Monday, April 12, 2010

Are Muslims Entrapped by Islam?


Amil Imani
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.5959/pub_detail.asp

"How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property - either as a child, a wife, or a concubine - must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.” Sir Winston Churchill- The River War 1899

Let’s face it. Islam is like a deadly, contagious disease. Once it invades the mind of its victim, it is capable of transforming him to a helpless pawn that has no choice but to execute what he is directed to do. It’s true that the vast majority of the victims of Communism were people living in Communist states. Some 38 million Soviets were killed because of Communism. Tens of millions of Chinese citizens were killed because of Communism. That the victims of Communism were largely members of socialist societies says a great deal about the ideology itself.

It is also true with Islam. Muslims are the main victims of Islamic ideology. The political system of Islam, just like fascism and communism, is a dysfunctional ideology that needs to be abandoned. Islam’s charter Koran is the root cause of Islamic terrorism, just as Marxism was the root cause of international Communist totalitarianism.

Of the reported 1.2 billion Muslims in the world, millions are already trapped in the terminal stages of this affliction, while millions of others are rapidly joining them. The people enslaved with the extreme cases of Islamic mental disease are highly infectious. They actively work to transmit the disease to others, while they themselves engage in horrific acts of mayhem and violence to demonstrate their unconditional obedience to the dictates of the Islamic cult.

A true Muslim does not and cannot believe in freedom of choice. In the religion of Islam, “submission,” leads everything is up to Allah, as clearly and repeatedly stipulated in the Koran. The raison d’ĂȘtre for the Muslim is unconditional submission to the will and dictates of Allah. Everything that a “good” Muslim does is contingent upon the will and decree of Allah, in which the Muslim has been indoctrinated.

Islam, by its very nature, is patriarchal and authoritarian. Once liberty is surrendered for submission, a host of serious consequences present themselves. The individual becomes little more than a passive obedient vessel of Allah and his perspective of himself and life drastically changes. Once he submits to the all-powerful, all-knowing, he is absolved of the responsibility of having to chart his own way of life.

Acts of horrors committed in Islamic lands aside, it is disturbing to see Muslims dissimulate, sweet-talk and use any and all means in free non-Islamic societies to convert people to their cult. Yet, if a Muslim, on his own free will decides to leave Islam he is condemned as apostate and automatically sentenced to death. And right here in America, the suffocating tentacles of Islamic bigotry are beginning to reach out to people. In the recent past, for instance, a teenage girl had to run away from her Muslim family fearing she would be killed by her own father for becoming a Christian.

Consider the boys. Millions of young boys are enrolled in madrassahs – religious boarding schools – learning very little beside memorizing and reciting the Koran. This is a case of total submission: Islam at its best, as championed by the oil-money-flushed Saudi patrons of the Wahhabi sect.

Slaveholder Islam is not content to limit its inhuman barbaric system to its traditional homelands. It has penetrated millions of adherents throughout Europe, America, and much of the world. Many of the new arrivals from the failed Islamic states do not realize that it is Islam that is the root cause of their centuries of backwardness and misery. These imprinted-from-birth Muslims are robots who are programmed to do all they can in obedience to the dictates of Muhammad’s Mein Kempf, the Quran (My Ummah).

It is a sad fact that generation after generation of Sunni Muftis – highest ranking Sunni clerics – and Ayatollahs – highest ranking Shiite clerics, over the years have indoctrinated their underling clergy as well as the masses with selective teachings that promote intolerance, exclusion and hostility toward non-Muslims – people labeled as heathens, infidels, unbelievers and apostates. Selective choice of the scripture, combined with a siege mentality endemic to the cradle of Islam, the Middle East, generate a fury of hatred that has the potential of devouring the world. If only Muslims could purge the negative aspects of its scripture and practice its positive teachings, the world would become a diverse community of humanity at peace with one another. The question is: Is that ever possible?

The fact that Islam is a splintered house complicates matters greatly. The faith is divided into Sunni and Shiites sects with numerous sub-sects. The divisions and contentiousness are so profound that members of one sect consider the other Muslims as apostates worthy of death. The division goes back to the time of the Prophet himself. Shiites believe that the enemies of true faith subverted its chain of authority at Muhammad’s death. They claim that the Prophet, while on his deathbed, asked for a parchment to dictate his will and to appoint Ali, his cousin and son-in-law, as his successor. The Shiites claim that Umar, an influential disciple and commander of the faith, declined the request saying to the Prophet: hasbena ketab-ul-llah – sufficient unto us is the book of God. Before long, division and infighting started in earnest and continues to this day. Oppression of Shiite minorities in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are only two glaring instances of this longstanding and irreconcilable intra-faith hostility. The Shiite majorities in other lands return the favor to the Sunni minorities, as is the case in Iran. The recent horrific sectarian killings in Iraq represent glaring instances of irreconcilable differences among the various claimants to the mantle of true Islam.

One of the issues Muslims, worldwide, are in general agreement on is the status of women. It places women squarely under the thumb of men. It says in the Koran: “Alrejaalo qawaamoon al-alnesa” – men are rulers over women. Women of the non-Islamic world have valiantly worked to attain a degree of equality with men. They are not likely to barter their hard-earned rights for the privilege of becoming head-to-toe covered second class citizens, deprived of education and opportunities. We, non-Muslim men, are not going to leave our emancipated, fully participating and contributing members of our society behind and subjugate ourselves to a barbaric set of Sharia laws which were enacted by a stone-age mentality.

Achievements thrive in a marketplace of free ideas, where beliefs and viewpoints, not people, clash. It is through the unimpeded clash of ideas that the best decisions and actions are reached. Political Islam is anathema to this invaluable principle. Islam violated this vital principle and it aims to continue to do so to this day. Islam's inflexible and intolerant dogmatism is at the heart of the Islamic world's stagnation and backwardness.

The best, yet difficult resolution of the conflict is to do what hundreds of thousands of Muslims have already done. They have abandoned the slaveholder Islam: they broke loose from the yoke of the exploitive clergy, renounced Islamofascisim, purged the discriminatory and bizarre teachings in the Koran and the Hadith, and left the suffocating tent of dogmatic Islam for the life-giving expanse of liberty.

Within the emancipating and accommodating haven of liberty, those who wish to remain Muslim can retain and practice the good teachings of Islam but renounce intolerance, hatred and violence. It takes great vision, effort and courage to ascend from the degrading pit of slavery to the mount of emancipation. Yet, I like to be hopeful that it is both possible and exhilarating to do it, since many have done so successfully and happily.

As more and more people leave the shackles of Islamic slavery, more and more will follow, and the long-suffering Muslims, victimized by Islam itself for far too long, will be a free people in charge of their own life and destiny. It is a painful yet worthy process of growing up, of asserting one’s coming of age, and marching lockstep with the free members of the human race.

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Amil Imani is an Iranian-born American citizen and a pro-democracy activist residing in the United States of America. Imani is a columnist, literary translator, novelist and essayist who has been writing and speaking out for the struggling people of his native land, Iran. He maintains a website at www.amilimani.com.

"Never Again"

Arlene Kushner

On Yom Hashoah day, continuing the themes of last night.

Mark Prowiser, on the "Yesha Views" blog, addresses the issue of "never again," which, as he points out, typically means, "we won't let our people be methodically slaughtered again, we won’t let such a genocide take place again, against our own people." But he asks, "Who exactly won’t let this happen again?" Good question. Expanding on this theme, he then asks, "Never Again...What?

"'Never Again' will Jews be victims of violence and terror.

"'Never Again' will Jews be evicted from their land, any of their land.

"'Never Again' will Jews stand quietly by and be fooled by our enemies.

"'Never Again' will Jews be led to the slaughter.

"NEVER AGAIN!"
http://yeshaviews.blogspot.com:80/2010/04/never-again-what.html

Amen! (And thanks to Doris M. for calling this to my attention.)

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The Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism at Tel Aviv University has just released a report:

2009 was the worst years for anti-Semitic incidents since monitoring of such manifestations began. There has been an increase in "coordinated and pre-planned attacks on Jews," as well as in spontaneous violence and instances of a hostile or violent atmosphere, with one feeding on the other (e.g., a demonstration that precipitated violence on the scene). Worldwide there was a 102% increase in violence, and much more in the way of threats, graffiti, anti-Semitic demonstrations, etc.

This is seen as a spike in what has been growing anti-Semitism over the last few years -- which makes clear that the increase is not just about our actions in Gaza.

Monitoring in the British Jewish community revealed a three-fold increase in anti-Semitic incidents since 1999, while in Canada there has been a five-fold increase since 2000.

Most violent attacks in West Europe came, unsurprisingly, from people of Arab and Muslim heritage. Attacks by extreme right and extreme left wing elements (among whites) are also increasing.

See here for further details:

http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=172884

We have our work cut our for us, and then some.

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Not incidentally: In national elections just held in Hungary, the far right has gained more seats in the parliament than it has had at any time since WWII. Jobbik, a radically far-right party with openly anti-Semitic and anti-gypsy policies (shades of the Nazis), has gained entry into the parliament for the first time. The party is closely tied to the Magyar Garda, or Hungarian Guard, a banned paramilitary group with insignia modeled on the Arrow Cross of Hungary's wartime Nazis. Gabor Vona, Jobbik's leader, has vowed to be sworn into parliament wearing the banned uniform.

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It's frustrating and bewildering.

The American Jewish Committee has just released its annual survey of American Jewish opinions. What is clear is that they "get" certain things very well, but then give knee-jerk opinions on related matters or abysmally fail to make necessary connections. What I suspect is that there are certain mantras, certain politically correct viewpoints, that are so solidly internalized that they cannot be readily released. Consider:

A full 75% of those polled agree that “The goal of the Arabs is not the return of occupied territories but rather the destruction of Israel.”

