By putting the actual Munich massacre in context, she makes us understand what is so very wrong about the movie.
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ELIMINATING ISRAEL POLITELY
by Daniel Pipes

  Daniel Pipes points out that Hamas and Fatah have the same goal: eliminating the Jewish state. Hamas is more open and wins the support of the Palestinian Arabs. Fatah is more circumspect and wins the support of the USA administration and seduces Israel. The pattern is repeated in the UN — except here, Kofi Annan takes on both roles. Unfortunately, as Pipes says, "Kofi Annan's record of both condemning and endorsing Israel 's elimination merely reflects the etiquette of destruction established by Israelis themselves."
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UN CEREMONY INCLUDES MAP OF "PALESTINE" IN PLACE OF ISRAEL
by Ezra HaLevi

  In this companion piece to the previous article, Ezra HaLevi provides more details about the shocking U.N. ceremony in which Kofi Annan and other UN dignitaries actively participated. A map of Israel labeled "Palestine" was prominently displayed; and, at the request of a UN official, all in attendance rose to pay respect to "... those who have given their lives for the cause of the Palestinian people..." (aka Arab terrorists). As David W. Rothschild commented on Pipes' article: "Unfortunately, Mr. Annan is seldom outed for what he is: a duplicitous, self dealing weasel who has never been a friend of Israel. How this clown walked away with clean hands from the Rwanda debacle and the oil for food scandal is one of life's great mysteries. Kofi Annan is the perfect head of a totally dysfunctional and irrelevant body."
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NEWS ABOUT THE MEDIA

MUSLIMS MARCH OVER CARTOONS OF THE PROPHET
by Kate Connolly

  If more proof were needed that Arabs will march, protest and riot for almost any or no reason, this article provides it. Kate Connelly writes that a recent march by Muslims residing in Denmark was set off by cartoons caricaturing Mohammed — Islamic law, but not Danish law, bans using his image. It can't be just because this involved religion. After all, Muslims were undisturbed by the destruction of Joseph's tomb or the desecration of the Church in Bethlehem, both the work of their fellow religionists.
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MEDIA BIAS IS REAL
by Meg Sullivan

  This article by Meg Sullivan summarizes a novel way of measuring media bias recently reported in a study by Tim Groseclose, a political scientist, and Jeffrey Milyo, an economist and public policy scholar. The study — which finds that the major TV and news media are generally more liberal than conservative — covers only news items, not opinion pieces.
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ISRAEL. Nobel prizes, a primer on Israel's political parties, and a possibly-workable peace plan

PROFESSOR ROBERT AUMANN: HE'S GOT GAME
by Hilary Leila Krieger

  This is an engaging article by Hilary Leila Krieger about an engaging personality, Dr Robert Aumann, who was awarded the Nobel Prize this year for his work in game theory. He has no problem being both mathematician and religious Jew. In fact, his personal experiences have suggested scenarios that can be used to refine models of specialized economics situations.
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ISRAELI POLITICS: A PRIMER
by Mike Levine

  Uneasy because you don't really understand about Israeli political parties — parties in the multiple? Read this article. Mike Levine explains Israel's political system, where you vote for a party, which picks the people who will sit in the Knesset, should the party win. Is that different than voting for someone who runs with the consent/aid/money of a party? Yes, it is. Mike Levine explains the difference as well as making the differences between the parties almost intelligible — well, as intelligible as is possible.
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THE BULGARIAN PLAN REVISITED
by Shmuel Neumann, Ph.D.

  Shmuel Neumann proposes a plan that likely has more chance of bringing a permanent solution to the Palestinian problem than all the half-cocked peace plans that rely on nibbling away at Israel piece by piece, while demanding zilch of the Palestinian Arabs. Essentially, he proposes that Israel firmly take control of its land, making its own law the law of the land both in Israel and on the West Bank. The plan deals with homesteading, refugees, citizenship, army service and relocation.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

NOVEMBER 2005 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE
DECEMBER 2005 BLOG-EDS    READ MORE

CORRECTION: The garble gremlin afflicted a couple of paragraphs in the very excellent article by Moshe Brody — "Containment Instead Of Victory" — in the September-October, 2005 issue. Please read the corrected version.


 

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September-October, 2005


The Muslim promotion of anti-semitism in England has been very successful, perhaps because it is able to graft onto longstanding, well-established British antisemitism. Robert Wistrich documents the persistence and wide span of anti-Jewish mainstream prejudice, particularly among the media and the upper echelons of British society – the same group that supported Hitler in the 1930s. Contrariwise, an odd thing seems to be happening at the extremes. Over the last half century, the far left and at least one far right party — the British National Party (BNP) — seem to be exchanging positions on anti-Semitism. Nick Cohen observes that the liberal left appears to have become "Jew-obsessed" and is partnering with Islamists. In contrast, as Robert Locke points out, the once Nazi-sympathizing BNP has forsaken anti-Semitism. Their focus is on reducing foreign immigration to prevent the English becoming a minority in their own country. More and more, this means tackling the huge Muslim immigration and population growth, a problem ignored by most of the other parties. Unlike Tony Blair's Labour party, it can take the fear of Islamification and the threat of Muslim terrorism seriously because it isn't hampered by an official policy of supporting the EU and multiculturalism.

CRUEL BRITANNIA
by Robert Wistrich

  Robert Wistrich examines the history of modern anti-semitism in Britain, pointing out that "Great Britain is today second only to France in serious anti-Semitic incidents reported among European countries." Most disturbing, "anti-Semitic sentiment is a part of mainstream discourse, continually resurfacing among the academic, political, and media elites", often taking the form of unsubstantiated, unreasoning criticism of Israel, while Arab terror is condoned or excused. What makes this ubiquitous and blatent bias particularly appalling is that it has been internalized and is considered legitimate.
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ANTI-SEMITISM ISN'T A LOCAL SIDE EFFECT OF A DIRTY WAR OVER A PATCH OF LAND SMALLER THAN WALES
by Nick Cohen

  Nick Cohen has a Jewish name but isn't Jewish. He considers himself left wing, held conventional liberal opinions and was positive the left was not racist. Being against the Iraq war went with the territory. In this essay he chronicles the anti-semitism he encountered when he cautioned that being anti-war meant keeping a dreaded dictator in power and maybe people ought to think seriously about what was at stake.
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THE BRITISH NATIONAL PARTY (BNP) GOES STRAIGHT
by Robert Locke

  Robert Locke provides us with a fair-minded assessment of the current thinking of the leadership of the BNP. Basing his conclusions in part on an interview with Nick Griffin, the party's leader, he suggests that the once very rightest BNP is cleaning its slate of "anti-Semitism, anti-Americanism, and fascist-socialist economics." Their concern is the large influx of foreign immigrants and the continuing threat of Islamification, a process that would change the British character of England.
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Considering that Muslim Arabs are driving out Christian Arabs from traditionally Christian towns in Israel such as Bethlehem and/or terrorizing them into dhimmitude, one might logically suppose that Christian Arabs would condemn this harassment. Instead, prominent Middle Eastern Christian theologians such as Naim Ateek and his group at the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center blame all their tribulations on Israel. They are some of the — if not the — prime movers in persuading mainline churches in the West to take a strong, emotional and cockeyed anti-Israel stance.

RACIST ROAD SHOW
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  With no desire to even try telling the truth, the Sabeel Center "Christians" and their Marxist buddies from the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) and other hate-Israel groups have developed an emotional, gory and highly effective narrative that they tout on speaking tours in the West and when guiding visitors through "Palestine" — wherever they have an audience of the ignorant to educate. Alyssa Lappen tells us about these shills for Arab terror and their road show.
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AN ANGLICAN RESPONSE TO THE ANGLICAN PEACE AND JUSTICE NETWORK (APJN) REPORT
by Dory Elliott

  This is a very human letter, written by a woman who taught school in Jerusalem and made friends with the locals, both Jews and Arabs. Dory Elliott writes of her own experiences, interspersing the general history of the area and specific events that she witnessed. She details the growing violence of the Muslim Arabs and the worsening condition of the Christian Arabs when the Palestinian Authority began the second intifada. In this essay she challenges the APJN report. It is worth noting that a prime instigator of the Report is Rev. Naim Ateek, who, by no coincidence, is also a prime mover in the American Presbyterian and Episcopal churches' campaigns to divest themselves of stock in companies investing in Israel. (See Merkley in the July-August 2005 issue. )
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A PRIMER ON SABEEL ECUMENICAL LIBERATION THEOLOGY CENTER
by Dexter Van Zile

  Dexter Van Zile provides us with a succint summary of the type of theology marketed by the folk at the Sabeel Center. They do CNNish weeping at the inconvenience caused by the keep-out-terrorists fence; they proclaim replacement theology, suggesting that Christianity — or is it Islam — has superceded Judaism; they describe the Palestinian Arabs in the language of the suffering Jesus. Their techniques may be disgusting and outrageous and wild, but they have a clear-eyed goal – the destruction of the State of Israel.
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This is such an odd time. Americans in general are more sure than ever that a Palestinian Arab state is sure to be a terrorist stronghold and they don't want it. At the same time, Jewish Americans have become anxious, fearing the enmity of their onetime friends, the (il)liberal Left, more than they love Judaism. The indifference of the American Jews permits the weakening of Israel — it helps destroy Israel's morale and it invigorates Arab hate. And what is most bizarre, the two leaders who most worked against Arab terrorism — Bush and Sharon — are now in the forefront of those aiding and abetting the practioners of Muslim-style peace. Does it matter whether Bush pushed Sharon to the Gazan folly or Sharon coopted Bush? Both leaders need to wake up or the West will lose the war waged by resurgent Islam.

THE SILENCE AND WORSE OF AMERICAN JEWS
by Rael Jean Isaac

  When it came to Sharon's decision to ethnically cleanse Gaza of Jews, The presidents of major Jewish organizations, previously level-headed Jewish commentators, Jewish newspaper editors and much of the Jewish rabbinate became the Jews of Silence or, even worse, applauded the expulsion of the Jews from Gaza. With no Jewish leadership to counter to mainstream anti-Israel propaganda or to encourage an examination of such a momentous decision, there was little debate in the American Jewish community and now there is little sympathy for the plight of the new refugees from Gaza. As Rael Jean Isaac writes, "When the history of this period is written, the current paralysis of American Jews, left and right, will be a source of incredulity — and deepest shame."
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AMERICAN JEWISH LEADERS AND THE GAZA WITHDRAWAL
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Emanuel Winston has spoken of the "pathetic uselessness of Jewish American leadership. When it comes to making decision or acting decisively, they park their brains at the door along with their hats. ... There is a disgusting arrogance residing within those who insist on making decisions on matters wherein they are totally incompetent. They preen and offer speeches, looking for admiration and especially respect." This essay by Rachel Neuwirth takes a positive approach and focusses on events in Israel the American Jewish leadership should be vigorously discussing.
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TAKING BUSH AT FACE VALUE
by Richard H. Shulman

  As Rael Isaac points out, one reason for the silence of some American Jewish opinion makers is their trust in President Bush's concern for Israel. In this essay, Richard Shulman crisply analyzes Bush's strong-sounding foreign policy on terrorism and the weak implementation of this policy in the Middle East, specifically in our handling of Iraq and Syria. And Israel.
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WHY HAS GEORGE W. BUSH GONE WOBBLY ABOUT REWARDING PALESTINIAN TERRORISM?
by Professor Paul C. Merkley

  What a difference a year has made in American and Israeli attitudes towards Arab terrorism! In August 2004, the leaders of both countries promoted a strong Israel and refused to deal with the terrorist leader of the Palestinian Arabs, Yassir Arafat. In August 2005, against the advice of his experts but with American approval, Ariel Sharon gave the Arabs a victory they could not win for themselves. And now both leaders happily deal with Arafat's weak philosophical clone, Mahmoud Abbas, and profess themselves happy with the results of their new policy of appeasement, ignoring of course the expanded entry of terrorists and weaponry into Gaza, Hamas' emerging control of the Palestinian Arabs and the weakening of Israel's ability to defend itself. And defend itself it must, because the goal of the Arabs is, more than ever, to destroy Israel; and the UN and EU and America's State Department don't say no to that.
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BUSH AND SHARON'S GAZA SLUMBER PARTY
by Don Feder

  Don Feder writes that both Sharon and Bush are culpable for the Gaza disaster. For whatever reasons, Sharon values his supposed special relationship with the American president above the security of Israel. And Bush reasoned erroneously that "[g]ive the Palestinians a state, ... and they'll settle down to the task of nation-building. Rockets will be beaten into pruning hooks. The fact that the Palestinians have never given the least indication that they're ready to coexist with Israel (however it's constituted) isn't allowed to intrude on this New World Order vision."
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Gaza happened. Israel bled. People were traumatized. But the world didn't stop. The politicians didn't say "we've done enough damage." The Arabs didn't say, "Let's start working on our own affairs." It's become clear that destroying Israel incrementally or in large chucks is their affair. So where are we? These next essays appraise Israel's new position vis a vis her enemies and put the lie to the benign expectation that Arabs want to be like everyone else. They have their own agenda, where we think we've bought their friendship and where we know we haven't.

THE REVOLUTION EATS ITS OWN
by Barry Rubin

  Professor Barry Rubin points out that in the Middle East "[t]he real problem is that of extremist revolutionary movements, without constraints on their behavior and with genocide as their goal, which are applauded by most regimes, media, and publicly vocal people of the Arab world and Iran. In short, an extremist minority sets the agenda for means and ends for a majority that accepts these things." With this as the core problem, "peace" initiatives and activities are worse than useless. This is as true in Iraq as in the Israeli territories.
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ISRAEL'S NEW STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT
by Caroline Glick

  As part of the reassurance that Israel's security would be enhanced by retreating from Gaza, PM Sharon promised that Israel "would respond dramatically and ferociously to any and all terror attacks emanating from post-withdrawal Gaza." Instead, the response has been timid and ineffectual. Israel has "... lost all deterrent power against the various Palestinian terror factions and the PA's security forces in Gaza..." "Today, free passage from Gaza to Judea and Samaria constitutes an open conduit for international terrorists into the Israeli heartland, with no Israeli supervision whatsoever." The Government is yet to concern itself with this new and very dangerous situation.
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OLD WINE IN OLD BOTTLES
by Alan B. Katz

  Alan Katz reviews what was expected of Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Arabs when they obtained Gaza. Unfortunately, it's been same old, same old — anarchy, violence, disorganization, burning synagogues, looting and destroying greenhouses. The Jews could not even trust their buried dead to the Arabs and were forced to uproot them. And the killing of Jews goes on. What's new is that the "people of London, New York, Madrid, Kenya and Beslan have had terrorism forced down their throats. But it is only because with every unanswered attack on Israelis the terrorists have grown in confidence, strength and support. We shall reap what we have sown."
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WHAT A PALESTINIAN STATE WOULD LOOK LIKE
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  As Cinnamon Stillwell writes, "The world has gotten an eyeful of just what a much-anticipated Palestinian state might look like and it's not a pretty picture." Considering that the Palestinian Arabs are said to be very needy, very poor, it is bizarre that they felt they had the luxury of destroying greenhouses that could feed them and buildings that could house them. And their barbaric behavior, which would be considered unacceptable in almost any other group, is explained away by the major media as harmless fun. It's too bad the on-site press can't tell it like it is — "The death cult that has subsumed their society is in fact what they offer the world. While people all across the globe, including Jews, have survived upheaval and gone on to forge new lives and societies, the Palestinians seem to be incapable of creating anything." Especially not a state.
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POST-DISENGAGEMENT IMPACT ANALYSIS
by Michael Anbar

  Michael Anbar provides us with some of the possible consequences that should have been considered before Israel engaged in so momentous an upheaval as withdrawing from Gaza and expelling the Gazan Jews from their homes and productive greenhouses. A full analysis of the multiple blunders committed in the name of increasing Israel's security is an absolute necessity if we are to prevent a repetition with the half million Jews living in Samaria and Judea and eastern Jerusalem.
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Hand in hand with assessments of Israel's new position in the Middle East and globally, those citizens of Israel who were most affected by the expulsion from a part of Biblical Israel are conducting their own assessments. BG (Before Gaza), Sharon demonized the religious Jews and promoted secularism. AG, these religous Jews are beginning to assess why Sharon won the Gaza battle and whether they should become more actively involved in the running of the State. But this is not enough. All Israelis need to reconstruct their image of themselves and each other. And some data on Sharon's corrupt financial dealings need to be given more attention.

ISRAEL'S BLACK SEPTEMBER
by Walter Bingham

  Walter Bingham brings us up to date on what's happening with the Jewish families expelled from Gaza. They were not transferred as cohesive communities to other areas where their talents and productivity would contribute to Israel's economy. Instead, they became instant refugees, except — unlike refugees helped by international organizations — they were pretty much left to fend for themselves or rely on private charity.
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RETHINKING
by Batya Medad

  Of all of Orthodox Jewry in Israel, only the chareidi are not, in the main, fervent patriots. Given the Sharon government's denigration of the Orthodox, demonizing the right wing as if they were the enemy, Batya Medad writes that she was beginning to wonder if the chareidi aren't right to ignore the State. But the fact is that the Chareidi are beginning to enter into full participation. Upon reflection, she feels the real problem is that from the beginning of the State the secular Jews in charge of the Government discouraged the religious from joining the army and building up Israel. She concludes that the solution is not rejection of the State, but more active engagement to "rebuild it into the Jewish state and society it should be."
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AN OPEN LETTER FROM THE YOUTH — AND A RABBI'S RESPONSE
by Hillel Fendel

  Hillel Fendel presents both a letter from a young man, a Yeshiva student, obviously someone who is reassessing many things he took for granted before the expulsion of the Gazan Jews and the response from a Rabbi. The article was submitted to Think-Israel by another young man who commented, "I read this article — and I'm not quite sure what to make of it. It seems that the 'question' is a lot more powerful than the response the Rabbi gave."
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THE SETTLERS AND THE LEFT — WORLD'S APART
by Emanuel A. Winston

  The gulf between the pioneers who labored to revitalize Biblical Israel and Israeli secularists is large. Their life styles, their values, their rituals are so very different. Secularists have been taught to transfer their fear of Arab terrorism to the demonized religious right. "The Left acts as if they believe that these hard working farmers, among other trades, who made the sandy desert bloom are a provocation to the Arab Muslim Palestinians who would otherwise be friendly, peaceful and no enemy to a non-Muslim State." Winston hopes the rift will be healed, and "Jews of the low lying coastal cities who may once again adopt the Jews of the Hills and the Settlements as their true brothers and sisters and adopt a credo of a higher plain of life on which to live that gives thanks to G-d."
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ISRAEL: THE ABUSED WIFE
by Arlene Bridges Samuels

  Usually the focus is on factors with which Israel has to contend – her hostile neighbors, Arab terrorists in and from the territories, the hostility from the EU, UN and the USA State Department. Arlene Bridges Samuels takes a different tack, pointing out that Israel has reacted like "an abused wife who keeps trying to make her cruel husband happy. The more she appeases him, the more abusive he becomes." This response is not the way to reduce her vulnerability.
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HOW ...?
by Patricia Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn asks "How?" How did it happen that an Israeli Government ignored the wishes of its citizens and, by excising Gaza, brought upon the country a calamity, the outlines of which are just becoming clear. And it is a calamity. If we had any doubts, observe that the enemies of Israel are rejoicing, its friends are bewildered and fearful. Sharon's government — aided by secularists in the judiciary, the educational system and the media — are implementing Shimon Peres' scheme to cleanse Israel of religion. This is a clear-eyed assessment of how it happened. And why.
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THE SHARON FILE: CORRUPTION
by Institute for the Study of Corruption in Israel

  This report covers Ariel Sharon's involvement in the Kfar Mallal Land Scandal, the Malmud Scandal, the Greek Island Scandal, the Ginaton Lands Scandal, his Sons' Business Dealings, the Straw Companies Scandal, the Cyril Kern Affair and the Oasis Casino in Jericho. His haste in kicking the Gazan Jews out of their homes, and leaving them to fend for themselves without alternative housing, suggests his involvement in a projected casino in Gaza will provide material for an update.
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Two essays on the history of the Middle East. The first counters the Arab propaganda ploy that they are part of the oppressed Third World with historic facts. The second highlights the irony that the UN promotes a (second) Palestinian state on Jewish land, when the UN itself is charged with aiding Jewish settlement on the land.

DO THE ARABS FIT THE THIRD WORLD MYTH? — RELIGION AND POLITICS IN MEDITERRANEAN HISTORY
by Elliot A. Green

  Elliott Green observes that the Arab claim that it is part of the oppressed and subjugated "Third World" may be good propaganda, but it is bad history. He writes of the Arab conquests in Europe for well over a millenium and the Arab slavers: "Arab raids kept broad coastal regions of Spain and Italy depopulated, underdeveloped and in decay for centuries." And until the Ottomans lost the Middle East, the Arabs were content under their rule and had no nationalist aspirations. No, the Arabs don't fit the Third World model: they weren't colonized; they aren't poverty-stricken; and they are hardly innocent victims — not when their "leadership rallied to the Nazi camp, thereby endorsing the most racist theory to be espoused by a modern state."
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SHARON BLOWS OPPORTUNITY AT UNITED NATIONS
by David Singer

  PM Sharon continues to take every opportunity to weaken the Jewish state. Addressing the U.N. at its 60th Anniversary celebration, "Mr Sharon meekly repeated the mantra continually preached by these countries: 'The Palestinians are also entitled to freedom, and to a national, sovereign existence in a state of their own.'" — knowing full well that there is no such thing as a Palestinian people and knowing that the UN Charter itself is tasked with the duty of encouraging Jewish settlement in the "West Bank." David Singer reminds us that the Jews aren't occupying Arab land; in reality, the Arabs are occupying Jewish land.
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These article discuss examples of America's appeasement of Islam at home as well as abroad — to America's detriment. And Israel's detriment. Appeasement appears to be at the root of America's policy towards Israel: appease the Arabs in the Middle East and maybe they will leave the rest of us alone. Believing some of the myths promulgated by Arab propagandists and their (un)paid buddies may have contributed to the belief that appeasement will work.

THE ACLU AND CAIR — STRANGE BEDFELLOWS
by Arlene Peck

  Muslims continue to use America's freedom of speech to curtail America's freedom of speech. And freedom of action. Arlene Peck write how CAIR, "seemingly and allegedly the 'legal arm' of HAMAS, the Islamic terrorist movement, or perhaps more broadly stated, the US-based eyes and ears of the worldwide Islamic terrorist effort, has turned into a Muslim version of our ACLU."
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AMERICA'S ATTEMPTS TO APPEASE "MUSLIM OPINION" ARE DEPRAVED AND SUICIDAL
by Alex Epstein

  Alex Epstein writes that our de facto policy toward Arab terrorism at the moment is appeasement. We have been led to believe that serious activity against Muslim terrorism will lose the good opinion of Muslims. "Muslim anger over America's support of Israel, we are told, is a major cause of anti-American terrorism." We ignore that the major condemnation against fighting terrorists seriously comes from Islamists — whose ambition is to gain global political control – "and their legions of 'moderate' supporters and sympathizers." He wisely points out that "[e]very attempt to appease "Muslim opinion" preserves, promotes, and emboldens our enemies. Every concession to angry Muslim mobs gives hope to the Islamist cause. Every day we allow terrorist regimes to exist gives their minions time to execute the next Sept. 11."
 READ MORE
 

CONTAINMENT INSTEAD OF VICTORY
by Moshe Brody

  Moshe Brody comments on the Western policy of appeasement of Islamic terrorists. Some of the material is from his book, "Troubleshooter in the Promised Land." He argues that America hopes to keep the terrorists from its door by putting the onus on Israel and letting the Arab terrorists have their way back home; i.e., America will continue to protect the terror organizations that prey on Israel by making sure Israel isn't allowed to inflict a fatal blow against them. He concludes that "[w]hatever hope there may have been for victory over Islamic terrorism has faded. In its place as a fallback position is a flawed policy that spells mortal danger for Israel and the West."
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7 MYTHS ABOUT ISLAM
by Timothy R. Furnish

  Timothy Furnish summaries myths that contribute to how we view Islam. These myths mainly promote the idea that Islam is a peaceful religion – a whopper we've swallowed since just after 911. It's time we looked at Islam realistically.
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These essays examine the internal stability of two of our Arab "friends": Egypt and Saudi Arabia. How democratic have they become? How tolerant of their minorities? We seem to have had little influence on them.

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR ABDUCTING COPTIC GIRLS AND FORCING THEM INTO ISLAM?
by Magdi Khalil

  The Copts are Christian and a minority group in Egypt; they number over 9 million. In this essay, Magdi Khalil writes about one aspect of the terrorized lives the Copts lead in Muslim Egypt. There is tremendous organized and systematic pressure on Coptic girls to convert to Islam, and abducting girls often occurs. The Egyptian Government is implicated in that it provides no protection and does nothing to stop the practice. In fact, it has ignored "the involvement of elements of its own security system in the crimes against the Copts." It consciously has marginalized the Copts within Egyptian society in various ways and it permits the Muslim clerics to malign them and encourage people to abuse the Copts physically as a religious duty.
 READ MORE
 

SAUDI ARABIA: STILL THE FACE OF THE DEVIL
by Robert Spencer

  Saudi Arabia gets expensive whitewashes every so often. A recent one has her forswearing religious extremism and jihad terrorism. However, as Robert Spencer informs us, the mullahs and Saudi TV continue to promote hatred towards the West and Israel; and they continue to raise money to support the Palestinian jihad — they have reportedly raised $4 billion for Hamas in the last 5 years. Moreover, they have supplied the majority of foreign suicide-terrorists in Iraq the past two years.It's time the Administration and Congress signed the Saudi Accountability Act.
 READ MORE
 

What's in a word? Sometimes a single word can express a whole complex of feelings and provide us with insights we didn't have. Of course the media have ways of protecting their readers against understanding what's going on in the Arab-Israeli conflict by using a bunch of bland and obscuring words to hide the obvious.

IS GAZA BURNING?
by Jack Engelhard

  The New York Times has often turned itself into a pretzel to avoid calling Arab terrorists terrorists and to avoid saying anything nice about Israel. Jack Engelhard has put together a set of definitions used by the media "wherever truth needs to be camouflaged." How did the New York Times avoid talking about Arab looting in Gaza? "There was no looting going on, only 'looking for usable materials.'"
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A GREAT GERMAN WORD
by Si Frumkin

  Si Frumkin puts into words the glee many felt when the barbarians who now have Gaza all to themselves burnt the Jewish greenhouses bought for them as a gift by a group of American Jews. The glee was payback for the indignation we felt when Mort Zuckerman and James Wolfensohn and the other fools ignored the wretched state of the Gazan Jews who were thrown out of their homes but eagerly sought to help the "Palestinians". Maybe now they will begin to understand that the Arabs aren't interested in being good citizens. Killing and looting and vandelism are their thing. And trying to destroy the State of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

September 2005 Blog-Eds    READ MORE
October 2005 Blog-Eds    READ MORE


 

=====================================================

July-August, 2005

It's clear we didn't nip terrorism in the bud when we had the chance – right after 9/11 and right before Pres Bush declared Islam was a peaceful religion. So we fight terrorism but not specifically ARAB terrorists, and because we fear doing damage to "innocent" civilians, we don't extirpate the terrorist hellholes. Israel wasn't allowed to defeat the local terrorists who have acted as test pilots for techniques later used successfully in Iraq. Now Israel seems to have abdicated from the fight against Islamic terrorists – handing them Gaza, a strategic piece of land, complete with airport and seaport. America, in its quest for Middle East democracy is willing to accept a Shiite-dominated theocracy in Iraq and, if London is any indication, increased terrorism is about to break out in Europe.


 

It's a rule of thumb that if you want to know what the Arabs will do in the Western World tomorrow, look at what's happening in Israel today. We begin this issue with an essay by Professor Louis Rene Beres who says what too many politicians still deny, at least publically — that terrorism in Israel and terrorism in America and terrorism in England have a commonality: they are by the same hand.

DANGERS OF CAPITULATION
by Louis Rene Beres

  Emanuel Winston said of this article: "[It] is a precise view into the future. American Generals tell us that the mix of Arab Muslim terrorists — Mujahadin (fighters for Islam) — will metastasize with new combat skills all over the globe. Be assured that the Mujahadin now fighting America in Iraq will pour en masse into Gaza and the 7 cities turned over to the Arab Muslim Palestinians. ... not only will Israel suffer an expanded terrorism but Europe and America will similarly be attacked..."
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Let's talk first about Israel's most recent and greatest folly, the expulsion of some of its best citizens — its most patriotic, its most productive, its most vibrant — from their homes. And to no purpose. Unless of course you believe that strengthening a terrorist stronghold is a good idea. These first set of articles were written by participants in the turbulence. (See the photo essays for more accounts of these terrible days.)

THE LYNCH AGAINST THE MAOZ YAM HOTEL
separate essays by Emanuel A. Winston and Nadia Matar

  These are essays by Nadia Matar and by Emanuel A. Winston, written when Sharon was beginning to intensify his campaign against the Jews of Gaza. In Jenin, he was rightly criticized for letting the Arabs control the tone of the publicity and for sacrificing Jewish lives to save Palestinian "civilians". But here in Gaza, he was the faultless tactician — demonizing the enemy; keeping them off balance; making what he did seem a necessity because of the settlers' unruliness and potential for violence; and he did not put his soldiers at risk. Oh, if he were only working for the Jews and not the Arabs!
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I WAS THERE: IMPRESSIONS OF KFAR MAIMON
by Catriel Sugarman

  When the Sharon government sealed off Gush Katif, Catriel Sugarman was among the thousands that eluded the police and came together in Netivot, and then marched towards Gaza, hoping to break through police lines and reach Gush Katif. In this essay, he describes what he saw when they came to Kfar Maimon. He writes of determined but disciplined protesters and — what I found most remarkable — the anguished dialogues on ethics between marchers and police and the love that poured from the people to their brethren, the soldiers, who, in some ways, are as beleaguered as the citizens of Gush Katif.
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A DAUGHTER OF ISRAEL
by Moshe Kempinski

  Moshe Kempinski relates a moving story of an American woman who came to Gaza to be with her Jewish brothers and sisters when the Sharon government imposed a blockade on Gush Katif. When they trekked to Netivot and Kfar Maimon, she trekked to Netivot and Kfar Maimon. If she can't get to Gush Katif, she will march with her people from Sderot and Ofakim. Where they go, so will she.
 READ MORE
 

GRAINS OF SAND
by Shifra Shomron

  Shifra Shomron is 18 years old and lives in Gush Katif. This is her poem.
 READ MORE
 

A SALUTE TO THE TRUE LEADERS
by David Ha'ivri

  David Ha'ivri pays tribute to the young heroes, uncompromised and uncompromising, who have actively resisted Sharon's wrong-headed drive to amputate Israel piece by piece. As he says, "They are de facto spearheading the 'national camp' today with strength and glory; and every time they achieve success, various politicians and organizations scurry to reap the 'profits' these youngsters gained." Ha'ivri describes the character traits of a true elder.
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These essays are some initial insights into the amputation of Gaza. They are more analytical and contextual and some provide data that has largely been ignored by the media.

THE UNBEARABLE EASE OF DESTRUCTION
by Asher Ragen

  The pain of Gaza is still too fresh; the rage at the government's stupidity is still too volatile; the shivering shock that so many Jews cared less for their fellow Jews than for the latest ballgame results still numbs thought; the shame at how shabbily those who are among the best of Israel's citizens have been treated is overwhelming; the self-flagelation that we didn't do enough doesn't stop. In this time before we can shake the pieces and our emotions into a cohesive whole, it is helpful to read the thoughtful analysis that Asher Ragen provides.
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IT'S NOT ABOUT GUSH KATIF!
by Shmuel Sackett

  With good reason, the present-day settlers of Israel are compared to the earlier settlers of the 19th century. With sweat and idealism, they are redeeming neglected and unpromising land. Unlike the early settlers, their anchor is the Torah, not Marxist ideology. And, it is unlikely that their children will go the way of the descendents of the early settlers, who have lost their idealism, if not their theology.
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OCCUPATION AND SETTLEMENT: THE MYTH AND REALITY
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi provides us with an insightful summary of the history of modern-day Israeli settlements over the past century. From the beginning Arab leaders sought to destroy Israel; and after Israel conquered Yesha (Gaza, Samaria and Judea) in 1968, the local Arabs began calling themselves "Palestinians" and retroactively decided – ignoring facts — that Yesha and Israel "proper" had always been their homeland. Meir-Levi carefully dissects out the facts about the Yesha settlements from the misinformation and plain lies that have fogged up a clear understanding of their status and signficance.
 READ MORE
 

GAZA VERSUS BERLIN
by Ben-Zion Krasnianski

  Ben-Zion Krasnianski looks at some mundane facts and sees an apocalyptic battle. He believes that the nihilistic behavior of the Arab terrorists is evil's best shot. It's losing. He wonders why then "Jews who have courageously led the battle against evil for 3800 years have totally abandoned the good fight and have deserted the front lines."
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GOING BEYOND SCAPEGOATING
by Isi Leibler

  When histories of this terrible period are written, blame will be liberally assigned to Sharon for his disasterous policy of expelling the Gazan Jews and to those politicians whose hatred of their fellow Jews prevented them for looking at the likely consequences of dismembering a piece of Israel and to the judiary for their instantaneously-created biased "laws". And certainly the Israeli media will be castigated for demonizing Israelis who live across the Green Line — after all, in a democracy the press is supposed to see to it that the public gets the information it needs to make important decisions. As Isi Leibler demonstrates, they flunked.
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ISRAEL AND THE HOLOCAUST
by Rabbi Dov Greenberg

  It has become fashionable to believe that Israel no longer has a major role to play to support Jewish communities around the world. Rabbi Dov Greenberg reminds us what a difference the existence of Israel would have made during the Holocaust years and has made since then. As Rabbi Greenberg points out, "Israel is the only nation in the world whose very existence is threatened by enemies supported by a majority of the United Nations." And a threat to Israel translates into a threat to the Diaspora.
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GAZA'S HISTORY AND THE JEWS
by Gary Fitleberg

  Many feel Gaza has little connection with the Jews. Gary Fitleberg recounts the history of Gaza, including some material from that well-known reference book: the Bible. It was part of the territory allocated to the tribe of Judah. Samson brought down the Temple of Dagon in Gaza. After Jerusalem fell, it was an important Jewish center during many invasions and changes of ruler. It certainly has more affiliation with the Jewish people than many people realize.
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UNRWA TO HELP EXPELLED JEWS
by Beth Goodtree

  Beth Goodtree asserts it is time to right a wrong. UNWRA is well-funded to aid Palestinian refugees. More Jews were made refugees when they were forced to flee Arab countries, and so came into "Palestine" pre and post the creation of the Jewish state than there were Arabs who fled Israel (not Palestine) to Jordan and other Arab countries. Yet UNRWA has never helped Jewish refugees. Now that there will be Jews forced out of Gaza — and thus classifiable as Palestinian refugees — UNRWA has a second chance to live up to its charter.
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ISRAEL: THE JEWISH AFFIRMATIVE ACTION STATE
by Ariel Natan Pasko

  There is an irreconciliable difference in how Israeli Arabs and Jews view Israel. Surveys show Israeli Arabs more or less accept Israel as Jewish — for the now — but reject settlement building and aliyah, which help maintain Jewish dominance. Contrariwise, Israeli Jews want the Arabs as full participants but want them to accept that Israel is a Zionist state, as does the international community. Ariel Natan Pasko points out that in the "righting of a historical wrong done to a persecuted people; it's not racist. Israel is a Jewish Affirmative Action State.
 READ MORE
 

OCCUPATION AND SETTLEMENT: THE MYTH AND REALITY
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi provides us with an insightful summary of the history of modern-day Israeli settlements over the past century. From the beginning Arab leaders sought to destroy Israel; and after Israel conquered Yesha (Gaza, Samaria and Judea) in 1968, the local Arabs began calling themselves "Palestinians" and retroactively decided – ignoring facts — that Yesha and Israel "proper" had always been their homeland. Meir-Levi carefully dissects out the facts about the Yesha settlements from the misinformation and plain lies that have fogged up a clear understanding of their status and signficance.
 READ MORE
 

One would think that Israel — a shining example of a people returning to its homeland and making of it a successful home for its citizens and a source of medical improvements and scientific innovations for humanity — would be poster child for all the emerging nations who want to improve the lot of their citizens. Instead, Israel is villified and demonized. Unfortunately, some of this condemnation has been incorporated, more or less, into Israeli society. In that some Jews want to delete Judaism from Israel, it has led to the Gaza debacle where the Israeli government turned on its own citizens, rather than confront its external enemies.

