-
-
- Resume builders: Be a broken record on Iran, cheer authoritarians … 1
- UN Committee: Israeli system ‘tantamount to apartheid’ 0
- Slater on Beinart 0
- And we live on… 0
- US official — we went to Israel first 3
- Israel lobby’s favorite senator tries to erase Palestinian refugee status … 23
- Israel takes 30 dunams of land near Salfit ‘for security … 4
- Aaron David Miller: After a short ‘peace process,’ look … 38
-
- BDS victory: South Africa strips Ahava’s ‘made in Israel’ label 713
- Video: Israeli mob demands all African refugees be deported from … 475
- Day after pogroms, Likud MK calls for internment camp for … 427
- Neverending Nakba: Israel breaks lull, attacks Gazan farmers 413
- ‘This is not fair play’: Mahmoud Sarsak’s family demands his … 389
- March of the Flags 345
- Neocons in Washington Post: Military strike on Iran would ‘calm … 323
- Nabi Saleh’s Bassem Tamimi convicted by Israeli courts based on … 293
-
- The Messiah’s Donkey: Settlers fire on Palestinian villagers as the … 235
- Aharon Appelfeld’s rage at the German language (and Arendt’s need … 156
- US to differentiate between ‘personally displaced’ Palestinian refugees and their … 129
- March of the Flags 127
- Affirming a Judaism and Jewish identity without Zionism 110
- Feeling the hate in Long Island 97
- Israeli judge to issue verdict in Rachel Corrie case 94
- WaPo’s Walter Pincus says US is ‘going above and beyond … 87
-
Recent Comments
click link to see last 100 comments- Resume builders: Be a broken record on Iran, cheer authoritarians in Gulf (1)
- Annie Robbins: Having recognized its weakness, the US knows that it will be the UN that takes the lead in Syria and...
- Did Israeli Eurovision contestant watch too much Juliano Mer Khamis? (54)
- Annie Robbins: GL, urban dictionary has PEP, just no explanation of progressive except for palestine....
- German Lefty: Annie, it looks like you got infected with the Eurovision virus. Great. The more fans, the better. The...
- US official — we went to Israel first (3)
- traintosiberia: OMG! Why I don”t have that Stockholm Syndrome yet! How long do I have to feign that I have it.
- Annie Robbins: a U.S. official…asked to remain anonymous owing to the sensitive nature of the issue. sensitive?...
- Carllarc: proof of ‘Israel firsters’, for sure
- Israel lobby’s favorite senator tries to erase Palestinian refugee status for millions (23)
- piotr: How many Jews who made aliya were actual refugees from Roman persecution? Thus the “Jew who taunted...
- Affirming a Judaism and Jewish identity without Zionism (113)
- yourstruly: what was that sound? the special relationship breaking down and the loud and sustained chorus that...
- MHughes976: I’m still a bit uncertain about what R.Brian means by ‘Zionism’: what proposition did...
- yourstruly: given, that the israel’s brutal occupation of palestine is why much of the arab/islamic world hates...
- Resume builders: Be a broken record on Iran, cheer authoritarians in Gulf (1)
Our Writers
- Philip Weiss
- Adam Horowitz
- Today in Palestine
- Annie Robbins
- Alex Kane
- Kate
- Alice Rothchild
- Ahmed Moor
Blogroll
The War of Ideas in the Middle East
How many Jews who made aliya were actual refugees from Roman persecution?
Thus the "Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming" qualify as an example? Are there others?
Why? The Treaty of Westphalia made no limit on the number of visit a vassal may pay to the hegemon state.
New Jersey company says it has permission for unique partnership to work toward the holy grail of energy sources
Mark Halper
guardian.co.uk, Friday 25 May 2012 13.59 EDT
The partnership comes amid tensions between the US and Iran over allegations that Iran is enriching uranium – a process that is different from fusion – to support a nuclear weapons programme.
Sceptics doubt whether US trade sanctions will permit the collaboration. But LPP claimed in a written statement that the pact qualifies as an official US department of treasury exemption "which authorizes collaborating with academics and research institutions on the … creation and enhancement of written publications."
------
Piotr: nuclear fusion may never happen, although who can tell for sure! and the technologies that I heard about have nothing in common with weapon programs. Even so...
Sometimes I wonder how many Jews offered Right of Return were actually expelled by the Romans, and how many are actually only the descendants? And should we have a subcommitee to resolve Khazar questions?
PS. However irrelevant, Khazar question is very interesting. I read an article discussing markers on Y chromosomes of Ashkenazi Jews. Apparently, two "priestly" groups, Cohens and Levys, have their somewhat separate markers that very consistently point to the origin of Cohens in Middle East/Fertile Crescent, while Levys markers connect them to Samoyeds and Aitay peoples, i.e. Siberia. Non-priestly Ashkenazi Jews have more eclectic markers, including a group that is well represented in Levant outside Fertile Crescent, Turkey and Aegean, which would point to Philistines. Siberian/Khazarian Y-chromosomes belong to 15-20% of Ashkenazis, about 1/2 of them Levys.
Unfortunately, I do not have the book at hand, and the quote is from memory. "Indolent, hookworm ridden" is verbatim. I think dbroncos time line is a bit off. Lowland Scotts probably descent both from Brythonic people who were conquered and Northumbrian Angles (while the ethnonym Scott comes from Celtic clans that invaded Caledonia from Hibernia around the same time, initially Scott was a synonym for Irish). In USA, the settlement of West Virginia was perhaps a bit earlier, after the war of 1755, while Central/Western Pennsylvania, Eastern Kentucky and Eastern Tennessee were settled about, 1790-1810, roughly at the same time.
Around the same time Darwin participated in an expedition to South America, and he noted that the natives of Terra del Fuego are least evolved part of human race, although he considered making an exception for the Irish.
But the prejudice was not always racial or religious. I have a book on American history written about 80 years ago, and in one chapter describing the society of southern states it mentions that they also had an indolent hookworm ridden population variously called as crackers, hillybillies or rednecks, subsisting on produce from indifferent attempts at farming, hunting vermin and most of all, hogs that were running everywhere.
Yeah, yeah, but does she ENTHUSIASTICALLY support settlements? Does she ADMIRE the adorable settlers? As Jimmy Carter wrote "Why not the best?" (now a collectible item, available from 3.84+shipping, link to amazon.com
Perhaps there should be some standards for sarcastic comments.
Ideally, the comment should be so over the top that "it could not be serious". This is hard to do. Few days ago an editorial in JPost argued that all criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic because it implies giving Arabs the right to murder all Jews. Approaching this level of over-the-topness is futile. The second approach is to put some phrase that could not possible be written by a serious practitioner of Hasbara, like "appeasing the Kristols". I guess that to appease the Shingos, Krauss should be a bit more clear.
One way is to write ... .
There is this "New Yorker map of the world" style of political pundintry based on the belief that world affairs are determined by lobbying in Washington. However, USA is overstretched militarily, economically and morally (excessive hypocrisy yields similar problems as overfishing, yields can drop catastrophically).
I think that Russia, China and several other Asian countries like Pakistan and India determine how far USA can go. If those countries are strongly opposed to an attack on Iran, it may lead to a siege of American forces in Afghanistan, cut-off of all supply routes, even if Iran unleashes supplies to insurgents and instigates Shia insurgency.
A serious attack on Iran may lead to tolerating a temporary blockade of Hormuz. Iran must have some support for such a move because eventually it has to trade with SOME countries. Yet more serious attack on Iran may lead to nuclear brinksmanship with Russia.
For the same reason, if USA exceeds reasonable parameters in negotiations with Iran, the Asian countries + Russia may basically dismantle a major part of sanctions. The reverse applies to Iran, of course.
At the end of the day, whatever a Washington lobby does, Israel is a small country that is not particularly relevant in the Great Game of Eurasian politics. Recall that before the last round of talks with Iran an idea was floated that Iran should be required, as a precondition, to dismantle Fordow. Someone, somewhere explained that this is exceedingly dumb and we did not hear about it again.
Why one should not grow bananas in the desert:
Jordan river is used up and Dead Sea drops every year. What looks pretty in one place leads to devastation elsewhere.
I was very impressed by the brave woman. In the past, a working class woman with strong opinions would be branded as a witch.
The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters link to en.wikipedia.org
Perhaps Eli Yishai. But does life slavishly follow the art? Why can't we have 30 stooges?
Israeli government resides in Jerusalem, and there is a frequent confusion between mundane Jerusalem and celestial Jerusalem. Perhaps Israeli government is angelic? (That would make former cabinet members and MPs fallen angels, I guess.)
In any case, one of Zionist principles that while all Jews may be created equal, they are not equal. By entering Israel a Jews acquires elevated status, and upon leaving, descents back to the lowly galut status.
With Israel/Eretz Israel the distinctions persist. For example, an IDF commander attacked by a group of Jews told journalists that he could not be expected to arrest fellow Jews, while other Jews, clearly inferior, are arrested on regular basis. Jews have three routes to perfection:
a. personally participate in molding the Jewish destiny by facts on the ground, this should be done while living in a settlement
b. religious perfection, best done with frequent visits to tombs of heroes and patriarchs
c. becoming a munificent business tycoon
Only the third route can be perfected in galut, and needless to say, no category of perfect Jews was present at the protest.
Someone should tell them that Israel is a county of gay parades, public sex on beaches and, worst of all! socialized medicine.
It seems that the goal of USA is to maintain as much acute sections as long as possible, REGARDLESS of the nuclear issues. So the question is what is possible.
I think that China has the pivotal role. China has its own complex deals and tradeoffs with USA, but it also does not want USA to play hegemon in Asia. Most crucially, China can disable the sanctions, perhaps not totally but most of the recent "ratcheting up". They can buy all Iranian oil if they want (or enough to embolden smaller Asian and African countries, and that includes India, to increase purchases of Iranian oil, presumably offered at some discount), USA cannot sanction main Chinese banks as China has a big role in controlling interest rates in USA etc.
