Ziohass in the Toronto Star

This letter appears in today's paper:

Re: Israel must grapple with uncomfortable truths, Opinion Aug. 28

Israel must grapple with uncomfortable truths, Opinion Aug. 28  

Albert Einstein once said, “Nationalism is an infantile thing. It is the measles of mankind.” Oscar Wilde stated, “Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious,” and Voltaire declared, “It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sounds of trumpets.” 

We are, of course, all familiar with the phrase, a little nationalism is a dangerous thing. What has evolved in Israel is a form of “puritanical ultra nationalism” and it has hijacked whatever reasonable and moderate form of democracy that previously existed in Israel. 

Israel’s efforts to liberate Jews from anti-Semitic discrimination has, paradoxically, devolved into a modern form of fascism fanatically stoked by the rhetoric and hyperbole of Benjamin Netanyahu and many ultra-orthodox Jews. 

Louis MacPherson, Bowmanville

Here's the letter I sent in response. I am not at all hopeful that the Star will publish it:

Since letter-writer Louis MacPherson is intent on quoting such intellectual luminaries as Albert Einstein, Oscar Wilde and Voltaire to make his case that Israel practices "a puritanical form of ultra-nationalism" that makes it fascist, allow me, in rebuttal to quote the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King. In a speech he delivered to a conference of American rabbis in 1968, Dr. King said:

"Israel is one of the great outposts of democracy in the world, and a marvelous example of what can be done, how desert land can be transformed into an oasis of brotherhood and democracy. Peace for Israel means security, and that security must be a reality."

The only thing that has changed since then is that Israel is now forced to fight Hamas, an ISIS-like cadre of jihadis which, like fascist Germany, aims to do the world "a favour" by ridding it of Jews--all Jewry, and not only the ones in Israel.

 

Since Arab Israelis sit on Israel's Supreme Court and in its parliament, and, army service apart, have all the rights of citizenship as Israeli Jews--and certainly far more rights than Arabs and Muslims living anywhere else in the Middle East--it is more than inaccurate to describe Israel as "fascist." It falls under the heading of "the Big Lie"--whoppers that, historically, have been told about Jews for a variety of reasons, none of them good.

Update: Zionhass at Yale.

Today In "Tiny Minority of Extremists" News...

'Small but notable' number of Canadians engage in terror abroad

Friends of Ceeb Radio Campaign Tries to Guilt the Government Into Giving It More Moolah

Just heard the ad on a local radio station.

I say we start a counter-campaign--Enemies of the Ceeb--that calls for the government to cut the incorrigibly leftist public broadcaster's funding even further. Or better yet, privatize it.

"That's Some Jay Vee Team, Mr. President"

More stuff Obama was wrong about.

Making Fun of ISIS

This one's making the rounds on social media:

The Birmingham Connection

Turns out the cleric who used to run a madrassa in Birmingham is a key funder of ISIS.

Obama 'Fessing Up That He Has "No Strategy"? Michael Ledeen Isn't Buying It

Ledeen says there is a strategy, and it's obvious for all to see should they care to look:

The actual strategy is detente first, and then a full alliance with Iran throughout the Middle East and North Africa. 

Why would the POTUS want to pursue such a bizarre, benighted plan? As Ledeen explains, Obama and America's enemies, including those wannabe-nuclear mullahs in Ayatollahville, are muy simpatico re the historical deployment of American power:

The central theme in Obama’s outreach to Iran is his conviction that the United States has historically played a wicked role in the Middle East, and that the best things he can do for that part of the world is to limit and withdraw American military might, and empower our self-declared enemies, whose hostility to traditional American policies he largely shares. 

That's your president, Americans. How proud you must be! (BTW, I started to read--and got about 150 pages into--The Invisible Bridge by Rick Perlstein. Perlstein's thesis is that there's, yes, an invisible bridge between Richard Nixon's failed presidency and the rise of Ronald Reagan, who assumed the mantle of American conservatism and changed the U.S. forever--and not in a good way. The reason I gave up after only 150 pages into a book with 800+ pages is because Perlstein's scorn for Reagan and is so ugly and so unhinged that it became painful to read. Also, I got tired of annotating, furiously. Also, I didn't buy the author's "big idea"--that the 60s were swell because they revealed huge divisions, which was a good thing for America, and that Reagan, a simpleton and a phony in Perlstein's view, did the country a huge disservice by papering over those divisions and inspiring Americans to believe, post-Watergate, that their nation was still exceptional.

Boo hiss, Reagan.

Anyway, it seems to me that there is, in fact, no bridge, invisible or otherwise, between Nixon and Reagan. There is, however, a visible, a glowing, bridge between those 60s radicals and the man who currently occupies the Oval Office. Don't expect Perlstein to write a book about that, though. He's too busy trashing wicked conservatives [this is, after all, an author who calls Nixon, though not the Viet Cong, "evil"], and getting into a spot of bother over plagiarism while doing it.)



Update: What Barack Obama Can Learn From Richard Nixon About Israel and Foreign Policy

New Yorker Cover Story: Congress Embraces AIPAC and Israel; American Jews Don't

The gist of the piece: the perception out there is that to support Israel is to side with Republicans, and (stoopid, spoiled--okay, my adjectives) American Jews are dumbly Dem 4-ever:

For AIPAC, whose stated mission is to improve relations between the U.S. and Israel, it is crucial to appeal across the political spectrum. In recent years, though, Israel has become an increasingly divisive issue among the American public. Support for Israel among Republicans is at seventy-three per cent, and at forty-four per cent among Democrats, according to a poll conducted in July by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press; the divide is even greater between liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans. 

This difference represents a schism among American Jews—AIPAC’s vital core. For decades, the Jewish community was generally united in its support for Israel. Today, a growing number of American Jews, though still devoted to Israel, struggle with the lack of progress toward peace with the Palestinians. Many feel that AIPAC does not speak for them. The Pew Center’s survey found that only thirty-eight per cent of American Jews believe that the Israeli government is sincerely pursuing peace; forty-four per cent believe that the construction of new settlements damages Israel’s national security. In a Gallup poll in late July, only a quarter of Americans under the age of thirty thought that Israel’s actions in Gaza were justified. As Rabbi Jill Jacobs, the executive director of the left-leaning T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, told me, “Many people I know in their twenties and thirties say, I have a perfectly good Jewish life here—why do I need to worry about this country in the Middle East where they’re not representing who I am as a Jew? I’m not proud of what’s happening there. I’m certainly not going to send money. ”

It reminds me of those German Jews who back in the day reviled the "Ostjuden," overtly Jew-y Jews from places like Russia and Poland who embarrassed--and did not "represent"--the secure, secular, assimilated German Jews.

