On August 28, 2010 we joined other progressive reporters who infiltrated Glenn Beck's rally in Washington in order to observe, take compromising pictures, and manufacture a plausible Current Truth, so that our sophisticated readers would know what to think.
Like many media organs, we had reserved a template page for the most ridiculous protest signs. All we needed was to photograph those signs and fill in the blanks to match our pre-approved hilarious captions. But the untrustworthy Beck preempted our planning by forbidding all signs. It forced us to revise our talking points. The new and improved Current Truth states: the lack of hand-written signs means that the rally lacked a discernible message. It can also mean that none of Beck's followers can read or write, and that these illiterate home-schoolers have never mastered the essential skills of holding a crayon or finger-painting.
~ In contrast, the signs and chants of public-school-educated counter-protesters contained deep, mutually exclusive messages, cleverly calculated to confuse their opponents and create enough cognitive dissonance to send them running away in panic, scratching their heads to the bone and rolling their eyes out of their skulls.
The most common method was to place Martin Luther King's face next to some far-fetched random statement about things he never knew existed - allegedly in order to prevent Dr. King's legacy from being hijacked or trivialized. Other tricks included waving "peace" signs and symbols while chanting "no justice, no peace," or carrying pre-printed, patriotic-looking "one nation" placards and Black separatist insignia simultaneously.
Organized by Rev. Al Sharpton, labor unions, and the A.N.S.W.E.R. coalition, they were a shining example of what a real grass-roots spontaneous mass protest looks like. One might even call it a very, very shining example - in part, due to the abundance of glossy mass-produced placards, cameras and other electronic devices, as well as sparkly chains and other jewelry carried by the oppressed, protesting masses.
Considering that Al Sharpton's counter-rally was in every way superior to Glenn Beck's meager showing of illiterates, this is what this report will be focused on.
Let's start in chronological order with the anti-progressive rally, whose attendants began to arrive as early as sunrise in order to reserve seats - a silly thing to do since, as you can see in this picture, only several dozen of them showed up.
King K’inich Kan Bahlum II reigned in Baalak from 685 AD to 702 AD. Like his father, the great K’inich Janaab Pakal, he was responsible for many of the most glorious architectural and artistic achievements of Mayan civilization’s “classical period;” it was he who oversaw the completion of the great pyramidal Temple of Inscriptions in Palenque, on one of whose walls he left a legend predicting that his dynasty would last until 21 October 4772.
I have to say, I’ve always been impressed by the absolute precision of these old Mayan prophecies: never any vague predictions of nameless catastrophes occurring at uncertain hours—“In the time of great sorrow, when the moon is in the third house and the curlew’s nest is empty, a dark fortune will descend upon the house of Tarquinio” or anything like that—but only exactly dated auguries of specific events. Admittedly, I would be considerably more impressed if, in addition to their precision, they occasionally exhibited some tendency toward accuracy, but you can’t ask for everything.
As it happens, Kan Bahlum’s dynasty died out some time in the early ninth century. There’s no need to quibble over four millennia here or there, though; what makes Kan Bahlum’s prophecy interesting is that it refers to an event scheduled to occur exactly 2759 years and ten months after 21 December 2012, which is supposedly the day on which, by the reckoning of the Mayan long calendar, the current “Great Cycle” of 5125 years will reach its end.
We have recently entered a period of popular fascination—which will become more intense over the next thirty-six months or so—with this date, or at least with the year 2012. Any number of recent books, articles, television programs, and viral videos, as well as one particularly bad film, tell us that this is date that the classical age Mayas predicted would end the world, or at least inaugurate a cataclysm of such enormous proportions that the vast majority of life on earth will perish. And yet here was Kan Bahlum, ever the sunny optimist it seems, confidently asserting that his family’s reign would continue on for better than twenty-seven centuries beyond that mark.
There’s no mystery here, really. The truth of the matter is that the ancient Mayas understood 2012 as the terminal year not of the cosmos or the planet, but of a calendrical rotation. There is clear evidence that they did indeed regard every transition from one Great Cycle to another as something quite momentous, with some greater mystical or cosmic significance, but they certainly did not see it as ushering in the end of time. In fact, they do not seem to have had any concept of the end of time.