Russia and to a degree India have the same situation. USA is a very valuable partner but not welcome as a hegemon.
The major events this year are EU sanctions, which is a huge success for "as much sanctions as possible", and actual talks. The second interesting event was that just before the previous round USA floated the idea of "preconditions", including dismantling Fordow facility that probably cannot be disabled by a conventional bombardment, and least of all, by Israeli bombers. Somehow, this was promptly forgotten, so someone had to communicate a veto, and I suspect that China and Russia could do it, with EU governments joining.
Neocon fantasists live in a world where USA decides what is good and what is bad and the game is won or lost by lobbying in Washington. But we are not there anymore.
About my disaster theory: the aftermath of an attack on Iran can be that the only way to deliver any supplies to military in Afghanistan, and to evacuate troops, will be to break through anti-aircraft defenses of Pakistan.
What emerges is the scope of FUBAR of Obama's policy in Af-Pak. The moronic policy of drone attacks in Pakistan clearly did not dent much Taliban capabilities, but the blowback in Pakistan is immense. For the last 6 months there were no deliveries for the military through Pakistan as a sanction. There exists also northern route that hinges on permits from the regimes in Central Asia. Kyrgystan already promised that they will not permit it, actually twice. If China, Russia and Iran will insist in concert to cancel the permits, they will be canceled. Pakistan is a more interesting case.
The elite is clearly "pro-American", but also with its own paranoias. Few things can fuel this paranoia more than clandestine support for Baluchi separatists, even though they also operate in Iran, and they were good allies -- unclear if for CIA or Mossad, and who will made fine distinctions in Pakistan? Drones clearly contributed to almost explosive unpopularity of USA. USA also meddles in Pakistan economy, by trying to scuttle supplies of natural gas from Iran. So the result is that Pakistan now goes full speed ahead building pipeline from Iran. Also, in Pew poll, this is the only country where MAJORITY (actually, 50%) is supportive for Iran getting nuclear weapons. Nowhere Iran has a better image. Part of it is tradition, strong cultural connection, but part is that Iran is sort of antithesis for USA. There goes Sunni/Shia divide that our strategic sages want to exploit.
Currently the government tries to patch the relations with USA and restore permits for military transit. It wants some little concession, like to promise to stop interference with the pipeline deal. But can you imagine what will happen of "Pakistani street", which is volatile at the best of times, in the aftermath on an attack on Iran?
Of course, USA could try to blame Israel. That would be credible if Israel got slapped with some sanctions that have teeth. If that would come to pass, we are in Yagil Levy scenario, Israel forced to profoundly -- and quickly -- change policies. If American establishment were rational, this is what would happen. I think that that this is called "counter-factual hypothetical". I also think that Netanyahu and Barak are already warned about possible dire consequences that USA will not be able to stop.
And note that so far, Iran did not do anything, but of course, it would do SOMETHING. Perhaps insurgents will get supplied with high quality anti-tank and anti-helicopter missiles, and the second insurgency, in Shia areas of Afghanistan (the center, poor, mountainous and remote) would start. American bases of helicopters and drones will be attacked with missiles, while helicopters and drones will start dropping from the sky. Our troops will be short of fuel, hence less mobile, while lethality of attacks will be much higher. The only good option will be to burn equipment and evacuate.
There are several reasons why it did not happen already. Taliban is intolerant of Shia so Iran hates Taliban. Going full speed ahead in arming the insurgents is bound to escalate conflict with USA and USA can make it painful. But if the armed conflict already exists, such considerations will go away.
Yagil Levy is clearly ironic, and I agree with his article.
Basically, only a major disaster can make the former coalition in Israel to change the course. Policies of creeping annexation were working very well, the only major argument against them (in Israeli serious discourse) is that in the long run Israel will not get away with it, i.e. it will lead to a disaster. Attack on Iran may precipitate a major disaster, although I would hypothesize a different scenario, less lethal for Israel but with more explosive consequences (thousands of Americans and allies being killed in Afghanistan in the worst disaster since Dien Bien Phu, and anti-Israeli blowback in USA).
And the punchline: " There is of course a much more practical option [...] promote a peaceful agenda with the Arabs in line with the neglected Saudi peace initiative." To me, this is "angelic position": 2SS on 1967 lines. After all, a major part of 1SS position is that Israel will never relinquish settlements.
RAMALLAH (Ma'an) -- A Gaza engineer kidnapped by Israel in the Ukraine last year is the last remaining prisoner held in solitary confinement, after the hunger-strike deal sought to end the practice, his lawyer said Tuesday. Dirar Abu Sisi is still being held in an isolation cell in Ashkelon prison, while all others have been returned to normal wards, lawyer Karim Karim Ajwah said, noting his case was "kept secret in an unusual way."
This is a very interesting/disturbing case. As far as journalists could figure out, Abu-Sisi is guilty of absolutely nothing, although a preposterous confession was tortured out of him. On the basis of the confession he is indicted, and for a while it seemed that Israel will have a show trial perhaps matching Eichmann case. Abu-Sisi is not a member of any Palestinian movement, he was managing Gaza power station, managed to make some improvements, then he perhaps decided to get a better life for his family and moved to Ukraine, his wife is a Ukrainian. Apparently he was "purchased" from corrupt Ukrainian secret service.
The indictment is that he organized something like "Hamas Academy of Rocket Sciences". However, education in electrical engineering, with specialization in power generation hardly prepares for such an endeavor. There were no stories of any "technologies" being applied to Qassam rockets, Gaza militants got hold on some better smuggled rockets. No trace that this alleged school existed. Indictment listed courses on missile design that Abu-Sisi took in a non-existent school from a non-existent professors -- something that journalists in Ukraine checked with ease.
Abu-Sisi is the proof of cruelty of Israeli secret services, something that they can be proud of (with some winks) and also of tremendous stupidity, something that they will never admit. He is a mistake to be buried. While other inmates were on hunger strike, Abu-Sisi was not, he simply lost more than 50 pounds because of mistreatment. I think they try to kill him or drive insane through extreme isolation.
What does it mean "Haredi leader"? They have many smaller communities that disagree with each other. Also, they tend to be non-Zionist or outright anti-Zionist.
Armenia is a vehicle to save Armenian people, but we are perfectly happy to leave the protection of the oldest Christian nation to Iran and Russia. Do we care if Armenians can mold their destiny rather than suffer the assimilation in the diasporah?
Didn't we read that Jews of Israel should not rely on ANYONE?
By the way, when and where did small Westphalian states exist?
Well, Jew lovers have many famous names to their credit, like Ahaseurus, Mussolini or Guliani.
And many Arabists were indeed experts on Arab culture etc. The adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan were perhaps doomed, but who knows what could be achieved with more knowledge-based approach.
The practice of law by US courts has its share of travesties, to be sure. However, the question is not merely if the evidence from interrogation was obtained legally, but if it should be impeached as not evidence at all.
What Fredblogs suggests is that if piotr is waterboarded and signs a confession incriminating himself and Fredblogs, it is OK to is it against Fredblogs. His attorney would probably argue that there exists reasonable doubt that the confession simply consists of the wishes of the interrogators rather then the truth as piotr knows it.
Because there are no videos or eyewitness testimonies about the start of the fire, one can merely conjecture. A possible cause could be even a broken beer bottle.
People who anticipated fire could set it. Brush fire can be quite harmless, or extremely dangerous (like several years ago in Oakland, California or more recently in northern Israel), so once the fires were noticed, Palestinians called for a fire truck to protect homes if needed.
I read that the settlers used rubber bullets which are described in ammo catalogs as "less lethal munition". I think this means that if someone is hit in the neck with a bullet, and this is not a "grazing shot", then with a more lethal bullet there is no chance to survive, and with a less lethal bullet, it is basically Russian roulette. Shooting at neck/head with a sniper rifle is homicidal.
There is a sequence of events on two videos.
The incident starts with a group running down the hill from the settlement to toward the village. They stop at a group of several trees.
Then we see the Israeli group close to the village and fire behind them, while men of the village line next to the fences of their homes, and throw stones to repel the invading group. Riflemen in Israeli group start shooting in different directions.
Some of the settlers swat at flames that approach them from behind.
Question: why this group run toward to village with fire swatting rockets and guns before the fire, through empty fields? My conclusion is that they somehow anticipated the grass fire. For religious reasons they deny setting the fire, and their version stresses that they used rubber bullets which are classified as "less lethal". Their explanations makes sense only if they were reacting to a fire on "their fields", but they started the incident before the fire. I have a strong impression that what the settlers see is VERY different what any recording device would show.
To compare, find the video of Lt. Col. Shalom Eisner. There is a moment when he has this glassy look and hesitates, while a Danish young man stands in front of him. [cut to the vision of Shalom Eisner, time rolls back 3000 years] Samson finds ass jawbone and meets a crowd of Philistines, raises the jawbone and smites the impure enemy left and right, while smacking Philistine girls brought to beguile him.
[cut, contemporary vision restored] Lt. Col. Shalom Eisner sees bicyclist rolling in pain while he, mysteriously, has an acute pain in a finger.
Appelfeld obviously grew up in a multi-lingual environment where choosing a language was -- a choice. In the same time, it was quite famous in Ashkenazi circles that no groups was more proud of their country of origin than German Jews (meaning, they had a tendency of viewing themselves as more cultured than their co-religionists from places like Romania).
Polish is perhaps less regular than Russian, I could live "in Poland" and "on Ukraine", "on Malta", "on Cuba", "on Island", but "in Ireland", "in Great Britain". More puzzling, "on village", "in town". Good example for "in island":
"In insula Creta mirus labyrinthus erat, in quo includebatur Minotaurus monstrum capite bovis et humano corpore."
