Original articles on Israel and related issues written by Steven Plaut, a professor at an Israeli university.
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Friday, August 27, 2004
Stop the Political Interference and Coercion by the Rabbis!
The political interference by the Rabbis is getting more and more
unbearable. The attempt to impose their opinions and life styles,
regardless of the preferences of the majority of their fellow citizens, is
outrageous. They are arrogant and anti-democratic and coercive.
I am of course referring to the Reform Rabbis in the United States.
While not every Rabbi or every member of the Reform synagogue movement
has been recruited into the "Political Liberalism as Judaism" school of
pseudo-Judaism, enough have. The "Political Liberalism as Judaism"
doctrine and pseudo-religion dominates the main institutions of the Reform
synagogue movement, including their council of Rabbis. And of course the
leftist SWAT team for the Reform movement is the Ridiculous - er, I mean
the - "Religious" Action Center, under the commissarship of David
Saperstein, who recently launched a Reform jihad against Israel's attempts
to defend its children from terrorists by constructing a security wall.
The RAC is more worried about inconveniencing the Palestinians than about
the rights of Jewish children to ride buses without being blown up. It is
far more critical of the Boy Scouts for not hiring gay scout leaders than
of the PLO.
But no less outrageous is the theological coercion efforts of the
Reform Rabbis, attempting to impose their liberal political theology not
only on fellow American Jews but on the US as a whole. While whining
about supposed Orthodox religious coercion in Israel, the Reform
Establishment today embodies the worst form of Jewish religious coercion
on earth, with the only problem being that the religion in question is
liberal politics and liberation theology.
The Reform movement has adopted the entire agenda of the American
Left, down to and including bashing Israel for daring to defend itself.
The Reform establishment is today barely distinct from the buffoons in the
Tikkun-Aleph-Renewal cult of Michael Lerner and Arthur Waskow, other than
the fact that they have not - yet - endorsed LSD use by Jews. The Reform
establishment opposes school choice for Jews and wants Jewish children
confined to public schools; it supports every wacky idea to emerge from
the most extremist environmentalist movements; it supports affirmative
action quotas that discriminate against Jews; the number one item on its
agenda these days is gay "marriage"; David Saperstein's comments opposing
welfare reform were so outrageous that a few years back the were cited
with approval by the American Communist Party newspaper. The Reform
establishment blocks school vouchers by trotting out the old bogeyman of
religious coercion, while at the same time its entire raison d'etre is
religious coercion - liberal theological PC fad "religion" coercion, that
is. No tradeoffs, no policy analysis, no understanding of markets, no
thinking nay deeper than a leftist bumper sticker.
The Reform Establishment supports partial-birth killings of babies but
vehemently opposes execution of convicted murderers and terrorists. It
wants Israel to return to its 1949 borders with all "settlers" expelled.
Reformies in Israel have led the anti-globalization hoodlums seeking to
make the world safe for Marxism. The US Reform movement has conscripted
itself on behalf of jailed Stalinist terrorist Lori Berenson, in Peru.
I have a serious question for David Saperstein and the Reform
Establishment (and for parts of the Conservative synagogue movement as
well). I am not being facetious. In your opinion, are Michael Moore,
Teddy Kennedy, and Ralph Nader Jewish?
I am serious.
After all, if being Jewish is nothing more than liberal political
activism, why are these people not to be regarded as Jewish? And don't
answer that it is because Jews eat kosher and keep shabbas, because we
know how common that is among Reform Jews. And do not reply that it is
because Reform Jews base their liberal politics on the Bible. Come on
now. Where does the Bible endorse homosexuality and abortion and
Palestinian statehood in the West Bank? And many of the Reform leaders I
have met know the Bible far less well than your average Mormon.
So seriously, if all of Judaism is liberal self-sanctimonious
agitprop, why can't Moore, Kennedy, and Nader be considered Jewish? And
if a Jewish liberal marries a non-Jewish liberal, why should anyone
consider that an intermarriage? After all, they have exactly the same
"religion"!!
There is virtually no religious coercion in Israel. True, the
politicized religious parties once forced the cinemas closed on Sabbath
but today the whole country has DVDs. True, once the Orthodox politicos
forced the buses to stop running on Sabbath, but who cares when everyone
has a car? I would venture to say that almost no Israelis ever are forced
to observe ANY religious ritual against their will. And other than some
minor difficulties for those wishing to have a "civil" wedding, which is
quite possible today, no secularist in Israel has to have any contact
whatsoever with the Orthodox institutions if he/she does not want to. It
is not the religious parties who are responsible for the nation
self-destruction in Israel but the secularist ones, although the religious
parties display cowardice in not stopping it.
But contrast that with the political interference and coercion by the
Reform movement in the US. In an era when true believers in liberalism
are an endangered species outside the Bay Area and Hollywood, the Reform
establishment lobbies in the name of "Judaism" and "Biblical ethics" to
impose its leftist political biases and life style on all Jews and on the
entire United States. It seeks to hijack Judaism, Jewish holidays, and
Jewish ethical authority on behalf of the PC fads of the liberal-Left.
The time has come to get these Rabbis and other Reform leaders out of
our bedrooms, out of our politics, and back to their proper roles. Stop
this liberal pseudo-theological coercion!
1. http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14838
2. More on the Right of Return:
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14820
3. Four Cheers for Zionist Arabs:
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14762
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Subject: Gush Katif Memories
From www.jewishpress.com:
Gush Katif Memories
Posted 8/25/2004
By Steven Plaut
Gush Katif is the name of the set of Jewish
settlements at the western end of the Gaza Strip. Just
recently, Ariel Sharon pushed through his plan for
unilateral Israeli disengagement from Gaza, thus
ensuring that he will go down in history as part of
the Oslo appeasement and capitulation pantheon.
Sharon showed that his concept of democracy differs
little from that of a Third World dictator; after
calling a Likud national referendum on the plan, which
was defeated 60 percent to 40 percent, Sharon declared
that Likud voters could get stuffed because he was
going to implement the plan anyhow.
The disengagement plan is not conditioned upon
anything the Palestinians may or may not do Â? not even
on whether they will refrain from using Gaza for
terrorism and rocket attacks against Jews.
What exactly does Sharon think the Palestinians will
do in Gaza once the Jews expelled Â? take up quilting?
Since the Peel Plan in 1937, each and every suggestion
for partitioning Palestine west of the Jordan River
between Arabs and Jews has been met with waves of
pogroms and Arab atrocities. Why should anyone expect
anything different to result from SharonÂ?s proposal?
The main victims of the SharonÂ?s plan will be the Gush
Katif settlements, which will be reduced to rubble,
or, worse, handed over to the jihadniks and mass
murderers.
Thinking about Gush Katif, I am taken back to an
earlier, more peaceful time Â? and my own tour of duty
there.
Gush Katif: Winter 1994.
Â?Fare thee well, O Gaza, for we are parting; Fare thee
well, O Gaza, and letÂ?s not see one another any more.Â?
The words are from one of the more popular songs heard
on Israeli radio these days, with Â?OrientalÂ? melody
and instrumentation. The song screams out in high
decibels from the ghetto-blaster in the room of the
regular soldiers next door in the barracks.