Rather, they had an insatiable predilection for large numbers arranged in magnificently intricate mathematical schemes, as well as an equally insatiable fascination with astronomy; and these two appetites in combination produced marvelous and fantastical myths and monuments and vaticinations, all embraced within a vision of time as a kind of endless epochal spiral, rather like Yeats’s system of “gyres,” but on a far greater order of magnitude. There could scarcely be a more drastic confusion of categories, therefore, than the application of eschatological themes to what is in essence a mythology of perpetual periodic regeneration within natural time.
It is probably an inevitable mistake for modern Westerners, of course, or for any people raised in a culture shaped by one of the “Abrahamic” faiths. For us, it seems perfectly natural to think in terms of a catastrophic or redemptive conclusion to the narrative of history and nature as we know them. And even many of those systems of thought with which we are most likely to be familiar and which involve some idea of eternal recurrence, like Stoicism or certain schools of Hinduism, presume periodic annihilations of the cosmos.
Some sense that “time must have a stop” is part of the common conceptual property of the whole “Indo-European world.” And that perhaps goes some way towards explaining the popular fascination with an imminent end of days. It does not, however, explain everything.
There is a question here worth pondering, I think. Why are apocalyptic fantasies such inexhaustible sources of popular entertainment? What is it that draws a great many of us to the idea of a world shattered and scorched and whelmed by the seas, or of civilization reduced to savagery in a single day? More importantly, why is the prospect of that day’s imminence one of the most tantalizing elements in these fantasies?
Admittedly, they probably would not entertain us very much at all if we really found them credible. But, still, there’s been such an abundance of post-apocalyptic novels, films, television stories, and so forth over the past five or six decades that the whole genre seems now to enjoy the sort of perennial appeal that once belonged to westerns. And it would be difficult to exaggerate the popularity of books, magazine articles, or “documentaries” that pretend to warn of the impending cataclysm in earnest.
Moreover, it is a market that crosses almost every cultural demographic boundary, albeit with significant variations. For some, the eschatological genre is simply a subcategory of the horror genre, and has no grander function than to inspire little macabre thrills of unease or Schadenfreude. For the more morally serious, it has a graver, minatory purpose, and should apprise us (ponderously) that nuclear war, environmental devastation, genocidal pandemics, swarms of omnivorous nano-robots, and dangerous experiments on subatomic particles are very bad things that ought to be avoided on most occasions. For certain Christian fundamentalists, “end times” fantasy is a kind of licit pornography, absorbed with an altogether unhealthy relish.
And so on. But I suspect that, underlying all the superficial differences, some essentially uniform impulse of the imagination—or collection of impulses—is at work, some species of shared desire or fear.
Not to say that I have any clear notion of what it is. It might simply be the result of history. The latter half of the twentieth century being what it was, it may be that our shared visions of the impending eschaton are nothing more than memories of the recent past allegorically inverted into fabulous premonitions of the near future. That, however, explains only the element of collective therapy in these fantasies, not the great pleasure they seem to afford.
PARIS - Friday in Paris. A hidden camera shows streets blocked by huge crowds of Muslim worshippers and enforced by a private security force.
This is all illegal in France: the public worship, the blocked streets, and the private security. But the police have been ordered not to intervene.
It shows that even though some in the French government want to get tough with Muslims and ban the burqa, other parts of the French government continue to give Islam a privileged status.
An ordinary French citizen who has been watching the Islamization of Paris decided that the world needed to see what was happening to his city. He used a hidden camera to start posting videos on YouTube. His life has been threatened and so he uses the alias of "Maxime Lepante. "
Lepante's View
His camera shows that Muslims "are blocking the streets with barriers. They are praying on the ground. And the inhabitants of this district cannot leave their homes, nor go into their homes during those prayers."
"The Muslims taking over those streets do not have any authorization. They do not go to the police headquarters, so it's completely illegal," he says.
The Muslims in the street have been granted unofficial rights that no Christian group is likely to get under France's Laicite', or secularism law.
"It says people have the right to share any belief they want, any religion," Lepante explained. "But they have to practice at home or in the mosque, synagogues, churches and so on."
Some say Muslims must pray in the street because they need a larger mosque. But Lepante has observed cars coming from other parts of Paris, and he believes it is a weekly display of growing Muslim power.
"They are coming there to show that they can take over some French streets to show that they can conquer a part of the French territory," he said.