By the way, "on an island" or "in an island"? I though that the second form is incorrect, although I could be influenced by my mother tongue where there is a strong distinction between "in" and "on", and "in island" is not only incorrect but also a tongue twister (no pronouns are used, so "on the island" and "on an island" is the same).
In any case, could mondoweiss.com send an intrepid reporter to Long Island and investigate "small family owned pizzerias" which, according to Wiki, is the most frequent type of food establishment over there? Perhaps the reporter will find some of the 62% Jews there? One could also compare if more Halachic plain or mushroom pizza has any relationship to political views, compared with positively non-kosher pepperoni and meat balls pizza.
Do not take me seriously on that. Pirate Jews would explain part of 38%, but I am not sure if Romney is a credible Pirate candidate. My main point is that there exists a host of issues on which GOP scares Messiah out of Jews. For example, starting a war with Iran may have dire consequences for Israel, and in general, dispensing with diplomacy in Muslim world can have dire consequences for Israel. Or you may believe in evolution, or climate change, or some regulation in banking system or health care.
I would not be so dismissive about ACTA. In Poland there were demonstrations when the government tried to legislate enforcement act for something similar (the government quickly folded) and in Germany we have now Pirate Party. Perhaps in USA we have a similar contingent of Pirate Jews.
And a host of other reasons why Jews will not vote for Obama make some sense.
What is most puzzling, if you read all these explanations, is where 62% of Obama supporter come from. A commenter in JPost conjectured that they are all insane, but it still begs a reason. Clearly, we need another video.
One clue is that many arguments against Obama are strangely reversible. "Deep down he has a larger agenda". I want my President to have a very small agenda. Romney, my perfect candidate, seems to have no agenda whatsoever! Or not.
In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit. [And it was not pretty.]
Judges:21:25
Other things that come to mind are stories about kings so strong that could not be possibly defeated, "till Birnam forest come to Dunsinane."
Attack on Iran will not happen. This dog will not hunt. NATO issued a statement that it will not support it, and Israel issued most conciliatory statement in years.
Gilad Atzmon perhaps never hurt a fly, but he proudly published a lengthy somewhat ignorant diatribe against an Israeli Jewish Marxist who was analyzing Israel and Palestinian situation using Marxist analysis, thus attacking a progressive anti-Zionist Israeli more or less for being a Jew.
Bill Kristol is in a different league. He is a board member of astro-turn called The Emergency Committee for Israel that is basically a vehicle to place expensive ads. The second board member is Gary Bauer, and the third, Rachel Abhrams who proposed to capture militants of Gasa and feed them to fish.
I think that you overly generalize. There are also absolute monarchies on that list. Plus, usually the aid is modest. For example, when Suharto massacred ca. 500,000 alleged Communist, CIA provided him with a list of targets that were presumably added to already identified targets, but it is hard to believe that Suharto's survival depended on that.
Isn't US funding for PA dedicated to maintenance and control of quisling security forces? Somehow anytime cut in that funding is proposed it is restored due to quiet lobbying of Israel and AIPAC.
Basically, we pay for Israeli Janisaries.
Israei economists could pay attention to other news:
Israel News
Economy
Ynetnews
Israeli exports to EU down 16%
Israel Export Institute notes discontenting trend in Q1-2012; adds overall global exports down 5%
Tal Litman, Calcalist
Published: 05.16.12, 15:15 / Israel Business
Israel's exports are experiencing a downturn, the Israel Export and International Cooperation Institute (IEI) said Tuesday.
A new IEI report said that Israel's exports came to $10.9 billion in the first quarter of 2012 – a 6.5% drop from Q4-2011 and a 5% tumble compared to last year's first quarter.
One disconcerting trend noted by the IEI was a 16% drop in Israel's exports to the European Union, which came to $3.6 billion. EU exports make up 33% of Israel's overall global exports.
Exports to Asia, which made up 20% of Israel's exports in Q1-2012, came to $2.2 billion, a 6% decrease from Q4-2011, but a 7% rise from Q1-2011.
Exports to the US, which made up 21% of Israel's exports in the first quarter, added 3% and amounted to $2.4 billion. Still, US exported dropped 23% compared to Q1-2011.
IEI Chairman Ramzi Gabay said that should the situation continue, "Exporters may be forced to close down production lines, or opt for overseas outsourcing.
"I urge the government to offer exporters the necessary assistance so they can resume growth."
Haifa is a bit far from settlements. Plaut is a think-tanker, editor of Middle East Quarterly, organ of Daniel Pipes. This journal has a highly qualified managing editor, Ms. Goodrobb, who lists the Delaware County Association for Retarded Citizens as one of her previous employers.
If only US Congress had such qualified staff!
Because I had some course on logic, I try to be precise. Hence I wrote "there is no humane justification" rather than "there is no justification".
link to original.antiwar.com
It was murder. Richard Silverstein:
The police, possibly because there had been several incidents in which Palestinians had driven cars or heavy equipment into Israeli Jewish crowds in acts of terror, began firing at Ziad’s vehicle. In the process, they wounded a small Palestinian girl sitting in a parked car nearby.
Shortly after the shooting began, Jilani turned his truck into an alley near where a cousin lived. The alley was a dead end from which there was no escape. Emerging from the vehicle, he was shot twice by the police, once in the arm and once in the lower back. He fell to the ground on his stomach and lay motionless, seriously wounded, though still alive.
At least two officers approached him and according to their own testimony and the autopsy, one fired at least two shots point blank (from between one and three feet) into his head. According to eyewitnesses, the killer then kicked Ziad’s body but never inspected it to determine whether the victim might’ve worn a suicide vest. [suspicion of suicide vest was the claimed reason for the killing]
--------
By the way, Jilani was a small businessman and he was returning home after meeting with his Jewish business partner who claims that gave him few thousands shekels, about 1000 dollars, that vanished from the car during the police search.
--------
Of course, this version of the event comes from Palestinian witnesses. But ballistic and forensic evidence should be available to determine the sequence of shots and the distance from which they were fired. There is simply no humane justification for executing someone by shooting back of the head from point blank range.
That would cause a humanitarian crisis, and thus should be avoided and can be avoided. IDF already developed a procedure how to do it.
1) Embargo all raw materials for food industry (flour, animal feed, fertilizer, fuel etc.) so the affected region cannot substitute the imported allowed products.
2) Compile a list of sufficient products for a healthy complete diet. Review if there is a well tasting item that can be removed. Remove and repeat.
3) Write a program that produces a sufficient list of items from the list in a random way. Apply the program every week.
4) Develop a ridicuously expensive method of inspecting cargoes. E.g. every ship with food product for Israel has to be inspected in Odessa, Ukraine, items not allowed in the given week removed, then escorted to Port Said, items not allowed in that week removed (if the new list is issued), then trucked to Taba crossing and waiting for the final inspections.
5) Regulate the allowed volume of goods to be sufficient for caloric and other dietary needs of the population assuming frugality.
For example, allowed diet of the week could consist of millet, navy beans, saltines, onions and frozen raspberries (it is important to add a touch of humor).
A terrorist in civilian attire:
link to beirut.indymedia.org
The article in which Derschowitz introduced "civilianality" was totally repulsive and it was a frank apology of despicable and counterproductive tactics of IDF. Basically, the population that "supports" the opponent is not civilian, and our troops are (all attacks at the Israeli troops are duly term "terrorist").
"Ticking bomb" concept is a baseless apology for torture. The concept is preposterous, because it assumes almost complete knowledge but with some key element missing, but known to a captured person (and we know that he/she knows). This never happens. What does happen is that a captured person is labelled "ticking bomb" and is tortured for months and years.
I tried to propose classification "Zionism piano", more traditional, "we have no peace partner, we have good cafe, gay parade and great bird watching opportunities", and "Zionism forte", "we do not need no stinking peace, we will get rid of sojourners and tresspasers and we will bow to no one". Dershowitz is a hard case because he is an extremely noisy specimen of "Zionism piano".
Arutz Sheva is as forte as you can get outside insane asylums. I stumbled upon some Zionist web site in Spanish which I do not understand, but it sports a cute map of "Eretz Israel" from Nile to Euphrates. That would make Arutz Sheva rather moderate. But those "plus ultra" Spanish Zionist are so extreme that they obviously cannot even find a tycoon to subsidize them, hence, they do not count.
Anyway, the critique of Dersh resembled a critique of Norman Finkelstein here. First, the tribute to immense contribution he made for the cause over the years, and to his undeniable talent. Dersh redefined the concept of human rights with concepts like civilianality (civilians of low civilianality can be bomb to smithereens) and ticking bombs (who can be tortured for years under proper judicial supervision). Alas, being of somewhat advanced age, he does not fully adapt to the realities of Jewish destiny which is being forged even as we speak.
Well, out Tea Party friends choose to ignore it, but in fact there is SOCIALIZED MEDICINE in Israel. Not to mention entire political parties of WELFARE BUMS in the ostensibly right wing government. Basically, it is a Communist country. Of course, when GOP legislators visit Israel on a junket, they never see such shameful details. [Thinking about it, I never read GOP congresscritter mentioning a gay parade after returning from the Holy Land.]
Mooser idea that someone should take initiative and settle what are the correct Jewish principles was already tried. From Wiki:
As the Jewish conflict with the Romans grew, the nations surrounding Judea (then part of Roman Iudaea province) all sided with the Romans, causing the House of Shammai to propose that all commerce and communication between Jew and Gentile should be completely prohibited. The House of Hillel disagreed, but when the Sanhedrin convened to discuss the matter, the Zealots sided with the House of Shammai.