That certainly worked out well for all concerned, didn't it?

I say we don't count on American Jews for anything because they simply don't get it. (In the words of one of my American Jewish relatives: "I'd vote for the Democrats even if Adolf Hitler was the Democratic candidate for president.") The American people, on the other hand, mostly do get Israel, and thank God for that.

Saudi King Shocked--Shocked!--That His Brand of By-The-Book Islam Gives Rise to Jihadi Violence

Reading this Reuters report you could get the feeling that the Wahhabi potentate, who exports his rigid version of Islam to Saudi-funded mosques and madrassas in the West, bears absolutely no responsibility for the type of indoctrination that can--and often does--engender jihad (a.k.a. "terrorism"):

DOHA (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah said terrorism would soon spread to Europe and the United States unless it is quickly dealt with in the Middle East, the Saudi state news agency reported late on Friday.  

The king made the statement during a reception for foreign ambassadors held in Jeddah. "I ask you to convey this message to your leaders... Terrorism at this time is an evil force that must be fought with wisdom and speed," said King Abdullah. "And if neglected I'm sure after a month it will arrive in Europe and a month after that in America."

The world's top oil exporter shares an 800-km (500-mile) border with Iraq, where Islamic State militants and other Sunni Islamist groups have seized towns and cities.

Riyadh has long expressed fears of being targeted by jihadists, including some of its own citizens, who have taken part in conflicts in Iraq and Syria. Earlier this year, it decreed long jail terms for those who travel abroad to fight...

To repeat a line in my previous post: a fat lot of good it'll do. If he really wanted to fight "terrorism" with "wisdom and speed," he'd stop funding all those mosques and madrassas.

"Moderate" Imam Crows That Canada Is as Muslim as It Gets

The NatPo seems to be all about Islam these days, what with Afsun Qureshi proffering the shahada as a sort of beheading repellent and articles galore about "homegrown" lads off to fight with ISIS. There's an article today, though, that suggests to me that the paper has finally lost it ("it" being its mojo). It's about "moderate" Canadian imam Zejid Delic by a tremendously sympathetic Joseph Brean. In it we learn that, according to Delic (whose new book on the subject is about to drop), "Islam is Canadian and Canada is Muslim."

It is? How, erm, "moderate" of you to say so, imam. (Although to me it sounds a lot like the same old supremacist palaver).

Bream knows that Delic's purported "moderation" may be a tough sell, but the reporter does his utmost to try persuade us to buy it:

In 2010, Defence Minister Peter MacKay cancelled a speech by Mr. Delic at an Islamic History Month event because he was then the new executive director of the Canadian Islamic Congress, which frequently indulged extremist views from 9/11 conspiracies to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians by Israel, and whose founder Mohamed Elmasry once made controversial comments about the Mideast conflict on a talk show that he later apologized for and retracted. 

Mr. Delic’s speech was by no means extremist. It was, like his book, a call to active citizenship for Canadian Muslims, and a rejection of Islam’s orthodox, insular traditions.
The episode revealed a major rift between Mr. Delic’s progressive vision and the extremist identity politics of the CIC’s old guard, and it threatened to isolate this renegade imam. Instead, as the CIC has since declined in influence, it opened to him the moderate middle ground between Islamophobia and Islamism.

There's no such beast as "a moderate middle ground between Islamophobia and Islamism." First, because Islamophobia is a Muslim Brotherhood invention designed to make infidels shut the hell up about the problematic aspects of Islam, of which there are plenty. Second, because it is precisely those problematic aspects which are animating the current round of the jihad (the Third Jihad, as it has been called), and those aspects are part and parcel of Islam proper. Sure, append an "ism" to it if you'd like, but that doesn't mean that the Islam sans the "ism" will suddenly become more tangibly "Western." It won't, for example, mean that Islam will separate mosque and state, or will accord women and kafirs the same rights as Muslim men, or will shun core doctrines that are inherently--and eternally--supremacist.

But let's return to 2010, a momentous year for the imam. For while it's true that one of his speeches was summarily cancelled back then, another one, included in an RCMP "outreach" conference, went ahead as scheduled. Here's what invaluable anti-jihad blogger Point de Bascule had to say at the time:

The program of the conference features Imam Zijad Delic, the executive Director of the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC) as well as Tehran University representatives. Imam Delic’s scheduled appearance at the Canadian Department of National Defence was cancelled recently by the Defence Minister as the Imam and his organization were deemed too radical. 

The CIC is also a member of the Mecca-based Muslim World League in Saudi Arabia, which propagates Wahabism around the world. This lobby promotes values that are contrary to Western liberal, pluralist and democratic values. It is an Islamist lobby that holds radical, fascist, antisemitic, totalitarian, and segregationist views. 

The event will be held at the Government Conference Center in Ottawa. The Conference Center appears to require, among other things, that the list of visitors be submitted three days prior to the event for security reasons. This is noteworthy given that the Canadian government just announced that it had ceased its activities with the CIC because of its extremist nature. 

Disturbing aspects of certain RCMP Community Outreach initiatives invite questions about whether the unit has drifted away from fulfilling its counter-radicalization mandate. The RCMP could now be perceived as catering to Islamists by pressing upon its affiliated community members an event with troubling implications and connections.  

This appearance of formal government support might well encourage attendance of those who would otherwise have quite sensibly kept their distance from the conference and its creators. 

The record of RCMP Community Outreach points to an Outreach unit that may have become an inadvertent Islamist-legitimizing platform In other words, the unit and those responsible for its general direction – including RCMP Assistant Commissioner Gilles Michaud^{1 & 2 & 3}, Commissioner William Elliott and Public Safety Minister Vic Toews – are, despite their best intentions, undermining national security...

