The 'mainstream' is located in France - Great humor

by Ann coulter

http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com |

The newspaper that almost missed the war in Iraq because its reporters were in Georgia covering the membership policies of the Augusta National Golf Club has declared another one of President George Bush's judicial nominees as "out of the mainstream." The New York Times has proclaimed so many Bush nominees "out of the mainstream," that the editorial calling California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown "out of the mainstream" was literally titled: "Out of the Mainstream, Again."

Among Bush's "many unworthy judicial nominees," the Times said, Brown is "among the very worst" -- more "out of the mainstream" than all the rest! Even Teddy Kennedy, who might be well advised to withhold comment on a woman's position relative to a moving body of water, has described Brown as "out of the mainstream," adding, "Let's just hope this one can swim."

Liberals are hysterical about Justice Brown principally because she is black. Nothing enrages them so much as a minority who does not spend her days saying hosannas to liberals.

On the basis of its editorial positions, the Times seems to have called a bunch of racist Southern election supervisors out of retirement to cover judicial nominations for the paper. The only difference is, instead of phony "literacy" tests, now we have phony "mainstream" tests. Amazingly, no matter how many conservative minorities Bush sends up, the Times has not been able to find a single one who is "qualified." The Times thinks Justice Brown should be the maid and Miguel Estrada the pool boy.

According to the Times, Brown has "declared war on the mainstream legal values that most Americans hold dear." What the Times means by "mainstream legal values" is: off-the-charts unpopular positions favored by NAMBLA, the ACLU, and The New York Times editorial page.

Thus, for example, opposition to partial birth abortion -- opposed by 70 percent of the American people -- is "out of the mainstream." Support for the death penalty -- supported by 70 percent of the American people -- is "out of the mainstream."

Opposition to government-sanctioned race discrimination -- which voters in the largest state in the nation put on an initiative titled Proposition 209 and enacted into law -- is "out of the mainstream." Opposition to gay marriage -- opposed by 60 percent of the American people -- is "out of the mainstream." Failing to recognize that totally nude dancing is "speech" is "out of the mainstream." Questioning whether gay Scoutmasters should be taking 14-year-old boys on overnight sleepovers in the woods is "out of the mainstream."

I guess if your "mainstream" includes Roman Polanski, Michael Moore, Howard Dean and Jacques Chirac, then Brown really is "out of the mainstream." This proverbial "stream" they're constantly referring to is evidently located somewhere in France.

Liberals are always complaining that they haven't figured out how to distill their message to slogans and bumper stickers -- as they allege Republicans have. Though it can't be easy to fit the entire Communist Manifesto on a bumper sticker, I beg to differ. (Bumper sticker version of the current Democratic platform: "Ask me about how I'm going to raise your taxes.")

The problem is, if Democrats ever dared speak coherently, the American people would lynch them. Fortunately for liberals, soccer moms hear that a nominee is "extreme" and "out the mainstream" and are too frightened to ask for details. (Ironically, based on ticket sales and TV ratings, soccer is also out of the mainstream.)

In addition to the fact that she is black and "out of the mainstream," the first item in the Times' bill of particulars against Brown was this:

"She regularly stakes out extreme positions, often dissenting alone. In one case, her court ordered a rental car company to stop its supervisor from calling Hispanic employees by racial epithets. Justice Brown dissented, arguing that doing so violated the company's free speech rights."

Despite the Times' implication that Brown was "dissenting alone" in this case, she was not. The opinion of the California Supreme Court in the case, Aguilar v. Avis, was as closely divided as it gets: 4-3. Among the dissenters was Stanley Mosk, who was once described by the Los Angeles Times as "the court's most liberal member." When Mosk died in 2001, his obituary in The New York Times described him as "the only liberal on the seven-member court." I suppose if the Times had mentioned that a prominent liberal jurist had agreed with Brown in Aguilar, it would be harder to frighten silly women with that "out of the mainstream" babble.

But the real beauty part of Brown's dissent in Aguilar is that she was vindicating a constitutional principle that is second in importance only to abortion for liberals: no prior restraints on speech.

In a major victory for Avis, the jury rejected almost all of the claims against Avis by Hispanic employees, but did find that two managers -- only one of whom still worked at Avis -- had called Hispanics names. So the lower court judge got the idea to issue an injunction prohibiting one single Avis manager from ever using derogatory language about Avis' Hispanic employees.

The injunction was broad enough to prevent the manager from using such language in his home, out of earshot of his employees, in a joking or friendly manner, as part of a hypothetical example, or even if his speech were incapable of creating a "hostile environment" under the law. Questions were also raised about whether he was even allowed to chuckle at the little dog in those "Yo quiero Taco Bell" TV commercials. It was basically a bill of attainder against this one manager (who was himself married to a Hispanic).

I note that liberals laughed at the idea that a "hostile environment" could be created by a single incident of a governor dropping his pants and asking a subordinate to "kiss it." But the mere speculative threat of a manager saying "wetback" -- one time -- was such a threat to the stability of the nation that the Times backed a prior restraint on the manager's speech.

Usually The New York Times is citing the law's antagonism to prior restraints on speech in order to wax eloquent about the Supreme Court's "landmark decision in the Pentagon Papers case." In a ruling that celebrated the very essence of the First Amendment, the court ruled that the government couldn't stop the Treason Times from publishing classified national security documents. As the Times put it, that case had "made it clear that only a showing of concrete, immediate risk to the nation could justify a judicial order imposing a prior restraint on any kind of publication."

But apparently, there is one interest even more vital than preventing an immediate risk to the nation: stopping a supervisor someplace in America from ever using the word "spic." Anyone who disagrees is "out of the mainstream." And any minority who is not duly grateful to liberals for supporting prior restraints against certain words is only qualified to be the maid.

Eye on the Media: The controversy of Israel

By BRET STEPHENS

Since when are the Shaba farms "disputed"?

According to the United Nations, this uninhabited strip of land - 14 kilometers long and two kilometers deep - falls squarely on the Israeli side of Blue Line dividing Israel from Lebanon. But because the farms are also on the Golan Heights, the UN insists they properly belong to Syria.

In the language of news agencies such as Reuters and the Associated Press, that would mean the farms are in "Israeli-occupied" territory. But there's a catch. Syria - which otherwise is so jealous of its territory that it refused Ehud Barak's 1999 offer to return the Golan Heights minus a strip of shoreline - does not claim the farms as its own.

Instead, in 2000 Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara informed the UN that the farms are Lebanese. Syria claims it made a gift of them to Lebanon in 1951 as part of what one Lebanese official described as a "kind of oral agreement," but neither government has been able to produce any documentation proving it.

The Lebanese government has also produced some handwritten deeds for the farms dating from the 1940s. But even if these are not forgeries, the fact that they predate the 1951 land transfer renders them inoperative - if indeed there was a land transfer. According to Lebanese military maps from the early 1960s, the farms fell squarely in Syrian territory.

So why did Reuters and the Associated Press describe the farms as "disputed" following this week's Hizbullah rocket attacks? Because, one inside source helpfully explains, the Golan Heights are "disputed" by Israel and Syria. But in that case, why do the news agencies otherwise describe the Heights as "occupied"? And if they are now so sensitive to Israeli claims, why not also describe the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as "disputed"?

The fact is, Syria and Lebanon jointly pretend the Shaba farms are Lebanese in order to furnish Hizbullah with a pretext for continued attacks on Israeli targets. By calling the farms "disputed," Reuters and AP only lend credibility to what should be described as a fraud.

I EXPATIATE on this topic to make a simple point: Just because someone disputes something - whether it's land, law, history, received opinion or whatever - does not mean it's disputed. A controversy is not created by the act of controverting alone.

Take a homely example: I may swan into your living room, refuse to budge and claim your house as my own. That does not make it mine. Nor does it make it "disputed territory," except semantically.

Still, if some camera crew were to arrive on the scene to report not on my invasion of your property but on this "dispute" of ours, it would go a long way toward shoring up my case. Let it go on for a month or two, and you might even be tempted to compromise. The basement apartment, perhaps?

What goes for your house and the Shaba farms goes also for the Jewish state. Israel's existential legitimacy has been widely assailed for years - but that came, or comes, mainly from Arab, Islamic and Soviet corners. By contrast, Israel's critics in the West usually confined themselves to arguing about Israel's borders. As for the rightness of the Zionist dream itself, that was ideological territory upon which they dared not trespass.

Now that's changed. A line has been crossed. With the media's help, Israel has become "controversial." As usual, Israelis and Jews have blazed this particular trail.

In August, Haaretz ran a long profile by Ari Shavit of "neo-Canaanites" Haim Hanegbi and Meron Benvenisti, two Israelis who have come to the conclusion that "Israel as a Jewish state can no longer exist here."

In September, former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg penned an article for Yediot Aharonot in which he argued that "after two thousand years of struggle for survival, the reality of Israel is a colonial state, run by a corrupt clique which scorns and mocks law and civic morality." The article was reprinted in the International Herald Tribune, Le Monde, The Guardian, the Suddeutsche Zeitung and (of course!), The Forward.

All this was bound to spill over on American shores, and earlier this month it did. In the New York Review of Books, Tony Judt, a British Jew who is a professor of history at New York University and director of the Remarque Institute, has announced "the depressing truth that Israel today is bad for the Jews." Judt's article is titled "Israel: The Alternative" - the alternative (actually, the "desirable outcome") being the binational state propounded by Benvenisti and Hanegbi. His argument is that Zionism "arrived too late": By the time the Jewish state was born in 1948, the world had moved beyond nationalism to globalism, multiculturalism, cosmopolitanism.

Israel, however, remains a state defined by ethno-religious criteria, even as a growing percentage of the population within its borders is not Jewish. So it faces a dilemma: It can either retreat to borders within which it may remain both Jewish and democratic; it can expel its non-Jewish population, meaning primarily the Palestinians; or it can become a binational state.

Judt implies that he prefers the first alternative. Only he doesn't think it's going to happen: "There are too many settlements, too many Jewish settlers, and too many Palestinians" for the two-state solution to work. American pressure could help, but none is forthcoming because Bush "has been reduced to a ventriloquist's dummy, pitifully reciting the Israeli cabinet line."

As for that cabinet, it is composed of extremists to whom the the fascist label "fits better than ever." The government, Judt claims, is moving Israel in the direction of "full-scale ethnic cleansing as a state project."

Thus we arrive, with Hegelian inevitability, at history's juncture. Either the Zionist fascists of the present government will get their way, leading to the permanent estrangement of decent Diaspora Jewry from their fanatical cousins in the Holy Land. Or the decent people will prevail, leading to a binational state of which Jews everywhere, and the whole world, can be proud.

This second outcome, Judt writes, "would not be easy, though not quite as impossible as it sounds." All that's required is "brave and relentlessly engaged American leadership"; "international force" to guarantee "the security of Jews and Arabs alike"; and "the emergence, among Jews and Arabs alike, of a new political class."

ABOUT JUDT'S scheme, many things can be said, the least of which is its mind-boggling impracticality.

A binational state? Surely Judt is aware of where that path led to in Lebanon, where the animosities and differences between Christians and Muslims were nowhere near as deep as they are between Muslims and Jews.

A new political class? Had Palestinian Arabs had such a class in the 1930s, a binational state may have come into being with the end of the British mandate, for there was no shortage of Jews advocating as much at the time.

"International forces" to guarantee the mutual security of Jews and Arabs? We know too well what such forces recently accomplished in Srebrenica and Kigali.

Then there's Judt's sense of history.
He says that Israel threatens to become the first modern democracy to engage in ethnic cleansing. Well, no: The United States and Australia, both modern democracies, did far worse with their aboriginal peoples.

He says that Jewish nationalism came to fruition too late. Wrong again: India and Pakistan and Indonesia were born alongside Israel; the Indochinese states emerged a decade later; the African states a few years after that. Should we do away with them, too, under the auspices of "international forces"? This is a cry for colonialism.