France's Islamic Future?
If France faces an Islamic future, a Russian author has already written about it. The novel is called "The Mosque of Notre Dame, 2048," a bestseller in Russia, not in France.
French publisher Jean Robin said the French media ignored the book because it was politically incorrect.
"Islam is seen as the religion of the poor people, so you can't say to the poor people, 'You're wrong,' otherwise, you're a fascist," Robin explained.
The book lays out a dark future when France has become a Muslim nation, and the famous cathedral has been turned into a mosque.
Whether that plot is farfetched depends on whom you ask. Muslims are said to be no more than 10 percent of the French population, although no one knows for sure because French law prohibits population counts by religion.
But the Muslim birthrate is significantly higher than for the native French. Some Muslim men practice polygamy, with each extra wife having children and collecting a welfare check.
"The problem of Islam is more than a problem of numbers," said French philosopher Radu Stoenescu, an Islamic expert who debates Muslim leaders on French TV. "The problem is one of principles. It's an open question. Is Islam an ideology or just a creed?"
"It doesn't matter how many there are," he aded. "The problem is the people who follow Islam; they're somehow in a political party, which has a political agenda, which means basically implementing Sharia and building an Islamic state."
In Denial or Fed Up
From the 1980s until recently, criticizing or opposing Islam was considered a social taboo, and so the government and media effectively helped Islam spread throughout France.
"We were expecting Islam to adapt to France and it is France adapting to Islam," Robin said.
About the burqa controversy, one French Muslim man told a reporter that Europeans should respect Muslim dress. One Parisian woman wearing a headscarf said "the veil is in the Koran" and "we only submit to God and nobody else."
But even if many government elites are in France are in denial over Islam, the people in the streets increasingly are not. Some have become fed up with what they see as the growing Islamization of France.
They've started staging pork and wine "aperitifs," or cocktail parties in the street. They're patriotic demonstrations meant to strike back against Islam. Another national demonstration is planned for Saturday, Sept. 4.
A Warning to the West
The French parliament is expected to debate the burqa law in September. Jean-Francois Cope, president of the Union for a Popular Movement political party, has a warning for the West and for America.
"We cannot accept the development of such practice because it's not compatible with the life in a modern society, you see," he said. "And this question is not only a French question. You will all have to face this challenge. "
Whether it’s Newsweek being sold to the husband of a Democratic congresswoman for a dollar, or ABC deciding to turn This Week into a BBC program by turning over to Christiane Amanpour, last week the dying media itself provided us with two examples of why it’s dying.
Take ABC’s news division, which has always been notorious for its political radicalism and distaste for the average American viewer.
Whether it was Peter Jennings comparing American voters to “a nation two-year olds” throwing a tantrum for voting in a Republican congress in 1994 (expect this metaphor to make a comeback after these midterm elections) or Ted Koppel turning the names of dead servicemen into an anti-war statement (Koppel was the alternative candidate to take over This Week), this has been the ABC way. But turning over This Week to Christiane Amanpour is part of the growing blend of ABC News and the BBC.
The question though is who is Christiane Amanpour meant to appeal to? To viewers who wanted another foreign talking head snootily reading the news at them, not to them. Who were desperately longing for an ABC News on air personality sympathetic to Islamic terrorists? And why would those people even bother with ABC News, when they already have the BBC.
The problem with the American media is that it doesn’t speak to Americans. That’s why FOX News is successful, and CNN is in the basement. Network news exists underwritten by medication and mutual fund commercials, and even so it’s losing money. ABC News is making severe cutbacks even while cutting Amanpour a 2 million dollar paycheck for a show hardly anyone watches anymore. And despite investing in a splashy media rollout for the Amanpour branded This Week, she finished a distant third, well behind Meet the Press. While viewers normally tune in to see a new host, the addition of Amanpour couldn’t even compete with CBS or NBC’s own similarly decaying programs on the day of her own debut.
The left is furiously blasting Washington Post TV Critic Tom Shales for stating what was obvious to everyone, that Amanpour is out of place, completely clueless about US politics and insists on internationalizing domestic issues. But shooting the messenger won’t save Amanpour. Her hiring is only the latest manifestation of a media that is too radicalized to save itself. Bringing in a personality from the sinking ship that is CNN was obviously a bad idea on commercial grounds alone. Amanpour left CNN, for the same reason that Campbell Brown did. And ABC News taking Amanpour in, demonstrates that they share CNN’s bad judgment.