In today's NatPo article, the imam insists that "Canada is more Islamic that any so-called Muslim state"--and he means that as a complement to Canada. He also hopes to use that argument to persuade the young'uns to remain in situ instead of running off to Syria. All of which may make him sound like the voice of moderation to reporter Brean, but which does nothing to allay fears about "homegrown" radicalism and Jew-hate, metastasizing cancers that go hand-in-hand, and that cannot be tackled by bromides and platitudes (from "moderate" imams) and wishful thinking (from sympathetic journalists).

Update: Re the aforementioned NatPo piece by Afsun Qureshi, Mark Steyn writes:

In a bizarre column even for the post-Conrad National Post, Afsun Qureshi suggests the best thing you could do to lessen the likelihood of being set upon by Muslims is to learn to recite the shahadah, "a testimony to the identity of Allah as the one true God, and Muhammad as his prophet". She might be right. Wearing a burqa might help, too. Or the shalwar kameez. On the other hand, most of those Syrian men paraded through the desert in their BVDs to their rendezvous with death knew the shahadah, and a fat lot of good it did.

I tend to feel the same way about Imam Delic's "anti-radicalization" message about Canada being Muslim to the core: a fat lot of good it'll do. And by that I mean that it won't stop the young-uns from being radicalized, nor will it put the brakes on the remorseless Islamization of Canada (which looks like this).

How to Speak "Leftese"

The Sandy Man Song

You can credit--or blame--Mark Steyn for this one:

Who can take a nation,
Make it buy his pitch?
Cover up the scandals
'Cuz the media's his bitch.
The Sandy Man.
The Sandy Man can.
The Sandy Man can
'Cuz he mixes it with race
And makes you folks feel bad.

Who can take the jihad
Divest it of Islam?
Never sweat the caliphate
'Cuz "strategy" is dumb.
The Sandy Man.
Oh, the Sandy can.
The Sandy Man can 'cuz he doesn't have a clue
And his worldview is askew.

The Sandy Man flails;
 Usually he fails.
Ask him 'bout the trade for Bergdahl.
He'll say, "Not another word y'all.
POTUS's is the preferred call."

 Who can take tomorrow
 Eff it up like mad?
 (Many years from now
We'll still be battle-ing jihad.)
The Sandy Man.
Oh, the Sandy Man can.
The Sandy Man can
'Cuz they fell for him--twice.
And now we're payin' the price...

Obama "Enraged" At Israeli Government

Must be Friday.

If You Thought Hamas Was the Only Terrorist Outfit Firing Rockets Into Israel During the Recent Gaza War...

Think again.

Calgary Conference Designed to Tackle Radicalization of Local "Yutes" Features "Right of Return" Singer

Since Calgary has become fertile ground for ISIS recruitment, the locals have decided it's time to take action to try to curb it. That action consists of a four day conference--OWN IT--wherein the young'uns will undoubtedly be told to:

•  ignore the jihad/sharia/supremacism embedded in core Islamic texts;
• shun those clerics who fail to put that stuff in "the proper context";
• close their ears and hearts to ISIS's enticing pitch which includes foreign intrigue, bloody beheadings and panting virgins.

Will it work? Probably not. Especially since the confab's featured performer is singer Maher Zain. Zain's biggest hit, a catchy little number called "Palestine Will Be Free," is a hymn to the "right of return" and Israel's demise.
 
To recap: ISIS's take on jihad is beyond the pale while a call to snuff out Israel is okey-dokey.

Own that, conference organizers.

Shaykh Yusuf Badat's Explanation of Radicalization on Ceeb Radio Leaves Much to Be Desired

Imam ShaykhYusuf Badat told Ceeb radio host Matt Galloway this morning that he's most concerned about the "radicalization" of local Muslim lads who take it into their heads to run off and fight with ISIS. (You can listen to their conversation here.) Badat, who's imam of the Islamic Foundation of Toronto and who serves as veep of the Canadian Council of Imams, claims that the problem is that the radicalization occurs when certain verses of the Koran are--stop me if you've heard this before (and I'm sure you have)--"taken out of context."

Badat didn't specify which verses he means, but we can be fairly certain that they include the ones Robert Spencer highlights here.

Galloway, being a typical Ceeb know-nothing, failed to challenge Badat on two sore points. First, that during this year's "Doors Open" event, Badat's Islamic Foundation displayed material calling for jihad. Second, that the Canadian Council of Imams has, yes, condemned ISIS for its violence. But it has also denounced the neo-caliphate because--and this is critical to understanding the CCI mindset--ISIS has flouted sharia law pertaining to dhimmitude.

Gee, do you think the young'uns who have heeded jihad's siren call think Badat is as big a hypocrite as I do? And isn't this hypocrisy a huge part of the problem?

Shocking and Purr-verse News

Hello Kitty is not a cat.

"Mohammed" the Most Popular Boy's Name in Oslo

Yes, Oslo. As in Norway.

Have Jihadis Like Anjem Choudary "Perverted" Islam?

That great Islamic scholar John McCain says they have.
 

Norman Berdichevsky sees it differently (and clearly):

Obama, Holder and our entire State Department nevertheless prefer to be willfully ignorant, even deaf, dumb and blind to what motivated practically all the terrorist acts committed by Jihad-directed Muslims perpetrated against innocent civilians from dozens countries of all cultural political types as well as against fellow Muslims. No matter how long the call remains unheard, lies passive, it is always there as part of one thousand four hundred years of violent expansion, it may be LATENT, but it is always LETHAL.

This is not “radical” but the standard, mainstream Islam that is inherently political and subject to the manipulation of demagogues, both “secular” and religious throughout history. A leader such as Saddam Hussein came to power through the Ba’ath political movement in Iraq devoted to “secular” Arab nationalism but when unable to fully mobilize public support for his failed policies, resorted to reforming his regime to make it appear more in line with traditional Islam, imprinting the first principle of Islam (There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his Prophet) on the country’s flag and putting his portrait on the currency in the image of Saladin.

Jihad, this Sixth Pillar of Islam is not a “marginal” or “perverted interpretation” practiced by a tiny minority. It may lay dormant for generations but has the power overnight to transform tens of millions of Muslims around the globe into a mob craving blood, and “revenge” for what they perceive to be an affront to their dignity and sacred beliefs.

