Comparing Refugees
I got the
photo above from
Talking Tachlis. They copied it from a flyer for an Israel-bashing event. I was at the event. There were a lot of pro-Israel people there to ask tough questions and to let the Israel haters know that we will challenge them and their useful Jewish idiots every chance we get. It was clear that the moderators of this Anti-Israel hatefest were intimidated by having a large minority of Israel supporters in the audience.
During the Q & A, they asked that questions be written on postcards. They were forced to ask some of our more intense questions, rather than just the easy ones from supporters.
As for the photo: the two photos, side by side, are supposed to show the moral equivalence between the Holocaust and the
Palestinian's "plight". The viewer, if properly trained by years of exposure to anti-Israel rhetoric, and rehashed and updated anti-Semitic libels, is supposed to see the poor beleaguered walkers in both pictures as equal in their victimhood. They are also supposed to take a leap of hate, with help from Hajo Meyer and his morally deficient crew, in order to blame Israel and Zionists for the Arabs (now officially Palestinians) who were either forced from their homes in a war of attempted genocide started by the Arab/Muslim nations surrounding the nascent state of Israel, or picked up and left on their own after being promised by their genocidal leaders that they could return to their homes and maybe even pick up a bit of plunder from the Jews, after the Jews were driven into the sea. Oops!
It's true, the Arabs, once they removed themselves from their premises in what is now Israel discovered, much to their chagrin, that their move was permanent. Bummer. But lets take a look at what happened to the people in both photos in the days, weeks, and years after those two photographs were taken. The Jews from the Warsaw ghetto were most likely reduced to smoke and ashes a short time after they arrived at Auschwitz, the destination of trains that they are most likely headed toward. Some may have lived longer, maybe as long as a few months, and a very few actually survived to tell their stories. And to have children and grandchildren.
The Arabs in the other photo, temporarily (they thought) fleeing their homes (maybe, we have to take the word of Jew-hating terror supporters) will grow up and have families of their own. They will live to see their children grow up to have children of their own. The fact that this will happen in "refugee camps" is the fault of their own feckless leaders, the UN, the Arab/Muslim world, and generations of useful idiots in the West. Any abuse they suffer will be at the hands of their fellow Arabs who will force them and their descendants to live as pawns in a war against Israel, one of the fronts of the world wide Islamic jihad.
As they fester in "refugee camps", they will be taught that it's all the fault of the Jews. They will grow up knowing nothing but hatred to the point that some of them will be willing to turn themselves into human bombs and blow up Jews along with themselves. Among the Muslim world, they will be called heroes and martyrs for trying to finish the job that was started back in 1930s Germany. Their fondest wish will be to murder the descendants of Jews who were fortunate to either live through the Nazi death camps or who were even luckier not to live in Europe during the Holocaust.
The point is that the Arabs we see walking down a dusty road through a picturesque countryside got to live their lives. The Jews being herded through a Warsaw street didn't. And there can be no moral equivalence between life and death.
Labels: Arabs, Hajo Meyer, islam, Israel, moral equivalence, Palestinians
A Grizzly Anniversary
On this day in 1974, Arab Muslim terrorists carried out the
Ma'alot Massacre. According to Wikipedia,
The Ma'alot massacre[1] was an attack on May 15, 1974 in Ma'alot, Israel, in which 22 Israeli high school students, aged 14–16, from Safed were killed by three members of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine.[2] Before reaching the school, the trio shot and killed two Arab women, a Jewish man, his pregnant wife, and their 4 year old son, and wounded several others.[3]
There have been so many brutal acts committed by Islamic terrorists since then, that this attack is almost forgotten. Our society has become morally inverted enough to elect Barack Hussein Obama as president of the United States. He is "reaching out" to the same kinds of minds that planned an perpetrated this massacre and
thousands of terrorist attacks since. He is
pressuring Israel to submit to the demands of Islamic terrorists. How is that supposed to work to our or Israel's benefit? How will that advance civilization?
Labels: Arabs, Israel, Ma'alot Massacre, Muslims, Obama, terrorism
Fun Facts from Tacitus
Reading the ancient historians, you really have to pay attention. While at times, they tell fascinating stories that resonate throughout the ages, there are times, I must admit, that things can get dull, kind of that "one thing after another" syndrome. Sometimes things are happening so quickly that you get lost in the names and events that may only get a page or perhaps even a sentence of description. As an example, I found Livy's history of early Rome dull in parts, but later, when he stretches out in his retelling of the Second Punic War, he creates quite the page-turner.