He says that US support for Israel has been "a disaster for American foreign policy." (Syria, by contrast, is praised "for providing the US with critical data on al-Qaida). In fact, what has been disastrous for US Middle East policy has been its support for Arab and Muslim autocrats such as Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and the Shah of Iran.

Judt is equally bad when it comes to understanding Israeli politics. He tells us that the current Likud government is the heir to Herut and the Revisionist Zionism of Vladimir Jabotinsky. Which is partly true, except that Sharon himself is an old Laborite who in recent months has sidelined the true heirs to Revisionist Zionism championed by Binyamin Netanyahu.

He says that Israel's security fence is like the Berlin Wall. But the Berlin Wall was built to keep people in, whereas the security fence is being built to keep people out. A better analogy for the security fence is the American border with Mexico.
He tells us that the forcible expulsion of Palestinians from the West Bank is an option seriously being considered by Israeli decision makers. Please.

Judt's resort to classic anti-Semitic tropes should also not be overlooked. He tells us, twice, that US policy is being conducted to suit Ariel Sharon's convenience. This is a view that finds wide expression in Arab media.

But does Judt seriously believe that the foreign policy of a superpower is being manipulated by its own client state? Truly it is an amazingly wily and manipulative client who can so hoodwink its patron.

Judt tells us that Israel is bad for the Jews because the actions of the Sharon government taint Jews by implication everywhere. What's more, he says, they contribute to "misdirected efforts, often by young Muslims, to get back at Israel" by torching synagogues in Lyon or attacking Jews in the streets of Berlin. But as Leon Wieseltier of The New Republic points out in a devastating critique of Judt, "if you explain anti-Semitism as a response to Jews... you have not understood it. You have reproduced it."

Then too, notice Judt's use of the word "misdirected." For an Algerian youth to stab a Parisian rabbi is "misdirected." Everything the Israeli government does is unadulterated fascism.
The fact that Judt is Jewish does not acquit him of the charge of anti-Semitism. It aggravates it.

A gentile with little or no knowledge of classic anti-Semitic tropes may make a comment that sounds anti-Semitic -"the Jews control Hollywood," for instance - without recognizing it as anti-Semitic.

That's stupid, but it is not necessarily ill-intentioned. But it is unforgivable for a man of Judt's pedigree and education to make similar kinds of comments. Explain, please, the difference between Judt's line that Sharon plays Bush like a "ventriloquist's dummy" and Mahathir Mohamad's remark to the Organization of the Islamic Conference that "the Jews rule this world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them." I see none.

SO MUCH for Judt's arguments. They collapse on first inspection, rather like Syrian and Lebanese claims regarding the Shaba farms.

Yet Judt remains a figure of respect. Not only was his essay allowed in the New York Review of Books, as far as I can tell he remains a contributing editor to The New Republic, the very magazine in which Wieseltier savaged him.

But will TNR sack Judt the way the American sports channel ESPN recently sacked Rush Limbaugh for making an arguably derogatory comment about a black football player? I doubt it.

No: Judt has merely exercised his right to free speech. It was a foolish speech, perhaps, but wasn't it Jefferson who said that error of opinion may be tolerated where freedom is left free to combat it? Instead, we will argue with Judt, show him the error of his ideas. Ostracism is not the democratic way. Engagement is.

Except that's not true. Polite society in the US has ruled that racist comments, or anti-Semitic comments, or sexist comments, or comments that hint at racism or anti-Semitism or sexism, are out of bounds. Rightly so. Especially in a free-speech country, some things must not be said.

It is the obligation of the people who rule polite society - academics, editors, teachers, TV producers and so on - to enforce the norms when government will not. Fail to do so, and you take the lid off the gutter and let the sewage run in the streets.

This is what is happening now with Israel. It does not really matter what Judt thinks about the dummy's ventriloquist. It matters that his views are being published in prestige magazines. It matters that his views are on this side of acceptable discourse.

It matters that his views are a matter of controversy, not disrepute.

It will be said that I am trying to quash debate. That is exactly what I would have done, were it still possible. It no longer is. The controversy of Israel's borders is over. Our enemies have won. The controversy of Israel is now upon us.

bret@jpost.co.il

WHY THE MEDIA BOTCHES IT

Bret Stephens
Jerusalem Post, October 17, 2003

In 1962, an American historian named Roberta Wohlstetter wrote a book that is required reading at Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon. It ought to be required reading for every foreign correspondent, too. The book, Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision was an effort to explain why the United States had failed to anticipate the Japanese attack, despite quantities of intelligence indicating that an attack was soon coming. For years, Americans had known of this failure, and that knowledge spawned the view that Franklin Roosevelt had taken the U.S. to war "through the back door," or, as Clare Booth Luce put it, that he had "lied us into a war because he didn't have the courage to lead us into it."

Wohlstetter saw it differently. In the run-up to December 7, she noted, U.S. intelligence knew not only that Hawaii was a potential target for the Japanese, but that Siberia, the Panama Canal, the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies were, too. All this information created what she called "noise," an overwhelming barrage of signals in which significant information tended to be drowned in trivia?

The analysis holds good in other situations. In the spring of 1941, Stalin had ample information that Hitler was massing troops on their shared front. In the fall of 1973, Israel knew the movements of the Egyptian and Syrian armies. The Soviets and Israelis were taken by surprise not because of faulty information. The problem was one of faulty interpretation, which in turn came from faulty assumptions about enemy motives. Stalin was convinced Hitler was maneuvering toward negotiation, not war; Israel thought the Arabs would never launch a war they were bound to lose.

Now fast-forward to August 3, 2000. On that day, The New York Times published a story by reporter John Burns, headlined "Palestinian Summer Camps Offer Games at War." "Last summer," Burns wrote, "some 27,000 Palestinian children participated in the camps, where they receive weeks of training in guerrilla warfare, including operation of firearms and mock kidnappings of Israeli leaders. A common theme in the camps was preparation for armed conflict: 'slitting the throats of Israelis' is one of the children's exercises at these camps."

To its credit, the Times ran this piece on the front page. [But] within a month the story was pretty much forgotten. When fighting broke out on September 30 most of the news media were prepared to believe that it was Ariel Sharon who had started it by taking a walk on the Temple Mount.

To me, Burns's reporting is of a piece with the early warnings about Pearl Harbor. Who, reading his dispatch now, can fail to see that it foretold the coming war? Yet with a few exceptions, everyone failed to foresee it, certainly everyone in the foreign media. As late as September 27, two days before the beginning of hostilities, Burns's colleague Deborah Sontag was writing that Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat had succeeded in "breaking the ice" over dinner, thereby providing "fresh momentum" for negotiation.

Now consider all this in the light of Wohlstetter's analysis. During the Oslo years, the dominant framework was roughly this:

First, Yasser Arafat, a reformed terrorist, had made a strategic decision for peace based on the calculation that a state in Gaza and the West Bank was the most he would ever get. Second, Yitzhak Rabin [had] concluded that the Jewish state was more secure with the majority of Palestinians outside smaller borders than it was with those Palestinians inside larger borders. He too wanted to cut a deal, and the PLO was the only really credible partner for it. Third, this new political center represented by Arafat-Rabin was threatened by Palestinian fanatics who would not abandon their claims to Haifa and Jaffa, and by Jewish fanatics who would not abandon theirs to Hebron and Shechem (Nablus). Fourth, the solution lay in strengthening the center, chiefly by supporting Rabin diplomatically and Arafat financially and militarily. Israelis would be moved to withdraw from their territories to the East if they felt more secure in their friendships with the West. As for Arafat, he ne! He needed guns and money to suppress "militant" Palestinian factions and establish the institutions of statehood.

That was the compelling logic of Oslo, and it was a logic to which most of world media subscribed. How often did we hear it said [that] peace was threatened by "extremists on both sides"? How much ink was expended on the question of Arafat's personal chemistry with Rabin/Peres/Netanyahu/Barak? And how little attention was devoted to countervailing data: for example, Arafat speeches that reaffirmed, in Arabic, his commitment to the PLO's old "plan of stages"?

No wonder, then, that Burns's August 3 dispatch did not cause the upset is should have. The idea that the Palestinian Authority was not part of the vital center for peace [was] information that could not be adequately explained within Oslo's interpretive framework.

The media was dutiful in reporting the terrorist summer camps. But it was not dutiful in asking the necessary follow-up questions about why these camps were there and what they betokened. Instead, we had what Thomas Schelling, in the foreword to Wohlstetter's book, described as "a routine obsession with a few dangers that may be familiar rather than likely"--settlers, terrorists, Sharon and so on.

Since then, things have changed somewhat. Whereas once there was one dominant interpretive framework, now there are three competing ones.

The first of these is the "occupation" framework. Its subscribers include all the Arab media, most of the European media, the BBC, the Economist magazine, and some U.S. news organizations. According to this framework, this is a conflict that began in 1967 when Israel "conquered" Palestinian land, attempted to settle it, and in the process dispossessed and eventually enraged the Palestinian people. Palestinian "militancy" is a consequence of this.

Then there is the "cycle-of-violence" framework? In this view, the conflict did not begin in 1967 or even in 1948 [but] sees Israelis and Palestinians as two tribes caught in a kind of blood feud, with each fresh assault demanding retribution?.

Finally, there is the "Arab rejectionism" framework. Its votaries in the media include the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, Fox News and the Christian Broadcasting Network. This framework holds that the conflict has its roots in the Arab world's refusal to accept a Jewish state in its midst?

From these separate frameworks identical headlines will often emerge. But the stories will read differently. Consider a hypothetical example: A Palestinian suicide bomber detonates himself in a Jerusalem bus and kills 20. Hamas takes responsibility.

A reporter from the "Occupation" school [discovers] that the bomber is from the Dehaishe refugee camp near Bethlehem; his family was originally from Ramle; his father used to work construction in Israel but has been unable to get to his job due to IDF closures. As for the bomber himself, he had a talent for carpentry but never found a job. He was recruited by Hamas after his brother was shot by the IDF; he hoped that his own martyrdom would bring honor and money to his parents and nine siblings.

Then there's the reporter from the "cycle of violence" school. [She notes] that a leading Hamas spokesman had recently been killed in an IAF helicopter attack and that the group had vowed revenge?

Finally, we have our reporter from the "Arab rejectionist" camp. He describes the scene of the bombing, interviews the families of the bereaved, attends the funerals. Little attention is paid to the personal circumstances of the bomber. Perhaps it will be noted that the bomber's brother was killed by the IDF while attempting to plant a mine on the road to a nearby settlement. Perhaps, too, the family expects to receive money from abroad. There's a story there about Saudi funding of terror?.

My point simply is to illustrate how different interpretive frameworks put reporters on the trail of different sets of facts. All of these facts may be true. The question is, which of them are significant? To a certain extent, the answer is in the eye of the reporter. But the suicide bombings belong to a larger narrative, and it's important that readers not be consistently misled as to where this story might be going.

Few people anticipated the collapse of Oslo because few reporters bothered to ask themselves whether incitement in Palestinian schools, corruption in Palestinian officialdom, or the collusive relationship between groups like Hamas and the PA, weren't really bigger stories than, say, new construction in Gilo.

Similarly, had a moderate Palestinian leadership taken control of events in the past few months and stamped out terrorist groups, the Arab rejectionism camp would have a hard time making sense of things. It might have resorted to rationalization or conspiracy theories. By the same token, the persistence of Palestinian terror aimed at targets in pre-'67 Israelis should put a heavy onus on the "Occupation" camp to explain Palestinian motives. As for the "cycle-of-violence" camp, they ought to be puzzling out why the August 19 bus bombing in Jerusalem preceded Israel's targeted assassination of Ismael Abu Shanab, which Palestinian spokesmen now claim was what brought the hudna to an end.