THE OSLO SYNDROME
by Kenneth Levin

  Over the years, Dr. Kenneth Levin has done a ground-breaking job in analyzing the puzzling fact that so many Israeli intellectuals and cultural leaders became so enthusiastic over the Oslo Accords, when every shred of analysis, experience and just plain commonsense said that trusting in Arafat was a recipe for disaster. In this essay, he defines the Oslo Syndrome.
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WHY SOME JEWS STILL BELIEVE IN ARAB MYTHS
by Dr. Alex Grobman

  Just as many Jews seemed psychologically incapable of accepting the truth of the mass extermination of the Jews as it became known in the 1940s, so, today, many Jews seem incapable of accepting that "the attacks against Israel by Arab religious and political leaders constitute a threat to our very existence as a people and as a nation." The attacks and the contempt are not new and they are not limited to a few marginal Arabs. Dr. Alex Grobman discusses this Jewish pathology.
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THE GAZA DISENGAGEMENT
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Initially published as three essays, Part I is, in Emanuel Winston's words, "an excellent wrap-up of the Sharon "Disengagement" plans." Rachel Neuwirth's clear summary sharpens the mystery: why, when there is no valid reason for this destructive plan, is Sharon's government bulldozing it through? In Part II, Rachel Neuwirth suggests some likely suspects — personal corruption and greed. Part III is a thoughtful look at the history of Jewish self-hatred.
 READ MORE
 

SCORCHED-EARTH KULTURKAMPF
by Caroline Glick

  It used to be that the Israeli government seemed stupid in that it let Palestinian Arab reporters set the tone of stories of IDF incursions into the territories. They did nothing about punishing Arab Knesset members preaching armed insurrection to Arab Israelis; and convicted Arab murderers of Jews were released from jail in return for a worthless promise to not kill again. But the government has become very savvy — they now indict Israelis for "insulting" unelected Government officials; they imprison children for sassing the police; they beat people exercising their civil rights protesting Sharon's expulsion plan. Unfortunately, these harsh measures are directed against religious Jews, not against Israel's real enemy, the Arabs.
 READ MORE
 

HOW TO SPOT A TERRORIST
by Bernice Lipkin

  Bernice Lipkin has some non-intuitive hypotheses about how things are done in Israel under the Sharon government that she believes worthy of further study. She also provides some operational definitions sure to be helpful to news folk and politicians alike.
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WHERE WILL SHARON FIND ANOTHER SUCH PEOPLE?
by Yossi Blum-Halevi

  The Bible records the stations of deterioration of the Jewish King Yannai, who persecuted his own people. Yossi Blum-Halevi writes of a more recent example of a corrupt leader. He describes the current phase of Prime Minister's Sharon's reversal of reality — castigating the anti-disengagement people as disobedient and destructive while billing himself as protector of democracy.
 READ MORE
 

COWARDICE AND DESECRATION: THE DEEPER JEWISH MEANINGS OF "DISENGAGEMENT"
by Louis Rene Beres

  This is a scathing indictment of the condition to which Sharon has reduced the Jewish state and of the people who have furthered this degradation and/or allowed this to happen.
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There is an absolutely critical fact that has been shunted aside by those opposed to a Jewish state: under unassailable international law, Israel has sovereignty over Gaza, Samaria and Judea. And the rationale for transferring the Arabs from Israeli land in an equitable fashion is again explored.

LEGAL RIGHTS AND TITLE OF SOVEREIGNTY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO THE LAND OF ISRAEL AND PALESTINE UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
by Howard Grief

  In this essay, Howard Grief brilliantly fulfills his objective "to set down in a brief, yet clear and precise manner the legal rights and title of sovereignty of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and Palestine under international law." This paper should be part of your armamentarium for the next time you are told that Resolution XXX of the U.N. guarantees the rights of the Palestinian Arabs to YYY.
 READ MORE
 

THE REAL LAWBREAKERS
by Boris Shusteff

  Boris Shusteff deftly refutes Ariel Sharon's argument that abdicating from Gaza is lawful and anyone who resists is a lawbreaker. He turns the argument on its head, demonstrating that if treason there be, it is Sharon who is the traitor. This article is a companion piece to Howard Grief's essay, expanding on several of its arguments.
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THE LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL
by Gilbert Simons

  Gilbert Simons provides a synopsis of his PSP Plan, which entails three interconnecting elements: "Permanence, Security, Peace." In this lucid and well-argued essay, he tells why he views the plan as key to Israel's survival. Israelis must reorient their thinking so that, as the author has said, "Israel can transform itself from a dependent and subservient protege of America into a strong, sovereign Jewish state." Emanuel Winston has said of the PSP Plan: "Herein is a brilliant presentation of excellent total actions that should be taken by a sovereign nation."
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America is involved in the Middle East, but there are some peculiar inconsistencies. She hopes eventually to establish democracy in the Arab states but at the same time she is weakening Israel, the only democratic state in the Middle East. The Bush Administration must know how unlikely a peaceful Palestinian Arab state is, yet she pushes Israel into suicidal activities to help create such a state. And the USA has a light touch when it comes to a, if not the, major deterrent to America's war on terrorism — Saudi Arabia.

THE GREAT PRETENSE
by Barry Rubin

  Barry Rubin writes that the current state of "...Israel-Palestinian negotiations can only be described as bizarre." Peace with the Arabs is obviously impossible, given Arab intransigence. Abbas is disinclined to stop terrorism, and it almost doesn't matter what he does, in that Hamas is taking over. There are less terrorist attacks only because Israel has killed off many of the terror handlers. The Western politicians know this but in their own interests keep up the pretense that there is movement towards peace. The only actual momentum is the occasional pressure on Israel for more concessions.
 READ MORE
 

WILL THE REAL SECRETARY OF STATE PLEASE STAND UP?
by Israel Zwick

  James Baker is an erstwhile secretary of state, longtime friend of the Bush family and longertime hater of Jews. His Institute published a report February 2005 that finds all factors that promote a Palestinian state good, even if that means encroaching on existing Israeli institutions that promote Israeli nationalism. Israel Zwick suggests that this document is driving the disengagement-roadmap plan and if implemented will eventually lead to the dissolution of the State of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

EYELESS IN GAZA: what the terrorists know that we don't
by Barbara Lerner

  Barbara Lerner points out that Bush latched onto Sharon's disengagement and Abu Mazen's election victory because they offered illusionary progress in an otherwise recalcitrant and unstable Middle East. Abbas is a dud and Sharon's retreat will strengthen Hamas but Hamas' ascendency is viewed as having only local consequences. In reality, "[c]ontrol of Gaza gives Hamas and its partners direct access to the land border with Egypt, as well as access by sea to terrorist supply ports in Lebanon and Syria, and from them, overland, to the terror training camps in Syria, Lebanon, and Iran and to the ratlines from Syria into Iraq."
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THE JEWISH STATE-ICIDE
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Ironically, with Europe showing signs of waking up to the Islamist threat, Frank Gaffney points out that "[t]he one place we apparently are indifferent to the rising power of the Islamists is in the would-be state of 'Palestine.' There, the establishment of an Islamofascist Gazastan is not only being tolerated by the West, it is being enabled by the government of Israel, the G-8 and the Bush Administration." This, despite the fact that "[s]uch an Islamofascist state will not only threaten the very existence of Israel, our closest, democratic ally in the Middle East, Gazastan will be a terrible menace for the United States, too."
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FAULTLINES
by Patricia Berlyn

In Part I, Patricia Berlyn discusses "the fault line between reality and feckless pretense in U.S. administration policy toward the PLO and its current chief Mahmoud Abbas." Part II examines "the fault line between genuine national interest and fawning self-interest in [American] policy toward the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia."
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SAUDI ARABIA: A KINGDOM IN CRISIS
by Jamie Glazov

  John Bradley had the unique experience of being able to travel without government supervision throughout Saudi Arabia. Some of what he learned has more to do with matters outside Saudi Arabia. The Saudis have been buying off politicians and ambassadors for years. And so it was that, just after 911, prominent Saudis — including two of Bin Laden nephews — were "whisked out of the US", even though it was already known that most of the terrorists were Saudi and there had to be a support infrastructure to carry out the coordinated attacks. They buy Middle East studies departments and think tanks and control journalists either with bribes or with threats. Bradley, himself, discovered how vindictive they can be when it became known the book he was writing was not a whitewash.
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America has shifted from a no-nonsense policy of eliminating terrorism to a policy of democratizing the Middle East. These articles examine how improbable an outcome this actually is. They explore whether the current Arab infrastructure can support a democratic society and whether America's intent will cut any ice with the Arab terrorists, convinced that terrorism will win them a Jew-free Middle East.

GLOBAL DEMOCRATIZATION: THE UNASKED QUESTION
by Lawrence Auster

  Lawrence Auster elaborates on an observation made earlier by Norman Davies that democracy is "as good, or bad, as the principles of the people who operate it." George Bush seems to believe that one can take our American experience with freedom and privacy and the expectation that people can make their own decisions and export these wholesale to other cultures and social structures. Because this belief underpins his foreign policy in the Middle East, "none of the very smart people on the Bush team ever asked the obvious question whether there was anything about Islam that would make liberal democracy unacceptable to Muslims." "... irreconcilable cultural and religious differences were not examined."
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THE ATOMIC ICEBREAKER LENIN IN THE ARABIAN DESERT
by Zack Lieberberg

  Our accepted social context is that people everywhere are all the same and share the same values and all you need to do is give them a ballot box and they turn their society into a functional democracy. Zack Lieberberg goes beyond characteristics such as intelligence and initiative and mature judgment that we, muzzled by the demand to be politically correct, are yet to examine in individuals. He takes on cultures and makes the point that some attitudes — tolerance and a sense of fairness — are not universal but take a great deal of time to develop, and some cultures haven't yet started the process.
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IS DISENGAGEMENT THE ANSWER?
by Dr. Alex Grobman

  Given the long term conflict between Arabs and Jews, separation of the two groups is a reasonable idea. But deporting Jews from their homes in the territories is not a reasonable idea. It is, in fact, illegal. It is also bad psychology in that it reinforces the Arab belief that terrorism is a technique worth continuing. But the core problem is Arab racial intolerance. Dr Alex Grobman persuasively argues that the Arabs "will not be swayed in any way by Israeli withdrawal..." because "[t]hey do not accept that national groups in the Middle East have the same right to self-determination that they have properly demanded for themselves."
 READ MORE
 

GOODBYE GAZA, HELLO HAMAS
by John Perazzo

  When Hitler was deep into the carrying out of the plans he'd described years before in Mein Kampf, people asked why no one had taken him at his word. Eighty years later, Arabs say over and over again they intend to destroy the state of Israel and kill off the Jews. And people — supposedly intelligent people — burble that letting the Arabs take over Gaza and maybe the "West Bank" is a great way to kickstart a new peace process. John Perazzo provides us chapter and verse of Arab intentions — this comes from Hamas, the most likely winner in the Gaza sweepstakes.
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In this section, we talk about a major reason why America's desire for a democratic Middle East is likely to come to nothing — it is up against Islamism and the Islamic character as shaped by its religion and culture.

THE MYTHICAL MUSLIM EXTREMIST
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori has written a series of brilliant essays on Islam. In this essay, she asks if an entire nation can be considered extremist. She starts with the proposition that by definition extremism is at a scale's endpoint, so if there is very little spread between the political endpoints, the term extremism can have no meaning. It is a pleasure to read the cleanly-stated logical arguments that support the essay's bottom line: "It is vitally important for us to understand that neither the perfectly real terrorism nor the imaginary Islamic extremism are our enemy. Islam is."
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ISLAMIC CULPABILITY
by Vernon Richards

  Vernon Richards points out that while we target Islamic terrorists, we continue to delude ourselves that Islam is a religion of peace. Meantime, in accordance with their religion, Muslims "... commit acts of inhumane brutality in the name of their god Allah. Previously unthinkable news and images invade our living rooms on a daily basis." It's time we faced reality.
 READ MORE
 

IS THERE RADICAL ISLAM?
by Shalom Noury

  Shalom Noury demonstrates that there is a radical Islam. But we knew that. He also demonstrates that radical Islam "... stems from the purest orthodox Islamic tradition of which all Islam's tendencies and divisions are unanimous." But "moderate Islam" lives mainly in the minds and hearts of those in the West who continue to deny that Islam is a threat to other civilizations, including Western civilization.
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MY NAME IS DAUD
by Boris Zubry

  A year ago, we published "Daud," by Boris Zubry. It is a story about the interweaving of lives: an Arab boy, an Israeli man; an Arab bomber, an Israeli soldier; a boy who loses his father, a father who loses his son. It left many a reader puzzled why a 'redeemed' terrorist would kill people who were kind to him. "My name is Daud" retells Daud's story, this time in the first person.
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Islam — sometimes known as radical Islam or Islamism or extremist Muslims — is active in America on many fronts. In this issue, we present samples of their activities in academia, the Protestant mainline churches and the media.

COLUMBIA AND THE ACADEMIC INTIFADA
by Efraim Karsh

  Unscholarly, bald pro-Palestinian bias in the classroom has been commonplace in many universities ever since politicized faculty took over the running of their Middle-East Studies departments. As Efraim Karsh demonstrates, it is particularly egregious at Columbia, where Edward Said, a linguist and Arab apologist, once ran the show and set the tone for Middle Eastern Studies departments across America. It is only recently that Jewish students have begun protesting against some of Said's disciples, who are accused of "abusing their positions in order to vilify Israel, to promote anti-Zionism, and to stifle free discussion of the Arab-Israeli conflict." Protected by the University administration, it is unlikely these academics will change their attitudes or what they teach anytime soon.
 READ MORE
 

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY: THE FUTURE OF MIDDLE EASTERN STUDIES AT STAKE
by Martin Kramer

  Emanuel Karsh (see above) laid out the current problems at Columbia U. engendered by the unscholarly conduct of faculty in the Middle Eastern studies department (MESD): scholarship has been replaced by anti-Israel propaganda and Jew-baiting is acceptable. In this essay, Martin Kramer looks at some larger issues. What is true at Columbia is true in other MESDs. MESD faculty has stifled the careers of scholars with alternative points of view. And due to their bias, the predictions of the MESD faculty on what's going on in the Middle East and the Islamic threat to America have been proven injuriously wrong. Changes are needed if America is to meet the "challenges arising from the coming transformation of the Middle East."
 READ MORE
 

IT IS ABOUT ISRAEL'S RIGHT-TO-LIFE
by Paul C. Merkley

  Mainline Protestant churches are divesting themselves of their holdings in companies that do business with Israel, and have called on Israel to dismantle her security fence. Professor Paul Merkley makes the case that divestment and dismantlement are "different faces of the same project": the destruction of the Jewish state. The small cadre, mainly Christian Arabs, who spearhead this effort uses libelous and emotive language that is heavy on "deicide imagery" to demonize Israel and make people question whether she has the right to exist while "terrorist acts against Israel are either ignored or rationalized as the hapless but heroic response of unarmed civilians against tanks and guns."
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SELECTIVE POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, NOT FREE SPEECH
by McQ of Qando Blog

  Here's a puzzle. NPR, BBC, CNN, Lehrer, Charlie Rose inter alia are bigtime anti-Israel, sometimes using a veneer of evenhandedness, most times smearing her with half-truths or misplaced emphasis and often with downright lies. And nothing stops them, certainly not the so-called Jewish defense groups like ADL. Contrariwise, when Michael Graham spoke some simple home-truths about Islam, he was fired from his talk show. Why is this? McQ of the Qando Blog gives us the facts of Graham's run-in with CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations).
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To date the Muslim takeover of Europe has been confined to bribery, taking advantage of the host country's admiration of its own tolerance and outbirthing every other ethnic group. But the July 7th bombing of London's transportation system may be the start of a new phase.

A NAMBLA KINDERGARTEN IN A UKRAINIAN VILLAGE
by Yashiko Sagamori

  If you know the likely consequences of certain acts and you continue doing them, are you not at fault when the likely happens? Yashiko Sagamori applies the general argument to England's cowardly encouragement of Islamic terrorism despite the fact that the Muslims openly preach treason and practice atrocities. "...it is just common sense that if you harbor Muslim freedom fighters, you shouldn't be surprised when they decide to fight for their Muslim freedom by attacking you at home."
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SOWING THE WIND IN GAZA, REAPING THE WHIRLWIND IN LONDON
by Don Feder

  Don Feder sarcastically suggests that London treat its bombers as it advocates Israel treat its Arab terrorists: give them everything they ask for and more. He then seriously points out that in expelling Jews from Jewish land and handing that land over to the Arabs, Israel will suffer, but as with Chamberlain's Munich agreement — which gave Hitler the confidence to become more aggressive and demanding — the same harm will come to Europe and America.
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NOT IF BUT WHEN
by Carrie Devorah

  Carrie Devorah writes how much harder it is getting to have any real security from the folks that continue to give us grief, while we continue to deny they are really very virulent. The only villain we will countenance is Osama — but is he really doing all this by himself?
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NEW YORK TIMES DISCOVERS NAIL PACKED BOMBS
by Emanuel A. Winston

  >From the beginning of the second intifada, the Palestinian Arabs spend time and energy perfecting low-cost but nasty explosives. Their gift to humanity was the poisoned nail bomb — an explosive with iron nails seeped in rat poison or feces inside. What delighted the homicidal Arabs was that while the bomb only killed, the nails perpetuated the suffering of those left living. As Emanuel Winston points out, The New York Times (NYT) among others ignored this, preferring to write heart-wrenching stories about the poor Palestinians wallowing in the dirt while the Israelis lived it up. Belatedly, the NYT discovered the nail-studded bomb when it became a major attraction in the recent London blitz.
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ISLAM DOES INCUBATE TERRORISM
by Mark Steyn

  There is a pattern to what may be called cooperative damage control between Muslims and their victims whenever a Muslim terror event takes place — from the immediate claims by Muslim spokesmen that they fear for their lives from "us irredeemable white imperialist racists" through our reassurances that we'd never dream of blaming them. Mark Steyn points out that ".. Islamic terrorists will only stop trying to kill us when their culture reviles them rather than celebrates them." Encouraging the Muslim community to play victim is the wrong thing to so.
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LONDON IS BOMBED. PROTECT MUSLIMS!
by Julia Gorin

  Julia Gorin shares with us how to prevent another terrorist attack in England. England must leave occupied Londonistan. Living conditions for Muslims must be improved — "... Muslims are leaving European countries to blow themselves up in Iraq, confirming that living in Europe is so yucky that people would rather be dead in Iraq than alive in Europe." And most important, England mustn't even think of retaliating lest the Muslims be justifiably angered into a repeat performance.
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WHEN DOES THE HUG-IN BEGIN?
by Arlene Peck

  Israel is very obviously at a critical time in her history. Less obviously, London's recent bombings may force the English to make some critical-for-her-future choices. Will she continue to pretend she has a special relationship with the Muslims that inhibits them from doing her harm? Or will she recognize that the terrorists and terrorist converts that she had sheltered have turned their expertise against another host country.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  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.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

NOTE: The Blog-Ed page now has an orange box labeled "Gush Katif" on every article that is about Sharon's Gaza retreat plan.

July 2005 Blog-Eds    READ MORE
August 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 

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May-June, 2005

"The imminent ethnic cleansing of Jews from Biblical Israel is the most serious problem confronting Israel. These first essays are personal stories from Israel about Gush Katif. And about an earlier expulsion of Jews — from Yamit.

MAYAN'S STORY
by Mayan Yadai

Mayan Yadai is a young mother of Croatian descent, who converted to Judaism and lives in Netzar Chazani in Gush Katif, Gaza, Israel, with her husband and two children. This is her story as she told it at the Young Israel annual dinner in New York City, May 22, 2005.
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EVERYBODY LOSES IN SHARON'S GAZA PLAN
by Jeff Jacoby

  Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe visited Gaza and saw what so many refuse to see: expelling the Jews of Gaza will benefit neither Jews nor Arabs. There are the practical considerations — Israel will lose 60 million dollars income; 3500 Arabs will be out of work. And, "[a]s a matter justice and sweat equity, the Jewish homesteaders whose faith and hard work have made the sand dunes bloom surely have as much right to their homes in Gadid and Neveh Dekalim as the Arabs have to theirs in nearby Khan Yunis and Dir El Balah."
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THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE PALESTINIAN CONFLICT WITH ISRAEL
by Barry Shaw

  As an aid to future historians who will write about the very many Israelis who changed their leftist views toward the center and right in and after the Oslo years, we present an essay by a self-labeled "average Israeli." To quote from www.KCholmim.org, "[a]former believer in the Oslo process and a former leftist, Barry Shaw voted for Rabin, Peres, Barak, as he firmly believed that Israel should make painful concessions to the Palestinians for the sake of peace. No longer. The Palestinians have proven to the world the type of state that they would establish. There is no need for yet another radical and violent Islamic entity, especially not as a neighbor of Israel."
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YAMIT: REFLECTIONS ON A TRAGEDY by Rabbi Meir Kahane
by Rabbi Meir Kahane

  Yamit was a town that was settled in the Sinai by Jews. Yamit was vacated as part of the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt. Israel gave back the Sinai that she'd conquered after Egypt started the Yom Kippur war. Egypt gave a cold peace, which she has kept, while sabotaging Israel whenever possible. Reading Rabbi Kahane's account of the last days of Yamit is heartrending. Will this happen again in Gaza, Samaria and Judea and Jerusalem, but on a larger scale, and with no possibility of peace?
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These essays are analytical and predictive; they are about Israel's unshakable right to Biblical Israel in international law, predictions of what the consequences of retreat from Gush Katif will be and a handbook on how to fight the disengagement.

RETREAT FROM GAZA
by Daniel Mandel

  With so many distorting the facts and claiming security and demographic reasons for retreating from Gaza — reasons that evaporate when examined — it is good to read Daniel Mandel's article, which clearly and simply presents actual facts. As Ariel Sharon said when his mind was clearer, "A unilateral withdrawal is not a recipe for peace. It is a recipe for war."
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TRUSTING IN PRINCES
by Herb Zweibon

  Herb Zweibon writes that "[o]ne of the most dispiriting developments in past months has been to find some of Israel's clearest-thinking supporters including William Safire, Charles Krauthammer and Norman Podhoretz publicly professing belief in the strategically absurd and morally infamous 'disengagement plan.'" In this essay he tells us where they went wrong.
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THEY SAY THIS IS WHY THEY ARE FOR THE DISENGAGEMENT
by Bernice Lipkin

  Have you heard the reasons for supporting disengagement? Here are the ones Bernice Lipkin has been given. What's that expression about a hill of beans?
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PARTING SHOT
by Avi Shavit

  Avi Shavit interviewed the outgoing Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon, who was recently forced out by Prime Minister Sharon for telling him that disengagement from Gaza will not lead to stability. It will lead to confrontation and more "[t]errorist attacks of all types," with the initial violence centered in Judea and Samaria. It's the Palestinian Arabs' way of saying: "You left Gaza? You get quiet. You will leave Judea and Samaria? You will get quiet. Leave Tel Aviv and things will be completely quiet." Asked what if the world imposes a two-state solution, he said "It is difficult to impose things that have no foundation. Something that is imposed and is unstable blows up." Wise words.
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THE PLANNED ETHNIC CLEANSING AND SOME OF ITS CONSEQUENCES
by Arieh Stav

  Unlike most prognosticators, Arieh Stav predicted the consequence of Oslo all too accurately. In this essay, he tells us what to expect from this latest inane game plan by Israeli politicians. As the author puts it, disengagement "... will leave Israel a bleeding stump...", and is incredibily stupid militarily and economically. He concludes "This is the first stage in the Arab plot to bring about the destruction of Israel, and these actions of the Israeli Prime Minister support their plot." The consequences are dire both for the State of Israel and for Jews around the globe, who will see open hate-the-Jews activity such as they haven't seen since the modern state of Israel was created.
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THE JEWISH RIGHT TO LIVE IN WESTERN PALESTINE: The Irrelevancy Of 'Belligerent Occupation' and the 4th Geneva Convention
by Yoram Shifftan

  The jurists of Israel in the Ministry of Justice appear to excel in creative albeit inappropriate reinterpretation of the law — and not only Israeli law, but international law. Misapplying the concept of "belligerent occupation" and the 4th Geneva convention, they recently rejected the appeal of the Gazan Jews that the government be stopped from carrying out Sharon's unilateral disengagement plan. Yoram Shifftan explains why the bases of their rejection are inapplicable to the current situation. He has called the Israeli justice system "a legal system a là demand," tailored for the legalization of the uprooting.
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SHARON'S QUESTIONABLE PREMISES FOR HIS WITHDRAWAL PLAN AND WHAT WE AMERICANS CAN DO
by David Bedein

  David Bedein provides us with some explicit refutation of Sharon's upbeat view of his plan to withdraw from Gaza. And he makes suggestions what we as American citizens can do to relieve the pressure by the Bush Administration on Israel.
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These next essays examine the Muslim character, as shaped by his religion, his generally backward culture and his unshakable belief he should be top dog. Mischaracterizing the Muslim character impacts on how seriously we fight the war on terror.

WHAT IS ISLAM?
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman suggests the difference between the more radicalized Muslims (Islamists) and "moderate" Muslims is one of degree, not kind. "...the Islamists have gotten most of their co-religionists to accept their more extreme position against the Jews — to murder them rather than just to humiliate them. The general Muslim reaction to 9/11 was joy." He concludes that "...the mass of Muslims are not moderate in their views, just inactive and amenable to being activated."
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U.S. SHOWING LACK OF UNDERSTANDING — OR HONESTY
by Douglas J. Hagmann

  Douglas Hagmann points out that America locked herself into the specious claim that Islam is a peaceful religion right after 9/11. Not only is this contrary to fact, but it forces America's political leaders such as Condoleezza Rice to invent all sorts of secular reasons for Islamic terrorism. Misdiagnosis doesn't lead to proper treatment. And it doesn't win wars. Winning "requires moral clarity and honesty about the enemy we are fighting. To misunderstand or deliberately mischaracterize our enemy for the sake of political correctness is to adopt an inappropriate and inadequate strategy..."
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ISLAM AND THE WEST: THE THREAT, THE DEFENSE
Interview with Srdja Trifkovic by Al Kresta

  Mohammad, the founder of Islam, set a pattern of duplicity, decapitation, rape and slavery when he massacred the Jewish tribes of Medina, a pattern for how Muslims should deal with infidels — and with each other. Osama bin Ladin is following in well-tread footsteps. Srdja Trifkovic believes that "[f]or a Christian the real task is to help our fellow humans who are trapped in Islam and to help them become free." Real democracy and Islam don't mix.
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JIHAD THROUGH HISTORY
by Daniel Pipes

  Daniel Pipes reviews David Cook's new book. Arab spokesmen have worked hard to obfuscate the meaning of jihad, often claiming it only means a personal spiritual struggle. But as Mr. Cook makes clear, the term primarily means "warfare with spiritual significance." The book tracks the evolution of jihad as practiced by Mohammad to its current rabid manifestations.
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SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS ARE ANTI-SEMITES!
by Julia Gorin

  Julia Gorin has reformed. She now accepts that she suffers from Islamphobia because she keeps thinking that all the suicide bombings and airplanes crashing into buildings are done by Muslims. She is beginning to appreciate that most everything bad that happens on the planet is Israel's fault, even when it looks like Muslims are the culprits. She realizes that Palestinians had a need to kill Jews. "If they [Palestinians] lose a grip on their hate, they'll have a massive identity crisis, and suicide bombers will become actually suicidal."
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The next articles look at Arab Muslims. What are they like when they are at home?

MIDEAST FANTASIES
by Barry Rubin

  This is a very wise article — and a very frightening one. Professor Barry Rubin reminds us we live in a time when it "is nice if people have quaint customs, diverse foods, and colorful traditional dress. What is not acceptable is to understand that some people think and behave differently." Applying these attitudes to the Middle East can lead to very incorrect assessments of how to deal with the Arabs.
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KINGDOM'S RELIGIOUS WRONGS
by Nina Shea

  To say Saudi Arabia has no religious freedom doesn't begin to describe what's going on. It isn't just that everyone must conform to Wahhabism, the state religion and that the state teaches hatred of Christians and Jews. But religion — the Saudi's brand of Islam – permeates all aspects of Saudi life — its politics, its dress codes, its civil rights — and encourages the propensity of its citizens to violence and terrorism.
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HAMAS AND THE REBIRTH OF ILLUSION
by Jonathan Spyer

  Some people in both England and America who set foreign policy are promoting the syllogism that if Hamas wins popular support by way of a democratic ballot box and we support democracy, then we too should accept Hamas. This enlightened viewpoint ignores that Hamas' core motivation is to exterminate Israel. Jonathan Spyer reminds us that "[h]istory is replete with examples of movements that sought to combine the use of the tools of democracy with the substantive rejection of its goals, and the desire eventually to subvert and destroy it.
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These essays examine how Muslims behave around the world, in places where they are in control to places they are just entering, and from plain old-fashioned slaughtering in Sudan to polite but persistent infiltration in Europe.

NAZI HAVENS ENDORSE KILLING JEWS
by Beth Goodtree

  The virulent anti-semitism coming from Arab countries is spreading around the globe — next to oil, it is the Arabs' largest export. Beth Goodtree tells us about their participation in an Arab-South American Summit. The South Americans countries are hoping for economic and political benefits, but, Goodtree warns, "If they're not careful, pretty soon they'll be calling their continent South Amerabia."
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THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD'S CONQUEST OF EUROPE
by Lorenzo Vidino

  For almost a half century, Muslim Brotherhood members and sympathizers have "steadily established a wide and well-organized network of mosques, charities, and Islamic organizations." in Europe. Their actual goal appears to be "... to extend Islamic law throughout Europe and the United States." Lorenzo Vidino paints a picture of their less savory activities in Germany, a country familiar to some of them from their Nazi affiliation days and a key location from which to infiltrate political and governmental institutions and spread their message of hate across the continent.
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PUNISHED FOR SUPPORTING PEACE
by Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury

  Salah Choudhury is a remarkable man. A native of Bangladesh, he has supported diplomatic relations between Bangladesh and Israel and interfaith dialogue between Islam and Israel. He was arrested in the airport on his way to Israel to attend a writer's conference and incarcerated for 17 month. Now released, he writes,"... it is now time to spread our message to the masses..."
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THE FORGOTTEN FIFTY-YEAR SLAUGHTER IN THE SUDAN
by Elliott A. Green

  Elliott Green recounts how the mainstream press and the international humanitarian organizations have ignored the persecution of the southern Sudanese blacks by the northern Sudanese Muslims for some 50 years, with only generally mild rebukes given the north Sudanese for the crime of mass murder. The recent history of the Sudan is also interesting as an object lesson for the Arab-Israeli conflict in that it points up that advocates of Arab dominance side with the Arabs, whether they are depicted as powerless and downtrodden or when they are in actuality conquerers and murderers.
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In the wake of Muslim resurgence and Israel's foolish attack upon its own citizens, there has been a concomitent resurgence of anti-Semitism, not seen since the days just prior to World War 2.

THE PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION ON THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY WEBSITE
by Dr. Reuven Erlich

  Dr. Reuven Erlich points out that an official website of the Palestinian Authority (PA) disseminates The Protocols by incorporating it into the story of their Nakba — they view the establishment of the Jewish state as a catastrophe. The linkage promotes the notion that the schemes of the Elders of Zion are responsible for all the bad things that have happened to the Arabs. Interestingly enough, The Protocols appear on the website the PA runs in Arabic, not on the English one.
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THE NEED TO HATE THE JEWS
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Considering how much political capital the Arabs are making out of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, we thought it might be useful to review its origins, how it fits into the very large genre of anti-semitic literature and why it is so satisfying a document for so many. Emanuel A. Winston does this in a very readable essay.
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ON THE FUTURE OF THE JEWS: And its dependence on the future of Christianity
by Barbara Lerner

  It becomes tiresome to remind skeptics again and again that Israel is legal and legally owns what was mandated Palestine and is not occupying Arab land — the reverse is true — and have them continue to believe the Arabs own the land of Israel. Barbara Lerner suggests a psychological reason for this persistent attitude. "Eurosecs see Jews as a foreign element, always and everywhere — a landless foreign people. So if they're on land, it must belong to someone else, to the 'natives'." The wandering Jews can not be owners of the Land of Israel.
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IS DIALOGUE POSSIBLE?
by Shalom Noury

  This essay is a departure for Think-Israel but the author, Shalom Noury, has some interesting ideas on why the resurgence of anti-Semitism in Europe — well beyond the obvious one that the Arabs are spending money effectively.
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What are the Muslims doing in and to America? What's happening and why are we susceptible?

