Monday Night Megalinkfest

In the wake of this transition period (more about that in a later post, HaShem willing), here is a linkfest to bridge a possible gap until my new offerings come up.

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Dhimmi Watch: an example of the platform-neutrality of the resistance to Islam: Not a dime’s worth of difference…, from October 27, 2007.

Little Green Footballs: an Islamic youth leader issues a niqabveiled threat to Australia should relations of the police with the Muslims not improve: Aussie Islamic Leader: The Violence Will Continue Until Relations Improve, from October 28, 2007.

Oleh Musings: Michael collects the news report to form a clear picture of what the goals of the “Palestinians” are (not that the Leftists are going to accept this information, for it would mean giving up their cause celebré, a cause far more important than trivialities like Tibet or Darfur): And the Campaign Continues…, from October 25, 2007.

Sultan Knish on the the issue of European resistance to Islam, which is now making the waves on the right-wing blogosphere: Brussels Journal, Altas and LGF: Dealing with the Devil, from October 29, 2007.

Woman Honor Thyself: Angel outlines most brilliantly why the term, “hate speech” is the first step on the road to the PC straitjacket: You say “Hate Speech”, I say “Truth”, from October 22, 2007.

Atlas Shrugs: Pamela (who was the other main actor besides Charles Johnson in the beginning of this spat) defends the European parties resisting Islam: Nazis? By Their Fruits We Shall Know them.......And so we know them, from October 28, 2007.

For Zion’s Sake: Bar Kochba comments on the Israeli Arabs’ (including Knesset Members. “Knesset Members?! How can there be non-Jewish Knesset Members?! Israel is an apartheid state!” /moonbat) latest round of treason: Treason Most Foul, from October 28, 2007. As in Europe, as in the USA, as in any country that cares about its national cohesion, so too Israel needs to deport, expel all those who can’t abide by its national sovereignty.

Israel Matzav: Carl brings a piece of news that dovetails perfectly with the Australian Islamic youth leader’s threat: ‘Palestinians’ threaten war again, from October 29, 2007, where the Pretendestinian leader Abu Ala says Israel can expect war if it does not cave in to the blackmail of Annapolis. Muslims operate the same ways everywhere. So much for seeing the Israel/“Palestine” conflict as a “nationalistic land dispute”.

Elder of Ziyon: the Egyptians claim that Israel is treating the “Palestinians” like the Jews were in the Holocaust that never happened: Egyptian newspaper compares Israeli prison—and Gaza—to Auschwitz, from October 26, 2007. This ties in to an article on Countercurrents (linked below).

Media Backspin: an argument I’ve often made is now repeated by Michael Medved: A World Without—Pakistan?, from October 29, 2007. Kudos to Medved, who follows up on an honorable article of his I linked to in January exposing the fraud of the “Palestinian nation”.

Kafir Canada: a new blog, with the post Islam is Peace in Word, but…in Deed?, from October 28, 2007. All are agreed that the picture on the top of this post needs to go viral:

The words and the reality. Click image to view full size.

Brussels Journal: Paul Belien has his word on the recent Nazimania that has gripped LGF: Are We All Nazis Now?, from October 27, 2007.

Vanishing American: on how the fear of being called “racist” is cowing even those on the Right against making a strong stand for national interests: PC everywhere, from October 26, 2007.

Gates of Vienna: Danish commenter Kepiblanc gives a clear and rant-free opinion the resistance to Islam in Europe: Kepiblanc Weighs In, from October 28, 2007. Down in the comments are some of mine too, detailing why I changed my mind about the whole issue, and why I left LGF.

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Thus from our side (infighting notwithstanding). And now for some from the enemy (the real enemy), to serve as a recording:

Common Dreams: Michael Birmingham complains that the world has been silent on the massacre of the “Palestinians” by the Lebanese Army at Nahr Al Bared: What Happened in Nahr Al Bared?, from October 25, 2007. Here’s a hint, Michael: the silence is because this event is of no use in bashing Israel, which is the entire raison d’être behind the Left’s support of the “Palestinians”. Maybe you should give Leftism a rethink, hmmm?

Common Dreams: Jared Genser and Meghan Barron indulge in typical Leftist hypocrisy: America Must Do More to End Myanmar Misery, from October 26, 2007. America must do more to end Myanmar misery?! The same America whose “imperialist meddling” the Left blames for nearly all the world’s troubles?! This is a contender for the Brass Chutzpah Award Winner.

Countercurrents: no-holds-barred “Jews are Nazis” inversion from Khalid Amayreh: Gaza: The Auschwitz Of Our Time, from October 26, 2007. The writer should be a high-priority candidate for being brought to stand trial by the future Sanhedrin, speedily in our days, amen.

Daily Kos: Lefty Coaster isn’t as outspoken, but the message is pretty much on the same vein: Israel Tightens it’s Economic Noose on 1.5 Million Gazans, from October 28, 2007 (yes, the apostrophe on the possessive pronoun is in the original). Rockets on Israel every day? No matter: cutting off fuel to Gaza is a war crime (this from the same types who say Israel isn’t at war but maintaining an occupation). “Palestinians” ought to be independent from Israeli fuel and electricity, if it’s all about their “self-determination”? Who cares—Israel is engaging in collective punishment. Hamas democratically elected (as the anti-Israel posters on DKos like to mention), therefore its positions reflect the will of all those who elect it, thus making them deserving of collective punishment? I’d probably be called a Nazi (with or without “Zio-” before it) for making that suggestion.

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Tha… That’s all, folks. And now to the drawing board. ’Till next time, with God’s help!

Sort Our Your Guilt

I have related to the Native Americans numerous times on my blog. From some of those, the reader may have gotten the impression that I hate Native Americans, but that is not so, nor is it exactly the opposite of that. I will say forthright that my attitude toward Native Americans is neither of love nor of hate, but simply, “incapable of having an unbiased opinion on the matter”, the reason for that being, of course, the use of comparisons to Native Americans by the anti-Zionist Left for scoring their points. The usual talking point of the anti-Zionists is that the Pretendestinians are the indigenous people of the Land of Israel just as the Native Americans are of North America, and therefore, by dint of logic, the Jews are colonial invaders and dispossessors of the former just as the Europeans from the Old Word are. As I have shown, this view is utterly false, and of such offense to us Jews that, if we Jews were in the habit of reacting toward offenses the way the Muslims do, we would make the Danish Mohammed Cartoons riots look like a kindergarten playground scrap. We do not, and we leave it mostly to God to scorch the anti-Zionists in His indignation, speedily in our days, amen. But from this brief account alone it can be understood why I could never deliver a fair and reasonably unbiased stance on the Native Americans, and for that I apologize for a likely bad impression.

What is clear, however, is that I am not impressed by the anti-Zionist Leftists’ self-righteous stance which they justify by that comparison. Their claim of “standing up for the rights of indigenous peoples’ rights” does not wash with me, for they are selective as to which indigenous peoples they support, the criteria being, always, appeasement and anti-Americanism. What has the oppression and the dispossession of the Tibetans on and from their native lands by the Chinese colonial invaders won them but a few perfunctory “Free Tibet” stickers? Some maverick (the Kossacks would say, “troll”) had this to say on the Daily Kos diary Jews, Neocons and Democrats, on August 1, 2007:

I will listen to your lament for Palestinians (6+ / 0-)

When you give your own home keys over to a Native American family from among those who are the rightful inhabitants of your little valley of hypocricy [sic]. Like the Sioux, the Comanche and the Iriquis who's [sic] land you have stolen, the Palestinans [sic] will just have to adjust to life among a different people. In land tenure might makes right. Your decision to object to that grim reality only in the case of indiginous [sic] people without a claim to your house and a few thousand miles away makes for exquisite hypocricy [sic].

