MEMRI Has A Blog

From the blog:

The MEMRI Blog is a new service, provided by The Middle East Media Research Institute, which will operate in conjunction with MEMRI.org, MEMRITV.org, and MEMRIFilms.org.

While MEMRI regularly provides translations from editorials and sermons, as well as expert analysis, The MEMRI Blog will specifically highlight brief NEWS ITEMS from Arabic, Persian, and Turkish language media sources.

The MEMRI Blog will at first focus almost exclusively on material from our Islamist Websites Monitor project, which monitors the 60 most important Islamist and Jihadi websites.

Over the next few months, The MEMRI Blog will expand to report breaking news (news often unreported by major media outlets) as well as monitor and report what Arab and Persian bloggers are saying.

Technorati Tag: MEMRI.

Is This Islamist Terrorist Really A Closet Zionist?

From MEMRI:

Sheik Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi: The Islamic Nation's Problem is That Muslims Do Not Work. The Zionist Gang Has Turned the Desert into an Oasis

The following are excerpts from a friday sermon on Qatar TV by Sheik Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi

Dr. Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi: We use trains and planes, but they are not our trains or planes. The (Westerners) manufacture them and export them to us. True, we can buy the most magnificent things in the world products for our homes and for ourselves. Our people can buy the most luxurious cars, Rolls-Royce or Mercedes 500 or 700, models S, M, and L with all the luxuries. We own them, but we don't manufacture them. We don't even produce a single nail in any of these cars. Others do this for us.

The income of the entire Arab world, including the oil-producing countries, does not reach the that of a European country, such as Spain. Spain – let alone Germany, France, Britain, or Italy. Just Spain, which is at the bottom of the list of industrial countries... The income of the entire Arab world does not reach it. How come? Because we don't work, and if we do work, we don't do it professionally.

They conducted a survey of the average time that a government employee spends working in a certain Arab country. The average was 27 minutes a day. 27 minutes! The rest of the time he drinks coffee, reads newspapers, and goes on errands here and there. Only a small number of people work. The rest do not.

In the mid 1970s I went to Germany. We arrived during in the morning. I asked the guy who took me from the airport to the convention hall… As I was passing through the empty streets, I asked him how come the streets were not busy, like in our countries. He said: "People are at work." After 7 p.m. he took me back to the hotel, and the streets were empty. I said to him: "What's going on, the streets are empty again." He said: people are back home from work, and they are exhausted. All they want is to eat their dinner, watch the news, and then go to bed, because early next morning they have to wake up for hard work. They commute more than an hour to work and back, and spend an hour at lunch. They work non-stop.

We are a nation that doesn't work. How can we develop if we don't work? When we do work, we don't do it professionally. We keep saying "Don't worry, later, later…" Islam teaches us to do things professionally. Doing things professionally is a religious duty. The Prophet said that Allah ordered to excel in everyhting. He imposed excellence and professionalism. Professionalism must be followed in everything. "If you kill, do it properly, and if you slaughter, do it properly." Even when killing, you must do well.

Unfortunately, we do not excel in either military or civil industries. We import everything from needles to missiles. This is our nation. We still haven't manufactured an engine in our Arab countries. We assemble parts, but have no manufacturing industries. India has manufactured a car, and even a plane, while we still go around in circles like a bull in who turns a grinding mill or a water weal until it reaches exactly where it started.

How come the Zionist gang has managed to be superior to us, despite being so few? It has become superior through knowledge, through technology, and through strength. It has become superior to us through work. We had the desert before our eyes but we didn't do anything with it. When they took over, they turned it into a green oasis. How can a nation that does not work progress? How can it grow? [emphasis added]

Technorati Tag: Israel and Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi and MEMRI and Islamists.

What College Students Need To Know about Israel

University campuses are an important battleground--the threat there is more than just to our children's Jewishness.

What College Students Need To Know about Israel Rebutting those who distort history.

-- Dr. Alex Grobman

A key element in raising a Jewish children is to encourage them to develop their informed opinion about the situation in Israel. This begins with building and maintaining a historical and current knowledge base of Israel issues. They need to learn to separate the facts from the misinformation, the good sources of information from the biased. Remember that you as parents are a key source for children. Once their information base is solid, encourage your children to build on this base by developing their interpretation of the situation, what should be done and what the implications will be of a certain action and then, encourage him to take action. You have heard the expression "Two Jews, two opinions." This is one of my favorite aspects of Judaism --- debate and questioning. It is very healthy. To feed your family discussions on Israel, we are privileged to have the following parenting op/ed from Dr. Alex Grobman, a historian with an M.A. and Ph.D. in contemporary Jewish history with a major in the Shoah from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He is president of the Brenn Institute, a think tank dealing with historical and contemporary issues affecting the Jewish community."

-- Flaura Koplin Winston, M.D. Ph.D.

Sending our children to college marks a major milestone for both parents and their children. Through no fault of their own, or ours, some of them will find themselves ill-prepared to deal with the anti-Israel propaganda disseminated throughout their campuses. Below are a number of suggestions that parents and teachers can use to help their children understand and effectively respond to the issues surrounding the Israel-Arab conflict.

Israel is engaged in a war for its survival. There is nothing in the Arab media or statements by Arab political or religious figures that indicates they have ever accepted Israel's right to exist. The Palestinians and their supporters have manufactured specious arguments that have fooled some in the West into thinking that Israel does not want peace and that the Arabs are the victims of Israeli aggression. Today, they say the obstacles to peace are the settlements; tomorrow there will be other excuses to justify murderous attacks against the Jewish State.

Students need to know the basics of modern Middle Eastern history and the Israeli/Arab conflict. Approaching the Middle East from the historians' point of view engages students intellectually and emotionally. With perspective, they can be confident when confronting those who distort history.

Knowing Facts

Students should be very careful about the information they do use. For example, a well-known and oft-used full-page quote from the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. equating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism is a fake. The alleged source is the August 1967 issue of Saturday Review, but this article does not exist in that or any other issue of the Saturday Review.

A week and a half before he was assassinated, at the annual convention of the Conservative Judaism's Rabbinical Assembly on March 28, 1968, Dr. King did say: "Peace for Israel means security, and we must stand with all our might to protect its right to exist, its territorial integrity. I see Israel as one of the great outposts of democracy in the world, and a marvelous example of what can be done, how the desert land can be transformed into an oasis of brotherhood and democracy. Peace for Israel means security and that security must be a reality."

Arabs have raised a number of questions about the context in which these remarks were made, insisting that Dr. King knew little about the Middle East and that this was said before Israel's "occupation" of the West Bank (even though the Six-Day War took place in June 1967).

Learning To Analyze

Students also need to learn how to analyze news. The media uses language and pictures to slant a story in order to make it "sell," and that determines how the story influences listeners and readers.

Sometimes the biases are a result of bad reporting and simple ignorance. At other times, the slant is deliberately anti-Israel and often anti-Semitic. Students should check HonestReporting.com, which dissects news reports daily, to see which reports are straightforward, which are not, and how the two approaches differ.

A Moral Imperative Beyond the Jewish Issue

Responding to Arab propaganda is a moral imperative that goes beyond the "Jewish issue." Universities have the responsibility to seek the truth. Failure to react to lies allows people to think there are no answers and to rely upon fabrications as truth.

Becoming involved in the campus newspaper and other campus organizations are important ways for students to develop strategic alliances and counter misconceptions. For example, when the Jewish National Fund (JNF) wanted to come to Harvard, members of the Sierra Club balked. As president of the Sierra Club, Josh Suskewicz, my student, researcher, and ultimately president of Harvard Students for Israel, convinced them that the JNF is not racist.