Unlike ABC producers, Americans are not interested in an “outsider’s perspective” on American politics. They can get that from the White House. Threatening to stab Tom Shales with a knife won’t change that either. Amanpour’s promise to “open a window on the world” for what she imagines are parochial American viewers is condescending even to those who agree with her. It’s grating to those who don’t. Because Amanpour’s window is the parochial European left-wing window from which you can see Brussels, but not Iowa, a stifling world that is upper class in its arrogance, and low class in its empathy for terrorists. ABC News producers may be determined to bring that tiny dollhouse of a world to Americans, but who exactly is supposed to underwrite this project? The BBC and its outrageous salaries are funded by taxpayers. ABC has to pay its own way.
And that is why the media is doomed. By putting politics over profitability, the media left alienated viewers and readers exactly during the critical transition period when it needed them most. And the worse its fortunes grow, the more radical its politics have become...
The investigative video produced by Jerry Gordon in conjuction with Tom Trento at the Florida Security Council, ACT! for America in Florida, and the superb videographer J. Mark Campbell is rapidly climbing the viral video chart. It came in at number 16 and has climbed to number 9 already this morning. The video will grace our front page later today, but if you haven't seen it, watch it now:
A key Muslim ally of Florida Governor and US Senate candidate Charlie Crist, Imam Muhammad Musri, hosted a fundraiser in Orlando for the terrorist group Hamas in June 2009, and a camera crew from ACT for America infiltrated the event held at Masjid Al-Rahman, Musri’s mosque, to record the proceedings. Imam Musri, head of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, serves on Crist’s Faith-Based and Community Advisory Council and was appointed by Crist to his 2010 Sunshine Census Committee.
The Orlando Hamas fundraiser featured as its keynote speakers former UK parliamentarian George Galloway and Mahdi Bray of the Muslim American Society-Freedom, and was intended to raise money for Galloway’s Viva Palestina organization.
That Galloway and Viva Palestina have provided material support for Hamas through the funds they have raised across the U.S. and elsewhere is hardly a secret. In March 2009, Galloway was videotaped by Al-Jazeera giving a duffel bag full of cash to Hamas social minister Ahmad Kurd, who called Galloway “a hero.” Kurd was designated a global terrorist by the U.S. government in August 2007.
In presenting Kurd with the cash, Galloway flaunted his violations of US and UK sanctions:
We are giving you now 100 vehicles and all of the contents, and we make no apology for what I am about to say: We are giving them to the elected government of Palestine. Just in case the British government or the European Union want to face me in any court, let me tell them live on television: I personally am about to break the sanctions on the elected government of Palestine… But I, now, here, on behalf of myself, my sister Yvonne Ridley, and the two Respect councilors – Muhammad Ishtiaq and Naim Khan – are giving three cars and 25,000 pounds in cash to Prime Minister Ismail Haniya. Here is the money. This is not charity. This is politics.
As a result of Galloway’s open funding of the terrorist group, he was banned from entering Canada later that month. So Galloway turned to his Florida friend Muhammad Musri to help take up the fundraising slack.
As the video taken by ACT for America shows, Galloway and Bray raised $55,000 at Musri’s fundraiser. During the event, Bray promised that the cash and materials collected from the Orlando event would be sent straight to Gaza:
Well we’ve got the equipment. We’re going to send it Insha’Allah. We’re going to go with your movement Viva Palestina… We’ll ship it here from Florida to New York, and from New York to Egypt, and from Egypt we will put it into Gaza.
According to a July 26, 2009 article posted on the Muslim American Society website authored by Aishah Schwartz (now since scrubbed from their site), documents how Bray was true to his word, with the supplies shipped by container from Orlando.
According to press accounts, more than $1 million in aid for Hamas, including the cash and supplies raised in Orlando at Musri’s mosque, along with funds raised in Kansas, New York and Illinois, was provided on Galloway’s July 2009. There to greet them and take possession of the cash was Hamas economic minister Ziad al-Zaza and Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh, another designated global terrorist.