[…]

by SmithsLastWord on Wed Aug 01, 2007 at 05:59:01 PM PDT

Pointful. It appears the anti-Zionists are not overly swept by guilt feelings for what happened—at least not so much that they would bring themselves to take the plane back to the Old Word, for the sake of “Justice, without there is no peace”:

Genocide that occured by my ancestors,,, (0+ / 0-)

not contemporaries. BIG difference.

by theralph on Wed Aug 01, 2007 at 06:43:55 PM PDT

And in a little longer formulation:

Such an act of sophistry. The Indian situation... (3+ / 0-)

is what it is. There is still time to stop the same from happening to the Palestinians.

Israel should have a state and Palestine should have a state.

by theralph on Wed Aug 01, 2007 at 06:09:16 PM PDT

And even more clearly, in case the reader still didn’t get his point:

They weren't alive and neither was I. The.... (2+ / 0-)

Israelis are actively, even as we speak, taking lands from the Palestinians. Not to mention they almost started WWIII last summer. Oh, don't think about that though. Just blindly defend them with stupid arguments about Native Americans. Man you are pretty stupid huh?

by theralph on Wed Aug 01, 2007 at 06:43:09 PM PDT

Now after my caveat that the reality behind the Leftists’ fixation on the “Palestinians” is nothing but appeasement and anti-Americanism, I still wish to go with what they say—their declared feelings on the matter, even though they are lies. I could put their stance this way: “We do feel guilty for the Native Americans, but that is now water under the bridge; we stand with the Palestinians because that’s a repeat happening in real-time, and if we prevent that we’ll have made up for the past wrong”. In this we can find a sentiment that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (may he go to hell soon, amen) has astutely exploited.

His arrival at New York had been protested on account of, among other things, his Holocaust Denial. He came nevertheless, and in his visit he scored a propaganda coup de grace against the Jewish people by cleaning himself of the accusation of Holocaust Denial, which he did by substituting Zionism Denial (the denial of the Jews’ scriptural, ancient and rightful connection to the Land of Israel, and the portrayal of Zionism as a “White European Settler Colonialist Movement”) for it. His question, “Why should the Palestinians pay for something done to the Jews in Europe, by Europeans?”, has found welcoming hearts in the anti-Zionist Left.

In fact, I do not think there is a logical fault with that question. As my blogosphere friend Bar Kochba says, the argument against “setting up a Jewish state on Palestinian lands” as compensation for the Jewish Holocaust in Europe is logically flawless, whereas it is the premise itself that is not only fallacious but totally erroneous—neither the Holocaust nor any of the wrongs suffered by the Jews for the past 2,000 years are justification for a Jewish state on the Land of Israel; it is the scriptural mandate that justifies that. And when the Jews took the Land of Israel for the first time, under Joshua’s command, it was not the 400 years of slavery in Egypt that justified the vanquishment of the Canaanites, but the repeated statements by HaShem that, on condition of following His Torah, the Israelites are entitled to the Land of Israel, even to take it by force from its long-time residents. “Righting past wrongs” and “compensation for past injustices done” never figured into it.

But I find Ahmadinejad’s statement (perfect in logic, flawed only in its premises, as I said) very useful in order to counter the anti-Zionist Leftists who muster comparisons to Native Americans in order to make their point. You saw above how the Leftists are (taking their narrative at face value, ignoring the Machiavellian reality of appeasement and “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” for the sake of the argument) intent on assuaging their guilt over the dispossession of the Native Americans by opposing Zionism. In which case we Zionists have a good opportunity to take Ahmadinejad’s good logic and ask, in a loud and clear voice: Why should we Jews be paying for what you did to the Native Americans a long time ago? Why should we bear the burden of compensating for something done to other people far away and at least a century ago? In like manner as Ahmadinejad implied the question, “What has the Holocaust to do with the Palestinians?”, we ask: What has Manifest Destiny to do with us?

Again, going along with their stated feelings of guilt, of overwhelming remorse for past wrongs done on their own continent, in fact very probably where they are standing right now, I offer, as a free gift, two offers for dealing with those feelings of guilt:

The first is the real-world solution: pack your bags and get your hineys where your ancestors came from in the Old World. Leave the Native American lands you’re dispossessing and colonizing in order that their Right of Return may be applied, thus satisfying the requirements of justice, without which, as you do not cease saying, there can be no peace. But of course, as commenter “SmithsLastWord” extracted from them with his probing comments, those are ideals to be preached at others from the comfort of one’s armchair, rather than be followed by oneself.

So I have a second, less demanding solution: therapy. It’s all the rage today, when having guilt feelings, to try to quash them by means of numerous sessions on the shrink’s couch. Sometimes it even works. Call your friendly neighborhood therapist, fix your appointments with him or her, and talk at length about your problem, as in, “My guilt feelings over what my ancestors did to the Native Americans is causing me sleepless nights and a lot of lost productivity at work!” If you’re in competent hands, then in a few months you can expect to feel pretty OK about what happened in North America in the 19th century.

Cynical? Insensitive? Callousness on my part? You could make that case, but as with most of my blog, I’m addressing, reacting to, participating in a battlefield on this war of minds. My form may or may not be the best, but the message ought to be clear: my message is for the Leftists to get off our backs. In the view of their perfunctory tributes to (if not blithe ignorance of) the real and acute ongoing injustices in Tibet and Darfur, my agreement to take their narrative (of guilt over the Native Americans) is an act of generosity. They really do not deserve other than to be called on their hypocrisy and their opportunism for their choosing to elevate the Israel/“Palestine” conflict above all others. But I have done them the courtesy of addressing their guilt complex as is, and I have shown that their argument is thoroughly felled by the logic of none other than their strange bedfellow, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. “No compensation for a wrong on expense of those who had nothing to do with it”—if that logic is good against Zionism (or more accurately against a strawman thereof), then it’s good against American Leftist anti-Zionism as well. And in fact it is worse for the anti-Zionists, for, as I said, in Ahmadinejad’s case it stands on false premises (the misconception that Zionism is about compensating Jews for past anti-Semitism), while, in the case of the Leftists, the premises are sound by their own admission (see the Daily Kos comments above).

Anti-Zionists on the Western Left, hear now this:

You will not appease the Muslims on our expense. You will not vent your anti-Western, anti-Bush, anti-American, anti-Capitalist or anti-anything-else steam on our expense. And you will not assuage your guilt for past colonial wrongs on our expense. Either repent of your actions completely or at least change to a neutral stance toward the Israel/“Palestine” conflict; if not, then may God destroy you all, speedily in our days, amen.

Lefty Blog Roundup for July 11, 2007

This is a roundup of some more noteworthy of the Leftist articles I’ve recently read. The most significant, US Role in Islamist Terrorism by Ivan Eland, has been given a post of its own. A reminder: the purpose of these links is to show the mainstreaming of Jew-hatred in the Western Left under the cover of anti-Zionism.

Slouching Toward A Palestinian Holocaust, by Richard Falk, from July 7, 2007. The “Zionists = Nazis” comparison is already in the title, as you can see. The author says of himself:

Against this background, it is especially painful for me, as an American Jew, to feel compelled to portray the ongoing and intensifying abuse of the Palestinian people by Israel through a reliance on such an inflammatory metaphor as ‘holocaust.’ [Emphasis mine. —ZY]

But despite his pain, he is conclusive in his verdict:

Is it an irresponsible overstatement to associate the treatment of Palestinians with this criminalized Nazi record of collective atrocity? I think not.

I have a question too: Is it an irresponsible lack of foresight to make a comparison which could easily lead to the international acceptance of a real repeat of the Holocaust (G-d forbid)? And I too am conclusive in my verdict.