Tacitus (in a well annotated edition) is really interesting. The man could tell a good story. Sometimes too, you just come across unexpected tidbits. I recently read the W. H. Fyfe translation of The Histories by Tacitus. I found it well done. It was readable, and made sense. It was modern enough to flow easily through my mind. That doesn't always mean better, but compared to
this translation on the web, I prefer Fyfe. Due to the fact that I'm lazy and don't feel like typing passages from the book though, I'm quoting from the web.
Our first selection is from book 1:
22. The soul of Otho was not effeminate like his person. His confidential freedmen and slaves, who enjoyed a license unknown in private families, brought the debaucheries of Nero's court, its intrigues, its easy marriages, and the other indulgences of despotic power, before a mind passionately fond of such things, dwelt upon them as his if he dared to seize them, and reproached the inaction that would leave them to others. The astrologers also urged him to action, predicting from their observation of the heavens revolutions, and a year of glory for Otho. This is a class of men, whom the powerful cannot trust, and who deceive the aspiring, a class which will always be proscribed in this country, and yet always retained. Many of these men were attached to the secret councils of Poppaea and were the vilest tools in the employ of the imperial household. One of them, Ptolemaeus, had attended Otho in Spain, and had there foretold that his patron would survive Nero. Gaining credit by the result, and arguing from his own conjectures and from the common talk of those who compared Galba's age with Otho's youth, he had persuaded the latter that he would be called to the throne. Otho however received the prediction as the words of wisdom and the intimation of destiny, with that inclination so natural to the human mind readily to believe in the mysterious.
At this point in our story, Galba is emperor, having taken over upon the death of Nero. An astrologer predicts to Otho that he will be replacing Galba on the throne. Otho accepts that prediction and goes on to overthrow Galba. He is then overthrown by Vitellus, who is in turn, overthrown by Vespasian, who serves for nine years. All of this overthrowing stuff takes place in the space of a year - a year of civil war.
If we replace the name Otho with the name Macbeth, substitute three witches for the astrologer, and change the author's name to Shakespeare, . . .
At the beginning of book five:
1. EARLY in this year Titus Caesar, who had been selected by his father to complete the subjugation of Judaea, and who had gained distinction as a soldier while both were still subjects, began to rise in power and reputation, as armies and provinces emulated each other in their attachment to him. The young man himself, anxious to be thought superior to his station, was ever displaying his gracefulness and his energy in war. By his courtesy and affability he called forth a willing obedience, and he often mixed with the common soldiers, while working or marching, without impairing his dignity as general. He found in Judaea three legions, the 5th, the 10th, and the 15th, all old troops of Vespasian's. To these he added the 12th from Syria, and some men belonging to the 18th and 3rd, whom he had withdrawn from Alexandria. This force was accompanied by twenty cohorts of allied troops and eight squadrons of cavalry, by the two kings Agrippa and Sohemus, by the auxiliary forces of king Antiochus, by a strong contingent of Arabs, who hated the Jews with the usual hatred of neighbours, and, lastly, by many persons brought from the capital and from Italy by private hopes of securing the yet unengaged affections of the Prince. With this force Titus entered the enemy's territory, preserving strict order on his march, reconnoitring every spot, and always ready to give battle. At last he encamped near Jerusalem.
What can we say about that? It began, so the story goes, with Jacob and Esau. It continues to this day. To Tacitus, who was unclear on that history, it was glossed over as just the usual hatred between neighbors.
And time still marches on.
Labels: Arabs, books, Jews, Shakespeare, Tacitus
Happy Nakba Day
On
Wikipedia, I discovered that "Palestinians" celebrate today as Nakba Day. Here they are, giving of themselves again. Besides offering gifts to the world like terrorism, homicide bombing, new permutations of Jew-hatred, and contributing to the general moral rot of civilization, these people who call themselves Palestinian now embrace a new holiday - so happy Nakba Day.
Let us join with the most thoroughly debased society on the planet as they once again demand recognition of their unique condition. That unique condition is multiple generations of dependency on the misguided charity of the West. The charity, of course, has given the Gazan and West Bank Arabs an entitlement mentality that causes them to demand huge infusions of cash and materials in order to avoid that humanitarian crisis that is continuously looming directly overhead and will come crashing down if we in the West don't keep the coffers of the P.A. and Hamas full. By now we know that their definition of a humanitarian crisis is a shortage of weapons with which to attack innocent Israelis.
That is certainly a Nakba . . . for the West.
After all, we are stupidly subsidizing the Middle East terror machine. And we know we are. There's no such thing as a free jihad.
It is a Nakba that our leaders are so blind and delusional that they keep throwing money at murderers thinking that will get them to stop murdering. It's a Nakba that we allow our good intentions to be held hostage. It's a Nakba that our compassion keeps us in denial of reality so that we too contribute to the moral rot.