The scene is an Israel Defense Force base deep inside
the Strip. In semi-tropical Gaza in February during
one of IsraelÂ?s worst winter droughts, it has been
raining nonstop since our group of reservists checked
in to the base for a 22-day tour of duty amid the sand
dunes along the Gaza Coast.
Gaza, land of the Philistines, land of Islamic
terrorists. One can see Egypt off in the distance.
North is Gaza City, a cesspool of Islamic fanaticism
and violence, the city in which the chained and
blinded Samson brought the house down upon his
Philistine tormentors.
We are near the Gush Katif settlements, a collection
of Jewish farming settlements populated mostly by
Orthodox Jews from the center of Israel and
immigrants. Just over yonder behind the dunes sits one
of the stripÂ?s seamier refugee camps.
The strip is home to some 800,000 Palestinian Arabs,
most of whom would like nothing better than to see us
and our ilk buried deep beneath the sand and mud here.
The northern two-thirds of the Strip are covered with
citrus orchards stretching in all directions, now lush
and green from the rains. The southern third is mostly
desolate sand dunes.
Our camp is a mound of sand and dirt with a few
barracks. We reservists have the honor of serving as
guards for the station and its indigenous inhabitants,
a group of young men and women doing their mandatory
army service, the Â?regularsÂ? or Â?sadirniks.Â? They are
19 and 20.
Reservists are Israeli men who have finished their
regular service and continue to spend quality time
away from their homes and families in military
service, up to the age of 50. The reservists,
miluimniks, are mostly recent dischargees in their
20Â?s. I am nearly twice their age, the oldest man here
Â? eight years older than the commanding officer.
As these things go, this base is considered to be a
relatively soft reserve assignment. It is quiet and
the surrounding countryside is beautiful and tropical,
the sea switching intermittently from stormy to
delightful. If one ignored the geography and politics,
it could be a hill anywhere along the central
California coast. The flora is the same.
In some ways the surroundings look like a photo from a
tourist brochure: countless palm and date trees,
flocks of sheep and goats tended by Bedouin shepherds
and shepherdesses, the occasional camel or donkey
cart.
The nights are filled with the croaking of millions of
Gazan frogs, enjoying the puddles and pools formed by
the recent unusually hard rains. When the sea is calm,
it fills with fishing boats, some actually run by
Gazan smugglers.
The food in the navy is considered edible, relatively
speaking. We sleep in real barracks, although
unheated, and my room has no glass in the window. We
have real, albeit unheated, showers with real hot
water.
By contrast, the infantry who fill the strip consider
the navy soldiers to be pampered sissies who actually
need food, toilets and hot water to function.
On the other hand, some of the more elite units, like
the paratroopers, look down their noses at the
infantry because they actually need sleep.
The navy is also considered a relatively civilized
branch of the military. The soldiers are well-behaved,
and even follow orders Â? well, sort of, after a
fashion, Israeli-style. Our duties are actually quite
simple. Guard the place. Just guard. That, and
occasionally riding shotgun on convoys racing around
the strip.
The night we arrive, the commander spells out our
duties. Back in the center of Israel the army has a
tough job, he explains. It has to locate the
terrorists. We are blessed with a far simpler
assignment. Here we do not have to search for the
terrorists because we know exactly where they are. He
then traces out a 360-degree circle around himself.
Once within the barbed wire, the main features of life
are the cold and the boredom. We do day and night
watches and patrols, each lasting four grueling hours.
The time passes at an excruciatingly slow pace. In one
sense I have lucked out. I am serving with Don, a
childhood buddy from Philadelphia who grew up with me
in the Habonim youth movement.
Doing reserves with a childhood chum is the army
equivalent of winning the lottery. We pass the time
gossiping and reminiscing, and when that gets boring,
we try to recreate dialogue from old TV shows, tell
jokes, and so on. In our drab green uniforms we look
like a couple of large middle-aged olives.
It is Friday morning, the Muslim Sabbath. It is the
last week of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. I am on
the bus heading back to camp after spending nearly 20
hours at home on a short furlough. Suddenly the radio
blasts a news flash: there has been a massacre in the
Machpelah shrine of Hebron perpetrated by one Baruch
Goldstein, an ex-American and a fanatic. The
passengers are shocked, none more than me.
In the evening I am dozing when the camp siren goes
off. The entire base scrambles to battle positions.
The loudspeaker tells us this is not a drill but a
real alert.
Groggily I climb into the fortified trench, banging my
knee in my half-awake rush. My helmet is on my arm, as
there is not a single one in the entire base that fits
my head. Don sarcastically tells me to prepare photon
torpedoes and phasers. A short while later the alert
is canceled. For the next week similar alerts and
scrambles will help us pass the time.
The violence is not restricted to the Â?territories.Â?
Arabs are rioting in Jaffa and Nazareth and even in
the Bedouin town of Rahat outside Beer Sheba. (The
Bedouins serve in the Israeli army and are usually
considered as loyal and moderate as Israel could hope
for.)
Israeli Arabs attack soldiers and police with rocks
and knives. The hatred in their faces, after two
generations of citizenship and democratic education,
matches anything that can be seen here in Gaza.
Despite the media myth concerning the Â?brutalityÂ? of
the Israeli army as it Â?suppressesÂ? the Palestinians,
the foremost concern of the military seems to be to
avoid shooting rioting Arabs, no matter what the
provocation.
At least once a day Â? sometimes more Â? we drill the
Procedures for Opening Fire (POF), a long list of
instructions and prohibitions designed for dealing
with rioters, attackers, and suspicious persons,
starting with warnings and ending with shooting into
the air and then, where there is no choice, at an
attackerÂ?s legs or car tires.
It is my 43rd birthday today, and I have celebrated by
pulling the very worst guard duty possible, the
double-whammy. It begins with an evening shift Â? 6 to
10 p.m. Â? followed by a 2 to 6 a.m. shift. In between
the two shifts one can sleep for maybe ten or twenty
seconds at a time.
In the morning I have also been selected for the honor
of riding shotgun on one of the convoys. By MurphyÂ?s
Law, I conjecture, a convoy on my birthday should get
attacked by rock-throwers. Don and I survived the 60Â?s
together. If they throw rocks at us, he notes, at
least this will give a new meaning to the expression
Â?getting stoned for your birthday.Â?
Gaza is filled with eccentrics and the bizarre. On
Sabbath, the settlers, mostly religious, go for long
strolls, oblivious to any dangers. Among them is a
group of Burmese Â? members of a tribe from the jungles
of East Asia who believe they are descended from one
of the lost tribes of Israel Â? who converted and live
as Orthodox Jews in Gaza. One sees them all over the
strip. The men sport yarmulkes and their tzitzit
dangle down their sides. Two walk by on Saturday and
point at us, probably saying to one another, Â?ThatÂ?s
funny, they donÂ?t look Jewish.Â?
Exactly one week has passed since the massacre in
Hebron. It is early Friday morning. I have lucked out
and got a weekend furlough, good until Sunday morning.
The sun has just come up and it will be a warm sunny
day.
At 7 a.m. I am outside the perimeter awaiting the bus,
carrying my laundry, my M-16 and two or three clips of
bullets. There is a mist over the palms and the birds
are singing.