From Left I on the News comes an ominous headline of the day for July 9, 2007, where, after citing Jerusalem Post on the likelihood of a strike on Iran, the blogger says, “Expect Joe Lieberman (D I-Jerusalem) to pick up the call tomorrow.” It was “D-Jerusalem” before an edit, as can be seen in the screenshot I took:

The principle, however, is the same: sentiments with which I’m familiar from my reading of the history of 1930’s Europe are now being repeated, only by the Left rather than the Right (except the most extreme fringes on the Right, which now form a mutually symbiotic system with the Left on that point). It’s in the form of anti-Zionism and “criticism of Israel’s occupation”, and framed in the narrative of post-colonialism, but underneath nothing’s changed. In Yiddish we have a saying for that: Der zelbe dreck mit an andre dekoratsye (“the same excrement with a different decoration”).

From Daily Kos, the diary Israel/Palestine; Violence, the State, and Democracy for Some, from July 9, 2007, from a poster with a username that screams out his obsession: “jon the antizionist jew”. (Who knows, maybe it’s Richard Falk himself.) Of a solidarity concert held in Tel-Aviv for the people of Sderot, he has this to say (after a “please do not get me wrong” passage I don’t find very convincing):

Just look at the intent, that the people of Sderot should live just live the ‘safe’ citizens of Tel Aviv. I can imagine that the Euro-American settlers felt much the same way on the constantly expanding borders of the American frontier, vulnerable to attacks from the ‘barbaric’ violence of the natives, which of course, they were just defending themselves from, of course. But that is the way of the colonial settler society; the central, thoroughly ethnically cleansed homeland is much less risky than the rough borders of such activity, whether we are talking about Sderot and Tel Aviv or Little Bighorn and New York City.

And he gives us a subtle hint of the idea that Sderot is getting something it deserves:

And let’s also not forget that this is not new; Sderot was built on/next to the ruins of the ethnically cleansed Palestinian village of Najd, and has, like many areas bordering Gaza and the OPT, has felt its share of violence from the conflict.

Now, I’m not saying Jon the quisling anti-Zionist Jew is representative of the stance of all Daily Kos posters (though the fact that he feels comfortable voicing such ideas there goes to show something); however, the casual brushing off of the continuous suffering of the inhabitants of Sderot by the charge of “blowback for settler colonialism” is something that has taken firm hold in the thinking of Western Leftists. Significant also is the fact that Sderot is within the 1949 Armistice Line border of Israel, i.e. it’s a pre-1967 part of Israel, meaning that the old and cold comfort of being spared the ire meted on the “West Bank settlers” can no longer be sustained. Ultimately, it means there are many on the Western Left who wouldn’t be shaken much by a Muslim massacre of Israeli Jews (G-d forbid).

To make lemonade out of these lemons you can see above: we can scarcely be under more condemnation and vilification than we are now, so let’s put down our reins of “civility” and accountability to “international law” and do what G-d says.

Dr. Reality-Based and Mr. Fiery Ideologue

There is the accusation of wishing reality to conform to one’s ideology. For example, it is said the “Christian Zionists manipulating the decisions at the White House at AIPAC’s behest” are forcing reality to be in conformance with their “vision of Armageddon”. This is in order to contrast with the “sane, rational, reality-based” attitude toward foreign policy on the Left, which is informed above all by respect toward reality, toward the facts—by going with them, not trying to bend them.

There are examples galore of how this dichotomous view is false, but I think nowhere is it more blatant than in the case of the Israel/“Palestine” conflict. Such a contentious point is I/“P” for the Leftists that they often do not bother to display even the rhetoric of being reality-based, although they spare no effort in blaming Israel and the Neocon Administration for ignoring the facts on the ground.

They speak of “justice”. No, justice is not a bad thing (but pay attention to the problem of “The Grand Sez Who”); however, it must be truthfully acknowledged that standing for justice and being reality-based are incompatible. Why is that? Because justice is an ideal, while being reality-based, as I said, requires compromising on ideals, or sometimes giving them up altogether, in the face of reality.

The Left’s pretensions to being reality-based, as far as the Israel/“Palestine” conflict goes, are all annulled by the recent (since about five years, maybe a little more) trend away from 1967-ism and into 1947-ism—away from the fairly pragmatic vision of land for peace on the lines of Israel’s treaty with Egypt, and into the idealistic, reality-be-damned vision of “fixing” the “mistakes” of the very foundation of Israel.

1967-ism, I have said many times, was a respected and mandated position among the majority of the Israeli Jewish public from 1993 to 2000, and even beyond despite its process of decline after the outbreak of the Al-Aksa Intifada, right until its demise after August 2005. That point and that date are all-important, for they demonstrate the thinking of the Israeli Jewish public—thinking which the “reality-based” Leftists think they can sweep aside, concocting the most treacherous of “peace plans” on the backs of the Jews like Neville Chamberlain on acid.

The uprooting of the entire Jewry of Gaza was followed by rocket fire on Sderot. The charge that the Kassams are “primitive”—though that didn’t prevent them from killing Jews, but of course the weighting of the number of Jews killed against that of “Palestinians” killed will be called forth as counterargument, just as the cry of “Disproportionate response!” was for Lebanon last summer—is a deflection from the real issue. The real issue is that Sderot is situated within the 1949 Armistice Line. And disregarding the significance of the 1949 Armistice Line as an item of Israeli Jewish concensus is the worst mistake a peace planner could make.

The Israeli Jewish public, in contrast to the “Palestinian” one, which is still beholden to the same ideas and slogans of 60 years ago, has known many shifts of opinion. One has only to compare Rabin’s denunciation of the 1975 UN resolution equating Zionism with racism, where he protested that it was “the opening for setting up an Arafatian state”, to Rabin’s signing of the Oslo Accords just eighteen years later. These were not merely his private decisions—the Israeli Jewish public had really shifted in opinion, from a hardline “No talks with terrorists” stance in 1975 to a pragmatic “Peace is made with enemies” stance in 1993. Post-Zionism is lamentable, but in it is the sign of strength, of a people willing to reconsider their opinions—and, therefore, the current shift toward hardline stances too is a sign of the same strength, however much the Leftists may think evil of it.

But with all those shifts of public opinion, there is one thing, one solitary article of Israeli Jewish thinking, that has not changed, from the first days of Zionism to this day: the vision of Israel as a Jewish state. Except for a handful of far-out lunatics, always ending up cutting themselves from the public, such as the quisling Ilan Pappé, the idea of Israel as a Jewish state has always been taboo, sacrosanct, unquestionable, non-negotiable. This is an immovable reality that the Leftists, in their most un-reality-based idealistic fervor, have since some years ago decided to go roughshod over.

Commenter “another American” on Daily Kos, much though I may disagree with him on some points, is a wise, pragmatic and reality-based one, showing it in his call to reject the One-State Solution (which Steven Plaut calls “The Rwanda Solution”) as something that no Israeli Jew would agree with. In one of his diaries he brings Amos Oz as an example of how “the most dovish of Israelis” does not support the “Palestinian Right of Return”. It was truly said: if Amos Oz says a flat-out “No!” to the influx of millions of “Palestinians” to within the 1949 Armistice Line territories, what chance is there for the Israeli Jewish public as a whole to accept it? For Oz’s dovishness is now a rapidly waning position among Israeli Jews.

It was interesting to watch the comments in reaction to aA’s diary: appeals to “justice” and “reparations for past wrongs” and denunciations of “the ‘Might Makes Right’ attitude that underlies the opposition to the Palestinian Right of Return” were swift and copious. One of the commenters said, when aA repeated his emphasis on Amos Oz’s inordinate dovishness and willingness to compromise on all other positions, that he wouldn’t care if Oz were an angel of light. In other words: uprooting all the Jews of the 1967 isn’t enough, and resettling the “Palestinians” there or in other Arab states isn’t acceptable, but the refugees (or more accurately their descendants—a unique case of inheritance of that status in the whole world) are to be allowed to flow, en masse, back to the same places from which they were driven away in the course of the war of 1947–9. All for the sake of “justice”, of course, and the reality that this issue is non-negotiable concensus among the Jews of Israel be damned.