Besides the Nakba of maintaining generations of Muslims in festering genocidal rage, there are the Nakbas that don't get the attention they deserve. This is due to the insanely detailed and cruelly biased reporting on Israel.
China has occupied Tibet since the 1950s. Why, besides bumper stickers, has there been so little concern? How many thousands or millions of Tibetens have been ethnically cleansed? Why are the brave reporters who speak truth to power not concerned with Tibet?
We've got a better idea of the body count in the current Darfur genocide. The U.N. and various NGOs are keeping better track of this Nakba than they did during the Sudanese
anti-Christian genocide of the 1990s. Don't worry if you've forgotten that. The whole sick chapter of
Sudanese history only got about as much coverage as the Muslim-inspired propaganda that caused an anti-Israel uproar when Israel tried to do some repair work to the
Temple Mount.And then there's Zimbabwe. How many are starving to death there due to Robert Mugabe's despotic rule? Nobody cares about that Nakba.
And where is the U.N. Human Rights Commission in all of this? Well, with China, Zimbabwe, and Sudan as members, they're right where you'd expect them to be - in session, condemning Israel.
So how are the pampered, overly photographed Arab refugees different from the rest of the current and past Nakba sufferers? Well - they have props. Those keys offer a visual. I used to think they were really a key to a jihadist's heart. But we know that the only key to a jihadists heart is a dead infidel.
The self-titled Palestinians have been spending their free time (which they have lots of since they live in a welfare state and don't have to work) persecuting Israel, the Jewish State. If Robert Mugabe were Jewish, he would have been driven from power years ago, and he would be discredited by every news medium in the civilized world. Claim the Chinese are descendants of the 10 lost tribes and there would be divestment rallies on college campuses throughout North America and Europe. Newspapers would rewrite Chines history to deligitimize 4000 years of Chinese history. Not even Chairman Mao would escape the wrath of the enlightened who hate the fact that Jews have power for the first time in 2000 years.
Let's face it. The real Nakba is the moral inversion that has willingly taken place in Western civilization at the behest of a barbaric enemy.
But that doesn't mean we can't party.
So happy Nakba Day everyone. Strap on that bomb vest and celebrate the most morally twisted holiday ever created.
Labels: al nakba, Arabs, Israel, Muslims, Palestinians
Israel at (3000 and) 60 - or so
It's late. I'm tired. I haven't had a blog post in weeks (thanks to
Jungle Mom for checking up on me) even though I really have been trying to put one together. I saved some links figuring that since I haven't had time to write my own post, I could link to a few others' posts that I thought were important. I hope to finish and post it soon. In the meantime, I'm going to leave this short paragraph by Hoffer, and I'm going to make my lunch and go to bed. I would have done this an hour ago, but my daughter was on the computer finishing a project for school.
In the meantime, as it is the 60th anniversary of the reestablishment of the State of Israel, I'm going to run a short piece by my favorite philosopher,
Eric Hoffer. It was emailed to me a couple of months ago and I've been saving it for just such an occasion.
Notice if you will, that Hoffer refers to "Arabs", not "Palestinians". Back then, the world hadn't been trained to accept the ancient race of people known as the Palestinians who had lived in the country of Palestine for thousands, or perhaps tens of thousands of years, who having left nothing to note their existence, are as mysterious as the extinct inhabitants of the continent of Atlantis. Perhaps they are the descendants of the Atlanteans. Nobody knows because the scholars who have convinced the world of the reality of this ancient and fabled race can offer no proof that they existed prior to the 1960s.
For people who are convinced of a government/Mossad conspiracy to bring down the twin towers though, this this lack of factual proof is unimportant. They will accept the myth (because the myth is more powerful than mere boring fact) of the Palestinians because to do otherwise would be Islamophobic . . . or something. One day an Islamic scholar will make up . . . um, I mean write the history of Palestinians and . . .
Sorry, I slipped off of my stated topic. Read Hoffer. I'm going to bed. I have to be up much too early.
ISRAEL'S PECULIAR POSITION
By Eric Hoffer, May 26, 1968
(In 1968 the LA times ran this article, written by Eric Hoffer, a former longshoreman and non-Jewish American social philosopher. Born in 1902, Hoffer died in 1983, after writing nine books and winning the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Although written 38 years ago, the following is as timely and applicable today as then )
The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews. Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it, Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchman. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese - and no one says a word about refugees.
But in the case of Israel the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab.
Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis. Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on.
There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him. The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore, and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.
The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources. Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general.
I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish the holocaust will be upon us.
Labels: Arabs, Eric Hoffer, Israel, Jews, Palestinians
War's legitimate object is more perfect peace. Flavius Vegitius Renatus
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CHALLAH AKBAR