In response to this second Hamas support convoy, Congressman Brad Sherman (D-CA), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, sent letters to Attorney General Eric Holder, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, demanding an investigation into Galloway and Viva Palestina’s U.S. fundraising for Hamas. Not long afterward, Mahdi Bray scrubbed any mention of the convoy from his personal website.
In December 2007, federal prosecutors identified Bray’s Muslim American Society as “the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in America,” and a 2004 Chicago Tribune exposé details the Society’s founding by the Muslim Brotherhood, the oldest and largest Islamist group in the world that has given birth to Al-Qaeda, Hamas and virtually every other Islamic terrorist group in the world today.
With such a tight U.S. Senate race in Florida, it’s doubtful that a Hamas fundraiser sponsored by Charlie Crist’s good friend Muhammad Musri at Musri’s own mosque, and the money and supplies raised in Orlando being given to designated terrorists on international TV, is going to help his election prospects. But Hamas fundraisers being conducted across the U.S. without any action by federal authorities should concern us all.
Rome, 27 August (AKI) - Mosques in Italy will not receive a share of income tax revenue the Italian government allocates to religious faiths each year. Hindu and Buddhist temples, Greek Orthodox churches and Jehovah's Witnesses will be eligible for the funds, according to a bill approved by the Italian cabinet in May and still must be approved by parliament.
Until now, the government had earmarked 8 percent of income tax revenue for Italy's established churches. The great majority of these funds go to the Catholic Church, although if they wish, individual tax payers may elect to give the money to charities and cultural projects instead.
The head of COREIS, one of Italy's largest Muslim groups, Yahya Pallavicini, said he was bitter that Islam had been denied the revenue from Italian income tax.
"Work should be begun on legally recognising those moderate Muslims who have for years shown themselves to be reliable interlocutors who are free of and fundamentalist ideology," he said.
Islam is not an established religion in Italy and there is only one official mosque in the country, Rome's Grand Mosque (photo). Politicians from the ruling coalition cite radical imams, polygamy and failure to uphold women's rights by Muslims immigrants as obstacles to recognising Islam as an official religion in Italy.
Until now, only the Catholic Church, Judaism and other established churches including Lutherans, Evangelists, Waldensians and 7th-day Adventists have received the income tax revenue from the Itallain government.
There are between one million and 1.5 million Muslims in Italy and 130 mosques linked the Muslim umbrella organisation UCOII across the country.
It is every parent’s desire to give their children the best start in life, but few would ever aspire to buying them a £1million house as a leaving home present. Unless, that is, you happen to be as wealthy as Tony and Cherie Blair. Just for the record, this is house number 9 for the Blair family.
Multiple Members of Karzai Administration on CIA Payroll
This is indicative of just how confused our policy in Afghanistan really is. Washington Post:
The CIA is making secret payments to multiple members of President Hamid Karzai's administration, in part to maintain sources of information in a government in which the Afghan leader is often seen as having a limited grasp of developments, according to current and former U.S. officials.
The payments are long-standing in many cases and designed to help the agency maintain a deep roster of allies within the presidential palace. Some aides function as CIA informants, but others collect stipends under more informal arrangements meant to ensure their accessibility, a U.S. official said.
The CIA has continued the payments despite concerns that it is backing corrupt officials and undermining efforts to wean Afghans' dependence on secret sources of income and graft.
The U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a significant number of officials in Karzai's administration are on the payroll. Paul Gimigliano, a CIA spokesman, disputed that characterization, saying, "This anonymous source appears driven by ignorance, malice or both."
A former agency official said the payments were necessary because "the head of state is not going to tell you everything" and because Karzai often seems unaware of moves that members of his own government make.
Top American officials including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) have expressed concern about Karzai's efforts to rein in anti-corruption teams, as well as intervention in the case against the security adviser. The aide, Mohammad Zia Salehi, is accused of accepting a $10,000 car as a bribe in exchange for his assistance in quashing a wide-ranging corruption probe.
But Karzai supporters accuse their U.S. counterparts of exploiting the issue, and the Salehi arrest in particular, to humiliate the Afghan leader while ignoring more pressing priorities.
In the latest sign of his vexation, Karzai said Thursday that President Obama's timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops "has given courage to the enemies of Afghanistan," and complained that the United States wasn't doing enough to force Pakistan to stop supporting the Taliban.
"We haven't progressed in the war against terrorism," Karzai said in a statement.