Subsequently Eleazar ben Ananias, the leader of the militant Zealots, invited the students of both schools to meet at his house; Eleazar placed armed men at the door, and instructed them to let no-one leave the meeting. These circumstance led to the deaths of many of the House of Hillel, meaning that those present from the House of Shammai were able to force all the remaining individuals to adopt a radically restrictive set of rules known as The Eighteen Articles; later Jewish history came to look back on the occasion as a day of misfortune.
link to boston.com
EU countries are increasingly irritated over Israeli repressions and obstructionism. The background that I have observed was that a Polish charity which is quite apolitical and performs "good will" projects in lots of places (Polish rural schools, North Korea, Zimbabwe) helps constructing and cleaning cisterns in several Area C villages, some of which were destroyed by IDF (cisterns and a village), Polish foreign ministry requested explanations and later released a statement that it will raise the issue in May on the respective EU meeting. And quite a few countries had the same experience. Israel, as usual, responded that EU does not know what it is talking about.
This is an interesting tention. EU countries mostly do not care, but are making various token gestures that are met with astonishing hostility by Israeli government. NGO issue was on that plane, irrelevant (in EU) token projects by very important charities were subject of a draconian Knesset legislative proposal, which could potentially trigger some sanctions. So the legislature was buried without a vote. But repression in Area C are much more central to Israel policy, so Israel is much more obstinate.
Concerning OlegR preposition, it is hard to see what that could actually mean within historical realities of Europe in 1930s. Soviet Union had no border with Germany, instead it had border with counties deeply paranoid of possible Soviet intervention -- perhaps with good reason. So neither Poland nor Romania would give a passage for Soviet divisions to buttress Czechoslovakia. Sadly, neither were those countries ready to mobilize to do it themselves.
Also, there is not such a thing like "attacking weapon industries". Germany could be occupied or not.
Some politicians did propose "preventative war" but it was just harmful distraction from what was possible: an alliance that would draw a line at Sudetenland the way it was belatedly drawn over Danzig/Corridor.
link to online.wsj.com
Seems that WSJ participates in "Google News" so some content can be accessed through Google News.
Concerning the whine that Israel is David on regional basis, the policy of Israel is a puzzle. It is deeply annoying to the three largest states in the region: treatment of Palestinians is annoying, killing of Turks execution style was celebrated as heroism, constant threats against Iran. Egypt is the closest to Palestinian question. If nothing improves there, eventually there may be a regional alliance involving all the three big countries and everybody in between and Israel will be eliminated.
Only peace with Palestinians can make Israel a viable state in 10-20 year window. Would Hazbarah sell well in Egypt, Iran and Turkey, the perspective would be different, but with the constant oppression of Palestinians, it will not happen. And neither pink washing, nor bird watching, nor Christian Zionism will help there.
"The biggest donor to Allies for Israel is Cherna Moskowitz, who gave $5,000 to the group in December 2011."
This is like piotr donating a nickel. Trailer-park Zionism, or Zionism for hicks. Seriously, the ideas like "one ethnically pure state" and "Jordan is Palestine" lead to Avigdor Lieberman berating members of the Knesset as poisonous extremists. So serious Zionist organizations tend to shy away from such fireworks, although "eccentric billionaires" do not (I wonder who funds Emergency Committee for Israel which is in that ideological mold). Tea Party is not about deep thinking but about taking extreme positions on whatever topic they comment. When they talk about gun rights, it has to be freedom of carrying concealed RPGs for all (or whatever can fit under your jacket, so perhaps the caliber has to be smaller).
What is strange is that Democrats still have not figure out how to attack extremists for being extremist.
The House “urges the President to reaffirm the unacceptability of an Iran with nuclear-weapons capability and opposition to any policy that would rely on containment as an option in response to the Iranian nuclear threat.”
This is meaningless. If President affirmed something, what good does it make to reaffirm? "Daily Affirmation With Stuart Smalley"? I am good enough, I am bright enough, and doggone, I will respond to the Iranian nuclear threat?
The bottom line is that as the West tries to change regimes, the reaction increases, and attempts in the core area of Eurasia will have Eurasian response, meaning Russia, China and bunch of other countries. Iran is not isolated. If USA engages directly, the response will also be direct, and because the stakes are small, USA will fold.
China is a dominant trade power now. Russia has some aces in the sleave, like anti-ship missiles for which USA has no countermeasures and which can reach across Persian Gulf. Iran may have some of them or not, which already makes any attack on Iran very iffy. If Russians officially supply them, this is FUBAR. If we attack Russians, even personel in Iran, they can respond with nukes, say, evaporate our base at Diego Garcia.
Not to mention a tiny problem that evacuation of our troops from Afganistan may become both urgent and damn difficult.
The key is that the phrase "nuclear capability" is either viewed narrowly, and the current negotiations may do the job, or widely, and then nothing can address that. If you want to achieve 5% more than possible, you fail. Say, if you want to make a turn 5% faster than possible, you fly out of the road.
About being certain about nuclear capability: there was an article in Technology Review that there exists a technology to separate isotopes which is orders of magnitude more efficient, less space and energy, than centrifuges. The idea is that with laser light of exactly proper frequency you ionize only the molecules that contain the target isotope and you collect ions with electrodes. Iranian labs are familiar with the principles, and without "regime change" you cannot remove knowledge. And Iran has many deep mines, so hiding a program as a mine expansion should be quite possible.
The history of Ashkenazi Jews is reasonably complete. As an ethnic group they formed in Middle Ages in Germany, hence Yidish is a German dialect, and then they were settling in Poland and Bohemia pretty much like Germans, as monarchs and nobility supported growth of cities and immigration of craftsmen and merchants. The percentage of Jews in the population of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was gradual and documented.
There exists also a very small population of Karaim who have a variant of Jewish religion and speak a dialect of Turkic origins, so they fit well what we would expect from descendants of Khazars. Tatars who were in contact with both groups call them "Jews with peyots" and "Jews without peyots". Some Karaims were probably absorbed by much larger Ashkenazi communities and clearly there was also some absorption of Slavic element.
The "Pale of settlement" in Russia was basically the boundary of former Poland-Lithuania, plus "new lands" of conquered Tatar state of Crimea. Subsequently Ashkenazi Jews migrated also to Russia proper, and in parallel, to Romania and Hungary.
Of course, however pure the origin of Ashkenazi, it does not justify expelling natives from Palestine. Suppose that the Britons managed to increase their numbers in the diasporah and then the Welch/Bretons etc. would expel English from England, except for occupied territories in East Anglia that would be divided into Area A, Area B and Area C.
If we can raise the peace process from the death bed, why shouldn't we also resurrect some humans? Or have a zombie process with zombie participants?
I would not deny achievements of Israel. What is needed is a proper perspective.
When Darwin was developing theory of evolution, the Irish were starving by millions and Dickens was writing his novels(about Dickensian conditions of the less fortunate members of the most advanced nation in the world).
Under Czars, Russia had many achievements, particularly on the aesthetic side. Imperial Ballet was perhaps the best in Europe (and US was rather backward in this respect at that time). In sciences, everybody knows Mendeleyev table.
Actually, in sciences Germany was most advanced for quite a while. Around 1900 about 40% of all scientific publications were in German.
Israeli universities definitely do good science. However, in my area I noticed something interesting: a number of top graduate students in USA are from Iran. And the department head in Tehran graduated from my department (in USA). I guess a visit to Iranian campuses may leave a very good impression too.
"Dooley lays out a possible four-phase war plan to carry out a forced transformation of the Islam religion. "
I think the first phase should include this:
"It's Obvious You Won't Survive by Your Wits Alone" link to barnesandnoble.com
I think one issue is "insularity", which is that Haredi communities are little theocracies that discourage cooperation with the state, like police and DA. The more interesting issue is to what extend they manage to manipulate the political system of the state, in this case, DA office, and the second NYT article expands on that.
And indeed, one can recognize the patterns that are present in the interactions of USA with Israel, and manipulation of the political system in USA. One can also ponder what would happen if we treated our domestic politics in the same fashion as we treat Middle East. For example, in addressing the issue of victims of sexual molestation, should we examine if those putative victim belong to a "genuine" ethnic group or to an "invented" one? When the victims are invisible, there is no limit on absurdities.
Haaretz: Ashton's visit to Israel is also slightly unusual. As opposed to all of her previous visits, Ashton's bureau refrained from officially announcing the visit or responding to journalists' questions on the topic.
This is indeed a bit strange. There exists a diplomatic code where talks are characterized as productive (meaning that they were not), frank (no blows were exchanged, but barely so) etc.
Cloak and dagger: I read that Obama has a scant edge over Romney, and the public seem to trust Romney more on economy and Obama more on foreign policy.
The bottom line seems to be that no one is certain what would do good for economy, but Romney had some "hands on experience". But on foreign policy Obama surely sounds less insane.
Iranians may have their faults but they are not yokels. They do not need "trust building measures", they need at the very minimum that EU drops their sanctions. And 5% enrichment. Of course, if EU position in the next round of talks will be drastically different from the unanimous plea of Lieberman, Barak, Mofaz and Netanyahu, all the better.
In the meantime, Lady Ashton is showing sensitivity and noting concerns. With all due respect to her, this is her job description. For which she was roundly condemned about a month ago by Lieberman, Netanyahu and the entire Israeli press (except Ha'aretz and some unpatriotic websites). I suspect that the Lady had to go through a number of perfumed hankies to survive these meetings.
Harold Bloom observed that numbers in Torah are used for much more profound purposes than mere counting. However, even smallish numbers can lead us to mysteries, check this link about 19: link to miraclesofthequran.com
Perhaps the normal meaning of "left" is the opposition to "right", which means correct, i.e. common wisdom of the majority or the ruling class.