With the world outside the perimeter filled with
madness, the insanity of army life is starting to seem
normal and sensible.
A hawk has landed in the field opposite the
watchtower, munching on something. Through the field
binoculars I can see it is a chocolate pudding
container, a treasure stolen from the scraps upon
which our infantry neighbors subsist. Seagulls are
bobbing on the gentle swell of the sea.
The warm sun makes it harder and harder to keep my
eyes open. My kingdom for a nap. Never mind the
violence and terror out beyond the dunes. Forget the
politicians. I can make my peace with the filth, the
food, the cold. Just let me sleep.
Like in the old Song of the Valley of the pioneers:
Â?Rest comes to the weary, and slumber to the toiler.Â?
Let me close my eyes. Let me curl up in fetal
position. Just for an hour or two.
*****
As part of the propaganda juggernaut designed to panic
Israelis into withdrawing from the Gaza Strip and
leave it judenrein, the Left Â? a term that these days
also means large parts of the Likud Â? has been
blustering about how Gaza was Â?never Jewish land,Â?
never had Jews living in it, is not at all part of the
JewsÂ? national heritage, and so on.
For example, Israeli Minister of Defense Shaul Mofaz
has declared that Â?Gaza is not at all Jewish
heritage.Â?
Oh, really?
Well, letÂ?s put aside for the moment all those stories
in the Bible about Jews spending time in Gaza, from
King David to Samson. LetÂ?s talk about the
historically unassailable evidence of Gaza being an
integral part of the Jewish homeland long before the
Gush Katif settlements were set up.
Gaza had a thriving Jewish community until the Jews
were ethnically cleansed from Gaza in the 1948-9 war.
When you hear the mindless Left blabbing about how
Â?ethnic cleansingÂ? took place in the Israeli War of
Independence, understand that the only ethnic
cleansing that took place was of Jews expelled from
Gaza (and the West Bank), and later of Jews from all
the Arab countries.
For some strange reason, the Left has never heard
about any of those ethnic cleansings.
The Gaza Jewish community had as its rabbi starting in
1906 one Nissim Ohana, born in Algeria and trained as
a rabbi in Jerusalem, who also served later as an
important spiritual leader in Alexandria, Egypt, in
Malta, in New York, in Cairo (where he was chief rabbi
of Egypt), and in Haifa (where he was Sephardic chief
rabbi in the 1950Â?s).
Not long ago the Israeli religious newspaper Hatzofe
devoted an article to Rabbi Ohana and to the Jews
living in Gaza in the first half of the 20th century.
Rabbi Ohana was on warm cordial terms with the Muslim
Mufti of Gaza, the article reports, and the two wrote
a book together.
There is one other detail worth knowing about this
famous rabbi of Gaza: I am married to his
granddaughter. In fact, the rabbi is one of the
figures discussed in my book The Scout.
So when Shaul Mofaz states that Jews have no heritage
to preserve in Gaza, let him speak for himself.
Steven Plaut is a professor at Haifa University. His
book Â?The ScoutÂ? is available at Amazon.com. He can be
contacted at steven_plaut@yahoo.com
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http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14811
EU Suddenly Opposes "Right of Return"
By Steven Plaut
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 26, 2004
The "right of return" has been of interest in much of the world press in
recent weeks, but this time - for a change - it is NOT the supposed
"right" of Palestinians to return to Israel's lands. The newest debate
over the right of return concerns that of ethnic Germans, at least 15
million of whom were expelled from their homelands at the end of World War
II. These have suddenly become a matter of interest (see for example the
Wall Street Journal's "War Echo: Ousted by Poland in 1945, Germans Want
Homes Back," Aug 11, 04) for the simple reason that many of the countries
who expelled German refugees after World War II have become or are
becoming full members of the EU.
There has arisen a wave of attempts by ethnic Germans expelled by these
countries to use EU institutions to recover property or receive
compensation, and in some cases possibly even to return to their former
homes. Their chances of success are negligible. That is because the EU,
led by Germany itself in this matter, is unalterably opposed to any "right
or return" for ethnic Germans. Yes, the same EU insists that "Palestinian
refugees" have an inalienable right to return to Israeli lands do not
think ethnic German refugees have such a right.
Before World War II, there was a large Diaspora of ethnic Germans
throughout Central and Eastern Europe. Many were from families who had
migrated in as far back as the Middle Ages or even earlier. They lived in
Poland, Russia, Czechoslovakia, the Baltic countries, Hungary, and the
Balkans. In some areas they had come in when the countries were absorbed
into the Habsburg Empire or freed from Ottoman domination. They had
entered as merchants, literate civil servants, shop owners, mercenaries,
missionaries, or other things. Most were urbanized and constituted almost
the only skilled non-agricultural craftsmen in the towns of underdeveloped
countries. They often dominated the guilds. In one of history's many
delicious ironies, German Christians often migrated to the towns and
villages of Central and Eastern Europe alongside Germanized Jews and they
often worked in the same trades.
The period between the two world wars saw the radicalization and
Nazification of many of these Germans. The best-known story is that of the
Sudeten Germans, who played a role in the annihilation of Czechoslovakia.
When Hitler signaled them that the time was right, the Sudetens launched
pogroms, terror atrocities, and armed uprisings against Czechoslovakia,
all in the name of "self-determination," but in reality to provide an
excuse for Nazi aggression. Pretending to be "oppressed" and "occupied" by
democratic Czechoslovakia (sound familiar, Middle East fans?), their
"plight" was the fig leaf for Fascist aggression by Germany. History would
later largely replay the story, when the "Palestinians" would be
Sudetenized, and their "plight" would become the cover for the aggression
by Arab Fascist states against Israel.
Less well known are the similar tales of insurrection and sedition by the
German minorities in the rest of Europe before World War II. While not
all ethnic Germans openly supported and aided Hitler, enough did. After
the War, most ethnic Germans were expelled at bayonet point from the
countries in which they had lived for generations, and the refugees were
"repatriated" to West Germany (and in smaller measure to Austria). Stalin
expelled large numbers of Russia's Germans to Siberia and other points
east.
Altogether, it is estimated that 15 million ethnic Germans were evicted
from the non-German states of Central and Eastern Europe, about three
quarters of these just coming from Czechoslovakia and Poland. (Ethnic
Japanese were at the same time expelled from Manchuria and Korea, for
essentially the same reasons.) The German refugees were absorbed and
resettled by Germany, mainly by West Germany, and without a dime in aid
from the UNRWA, the UN's refugee agency that has ladled out cash to
Palestinians for decades. Like the Palestinians, these ethnic Germans had
become refugees due to a war of aggression launched by their ethnic
compatriots, a war in which they found themselves on the losing side.
Unlike most Palestinian "refugees,Â? who became "refugees" by fleeing
battle zones at the command of Arab militia chiefs in the Israeli War of
Independence, these Germans became refugees because they were driven out
by force by their host countries AFTER World War II had been ended. The
Germans left behind large amounts of property, whereas almost all the
Palestinian "refugees" had been impoverished sharecroppers for Arab
Feudalist aristocrats, with little or any property left behind.