The CIA has maintained relationships with Afghan government officials for years. But the disclosure that multiple members of Karzai's government are on the CIA's payroll underscores the complex nature of the American role in Afghanistan. Even as agency dollars flow in, U.S.-backed investigative units are targeting prominent Afghans in the government and trying to stem an exodus of more than $1 billion in cash annually from the country...
Karzai also says the US will need to stay in Afghanistan for ten more years. Any questions?
Bruce Kessler does the right thing. More people need to follow his lead and give to institutions working to preserve Western civilization and America rather undermining them both.
I just updated my will and trust and, with heavy heart, cut out what was a significant bequest to my alma mater, Brooklyn College.
What caused the disinheritance is that all incoming freshmen and transfer students are given a copy of a book to read, and no other, to create their “common experience.” This same book is one of the readings in their required English course. The author is a radical pro-Palestinian professor there.
When I attended in the 1960s, Brooklyn College – then rated one of the tops in the country -- was, like most campuses, quite liberal. But, there was no official policy to inculcate students with a political viewpoint. Now there is. That is unacceptable.
The book is How Does It Feel To Be A Problem?: Being Young and Arab in America It is interviews with seven Arab-Americans in their 20s about their experiences and difficulties in the US. There’s appreciation of freedoms in the US, and deep resentment at feeling or being discriminated against post-9/11.
The seven are not a representative sample. Six are Moslem and one Christian. According to the Arab American Institute, 63% of Arab-Americans are Christian, 24% Muslim. The author chose those interviewed and those included in the book.
The title of the book is drawn from communist WEB DuBois’ same question in 1903 in his treatise The Souls of Black Folk. The current book consciously draws a parallel, ridiculous on its face, between the horrible and pervasive discrimination and injustices that Blacks were subjected to a century ago and Arab-Americans today.
The author asserts “The core issue [of Middle East turbulence] remains the rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination,” that the post-1967 history of the entire area is essentially that of “imperialism American-style,” and that the US government “limits the speech of Arab Americans in order to cement United States policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” Again, preposterous.
The second featured speaker at WCU's forum was Moustafa Bayoumi, an associate professor of English at Brooklyn College and co-editor of The Edward Said Reader. Bayoumi contends that in the aftermath of 9/11, armed INS officials, U.S. Marshals, and FBI agents routinely roused Muslims from their beds "in the middle of the night"—indiscriminately arresting, shackling, and investigating them for possible terrorist connections.
In September 2002, a year after 9/11, Bayoumi lamented that "an upswing in hate crimes [against American Muslims] has already begun." As proof, he cited statistics, which would be thoroughly discredited, put forth by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). He then pointed to CAIR's claim that "57 percent of American Muslims report that they have experienced bias or discrimination since Sept. 11," and that "48 percent of [Muslim] respondents believe their lives have changed for the worse since the attacks." "This is hardly surprising," Bayoumi reasoned. "For the past year, Muslims have endured a daily barrage of demagoguery, distortions and outright lies about their faith. Never well understood in this country, Islam is now routinely caricatured."
In March 2006, Bayoumi took up this theme again, asserting that "Muslim-bashing has become socially acceptable in the United States." In 2008 he wrote: "It's been seven years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, and many young American Muslims are convinced that much of American society views them with growing hostility. They're right."
The theme of Muslim victimhood is by no means restricted solely to Bayoumi's view of the United States. Indeed, he depicts Palestinian suicide bombings as little more than desperate reactions to "a brutal [Israeli] military occupation that has been strangling the Palestinian people for decades."
Most recently, Bayoumi edited a book, Midnight on the Mavi Marmara: The Attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and How It Changed the Course of the Israel/Palestinian Conflict, defending it and calling it Israel’s Selma, Alabama, the focal point for US civil rights struggles in the 1960s.
Online I found two professors who protested to the college president. One, retired from Brooklyn College, said: "This is wholly inappropriate. It smacks of indoctrination. It will intimidate incoming students who have a different point of view (or have formed no point of view), sending the message that only one side will be approved on this College campus. It can certainly intimidate untenured faculty as well."
Another, currently on the faculty, said: "While our community of learning is committed to freedom of speech and expression, does that require that we must expose new students to the anti-American and anti-Israeli preachings of this professor? At the least, do not our students deserve a balanced presentation?"