Every reporter and editor needs at least some kind of framework to make sense of the news. I am certainly not coy about the framework to which this newspaper subscribes. I believe it is solidly grounded in historical fact, and I think its predictive record has been good. Still, I admit it's a sign of media vitality when no single framework dominates news coverage as it did in the 1990s. And I will try, at least occasionally, to pose the sorts of questions my colleagues in the other two camps so routinely ask. The wiser journalists among them will return the favor.

Who Lost the Campus?

By Jonathan Tobin

Animus against Israel goes deeper than policy disagreements with Sharon

http://www.jewishworldreview.com | American Jews are very good at ignoring the obvious, but they can at least give themselves credit for being smart enough to understand that their house is on fire, just as the flames are starting to toast their toes.


Case in point is the fact that lately, we have gradually come to terms with the fact most American college campuses were hothouses for anti-Israel bigotry. That this realization occurred long after the problem became serious is besides the point. Incidents last year, such as the anti-Jewish violence at places like San Francisco State University or Concordia University in Montreal, have created enough of a stir to put this issue on the communal radar screen. That's the good news. The bad news is that students who support Israel are still placed in the position of a precarious and unpopular minority as anti-Zionist radicals on faculties and in the student body make it hard to stand up for Jewish rights.


Predictably, there is division in our ranks as to what created this situation.

'JEWS OF SILENCE'

Former Soviet refusenik and current Israeli Cabinet member Natan Sharansky wrote in the Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv about his recent tour of American campuses and the sorry state of Jewish activism.


The picture he paints is a gloomy one, in which colleges are virtually "enemy territory" for affiliated Jews. Even worse, he returned to Israel with the impression that most young Jews had opted out of the struggle. Though a few were standing up for Zionism (and a smaller minority were anti-Israel), most were on the sidelines, afraid to speak up because to do so might damage their grades and their academic futures, not to mention their social standing.


To Sharansky, the overwhelming majority of young American Jews are contemporary "Jews of silence" in contrast with the more vocal Jewish activists of 20 and 30 years ago. That's a telling phrase, since it was also the title of the 1966 book by Elie Wiesel that helped launch the movement to free Soviet Jewry. Sharansky blames the current situation on Arab influence in the makeup of Middle East Studies departments and effective public relations work by the Palestinians.


But to liberal activist and columnist Leonard Fein, the blame for the decline of support for Israel has less to do with Arab propaganda than it does with reasonable criticism of Israel's positions.


In his attack on Sharansky's position, Fein acknowledges that there are many on campus who oppose Israel's existence under any circumstances. But he feels it is primarily Israel's fault that young Jews won't support it. For him, "excesses in Israel's actions" and "the real suspicions fair-minded people harbor regarding Israel's motives and intentions," explain hostility to the Jewish state.

According to Fein, if Israel were a good liberal state, accommodating Palestinian ambitions and not run by the likes of Ariel Sharon, then more Jews would be behind it.


The problem with this argument is that it flies in the face of the facts of the last decade. During this time, Israeli governments of both the left and the right have made a string of concessions to the Palestinians. But Oslo did not set off a wave of pro-Israel sentiment on campuses in the 1990s, nor did the fact that Israel offered the Palestinians what they demanded in July 2000 -- and were answered by terrorist warfare.


In fact, just the opposite has happened. As Israel moved to a point where even Sharon has come to terms with the eventual necessity of a Palestinian state, anti-Israel sentiment has grown by leaps and bounds. Indeed, the more it became apparent to those who were truly fair-minded that Israel was the victim and not the aggressor, the more intense the assault of lies about Israeli "excesses" has become.


Instead, anti-Israel forces in the media and academia have seized upon the conflict to heighten their abuse, and attacks on Israel's existence are now far more commonplace than they were before Oslo.


But while Sharansky is right about the extent of the problem, his nostalgia for campus Jewish activism of the past is a bit misplaced. As much as we need to draw on the successes of that era, it would be a mistake to buy into the notion that Jewish students were united behind the Soviet Jewry movement -- or any other Jewish cause.

MYTHS ABOUT THE PAST

In fact, it was just as hard, and often just as unfashionable, for students to support Jewish causes then as it is today. Although the majority of Jews were supportive of the cause at the very end of the struggle for Soviet Jewry, those who were screaming about it in the early 1970s were a tiny minority, both on and off the campuses.


And though Israel was less unpopular then than it is today, the idea that all, or even most Jewish students, were unified in solidarity with its struggle to survive is also something of a myth.


The majority of Jewish students then, as is the case now, were far more interested in the fashionable left. Their cause c?l?bre was either Vietnam, or apartheid, not Israel or Soviet Jewry. Today, you are more likely to get Jewish students to attend a rally opposing the war in Iraq (which toppled an anti-Semitic dictator) than you would to hear an Israeli like Shimon Peres, whose views conform to Fein's vision of what Israel ought to be. However, Sharansky is on target when he notes that the structure of academic study has changed for the worse. The rise of Middle Eastern studies as a separate discipline has coincided with the advent of a generation of scholars who are anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian in their orientation.


They succeeded because they were able to tap into the same vein of anti-American leftism that transformed campuses in the 1960s. As faculties became more hostile to those who disagreed with the left, support for Israel has become as unfashionable and academically perilous in many instances as support for George W. Bush.


The unavoidable truth is that college students will always find it hard to stand against the tide of what is the conventional wisdom of the day. For most students, being for Israel simply isn't cool. And so long as the Palestinians are embraced by the political left -- and Israel is identified with the United States -- Zionism will find few friends on the quad.


Changing this will require not merely more Jewish programming, but a counter-revolution aimed at stiffening the resolve of Jewish students, striking back against Israel's detractors and pointing out their hypocrisy and mendacity. But until we reject the notion that Israel itself is to blame for the assaults on its existence, we haven't a chance.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and in the media consider "must reading." Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

JWR contributor Jonathan S. Tobin is executive editor of the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent. In June, Mr. Tobin won first places honors in the American Jewish Press Association's Louis Rapaport Award for Excellence in Commentary as well as the Philadelphia Press Association's Media Award for top weekly columnist. Both competitions were for articles written in the year 2002.

Excerpts from "From Prague to London - By Barry Rubin

The Jerusalem Post"

London is a more complicated place in this regard. The government is not so hostile to Israel, at least less so than in the past. The media is split, though the main television news is in practice antagonistically partisan.

Many campuses are hysterical on this issue. The most outrageous statements can be made with little fear of contradiction. It is open season on Israel. England was, after all, the country where George Orwell explained that certain ideas are so stupid that only an intellectual could believe them.

Yet how much practical effect does this widespread misrepresentation actually have? And are things getting better or worse? These questions are hard to answer.

Of course, much of the problem stems from a far Left desperately seeking a post-Marxist revolutionary cause. There are many professors and journalists who are passionate about their political engagements and far less so regarding their professional ethics.

Yet there are also many people with open minds who are genuinely baffled as to why the region remains so turbulent, its problems seemingly so unsolvable. How can one comprehend the damage done to the region by dictators deceptions and extremist ideologies if they are merely excused by Western observers? Recently, an Israeli colleague explained to a European audience that it overstated the ease of solving Middle East problems. A French military official sneeringly attacked him, making clear his detestation for anyone so foolish as to believe in the brutal notion that force determines the course of events in the world. What is needed, he explained, is peaceful diplomacy and the willingness to make concessions.

Consider the proposed deal worked out by French and other European negotiators with Iran which was hailed in Paris as a great victory for diplomatic methods in stopping Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. The Europeans will tightly control uranium, but let Iran build a reactor that will produce plutonium. No doubt, Iran will use this reactor to build more deadly plutonium bombs.

An American participant asked how, in light of this philosophy, he explained that France had intervened 47 times with military force in Africa without ever seeking a UN resolution. The official looked so angry that I believe he would have punched the American in the face if he had not just made a speech extolling pacifism.

Bush's war on chaos

http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | This week, the Pentagon announced that more American troops -- 115 -- had sacrificed their precious lives in combat since President Bush announced major combat operations were over in Iraq on May 1 than had died in the war between March 20 and the end of April.

The news comes as public support for the war in Iraq seems to be wavering. The latest Harris poll found that 47 percent of Americans want to bring most U.S. troops home from Iraq within the next year and 46 percent want to keep the troops in Iraq until there's a stable government.

Of course support for the war is slipping -- every Democratic presidential candidate has hurled an endless barrage of one of two messages: 1) The war in Iraq was all wrong, or 2) the war is being done all wrong. During Sunday's candidates' debate, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said that Bush had failed to "do it right." Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., charged that Bush had "no plan." All agreed that the war would be going better if only Bush had put together an international coalition.

The Democrats have a right to criticize Bush, but the very notion that the war would be cleaner following a different PowerPoint-detailed plan, that the pitfalls could have been foreseen, or that there would be an end in sight to American involvement if only there were Frenchmen fighting side by side with U.S. soldiers, well, it reveals a naivete unbecoming of a White House hopeful.

Top Dems apparently forgot that America fought a war with a broad international coalition in 1991 and that it ended when an eager-to-please President George H.W. Bush dropped the ball of victory in Iraq by withdrawing U.S. troops too soon.

Implicit in the criticism of George W. Bush is the illusion that U.S. troops could have invaded Iraq, overthrown Saddam Hussein and worked to install a new representative government, and that the whole agonizing ordeal wouldn't have been as prolonged and messy -- if only there had been better planning.

Rebuilding Iraq always was going to be grueling, and so, alas, it is. There is no efficient, low-risk way to fight an enemy who kills civilians rather than confront an army. As Bush noted Tuesday in his press conference, "That's what terrorists do. They commit suicide acts against innocent people and then expect people to say, 'Well, gosh, better not try to fight you anymore.'"

That's what happened when President Clinton pulled U.S. troops from Somalia after an al Qaeda raid left 31 Americans dead. It's what happened in 1983 in Lebanon when President Reagan withdrew troops after a terrorist bomb killed 241 Marines. Terrorists learned that killing American soldiers paid off.

Yet the anti-war crowd argues that the best way to support American troops is to bring them home -- even though virtual surrender would make every U.S. soldier or sailor serving abroad a more inviting target.

If, on the other hand, American and allied efforts prevail, if a representative government is installed, if young men in the breeding grounds of terror see determined Iraqis survive the vicious attacks designed destroy their ability to live, work and move freely and then go on to build their own nation, then terrorism loses.

There's always room for improvement in how any war is waged. But when I hear Democrats carp at Bush as if there would be markedly different results in Iraq with better planning or more allies, well, that's where I see deliberate deception about the war.

Victory in Iraq will not hinge on three-step proposals or international coalitions. One quality alone will spell the difference between victory and capitulation in Iraq: will.

Bush's foreign and domestic successes -- do the media care?

http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | " . . . You're not going to like this, but my gut feeling is that all media is against George, a Republican, any Republican." Former First Lady Barbara Bush gave this assessment recently on NBC's "Dateline." For this reason, said Mrs. Bush, she had predicted defeat for her son, George W., in his 2000 presidential run.

And why not? The piling on continues from Democratic presidential contenders like Rep. Dick Gephardt (Missouri) and Sen. John Kerry (Mass.), both of whom decry, for example, the administration's alleged inability to get other nations to help finance the rebuilding of Iraq. "You remember on your report card you had your English grade, your history grade and then it said, 'plays well together'?" said Gephardt. "(Bush) flunked that part."

Bush dispatched Secretary of State Colin Powell to attempt to get other nations and international groups to financially chip in. Many pundits predicted disaster, with the U.S. receiving little or no economic assistance. USA Today wrote, "Many officials say the final figure may fall below $6 billion." The Los Angeles Times wrote, "Bathsheba Crocker, who has been studying Iraqi finances at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said she would be surprised if participants were to pledge more than a combined $1 billion . . . "

Well, what happened? The international community pledged $13 billion in grants and loans, exceeding the most dire predictions. So how did the media deal with this relatively good news?