The participation of Arabs within the 1949 Armistice Lines in the Al-Aksa Intifada of October 2000, the firing of Kassam rockets into areas within the 1949 Armistice Line, and the recent documents by Arabs (Muslims, and Christian dhimmi helpers of theirs—the latter are being cleansed from Gaza by Hamas as we speak) within the 1949 Armistice Lines demanding the dilution of Israel’s Jewish character—all are direct strikes on that inviolable nerve of Israeli Jewish concensus: the founding of Israel as a Jewish state. Israel’s Declaration of Independence states the intention of lack of discrimination against citizens based on religion, sex or creed, but it also contains, written before and after that statement, the clear and unequivocal idea that Israel is a Jewish state, with a Jewish character.

A reality-based person would realize this fact and go from it. Going from it would mean that, in order to achieve a negotiated peace, 1967-ism is the only option. That means making it clear to the “Palestinians” that the 1967 territories would be all they were going to get, and the “Right of Return” was headed to the trashcan. But the Leftists display their reality-based façade only when it suits, for example for bashing Bush, while, in their stances on the Israel/“Palestine” conflict, there is a wide faction among them, possibly already a majority, and certainly growing with each passing day, who are fiery ideologues who couldn’t care less about reality, preferring to bend it to their views of what ought to be—all on the Israeli Jews’ expense, it cannot be stressed enough.

Of course, there is no shortage of justifications for that stand, most common of which is the idea popularized by Dhimmi Carter (may he go to hell soon, amen): that the insistence on the hardline, 1947-ist stance is equivalent to the insistence on the hardline stance against Apartheid South Africa. Never mind that the status of non-Jews in Israel is incomparable to that of the blacks of South Africa of then (was there a black Minister of Science in South Africa before 1994? There is an Arab, Muslim Minister of Science in Israel right now—Ghaleb Majadleh), and never mind that the other side is most unlike the blacks of South Africa in its view of the desired solution and its aftermath. (Consider this: the African National Committee not only lacked genocidal statements in their charter, but followed with peaceful reconciliation with the whites after 1994; whereas the “Palestinians” are genocidal in both word and deed, even unto the education of their children, and even unto killing their own without mercy. And we are expected to trust them?!)

Charges of “racism” and “apartheid” can be leveled without refrain, but the concensus of the Israeli Jewish public regarding the core of the Jewish state will not be moved—it has not budged through decades of manifold events and upheavals, so it won’t be changed by mere boycotts and resolutions. The shift of the world’s stance on addressing this conflict from 1967-ism to 1947-ism, no matter by how severe sanctions and boycotts it is reinforced, serves only to strengthen the Israeli Jews’ conviction that concessions are not in their best interests, and that survival is more important than compliance with international law. The Left’s preference of a fiery ideological stance over being reality-based is a most potent factor in turning Israeli Jews Kahane-ward.

What a pity Barbara Tuchmann is no longer alive. Watching this unfolding of events would have provided her with the most superb example ever for her book The March of Folly.

Re: My Intentions

The good: not deleting the diary.

The bad: banning me before I was going to respond (four days after I posted it). My response had been awaited: “[…] Would like to see the diarist respond”, by “decembersue” (among others).

The ugly: near-total focusing on background information and feelings instead of the content of the diary. “Troll” and “links to LGF” are not germane to the points I made. I purposely left out my ideological leanings out of the diary in order to enable debate based on pragmatic merits alone. That this has failed to prevent the degeneration of the diary is of no surprise to me, for, as I said many times, the acrimony of the I/“P” debate in words is but a reflection of the acrimony of the I/“P” conflict on the ground.

Some people ask this:

I do not believe this one's intentions are honorable. I gets [sic] the feeling we are part of some science project for him. At least we know where he'll post the results. […]

by MajorFlaw on Sun Jun 03, 2007 at 03:27:43 PM PDT

And this:

[…] This guy is playing us and intends to publish the results. No thanks.

by MajorFlaw on Sun Jun 03, 2007 at 06:49:23 PM PDT

And this:

Is this diary attempting to elicit remarks that can be used against dkos?

by decembersue on Sun Jun 03, 2007 at 11:30:42 AM PDT

And I will answer:

The purpose of the diary was to make the diarists and commenters of Daily Kos think what it means that your website has become a platform where sympathy for Islamic suicide terrorists and advocacy of the end of Israel as Jewish state (G-d forbid) are all but acceptable. Where, despite having these words in their charter:

For our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave, so much so that it will need all the loyal efforts we can wield, to be followed by further steps and reinforced by successive battalions from the multifarious Arab and Islamic world, until the enemies are defeated and Allah’s victory prevails. …The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!

…Hamas is supported, and its atrocious words and deeds rationalized as “blowback”.

From my reading of the diaries ever since that one, it looks to me as if I had never posted it. Very well, Koslings: you stand condemned—condemned by G-d, and by history. Condemned as sympathizers with today’s form of imperialistic fascism, more commonly known as Islam. Condemned for selling your own stated liberal values for the lentil stew of “expiation of the West’s colonialist wrongs”. Condemned for standing with evil against the good.

[…] since an actual look at his blog was taken a look at, and one can make a case from it that he does not have the best interests of dkos in mind.

by TLS66 on Sun Jun 03, 2007 at 10:58:44 AM PDT

My interests regarding DKos are a simple matter of give-and-take: you started that psychotic obsession of yours with Israel ever since the war in Lebanon last summer, so I started my focus on Daily Kos as a result; had you not done so, I would never have written, possibly not even heard, of Daily Kos. The question is not whether I come in the best interests of Daily Kos; the question is whether it is in the best interests for a site concerned with “getting American Democrats elected” to latch so obsessively onto a conflict whose significance, as far as both pragmatic (getting American Democrats elected) and idealistic (standing for equality and justice) viewpoints are concerned, pales in comparison to so many others.

And I know a hate site when I see one.

Tip: Haveil Havalim #117 (with additional links)

Here is the roundup of the 117th issue of the great Jewish blog carnival Haveil Havalim, from May 20, 2007, hosted on Jack’s Shack. My favorite posts:

1. Elder of Ziyon tops the list with the best show of enemy duplicity, with his post Lifestyles of the rich and terrorist, from May 16, 2007. Reference this for the next time a Leftscum terror apologist talks about those “poor, starving Palestinians”.
2. One Jerusalem brings VIDEO EXCLUSIVE:: Semi-protected Schools, Damaged Homes and Kassam Rockets: A Day in the Life of Sderot, from May 15, 2007. Videos that should be on the Mainstream Media but aren’t, because they’d be unhelpful for later portraying Israel as a “brutal aggressor” when it does something about it all.
3. Speaking of our reaction, Robert J. Avrech of Seraphic Secret has a few words about our military situation and world opinion, in his post The Inbetween War, from May 18, 2007. As I put in on Belmont Club, we’re going to have to leave all those niceties if we’re to survive.
4. Lel, the Fiery Spirited Zionist, in her post Why “Palestine” should never come into existence (with those good scare quotes round the name of the fictitious nation just like there ought to be!), from May 12, 2007, explains why the “Palestinians” have no valid claim on this land and do not deserve to have a state of their own. She also jabs at the hypocrisy of those who are in no hurry to created a state for the Kurds, who, in contrast to the “Palestinians”, have proven themselves worthy of a state. This Is The World, 2007: no evil deed unrewarded, and no good deed unpunished.
5. On the Astute Bloggers, Omri (of Mere Rhetoric fame) posts Islamists Advocate Raiding American Forums And Repeating Democratic Talking Points, from May 16, 2007, in which he brings yet another damning exhibit of the Left/Islam alliance. “Nazis and Nazi-sympathizers of the world, unite!”
6. Yid With Lid has the post The Muslim American Society Promotes Terror, from May 17, 2007. Note the fatwa, especially the part, “The enemy relies on sophisticated military equipments […] So the Palestinians have nothing but throwing stones at their enemy in order to defend their country. […] So the Palestinians resort to martyr operations, in which the martyr seriously harms the enemy meanwhile sacrifices his own life.” This appears frequently as the terrorism apologists’ line on lefty sites like Daily Kos.
7. Saving the most personally rewarding post for the last: Rabbi Without A Cause posts My problem with Platonics, from May 16, 2007, in which he details the fences which our saintly rabbis raised around the holy institution of marriage. I just want to say this: I don’t care if this sounds like the dictates of Islam to some people; the fault of copying the original (and bastardizing it) lies with the copier, not with the one who has the original.