Informal discussions in the dorms also offer important opportunities to defuse anti-Israel feelings. Providing a balanced view that tells the truth can influence people.

Preemptive Action

Students should learn to counter Arab propaganda by seizing the initiative, publicizing Israel's positive actions, and explaining her specific policies. Before someone decides to build a "Wall" in front of the dining hall, preempt them by holding a teach-in about why the Israeli security fence was built and how many lives it has saved on both sides. The same should be done before "check-points" are erected on campus.

Exhibits

To inhibit use of the "Zionism is Racism" canard, mount an exhibit about Zionism and Israel's accomplishments. For example, a few years ago, students at Harvard produced an effective display of posters highlighting Israel's contributions to the world.

Recent examples of such stories include Israelis who: won the 2004 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for discovering a cell process that leads the way to DNA repair and may control newly produced proteins and immune systems; created human monoclonal antibodies that neutralize the smallpox virus without inducing dangerous side effects; devised a simple blood test that diagnoses mild and more severe cases of Multiple Sclerosis; developed of a non-invasive treatment of intrauterine fibroid tumors.

Most of Microsoft's Windows operating systems were developed in Israel. The complete design, development, and production of Pentium NMX Chip technology, the Pentium 4 microprocessor, and the Centrium processor-were all carried out in Israel.

Cell Phones and Gay Rights

Israeli techies developed voicemail, and cell phones can't work without Israeli technology. The Israelis developed ICQ, now mostly known as Instant Messenger. Microsoft's and Cisco's only research and development facilities outside the US are in Israel.

Another Harvard exhibit explored democracy, gay rights, women's rights, ethnic diversity, and technology in Israel. An Israeli rock concert attracted students indifferent or hostile to the politics.

According to my student Josh, "When we demonstrate that we can co-exist and get along, it enormously improves our standing as advocates. Highlighting Israel's unique culture allows people to feel closer to Israel and brings the connection to life, resulting in more dedicated and focused advocates."

The Write Stuff

Letters to local college newspapers and media are another way to counter distortions from Arab propagandists and to gain support from non-Jews. Correspondence should stick to the facts and not become personal attacks.

Qualified students should try to become regular contributors to the campus paper. When truth is distorted, it should be corrected in print via a letter to the editor or in an op-ed piece.

During his first two years in school, Josh published several articles in the Harvard Crimson. As his mentor, I reassured him, checked his facts, and made sure the arguments were cogent.

An English major, Josh did his "homework" by engaging in extensive reading and felt confident enough to question his professors when they intended to invite Tom Paulin - who said that Israeli settlers should be shot - to lecture.

Confidence

Rachel, a student at Yale University, worked with me via e-mail and telephone to learn about the Middle East conflict. She was frustrated by her inability to respond effectively first to Arab lies on campus and then to Jews participating in a Jewish Federation program which sympathized with Arabs and Arab propaganda.

As a result of our correspondence, she successfully confronted an anti-Israeli professor from the university about his attacks on the Jewish state.

Sometimes pressure from alumni and the fear of losing funds are the most effective means of protest. Verbal abuse of Jewish students at Columbia University became so serious that students, working with a Boston-based organization called the David Project, documented the harassment.

It took a massive letter-writing campaign to Columbia's president by concerned alumni, students, parents, and faculty as well as coverage of the incidents on campus by the mainstream national media before the Columbia administration agreed to take steps to address the problem.

Primary Sources

David Ben-Gurion once observed, "Nothing is more dangerous for Zionism than the fatalistic belief in the eternity of Israel."

The fight for the Jewish State will continue for years to come. We must educate the next generation to defend Israel-and we need to do it now.

I suggest students begin by reading the following material: Primary books: Alan Dershowitz, The Case For Israel, (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons, 2003); and Mitchell Bard's Myths and Facts: A Guide to the Arab-Israeli Conflict, (Chevy Chase, Maryland: American Israeli Cooperative Enterprise, 2001), Reply Myths and Facts; and Alex Grobman, Nations United: How the UN is Undermining Israel and the West (Green Forest, Arkansas: Balfour Books, 2006).

One of the most important ways students can demonstrate their concern for Israel is to vote for candidates who strongly support the Jewish state and Jewish causes. For many undergraduates, their first election may occur during their first semester of college. Voting is a very tangible way for them to help Israel, the Jewish people, and the U.S. in their fight against those who wish to destroy our democratic way of life.

Primary websites to check regularly

• The Daily Alert of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations ;
• Israel Campus Beat;
• The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI); and
• Arutz Sheva and the Israel Hasbara Committee.

Additional Internet and Hard Copy Sources

The following should be read on a regular basis:

• Commentary
• Midstream,
• Azure,
• The Jerusalem Post,
• The Forward,
• The Jerusalem Report,
• Ha'aretz,
• Maariv (in Hebrew),
• Jewish Telegraphic Agency Daily News Bulletin,
• DEBKA,
• CAMERA,
• Jewish World Review,
• Daniel Pipes,
• Israel 21c .

Personal search engine keywords such as Israel, Jews, Jewish, Middle East will put news articles with those words into your own mailbox, daily or as set.

The Basic Library-must-reads-should include:

• Alan Dershowitz, Why Terrorism Works: Understanding the Threat, Responding to the Challenge;
• Arthur Hertzberg, The Zionist Idea;
• The Palestinian Liberation Organization Covenant;
• Kenneth Levin, The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People Under Siege;
• Yaacov Lozowick, Right To Exist: A Moral Defense of Israel's Wars; Martin Gilbert, Atlas of the Arab-Israeli Conflict and any of his works on Israel;
• Efraim Karsh, Arafat's War: The Man and His Battle for Israeli Conquest and Fabricating History;
• Yoram Hazony, The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel's Soul;
• Kenneth W. Stein. The Land Question In Palestine, 1917-1939; and
• Barry Rubin and Walter Laqueur, The Israel-Arab Reader.

An historian, Dr. Grobman's most recent book is Battling for Souls: The Vaad Hatzala Rescue Committee in Post War Europe. He is also co-author of Denying History: Who Says The Holocaust Never Happened? His most recent book is Nations United: How the UN is Undermining Israel and the West.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tag: Israel and Hasbarah and University Campuses.

Sheikhs, and Imams and Ayatollahs--Oh My!

Arutz Sheva notes the reaction of Sheikh Raad Salah to plans by MK Uri Ariel to build a synagogue on the southeastern corner of the Temple Mount. Salah warns that the entire complex is Moslem--despite the fact that Islam was founded 550 years after the Jewish Temple was destroyed.

"The day will never come when a Moslem or an Arab will have the right to cede even one foot of the Al-Aqsa Mosque or of Jerusalem," the Sheikh's Al-Aqsa movement announced.

..."We remind, for the 1,000th time, that the entire Al-Aqsa mosque, including all of its area and alleys above the ground and under it, is exclusive and absolute Moslem property, and no one else has any rights to even one grain of earth in it."

Debka recounts other comments made by Salah back in September, at a time that comments made by Pope Benedict caused outrage by Moslems who were indignant at being accused of being violent:

the leader of Israeli Arab Muslims, Sheikh Raad Salah promised a gathering of 50,000 Israeli Arabs, Friday night Sept. 15 that “very shortly the Israeli occupation of Jerusalem would be eclipsed and the city (Israel’s historic and national capital), will become the capital of the “world Islamic caliphate.”

His audience eagerly thundered: “With fire and blood we will liberate al Aqsa!”