In a parliament, the right would favor autocracy of the king and the left would oppose, hence the seating arrangement would reflect the monarch's favor, the right thus would be both "correct" and "favored by the King". The actual issues would vary, but the separation of left/right would reflect "free thinking" versus, hm, "constrained thinking".
In particular, the labels "progressive", "reactionary", "liberal" circulated in post-Napoleonic states like France and Spain and they predate socialist movement.
The fate of various political labels is quite interesting. "Radicals" usually were very moderate, and at some point in France Radicals were dubbed "possibilists" or "opportunists" and for a while they used those labels themselves. What remains true till today that there is a strain of politicians and thinkers (think-tankers) who are radical in their opportunism. They tend to hate anti-opportunists, i.e. those who do not wait for a proper opportunity to raise an issue. Disputes among the opportunists often focus on who is in the mainstream, and who is not, mainstream being the location of best opportunities.
And here comes our Anat who does not even care if she is in the mainstream. In Israel, "mainstream" and "Zionism" are used somewhat interchangeably. Therefore we see streams of arguments that operate in quite different thinking systems. "Leftists" (or "human rightists") think that a position is right or wrong regardless of its popularity, and "radical opportunists" spend time arguing that these positions are unpopular -- which one their terms disqualifies them from further discussion, as not presenting political opportunities. By the way, this means that Anat kind of looks into herself to decide what is right or wrong. This "though crime" is sometimes labelled "narcissism", or "individualism".
Then there is the concept of human rights. American mainstream thinking is that all good people are endowed with certain rights which are alienated as soon as we discover that they are not good. So radical human rightists spend time arguing that some rights spelled here and there are violated, and the mainstream folks reply with arguments that the respective people are not good.
Zionist applications of such principles are perhaps further reaching, because Palestinians are not good for reasons that are so numerous that different factions of Zionism center of their favorites, like (a) they are Amelak (Amalek?) (b) they are Nazi (c) they are suicide bombers (d) culture of death (e) homophobia (f) Muslim (g) they do not exist. "Liberal Zionism" tends to favor (e). However, more narcisstic Liberal Zionists, like Peter Beinart, seem to avoid the issue of evility of Palestinians altogether, but instead postulate, quite reasonably, that we have to figure some compromise on the issue of rights to avoid a disaster.
And this is a conundrum that I do not know how to aswer. Logical application of laws (especially the Constitution which was apparently written by well meaning idiots) would unravel social order in USA. For example, testimony offered in exchange of something of value is invalid. Half of the trials use testimony obtained in exchange for reduced sentences and similar quid-pro-quos. Hence the courts adopted interpretation that a promise to be freed from jail/prison has no value. That seems to violate common sense, so I guess that the courts had to value the rights of the bad people, already in prison, against the rights of the good people who are afraid of the bad ones. And this is what: about a million of potentially dangerous criminals released among 300 millions.
In Israel, applying logic and justice could release 2-4 million among 6-7 millions. So I guess that Anat abandons all possibilist principles, if she had any, and Peter tries to explore a possible solution.
Why there should be no self-hating Palestinians?
At least they should represent the diversity within wonderful tapestry that Israeli Jews make. Perhaps with role playing games.
Today we will learn about tzniut. Ashia will play a Jewish girl, and Bill and Jack will play Haredi boys. Let them sit and she should walk in front of them. Yes! Now, boys, spit -- just a little, this is only a play. Why did you spit, Jack? Ahh, you will learn in a moment.
Today we will learn about sicarii. Not all Haredi boys would spit at a little girl, but sicarii would. Long time ago Sicarii were the heroes who defended Masadah. Here is a picture of Masada. They were very brave. And a bit crazy.
With the real crime much diminished, NYC police is inventing new pursuits. For example, the latest fad seems to be to frisk women on the street and confiscate condoms if they have any. Which is so crazy that NY legislature wants to do something about it. Of course, IDF goes for higher levels of absurdity, like the expedition to Ramallah to steal 2 laptops, 3 hard drives and 10 memory cards. Or regulating bicycle traffic by smacking bicyclists with M-16. NYC police had its share of fights with bicyclists too but so far they do not confiscate laptops.
About M-16, I do not think that Col. Eisner wanted to use a fire arm. My impression was that he was raptured by a vision, that he found a jawbone of an ass and then faced a crowd of Philistines.
3/18/12 Barak sells Akirov Towers apartment for NIS 26.5M
Minister of Defense Ehud Barak has bought an apartment in the prestigious "Assuta Bauhaus Village" project on Tel Aviv's Jabotinsky Street for NIS 8-10M.
Hm. Assuta Bauhaus Village seems to be a crime against two venerable concepts, village (26 floor towers?) and Bauhaus.
More seriously, the way we penalize criminals is more about us than about them. Are we savages or are we not?
I think that demolishing the building where Ehud Barak lives would be a measure of deterrence for innumerable cruel and senseless attacks. It would also serve as a deterrent for selling condo units to war criminals.
Yet that would not be a civilized action.
It is not important if there are many voices in Israel that attacking Iran would be insane or few, it is important that it is insane.
Direct blowback would most probably be directed elsewhere, unless Israel will attack Hezbollah first (which is highly possible). In my estimate, Iran will perform the easiest retaliations as its first priority, and they would be easiest because of the support in Russia, China and Pakistan (and all Central Asia which is surrounded by Iran, Russia and China, and is at least nominally Muslim). Transit of military supplies to NATO in Afghanistan will be cut, except for illegal flights over Pakistan, while the scope of supplies to insurgents in Afghanistan will be vastly different. It can result in thousands American casualties and very humiliating retreat (or surrenders?) With "thank you" notes for Israel.
That retaliation would have negligible cost for Iran, except for overcoming their profound mutual hatred with Taliban.
Sinking major US navy vessels would have a larger cost, but it is the second possibility. Hormuz is the third.
I guess on Iran issue Mofaz can be Obama's man in the Cabinet. Lieberman opposes the insanity as well, and so does Shas.
Mofaz could provide support for obeying Supreme Court, with no differences in the overall scope of settlement expansion.
The only major departure from current policies that I can imagine is in cutting the privileges of the ultra-Orthodox and the Rabbinate. Civil marriages? Basically, Lapidism without Lapid. However, I doubt it. My impression is that secular politicians in Israel do not have the stomach to do it. In their ideology, Israel is a Jewish state, so it should provide super treatment to super Jews. And the latter come in three categories: super nationalistic (settlers), super religious (Jews are defined by a religion after all) and super rich.
One difficulty is of course removed, namely the threat that the coalition will fall. I do not recall a precedent of Israeli Supreme Court finding government officials in contempt, although a number of rulings were violated. The difference is that the government already promised to carry out the ruling, so this is unusually direct refusal.
It is interesting that the request of the government was basically without ANY legal argument. Israeli Supreme Court was basically insulted:
State Attorney’s representative Mandel: “I am not able to refer you to such a precedent or legal provision” [Sorry, I am just following idiotic instructions.]
I agree that Oren is a diplomat who performs his job with aplomb and elan. But as he zooms from one audience which is invited to Tel Aviv Gay Parade to another which "shares his commitment to Torah", he relies on both audiences being quite stupid.
OTOH, I see nothing anti-Semitic in belief that Jews will go to the Lake of Fire. It is nothing personal or racist, but even very nice people who refuse to recognize J.C. as Lord and Savior will go to the LoF barring some unexpected mercy of the Lord. Some of my best friends are already at Lof!
Unique conception of ‘democracy’ — we will starve you, threaten you, destroy your economy, maybe even drop bombs on you until you do what I want you to do.”
To the contrary, this is the most traditional concept. Read about Mossadegh. The coup followed a period of economic boycott and sabotage. About 2 years later, in 1954, freely elected Guatemalan president, Arbenz, was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état. The list is pretty long, and some of these incidents were very bloody, in particular Indonesia 1965.
As Wahhabi's wage religious wars on other Muslim (by means of ideas and weapons) for nearly 300 years, propaganda tracts vilifying them may have pretty old and "reputable" sources. Importantly, this story features a medieval stock character of a treacherous infidel merchant, but the targets are Wahhabi as the sect and House of Saud as its sponsor.
I think that actual anti-Semitism does exist, although very little is in evidence in USA. The professional anti-Semitism watchers acknowledge that there is "modern" anti-Semitism which mostly attacks Israel and Zionism. So perhaps it is good to compare with still existing "paleo-anti-Semitism".
European paleo-anti-Semitism tends to be anti-Semitic. Namely, these guys do not have any sympathy for any Semites. Accordingly, they can be very approving of Israel. One of the "ancient" slogans was "Beduins to Palestine". Even more, if the belief of undue influence of Jews working in concert on USA, EU, world finance is followed, it can be a patriotic duty to have very good relations with Israel. When Nazis were on top, the same kind of thinking would encourage collaboration with Nazis. Basically, the mentality is that the duty of a "tribal patriot" is the benefit of his tribe and not "so-called human rights".
While web surfing I stumbled on a fascinating anti-Semitic story. This is from an anti-Salafi web page. In short, about several hundred years ago some members of Saud family fled their native Najd because of some local strife and join a caravan to Basra. There they contacted, unknowingly, a wealthy Jewish merchant who pretended to be their kin who migrated to Basra, and organized a rich caravan to travel back, with many goods for bribes and weapons and this Jewish impostor became a petty ruler. Subsequently he started to support a pernicious heretic al-Wahhabi with the goal of eradicating true Muslim from Arabia, and this family of crafty Jews succeeded only too well. Luckily, true Islam survived in India/Pakistan. An evil Jew is a stock villain in Tales of Thousand and One Nights (other typical villains are Christian merchants and Kurd bandits) and this story really fits.
By the way of contrast, Iranian anti-Wahhabi web pages make no references to Jews. They often quote a saying of the Prophet (PBUH) foretelling that evil and strife will come from Najd.