Revisiting the Eve of Destruction

The NatPo has another story about John Maguire, a nondescript lad from small town Ontario who "reverted" to Islam and ran off to fight with ISIS. That jogged my memory about a song parody I once wrote of Barry McGuire's 1960s hit, "Eve of Destruction." When I searched for it on the Web, I was shocked to see it was from almost five years ago, a time when the "Arab Spring" was pushing the likes of Thomas L. Friedman to paroxysms of jubilation and ISIS wasn't even a glimmer on the horizon. Re-reading (re-singing) it now all I can say is, damn, I'm prescient:

The eastern world it is ignitin'.
Bombs explodin’, lots of fightin’.
Shia killing Sunni--their very brothers
They also want to kill so many others.
Sharia would prevail, had they their druthers.
And you tell me over and over
And over and over again
That you don’t believe
We’re deep indeed in a jeehad.

Don’t you understand what they’re tryin’ to say
Can’t you feel the hate “extremists” purvey?
If the mullahs push the button, there’s no runnin’ away.
There will be no Jews to save,
They will all be in the grave.
[Take a look around ya folks, it ought to scare ya folks.]
And you tell me over and over
And over and over again, my friend
That you don’t believe we’re deep indeed in a jeehad.
That you don’t believe we’re deep indeed in a jeehad.

Yeah, their blood’s so hot it ain’t coagulatin’.
Our cluelessness and blindness are so frikkin' frustratin’.
Allowed to twist the truth--it’s called taqiyyah.
Handful of  “radicals” ain't nothin’ to fear.
The faith’s chock-full of “peace”
Is all we’re s’posed to hear.
And if you dare to differ they say, “Stick it in your ear.”
And you tell me over and over again... 

Think of all the hate there is in the Mideast
They loathe the Zion project,
They pray it soon is deceased.
Strap on a bomb for Allah, go earn a virgin,
And while the chaos spreads
The truth should be emergin’:
It’s all about what’s “pure”;
What isn’t they are purgin’.
But political correctness presents a phony version.
After ev’ry shahid mission
It's no “backlash” they are urgin’.
And you tell me over and over
And over and over again, my friend
That you don’t believe we’re deep indeed in a jeehad.
That you don’t believe we’re deep indeed in a jeehad.

ISIS Recruiting Methods Via Social Media Exceedingly Savvy and Effective; U.S. Gov's Efforts to Counter 'Em...Not So Much

So far ISIS is running rings around the infidels:

A typical interaction between a "lone wolf" and a recruiter might go as follows: A young man sees professional-looking propaganda videos produced by the Islamic State. He watches a few of the videos and feels that he has something in common with the men in the video. He then might reach out to the person who posted the video, either on Twitter or Facebook, and engage with him. Eventually, a series of conversations online might encourage the "lone wolf" to travel to Europe, with instructions to find a particular person who might help him make his way into Syria. 

While some people are directly encouraged to come to Syria via social-media conversations, Mr. Berger has monitored other exchanges in which a person has tweeted that he has arrived in Turkey, a signal that he needs an extremist to assist him with travel over the border.  

The Islamic State produces high-resolution videos and hashtag campaigns. It even has an app that can automatically tweet the organization's content on users' accounts. 

"They have a very good Twitter army; they have social-media savvy," said Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. 

The group's battlefield success makes Islamic State content all the more appealing, finding would-be recruits where they spend most of their time, on the Internet. 

"It's like attracting the moth to the light," Mr. Shaikh said. 

As for the U.S. government's counter-jihad initiatives on social media--the lights are out and nobody's biting:

The U.S. conducts its own counterpropaganda campaign on social media through the State Department's Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications, although it is unclear how persuasive the campaign is. 

The targets are "fence-sitters," mostly disaffected teens and people in their 20s and 30s. "Those people don't tend to listen to the U.S. government," said Aki Peritz, a former CIA counterterrorism analyst...

No kidding. What "lone wolf" wants to get the scoop on holy war from Great Satan?

Anti-Zionist Jews Kvetch Because They Can't Use the Vehicle of CIJA to Press Their Kooky, Ahistoric Case

This letter appears in the current issue of the CJN:

Janice Arnold’s online article “Anti-Israel protesters gain entry to federation building,”(cjnews.com) repeats an intentionally misleading press release about us.
CIJA claims we were there to “incite hatred against Jews in Quebec” but in fact  we are Jews committed to confronting anti-Semitism where it exists. Accusations of anti-Semitism are consistently employed by CIJA/CJA in this cynical manner to silence criticism of Israel. In the process, those of us who oppose the State of Israel are made to disappear as Jewish people. Worse, by making these kind of claims, CIJA/CJA are undermining those working to uproot real forms of anti-Semitism. 

CIJA refuses to acknowledge that we are Jews because its aggressive politics on Palestine and its efforts to control the discourse of the Jewish community require that all criticism of Israel originates from anti-Semites. For that reason, anti-Zionist Jews are an inconvenient fact. By refusing to acknowledge our existence as an organized group of Jewish people, CIJA/CJA is continuing their campaign of intimidation within the Jewish community, silencing all dissent on the issue of colonialism in Palestine.  

David Zinman and Sam Bick
Montreal. 

Messers Zinman and Bick are apparently misinformed re CIJA's mission. It isn't, as they believe, to provide a forum for every single Jew with a grudge against Zionism and a gigantic lefty chip on his shoulder to crap on "colonialist" Israel. Should the Bickmans want to air their grievances about "colonialism in Palestine," an idea which completely and maliciously ignores Jewry's genuine historical and religious claim to Eretz Israel, they are free to do so under a plethora of auspices, including such redoubts of the Zion-loathing as Not in Our Name, Canadians for Peace and Justice in the Middle East, and rabble.ca.

Also in the this week's CJN letters: don't miss the one (scroll back to the top) by Steven Sheffer. It rocks and rolls!

Shira Herzog, "Progressive" Pundit, Dies of Cancer

I am sorry to hear of the death at far too young an age of Shira Herzog, a woman who fought--and ultimately lost--her battle with breast cancer. That said, Ms. Herzog was emblematic of those "progressive" Jews who are clueless about the jihad being waged against the Jewish state (for having the chutzpah to be sovereign and Jewish, and for therefore making a mockery of Islamic doctrine about Jews and their proper place--supine, debased--in a land claimed for Allah forever). She wrote so much wishful thinking, mishegas and utter bollocks about the wonderful things that would come to pass if only Israelis believed as she did--in unicorns, rainbows and the peaceful intentions of "moderate" Palestinians; no wonder she was given a perch in the pages of the Globe and Mail, a rag of the elites that simply does not "get" Zionism, and which therefore trashes it every chance it gets. Ironically, in a career as a gushing pundit pushing the "peace" agenda, Ms. Herzog actually set back the cause of peace--real peace, that is, and not peace in the Islamic/sharia sense of the word, or the fanciful, delusional "peace" of bien pensents who write for and read the Globe and Mail.