An article in Haaretz back in 2003 describes Salah talking about

how the Jews had no right to Al-Aqsa. You know, he said, even according to the Israeli historians, even according to Ha'aretz Magazine, the Jews have no right to Al-Aqsa: The whole story of the Temple Mount never happened. [Note that nowhere does the article take the time to refute the claim ascribed to it]

This really is beginning to get rather tired. The ignorance and hypocrisy of Moslem leaders is not exactly a new phenomenon--ignoring the history of Israel and claiming for themselves the kinds of rights which they routinely deny to other religions. The hate they spew is readily accessible from MEMRI on both video and transcript.

If this kind of hate is supposed to be normal fare from Moslem religious leaders, then when is it that they are supposed to be preaching about living a proper Moslem and internal jihad? Secular leaders for decades have used Anti-Semitic and Anti-Israel propaganda as a way to control their people. Is that the reason that Imams have been reduced to their rants--in order to get more people into their mosques?

I'm sure it beats Bingo night and basketball leagues.

Technorati Tag: Israel and Sheikh Raad Sala and Temple Mount and Israel Sala

Video: The Moslem Reaction to 9-11

MEMRI has put together an online video entitled The Arab and Iranian Reaction to 911: 5 Years Later, showing the Moslem reaction to the 911 attack.

Powerline has the 'teaser' for the video here.

There are many things to remember on the anniversary of 9-11.

This is one of them.

Technorati Tag: 9-11 and Moslems and Iran.

Nasrallah Is Feeling The Heat

While Nasrallah is now vowing that he will fire missiles even deeper into Israel--even beyond Haifa--he apparently has also become more cautious:

Anticipating the ground assault, Nasrallah sought to ensure his group’s survival and safeguard its widening base of support in Lebanon and abroad by lowering the bar for what would constitute victory in a television interview broadcast Friday. He defined victory as a successful defense, but was not more specific.

According to the Washington Post, Nasrallah was more specific:

"Victory in this case does not mean that I will enter and conquer the north of Palestine," he said. "If the resistance survives, this will be a victory. If its determination is not broken, this will be a victory."

Of course Nasrallah is helped by the fact that he is defining his version of victory after Israel has already made public that their goal in Lebanon is to clear Hizbollah out of the area and seriously degrade their infrastructure--but not to destroy them. [Update: Now that Israel has rejected the army's recommendation for a larger-scale ground offensive, Nasrallah's ability to claim victory is all but assured ]

Not only has Nasrallah lowered the bar on how he defines victory, he apparently has also lowered the bar on how he defines martyrdom as well:

“We love martyrdom,” he has said in the Friday interview. “But we take precautions to deny the enemy an easy victory.”

Maybe there is a connection...?

Of course Iran wants to make sure that Nasrallah does not appear to be too cautious, so they came out publicly to deny the rumors that Nasrallah has been hiding out in the Iranian embassy--though they did not respond to speculation that the kidnapped Israeli soldiers may be there. [Update: Now a Kuwaiti newspaper is reporting that Nasrallah is in Damascus and the Jerusalem Post has more]

On the other hand, the admission by Mahmoud Komati, deputy chief of Hezbollah's political arm, that Hizbollah did not see Israel's response coming makes Nasrallah look careless, and worse:

"The truth is _ let me say this clearly _ we didn't even expect (this) response.... that (Israel) would exploit this operation for this big war against us," said Komati.

Such an odd admission--which might, as Powerline suggests, be a ploy to exploit the "disproportionate use of force" angle--might also add fuel to the anger of those Lebanese who feel that Nasrallah is destroying their country.

One of those is Lebanese Druze Leader Walid Jumblatt who responded to an interviewer's suggestion that Nasrallah is considered a hero by the Arabs:

"Great, so he's a hero. But I'd like to challenge this heroism of his. I have the right to challenge it, because my country is in flames.

If Jumblatt really wants to challenge Nasrallah, he is going to have to wait in line--assuming anyone can find him.

UPDATE:
According to Haaretz:

An Israel Defense Forces analysis of the messages transmitted by Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah to his men during the fighting in Lebanon reveals a slightly different tone from the one he took in three public television interviews in the same period and in an interview with the Lebanese newspaper A-Safir.

A senior officer said Nasrallah took a less bellicose position when engaging in his internal dialogue in his organization, than in his appearances in the Arab media - but he remained aggressive.

Nasrallah's tone is apologetic in his messages and he explains that Israel escalated the confrontation by striking deep inside Lebanon after the soldiers were abducted, the officer said.

Nasrallah admits that his organization is having morale problems and says his group will receive support and encouragement.

He adds that not only Hezbollah, but also Israel, has been badly hit.

He also complains frequently that the Arab states have deserted Hezbollah and the Lebanese and are not helping them against Israel.

In The Nasrallah Blues, Captain's Quarters gives his impressions on what this means:

It also sounds like Nasrallah had to make an accounting of his actions in order to convince his men to continue their fight. Having a commander communicate an apology of this sort indicates a growing dissatisfaction with leadership in the ranks. Nasrallah so far has done nothing to convince anyone that he has a grasp of either strategy or tactics. He has proven that he has no understanding of his enemy, nor much of his putative allies in the region, almost all of whom have declined to rush to his side in this fight.

Nasrallah had better have a victory to show them soon, or he may find himself replaced with wiser counsel.

And the momentum for pushing Nasrallah out may come from inside, not out. Michael Totten writes about what may happen in Lebanon after the smoke clears and Israel leaves:

My sources and friends in Beirut tell me most Lebanese are going easy on Hezbollah as much as they can while the bombs are still falling. But a terrible reckoning awaits them once this is over.

Technorati Tag: Israel and Nasrallah and Lebanon and Hizbollah and Hezbollah.

Did Hamas Try To Kill Abbas?

Today's Sunday Times reports:

A HAMAS plot to assassinate Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has been thwarted after he was tipped off by Israeli intelligence.

Hamas’s military wing, the Izza Din Al-Qassem, had planned to kill Abbas at his office in Gaza, intelligence sources said.

I suppose this could be part of the smoldering civil war that has been brewing between Hamas and Fatah since the election in January, and considering how the two sides have been shooting at each other, it is not hard to believe. YNet and Haaretz (which reports there is no independent verification of the report) have both carried the story.

Meanwhile, not surprisingy, the spokesman for the Al Qassam Brigades of Hamas, Abu Obaida, denied the reports and Dr. Salah Al-Bardaweel, the spokesman of the Palestinian Legislative Council told the Kuwait News Agency: "Assassinations are not our style" (a relief to Israelis everywhere, I'm sure).

The Sunday Times article was written by Uzi Mahnaimi. According to the bio to his book The Best of Enemies: The Memoirs of Bassam Abu-Sharif and Uzi Mahnaimi on Amazon.com, he is a former Israeli intelligence officer who specialized in recruiting Arab agents. He resigned in 1984 and became a left-wing journalist.

In 1998, he co-wrote an article for the Sunday Times entitled "Israel Planning 'Ethnic' Bomb as Saddam Caves In" (reprinted here--need to scroll down). Winds of War discounts the reliability of such a report on the grouds that a significant proportion of the Jews in Israel ARE ethnic Arabs.

In another article for the Sunday Times, Mahnaimi wrote in July 2004 about Israel's impending attack on Iran:

Amid growing concern in the US government over Iran's apparent determination to build a nuclear bomb, the official said he believed Israel would attack the plant, on the Gulf coast, if it appeared fuel rods were about to be shipped there.

In December 2005 he wrote a similar article entitled Israel readies forces for strike on nuclear Iran:

Israel's armed forces have been ordered by Ariel Sharon, the prime minister, to be ready by the end of March for possible strikes on secret uranium enrichment sites in Iran, military sources have revealed.