WHAT IS ALL THIS INSURGENT/MILITANT STUFF? THEY ARE TERRORIST!
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck writes of the inroads Muslims have made into America to make life better for Islam and worse for all the rest of us. In her own forthright way, she provides us with multiple examples to back up her conclusion that "America is caught fast in the quicksand of politcally correct rhetoric, realpolitik, and multicultural Arab/Muslim appeasement."
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MEET THE PARENTS CIRCLE
by Lee Kaplan

  In November 2002, Frimet Roth, whose daughter Malki was killed in the Sbarro pizzeria suicide bombing, described the Parents Circle as "prototypical 'Stockholm' hostages" in that they have identified with the suicide bombers (http://www.kerenmalki.org/Press/ Frimet_Roth_POINT_Stockholm_Syndrome_27Nov02.htm). In this article, Lee Kaplan writes of their latest shenanigans — teaming up with their Arab buddies to deliver mendacious but effective Arab propaganda to naïve schoolchildren in the USA.
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THE LIMITS OF TOLERANCE
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  Perhaps the time to examine a belief is when it has become so pervasive that no one questions it. Perhaps that's the time to ask about limitations and boundaries. Dr. Babu Suseelan asks what are the limits of tolerance, generally a good thing, when we are confronted by an intolerant group, specifically, an Islam that is taking advantage of our tolerance to impose a very intolerant ideology. Our need to cling to our pride in our tolerance has distorted our own reality.
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WHAT CAUSED THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE?
by Yashiko Sagamori

  The USA is in denial about the Islamic threat. It pretends all the damage is done by a small group of Muslim militants. (In World War 2, when it took the war seriously, it didn't separate Germans by degrees of innocence.) The FBI refuses to label obvious acts of terror as terrorist attacks. The core problem is that people can't deal with the fact that the Muslim religion isn't the good and uplifting force we expect from a religion. As Yashiko Sagamori says, "Islam didn't go postal, it was born postal."
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The first essay summarizes the dealings of American presidents with the Arabs. From Truman to Bush, there's hardly been an American president that hasn't professed deep concern for Israel's security. There's hardly been a president that hasn't actively catered to the Arabs. The second essay is about an interesting event in Roosevelt's time when the Arabs were just entering the world stage as serious players.

PRESSURING ISRAEL
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Rachel Neuwirth examines the continued pressure exerted on Israel by American presidents, those with a reputation of being Israel's friend and those with more overt hostility. America has seen to it that Israel has never been allowed to inflict a resounding defeat on her enemies, no matter how many times they invaded Israel. And yet, it is significant that history records times that Israel withstood the pressure — and won out.
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THE INTRIGUING MEETING OF FDR AND IBN SAUD
by Lewis Lipkin

  President Roosevelt and Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia met once, in 1946. No minutes of the meeting have survived and Roosevelt died within weeks. The arabs have since mythologized the meeting and each year the extent of the supposed special relationship between America and Saudi Arabia grows. Lewis Lipkin examines the evidence, which doesn't support this assertion.
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American Jews should be a wall protecting Israel from foreign encroachment, including American coercion. Unfortunately, too many are quiescent or indifferent. And Aipac is under Sharon's thumb.

AN EDITORIAL

On Tuesday, May 24, Prime Minister Sharon came to Washington and made a speech at Aipac, reassuring a polite bunch that  'Less is More.' By giving up Gaza, Israel would be allowed to keep much of Samaria and Judea by its good friend, President Bush.  Allowed!  Sharon has forgotten the first rule of diplomats and politicians: "If you squeeze and the guy cries 'Uncle,' keep squeezing." It's less work and more profitable than pushing on someone who stands tall and firm. It leaves more time for long lunches. Within days Bush announced he is pleased with his new pet, Mahmoud Abbas, and warned Israel to do nothing to impede the formation of a thriving Palestinian state that is to encompass Gaza, the West Bank and Jerusalem. And to tighten the noose, after Sharon's agent Dov Weisglass has reassured everyone that things are fine, a spokesman for Sec-of-State Rice said of Weisglass: "He does not understand the way secretary of state Condoleezza Rice thinks. Nor does he understand her diplomatic vocabulary. During his meetings with Rice, he misinterpreted her naturally courteous demeanor as consent to everything he said."

So here we are: a 4000-year-old people is to make way for a 40-year-old 'people'. A vibrant and productive country — whose citizens make the whole world a better place to live in with their innovative advances in agriculture, electronics, science, medicine and the arts — is to be cut in half so that a ragtag group of Arabs — whose major industry is the manufacture of low-tech bombs, missiles and explosives laced with nails and rat poison — can have a country whose parts are contiguous. Tiny Israel is to surrender land that belongs to her — by the bible, by history, by morality, by the Mandate, by international law and by conquest — and in the process give a bunch of terrorists control over her drinking water and her air and sea space. President Bush's decree and Sharon's panicky rush to carry out this destruction guarantee damage to America's only ally in the Middle East. It will weaken Israel so it will be less able to fend off the next attack by the Arabs. And there will be a next attack.

While the 'prime minister' of the Palestinians politely but firmly makes clear he will do nothing to stop terror, the prime minister of Israel announces — against the advice of his own military and intelligence people — that he will destroy productive Jewish towns, chock full of loyal citizens, who will be turned into unproductive refugees in their own country. We know he knows this will make other towns more vulnerable to terrorist attacks because he has just designated 44 towns in Israel "proper" as being in the war zone and vulnerable to attack from the soon-to-be-expanded terrorist territory. And what are the men and women of Aipac doing to save their fellow Jews? What are the Presidents of the Major Jewish Organizations doing? — Sharon spoke to them in NYC last Sunday. These worthies are doing what the Jewish leaders did before and during World War 2. Nothing.

Let it not be said that all Jews did nothing. Thanks to the dedicated efforts of many Israelis and some Jewish-American organizations, Israelis are beginning to understand that a retreat from Gaza is very serious and very likely suicidal. As our small contribution, we bring you four takes on the Aipac meeting. And our blog-ed pages — where items on Gush Katif and the Gaza retreat have orange labels — are filled with much information on the largely unreported struggle in Israel to save Israel from its demented politicians.

SHARON HUSTLES AIPAC by Emanuel A. Winston
 

AI PAC OF LIES by Beth Goodtree
 

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE — DISENGAGEMENT: THOUGHTS ON ATTENDING AIPAC by Marion D.S. Dreyfus
 

THE HOPE OF AFSI VERSUS THE DOOM OF AIPAC by Dr. Judah Tzoref
 

Israel can not expect fair treatment — let alone understanding — from many academics and most of the media. They seem to have lost their integrity. Of course, Israel's own ineptitude at telling its story doesn't help. But that doesn't explain why the arrogant disregard of truth when writing about Israel is spreading to how stories about America's fight against terror are written.

THIEVES GET NO SYMPATHY
by Max Singer

  Max Singer points out that "Israel talks about its needs; while Palestinians talk about their rights...Palestinians talk about justice and Israelis talk about violation of agreements." He wisely concludes that "[s]o long as the dispute with Palestinians is seen as a fight between a thief and his victim, a fight about when "Palestinian land" will be returned to its rightful owner, Israel's talk of its security needs will fall on deaf ears."
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J'ACCUSE
by Tom Gross

  Tom Gross notes the irony that "Europe's relatively strict freedom of speech laws ... were to a large extent drafted as a reaction to the Continent's Nazi occupation. Yet the one group the European media has routinely defamed has been the Jews, especially Israeli Jews. But now, a French court has found writers for Le Monde guilty of "racist defamation." The verdict, unfortunately, hasn't trigger soul-searching in the press. In fact, there's been "virtually no coverage..."
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THE JIHADNIK PROFESSOR HAJJAR OF UC-SANTA BARBARA
by Steven Plaut

  If Rashid Khalidi of Columbia University is a CEO of the Islamic Academic Jihad enterprise, Lisa Hajjar is solidly middle management. She specializes in shrillery and clobbery, accusing America and Israel of all sorts of unsubstantiated crimes. Steven Plaut describes her "academic" activities in absorbing detail.
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MAINSTREAM NEWS MEDIA VERSUS AMERICA
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  The mainstream news media is rabidly opposed to our fighting back in a war Islamic terrorists started and continue. As Cinnamon Stillwell puts it, "The mainstream news media is doing all it can to defeat the United States abroad." It condemns any and all American transgressions — even when they have not been proven or even when they have been proven not to have happened — and they forgive all monstrosities committed by the terrorists, even when these are well-documented and proudly acknowledged by the terrorists themselves.
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As long as the Israeli Government aided by the media and the political left continues to promote the belief there's no alternative to withdrawal from Biblical Israel, we will continue to present alternatives to amputating Israel in order to keep it Jewish. Here are several ideas.

THE NAHALAL MANIFEST
by Yoav Tuvia, Tsafrir Ronen and Amnon Shapira

  There is truth in the notion that the extremist Israeli Left is virulently opposed to the new settlers of Gaza, Samaria and Judea because so many of the Leftists are descendents of the early settlers of the 19th century. They themselves have lost their moxie and they act out of jealousy and guilt. Or maybe it's because the early settlers were by and large Communist-Socialists and the new settler movement is based on Judaism. But it's not the whole truth. This document represents the views of thousands who live on kibbutzim and moshavim who refuse to have a "Palestinian" state carved out of an integral part of Israel. This essay proposes Arabs legally living in the West Bank be given autonomy and citizenship in Jordan, where Palestinian Arabs are a majority, and Gazan Arabs become citizens of Egypt.
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HOW TO DISENGAGE FROM THE ARABS
by Gary Cooperberg

  Maybe if the Israeli government described the Arab-Israeli conflict as clearly as Gary Cooperberg does, they would long have stopped doing the pointless, the wrong and the self-destructive. The Arabs wish to kill off Israel. Why should Israel oblige them? Cooperberg points out that given the history of Arab aggression, by now there are only two choices: "Either we remove all the Arabs from our country, or we just pack up and leave."
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ISRAEL'S DEMOGRAPHIC AND SECURITY CHALLENGE: Is Transfer The Only Rational Answer?
by Bernard J. Shapiro

  To become peaceful neighbors, the Arabs need to become democratized and to "create secular states not subservient to the rule of Islam." Until this happens, how does Israel protect itself? Bernard Shapiro analyzes the security and demographic requirements for retaining and maintaining a Jewish state and makes specific suggestions.
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The history articles this issue are directly applicable to the current demands of the Arabs that Arab refugees from the 1940s be allowed to return to Israel and that Jerusalem really belongs to them.

ARAB REFUGEES: THE BIG ARAB LIE
by David Meir-Levi

  David Meir-Levi destroys a most persistent and pernicious myth — that when Israel was created, Israel "caused the flight of almost a million hapless, helpless and hopeless Arab refugees. Israel caused the problem and thus Israel must solve the problem." The Arab inhabitants of Israel that fled their homes were molded into a piteous group to serve as the excuse for the Arabs to maintain a relentless rejectionist attitude toward Israel. Unlike the Jews who fled the Arab countries and were integrated into Israel, these Arabs were not allowed to lead a normal life. And UNRWA has taken a willing part in this abuse.
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IN DISCUSSING JERUSALEM, HISTORY MATTERS
by Jenny Grigg

  Jenny Grigg highlights the major periods in the history of the city of Jerusalem, pointing out that not only is it Judaism's holiest site and capital of Jewish states both in ancient times and in modern times, but there has been a Jewish presence there for some 3000 years. As for the Palestinian Arabs, their claim to the city "seems to be based solely on their desire to possess it." Paradoxically, to ensure that people of all religions can worship in Jerusalem freely requires that Jerusalem remain under Israel's sole rule.
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READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. The Blog-Eds page for the month is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

NOTE: The Blog-Ed page now has an orange box labeled "Gush Katif" on every article that is about Sharon's Gaza retreat plan.

May 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

June 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 

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March-April, 2005

The Gaza withdrawal proposal imposes no requirements on the Arabs to safeguard Israel's water supply. These papers are all about water that enormously important subject that has been largely ignored when discussing Israel's unilateral retreat plan. The first — AKA Water 101 — summarizes background data and focuses on what to expect when the Arabs control Israel's water supply. The second is a more comprehensive examination of the water problem.

WHAT RETREAT FROM THE TERRITORIES MEANS FOR ISRAEL'S WATER SUPPLY
by Aubrey Wulfsohn

  Lake Kinnert and the Coastal and Mountain aquifers are the main sources of Israel's water supply. When the Palestinian Authority took control of the Gaza aquifer as part of the Oslo Accord, they quickly ruined it. Now the Sharon government is bent on letting the Palestinians Arabs take over much of the land overlying both aquifers. And there are calls for Israel to give up the Golan to Syria, which would put much of the sources of Lake Kinneret in Syrian hands. What madness!
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WATER IN ISRAEL: The Dry Facts
by Martin Sherman

  Dr. Martin Sherman analyzes the complexities of Israel's water supply and why it must be a major consideration in political dealings with Israel's Arab neighbors. He provides us with the details of "the growing imbalance between available natural supplies and increasing demand" and the deterioration of Israel's water resources. Written in 2000, when some people still thought Israel and the Arabs could jointly manage Israel's water supply, it remains (depressingly) accurate.
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As PM Sharon's deadline for expelling the Jews of Gaza approaches, the crisis in Israel grows. The argument used to be that Israel couldn't hold onto the territories and remain a democracy. As Sharon becomes more dictatorial and civil disobedience is denounced as civil war, Israel is in danger of losing both her historical lands and her democratic nature.

SYMPOSIUM: THE GAZA WITHDRAWAL
by Jamie Glazov

  Jamie Glazov moderated a symposium that asked: "Is Sharon's pull-out plan shrewd or suicidal?" Saul Stern and Abraham Rabinovich optimistically argue it is strategically sound because America has agreed Israel can retain much of the West Bank; contrariwise, if Israel doesn't leave, it will soon have — by demographic projections – a 40% Arab minority. [Unfortunately for them, America has asserted almost all of the West Bank is also to be part of a forthcoming Palestinian Arab State and the demography assertion was recently shown to be based on a false reading of the data.] Their opponents, P. David Hornik and Steven Plaut, base their arguments on what we know of ingrained Arab behavior and attitudes and on Israel's experience – letting the Arabs get away with random violence has led to well-organized violence; appeasement and concessions lead to more ambitious Arab demands. They feel withdrawal is suicidal. [If Sharon persists, unfortunately, they are likely to be proven right.]
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ARIEL SHARON'S FOLLY
by Daniel Pipes

  In clear language, Daniel Pipes writes why retreating from Gaza would be the wrong thing to do — it is probably illegal and unprecedented; it gains Israel nothing; it is divisive; and it is a major boost to Muslim rejectionists.
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THE TRUTH ABOUT THE SHARON EXPULSION-OF-JEWS PLAN
by Marlene Young

  They say the devil is in the details, and certainly the rules and the obvious consequences of Sharon's bid to expunge Jews and Judaism from Biblical Israel are monstrous. But then, so is Sharon's insistence that Israel's history and belief system are inconsequential.
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MY ISRAEL DIARY
by Deb Kotz

  Deb Kotz is just back from an Israel experiencing the relative calm of the latest Arab ceasefire. Unlike much of the optimism that gets published, Kotz writes that for Israelis, "beneath the surface, there's a simmering anger, a hostility of disbelief." She shows us this by recounting an informal interview in Jerusalem with a family member, who lived through a terror attack.
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DISENGAGEMENT OR DISASTER
by Serena Weil

  In a straightforward manner, Serena Weil examines the arguments that have been put forth in favor of disengagement and finds them lacking in common sense or just plain wrong. She concludes that Sharon has "engaged the country in a disastrous process. Anti-democratic, anti-Zionistic, militarily and economically incomprehensible. Add that to the national, emotional and religious issues which have been stirred up and you wonder if the man has not gone mad?"
 READ MORE
 

THE BIG QUESTIONS
by Yuval Zaliouk

  Yuval Zaliouk writes that the Disengagement Plan, because it will have a profound effect on the future of Israel, "deserves a lengthy, exhaustive, and profound examination." He lists some issues that should be seriously considered by all of us before precipitous action is taken.
 READ MORE
 

THE PEACE AT THE END OF THE ROAD MAP
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut paints a grim picture of a future where, to obtain Peace at Last, the Jewish government of Israel has thrown Jewish settlers out of their homes in the territories. The Palestinians then repeat the intifada, this time demanding the Galilee and the Negev. Impossible? Who would have believed a few years ago that Jews would treat Jews as the enemy and treat Arab terrorists with consideration?
 READ MORE
 

BILLY'S DIARY: BOOT CAMP IN ISRAEL
by PFC (Ret.) Billy Jacobs

  An American, Billy Jacobs, recounts his experience at a boot camp just a half year ago, training with the IDF, which he describes as "the most effective fighting force in this part of the world ... because they are reluctant citizen soldiers." If Sharon attempts to carry out his 'disengagement' plan, the IDF will be put in the appalling position of fighting its own people, not the enemy.
 READ MORE
 

MADNESS AND METHOD
by Patricia Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn traces the progressively more insane behavior of Israel's governments beginning in 1967 with the bizarre notion that "defeated aggressors must be bribed to cease aggression". Then they actually gave up control of parts of the Jewish homeland for nebulous promises of peace. Now Sharon proposes to vacate Biblical Israel. The emboldened PLO terrorists don't worry him; he's busy preparing to fight the enemy — the Jews who object to his insane behavior.
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THE LAME DUCK THAT LAID A GOLDEN EGG
by Ellen W. Horowitz

  Ellen Horowitz takes us back to a time not too long ago when the then Prime Minister Barak crowed about giving the Golan up to Syria; the politicians and media — foreign and domestic — cackled about a 'comprehensive peace'; America sang sweetly and applied pressure on Israel; and the Israeli public, as usual, was cracked down the middle. But nothing happened, in part because a previous Knesset — spearheaded by a Laborite! — had passed a law that returning the Golan required a majority vote of the Knesset and the consent of a majority of the registered voters by referendum. What an interesting precedent.
 READ MORE
 

Starting with the premise that amputating part of Israel to no purpose is too irrational, these essays postulate other reasons for Sharon's single-minded war on the Jews in the territories.

OSLO III: ARIEL PERES, SHIMON SHARON AND THE END OF ZIONISM
by Moshe Dann

  For many, this essay will be an 'aha' experience. Moshe Dann makes a compelling case that the motive power behind the Sharon/Peres policy is the desire to promote the interests of Israeli's ruling elite, which has always longed for a secular Israel that doesn't carry the burden of a nationalist ideology. 'Naturally,' it views religious Jews, not the Arabs, as its major adversary. "The struggle in Israel over Sharon's policy of retreat is not merely about power, and certainly not peace, but over Jewish identity and Jewish values."
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL'S COUP D'ETAT
by Ya'akov-Perez Golbert

  Ya'akov-Perez Golbert postulates that what is happening in the Jewish state is due to the Labor establishment taking control of the Government by blackmailing Prime Minister Sharon, who is susceptible to charges of corruption and breach of public trust. Labor, which lost the election, has half of the ministries, Peres is back in power and Laborites run the judiciary. Demoralizing the religious settlers of Gaza will further the aim of Labor to de-Judaize Israel.
 READ MORE
 

The reason for expelling Jews from Gaza and the other territories is to make room for a viable Arab state. These essays deal specifically with what to expect from yet another Arab state carved from Mandated Palestine.

A PALESTINIAN STATE WILL NOT BRING PEACE
by Shmuel Katz

  Shmuel Katz points out there can't be two states living peacefully side by side, not if one of them is fixated on demolishing the other. Sharon is leading his people into disaster.
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL FREEING ARAB TERRORISTS AND SURRENDERING JEWISH LANDS, LIVING PRECARIOUSLY IN THE DELIRIUM OF EXPECTATION
by Louis Rene Beres

  Given the ties between the Palestinians and Al-Queda, a Palestinian Arab state will "become a base for terrorist operations against both Israel and the United States." The "Phased Plan" of the PLO (now the P.A.) has never changed: the Arab terrorist state will try to make the official P.A. map of Palestine — in which Israel does not exist — a gory reality, as a first step in global conquest. And yet, as Professor Beres points out, Israel continues "to wallow in engineered delusion, to waste critical strength in vain concessions, to elicit still-growing enmity by its weary capitulations..." Under Sharon, will it ever face reality?
 READ MORE
 

THE PALESTINE PROBLEM
by Caroline Glick

  As Sharon rushes ahead to evacuate the Jews from Gaza, America pushes with the same unseemly haste to establish a Palestinian State in the Jew-free territories and the Arabs intensify their military training and stock pile weaponry so that they can turn the emptied land into "a staging ground for the next round of a war whose sole aim is the total destruction of Israel."
 READ MORE
 

Actually, arguments justifying Israel's ownership of Biblical Israel are unnecessary — her ownership is woven into the fiber of international law. But Israel hasn't asserted her rights, and this allows the world community to ignore her ownership.

A LEGAL CHALLENGE TO SHARON'S UPROOTING POLICY
by Yoram Shifftan

  This is the latest of Dr. Yoram Shifftan's meticulous analyses of the legal status of the "territories". He bases the legitimacy of the Jewish claim to Biblical Israel — Gaza, Samaria and Judea (aka the West Bank) — on rock-solid international law. Israel holds Biblical Israel as a sacred trust for all future generations and can not gift it away. What is surprising — and appalling — is that Israel's diplomatic corps and its educational system do not proclaim these truths; they are mute while the Arabs invent fanciful claims.
 READ MORE
 

THE TRANSFER OF JEWS UNDER PRIME MINISTER SHARON'S UNILATERAL DISENGAGEMENT PLAN
by Howard Grief

  A prominent specialist in international law and Israeli constitutional law lays out the illegality of Sharon's Disengagement Plan. In meticulous detail, he tells us why "[t]he implementation of this plan will infringe Jewish national and political rights to the Land of Israel under international law, Israeli constitutional law and criminal law, as well as Jewish religious law."
 READ MORE
 

Thanks to mind-numbing propaganda and a blackout on interactive discussion, many believe there's no alternative to withdrawing from Biblical Israel, even as they acknowledge that retreat will bring escalating hostilities, and no peace. Think-Israel has published several articles over the years on alternative and real solutions to the Arab-Israeli conflict. This is another plan that deserve serious evaluation.

A CONSTRUCTIVE SOLUTION
by Michael Anbar

  Implicit in George Bush's conditions for establishing a new Arab state — dismantling the terrorist organizations and the establishment of genuine democracy" is "the requirement that the new Arab state will not endanger the security of Israel." Michael Anbar argues that two other conditions are essential: (1) the Arabs must acknowledge that this has been the Jewish homeland from Biblical times and (2) both Jews and Christians must be allowed to live there and anywhere in the Arab states with full rights, just as Muslims live in Israel, in Europe and in America. He believes this would allow a peaceful solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, whereas Sharon's expel-the-Jews solution does nothing to counter the Arab's religious doctrine of 'infidel-free Arab land'."
 READ MORE
 

These essays deal with terrorism and Muslim terrorists, both in the Middle East and around the world.

CAN ABU MAZEN BE A TRUSTED PEACE PARTNER?
by Asher Eder

  Dr Asher Eder points out the question doesn't address the real issue, because Abu Mazen is only a figurehead. The question should be rephrased: Are the Arab nations ready to make peace with Israel and to accept the existence of Israel in their midst?" Unfortunately for the latest pumped-up round of optimism about peace, the answer is 'No.' In truth, the longer Israel keeps up the pretense that this time will be different, the more lethal the terrorists become.
 READ MORE
 

CONVENIENT CULPRITS
by Caroline Glick

  As Caroline Glick points out, "since Arafat ordered Fatah chief Marwan Barghouti to form the "Unified Command of the Intifada" with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the separation of the various terror groups has been more theoretical than real." Nevertheless, to prevent political embarrassment, Clinton and Peres gave Arafat more weapons and resources. The party line was that if he was strong, he would confront the terrorist organizations. Abbas has replaced Arafat, but the collusion between the terror groups continues. As Glick says, "this problem will only grow if Israel vacates Gaza, providing them with a secure base of operations where Syria, Iran and Hizbullah will be able to arm and train them to attack at will."
 READ MORE
 

THE SEVEN PAIRS OF ASSES
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori takes a scalpel to the tender subject of America's heavy investment in building democracy in the Arab world rather than fighting terrorism head on. Using Muslim behavior in democratic Europe as indicator, it's clear that Islam's response to democracy has been negative. "The question remains whether democracy is in fact compatible with Islam."
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TSUNAMI RESCUES UN
by David Frankfurter

  The UN has aided terrorism by supporting Arab refugees financially while Arab UN personnel allow the refugee children to be indoctrinated with hate and recruited as terrorists. As skilled as the UN is at protecting its own, some appalling information has been leaking out about what the UN — lowly workers up through UN toplevel staff — has been up to: playing partisan politics, taking bribes, aiding and abetting terrorism, working against member nations, mismanaging funds entrusted to them. UNRWA's corruption has been the most egregious, but even sacred cows such as UNICEF are involved. David Frankfurter gives us a succinct summary of where we are now. Does anyone think the scandals uncovered are all there are?
 READ MORE
 

LIES TERRORISTS TELL
by Donald R. Hamilton

  Speaking from many years of experience working to prevent terrorism, Donald Hamilton talks about the lies terrorists tell, lies to make themselves appear reasonable and their destructiveness justified.
 READ MORE
 

IS THERE A HOPE TO "REFORM" ISLAM? An analysis of the real roots of Islamic terrorism and possible solutions
by Tawfik Hamid

  Once a member of a terrorist group, Mr. Hamid writes knowledgeably about Islamic terrorism. He tells us that "the origin of Islamic Terrorism is deeply rooted in the way Muslims understand their religion." Clearly and concisely, he describes how traditional Islamic teachings interpret particular terms and verses in ways that promotes violence. Reverting "to the pure Arabic language-based understanding of the words" would encourage peace.
 READ MORE
 

WHAT IS IT THAT WE'RE UP AGAINST?
by Patrick D. O'Brien

  Patrick O'Brien asks if our war on terrorism is a war on Islamic terror or on Islam itself. Clearly the terrorists we are fighting are always Muslim, where ever they are in the world. And yes, "we are at war with the doctrine of offensive, violent jihad against the infidel, which has always been, and still is, a central component in Islam – because we are the primary target, along with Israel, of this religious warfare." O'Brien points out that in fighting jihad, we can move humanity forward, and "can offer a chance at freedom to a lot of our fellow humans."
 READ MORE
 

Christians have been among the strongest of Israel's supporters and among the most offensive. The first essay speaks to why Christians should support Israel. The second reports on the recent decision by the World Council of Churces to divest themselves of holdings in Israel or in Israeli companies.

HALF AN ACRE AND A MULE
by Zack Lieberberg

  In this letter to Christians, Zack Lieberberg recounts the crimes Jews as a community have been accused of committing, crimes that were the overt reasons for Christians demonizing and murdering Jews. Today, "[o]nly the deaf can ignore the Arab threat to Israel. Only the blind cannot see that the 'two state solution" will be final in the Hitlerian sense.'" It's time Christians stopped covertly aiding the Arabs in their war against Israel and started actively promoting Israel's right to live securely in its own land.
 READ MORE
 

PROFESSOR MERKLEY ON THE DIVESTMENT DECISION OF THE WORLD COUNCIL OF CHURCHES (WCC)
by Joseph Alexander Norland

  Professor Paul Merkley suggests that the decision of the WCC's leaders to rid themselves of Church investments in Israel is a result of decades of absorbing misinformation about Israel mixed with a liberal-relativist theology and a tendency to pursue trendy ideas. Their view of Israel as illegitimate goes along with their "celebration of the alleged record of religious tolerance in Muslim empires." But it doesn't match the opinions and values of a growing number of their Church members.
 READ MORE
 

Oslo and now Disengagement seem to have been concocted by Israelis and then adopted by whatever American admininistration was in power. So, whether or not Bush instigated Israel's current crisis, he is a willing participant and deserves the criticism he is starting to get.

WITH GEORGE BUSH AS A FRIEND ...
by Rachel Neuwirth

  In the current issue of Commentary, Norman Podhoretz lays out many of the problems with the Gaza Disengagement Plan and then says he's for it because he has faith in George Bush. Charles Krauthammer feels the same. In this essay, we have a counterweight. Rachel Neuwirth writes a modern version of "Put not your faith in princes."
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RICE'S "VIABLE PALESTINIAN STATE" WOULD SHRINK ISRAEL OUT OF JORDAN VALLEY AND MOST OF WEST BANK
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Unless Secretary of State doesn't know the meaning of the word "contiguous", it behooves us to take her statement that the pieces of the projected Palestinian Arab state are to be joined. Basing his analysis on information from the DEBKAfile, Emanuel Winston spells out a frightening scenerio that follows logically from what seems a minor upheaval — uprooting the 8-9000 Jews from Gaza.
 READ MORE
 

WHY IS BUSH SO NICE TO PALESTINIAN TERRORISTS?
by Jock L. Falkson

  We know that terrorists become terrorists because they are bred that way, in conformity with their religion and the teachings of their leaders and educators. But we mustn't lose sight of another important reason: terror pays. In this essay, Jock Falkson points out the inconsistencies in Bush's policy of condemning terrorism that targets Americans and rewarding terrorism that is aimed at Israelis.
 READ MORE
 

These next essays deal with Israel's soul. What defines Judaism? What is the relationship of the Jewish people to their land?

WHAT IS ISRAEL'S MESSAGE?
by Martin Wasserman

  There is much evidence demonstrating Israel's ineptitude in making its case in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Martin Wasserman suggests that "maybe the problem is not the delivery, but the message itself." He suggests that Israel simply state that the land is ours because God gave it to us and we've returned home. "What's important is not that the world accepts the covenant, but that we accept it. If we live up to it, and achieve the promised results, the world will have no choice but to accept it."
 READ MORE
 

MISOJUDAISM AND ANTI-ZIONISM
by Michael Anbar

  Zionism is often thought to be a recent movement and, according to some, no longer of significance. In this insightful essay, Michael Anbar argues that "Zionism is a non-separable, fundamental aspect of Judaism — an aspect without which Judaism loses its meaning as a national culture. Eliminating Zionism and the hope for the Messiah leaves Judaism without its soul, leaving a dead skeleton of bare rituals." Perhaps that is why Jew-haters try so hard to rid Judaism of its Zionist convictions.
 READ MORE
 

THE TEMPLE MOUNT SECRET
by Boris Shusteff

  The dismal way some secular Jews view their Jewish roots was shown when Moshe Dayan turned over the keys to the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site, to the Arabs. The Arabs understood what the Jews did not: that the Temple Mount was linked to our very peoplehood. And they have been trying to destroy Judaism by destroying this connection ever since.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. The Blog-Eds page for the month is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

March 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

April 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 

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January-February, 2005

Sharon's plan for ethnically cleansing the Jews of Gaza continues, in what is apparently the start of a campaign to drive the Jews from the rest of Biblical Israel. These first essays examine what's happening, particularly from the point of view of how it is affecting the settlers and how amputation of part of Israel, setting Israeli against Israeli, will damage all of Israel.

A GUSH KATIF-STYLE CELEBRATION
by Anita Tucker

  Anita Tucker tells us how her community celebrated the writing of a new Torah scroll. They celebrated in the aftermath of a Kassam missile attack. "Through the Kassam rockets' red glare..." What a wonderful example of the magnificance of the human spirit under fire!
 READ MORE
 

BAGELS FOR BASTARDS
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein lives in Gush Katif, Gaza. As an immigrant from America, he's often coopted into talking to visiting firemen. Here is his latest email. As always, it's filled both with angst and with humor. We can't help wondering if the Jews developed into stand-up comics as a response to being exposed to imminent dangers and close calls with death. If true, wouldn't it be nice to let some other people develop its sense of humor?
 READ MORE
 

THE FUNDAMENTAL, ETERNAL VALUES OF OUR PEOPLE
by David Wilder

  The Sharon government is clearly no longer controlled by rule of law. Under the pretext of upholding the law, they have perverted policies intended to protect Israeli citizens. In this case, they arrested women protesting the edict that they were to be kicked out of their homes and homeland. Then the government moved to take away their children — accusing the women of child neglect.
 READ MORE
 

A CLASH OF WORLD VIEWS
by Moshe Kempinski

  Moshe Kempinski provides us with insight in how the unique vision that sustained Jews through centuries of an abusive exile is playing out in Israel. For those who, like abused children, blame themselves, "Universalism has become the battle cry." — they want to be like everyone else. For others "...the return of the exiles to their homeland serve[s] as sign post that Destiny is being fulfilled." Ironically, these 'visionaries' have the better pragmatic understanding that retreating from Gaza is the start of a disasterous and general retreat.
 READ MORE
 

TO PREVENT AN UNBRIDGEABLE RIFT
by Boris Shusteff

  Ariel Sharon has spoken of the need for kindness and unity among Israelis. But, as Boris Shusteff points out, his recent dictatorial political decision to expel the Jews of Gaza from their homes – independent of its political wisdom — has the divisive effect of setting Jew against Jew.
 READ MORE
 

THE GYPSY AND HIS HORSE
by Boris Shusteff

  In this second essay, Boris Shusteff points out that Sharon's government intends to follow the Gaza retreat by abandoning Judea and Samaria. Weakened by internal dissension and the likely establishment of a hostile Arab state, Israel will be easy prey to the Arabs, who have never abandonned their goal of destroying Israel.
 READ MORE
 

UNITED WE STAND
by Paula R. Stern

  The Israelis who live in Gaza or Samaria or Judea have been so demonized and disparaged that many a secular Israeli feels no kinship with them. And the 'settlers' in turn often are dismissive of the secularists. Paula Stern points out that both sides need to regain a sense of community, an understanding that all Israelis are settlers and all Israelis have the right to live in safety. Animosity should be directed not at each other but at the Arab terrorist organizations who want to destroy all of Israel, not just the territories.
 READ MORE
 

FOUR PARABLES FOR ISRAEL
by Bernard J.S. Shapiro

  In this delightful essay, Bernard Shapiro uses parables to makes some insightful points about Israel's leader — Arik the bulldozer — whose rampages are taking Israel away from peace and very much towards disaster.
 READ MORE
 

THE OBLIGATION OF AN HEIRLOOM
by Michelle Nevada

  Michelle Nevada tells us a simple story that makes a strong point — as she is keeper of her family's heirlooms, so is the Israeli government steward of the Land of Israel for all Jews. As she says of the plan to retreat from Gaza, "We should not allow the greatest, most important heirloom every given to our family, by G-d, to be given away to strangers."
 READ MORE
 

These essays also look at the perturbations caused by Sharon's policy. They look at the economics and implementation of the expulsion, its faulty underpinnings, and how to prevent the catastrophe.