And 61% believe that Jerusalem should stay united under Israeli jurisdiction.

Yet, 48% are in favor of the establishment of a Palestinian state (compared to 45% opposed), and 56% think Israel should relinquish some land. How do you favor this when you know the Arabs want to destroy Israel?

Add to this the fact that 55% approve of how Obama is handling relations with Israel, even though he is clearly not for a Jerusalem undivided and wants Israel to relinquish land acquired in '67.

http://www.ajc.org/site/c.ijITI2PHKoG/b.5915517/k.D620/2010_Annual_Survey_of_American_Jewish_Opinion.htm

Doesn't compute. Another place where we have our work cut out for us.

The consolation: 75% of American Jews voted for Obama, but now only 57% think he is doing a good job as president (across the board). The approval rate is dropping.

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The nuclear summit begins in Washington today, with 46 nations in attendance. According to One Jerusalem, Netanyahu cancelled his plans to participate when US national security advisor Jim Jones let it be known that "the agenda had been modified to give two critics of Israel, Jordan's King and the Prime Minister of Pakistan enhanced speaking roles at the summit. This raised concern that Israel's nuclear program would become a central topic of discussion." (Don't know if this is accurate in all details, as Pakistan is itself vulnerable on nuclear issues. Elsewhere I have read that it was Turkey and Egypt that were going to come after Israel at the summit.)

What is clear, and disconcerting, is that State Department spokesman Phillip Crowley said last week that, "President Obama signed with Russia an important agreement of decreasing nuclear weapons that carry a future vision that includes removing the nuclear weapons in the world entirely including a vision of a Middle East empty of nuclear weapons. We shall continue in efforts of implementing this track..."

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Defense Secretary Robert Gates made news yesterday when he said on NBC's "Meet the Press" that it is the opinion of the US that Iran is "not nuclear capable, not yet...and in fact we are doing everything we can to try and keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons."

Sounds encouraging. Seems to indicate that the US is not resigned to a policy of containment and has all options still on the table. But let's look at what he said next, as reported by Reuters:

"'We are probably going to get another U.N. Security Council resolution' of sanctions on Iran,' Gates told NBC.

"Gates added that the United States and other countries will continue trying to convince the Iranians that they are 'headed down the wrong path' by pressuring Iran with sanctions as well as more missile defense and other military cooperation in the Gulf region.

"'At the end of the day what has to happen is that the Iranian government has to decide that its own security is better served by not having nuclear weapons than by having them,'" Gates said."

Iran has to decide that it's own security is better served by not having nuclear weapons...

Sanctions and missile defense in the Gulf region will NOT do this. Sanctions are worthless as they are without teeth, and "missile defense" smells like containment. Ultra-serious deterrence might work, but the threat of military action would have to be real, and that military action would have to be taken if necessary.

Wish I could believe that this -- ultra-serious deterrence -- is where Obama and company were going. I don't.

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Many is the time that you've heard me say that PA president Mahmoud Abbas could not make peace with Israel, which would require his having to make compromises, even if he wanted to (he doesn't), because he would have no backing for it and the political climate would not permit it.

Today Khaled Abu Toameh reports in the JPost that a small Islamic fundamentalist group in Gaza, Jaish al-Umma (Army of the Nation) said it would slaughter Abbas if he collaborated with Jews. The commander, Abu Abdalah Ghazzi, said that "If it is proven that Abu Mazen [Abbas] is helping the Jews, we will slit his throat."

Ghazzi gave an interview to Al-Hayat in London, in which he said that "Our goal is to liberate Jerusalem...and to implement sharia [Islamic law] in the rest of the world." He said that while his group sometimes works with Fatah, it considers Fatah an "enemy."

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According to "The Cable" a foreign policy Internet magazine, no decision has been made on the Obama administration imposing a plan for "peace" on Israel and the PA. In fact, says this report by Josh Rogin, "Obama advisors are all over the place," with a diversity of opinions on the appropriate tactic and tone. National Security Advisor Jim Jones heads up the group pumping most vigorously for direct US involvement -- this should be clear from the NYTimes article, by David Ignatius, which mentioned Jones so prominently. But even many for favor this approach in time, feel that it is premature. Envoy George Mitchell is of this opinion. There is great unease that the US will fall on its face, if both side outright reject what America puts forward.

But just because we don't have to contend with the worst case scenario right now does not mean all is well. Secretary of State Clinton, for example, says both sides need a lot of pushing to do things they don't want to do. I haven't noticed Abbas being pushed all that much, but we can be sure they're going to keep the pressure on us.

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/04/09/obama_advisors_all_over_the_map_on_israel

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Laugh for the day (if you can laugh at this). In a meeting with the president of Kazahkstan yesterday, President Obama said that the US was still working on its democracy. An unnamed top aide said that Obama has taken "historic steps" to improve democracy in the United States during his time in office.

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Please note the following points that Dr. Dore Gold, Director of Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, makes in a briefing called, "A Crisis in U.S.-Israel Relations." This is information all should have, and use:

* As a result of the June 1967 Six-Day War, Israel entered the eastern parts of Jerusalem and the West Bank in a war of self-defense. It is very important to recall that Israel entered these areas after it was attacked, and after it requested that the Jordanians not join the Egyptian war effort. There were Jordanian artillery attacks throughout Jerusalem and all of Israel, as well as movement of Jordanian ground forces into areas that were previously no-man's land.

* There is presently a marked shift underway in U.S. policy on Jerusalem. True, no U.S. administration accepted Israel's annexation of Jerusalem in July 1967. Nonetheless, in the past we saw the U.S. and Israel coming to a modus vivendi with respect to Israeli policy in Jerusalem, when Israel built various neighborhoods in the eastern parts of the city, from Ramat Eshkol to Gilo to Ramot.

* A neighborhood called Har Homa in southeastern Jerusalem was established in 1997 during the Clinton administration to ease the considerable shortage of housing in the Jewish sector. On two occasions, the Arab bloc initiated a draft resolution in the UN Security Council to condemn Israel for constructing Har Homa. On both occasions, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Bill Richardson, vetoed those resolutions under instructions from the Clinton administration.

* The Oslo Agreements in 1993 do not require a freeze on construction in the neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Furthermore, under the Oslo Agreements, Jerusalem was treated as having a completely different status than the West Bank and the city was kept under Israeli control, while seen as an issue for permanent status negotiations in the future.

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Gil Z. has shared an incredible blog that contains pictures from Life Magazine from Jerusalem in 1948. Fascinating and moving photos in any case. But extremely significant from an historical perspective because it shows Jews fleeing from and being pushed out from eastern Jerusalem, which has just been lost. So much for eastern Jerusalem as "Arab."

http://benatlas.com/2009/07/life-in-israel-in-1948-part-1/

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see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

A Crisis in U.S.-Israel Relations: Have We Been Here Before?

Dore Gold
http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage.asp?DRIT=1&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID=111&FID=376&PID=0&IID=3655&TTL=A_Crisis_in_U.S.-Israel_Relations:_Have_We_Been_Here_Before?
Vol. 9, No. 23 8 April 2010


* As a result of the June 1967 Six-Day War, Israel entered the eastern parts of Jerusalem and the West Bank in a war of self-defense. It is very important to recall that Israel entered these areas after it was attacked, and after it requested that the Jordanians not join the Egyptian war effort. There were Jordanian artillery attacks throughout Jerusalem and all of Israel, as well as movement of Jordanian ground forces into areas that were previously no-man's land. * There is presently a marked shift underway in U.S. policy on Jerusalem. True, no U.S. administration accepted Israel's annexation of Jerusalem in July 1967. Nonetheless, in the past we saw the U.S. and Israel coming to a modus vivendi with respect to Israeli policy in Jerusalem, when Israel built various neighborhoods in the eastern parts of the city, from Ramat Eshkol to Gilo to Ramot.

* A neighborhood called Har Homa in southeastern Jerusalem was established in 1997 during the Clinton administration to ease the considerable shortage of housing in the Jewish sector. On two occasions, the Arab bloc initiated a draft resolution in the UN Security Council to condemn Israel for constructing Har Homa. On both occasions, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Bill Richardson, vetoed those resolutions under instructions from the Clinton administration.

* The Oslo Agreements in 1993 do not require a freeze on construction in the neighborhoods of Jerusalem.
Furthermore, under the Oslo Agreements, Jerusalem was treated as having a completely different status than the West Bank and the city was kept under Israeli control, while seen as an issue for permanent status negotiations in the future.

* It is possible to discern a growing view, which has been reported in the Washington Post, that the Obama administration intends to put on the table its own plan for Middle East peace, based on a nearly full Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines, that most Israeli planners view as militarily indefensible. As the Palestinians see this scenario unfold, their incentive to re-enter negotiations will decline as they look forward to the prospect that an American peace plan will be imposed. If indeed there is such a plan being prepared, then the recent U.S.-Israel tensions over construction in east Jerusalem may only be Act I in a much longer drama that the two countries are about to face.



We are in a period in which the U.S.-Israel relationship appears to be in flux, but it is hard for many observers to establish whether the policies of the Obama administration represent a sharp break in U.S. policy toward Israel or a continuation of past U.S. policies. Will military ties between the two countries be affected? According to a charge that has been associated with officers in the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), Israel's disagreements with the Palestinians, or Israel's construction efforts, have a negative effect on the U.S. military posture in the Middle East, with some reports even going so far as to suggest that they risk the lives of U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Finally, on the basis of past experience, is it likely that the U.S. and Israel will ultimately resolve their differences, or are the present gaps between the two countries so wide that their long-term relationship will change?