Another retired professor living in Brooklyn, protested and received back from a Dean:
Each year professors in the English Department and I select a common reading for our entering students. We choose memoirs (a genre familiar to students) set in New York City, often reflecting an immigrant experience, and written by authors who are available to visit campus. Students in freshman composition respond to the common reading by writing about their own experiences, many of them published in ‘Telling Our Stories; Sharing our Lives’. This year we selected How Does It Feel to be a Problem: Being Young and Arab in America by one of our own faculty members, Professor Moustafa Bayoumi, because it is a well-written collection of stories by and about young Arab Brooklynites whose experiences may be familiar to our students, their neighbors, or the students with whom they will study and work at Brooklyn College. We appreciate your concerns. Rest assured that Brooklyn College values tolerance, diversity, and respect for differing points of view in all that we do.
The professor tells us what happened next:
So I wrote to her again, and again, and then again once more, suggesting that she provide some balance to Bayoumi's book, that she provide additional authors and additional speakers. I even suggested another author, Paul Berman, also resident in Brooklyn, also writing on Arab themes, also willing (I would assume) to speak to her students. And what did Dean Wilson reply to these repeated suggestions of mine ? You guessed it, she did not deign to reply at all.
Another professor’s unpublished letter (which I verified with him; I've verified the others also) to the college president said: “Anyone who has taught at a university during the past quarter-century and more knows that the slogan of ‘diversity’ generally alludes to its opposite (i.e., imposed uniformity of thought camouflaged by diversity of physical appearance) and also foretells mischief.”
I will always appreciate the excellent liberal arts education I received at Brooklyn College, and the critical thinking that has caused me to disinherit it.
The Man Behind, the Man Behind the Ground Zero Mosque
Sharif el-Gamal is the young developer of the Ground Zero mosque whose meteoric rise from lowly waiter to wealthly real estate entrepeneur is very suspicious. He seems to be a front man for another man, Hisham Elzanaty, who may in turn be a front man for someone else. Raheel Raza, who has spoken out against the mosque, says el-Gamal threatened her over the phone. This interesting FOX News video comes from a website called Hyscience (h/t: VFR).
[...] Naturally, we wanted to talk to Sharif el-Gamal to learn more about the man and his plans, but apparently he didn't want to meet us. We made repeated requests for a sit down interview with him, left him multiple voice mail messages and he never returned any of our calls. We even went to his office and talked to colleagues, but we were turned away. He left us with no choice: We had to go find him.
El-Gamal is an American Muslim reportedly born to a Polish mother and an Egyptian father. He was raised in Brooklyn.
Today, el-Gamal's company, Soho Properties, owns the building where arguably the most controversial mosque in the world will be built. He bought the old Burlington Coat Factory building at 45 Park Place, two blocks from the World Trade Center site, for $4.8 million in cash in 2009.
We asked him where he got the money to put down on the property, but he stayed silent when we approached him.
His newfound notoriety was an extraordinary leap from his not-too-distant days as a waiter at Serafina, a trendy Upper East Side eatery, and at Michael's, an upscale celebrity-filled restaurant packed with a veritable who's who in media.
[...] Ken Brandman, president of N.Y. Commercial Real Estate Services, knows el-Gamal well. He, too, was a bit surprised to hear el-Gamal is the developer in the mosque near Ground Zero.
"I don't think he has a lot of money," Brandman said. "I'm sure he didn't buy it with his own money."
Soho Properties bought the site for the mosque for $4.8 million in cash. Just four months later, with Manhattan's real estate market collapsed, el-Gamal made an even bigger deal.
With credit super tight, and prices plummeting, he paid $45 million for a 12-story commercial building in Chelsea that sold three years earlier for $31 million.
"It seems like a lot of pay in a downturn, considering it went for considerably less during the boom," said Stuart Elliott, the editor of Real Deal magazine.
El-Gamal, the waiter turned mogul, plunked down another $5 million as down payment on the Chelsea building.
"Something's up with that deal," Ken Brandman said. "Unless someone gave him a lot of money, or he won the lottery, than somebody else put up the money."
Fox 5 News has learned that el-Gamal did have help from a man named Hisham Elzanaty. Mortgage documents show that Elzanaty is the guarantor on the $39 million loan el-Gamal's company secured to buy the building.