The Los Angeles Times' front-page headline said, "Thirteen Billion for Iraq Exceeds Expectations but Falls Short." While the New York Times headline read, "Over $13 Billion in Aid is Pledged To Rebuild Iraq: Sum Exceeds Predictions," the paper duly noted that the assistance primarily consisted of loans rather than grants: "The total surpassed what many had expected, although roughly two-thirds of the aid appeared to be in the form of loans rather than grants, which might complicate efforts by the Bush administration to beat back a drive in Congress to make more American aid in the form of loans."

The Los Angeles Times threw cold water on the relatively good news. "The aid," said the L.A. Times, "which will be combined with an expected $20 billion in U.S. grants, was more than American officials had predicted at the beginning of the month, but the total is less than the $56 billion needed. U.S. officials said that some of the promises made at a two-day conference might not pan out and some confessed disappointment that Persian Gulf states had not given more, despite U.S. pressure."

Understand this. When the United States led a coalition to enforce U.N. Resolution 1441 in the face of United Nations fecklessness, we did so out of a concern for our national security interests. Many in the "international community" still fail to see that radical Islamists, who seek to practice terrorism, threaten civilization itself, not just the United States. But their failure to see the enemy before them simply means that the Unites States must do its duty and accept that -- at least in the short run -- this requires us to do the heavy lifting.

Many nations don't get it, and perhaps never will. Despite the United Nation's unwillingness to put muscle into Resolution 1441, terrorists attacked the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad. On Oct. 6, 2002, terrorists blew up a French tanker. On Oct. 12, 2002, in Bali, Indonesia, terrorists bombed a nightclub. And terrorists in Iraq recently bombed a Red Cross building.

As for President Bush, not a bad couple of weeks. First, the economy appears to be bouncing back nicely, with unemployment compensation claims going down, the stock market in a boom, and economic growth last quarter now pegging the '90s boom rate of growth at a brisk 6 or 7 percent.

Congress voted for his requested $87 billion to support the troops in Iraq and to assist in that country's reconstruction. And the United Nations unanimously approved a resolution opening the door for the possibility of foreign troops in Iraq as well as the discussed financial contributions.

North Korea earlier refused to discontinue a nuclear weapons program without a formal U.S. non-aggression treaty. Now Kim Jong Il agrees to discontinue with only a written security assurance from the United States. (But as President Ronald Reagan warned, trust but verify. Remember, the Koreans lied to former President Clinton.)

In Iran, after many defiant statements, the country now agrees to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect and assure the world that it, too, intends to discontinue its weapons program. Do you think that perhaps the president's invasion of Iraq made the other two-thirds of the Axis of Evil just a tad skittish? Coincidence?

Oh, well, as always, the Democratic presidential contenders can still browbeat Bush for failing to master the pronunciation of the word "nuclear."

Why Dems are wrong on taxes

http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | The Bush administration's prophecy that its tax cuts would produce an economic recovery is coming true. The New York Times - whose editorial page tirelessly campaigns against any and all tax cuts and sees government as our salvation from virtually every problem - carried an item last Monday (Oct. 27) that must have caused the newspaper's editorial staff to suffer the journalistic equivalent of shock and awe.

In a front-page story about the fastest pace of economic growth in four years, there was this rare (for The Times) admission: "Most of that growth stemmed from a sharp rise in consumer spending, driven largely by a continuing boom in mortgage refinancing and checks that were mailed out as part of the recent tax cut." (emphasis mine)

Low interest rates and tax cuts are the twin strategies of the Bush administration for restoring the economy following the post-9/11 recession. They appear to be working.

Millerisms

As reported in the American Enterprise, sultan of smirk Dennis Miller recently let loose with some trademark bits of wit.

On Bill and Hill:
"Bill and Hillary's marriage couldn't have been any more about convenience than if they'd installed a Slim Jim rack and Slurpee machine at the base of their bed."

On Hill's New York residence:
"I'm convinced that Bill Clinton put her up there because he knew New York was a community property state, vis-א-vis divorce settlements."

On the Dixie Chicks:
"When it first happened, I thought, 'I'm never going to buy another one of their albums.' And then I thought, 'You know what, I've never bought one of their albums -- I don't like their music.'"

On show biz:
"Show business is a freakish break. It's an amazing confluence of events that affords you a life for which you should hit your knees every night and thank God that you've been blessed to be given."

On President Bush's religious beliefs:
"In this messed-up world, I like seeing my president pray. I don't think a person can get answers out of books anymore. This is an infinitely complex world, and at some point one has to have faith in one's religion. I find it endearing that President Bush prays to God and that he's not an agnostic or an atheist. I'm glad there's someone higher that he has to answer to."

The Left Coast Report thinks Miller's just what the comedic political field needs -- a cerebral guy with a charismatic style who makes conservatives smile.

Bubba and the Russian Orchestra

A new CD is about to be released. This one is going to feature performances by Sophia Loren, Mikhail Gorbachev and, believe or not, William Jefferson Blythe Clinton.

The unusual trio will be narrating along to classical music that will be performed by the Russian National Orchestra (RNO).

"I first heard the RNO some years ago and welcomed the opportunity to collaborate artistically with this remarkable orchestra," the legendary Loren said in a statement.

All three CD personalities have designated charities they would like to see receive their royalties from the project.

Loren wants the dough to go to Magic of Music, an arts therapy program.

Gorbachev wants the cash funneled into Green Cross International, the enviro-socialist organization that he controls.

Clinton wants the money donated to the International AIDS Trust.

The musical pieces that the RNO will perform are Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf" and Jean-Pascal Beintus' "Wolf Tracks."

The Left Coast Report wonders if, by any chance, the wolf is going to have an Arkansas accent.

U.S. VOICES ASSESSMENT OF WMD TO SYRIA

WASHINGTON [MENL] -- For the first time, the U.S. intelligence community has released an assessment that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were transferred to neighboring Syria in the weeks prior to the U.S.-led war against the Saddam Hussein regime.

U.S. officials said the assessment was based on satellite images of convoys of Iraqi trucks that poured into Syria in February and March 2003. The officials said the intelligence community assessed that the trucks contained missiles and WMD components banned by the United Nations Security Council.

The U.S. intelligence assessment was discussed publicly for the first time by the director of the National Imagery and Mapping Agency in a briefing in Washington on Tuesday. James Clapper, a retired air force general and a leading member of the U.S. intelligence community, said he linked the disappearance of Iraqi WMD with the huge number of Iraqi trucks that entered Syria before and during the U.S. military campaign to topple the Saddam regime.

"I think personally that the [Iraqi] senior leadership saw what was coming and I think they went to some extraordinary lengths to dispose of the evidence," Clapper said. "I'll call it an educated hunch."

Christians in Islamic Countries

by Giuseppe De Rosa S.I.


How do Christians in Muslim-majority countries live? [...] We must first highlight a seemingly rather curious fact: in all the countries of North Africa (Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco), before the Muslim invasion and despite incursions by vandals, there were blossoming Christian communities that contributed to the universal Church great personalities, such as Tertullian; Saint Ciprian, bishop of Carthage, martyred in 258; Saint Augustine, bishop of Hippo; and Saint Fulgentius, bishop of Ruspe. But after the Arab conquest, Christianity was absorbed by Islam to such an extent that today it has a significant presence only in Egypt, with the Coptic Orthodox and other tiny Christian minorities, which make up 7-10 percent of the Egyptian population.

The same can be said of the Middle East (Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Jordan, Mesopotamia), in which there were flourishing Christian areas prior to the Islamic invasion, and where today there are only small Christian communities, with the exception of Lebanon, where Christians make up a significant part of the population.

As for present-day Turkey, this was in the first Christian centuries the land in which Christianity bore its best fruits in the areas of liturgy, theology, and monastic life. The invasion of the Seljuk Turks and the conquest of Constantinople by Mehmet II (1453) lead to the founding of the Ottoman empire and to the near destruction of Christianity in the Anatolian peninsula. Thus today in Turkey Christians number approximately 100,000, among whom are a small number of Orthodox, who live around Phanar, the see of the ecumenical patriarchate of Constantinople, who has the primacy of honor in the Orthodox world and who holds communion with eight patriarchs and many autocephalous Churches in both East and West, with approximately 180 million faithful.

In conclusion, we may state in historical terms that in all the places where Islam imposed itself by military force, which has few historical parallels for its rapidity and breadth, Christianity, which had been extraordinarily vigorous and rooted for centuries, practically disappeared or was reduced to tiny islands in an endless Islamic sea. It is not easy to explain how that could have happened. [...]

In reality, the reduction of Christianity to a small minority was not due to violent religious persecution, but to the conditions in which Christians were forced to live in the organization of the Islamic state. [...]

THE WARRIOR FACE OF ISLAM: "JIHAD"

According to Islamic law, the world is divided into three parts: dar al-harb (the house of war), dar al-islam (the house of Islam), and dar al-`ahd (the house of accord); that is, the countries with which a treaty was stipulated. [...]

As for the countries belonging to the "house of war," Islamic canon law recognizes no relations with them other than "holy war" (jihad), which signifies an "effort" in the way of Allah and has two meanings, both of which are equally essential and must not be dissociated, as if one could exist without the other. In its primary meaning, jihad indicates the "effort" that the Muslim must undertake to be faithful to the precepts of the Koran and so improve his "submission" (islam) to Allah; in the second, it indicates the "effort" that the Muslim must undertake to "fight in the way of Allah," which means fighting against the infidels and spreading Islam throughout the world. Jihad is a precept of the highest importance, so much so that it is sometimes counted among the fundamental precepts of Islam, as its sixth "pillar."

Obedience to the precept of the "holy war" explains why the history of Islam is one of unending warfare for the conquest of infidel lands. [...] In particular, all of Islamic history is dominated by the idea of the conquest of the Christian lands of Western Europe and of the Eastern Roman Empire, whose capital was Constantinople. Thus, through many centuries, Islam and Christianity faced each other in terrible battles, which led on one side to the conquest of Constantinople (1453), Bulgaria, and Greece, and on the other, to the defeat of the Ottoman empire in the naval battle of Lepanto (1571).

But the conquering spirit of Islam did not die after Lepanto. The Islamic advance into Europe was definitively halted only in 1683, when Vienna was liberated from the Ottoman siege by the Christian armies under the command of John III Sobieski, the king of Poland. [...] In reality, for almost a thousand years Europe was under constant threat from Islam, which twice put its survival in serious danger.

Thus, in all of its history, Islam has shown a warlike face and a conquering spirit for the glory of Allah. [...] against the "idolaters" who must be given a choice: convert to Islam, or be killed. [...] As for the "people of the Book" (Christians, Jews, and "Sabeans"), Muslims must "fight them until their members pay tribute, one by one, humiliated" (Koran, Sura 9:29). [...]

THE REGIME OF THE "DHIMMA"

According to Muslim law, Christians, Jews, and the followers of other religions assimilated to Christianity and Judaism (the "Sabeans") who live in a Muslim state belong to an inferior social order, in spite of their eventually belonging to the same race, language, and descent. Islamic law does not recognize the concepts of nation and citizenship, but only the umma, the one Islamic community, for which reason a Muslim, as he is part of the umma, may live in any Islamic country as he would in his homeland: he is subject to the same laws, finds the same customs, and enjoys the same consideration.

But those belonging to the "people of the Book" are subject to the dhimma, which is a kind of bilateral treaty consisting in the fact that the Islamic state authorizes the "people of the Book" to inhabit its lands, tolerates its religion, and guarantees the "protection" of its persons and goods and its defense from external enemies. Thus the "people of the Book" (Ahl al-Kitab) becomes the "protected people" (Ahl al-dhimma). In exchange for this "protection," the "people of the Book" must pay a tax (jizya) to the Islamic state, which is imposed only upon able-bodied free men, excluding women, children, and the old and infirm, and pay a tribute, called the haram, on the lands in its possession.

