Amira Hass is the great journalist for Haaretz who is due to get an award for journalistic courage for her work in Gaza. Phyllis Chesler is an American who writes about the unending rise of anti-Semitism, which is the same in her mind as anti-Zionism. She opposes the prize. This piece at Pajamas Media is so weird and nutty, it’s fun to read.
Hass is the daughter of Holocaust survivors and I have met a few such Israelis-on-a-Holy Mission who are absolutely obsessed with the Palestinians and truly see them as the “new Jews.” Perhaps they are, belatedly, trying to rescue their parents or their collective ancestors by focusing on the tragic plight of yet another people—and by so doing, perhaps unconsciously seeking “special” treatment for themselves in any future Islamist Reich.
Islamic Reich? What kind of ridiculous historical revisionism is this? Hamza Andreas Tzortzis refutes this by using Jewish historians:
“Heinrich Graetz, a 19th century Jewish historian expressed how Islamic rule in Spain favoured the Jews in the context of kindness and liberty of belief, “It was in these favourable circumstances that the Spanish Jews came under the rule of Mahometans, as whose allies they esteemed themselves the equals of their co-religionists in Babylonia and Persia. They were kindly treated, obtained religious liberty, of which they had so long been deprived, were permitted to exercise jurisdiction over their co-religionists, and were only obliged, like the conquered Christians, to pay poll tax…”
“….In Islamic history, where the cohesive values of Islam such as justice were propagated, the conclusions made by some historians are unparalleled, an Italian Rabbi, Obadiah Yareh Da Bertinoro, travelled to Jerusalem in 1486 CE and he wrote a letter to his father telling him about the country and its people under the Islamic Social Model, “The Jews are not persecuted by the Arabs in these parts. I have travelled through the country in its length and breadth, and none of them has put an obstacle in my way. They are very kind to strangers, particularly to anyone who does not know the language; and if they see many Jews together they are not annoyed by it. In my opinion, an intelligent man versed in political science might easily raise himself to be chief of the Jews as well as of the Arabs…”
The Jewish historian Amnon Cohen states that the Jewish minorities sought justice from the Islamic courts rather than their own, “The Jews went to the Muslim court for a variety of reasons, but the overwhelming fact was their ongoing and almost permanent presence there. This indicates that they went there not only in search of justice, but did so hoping, or rather knowing, that more often than not they would attain redress when wronged…”
Distribution of Resources
The distribution of wealth and resources constitutes the macro-economy of the Islamic economic model; the Qur’an repeatedly mentions distribution of resources and charity. “Do good to the indigent till their economic imbalance is no more.”
“Feed the indigent, without wishing any return from them, not even a word of thanks.”
The famous letter from a Rabbi found in Phillip Mansel’s book ‘Constantinople’, reflects the Qur’anic reality of distributing resources, “Here in the land of the Turks we have nothing to complain of. We possess great fortunes; much gold and silver are in our hands. We are not oppressed with heavy taxes and our commerce is free and unhindered. Rich are the fruits of the earth. Everything is cheap and every one of us lives in peace and freedom…”
Red-baiting, too!
Who’d have thought Women and Madness would turn out to be an autobiography?
Gee, isn’t the test of collective virtue, power? Going by the Old Testament (Torah), what does that tell us, e.g., in the Joshua section? And now, the Jews have once again military power, and so what have they given the world, especially the Palestinian world? What am I missing here? Have they shown themselves to be at least as virtuous as the WASPs, all things considered? Just asking.
Ah, yes, good old Phyllis Chestnut.
Her whole ‘argument’ boils down to Gabriel’s (JSF) ‘We Rock! They suck!’ guide to Hasbara.
Of course this mix of ‘anti-Jihadism’ and red-baiting will go down a storm with Conservatives at Piyamas Media. Also, you have to love this Conservative faux-concern for women’s rights: if it wasn’t for past European progressive emancipation movements women would still be walking six feet behind their menfolk… One of Phyllis’ books is titled: ‘The death of feminism’!
The comment section to Phyllis’ ruminations is well worth reading for a few belly laughs… This one by ‘Lynn’ for instance:
“I also thought your analogy between modern Israel and the Nazi enforced Jewish ghettos you wrote about in a past article was spot on. The world seems to be fooled that Israeli is blocking people from entering, but the true fact is that Israel is being fenced in by those who believe in a god that calls for their annihilation.”
Gmeyers, LOL, that link to Gabriel’s “We Rock! They Suck!” is the ultimate speed-read guide to hasbara! I don’t know why Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, president of the Israel Project, had to spend big bucks on Frank Luntz’s 116 page how-to-spew-hasbara guide — Gabriel gets it down to ten paragraphs and four simple rules.
As Phil himself said, some stuff is so crazy, it’s fun to read! Certainly that’s the case with this piece of work . . . link to newsweek.com
US_Objector:
spread it far and wide, bro!
And can you please take Frank Luntz back? We’ve had thoroughly enough of the dial fiddling troll…
An amazing document. I’m not sure if it’s “fun” but it is a great resource, one that apparently was not supposed to be published. Do you know how it was leaked?
I’m referring to US OBjector’s cite
David:
It’s been around on the Internets for some months now.
Cracking good read, eh?
D-Sam, indeed, it was leaked on the Newsweek website a few months ago, and if you google it, you’ll see that it was much maligned in the blogosphere.
Here’s Mondoweiss on the talking points, and how Newsweek wimped out by watering down the evil intention of the document:
link to mondoweiss.net
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