THE GREAT LAND ROBBERY
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Many reasons have been adduced for Sharon's fantastic desire to expel Jews from Biblical Israel, abandonning the land to hordes of Arab terrorists. In this essay, Emanuel Winston focusses on some hard economic facts. The Jews of Gaza came to a barren rocky land some 30 years ago and have made it beautiful and productive. How does Sharon propose to reimburse them for their property? Or doesn't he. Is it just, au fond, a land grab?
 READ MORE
 

THE REALITY OF A FAKE DOCUMENT
by Elyakim Haetzni

  While the politicians and media wisemen reassure us how important it is to clear Gaza of Jews, making it seem a surgically necessary but clean withdrawal operation, the IDF planners are devising ways of handling ugly contingencies. The plans are designed to maximize an easy take-over by the Arabs. And if the Jews are injured and demoralized? If their lives and livihood are destroyed? Oh well.
 READ MORE
 

THE DEMOGRAPHIC BOMB IS A DUD
by Caroline Glick

  Much of the Arab success in demoralizing Israel has been their clever psychologics, bolstered by a 1997 report that projected that the Arab population west of the Jordan would predominate by 2015. The data have recently been reexamined — and the 1997 report was dead wrong. As Caroline Glick concludes, "Something has gone very wrong within Israeli society. The numbers are so clear. The data have always been readily available. And yet, like bats attracted to the darkness of a cave, we preferred the manipulative lies of the PA to the truth."
 READ MORE
 

HOW TO DEFEAT THE SHARON PLAN
by David Bedein

  David Bedein has been examining the Sharon plan to retreat from Gaza while expelling the Jewish inhabitants of Gaza. In this essay, he proposes specific practical activities that will help all of Israel understand what is at stake in the innocuous-sounding "Disengagement Plan."
 READ MORE
 

These essays examine some factors that made it possible for Sharon to act dictatorially, against the wishes of the Israelis in the last election. There are some alternatives to Sharon and his plans.

ISRAELIS, UNITE! IT'S TIME FOR CHANGE!
by Boris Celser

  Some months ago, Boris Celser wrote an incisive analysis of why Israel's political system of proportional representation with no direct election of local politicians is the root cause of Israel's political woes. He intends this article to jumpstart the process of correcting Israel's political system by making some practical and doable suggestions. It is also a challenge to those in a position to do something, principally those in the media and experts in various fields.
 READ MORE
 

THERE IS A SOLUTION TO THE CONFLICT
by Martin Sherman

  Martin Sherman points out that "[t]he Palestinian problem is very much an artificial product of the evilness of Arab states (and the foolishness of the state of Israel). The world has bought the lie that there is a Palestinian people and it longs only to recapture its lost and ancient homeland. But recent polls suggest these Arabs would be amenable to transfer to decent housing in Arab countries.
 READ MORE
 

THE NEXT PRIME MINISTER OF ISRAEL
by Ben Shapiro

  In response to those who feel there's no substitute leader for Sharon, we bring you an assessment by Ben Shapiro of Moshe Feiglin, co-founder of Manhigut Yehudit, a group of people within the Likud party, who believe that Israel can be a thriving and modern state based on Jewish values, with a Jewish identity.
  READ MORE
 

The Arabs have used their religion as inspiration and directive and as powerful weapon to disarm criticism. They would have to change much of their culture for real peace in the Middle East and in the rest of the world. Is such a change possible?

TAKING AWAY THEIR GREATEST WEAPON
by Beth Goodtree

  In this essay Beth Goodtree focuses on religion, how the West sees it as sacrosanct and, because of our hands-off attitude, how the Islamists carry out their goals under cover of religion. If you think this alarmist, also read Lappin's article "Ford Has A Better Idea: One Nation Under Allah" (http://www.think-israel.org/lappen.fordfoundation.html) on how Arabs are using respect for Sharia (Muslim law) to nullify freedoms granted us in our Constitution.
 READ MORE
 

PALESTINIAN MYTHS PRECLUDE A LASTING PEACE
by Salomon Benzimra

  Democratic institutions and new leaders of the Palestinian Authority are insufficient to develop real peace between Israel and her Arab neighbors. Salomon Benzimra discusses the importance of dismantling the myths that have sustained the Palestinian cause since its inception in the 1960s. The Palestinian Arabs need to unlearn the lies they value so much they are willing to die for them.
 READ MORE
 

PEACEMONGERS AND JIHADEERS
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori writes of the need to defeat Islam, because otherwise it will continue to try to destroy all that isn't Islam. And in the name of Islam, it must continue to try to bring the deadening peace of Islam to all of us. The question then is — do we have the will to defeat Islam, whether it wears the violent face of terror or, what is more dangerous, the peaceful face of moderation?
 READ MORE
 

By any measure, the Arabs have behaved bestially during the second intifada, yet the world sympathizes with them, taking any tiny deviation from Arab violence as an excuse to pressure Israel to appease the aggressors. Changing this will take time and effort. One requirement is serious reform the United Nations. Changing Israel's image with intelligent hasbara is also necessary.

ASSESSMENT: ISRAEL IN 2005
by Morris J. Amitay

  This is a clear-eyed assessment of what the "election" of Abu Mazen means and doesn't mean. It is unlikely to create a benign attitude towards Israel among the Palestinian Arabs; it is likely to provide the occasion for pressuring Israel, a tactic traditionally advocated by the "peace camp" in Israel, the pro-Arab relics of previous American administrations and much of the media. It is unfortunate that most American Jews don't yet understand the dangers Israel is likely to face this year, so they make a poor counterforce.
 READ MORE
 

EVERY PARTY NEEDS A POOPER ...
by Jeff Dunetz

  Did you yawn when the smiling faces of Rice, Abbas and Sharon announced a new peace initiatve? Been there. Done that. Jeff Dunetz tranlates everyone's cynicism — or is it realism — into boardgame terms.
 READ MORE
 

WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE?
by Israel Zwick

  Israel Zwick writes a logical article about a glaring illogic – contrary to the facts and to any sense of justice, since the second intifada started in 2000, the world has poured forth sympathy to the terrorists while continuing to vilify the Israeli victims. There were flowers aplenty for Arafat, but none for the Jews who died or were maimed for life because of his successful terrorist attacks. Zwick suggests that blaming Israel is a stand-in for an underlying and ongoing hostility to Judaism as Judaism.
 READ MORE
 

UNDIPLOMATIC IMBALANCE
by Anne Bayefsky

  The U.N. is expending time and effort to appear to be reforming itself. Actually, the problem is simple and unexamined. As Anne Bayefsky puts it: "For the past four decades the United Nations has become the personal propaganda machine of the ... Arab and Islamic states" and their surrogate: the Palestinians. And, she concludes, "... so far, no one is prepared to do anything about it."
 READ MORE
 

PALESTINIAN WORD GAMES
by Daniel Pipes

  By persuading the foreign media to adopt their terms and descriptors for people and places, the Palestinian Arabs has succeeded in selling their version of events in Israel to the world. The association of ideas that come with these labels give the Arabs a strong advantage in the language war, an important component in the war the Arabs have waged against Israel since before its inception. As Daniel Pipes asks, "Who, a century back, would have imagined Jews making the better soldiers and Arabs the better publicists?"
 READ MORE
 

HOW ISRAEL CAN IMPROVE ITS HASBARA: And Why It Needs To
by Bernard J. Shapiro

  Israel's hasbara (its public relations) was never good and certainly didn't improve when Shimon Peres as Foreign Minister decided to abolish hasbara — he didn't feel it was necessary. Bernard Shapiro suggests Israel needs to do what its enemies do, and "mold public opinion" instead of ignoring it. This is particularly important now that — thanks to long-term, broad-based and excellent Arab propaganda — it is politically correct is to be pro-Arab, no matter what they do. And the major media outlets have no qualms about misreporting, omitting contextual facts, and telling plain ordinary lies that defame Israel.
 READ MORE
 

EUROPE: WAKE UP
by Dr. Emmanuel Navon

  Dr. Emmanuel Navon points out there are "many reasons why European public opinion is so antagonistic toward Israel, but one of them is the manipulation of media and information by Israel's foes." Most Europeans believe "that the Arab-Israeli conflict is the source of Islamic terrorism..." Dr. Navon suggests some corrective facts that might convince Europeans that the basic problem is the Arab appetite for conquest. They want to take over Israel — and Europe.
 READ MORE
 

In this section we talk about the media and how it spreads the virus of anti-Semitism, sometimes openly, sometimes under the guise of just being anti-Israel.

COCKBURN'S COCKROACHES
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut, himself an academic, has become an impurtant figure in the defense of free speech and accurate scholarship, fighting intolerant and sloppy, often mendacious, often rabid, Leftist academics, both in Israel and America. Here he writes about the relationship of Ward Churchill, Counterpunch magazine and its editor, Alexander Cockburn.
 READ MORE
 

WASHINGTON POST DISTORTS BUILDING IN JERUSALEM
by Lee Green

  Lee Green dissects some of the errors in a slipshod Washington Post story by John Ward Anderson on illegal construction in the eastern part of Jerusalem. Contrary to the impression given by the story, most of the illegal building is done by Arabs, as part of a strategy to claim Jerusalem as their own. And, again negating the claims in Anderson's story, very few of these illegal Arab buildings are demolished. Jews are treated much less kindly.
 READ MORE
 

TERRORISM'S AMERICAN GIGOLO: Richard Gere's Palestinian Bedfellows
by Debbie Schlussel

  It's rather surprising that Richard Gere, who is so associated with an image of a peaceful Tibet quietly resisting Chinese aggression, also identifies with the violence and terrorism with which the Palestinian Arabs promote their cause. But, as Debbie Schlussel writes, there he is, arm-in-arm with some pretty aggressive folk in a get-out-the-post-Arafat-vote. Does he realize he's being used by some slick sleaze?
 READ MORE
 

As if we don't have enough enemies, some American Jews are proving to be just as virulent. And some anti-Semitic myths have been allowed to flourish. What is most distressing: those who should be showing leadership are doing a poor job fighting back.

THE ANTI-ZIONIST ZIONISTS
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  Alyssa Lappen carefully dissects Brit Tzedek v'shalom, an anti-Israel organization that has been received at the White House as if it were a genuine voice of American Jewry. She traces its affiliation with other groups whose mission is to destroy Israel; many of these have direct links with terrorist groups. She traces its funding to the Ford Foundation, which "claims to have stopped directly funding Brit Tzedek and Palestinian NGO's." But hasn't.
 READ MORE
 

SUICIDAL JEWS: WHEN WILL THEY LEARN?
by Cinnamon Stillwell

  Cinnamon Stillwell links the bonding of Jews in the Bay area with those who want to destroy Jews and Judaism to the identification of the Jewish kapos with their Nazi masters. She points out that "[t]he current disengagement plan and the resurgence of Oslo-like naiveté ... [are] the capitulation without cause that seems to plague ... [Israel] in moments of doubt."
 READ MORE
 

THE INVASION OF IRAQ WAS NOT AN ISRAELI PLOT
by Eugene Girin

  It is a myth that policy in the Middle East is dominated by a group of reconstructed Jews — once liberal, now conservative — who manipulate America's foreign policy for Israel's benefit. In point of fact, the neocons are devoted to exporting democracy and it is Iran, not Israel, that has benefitted from the invasion of Iraq.
 READ MORE
 

REPORT CARD ON AMERICAN JEWISH LEADERSHIP
by Rachel Neuwirth

  This forthright essay by Rachel Neuwirth on the general lack of effective leadership by Jewish American institutions in addressing the serious problems confronting Jews in America is a gem. It says what should have been obvious all along. It will make you wonder why it hasn't been said — and addressed — by now.
 READ MORE
 

These essays are about historical events. The first is a summary of important facts people should know before they start spouting off about the Arab-Israeli conflict. The others discuss the British handling of the Balfour declaration and the connection between the Arabs and the Nazis.

A FEW UNFASHIONABLE FACTS WORTH KNOWING ABOUT THE MIDDLE EAST
by Steven Plaut

  This essay is strictly facts — no interpretation. Steven Plaut accurately makes the point that "Palestine was stolen from the Jews by the Arabs and not the other way around." Several articles in Think-Israel — as well as much of the background page — have made the same points in different ways. And we will keep repeating the truth until the Arabs and their buddies stop lying.
 READ MORE
 

PALESTINE: THE ORIGINAL SIN
by Meir Abelson

  This is a remarkable essay on a major reason why radical Arabs set the tone of the attitude of the Arab to the Jew. Around the time of the Balfour Declaration, there were Arabs who welcomed the return of the Jew and there were hostile Arabs — we are just now beginning to recognize the underpinning of their hostility. Why have the hostile Arabs succeeded? Meir Abelson writes, "painful though it may be to admit — the fact is that the seed [of anti-Semitism] was sown by the British in Palestine under the Mandate..."
 READ MORE
 

ARABS AND NAZIS — CAN IT BE TRUE?
by Elliott A Green

  Elliott Green eschews fanciful analogies and provides us with a substantive article on the strong affiliation of the Arabs with the Nazis and their Axis partners, during World War 2, with the Mufti of Jerusalem as a prime example. A major theme of the article is to counter the softsoaping of the relationship that many reference encyclopedias now present.
 READ MORE
 

NAZI ROOTS OF PALESTINIAN NATIONALISM
by David Storobin

  While dealing with the same period as does Elliott Green, David Storobin describes how Husseini was able to con the British while promoting the German war effort. Change the names of the players, this essay could be describing how Arafat manipulated the Western powers just yesterday.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

January 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
February 2005 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 

=================================================

November-December, 2004

These essays are about the Jews of Gaza and Ariel Sharon's plan to expel them from their homes, making Biblical Israel Judenrein. Leaving Gaza will also make it easier for the Arabs to attack the rest of Israel.

HAVE YOU READ THE SHARON PLAN? PLO EMPOWERMENT, NOT DISENGAGEMENT
by David Bedein

  Aryeh Zelasko said of this article, "David Bedein makes clear that the Sharon plan make no sense as a disengagement plan. After the extermination of the Jewish presence in Gaza, Israel will still be responsible for all aspects of life there and will continue to provide all vital services. Also, there will be no change in the economic relationship between the Arab workers of Gaza and their Jewish bosses in Israel. In short, the only thing Sharon's plan does is expel the Jews of Gaza and steal their property."
 READ MORE
 

I AM A SETTLER
by Ashley Perry

  The settlers of Gaza, Samaria and Judea have been so demonized, trivialized and neutered, it almost comes as a shock to read what a settler is really like. Get the scoop from Ashley Perry, who writes, "So yes I am a settler! I make no apology for it. I never hurt anyone, I never stole anyone's land." "I'm just like most people on this planet ... a regular person. A regular person doesn't hate any particular people."
 READ MORE
 

REPENTANCE OR DISSECTING SHARON
by Boris Shusteff

  The past is very often an excellent guide to understanding what's happening now and what to expect in the future. Boris Shusteff calmly and skillfully relates the details of Sharon's political history. As he points out, Sharon has seesawed between contradictory positions not out of conviction or ideological principles but out of personal interest and the desire to remain in power.
 READ MORE
 

WHAT IS A SECURE AND SOVEREIGN JEWISH STATE OF ISRAEL?
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanuel Winston discusses how Israel's security requirements have been whittled away by the failed Oslo peace accords. "Now, we have Arik Sharon retreating from Gaza at the behest of friends and enemies – even as the terrorists have introduced longer range Kassem rockets that are already being fired into what Sharon calls 'Israel proper.'"
 READ MORE
 

'WITHER' ISRAEL?
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Frank Gaffney, Jr. assesses Israel's current condition as grim. Its "leaders who promised to protect [Israel] against Arab neighbors bent on the destruction of the Jewish State" have not and do not. The Arabs, the Europeans and the U.N. apply coercive pressure. And Sharon "is unilaterally withdrawing from the Gaza Strip, a superficially appealing and politically popular cut-your-losses move that will, unfortunately, give rise to a new safehaven for terrorists..."
 READ MORE
 

No one really believes that the Gaza disengagement will stop terrorism or bring peace, not even those who, for all sorts of sleazy reasons, sing its praises. These next essays suggest some new approaches for Israel to try. Unlike the Disengagement Plan, they are worth exploring.

DISMANTLE REFUGEE CAMPS, NOT SETTLEMENTS
by Israel Zwick

  Expelling the Jews of Gaza in the expectation that Gaza will be the start of a peaceful, democratic Palestinian state is unrealistic. As Israel Zwick observes, "There isn't a single, democratic Islamic state in the whole world, why would this be different?" He suggests an autonomous representative government that might serve as a model for the Middle East.
 READ MORE
 

THE ARAB DEMOGRAPHIC PROBLEM: A NEW APPROACH
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Paul Eidelberg proposes an innovative way to deal with the Arab demographic problem: the explosive Arab birthrate threatens to destroy the character of the Jewish state. Professor Eidelberg's solution is to "make the State of Israel increasingly Jewish and proud on the one hand, and authentically democratic on the other!" This article discusses implementation.
 READ MORE
 

THE JEWISH STRUGGLE AGAINST ARABS IN ISRAEL
by Ariel Natan Pasko

  It is ironic that while the Arabs strive to make land they control Jew-free, in the name of democracy an activist leftwing judiciary and a timid government have encouraged Arab takeover of Jewish communities in Israel. In contract, as Ariel Natan Pasko points out, 63.7% [of Israeli Jews] "believes that the government should encourage Israeli Arabs to emigrate from Israel," while "71% [of Israeli Arabs] specified one or more material factors that would induce them to emigrate permanently..."
 READ MORE
 

REDEFINING THE (ARAB) PALESTINIAN PROBLEM
by Martin Sherman

  We have abundant evidence that "the goal of the Palestinians is not to establish a state for themselves but to dismantle a state for others – the Jews." But setting their political aspirations aside, a beneficial change in their environment can be addressed. Martin Sherman points out that "[t]he sums required for the humanitarian resettlement of the entire Palestinian population in countries with a similar/familiar socio-religious environment would be significantly less than those already spent by the U.S. on the Iraq War."
 READ MORE
 

Muslims have traits — fostered by Islam — that create problems for everyone, perhaps even for themselves. They view any land that becomes Muslim as being Muslim forever after. Their harsh environment has conditioned them to perpetual battle, not negotiation. Their religion degrades women and denigrates other religions. For these reasons, Western optimism and the search by the West for the moderate Muslim is the wrong approach.

TIME TO GET CRACKING AT THE VATICAN
by Hugh Fitzgerald

  The Vatican explains Muslim "Christianphobia" as a response to the war on terror. Hugh Fitzgerald presents cogent arguments that contradict that simplistic and erroneous explanation.
 READ MORE
 

HOPE OR ILLUSION?
by Len Estrin

  Much of the Middle East is desert, barely capable of supporting life and it has formed the Arab character. Len Estrin points out that "[s]urvival in a desert land requires its own set of rules; and ... these rules are not truly understood by Western society, including a Westernized Israel." The bottom line: peace will come to the region "through victory or defeat." "Negotiation, conciliation or compromise" will continue to fail.
 READ MORE
 

STOP THEM!
by Koorosh Afshar

  The author, an Iranian student who writes under a pseudonym, observes that "[t]he infamousness of the Shiite clerics of Iran is not a new story ... as they are already known to the world as the 'bad guys'." He talks in this article about the appalling behavior of judges appointed by the mullahs and how destructive their immorality is to the younger generation.
 READ MORE
 

CAIR'S  "ANTI-MUSLIM" HYSTERIA
by Steven Stalinsky

  A poll by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) concluded that many Americans have a negative image of Muslims. Steven Stalinsky notes that "CAIR doesn't address why Americans might have legitimate concerns about some aspects of the Muslim world ... Instead, it placed the onus on Americans to learn about Islam — which is a code word for the Islamic concept of da'wa, converting non-Muslims."
 READ MORE
 

MUSLIM "MODERATES"
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  In another essay, Professor Eidelberg quotes De Tocqueville, "... by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad. So far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and, though less absurd than the polytheism of old, its social and political tendencies are in my opinion more to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress in relation to paganism itself." Professor Eidelberg argues in this essay that the optimism voiced by some scholars about Islam may be politically correct but is delusional.
 READ MORE
 

The previous set of essays examined the aspects of the Muslim character that make it unlikely that we can obtain a lasting peace by peaceful means. Yet, despite all the evidence, many — even many in power – still believe the road to peace is through appeasement. This set of essays discuss various aspects of the general War on Terrorism we are reluctantly fighting.

LESSONS FROM NORTHERN IRELAND FOR THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
by Dean Godson

  In this insightful essay on the British mindset, Dean Godson writes that "Many British officials [Tony Blair included] see a strong resemblance between the Israelis and the [Protestant] Unionists"; both are viewed as having "driven out indigenous peoples with a greater right to the land." Both are urged to make a "massive number of political concessions" to the IRA and the Palestinian Arabs, who, whatever they do, are not seen as really terrorists because, after all, they are in the right.
 READ MORE
 

A SYMPOSIUM: THE TERROR WAR: HOW WE CAN WIN
by Jamie Glazov

  Jamie Glazov of Front Page Magazine was moderator of a symposium on the nature of Islamism, "a totalitarian ideology" and how to fight the war the Islamists are waging against us. The participants — Walter Laqueur, Ion Mihai Pacepa, Robert Leiken and Ralph Peters — proposed, besides killing terrorists for however long it takes to subdue them, such countermeasures as better intelligence, education, PR, preemption, civilizing Iraq and recognizing that a small group of terrorists might acquire weapons of mass distruction. The core of the problem, as Mr. Peters put it is, "This isn't really a battle of ideas, but a contest of souls." The struggle "began in the seventh century A.D. As Islamic conquerors burst out of Arabia, a war began that has never ceased."
 READ MORE
 

OF COURAGE AND COWARDICE
by Caroline Glick

  Caroline Glick writes about the courage of Theo van Gogh and Pim Fortuyn, two Dutchmen both murdered by Muslims, concluding that "... if at the end of the day Holland is able to protect itself from the gathering threat of Islamic terrorism, their sacrifice will have saved countless lives of their countrymen." In contrast, In Israel "... our leaders seem hell-bent on relinquishing the battleground to our enemies and to those who see their advancement resulting from our diminishment."
  READ MORE
 

ISRAEL HAS THE RIGHT
by Patrick D. O'Brien

  When I finished reading this article, I thought it could have been titled 'Why's a nice Jewish country like Israel so stupid and so benevolent towards its enemies?' Patrick D. O'Brien points out "that Israel works extremely hard to strike the difficult balance between defending its citizens and respecting the rights and lives of its enemies." And yet, "[t]he world erupts in outrage when Israel hunts down the Islamic terrorists who hide and operate among a civilian Arab population." but keeps silent when Jews are slaughtered.
 READ MORE
 

FRAUD! UNRWA EXPOSED
by Moshe Dann

  Unlike all other groups who have become refugees temporarily, the refugee status of the Palestinian arab is artificially maintained by the United Nations Relief and Welfare Agency (UNRWA). The problem is not just political. As Moshe Dann writes, "... UNRWA receives funding from terrorist organizations (including al Qaida connected) and [UNRWA's] 'refugee camps' are major centers of terrorism."
 READ MORE
 

GETTING BEYOND HYPOCRISY
by Hillel Halkin

  Hillel Halkin carefully dissects the ideas associated with the word terrorism and how it differs from insurrection, from guerilla warfare, from ordinary murder. He concludes with what most of us not in the media always knew: "the Palestinians who for decades killed Israelis ... in order to promote the goals of the Palestinian Liberation Organization were terrorists ..."
 READ MORE
 

CYCLE OF VIOLENCE?
by Dr. Steve Berger

  Dr. Steve Berger debunks the notion that there is an escalating cycle of violence in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Instead, there is a marked asymmetry between the indiscriminate barbarity — bombings, decapitations, stonings, dismemberings — of the Arabs and the pinpoint Israeli response.
 READ MORE
 

GIVING TERROR A BOOST
by Daniel Mandel

  Daniel Mandel points out that while the media profess to be objective, in reality they too often sanitize the Arab terrorist, while using "highly judgmental language" about Israeli counterterrorism. He suggests the media act out of pro-Palestinian bias and fear that publishing the truth would leave their reporters open to Arab anger. In the end, "... they become obliging accomplices of terrorists."
 READ MORE
 

TERROR'S FINANCIERS
by Neal M. Sher

  It has become clear, as Neal M. Sher tells us, that Saudi Arabia "has for years been engaged in a criminal conspiracy to give aid, comfort, and material support to mass murderers [Hamas]." "Not some rogue Saudis, not a fringe element seeking to destabilize the nation. No, the Saudi government itself." To counter the Saudi threat, Sher suggests that "[t]he passage of a strengthened Saudi Arabia Accountability Act — which makes it difficult to waive its provisions — would be a good beginning."
 READ MORE
 

Arafat is dead. The question now is: after Arafat, what?

LONG LIVE ARAFAT!
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Now that he's dead, some of the horrible details of Arafat's life have finally received wide exposure. Yashiko Sagamori takes the opposite tack and tells us about Arafat's straight-faced sense of humor — how he generously donated his AIDS-infected blood to the 9/11 terror victims — and how he was idolized by the very people whose future he ruined. Does Arafat's death usher in a new era? Sagamori reminds us that Lenin was followed by Stalin, Kim Il Sung by Kim Jong Il and Hafez Assad by Bashar Assad.
 READ MORE
 

THE MAUDLIN MEDIA MANIA FOR THE MURDERER
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut summarizes the extreme adulation given Arafat by the media, politicians, "statesmen" and some on the Israeli left. It probably says as much about Arafat's admirers as it does about Arafat.
 READ MORE
 

UNDERSTANDING PALESTINIAN POLITICS
by Barry Rubin

  While most of the press, ever optimistic, expect that now, with Arafat's death, negotiation with his successor should be possible. Professor Barry Rubin is less sanguine. He names the major players – the people and factions — that will try to assume power. He believes that "[i]f there is a collective leadership, it will include leaders of very different viewpoints who will be unlikely to agree to any new or different direction. With no single leader or chain of command, it is going to be hard for anyone to make policy or take actions such as ending the violence or engaging in serious negotiations. The most likely outcome "... is a quiet anarchy in which different groups operate on their own and ignore instructions from the top."
 READ MORE
 

WILL A GAZA "HAMAS-STAN" BECOME A FUTURE AL-QAEDA SANCTUARY?
by Maj-Gen. (res) Yaakov Amidror and David Keyes

  Major General Yaakov Amidror and David Keyes lay out likely consequences of Sharon's Disengagement plan coupled with Yasser Arafat's death. A likely scenario is that Hamas — one of the resident terrorist groups — will take over and offer Al-Qaeda a working base and a safe haven. The authors point out that, "Ironically, by seeking to neutralize Israeli military power, Western states would help create the very sort of security vacuum in Gaza that al-Qaeda requires in order to establish a new sanctuary.
 READ MORE
 

The next essays discuss anti-Semitism from anti-Semitic acts through the centuries up to a major modern-day offender, the United Nations. Professor Beres asserts it is a religious duty for American Christians to prevent a second Holocaust, and the final essay makes the subtle point that depriving Israeli Jews of their ordinary human rights and "usurpation of Jewish national assets and sacrilege of Jewish spiritual heritage" is the start of the slippery slope to what was once called the 'Final Solution'.

ANTI-SEMITISM  -  WHAT IS IT?
by Laureen Moe

  Laureen Moe, a Canadian, provides a brief but excellent historical summary of anti-Semitism from Roman times to the present, where she concentrates on the start of Modern Zionism, the Holocaust and Canada's rejectionist response to the pleas to save Jews. She notes, however, that things are changing and "Christians throughout the world are awakening to a call to stand by the side of the Jewish people."
 READ MORE
 

THE U.N. DISCOVERS THE CAUSE OF ANTI-SEMITISM: JEWS
by Anne Bayefsky

  Swathed in the trappings of a serious report, the draft report of the UN conference in Barcelona on anti-Semitism has produced a ludicrous explanation of the causes of anti-Semitism — it's the Jews. As Anne Bayefsky writes of the report's conclusions, "Simply put, Jews are responsible for anti-Semitism. Or, if it weren't for Israel's annoying insistence on defending itself, on the same terms as would be applied to any other state faced with five decades of wars and terrorism aimed at its obliteration, Jews would be better off."
 READ MORE
 

HOW AND WHY AMERICA'S CHRISTIANS MUST CARE FOR ISRAEL
by Professor Louis Rene Beres

  "Arab terror in Israel ... is openly genocidal." Professor Beres makes the case that the responsibility of Christians to help prevent a second Holocaust goes beyond what is expected from ordinary human decency. It is a religious obligation. As he says, "At the heart of G-d's covenant with Israel is the promise to the Jewish people — His People — to the land of Israel. For Christians, this promise is the only 'Road Map' of value."
 READ MORE
 

PEACE CANNOT REST ON INJUSTICE
by Judah (Yehuda) Tzoref

  We are so used to hearing "human rights" associated with the Arab encroachment of the Land belonging by every legitimate measuring stick to Israel that it comes almost as a shock to read Judah Tzoref's valid argument that Arab aspirations can not be fulfilled by depriving the Jews of their right "to human and national equality."
 READ MORE
 

This section is about some of the pernicious Left. It is about the Israeli academics who defend the Arabs, no matter what they do, and work against Israel, no matter what it does. It has even coopted some concepts intrinsic to Judaism to work against Judaism. In the United States, we have the earnest liberal, who have taken up the cause of the 'poor Palestinian' underdog, without bothering to fortify his prejudices with facts.

EXPOSED: ISRAEL'S TENURED RADICALS
by Robert Kornfeld

  Robert Kornfeld writes about entrenched Marxist Israeli academics who teach the young "that Israel is a criminal 'colonial' entity responsible for the Arab violence against it, that the Arabs are the victims, and that Israel can end the violence by satisfying Arab demands... It was such ideas that led to the disastrous Oslo accords, which glorified Yasser Arafat as a peacemaker and brought a rain of death and destruction on Israel that continues to this day." He writes, too, of a new group, Israel Academic Monitor, devoted to exposing and monitoring abuse of academic freedom.
 READ MORE
 

AT JEOPARDY — Part II
by Patricia Berlyn

  In Part I, Patricia Berlyn discussed how dangerous Sharon's ill-considered disengagement plan is for Israel. In Part II, she looks at the "obstinate intiguers" within the State, the "... several, often overlapping, cliques bent on obliterating the meaning and purpose of Israel." This includes media people, artists, the Marxist Left and the fervently irreligious politicians. They have mounted an assault on the right of free speech for anyone except themselves.
 READ MORE
 

BETWEEN THE UNIVERSAL AND THE GLOBAL
by Dr. Judah Tzoref

  In this insightful essay, Dr. Judah Tzoref contrasts the Jewish concept of universality — which views other cultures "as a manifestation of the natural order of creation" — and the notion of globalization, which strives "to press nations into the confines of a global village, where all national distinctions are eventually obliterated. Unfortunately, the ingrained Jewish belief in universality has been distorted by Israel's political Left to support its "ideological endeavor to dismantle social textures intrinsically related to human nature, such as family and nation."
 READ MORE
 

THE ASSOCIATES OF HERR ZUNDEL
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut chronicles the history of Ernst Zundel, a German-born Canadian, whose website, Zundelsite, became a major node in the distribution of Holocaust-denying Hitler-venerating propaganda. The author of this article has more than an academic interest in Zundel and his buddies. A contributor to the Zundelsite, Neve Gordon, lecturer in political science at Ben-Gurion University, has sued Plaut for criticizing him.
 READ MORE
 

INTERPRETERS OF PEACE: PLO Flag Waving In Dupont Circle
by Carrie Devorah

  How far away is the Arab-Israel conflict? It's as far away as your local university and wherever pro-Palestinian folks can set up a table, raise a poster, woo a passerby. Carrie Devorah writes of her encounter with members of one such group in Washington, D.C. Their passion was almost as strong as their ignorance.
 READ MORE
 

The next essays are about historical events. The first two tell about Jerusalem and Israel in the first part of the 20th Century, well before the Arab League created a 'people' from ordinary Arabs who lived locally and/or were migrating into what the British called Palestine. What hasn't changed is Arab instability and violence. The third essay could serve as a parable for what happens when academics seem to be the last to wake up to reality.

THE LAND OF ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM IN 1900
by Elliott A. Green

  Elliot Green writes of a time — all of a hundred years ago — when there was no such entity as Palestine, let alone a Palestinian people. There was not even such a thing as Arab nationalism. As they had from Biblical times, Jews lived in the Land — then an undifferentiated part of the Ottoman Empire — and were not called occupiers. Arabs lived there and were not called owners.
 READ MORE
 

THE HEBRON MARKET
by Elyakim HaEtzni

  Hebron is where Abraham and Sarah are buried. Hebron is where David was crowned king of Israel. The Jews lived in Hebron continously from Biblical times until 1929, when, after the Hebron massacre, the British expelled them. Hebron is where determined Jews have come back to live, despite having to fight hostile Arab neighbors and a hostile, secular government. Elyakim HaEtzni gives us a glimpse into Hebron's history.
 READ MORE
 

THE NAZI WHO RETURNED TO HARVARD
by Jeff Jacoby

  Jeff Jacoby recounts the story of Ernst Hanfstaengl, a Harvard graduate and a Nazi, who, when he returned to the University for his 25th reunion in 1934, was greeted warmly by many. Instead of taking a stand against Nazi ideology, many of the faculty immediately raised the banner of free speech. Eventually, they became anti-Nazi, but they weren't in the vanguard, when, as Jacoby says, "it would have done the most good."
 READ MORE
 

 READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

 November 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

December 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 

=======================end of issue==========================

September-October, 2004

A major focus in this issue is on Arab strategy — jihad and terror — and how "friendly" Arab countries are contributing to the campaign to eradicate Israel from the Middle East. Recent articles by PLO spokemen have made it clear that, no matter what Israel does – even withdrawing from Gaza and consenting to a Palestinian state — the PLO will not be deviated from its goal of destroying Israel.