As for the freedom of worship, the dhimmi are prohibited only from external manifestations of worship, such as the ringing of bells, processions with the cross, solemn funerals, and the public sale of religious objects or other articles prohibited for Muslims. A Muslim man who marries a Christian or a Jew must leave her free to practice her religion and also to consume the foods permitted by her religion, even if they are forbidden for Muslims, such as pork or wine. The dhimmi may maintain or repair the churches or synagogues they already have, but, unless there is a treaty permitting them to own land, they may not build new places of worship, because to do this they would need to occupy Muslim land, which can never be ceded to anyone, having become, through Muslim conquest, land "sacred" to Allah.

In Sura 9:29 the Koran affirms that the "people of the Book," apart from being constrained to pay the two taxes mentioned above, must be placed under certain restrictions, such as dressing in a special way and not being allowed to bear arms or ride on horseback. Furthermore, the dhimmi may not serve in the army, be functionaries of the state, be witnesses in trials between Muslims, take the daughters of Muslims as their wives, be the guardians of underage Muslims, or keep Muslim slaves. They may not inherit from Muslims, nor Muslims from them, but legacies are permitted.

The release of the dhimma came about above all through conversion of the "people of the Book" to islam; but Muslims, especially in the early centuries, did not look favorably upon such conversions, because they represented a grave loss to the treasury, which flourished in direct proportion to the number of the dhimmi, who paid both the personal tax and the land tax. The dissolution of dhimma status could also take place through failure to observe the "treaty"; that is, if the dhimmi took up arms against Muslims, refused to remain subject or to pay tribute, abducted a Muslim woman, blasphemed or offended the prophet Mohammed and the Islamic religion, or if they drew a Muslim away from Islam, converting him to their own religion. According to the gravity of each case, the penalty could be the confiscation of goods, reduction to slavery, or death - unless the person who had committed the crimes converted to Islam. In that case, all penalties were waived.

CONSEQUENCE: THE EROSION OF CHRISTIANITY

It is evident that the condition of the dhimmi, prolonged through centuries, has led slowly but inexorably to the near extinction of Christianity in Muslim lands: the condition of civil inferiority, which prevented Christians from attaining public offices, and the condition of religious inferiority, which closed them in an asphyxiated religious life and practice with no possibility of development, put the Christians to the necessity of emigrating, or, more frequently, to the temptation of converting to Islam. There was also the fact that a Christian could not marry a Muslim woman without converting to Islam, in part because her children had to be educated in that faith. Furthermore, a Christian who became Muslim could divorce very easily, whereas Christianity prohibited divorce. And apart from all this, the Christians in Muslim territories were seriously divided among themselves - and frequently even enemies - because they belonged to Churches that were different by confession (Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian Churches) and by rite (Syro-oriental, Antiochian, Maronite, Coptic-Alexandrian, Armenian, Byzantine). Thus mutual assistance was almost impossible.

The regime of the dhimma lasted for over a millennium, even if not always and everywhere in the harsh form called "the conditions of `Umar," according to which Christians not only did not have the right to construct new churches and restore existing ones, even if they fell into ruins (and, if they had the permission to construct through the good will of the Muslim governor, the churches could not be of large dimensions: the building must be more modest than all the religious buildings around it); but the largest and most beautiful churches had to be transformed into mosques. That transformation made it impossible for the church-mosques ever to be restored to the Christian community, because a place that has become a mosque cannot be put to another use.

The consequence of the dhimma regime was the "erosion" of the Christian communities and the conversion of many Christians to Islam for economic, social, and political motives: to find a better job, enjoy a better social status, participate in administrative, political, and military life, and in order not to live in a condition of perpetual discrimination.

In recent centuries, the dhimma system has undergone some modifications, in part because the ideas of citizenship and the equality of all citizens before the state have gained a foothold even in Muslim countries. Nevertheless, in practice, the traditional conception is still present. [...] The Christian, whether he wish it or not, is brought back in spite of himself to the concept of the dhimmi, even if the term no longer appears in the present-day laws of a good number of Muslim-majority countries.

To understand the present condition of these Christians, we must refer back to the history of the 19th and 20th centuries. In the Ottoman empire of the 19th century, where the millet system was in force, the tanzimat, "regulations" of a liberal character, were introduced. [...] From the second half of the 19th century to the end of the first World War, there was a "Reawakening" (Nahda) movement in the Arab world, under Western influence, in the fields of literature, language, and thought. Many intellectuals were conquered by liberal ideas.

On another front, the Christians created strong ties with the Western powers - France and Great Britain in particular - which, after the dissolution of the Ottoman empire, obtained the protectorate of the countries that had belonged to the empire. This permitted the Christians both greater civil and religious liberty and cultural advancement. Moreover, during the first half of the 20th century various political parties of nationalist and socialist, and thus secularist, tendencies were born, such as the Ba'th, the Socialist Party of the Arab Renewal, founded at the end of the 1930's in Damascus by Syrian professor Michel `Aflaz, a Greek Orthodox. In 1953 this party was united with the Syrian Popular Party, founded in 1932 by Antun Sa'ada, a Greek Orthodox from Lebanon. In brief, political regimes inspired by the liberal and secular principles of Western Europe rose up in various Islamic countries.

THE BIRTH OF RADICAL ISLAM

These events provoked a harsh reaction in the Islamic world, due to fears that the secularist ideas and "corrupt" customs of the Western world, identified with Christianity, would endanger the purity of Islam and constitute a deadly threat to its very existence. This reaction was fed by strong resentment against the Western powers, which had dared to impose their political rule upon Islam, "the greatest nation ever raised up by Allah among men" (Koran, s. 3:110), and against their customs "despised" by the "nation (umma) that urges to goodness, promotes justice, and restrains iniquity" (ibid, s. 3:104).

Thus was born "radical Islam," which set itself up as the interpreter of the frustrations of the Muslim masses. Hasan al Banna, Sayyd Qutb, Abd al-Qadir `Uda in Egypt with the Muslim Brotherhood; Abu l-A`li al-Mawdudi in Pakistan, and the Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran are its most significant witnesses, and their followers have spread from Dakar to Kuala Lumpur. [...]

THE PRESENT CONDITION OF CHRISTIANS IN THE MUSLIM WORLD

Radical Islam, which proposes that shari'a law be instituted in every Islamic state, is gaining ground in many Muslim countries, in which groups of Christians are also present. It is evident that the institution of shari'a would render the lives of Christians rather difficult, and their very existence would be constantly in danger. This is the cause of the mass emigration of Christians from Islamic countries to Western countries: Europe, the United States, Canada, and Australia. [...] The estimated number of Arab Christians who have emigrated from Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Israel in the last decade hovers around three million, which is from 26.5 to 34.1 percent of the estimated number of Christians currently living in the Middle East.

Furthermore, we must not underestimate grave recent actions against Christians in some Muslim-majority countries. In Algeria, the bishop of Orano, P. Claverie (1996), seven Trappist monks from Tibehirini (1999), four White Fathers (1994), and six sisters from various religious congregations have been brutally killed by Islamic fundamentalists, although the murders were condemned by numerous Muslim authorities. In Pakistan, which numbers 3,800,000 Christians among a population of 156,000,000 (96 percent Muslim), on October 28, 2001, some Muslims entered the Church of St. Dominic in Bahawalpur and gunned down 18 Christians. On May 6, 1998, Catholic bishop John Joseph killed himself for protesting against the blasphemy law, which punishes with death anyone who offends Mohammed, even only "by speaking words, or by actions and through allusions, directly or indirectly." For example, by saying that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, one offends Mohammed, who affirmed that Jesus is not the Son of God, but his "servant." With this kind of law, Christians are in constant danger of death.

In Nigeria - where 13 states have introduced shari'a as state law - several thousand Christians have been the victims of incidents. Serious incidents are taking place in the south of the Philippines and in Indonesia, which, with its 212 million inhabitants, is the most populous Muslim country in the world, to the harm of the Christians of Java, East Timor, and the Moluccas. But the most tragic situation - and, unfortunately, forgotten by the Western world! - is that of Sudan, where the North is Arab and Muslim, and the South black and Christian, and in part, animist. Since the time of president G.M. Nimeiry, there has been a state of civil war between the North, which has proclaimed shari'a and intends to impose it with fierce violence on the rest of the country, and the South, which aims to preserve and defend its Christian identity. The North makes use of all of its military power - financed by oil exports to the West - to destroy Christian villages; prevent the arrival of humanitarian aid; kill the cattle, which are the means of sustenance for many South Sudanese; and carry out raids, for Christian girls in particular, who are brought to the North, raped, and sold as slaves or concubines to rich, older Sudanese men. According to the 2001 report of Amnesty International, "at the end of 2000, the civil war, which started again in 1983, had cost the lives of almost two million persons and had caused the forced evacuation of 4,500,000 more. Tens of thousands of persons have been compelled by terror to leave their homes in the upper Nile region, which is rich in oil, after aerial bombardments, mass executions, and torture."

We must, finally, recall a fact that is often forgotten because Saudi Arabia is the largest provider of oil to the Western world, and the latter therefore has an interest in not disturbing relations with that country. In reality, in Saudi Arabia, where wahhabism is in force, not only is it impossible to build a church or even a tiny place of worship, but any act of Christian worship or any sign of Christian faith is severely prohibited with the harshest penalties. Thus about a million Christians working in Saudi Arabia are deprived by violence of any Christian practice or sign. They may participate in mass or in other Christian practices - and even then with the serious danger of losing their jobs - only on the property of the foreign oil companies. And yet, Saudi Arabia spends billions of petrodollars, not for the benefit of its poor citizens or of poor Muslims in other Muslim countries, but to construct mosques and madrasas in Europe and to finance the imams of the mosques in all the Western countries. We recall that the Roman mosque of Monte Antenne, constructed on land donated by the Italian government, was principally financed by Saudi Arabia and was built to be the largest mosque in Europe, in the very heart of Christianity.

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A link to the historic magazine of the Jesuits in Rome:

> "La Civilt? Cattolica"

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The following is an interview published in the latest edition of "Il Regno," the biweekly of the Sacred Heart congregation of Bologna. The man interviewed is a Coptic Orthodox Christian, the director of a Cairo weekly. The picture he paints of the condition of Christians in Egypt - usually classified among the "moderate" Arab countries - fully confirms what was more generally described by "La Civilt? Cattolica":


Christians in Egypt. The Humiliation Continues

An interview with Youssef Sidhom, director of "Watani"


CAIRO - Youssef Sidhom is the director of the weekly "Watani" ("My Homeland"). Founded in 1958 by his father, Antoun Sidhom, it has always published news and commentary on the Church and Christianity, themes completely overlooked by all the other Egyptian newspapers. Many believe it to be a newspaper of the Coptic Orthodox Church, but that's not true. It is independent, and has no particular relationship with that Church, nor does it receive financial support from it. [...]

What are the main problems of the Christians in Egypt?

"The most striking problem is the extreme difficulty in receiving permission to build a church. Current legislation offers all of the incentives for the construction of mosques, but it poses almost insurmountable obstacles to the construction of churches. In 1934, the undersecretary for the minister of the interior, Muhammad al-`Azabi, made ten conditions for giving permission for the construction of a church, and those conditions are still valid. Let's cite a few of them: a church must not be built on farm land; it must not be close to a mosque or monument; if it is to be constructed in a zone in which Muslims also live, one must first obtain their permission; there must be a sufficient number of Christians in the area; there must not be other churches nearby; police permission must be obtained if there are bridges or canals of the Nile near or if there is a railroad; the signature of the president of the republic must be obtained. All these conditions cause insurmountable difficulties. In fact, more than ten years can go by while waiting for police permission, and in the meantime mosques are hurriedly erected in the vicinity of the area where the church was meant to be, and the project stumbles against another prohibition. Moreover, it is not specified how many Christians there must be for them to have the right to a church. If, for example, there are 1,500, the government can say that that's not a sufficient number, when a hundred would be enough to fill one of our churches."

But hasn't President Mubarak facilitated the granting of these permissions by delegating the matter to the provincial prefects?

