Garbanzo Toons

The Farhud

On this day in 1941 the country of Israel did not exist. There was no "Palestinian problem" as no Arabs or Muslims referred to themselves as "Palestinians". There was no "occupation" of Gaza or the West Bank. And yet . . .

That day in 1941, on the Jewish festival of Shavuot, the sight of Jews returning from the Baghdad airport to greet the returning Regent Abdul al-Ilah, ruler of Iraq, was all the excuse an Iraqi mob needed to unleash its vengeance.

The attack began at 3 p.m., as the Jewish delegation crossed Baghdad’s Al Khurr Bridge. Violence quickly spread to the Al Rusafa and Abu Sifyan districts. The frenzied mob murdered Jews openly on the streets. Women were raped and infants were killed as their horrified families looked on. Torture and mutilation followed.

Jewish shops were looted and torched. A synagogue was invaded, burned, and its Torahs destroyed in classic Nazi fashion. The shooting, burning and mayhem continued throughout the evening. Jews were dragged from their automobiles. Homes were invaded, looted and burned. On June 2, the fury continued with policemen and slum dwellers joining in.

At the Muallem-Cohen house, young Nezima was terrified. Her father had just returned from the synagogue, relating terrible stories about daughters being raped and homes burned, when suddenly shouting, armed men crashed through his own front gates. Quick, Mr. Muallem-Cohen rushed his family to the stairs to escape to the roof. Up they scampered, first young Nezima, then her mother, and then her father. A shot — Mr. Muallem-Cohen was dead.

Mrs. Muallem-Cohen looked back in horror. Just then a policeman appeared. “They killed my husband,” she shrieked. “How do you want to die?” the policeman snapped back, and then cracked her skull with his gun.

Finally, in the afternoon, British forces punched into the city. They opened fire on the rampagers. A 5 p.m. curfew was broadcast. Scores of violators were shot on sight. The disturbances were finally quelled.

The carnage of those 48 hours would be forever seared upon the collective Iraqi Jewish consciousness as “the Farhud,” best translated as “violent dispossession.”

So much for the fairy tale of Jews and Muslims living in peace and harmony until the founding of You-Know-Which-Jewish-State destroyed that peace and harmony by upsetting that carefully balanced aspect of Islamic society wherein Muslims were masters and Jews dhimmis. By 1951, after a continuous presence in Iraq of 2,600 years, almost all of Iraq's Jews were forced to emigrate to the fledgling state of Israel. A very few remained to be persecuted by the Iraqi government. If there are any Jews left in Iraq today, they are very quiet about it, and they number fewer than ten. Sounds like genocide to me, even though it is politically incorrect, islamophobic, and not very polite to record any of the known genocidal episodes perpetrated by Muslims on people of (not necessarily) other religions.

One more thought: just as almost all of the ancient Jewish communities in the Muslim world have been ethnically cleansed of Jews over the centuries, so have Christian communities. Apologists for Islam never acknowledge that fact and try to ignore it altogether. They will only discuss the Christians who are being forced out of Gaza, Judea, and Sumeria, because they can pin false blame on Israel. We know which religion of peace is at fault though.

Labels: anti-semitism, Christians, Farhud, genocide, Iraq, Jews

posted by Harry @ 7:34 PM 1 comments

Where Do Sudanese Asylum Seekers Go? Why to Israel, of Course.

According to this article in the Detroit Jewish News, Israel has become the promised land for Sudanese refugees escaping that country's genocide.

With two miles of bare footprints behind them, Ahmed, Fatima and their three children approached the border with Israel in the middle of a cold winter night. Snow was falling in the Sinai.

Avoid the Egyptian military patrols, warned their Bedouin smugglers, who were paid with money borrowed from Sudanese friends.

"If they catch you, you could be shot or deported back to Sudan," the Bedouins said.

The 12-hour trip was the last leg of a multi-year journey stretching from the violence of Darfur to Sudan's dangerous capital, Khartoum, to the teeming streets of Cairo. Ahmed had been imprisoned in each city.

Israel was their last hope for what Fatima calls "a normal life" without "fear of being sent back to Sudan."

[ . . . ]

The Israeli soldiers gave the children their green military coats.

In an often-reluctant ritual that has been repeated almost weekly for two years with Sudanese sneaking into Israel, Israel Defense Forces patrols gathered up the tired refugee family, placed them in an ambulance and handed them over to the Border Police.

"We were afraid of the Egyptian army, not of the Israeli army," Ahmed recalled later.

This creates a new quandry for Israel. On the one hand,

The failure of the United Nations to cope with the doubling of refugee applications in the past decade or to intervene to prevent the genocide in Darfur has had ripple effects throughout the world.

That now includes Israel and the Jewish world.

Faced with genocidal threats from Iran and terrorist groups, a legacy of the Holocaust and even echoes of the Exodus 3,700 years ago, Israel is torn between its commitment to universal humanitarian concerns and its own security interests.