In July 2005 an article entitled "Finger points to British intelligence as al-Qaeda websites are wiped out" quoted Mahnaimi as a source. MEMRI has a piece that discredits the report and Yigal Carmon, head of MEMRI casts doubts on Mahnaimi part in it as 'not credible.'

All of which is not to say that the story about the Hamas plot is not true or that Mahnaimi is not reliable. There are all kinds of leads and sources available in the area that don't pan out. Also, Israel no doubt has some sort of plan in dealing with Iran and the fact they have not acted upon it yet does not mean it does not exist. But without outside verification of the story of Hamas, I don't know how much weight it can be given, and given the potential repurcussions in the ongoing conflict between Hamas and Fatah, such a story probably would need corraboration in order to be taken seriously.

UPDATE: Check out Meryl Yourish and Joe's Dartblog who have more current information on Mahnaimi.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tag: Israel and Hamas and Fatah and Abbas and Uzi Mahnaimi.

Mohammed: Thomas Jefferson of Arabia?

Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy.
Senator Lloyd Bentsen to Senator Dan Quayle during 1988 Vice Presidential Debate

On April 10, President Bush discussed the war on terror at John Hopkins Univesity, after which he answered questions from the students. Here is one of them:

I have a more general question about the United States' work to democratize the rest of the world. Many have viewed the United States' effort to democratize the world -- especially nations in the Middle East -- as an imposition or invasion on their sovereign rights. Considering that it was, in fact, the Prophet Mohammed who established the first known constitution in the world -- I'm referring to the constitution he wrote for the city of Medina --and that his life and the principles outlined in his constitution, such as the championing of the welfare of women, children and the poor, living as an equal among his people, dissolving disputes between the warring clans in Arabia, giving any man or woman in parliament the right to vote and guaranteeing respect for all religions, ironically parallel those principles that we hold most precious in our own Constitution. I'm wondering how might your recently formed Iraq Study Group under the U.S. Institute for Peace explore these striking similarities to forge a new relationship with Iraqis and educate Americans about the democratic principles inherent in Islam?

At The Corner, they give a link to an english translation of the Medina Constitution. One commentor notes an incongruity in that the document includes "A woman shall only be given protection with the consent of her family," and that the Athenian Constitution actually predates the Medina one by about 1000 years. But another commentor claims that:

Actually, that thing is pretty interesting. There's a lot of Jew-regulation (i.e. regulation of Jews), but some of it seems benign, given the period. It's certainly more friendly to Jews than, say, much of the stuff you find in the Arab press today (at least going by what Memri puts up).

This of course assumes 2 things:

o The line of the Medina Constitution that reads "(16) To the Jew who follows us belong help and equality. He shall not be wronged nor shall his enemies be aided" is translated from the Arabic accurately.

o This constitution, as translated, was actually put into effect.

Some things do seem to make the assumptions unlikely. First of all, Mohammed himself. As Mitchell Bard points out:

Muhammad, the founder of Islam, traveled to Medina in 622 A.D. to attract followers to his new faith. When the Jews of Medina refused to convert and rejected Muhammad, two of the major Jewish tribes were expelled; in 627, Muhammad's followers killed between 600 and 900 of the men, and divided the surviving Jewish women and children amongst themselves.(3)

The Muslim attitude toward Jews is reflected in various verses throughout the Koran, the holy book of the Islamic faith. "They [the Children of Israel] were consigned to humiliation and wretchedness. They brought the wrath of God upon themselves, and this because they used to deny God's signs and kill His Prophets unjustly and because they disobeyed and were transgressors" (Sura 2:61). According to the Koran, the Jews try to introduce corruption (5:64), have always been disobedient (5:78), and are enemies of Allah, the Prophet and the angels (2:97­98).

Bernard Lewis, who generally downplays the disadvantages of the Dhimmi status, writes in The Jews of Islam, about the recent vintage of the claim of equality under Islam:

The claim to tolerance, now much heard from Muslim apologists and more especially from apologists for Islam, is also new and of alien origin. It is only very recently that some defenders of Islam have begun to assert that their socety in the past accorded equal status to non-Muslims. No such claim is made by spokesmen for resurgent Islam,' and historically there is no doubt that they are right. Traditional Islamic societies neither accorded such equality nor pretended that they were so doing. Indeed, in the old order, this would have been regarded not as a merit but as a dereliction of duty. How could one accord the same treatment to those who follow the true faith and those who willfully reject it? This would be a theological as well as a logical absurdity.

Mohammed as a Moslem Thomas Jefferson?
Not really.

More on the propogation of the myth of Islamic equality at Soccer Dad.

Technorati Tag: Mohammed and Islam and Medina Constitution.

The Hamas Covenant and Jihad

Power Line points out that MEMRI has a new translation of the Hamas Covenant:

In view of the recent victory of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the Palestinian Authority Legislative Council elections, it is important to make the Hamas covenant [1] available in English for English speaking readers. The English version which is currently posted in a number of websites is not satisfactory, and therefore MEMRI is providing here a closer, more accurate translation.

Power Line notes:

A reading of the covenant demonstrates that Hamas exists for two purposes alone: 1) to eliminate the state of Israel, and 2) to replace it with an Islamic state. These purposes are apparent in every article of the charter, though in some more concisely than others. Article Six, for example, provides:

The Islamic Resistance Movement is a distinct Palestinian movement that is loyal to Allah, adopts Islam as a way of life and works to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine. Under the wing of Islam, followers of other religions can all live safe and secure in their life, property and rights; whereas in the absence of Islam, discord arises, injustice spreads, corruption burgeons, and there are conflicts and wars.

Article Eight is even more concise:

Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model to be followed, the Koran its constitution, Jihad its way, and death for the sake of Allah its loftiest desire.

First of all, the idea that "Under the wing of Islam, followers of other religions can all live safe and secure in their life, property and rights" has 2 problems:

1. It is contingent upon living as dhimmis, second class citizens with restrictions and a protection-tax.

2. It just isn't true:

At various times, Jews in Muslim lands were able to live in relative peace and thrive culturally and economically. The position of the Jews was never secure, however, and changes in the political or social climate would often lead to persecution, violence and death. Jews were generally viewed with contempt by their Muslim neighbors; peaceful coexistence between the two groups involved the subordination and degradation of the Jews.

Read the rest for a history of the Moslem persecution and murder of Jews.

Secondly, on the issue of Jihad and death for the sake of Allah -- Hamas, along with others, have mangled the concept of Jihad, badly. According to Bernard Lewis in The Crisis of Islam:

Those who are killed in the jihad are called martyrs, in Arabic and other Muslim languages shahid...The Arabic term shahid also means "witness" and is usually translated "martyr," but it has a rather different connotation. In Islamic usage the term martyrdom is normally interpreted to mean death in a jihad and reward is eternal bliss, described in some detail in early religious texts. Suicide, by contrast, is a mortal sin and earns eternal damnation, even for those who would otherwise have earned a place in paradise. The classical jurists distinguish clearly between facing certain death at the hands of the enemy and killing oneself by one's own hand. The one leads to heaven, the other to hell. Some recent fundamentalist jurists and others have blurred or even dismissed this distinction, but their view is by no means unanimously accepted. The suicide bomber is thus taking a considerable risk on a theological nicety. (p38-39 emphasis added)

Of course, this is assuming that the suicide bombers themselves--as well as their enablers--are really taking Islam and sharia into account, or just using it for purely politcal and military aims.

Then there is the issue of the murder of innocent women and children in Islam. Lewis writes:

Because holy war is an obligation of the faith, it is elaborately regulated in the sharia. Fighters in a jihad are enjoined not to kill women, children, and the aged unless they attack first, not to torture or mutilate prisoner, to give fair warning of the resumption of hostilities after a truce, and to honor agreements.