JIHAD, APOCALYPSE, AND ANTI-SEMITISM: An Interview with Richard Landes
by Manfred Gerstenfeld

  Richard Landes makes the case that "in monotheistic and modern times, apocalyptic thinking has often involved exterminationist anti-Semitism. Jihadism is the main contemporary example." The "religious Hamas and the secular PLO" both use apocalyptic rhetoric "characterized by "global conspiracy theory, total war, virulent anti-Semitism, contempt for human life, and child sacrifice."
 READ MORE
 

ROCKET SCIENCE 101
by Dr. Mitchell Finkel

  Michell Finkel explains the menace of the rockets now being manufactured and used by the Gazan Arabs. To leave Gaza in Arab hands makes attacks on the rest of Israel more certain and more accurate.
 READ MORE
 

THE NEW ANTI-SEMITISM
by Clifford D. May

  Clifford D. May describes the one of the latest forms of anti-Semitism. The intifada has not brought Israel to its knees. So now Arabs are proposing a Chomskyian one-state solution with a majority Arab population, to be achieved by opening Israel to anyone and everyone who claims to be a dispossessed Palestinian. The end goal, a Judenrein Israel, is sanctioned in the pages of the New York Times, where it is seen as a fight against bigotry.
 READ MORE
 

A GIANT PALESTINIAN STEP BACKWARD
by Barry Rubin

  Speaking of recent articles by PLO spokesmen, Barry Rubin writes that the PLO has come into the open about its plans for Israel. "The PLO's position is now publicly and officially back to where it was in the 1960s and 1970s. Its open goal is Israel's elimination." This puts the lie to the wishful supposition that all the local Arabs really want is a 'Palestinian' homeland.
  READ MORE
 

"TERROR HELPED US ACHIEVE GOALS"
by Jerusalem Newswire Editorial Staff

  The Western media has by and large preached that the Palestinian Arabs oppose violence against the Jews and would prefer negotiations. But a recent poll "found that the vast majority of Palestinian Arabs continue to support the terrorist murder of Jewish men, women and children." Prime Minister's Sharon plan to disengage from Gaza is seen as a victory for terrorism.
 READ MORE
 

HAMAS — THE ISLAMIC RESISTANCE MOVEMENT
by Reuven Erlich

  The papers are full of the equitable divving up of Gaza by Arafat's Al Fatah and Hamas, in anticipation of Israel's expulsion the Gazan Jews. Dr. Erlich of the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center provides us with a factual description of the Hamas organization. For more information, read Lappen, "Hamas and the Palestinian Authority Are One" (http://www.think-israel.org/lappenRM.html); and Kaufman "A Night of Hamas 'Heroes'"
(http://www.think-israel.org/kaufman.hamas.html).
 READ MORE
 

A CLOSER LOOK AT EGYPT
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Egypt launched an attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, 1973, and was defeated. As reward for signing a peace treaty in 1978, she got back a value-added Sinai, courtesy of Israel, and she also received huge monitary and equipment rewards, courtesy of the United States. Rachel Neuwirth writes that in return, she allows weapons smuggling into Gaza via tunnels from Egypt, encourages her imaginative media workers in their hate-Israel campaign, and targets Israel with her overblown military armament.
 READ MORE
 

SAUDI ARABIA'S RELIGIOUS HATRED
by Jeff Jacoby

  The U.S. Department has finally put Wahhabi-dominated Saudi Arabia on "its list of the world's most religiously intolerant nations. It was a step long overdue." But Colin Powell and other U.S. officials continue to reassure the Sauds we're not serious about the charge. Jeff Jacoby points out that "Saudi oil fuels the world, but the enemy we are fighting is fueled by the feverish religious bigotry that is Saudi Arabia's other leading export."
 READ MORE
 

Compared to the attacks on Israel itself, the infiltration of Muslims into Europe and their impact on European society is muted. But both are designed to make Islam predominent globally. The new Muslim immigrants have also produced anti-Semitic rhetoric and actions and revitalized a Jew-hatred that was suppressed after the Holocaust. And much of Europe has bought into the Arab rhetoric. It has affected their legal decisions and their policy in the Middle East.

THE NEW NEO-COLONIALISM: The Arab-Moslem Invasion Of France
by Lewis Lipkin

  Lewis Lipkin examines the French conflict with its Arab immigrants, where "[t]he Arab immigrants' refractoriness to nationalism is confronting centuries-old French social theory." He writes that "the alien influx has reached a level where it is not simply the economy that is strained, but the very nature of the national character is being put to the test." France's attempt at integration has benefitted the Muslims and at the same time has conflicted with the Muslim desire for retaining their own ways — and making others conform to them.
 READ MORE
 

EUROPE WILL BE ISLAMIC BY THE END OF THE CENTURY
by Robert Spencer

  Robert Spencer describes the rapid growth of a Muslim population in several European countries. Typically, they have tried to impose their own way of doing things on the host country. There are signs, however, that the current catering to the Muslims in the name of political correctness may be changing.
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AN AMERICAN IN LONDON
by Carol Gould

  Carol Gould recounts her experiences in London, receiving verbal abuse from strangers because she was American, because she was a Jew. She writes, "... my hunch is that the daily dose of relentless America-bashing in the European media, combined with the abundance of criticism of Israel has created an atmosphere of anger and hostility that for the first time in my lifetime makes me fearful for my safety in my beloved adopted country, Great Britain."
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UNITED NATIONS VOTE PRESAGES STATE SPONSORED GLOBAL ANTI-SEMITISM
by David Singer

  Recently, the International Court of Justice [ICJ] demanded "the immediate demolition of Israel's security barrier in the West Bank and declared "Israeli settlements in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) to be in breach of international law." This decision – which is fundamentally flawed and based on incomplete information — is likely to be used in a campaign of vilification that will affect not only Israel, but "Jews living in many of those 150 member States endorsing the ICJ opinion, such as France, United Kingdom, Argentina, Italy, Russia, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and Holland..." Thus the importance of Article 80 of the UN Charter.
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EUROPE'S FAILED MIDDLE EAST POLICIES
by Gerald M. Steinberg

  Gerald Steinberg suggests that "Europe's substantive policy is based on a belief that stability in the Middle East will come from a formal agreement to create a Palestinian state. This theology was formed in the aftermath of the 1973 war and the oil boycott, and has remained unquestioned. Since than, in explaining the absence of peace, Europe has consistently blamed Israel, while ignoring signs that the Palestinian leadership is not interested in a 'two state solution', and seeks to roll back the 1947 UN partition resolution."
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Israel owns Israel — and that includes Samaria, Judea and Gaza – biblically, historically, by living there for centuries into the modern era and by right of conquest. But the ultimate foundation is the League of Nations mandate that was transferred intact to the United Nations. If it no longer applies, then the Arab countries it created are also illegal. For obscure reasons, Israeli hasbara downplays and often distorts its own best arguments.

IS ISRAEL'S LEGAL SYSTEM ACTING ILLEGALLY?
by Yoram Shifftan

  Dr. Yoram Shifftan continues his brilliant explication of the legal bases for Israel's possession of Samaria, Judea and Gaza. Citing Julius Stone, Professor of International Law, Shifftan carefully extracts the applicable and appropriate legal interpretations from the inaccuracies that have wantonly been heaped over the truth.
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WHO IS ENTITLED TO GIFT AWAY JEWISH NATIONAL RIGHTS?
by Yoram Shifftan

  This is a companion piece to the previous article, which focusses on the lack of awareness of the legal foundation of the right of the Jews to what was Mandated Palestine. This essay makes the point that the Land of Israel can not be gifted to another group until its citizenry is fully aware of the legalities and the consequences of such an action.
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Israel is at jeopardy. The legal system and Israel's hasbara work against Israel's integrity. Its Prime Minister, who was elected to go boldly after the terrorists, has adopted the policy of the party he defeated. Its government proposes to do what the Arabs haven't been able to do in 50 years of warfare — expel Jews from their homes. The extreme Left has joined the Arabs in promoting the welfare of the local Arabs above the future of the Jews. These essays analyze the sickness and propose remedies.

AT JEOPARDY — Part I
by Patricia Berlyn

  In this thoughtful article, Patricia Berlyn writes that Israel is at jeopardy, both in the word's ordinary meaning because Sharon's disengagement plan is dangerous and divisive and in the sense that at the moment "the outcome is not yet decided, and can go right or wrong."
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LAND FOR PEACE (L-F-P) IGNORES REALITY: A Politically Incorrect Examination
by Yoram Ettinger

  Yoram Ettinger lists some very sensible reasons why Israel should not cede real land for hopes-of-peace, whether the deal is by way of a piece of paper or by a unilateral withdrawal. With regard to biblical Israel — Samaria, Judea and Gaza — he points out that "[r]arely would nations agree to cede land to aggressors; never would nations contemplate a giveaway of their cradle of history, lest they lose their future."
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GETTING GAZA WRONG
by Evelyn Gordon

  It isn't just Sharon that has things wrong about Gaza. Evelyn Gordon notes that "[l]ike Dali's limp watches, all the normal rules of human behavior appear to have been bent out of shape." Told that Kassam rockets were hitting the town of Sderot, Minister Tommy Lapid said, "Let them reinforce their roofs." And the 'civilized' world cares about the death of an Arab killer but not for the Jewish child he killed.
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ARAB TIME BOMB: The Demographic Argument
by Moshe Dann

  Given the Arab growth rate, an argument made for withdrawing from Gaza — and some as yet unspecified territory — is that it will preserve the Jewish character of the state. Moshe Dann points out fallacies in the demographic argument.
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THE PEOPLE, THE PEOPLE'S ARMY, THE STATE AND THE REGIME
by Yossi Blum Halevi

  Recalling the history of Israel's last 60 years and projecting from developing trends, Yossi Blum Halevi describes possible scenerios that could easily become real, should Sharon continue his plan to expel the Jews who live in Gaza and Samaria. Amazingly, the tone is not strident; it is poetic and thoughtful, perhaps thus making Halevi's arguments all the more convincing.
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ON CONCEPTUALIZATION, LOW-INTENSITY CONFLICTS AND OTHER BASIC CONCEPTS FOR UNDERSTANDING THE IDF'S SENIOR COMMAND
by Yossi Blum Halevi

  In a companion piece to the previous article, Yossi Blum Halevi takes on a very practical topic: Why has the IDF done so poorly fighting the current unconventional war waged so ruthlessly and effectively by the Arabs? His answer — one we in America should take to heart about our fight in Iraq — is: it's not the IDF, it's the senior command politicians who have hobbled the army.
 READ MORE
 

JEWISH ANTI-SEMITISM AND THE RISE OF THE LEFTIST ASCENDANCY IN ISRAEL
by Steven Plaut

  In this thoughtful essay, Steven Plaut traces the modern roots of what seems an anomaly — blatant anti-Semitism in the Jewish state. It grew rapidly during the Oslo years, powered by the Israeli Left which – although relatively small in numbers — controls much of Israeli education, journalism, the justice system and national policy making. The hostile rhetoric of the Left has cost Israel its self-confidence and has served both as model and provider of credibility to world anti-Semitism.
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A HOLY PEOPLE
by Moshe Saperstein

  Moshe Saperstein, lives in Neve Dekalim in Gush Katif in Gaza, which is constantly under bombardment by its Arab neighbors. In this essay, written during the High Holidays, he observes, "That so many [mortars] hit in the area of the shul indicates that our enemies have a clear view of what this conflict is about. Unlike our leaders and ideologues who, so removed from faith in anything other than their own cleverness, can't conceive that religion is a cause anyone would die for."
 READ MORE
 

HOW TO PREVENT ISRAEL'S DEMISE
by Professor Paul Eidelberg

  The previous articles in this section dealt with specific problems now afflicting Israel. This essay suggests that the reason Israel deals poorly with external threats and is unresponsive to its citizenry is the Israeli governmental system itself. Long a strong advocate of convening a constitutional assembly, Professor Eidelberg suggests the formation of a non-partisan group that will act as 'shadow government' to lay out and develop implementation for the reforms Israel needs to its system of government.
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These essays examine some basic facts about Israel and the Palestinian Arabs. And some little-known facts about religion in Saudi Arabia.

IS SAUDI ARABIA HOLY SOIL?
by Stephen Schwartz

  Many media people — Pat Buchanan inter alia — have claimed that Saudi Arabia — the country that curtails religious rights for all non-Muslims and all Muslims except the Wahhabis — is sacred soil. Stephen Schwartz corrects the record. Mecca and Medina are considered sacred by all Muslims, but only Wahhabis believe the rest of Saudi Arabia is holy. But then again, "the Wahhabis do not consider other Islamic believers, including but not limited to Shias, as Muslims."
 READ MORE
 

HOW STRONG IS THE ARAB CLAIM TO PALESTINE?
by Lawrence Auster

  Lawrence Auster examines the Arab claim to Palestine. He points out that the Arabs — and that includes the 'Palestinians' — are not native to Palestine and their control of Palestine has long since been over. He also demolishes other beliefs dear to the hearts of pro-Arab propagandists.
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We look at the media, both in the United States and in Israel. Both show a preponderance of Left liberal writers. Ideology should not result in unprofessional conduct — distorting the facts and often creating them — but, regrettably, it often does.

THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE'S ISLAMIC SPIN
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanuel Winston takes the Chicago Tribune to task for portraying yet another suicidal bomber as a sympathetic hero and not as what he was — a "religious pathological killer submerged in a religion that produces Islamic killers." To read the Tribune, one would never suspect that the misery of the Gazan Arab was caused by the Arab leadership, who exploited the poor fool for all the usual reasons: money, publicity and sympathy. Instead, there's psychobabble — "he experienced alienation and humiliation..." — a wound Israel inflicted just by surviving attack after attack by her hostile Arab neighbors.
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THE LA TIMES'  SPYTFUL TALE
by Bernice Lipkin

  The recent article on the lastest spy scare in the Los Angeles Times is but one of many. It shares with most of them a marked weakness of fact and a strong — unusual in a Left liberal newspaper – respect for statements by Government officials. In addition, the writing is so poor, it underscores the weakness of the arguments.
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FROM RATHER TO BARNEA
by Yisrael Medad and Eli Pollak

  In America, Dan Rather has recently provided us with a sharp-edged example of "the liberal-conservative political-cultural divide." In Israel, Yisrael Medad and Eli Pollak write, "[t]here is a media elite. It's usually liberal and often behaves unprofessionally." They provide some unappetizing examples of unprofessionalism.
 READ MORE
 

 READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

 September 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 October 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

==============================================

July-August, 2004

We continue our exploration of what is still unfamiliar to Westerners — the mindset and value system of Islam, particularly when Islamic values lead to terrorism and violence.

WHY AMERICAN MUSLIM CONVERTS TURN TO TERRORISM
by Robert Spencer

  Robert Spencer examines a puzzling happening — why Western converts to Islam become terrorists. Using Adam Yahiye Gadahn as example, Robert Spencer points out that these converts are not alienated; they are simply following the Koran as taught them by the imams who instruct them. They have become "warriors of jihad" for Islam.
 READ MORE
 

WHY DO THEY HATE US? AND WHY DO WE CARE?
by Patrick D. O'Brien

  Islamic terrorists hate us. But, as Patrick O'Brien points out, that doesn't mean we have given them cause. It is their religion and culture that fuel their hate — both of America and Israel. It is NOT despair; it is NOT poverty; it is NOT that we are free and they are not.
 READ MORE
 

RELIGION OF HATE
by Jackie Mason and Raoul Feder

  Jackie Mason and Raoul Feder examine the implications of the belief ingrained in Islam from Mohammed's time to the present day — that Muslims are entitled to rule over everyone else. "Muslims, married to a failed past, offer little hope for integration into modern society. Israel giving them land to which they are not entitled, or the United States not punishing them for criminal acts, will not assuage their rage."
 READ MORE
 

WORD GAMES DON'T CHANGE THE FACTS; THIS IS A WAR ON RADICAL ISLAM
by Nolan Finley

  Nolan Finley emphasizes the importance of religion in the war radical Islam initiated against us. He makes the point that "[t]he enemy today is radical Islam, an ultra-conservative and extremely intolerant religious movement that has taken root in the Middle East and is fast becoming a beacon for dispossessed and disenchanted Muslims worldwide."
 READ MORE
 

More and more, Iran has become a particularly worrisome part of the Muslim world, even though it shares little with its Arab neighbors besides religion and rage. These essays discuss Iran's growing threat to the region and to the world.

IRAN'S GROWING THREAT
by Rachel Ehrenfeld

  Rachel Ehrenfeld lays out the reasons why Iran should be taken seriously as a threat. Iran provides money and materials to international terrorists such as al-Qaeda; she is pushing to acquire nuclear weapons; she riles up neighboring Iraq; and America and Israel are her target of hate propaganda.
 READ MORE
 

AXIS OF EVIL, PART TWO
by Charles Krauthammer

  Charles Krauthammer notes that some of the countries composing the axis of evil have been neutralized but Iran is daily getting closer to its goal of acquiring weapons of mass destruction. And it must be stopped. He provides the strategic 'how'.
 READ MORE
 

These essays discuss some recent screwups such as the ruling of the International Court of Justice that the terrorist-hampering fence Israel is building is illegal. They have a common theme: the international laws that support Israel's claim to Palestine are ignored.

INTERNATIONAL IGNORANCE IGNITES INJUSTICE
by David Singer

  The general public is unaware that Israel has a unassailable "right in international law to facilitate the settlement of Jews in the West Bank." Apparently, this ignorance extends to the judges of the International Court of Justice, who decided that Israel hasn't the right to build a security fence to protect against Arab terrorism. By failing to provide the Court with the relevent documents, Kofi Annan was at fault. David Singer concludes that "the decision will give credence to the perception of a biased and anti-Israel United Nations and a Court that cannot be trusted ..."
 READ MORE
 

JUDGES' RULING REWRITES UN CHARTER ON SELF-DEFENCE
by Leanne Piggott

  The International Court of Justice has recently decreed — in an action that could serve as the story line of a Gilbert and Sullivan comedy — that Israel is not entitled to build the fence she believes protects her citizens from Arab terrorists. Leanne Piggott points out the implications not just for Israel but for all the nations of the world — the Court's ruling could "radically rewrite the rules of international law governing the inherent right of states to defend themselves and their citizens."
 READ MORE
 

OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES?
by Salomon Benzimra

  Salomon Benzimra points out a logical inconsistency. When the Arabs waged war against Israel in 1948, the UN was bound to defend Israel because of Resolution 181. As Salomon Benzimra notes, they did no such thing. Winning that war, Israel's conquest of some of the land allocated by the UN to the Arabs was (properly) deemed valid. So why was Israel's conquest — when the Arabs again attacked Israel in 1967 – declared an occupation? He traces the problem back to the preamble of UN Resolution 242.
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ISRAEL'S STRANGEST SELF-DEFEATING PARADOX: Forgetting To Teach Itself And The World Jewish National Rights In Palestine
by Dr. Yoram Shifftan

  Yoram Shifftan expands on earlier articles that discussed the centrality of international law to support Israel's right to mandated Palestine — land the Arabs claim as theirs. He suggests that Israeli leaders have been delinquent in not teaching the facts to their own citizens as well as proclaiming them to the world.
 READ MORE
 

These next articles focus on recent disasterous Israeli decisions and one-sided concessions. They have gained Israel nothing — not more security, not cessation of terror attacks. Not even a pat on the back from the world for Israel's forbearance.

HOW TO RECRUIT A JEW TO KILL HIMSELF
by Emanuel A. Winston

  In this essay, Emanuel Winston speculates on the components that led to the disasterous decisions that Israeli leaders have been making for some time now. Aside from external pressure, a significant element has been a significant internal weakness — the naivité of Israeli leaders and their inability to play serious global politics.
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PRESSURING ISRAEL
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Like Winston's essay, Rachel Neuwirth acknowledges that a major reason for the "many disasterous unilateral concessions" made by Israel the past 10 years has been the weakness of Israeli leaders. But she makes the case that the major factor in the current disaster has been the external pressure applied by Israel's friend, the U.S.A.
 READ MORE
 

The Human Chain from Gush Katif to Jerusalem on July 25, 2004 may be the trigger for awaking Israel from its Oslo Coma. These next essays comment on the event.

THE HUMAN CHAIN FROM GUSH KATIF TO JERUSALEM
by Hillel Fendel and Ezra HaLevi

  Hillel Fendel and Ezra HaLevi paint a vivid picture of the Human Chain, which extended not just from Jerusalem to Gush Katif, but, by speakerphone, from Jerusalem to communities across America. The chain stretched, literally as well as symbolically, from the Shamirs, who lived in the pre-State K'far Darom in Gaza until it was destroyed by Egyptian forces during the 1948 war, to their grand daughter, who lives in Gush Katif.
 READ MORE
 

CHAINS OF FREEDOM OR CHAINS OF SLAVERY
by David Wilder

  Between 150,000 to 200,000 people from all over Israel and outside of Israel joined hands from Jerusalem to Gush Katif in Gaza to sing HaTikva — Hope — while Arab terrorists used the occasion to fire missiles that injured children in Gush Katif. David Wilder writes, "Ariel Sharon still does not understand that Israel is at war. The war for independence did not end in 1949."
 READ MORE
 

The human chain was cause for jubilation. But expelling Jews from Gaza is still on the table. These essays look at the issue from different perspectives.

THE CASE AGAINST DISENGAGEMENT
by Yuri Shtern

  This is an incisive article clearly stating the damage Sharon's plan will do to Israel's morale, its democratic procedures and its security.
 READ MORE
 

THERE'S NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN UMM AL-FAHM AND KEDUMIM
by Yosef Ben Shlomo

  Yosef Ben Shlomo discusses the logical fallacy practiced by the Left of regarding a theoretical transfer of Arabs as a matter of deep moral concern while disregarding the imminent transfer of Jews. He raises logical and linguistic questions.
 READ MORE
 

A REFUGEE IN MY OWN COUNTRY
by Nadav Shragai

  The Jewish citizens of Israel who live in the territories are a remarkably law-abiding group. But now the Israeli government wants to turn them into refugees in their own country — an act both immoral and illegal. Nadav Shragai examines their state of mind.
 READ MORE
 

DAUD
by Boris Zubry

  This is a story about the interweaving of lives: an Arab boy, an Israeli man; an Arab bomber, an Israeli soldier; a boy who loses his father, a father who loses his son. Boris Zubry has written a fascinating modern fable.
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL'S MOTIVATION GAP
by Larry Derfner

  Larry Derfner believes the majority of Israelis agree with Sharon's disengagement plan. Nevertheless, he believes the Jewish communities of Gaza will not be ousted — because they are highly motivated and are waging an effective campaign to save their homes and save a part of biblical Israel.
 READ MORE
 

WHAT TO DO WITH THE GAZA SETTLEMENTS
by Calev Ben-David

  Tongue in cheek, Calev Ben-David lists some ideas for utilizing the property that the Jews will be forced to leave behind — from creating a museum to relocating the UN.
 READ MORE
 

Are there better solutions to the Arab-Israeli conflict than for Israel to commit suicide? Here are two proposals.

CHECKMATE
by Ross C. Leiber

  This is an incisive and well-reasoned essay with a bold suggestion designed to 'defrost' the Israelis and jumpstart them into playing from strength, not weakness, in their fight for survival. We invite readers' comments on the general idea and on the specifics.
 READ MORE
 

A WIN-WIN SOLUTION TO THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Scraping away false facts that serve as base for unworkable peace proposals to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, Rachel Neuwirth uses significant factual data on land availability to propose a resolution that would benefit the Palestinian Arabs as well as the Israelis; namely, transfer the Palestinian Arabs to their own place in a sparsely inhabited part of an Arab country such as Saudi Arabia.
 READ MORE
 

Sometimes facts, no matter how significant, just aren't enough. These essays are inspirational. And necessary.

TZAHAL — THE MIGHTY MEN OF VALOR
by Patricia Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn writes a lyric appreciation of the men and women of the IDF, who have battled since before Israel's birth to preserve her against a mass of murderous Arabs. Today, they need also to contend with "organs of their own government and society" who act out of poor judgment or intent. Through it all, they keep high moral standards and compassion.
 READ MORE
 

IN DEFENSE OF THE HOLYLAND
by Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson

  This essay was composed from discourses of Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson The heart of the essay — no one has the right to give away what does not belong to him — is perhaps more pertinent today than it was when it was published in 1976.
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ONCE UPON A TIME
by Dov Kahn

  Dov Kahn has written a modern parable. How do we describe it? — a work of faith for secularists? A poem in paragraphs? A history without dates? Just read it.
 READ MORE
 

We present some recent Middle East history: an excellent review of the history of Palestine and an unusual perspective on the Arab's view of the founding of modern Israel.

THE HISTORY AND MEANING OF "PALESTINE" AND "PALESTINIAN"
by Patricia Berlyn

  This is a tightly woven excellent review of the badly-misused terms: Palestine and Palestinians.
 READ MORE
 

NAQBAH: THE SELF-INFLICTED CATASTROPHE
by Dr. Asher Eder

  Dr. Asher Eder writes of the beginnings of Arab rejectionism of the return of the Jews to their land. The essay includes additional information by Shaykh Professor Abdul Hadi Palazzi. Drs. Eder and Palazzi are co-chairmen of the Islam-Israel Fellowship.
 READ MORE
 

These essays continue our exploration of the spread of anti-Semitism by people in the media, at universities and in libraries. We include an eyewitness account of the growing antisemitism in London, England.

THE NEW YORKER ON ISRAEL
by Richard H. Shulman

  In May, The New Yorker published an article by Jeffrey Goldberg demonizing the Jews who live in the territories. It slanders the Jews and absolves the Arabs by its choice of value words and selective details — details that give us a distorted picture instead of an understanding of what's going on in Israel's heartland. Richard H. Shulman analyzes Goldberg's article in detail.
 READ MORE
 

THE CASE OF REUTERS: A news agency that will not call a terrorist a terrorist
by Tom Gross

  Tom Gross points out how "Reuters's coverage of the Middle East is deeply flawed." It repeats obviously unreliable information; its basic sources are often stringers linked to Arafat's Palestinian Authority; it buries pro-Israel crucial information; it shows semantic bias. As a news agency with a reputation for fairness, its false information is uncritically accepted by much of the media.
 READ MORE
 

WHAT THE UNITED ARAB EMIRITES (UAE) BOUGHT
a New York Sun Editorial

  Columbia University accepted a large donation from UAE to fund a chair in Arab studies that will be held by Professor Rashid Khalidi. Based on Khalidi's writings, we can expect sloppy scholarship and a "lack of basic knowledge about the Middle East." The editorial asks, "Why is Rashid Khalidi holding a tenured professorship at Columbia? Does his latest work enhance the university's reputation for solid, careful scholarship, or does it stain it? Would he be there were not the United Arab Emirates paying the bill?"
 READ MORE
 

THE CULT OF SEYMOUR HERSH
by Rael Jean Isaac

  Seymour Hersh has made a career of character assassination, conspiracy theories based on unsupported suppositions and just plain lies. Rael Jean Isaac documents his less than illustrious career.
 READ MORE
 

FAIRNESS OVERDUE
by Andrea Levin

  Libraries decide their book purchases in part on book reviews in reputable journals. Unfortunately, reviews on books on the Middle East in Libary Journal show "a striking pattern of laudatory, uncritical endorsement of patently one-sided books written by extreme critics of Israel." As Andrea Levin concludes, "Whether such bias in Library Journal reviews is inadvertent or a conscious policy, the publication is obviously not providing the 'expertise' and 'intellectual integrity' it claims to offer."
 READ MORE
 

TALES FROM A CANADIAN JEWESS FORMERLY LIVING IN BRITAIN
by Carrie Devorah

  Carrie Devorah, a photojournalist, paints us a word picture of life in present-day London, as it has accomodated to its influx of muslims: stores selling Middle Eastern clothing, anti-Israel posters, anti-Israel and anti-American protest meetings punctuated by Muslim men stopping their messages of hate to pray, and the growing anti-Semitism of ordinary Englishmen.
 READ MORE
 

 READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

 July 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 August 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

==============================================

May-June, 2004

It strikes us that almost 3 years after 911, 1 year after the beheading of Daniel Pearl, and weeks after Arabs in Gaza played with Jewish body parts, too many of us still don't have a handle on some crucial differences between the Arabs and Western civilization. To rethink Pogo, "We have met the enemy and they ain't us."

FICTION VERSUS FACTS
by Hampton Stevens

  Hampton Stevens gives us an excellent precis of the actual facts versus the fictions that have been slickly painted over the facts to obscure reality. The essay serves both to orient us properly and to exemplify, yet again, that the Arab culture sees nothing wrong in substituting invention for truth.
 READ MORE
 

DE PROFUNDIS
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Yashiko Sagamori makes the simple but profund observation that the more humans believe they resemble each other, the less do they understand their cultural differences. Take us and the Muslims.
 READ MORE
 

WHY ISRAEL MATTERS
by Barbara Ann Zweifler

  The author reminds us that wars are "fought first with ideas" and reminds us of two such ideas: (1) "Traditional American and Western society is based on the Judeo-Christian ethic;" and (2) "Islam is infinitely more compatible with totalitarian ideas than it is with Judeo-Christian ideals, and so the two naturally form an ideological alliance." To say it another way: "If Israel falls we will not be far behind her."
 READ MORE
 

"ARAB" MEANS NEVER HAVING TO SAY YOU'RE SORRY
by Nonie Darwish

  Nonie Darwish explains why we can't expect Muslim Arabs to show remorse for barbaric acts. "Those who admit guilt, even if it is accidental, are given no mercy and may end up taking all the blame and being brutally punished." Bush's apologies for Western abuses are not seen as civilized; they are perceived as weakness.
 READ MORE
 

THE PSYCHOANALYTIC ROOTS OF ISLAMIC TERRORISM
by Phyllis Chesler

  Phyllis Chesler asks, "... from a psychological and anthropological point of view, what kind of culture produces human bombs, glorifies mass murderers, and supports humiliation-based revenge?" Given the prevalence of homosexuality and pedophilia, she suggests, "it is a culture in which shame and honor play decisive roles and in which the debasement of women is paramount."
 READ MORE
 

WOMEN'S NON-EXISTENCE IN THE ARAB WORLD
by Ariell Choy

  We can read this poignant account of a young girl's encounter with Arab culture as an instantiation of Phyllis Chesler's analysis. Ariell Choy writes of her own experience. She concludes, "In Canada, Sharia law has been secretly passed and infringes on the rights of Muslim-Canadian women whose civil liberties in a supposedly free Western country will be walked upon even with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms."
 READ MORE
 

UNDERSTANDING THE UNIQUE BARBARISM OF PALESTINIAN TERRORISM
by Louis Rene Beres

  Professor Beres has been exploring the unique nature of Palestinian Arab terrorism for several years. He has observed that unlike other "freedom fighters," the Palestinian Arab will use violence even where it is clearly unsuitable for political gain. He demolishes several myths: that terrorism is not endemic in the Palestinian community; and that they are forced by their military weakness to excesses.
 READ MORE
 

A CAMPAIGN OF DENIAL TO DISINHERIT THE JEWS
by Nadav Shragai

  After 1967, Israel foolishly put the Arab Waqf in charge of the Temple Mount. The Arabs saw this as another occasion in which to practice identity theft — to try to take over Jewish history as well as Jewish geography, to be the new lovers of Jerusalem. What is really amazing is that the Jews haven't put a stop to their predations.
 READ MORE
 

WRONG-HEADED VISION
by David Basch

  David Basch points out America and Israel "[b]oth see the Arab as they imagine him, not as he is." Unfortunately, "[b]oth Israel and the U.S. are failing to understand the nature of Arab societies, characterized by a passive majority that is used as a screen behind which controlling, determined, active minorities attain their purposes."
 READ MORE
 

HOW DO I KNOW?
by Dr. Babu Suseelan

  The notion that without "experience with Islamic life, you are unable to discuss the meaning of Jihad and Islamic history," is intended to silence critics. Dr. Suseelan reassures us that "[o]ne can gain knowledge and insight about Islamic theocracy without believing in Koranic concepts or practicing Islamic dictates." He uses the concept of "coherence theory" to explore some Muslim fundamentalist beliefs.
 READ MORE
 

WHY THEY HATE US
by Robert Spencer

  The differences between cultures is not in which commits crimes – members of each may — but how the culture responds. Robert Spencer's thoughtful essay reminds us that "... one civilization will condemn and punish those who commit such crimes; the other will not." The disparity is too great for palliatives such as negotiations, peaceful coexistence, or mutual understanding.
 READ MORE
 

ISLAM VERSUS JUDAISM AND CHRISTIANITY: SOME OBSERVATIONS
by Ariel Natan Pasko

  Ariel Natan Pasko puts the values of Islam in context by contrasting them with the values of the Jews and Christians. The sacrifices of Abraham and Jesus — at the core of Judaism and Christianity — are alien to the initialization stories of Islam.
 READ MORE
 

TWENTY-YEAR PLAN FOR USA: ISLAM TARGETS AMERICA
by Dr. Anis Shorrosh

  It is commonly believed that at the moment, Islamists are focused on ridding the Middle East of Jews and other 'foreigners'. The battle for America is to come later. Dr Anis Shorrosh disagrees. He believes Islamists have already begun an intensive attack on America. This is his checklist of what they have already begun to do.
 READ MORE

How has Israel reacted to the sustained Arab agression? What should she do? These next essays address the what is and the what should be.
BLOWIN' HOT AIR...
by Gerald A. Honigman

  Israel keeps threatening to combat her enemies effectively. But she doesn't. Gerald Honigman emphasizes she has more to lose from a war of attrition that do the Arabs, who lose relatively few Arabs during their suicide-murders and during the minimalist Israel response. And with a population of 60 Arabs to every 1 Jew, they can afford it. As Honigman says, "it's time to stop blowin' hot air."
 READ MORE
 

THE NEXT EVACUATION: "HATE THE SETTLERS" CAMPAIGN
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Sharon and the Israeli Leftists who favor the 'Gaza Retreat' and its concomitant 'Expel The Jews' campaign have emphasized that leaving Gaza will make it easier to defend the rest of Israel (!). Of course, they plan to also leave Samaria and Judea — and then create the terrorist state of Palestine. It is not surprising that sane people find the whole idea of vacating Biblical Israel daft. Emanuel Winston tells us how Sharon spends his energy — demonizing the Jews who live and have developed Biblical Israel.
 READ MORE
 


SHARON AS JUDAS GOAT: Leading The Jews Out Of The Promised Land
by Yoram Shifftan and Bernice Lipkin

  Sharon was elected to stop the passive response to Arab terrorism made by the previous Israeli administrations: increasing land concessions and ignoring the Arab teaching of hate and violence. Instead, Sharon has accelerated the process of cutting away Biblical Israel. To do so, he has let stand the debilitating but incorrect assertion by the Arabs and the pro-Arab media that the Jewish settlements are illegal. This article points out that, on the contrary, the settlements are legal by international law and it would be illegal for Sharon to give up the land.
 READ MORE
 

STRAIGHT ANSWERS FOR TOUGH QUESTIONS
by Bernard J. Shapiro

  Bernard Shapiro discusses the disasterous consequences we can expect should Israel retreat from Gaza. He predicts what we can expect from the Palestinian Arabs, from the Egyptians and from America.
 READ MORE
 

WHY THE STAKES ARE HIGH IN GAZA
by Rabbi Baruch Binyamin Hakohen Melman

  Rabbi Melman emphasizes that withdrawal from Gaza will lead to further withdrawals as a demoralized Israel pursues "a chimera of false hopes. Each withdrawal pours greater fuel on the problem, leading to ever escalating conflagration."
 READ MORE
 

THE CASE AGAINST DISENGAGEMENT FROM GAZA AND NORTHERN SAMARIA
by Yoram 'Tex'  Ettinger

  In concise fashion, Yoram Ettinger lays out the many reasons Israel should not leave Gaza. On the contrary, she should work more aggressively to win the war on terrorism in the territories.
 READ MORE
 

ARMING THE ARAB MUSLIM PALESTINIANS IN GAZA
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanuel Winston first examines Egypt's role in arming the Arabs in Gaza and Sharon's role in concealing Mubarak's collaboration with the terrorists. (Taken together with the American-supplied long-range sophisticated weaponry in Egypt — see Rand Fishbein, "Denial on the Nile",
http://www.think-israel.org/fishbein.egyptarsenal.html, November 2003 — this is ominous.) Winston then focusses on Sharon, who has made himself an internal enemy of Israel.
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FACE REALITY OR FACE ANNIHILATION
by Beth Goodtree

  Beth Goodtree suggests it is more than time that the "policy makers and shakers" who control the Middle East start facing reality. George Bush waffles, the European Union ignores that "Europe is under invasion from the Moslem hordes and seems to think appeasement will work" and Ariel Sharon "does more about-faces than a military academy on parade day." The "civilized world in general" has "bought the line that the enemy is terror. In truth, terror is merely a tactic of the real enemy, Islamism." Meantimes, the Islamic world continues to supply us with proof of how much they hate us and want us dead.
  READ MORE

Clearly the war on Iraq was better-formulated and carried out than the aftermath, when we tried to bestow democracy on a people, while ignoring their national character. If we are to make a dent in the war on terror, we are going to have to deal with Iran. Perhaps these essays will encourage a serious examination of Iran's history and values before we proceed.