I got impression that George is serious about education of his children, so that may motivate him to learn what is going on in the temple.
By the way, nobody uses the argument about truth being related to the price better than Scientology. Without paying considerable money you do not even know if Zanu was good or bad. Thinking about it: how much one has to pay a rabbi to learn if what Levi and Simeon did in Shechem was good or bad?
Sometimes I think that it would be good idea to quizz a congressman like Walsh why does he think that Israel shares American value if it tolerates gay in the military, has socialized medicine and people in the cities have no right to carry concealed weapons?
"Jordan is Palestine", by the way, is a position vehemently opposed by Avigdor Lieberman. Who those people (who actually wrote the letter that Walsh signed) think they are to criticize democratically elected government of our ally?
I followed the link to the website of Joe Walsh to check if he is an idiot.
After all, Zio-supremacism may be a sign of moral decrepitude combined with above average intelligence and/or education. But this is not the combination we have here. One should not be snobbish against carrier of teaching "American government" in community colleges and even in Hebrew Theological College, but one should be worried about recipients of Walsh's wisdom during his teaching years. Consider this recent statement of good Congresscreature:
"The Muslim Brotherhood has had one of the worst women's rights records in the Middle East and upon assuming power in Egypt after the fall of President Mubarak, they have illustrated this fact. The Brotherhood has scaled back the right to legally seek a divorce and the right to make basic educational choices for their children, and in 2007 their platform forbid that a woman could be President of Egypt."
Where to start... Egyptian parliament is still not ruling in Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood does not have majority in that parliament, and as Egyptian press informed one month ago "Parliament rejects proposal to cancel women's right to divorce." This was news two days before Joe Walch made his statement to condemn Administration contacting Muslim Brotherhood. As a student of government, Walch should be aware that party platform do not forbid anything.
Also, if Walsh has even most elementary curiosity, his working at Hebrew Theological College should made him aware that Sharia is quite similar to Halacha in many respect, and conservative Jewish theologians (and their political parties) are very similar to conservative Muslim theologians in their views on proper occupation, education and dress of women. Should US government refuse contact with MK's and ministers from those parties? And closer to his education, American conservative Catholics have similar views and many Latin American countries, including our best allies, limit rights to divorce, abortion and contraception.
Which of course raises questions what are the views of Joe Walch himself on the rights to divorce, abortion, contraception, equal pay, gay and transgender people, gay in the military etc. Consider the end of Walch's statement:
" It is insulting that the President would meet with a group that blatantly disregards religious freedom on the eve of Passover and Good Friday, and a group that does not even recognize Israel’s right to exist. I call on the President not to meet with or recognize groups that do not respect women’s rights and basic freedoms."
Basic women's right is the right of Israel to exist? And what is the Good Friday connection? Perhaps one should desist from any controversial activities at an anniversary of some atrocity, e.g. "Good Friday Massacre". From the pages of history:
The Good Friday Massacre, (French: la bataille du Vendredi saint), was a second-round playoff match-up during the 1984 NHL Playoffs. The game occurred on Good Friday, April 20, 1984 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, between the Quebec Nordiques and the Montreal Canadiens. After a number of fights, a bench-clearing brawl broke out near the end of the second period. When the teams returned to ice for the extended third period, a second brawl broke out between the teams, including players who had already been ejected from the game but had not been notified prior to their return to the ice. [...] A total of 252 penalty minutes were incurred and 10 players were ejected. Amongst the fourteen altercations were the Canadiens' Mario Tremblay smashing the nose of the Nordiques' Peter Stastny, and Louis Sleigher knocking Jean Hamel unconscious by hitting him in the eye
Clearly, what Tel Aviv police tolerates and what it does not tolerate is very different than in USA. Based on the most recent events, seems that Zochrot activists would be cheerfully ignored by the police (and tolerated by the public) if they only undressed from waist down. While in USA public nudity is typically not tolerated, and public reading from a book is.
After Bograchov and Zochrot incidents I started to read news with a different perspective. There was a report in Ha'aretz about Tel-Aviv police warning the public that African aliens may be snatching purses on Tel-Aviv beaches. Favorite tactic: they pay attention to couples who are "totally pre-occupied with themselves". Perhaps they represent an Islamic intolerant culture and try to punish couples engaged in public sex?
"To let Bilal Diab and Tha’er Halahleh die is to bring massive attention and condemnation to the indeterminate detentions, and Israeli policy is to fly just under the radar of outrage"
I am not sure. The radar of outrage is on somewhat different level today, but the levels will never be equal. I remember when a Pakistani journalist wrote "In our country a crisis is when 5 people are shot in Punjab, or 50 in Sindh or 500 in Baluchistan."
I think that the biggest challenge for Israel is the actual outrage in West Bank where Palestinian quislings are protecting Israel. PA suppresses popular movements in areas it controls, but it seems that not on this issue.
Relic of early years of occupation? Or a British invention, dating to the same era when they introduced concentration camps?
Annals of free thought.
The speech, [of Mao Zedong] published on February 27, 1957, encouraged people to vent their criticisms as long as they were "constructive" ("among the people") rather than "hateful and destructive" ("between the enemy and ourselves"). [...] In the period from May 1 to June 7, 1957, millions of letters were pouring in to the Premier's Office and other authorities.
People spoke out by putting up posters around campuses, rallying in the streets, holding meetings for CPC members, and publishing magazine articles. For example, students at Peking University created a "Democratic Wall" on which they criticized the CPC with posters.[3] "They protested CCP control over intellectuals, the harshness of previous mass campaigns such as that against counterrevolutionaries, the slavish following of Soviet models, the low standards of living in China, the proscription of foreign literature, economic corruption among party cadres, and the fact that 'Party members [enjoyed] many privileges which make them a race apart'".
Of course, intimidation on Communist China was harsher by orders of magnitude, but we still have rowing gangs of intimidators like the black sotnia of Ataman Horowitz. But hopefully their bark is worse then bite.
I think that as Christians, Methodist should believe that God truly promised a land to the Jews, but that old law given to Jews has no importance after the Good Message of Jesus Christ.
You can eat shrimp, drink mare's milk, wear garments made of mixed thread and you do not have to worship in the Jerusalem Temple.
Methuselah, age 4,789, Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) Inyo County, California, United States Oldest currently living tree.
Does it mean that Woody sprouted in 987 Anno Mundi?
I am not sure if "defeat" and "victory" are good categories here. I guess "a measure of progress" is a better one.
The situation on the ground that activism is addressing is affected by Israeli mentality as small nation (tribe if you will) with "chip on the shoulder". Basically, they do what they can get away with. From that perspective, Israel is not unique only in what it can get away with. Subjected to sanctions like those imposed on Iran it would change policies in 10 minutes. (For that matter, Iran would change nuclear program in 10 minutes, but USA would like to make them change WITHOUT dropping sanctions, and even the mightest power cannot achieve goals if they are self-contradictory, an Earthly power cannot change rules of logic).
Thus a lot of progress is achieved just by raising the issue. Formal measures of success help too, because they affect "common wisdom", and clearly, at the start it is not crucial which resolution was adopted. The strategy of "Israel-firsters" is to isolate, marginalize and criminalize for a good measure. Fences, dams and walls. A crack in a wall is not "victory", but a clear mark of progress.
I beg to differ. Prostitution is about faking love, and GoI really, really loves settlers. They may fake anything else, but settlements are "apple of its eye". They are adorable!
So a government can decide that a car hitherto owned by Samuel T can be transferred to Piotr on the account that Piotr is a jolly good fellow and Samuel T is a troll?
In actuality, in USA there were Supreme Court cases where the government made quite a bit more coherent case concerning the exercise of "eminent domain" and lost. And, not very peculiar to USA, the court had the last word.
One criterion for eminent domain is that the purpose should benefit the entire community. Transferring Samuel's car to Piotr does not. Transfering a Palestinian farm to settlers offers rather slim benefit to Palestinians. And if you think about it a bit longer, there is no "community" under occupation -- is there?
What is Daniel's middle name? "Peace is not an option"? link to barnesandnoble.com
Tribalism with nukes does not bode well for the survival of the species.
The article of Ignatius is just sycophancy. I think that Israel has a choreographed part of "interlude with clowns". Palestinian rights do not have much sway in the halls of power, but (a) an attack on Iran may result in an extremely humiliating debacle in Afghanistan without Iran doing much (b) sanction on Iran enacted by EU have a painful effect in EU itself, especially in the south of Euro zone, but Germany may feel it too.
Israeli hardliners believe that they can avert international pressure forever by dint of ironclad support from USA and neutralizing three main Muslim countries in the region: Egypt, Turkey and Iran. This issue was not about nukes but "attitude".
True to her historical heritage (or mythical, if you will) Israel is resting its policies on thin reeds.
I do not see how Israel can have any influence in Europe apart from indirect influence through US politics.
I would quibble that North Korea is not a client state but a buffer state. Maintaining a client state is very valuable strategically so the dependency is not one sided.
"Meanwhile, Chinese officials agreed to investigate Chen's extralegal detention in his village of Dongshigu, where he was held without charge under house arrest for 19 months. During that time, he and his family were reportedly regularly beaten, harassed and denied medical attention.
Promises were also made not to punish supporters who helped Chen escape to the embassy."
Nice to see that government of People's Republic agrees that this treatment is an aberration, as opposed to detention without trial by Israel which is a norm.
"Any technology used for keeping law and order is harmful to those who would violate the law, regardless of whether you or I agree with the laws or not. "
Is law always just? Is law always beyond discussion?
If so, why right wing Israel is full of opposition to laws and courts when they would affect negatively the settlers? Luckily, both the Cabinet and the command of IDF are resolutely oppose to laws. There is only force, i.e. decisions of military commanders. So the sentence has to be re-written.
"Any technology used to support force is harmful only to those who oppose force."