"Yes, he allowed the permits to be given by the provincial prefects, and a year later he ruled that they can also be given by the territory's local authority. But this delegated authority only regards the permits to repair and restructure the churches. The permission to construct a new church is still the sole prerogative of the president of the republic. [...] This discrimination in the matter of the construction of churches leads Christians to the bitter conviction that the state considers them second-class citizens. For the state, a Christian is a kafir, an infidel, he doesn't know the true religion or have the true faith, so it's not worth it to listen to him. In Egypt we live with humiliating discrimination on religious grounds." [...]

Does the discrimination regard only the construction of churches, or other aspects of social life for Christians in Egypt as well?

"It regards our entire life. There's discrimination in state offices. According to the constitution, the president must be a Muslim. The Islamic religion is the foundation of Egyptian legislation. Today, no Christian can be prime minister, even though there have been Christian prime ministers in the past. Of the thirty-two ministers, only two are Christians: the finance minister and the minister of the environment. No city or village mayor can be a Christian. The high posts in the military, the police, and the presidential guard are filled only with Muslims. There are hundreds of persons in the diplomatic corps, but only two or three Christians. No Christian can attain high office in the tribunals. According to the law, two witnesses are necessary to justify a sentence, but if one of them is Christian, the judge may refuse his testimony because it comes from an infidel. The rectors of the universities must be Muslim. [...] In any office, the career of a Muslim who has just arrived will advance beyond that of a Christian who has been in his post for years. In the 2000 elections, the al-Watani party, which dominates politics in the country, listed only three Christians among 888 candidates. A Christian may not teach Arabic, because this material is linked to the teaching of the Islamic religion. Discrimination is at work even on our identity card, where the religion of one's father is shown."

And in case of divorce?

"The law provides that the children should remain with their mother. But if the father wants to divorce because he has become a Muslim, which happens frequently, the judge rules that the children should remain on the side that has the true faith, meaning the father. So children born to Christians grow up in a completely Muslim family."

"Is changing religions permitted?"

"Anyone who becomes Muslim is welcomed with big parties. They change his identity card very quickly; he is helped in his job, with his house, etc. But if a Muslim wants to become Christian, they not only seek to dissuade him by any means, but his very life is in danger. I believe that every day there are Egyptians who change religions, but it's impossible to know how many. Al-Ahzar would willingly publish the statistics, which would be a sign of victory and glory, but the Church could never make a choice like this, because it would bring about many tragedies. In any case, there is a ruling by the tribunal that establishes that if an Egyptian is born non-Muslim, becomes Muslim, and then wants to return to his original faith, he may do it. But a Muslim by birth may never change religions, on pain of exclusion from his inheritance and from the society to which he belongs - with danger to his own safety."

(Interview by Camillo Ballin and Francesco Strazzari)

__________


The complete text of the interview is in the September 15, 2003 edition of

> "Il Regno"

A link to the Cairo weekly directed by Youssef Sidhom, with articles in English:

> "Watani"


On this site, on the confrontation being played out in the leadership of the Catholic Church over relations with Islam and the manner of treating conversions from Islam to Christianity:

> My Friend, Islam: The "Dialogue At All Costs" of Pope Wojtyla (8.9.2003)

And on the roots of the widespread philo-Islamism in Catholic circles:

> Is Europe a Province of Islam? The Danger is Called Dhimmitude (17.3.2003)

BIG FRIGGIN' DEAL - Parody

By Dr. Professor Dr. Paul Krugman, PhD

NY Times Economic Analyst (lol)

The Commerce Department, part and parcel of the Bush junta, and likely populated by Enron criminals, announces very "good" growth during the previous quarter. To many unsophisticated, non-Princeton employed observers, the economy's troubles are magically over, and there will be kittens and rainbows and beautiful lollipop flavored unicorns and so forth. And the administration's supporters claim that the economy's turnaround validates its policies.

That's what happened 18 months ago, when a preliminary estimate put first-quarter 2002 growth at 5.8 percent. That was later revised down to 5.0, which is an 0.8 percent reverse over a basis of 5.8 percent, which barely covered the weekend line at Harrahs. More important, growth in the next quarter slumped and staggered to 1.3 percent, reeling and spinning and then embarrassingly putting on a lampshade and singing "Put Some Sugar On Me" by Def Leppard before passing out in the guest toilet. We now know that the economy wasn't really on the mend, and that the Bush plan to revive the totally wasted economy by putting its finger in a warm glass of tax cuts would cause it to pee 600,000 jobs all over the guest bed.

The same story unfolded in the third quarter of 2002, when growth rose to 4 percent, and the economy actually gained 200,000 jobs. But growth slipped back down to 1.4 percent, and job losses resumed. Up and down, up and down.

My purpose is not to denigrate the impressive wild-ass guess of 7.2 percent growth rate for the third quarter of 2003. It is, rather, to stress the obvious: we've had our hopes dashed in the past, hoping against hope for a $50,000 no-show consulting gig or maybe an all-expense paid trip to Indonesia, like in the golden era of Clinton's internet economic Camelot. Rotsa ruck, naive hope-boy.

The weakness of that spurt 18 months ago was obvious to those who bothered to look at it closely and administer strict Olympic doping tests. Half the growth came simply because businesses, having set fire to their inventories in the previous quarter possibly to cover a nasty alimony settlement, were forced to ramp up production by "The Outfit" to keep the whole thing quiet-like, kapeesh?. This time around growth has a much better foundation: final demand -- demand excluding changes in inventories less Napster dowloads divided by predepreciation spoilage -- actually grew even faster than G.D.P.

But -- you knew there would be a but -- and you probably also knew there would be a hyphenated clause following the but -- but you were probably not expecting the previous hyphenated clause -- there are still some reasons to wonder whether the economy has really turned the corner or merely stopped at Stuckeys for a Pecan Log and hillbilly souvenirs.

First, while there was a significant pickup in business investment, the bulk of last quarter's growth came from a huge surge in consumer spending. This clearly indicates mass insanity, as I have long noted that consumers are best advised to revert to subsistence practices -- gathering their own wool, feeding on stray animals and so forth -- until the long illegal Bush nightmare ends in 2004. Yet the idiots are wasting money on cars and houses and spitting Kristal like some Eastside Gangsta on MTV Cribs. Christ, you people are nuts.

This can't go on -- in the long run, consumer spending can't outpace the growth in consumer income. Soon the repo man will put the smackdown on the Bentley and the Virage and the Escalade with the phly-ass Latrell spinner dubs. Your baby's momma be all over you ass for child support. You be drinkin' away all that Courvoisier in you Sub Zero. Fitty, he stop returning you cell calls. Your crew drop you like a punk. Then you be all sad ass joke, like MC Hammer, doin' infomercials and Hollywood Squares and shit.

The big question, of course, is jobs. Despite all that growth in the third quarter, the number of jobs actually fell. And the leading academic phrenologists see little hope for either reduced unemployment claims or a new "special someone" in your life. (By the way, for the last month there's been a peculiar pattern: each week, people are all happy and excited on Friday, the following Monday their mood has been revised significantly downward, and the apparent optimism decline disappears.)

Still, it's possible that we really have reached a turning point. If so, does it validate the Bush economic program? Well, no. Duhhhh.

Stimulating the economy in the short run is supposed to be easy. All you need to do is invite the economy out -- if it's reluctant, just say it's "completely like a platonic friendship thing" -- and then drop a few taxcut "Roofies" in the economy's drink at the PhiDelt Friday smoker. Then drag the economy back to the dorm, put a sock on the doorknob, and wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am. The trick is to do this without incurring debt, and still make it to your 8am section of Macro Econ.

To put it more bluntly: President Bush totally sucks.

October 31, 2003, 8:40 a.m.

"Those Jews"   Victor Davis Hason NRO

If only Israel and its supporters would disappear.

There are certain predictable symptoms to watch when a widespread amorality begins to infect a postmodern society: cultural relativism, atheism, socialism, utopian pacifism. Another sign, of course, is fashionable anti-Semitism among the educated, or the idea that some imaginary cabal, or some stealthy agenda -- certainly not our own weakness -- is conspiring to threaten our good life.

Well apart from the spooky placards (stars of David juxtaposed with swastikas, posters calling for the West Bank to be expanded to "the sea") that we are accustomed to seeing at the marches of the supposedly ethical antiwar movement, we have also heard some examples of Jew-baiting and hissing in the last two weeks that had nothing to do with the old crazies. Indeed, such is the nature of the new anti-Semitism that everyone can now play at it -- as long as it is cloaked in third-world chauvinism, progressive thinking, and identity politics.

The latest lunatic rantings from Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad are nothing new, and we should not be surprised by his mindless blabbering about Jews and his fourth-grade understanding of World War II and the present Middle East. But what was fascinating was the reaction to his madness: silence from the Arab intelligentsia, praise from Middle Eastern leaders ("A brilliant speech," gushed Iran's "president" Mohammad Khatami), and worry from France and Greece about an EU proclamation against the slander. Most American pundits were far more concerned about the private, over-the-top comments of Gen. Boykin than about the public viciousness of a head of state. Paul Krugman, for example, expressed the general mushiness of the Left when he wrote a column trying to put Mahathir Mohamad's hatred in a sympathetic context, something he would never do for a Christian zealot who slurred Muslims.

Much has been written about the usually circumspect Greg Easterbrook's bizarre ranting about "Jewish executives" who profit from Quentin Tarantino's latest bloody production. But, again, the problem is not so much the initial slips and slurs as it is the more calculated and measured "explanation." Easterbrook's mea culpa cited his prior criticism of Mel Gibson, as if the supposed hypocrisy of a devout and public Christian's having trafficked in filmed violence were commensurate with the dealings of two ordinary businessmen who do not publicly embrace religion. Michael Eisner and Harvey Weinstein simply happen to be movie executives, with no stake in producing Jewish movies or public-morality films, but -- like most in Hollywood -- with a stake in making money from films. That they are Jewish has absolutely no bearing on their purported lack of morality -- unless, of course, one seeks to invent some wider pathology, evoking historical paranoia about profiteering, cabals, and "the Jews."

Recently, Joseph Lieberman was hissed by an Arab-American audience in Dearborn, Mich. when he briefly explained Israel's defensive wall in terms not unlike those used by Howard Dean and other candidates. What earned him the special public rebuke not accorded to others was apparently nothing other than being Jewish -- the problem was not what he said, but who he was. No real apology followed, and the usually judicious and sober David Broder wrote an interesting column praising the new political acumen of the Arab-American community.

Tony Judt, writing in The New York Review of Books, has published one of the most valuable and revealing articles about the Middle East to appear in the last 20 years. There has always been the suspicion that European intellectuals favored the dismantling of Israel as we know it through the merging of this uniquely democratic and liberal state with West Bank neighbors who have a horrific record of human-rights abuses, autocracy, and mass murder. After all, for all too many Europeans, how else but with the end of present-day Israel will the messy Middle East and its attendant problems -- oil, terrorism, anti-Semitism, worries over unassimilated Muslim populations in Europe, anti-Americanism, and postcolonial guilt -- become less bothersome? Moreover, who now knows or cares much about what happened to Jews residing under Arab governments -- the over half-million or so who, in the last half-century, have been ethnically cleansed from (and sometimes murdered in) Baghdad, Cairo, Damascus, and almost every Jewish community in the Arab Middle East?

And what is the value of the only democratic government in a sea of autocracy if its existence butts up against notions of third-world victimhood and causes so much difficulty for the Western intelligentsia? Still, few intellectuals were silly enough to dress up that insane idea under the pretext of a serious argument (an unhinged Vidal, Chomsky, or Said does not count). Judt did, and now he has confirmed what most of us knew for years -- namely, that there is an entrenched and ever-bolder school of European thought that favors the de facto elimination of what is now a democratic Jewish state.

What links all these people -- a Muslim head of state, a rude crowd in Michigan, an experienced magazine contributor, and a European public intellectual -- besides their having articulated a spreading anger against the "Jews"? Perhaps a growing unease with hard questions that won't go away and thus beg for easy, cheap answers.