The Neighborhoods of Eastern Jerusalem Were Captured in a War of Self-Defense


The present tensions in U.S.-Israel relations appeared to erupt in response to an Israeli building project in the Jewish neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo in Jerusalem, where 1,600 new apartments were approved by a local zoning board. Ramat Shlomo is one of several Jerusalem neighborhoods that were established in Jerusalem in territories that were captured by Israel as a result of the 1967 Six-Day War, when Israel formally extended Israeli law to these parts of its newly united capital.

Formally the U.S. did not recognize the annexation by Israel of the eastern parts of Jerusalem in July 1967. And while past administrations did not support Israeli construction of new neighborhoods, they did not let this issue disrupt the overall U.S.-Israel relationship. Much of the present discord in the relationship is partly attributable to the fact that the background of how Israel entered the eastern parts of Jerusalem has been forgotten. It is important to remember that Israel entered the eastern parts of Jerusalem and the West Bank in what it saw as a war of self-defense.

Factually, Israel only entered these areas after it was attacked, and after it requested that the Jordanians not join the Egyptian war effort. That didn't happen. There were Jordanian artillery attacks throughout Jerusalem and all of Israel. There was movement of Jordanian ground forces into areas that were previously no-man's land, and Israel responded and captured the eastern parts of Jerusalem.

The Soviet Union, which was an adversary of the State of Israel back in 1967, tried to have Israel branded as the aggressor in that war. The Soviets first went to the Security Council and failed. Then they went to the General Assembly, which is not exactly Israel's home territory, and also failed. The new situation produced a particular dilemma for U.S. policy about how to treat the issue of Jerusalem. On the one hand, Israel had now moved into territories which were previously not in its possession. But on the other hand, there were fundamental problems with the status quo ante. Jerusalem had originally been slated to be internationalized for ten years as a corpus separatum under Resolution 181, that the UN failed to implement, and the city was invaded in 1948 by an Arab war coalition that included the Arab Legion. The UN secretary general in 1948 called that invasion a war of aggression. And as a result of that war, the Jews were ethnically cleansed from the areas that came under Jordanian control, and were denied access to Jewish holy sites.

To call for a restoration of the status quo ante would mean that the U.S. backed the return of an illegal situation that was imposed in 1948, which also denied religious freedom. Ultimately, the international community decided not to restore the status quo ante that existed prior to the war, and sought some other kind of outcome, which was reflected in the resolutions and decisions taken with respect to Jerusalem. Following the war, UN Security Council Resolution 242 was adopted in November 1967, and did not call for Israel to return to the pre-1967 lines. It called for a withdrawal from territories but not from all the territories, which is what the Soviet Union was insisting upon. Resolution 242 did not mention Jerusalem. The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations at the time, Arthur Goldberg, wrote to the New York Times in 1980 that the Johnson administration kept Jerusalem out of 242 intentionally.



Shifting U.S. Policies on Jerusalem

U.S. policy on Jerusalem went through different shifts. Back in 1948, the U.S. was originally committed to the failed internationalization proposals in UN General Assembly Resolution 181. This original position was quickly replaced in the 1950s by acceptance of the 1949 armistice agreements.

When President Richard Nixon came to the White House in 1969, there was a definite hardening of the U.S. position on the issue of Jerusalem. For the first time, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Charles Yost, described Jerusalem as "occupied territory," terminology that had not been used by Ambassador Arthur Goldberg, who served under President Johnson. Under Nixon, the United States did not veto or even abstain from resolutions that disagreed with Israeli policy on Jerusalem in 1969, 1970, and 1971.

In successive administrations, we see that the U.S. did not want the issue of Jerusalem addressed by the UN Security Council, and we see a movement of U.S. policy much closer to the Israeli position. No U.S. administration formally recognized Israel's annexation of Jerusalem in July 1967. Nonetheless, in the past we saw the U.S. and Israel coming to a modus vivendi with respect to Israeli policy in Jerusalem, when Israel built various neighborhoods in the eastern parts of the city.

For example, Gilo, in southern Jerusalem, with nearly 30,000 residents, was founded in 1971 at the time of the Nixon administration. Though Israel had differences with the U.S., those differences did not lead to a crisis in relations between the two countries. In 1973 the Neve Yaakov neighborhood was reestablished. It was originally established in 1924, but was overrun by the Arab Legion in 1948. The Ramat Eshkol neighborhood was established in 1969 at the very beginning of the Nixon administration. The Ramot neighborhood, established in 1974, has over 40,000 people living there today.

A neighborhood called Har Homa in southeastern Jerusalem, next to Gilo, was established in 1997 during the Clinton administration. Israel had just completed negotiations with the Palestinian Authority under Yasser Arafat over the Hebron agreement. At that time, the Israeli government informed the Clinton administration that after completing the deal on Hebron, it would be taking some initiatives in Jerusalem that were necessary because of the considerable shortage of housing in both the Jewish sector and even to some extent in the Arab sector. The Clinton administration was informed when Israel decided to approve the Har Homa project, which the Israeli government saw as compensation for the big initiative it took in signing the Hebron agreement. Now the Clinton administration did not say it welcomed this initiative, but it basically accepted that Israel was going to go ahead and build Har Homa.

On two occasions in 1997, the Arab bloc, together with some other countries, initiated a draft resolution in the UN Security Council that would have condemned Israel for constructing Har Homa. And on those two occasions the U.S. ambassador to the UN, Bill Richardson, vetoed those resolutions under instructions from the Clinton administration. So even though we didn't always agree on the details of the legal status of the territory, we were able to cooperate, we were able to work together, and again a modus vivendi was worked out.

Ramat Shlomo, the current Jerusalem neighborhood being discussed, was originally begun in 1995 during the period when President Bill Clinton and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin were in office. So again, in the past, the U.S. did not actively oppose Israeli efforts to construct housing for both the Jewish sector and the Arab sector in the eastern parts of Jerusalem.

The policies of the Obama administration definitely represent a shift in U.S. policy towards Israel and Jerusalem because of the efforts to have Israel freeze all construction in the eastern parts of the city. The original Oslo Agreements in 1993 do not require a freeze of any kind on construction in Jerusalem. Furthermore, under the Oslo Agreements, Jerusalem was treated as having a completely different status than the West Bank and the city was kept under Israeli control, while seen as an issue for permanent status negotiations in the future. Israel kept building for its residents, just as Palestinian Arabs built for their needs in the areas under their control and elsewhere.

The relationship between the United States and Israel is not confined to their governments. It involves the people of the United States, who overwhelmingly support the State of Israel, and it also involves the U.S. Congress which reflects the will of the people. While U.S. administrations have not formally recognized Israel's unification of Jerusalem, back in 1995 the U.S. Congress adopted the Jerusalem Embassy Act by a massive bipartisan majority. It called for the movement of the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Equally important, it also acknowledged that Jerusalem must remain united under Israeli sovereignty.



Does Construction in Jerusalem Affect the U.S. Military Posture?

Israel is not within the area of responsibility of CENTCOM, the U.S. Central Command. U.S. military planners kept Israel, Syria, Lebanon, and Turkey within the responsibility of EUCOM, the U.S. European command, while in 1983, Jordan, Egypt, and the Gulf States were put under the responsibility of CENTCOM. The statement by CENTCOM commander General David Petraeus to the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee on March 10, 2010, says the whole issue of the Arab-Israeli conflict fits into a category called "Cross-Cutting Challenges to Security and Stability." It doesn't fit into the more severe category of "Significant Threats." General Petraeus' written statement says that the enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to the U.S. ability to advance its interests. But he did not specifically make this point in his oral remarks, and in neither his oral or written remarks did he suggest that Israel had become a strategic burden because its policies threatened U.S. soldiers, as some have tried to suggest.

All of this ignores the posture statements and other testimony given by EUCOM commanders, which actually give Israel a lot of praise. Israel appears as an asset. General Bantz Craddock was the EUCOM commander in 2007 and spoke extensively about Israel in his appearance that year before the House Armed Services Committee. He specifically described Israel as the closest ally of the United States in the Middle East. Moreover, the U.S. ambassador to Israel at the time, Richard Jones, spoke about Israeli research and development on countermeasures against IEDs, those highly lethal roadside bombs used by insurgents that had become the single largest cause of U.S. casualties. Jones disclosed that Israel was helping the United States Army in Iraq in this area. In short, Israeli efforts were saving American lives, and not putting them at risk, as some irresponsible pundits contended.



Will the Relationship Recover?

Is it possible for the U.S.-Israel relationship to recover from the recent tensions? If history is any guide, we have had such problems at different times in the past and we have recovered each time. At the very beginning of the Reagan administration, in 1981, Prime Minister Menachem Begin decided that it was necessary for the future of Israel to destroy Saddam Hussein's Osirak nuclear reactor in Baghdad. Israel took upon itself to do that and U.S.-Israel relations went into a period of extreme tension. Yet by 1983, the United States and Israel reached the first of a series of strategic cooperation agreements that brought their military relationship to unprecedented heights. So there was a crisis for about two years, which basically ended as the U.S. and Israel pulled together because they had paramount strategic interests and reasons to cooperate. Ultimately, the strategic challenges that both countries faced and saw in a similar light trumped the differences that existed in the background of the destruction of the Iraqi reactor.