SHI'ITE  IRAN: THE KEY TO THE MIDDLE EAST: 
        Part II. From World War I To The Present
by Lewis Lipkin

  The end of World War I saw the emergence of the Pahlavis; the predominance of oil; and the playing out of the Shi'ite subversion. The 1979 revolution produced a Khomeni-defined theocratic regime that is now the major factor in the Middle East. Lewis Lipkin urges that American policy toward Iran be based on real knowledge of Iran and Iranians. "...a flexibility in the face of temporary reverses seems the best hope to turn the key of the Middle East."
 READ MORE
 

IRAN'S A GROWING DANGER IN IRAQ
by Richard Z. Chesnoff

  Richard Chesnoff discusses how Iran's rulers have provided moral support, training and weapons to various terrorist groups throughout the Middle East.
 READ MORE
 

IRAN'S NUCLEAR ADVENTURISM: A Review of Sweet's IEEE Article
by Lewis Lipkin

  Lewis Lipkin reviews a recent important article by William Sweet assessing Iran's nuclear potential.
 READ MORE

Anti-Semitism has many faces. Here are two: one worn by an academic; the other, cruder, by ordinary Russians.

TOM PAULIN: Poetaster of Murder
by Edward Alexander

  Edward Alexander chronicles the recent free-verse rantings of Tom Paulin, who openly advocates the killing of Jews in (at a minimum) Samaria and Judea. His verses may be stupid and ugly but everyone understands they are anti-Jewish — everyone, that is, but some other academics, who in supercilious and/or just plain silly fashion put "free speech" uber alles. While his defenders — Jewish and non-Jewish — continue to argue about the precise definition of anti-Semitism, thanks to Paulin's ground-breaking efforts, it becomes ever more acceptable in academia to openly hate Jews and accuse them of any and all the ills the world is subject to.
 READ MORE
 

MY FIRST POLITICAL EXPERIENCE
by Boris Zubry

  Boris Zubry reminisces about his first encounter at age five with anti-Semitism. This being real life and not academia, he confronted hate that was more physical than verbal. And even the words of hate were crudely phrased. Perhaps that made it easy to understand immediately how to respond.
 READ MORE

Pro-Palestinian propaganda comes in many flavors. Too many groups who claim to promote human rights, peace and justice are nothing but fronts for Palestinian Arab terrorists. And even Arafat is presented as a 'peace-loving' leader of a peace-loving people. A favorite trick is to minimize the number of likely terrorists. And Muslim student in America are busy, busy, busy.

PRO-'PALESTINIAN' EQUALS ANTI-ISRAELI
by Dafna Yee

  Many anti-Israel organizations call themselves peace groups and pretend neutrality. Dafna Yee examined "over 300 websites put up by groups, organizations and individuals who claimed that all they wanted was 'peace', 'justice', 'human rights', etc., for the 'Palestinians'. With only FOUR exceptions, every one of the sites which claimed to be promoting those ideals on behalf of the 'Palestinians' was flagrantly anti-Israel."
 READ MORE
 

REVAMPING ARAFAT'S SPEECHES: How His "Terrorize Your Enemy" Speech Was Reported
by Bernice Lipkin

  On the anniversary of the day Israel became a state, Arafat delivered a speech encouraging the Arabs to destroy Israel. Magically, before the words reached the ears of the West, they were transmogrified into a message of willingness to make peace with Israel. How dey do dat?
 READ MORE
 

270 MILLION SUICIDE BOMBERS
by Puddle Pirate

  When all else fails, pro-Arab propagandists point out that radicalized Muslims are a small percent of the Muslim world. Using published data from polls and demographic statistics, this essay estimates the number of potential terrorists this small number comes to.
 READ MORE

ISLAMISM'S CAMPUS CLUB: THE MUSLIM STUDENTS' ASSOCIATION (MSA)
by Jonathan Dowd-Gailey

  MSA promotes itself "as a benevolent, non-political entity... its constitution declares the MSA's mission as serving 'the best interest of Islam and Muslims in the United States and Canada. ...'" Jonathan Dowd-Gailey describes some of their recent activities and concludes that "[t]here is overwhelming evidence that the MSA, far from being a benign student society, is an overtly political organization seeking to create a single Muslim voice on U.S. campuses — a voice espousing Wahhabism, anti-Americanism, and anti-Semitism, agitating aggressively against U.S."
 READ MORE
 

These essays discuss two articles on Gaza. In the first, the facts are wrong; in the second, the facts are right, but they don't support the conclusions.

RESPONSE TO HALKIN: "DOES SHARON HAVE A PLAN?"
by Jerome S. Kaufman

  The title suggests that what will follow will be a reasoned discussion of the proposed plan for Israel to evacuate Gaza, transferring out the Jews who live there. Halkin's essay is a justification of Sharon's plan to evacuate Gaza but his base facts are incorrect and thus do not back up his view of Sharon's plan.
 READ MORE
 

ALAN DERSHOWITZ MAKES THE CASE FOR ISRAEL
by Salomon Benzimra

  Alan Dershowitz is a deservedly well-respected defender of Israel's right to exist. And many hold the belief, as does Dershowitz, that expelling the Jews from Gaza is good policy for Israel. What Salomon Benzimra does in this essay is to point out the disparity between Mr. Dershowitz's accurate facts and "the conclusions he draws from his own observations."
 READ MORE
 

 READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

 May 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 June 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

==============================================

March-April, 2004

As if Israel didn't have enough on its plate, its Prime Minister has suddenly decided to expel the Jews of Gaza, as prelude — if the news leaks are accurate — to transferring a half million Jews out of Samaria, Judea and the eastern part of Jerusalem. Some of these articles analyze different aspects of the proposed expulsion of Jews from land that belongs to them biblically, historically, by international Mandate and by legitimate conquest when repelling Arab invaders. Others talk about disrupting pioneering communities, which house Jews who are among Israel's most dedicated and loyal citizens.


SHARON'S DISENGAGEMENT PLAN
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanuel Winston points out defects in Sharon's plan to evacuate Gaza. He explains why nice-sounding advantages to Israel are unlikely and why negative consequences are almost certain both for Israel and for America.
 READ MORE
 

I'M MAD AS HELL: Don't Ask Me To Be A Nice Jewish Boy
by Bernard J. Shapiro

  Bernard Shapiro presents a likely scenario of the disasters that will be visited upon Israel, should she withdraw (retreat) from Gaza, Samaria and Judea, leaving a vacancy for the indigenous terrorists and the swarming hordes of Arabs from neighboring lands and to occupy. This is a powerful article we should all take to heart.
 READ MORE
 

BEWARE OF THE GAZA TRAP
by Dr. Rand H. Fishbein

  Withdrawing from Gaza is likely to prove a disaster not only for Israel but it will create problems for America. "President Bush may find it difficult to explain to a skeptical public why it was important to destroy the terrorist infrastructure in Afghanistan and Iraq while at the same time he is permitting it to flourish in Gaza." Moreover, "President Bush's cooperation in this plan may put him in jeopardy of violating the very anti-terrorism statutes he is sworn to uphold. As a consequence, U.S. national security could be significantly undermined."
 READ MORE
 

THE GENERALS' CONFUSION
by Caroline Glick

  "... the entire rationale of moving ahead with Sharon's plan [to evacuate Gaza] is that Sharon has claimed that the US has given Israel something in exchange for implementing it. And yet, over the past week, the US has made quite clear that it will give Israel nothing." Caroline Glick helps us understand the behavior of Israeli "generals turned prime ministers." She concludes "... that, in electing 'security hawks' to the prime minister's office, Israel has gotten neither the security it sought nor the political acumen and diplomatic savvy it needed."
 READ MORE
 

BREACHES OF FAITH
by Patricia Berlyn

  Why is withdrawal from Gaza, Samaria and Judea the wrong thing to do? Patricia Berlyn spells it out: it would be a breach of faith with 4,000 years of history and heritage, with all who defended and redeemed the heritage, with the most fundamental principles of democracy, and with Israel's staunch friends. To do so will put Israel's "future in desperate jeopardy, morally as well as physically."
 READ MORE
 

NEVE DEKALIM, GUSH KATIF, GAZA, ISRAEL
by Moshe Saperstein

  These are the latest entries from the diary of Moshe Saperstein, who lives in Neve Dekalim, a Jewish community in Gaza, a town which has bravely withstood the sustained violence of its Arab neighbors. It is now faced with an almost inconceivable threat — the Jews of Gaza are to be ethnically cleansed by their own Government, a Government elected because it promised to get tough with Arab violence.
 READ MORE
 

OUR HALACHA, OUR HISTORY, OUR SECURITY ARE TIED TO GUSH KATIF, GAZA
by Menachem Kovacs

  Gush Katif is a group of some 20 Jewish farming communities in Gaza. Now, Ariel Sharon intends to do what no Arab has been able to do: expel the inhabitants of Gush Katif. The Jews there, who have legally reclaimed the area from the desolation it has been mired in since the Middle Ages, are to be transferred out. Rabbi Kovacs makes the case for keeping Gaza Jewish: (1) biblically and historically, Gaza belongs to the Jews and (2) controlling Gaza is important to Israel's security. He asks for your help in keeping Gaza under Israeli control.
 READ MORE
 

I STRIVE TO BE POLITICALLY INCORRECT!
by Arlene Peck

  More and more, being politically incorrect means speaking the truth, not just phrasing the truth in a less kind, less gentle way. More and more, the politically correct seem determined not to confront simple facts. Arlene Peck, writing about Arabs such as those in Gaza, says, "Look into the faces of these barbarians who strive to kill... anybody, everybody! They have a cause? What is that? Death? We are dealing with elements of insanity and nobody seems to grasp that simple fact."
 READ MORE
 

THE MASK SLIPS IN GAZA
by Hugh Fitzgerald

  Should Israel abandon Gaza, Hugh Fitzgerald points out that the future caretakers are terrorists — "Hamas or Hezbollah or Al-Aksa Martyr's Brigade, Arafat or Shukairy..." Whatever the name, they are all dedicated to Jihad — to forcing infidels to submit to Islam. The confederacy of dedicated muslim terror groups is not, of course, confined to Gaza. "... Al Qaeda is only the most prominent and mediagenic of the many groups intent on destroying Infidels if they oppose Muslim aims, including the world-wide spread of dar al-Islam: Laskar Jihad, Jaish-e-Toiba, Abu Sayyaf, Lashkar Jihad, Gemaaa Islamiyya, Jemaa Islamiah, Jaish-e-Mohammad, and so many others."
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL'S GAZA GAMBLE
by P. David Hornik

  P. David Hornik reminds us of the reassurances that encouraged Israel to embark on the Oslo disaster. He reminds us that the optimistic predictions when Israel left Southern Lebanon and the Sinai peninsula were proven wrong as soon as Arab terrorists filled the space vacated. Why now does Sharon want to create another vacuum for Arab terrorists to fill?
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL'S REAL CHOICE IS EITHER TO FIGHT AND SURVIVE, OR TO CAPITULATE AND BE DESTROYED
by Steven Plaut

  Steven Plaut cuts through the nonsensical explanations of why Palestinian Arabs behave barbarically and resort to terrorism. The current violence isn't due to Israeli occupation; on the contrary, it happened, thanks to Oslo, because the Israeli 'occupation' was removed. Professor Plaut argues that "[t]he only way to suppress the carnage is for Israel to re-occupy the West Bank and Gaza in full, implement open-ended military control there and a long-term program of Denazification..., and to expel the terrorists and destroy their infrastructure. Everything else is wishful thinking and delusion."
 READ MORE
 

It is a curious fact that those who know the history of Israel have no problem understanding that Jews, the Land of Israel and the Torah are a singularity. These essays are pragmatic but do not ignore the abiding linkage of Jews and their Land, Israel. All of it.


PALESTINIAN FALLACY
by Judah Tzoref

  Judah Tzoref contrasts 'Palestinian peoplehood', a term that "has been used only for a few decades as a political instrument in the Arab strategy to annihilate Israel" with the undeniability of the historical attachment and "the spiritual bond between the Jews and the Land of Israel."
 READ MORE
 

ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM: Historical Background And Perspective
by Hanna Honein

  In narrative style and from a personal point of view, Hanna Honein talks about the Jewish and Christian origins of Islam and contrasts the difference between the Jews building up 'Palestine' and the Arabs living on pipe dreams and held down by a corrupt leadership. He emphasizes that the Land of Israel belongs only to the Jews. The Bible testifies to the Jews' ownership; they are the ones who developed it and defended it.
 READ MORE
 

ZIONISTS AND THE LAND
by Hilda Terry

  Drawing on family stories and letters, Hilda Terry writes about the early Zionists and their battle with the mosquito in bringing the Land of Israel back to life. Their coming raised the standard of living of the ordinary Arab, but that has never been the goal of the Arab leadership.
 READ MORE
 

OCCUPATION AND GENOCIDE
by Pat Gilsan

  Pat Gilsan answers the Arab claim that Israel is occupying land belonging to the 'Palestinian people' and counters with facts that show that the only genocide has been by the Arabs and perpetrated against the Jews. The solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict? "The answer is not to give up land. The answer is to transfer the Arabs."
 READ MORE
 

These next essays combine history and analysis. Iran, the international legitimacy of Israel, the Arab failed promises and the status of Jerusalem are subjects both Americans and Israelis need to be clear about, if they are to make intelligent decisions in the future.


SHI'ITE  IRAN: THE KEY TO THE MIDDLE EAST: 
        Part I. To The End Of World War I
by Lewis Lipkin

  Khomeini's Iran is a logical Islamic evolution of the Shi'ia mindset over the last half millenium. Lewis Lipkin chronicles some of the major players and events that have shaped the xenophobia that characterizes today's Iran.
 READ MORE
 

INTERNATIONAL LAW REGARDING THE LAND OF ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM
by Elliott A. Green

  The mindless media have so often repeated the Arab mantra that "Israel is occupying our land," that most people believe it to be true. And unfortunately, Israel has done poorly presenting the facts: Israel and the territories, by international law, belong to the Jews and not to the Arabs. This essay by Elliott Green can serve as an excellent reference and as background material.
 READ MORE
 

HOW DID JERUSALEM COME TO BE SO HOLY: Why and when was the myth of al-Aqsa created?
by Mordechai Kedar

  Mordechai Keder reviews the history of how and why the Muslims attempted to islamize Jerusalem. It has little to do with religion and much to do with politics. "Another aim of the Islamization of 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."
 READ MORE
 

The notion that the Arab-Israeli conflict is responsible for all the ills of the Arab world has been echoed by willing fellow-travelers. The next articles analyze why this is not a credible argument and describes for us yet another purveyor of the lie: the Christian churches in Palestinian-dominated areas.


DEATH OF A MYTH
by Jonathan Rosenblum

  The Arab countries have for too long protested they can't clean house until their Palestinian brothers (sob, sob) have settled their claims with Israel — an assertion echoed by their western apologists, such as Jimmy Carter and Zbigniew Brzezinski. This falsification is certainly beginning to crumble and may even, as Jonathan Rosenblum asserts, be dead.
 READ MORE
 

THE RAVAGES OF THE JIHAD-OCCUPIED MIND
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  Walid Shoebat was born a Muslim in Bethlehem, Israel and was infected with Israel-hate at an early age. He has found his way to Christian Zionism. As we read about his life journey, we also learn that even Christians under Palestinian control are "indoctrinated in jihad ideology" and that "Michael Sabbah, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, taught Islamology and Arab philology for decades. According to Shoebat, he hews to Islamic jihad dogma as well."
 READ MORE
 

The "T" word. Transfer was considered racist when Rabbi Kahane used it. But many of Israel's enemies are delighted when Sharon talks of transferring Jews from Gaza. Now that he's made it respectable, why not strike out a new path — one that may actually lead to peace; namely, Israel keeps its homeland and the 'Palestinian' Arabs are moved to some part of the vast area that is Arabland. Let's talk about a sensible and effective Transfer.


TRANSFER VERSUS SEPARATION: Kahanism In Reverse
by Ariel Natan Pasko

  Ariel Pasko makes the important point that the Israeli Left has finally acknowledged "the 'demographic threat' that Rabbi Meir Kahane warned about, when he encouraged transferring the Arabs out of Israel."  But the "current separationists... want to 'Transfer' Jews out of parts of the Land of Israel and 'Transfer' parts of the Land to Arab control."
 READ MORE
 

DO NOT CONDEMN THEM: Why the "Palestinian state" is bad for the Arabs
by Boris Shusteff

  Boris Shusteff explains why, even with the best of intentions, a third state in Mandated Palestine will not be viable. Its culture has blocked the building of necessary infrastructure. The Palestinian Arab has incorporated a culture of hate into his soul, which will lead to "the inevitable moral demise of Palestinian society and the total economic non-viability of this artificial entity." Given the failure of a 'show them kindness and shower them with material goodies' in Iraq, it is unlikely America will repeat this experiment in a Palestinian Arab state. Nor will Israel be obligated. Shusteff's suggestion: separate them from their soul-destroying leaders and relocated them in Jordan.
 READ MORE
 

TRANSFER IS NOT A DIRTY WORD
by Ben Shapiro

  Ben Shapiro reviews measures that have been suggested for stopping Arab terrorism. He points out that these are half measures and "..merely postpone our realization that the Arabs dream of Israel's destruction." He proposes transferring the Arabs out of Israel as the only effective solution to imbedded Arab violence.
 READ MORE
 

LEVERAGING ARAB FEAR
by Beth Goodtree

  Arab leaders have have used the pseudo-people, the 'Palestinians', "as the frontline army in the destruction of the Jewish aboriginal homeland," but they don't want them disrupting Arab countries. Beth Goodtree suggest that, '[i]n return for not [precipitously] disengaging with Arafat's Arabs, and not evacuating Gaza, Israel should demand that Egypt, Jordan, and the other Arab countries [slowly] repatriate their former Arab citizens and their descendents". Else Egypt and Jordan will need to deal with the consequences.
 READ MORE
 

Israeli Jews are not the only people who suffer from Muslim brutality. The Kurds and the Sudanese Christians have also been under persistent and brutal attack.

STATE DEPARTMENT MATH
by Gerald A. Honigman

  Gerald Honigman argues that an authentic people like the Kurds, who live marginally in several Arab countries, clearly deserves its own country. Instead, the world spends its resources attempting to establish a homeland for an inauthentic people — the Palestinians.
 READ MORE
 

AN UNTONED-DOWN COMMENTARY ON SUDAN
by Kola Boof

  Kola Boof has written an untoned-down tone poem about the enslavement and degradation of the black African under Arab Islam rule. She asks: "how can I support the colorstruck machinations of the Palestinians?"
 READ MORE
 

Anti-Semitism — the Gentile's disease. It is flaring up again, mostly carried by Islamists, but there's a persistent undercurrent of old fashioned Marxist anti-Semitism that helps keep it alive — all over Europe, among the Muslims in America and on American campuses.


MEMORIES ARE SHORT, HATRED IS FOREVER
by Omer Bartov

  Professor Bartov writes of resurgent European anti-Semitism and contrasts the latest manifestation of anti-Semitism with its World War II predecessor. He notes that Hitlerian anti-Semitism has found "..its most lethal incarnation in the Muslim world, where it has become a prevalent subculture, a focus of identity, a rallying cry for the masses, a tool to divert attention from the real reasons for poverty and despair, and a cause for militant mobilization and destructive urges."
 READ MORE
 

MAKING THE CASE FOR JEW HATRED: Martin Jay Explains How Jews Cause Antisemitism
by Professor Edward Alexander

  Professor Alexander examines Martin Jay's recent essay, "Ariel Sharon and the Rise of the New Anti-Semitism", which blames Jews for the recent insurgence of Anti-Semitism. Jay, a professor of history at UCLA, Berkeley, has sympathetic understanding for any and all practicing anti-semites while he demonizes Jews. Alexander writes that Jay is "... a representative example of the academic fellow-traveller in the ongoing campaign to depict Israel as the devil's own experiment station and make it ideologically vulnerable to terror."
  READ MORE
 

WHY DO THEY HATE US?
by Boris Zubry

  Boris Zubry's account of his experiences working in Saudi Arabia appeared in the November-December issue of Think-Israel. In this issue, he writes about when he first came to the United States and learned from a child not just to cope with anti-Semitism but to try and understand it.
 READ MORE
 

These articles discuss how we'd perceive Islam if our vision wasn't fogged by propaganda fantasies that Islam is a peaceful religion and that Arab 'freedom fighters' want only to regain their land in Israel. In consequence, we're ignoring infiltration of Islamists into Western democracies, fifth columns that do not wish us well.

APPLYING COMMON SENSE TO MADNESS
by Dov Kahn

  Dov Kahn does just that — he applies some simple if-then logic to some current experiences we've had with Islam; and he explores the puzzling differences in how we treat our 'good friend', Saudi Arabia, and our real friend, Israel.
 READ MORE
 


ISLAMIST FIFTH COLUMNS
by Arnaud de Borchgrave

  Fifth Column is a term from World War II, describing "secret sympathizers, sleeper cells, or supporters of an enemy that engage in espionage or sabotage, or simply disinform about the attacker's intentions." Arnaud de Borchgrave lists recent examples of Islamist penetration into Western democracies and the lack of support "moderate" Arab organizations such as CAIR give to supporting America's fight against terrorism.
 READ MORE
 

A NIGHT OF HAMAS "HEROES"
by Joe Kaufman

  From the angry way many of that merry band of self-appointed moralists — the media, UN, EU — reacted to Israel's killing Shekh Ahmad Yassin, you might think Hamas and Hizbollah only cared about killing Israelis. So — if the other countries of the world don't stir up the mud, they will be safe. Joe Kaufman sketches the Hamas connections of American Muslim organizations that are labeled 'moderate' by focusing on the recent history of Nihad Awad, currently the executive director of CAIR (the Council on American Islamic Relations).
 READ MORE
 

HIZBULLAH TV
by Richard H. Shulman

  A problem with ignoring terrorism and hoping it will go away is that terrorists make house calls. The Hizbullah's TV station has incited Arabs to despise Jews for years. Now it has come to the United States. Richard Shulman describes its programming for us.
 READ MORE
 

This is another episode of Marion Dreyfus' life teaching at a Chinese university.


CHINA DIARY: CELEBRATING PURIM AND PASSOVER
by Marion D.S. Dreyfus

  Marion Dreyfus is teaching at the University in Wuchan, China. Spring comes to Wuhan and Purim means gifting shaluch manus goodies to faculty members, even if they don't know what it means. At Passover, she travels to Beijing, to celebrate, where "the unchanging melodies and remembered accents of Hebrew liturgy bring me flying back without a time machine. Or rather, the prayers to me are time machines."
 READ MORE

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials and share articles they find informative. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: A Blog-Ed page now has a quick list of the articles from which you can access any of the articles immediately. Click the "Blog-Eds List" box in the Blue Strip on the top of the Blog-Ed page.

 March 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 April 2004 Blog-Eds   READ MORE

===========================================

January-February, 2004


We begin with readings on the current crop of Islam's intellectuals and theologians who justify and offer absolution for killing infidels. What they say is intrinsic to Islam, and has been from the time the Koran was written. Guilt-free terrorism together with the unabashed use of demographics make a formidable weapon against the West, one which many in the West refuse to acknowledge.

AL-QAEDA'S INTELLECTUAL LEGACY: New Radical Islamic Thinking Justifying The Genocide of Infidels
by Jonathan D. Halevi

  Jonathan Halevi's essay gives the lie to the idea that Islam, as it is currently practiced, is a peaceful religion. He argues convincingly, using the writings of influential Muslim clerics and intellectuals as source material, that Islam's ferocious appetite for killing infidels — Christians and Jews — singly and en masse is cleric-driven and mullah-justified.
 READ MORE
 

TARIQ RAMADAN'S TWO-FACED ISLAM: The West Is The Land Of Conquest
by Sandro Magister

  Some people believe that the Americans and Israelis who worry about Islam's appetite for gobbling up Western civilization are unnecessarily alarmist. On the other hand, those of us who see Islam as a danger — we alarmists — may feel that only America and Israel understand the danger, while Europe is oblivious. Both sides may be wrong. Sandro Magister analyzes this newest danger to our civilization by examining the philosophy of Tariq Ramadan, who has his own roadmap for islamicizing the West.
 READ MORE
 

STOP FEELING GUILTY. FEEL GOOD. WE'RE WINNING
by Al Skudsi bin Hookah

  Mr. bin Hookah, foreign correspondent and roving reporter for The Gaza Gajeera, is back. He explains to his readers why they should not feel guilty about killing infidels. It is an enterprise of great importance and it has the whole-hearted approval of Islam's theologians.
  READ MORE
 

THE PEACETIME WAR
by Judah Tzoref

  Arab propaganda has cleverly sold the idea that the conflict in the Middle East is between the Jews and the Palestinians. Dr. Tzoref makes the case that this notion masks the real problem: it is the Arab states that work to destroy Jewish Israel. Since Oslo, the major weapons have been terrorist snipers, homicidal suicide bombers and an uncontrolled high birthrate. Arab strategists — intellectuals and clerics — tell us that future plans are to augment these tactics with increased legal and illegal immigration of Arabs into Israel and the utilization of friction foci where ever this expanded Arab presence is thwarted.
 READ MORE
 

THE AGENDA OF ISLAM — A WAR BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS
by Professor Moshe Sharon

  Professor Sharon asserts that the war between two civilizations – "between the civilization based on the Bible and between the civilization based on the Koran" — started a long time ago.
 READ MORE
 

TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE STAR
by Yashiko Sagamori

 There is a strange intertwining between the actions of Muslim terrorists and the responses of Western leaders. The Arabs continue to kill Jews, and, more and more, they kill Americans. If Europe continues to ignore reality, Yashiko Sagamori suggests, soon, they too will be victims of the ongoing Muslim jihad. Yet American and European continue to pretend that the Muslim drive toward world domination – bolstered as it is by a belief system inculcated by their religion – can be changed by loving kindness and off-target propaganda.
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The demoralization of Israel isn't all due to attack by its Arab enemies. These next essays deal with the state of the State of Israel in general, with Ariel Sharon specifically and with the present structure of Israel's government, which contributes to Israel's inability to successfully withstand "friendly" external pressures.

A JEW IN GAZA
by Moshe Saperstein

  Under cover of humor, Moshe Saperstein gives us a pithy, accurate and brilliant analysis of the state of the State of Israel. Indirectly, he also gives us insight into the character of those remarkable people, the settlers of Biblical Israel. The residents of his town, Neve Dekalim in the Gaza Strip, under constant bombardment by the local Arabs, now face removal from their homes by their own government. He concludes his trenchant remarks with this comment to someone contemplating aliyah: "Whatever we have given to Israel, Israel has given us infinitely more. Israel has given us pride. Israel has given us self-respect. Israel has given us purpose and meaning far beyond mere existence. Israel has allowed us to lead extraordinary rather than ordinary lives."
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THE FOLLIES OF SHARON
by Arlene Peck

  Arlene Peck summarizes Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's spectacular follies: letting a flock of terrorists out of jail, starting to ethnically cleanse Jews from their historic lands, OKing the creation of a terrorist state in Biblical Israel. "Why," she asks "have their [Israel's] leaders lost the ability to lead? Or, behave as it seems that they have lost the will to win. Appeasement isn't the answer. What has recently been done by opening the jailhouse doors will, I'm afraid, come back to haunt them."
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THE ROOT CAUSE
by Boris Celser

  Israel does not have a Constitution. Writing one is commonly treated as a nice but not very urgent activity. Israel is a democracy, but it doesn't have direct representation on the local level. This means that Israeli citizens have few ways to influence a government that willfully negates what it was elected to do and does what the electorate voted against. Boris Celser provides compelling reasons why writing a Constitution and restructuring the government are urgent requirements for Israel's survival.
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So what should Israel do? And what should she not do?

WHAT ISRAEL SHOULD DO NOW: A Time For Moral Clarity
by Yosef Y. Jacobson

  Rabbi Jacobson responds "to some of the painful questions people of goodwill are asking today." His answers are succinct and clear and explain why basic concepts many accept as true — that there is a Palestinian people and that Israel is occupying Palestinian land — are not true. Given the facts, he suggests that "[t]he best way to bring about genuine peace in the Arab-Israeli war is by Israel putting an end to any future negotiations on the land. Israel must assume full security and military control over all of the territories under the united banner of a single country, Eretz Israel."
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ISRAEL'S SECURITY: The Hard-Learned Lessons
by Yaakov Amidror

  Oslo failed. The Palestinian Arabs took to war, calling it a popular uprising. Yaakov Amidror writes that "[a]ll observers were stunned by the rapid collapse of the security arrangements that were at the heart of the Oslo concept." He asks what went wrong and what lessons Israel must take from the Oslo experience in planning future defenses.
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TIME FOR A CHANGE: A Review of "A Concubine in the Middle East: American-Israeli Relations"
by Lewis Lipkin

  Ezra Sohar, author of a "Concubine in the Middle East," uses the metaphor of a relationship where one of the participants "is not accorded the respectful status of a legitimate wife" to describe American-Israeli relations. The book, written in 1999, is not outdated — if anything, recent events underscore his wise words.
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WHY WE SUPPORT ISRAELI SETTLEMENTS
by Daniel Kaganovich and Michael Butler

  When all the arab-promulgated arguments are shot down, the nuisance-value one remains: "Yeah, so they're not legally or historically entitled to it, so maybe some of them came in illegally just yesterday, but if you give the territories to these 'Palestinians' there will be peace." This presupposes that removing Jewish settlements will reduce friction. Daniel Kaganovich and Michael Butler argue that  removing the source of the "friction" (Jews) will not make a dent in the ideology that causes it. It will only encourage its spread."
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WHAT WOULD AMERICA DO?
by Beth Goodtree

  Israel has released a mass of prisoners and eased restrictions that make it easier for its enemies to wage war. Beth Goodtree points out that "[t]he result of all these concessions and appeasements has been more war." She suggests that Israel stop what she's doing and start emulating the USA: "The United States protects her own and does whatever it must to keep herself safe."
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We continue our examination of how anti-Israel bias is spread in America by the media and the 'peace and humanity' foundations. Several of the essays deal with the sick-making phenomenon of Israel-hate as manifested by Marxist Jews, both here and in Israel, and by far-left Jewish newspapers in Israel.