A Malaysian official and his apologists must realize that gender apartheid, statism, tribalism, and the anti-democratic tendencies of the Middle East cause its poverty and frustration despite a plethora of natural resources (far more impressive assets than the non-petroleum-bearing rocks beneath parched Israel). But why call for introspection when the one-syllable slur "Jews" suffices instead?

And why would an Arab-American audience -- itself composed of many who fled the tyranny and economic stagnation of Arab societies for the freedom and opportunity of a liberal United States -- wish to hear a reasoned explanation of the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian war when it was so much easier to hiss and moan, especially when mainstream observers would ignore their anti-Semitism and be impressed instead with the cadre of candidates who flock to Michigan?

How do you explain to an audience that Quentin Tarantino appeals both to teens and to empty-headed critics precisely because something is terribly amiss in America, when affluent and leisured suburbanites are drawn to scenes of raw killing as long as it is dressed up with "art" and "meaning"?

How could a Tony Judt write a reasoned and balanced account of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when to do so would either alienate or bore the literati?

So they all, whether by design or laxity, take the easier way out -- especially when slurring "Israel" or "the Jews" involves none of the risks of incurring progressive odium that similarly clumsy attacks against blacks, women, Palestinians, or homosexuals might draw, requires no real thinking, and seems to find an increasingly receptive audience.

You see, in our mixed-up world those Jewish are not a "people of color." And if there really is such a mythical monolithic entity in America as the "Jews," they (much like the Cubans) are not easily stereotyped as impoverished victims needing largesse or condescension, and much less are they eligible under any of the current myriad of rubrics that count for public support. Israel is a successful Western state, not a failed third-world despotism. Against terrible oppression and overt anti-Semitism, the Jewish community here and abroad found success -- proof that hard work, character, education, and personal discipline can trump both natural and human adversity. In short, the story of American Jewry and Israel resonates not at all with the heartstrings of a modern therapeutic society, which is quick to show envy for the successful and cheap concern for the struggling.

This fashionable anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism -- especially among purported intellectuals of the Left -- reveals a deep-seated, scary pathology that is growing geometrically both in and outside the West. For a Europe that is disarmed, plagued by a demographic nightmare of negative population growth and unsustainable entitlements, filled with unassimilated immigrants, and deeply angry about the power and presence of the United States, the Jews and their Israel provide momentary relief on the cheap. So expect that more crazy thoughts of Israel's destruction dressed up as peace plans will be as common as gravestone and synagogue smashing.

For the Muslim world that must confront the power of the patriarch, mullah, tribe, and autocrat if it is ever to share the freedom and prosperity of the rest of the world, the Jews offer a much easier target. So expect even more raving madness as the misery of Islamic society grows and its state-run media hunker down amid widespread unrest. Anticipate, also, more sick posters at C-SPAN broadcast marches, more slips by reasonable writers, and more anti-Israeli denunciations from the "liberals."

These are weird, weird times, and before we win this messy war against Islamic fascism and its sponsors, count on things to get even uglier. Don't expect any reasoned military analysis that puts the post-9/11 destruction of the Taliban and Saddam Hussein's evil regime, along with the liberation of 50 million at the cost of 300 American lives, in any sort of historical context. After all, in the current presidential race, a retired general now caricatures U.S. efforts in Iraq and quotes Al Sharpton.

Do not look for the Islamic community here to acknowledge that the United States, in little over a decade, freed Kuwait, saved most of the Bosnians and Kosovars, tried to feed Somalis, urged the Russians not to kill Chechnyans, belatedly ensured that no longer were Shiites and Kurds to be slaughtered in Iraq, spoke out against Kuwait's ethnic cleansing of a third of a million Palestinians -- and now is spending $87 billion to make Iraqis free.

That the Arab world would appreciate billions of dollars in past American aid to Jordan, Egypt, and the Palestinian Authority, or thank America for its help in Kuwait and Kosovo, or be grateful to America for freeing Iraq -- all this is about as plausible as the idea that Western Europeans would acknowledge their past salvation from Nazism and Soviet Communism, or be grateful for the role the United States plays to promote democracy in Panama, Haiti, the Balkans, or the Middle East.

No, in this depressing age, the real problem is apparently our support for democratic Israel and all those pesky Jews worldwide, who seem to crop up everywhere as sly war makers, grasping film executives, conspiratorial politicians, and greedy colonialists, and thus make life so difficult for the rest of us.

HEY NPR...THERE'S A THIRD ALTERNATIVE

By Gerald A. Honigman
October 22, 2003

I was driving home from work on October 20th when I was treated to some more National Public Radio wisdom. Keep in mind, the American taxpayer funds much of this programming.

The show was about the Arab-Israeli conflict and reflected NPR's usual anti-Israel slant. This time the topic was about growing frustration on the Arab side regarding the improbability of another viable Arab state in Palestine arising any time soon. Of course, no mention was given to why that second state would not likely emerge: the rejectionist mentality of the Arab side for a viable Jewish neighbor.

So the issue of an alternative solution became the focus of the program. Since Arabs could not get everything that they want in this proposed second Arab state (compromise is evidently not in the Arab vocabulary), the focus of the show turned to a discussion of the creation of one binational state for Jews and Arabs instead. At no time did the fact that Arabs had rejected a solution a few years earlier which would have given them almost everything they claim they wanted short of Israel agreeing to slit its own throat come out in the program.

The discussion went like this: Since the sole miniscule state of the Jews (my own description) won't consent to giving up on its own minimal security needs (most nations demand far more) so that a 23rd Arab nation can be born, the soaring Arab birth rate would insure that the Jews would be overwhelmed in any democratic binational endeavor. Jews were then interviewed about their own feelings regarding this proposed alternative, and Israel, of course, was the "heavy" for not consenting to allowing Arabs to have all that they want in the disputed territories.

Now what I'm about to say next is really nothing new. Indeed, not much "new" has been written about this conflict for decades...just rehashed old arguments and positions.

What was missing from NPR's program, to no real surprise, was the obvious third alternative. The producers at NPR are not dummies, so the omission was deliberate....and so far worse.

After the Paris Peace Conference closing World War I, Great Britain was awarded its share of the spoils of the former Ottoman Turkish Empire. The Turks had ruled the Middle East and North Africa for some four centuries. The Brits' share largely consisted of Mandates for Palestine and Mesopotamia. The borders of Palestine Britain received on April 25, 1920 included lands which are now Israel, Jordan, and all unapportioned territories in between as well.

But these were complex times of multiple promises to competing national groups. Britain's chief allies in the area were the Hashemites of Arabia, Sheriff Hussein and his sons, Emirs Abdullah and Feisal (remember the movie Lawrence of Arabia?). The Hashemites were in the process of getting their own derrieres booted out of the Arabian Peninsula by the rival clan of Ibn Saud...hence, Saudi Arabia today.

The French were also grabbing their share of the spoils. Their moves into Syria and Lebanon cut into the Hashemites' "Greater Syria" schemes. So now, to appease the Hashemites, the British backed off of promises to the Kurds in oil rich Mesopotamia--Hashemite Arab Iraq being created instead--and, in 1922, handed over some 80% of Mandatory Palestine to another Hashemite prince, creating the purely Arab Emirate of Transjordan and making it totally off limits to Jews.

While mention is often made to the largely "Palestinian" Arab population of Jordan, the hows and whys of this fact seldom seem to register with journalists and others involved in such discussions.

And so, the third alternative...

It's obvious that in the small area between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River, there's not a heck of a lot of room. The Jordan River was the obvious natural boundary of the Jewish State if Palestine was to be divided between Jewish and Arab nationalisms and Arabs had already received the lion's share of the original 1920 borders...all the land east of the River. When arriving at other such compromise solutions, such as that which created Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan, population exchanges were frequently part of the package...not a "perfect" solution by any means, but one which allowed each party an honorable outcome. For every Arab who eventually became a refugee because of the Arabs' own total rejection of a Jewish state regardless of size, there was a Jewish refugee who fled Arab lands...but without the choice of some two dozen other potential states to choose from.

So, for Israel to remain viable in the face of a totally rejectionist enemy whose idea of "peace," in the Arabs' own words, is only a temporary "Trojan Horse" truce designed to further a "destruction in stages" agenda, Israel cannot cave in to all the demands Arabs make regarding the disputed territories. Those lands were not lands apportioned solely to Arabs by the Mandate...so a compromise solution must be found whereby Israel gains a bit more essential strategic high ground depth while not ruling over millions of Arabs. It will never return to its former 9-mile wide, armistice/Auschwitz line existence.

Thus, the proposed 23rd Arab state and second Arab one in Palestine will have to be very small. It's desires cannot displace the needs of the sole state of the Jews it seeks to replace, not live side by side with.

The real solution, once popular but now never mentioned, lies with Jordan, since the latter encompasses 80% of the original land to begin with, and the majority population is already "Palestinian" (however you define it...many Arabs entered the Mandate from other surrounding states). So, if a compromise with Israel was to occur regarding the West Bank/Judea and Samaria with Jordan, the latter emergent Jordanian-Palestinian State would still be a much larger entity while granting Israel the minimal security adjustments it needs in the area as well.

This, of course, is never brought up these days--certainly not on NPR-- for fear of destabilizing the Hashemite rulers, who have indeed proven to be reasonable neighbors of late to Israel. It's worth recalling that it was Israel who saved Jordan from a joint Syrian-PLO attempt at the overthrow of the Hashemites in 1970.

But isn't it interesting (no, sickening) that NPR would pursue the binational alternative in its program regarding Arabs and Jews, but totally ignore the far more sensible creation of a binational Arab-Arab state in Jordan/Palestine. It's thus "legitimate" to discuss undermining the sole state of a millennially-persecuted people who finally lived to see the resurrection of their nation, but not so to discuss a solution which would merely bring together different elements within the same Arab family. Israel's Jews also come from many different lands, but that didn't mean that they expected the creation of dozens of individual Jewish states...and at the expense of everyone else.

NPR...know who not to send your money to.

Poll controversy as Israel and US labelled biggest threats to World peace

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Over half of Europeans think that Israel now presents the biggest threat to world peace according to a controversial poll requested by the European Commission.

According to the same survey, Europeans believe the United States contributes the most to world instability along with Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and North Korea.

The specially commissioned poll which asked citizens 15 questions on "the reconstruction of Iraq, the conflict in the Middle East and World peace", has caused controversy in Brussels.

The European Commission is coming under fire for publishing the results of a number of questions - relating to Iraqi reconstruction - while failing to publish the results which revealed the extent of mistrust of Israel and the United States in Europe.

A Commission spokesperson today (30 October) denied that the decision to withhold some of the results until next Monday was politically motivated, adding that some of the results not yet published are still "unstable".

He did, however, add that a decision was made to publish a preview of the questions pertaining to the reconstruction of Iraq, to coincide with the Iraqi donors conference in Madrid, which took place at the end of last week.

This admission has raised questions about whether the Commission sought to suppress the results which would have came at a particularly sensitive moment.

One pollster involved in the survey told the EUobserver that some questions being raised about the poll were unfounded.

"The questions were decided upon by both the polling organisations and the European Commission", the source said.

Israeli officials dismissed the results of the poll as propaganda.

According to El Pais, a massive 59 percent of Europeans said they believed that Israel is the biggest obstacle to world peace.

The poll, conducted by Taylor Nelson Sofres/ EOS Gallup Europe, was conducted between 8 and 16 of October.

Press Articles La Libre Belgique

UK media blasted over Israel

Media war: Daily Mail columnist Melanie Phillips and The Times' assistant editor Michael Gove debate the coverage of Israel

By Lawrence Marzouk in Barnet and Potters Bar TIMES

The media bias against Israel and the Jewish community is at pre-Second World War levels, a leading Jewish journalist has warned.