Rest in peace, Shira. In real peace, that is.

BDS Stormtroopers Change Tactics

Instead of calling for a boycott of Israeli companies they are strong-arming shopkeepers who have the temerity to stock Israeli goods.

Obfuscation Via Euphemism: Report Blasts Gangs of "Asian Men" Responsible for Horrific Sex Crimes in U.K. Town

"Asians"? Oh, you mean blokes from China, Japan and/or Korea?:

The horrifying cost of official failure to confront widespread child sexual exploitation has been revealed in a damning report detailing how abusers exploited 1,400 children from a single town over 16 years. 

Gangs of Asian men groomed, abused and trafficked vulnerable children while police were contemptuous of the victims and the council ignored what was going on, in spite of years of warnings and reports about what was happening. 

Despite what the inquiry head called a “blatant” failure of leadership at the Labour-run council, nobody will be sacked or face inquiries into their inaction. The leader of the council, Roger Stone, quit today because of what he called “historic failings”. He apologised in 2013 for the failure to protect children in the town – and the inquiry said the act of contrition should have been made years earlier. 

The report commissioned by the council, covering 1997 to 2013, detailed cases where children as young as 11 had been raped by a number of different men, abducted, beaten and trafficked to other towns and cities in the north of England to continue the abuse. 

Professor Alexis Jay, who wrote the report, said she found “children who had been doused in petrol and threatened with being set alight, threatened with guns, made to witness brutally violent rapes and threatened they would be next if they told anyone”. 

It said that three reports from 2002 to 2006 highlighted the extent of child exploitation and links to wider criminality but nothing was done, with the findings either suppressed or simply ignored. Police failed to act on the crimes and treated the victims with contempt and deemed that they were “undesirables” not worthy of protection, the inquiry team was told...

How can they hope to confront the exploitation if they're still hiding behind the "Asian men" euphemism? 

Obviously, they can't. And the effort to disguise the provenance of these "Asians" is so revolting that a local Muslim can't help but condemn it:

Professor Alexis Jay's report, commissioned by Rotherham Borough Council, said:  

"Several councillors interviewed believed that by opening up these issues they could be 'giving oxygen' to racist perspectives that might in turn attract extremist political groups and threaten community cohesion." 

This has left the leader of a Muslim organisation in Rotherham furious. 

"In the name of what community cohesion and political correctness? Not in the name of my community," said Muhbeen Hussain, founder of British Muslim Youth. 

"I'm truly disgusted to see such a report in my home town of Rotherham. 

"The fact these guys were predominantly Pakistani heritage men should not be a reason for providing a cloak of invisibility."

Asia is a huge continent, and euphemizing "Pakistani" as "Asian" can cover a multitude of sins. There is no way, however, that the craven Rotherhamers would ever deploy the "A" word had these gangs been comprised of sexual predators whose last names were/are Lee and Kim.

Liberal Jew Urges Us to Put Our Trust In Justin

Jonathan Goldbloom, who wants to be the Liberal candidate in the federal riding of Mount Royal, insists that Justin Trudeau is entirely trustworthy when it comes to Israel:

Canada, under a Liberal government, will solidly support Israel.  We could also play a constructive role in the peace process. One vital step, for example, would be to help in establishing mechanisms to ensure a genuine, verifiable demilitarization of Gaza.   

Canadian expertise could also be used to help the people of Gaza build a democratic and productive society. 

Trudeau is earning respect for the consistency of his message, and for his courage in expressing it to all audiences.  I urge readers to review key statements he has made by going to Liberal.ca. Or look at the video on YouTube of Marc Garneau’s speech several weeks ago at an Ottawa rally. 

 Actually, Jonathan, I think "mosqueteer" Trudeau's key statements about "reaching out" and holding "conversations" tell us everything we need to know about him, his party and his so-called courage.

U.K. Jihadist Anjem Choudary Clears Up Some Misconceptions Re the Foley Beheading

Thanks for the, er, clarity, Anjem:

British cleric Anjem Choudary told the Clarion Project that reports linking him to Abdel Majed Abdel Bary, the British rapper identified as the Islamic State terrorist who beheaded American journalist James Foley, are false. However, he did endorse the atrocity and the caliphate declared by IS. 

Choudary denied ever meeting Bary or his father, an Al-Qaeda member involved in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa who was extradited to the U.S. in 2012 from Britain. Choudary said his group did protest the elder Bary’s prolonged detention in the United Kingdom since 1998. 

He also rejected press reports that his organization radicalized Bary. Choudary said no one in his group ever mentioned meeting Bary and that he’s confident someone would have discussed it if they had. 

Choudary told the Clarion Project that the beheading of Foley by the Islamic State is permissible under sharia

 

“Muslims who abide by the sharia and follow the jurisprudence do not make a distinction between civilians and army,” he said. 

“This fellow was not just a civilian of America. He was a journalist,” he stated.  

Choudary said journalists are responsible for attacking Muslims, including the Islamic State, in the media. 

Choudary justified the beheading and attacks on civilians by pointing to the “Battle of the Trench” in Islamic history. He said that Mohammed, the prophet of Islam, targeted an entire Jewish tribe due to the actions of a few leaders. All 700 mature men of the tribe were executed. 

The specific act of kidnapping and execution was also justified by Choudary. He said that sharia permits only three options for handling hostages: ransom, exchange or death.
Choudary also expressed support for the Islamic State’s declaration of a caliphate.  

“There is no doubt in my mind that the criteria for the khalifah [caliphate] have been met,” he said...

Not A Pretty Picture--The Visage of UN "Human Rights" 'Roo Whose Verdict Re Israel Is a Foregone Conclusion on the Cover of the CJN

The dead tree version of the Canadian Jewish News has this bloke's photo on the front page and poses a question which, frankly, is more than a little silly: "Will he judge Israel fairly?"