On another note, sometimes it is really strange why IDF is not using certain technologies. There was a video about an attempt to confiscate Palestinian sheep, and apparently sheep were effectively resisting "arrest" and soldiers gave up after 15 minutes. It should be obvious that a shepherd's crook is more effective than M16 for that purpose. Perhaps the command was lulled into complaisance by a success against small lambs: kicking lambs is very effective, but with adult animals with thick wool layer, not so much.
A more sad occasion was when a settler rabbi was shot dead at a checkpoint. A suspiciously slow moving vehicle was spotted near that settlement so soldiers were dispatched to set a checkpoint and intercept the vehicle. One would think that half of IDF activity is setting checkpoints. But it was done at pre-dawn hour, soldiers just stopped and one hailed the car to stop, the elderly rabbi did not see the soldier in the dark so soldiers shot through the car when it passed them. Clearly, very visible signs can be mounted on little trucks, or can be improvised with flares (this is what they do on highways in USA when they want to stop traffic because of an accident etc.) while there is a device that is remotely controlled and blocks the road with tire-piercing spikes, so there is no need to shoot.
But IDF is very well equipped for demolishing, burying under sand and tree cutting. Is there any other military force in the world that devotes bulk of activity, planning and considerable technological development (skunk water! special chemicals to treat tree stumps! aerial photography to discover illicit outhouses and animal sheds!) to such idiocies? So let us rejoice! We can remain idiots and bastards for few more years!
I would stress that until 1950-ties the British (and French, American etc.) policies were based on the notion of superiority of Europeans over other races. South African Act of 1912 paved the way to Apartheid, in conjunction with settlement policies in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and Kenia. This is the context of Balfour declaration.
One should compare unequivocal South African Act with quite ambigous Balfour, San Remo etc. The first gave clear (if implicit) advantage to "highly civilized" Dutch and English. The second was giving advantage to Europeanized Semites (mostly from "less civilized" part of Europe from British perspective) over native Semites, which motivated ambiguities, second thoughts etc.
Iran as Amelek indeed justifies suspicion that Israel may resort to nuclear missiles launched from submarines in an attack on Iran. I guess that Israel has very limited credibility now.
On the diplomatic front with Iran I think that there are promising signs. My suspicion is that "when the chips are down" Russia and China will side with Iran if Iran stays within some reasonable parameters. These two countries have limited but powerful influence here. On the eve of the last round of talks our Administration floated an Idea that Iran should dismantle Fordow facility because it is resistant to bombardment. This idea was gently ignored not to be seen again. I guess it was outside the envelope of international consensus. After that round Netanyahu had some negative comments which basically enhanced the impression that the talks were productive.
Moreover, attacking Iran is NOT popular in USA. I read that on no issue Obama has higher advantage over Romney than on foreign policy. And where is the difference between the two?
There were interesting stories about "messianic complex" of Ahmedinejad. I got impression that when Armageddon comes, the scene can be awfully crowded, with Shia's Hidden Imam, a Sunni Mahdi, Jewish Messiah and at least one Christian. However, in Iran the talk of imminent return of Hidden Iman was cut short by clerics of Qom in the most decisive way possible.
Not surprisingly, theocrats of Iran and Israel (Ovadia Josef) agree: Messiah will make short work from our enemies, but in the fullness of time. In the meantime, the talk about military action is foolish. Being rather secular, it is hard to see how Netanyahu and Barak can be messianic, I would rather see Napoleonic complex.
In the meantime, an attack on Iran would be a disaster. For starters, it is hard to see how it would damage Iran: the nuclear program, such as it is, really has no military importance. Israel may fail to make significant damage to that program, loose some planes and look foolish, or make significant damage to that program, and provoke "Iranian wrath", or attack some targets outside that program, and open itself to more general outrage. Iranians had years to prepare various calibrated ways to respond.
In the first case, they will simply declare victory.
In the second case, American fingerprints on the action will be used to direct the retaliation at USA and NATO. Number one, the transit rights of USA and NATO through Central Asia can go. Russia and China will concur. Number two, I am not sure if Pakistan restored such transit rights, the relationship of Pakistan with USA is pretty bad right now, and they can make a ban on transit as well. Foreign forces in Afghanistan will be under siege. There is potential there for bloody and humiliating disaster. And Iran will not have to do much at all, Russia and China already threatened bad consequences of an attack on Iran, and Pakistan is also already royally pissed off.
With Iran being more damaged it can get away, diplomatically, with more direct retaliation directed at US navy and tanker traffic. This would start diplomatic three ring circus, and Iran would need some degree of support from Eurasian powers. There is no way to tell where it would go. A direct American attack on Iran could get a direct Russian counter-threat of the highest degree. This is WWIII material. Perhaps far-fetched, but for decades Soviet-American clash over Iran was the most plausible scenario how WWIII may start.
It seems that a number of leaders repeated to GoI in very stern terms that attacking Iran would be foolish, including every single one leader of a government of an Anglo-Saxon country (well, I am not sure about New Zealand), Russia, China and Germany.
My conclusion is that Bibi and Ehud use grandiose talk to divert attention from the fact that IDF is the most expensive tree-cutting force in the word. Goons to harass villagers. Yeah, but we are ready to take on Iran!
Something is missing here: "the starry sky above and the moral law within" -- do those guys have anything within?
Schumer is a gutless moderate, well behind the curve. He was talking about strangling of Gaza because the contumely population there voted for Hamas. Here the strangling is done in West Bank, something that good Senator does not promote. Perhaps State Department will make another "it is not helpful" declaration.
Real men (with guts) want to strangle Palestinians everywhere, defund UNRWA etc. and then to move on the rest of Muslims that should be pounded until they admit that they are untermensch.
Apart from dubious morality of certain police tactics, from the description of cases we have read about, what police and FBI are doing is outright dangerous.
At the most benign, by sticking in "passive" agents and invading privacy the security agencies can capture some amount of loose talk and pseudo-activities that do not amount to anything and build cases of "terrorist intent". Especially when FBI translate totally inconsequential loose talk into something horrible by postulating so-called code words. Give me a church-going girl (or mosque-going) interested mostly in knitting and I will make a terrorist out of her -- Afghans will connect her to Taliban, and all the discussions on knitting could code word explosives etc.
But passive agents do not get any info, so they are usually active, i.e. provocateurs. And they positively push terrorist ideas on impressionable and unstable individuals. And with luck they can be "stopped" and police get highly coveted catch of highly dangerous plot. Unless one of the guys so encouraged gets himself a gun and goes solo. My impression is that this is EXACTLY what happened in Touluse.
You cannot mechanically copy from one society to another. Since Israeli Jew do not have any shortage of bread, it is hard to tell if bread trumps anything. But the prices of cottage cheese definitely trump norms of decency violated by the Occupation.
While in America torture is less important than price of gasoline (nobody seems to care about the price of cottage cheese, or the price of beets which is extraorbitant if you ask me). My impression is that if you could slaughter several hundred thousand people and deliver cheap oil to USA, it would be popular, and the problem was that there was slaughter and torture, but the gasoline prices went up. Bummer.
What is quite unique to Israel is invention of propaganda arguments that are so inane that they actually seem to work. For example, if Motorola would not open a design lab in Israel we non-Jewish morons would be reduced to use Nokia cellphones (or even worse, Samsung). Thus we should remove Palestinians from wide swaths of the West Bank. Palestinians would spare us neither Nokia nor Samsung and thus are a worthless people.
Mooser, I do not understand you Bourgeois preoccupation with "well defined procedures". What is important is to establish the true will of the People, and the way to do it is not to go through some rigmarole but to rely on avantgarde that flexibly organizes itself as the situation requires. Then masses join with joy (some nudging may be required) with notable exception of backward and/or degenerate elements or those who obstinately exhibit false consciousness.
I will try to translate words of a poet:
an individual is nothing, and individual is nonsense,
even a great personage cannot lift 5-inch-thick log
the Party is like a palm with million fingers
clenched into one powerful fist
"Settlements" is a package of policies that oppress and dispossess Palestinians in West Bank and East Jerusalem, the most grotesque project ever defended by United States. And as long as USA blocks any attempts of to temper Israeli policies they will be increasingly more severe. And all main Jewish organizations in USA vehemently oppose even tiniest steps that would nudge, even very slightly, Israel away from the policies of moral, humanitarian and eventually, political disaster.
The letter of 1200 rabbis to the congress of Methodist Church is but one example. We know about pandemonium that erupted when Obama tried to put life into peace process and get the freeze of settlements. Needless to say, main Jewish organizations supported it fully, and thus they are on the record as anti-peace and pro-settlement. These policies continue.
There is not talking point of Israel hasbarah machine that would be to brazen or too immoral not to be parroted by main Jewish organization and bulk of rabbis in USA. My favorite was that during Cast Lead IDF had historically unprecedented effort to avoid innocent casualties. They behaved better than Janjaweed in Darfur! Isn't IDF adorable?
They eat shrimp and their women are not modest. They are heretics.
This is the joy of living in the Jewish state. Who was a heretic in exile? I mean, after Spinosa and before the Jewish State. New dogmas relate to Jewish State, like Immaculate Conception of the State. Recently Tel Aviv police had to detain and arrest heretics (Zochrot) who denied that dogma.
In more plain language, Israel may choose to simply ignore what minority views are rather that vent rage at the apostates. In pretty much the same way that the government ignores ruling of Supreme Court when inconvenient.
By the way of contrast, if the court orders in the rare cases ruled favorably for Palestinians were obeyed, you could get a breakdown of the ruling coalition or may be worse.
The Daniel, with whom I do not have any disagreements, inject an aphorism that simple makes no sense to me.
I also made clear that laws are not created by Goddess Temis but by a highly fallible human institution. Legal and just are not synonymous. Nevertheless, it is bizarre for the state to ostentaciously break laws.