Lewis presents this as straightforward. He does not address the excuses used by terrorists that every Israeli (even children?) are part of the Israeli army. As far as sharia requiring agreements to be honored, someone obviously forgot to tell the PA...and Hamas.

On the issue of Kassam rockets, sharia apparently provides Hamas with some leeway... :

...The medieval jurists and theologians discuss at some length the rules of warfare, including questions such as which weapons are permitted and which are not. There is even some discussion in medieval texts of the lawfulness of missile and chemical warfare, the one relating to mangonels and catapults, the other to poison-tipped arrows and the poisoning of enemy water supplies. On these points there is considerable variation. Some jurists permit, some restrict, some disapprove of the use of these weapons. The stated reason for concern is the indiscriminate casualties that they inflict. [emphasis added]

...but seemingly not when it comes to suicide bombers:

At no point do the basic texts of Islam enjoin terrorism and murder. At no point--as far as I am aware--do they even consider the random slaughter of uninvolved bystanders.

In The Danish Cartoons and The Hijacking of Islam, I quoted Lewis on extremist groups and their selective interpretation of Islam. Hamas is dressing up their own agenda in selective interpretation of sharia. In so doing, they fit right in with Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Al Qaeda--a distinction they no doubt are proud of.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tag: Hamas and Terrorism and Israel and Islam.

Hamas Improves on the Arafat Model

There was a time, when Arafat was in charge, that it was frowned upon for leaders of countries dependent on Western aid to come right out in public and say that their goal was to destroy Israel. Arafat's technique was to say one thing in public in English for international consumption and something else in Arabic for his Moslem audience. The West was so eager to believe in Oslo that even when Arafat's words in Arabic were translated into English, you could hear the creaking sound as people bent over backwards to justify and explain what Arafat really meant.

But today you don't even have to go to the trouble. Take Hamas for example. If you phrase things just right, then like looking at a Rorshach ink blog, the listener can hear what he wants to hear. The Jerusalem Post quotes a Hamas spokesman and even does us the favor of explaining what he's supposedly saying:

Sheikh Adnan Asfour, one of the political leaders of Hamas in the West Bank, said Hamas did not want to destroy Israel or remove it from the map.

"Hamas recognizes Israel as a fact on the ground," he said. "But we don't recognize the legitimacy of its occupation."

But Asfour didn't say that Hamas did not want to destroy Israel. All he said is that Israel's existence is a fact, but does not think its occupation of Palestinian land is legitimate. Does this imply that he--or Hamas--is ready to live with Israel or have given up on the idea of destroying it?

Further:

Asfour reiterated his movement's willingness to accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 boundaries and to reach a long-term cease-fire with Israel.

"That way the Israelis would be able to guarantee their security and we would also be able to live in security," he said. "Let's leave the conflict to future generations to resolve."

Even assuming that the Hamas definition of a Palestinian state matches Israel's definition--including agreement on what the capital of this Palestinian state will be--how is leaving the issue to future generations anything more than a Hudna? How long is "long-term"--is it as long as it takes a child with a gun to be old enough to learn how to fire a rocket?

And Hamas has more than one spokeman:

Another Hamas representative, Anwar Zaboun, said negotiations with Israel were not haram (forbidden by religion).

"It's forbidden to make concessions on our rights," he said. "But negotiations and discussions are not sinful."

Anyone notice that Zaboun just said that it's OK to negotiate and discuss but not to concede anything? Just what does that leave to negotiate? Apparently Zaboun and Abbas went to the same school of negotiation.

Then there is Khalid Mish'al, whom The Guardian informs us is head of the political bureau of Hamas, but neglects to mention that he is one of Israel's most wanted terrorists (hat tip Conservajew). Mish'al assures us:

Our message to the Israelis is this: we do not fight you because you belong to a certain faith or culture. Jews have lived in the Muslim world for 13 centuries in peace and harmony; they are in our religion "the people of the book" who have a covenant from God and His Messenger Muhammad (peace be upon him) to be respected and protected. Our conflict with you is not religious but political. We have no problem with Jews who have not attacked us - our problem is with those who came to our land, imposed themselves on us by force, destroyed our society and banished our people. [emphasis added]

The nonsense about "peace and harmony" is easily disproved by the documentation at jewishvirtuallibrary.org that gives a history of the Moslem persecution of Jews.

As a side note: to minimize the history of Moslem persecution and murder of Jews by contrasting it to the Holocaust is like pointing to the murder of over 3,000 innocent people on 9/11 and ignoring the non-Moslems murdered and injured by Islamists in 2005 alone in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Chechnya, Dagestan, Denmark, Egypt, Ethiopia, France, India, Indonesia, Ingushetia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kabardino-Balk., Kosovo, Kuwait, Lebanon, Mauritania, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine (Jebaliya and Gaza City), Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Scotland, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, UK, and Yemen.

Numbers alone are not the issue--it is the persistant hatred, persecution and murder by Islamists.

(Actually, if we count only non-Moslems the number is less since we would have to exclude the Palestinian Arabs killed by Hamas in 2 "work accidents".)

In any case, while it is awfully nice of Mish'al to bring up how Jews are refered to as "the people of the book" in Islam, he does seem to have forgotten that based on the Koran, Moslem clerics teach that the Jews Are the descendants of apes, pigs, and other animals--as documented by MEMRI.

One last point made by Mish'al--that Jews are to be respected and protected. The typical reader of the article might assume that the protection Mish'al is refering to is from outsiders; actually it is protection from the Moslems themselves. The American Thinker points to an interview last year with yet another Hamas spokesman:

Interviewed by Wall Street Journal reporter Karby Legget (and published in the December 23-26 edition The Wall Street Journal), Hassam El-Masalmeh, who heads the Hamas contingent at the municipal council of Bethlehem, confirmed the organizations plan to re-institute the humiliating jizya, a blood ransom Qur’anic poll-tax (based on Qur’an sura [chapter] 9, verse 29), levied traditionally on non-Muslims vanquished by jihad, and forced to live under Islamic Law (the Shari’a). Under the Sharia’s regulations, either the non-Muslim infidels must convert to Islam, or they pay the jizya—classically, in a humiliating public ceremony which often involved blows to the head or neck—and their life and belongings are protected. The nature of such “protection” is clarified in this definition of jizya by the seminal Arabic lexicographer, E.W. Lane, based on a careful analysis of the etymology of the term:

The tax that is taken from the free non-Muslim subjects of a Muslim government whereby they ratify the compact that assures them protection, as though it were compensation for not being slain.

Mish'al is merely giving Jews an invitation to go back in time to classical Islam when non-Moslems, Jews and Christians, were treated as second-class citizens--dhimmis.

As long as there are Western leaders and journalists who are predisposed towards a positive or sympathetic view of Islamist terrorists in their guise as freedom-fighters or politicians, it becomes that much easier for Hamas to pursue their goals. After the obligatory expressions of shock and disapproval are done with, excuses can always be found by the West to pursue policies that ultimately will do no one but Hamas any good. Just watch.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tag: Hamas and terrorists and Dhimmis.

The Phenomenal Cosmic Power--of Israel

"Phenomenal Cosmic Power in an itty bitty living space"
Disney's Aladdin

The Islamic Republic News Agency has an article on how World scholars support Ahmadinejad's stance on Holocaust. James Taranto takes a look at these world reknowned scholars:

• Robert Faurisson, "a former professor at Lyon University in France." The Anti-Defamation League notes that Faurisson was "removed from his academic post as a result of his anti-Semitic activities, and has been convicted on three occasions of violating French hate-crime laws."
  