But on the other hand,

"Sudan is one of six nations that supports Islamic terror," he said. "All the security services say that there is a danger when it comes to the Sudanese. Detention or alternative detention is legitimate in a democratic country and also in the State of Israel."

Debate is being waged about how many Sudanese would seek refuge here if the detainees are released from prison and accorded good treatment in the Jewish state.

"What we do here will determine if 3 million will come" from Egypt or will stay there, said Yossi Edelshtein, director of the Enforcement Unit of the Immigration Police.

and

"Sudan is one of six nations that supports Islamic terror," he said. "All the security services say that there is a danger when it comes to the Sudanese. Detention or alternative detention is legitimate in a democratic country and also in the State of Israel."

Debate is being waged about how many Sudanese would seek refuge here if the detainees are released from prison and accorded good treatment in the Jewish state.

"What we do here will determine if 3 million will come" from Egypt or will stay there, said Yossi Edelshtein, director of the Enforcement Unit of the Immigration Police.

and

In 2005, the security forces caught 5,600 people trying to infiltrate across the Egyptian-Israeli border, including drug and weapon smugglers, women destined for prostitution, foreign workers and refugees.

In 2006, 100 of those caught trying to infiltrate belonged to terror organizations, according to Israeli media reports. That same year, the U.N. High Commission for Refugees in Israel saw an increase in its case load, with 1,600 applying for refugee or asylum status, up from 1,000 in 2005.

Most of the increase was from foreign workers who did not want to return to their native lands, often because of wars in the Congo, Sierra Leone, the Ivory Coast and other African countries.

We know that none of the Islamic countries care one whit for the life of any Muslim beyond their use as a tool of jihad. We also know that Israel will be pressed to accept any and all refugees because as some Israeli leftists are already saying,

"I am ashamed as a person and as a Jew," Braverman told JTA, referring to the practice of imprisoning asylum seekers. "We of all people have to know how to behave."

So, if Israel refuses to accept and settle each and every Sudanese refugee, they will be condemned by all Muslim nations, by the EU, by the UN, and by the left in general. Meanwhile, the president of Sudan denies there is a genocide going on. As he relayed to a Detroit audience recently,

"Colonial powers ... want to come back" to Sudan, al-Bashir said through a translator to a crowd inside Cobo Center, the site of a three-day convention by the Nation, founded in Detroit and headed by Louis Farrakhan. There is an "American, Israeli, British alliance to dominate all the region."

In recent years, al-Bashir and his government's military forces have been criticized for allegedly killing people inside Sudan, allowing slavery, and providing a haven for terrorists. The U.S. State Dept. lists Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism.

But al-Bashir said that "there is no ethnic cleansing at all" and "there isn't any slavery in the Sudan."

We know that Islam and honesty are rarely on speaking terms. Rather than face that fact, all of the afore mentioned groups find it simpler to blame Israel and the Jews for the world's problems.

There is a simple solution though. The first step is to stop pandering to the islamists and admit they are at war with us. Forcing Israel to take Sudanese refugees (pawns) is a tactic in that war. Once we can admit the war, we can figure out the best way to fight back. I don't know what that best way is, but it's sure to be ugly. The longer we wait though, the uglier the final fight will be.

Labels: Detroit Jewish News, genocide, islam, Israel, Muslims, Sudan

posted by Harry @ 9:46 PM 2 comments

Muslims Killing Lots and Lots of Muslims

Here is a great, but lengthy article that you should read. It compares the millions of Muslims murdered by fellow Muslims in genocidal campaigns compared with the number of Muslims killed by Israel as they defend themselves from a Muslim genocidal campaign. It is reprinted in its entirity at Greetings From the French Hill. The original link was from Abbagav.

Since the establishment of the State of Israel a merciless genocide is being perpetrated against Muslims and/or Arabs. Fact no. 2: The conflict in the Middle East, between Israel and the Arabs as a whole and against the Palestinians in particular, is regarded as the central conflict in the world today. Fact no. 3: According to polls carried out in the European Union, Israel holds first place as “Danger to world peace”. In Holland, for instance, 74% of the population holds this view. Not Iran. Not North Korea. Israel. Connecting between these findings creates one of the biggest deceptions of modern times: Israel is regarded as the country responsible for every calamity, misfortune and hardship. It is a danger to world peace, not just to the Arab or Muslim world.

The finger is pointed cleverly. It’s difficult to blame Israel for the genocide in Sudan or for the civil war in Algeria. How is it done? Dozens of publications, articles, books, periodicals and websites are dedicated to one purpose only: Turning Israel into a state that ceaselessly perpetrates war crimes. In Jakarta and in Khartoum they burn the Israeli flag, and in London, in Oslo and in Zurich hate articles are published, supporting the destruction of Israel.