The period of 1989 to 1990 was another one of unusual tension in the U.S.-Israel relationship, when President Bush and his Secretary of State, James Baker, got into direct conflict with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir over the question of settlement construction. We remember Secretary Baker saying to Israel: "When you're serious about peace, here's the White House phone number." Then in 1990 Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and the Middle East changed entirely, and in the First Gulf War the military cooperation between the U.S. and Israel reached new heights. Strategic circumstances led both countries to realize their mutual interests and overcome their differences.

The United States and Israel have been tied by mutual strategic interests for many years, and those interests will eventually trump the differences that we're seeing today. The major strategic interest that both countries share is the threat of Iran. The Iranian nuclear program is advancing steadily towards a point where it will cross the nuclear threshold in a military sense. Therefore, the restoration of U.S.-Israel cooperation and understanding is probably a greater imperative today than it ever was in the past. It is extremely important for both countries to bury their differences because the only ones who are smiling during this entire episode are the leadership in Iran, who are continuing to move toward a military nuclear program.

There is one caveat to the idea that U.S.-Israel relations will get back on track in the near future. It is possible to discern a growing view, which has been reported in the Washington Post, that the Obama administration intends to put on the table its own plan for Middle East peace, based on a nearly full Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines, that most Israeli planners view as militarily indefensible. As the Palestinians see this scenario unfold, their incentive to re-enter negotiations will decline as they look forward to the prospect that an American peace plan will be imposed. An Obama plan for a complete Israeli retreat of this sort would not only deny the Jewish state "defensible borders," but would also divide Jerusalem, placing the Old City and its holy sites within Palestinian jurisdiction.

If indeed there is such a plan being prepared, then the recent U.S.-Israel tensions over construction in east Jerusalem may only be Act I in a much longer drama that the two countries are about to face. Undoubtedly there are sober voices in the U.S. government today that would advise against the President taking such a course of action. But should he indeed advance a new division of Jerusalem, then in the months ahead the U.S. and Israel will be facing a serious crisis in their relationship, just as the military threats from Iran can be expected to worsen.





* * *



Ambassador Dore Gold, President of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, was the eleventh Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations (1997-1999). Dr. Gold served as foreign policy advisor to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his first government and has advised Israeli governments since that time on U.S.-Israel relations. He is the author of the best-selling books: The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West, and the Future of the Holy City (Regnery, 2007), and The Rise of Nuclear Iran: How Tehran Defies the West (Regnery, 2009). In 1993 he wrote a book on the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) for the Israel Ministry of Defense publishing house. This Jerusalem Issue Brief is based on his presentation to the Institute for Contemporary Affairs in Jerusalem on March 25, 2010.

'Openly Anti-Semitic' Party Gains Power in Hungary


Maayana Miskin
A7 News

The center-right and far-right won big in Hungary's elections Sunday, initial results showed. The right-wing Fidesz party took 52.77 percent of the vote, and the far-right Jobbik party took 16.71. The incumbent Socialist party took only 19.29 percent.

Runoffs will be held later in the month in districts where no candidate received a majority of the votes. The results were a cause for concern for European Jewish groups, which have accused Jobbik of anti-Semitism and racial hate. One Hungarian Jewish group labeled Sunday's election the first time “a movement pursuing openly anti-Semitic policies” has gained power in Hungary since the Nazi era.

The victory for Fidesz and Jobbik came as Hungary faces increasing poverty and unemployment. The country recently turned to the International Monetary Fund with a request for aid, becoming the first European Union country to seek an IMF bailout.

On Sunday, Hungarian Jews protested in Budapest against the anti-Semitic climate in the country in advance of the elections. Recent anti-Semitic incidents have included vandalism, a neo-Nazi rally, and an attack on a rabbi's home over Passover.

In 2009, Jobbik candidate-for-parliament Judit Szima was accused of approving an article for publication that referred to anti-Semitism as “the duty of every Hungarian homeland lover,” and called to “prepare for armed battle against the Jews.” Another candidate, Krisztina Morvai, allegedly responded to criticism by saying, “I would be glad if the so-called proud Hungarian Jews would go back to playing with their tiny little circumcised tail rather than vilifying me.”

The party's magazine recently ran a picture of a statue of a bishop holding a menorah instead of a cross. “Is this what you want?” the headline asked.

Jobbik vehemently denies that it is an anti-Semitic movement, and similarly denies charges that it has promoted hate against the Roma (gypsy) minority. The party has denied that the statements attributed to Morvai were said by her.

While the party denies charges of anti-Semitism, it admits to being politically pro-Arab. “The Movement for a Better Hungary has always been primarily sympathetic to the Palestinian cause... as Hungarian nationalists, we can sympathize more readily with a people who have had their land taken away from them, in order to form a new country,” Jobbik states on its website.

Jobbik also states that Israeli companies “dominate the Budapest property market,” and says it wants to reduce Israeli firms' control in the Hungarian capital.

Jobbik leader Gabor Vona is a founding member of the Hungarian Guard (Magyar Garda), a black-suited civilian patrol group accused by detractors of styling itself after Nazi-era groups. The Hungarian Guard was recently banned, but has not disbanded. Vona has promised to wear a Guard uniform when he is sworn in to parliament.

Death By Hijab. But What’s It Got To Do With Isadora Duncan?


by Phyllis Chesler


I have gone on record, many times, about how hazardous the Islamic Veil is to women’s health in both medical and psychiatric terms. There are other kinds of health risks involved in adopting Islamically “modest” dress. For example, in England, Muslim nurses are now refusing to leave their arms uncovered below the elbow which can potentially lead to spreading hospital superbugs and to the death of patients. The British National Health Service has given in to this demand—but has prohibited short-sleeved nurses from wearing crosses. Two days ago, a Muslim woman was killed when her Islamic Veil (one account describes it as her burqa) got caught up in the wheels of her go-kart at a recreational park in New South Wales, Australia. Why was she wearing a burqa in a go-kart? Let me guess: Her Wahabi-Salafi oriented husband, father, brother, expected her to do so?

Guess what? Those who specialize in prurient interest have been making the most unsavory comparison between this poor soul, probably from Afghanistan, and the pioneering dancer Isadora Duncan. Duncan defied convention—she did not dance because she was forced to do so. She met everyone of “consequence” in artistic and intellectual circles, stunned thousands of audiences all across Europe and America with her innovative dance—and yes, she also took many lovers. Duncan created modern dance. She did not lead her life in a burqa.

Thus, I talked to Cherlyn Smith, the current Associate Artistic director of the Isadora Duncan Dance Company who is puzzled and aggravated by the comparisons being made on thousands of websites between Duncan’s 1927 death and the recent death-by-hijab which took place in New South Wales. Smith has been inundated by Google alerts which send her to websites which “disappear” the meaning of both women’s deaths.

There is no comparison at all.

The great dancer Duncan was not forced to wear a veil nor was she wearing one of her many diaphanous dancing scarfs. In fact, at the suggestion of her friend, Mary Desti, Duncan only took a shawl along at the last moment because the weather was getting cold. Duncan’s shawl got caught in the wooden spokes of the low-slung convertible automobile–which was being driven by an experienced driver.

What is this almost erotic fascination with the violent death of women and this unseemly penchant to compare women of great acomplishment with unknown women? Are women really all the same? Are their violent deaths, their victimization, and tragedies of more interest to us than their achievements? Are women to blame for their own violent deaths because a) they insist on wearing “fashionable” clothing (this was Gertrude Stein’s comment on Duncan’s death); or because women foolishly obey and conform to certain cultural expectations (wear a burqa or risk death)?

Duncan should be remembered for her pioneering work as a dancer and teacher, not for the few moments in which she died. Smith says: “Ducan’s legacy is far more important than the bizarre manner in which she died. Why do people minimize this American woman’s enormous contribution and choose to continuously associate her with the scarf, the car, and the violent death?”

Amen.

And, all those who taught, forced, encouraged, the woman in New South Wales to wear the burqa should be tried as accomplices in her death.
http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/04/12/death-by-hijab-but-what%E2%80%99s-it-got-to-do-with-isadora-duncan/