  
• "A New York-based university professor, Abdullah Mohammad Sindi." Memri notes that Sindi's "articles have been published by notorious Holocaust-denial websites, including Radio Islam and the Institute for Historical Review."
  
  
• "The author of 'The Hoax of the Twentieth Century,' Professor Arthur Butz," who backed Ahmadinejad "in a letter written from the US state of Chicago" (Raquel Welch, where are you?). The ADL notes that Butz is a professor of electrical engineering who "has steadily promoted Holocaust denial on the Internet, in articles and in public speeches for almost thirty years."

Last month, I quoted the New Jersey Jewish News, "As Jewish majority lashes Bush on Iraq, a vocal minority insists on staying the course":

After staying largely in the shadows for several years, the organized American-Jewish community has jumped full throttle into the debate over the Iraq war.

... As the volume of pro- and anti-war debate continues to grow in the Jewish community, a poll of American Jews by the American Jewish Committee shows at least 70 percent of those polled oppose the conflict — a figure that has risen 4 percent since last year and 16 percent since 2003.

According to the article, back in 2003 about 46% of Jews were in favor of the US going into Iraq. With that in mind we can contrast what Yoffie is trying to accomplish with what Rep. Jim Moran thought--and apparently still thinks--Israel, and Jews, are capable of:

A Democratic congressman who opposes the liberation of Iraq is blaming the Jews for threatening Saddam Hussein's hold on power. "If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq we would not be doing this," the Connection newspapers of northern Virginia quoted Rep. Jim Moran as saying last week. "The leaders of the Jewish community are influential enough that they could change the direction of where this is going and I think they should."

Moran seems not to have changed his way of thinking much; and his has kept himself busy. On June 16, 2005 he joined some other democrats in playing house:

In the Capitol basement yesterday, long-suffering House Democrats took a
trip to the land of make-believe.

They pretended a small conference room was the Judiciary Committee hearing
room, draping white linens over folding tables to make them look like
witness tables and bringing in cardboard name tags and extra flags to make
the whole thing look official.

...The session took an awkward turn when witness Ray McGovern, a former
intelligence analyst, declared that the United States went to war in Iraq
for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration "neocons" so
"the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world." He
said that Israel should not be considered an ally and that Bush was doing
the bidding of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

"Israel is not allowed to be brought up in polite conversation," McGovern
said. "The last time I did this, the previous director of Central
Intelligence called me anti-Semitic."

Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), who prompted the question by wondering
whether the true war motive was Iraq's threat to Israel, thanked McGovern
for his "candid answer."

At Democratic headquarters, where an overflow crowd watched the hearing on
television, activists handed out documents repeating two accusations -- that
an Israeli company had warning of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and that there
was an "insider trading scam" on 9/11 -- that previously has been used to
suggest Israel was behind the attacks.

It Worked Against Hitler; Would It Work Against Abbas?

In Nazi Germany in 1943 there was a rare incident where a public outcry led to a small victory over state-sponsored murder. It was researched by Nathan Stoltzfus and described in his book Resistance of the Heart: Intermarriage and the Rosenstrasse Protest in Nazi Germany, which was later made into a movie. Richard Levy summarizes the book in a review:

Nathan Stoltzfus tells the little-attended-to story of the German women who rescued their husbands from deportation and death in early 1943. Swept up from their forced labor jobs in what was meant to be the Final Roundup in the national capital, 1700-2000 Jews, mostly men married to non-Jewish women, were separated from the 6000 other victims of the Gestapo and SS and herded into Rosenstra§e 2-4, a welfare office for the Jewish community in central Berlin. Because these Jews had German relatives, many of them highly connected, Adolf Eichmann hoped that segregating them from the others would convince family members that their loved ones were being sent to labor camps rather than to more ominous destinations in occupied Poland. Normally, those arrested remained in custody for two days before being loaded onto trains for the East. Before that could happen in this case, however, wives and other relatives got wind of what was happening and appeared at the Rosenstra§e address, first in ones and twos, and then in ever-growing numbers. Perhaps as many as six thousand participated in the protest, although not all at the same time. Women demanded back their husbands, day after day, for a week. Unarmed, unorganized, and leaderless, they faced down the most brutal forces at the disposal of the Third Reich. Goebbels, Gauleiter of Berlin and anxious to have it racially cleansed, was also in charge of the nation's public morale. On both counts he was worried about the possible repercussions of the women's actions. Rather than inviting more open dissent by shooting the women down in the streets and fearful of jeopardizing the secrecy of the Final Solution, Goebbels with Hitler's concurrence released the Rosenstra§e prisoners and also ordered the return of twenty-five of them already sent to Auschwitz. To both men, the decision was a mere postponement of the inevitable. But they were mistaken. Almost all of those released survived the war. The women won an astonishing victory over the forces of destruction.

Hitler placed great emphasis on winning the support of Germans. Terror was never conceived of as the best means of achieving the perfectly united Volk or even the lesser goal of extorting its compliance...

I just wonder what would happen if a similar situation would occur--not under the unspeakably cruel and horrific Nazi Regime--but under the PA and Abbas.

o How would the PA and Palestinian Arabs in general react to the marriage of Arabs to Jews within their midst--what would they do?

o Whereas the morale of Nazi Germany--when mobilized--could be brought to oppose the murder of Jews, where does the morale of Palestinian Arabs lie?

o While the likes of Goebbels was worried about public reaction to the shooting of Germans, how would Palestinians--and Abbas--react to the shooting of their fellow Palestinians?

o While Nazi Germany eschewed the use of terror as a tool, how does Abbas--who chairs Fateh's main governing body--feel about using terror?

Just asking.

Mark Krikorian at The Corner has a post entitled Nation of Jihad

MEMRI sent out a report the other day that got my attention. It translated the ravings of a sheikh saying that the Palestinians "are a Nation of Jihad and Martyrdom." This is more telling than he probably realizes. Many observers dismiss Palestinian nationalism as fictitious, promoting a non-existent people invented only after 1967. As true as that was, the Palestinians are now a real nation in the hearts and minds of its people, the only way that counts -- but a nation which exists solely to extirpate the Jews. In other words, the Palestinians really are a "nation of jihad" because, unlike the Chinese nation or American or Persian or Mexican or Russian, Palestine has no past, no distinctiveness, no commonality other than being the negation of Israel, the anti-Israel -- anti-matter, if you will, on the periodic table of nations. (I'll accept nominations for which nation is which element -- I vote for France as helium, an inert gas.) I don't mean that every Arabic-speaking person from the old British mandate of Palestine is a killer, but that Palestinian nationhood as an idea is inextricably tied to the liquidation of Israel. And this is why they need to be walled off.

Nazi Germany, with all of its atrocities, at some level had roots to civilization--or there could be no united democratic Germany today.

Where are the roots of Palestinian Arabs?

Like I said, just asking.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tags: Palestinians and Nazi and Holocaust.

Jordan: Blind Terrorism

In commenting on yesterdays triple bombing in Amman, Jordan yesterday, the Wall Street Journal notes:

If yesterday's attacks illustrate anything, it is that all Arab countries -- not just Iraq -- are threatened by jihadist violence, which is one good reason they should lend greater support to Iraq's embattled democratic leaders. Previously, the governments of Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have sought a middle course, affecting a pro-American foreign policy while using state-run media to feed anti-American flames and praise the Iraqi "resistance." That will no longer do.

Specifically, the Wall Street Journal focuses on the negativity of the Jordanian state-run media:

As for Jordan, the MEMRI media research institute reports that a Jordanian TV station last month aired a series, timed for Ramadan and originally produced by Hezbollah, which tells the story of the Jews, using the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" as its primary source. The Protocols, of course, are among the most enduring anti-Semitic tracts.