My featured post: Nachamu, Nachamu Ami!, from May 16, 2007, in which I call for rebukes to be based on both truth and love.

---

I now take advantage of this opportunity to bring links from outside Haveil Havalim:

1. Blogfather Gates of Vienna brings All Jihad is Local, from May 17, 2007, with a wonderful attempt by the Baron to convey the meaning of the rocket barrage on Sderot.
2. On Jihad Watch, the post U.S. embassy in Iraq to be world’s biggest, priciest, from May 20, 2007, provides an impressive view into the cluelessness of the current American administration, an administration that can be praised only in comparison to the treasonous opposition, the Democrats. Many otherwise right-thinking people get this wrong: if you root for American victory, then that’s good, but you need to define the meaning of victory. I have long maintained that a US victory in Iraq is to be defined thus: Iraq being turned into a non-Muslim country. But that’s blood for the “Racist! Bigot! Cultural imperialist!” yapping chihuahuas on the Left.
3. And from Jihad Watch’s subsite, Dhimmi Watch, is the post “The principle of secularism cannot be applied on Bosnia because Muslims are not a minority”, with a title straight from the horse’s mouth. Interesting is how the permission of Christian icons and crosses to be brought into classrooms in Bosnia is being debated—in what was the birthplace of the Cyrillic alphabet! I’m not a Christian, but you don’t have to be a Christian in order for it to outrage you; just the principle of it is enough.
4. In that vein, from Little Green Footballs, is Little Mermaid in a Hijab, where it is told how vandals had put a hijab on the famous Danish statue. The photo is the real-world equivalent of those “Wishful Thinking” thought-balloons that I saw once as an article on MAD Magazine. To let you know what the Muslims’ wish for the world is. Ah, but it can all be solved by forcing an end to the Israel/“Palestine” conflict! (Deep sarcasm intended, of course.) [UPDATE: this is probably an anti-dhimmi jab. See comment by “kepiblanc” on Gates of Vienna.]
5. From the enemy side, take a look at the Daily Kos diary Sderot: On the Frontline, by Jewish, pro-Israel poster Pumpkinlove, from May 20, 2007, where he attempts to portray the effect of the Kassam rockets, only to get a handful of apologies for terrorism (a sample, by commenter “cenobite”: “And now there are rockets falling on Israeli towns? This should surprise no one. Everything that has happened is the result of decisions the Israeli government has made. Step 1 is stop listening to Dubya and his neocon friends”). Beloved brother Pumpkinlove: you’re better off posting on Stormfront—they’re just as Jew-hating, only more honest about it.
6. Moonbattery (on our, the good, side) brings the post Retroactive Correctness, from May 19, 2007, which struck me with the similarity of the Muslim and Marxist ways of handling the world: the thought that they know what’s best for everybody; the desire to force their ways on the whole world; and, demonstrated by this post especially, the lust for visiting their own vengeance for sins committed ages ago. The face of evil.

That’s for now. In case I don’t post anything new by tomorrow evening: Happy Shavuot!

“From the Page of Time”

For a change, at least outwardly, the world really was shocked when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (may he go to hell soon, amen), said, “Israel must be wiped off the map” (G-d forbid). But soon afterward, an American university professor named Juan Cole (a Baha’i, but one who has chosen to be on the wrong side of history, and to side with those who persecute his brethren—contrast Carridine of LGF) called it a mistranslation, saying Ahmadinejad was speaking of Israel “vanishing from the page of time” (G-d forbid). The world then relaxed, having been saved from what could have been a repeat of the Mokusatsu Affair (reputedly the mistranslation from Japanese that drove the USA to decide to drop the atom bombs).

Apparently, if it’s not about a nuclear holocaust but about wiping the Zionist regime from the page of history (G-d forbid), then it’s OK. It really is, to take it from many “progressive” websites, including not a few comments on the Daily Kos Israel/“Palestine” diaries. Here are two fine specimens, the one from the diary Behind the “Zion Curtain” by “another American”, from May 17, 2007:

Lots of things have existed!

Lots of things have existed; Soviet Union, Apartheid, Slavery, segregation, etc. That does not mean that they will continue to exist. They had their time and are now gone. There are few tears shed.

Israel is a country that discriminates against people because of their religion and ethnic origin. Systems based on maintaining the supremacy of one group over another will never be at peace. Israel can gain peace by becoming a country of equal rights. The alternative is to join that list above.

by speaker4peace on Thu May 17, 2007 at 09:43:41 AM PDT

And the other is on Heathlander’s diary Restoring The Palestinian Voice To Daily Kos, from May 17 too:

Yes, you have.

You're no more interested in civil discourse than you have accused umkahlil and sabbah. And you squandered whatever opportunity you had with not one, but TWO Palestinians to have some kind of dialogue, to reach some kind of understanding, even if you in the end disagreed.

No, you chose to stalk them. And attack them. You were never interested in their views.

You see one-state as destroying Israel, yes? You realize this comes across as racist, right? But you can't say that can you? Therefore you label these two your ENEMY and you actually believe this hatefulness would be productive to understanding each other?

[…]

by callmecassandra on Thu May 17, 2007 at 01:12:08 PM PDT

The above comment was in response to “another American”, referring to his calling “Palestinian” commenter “umkahlil” his enemy for advocating the one-state solution. These two samples from what passes as perfectly acceptable for “progressive” thought today show that the world has no problem with Ahmadinejad’s statement assuming Juan Cole’s translation. Following on such figures as Jimmy “Too Many Jews” Carter and Desmond Tutu, the “voices of reason” on the Left think advocating the end of Zionism is totally, essentially, entirely, unbridgeably different from calling for a nuclear attack on Israel (G-d forbid). And we have in this a warning: should the leaders of Israel be so insane as to have reached the situation where the next pound of flesh demanded of Israel is the application of the “Palestinian Right of Return”, any opposition to that demand would be decried as racism. The very concept of Israel as being a Jewish state, with a Jewish majority, is already being condemned as racism. This is the sign of the worse to come.

There are answers to this charge, some of them made by commenters on those very Daily Kos diaries: that “Israel as a Jewish state” is no more racist than “Ireland as an Irish state”, for example. The exchange of these comments and their rejoinders is the usual invective of the Daily Kos I/“P” diaries, which has gotten so bad that even the admins woke up to it and had to do something. But I am interested in taking a different route, the route of arguing that, with such adversaries as we have, we have no choice but insist on a Jewish majority, even if such a thing were racist.

We judge the other side by their words and by their deeds. The words need to be checked against the deeds, because—contrary to the faith of the paper-worshipers—human beings, even non-Western, indigenous “noble savages” like the “Palestinians”, are still capable of lying. Hamas are better than Fatah in that regard, in that they are more honest than Fatah in voicing out their true intentions of Jewish genocide (G-d forbid), but the Leftists are wont to latch onto the feeblest words of peace, the thinnest straws of an apparent olive branch, and say, “Look, they support a negotiated peace with Israel! Israel has an obligation to go with that”, and then condemn Israel for its “hardlining” when it has to respond forcefully to suicide bombers and Kassam rockets, the deeds that expose the truth of what resides inside the the other side’s hearts.