More important is the fact that Germany and Austria have renounced the
rights of any of these ethnic German refugees to return to their previous
homelands and even to receive any compensation from those countries in any
form. To the contrary, Germany (but not Austria) has paid out reparations
to the very same countries who evicted these German refugees. True, many
of the ethnic German refugees were innocent bystanders, who had never been
Nazis and had never abused anyone.
But the German government and the Eurocrats say: Tough. These German
refugees were just a few more millions out of the untold millions of
victims of Germany's own crimes, and they simply had to go on with their
lives without handouts. Their "compensation" would consist of their
resettlement in a free, democratic, and prosperous capitalist Germany. It
was a Germany that passed its own Law of Return that allows all ethnic
Germans to receive citizenship therein. The same Eurocrats and media
pundits who denounce Israel as "racist" because it has a Law of Return
granting automatic citizenship to Jews requesting it have never had any
problem with the similar German "racist" law. Meanwhile, there has been
intense resistance in Europe even to commemorating the plight of ethnic
German refugees.
There is a lesson in all this for 2004. Those ethnic Germans actually had
far more of a legitimate claim for compensation and recovery of property
than any "Palestinian" claiming to be a "refugee" does. Palestinians
played exactly the same role as Sudeten Germans played, and calls for a
Palestinian "right to self-determination" echo similar calls for the
Sudeten Germans from the 1930s. Both sets of calls are little more than a
figleaf for fascist aggression against a democracy.
Like the Tory Loyalists who fled the infant United States, the ethnic
German refugees were never thought to be entitled to any compensation from
the states they fled nor from which they were driven. Not only did they
get no compensation from the countries evicting them (neither did the Tory
Loyalist refugees expelled from the US), but Germany itself paid
compensation to the countries expelling these ethnic Germans, countries
that had fallen victims to Nazi aggression. The very same world leaders
and media commentators who insist Israel must compensate "Palestinians"
and allow them to "return" to Israeli lands, the lands of that same Israel
that has been the victim of Arab aggression and Fascism for almost six
decades, cannot understand why these "Palestinian refugees" should become
as much of a non-issue as are the ethnic German refugees from the late
1940s.
So what is the real reason the Euroclowns have no interest in any "right
of return" for ethnic Germans, but demand one for "Palestinians"?
Simple.
Granting such a right to ethnic Germans would not result in the demise of
Israel, so the Europeans have no interest in it.
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Announcing the new Israeli Reality Show "Israeli Political Survivor"
In the show, assorted people seeking to become political leaders go to
the ISLAND and then there are votes to see who gets dismissed. The only
problem is that whenever there is a vote to make one of the contestants
leave the ISLAND, ... they don't.
In the first vote, Shimon Peres is voted off the ISLAND but then does
not leave. Then Ehud Barak is voted off the ISLAND, and leaves but for
only a short break and comes back in order to introduce new FEAR FACTOR
into Israeli lives. Bibi Netanyahu gets voted off the ISLAND after
offering its bungalos to the PLO at Wye, but never leaves. Amram Mitzna
gets voted off the ISLAND but the Ariel Sharon announces he will be
standing in for Mitzna and representing him in all new rounds.
The Pro-Palestinian Sap
In recent decades the misnamed Religious Action Center of the Reform
synagogue movement has emerged as the leading promoter of the
pseudo-religion of "Political Leftism as Judaism", a "liberation theology"
parody of Judaism and religion, holding that all of Judaism can be reduced
to this week's leftist PC political fads. It is also known as Tikkun Olam
Paganism, because every endorsement of a leftist fad is proclaimed in the
name of the intentionally misrepresented Judaic concept of "Tikkun Olam",
which in reality has little to do with "social justice" and even less to
do with the Left's pursuit of injustice in the name of "social justice".
The leading guru of this is "Rabbi" David Saperstein, the chief
pseudo-clergyperson of the RAC.
The RAC is so radical and un-Jewish that it has motivated many an
observer to question whether Reform Judaism itself should even be regarded
as a branch of Judaism, rather than as a form of leftist political
agitprop, a sister organization of Tikkun and ANSWER and Moveon. This is
somewhat unfair because many people and large segments of the Reform
movement share little with the pagan leftist "activism" of the RAC. The
fault for the wholesale delegitimization, however, is of the Reform
movement as a whole, which has failed to distance itself from and renounce
Saperstein and the rest of the Tikkunite-wannabes operating out of the
RAC. These RAC leftists have insisted for years that all of Judaism can
be conscripted as artillery support for homosexual marriage, sexual
deviance, affirmative action quotas and lowered standards that happen to
discriminate against Jews. They claim to oppose school choice, welfare
reform, free markets, and use of American arms - all supposedly in the
name of Biblical ethics.
But in the latest twist, the RAC and their buttonmen have gone on a
jihad against Israel's rights to defend itself. They issued a recent
fatwa glaring in its "even-handed" denunciation of Arab terror and at the
same time denouncing Israeli efforts to fight terror. The Reformies, very
few of whom live in Israel and who have in recent years cancelled youth
trip after youth trip to Israel out of liberal cowardice, insist Israel
must never use arms if "innocent" Palestinian civilians get injured. And
since no one has ever fought a war in which only uniformed fighters get
hurt and since Palestinian terrorists never wear uniforms and hide among
civilians, this amounts to an insistence that Israel not fight terror at
all. At the same time the Reformie leftists, led by the Sap Rav, insist
Israel implement the agenda of the most radical Israeli leftists. All
settlers must be evicted and Israel must return to its 1949 Auschwitz
borders with no quid pro quo from the Arabs.
The difference between the Israeli lefties and the suburban Reformies
in the US of course is that the Reformies, sitting in their air
conditioned offices in DC or elsewhere and riding in their SUVs in the US,
bear no cost nor penalty when these leftist policies actually get
implemented and result in mass murder and carnage.
The Jerusalem Post recently attacked the armchair peaceniks in the RAC
and their "even-handed" anti-Israel propagandizing. The Sap Rav himself
took time off from fighting for the promotion of lesbian Reform Rabbis
and demonizing the Boy Scouts for unwillingness to have gay scout
troop leaders long
enough to respond. In his response, he insists that Reformies in the
US have as much right to undermine Israeli security and promote the Arab
agenda as Israel's own leftists.
They do not.
If Sappy and his buffoons wish to promote Palestinian "freedom", let
them make aliya, pay Israeli taxes, serve in the army, and suffer on their
own persons the consequences of leftist folly, like Israel's own
home-grown leftist extremists. But even then, while they will have the
right to promote their agendas, EVEN THEN they will not have the right to
misrepresent leftist political extremism as Judaism.
Here is Saperstein's new fatwa from the POST:
The editorial "rebuttal" by "Rabbi" David Saperstein:
We support reengagement
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Saperstein, THE JERUSALEM POST Aug. 24, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Recent policy statements from the Union for Reform Judaism have twice come
under editorial and op-ed attack in these pages. Those attacks threaten to
drive a wedge into the broad pro-Israel coalition in America that embraces
both doves and hawks.
Polls repeatedly show that millions of Jewish and non-Jewish pro-Israel
Americans are dovish on peace process issues. These include, as Israeli
foreign service officers who served in the States can testify, many
senators, congresspersons, journalists, prominent Jewish leaders, and
other influentials. Certainly, they include a sizable majority of the 1.5
million Reform Jews.