Anti-Semitic violence doubled in 2009

HAVIV RETTIG GUR
12/04/2010 01:29

European Jews seek multi-nation legislation against bigotry and violence

Anti-Semitism increasingly reared its ugly head worldwide in 2009, with particularly steep jumps in anti-Jewish incidents, including violent attacks, in Western Europe and Canada, according to a major annual study of the phenomenon released Sunday.
After two years of decline in anti-Jewish attacks in many parts of the world, the past year saw “coordinated and preplanned attacks on Jews” alongside “violent incidents and a [violent] atmosphere that feed on each other,” according to Prof. Dina Porat, editor of the “Anti-Semitism Worldwide 2009” report. The annual study is conducted by the Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism at Tel Aviv University.
“The year in the wake of Operation Cast Lead was the worst since monitoring of anti-Semitic manifestations began, in terms of both major anti-Semitic violence and the hostile atmosphere generated worldwide by the mass demonstrations and verbal and visual expressions against Israel and the Jews,” the report said.
The report, considered an important bellwether of anti-Jewish sentiment worldwide, was released ahead of Holocaust Remembrance Day in cooperation with the European Jewish Congress (EJC).
Among its most dramatic findings was a 102 percent increase in anti-Jewish violence worldwide, from 559 incidents in 2008 to 1,129 in 2009.
In addition, there were “many more hundreds of threats, insults, graffiti signs and slogans and demonstrations featuring virulently anti-Semitic content… sometimes resulting in violence,” according to the report.
A significant part of this increase took place in the UK, where violence jumped from 112 incidents in 2008 to 374 last year; in France, where the jump was from 50 to 195, and in Canada, where incidents soared from 13 to 138.
The US, which ordinarily enjoys a very low rate of anti-Jewish violence compared to the size of its Jewish community, nonetheless saw a modest rise, from 98 to 116 incidents.
In some countries, these figures are only the latest spike in a continuing trend. The British Jewish community’s monitoring system counted a three-fold increase in anti-Semitic occurrences since 1999, while Canada counted a five-fold increase since 2000.
Most violent attacks in Western Europe came from people of Arab or Muslim heritage, the report found. Yet while the major jump in 2009 was thought to be connected to Operation Cast Lead in January, the baseline of attacks by extreme Left and extreme Right activists has been rising since the early 1990s.
This trend of a growing baseline of “white” perpetrators alongside occasional spikes by attackers stemming from the Muslim community is borne out most clearly in the UK.
In 2008, “when there was no trigger event in the Middle East,” the Jewish community’s Community Security Trust counted 63% of perpetrators of anti-Jewish violence being described by victims and witnesses as “white,” while descriptions of “Asian” or “Arab” – suggesting members of the Muslim community – counted for just 31%.
In 2009, however, “white” attacks dropped to 48% and “Asian” or “Arab” attacks jumped to 43%.
During the month of January 2009, in the midst of Operation Cast Lead, “Asian” and “Arab” attackers accounted for fully 54% of incidents, although the Muslim community numbers just 4% of the general population.
Germany, Russia and the Ukraine do not seem to have been affected by the trend in the West, and may even have seen a decrease in incidents for 2009, the report found. It is unclear if the difference is real, or due to difficulties in discovering and reporting incidents.
Some countries that had no violent anti-Semitic incidents at all in 2008 saw a sudden surge in 2009. Thus, Brazil went from 0 to 15 last year, and Austria from 0 to 22.
In response to these figures, the European Jewish Congress vowed “go on the offensive,” in the words of EJC president .
The growth of anti-Jewish violence must be challenged in “a very professional and very serious way, and we are in a position today to be offensive,” Kantor said Sunday.
The central plank of this effort will include turning to the European Council of Tolerance and Reconciliation to accelerate the council’s efforts to forge unified European anti-racism legislation that will offer states more tools – and create greater political pressure – to deal effectively with racist expressions.
Such legislation has been discussed in the ECTR since its formation in 2008, but a draft bill has yet to be written.
The council, a grouping of former European heads of state charged with working to combat bigotry and racism in Europe, has gone only as far as preliminary studies of various tolerance laws at the national level.
But for the EJC, a Europe-wide law will set a Europe-wide standard in combating intolerance.
“Synagogues are burned, and in response people at the top levels of European government say to us that this is a ‘natural response’ to these pressures, to what is happening in the Middle East,” said Arie Zuckerman, an Israeli attorney who serves as the secretary-general of the European Jewish Fund and an adviser to the EJC.
“It is unthinkable that there are no boundaries to the kinds of reactions Europe is willing to tolerate inside the continent,” he said.
“Every time the conflict flares up in Israel, we have to accept someone setting a synagogue on fire? If mosques were being attacked, would anyone say this was to be expected because there are conflicts in the Muslim world?” asked Zuckerman.
According to the researchers involved in the new TAU study, obtaining accurate statistics for anti-Semitic violence is difficult, since many factors could skew the results.
According to Dr. Roni Stauber, the coeditor of the study together with Porat, the countries with the highest number of violent incidents, France and Britain, also have the largest Jewish and Muslim communities in Europe, and the most powerful far-Left movements on the continent.
At the same time, explains statistician Dr. Haim Fireberg, who worked on the study, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe has found that the United Kingdom, for example, has a higher rate of racist expression generally than other European countries, which may account for the high number of attacks against Jews and Jewish institutions.
Furthermore, say the researchers, Western democracies like the US, Canada and the West Europeans may be over-represented in the statistics because they have better monitoring and record-keeping compared to East European and other states, and not necessarily because of higher rates of violence toward Jews.
“It is in the democratic liberal countries that you have better monitoring and a higher willingness of the citizen to report incidents,” while other countries face reporting problems ranging from fearful victims to disorganized or uninterested law enforcement agencies, said Porat.
And finally, the anti-Semitic incidents have not been compared to the level of violence in these countries’ general populations, since in many countries crime statistics for 2009 are not yet available, according to the researchers.
However, say the study’s authors, even after factoring for these problems, the statistics still point to a huge escalation in anti-Jewish violence and abuse.
First, the report imposes a strict criteria for incidents classified as “anti-Semitic.”
“We only counted incidents that are demonstrably targeting Jews,” said one researcher. “So we didn’t count a swastika painted in the street, but we did count it if it was painted on a Jewish site.”
In some cases, the report uses figures that are even lower than that of the local government. For example, in the case of France, the report cites the French Jewish community’s figure of 832 anti-Semitic incidents (including nonviolent ones) for 2009, rather than the much higher 974 counted by the French Interior Ministry.
Timing, too, points to anti-Semitic intention. Most of the attacks on Jews took place on Jewish holidays or Shabbat, when the victims were more likely to be dressed in traditional Jewish garb.
The report also notes that attacks often spike alongside increases in “bloodthirsty imagery” of Jews and Israel in the Arab and Muslim press and on the political margins of Europe and the West.

Finally, in countries where figures for the general population are available, the rate of violence against Jews is dramatically higher than for the general population.
Thus in Germany, in a statement issued December 17, 2009, German Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt) President Joerg Ziercke “reported that almost three acts of racial violence were committed in Germany daily and some three anti-Semitically motivated assaults took place per month,” the report notes.
That translates roughly into 1,080 violent racist acts each year, with some 36 of them directed at Jews – or almost 3% of all attacks.
That’s an extremely high figure when compared to the size of the Jewish community – roughly 120,000 out of 82 million Germans, or just over one-tenth of 1%.
According to these figures, though racist attacks as a whole are rae in Germany, Jews are 21 times more likely to face one than the average German.
http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=172884

Sunday, April 11, 2010

PA transfers 17 bombs to IDF


Palestinian security forces uncover explosive devices near Tulkarem, hand them over to Israel where they are detonated. IDF official says cooperation with PA security helps maintain high level of calm

Hanan Greenberg
YNET News
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3874140,00.html

Cooperation between Israel and Palestinian Authority: Over the weekend, Palestinian security forces transferred to the Israel Defense Forces 17 explosive devices in various sizes uncovered during activity around Tulkarem. The explosives found include pipe bombs and more complex devices intended for terror attacks. The explosives were detonated by a military sapper. The incident joins a serious of cases in which Palestinian security forces uncovered weapons and transferred them to the IDF. Recently, the Palestinians uncovered near Nablus a powerful bomb weighing over 20 kilograms connected to a gas balloon and transferred it to the IDF.


This attests to the good coordination between the Palestinian security forces and the IDF. A military official commenting on the situation in the West Bank said such cooperation "secures a higher level of calm".


Nonetheless, it seems Hezbollah and the Hamas leadership abroad are trying to ignite the region by attempting to carry out terror attacks from within the West Bank.


Since Hezbollah fears a flare up in south Lebanon, and Hamas is in no rush for another confrontation in the Gaza Strip, both parties consider the West Bank a legitimate "playing field."


According to the military source, the IDF forces' daily activity is what foils attempts to launch terror attacks from within the West Bank.


But vigilance remains high. Central Command Chief Major-General Avi Mizrahi ordered the forces to maintain a high level of preparedness despite the relative calm and the terror organization's failure to carry out serious attacks.


In a conference last week Mizrahi outlined to commanders to be tasked with leading operational activity in the West Bank their main mission – to protect the residents and foil attacks. He said this should be done with caution, and that in any instances where there is no immediate threat to the forces, an effort should be made to end the incident without casualties.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

WaPo, NYT spike coverage of Obama Admin Denunciation of Abbas, Palestinian Authority

Leo Rennert
In his press briefing on April 8, State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said the following:

"Regarding the Middle East, we are DISTURBED by comments of Palestinian Authority officials regarding reconstruction and refurbishing of Jewish sites in the Jewish quarter of Jerusalem's Old City.

"Remarks by the Palestinian ministry of Information denying Jewish heritage in and links to Jerusalem UNDERMINE THE TRUST AND CONFIDENCE needed for substantive and productive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. "We also STRONGLY CONDEMN the GLORIFICATION OF TERRORISTS.. Honoring terrorists who have murdered innocent civilians either by official statements or by the dedication of public places HURTS PEACE EFFORTS and MUST END.

"We will continue to hold Palestinian leaders ACCOUNTABLE FOR INCITEMENT."


Not one word of Crowley's statement appeared in the April 9 editions of the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Yet, this official U.S. statement with its STRONG CONDEMNATION of Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority, accusing it of HURTING PEACE EFFORTS and UNDERMINING U.S. efforts to restart peace negotiations was highly newsworthy for at least four compelling reasons:

1. It was the strongest slap yet at Abbas and the PA by the Obama administration. Yes, from time to time, Team Obama has criticized anti-Israel incitement by the Palestinian Authority, but mostly in a muted, non-specific way. In this instance, Crowley referred specifically to PA incitement against the reopening of the Hurva Synagogue, the most prominent of the Old City's Jewish houses of prayer, which was destroyed by Jordan in 1948. Crowley's statement linked the PA's denial of Israel's right to revive the Hurva Synagogue to a wider PA campaign of denial of historic and Jewish connections to Jersualem, which in turn has fostered violent Arab riots in the Old City Also the tone and substance of Crowley's condemnation of Abbas's PA was much harsher than the usual slaps on the wrist the administration has used to give an appearance of balance and even-handedness in its dealings with both sides.

