From a reader in Austin:
I cannot believe what I saw today. I was driving [my son] back from a doctor's appointment at when I pulled up behind a red truck at a stop-light. The truck's bumper stickers said "Obliterate Israel" with a nifty little mushroom cloud and the other had the universal strike-through sign with the word "Israel." I was in shock! Here, in the heart of ultra-liberal Austin, is someone driving proudly around in his shining red pick-up advocating wiping out an entire nation!
The Jew-hatred is getting to be very scary. It's one thing to be against the state of Israel's policies. But to advocate genocide? One hardly knows what to say. But it's happening all over. Jews in Europe are not safe any longer from their Muslim neighbors. As Mark Steyn writes:
Only Israel attracts an intellectually respectable movement querying its very existence. For the purposes of comparison, let's take a state that came into existence at the exact same time as the Zionist Entity, and involved far bloodier population displacements. I happen to think the creation of Pakistan was the greatest failure of post-war British imperial policy. But the fact is that Pakistan exists, and if I were to launch a movement of anti-Pakism it would get pretty short shrift.But, even allowing for that, what has a schoolgirl in Villiers-le-Bel to do with Israeli government policy? Just weeks ago, terrorists attacked Mumbai, seized hostages, tortured them, killed them, and mutilated their bodies. The police intercepts of the phone conversations between the terrorists and their controllers make for lively reading:
"Pakistan caller 1: 'Kill all hostages, except the two Muslims. Keep your phone switched on so that we can hear the gunfire.'
"Mumbai terrorist 2: 'We have three foreigners, including women. From Singapore and China'
"Pakistan caller 1: 'Kill them.'
"(Voices of gunmen can be heard directing hostages to stand in a line, and telling two Muslims to stand aside. Sound of gunfire. Sound of cheering voices.)"
"Kill all hostages, except the two Muslims." Tough for those Singaporean women. Yet no mosques in Singapore have been attacked. The large Hindu populations in London, Toronto and Fort Lauderdale have not shouted "Muslims must die!" or firebombed Halal butchers or attacked hijab-clad schoolgirls. CAIR and other Muslim lobby groups' eternal bleating about "Islamophobia" is in inverse proportion to any examples of it. Meanwhile, "moderate Muslims" in London warn the government: "I'm a peaceful fellow myself, but I can't speak for my excitable friends. Nice little G7 advanced Western democracy you got here. Shame if anything were to happen to it."
You might want to check out Melanie Philips' account of an incident in the life of a London Jew. This is not Berlin 1934. It's Londonistan 2009.
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Where were you when the Janjaweed was raping and murdering in Darfur? Where were you when the massacres in Mumbai took place? Where were you when the butchering in central Africa occurred.?
Advocating that shotguns and shells be air-dropped to the folks who were being raped, murdered, and massacred so that they could defend themselves.
A"re you aware that since the beginning of the Israeli incursion into Gaza, anywhere from 1500 to perhaps 10,000 men, women, and children have been killed in the Congo? They have been killed often not at long distance, by a bomb or bullet, but up-close, hacked to death by machetes."
I am aware of that. I also know that U.S. money isn't funding the Congo government or the rebels. The same can't be said for Israel and Gaza.
I agree that we aren't paying enough attention to Congo. We didn't pay enough attention to the Serbia until it was too late. We were late into caring about Darfur and Somalia. Arguably, however, AIPAC never lets us forget about Israel and Gaza. The neocons who cheerlead Israel just like the cheerleaded the war in Iraq never let us forget Israel and Gaza. I guess it's something about having the right enemeies.
My fondest (and most unrealistic) dream is for Israel and Palestine to live side by side peacefully with open borders and free trade. The problem is how does one teach a population who hasn't any distinct ethnic identity nor history of self-governance that they are a people and share responsibility for the actions of their elected officials?
The Palestinians have been treated like children by the International Community. They are fed and subsidized and have been so for 60 years. The UNRWA alone feeds 750,000 people.
It's about time that they grew up. Thus, Israel is doing the Palestinians a favor by bombing the hell out of them. The only hope for a thriving democracy in the Palestinian territories is the clear understanding by Palestinians that if their elected leaders do something stupid like allowing rockets to be launched into Israel from their territory, there will be serious repercussions.
Having never had a national identity, they have no idea how one is lost. Israel is also teaching them this lesson, but alas, not very well. We Jews throughout our history have faced the death of our culture many many times. Fortunately G-d has led us out of this trap each time, though our enemies have often not lived to tell the tale. Through these near misses we have learned to love peace and not to test G-d. This would be a valuable lesson to impart upon the Palestinians as well.
The best of all lessons would be complete and utter defeat of the Palestinians. Scraping themselves off of the dirt they would hopefully look towards a new paradigm for looking at their place in the world. They might even find they have a lot to learn from the Jews.
The Scots learned from the British and within a century Edinburgh became a center of scholarship and Scots led the world in Economics and Engineering.
The Japanese were defeated by America and within a generation turned their country into both a democracy and an industrial powerhouse.
The wrong lessons for them to learn would be those of the American South. After the surrender of the South, many of the unrepentant losers who were left slaveless and without economic prospects nourished their resentments and generations hence harbored anti-black views and even joined violent anti-black organizations like the KKK.
Hamas is little more than a Middle Eastern version of the KKK without the need to doctor up its sacred texts.
Israel is doing the Palestinians a favor by bombing the hell out of them.
Words fail me.
ArikW
The only hope for a thriving democracy in the Palestinian territories is the clear understanding by Palestinians that if their elected leaders do something stupid like allowing rockets to be launched into Israel from their territory, there will be serious repercussions.
The only hope for a thriving democracy in Israel is the clear understanding by Israelis that if their elected leaders do something stupid like allowing their government to invade Palestine and kill Hamas members during a ceasefire, there will be serious repercussions.
The only hope for a thriving democracy in the United States of America is the clear understanding by Americans that if their elected leaders do something stupid like allowing their government to fund the Israel military and placing troops in Muslim holy cities, there will be serious repercussions.
Those are all true, if by 'a clear understanding that there will be serious repercussions', you mean 'changing the viewpoint of the civilian population by using violence against them'.
Aka, terrorism.
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