VIOLENCE AND LEFT-WING POLITICS: What's Going On At UCLA'S Hillel?
by Sharon Hes

  The surface event was an angry and inappropriate physical assault on a pro-Zionist journalist by a left-wing pro-Palestinian director of a youth group. Its significance for American Jews is that the director is the leader of Hillel at UCLA, and this was an acting out of his political passions, which also determine how he runs Hillel — its activities and events encourage Jewish students to develop an anti-Israel mindset. It is a chilling reminder of what goes on less blatantly in too many Jewish groups on too many American campuses: they are debating societies stressing fair-minded discussions of different points of view regarding Israel. They offer little resistance to the pro-Muslim groups preaching anti-Semitism and actively propagandizing the student body.
 READ MORE
 

THE PRICE OF ARROGANCE
by Ellen W. Horowitz

  Commenting on the attraction of Jewish Americans such as Ian Lustick and Tom Friedman to the radical-left Israeli daily Ha'aretz, Ellen Horowitz explains why "we have to question the motives behind the Jewish intellectuals in America and elsewhere in the Diaspora who base their venerated views on what may amount to nothing more than cheap, yellow journalistic tactics used to sell a bankrupt political line (and a newspaper)."
 READ MORE
 

IS IT ANTISEMITIC TO CRITICIZE ISRAEL? IS ISRAEL AN APARTHEID STATE?   Part 1.
by Jared Israel

  Israel is commonly described as an apartheid state by her enemies – many of which actually do practice apartheid. Jared Israel examines a major "fact" supporting this assertion: Arabs are not allowed to purchase land in Israel. This is true — as far as it goes. The author demonstrates that it is lying by omission: a fact is overextended, while contextual facts are suppressed, encouraging the audience to come to a false conclusion.
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ALL THE NEWS THAT'S FIT TO PRINT?
The New York Times and Israel
by Tom Gross

  Way back when, the New York Times earned a reputation for accurate reporting of ongoing events. When it comes to Israel, however, the Times lies by omission, exaggeration, distortion, context-stripping, underplaying Arab terrorism and just plain lying. Tom Gross provides us with a restrained but piercing analysis of how the Times (mal)treats Israel.
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FORD FUNDS THE PALESTINIAN LEFT
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan presents us with a detailed summary of how the Ford Foundation funds non-governmental Palestinian organizations and groups in Israel that support the Palestinian Arab cause. These are not social welfare groups; they are political and aggressively anti-Israel. The Ford Foundation's claim that its mission is to promote peace and social justice is macabre. Operationally, it funds unscrupulous groups who use propaganda and the legal system to undermine the State of Israel and who give direct and indirect aid to the terrorists who kill Israel's citizens.
 READ MORE
 

FORD HAS A BETTER IDEA: One Nation Under Allah
by Alyssa A. Lappen

  Several months ago, Edwin Black's series in the Jewish Telegraphic Agency detailed how the Ford Foundation funded Arab and pro-Arab groups, some of them with ties to terrorist groups, whose activities were aimed at demonizing Jews and delegitimizing Israel. Alyssa Lappen concentrates on another objective Ford indirectly supports when it funds the Constitutional Rights Foundation: the promotion of Sharia (Muslim law) in this country and the curtailing of activities and speech that Muslims regard as blasphemy — even if this means non-Muslim groups are deprived of their Constitutional rights.
 READ MORE
 

These essays discuss specific historical events: Palestine around time of World War II and the birth of Israel, the Damascus Affair of 1840 and the history of Samaria and Judea.

THE UNITED NATIONS AND THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES
by Hilda Terry

  Hilda Terry is a cartoonist, who has 'been there, done that' in cartoons from the Golden Age of cartoons through the graphics of the internet. She writes from her experiences, her notes and her recollections of events in Palestine around World War II. In this article, she examines why and how the figures for the number of Arab refugees of 1947 became so bloated.
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FROM DAMASCUS TO JENIN
by Elliott A. Green

  Elliott Green tells the story of the Damascus Affair, when in 1840 the Jewish community was accused of murdering a monk and his servant for their blood — it was a widely-held though erroneous belief among Europeans and Muslims that blood was a necessary ingredient of the Passover Matsot. The author associates the Damascus Affair with the latest egregious case of a false accusation, when Arab eye witnesses swore they'd seen the IDF massacred Arabs in the hundreds (or thousands) in Jenin. In both cases, it was a vicious lie. In both cases, there was an obsession to find the bodies. The accusations were lies, so no evidence could be found. Yet, the conviction that the Jews had done some terrible deed remained.
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JUDENREIN PALESTINE?
by Rachel Neuwirth

  Rachel Neuwirth traces the history of Judea and Samaria over the centuries. She points out that "[t]he Jewish presence there has been continuous, except for 19 years from 1948 to 1967 when the area became judenrein" under Jordan's rule. "After the 1967 war, the Jewish people have simply been returning to the land from which they were forcibly expelled during the first Arab-Israeli war of 1948-49."
 READ MORE
 

This is another episode of Marion Dreyfus' life teaching at a Chinese university.

CHINA DIARY: On Vacation
by Marion D.S. Dreyfus

  Marion Dreyfus records her impressions when on vacation from teaching at Wuchan, China. On holiday in Shanghai, she visits the synagogue Ohel Moishe, used by the Jews who escaped from Europe to China in World War II, and Sun Yat-sen's house. Her cousin, 2-Gun Cohen, had been a Sun Yat-sen bodyguard. In January she has some unusual experiences: she visits an 800-year old city at the foothills of the Himalayas and a lamassery; she sees the remarkable clay soldier statuary from the Chin dynasty and visits the Muslim quarter in Xi'an. She also has some more typical tourist experiences — trying to get food she can eat and dealing with having her camera, knapsack and money stolen.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. These are (for the most part) serious, thoughtful and from the heart. They should be shared with other readers. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.
 January Blog-Eds   READ MORE
 February Blog-Eds  READ MORE

===========================================

November-December, 2003

We begin with Saudi Arabia, which funds today's terrorists and builds schools in America, the Middle East and Asia that inculcate extreme Islamic attitudes in the next generation. These articles present some necessary background.

THE SAUDIS: The Middle East Mafia
by Lewis Lipkin

  It has been said that Saudi Arabia is the only family-owned business in the United Nations. The gifted dons of the Saud family shaped the modern state by melding the desert Bedouin's ruthlessness and guile with the religious force of Wahhabism, a harsh version of Islam. Lewis Lipkin chronicles the historical and cultural roots of the Sauds.
 READ MORE
 

THE PRINCE
by Elsa Walsh

  This is the story of how the Saudi Ambassador, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, became a Washington operator, chumming it up with the rich and famous, promoting the interests of Arafat and the Palestinians, and acting as go-between between Prince Abdullah, who runs the kingdom, and other heads of state. He is a son of Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, second in line to the Crown, and a grandson of Abdul Aziz, who created present-day Saudi Arabia. He is a long-time family friend of George Bush senior. The question is, after 9/11, how warmly does President Bush feel towards him?
 READ MORE
 

LAND OF SINBAD THE SAILOR
by Boris Zubry

  Boris Zubry has worked as a mechanical engineer in several countries. He recorded his experiences living and working in Saudi Arabia in this essay, which forms a chapter in his book, Miles Of Experience.
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MIDDLE ISRAEL: WHAT BURIED ARABIA?
by Amotz Asa-El

  Amotz Asa-El argues that "the root of the Saudi malaise isn't in its politics, but in its sociology: a high illiteracy rate, an anti-meritocratic social order, and the impossibility of its foreign workers — who hold 70% of the jobs — to become citizens. The result is social stagnation.
 READ MORE
 

THE SAUDI ARABIAN EMBASSY ON ISLAM AND MUSLIMS
by Steven Stalinsky

  The Saudi Embassy has a website explaining Islam and Muslims to Americans. Steven Stalinsky reports on how several topics are presented: Jihad and Martyrdom, Teaching Islam's Superiority over Christianity and Judaism, Rights in Islam of Dhimmis (non-Muslims under Muslim rule), the Punishment of Non-Believers, the Superiority of Polygamy in Islam to Western Monogamy, and the Rights of Women.
 READ MORE
 

A TROUBLING INFLUENCE
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.

  Ever since 9/11, it has become harder for Saudi Arabia to suppress information about its subversion of academic departments and U.S. State Department diplomats, its indoctrination of Arab schoolchildren and Muslims in the military in anti-Western Wahhabism, its funding of Middle Eastern terrorists and its outpouring of anti-Semitic hate literature. Articles on the extent of Saudi's anti-Western activities continue to surface. Frank Gaffney's essay is unique in tracing the damage done by a single individual — Grover Norquist — who, in David Horowitz's words, has been working in the higher levels of Washington's political circles "... on behalf of the Islamist Fifth Column."
 READ MORE
 

These article discuss the increase in Egypt's war arsenal and the deterioration of the Peace Treaty between Egypt and Israel.

DENIAL ON THE NILE
by Rand H. Fishbein

  This is a reprint of an article Dr. Fishbein wrote soon after 9/11 on the dangers of Egypt acquiring ever more sophisticated weaponry from the United States and North Korea, especially when Egypt in its rhetoric and in its actions was showing increased hostility to the United States and Israel. It could not, the author wrote, "be discounted as an adversary in any future regional conflict." In view of the developments in the past two years (see Dan Eldar's article below), the article was most prescient.
 READ MORE
 

EGYPT AND ISRAEL: A Reversible Peace
by Dan Eldar

  The peace treaty of 1977 between Israel and Egypt was, in Dan Eldar's words, "between a society of Western political culture and norms and an Arab-Muslim society with different attitudes regarding the character of peace, the parameters of truth, and the meaning of justice." Since then, while claiming to be a peace broker, Egypt has been "making sure that peace never spreads," encouraging the intifada, while blaming it all on Israel and spewing out Nazi-quality anti-Semitic hate literature. As Egypt becomes poorer, less stable and more radicalized by Islamists, both Israel and America need to reassess how durable this peace is.
 READ MORE
 

It is often asserted Islam is a religion of peace. These articles explore the question of just how peaceful a religion Islam is, the relationship between Islam and terrorism and some thoughts on avoiding both terrorism and Islam.

ISLAM: A RELIGION OF PEACE?
by Larry Elder

  This is an interview Larry Elder conducted with Robert Spencer, about his new book, "Onward Muslim Soldiers: How Jihad Still Threatens America and the West." It is possible that President Bush may actually believe that Islam is a "religion of peace," But Spencer asserts that what we call "'Islamic extremism' stems from a straightforward reading of the Koran and interpretative Islamic texts."
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ONLY U.S. STRENGTH CAN DEFEAT ISLAM
by David Gutmann

  Dr. David Gutmann, a clinical psychologist, asserts that "Terrorist organizations must be smashed, and their sponsoring nations made to pay the price. If we withdraw in feebleness, triumphant Islamic terrorism will increase catastrophically." Arguing from historical experience and the national character of the Muslims, he show why this is so.
 READ MORE
 

THE GREAT WALL OF ISRAEL
by Yashiko Sagamori

  Israel is building a security fence. Among Israel's friends, the focus is on whether it is or isn't effective in protecting Israelis from local terrorists. Israel's enemies, fearing it just might be effective, complain it inconveniences the local Arabs. The author asks whether something as drastic as the wall is for Israel might save Europe from "succumbing to Islam" — or is it too late?
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The recent flurry over the latest Peace Miracle Pill is almost spent. These articles provide further evidence why trying to negotiate with the Palestinians is futile. The sooner the futility is accepted, the sooner people can start thinking about workable solutions to the conflict.

THE TWO BIG MISTAKES THAT KEEP THE CONFLICT GOING
by Professor Barry Rubin

  All the diplomatic peace plans proposed by Israel to solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict have in common the notions that (1) if Israel makes sufficient concessions, she will gain peace; and (2) making concessions will win her brownie points in the world community. Professor Rubin discusses why this strategy is doomed to failure.
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THE SANCTITY OF THE UNSACRED
by Guy Bechor

  Speaking of the Arab attitude towards formal agreements, the author writes, "... the Western concept of the "sanctity of contractual agreements does not exist in this part of the world, and... an agreement is always relative and not total, and it changes according to considerations of security, religion, history, and military power." In bringing this article to our attention, Aryeh Zelasko put it this way, "As long as the parties involved maintain their respective power levels, the agreement is in force. However, as soon as the balance of power changes, goodbye agreement."
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PART OF THE PROBLEM? THIS IS THE PROBLEM
Separate essays by Mike Hendrix and Stephen Green

  After the Arafat-Barak fiasco, it seemed that Dennis Ross, the US point man involved, swore he was no longer a peace junky and renounced Arafat's machinations. But it looks like he's fallen off the wagon – the Geneva Accord were announced and he smells action all over again. Mike Hendrix of the Cold Fury website and Stephen Green of VodkaPundit try to sober him up with cold facts why the peace process can't work.
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The history and culture of the Arabs, their religion, their nonchalant attitude to contractual agreements, the way they teach their children hate for non-Muslims and their consuming desire to be again top dog lording it over a chastened Western world suggest that any peace treaty, no matter how specifically or ambiguously worded, will have the lasting power of a paper bag in a rainstorm. These essays explore an alternative: separating the Jews and Arabs by transferring the Arabs to some part of the vast Arab land area.

ON MIDEAST'S MENU
by Lou Marano

  Lou Marano focuses on the Arab strategy to destroy Israel as embedded in the 10-point program adopted by the Palestinian National Council in 1974. And never repudiated. This means that giving the Palestinian Arabs a state will inevitably be followed by their renewed demands for more concessions backed up by renewed acts of terror. He discusses the Elon plan, which makes Jordan  the only legitimate representative of the Palestinians."
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TRANSFER MEANS PEACE
by Boris Shusteff

  Mr Shusteff emphasizes that in the near future, even if it is stigmatized as ethnic cleansing, we will have population transfer. The question is: will it be the Jews who are transferred out of Biblical Israel, including a part of Jerusalem, or will it be the Arabs who are moved back to Arab countries. He points out that Jordan is already a Palestinian state, some twenty times larger than Samaria, Judea and Gaza, and the majority of its citizens consider themselves Palestinians.
 READ MORE
 

A JEWISH ROAD
by Ruth King

  Ruth King makes the case for Israeli annexation of Samaria, Judea and Gaza. "It is time," she says, "for Israel to face reality. No concessions will make the United Nations ... accept them nor will it placate the Arabs and their Muslim sympathizer Peace will come only through determination and strength and unity and the total destruction and disarming of the Palestinian Authority."
 READ MORE
 

Freedom of speech is becoming increasingly selective, both in America and in Israel. In both cases, it is becoming politically correct to denigrate Israel and attribute the worst motives and behavior to her, but criticism of Arab behavior is considered inpolite at best and telling lies at worst.

THE BROWNSHIRTS OF OUR TIME
by Phyllis Chesler

  Phyllis Chesler, long identified with the Woman's Movement, recounts her pain when she was confronted by members of the movement with ingrained Jew-hate. These Brownshirts see "Palestine" as a "symbol for every downtrodden group of color 'resisting' the racist-imperialist American and Zionist Empires." They can't be reached by facts on the actual treatment of women in Arab society or by an appeal to their own anti-racist principles. Anti-Semitism is becoming politically correct among those who define political correctness.
 READ MORE
 

EXPULSION, NOT TRANSFER
by Gil Ronen

  Tamar Rush of Herzliya has observed, "Passing out hundreds of copies of the wiretap transcripts of our Prime Minister's private conversations is perceived as 'harmless fun' — but writing a half-satirical letter to a website could get you some serious time in the klinker." Gil Ronin wrote just that sort of letter to Arutz-7, and MK Gal-On has been demanding his arrest on charges of 'incitement' ever since." This is Ronen's letter, translated into English. Read it, and decide if Gil Ronin deserves to be jailed for his views — especially when more and more Israelis are debating how, not whether, to transfer the seditious and violence-prone Arabs out of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

INCREASINGLY SELECTIVE DEMOCRACY
by Steven Plaut

  Gil Ronen's article in Arutz-7 (see above) was deemed a violation of the law against incitement and an investigation was launched against the managers of the Arutz-7 website. Steve Plaut uses actual examples to highlight how Israeli Leftists are twisting the Law to punish pro-Israel free speech, while allowing any and all pro-Arab speeches, including some that really are seditious and an incitement to riot.
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The right of Jews to a Jewish homeland is again under attack. These articles present historical information that refute the arguments of the Arabs and their allies. Dr. Shifftan reminds us that if Israelis weren't afraid of an Arab voting majority, they'd give more weight to the reasons for keeping Biblical Israel.

THE JEWISH RIGHT TO THE LAND OF ISRAEL
by Alex Rose

  Alex Rose writes of the time of the Balfour Declaration, when the resolve of the English to create a Jewish state was strongly asserted by influential members of the British Cabinet. He examines the Arab case against the creation of the Jewish State, showing that their arguments were and are invalid. Jews have claims to their land biblically, by their unbroken ties to the land historically, and by their reclamation of the
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AN ANSWER TO THE NEW ANTI-ZIONISTS: The Rights Of The Jewish People To A Sovereign State In Their Historic Homeland
by Dore Gold and Jeff Helmreich

"Jewish nationhood preceded the emergence of most modern nation-states by thousands of years" — well before the first Arab came into the region — and, as the authors point out, in modern times, "[t]he links of the Jewish people to their historic land were well-known and accepted..." Yet, of all the 190 States that are members of the U.N. — many of whom lack "national identity" or are monolithic in religion or culture or have governments that govern inadequately or repressively, only Israel's legitimacy is questioned.
 READ MORE
 

IF THE ARABS DON'T SERVE IN THE ARMY, THEY SHOULDN'T VOTE
by Yoram Shifftan

  The major practical reason for giving away Biblical Israel is demographic: if Israel is to remain a Jewish state, it needs to retain a Jewish voting majority. Dr. Shifftan proposes another solution. Those communities that don't serve in the army will not be allowed to vote in national elections. This would apply to Israeli Arabs and the Arabs in the terrorities, because Arabs do not serve in the army.
 READ MORE
 

We continue our examination of how anti-Israel bias is spread in America by the media and through other gateways of the public's access to information.

COMMEMORATING KRISTALLNACHT AT THE SEATTLE TIMES
by Stefan Sharkansky

  On the day we remember Kristallnacht, the Seattle Times reprinted an Avraham Burg piece, which included this gem: " They [suicide terrorists] spill their own blood in our restaurants in order to ruin our appetites because they have children and parents at home who are hungry and humiliated." Burg was a proponent of the original Oslo Agreement and is now involved in the Geneva Accord. Stefan Sharkansky rebuts two recent Times pieces on Israel: one by Burg, the other by a Times columnist on the Geneva Accord.
 READ MORE
 

IDENTIFYING ISLAMISTS ON CAMPUS
by Emanuel A. Winston

  The author points out one silver lining to the storm of anti-Jewish activities by Islamists on campus: the FBI and CIA can more easily track these radical Muslim students. He also examines the responses of college administrators to anti-Jewish activities on campus and lists organizations that monitor anti-Semitic activities.
 READ MORE
 

PLO HASBARA: A VERY PROFESSIONAL PIECE OF WORK
by Miki Daners

  This is an extremely informative article about the slick techniques of PLO propaganda and their paid publicists who manipulate the foreign media. She discusses some of their networking, training and funding resources as well as their excellent Washington lobbyist, Edward Abington, who earns his keep whitewashing Arafat. While the PLO lies about Israel by attributing to them untrue misdeeds, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Service lies about the PLO by playing down their false propaganda and ignoring their atrocities.
 READ MORE
 

These next two articles were written by Jews who live in exotic places. Moshe Saperstein lives in Gaza near Israel's 'Peaceful Peace Partners' and Marion D.S. Dreyfus teaches at the University in Wuchan, China and does a radio talk show.

MOSHE AMONG THE MORTARS
by Moshe Saperstein

  In this letter, Moshe talks of uneventful happenings: being shelled by Arab mortars, traveling to Jerusalem to do errands and rescuing an injured bird.
 READ MORE
 

FRIENDS AND STUDENTS
by Marion D.S. Dreyfus

  It's winter and the pressing problem in Wuchan is keeping warm. Marion lectures, does a radio show and fends off the Administration. This takes up much too much time, leavng little time to travel and see the countryside.
 READ MORE
 

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. These are (for the most part) serious, thoughtful and from the heart. They should be shared with other readers. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.
 November Blog-Eds  READ MORE
 December Blog-Eds  READ MORE

===========================================

September-October, 2003

The latest reincarnation of the Peace Process died August 19th as surely as did the passengers on Egged bus #2. Both the Road Map and the people were blown up by the Arabs. This first group of essays suggest that the way we have pursued peace for the last 36 years must fail because we have made the wrong assumptions and have ignored important facts.

WHY THE PEACE PROCESS CAN'T WORK AND SHOULD BE ABANDONNED
by Robert Locke

  In simple language that even a politician should understand, Robert Locke demolishes the notion that there can be a negotiated peace process when the two sides have incompatible objectives. As the author says, "The Palestinians want to drive the Israelis into the sea, and the Israelis want to not be driven into the sea."
 READ MORE
 

THERE IS ONLY A MILITARY SOLUTION
by Ariel Natan Pasko

  The major reason Israel can't negotiate with the Arabs in that they want to destroy Israel, not reason with her or negotiate with her. Ariel Pasko reinforces that conclusion with an impressive set of statistics that indicate the Palestinian Arabs feel strongly that: "The rights and needs of the Palestinian people cannot be taken care of as long as the State of Israel exists." He concludes that the only way to peace is by military means.
 READ MORE
 

TWELVE BAD ARGUMENTS FOR A STATE OF PALESTINE
by Patricia J. Berlyn

  Patricia Berlyn critically examines the current reasonable-sounding arguments that are put forth by the well-meaning and not so well-meaning as reasons to establish a PLO state for the Palestinian Arabs. And she reminds us how quickly the U.S. went from a position of not negotiating with the PLO — which was and is and will be a terrorist organization committed to destroying Israel — to its current promotion of such a state.
 READ MORE
 

INDIA AND PAKISTAN — A Cautionary Tale for Israel and Palestine
by Jeffrey Weiss

  In a clear and logical fashion, Jeffrey Weiss lays out a powerful and detailed case against creating a Palestinian Arab state, using the history of the partition of India and Pakistan as example. He points out that "Oslo's advocates argue that two states are needed for there to be peace and self-determination for Arab and Jew alike...[yet] the Palestinian Authority has demanded the right of Palestinians to 'return' to live in Israel."
 READ MORE
 

ALL IS NOT LOST
by Frank Gaffney, Jr.

  We present this article on September 11th. America resolved to fight a war on terror on September 11, 2001. Frank Gaffney says wisely that "...terror is a technique, an instrument of warfare...And, to be effective, military and other responses to that threat have to be aimed not at the technique but at those who employ it to advance their political or other goals...In the War on Terror, our principal foes are Islamists and those who assist their murderous, jihadist agenda."
 READ MORE
 

WHERE ARE THE MODERATE ARABS?
by Michael Anbar, Ph.D.

  Michael Anbar demonstrates that the theological and cultural differences between "moderate muslims" and "fundamentalist muslims" are on a par with the differences between "Arab militants" and "Arab terrorists." There are none.
 READ MORE
 

VIEWING ISLAM CLEAR. VIEWING ISLAM MUDDY
by Emanuel A. Winston

  Emanual A. Winston cuts through the propaganda that portrays Islam as a kind and gentle religion. Perhaps it is. But it fosters terrorism and terrorism is a world-wide threat. Much of the world has responded by playing 'let's pretend.'
 READ MORE
 

THE "RIGHT OF RETURN" DEBATE REVISITED
by Max Abrahms

  The Arabs continue to pursue their goal of destroying Israel. They have pursuaded many that all they want is a state for the Palestinian Arabs. But they have also demanded the return to Israel of the Arab refugees, whose numbers have remarkably multiplied some 700 to 1000 percent (depending on whose numbers you use) in 55 years. This huge size made it hard to sell the "right of return" until a recent poll seemed to show that only a few refugees would insist on returning. Max Abrahms shows that these results are downright misleading.
 READ MORE
 

HOLOCAUST IN PROGRESS
by Yashiko Sagamori

  In the wake of the August 19th bus bombing in Jerusalem, Yashiko Sagamori's lucid essay points out that "[w]hat the world euphemistically dubbed a peace process is actually a Holocaust in progress." The author notes that "Bush...promised to never negotiate with terrorists. Unfortunately, he failed to specify which terrorists he was not going to negotiate with, what exactly he was not going to negotiate with them, and how often."
 READ MORE
 

These next essays talk about reform in Israel. Israel has been thrown off track by Arab terrorism and its own inhibited response to this ongoing terrorism. It needs to (re)establish its unique identity.

JEWISH NATIONAL STRATEGY
by Paul Eidelberg

  Professor Eidelberg reviews the components necessary for a Jewish state. The strategy for achieving a Jewish state must start with a "...[p]ublic affirmation that a Jewish State must be based on Jewish principles and values." and the corollary "...that the primary source of Jewish principles and values is the Torah."
 READ MORE
 

THE G.O.D. MANDATE
by Beth Goodtree

  Beth Goodtree usually writes political commentary and humorous articles. She is just as effective when she writes seriously about the fundamental need for Israel to set forth a written declaration of its own identity and goals.
 READ MORE
 

TO CREATE A JEWISH STATE OF ISRAEL
by Moshe Feiglin

  Manhigut Yehudit (Jewish Leadership) is a movement inside the Likud Party that is working to create a strong Jewish identity in Israel. It has protested Oslo and held street demonstrations against attempts to uproot settlements. At the same time, it is formulating an ideology based on authentic biblical and historic Judaism for the governance of the Jewish state.
 READ MORE
 

HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH?
by Arlene Peck

  In her refreshingly candid style, Arlene Peck asks when will the Israelis accept that they are at war? When will they take charge of their own destiny and start dealing intelligently with the Muslim-Arab-Palestinian terrorists whose goal is to destroy the Jewish state.
 READ MORE
 

THE UN AND THE ASSAULT ON ISRAEL'S LEGITIMACY: Implications Of The Roadmap
by Anne Bayefsky

  Anne Bayefsky writes, "Human rights may be the most highly-rated political currency in modern times. This is exactly why the criminal state or political actor has sought to appropriate it. The United Nations, as the pre-eminent guardian of human rights, has been the staging ground for this subversion. The body erected upon the rejection of anti-Semitism now perversely serves as a major international vehicle for anti-Semitism." Clearly, Israel needs to assert its sovereign rights; it must take "concrete steps to protect" itself.
 READ MORE
 

ACADEMIC FREEDOM AND FREEDOM OF SPEECH IN ISRAEL'S UNIVERSITIES DURING THE OSLO DECADE: 1993-2003
by Arieh Zaritsky

  Professor Zaritsky talks about the one-sided freedom of academic expression fostered in Israeli universities during the Oslo decade. Views critical of the Oslo Accords and the Peace Process were subtly and not so subtly discouraged. This essay would be just a nice reminiscence, except for one problem: these peace-process academic Marxists continue to control academic departments and continue to promote a failed policy that continues to bring extreme harm to Israel.
 READ MORE
 

VIEW FROM THE ASYLUM
by Elyakim HaEtzni

  So what is life like right now in Israel, now that Oslo is dead, but lots of the politicians don't seem to know it? In this essay that is likely to become a classic, Elyakim HaEtzni draws a stark analogy to the madness seen in a closed ward of an insane asylum. He concludes, "I know of only one way to restore national sanity: to take to the streets and raise a public outcry, until the Closed Ward Government falls."
 READ MORE
 

We need to reexamine the entire question of how to achieve peace in the Middle East.

These next articles discuss Population Exchange — transferring the Palestinian Arabs out of Israel, an exchange that began when the Jews were forced out of Arab countries in the 1940s. Population Exchange is a plan that has a better chance at promoting peace in the Middle East than the Road Map, because it is based on reality, not fantasy.

PARTITION VERSUS POPULATION EXCHANGE
by Richard H. Shulman

  Richard Shulman examines Chaim Kaufmann's study on Population Exchange, which developed rules predicting when partition will work and when population exchange is necessary. He points out some mistakes in Kaufmann's arguments for partitioning Israel, because "[Kaufmann] did not understand enough about the Arab-Israel conflict to apply his own theory properly."
 READ MORE
 

TRANSFER: A MORAL DISCOURSE
by Boris Shusteff

  Using Ruth Gavison's essay on the Jewish right to statehood as springboard, Boris Shusteff demolishes the notion that, from the point of view of universal human rights, transferring the Arabs out of Israel — including Yesha — would be an immoral act. There is also the practical problem that Arab activity over the years has focussed on demolishing Israel, not "establishing institutions of Arab government."
 READ MORE
 

THE THIRD RAIL OF MIDDLE EAST POLICY
by Ruth King

  Ruth King makes clear that no peace that depends on Arab goodwill has a chance to succeed. We need to consider a more practical solution: transferring Palestinian Arabs to the current Palestinian state, Jordan.
 READ MORE
 

These next essays are on Middle East terrorist groups. The first two discuss Hizballah, an international terrorist network with direct linkages to other terrorist organizations and to terrorist activities globally. Using Hamas as example, the third essay makes clear than "[f]rom the standpoint of international law, one man's terrorist can never be another man's freedom-fighter."

HIZBALLAH'S WEST BANK FOOTHOLD
by Matthew Levitt

  There is a direct linkage of Hizballah and the Palestinian Arabs in Samaria, Judea and in Gaza. Matthew Levitt discusses how, beginning in 2000 with Iran's use of "the social-welfare hook to recruit Palestinians into Hizballah," Palestinian Arabs were trained in Lebanon and then sent back. The author writes, "Among the activities Hizballah's Palestinian squads have conducted are arms smuggling, recruitment, attempted suicide bombings, sniper and roadside shooting attacks, preoperational surveillance of Israeli communities and army bases, and planned kidnapping of Israelis."
 READ MORE
 

HIZBOLLAH INTERNATIONAL
by Lewis Lipkin

  Lewis Lipkin focusses on the extent of Hizbollah activity outside the Middle East. They are alive and well in Europe, South America and in the United States.
 READ MORE
 

ON HAMAS "FREEDOM FIGHTERS": The View From International Law
by Louis Rene Beres

  Professor Louis Rene Beres points out that "even if Hamas claims of an Israeli 'occupation' were correct rather than concocted, their corresponding claim of entitlement to oppose Israel 'by any means necessary' would remain unsupportable." He educates us on the "precise standards that must be applied in judgment of all insurgent resorts to violence," and defines just cause and just means.
 READ MORE
 

We continue our examination of how anti-Israel bias is spread in America by the media and through other gateways of the public's access to information.

SUCKERED BY THE ARABS: Are Jewish and Christian Pro-Israel Groups Being Suckered By The Arabs?
by Lee Kaplan

  Lee Kaplan writes about Saudi-financed activities in America that are detrimental to us and to Israel. He reasons that activist Zionist groups are "wasting our time in our own country constantly putting out forest fires instead of going after the arsonist."
 READ MORE
 

RUTGERS' SUKKOT HATEFEST
by Merav Zarifa

  Is Jew-Hate becoming a part of Political Correctness? Is a Fest designed to encourage the killing of Jews and the dismemberment of Israel a manifestation of free speech? The New Jersey Solidarity group seems to think so. Until very recently, Rutgers went along with hosting them on campus. At the last moment, the event was cancelled.
 READ MORE
 

THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION, The P.A.'s Pal
by N. Leonard Tolkan

  Most people would say their public libraries are apolitical and desire only to educate the public by encouraging the purchase of books of varying points of view, providing they are not hate literature and providing they have their facts straight. So isn't it surprising to find that the American Library Association (ALA) — the oldest and largest and probably the most influential society of librarians in the world — apparently considers it has a duty to bash Israel and support the 'Palestinian' cause. N. Leonard Tolkan, the author of this article, is a veteran librarian who, for obvious reasons, chooses to remain anonymous.
 READ MORE
 

An unusual and fascinating way to spend the High Holidays.

CHINA DIARY: Settling Down In Wuchan. L'Shana Tova From Beijing.
by Marion D. S. Dreyfus

  Marion D. S. Dreyfus is a freelance journalist, a film critic and an intrepid traveler. I met her on a bullet-proof bus on an Americans For A Safe Israel (AFSI) trip to Samaria, Judea and Gaza. When she announced she was off to China and asked what Think-Israel was interested in, I had a long list for her to investigate: (1) Chinese Jews — is there a Jewish community? Are there converts? Are there any left over from the WW2 escape from Europe? Are there any from an older immigration?; (2) Businessmen from Israel and Canada that do business in Shanghai — do they influence the Chinese in any way to be pro-Israel? I have heard there's at least one kosher restaurant; (3) China's Islam problem — are they handling it by being politically correct? Or what; (4) Does Israel have any PR or hasbara in China?
 READ MORE
 

And finally, our newest feature: the Blog-Ed page.

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. These are (for the most part) serious, thoughtful and from the heart. They should be shared with other readers. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.
 September Blog-Eds
 October Blog-Eds  READ MORE
 

===========================================

July-August, 2003

This first group of essays center around a regional peace plan articulated by Israeli Minister Binyamin (Benny) Elon.

THE RIGHT ROAD TO PEACE: A Regional Solution To The Arab-Israeli Conflict
posted by Benny Elon, May, 2003.

  Israeli Cabinet Minister Binyamin Elon proposes a regional peace plan: give the Arabs on the West Bank full citizenship in Jordan, resettle the Arab refugees in Arab countries and annex the West Bank and Gaza to Israel. This would make for two stable and viable Palestinian States, one Arab, one Jewish, in what was Mandated Palestine. His plan takes into account critical factors the Road Map ignores: a role for the Arab countries that neighbor Israel, the solution to the Arab refugee problem, Israel's security, a natural border and Israel's historic and biblical claim to the Land.
 READ MORE
 

SHARON'S ACCIDENTAL TOURIST
by Caroline B. Glick, July 10, 2003.

  This is a copy of an interview with Minister Elon conducted by Caroline Glick. It adds details to the Elon plan, which is described in "The Right Road to Peace" (see above).
 READ MORE
 

ARE THE SETTLEMENTS LEGAL?
by Eugene V. Rostow, April 23, 1990 and October 21, 1991.

  Eugene V. Rostow wrote two articles on the Jewish settlements for the New Republic during the presidency of George H.W. Bush. The first was written a few months before Saddam Hussain of Iraq invaded Kuwait and precipitated the first Gulf War. Bush excluded Israel from fighting during the War and then, after the USA had forced Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, he pressured the then Prime Minister, Yitzhak Shamir, to attend the Madrid Conference, a Middle East peace initiative that led to Oslo 1. The second article was published just days before the Madrid Conference. Mr. Rostow helped draft the UN Security Council Resolution #242, which called on Israel and the Arab States (not the Palestinians) to make peace, and allows Israel to administer the territories until there is a just and lasting peace.
 READ MORE
 

ISRAELI HASBARA: A Nation Working Against Itself
posted by Yoram Shifftan, Ph.D., July 2, 2003.

  Much of the fault-finding with Israeli Hasbara (education/PR/persuasion) suggests it just hasn't come up with the right way to reach the public. Dr Shifftan suggests it isn't even trying.
 READ MORE
 

ONLY THE ARABS CAN MAKE PEACE
posted by Alex Rose, July 10, 2003.

  Reviewing modern Arab history in the Middle East, Alex Rose argues that " [t]he time has come for the Arab World to invest their resources in democracy and freedom instead of financing an international 'kill the infidel' culture." This will mean acknowledging that the same politics that gave them such an enormous chunk of the Ottoman Empire gave the Jews a right to Israel, Samaria, Judea and Gaza.
 READ MORE
 

DON'T CONDEMN ISRAEL TO INDIA'S FATE
by M.D. Nalapat, June 22, 2003.