Will someone associated with the UN's odious and risibly named (misnamed) "human rights" outfit, which lives and breathes Zionhass, judge Israel fairly?
 
In a pig's ear, he will.

To confirm the obvious, here's a portion of the CJN's interview with the 'roo:

During the recent conflict, rockets were found in UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) schools on at least three occasions that I know of, and they were turned over to Hamas. Doesn’t that indicate that any organization supported by the UN to look into this is not impartial and cannot come out with an impartial verdict?  

I don’t really understand your question. You’re telling me something, which is something quite possibly that the commission would investigate, but why would that affect the impartiality of the commission? I don’t really understand the question here. Well, they were taking sides.  

How can the body that runs UNRWA come to an impartial verdict here?  

The Commission of Inquiry set up by the HRC is not UNRWA. UNRWA is different. There’s no connection between the commission of inquiry set up by the HRC and UNRWA. I don’t see the relationship, unless you think that everything to do with the United Nations is somehow fatally tarnished. I don’t believe you’d be saying that. Do you believe that the UN Security Council is also terribly biased in the situation?

Not everything to do with the UN is fatally tarnished. But both UNRWA and the UN "human rights" racket are. (And, man, I wish that had been the interviewer's comeback to this sanctimonious gasbag.)

B.O. Is J.V.

And to think that this POTUS knows what he's doing and is bringing his A Team to a world in disarray is jay cee--just crazy.

Some Famous Hollywood Types Sign Pro-Israel/Anti-BDS Petition

Shockingly, not everyone in Tinsel Town is a Zion-loathing loon.

Maguire: Funny, That Doesn't Sound Jihadish

There once was a lad named Maguire
Who played hockey with zeal and real fire.
But the NHL
Can go to hell
Now Maguire's sporting ISIS attire.

Play It Again, Mo

The Islamic Terror Orchestra

The Entity Formerly Known as CAIR-Can "Endorses and Echoes Imams' Denunciation of ISIS"

Oh, you mean the one in which the imams chastise ISIS for failing to apply those age-old dhimmi rules?

Call me less than impressed.

"Elvis Was Our Shabbos Goy"

A true story of interfaith friendship.

A Zionhass Round Up

This one's my fave:

South America In Colombia, Semana – the country’s premier weekly magazine – published an op-ed arguing that Palestinian land has been occupied, “since three thousand years ago, when Jews arrived there escaping from Egypt with Moses and Joshua, cutting heads and foreskins off of local inhabitants.”

But surely not at the same time.

The Only Diff Between Hamas and ISIS: Hamas Can Do No Wrong (Even When It Does Wrong)

Claudia Rosett writes:

Just another episode of Hamas rule in Gaza, as — quoting Reuters here — “Hamas-led gunmen in Gaza executed 18 Palestinians accused of collaborating with Israel on Friday, accelerating a crackdown on suspected informers after Israeli forces tracked down and killed the three senior Hamas commanders.” 

How did these Hamas-led executions proceed? This from the New York Times:  

“Masked gunmen in matching black T-shirts and pants paraded seven of the suspected collaborators, handcuffed and hooded, to their deaths before a boisterous crowd outside a downtown mosque after the Friday prayer, in a highly theatrical presentation. Photographs showed a pair of militants leaning over a doomed man on his knees against a wall, and masses of men and boys cheering and clamoring for a better view.”  (Reuters has a video clip here, including the crowd and the bloodied street).

Thus runs the course of “revolutionary justice” in Gaza — which is how this process was labeled on the website Al Majd, which is described by the Times as “managed by the Internal Security Service of the Hamas government that ran Gaza until June” (when the Hamas government morphed into the “National Consensus Government” of Hamas and the Palestinian Authority’s Fatah).

The blood lust of jihadis (including--no, especially--Hamas) knows no bounds.

TIME Magazine Retracts Its Blood Libel About Joooos Harvesting Palestinian Organs

It can "retract" it, but it can't take it back (because once it's out there, there it remains).

Junior Jihdadi Plays Decapitator Dress Up

How adorbs!

Journalists (Including the Late James Foley) Try to Drum Up Fears Re the Real and Present Threat of Scary Right-Wingers

As Daniel Greenfield notes, however, "The incredibly deadly right-wing extremists have yet to show off the severed head of a journalist."

A British Export We Could Do Without--Jihadis With a Yen for Decapitation

Refreshingly, Douglas Murray writes (in the Spectator) that it's about them, not us. Not that that in any way mitigates or minimizes the problem:

Of course, one line of argument claims that if we just left all these places alone then none of this would come to us. But we left the Balkans alone and created one generation of jihadists. Then we didn’t leave Afghanistan and Iraq alone — and created another generation of jihadists. Now we have very much left Syria alone — and lo and behold, we seem to have created another jihadist generation. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, apparently. Yet remarkably few people seem to realise that this isn’t really about us. 

Nevertheless, it comes ever closer to home. In recent weeks the black flag of jihad as used by Isis has been flown openly in London — supporters of Isis have appeared on Oxford Street — and elsewhere. Just this week, the imam of a leading Welsh mosque resigned after a pro-Isis guest preacher was invited to speak at his mosque. 

This battle is going on in households and mosques up and down this country. We fear joining up these dots. And we fear giving offence more than we fear the international opprobrium that is coming our way. 

The country that brought liberty to much of the world is now exporting terrorism to large parts of it. Britain needs to look to itself, and address this problem, if there are not to be many more videos like this week’s.

Harf: Barf

Obama factotum Marie Harf delivered a most important message re the Islam in ISIS (that being that there isn't any to speak of):

Harf also emphasized the administration’s view that ISIS does not accurately represent the religion of Islam as a whole.

“[ISIS] does not operate in the name of any religion. The president has been very clear about that, and the more we can underscore that, the better,” Harf said.

The president does not operate in the name of any reality. The more we can underscore that, the better.

TIME Magazine Eats Readers' Brains

Hey, if that rag can manufacture blood libels about Israel, I can do the same to it.



TIME magazine and the Grandiose Ayatollah's FARS News--
who knew they had so much in common?

Gloom 'n' Doom 'n' Fukuyama

The man who, in the 1990s, optimistically foresaw "the end of history" today espies an America in decline.

Death By Excessive Effervescence

Today's "Fun Fact": You are more likely to be killed by a flying champagne cork than by a poisonous spider.