2. Under the U.S.-drafted "road map" toward a Mideast peace deal, the Palestinians are obligated at the very outset to end all incitement against Israel. Abbas has been saying for months that the PA is in full compliance with this provision. Crowley's statement belies any such Abbas claim. Instead, it accuses him and the PA of harming the peace process by continued glorification of terrorists.

3. This is the first time the Obama administration has cited Jewish rights in Jerusalem's Old City based on historic and religious links. As far as Abbas and the PA are concerned, the Old City is "occupied" Palestinian territory because it was captured by Israel during the 1967 war. By siding with Israel on the Hurva Synagogue, the administration separates itself sharply from Abbas over Jewish rights and claims in the Old City.

4. Crowley's statement was not an ad-lib comment by a lower-level State Department official. Crowley read his statement at the top of the briefing. The statement has all the earmarks of careful preparaton and review at the highest level of the Obama administration.

The failure of the Times and the Post to cover the administration's strong condemnation of Abbas's PA points up a wider anti-Israel bias among the vast majority of reporters who cover the State Department and the White House -- especially in view of their meticulous and detailed reports of every jot and tittle of any administration slap at Israel.

White House and State Dept. reporters troll press briefings with great alacrity to find any morse of anti-Israel criticism, repeatedly pelting administration spokesmen with questions designed to elicit another slap at the Netanyahu government or to ratchet up Israeli-U.S. tensions. But they show absolutely no such fervent interest in pursuing angles that bear on Palestinian transgressions of the peace process, the grooming of future generations of Palestinians to venerate suicide bombers and Palestinian rejection of any practical concessions and compromises to move toward an end of the conflict.

That's one of the reasons Crowley came to the April 8 briefing with his prepared statement, knowing full well that he wouldn't get any questions from the assembled reporters that would allow him to make the same comments.

And with a press corps that includes full-time New York Times and Washington Post diplomatic correspondents, it's also quite revealing that, once Crowley made his statement at the top of the briefing, there was not a single follow-up question from reporters from the start to the end of the briefing.

Since they weren't going to write about his statement condemning Abbas and since their editors couldn't care less about the administration's hard knock on Abbas's PA, why waste time on follow-up questions like:

1. Has the State Department conveyed Crowley's comments to Abbas and the PA?

2. Given your statement, Mr. Crowley, is Abbas lying when he claims to have ended all incitement and has fully complied with the "road map"?

3. Did Secretary Clinton and Mideast envoy George Mitchell have a hand in the drafting of your statement?

4. Will President Obama himself bring up with Abbas the kinds of Palestinian incitement against Israel and Jewish historic links to Jerusalem, that are emphasized in your statement?

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/wapo_nyt_spike_coverage_of_oba.html at April 10, 2010 - 12:03:49 AM CDT

Friday, April 09, 2010

"Bad to Worse"

Fervently do I wish I had only good news to carry into Shabbat. But this is not the case. Thank G-d for Shabbat, which gives us a break and provides a perspective. Without it, I think several of us (myself included) might go mad.

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Let me begin with a link to a piece of mine that just went up on American Thinker. It addresses the horror of PA incitement and the degree to which Obama ignores it while coming down hard on us.

I just got word of the acceptance of this material now. I'll come back to this, and perhaps run the entire piece in my next posting. But please, see it now, and share it, with attribution to the American Thinker. This is important stuff that must be made public broadly:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/the_outrage_acceptance_of_pale.html The sense I have is that Obama (whatever his motivation, which I choose not to analyze) is working to progressively weaken the US -- which means the free Western world, and certainly Israel, are peripherally affected, as well.

I have already mentioned the decision to remove terms such as "jihad" from the national security document -- which means the blinders Obama and members of his administration are wearing are about to become even larger than they already were, and the enemy will go unidentified.

But there are also recent decisions that Obama has made with regard to US nuclear deterrence. As the New York Times explained earlier this week:

"[Obama will be] revamping American nuclear strategy to substantially narrow the conditions under which the United States would use nuclear weapons.

"Mr. Obama’s strategy is a sharp shift from those of his predecessors and seeks to revamp the nation’s nuclear posture for a new age...

"It eliminates much of the ambiguity that has deliberately existed in American nuclear policy since the opening days of the cold war. For the first time, the United States is explicitly committing not to use nuclear weapons against nonnuclear states that are in compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, even if they attacked the United States with biological or chemical weapons or launched a crippling cyberattack."

But nations contemplating use of biological or chemical weapons are deterred by the possibility of nuclear response. Obama has now made it more feasible for them to consider such attacks. The president says that deterrence can be maintained via “a series of graded options,” whatever this actually means. I am not convinced, nor are many of his critics.

He does say, and I mention here, that the US would respond to "outliers like North Korea and Iran" in different terms. And yet... America has just gotten a bit weaker.

~~~~~~~~~~

For Israel, deterrence depends on that element of not knowing what weaponry we possess and what we would do with regard to our alleged nuclear weaponry if threatened or attacked. We need to keep our enemies off balance. That's a good part of what protects us here. Any move to increase the transparency of our intentions or to limit our ability to respond is very much bad news for us.

This coming Monday and Tuesday, there will be a Nuclear Security Summit in Washington DC, to which 40 nations have been invited. At least in theory, the topic of discussion will be preventing nuclear weapons from getting into the hands of renegades and terrorists.

As of yesterday, it was the intention of Prime Minister Netanyahu to attend. Today's Jerusalem Post, written last night, says that Netanyahu had been reassured by the US administration that Israel's alleged nuclear capabilities would not be a "central issue" at the gathering, and he felt secure enough in this respect to proceed with plans to participate. This, even though it was clear that Arab states would bring up the issue, and even though not making it a "central issue" still leaves a lot of latitude for action.

But now it has been announced that Netanyahu will not be attending, but will send Intelligence Minister Dan Merridor (Likud) instead. The sudden change comes with information that "participating Arab countries led by Turkey and Egypt plan to use the summit to demand that Israel sign the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) and allow its alleged nuclear capabilities to be placed under international inspection."

I ponder, but have no answers, regarding how this move makes it less possible for the Arab nations to proceed with their intended plans -- perhaps Merridor can defer on matters in situations where a prime minister could not. I'm glad for Netanyahu's reluctance to attend, as too often, eager to be a participating part of the world community, we end up trapped in a hostile international forum.

~~~~~~~~~~

Please see Dr. Aaron Lerner's commentary on IMRA today: "Israel Must Reject American Nuclear Blackmail."

http://imra.org.il/story.php3?id=47681

~~~~~~~~~~

And what of the projected Obama plan for peace in the Middle East? My guess, a matter of educated intuition, is that this was either a proposal put forward by those eager to see this happen, or a trial balloon. What has transpired since the NYTimes article was released is that denials have come from the White House. It's possible that these denials have come because initial response was negative in too many quarters. Keep up the pressure here, please!

~~~~~~~~~~

It's a scandal and a security nightmare of the worst order. Only now, as a blackout on this information is lifted is the full story being told.

Anat Kamm, a former member of the IDF who served at Central Command, who allegedly stole 2,000 sensitive IDF documents (making copies of them), is being charged with espionage. Currently she is under house arrest.

She is said to have turned the documents over to Haaretz reporter Uri Blau who published some articles based on the information they contain. He is currently in London and has been for some period of time. The Shin Bet has been negotiating with him for return of all documents, and some but not all have been secured. He is believed to still be in possession of hundreds of top-secret classified military documents, and he refuses to voluntarily return from London.

Shin Bet Chief Yuval Diskin says that as long as the whereabouts of these documents is unknown, there is a direct, ongoing threat to national security. "This pose[s] a direct and real threat to the lives of IDF soldiers and Israel citizens." The concern, of course, is what hands they will fall into. The material includes information on such matters as the steps Central Command would take in the event of a major military escalation.

It is when negotiations with Blau broke down that the gag order was lifted. The Shin Bet is working vigorously to secure return of all materials and now, I believe, regrets the time expended in "negotiating." Stronger techniques will now be utilized. Part of the problem has to do with the freedom of the press in a democracy.

~~~~~~~~~~

There is a great deal more to say, about the above and many other issues. But Shabbat preparations call.

~~~~~~~~~~
see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

The Real Two-State Solution: Let the people choose

http://www.jewishledger.com/
By Fred Leder
Published: Wednesday, April 7, 2010 1:06 PM EDT

Has there ever been a country whose very existence has been subject to more intense scrutiny than Israel? Other considerations aside, there is one thing that should be apparent to any objective observer: everything proposed over the past 60 years has not worked. The Arab world has rejected each and every proposal that includes a Jewish State between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Instead of acknowledging that very obvious truth, third parties close their eyes to it and insist on hopeless wishful thinking that is divorced from reality. Today's manifestation of that wishful thinking is the 'two state solution' and the only means of implementing it is by using force to impose it on the populations involved on both sides of the divide. Far better would be a solution that puts its faith in the strength and dignity of the individual by creating a single entity: one democratic state accepted by all those who want to be its citizens.

Israel is already a vibrant and functioning democracy. The method of their approval is well defined: they'd vote. The putative partner-state is a seething cauldron of grievance, animosity and violence. One has to believe that there are, however, residents in the non-Israel areas who would be amenable to a solution that allows them freedoms they now are deprived of. They can't embrace this proposal under the circumstance in which they live today but once free from the violent gangs that shape their world they'd be able to make choices that are now unavailable to them.

This kind of solution would be based on the realities that exist and not the wishful thinking. One democratic state between the Jordan and Mediterranean would provide a place where its citizens can live in freedom and peace because inclusion in it would be voluntary. If living in a democracy isn't acceptable to some of the population there now, for whatever reason, they can choose another way to live. Absent third party meddling, most would choose to be part of the new entity.