To understand why the Post's criticism is so bewildering, simply reread
the paper's editorial. As it fairly and correctly acknowledges, the Reform
movement expressed its solidarity with Israel, denounced terrorism,
condemned Arafat, supported the security fence, condemned the ICJ's ruling
on the fence, and criticized Arab and international media "hatred and
falsehoods against Israel."
Is this not what the Post would want the millions of Jewish doves in the
US to be doing? Might it not have better served Israel and the Jewish
people by editorializing approvingly that even major Jewish organizations
more focused on the peace process than the Post feels is wise remain
staunchly pro-Israel?
Apparently not. Instead, the Post turns passionate only when criticizing
us for calling for more energetic efforts to restart the peace process,
expressing concern about the humanitarian plight of the Palestinians,
urging that the Gaza withdrawal be done in a way that strengthens moderate
forces and does not leave a vacuum that Hamas and Islamic Jihad can fill
and, finally, for suggesting that the security fence's placement must take
into account, as one factor, the dispossession and hardship it imposes on
the Palestinians Â? exactly the position of Israel's own High Court of
Justice. Indeed, all of these positions also reflect the formal policy of
the Bush administration.
Why, then, this editorial? Apparently, the only proper role for
(non-governmental) pro-Israel Americans (Jews and non-Jews) is as a
cheering section for whatever policy the government of Israel espouses.
That is a recipe for alienation, not for involvement; and we reject it. It
risks alienating large reservoirs of American support at exactly the time
that Israel needs them most: Many of the best and brightest of our
idealistic young Jews, the tens of millions of pro-Israel Jews and
non-Jews, including many of Israel's staunchest supporters on Capitol Hill
Â? people who love Israel, support it forcefully, but question specific
Israeli government policies. If the Post were to respond to them as it has
to us ("narcissistic," "moral posturing"), the alarming message would be:
You are not with us.
Let us be clear: The Reform movement has always held that because it is
the people of Israel who live and die by the decisions that Israel makes,
its citizens alone are entitled to make those decisions. But it does not
follow, not at all, that lovers of Israel abroad are precluded from active
participation in the debate over the wisdom of those decisions. Israel's
deliberations can only be enriched by such perspectives and analysis.
At the same time, as citizens and active participants in our own public
life, American Jews are obligated to address US policy, including American
policy vis-a-vis Israel.
The Post holds that we engage in moral posturing when we urge that Israel
implement the withdrawal from Gaza in a way that strengthens Palestinian
moderates and assists in revitalizing a peace process and restarting
negotiations. Moral posturing? Even those of us who believe that Arafat
must be replaced or those who believe there is no partner at all with whom
to speak now, should surely agree that American and Israeli interests are
not served by passively leaving a vacuum in Gaza that extremists will
fill.
Similar concerns underlay IDF Chief of Staff Maj.-Gen Moshe Ya'alon's
forceful criticism of Israel's failure to engage Palestinian moderates in
a way that provides the incentive and the wherewithal to stand up to
Arafat and Hamas. But the issue is less with whom can Israel talk at this
moment but what Israel and the US can now do to create conditions that
will lead to the resumption of meaningful talks.
Yitzhak Rabin had it right. As our resolutions have long argued, a
two-state solution remains indispensable to stability in the region,
reducing terrorism, avoiding the isolation of Israel on the world scene Â?
and, crucially, to addressing (as does our position on the placement of
the security fence) the urgent demographic threat to the Jewishness of the
Jewish state.
We question the Post's position that the purpose of disengagement is to
serve as an alternative to direct negotiations. We stand, instead, with
the Bush administration, which remains formally committed to a peace
process that points beyond disengagement, that points towards the
difficult reengagement that alone can one day bring genuine peace to the
region.
The writer, a rabbi, is director of the Religious Action Center of Reform
Judaism.
Sunday, August 22, 2004
1. Apologies for the glitch in last week's message in which addresses
inadvertently appeared.
2. There is one major issue related to the "Security Wall" that is being
totally ignored by the media and by Israelis.
Sure, the weaknesses associated with the idea of the "Security Wall"
have already been well expounded. The Wall is too easy to climb over,
dig under, swim around, or blow holes in. Even worse, there is nothing
stopping the Palestinians from shooting mortars, rockets, and missiles
over it. The Wall is much too close to the "Green Line", and signals
Israel's willingness to capitulate and return to its 1949 "Auschwitz
Borders". The Wall should in fact be a set of security cages, caging in
the large Palestinian towns while leaving the rest of the West Bank and
Gaza as free range in which Jews live and move freely.
But all that is old hat. There is one OTHER reason why the Wall will
fail.
Suppose hypothetically Israel were to build a Security Wall 3000
kilometers high, one that could not be dug under, shot over, nor could it
have any holes blown in it. Just suppose.
Even then, the Wall would do nothing to stop the terror and carnage.
Why? Because the Wall does nothing if you let the terrorists walk into
Israel through the gates in the Wall!
Israel's policy has always been to allow tens of thousands of
Palestinian day laborers to enter Israel freely. Even after each terror
bombing, a few days later the gates have been opened. The
much-touted Gaza fence, supposedly a precedent and role model for Sharon's
new "Security Wall", has failed to prevent the suicide bombers and other
murderers from entering israel for the simple reason that Israel just lets
them waltz in through the gates! Indeed, one part of Sharon's pledge to
President Bush in the recent White House pow-wow was that Israel promises
to continue to let the "day laborers" enter, no matter what. The US
does not allow unrestricted entrance of day laborers from Mexico nor
Canda, but wants Israel to agree to allow tens of thousands of
Palestinians to enter Israel, no matter how many Israelis get murdered as
a result.
So never mind that the Wall cannot stop a single Kassem rocket
(Kassems were discovered this week in the West Bank, and so are no longer
just a problem from Gaza, and can strike Lod airport and Jerusalem).
The Chinese Wall failed. The Roman Walls failed. Sharon's Wall will
fail.
The Security Wall is the latest Israeli attempt to find an alternative
to Israeli military victory. There is no magic solution that can serve as an
alternative to Israeli military control of the ground in the West Bank and
Gaza Strip. Everything else is wishful thinking and foolish belief in
magic.
Friday, August 20, 2004
1. http://www.jewishworldreview.com/michelle/malkin.html
2. Maariv, August 17, 2004
The weird right of return coalition
The German left opposes the right of return of all European post WW2
refugees. Our left could learn from them.
Ben Dror Yemini
The years following WW2 saw several waves of refugees. In Europe eleven
million ethnic Germans living in areas lost to Poland and Czechoslovakia
in the aftermath of the war were unceremoniously given one-way tickets and
told never to return.
Within a few short years they were totally absorbed into Germany, ceased
being refugees and disappeared as an issue from the headlines. No UNRWA,
no refugee camps, just Germans living in Germany. How different from the
Palestinians, who were deliberately kept refugees, in order to develop
into a festering sore to be blamed on Israel.
The Germans had a better claim to demand a right of return, or
alternatively of compensation. They became refugees after a war, unlike
the Palestinians who became refugees during a war they had initiated, and
coerced the Arab world into joining.