[ . . . ]

The tragedy is that in Arab and Muslim countries a massacre is happening. A genocide protected by the silence of the world. A genocide protected by a deception that is perhaps unparalleled in the history of mankind. A genocide that has no connection to Israel, to Zionism or to Jews. A genocide of mainly Arabs and Muslims, by Arabs and Muslims.

This is not a matter of opinion or viewpoint. This is the result of factual examination, as precise as possible, of the numbers of victims of various wars and conflicts that have taken place since the establishment of the State of Israel up till this time, in which the massacre continues. It is, indeed, death on a massive scale. A massacre. It is the wiping out of villages and cities and whole populations. And the world is silent. The Muslims are indeed abandoned. They are murdered and the world is silent. And if it bothers to open its mouth, it doesn’t complain about the murderers. It doesn’t complain about the perpetrators of these crimes against humanity. It complains about Israel.

This great deception, that covers up the real facts, endures and even grows because of one reason only: The Media and Academia in the West participate in it. In endless publications, books, periodicals and websites Israel is portrayed as a state that perpetrates “war crimes”, “ethnic cleansing”, and “systematic murder”. Sometimes it is because this is fashionable, sometimes it is mistakenly, sometimes it is the result of hypocrisy and double standards. Sometimes it is new and old anti-Semitism, from the left and from the right, overt and covert. Most of the classic blood libels were refuted not long after they came into being. The blood libel of modern times, against the state of Israel, continues to grow. Many Israelis and Jews are accessories to the nurturing of the libel.

[ . . . ]

To all the above, one can add this data: The great majority of Arabs killed in the framework of the Israeli-Arab Conflict were killed as a result of wars instigated by the Arabs and as a result of their refusal to recognize the UN decision regarding the establishment of the State of Israel, or their refusal to recognize the Jews’ right of self-definition.

The number of Israelis killed by Arab aggression has been relatively far than the numbers of Arabs killed. In the War of the Independence, for example, more than 6,000 Israelis were killed out of a population that was then made up of 600,000. This means: One percent of the population. In comparison with this, Arab fatalities in the war against Israel came from seven countries, the populations of which were already tens of millions. Israel did not dream, did not think and did not want to destroy any Arab state. But the ostensible goal of the attacking armies was “to liquidate the Jewish entity”.

Obviously, in recent years, the Palestinian victims have received most of the attention of the Media and the Academia. In actual fact, these make up just a small percentage of the total sum of all victims. The total sum of Palestinians killed by Israel in the territories that were conquered is several thousand. 1,378 were killed in the first Intifada, and 3,700 since the start of the second Intifada.

This is less, for instance, than the Muslim victims massacred by former Syrian president, Hafez Assad in Hama in 1982. This is less than the Palestinians massacred by King Hussein in 1971. This is less than the number of those killed in one single massacre of Muslim Bosnians by the Serbs in 1991 in Srebrenica, a massacre that left 8,000 dead.

Every person killed is regrettable, but there is no greater libel than to call Israel’s actions ‘genocide’. And even so, the string ‘Israel’ and ‘genocide’ in Google search engine leads to 13,600,000 referrals. Try typing ‘Sudan’ and ‘genocide’ and you’ll get less than 9 million results. These numbers, if you will, are the essence of the great deception.

[ . . . ]

Another fact: Since WWII, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the national conflict with the lowest number of victims, but with the world’s highest number of publications hostile to Israel in the media and in the Academia.

At least half a million Algerians died during the French occupation. A million Afghanis died during the Soviet occupation. Millions of Muslims and Arabs were killed and slaughtered at the hands of Muslims. But all the world knows about one Mohammed a-Dura (whose death was regrettable, but there is some doubt whether he was killed by Israeli gunfire at all).

It is possible and acceptable to criticize Israel. But the excessive, obsessive, and at times anti-Semitic criticism serves also as a coverup, and in some cases also as an approval, of the genocide of millions of others.
Occupation is not enlightened and can’t be enlightened. But if we try to create a scale of ‘brutal occupation’, Israel will come last. This is a fact. This is not an opinion.

And what would have happened to the Palestinians if, instead of being under Israeli occupation they were under Iraqi occupation? Or Sudanese? Or even French or Soviet? It is highly probable that they would have been victims of genocide, at worst, and of mass killings, purges, and deportations at best.

But luckily for them they are under Israeli occupation. And even if, I repeat, there is no such thing as an enlightened occupation, and even if it is acceptable and possible, and at times necessary, to criticize Israel, there is no occupation and there has never been an occupation with so few fatalities (indeed, there are other injuries that are not manifested in the numbers of fatalities, such as the refugee problem. This will be discussed in a separate chapter).

Take your time. Read the whole thing. It's very enlightening.

Labels: genocide, islam

posted by Harry @ 5:55 PM 0 comments