So far, it is possible for our “Progressive” friends to chalk it all up to “resistance against the occupation”. But there is one thing that cannot, in any way, in any wise, by any context, with any excuse, be explained away as “resistance”, and that is the education of their children. It is because of the absolute strength of that point that the “progressives” take such pains to either brush it off as mistranslation (looks like a recurring theme now…) or as frivolity, claiming it is a distraction from the real issues of “the occupation, Israeli brutality” et cetera (from that link: “Every day Palestinian children face the reality and brutality of occupation. Does anyone really believe that it takes propaganda to teach Palestinian children to hate the occupiers?”). As far as the question of translation goes, that’s beyond my ken; the charge of frivolity, in contrast, is at the center of my mode of writing, because it concerns the role of ideology in shaping events. To this I now go.

The children in the “Palestinian Authority” (oxymoron) are being taught to hate the Jews, to nurture that hatred and to preserve it until the moment of action (G-d forbid). Their education is, in essence, no different from Nazi education, that which resulted in the Holocaust. This education, despite the attempts of certain moral equivalators to show otherwise, has no parallel among the Jews. I wasn’t brought up on hating the other side; on the contrary, I went through a school program teaching me that the Arabs were the same as me, just with a different culture. That I hold the positions I hold now is cause-based, not indoctrinated, and that is true for countless Israeli Jews.

There is no frivolity whatever in the education of children, and great will be the downfall of whoever takes this issue lightly. G-d says: “[…] ask thy father, and he will declare unto thee, thine elders, and they will tell thee.” (Deuteronomy 32:7); ask the elders, those Zionist pioneers who came to the Land of Israel from any period between 1870 and 1947, or just read their history if they have gone away to their world, and they will tell you it is possible for a peaceful and friendly life of decades alongside the Muslims to be followed, all of a sudden, by being murdered by them (G-d forbid). How is that possible? The wisest of all humankind, King Solomon, answers: “Train up a child in the way he should go, and even when he is old, he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22:6). The teen may rebel against his parents, and live his own life turning his back on their teachings, but they are etched onto his brain, and one day, by some unknown, unforeseen trigger, they can spring back into action. That is the root cause of Sudden Jihad Syndrome, in which a “good boy, who would never hurt a fly”, one day goes on a suicide-terrorism mission (G-d forbid).

The education of “Palestinian” children, as does the education of Muslim children in general, ensures that there will never be peace, no matter how generous the concessions made. It may be after decades of peace, of being bosom friends, but one day that childhood education will rise anew, at some unexpected incident (could be as petty as a bunch of cartoons), and then the old training, those words “Kill the infidels wherever they are!” that were inculcated into those minds when they were soft and receptive, will make it as if all the negotiations, concessions and treaties had never been held, made and signed.

One good thing I learned from reading the diaries and comments on Daily Kos: if there’s an issue that the posters there (even the pro-Israel ones) insist on ignoring, then it means that issue is all-important. Even the saner denizens of Daily Kos are beholden to the basic premises of historical materialism, to the view that addressing the material grievances will do away with all the hatred; therefore, those ideological points that they insist on writing off as “frivolities” are exactly the ones that are crucial to this conflict—the ones which, unless solved, will guarantee the continuation of bloodshed in perpetuity.

Our sages say, “Why is it called Sinai? Because, from it, hatred [Hebrew sin’ah. —ZY] went down to the world”. It is not so much that we, as people, are hated as is the message G-d has appointed us to bring to the world—the message that He exists, that He is both Father (contra Islam) and Judge (contra the New Age) and that He is the only one in real control, the only one capable (contra the Marxists and other utopianists) bringing permanent peace to the world and ridding it of evil. The common desire of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and of the “Progressives” to “wipe the Zionist regime from the page of time” is really the wish to kill the messenger, because of his hated message. With the setting up of the State of Israel, we Jews are back in history, and our situation is giving the world the graphic message that there is here a confrontation with unappeasable evil. There are some who, no matter what their thoughts about this whole conflict are, have read this message plainly, for what it is, such as Walt Disney’s daughter:

The only surviving child of Walt Disney has called Hamas “pure evil” for using Mickey Mouse to teach islamic radicalism to children.

Diane Disney Miller said she was disgusted that a rip-off of her father’s iconic cartoon character was being used on a new Hamas TV show to encourage Palestinian children to take up arms against Israel and America.

“Of course I feel personal about Mickey Mouse, but it could be Barney as well,” Ms Miller, 73, told the New York Daily News.

“It’s not just Mickey, it’s indoctrinating children like this, teaching them to be evil,” said Ms Miller, who owns a winery in northern California.

“The world loves children and this is just going against the grain of humanity.”

Just so. There is no context that can excuse such a thing. “Resistance to occupation” can involve many things, but this is not one of them. Teaching kids to hate the other side for posterity is not resistance any way you slice it, although some think otherwise.

The blood of those children is on the hands of whoever dismisses their education as “frivolity” or “preaching resistance”. What will be wiped out from the page of time, by the hand of G-d Himself, is this unmitigated evil, speedily in our days, amen.

Hello, Life-Chooser

A Jew who posts on Daily Kos has realized the forum is brimming with people who are willfully, obstinately ignorant of his vital concerns. Eyal Rosenberg begins his reasons for leaving DKos thus:

Reading these past months on dkos has led me to believe that people here, under the "progressive" banner, support views that end up in one place: Me dead.

He points out the hypocrisy involved:

Barely a word for Darfur - Israel has been in a diary on dkos over 5000 times in the past year, Darfur less then 1000. How many thousands continue to be killed there by Muslims? If I did not know better I would think that on dkos bashing Israel was more important than saving lives. But what has gone in Sudan? Only 2 million dead versus the circa 7 thousand in the I/P conflict in the same period.

And, near the close of the diary, he voices the exact feeling I felt a few years ago, when I watched with consternation as my interest-group, an environmental activism forum, heaped vitriol on Israel with insane passion:

That is why I am upset. People here are advancing ideology that leads directly to Israel being destroyed as a Jewish and democratic, and me dying - since the two are one and the same. […]

[…]

I came to this site with Leftist Zionist Environmentalist Pro-Peace ideology (Meretz style).

I leave it with a heavy doubt of the entire "Progressive" ideology, morals and goals.

I don’t think, and more importantly, I don’t even wish it to happen, that Eyal is turning right-wing. As I said myself, in September last year, it was with no happiness that I abandoned the Left. I still have a soft spot for a lot of its ideas and goals, and the main reason I’ve left it is that it has long turned its back on those same ideas and goals (or, as Ronald Reagan said, “I never left the Democratic Party, the Party left me”).

No, I commend Eyal’s move not as a change of political orientation, but as a fulfillment, whether he is aware of it or not, of G-d’s mitzvah, “Therefore choose life” (Deuteronomy 30:19). He has acknowledged the issue, and seen beyond all the high-sounding words, and come to the realization that, to quote one of the pro-Israel counter-protest signs, “Free Palestine” is code for “Kill the Jews”, even if some are sincere in believing it is possible to be pro-Israel and pro-“Palestine” at the same time—the truth need not agree with our feelings.

Are all the Daily Kos Israel-bashers anti-Semitic? I can’t determine that. It’s an internal matter, and what’s more important, my religious Jewish view has it that Jew-hatred does not come inwardly from the person, but is inspired on him outwardly by G-d, for Jew-hatred is His institution for the purpose of keeping His people close to Him and praying for His help and deliverance and salvation. Because G-d works through natural means, the anti-Israel rhetoric on Daily Kos and other Leftist sites has such a well-meaning ring to it. So much so that many Jews do not pause to think as Eyal Rosenberg did, and keep lending their hand to that ill-ending cause.