Any country that suffers a terrorist attack as grievous as yesterday's deserves sympathy and assistance. But Jordan needs to think carefully about its own part in fostering the culture of hatred in which al Qaeda thrives.

The Jordanian government did step in after a group of rabbis who had met the King a few months ago sent a letter. The official explantion of Jordan is:

It has come to our attention that a controversial program entitled "Al-Shatat" or "The Diaspora" has been broadcast from an independent/private channel entitled "Mamnou'" operating from the Media Free Zone in Jordan, which is not subject to Jordanian Law. The program itself was not broadcast from any Jordanian channel.

"Al- Shatat" drew concerns for inciting hate. Accordingly, the program has been stopped from the private channel as of Tuesday, October 25th 2005. The stoppage was only done through personal intervention of responsible Jordanians.

The Free Media Zone broadcasts different programs through 84 different channels and more channels are expected to emerge from the zone in the near future. The Government of Jordan does not monitor or control the content of any program broadcasting from the free zone, whether it is cultural, political, or otherwise. This is in accordance with the agreement between the government of Jordan and the Media Free Zone which is, in turn, affiliated with the Arab Media Company ART.

"Al- Shatat" does not just tell 'a story'--it is propaganda for the purpose of inciting its viewers to violence. According to Arutz Sheva:

The Syrian-produced television series, called "Al-Shatat," includes horrific distortions of Judaism, including the presentation of the use of a Christian child's blood in preparation of Matzah for Passover, as religious necessity. The graphic episode features Jews kidnapping a Christian boy and slitting his throat to drain his blood, and the brutal execution of a Jew by a "Talmudic" court, by pouring boiling lead down his throat. [Warning: The following two video links to the above episodes are very difficult to view: 1) Christian boy, 2) Talmudic Execution] All of the anti-Semitic libels in this series are presented as fact.

Another example of this is the animated children's film that promotes suicide bombing.

Or the video of the preaching of hate in a mosque.

As long as the rhetoric used in the Arab and Moslem world--in the media, in the movies, in the mosques, and by the Imams around the world-- to describe their perceived enemies is allowed to be maintained at such a fevered pitch (while the West either ignores it or makes excuses for it), the terrorism, no matter what you blame it on, will have the hate and fanaticism it needs to continue.

And yesterday, Arabs in general--and Palestinian Arabs in particular--got another reminder that their blind terrorism doesn't really care all that much about whom it blows up.

Technorati Tags: terrorism and Anti-Semitism .

Uproar Over Iran

There seems to have been quite an uproar over remarks made by Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad about Israel while at a conference in Tehran entitled “A World without Zionism”.

According to the letter written by Israeli Ambassador Dan Gillerman:

he declared, “Israel must be wiped off the map of the world…and God willing, with the force of God behind it, we shall soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism.” He added, “the establishment of the Zionist regime was a move by the world oppressor against the Islamic world” and “the Islamic Umma (Nation) will not allow its historic enemy to live in its heartland.”

And what was the reaction in Europe? Condemnation!

Europe strongly condemned Iran's president on Thursday for saying Israel should be wiped out and said the call raised concerns about the aims of a country the West suspects is planning to build an atomic bomb.

..."Calls for violence, and for the destruction of any state, are manifestly inconsistent with any claim to be a mature and responsible member of the international community," EU leaders said in a statement issued at a one-day summit outside London.

"Such comments will cause concern about Iran's role in the region, and its future intentions," they said.

OK, so apparently the EU feels that statements about the destruction of Israel

1. Raise concerns
2. Are inconsistent with being a mature and responsible member of the international community
3. Cause concern about their role in the region and their future intentions

So why is the EU so complacent about statements made by Hamas?
And why are terrorist attacks and the murder of civilians reduced to a "cycle of violence"?

As Bones (might have) said to Captain Kirk:
"Dammit Jim, I'm a blogger--not a pundit!"

But I imagine that it's easier to make excuses for "freedom fighters" than for a country intent on making nuclear bombs.

Technorati Tag: Israel.

Without Rhyme or Reason

Unbelievable.

Arutz Sheva reports on another fine product of Syria:

The Syrian-produced television series, called "Al-Shatat," includes horrific distortions of Judaism, including the presentation of the use of a Christian child's blood in preparation of Matzah for Passover, as religious necessity. The graphic episode features Jews kidnapping a Christian boy and slitting his throat to drain his blood, and the brutal execution of a Jew by a "Talmudic" court, by pouring boiling lead down his throat. [Warning: The following two video links to the above episodes are very difficult to view: 1) Christian boy, 2) Talmudic Execution] All of the anti-Semitic libels in this series are presented as fact.

The series also portrays Jews conspiring to assassinate world leaders, cause stock market crashes, and provoke world wars, as part of a plan to conquer the world. Another episode shows Jewish leaders helping the Nazis slaughter Europe's Jews in order to win world sympathy for Zionism.

This is the movie that Natan Sharansky took with him last year to Berlin to show to German, French and other European officials. According to Joel C. Rosenberg, who worked with Sharanksy briefly in 2000:

He told me the European officials he met with initially hemmed and hawed over whether anti-Semitism is really on the rise, or posing a serious threat of any kind — that is, until he showed them video clips of the Syrian film. Then the debate stopped, and everyone in the room sat in stunned silence.

The movie was recently being shown in Jordan, that epitome of Moslem moderation--until the Government of Jordan received a letter of protest from 24 American rabbis who met last month with Jordan's king. The movie has been stopped.

The Embassy of Jordan issued the following statement:

It has come to our attention that a controversial program entitled "Al-Shatat" or "The Diaspora" has been broadcast from an independent/private channel entitled "Mamnou'" operating from the Media Free Zone in Jordan, which is not subject to Jordanian Law. The program itself was not broadcast from any Jordanian channel.

"Al- Shatat" drew concerns for inciting hate. Accordingly, the program has been stopped from the private channel as of Tuesday, October 25th 2005. The stoppage was only done through personal intervention of responsible Jordanians.

The Free Media Zone broadcasts different programs through 84 different channels and more channels are expected to emerge from the zone in the near future. The Government of Jordan does not monitor or control the content of any program broadcasting from the free zone, whether it is cultural, political, or otherwise. This is in accordance with the agreement between the government of Jordan and the Media Free Zone which is, in turn, affiliated with the Arab Media Company ART. [emphasis theirs]

It's very nice of the Jordanian government to not monitor or control what goes on in this 'free zone,' but isn't there anyonewatching the store? It's nice that 'responsible Jordanians' intervened, but the statement does seem to neglect to mention those 24 rabbis who first had to write that letter.

Speaking of being responsible, on the production end, Syria actually had factchecking for this movie of theirs. According to MEMRI:

The series was written by Dr. Fathallah Omar, lecturer at the University of Aleppo, and Syrian historian Dr. Suheil Zakar was appointed to check its historical accuracy...Later, Dr. Zakar discussed the Jews' influence in the U.S., which the series addressed, albeit not extensively, by referring to 'Benjamin Franklin's Speech,' whose source is a 1935 piece of Nazi propaganda:"Regarding the Jews in America, their control of the money, media, and political decisions frightened some of the American leaders, such as President [sic] Benjamin Franklin, who tried to include in the Constitution sections against Jewish control. [emphasis theirs]

President Benjamin Franklin? Good to know that Dr. Zakar the historian is on the case.

And meanwhile, in Great Britain they are banning those offensive piggy banks.

Unbelievable.

See It's Not Anti-Semitic If It Rhymes
See The EU, Reuters, and Fear


Technorati Tag: Anti-Semitism.