"The Buck Stops There"

Obama's motto.

What's the Deal With "Liberal Zionists"?

They're so angsty--and soooo annoying:

To be a “liberal Zionist” is about key words and key people. Everyone reads Beinart and Grossman. They speak about “moral struggle” and they see Zionism as primarily being a movement one argues with, not that one is truly a part of. These “liberal Zionists” don’t discuss Israel the way progressives in France or the US discuss their countries. They don’t even discuss it the way Palestinian radical leftist communists discuss Palestine. They are profoundly only operative as an oppositional group. They put Israel on an Israelocentric pedestal, mark it as the cause of much of the region’s problems and the cause of most anti-semitism, and subject it to a tirade of critique they don’t subject any other movement or nation to...

"Run for the Tunnels"

My name for the this year's Run for Palestine, which is being held today, rain or shine or homemade Easy-Bake oven rockets.

Canadian Council of Imams Condemns ISIS for Eschewing the Laws of The Dhimma, Dammit

The gist of its missive is that ISIS's primary faux pas is its failure to hew to sharia law's strict regulations for Jews and Christian living under Islamic rule (a.k.a. the dhimma pact):

Since their advent, ISIS mercenaries have caused nothing but destruction and corruption and have violated core Islamic teachings and principles such as the sanctity of life and the importance of treating others with dignity and respect. By self-admission, ISIS has terrorized different religious and ethnic communities in Syria and Iraq and they have destroyed Mosques and Shrines of Muslim scholars and leaders. Anyone who disagrees with them is murdered and they expropriate the property of others. 

ISIS attacks on non-Muslim minorities in Syria and Iraq, who have lived peacefully for centuries alongside Muslims, clearly demonstrate the deviant nature of this group and their renunciation of the Prophet Muhammad’s (peace and blessings of God be upon him) teachings and clear instructions regarding the full protection, privileges and rights to people of other faiths [reference: for example, see the Charters of Privileges to the monks of St. Catherine Monastery in Mount Sinai by Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him) in 628 CE]. Muslims throughout the centuries have honoured and applied these rights in all lands they ruled. 

At the present, we call upon all Canadian Muslims to denounce this deliberate perversion of the Muslim faith and to dissociate themselves totally from such a despicable ideology and dangerous people who intentionally use the name of Islam in their ongoing campaign of distortion and destruction.

So that's our choice? Decapitation or dhimmitude? 

Thanks for nothin', imams.

Justin Trudeau's Right Hand Man Is Helping Him Lock Up That All Important Pro-Sharia Vote

Ezra Levant writes:

Of course, most Canadian Muslims want to live in peace and freedom like the rest of us. But many don’t abide Harper’s strong support for Israel. And according to a 2007 Environics poll of Canadian Muslims, taken after the arrest of the so-called Toronto 18 terrorist plotters, a significant number actually support terrorism. Fully 13% of Canadian Muslims said the planned terrorist attacks would have been either completely or somewhat justified.

There are about a million Muslims in Canada – which means about 130,000 actually support a massive terrorist attack on their own country. Add to that Muslims who wouldn’t go so far as to support terrorism against Canada, but who merely despise Harper’s support for Israel, and you’re talking about a very large voting block – especially in certain ridings, including Trudeau’s own.

Which is precisely why Trudeau has targeted them. And he’s hired the right guy for the job: Omar Alghabra, the Saudi-born extremist who used to run the anti-Semitic Canadian Arab Federation. That lobby group claims that Hamas and Hezbollah are not terrorists. Normally, in politics, Alghabra is someone you keep far away from you. But Trudeau keeps Alghabra very close – he’s been the key to unlocking the anti-Israel vote, the anti-Semitic vote, the pro-Hamas vote, and the pro-sharia vote.

Sounds like a winning strategy to me, one based on the appeal of bouncy hair and Zionhass.

Imbecillic Dhimmitude Down Under

Are these the dumbest, most supine infidels on the planet? I vote "yes":

Christian and Jewish leaders have rallied to support the Muslim community, asking members of the Australian public to join them in a campaign called “We’ll love Muslims 100 years”. 

Rabbi Zalman Kastel will join Australian Christian Churches pastor, Brad Chilcott, Tim Costello and other denominational leaders in three events in New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia on Friday to declare their support for Australian Muslims. 

The title makes a play on a recent headline in the Weekend Australian, “We’ll fight Islam 100 years”, which accompanied a story quoting a former head of army Peter Leahy saying that Australia must prepare for a war against radical Islam lasting for the rest of the century. 

Leaders will hold a banner headline, “We’ll love Muslims 100 years”, under a mock-up newspaper masthead called The Welcoming Australian. 

He also described as divisive the “us and them” language developing around Christians being killed but not acknowledging Yazidis and Muslims were also being targeted. 

Muslim leaders have expressed their disquiet at the national political debate in response to terrorism in the Middle East. 

“That headline would be like running a headline ‘we’ll fight Christianity for 100 years’ in response to the sexual abuse allegations within the churches,” said Chilcott, who is national director of Welcome to Australia. 

“Young Muslims in all walks of life are feeling very alienated by this conversation. They are uni students, engineers, doctors, all rightly feeling they are contributing to Australian life.” 

Kastel, who was raised in an “ultra orthodox” Jewish tradition, is national director of a multi-faith organisation, Together for Humanity Foundation. His foundation has a Muslim president, a Christian chairman and atheist Janet Holmes a Court as patron. 

Kastel said he felt compelled to act because of “shrill, harsh talk” against Muslims in mainstream and social media. 

“I was concerned about shrill, harsh talk we see both in social and mainstream, even though there is a lot of good interfaith work going on in Australia every day,” he said. 

“As a result, we have Muslims who are made to feel like terrorists in the past few years and they report the atmosphere is similar to post-9/11 and it is simply as a result of cultural incompetence. 

“We are all on the same team, if I may use that word, in terms of the result, and that is peace.”...

Well, some on the Muslim team (including Hamas and ISIS) are working hard to bring about peace in the sharia sense of things. And, sure, Christians and Jews can play on that team, too, provided they're willing to kowtow to Islam and cough up the jizya, the dhimmi poll tax.

That's a small price to pay to ensure that Muslims don't "feel like terrorists," right?

ISIS Is a Joooish Plot Sez Dutch Minister of Justice and Security

What a loon!