Melanie Phillips, who is an author and columnist for the Daily Mail, made the remarks at a debate last Sunday on the Media and the Middle East at The New North London Synagogue in Finchley, hosted by Michael Gove, assistant editor of The Times.

Both hacks lambasted the British media, branding it dysfunctional, and attacked it for its pro-Palestinian slant on the coverage of Middle Eastern affairs.

Ms Phillips, who is a member of the synagogue, said: "9/11 brought a type of dysfunctionality and corruption of the British media. It is not just the gullible, but the majority of the country, who have formed a very strong view over Iraq and believe that it is not so much a rogue state as Israel. What the public will be seeing of the state of Israel is not objective and not equal."

When asked whether the world today is similar to that of the 1930's, Ms Phillips said: "This is more than an etching of the 1930's. We are not facing the same thing but I do think it is extremely similar. I do not think opinions would change until there is a September 11 here. But if we have a significant attack [on a Jewish target] I do not think that we will alter people. People will simply say they had it coming."

Both journalists claimed the press cherry-picked evidence to distort stories on the Middle East, and many other issues. The lack of ethics shown by journalists in terms of cross-checking Palestinian versions of events was also criticised, and the paucity of balanced reporting bemoaned.

The BBC was also condemned for its policy to seek balance rather than objectivity in reporting. Mr Gove urged people to respond to any bias with a a specific complaint to the public company, providing full details of where factual errors were made.

Ms Phillips said: "I would read the full report of the Hutton Inquiry and then the BBC coverage. To read the press coverage the next day, it was like being in two different universes."

Mr Gove said: "I do not know how newspapers can get away with it. You can have criticism of the state of Israel but it is entirely different to say it shouldn't exist. It is applying to the Jew a different standard than you apply to anyone else." "It is Israel which is called into question, because criticising Israel is far easier than for other countries."

"The most scandalous [reporting] was of events in Jenin. The word massacre was branded around. When the UN investigated, it discovered that the number was around 60 from both sides.

"Robin Cook said it was wrong that we are fighting to enforce UN resolutions in Iraq but not in Israel. But he knew that they were under a different charter of UN resolutions. Robin Cook must have known the difference after the time he spent in the Foreign Office."

Ms Phillips also blamed Israel for losing the PR game, saying while the Palestinian authorities fawn to foreign journalists, the Israeli government does not provide journalists or news agencies with any help.

"They [Israeli government] say that if you have the right foreign policy it will talk for itself -- well it doesn't. They say they do not have any friends -- apart from the US. When you say there is a crisis in Britain and Europe with Jewish attacks, they answer 'what would you expect from the Europeans,'" she said.

Muslim Medicine

Tonight, on our local NPR station in the Bay Area, the guest speaker at the "Forum for International Affairs" was Dr. Nabil Shaath, the political adviser to none other than Yasser Arafat.

This intrigued me because I really wanted to hear what he had to say for an hour - I wanted to understand what on earth he could possibly say which could justify the unleashing of the culture of death in the form known as "The Intifada". This is a name to which I am completely in opposition, mind you, as the word "Intifada" means "uprising" in Arabic and, as we all know by now, it is not an uprising but an attempt at Genocide.

I must admit, he spoke very well. Too well, in fact. All he could mention were "the good years" of the Oslo process in which he described only three "bombing incidents", failing to recognize that this was entirely demonstrative of the rotten core of the beliefs of his own people bubbling to the surface far too early in their plans for the attempted total destruction of the Jewish State. But there he was, criticizing both sides for opportunities missed, and how to return to the path of peace for a dual coexistence.

He mentioned the words "ending the incitement" twice in his critique of the Palestinian side. This was refreshing. At least he recognizes that there is such a thing - never mind that the Left doesn't even recognize this facet at all in the reality of the situation.

But he entirely dismissed it as something which should be done in parallel with Israeli "steps" towards peace. Meaning: Palestinians should end incitement during the negotiations to peace, and not as a prerequisite.

This abortion of a concept is absolutely insane.

Think about it for a moment. Just think about it. The Palestinians see the public declarations to murder all the Jews in the world as a step equal to, say, ending the construction of a house on absolutely barren land. Their view that calling for Genocide, and acting it out, is no different than the will of a Jewish family to return to a city from which Jews were forcibly expelled during the riots of the late 1920's. Their wish for the West to understand their point of view is for us to accept the notion that the driving force behind Mein Kampf was merely the product of a legitimate claim of grievance; that the extermination of a people can be dealt with on a political level, and not a moral one because it is merely the product of a legitimate situation of "oppression".

This is, naturally, exactly what the Muslim world sees as just. They say it openly, proudly, without any hesitation or excuses, and they don't really hide it. They count on the denials of the Left to hide it for them. After all, how many people in America really know what goes on in Palestinian and Arab media? How many Americans and Europeans know exactly what the Arabs are calling for in specific terms? Most Americans I know have no knowledge of this in the slightest way whatsoever. Either that or they shrug it off as rhetoric.

Of course, it isn't mere rhetoric since it is being carried out each day, bomb after bomb and bullet after bullet.

The mere acceptance that the call for Genocide is an equal step to a road map of peace requires us to abandon any notion that we have about who is right and who is wrong. If we accept that this is a legitimate response in any way, then Bin Laden, of course, was merely responding to legitimate grievances of his own - something which most Americans are loathe to accept because it goes against all common sense in our own culture and runs completely against our own values as a people.

The Muslims know this. They understand this. Their wish is for us to finally concede that point. When we accept that calls for Genocide will stop in parallel with Israeli and American concessions, we accept the current legitimacy of their hatred towards us. We start to recognize that everything is just another debatable point of view and that truth is completely relative. There are no moral boundaries. In that vein, Hitler was somebody who could be negotiated with merely because his truth was an equal one to ours. If that were the case, we should have made peace with him and his termination of concentration camps would merely have been another step on the long road towards mutual understanding between Nazis and the Allies.

Such is not the case, however, and we all know it. Yet they persist in this insistence because they know that if we do concede, they can negotiate us out of everything else. The driving force behind their entire campaign over the last century has been to make us concede on their moral ground. Everything they say reeks of this tactic. Is there a single Arab leader or spokesman out there who does not use the word "...but..." when confronted on the issue of condemning terrorism? Is there a single Arab representative who condemns all suicide bombings completely when they occur? Their world has become filled with "buts" and their condemnations as shifting as the sands of their own desert wastes.

Israel should never - ever - accept the notion that calls for Genocide be part of a negotiation process. After all, there is no Israeli media which bombards Israelis every day with the idea that all Muslims and Arabs should be killed to satisfy a higher purpose. These words matter. These words produce reactions which we can see in our newspapers and on our televisions every day of the week. After all, Hitler only started with words and we all understand the result of them.

All the Arabs have is that hatred. The sad truth is that they produce nothing else with which to negotiate. If one only has hatred with which to deal, then the position is clear: that side is in the wrong. It is exactly like the schoolyard bully beating up on another kid and "negotiating" for an end to the violence if that kid just gives up the money in his pocket - money to which the bully never had any rights in the first place. Yet the typical Leftist now looks at the bully to try to see what makes him tick, forgetting that he is a bully. Too long they look into the enemy's mind to try to understand it and they have become overwhelmed with the idea that this is just another person with yet another point of view, forgetting the original crime because they have lost their own perspective and can only now see from the eyes of that bully.

This is exactly the position expressed by the Arabs and Muslims of the world: they have nothing else but their hatred to negotiate with us. They know that as soon as they stop the calls to violence, and let things simmer down for a while, their cause is lost. They understand that if they didn't continuously call for Genocide, their people would start minding their own business and call for real reform because they will have lost interest in the entire affair. This notion of negotiating these calls for murder should be so clear to all that their cause is not just and never was.

And so it is fairly clear why we see the dividing lines which have emerged. The reason is simple: Leftists want to always look from the point of view of others, starting with the notion that everyone is equal and since people make morality, every morality is just as equal as well. Whereas we also have the stolid Christians and Jews of conservative backgrounds whom, while they deeply believe and act out in the name of charities to try to reform the bullies of the world, also understand that without their moralities, without their viewpoints, these reforms would never take place. The Fundamentalist Christians, much as I disagree with some of their views, are people who know exactly what they are about. These Southern Baptists and others who stand by Israel do so because they understand that their values are the same as the values of Jews. They are the true Christians in so many ways. Conservatives as well have a deep streak of knowing themselves and knowing what works for them, questioning the need for some changes over others, they understand that not all points of view are necessarily good or needed. It is so clear to see why the dividing lines are thus. They recognize that and understand it, which is something the Left doesn't even understand about itself.

This is extremely disturbing. Not only because the Left is now justifying the calls for Genocide as a legitimate claim to a grievance, but because a society needs both sides to function properly. One cannot merely exist in one state or the other to build a healthy society which questions itself, but only in moderate steps. Here, questioning is not the problem, but the rationalization of every single opposing view as an equal partner in the process, losing sight of exactly where it is that one started from. Clearly the Left has lost it's way and the Right has remained where it has always been: solidly behind it's morality and values.

This is the fundamental issue and just as important a fight in winning this war against the scourge of the Islamic world. It is not enough to stand fast against our enemies abroad, but also against the enemies here, to make them understand where they have lost their place, and how stupid they have become as tools of the real evils of the world in the guise of understanding. That fact is becoming lost even on us because of the dance of words being woven in front of our eyes by both our enemies and the Left around the world and, in particular, this country and Europe.

This is a huge problem because we will now be charged with rebuilding our own liberal society after the war is won - if it ever is. Europe is already in moral decay and we see the results before our very eyes in what they would term a "political process" to eradicate the very things they once treasured and give up all their rights to the laws of Sha'ria. Because of their incessant questioning for fifty years, they have accepted that every point of view is legitimate and that even those who call for Genocide are only satisfying some deeper need to a legitimate claim, regardless that the claim might actually be the Genocide itself. All the rashes of anti-Semitism which have sprouted up in the European world today are of no real surprise. After all, there was another time in which Europe also questioned all of her values - the time between World War I and World War II. We all know the result of that incredible failure to try to understand all moralities as equal. We have history as a lesson to this way of thinking and dealing with problems. The Arabs have understood this history as well. Look at Iraq and understand that it is of no mere coincidence that the Leftists and Arabs themselves are trying to portray that particular fight as another Vietnam.

Why?

Because during that time we ended up questioning all of our values as well, and it nearly led us to ruin.

Which are the related scenarios that they wish to impress upon Israelis? They use the scenario which led to the retreat from Lebanon - another Vietnam reference - and apply it to the West Bank, because they know that Israel's time in Lebanon made it question all of her values, and it was that, and not the actual war itself, which nearly made her lose her very existence as a nation.

And which conflict does Bin Laden refer to when claiming that victory is possible over the United States? None other than Afghanistan, the Soviet Vietnam. And that particular conflict did finally end up destroying the Soviets, and we all know it. This is not to mean that the Soviets didn't need tumbling, but that the tactic which was used was so successful that it can be applied to any people of the world, including ourselves.

So what do we have? We have a good dose of hatred for everything we stand for, for our people, for our religions and morals. They can never win militarily, and so force never was a negotiation point with them. Instead, it is our very existence which they seek to negotiate, until we concede not only every inch of land, but our own souls as well. The very fact that we can negotiate the legitimacy of Genocide resounds volumes in their world as being part of their final solution.

Some would argue that these words matter little, but this is not so. Already the U.S. Government has included the calls for Genocide to end as a parallel to steps which Israel must take to appease the terrorists. Already they have legitimized these calls as a political point, and not singled them out as the inherent weakness in the Muslim argument: that they are bent on hatred and have nothing else to offer.

This call has been the driving force and entire point of the Muslim perspective for far too long. It is time for this questionable point of view to end, to call a spade a spade, for us to take a stand against the call for Genocide as a natural political expression, and to end the madness once and for all.

Posted by trafael at 6:18 PM EST

Updated: Tuesday, 4 November 2003 4:13 AM EST

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