In addition, it should be remembered that there was a mutual wave of
refugees in the Middle East, as entire Jewish communities, numbering at
least as much as the Palestinian refugees were forced to flee their homes,
leaving behind assets worth at least those abandoned by the Palestinians.
The German left, true to its ideals of historic d?tente and pacifism, has
always rejected any talk of right of return or compensation. It claims
that any such attempt would re-ignite dormant nationalistic passions best
forgotten, and that even though many of the refugees were not Nazis, a new
reality has been created, and must be respected. Any attempt to do
otherwise would be seen as a provocation.
The BDV (organization of German refugees) received whatever scant public
support it has from the right hand corner of the German political map.
With the recent enlargement of the EU, which now includes those countries
from which the Germans were evicted, the BDV has attempted to re-air the
issue. Erkia Steinbach, a lone voice on the BundestagÂ?s backbenches has
been making a lot of noise over the matter, but no one is taking notice.
The demand for compensation, couched as Â?historic justiceÂ? is seen as a
non-starter, which could only bring back the Â?bad old daysÂ? Germany and
Europe have spent the last fifty years forgetting and dismantling.
However when it comes to the Middle East, every thing becomes topsy-turvy.
Elements of the German left, which regards itself as so progressive and
peace loving, make common cause with the disciples of the pro-Hitler
Mufti, in supporting the right of the Palestinians to return to a home
they have not lived in for over fifty years.
The really funny thing is that the arguments they use to reject precisely
such claims in Europe are equally valid when applied to the Middle East.
Here, as in Europe, it would be a giant step backwards for any chance of
peace and accommodation, releasing demons best left tightly locked up. The
total lack of logic and consistency between their position regarding right
of return or compensation in Europe, and that pertaining to the Middle
East clearly doesnÂ?t bother them.
Whoever favors peace should unambiguously reject any talk of right of
return for what it is, a massive provocation and rejection of reality that
can only encourage strife and hinder peace.
IsraelÂ?s noisy but marginal post-Zionist anti-Zionist minority just
doesnÂ?t get it. Instead of rejecting a cause that is inherently
incompatible with peace and accommodation, they insist on making common
cause with GermanyÂ?s ultra- right wing fringe, mindlessly parroting same
lines regarding the Palestinians the ultra-right wing nationalists in
Germany say regarding German refugees, the need to right a historic wrong,
achieve historic justice and so on and so forth.
(As usual, Yemini tries to be "balanced" between the treasonous Left
and its opponents here:)
And as usual, we see our lunatic left wing fringe
lined up with the
ultra-extremist lunatic right wing. Both of them support the right of
return, the former of Palestinians to ancestral homes in Jaffa and Haifa
they have not lived in for fifty years, the latter of Jews to return to
the ancestral cities of Shechem (Nablus), Bethlehem and Hebron. They talk
about righting historic wrongs, but implement policies that lead to the
robbing and humiliation of the Palestinians. One can understand a common
denominator between the Israeli and German ultra-nationalist
right-wingers, a common denominator between fellow zealots. What on earth
the Israeli post-Zionist ultra-left is doing in bed with them defies human
understanding.
Interestingly, many of the Israeli left who support the right of return
reject claims by descendents of Jewish refugees from Arab countries for
compensation, saying this is a provocation, and that they need to
understand the need to sacrifice for the greater good. An interesting
concept, is it not?
This week Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder visited Poland. He put and end to
any lingering tension or suspicions over the issue, saying a resounding no
to any talk of right of return or compensation.
3. Jewish Settler, Jesus, Crucified By Arafat
by Ariel Natan Pasko
Newsflash...Dateline Palestine: Jewish settler named Jesus born in illegal
outpost in occupied Bethlehem. His family builds settlement on occupied
Arab land. The young Jewish radical then grows up and decides as one of
the "hilltop youth" to go settle in Muslim Nazareth, oppressing peaceful
Arab Canaanites. Joining a settler group, he later sets up shop as a
carpenter, but is drawn into radical Jewish politics and becomes one the
most wanted right-wing extremists in Palestine. Years later, as a grown
man, he goes up to the Temple Mount in an attempted attack on the holy
Arab Canaanite Mosque, but Palestinian security forces arrest him and
bring him to President Arafat for trial. The "Rais" finds him guilty of
all the Palestinian's sins and orders his execution as a collaborator. One
more Jewish settler crucified in Palestine. As broadcast by PA TV...
Sounds crazy? Not really, if you pay close attention to what the
Palestinian Authority has been broadcasting to its people, as "history"
lately.
Thanks to Itamar Marcus over at Palestinian Media Watch (www.pmw.org.il),
who monitors Palestinian television broadcasts, we now "know" that:
1. The Hebrews of the Bible have no connection to the Jews of today.
2. The Hebrews of the Bible were Arabs.
3. The Prophets of the Bible were Muslims.
4. Biblical King Solomon was a Muslim Prophet.
5. Solomon's Temple was not built by Israelites but by Arab Canaanites.
6. The Canaanites are the forefathers of the Palestinians.
7. The Bible is legends based on what Jews imagined and not on history.
8. The Jews of today are descendents of a 13th Century Khazar tribe with
no history in the Land of Israel.
9. The location of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem is a Zionist invention.
10. Zionism is Racism.
The following discussion below, was broadcast on PA TV by "historians,"
Dr. Jarir Al-Qidwah, Head of the PA Public Library and Arafat's Advisor on
Education and Dr. Issam Sissalem, senior historian and Educational TV
host, who is the former head of the History Dept. of the Palestinian
Authority University. The moderator was Mohammed Albaz.
PA TV, Aug. 2, 2004...
Albaz: "Where did the story of Solomon's Temple come from?"
Al-Qidwah: "Solomon's Temple, I believe, was built by the Canaanites who
were the neighbors of the Israelis, the Israelites...I want to state
several words clearly: the Bible became an archival document, not
representing what the Israelis and the first Jews were, but what they
thought they were, what they imagined. The Temple is the fruit of their
imagination. In any case, when our nation or our Canaanite forefathers
came to Palestine, they built the Temple, a temple in Jerusalem."
Sissalem: "We, as the Palestinian nation fighting for its freedom and
liberation, must not focus too much attention on these false [Biblical]
legends. The history of our land continues more than ten thousand years.
The land of battles and wars, [many] armies, tribes and commanders came
through. I want to point out that we should not focus much on what is
called the [Biblical] Hebrew tribes, who are in fact Bedouin - Arab
tribes. There is no connection between them and these Khazar Jews [of
Israel today]. Those [Hebrew - Arab] tribes were erased and ceased to
exist and no traces were left of them. That group did not have a pure
religion. They claimed that Solomon, may he rest in peace, built the
Temple. Does the land testify to this? Solomon was a prophet and we see
him as a Muslim and part of our [Islamic] heritage. There is no historical
text that proves the existence [of the temple] or that it has a real
history other than the Bible, and the Bible as we have previously
mentioned, was written based on
ancient legends."
I won't bore you any longer with this insanity, if you "must" read it,
check out PMW's site.