Here is what one state would look like. Judea and Samaria as well as the Golan Heights would be united with Israel. Gaza, which was never an integral part of the Jewish homeland, would be excluded.

Politically derived estimates of Arab population in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem run as high as 2.6 million, but the likely number of Arabs in this area is no more than two million. There are some estimates of the Arab population that are much smaller than even this number. In addition, Arabs in Judea and Samaria who don't feel they can live in a democracy besides Jews, Muslims and Christians would be offered cash incentives to leave.
There are 1.2 million Arabs who live in Israel proper now so that a new state would contain about three million (or fewer) Arabs. There are slightly over five million Jews in Israel today and once Israel's borders are secure, one might anticipate another million coming from Europe in the not too distant future. This would mean that the new state of Israel would have three million or so Arabs and six million Jews.

The character of a Jewish state can be maintained at that level especially since Jewish fertility rates are now about the same as the Arab's. The mantra projecting a demographic time bomb in Israel has always been refuted by the facts in every decade since 1948. However, there are constituencies that continue to promote this narrative and the myth persists.

The Arabs in Judea and Samaria would be offered full Israeli citizenship and would be granted all of the rights and responsibilities that come with being part of a democracy. A bill of rights for all citizens can be a valuable safeguard for Jews and non-Jews alike. Those who decline the privilege of citizenship and remain would be resident aliens with local autonomy over their own affairs but with none of the rights and obligations of a citizen.

Gaza would be considered a separate Arab state. The second state if you like. They are free to negotiate their southern border with Egypt if they feel the need to expand.

This path to this plan is short and could be put in place quickly. Its parameters, once outlined, should be clear so that individuals can choose their own way forward. The key to this proposition is that democracies function with the consent of the governed and if the nine million people of a newly constituted Israel consent to their governance, we could soon see Jews, Muslims and Christians living side by side in peace with mutual respect for each other's rights. There is no reason that the American model cannot be sustained in the land that gave the world the rule of law and has always championed the sacred uniqueness of every individual.

This solution is not the implementation of wishful thinking by force. It is the recognition of the realities of people finding their own way by living the life they choose for themselves and their families.

Frederic Leder, Ph.D. is a retired oil company executive now living in Westport. (Thanks to Ted Belman.)

Thursday, April 08, 2010

Slent by Walid Shoebat, an Arab friend of the Jews‏

The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.

Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it.

Turkey threw out a million Greeks and Algeria a million Frenchman.

Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese and no one says a word about refugees.
But in the case of Israel , the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single one.

Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious, it must sue for peace.

Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world. Other nations, when they are defeated, survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed.

Had Nasser triumphed in June [1967], he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on.

There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Blacks are executed in Rhodesia.

But, when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one demonstrated against him.

The Swedes, who were ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we did in Vietnam , did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore, and ball bearings, and serviced his troops in Norway.

The Jews are alone in the world.

If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources.
Yet at this moment, Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally.

We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us.

And one has only to imagine what would have happened in the six day war [1967] had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war, to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general.

I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us.

Should Israel perish, the Holocaust will be upon us all.

This was written by Eric Hoffer in the LA Times in 1968 -- 42 years ago! Some things never change!

Eric Hoffer was one of the most influential American philosophers and free thinkers of the 20th Century. His books are still widely read and quoted today. Acclaimed for his thoughts on mass movements and fanaticism, Hoffer was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1983. Hopewell Publications awards the best in independent publishing across a wide range of categories, singling out the most thought provoking titles in books and short prose, on a yearly basis in honor of Eric Hoffer.

Journalist Stole 2,000 Classified Documents while Serving in IDF

A7 News

A top secret case involving national security that was kept under wraps by the IDF censor for a week but was published in the international media was authorized for publication this morning. It involved the theft of 2,000 secret IDF documents by a former soldier who worked as a journalist for the left wing Hebrew language news website, Walla. Some details still remain classified, as the investigation by police, Shabak (Israel Security Agency) and IDF Information Security Department continues.

Despite protests by the Israeli media over the past several days, the State Prosecution insisted that the investigation remain under a gag order, for two reasons: To exhaust all possibilities of recovering the documents, and in order to prevent interference with the ongoing investigation of what appear to be the very grave crimes committed in this case. Finally, under pressure from Israel Press Council Chairperson and former Supreme Court Justice Dalia Dorner and others, and in light of developments in the case, the Prosecution has given in and withdrawn its demand for secrecy.

The State Prosecution says it was guided throughout the investigation by the overriding need to ensure that the secret documents not find their way into enemy hands.

The facts that are permitted for publication are as follows:

Journalist Anat Kam is accused of stealing over 2,000 IDF documents, many hundreds of which are termed “secret” and “top secret.” The alleged crimes occurred when she served as a soldier clerking in the IDF military - specifically, in the office of the Commander of the Central District - three years ago.

She allegedly handed over many of the “top secret” and “secret” documents to Haaretz reporter Uri Blau. Blau, who was abroad when the investigation started, has refused thus far to return to Israel for investigation. It is suspected that many of the classified papers are still in his possession – despite an offer made to him that the returned documents would not be used to prosecute him or his source, Anat Kam.

Kam, who was secretly arrested during the investigation, has been indicted in the Tel Aviv District Court. She stands accused of collecting secret information, giving it to unauthorized individuals, and attempting to harm state security.

Some of the documents include detailed plans for military operations, the deployment of IDF forces in routine and emergency situations, operations against terrorist leaders, evaluations, and more.

Comment: Hmm, wonder why the MSM has made this such a huge story re: freedom of speech? Is it not ironic that they frame this event in such a way yet the act of theft of secret documents is given a pass-ah, Left Wingers, you are what you are!

Tariq Ramadan: A Viper in Our Midst (Thanks to Hillary Clinton)

David Solway

Islamic scholar and stealth jihadist [1] Tariq Ramadan is on the move again, having been welcomed to our shores as an apostle of moderation and a harbinger of reconciliation between Islam and the West. Ramadan had been banned from the U.S. under the provisions of the Patriot Act for having contributed to the Holy Land Foundation, an Islamic charity with ties to Hamas which is listed on the U.S. State Department calendar of Foreign Terrorist Organizations [2]. Under an exemption issued by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Ramadan is now free to bring his message to the American people from within their own public institutions, addressing Cooper Union and CAIR-Chicago [3]. Later this month, Ramadan will be revisiting Canada, mounting his carefully calculated charm offensive in Montreal and Ottawa, explaining how Islam can be seamlessly integrated into Western culture. Ramadan is especially fond of Ottawa [4], Canada’s capital, a city with six [5] official mosques, another 22 [6] university and student mosques, and yet another four [7] mosque-building projects currently on the books. What’s not to like? But this is only a sign of what’s to come. Under cover of Ramadan’s glabrous rhetoric, the Muslim Brotherhood’s campaign to subvert the West from within takes another giant step forward. And we are going along with it.

We have simply not understood — or stubbornly refuse to understand — that Islam is our “world-historical” antagonist. But it is also more than that. The welcome we extend to those who would subdue us is also an indication of what is wrong with us. How else to explain the warm reception we give to a crypto-Islamist like Tariq Ramadan, who passes himself off as a Muslim reformer but strongly implies in Western Muslims and the Future of Islam [8] that Islam will envelop and, so to speak, outperform Judaism and Christianity? How else to explain how the author of an arguably anti-Semitic tract entitled Critique des (nouveaux) intellectuels communautaires [9] can be celebrated by Time magazine [10] as an intellectual innovator and invited by Notre Dame University [11] to assume the Henry R. Luce chair in its International Peace Studies program? Ramadan has recently been appointed to the Sultan of Oman chair of Islamology at the University of Leiden, which does not appear to have objected to Ramadan’s presenting himself on the bookflap of his Radical Reform [12] as “teaching in the Faculty of Theology at Oxford University” — there is no such position in Islamic Studies in the Oxford Faculty of Divinity and Ramadan has no formal appointment there.

Ramadan believes that Islam can infiltrate and conquer the West by initially peaceful means, continuing immigration, and the “duty for Muslims … to take Islam from the periphery of European culture to the centre,” to cite from an interview [13] in the New Statesman. The warrant here is clearly Koran 9:33 in which Allah sends forth his apostle “to make the true faith supreme over all religions” — a mandate which may be dissembled but cannot be go unheeded. Ramadan coquettishly advances toward his goal of disarming resistance via the rhetoric of ethical harmony and doctrinal alignment between the various faith communities. He even goes so far as to refer to Islamic philosophers like Avicenna, Averroes, and Ibn Khaldun as “European Muslim thinkers … who … confidently [accepted] their European identity” — a proposition as staggering as it is absurd. A cursory perusal of Robert Spencer’s The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam [14], a kind of Islam for Dhimmis, would quickly torpedo Ramadan’s strange notion of cultural, religious, and jurisprudential consonance. (In her last book, The Force of Reason [15], Oriana Fallaci also calls attention to the new and concomitant Islamic “design based on gradual penetration rather than brutal and sudden aggression.”)