  In a letter to the Jerusalem Post, June 22, 2003, Larry Hall pointed out that "Israel and India have many things in common — broken British promises, convenient isolation by greedy nations, disparate populations living in progressive societies. And all the while, Islam besets them, sets its populations to suffer in the hope that it might destroy them." Professor Nalapat discusses this from the Indian perspective.
 READ MORE
 

Hudna is an Arabic concept. It is a very temporary suspension of violence, usually during an all-out war. It is not a cease-fire. As Yuval Zaliouf reminds us, "Normally, a Hudnah would be declared between the warring parties. However, the Palestinian terror organizations agreed to a Hudnah not with Israel, but as a flimsy internal arrangement between them and Abu Mazen. The survival of this Hudnah depends entirely on the success of a blackmail scheme aimed at forcing Israel to release Palestinian prisoners outside the frame of the already agreed Road Map."

How well is the Road Map working in this period of Hudna?

A TYPICAL DAY IN SHARON'S ISRAEL
Arutz-7 news items, July 20, 2003.

  This is a snapshot of the events in a typical day in an Israel under Sharon's guidance: the Palestinian Arabs have been enboldened to ask for more and more Israeli concessions while doing nothing to eliminate terrorism; Sharon denies he is releasing terrorists, but of course he is; the Israeli Security Services have found someone they can bully: the father of Shalhavet Pas, the 10-month old child who was assassinated by an Arab sniper; and Arab bombings and sniping continue.
  READ MORE
 

PALESTINIAN WORDS SINCE AQABA: More Telling Than Deeds
posted by Itamar Marcus, June 22, 2003.

  Speaking in English, abu Mazen has promised to act vigorously against incitement to violence and hatred. But educating the Palestinian Arab children in Jew-hatred hasn't ceased. Not for a moment.
 READ MORE
 

PRISONER RELEASE: VEERING OFF THE ROADMAP
posted by Eli Kazhdan, July 14, 2003.

  The Palestinian Arabs were supposed to perform the very first task on the Road Map: an immediate and complete cessation of violence. Instead, they have pulled the old one-two. First they declared 'prisoner release' the primary and immediate issue. Then they threatened to cancel Hudna, if the prisoners aren't released. And they have done nothing about stopping Arab terrorism.
 READ MORE
 

HAMAS AND THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY ARE ONE: An Open Letter To President Bush
posted by Alyssa A. Lappen, June 19, 2003.

  Alyssa Lappen writes that, despite the PR show, Hamas and the Palestine Authority have worked together for many years towards the same goal: the destruction of Israel. Nothing has changed.
 READ MORE
 

OUR FEARLESS LEADERS
posted by Al Skudsi bin Hookah, The Gaza Gajeera, July 5, 2003.

  Mr bin Hookah is foreign correspondent and roving reporter for the Gaza Gajeera. This is his assessment of how the Palestinian leaders are doing in the latest round of diplomacy and negotiations.
 READ MORE
 

A CULTURE WEDDED TO WAR
posted by Emanuel A. Winston, May 9, 2003.

  In this essay, Emanuel A. Winston analyzes the national character of Muslim Arabs. He makes clear why appealing to their reason or bribing them with Israeli concessions will have the same effect as stopping a sand storm by waving a wet noodle at it.
 READ MORE
 

BASEBALL, HOT DOGS, APPLE PIE AND HUDNA
posted by Ellen Horowitz, July 3, 2003.

  Ellen Horowitz talks about the flaws in the national character of the Americans, the Arabs and the Israelis that allowed the Road Map and Hudna.
 READ MORE
 

These next essays deal with history: the resurgence of Anti-Semitism in France and the ongoing anti-Semitism of Israel's neighbors.

FRENCH ANTISEMITISM: From the Middle Ages to the Dreyfus Affair
posted by Lewis Lipkin, July 5, 2003.

  This essay traces some major sources of French anti-Semitism, from the teachings of the Catholic Church and the decrees of the Monarchy on the Right to the Humanists and the Enlightenment philosophes on the Left. Of particular interest is the development of the Blood Libel, which has become a staple of Arab anti-Semitism.
 READ MORE
 

JEWS AND ANTI-JEWS
by Ruth Wisse, July 16, 2003.

  Ruth Wisse puts the Arab war against the Jews in the broader context of some major reasons for habitual anti-Semitism: deflecting anger from a ruler's ineptitude and poor governance and as an excuse for a ruler to shackle his country.
  READ MORE
 

A TALE OF TWO NAKBAS
posted by Gerald A. Honigman, July 10, 2003.

  Arabs consider the rebirth of Israel the major if not the only catastrophe — a nakba — to have happened in the recent history of the Middle East. This ignores the catastrophies inflicted by the Arabs on the non-Arab populations ever since the Arabs came into the Middle East, including the nabka of the Jews, who had to flee from Arab countries when Israel was reborn.
 READ MORE
 

THE REAL PALESTINIAN REFUGEES
posted by David Silon, July 17, 2003.

  The success of the Zionist enterprise ignores that Jews never left the Holy Land throughout the centuries. This essay points out that in recent history Arab savagery made refugees of the indigenous Jewish population in Palestine between 1920 and 1949.
 READ MORE
 

Anti-Israel propaganda is spread all over the media. Here are two examples: one from a newspaper, the other from TV.

AN EXPERIMENT IN PREDICTING THE LOS ANGELES TIMES' SPIN
posted by Michael Levy, July 20, 2003.

  Michael Levy has made himself the subject of an ongoing experiment. Can he predict how the Los Angeles Times (LAT) will slant a story on the Arab/Israeli conflict? He started with 9 rules, on which he bases his predictions. These are his rules with some of his commentary. Read his site, http://lat-early.blogspot.com, for the latest results. Better still, apply the rules yourself to the Washington Post or the New York Times or Ha'aretz.
  READ MORE
 

UNHOLY, INDEED
posted by Bill Hobbs, July 7, 2003.

  Anti-Israel propaganda pops up in the oddest places. Ask people to name TV shows hostile to Israel and NPR, Nightline and Peter Jennings are obvious choices. But with just a single episode, The Agency, a CBS drama, put itself in the running.
 READ MORE
 

And finally, we introduce a new feature to Think-Israel: the Blog-Ed page.

READERS' BLOG-EDS

  This is where our readers get a chance to write opinions and editorials. Why Blog-Ed and not Op-Ed? Because we have retained the typical blog style of a stream of text organized chronologically. These are (for the most part) serious, thoughtful and from the heart. They should be shared with other readers. Blog-Eds is updated every few days.
 July Blog-Eds
 August Blog-Eds
 

===========================================

May-June, 2003

ANATOMY OF AN ILLUSION: THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN TWO-STATE SOLUTION
posted by Eric L. Rozenman, June 10, 2003.

  This is a masterful presentation of the history of attempts at creating a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinian Arabs. Mr. Rozenman makes clear why such a solution can't work.
 READ MORE
 

A ROADMAP TO PEACE: WITH WHOM?
by Michael Anbar, May 6, 2003.

  The Road Map makes the wrong assumption that peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel can bring peace to the Middle East. But as Michael Anbar points out, the Palestinian Arabs are only "a minute part of a large nation, which [has been] in a continual state of war with the Jewish nation from the day Israel was established." Palestinian Arabs are not politically independent. They train in Lebanon; their military supplies come in from Egypt. "As long as Arab Islamism maintains its grip on the Middle East," Israel has no peace partner.
 READ MORE
 

ROADMAP TO HELL
posted by Elyakim Haetzni, April 27, 2003.

  Mr. Haetzni has written elsewhere that the Road Map is even worse that the Oslo Accords. Unlike Oslo, the Road Map (1) mandates a Palestinian State; (2) restricts settlement development; and (3) encourages foreign interference with Israeli sovereignty. In this article, he examines the Road Map stipulations on issues important to Israel.
 READ MORE
 

BY WHAT RIGHT, MR. PRESIDENT?
An Arutz-7 Editorial, June 11, 2003.

  The implementation of the Road Map is just beginning and already it has encouraged a marked increase in deadly bombings by Hamas and the other Arab terrorist groups. This open letter to President Bush is indicative of the disappointment in Israel in President Bush, who has made a 180 degree turn from his intelligent assessment of what was required for Middle East peace just a year ago.
 READ MORE
 

THE CONFLICT AS SEEN BY ORDINARY PEOPLE
posted by Bernice Lipkin, June 11, 2003.
crossposted on IsraPundit.

  So many of the media experts have started talking up Oslo 2 as the way to peace, as if we've had no experience with Oslo 1. So many ordinary people are analyzing the Road Map and pointing out its defects. This is a sampling of the concerns they raise by Letters and Comments and emails to each other.
 READ MORE
 

How did we get from the clarity of the analysis of Middle East issues in June 2002 to a retread of unsuccessful plans in June 2003? The next few articles provide some analyses.

MISREADING THE MAP
by Herb Keinon, May 30, 2003.

  During the period between when the Road Map was announced and when it was presented as unchangeable, the Israeli Government underplayed the Road Map's unsavory demands. As Herb Keinon writes, "...the country was presented with one picture of Washington's position, and woke up to another." He examines some of the elements in the Government's disasterous miscalculations.
 READ MORE
 

JUST THE FACTS
by Caroline B. Glick, May 21, 2003.

  Caroline B. Glick's recent article "Washington's Betrayal" in the Jerusalem Post is a cogent summary of how the Bush Administration made the creation of a Palestinian State its main goal in the Middle East, without the Arabs having to renounce their goal of destroying the Jewish State. This article focusses on one of the reasons the Bush Administration could do so with so little backlash: the current mindset and conventional wisdom in the world, which is fed by a lazy and pro-Arab media, and a bunch of politicians and diplomats who don't want to be confused by the facts.
 READ MORE
 

PEACE IN OUR TIME?
posted by David Vance, June 1, 2003.

  After 9/11, America went after Arab terrorists militarily. Why is it now regressing to 'peace processes' and diplomatic negotiations? David Vance explains how the concept of conflict resolution dominates political thinking to the detriment of a real solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
 READ MORE
 

LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON
by Yedida Atlas, June 10, 2003.

  Mr Atlas talks about some probable reasons why George W. Bush let his vision become fogged in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
 READ MORE
 

AMERICA LEADS THE WAY
posted by Karen Cheesman, May 29, 2003.

  Mz Cheesman is a straightforward tell-it-as-I-see-it letter writer, who proposes a way for President Bush to provide a good example on how to implement his current view of what will bring peace to the Middle East.
 READ MORE
 

LETTING THE UNITED NATIONS STEER
by Anne Bayefsky, June 10, 2003.

  The article deals with the future role of the UN, which will monitor Israel and redefine Arab terrorism (out of existence). As Anne Bayefsky writes, "For all those at the United Nations fretting over the loss of a terrorist state in Iraq, a Palestinian replacement is shortly at hand. Israeli self-defense will soon mean violating international borders. It is not surprising that Arab states are happy to tell Mr. Bush they are all for the road map. What is surprising is that the president is, too."
 READ MORE
 

DOES THE INTERNATIONAL NEWS MEDIA OVERLOOK ISRAEL'S LEGAL RIGHTS IN THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT?
by Dan Diker, June 10, 2003.

  This is a meticulous examination of how the media, by using sloppy language, intentionally or unintentionally further Arab land claims. The media promote the wrong idea that the Arabs have international law on their side, even though, as an example, the drafters of Resolution 242 did not plan on an Arab state, except Jordan, west of the Jordan River. As Dan Diker writes, "The emotionally charged Palestinian liberation story is, for many reporters, more compelling than the dry, factual context of history, especially existing international laws and resolutions that support Israel's narrative."
 READ MORE
 

To extricate ourselves from the swamp the Bush Administration has now endorsed requires a very necessary change: reorganizing the State Department so that it works for America. The next three articles discuss the details.

THE NEXT CHALLENGE FOR BUSH
by Newt Gingrich, April 22, 2003.

  The State Department was "ineffective and incoherent" at the U.N. in the days before we went into Iraq. Newt Gingrich urges the President to reorganize the State Department because "America cannot lead the world with a broken instrument of diplomacy." He points out that after our military victory, "...the State Department is back at work pursuing policies that will clearly throw away all the fruits of hard-won victory."
 READ MORE
 

WINNING THE WAR, LOSING THE PEACE
by Tony Blankley, April 23, 2003.

  Tony Blankley contributes insightful glosses to Newt Gingrich's call for re-forming the State Department. He highlights some of the major points; this is all to the good. He concludes that, "[i]t will be a brawl, but one the country desperately needs. Winning the wars and losing the peace has got to stop."
 READ MORE
 

MIDEAST ROAD TRAP
by Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., May 6, 2003.

  Frank Gaffney focusses on one of the reasons the State Department needs to be transformed: the State Department has nullified President Bush's policy statements of June 2002 on the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Arabs are excused from making real reforms in their leadership. The Quartet — "a State Department invention" — will be able to dictate terms to Israel. And stopping terrorism dead is no longer the first order of business.
 READ MORE
 

And finally, some history, past and future.

SOME ORAL HISTORY
letters between Mary Jensen and Bernice Lipkin, June 10, 2003.
crossposted on IsraPundit.

  Everyone knows how Arab terrorists hide themselves and their bombs and guns among groups of woman and children. This talks about how the Arabs used woman and children as suicide bombers during World War II.
 READ MORE
 

SOMEDAY WE'LL KNOW
posted by Bernice Lipkin, June 10, 2003.
crossposted on IsraPundit.

  The Road Map is so bizarre and inappropriate a solution to the conflict between the Arabs and the Jews that many people didn't take it seriously until it burst out, full-grown. This article asks some of the questions whose answers await analyses by future historians.
 READ MORE
 

===========================================

Road Map Issue, April 2003

All the articles in this special Edition are about the road map, the latest threat to Israel's sovereignty and security.


  WHEN BUSH COMES TO SHOVE
posted by Bernice Lipkin, April 14, 2003.
crossposted on IsraPundit.

  The latest international threat to Israel's sovereignty and security comes from the road map issued by the Quartet. It is Oslo all over again, but more virulent — instead of negotiations, it would impose dangerous restrictions on Israel. The UN, the EU and Russia didn't fight Iraq. Apparently, Israel is more their size.
 READ MORE
 

HELP CONGRESS PROTECT ISRAEL FROM THE ROADMAP
received from J.A.T. and others, April 14, 2003.

  At the moment, the most effective rebuttal of the Quartet plan is coming from Congress. Bipartisan letters supporting Israel are circulating in both the House and the Senate. Here is some practical information on contacting your congressman and senators to let them know you reject the Quartet's plan and appreciate their support of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

OBFUSCATION OF TRUTH: Reading Mitchell's Report
by Boris Shusteff, May 20, 2001

  On February 7, 2003, President Bush and Prime Minister Sharon had a heart to heart in the Oval Office. Afterwards, Bush said, "...we had a good discussion about how best to work together to get the Mitchell process started, to get into Tenet and then in Mitchell." For those of us who have forgotten, this is an excellent article on the Mitchell Plan, a flawed, pro-Arab document, filled with inaccuracies.
 READ MORE
 

KEVORKIAN-ASSISTED SUICIDE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
by David Wilder, February 10, 2003.

  Mr. Wilder lays out the major points of the road map as they were known in February. The emphasis is on the impact on Israel, its settlement communities and eastern Jerusalem. Mr. Wilder lives in Hebron, the second holiest city in Israel and home of the Tomb of the Patriarchs.
 READ MORE
 

DANGERS OF THE ROADMAP
posted by Yuval Zaliouk, April 6, 2003.

  Mr Zaliouk points out that the Road Map talks of disbanding the settlements as a precondition. For the first time, the word "occupation" is used. This is language that has serious consequences for Israel's borders.
 READ MORE
 

COMMENTS ON THE ROAD MAP
posted by Ric Shulman, April 14, 2003.

  Mr Shulman comments on the role of the CIA, the peace process in general, Arabs calling Jews nazis, and road map amendments.
 READ MORE
 

REJECT THE ROAD MAP
posted by Ted Belman, April 14, 2003.
crossposted on IsraPundit.

  Mr. Belman makes clear why the road map is an unmitigated disaster for Israel and wonders why we are rushing into it. This is a companion piece to Mr. Belman's "A Unifying Theory: Palestine for Iraq" and "Perfecting the Unifying Theory ", which can be read on the IsraPundit website.
 READ MORE
 

ROAD MAP, ROAD KILL
by Jonathan S. Tobin, April 3, 2003.

Mr. Tobin projects a frightening but — based on previous experience – realistic forecast of where the Quartet's "diplomatic strong-arm tactics" will lead.
 READ MORE
 

THE DANGER, ISRAEL, IS TO THE WEST
by Stan Goodenough, March 23, 2003.

  Mr. Goodenough points out weaknesses in Prime Minister Sharon's response to the Road Map. He writes of Prime Minister Blair's push to "remove the ancient land of Israel from Jewish control."
 READ MORE
 

THE SWASTIKA AT THE END OF THE ROAD MAP
posted by Steven Plaut, March 15, 2003.

  This is the letter Arial Sharon should send to President Bush, rejecting the Road Map in toto, because it would put a genocidal nazi-like state in the middle of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

A MAP TO NATIONAL DISASTER
by Uzi Landau, April 11, 2003.

  Mr Landau, a Minister in the Israeli Government, cogently lays out objections to the roadmap: the Palestinian Arabs do not have to relinquish terror as a precondition or educate their children for peace. Israel, on the other hand, will need to freeze settlements, divide Jerusalem, and have an international supervisory body exerting sovereignity over implementation of the plan. Aside from jeopardizing Israel's security, it will teach the Arab world that terror pays.
 READ MORE
 

AFTER IRAQ: A PALESTINIAN STATE AND REGIONAL NUCLEAR WAR
by Louis Rene Beres, March 27, 2003.

  Professor Beres postulates some plausible scenarios, given a Middle East with Iraq unable to acquire nuclear weapons but an Arab state of Palestine, which would serve as a launching-point for unconventional terrorism by the different terrorist groups in the area. "President Bush should now consider carefully that an exchange of Iraq for 'Palestine' would be foolishly shortsighted and very dangerous."
 READ MORE
 

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March-April 2003

 

Saddam Hussein's regime is finished. This will make a big hole in the resources of some of the Islamic terrorists who prey on Americans and Israelis. But it will do little to destroy the confederacy of Arab terrorists in Israel.

We, who love Israel, have a vital job to do in the coming weeks. If this Administration acts like the senior Bush Administration did in the Gulf War, it will pressure Israel to return to the peace table, using the Roadmap for Peace, a refurbished Oslo Peace Plan that again subjects Israel to terrorism and destruction.

To believe that peace is possible without decades of training the Arabs to develop a brand-new mindset is more than naive. It ignores a crucial fact that wasn't as blatantly obvious during the Gulf War: the Arabs will not be satisfied with another Arab State. Their objective is to destroy Israel as the start of a renewed world-wide conquest by Islam. Israel, after all, gave the West the basis of its ethics. And eliminating the State of Israel would make the Middle East completely Muslim. The Arabs have not hidden their plans. Yet so many well-meaning Americans continue to believe that if Israel just tries a little harder, all will be well.

For peace in the Middle East, the Arabs need to reinvent themselves. They need to change how they educate their children — they need to focus on math, not murder. They must stop treating their wifes and daughters as chattel. They must stop regarding Christians and Jews as inferiors. They need to leap forward some six centuries into the modern world.

Israel must also change. It needs to regain its self-respect. It needs to forthrightly put forth its claim to its historic land. It needs to put the lives of its citizens above petty local politics and above the desire to please other countries. It needs to root out terrorism forcibly; it needs to be proactive, not reactive.

Pressuring Israel to make concessions will not lead to peace but to a resurgence in terrorism that will again spread around the world.

Pressuring Israel is not the way to promote democracy in the world.

It is up to us to see that Israel is not a casualty of the Iraq war.

 

ISLAM AND VIOLENT TRENDS
Don Feder, February 16, 2003.

  This is a direct, incisive essay on the violence practiced by so much of Islam. It contrasts the actuality with the pretense that Islam is a peaceful religion. As the author says: "avoiding reality doesn't change reality."
 READ MORE
 

THE LOSS OF EAST PALESTINE: British Perfidy, Jewish Infirmity of Purpose and Arab Intransigence. Part II.
posted by Lewis Lipkin, March 10, 2003.

  Part I (see below) dealt with events leading to the Balfour Declaration. Part II deals with the continued efforts of the British to meet their conflicting commitments, retain control of both the Arab and Jewish populace, and maintain their Middle Eastern empire. This essay chronicles the early years when the nibbling away at what was slated to become Israel had already begun: Israel was reduced in size from all of Palestine to a vaguely defined area in the Western part of the Mandate.
 READ MORE
 

MY GRANDFATHER INVENTED IRAQ: And He Has Lessons for Us Today
Winston S. Churchill, March 16, 2003.

  The article above, The Loss of East Palestine, made plain the circumstances at the time of World War I that would lead to the drastic redrawing of the map of the Middle East. We all know that Israel was created. Fewer people realize that many of the Arab countries were also created after England took over what had belonged to the Ottoman Empire. Churchill's grandson focusses on Iraq and Jordan and draws parallels to what currently confronts us.
 READ MORE
 

AN AMERICAN DIES IN GAZA
posted by Bernice Lipkin, March 20, 2003.

  A few days ago, an American girl, Rachel Corrie, a pro-Arab activist, was killed by an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza. Unlike the response to the daily attacks by Arabs on Israeli civilians, this aroused world-wide outrage. She may yet become the second Mohammad al-Dura. For several reasons.
 READ MORE
 

ON MUSIC, FOOD AND FAMILY VISITS
Written by Moshe Saperstein; posted by Judy Balint.
March 1, 2003.

  Moshe Saperstein lives with his wife Rachel in Neve Dekalim in the Gaza Strip. He is an essayist, and a member of the Jerusalem Diarist group, which is doing a great job capturing the immediacy of living in Israel today. This essay, written during a spell of cold fierce weather in Israel, is about aesthetics — or his lack of appreciation thereof. We read of a musicale at Gush Katif, a cantorial performance at the synagogue and how much he prefers his food served unadorned. Moshe bravely faces going to the dentist and having the family visit.
 READ MORE
 

HISTORY AND CHRISTIANITY
posted by Dutch W. Griffin, March 10, 2003.

  This is a brief history of the changing attitudes of Christians towards Jews. Mr. Griffin differentiates between Christian sects that have no particular injunctions to recognize Israel's importance to Christianity and those that do. Among the latter, he separates those whose support is only theologically based from those who, in addition, have a genuine love of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST: A Pragmatic Road Map from Truth to Peace
posted by Salomon Benzimra, P.Eng., January, 2003.

  This is a thoughtful essay about the Road Map, the latest version of the Oslo Peace Plan. It makes an important point: peace must be constructed on a base of facts and truth. Diplomatic 'constructive ambivalence' is doomed to fail. This paper lays out the facts that need to be factored into any plan that will bring peace to the Middle East.
 READ MORE
 

HOW TO INVITE CONTEMPT AND ENCOURAGE TERRORISM
posted by Yohanan Ramati, March 5, 2003.

  The Director of the Jerusalem Institute for Western Defense points out that the Muslim mindset despises weakness. Concessions by non-Muslims are considered a sign of weakness. Consequently, concessions by the West and Israel are doomed to fail.
 READ MORE
 

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January-February 2003

THE LOSS OF EAST PALESTINE: British Perfidy, Jewish Infirmity of Purpose and Arab Intransigence. Part I.
posted by Lewis Lipkin, February 14, 2003.

  The current problems in defining the boundaries of the Jewish state began in the critical years before World War I, when the map of the entire Middle East was about to be redrawn. The Arabs were encouraged to ask for everything, the Jews asked for very little, and the British screwed them both.
 READ MORE
 

WHY DON'T THE ISRAELIS GET MAD?
posted by Bernice Lipkin, February 20, 2003.

  Why aren't the Israelis reacting violently to the inadequate response of their Government to Arab terrorism? Why are they not demanding that the Government do more to end the slaughter? Different answers have been offered by different people. Whatever the reason, the people's passivity has consequences for the future of Israel.
 READ MORE
 

ASSISTED SUICIDE, ISRAELI ACADEMIC STYLE
posted by Bernice Lipkin, January 20, 2003.

  In The Unenviable Fate of Israeli Academic Leftists (July-August, 2002, see below) I described the efforts of some Israeli leftist academics to aid the Arabs, even to the point of petitioning that Israeli scientists and academics be shunned by the world's academic institutions. I speculated that the more their efforts were successful, the worse it would be for them personally. The tale of Oren Yiftachel, a geographer at Tel Aviv University, shows this has already begun to happen.
 READ MORE
 

WHO ARE THE PALESTINIANS?
by Yashiko Sagamori, November 2002.

  All the Arab states, much of Europe and many in America, including President Bush, act as if a Palestinian State is inevitable. But the future leaders of such a State, the Palestine Authority and its fellow terrorists, have turned the Oslo Peace into the Oslo War, and continue to proclaim that destroying Israel is their real goal. So maybe we ought to rethink the idea of a separate and sovereign state for the Palestinians. Christian Action For Israel has compiled a remarkable page of articles devoted to examining the idea of a Palestinian state (http://christianactionforisrael.org/palstate.html). Last November, they featured an essay by Yashiko Sagamori, who asks the right questions about the obscure birth of the Palestinian people.
 READ MORE
 

SHARON, SPEAK TO US
posted by Ramy Dishy, December 26, 2002.

  This is a companion piece to the previous article, which suggested a serious examination of the origin of the Palestinian people. This letter lists some questions that need serious and detailed discussion before Israel can agree to the creation of a State for these people.
 READ MORE
 

WHERE DO WANNABE TERRORISTS BELONG, STATISTICALLY SPEAKING
posted by Bernice Lipkin, January 15, 2003.

  Have you ever considered how hard it is to assign a would-be terrorist who blows himself up prematurely to the right group to ensure accurate statistics. How should he be counted? What about his lost wages? These are some of the considerations.
 READ MORE
 

ON TANGERINES, ARAB CRUELTY AND GAS MASKS
written by Moshe Saperstein; posted by Judy Balint. 5 January, 2003.

  Moshe Saperstein lives with his wife Rachel in Neve Dekalim in the Gaza Strip. He is an essayist, and a member of the Jerusalem Diarist group, which is doing a great job capturing the immediacy of living in Israel today. This week he discovers he has tangerines growing in his garden, ruminates on gratuitous Arab cruelty, is disheartened by the killing of the yeshiva students in Otniel, upgrades his gas mask and thinks about election time scandals.
 READ MORE
 

MAINTAINING FAMILY HONOR
posted by Al Skudsi bin Hookah, The Gaza Gajeera. Jan 20,2003.

  Mr bin Hookah, foreign correspondent and roving reporter for The Gaza Gejeera is back. He explains to his readers how important honor killings are in maintaining family honor.
 READ MORE
 

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November-December 2002

THE SETTLEMENTS REVISITED
posted by Bernice Lipkin, November 21, 2002.

  A few weeks ago, Americans For A Safe Israel (AFSI) conducted a tour of settlements in Samaria, Judea, Gaza and East Jerusalem. We spoke to the settlers; we saw what they have accomplished. They have character, fortitude, self-respect, civility and dedication to Israel. They are worthy successors to the earlier Zionist settlers in Israel.
 READ MORE
 

A TALE OF TWO REALITIES
Posted by Caroline B. Glick, The Jerusalem Post. October 25, 2002.

  Caroline Glick writes about the evacuation of Gilad Pass within the larger context of Israeli politics and the Oslo War. In a brilliant analysis, she contrasts the reality of the Israeli Left, which regards the Israeli Right and the settlers as the enemies of peace and the reality of the Israeli Right, which understands that Israel is fighting for its survival as the Arabs continue to wage war.
 READ MORE
 

  EVERYDAY LIFE IN ISRAEL
  Posted by Judy Balint, author of Jerusalem Diaries. November 14, 2002.

  Moshe Saperstein writes with humor and warmth of his everyday life in Neve Dekalim in the Gaza Strip. This week, he goes to two weddings, visits his grandchildren, listens to shelling while watching a thunderstorm in the night, spends the Shabbat of Chaye Sarah at Hebron, hears of another terror murder and lives through a couple more attacks by neighboring Arabs. Just an ordinary week.
 READ MORE
 

  THE WEST BANK/GAZA SETTLEMENTS: The Fake Issue of the Current Middle East Crisis
  posted by Sarah Bedein, Israel Resource News Agency, Jerusalem.

  Sarah Bedein asks whether ceding the Jewish settlements in Samaria, Judea and Gaza would really satisfy the demands of the Palestinian Arabs. What about their right of return to the 531 villages inside the Green Line that they lost in 1948?
 READ MORE
 

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE THEORY THAT JEWS ARE DESCENDENTS OF THE KHAZARS
posted by Lewis Lipkin, November 21, 2002.

  In The 13th Tribe, Arthur Koestler asserted that Ashkenazic Jews are not of the seed of Jacob; they are the descendants of the Khazars, a semi-nomadic tribe that lived in the Caucasian Mountains and converted to Judaism in the 8th century C.E. Modern genetics proves him wrong.
 READ MORE
 

DYING FOR REVENGE: Controlling Allies In Wartime
posted by Rand H. Fishbein, Ph.D., November 15, 2002.

  Suppose a local paramilitary group loosely associated with an outside country engaged in warfare in the region. Suppose this local group independently carries out an act of vengeance against its ancient enemy? Examples are: (1) the killing of captive al-Qaeda members by the USA-backed Northern Alliance in Afghanistan; and (2) the killing of Muslim Lebanese in the Shatila and Sabra refugee camps by Christian Lebanese, who were allied with Israel. Is the major partner responsible?
 READ MORE
 

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September-October 2002

THE CASE FOR POPULATION EXCHANGE
posted by Lewis Lipkin, October 15, 2002.

 Population exchange is not a new idea. Sometimes a complete separation is the only way that two groups unable to live together can get on with their lives. It might be time to complete the separation of the Jews and the Arabs. The Jews were evacuated from Arab countries when Israel was born. Maybe it's time to do the second half of the transfer: move the Palestinian Arabs to Arab countries.
  READ MORE
 

  ARAB INTRIGUE KEEPS PALESTINIAN ISSUE ALIVE
posted by Mark Alan. October 2, 2002.

This is an incisive essay on resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a way that helps the Palestinian Arabs without destroying Israel. This solution would also be helpful to the United States in that it would cut out an argument the Arab states use to prevent the invasion of Iraq.
  READ MORE
 

  AT THE BIRTH OF A MYTH
Posted by Bernice Lipkin. September 26, 2002.

It isn't often that one gets to see and hear an Arab myth in the making. This might be one. Time will tell if it will grow and get hair on its chest. Or maybe not.
  READ MORE
 

  A FRAUDULENT HISTORY OF PALESTINE
  Posted by Bernice Lipkin. September 29, 2002.

This is an examination of a history text disseminated on many Arab websites and some neutral sites that provide historical documents on the Middle East. It is said to have been produced by a group of Jewish scholars, an anonymous group that calls itself Jews for Justice in the Middle East. We think it's a fraud.
  READ MORE
 

  IT'S BEEN A GOOD YEAR
Posted by Al Skudsi bin Hookah of the Gaza Gajeera. September 11, 2002.

Mr bin Hookah is foreign correspondent and roving reporter for the Gaza Gajeera. He looks back on the year since September 11, 2001.
  READ MORE
 

  EVERYDAY LIFE IN ISRAEL
  Posted by Judy Balint, author of Jerusalem Diaries. September 24, 2002.

A new immigrant from North America celebrates Sukkot at Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu in Israel. Sukkot should be a time of happiness. This Sukkot is a time of sadness: her roommate was friends with a boy recently killed by an Arab terrorist. Miriam Edelman writes of her conflicted feelings as her group celebrates Sukkot and redefines happiness.
 READ MORE
 

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July-August 2002

ISRAEL CAN'T PROTECT THEM EVERY TIME
Report #270, Jinsa, July 25, 2002.

This is a thoughtful examination of Israel's killing of Salah Shehadeh, founder of Izzadine el-Qassam, the Hamas terrorist army.
  READ MORE
 

  DO WE NEED A THIRD PALESTINIAN STATE?
Posted by: Bernice Lipkin, July 11, 2002

For decades, it was the American and Israeli position that a Palestinian State was a deterrent to peace in the region. When they were hosted in Jordan and Lebanon, the Palestinians had shown themselves to be unrepentant trouble makers. After Oslo, a Palestinian State on the West Bank was automatically accepted. In the wake of the second intifada, the issue is again being reexamined. We present some major nodes on the spectrum of ideas about creating a Palestinian State.
  READ MORE
 

  SHOOTOUT AT THE LOS ANGELES AIRPORT: The Effrontery of the Jews.
Posted by: Al Skudsi bin Hookah of the Gaza Gajeera, July 11, 2002.

Mr bin Hookah is foreign correspondent and roving reporter for the Gaza Gajeera. This is his report on the recent incident at the Los Angeles airport.
  READ MORE
 

  THE STEPFORD ARAB SPOKESMEN
Posted by: Bernice Lipkin. July 11, 2002.

Remember the book, The Stepford Wives? The wives were robots that replaced humans. Spooky.
 READ MORE
 

  TWO ACADEMICS AND A RABBI
  Posted July 11, 2002.

When virulent denunciations of Israel come from a Jew, it's called Jewish self-hatred. We aren't convinced all such manifestations come from the same source and motivation. Today, we bring you sketches of two Academics and a Rabbi, all of whom are prominent Haters of Israel: Steven Rose, Noam Chomsky and Rabbi Michael Lerner.

Blogs, short for Web Logs, are websites that contain personal, informal musings and thoughts about almost any subject under the sun. We borrowed material from several of these sites.
 READ MORE
 

  THE UNENVIABLE FATE OF ISRAELI ACADEMIC LEFTISTS
  Posted by Bernice Lipkin, July 14, 2002.

Several international scientific and scholarly groups are attempting to deprive Israeli academics of the company and intellectual stimulation of their international colleagues. There's a small group of Israeli academics that is actively helping them.
 READ MORE
 

  EVERYDAY LIFE IN ISRAEL
  Posted by Judy Balint, author of Jerusalem Diaries. July 14, 2002.

In the midst of the turmoil, a group of North American immigrants has just arrived in Israel. They come with a love of Israel and, as citizens of the USA and Canada, a repetoire of skills on what to expect in a democracy and how to make their voices heard. This account comes from Ezra Halevy, who made aliya all of a month or so ago. If this is any indication, these newbies are definitely going to make a difference.
 READ MORE
 

 

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