But what I can tell you is, that the falsehood bothers Israelis so much,
that the usually self-flagellating, left-leaning Ha'aretz, last May,
featured an article "A campaign of denial to disinherit the Jews".
In it, the author tells us, "Years ago, a group of archaeology students
from Bar-Ilan University went to Jerusalem's Kidron Valley, hoping to save
archaeological remnants from earth the Wakf [Muslim religious trust] had
dug up on the Temple Mount and dumped in the riverbed. A Wakf official who
noticed the students began yelling at them. One sentence struck them in
particular: 'You have nothing to look for here, just as the Crusaders had
nothing to look for here. Jerusalem is Muslim.'"
According to the article, a recent study by Dr. Yitzhak Reiter, conducted
for the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies states: "In the last
generation, the Islamic and Arab history of Jerusalem has gradually been
rewritten. At the heart of this new version is the Arabs' historic right
to Jerusalem and Palestine. The main argument is that the Arabs ruled
Jerusalem thousands of years before the children of Israel. In addition to
building the Arab-Muslim case, the Muslim thinkers are formulating a
denial and negation of the Jewish-Zionist narrative. Included in that
effort is the de-Judaizing of the Temple Mount, the Western Wall and
Jerusalem as a whole."
And if you thought Palestinian insanity was bad enough, it seems to be
contagious...
Reiter - who is a specialist in Contemporary History of the Middle East at
Hebrew University's Truman Institute - points out that not only
Palestinian propagandists like Arafat and PA-appointed mufti of Jerusalem,
Sheikh Akram Sabri, have lost it, but both former and current Jordanian
Ministers of Wakf Affairs, the Muslim world's most popular cleric, Sheikh
Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, and others as well.
For example, the former Jordanian minister of Wakf affairs, Abed al-Salaam
al-Abadi, Sheikh Raed Salah and several Islamic Internet sites refer to
Abraham as the builder of the Al-Aqsa mosque 4,000 years ago. Whereas the
current Jordanian minister of Wakf affairs, Ahmed Khalil, has said that
Israel is intervening in Al-Aqsa (Temple Mount) affairs "in order to build
the fabricated temple there".
The Qatar based Islamic cleric, Egyptian-born Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi,
spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and a leading theologian - who
achieved star status thanks to his weekly religious phone-in program
Al-Sharia wa Al-Haya (Islamic Law and Life) on the Qatari satellite
channel, Al-Jazeera - has identified the Jebusites as an ancient Arab
tribe that wandered from the Arabian peninsula, together with the
Canaanites, around 3,000 BCE and therefore predated the children of Israel
in the land. So have members of the Saudi royal family, Palestinian
archaeologists, such as Dr. Dimitri Baramki, Syrian clerics and others in
the Arab/Islamic world.
And of course the Palestinians are descended from the Jebusites...
Egyptian archaeologist Abed al-Rahim Rihan Barakat, the manager of the
archaeological site at Dahab in Sinai, recently wrote in an article
appearing on the Internet site of the northern branch of the Islamic
Movement in Israel, "The myth of the fabricated Temple is the greatest
crime of historical forgery." And, a Fatwa on the Internet site of the
Wakf in Jerusalem states that David, Solomon and Herod did not build the
Temple; rather they repaired something that had been there since the time
of Adam.
So, next time you get the "crazy idea" that just maybe Israel can make
peace with the Palestinians, or that the Islamic world is ready to live in
peace, justice, and "truth," with the rest of the world, knock that
revisionist baloney right out of your head.
They're having a psychotic episode, gripped in mass insanity...
And, if Jesus ever comes back, he'll be a Palestinian "Shaheed" (martyr)
who the Israeli occupation has killed - as Yasser Arafat has stated on
numerous occasions - and you'll hear it first, on PA TV.
Ariel Natan Pasko is an independent analyst & consultant. He has a
Master's Degree in International Relations & Policy Analysis. His articles
appear regularly on numerous news/views and think-tank websites, in
newspapers, and can be read at:
www.geocities.com/ariel_natan_pasko
(c) 2004/5764 Pasko
THIS ARTICLE CAN ALSO BE READ AT:
http://michnews.com/artman/publish/article_4665.shtml
4. Cute exchange:
http://chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=9141
Wednesday, August 18, 2004
Kassams found in Nablus
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Margot Dudkevitch, THE JERUSALEM POST Aug. 17, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IDF troops operating in Nablus in an intensified operation to hamper
terror infrastructure uncovered on Tuesday two Kassam rockets in a
building in the city's casba (old city).
Palestinians reported that a 10-year-old boy was killed in Nablus by IDF
gunfire on Tuesday. The IDF is investigating the claim.
Its not the first time Kassams have been found in the West Bank. In
January of this year, IDF and Shin Bet forces arrested six members of a
Hamas cell operating in Ramallah who had been manufacturing Kassam rockets
in a residential apartment building.
On September 30, 2002, IDF forces discovered a Kassam rocket and launcher
in a field that were aimed at the nearby community of Kedumim in Samaria.
In February of same year, IDF reservists uncovered eight Kassam rockets
and a number of launchers while searching a truck at a surprise roadblock
set up near Ein Bidan north of Nablus. The rockets had been hidden in
flour sacks, and were complete with warheads and launchers.
Kassam attacks have become a regular feature of the war since 2002, though
they have generally been fired from the Gaza Strip. The rockets are
unsophisticated weapons homemade from simple materials, but their
4-kilometer range easily bypasses the security fence, endangering nearby
communities.
During the operation in Nablus on Tuesday, IDF soldiers shot and wounded
three Palestinian men. One of the men had hurled a firebomb at the
soldiers, and the other two men had thrown bricks. The IDF reported that
in two of the incidents soldiers shot low to the legs of the attackers.
Paratroopers operating in the city also discovered a second bomb factory
in which soldiers uncovered two explosive belts ready to use and a bomb.
It is the second bomb factory found in the city in the last 24 hours.
IDF troops operating in the Ein Beit Ilma refugee camp near Nablus
uncovered two rifles, a number of magazine clips, ammunitions and
electronic equipment used to prepare bombs.
IDF soldiers deployed in the Ramallah area on Tuesday arrested a Tanzim
man and three other Palestinian fugitives at a checkpoint near Bir Zeit. A
rifle was found at the Tanzim man's house.
In the Gaza Strip, two Palestinians were shot and killed by IDF troops
late Monday night after they were spotted approaching the security fence
near the settlement of Atzmona in Gush Katif and digging in the ground. It
seems the two were planning to plant a bomb.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This article can also be read at
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1092712287322&p=1078027574121
2. Too little, too late:
Court expels US pro-Palestinian activist
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Associated Press, THE JERUSALEM POST Aug. 16, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Tel Aviv District Court ordered a pro-Palestinian American activist
deported from the country Monday, the latest move against a foreign group
opposing Israeli military activity in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
A Tel Aviv District Court judge ordered Adam Wilson, a 28-year-old union
organizer from New Orleans, Louisiana, to leave Israel by Tuesday.
Wilson is affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement, a
Palestinian-sponsored group in the forefront of protests against IDF
military operations and the security fence Israel is building.
ISM activists have sometimes disrupted IDF operations by placing
themselves between soldiers and Palestinians.