It is in this light that we should place Ramadan’s agitating in Western Muslims and The Future of Islam for unimpeded immigration: “Policies proposed to combat immigration are dreadful and assume that the ‘clandestine immigrant’ is a liar, a thief, even a bandit.” But why stop there? Such policies might also correctly assume that the “clandestine immigrant” is a misfit, a parasite, even a terrorist, as several Western nations are now beginning to learn. It is perhaps not without significance that Ramadan’s father Said, notwithstanding having received political asylum in Geneva, used the pages of his journal El Mouslimoun [16]to promote ideological warfare against the West [16]. In this regard, the son, playing the role of the “good cop,” is far more sophisticated than the father in the prosecution of their common goal, and Western academics have fallen for this tactical combover. It would be more appropriate to ask why Hassan al-Turabi, the Sudanese host of Osama bin Laden, proclaimed Tariq Ramadan “the future of Islam [17]” and why, for that matter, Ramadan continues to sit on the board of the Saudi-funded Geneva Islamic Center [18], which is directed by his brother Hari and which, according to reports, has come under suspicion by the Swiss Secret Service for connections to terrorist organizations and banks.

But there are moments when the mask drops. Ramadan wants Muslims who live in the West, as he writes in Western Muslims, to “become assured as people who know what they hold (a universal message)” and to bring into Western education “the overall philosophy of the Islamic message,” blithely claiming that “there is in fact no confusion between the restraining authority of the religious and the civic independence of the individual, between the realm of dogma and that of reason.” Islam, he continues, “is a Western religion in the full sense of the word” and that what should “be called into question” is not Islam in itself or the violence it is said to engender but “the immigration policies of Western countries and their social and urban policies,” which give “rise to vexatious, discriminatory, and unjust administrative measures.”

One may wonder whether Ramadan is living in the same world as the rest of us or is just being shrewdly disingenuous. The answer should be evident. His next move is an attempt to refute the well-known argument that the two realms of Church and State coalesce in Islam into a single entity. His contention that there is a “distinction” between the two spheres which “has not had to go as far as separation, even divorce, as in the Christian era” is simply not supported by the evidence pouring in from the international political arena or by the frequent legal suits against free expression mounted by Islamic organizations in our own societies. That a “distinction” between Church and State is as effective as a “separation” or a “divorce” — only subtler — or that it even exists, is a sophistry of the first order.

The argument for separation is developed by the honest and reputable Muslim thinker Amin Maalouf in his In the Name of Identity [19]: “It is not enough to separate Church and State: what has to do with religion must be kept apart from what has to do with identity.” But ultimately, as Patrick Sookdheo maintains in Understanding Islamic Terrorism [20], no matter what concessions we are disposed to make toward Islam and its apologists, “there will still remain reasons for Muslims to wage war, unless Islam itself can change.” Philosopher Roger Scruton agrees. “It is not possible,” he writes in The West and the Rest [21], “for a Muslim to believe that the conception of the good that is so clearly specified in all the intricate laws and maxims of the Koran is to be excluded from the social contract. On the contrary, in Muslim eyes this conception, and this alone, gives legitimacy to the political order.”

Curiously, Ramadan implicitly concurs. For when he goes on to develop his thesis on “the level of political involvement,” we find that Muslims are expected to take “their Islamic frame of reference as the starting point” before “deciding on … strategies that make it possible to be faithful to both the essential principles and ethics.” The “distinction” he has posited is not so subtle after all. And this is only the tip of the sand dune. Ramadan claims to be no Salafist or literalist (from Arabic salaf or “ancestor”), but his cassettes, made to appeal to Muslim youth, and some of his radio interviews suggest otherwise. These cassettes may be procured on the internet or in specialized bookstores, and his more direct, unguarded utterances have been carefully referenced by Caroline Fourest in her must-read Brother Tariq: The Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan [22].

As Paul Berman says in an important New Republic essay, “Who’s Afraid of Tariq Ramadan [23],” “Ramadan invokes civil libertarian arguments in order to defend the autonomy of his reconstructed Muslim community.” And indeed, “the anti-globalist rhetoric of his left-wing allies” has proven brilliantly effective as well. Thomas Haidon, a member of the Qur’anist reform movement, goes even further, describing Ramadan [24] as a “false moderate”; false moderates, he continues, are “no better than al-Qaeda terrorists” and perhaps “far more dangerous.” Ramadan, however, is only following the counsels of his mentor, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, spiritual head of the Muslim Brotherhood (founded by Ramadan’s maternal grandfather Hassan al-Banna), who maintains [25] that the Islamic reconquest of Europe will be achieved by “preaching and ideology.” Qaradawi and Ramadan appear to be well on the way toward realizing their program, not only in Europe but here in North America.

The argument that Ramadan and his acolytes are developing about the compatibility of Islam and the West seems on the surface plausible enough, especially considering Ramadan’s dulcet presentation of multiple factoids and the plangent tones he so persuasively commands. It strikes the unprepared observer as a rational analysis of a complex subject. But it is a false analysis, sort of like putting Descartes before the hearse, as shari’a, the Koran, and the hadith move covertly from the margins to the center behind an apparatus of ostensibly sober and judicious reasoning.

Tariq Ramadan is not only the future of Islam. If we are not minded to resist his tunneling rhetoric and the ideological sabotage he both furthers and represents by educating ourselves and taking a principled stand, he may also be the future of Western civilization.

Article printed from Pajamas Media: http://pajamasmedia.com

URL to article: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/tariq-ramadan-a-viper-in-our-midst-thanks-to-hillary-clinton/

If Obama gets 20% of Jewish votes in 2012, it proves we can't defend ourselves

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=172451
American Jewry’s deafening silence
By SHMULEY BOTEACH

When it came to protecting the right of the Libyan Ambassador to the UN living immediately next door to me in Englewood, my Democratic Congressman, Steve Rothman, found his voice, issuing a three page press release about a deal he had brokered with the State Department 27 years ago for the Libyans to bizarrely remain in a New Jersey suburb. But when I asked Rothman, who is Jewish, to comment on US President Barack Obama’s degrading treatment of Israel’s elected officials recently and the administration’s opposition to Jews building in all parts of Jerusalem, his chief of staff sent me an email that said the congressman was “away for the holidays so we won’t be able to provide you with a statement.” Attitudes like these on the part of influential Jewish members of the American establishment explain why Obama has been allowed to get away with his treatment of Israel. Yes, it is we Jews who allow it, afraid to take a stand against a president who is rapidly emerging as the new Jimmy Carter.

Don’t think Obama isn’t listening.

When it came to endorsing a recent Congressional vote to label the Turks’ slaughter of over one million Armenians during the first World War a genocide, Obama quickly broke a campaign pledge, and a moral duty, to do just that and publicly distanced himself from the term genocide in order not to offend the Turkish government. And when it came to hosting the Dalai Lama at the White House, the president quickly bowed to Chinese bullying, not only refusing to greet the great humanitarian publicly but sending him out through the service entrance of the White House where he was photographed surrounded by giant bags of garbage. But when it comes to treating America’s most reliable ally like a pariah nation, Obama has no fear of the American Jewish community because he’s convinced there will be no price to pay. The Jews are too timid to react.

HOW SAD that we Jews have become so politically pathetic. Although there were grave suspicions about Obama’s position on Israel before the campaign, greatly compounded by his having sat through 20 years of vitriol toward Israel from his own pastor, American Jewry gave Obama the benefit of the doubt. Nearly eighty percent of American Jews voted for him against a proven friend of Israel in John McCain.

But as they say, “fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”

Amid the Jewish propensity to blindly pull the Democrat lever in every vote without even thinking, if Obama gets anything more than twenty percent of the Jewish vote in 2012 it will be a manifestation of a community which simply doesn’t know how to stand up for itself and has contempt for its own interests.

And spare me the lectures on dual loyalty. If there is one thing the American people have learned it’s that the Israeli people are their canaries in the coalmine. Attacks that Israelis experience first just presage what Americans will later face.

Why? Because the Islamic nations hate Israel for the same reason they hate America. Israel is a bastion of freedom in a region of tyranny. The mullahs are religious, the Arab dictators mostly secular. But what they share in common is an absolute desire to rule absolutely. They hate Israel and America for its freedoms. They know that elections will knock them out of power and, like Saddam Hussein, they would face trial for crimes against humanity.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hates his own people even more than he hates Israel, brutalizing and slaughtering them in the streets whenever they stand up for themselves. The last thing the House of Saud wants is democracy, preferring to plunder their country’s oil wealth and concentrate it in the hands of princes of the blood, all of whom live like kings.The same hatred of liberty is harbored by all the other Arab potentates who have oppressed their people for decades, from Mubarak who has been in power for three decades, to Gaddafi and the Assads.

RATHER THAN pressuring Jews not to build condos in Jerusalem, Obama ought to pressure the Arabs to liberalize and democratize. He ought to use his considerable eloquence to state the obvious truth.That until such time as the Arabs allow their citizens to be free, there will never be peace in the Middle East.

Israel is the solution rather than the problem. The more Arab countries emulate its market economy and liberal democracy, the more our oppressed Islamic brothers and sisters will prosper. They will not need scapegoats, like Jews, to vent their understandable frustration at their wretched, impoverished lives, all brought about by clerics and dictators whose steal their money and their freedoms.

According to many estimates, Muammar Gaddafi is the richest man in the world, with a net worth of over $70 billion. That a thief and a murderer of that magnitude is allowed to own a tax-free mansion next door to me where we, honest and hard-working Americans, pay for his police protection and trash removal, is a travesty of truth and justice.

When American Jews stand up to the lie that Israeli intransigence is the reason for conflict in the Middle East, they end up helping their Arab brethren as well. Because the last thing the five hundred million Arabs who live under state censorship and political oppression need is their rulers and clerics finding a convenient scapegoat upon whom to place the blame for their people’s suffering.

And every time Obama falsely puts the blame on Israel for the region’s tensions, he puts another nail in the coffin of future Mideast freedom and Arab democracy and liberty.

The writer is founder of This World: The Values Network. His most recent book is The Blessing of Enough: Rejecting Material Greed, Embracing Spiritual Hunger. Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.