They say it’s just criticism of Israel’s policies. They say it’s about empathy, about caring for the oppressed and the downtrodden. And from those points, they delve into a multitude of particulars (the “Apartheid Wall”, the Jewish Law of Return, the “ethnic cleansing of 1947–9”, the “persecution of Azmi Bisharah”, and so on). And I call rubbish on all those particulars, and tell you what the two underlying generalities driving them are:

1. The opinion that this land is stolen—that it does not belong to the Jews.
2. The belief that this conflict fuels the hatred of the Arab and Islamic worlds, therefore its defusion is necessary in order to bring us back to at least pre-9/11 levels of tranquility.

There are really no other issues than those. All the particulars stem from those two generalities. Both are erroneous, and the second is selfish as well—selfish as in, “Giving the lie to the statements about caring for the oppressed and the downtrodden”.

The first generality means we are not on this land by right. It means we are thieves, with all that that status entails. People would agree that the blood of the thief who breaks into someone’s house is free for the taking; therefore, if the entirety of the Jewish population is on “Palestine” wrongly and not rightly, it follows that their blood is free for the taking (G-d forbid). Oh no, I’m not suggesting the “Progressives” actually call for spilling Israeli Jewish blood—no, that’s inhumane; instead, they “only” show understanding and sympathy (“What do you expect after brutally occupying the natives for nearly 60 years?”) when the “Palestinians” do just that.

There is no other root issue than this: the question whether this land is stolen or not. Rashi, through G-d’s direction, nailed it down nearly a thousand years ago, and in his commentary for Genesis 1:1 no less: that the nations will say to us, “Ye are robbers”. This accusation is without any qualifier: not a particular piece of the Land of Israel, not a limited space taken at some period (like 1967), but everything.

On this note, it is worthy to mention that even their worship of the United Nations is dampened by their passion for the accusation of us as thieves. If you say, “The British provided for this land as our homeland beginning with the Balfour Declaration of 1917”, they will reply, “The British colonials had no right to promise the land of a nation to another”. That is not surprising. But the reaction is similar if you say, “The UN partitioned the land between Jews and Arabs in 1947”; here too I have seen, more than once, more than twice, a response on the lines of, “The UN had no right to take any part of this land away from its indigenous inhabitants and give it to another nation”. So powerful is this passion for the accusation, “Ye are robbers” that even the UN, that shining light of all Progressive values, is not exempted from criticism.

It is about moral right, even though that sounds so “primitive”, so far removed from reality-based discussion. The answer to the question whether we Jews have stolen this land or inhabit it by right colors the entire view of this conflict. If we have stolen it, then the accusations of racism, apartheid, oppression, brutality and imperialism inevitably follow; if we are on this land by right, then support for us, for our democratic, Western state, for our material achievements, for our spiritual fortitude in the face of all adversity and for our standing at the forefront of the war against Islamic imperialism inevitably follow. I have seen this correlation far too many times to regard it as a coincidence. The question of moral right is the root, the only substantial matter, and all the rest are just by-products. Tackle the question of moral right and all the other issues will fall into place like dominoes.

The second generality is the erroneous belief that this conflict is at the core of, or is the principal fuel for, the clash of cultures now taking place in the world—the misnamed “War on Terror” (should be, “War against Islam”). It is that old sentiment, “How horrible, fantastic it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far away country between people of whom we know nothing” (Neville Chamberlain in 1938, not on Israel, which didn’t exist yet).

One could say, “And if so, so what? What’s wrong about self-interest?” In their own self-interest, Israeli Jews have the right to resist being sacrificed for an unproved (and that’s being very charitable—“disproved” would be more like it) idea of bringing world peace. And, as I said, it belies the many statements that this is all about empathy and support for the underdog. Eyal has observed well: over 5,000 Daily Kos diaries a year about Israel and less than 1,000 about Darfur, given more than 2,000,000 dead in Sudan as against about 7,000 here in about the same extent of time, does not bear good witness of empathy and support for the underdog. Only the belief, the untested, uncritically accepted, unchallenged belief, that the Israel/“Palestine” conflict fuels the hatred of the Arabs and Muslims can explain the passion for this topic.

I don’t know where Eyal’s journey (his “heavy doubt of the entire ‘Progressive’ ideology, morals and goals”) will lead. Again, I cannot praise him enough for seeing the truth behind the façade; but my post goes beyond congratulations, and into suggestions as to the way forward. In counterpoint to the two generalities that underpin the anti-Israel line, here are what I can call the two general arguments of resurgent Zionism (or “post-post-Zionism”):

1. None of this land is stolen; all belongs to the Jews by right.
2. The global threat of Islamic imperialism was not caused by Israel; rather, Israel was just the first to suffer from it in modern times.

From there, Eyal, Resurgent Zionist, I recommend you go. HaShem be your helper!

Raise the flag! From the Salute to Israel Parade in New York, May 2007, taken by Urban Infidel.

Anti-Bigotry: a Catch-22

Education against bigotry is a staple of the kumbayistic curriculum. Such education is not, of course, a bad thing in and of itself; its flaws in our time stem from the global context. There are two flaws:

1. It is not universal; that leads to imbalance of power.
2. It gives rise to its own variety of bigotry.

The first point is the same fact that holds true for disarmament, for birth control and for non-dualism: it can only work if all parties do it. There is a reason the vision of all nations beating their swords into plowshares is an End Times vision: currently, the result of any nation doing that is that it will be subjugated by another nation that has not done that. Birth control is the same: it could achieve its purported goal of “saving the planet from human population explosion” only if all human groups carried it out; in the current situation, it means the overrunning of the population-conscious by those who do not share that idea. And non-dualism, the core of anti-bigotry education, leaves one vulnerable to those who have remained dualists.

Anti-bigotry education consists in such guidelines as the following:

• Human beings are complex; simplistic judgments should be avoided.
• Do not generalize or stereotype.
• Truth is not black and white but shades of gray.
• Divisive labels are the source of all conflicts; we must accept that we are all citizens of the world.
• Diversity is to be cherished.
• The dreams and desires of all human beings are common; happiness on earth is the summary of them.

On the face of it, it doesn’t sound bad; nor do I advocate any return to a world where racism and baseless stereotyping is acceptable. There are contradictions in the above list, as well as a bit of cultural imperialism (some of the points go contrary to the culture of some groups), but that isn’t the main problem here. The main problem is, as I said, the impotence, nay, backfiring, of this education if any group of people fails to fall in line.

Much has been written of “the perils of childish binary thinking”. It is proposed that all conflicts can be healed by discarding the “Us vs. Them” mentality. Sixties-soaked “educators” in the West have been busy for years indoctrinating kids against black-and-white thinking. Which may not be bad per se, but when viewed against the fact that no such mode of education has ever been implemented by those who oppose Western civilization, this means the next generation is being mentally disarmed, forced to beat their cultural swords into plowshares while the enemies of the West have never had even the intention of doing so.

There are no calls for the intellectuals and clerics of the Muslim world to jettison their “Muslim vs. Kafir” dualism; the rare acknowledgment of the existence of such dualism is usually brushed off by the “Tiny Minority of Extremists” canard. They can keep calling the non-Muslims “the vilest of all creatures”, as per the Koran, and Jews “the sons of apes and pigs”, without criticism, although such tenets, such a heritage on which they bring up their children, are the very antithesis of anti-bigotry education. In effect, the non-Muslim child grows up believing in meeting the Muslim adversary with a welcoming embrace, while the Muslim child grows up harboring contempt for the former, hatred just waiting for the opportune moment of action. This has been the story of the West–Islam War for the past few decades. In the name of anti-bigotry, the non-Muslim approaches the adversary as a dove even in the face of the most hawkish statements of intent on the latter’s part. Even the word, “adversary” constitutes a thought-crime in the Politically Correct framework.