Musharraf, Al Jazerra, and Douste-Blazy on The Holocaust

Attitudes towards the Shoa are being pointed out this week.

Over at The Corner, Warren Bell writes:

Daniel Pipes provides his thoughts on Musharraf's speech. This is the strangest compliment to pay a bona fide world leader, but Musharraf did not deny the Holocaust! (Among Muslim leaders this is, shall we say, unusual.)

Still at The Corner, Jim Robbins notes that:

The English online edition of Al Jazeera has a very straightforward obituary on Simon Wiesenthal. They headline it in a big box with a nice photo on the Culture page. Might be called progress. But for some reason I haven't found the same story in the Arabic edition...

And finally, for your consideration, at The American Thinker, the following is quoted from Haaretz by Clarice Feldman:

The French satirical magazine Le Canard Enchaine reported in its September 14th issue that during the visit of French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy to the new Holocaust museum in Jerusalem's Yad Vashem on September 8, he asked - while perusing maps of European sites where Jewish communities had been destroyed - whether British Jews were not also murdered. Needless to say, Douste-Blazy's question was met by his hosts with amazement. "But Monsieur le minister," Le Canard quoted the ensuing conversation, "England was never conquered by the Nazis during World War II."

The minister apparently was not content with this answer, which, according to the magazine, was given by the museum curator, and persisted, asking: "Yes, but were there no Jews who were deported from England?" [emphasis added]

No matter how impressed Pipes may be with Musharraf's speech, I think he himself hints at the problem:

Properly to appreciate the significance of this speech means hearing it with Muslim ears. It may not sound like much, for example, that he referred to the Holocaust as the Jewish people's "greatest tragedy," but the profusion of Muslim Holocaust deniers, including Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, makes this an important statement.

The point is that when they listen to Musharraf's speech with "Muslim ears" the Moslems will hear English and assume that Musharraf is exploiting the pro-Israel card to get something out of the US. Likewise, as Robbins points out, the Al Jazeera piece on Wiesenthal, bluntly acknowledging the Holocaust, only appears in English.

And what about French Foreign Minister Douste-Blazy?

Some things never change.

Technorati Tag: Israel.

Peace At What Price?

Dr. Alex Grobman

For years, Israelis were reluctant to acknowledge the potent and inexhaustible stream of antisemitism in Arab media and in pronouncements by Arab religious and political leaders.

According to Menahem Milson, professor of Arab literature at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the Israelis repress the virulent plague of hatred that surrounds them because of the Zionist ideal. Zionism, the dream, was supposed to be the end of European antisemitism. Jews came to the Promised Land to escape Jew-hatred, and when they got there, they discovered it to be ubiquitous. And then, after the Holocaust, by psychological necessity, they slipped into denial.

Milson says if the Jewish intellectuals and politicians in Israel concede that the strength of Arab antisemitism has poisoned the psyches of their Palestinian partners in peace, it justifies those who question Arab sincerity in peace talks and support those who refuse to surrender land.

Itamar Marcus, who monitors Arabic sermons, speeches and media via the Palestinian Media Watch, reports on the constant barrage of hatred and lies broadcast by the Palestinian Authority, much of it imported from other Arab lands. Arie Stav, director of the Ariel Center for Policy Research, reports that, in general, Israeli academic institutions were minimally interested in analyzing this phenomenon and its effects.

Shimon Peres as Foreign Minister in 1993, Stav notes, ordered the Palestinian Covenant removed from all Israeli government offices. The Covenant is anti-Israel and contains the PLO’s ideology, its objectives and calls for the “elimination of Zionism in Palestine (article 15). It also proclaims the “entire illegality of the establishment of Israel” (Article 19) and the need “to destroy the Zionist presence.”

After a number of wars, two intifadahs and the failure of the Oslo Accords to bring peace, some Israelis are now convinced that the Arabs will never accept the existence of the Jewish State and will use every subterfuge to destroy it. Not all Israelis share this view. There are those who believe that there are Arabs who want peace. That is understandable, at least from a psychological perspective.

Sixty years after the Holocaust, the Jewish State is negotiating with an Arab leader who denies that it ever happened. He used his “knowledge” to spread lies and hatred for Jews among Arabs in many lands, lies and hatred found in his 1982 doctoral dissertation for Moscow’s Oriental College. The president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas (a.k.a. Abu Mazen), claimed that the Nazis and the leadership of the Zionist movement conspired together to create the Holocaust.

In 1984 he published a book based on his dissertation, questioning if gas chambers were used to exterminate Jews, and claiming that “even less than a million” might have been murdered. The Zionists used a higher number of victims, he said, to extract “greater gains” when they would “distribute the spoils.” He asserted, “Raising a discussion regarding the number of Jews [murdered] does not in any way diminish the severity of the crime committed against them, as murder – even of one man – is a crime that the civilized world cannot accept and humanity cannot accept.”

Abu Mazen’s Holocaust denial challenges the legitimacy of the Jewish State. Scholars at MEMRI say that he does that by showing how the Zionists worked with the Nazis to destroy the Jewish people—because only “Palestine” was the right place for Jews. He claims “The Zionist movement led a broad campaign of incitement against the Jews living under Nazi rule in order to arouse the government’s hatred of them, to fuel vengeance against them, and to expand the mass extermination.”

Denying the Holocaust is part of a strategy to deny the Jews any connection to the Land of Israel, including the strategy of denying the Bible. Itamar Marcus illustrates the problem:

*“Biblical Judaism is really Islam. Biblical Jews are really Arab, and the Land of Israel is really the Arabian Peninsula [Judaism is not a religion on the full sense of the word…] The religion of Moses is a religion, apparently it is the Islamic religion, and some research that was published find[s] that, when translated correctly, the Torah texts show that it is a continuation of Islam.”
*“It is known scientifically as well, that a homeland of all the [Israeli] tribes exists today in Asir [in the Arabian Peninsula]. Their history is there.”

*“Modern Judaism, the Torah and Bible are forgeries. Jews are falsifiers and the enemies of Allah and Islam. The Torah was brought down while it contained guidance…. They [the Jews] faked the words of Allah and changed their religion and laws are wicked…

Professor Arthur Hertzberg, a Jewish leader and major historian, says, “The attack by Holocaust deniers is… the most hurtful that has ever been leveled against Jews. We have long been prepared to defend our religion and our corporate character …but the immediate reaction to the Holocaust deniers is outrage….”

In our book Denying History, Michael Shermer and I note that Holocaust denial is a form of pseudohistory. It is an affront against history and how the science of history is practiced. To deny the Holocaust is shocking because it attempts to deny our search to understand extreme acts of humanity. Holocaust denial is so dangerous and despicable—it is an attempt not just to deny a true past, but to deny a meaningful one.

By denying the Holocaust and vilifying Zionist leaders, Abu Mazen declares Jews have no legitimate right to any part of Israel.

Before anyone signs an agreement involving the security of the Jews in the State of Israel and perhaps its viability, is it unreasonable for someone to go up to Abu Mazen and just ask him if he really believes what he wrote? Don’t we need to know if there is a reason to believe he is different from his predecessor? So far, the only difference is better personal grooming. Since his election, things do not bode well. For years the Jews in America and many of its leading academics argued against meeting with deniers lest they be given legitimacy. Are we legitimizing Holocaust denial and Jew-hatred while we delegitimize Israel?

We yearn for peace, but at what price?

An historian, Dr. Grobman most recent book is Battling for Souls: The Vaad Hatzala Rescue Committee in Post War Europe [KTAV]. He is also co-author of Denying History: Who Says The Holocaust Never Happened And Why Do They Say It? (University of California Press, 2000). His next book Zionism Equals Racism: The New War Against The Jews will be published in 2005.