What Harpoon Siddiqui Knows About Israel Couldn't Fill a Pygmy's Belly Button

The Toronto Star's resident shill for the Islamic perspective claims that the Israeli right's hatred of Arabs is endangering the joint's status as a democracy.

Re the "hate": I see it as yet another instance of a Zion-loather projecting his own animus onto the Joooos.

"Moderate" Calgary Imam Syed Soharwardy Gets a Death Threat From ISIS

Sheesh, you'd think his work on behalf of sharia law and his "human rights" complaint re the publication of those blasphemous Motoons would have exempted him from ISIS's ire.

Deborah Lipstadt's NYT Piece on the "New" Jew-Hate Misses the Boat (i.e. the Islam)

She defines the latest version of anti-Judaism here:

The differences between then and now are legion. When there is an outbreak of anti-Semitism today, officials condemn it. This is light-years away from the 1930s and 1940s, when governments were not only silent but complicit. Memory also distinguishes the present from previous events. Now, in contrast to the 1930s, we know matters can escalate. Jews today are resolute in their determination: “Never again.” 

And despite all this I wonder if I am too sanguine. Last month, pro-Gaza protesters on Kurfürstendamm, the legendary avenue in Berlin, chanted, “Jews, Jews, cowardly swine.” Demonstrators in Dortmund and Frankfurt chanted, “Hamas, Hamas; Jews to the gas!” And a pro-Hamas marcher in Berlin broke away from the crowd and assaulted an older man who was quietly standing on a corner holding an Israeli flag. 

On the eve of Bastille Day, a group of Parisian Jews were trapped in a synagogue by pro-Palestinian rioters and had to be rescued by the police. A few weeks ago signs were posted in Rome urging a boycott of 50 Jewish-owned businesses. In central London last week, anti-Israel protesters targeted a Sainsbury’s grocery, and the manager reflexively pulled kosher products off the shelves. (The supermarket chain later apologized.)

It would be simple to link all this outrage to events in Gaza. But this trend has been evident for a while. In March 2012, four people were killed at a Jewish day school in Toulouse, France. (Last month, a Jewish community center there was firebombed.) In December 2012, Israeli officials warned Jewish men who wanted to visit synagogues in Denmark not to don their skullcaps until they were inside the building. It is increasingly common for Jewish tourists in Western Europe to avoid carrying anything that might distinguish them as such. A shooting at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in May, a month before the latest Gaza conflict began, killed four people. 

I am unpersuaded by those who try to dismiss what is happening as “just rhetoric.” It is language, after all, that’s at the heart of the ubiquitous slippage from anger at Israeli military action to hatred of Jews.

In other words, Zionhass. That's only half of it, though. The other half: hating Israel because it is Jewish (as the Muslim supremacists do). Unfortunately, even Lipstadt, who should know better, has a hard time pinning the blame for such Jew-hate where it belongs--on what is written in core Islamic texts:

It’s true that this is not the anti-Semitism of the 1930s, which came from the right and was rooted in longstanding Christian views that demonized the Jews. Traditionally, Islam did not treat Jews this way. But in the past century a distinct strain of Muslim anti-Semitism has emerged. Built on a foundation of antipathy toward non-Muslims, it mixes Christian anti-Semitism — imported to the Middle East by European missionaries — and a more leftist, secular form of anti-Semitism. It is evident in political cartoons, editorials, television shows and newspaper articles.

The Hamas charter is an example. It contains references to “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a notorious forgery created by Russian czarist police officers in 1903 and later used as Nazi propaganda. The charter accuses Jews of relying on secret societies to foment global economic and political disasters. It calls on adherents to prepare for “the next round with the Jews, the merchants of war.”

Maybe so, but the Hamas Charter is pure, unadulterated, by-the-book supremacist Islam. Here, for example, is Bat Ye'or on the subject (from her book, Islam and Dhimmitude):

In the PLO's charter, an Arab state will replace the State of Israel; for Hamas, this state will be Islamic, yet both versions are idyllically described (PLO Charter; art. 6; Hamas Constitution, art. 6 and 31). Hamas expanded those ideas in classic terms:

[It] strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine. Only under the shadow of Islam could the members of all religions coexist in safety and security for their lives, properties and rights. In the absence of Islam, conflict arises, oppression reigns, corruption is rampant ands struggles and wars prevail. (art. 6)

[Hamas] is committed to the tolerance inherent in Islam as regards attitudes toward other religions [...] Under the shadow of Islam it is possible fo rthe members of the three religions: Islam, Christianity and Judaism, to coexist in safety and security. Safety and security can only prevail under the shadow of Islam, and recent and ancient history is the bet witness to that effect. The members of other religions must desist from struggling against Islam over sovereignty in this region. For if they were to gain the upper hand, fighting, torture and uprooting would follow; they would be fed up with each other; to say nothing of members of other religions. The past and the present are full of evidence to that effect [...]

Islam accords his rights to everyone who has rights and averts aggression against the rights of others. (art. 31)

This, therefore, is a call for the idyllic state of dhimmitude for the Jews--and for anti-Zionist Christians. This future of peace and prosperity in the Islamic state which would supplant Israel was favorably described by Ismail R al-Faruqi, a Palestinian professor of Islamic Studies at Temple University, Philadelphia.

According to the author, in this new state--where Jews would no longer be Israelis--the Muslim leader will be able to repeat the message which the Turkish conqueror of Constantinople in 1453 sent to the Greek patriarch who, for his collaboration, was rewarded with Islam's protection. This is hardly a convincing conclusion in view of the almost total disappearance of the Greek population of Anatolia in the twentieth century...

But the denial of national characteristics is not limited to Israel alone; it is rooted in the conception of mankind, which should be compulsorily subjected to the shari'a. Nationalism has no legitimacy whatsoever and, as Hamas says, "When Islam appears, all the forces of unbelief unite to confront it, because the community of unbelief is one" (art. 22)--that is, the dar al-harb, the region of war. 

The obvious conclusion: Hamas may have embraced certain tropes of infidel Jew-hate, including the Protocols, but if such material did not exist Hamas's own brand of Islamic supremacism would be more than enough to inspire it to fits and feats of Zionhass.

Lipstadt, an exceptionally smart cookie, must know that. Which makes her line of reasoning here very odd indeed.