I do not understand you. Laws are not statements about truth but declarations of the State, and if enforced, rules that inhabitants of a jurisdiction should follow.
"Freedom of speech is incompatible with the Jewish democracy. "
This is actually demonstrably false. For starters, I understand that Zochrot has done it for several years. One can make a better case that the Jewish democracy cannot survive a serious attempt of imposing rule of law, like government obeying every single sentence of Supreme Court of Israel. Should courts deviate from their proper role, which is decorative, the state would be in trouble. But no government will fall because some squeaks of free speech can be heard.
But this leaves a puzzles, what propels Israel to do it now, why was that day a special day, but not a year ago? Perhaps it is another canary showing us that the air in this coal mine, famous of its purity for so long, is not as good as advertised.
"There was a soup course and then a main course of chicken at 11 o’clock. The food was excellent. The wine was excellent. I know because I drank a lot of it. Shmully kept refilling my glass. "
Ah, bitterness and humiliations of Exile! Without spiritual nourishment that only the touch of Sacred Soil can provide, one has to make do with fine spirits.
I guess Phil does not have to mention that as detoxification was completed, he did not mend his ways after all.
I can feel his pain: with charming rav pouring fine wine on one side and accusing gaze of vivacious rebetzin on the other side, rhetorical skills can deteriorate. Plus, there is futility of rhetoric. You can bring horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.
You would be on stronger ground claiming that this is a lunacy. But to me nationalistic symbols should contain something irrational, otherwise we could have number codes on our banners. So I would not say that this is deranged.
By the way, I am not familiar with the Jewish Lunar calendar, so I think that I have made a mistake in the dating of Natufian culture. It was probably 9,500 to 6,500 BBoW. Perhaps commemorating the Natufians should be illegal because it denies the veracity of Torah which is the cornerstone of the Jewish nation. More precisely, I read that attempts of converting Jews away from Judaism are illegal in Israel, so distributing pro-Natufian literature in the middle of a Jewish population center could be interrupted by the police, once they figure the true import of the situation.
Moreover, the state religion as practiced/worshiped in Israel has a number of tenets that post-date the creation of Israel, and one of them is "people without land to the land without people". So this is what we see in the pictures above: apostates trying to convert others to their error.
This explains why Arab citizens could have a march of thousands to commemorate villages erased by Nakba -- in pluralistic theocracy minorities are entitled to their beliefs. And why police in Tel Aviv tolerated Zochrot's mini-demos for 6 years -- it took some time to realize how pernicious the little recitations were. Some rabbis surely alerted authorities early on, but police has to prioritize. Selling socks from mixed thread is still allowed, apparently link to alibaba.com
Jeff, it is better not to go to far.
There is nothing deranged in commemorating what you wish and when you wish. I would like to use Jewish calendar in archaeology, because you can date neolithic communities in Palestine "before the beginning of the world, e.g. Natufian culture can be dated from 12,500 to 9,500 BC or "9,000 to 6,000 BBoW".
Attacking people who commemorate events we do not like to mention is perhaps not deranged but a straight continuation of the finest Soviet traditions.
A journalist in Poland who comments on American affairs had a very perceptive observation. Manning's crime was worse than treason. Leaked documents made US government look ridiculous, THAT is never forgiven.
Cats do not make photogenic singers: link to youtube.com
As we can see, the true teeth of a singing cat look a bit scary, they are predators after all. And here we can see how to convince a cat to sing for PM: link to youtube.com
One aspect of the situation is that there are fascists in every society, and the question is what is being done about them.
Hopefully, they should operate somewhere on the margin and be shunned by the "responsible politicians". But there is a continuum between having regard for human rights and avoiding "red meat" and what mainstream politicians do. In Europe fascists are mostly in separate parties that are shunned. In USA this is pretty complex, mongering of fear, war, draconian penalties, vilification of some immigrant groups is definitely seeping into mainstream parties.
In Zionist context, the guys basking in the glory of conquest while sitting on their war trophy are definitely fascistic. Just to make the most recent cite, Ben-Ari notified the press that he had an orgasm (= spasm of pleasure) watching Col. Eisner applying "heavy hand" to protesters. As opposed to guys like Netanyahu and Lieberman who at least know not to tell the press how much they enjoyed it. And there is absolutely no shunning and no separation in Zionism from the real-clear fascism. Ben-Ari has cordial cooperation with coalition members, and on commentariat, you can proceed from blood-thirsty Rachel Abrams to Caroline Glick to Pamela Geller etc. to so-called "moderates" and all seem to be one big happy family.
This is a magnificent sofa! One could sit the entire National Union party here!
Good time to remember that our culture owes a lot to Orient; it is not just falafel, but also sofas and ottomans. I read that before interacting with Turks Europeans did not use buttons. You would be watching TV sitting on a wooden bench, dressed in draw-string leggings and a tunic.
Stupid people make wars over women, like Helen of Troy. Wise people set their gaze on a good sofa.
This "getting desperate" should be viewed rather skeptically. For the Lobby, there is always a crisis, "Israel now more than ever needs your help, please send us the largest donation you can afford. " To give an analogy, consider this joke:
Two Jewish mothers are sitting in a restaurant. The waiter comes over.
"Is ANYTHING alright...?" he asks.....
By "going back to my roots" I am 1/4 Polish. So I guess various parts of my roots have a lot to apologize to other parts and I should be thoroughly humble.
The story of Jews in Poland is very complex and it is not "they were persecuted which made them leave". Of those who left, the ones that ended up in USA, Belgium, England etc. do very well, thank you very much, without any help from "their state". Does Michael Bloomberg needs his own state? Or his own city is enough (not cheap, mind you, if you check how much he spend)? Why Sheldon Adelson needs Israel? So he can display to his fellow moguls the most precious tchotchke of them all: his very own Prime Minister? Why anti-Zionist Haredi need Israel? To log more hours of Torah study than their colleagues in Brooklyn? Why a daughter of Judge Goldstone who moved from South Africa to Israel and later to Canada needs Israel? Can a single answer describe them all?
This is one of the hallmarks of the Jewish state. It provides protection and favors to Jews according to their quality. There are super-Jews, so-so Jews, mediocre Jews and unfortunately-they-are Jews.
There are three ways of becoming a super-Jew: super-active Zionist == settler who personally bashes "Pals", super-rich Zionist and super-religious Jew. And bicycling anarchists are on the bottom of the heap. There are very few of them, but they are like a drop of tar in a barrel of honey. They are probably the reason for a violent reaction to a bicycle outing of Sharek Youth Forum which was never before branded as "anarchist".
The degree of deference to super-Jews is hilarious at times. For example, a stupid hasbarah chief Yuli Edelstein designed a campaign promoting immigration to Israel where a Jew can date Jewish girls unlike in USA. That touched a raw nerve and after few TV ads this motif was dropped. Which made me thinking: why suddenly a hasbarah chief is so sensitive? Anything to do with Michael Bloomberg, mayor of NYC, owner of Bloomberg News and a munificent Zionist, having a shiksa girlfriend? I imagine that Edelstein had to admit his stupidity personally and profusely apologize for any implied aspersions on the august personage of Bloomberg, in a phone call to Bloomberg secretary.
Exactly. One can make arguments for not involving arts and sciences in political conflicts, but it is Israel and supporters that show initiative and achieve results: destroyed universities, banned books, blacklisted artists, theatre performances closed by police (Year of Jerusalem as an Arab Cultural Capital) etc.
110 years ago Czarist Russia was notable for exquisite ballet etc. and pogroms, somewhat comparable situation. But Czars did not involve arts and science in the conflict as opposed to what happened 30 years later in Germany. For example, Czar Alexander purchased a painting of a Jewish painter Repin for a record amount of 35,000 rubles. Thus a hypothetical case for boycotting a visit in London of a ballet sponsort by the Czar would be weaker -- still arguable, but weaker. (My history is iffy here, individual Czars had very different policies, but I think the historical analogy is very good here). But Israel and supporters are really engage in Kulturkampf or Kulturkrieg.
Zionist are true bookburners of 21st century.
Examples of censorship, censorship, blacklisting and harassment could fill a book, which is perhaps worthwhile to compile. For starters, books are contraband subject of confiscation if printed in Beirut, even if this is an Arabic translation of Pinocchio.
My suggested book would have chapter on every art form, while sciences would also have their entries. What other country bombed a university in this century?
In Polish there is a proverb "jaki pan taki kram", "what [kind of] master that [kind of] shop". The master of this shop is Avigdor Lieberman. Do not expect Oren to be subtle.
My favorite innovation is skunk water.
In bad old days IDF soldiers had to defecate in Palestinian offices and homes to impart desired sensory messages. It was time consuming and, let us face it, undignified. Moreover, the sensory effect (the stink) was quite limited.
Now a hygienic formulation is sprayed from special trucks, and with a magnificent feat of chemistry, the stink persist for at least 3 weeks and can be applied to human targets, vehicles and buildings.
Another application which is very impressive is data mining social networks to identify undesirable persons. This is a very complex problem that I know a little about. For example, from a Twitter message you may want to identify the geographic location from which a message originates. Doing it reliably and quickly with a computer program is quite challenging, with ambiguities, misspellings, synonyms and tricky cases where "St" can stand for "State" (frequent in American college names) "Street" or "Saint". Now you want to sift through millions (hundreds of millions) of messages in social media and blogs to identify unfriendly individuals and, say, deny them entry to Israel on "pre-interview" basis or alert the airport security. Recently in a brilliant actions Israel denied the right to use tickets to roughly 1000 individuals, with about 40% false positive rate. If you think about complexities involved in that task, the success rate -- 60% -- is astounding.
About Intel chips: (a) doesn't Intel have laboratories in Austin, Texas