The deportation order came as an Israeli court prepared to take up the
case of Ewa Jasiewicz, 26, an ISM sympathizer from London who was stopped
at Ben Gurion Airport on August 11.
In June the Shin Bet security service justified its efforts to expel ISM
activist Ann Petter, 44, on the grounds she constituted a threat to
Israel's security.
Wilson said he was detained by authorities at an airport detention center
the same day as Jasiewicz after he refused an order to leave Israel.
"They interrogated me and I spent about 10 hours at the airport," he said.
"They tried to put on the plane (August 13) and I refused to leave."
Wilson's attorney Yael Berda said the judge ordered his deportation after
he was unable to pay 4,000 shekels (US$890) to cover court costs.
"They're asking for money to be guaranteed for the state expenses of the
court fees," Berda said. "(ISM activists) don't have that kind of money.
They are here for their own volunteer opportunities."
In March 2003 ISM member Rachel Corrie, 23, of Olympia, Washington, was
crushed to death by an IDF bulldozer in a Gaza refugee camp while trying
to stop soldiers from demolishing a house. Her death was ruled accidental.
Thursday, August 12, 2004
http://www4.alternativenews.org/display.php?id=3830
Get set for new Israeli made movies and plays and paintings and
sculpture honoring the terrorist woman collaborator, who will be the new
role model for the Radical Israeli Left.
The Poster Girl of the Israeli Left
By Steven Plaut
Israelis this week are expressing shock and
astonishment over the arrest of a 29 year old Jewish
leftist woman from Tel Aviv for collaboration with one
of the worst Palestinian terrorists and murderer still
above ground.
They should be neither shocked nor surprised.
The Jewish "peace activist" from Tel Aviv,
29-year-old Tali Fahima, has been arrested on
suspicion of planning terrorist attacks against Jewish
targets and aiding arch-terrorist Zakaria Zubeidi from
Jenin. She was assisting her Palestinian terrorist
Â?loverÂ? in planning terrorist atrocities. Tali had
been a long time activist in IsraelÂ?s pro-Palestinian
anti-Israel Left. Along with the rest of her
comrades, she frequently demonstrated for Â?peaceÂ? and
against Israeli Â?oppressionÂ? and Â?occupationÂ? of
Palestinians. Like the rest of her comrades, the
real Â?rights of the PalestiniansÂ? she was interested
in defending were the Â?rightsÂ? of Palestinians to
conduct mass murder and genocide against Jews. Her
Â?allianceÂ?, one between a Jewish leftist and a
Palestinian terrorist, is symbolic of the broader
alliance between the anti-Semitic Jewish Left and
Islamist fascism, and that is the real Â?axis of evilÂ?
currently endangering Israeli survival.
TaliÂ?s arrest will come as a shock only for those
who have been blissfully ignorant of the nature and
the agenda of IsraelÂ?s radical Left over the past two
decades. In reality, just like the American campus
Left has long been little more than a movement of
anti-Americanism, so IsraelÂ?s Far Left is today - even
more so - nothing more than a movement of
anti-Israelism and Jewish self-hatred. IsraelÂ?s
radical Leftists seek the destruction of their own
country. They consider their country an evil
apartheid monstrosity and they are willing to see as
many Jews murdered as it takes to end this Â?Zionist
abominationÂ?.
For the past two decades, IsraelÂ?s leftists, led
by the academic extremists and tenured traitors from
Israeli universities, have served as the attack dogs
against their own country, as IsraelÂ?s version of
Taliban John. Like Taliban John and the handful of
other American-born terrorists, they regard their own
country as the embodiment of all that is evil. They
denounce Israel as an apartheid country, whereas in
reality Israel is the only country in the Middle East
that is NOT one. They justify Palestinian terror and
atrocities (and also support the Iraqi Â?resistanceÂ?
against the United States and Britain), while
denouncing every effort by Israel to defend its
civilians as Â?state terrorismÂ? and as barbarism. The
only form of resistance against terror by Israel they
are willing to countenance is total capitulation to
Arab fascism.
Israeli Leftists today serve as the
Jews-for-hire, as the Israel-bashing court jesters for
every anti-Semitic and Israel-hating organization,
magazine and web site on earth. The anti-Semites
never tire of the rush and thrill of seeing yet
another Jewish leftist willing to declare from their
podium that all the problems of the planet are the
JewsÂ? fault, that the Jewish Israelis are evil and
greedy and racist, that Israel is an aggressor and the
obstacle to peace, and that Arab atrocities and
violence are the understandable response of
Â?oppressedÂ? Arabs to Jewish bullying.
The Israeli Left has produced its own school
of historic revisionists, the Â?New HistoriansÂ?, who
have rewritten history and distorted truth in order to
advance the cause of Arab aggression and
Islamofascism. These Jewish leftist pseudo-historians
are the moral equivalent of Holocaust Denials in other
countries. Academic standards have been junked and
Far Leftist faculty members hired and promoted as acts
of solidarity by other leftists within the university
system.
Faculty members at Israeli universities
routinely denounce their own country as a racist,
fascist anomaly. Some openly call for Israeli
existence to be ended and for Israel to be replaced by
a Palestinian-majority Middle East PLO-led state,
covering all of Israel and the Â?occupied territoriesÂ?.
Were such a state to come into existence, a second
Holocaust of Jews would quickly follow and Jewish
history would likely end. A sociologist at Ben-Gurion
University recently made headlines for publishing an
article in anti-Israel European newspapers denouncing
Israel for implementing Â?symbolic genocideÂ? in the
form of assassinating Palestinian terror leaders.
(Had Jews managed to assassinate Hitler in 1943, they
would also have been guilty of genocide against
Germans according to this Â?academic thinker.Â?) The
articles of a colleague of his at Ben-Gurion
University from political science appear on neonazi
and Holocaust Denial web sites, including the one run
by convicted nazi Ernst Zundel, and this Â?academicÂ?
routinely denounces Israel as a nazi, fascist,
terrorist country.
For the past two decades, the loyalty of
IsraelÂ?s Far Leftists has been pledged to the enemies
of their own country. Their mantra has effectively
been: Â?The enemies of my country, right or wrong!Â?
Tali Fahima is not the first traitor and
collaborator with terror to emerge from the Israeli
radical Left. A terror and espionage ring broken up
and arrested in the 1970s featured two Jewish
leftists, one an ex-kibbutznik. Mordecai Vanunu, a
communist graduate of Ben-Gurion University recently
released from prison after serving a long term for
nuclear espionage, has long been the guru and role
model for IsraelÂ?s radical Left. A few other Israeli
Jews have been arrested for collaboration with and
assistance to terrorists.
Tali Fahima personally symbolizes everything that
went wrong with IsraelÂ?s Left in the past two decades,
during which treason largely replaced protest and
dissidence as the driving motive of the radicals.
Like Taliban JohnÂ?s capture, her arrest should serve
as an ominous wakeup call and siren warning about the
dangers from leftist radicalism.
For years, the Israeli media has been hectoring the opponents of Oslo
and the anti-Left dissidents, claiming they are collectively responsible
for Yigal Amir and the assassination of Rabin. Let us see what they will
be saying now about the Eva Braun that has emerged from the Left.