The second point is that the doctrine behind anti-bigotry—that all conflicts can be solved through education to acceptance of the Other—breeds its very own kind of bigotry, intolerance and dualism: the war against those who are perceived to be obstructing the doctrine. Remember that, in the name of “Imagine no possessions” (Communism), several of the opponents were branded, “Enemies of the people” and executed; now this vision, of “Imagine there’s no Heaven” and “Imagine there’s no countries” and “A brotherhood of man”, is a utopianism all its own, to be brought at all costs, its enemies in need of being laid low. From Gates of Vienna, November 15, 2006, is the story of how the cross in Wren Chapel at the College of William & Mary was removed in the name of “diversity”. Baron Bodissey quotes the President of the College, Gene R. Nichol:

But the Chapel is also used frequently for College events that are secular in nature—and should be open to students and staff of all beliefs. Whether celebrating our happiest moments, marking our greatest achievements, or finding solace during our most profound sadness, our Chapel, like our entire campus, must be welcoming to all.

I believe a recognition of the full dignity of each member of our diverse community is vital. For this reason, and because the Chapel is surpassing [sic] important in William and Mary’s history and in the life of our campus, I welcome a broader College discussion of how the ancient Chapel can reflect our best values.

So, in the name of “diversity”, one of the major objects making the chapel a chapel is hidden away from sight. Heaven forfend that, for example, a non-Christian student should accept that Christians write “AD” because they really believe in what is behind it (Anno Domini stands for, “year of our Lord”), and he, the non-Christian student, would continue writing “CE” (“Common Era”) himself; under the PC regime, with its utmost carefulness to avoid even the dust of bigotry, “AD” is to be banned, prohibited even for Christian students.

The cause of world peace—a noble one, no argument about that; intentions are not in dispute here—is the banner under which the PC regime justifies purging all perceived opponents. It is a dualism for all intents and purposes: believers in the opposing doctrines of American exceptionalism, Jewish exceptionalism, the relevance of the Bible, the belonging of the Land of Israel to the Jews, the threat of the inherent supremacism of Islam, the cultural superiority of the West (I could go on, but you get the drift) are enemies of The Idea (recall Lennon’s Imagine again), therefore requiring ostracism.

I recently encountered two instances, admittedly just harbingers and not yet full-blown manifestations, on Daily Kos. Diarist EnderRS posted a diary, Jewish “Loyalty” to Israel—love is what it is, on April 30, 2007, to counter the notion, common on the Daily Kos Israel/“Palestine” diaries, that American Jews are more loyal to Israel than to the USA (a notion that, with just “Jewish interests” substituted for “Israel”, was common among 1930’s “America First” members as well—hint, hint). Predictably, another diary of irenic intention degenerated into the usual flamefest that the DKos I/“P” diaries are. Two comments stand out in relation to my thoughts on anti-bigotry. First, “shpilk” says:

I did a diary about this a while back and asked people to 'self-identify'.

It was sort of tongue in cheek, but what I was trying to get people to understand is that 'human', or maybe even 'Terran' should be our first and primary identifier.

It didn't get too far.

[…]

ya, it's the hippie part of my past blasting through into the current time frame.

What can I say.

I'd love to think mankind could reach a point at which no one on this planet feels the need to self identify with any label other than 'human' or 'Terran'.

But we are a long, long way off.

“Shpilk” resigns himself, but there are many other Lennonist believers who take a more active, prescriptive, proscriptive position in order to bring the vision of Imagine to fulfillment. It is they who make the equation, “Zionism = racism” and think the state of Israel, at least as a “Jewish ethnostate”, needs to be done away with (G-d forbid). Rootless cosmopolitanism is the way to their conception of Olam Ha-Ba (“World To Come”, i.e. the Messianic Age), and it is a requirement—anyone who goes against it is an “enemy of humanity”—dubbed “racist, hatemonger, warmonger, bigot” and so on ad infinitum.

The second comment from that diary, by “skwimmer”:

Hatreds that run deep don't die without intermarriage. IMHO.

By “hatreds” he was referring to the hatred running in the Israel/“Palestine” conflict. He suggested that the conflict would reach its really ultimate resolution when the Jews and Arabs of Israel intermarried (G-d forbid) until their distinction were erased. Now, intermarriage is against Jewish Law. As a Torah-believing Jew, I hold this view out of nothing more and nothing less than the belief that that is what HaShem has decreed for the Jewish nation. If, however, the idea of intermarriage as the only solution to this conflict should gain wide currency, it will not be long before not just Zionism but Judaism will be seen as a major obstacle to world peace. Again, this comment may not be representative even of the Daily Kos Israel/“Palestine” diary comments, but then that was true of anti-Zionist sentiments not long ago.

In closing, I have only to quote Uri Elitzur, from his March 16 article:

At the end of the 20th century, fashion changed. The post-colonial discourse took the stage by the storm, and it rules with a high hand and with zero tolerance. In nowadays’ films, the Indian is the hero dancing with wolves, and the white settler is the evil one. In all of them without exception. There is no tolerance whatsoever toward any film or book or scientific study that does not obey that rule. […]

However good the intentions underpinning it may be, the “anti-bigotry” stance of the PC regime will not achieve its purported goal: it both leaves the non-Muslims unarmed in this great Clash of Cultures, and leads to internal warfare through its own intolerant, uncompromising vision.

---

In Israeli Hebrew we have the phrase, “Im ata k’var ba-shvung”, meaning, “If you’re already carried away in that direction…” (“Shvung” is from Yiddish, of course). That diary from Daily Kos has more I want to excerpt here. Just a few snippets with my short commentary.

By “fugue”:

so few of us?

Hey go say that to the Palestinian. The [sic] are even fewer.

Lesson: under the true narrative of one small Jewish state against the mass of Arab (22) and Muslim (57) states, support for Israel as the underdog would be a no-brainer; the false “Palestinian nation” narrative inverts the roles of David and Goliath, turning it against us.

From a comment by “mickT”:

[…] May I start with 'Our Jewish Lord' Jesus. He saw the Jewish money changers and the Jewish suck ups to Roman rule and said 2000 years ago that these were nothing but con artists. Land and money can come and go. Races mean nothing. 'How you treat the least of us', was the important thing. […]

Wow, a good Christian posting on Daily Kos? Not so. Back on January 23, 2007, I recorded a comment by this “mickT” telling us what he thinks about the Bible. The relevant snippets:

Or does having something written in the 'approved' bible mean more than other unapproved documents uncovered about history of the 'sacred lands'.

Does myth make right?

[…]

I kind of thought that if a family had lived on a land for generations, that might stand for just some small shred above myths/ancient history/brute force. Oh well.

You get the message: we have here a typical Marxist, normally spitting on the Christian Bible, but quite happy to use it for his own Leftist agenda. And here he is using the New Testament as a springboard for his Marxist (“‘How you treat the least of us’, was the important thing”), anti-Zionist (“Land and money can come and go”) and anti-Jewish (“Races mean nothing”) opinions. This is classic Replacement Theology. How the Left and the Right have switched their positions!

Finally, there is an exchange between “theRoaringGirl” and “Bensdad”. She says (HaShem bless her):

Will someone answer this question for me:

When the conflict in Northern Ireland was raging, why weren't Irish-Americans who gave money to the IRA and supported the cause not accused of dual-loyalty? Why are the Jews the only group that are under suspicion when it comes to loyalties?

This has bugged me for years.

Thanks.

To which he responds:

I would certainly accuse them of dual-loyalty. But the answer may be that the covert support for the IRA by Americans, has never engendered the kind of hatred and reaction that our overt support for Israel has. In other words, support for the IRA, while perhaps immoral, does not threaten Americans. Our support for Israel has come at a very high price at times... including American lives.

Remember that when a Leftist starts using the language of human compassion and the bleeding heart regarding the “Palestinians”. That’s the real man behind the curtain.