We repeatedly asked El-Gamal where he raised the money, where it was coming from, but he refused to answer our questions and run from us. He also did not answer the question of whether he would consider relocating the mosque.
One piece of construction equipment at the future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro was set afire in the overnight hours while others had gasoline poured on them, according to a spokesperson for the ICM.
Carmie Ayash, spokeswoman for the ICM, told The DNJ Islamic Center officials were contacted by the sheriff’s department around 1:30 a.m. Saturday in reference to the damaged equipment. It appeared gasoline had been poured on several pieces of equipment at the site and one was lit afire. Ayash said it appeared the responsible arsonist was spooked during the act and fled the scene before other equipment could be set on fire.
“We were contacted by police department around 1:30 a.m,” Ayash said Saturday afternoon. “They said someone had caught fire to some of the equipment. I think they lifted the hood and poured gas into the hood and set it on fire.
“The other equipment had gasoline poured on it but was not set on fire. It seems like it was intentional. Probably, whoever did it got caught in the middle of the act, got scared and left.”
Islamic Center officials have contacted the FBI and Department of Homeland Security, according to Ayash, and sheriff’s department investigators “told us they will be investigating this as a hate crime.”...
Middle America is feeling more confident in standing against mosque construction. Mayfield is a town of about 12,000. WPSD:
MAYFIELD, Ky. - After weeks of debate and speculation, zoning board members voted down a conditional use permit that would allow area Muslims to worship in a building they were hoping to turn into a mosque.
The unanimous vote Tuesday came after a heated meeting held at city council chambers.
Ultimately, board members said it was not a first amendment issue but rather a parking issue. Board member Richard Wright cited Kentucky Revised Statute 100-243, which reads, in part, a variance can only be granted if it, "... will not adversely affect the public health, safety, or welfare ... and ... will not alter the essential character of the general vicinity."
Commissioners went on the record saying the limited building capacity and six parking spaces would cause further traffic congestion and place additional burdens on nearby businesses.
Chairman Austin Copeland had called the meeting to order 30 minutes earlier by asking the crowd of more than 100 to stay on topic and "avoid the religion issue."
But despite Copeland's plea, religion dominated the meeting.
"I don't want to keep them from worshiping, I just don't want them here," businessman Dick Conner said.
"I just don't feel like there's room," a woman chimed in, during the time allotted for public comments.
While comments were heard from neighbors and business owners, the Muslims who had petitioned did not have an opportunity. Turns out, the petitioners were turned away because the meeting was so crowded. Overflow crowds nearing 100 were allowed in the hallway and outside City Hall, but the group of Muslims simply returned home.
When the mistake was noticed, Sheriff John Davis left to track them down. When they were unable to be located within a few minutes, the meeting continued.
A motion was made to deny the request and passed unanimously. Loud cheers erupted and Commissioner Richard Wright said later, "We clearly made the right decision."
Commissioner Wright said it was unfortunate none of the petitioners were on hand as, "things could have turned out differently."
He said the city would welcome the Muslims applying for a permit at a different site. Local 6 did talk with one Muslim who said his community is aware of the city's decision. He declined to comment on future plans.
Saudi couple hammered 24 nails into Sri Lankan maid
This is certainly an egregious example, but there have been many, many stories like this, often involving rape.
(Reuters) - A Saudi couple tortured their Sri Lankan maid after she complained of a too heavy workload by hammering 24 nails into her hands, legs and forehead, officials said on Thursday.
Nearly 2 million Sri Lankans sought employment overseas last year and around 1.4 million, mostly maids, were employed in the Middle East. Many have complained of physical abuse or harassment.
L.T. Ariyawathi, a 49-year old mother of three, returned on Friday after five months in Saudi Arabia.
Her family only realized what had happened to her when she complained of pain and they took her to see the doctor, Foreign Employment Bureau officials said.
"The landlord and the wife of the landlord hammered 24 nails into her when she complained of the heavy workload," Kalyana Priya Ramanayake, media secretary of the Foreign Employment Bureau, told Reuters.
Ariyawathi has been taken to hospital for surgery to remove the nails, which according to the maid were hammered in when they were hot.
X-rays showed one- to two-inch nails in her hands and legs, with one over her eyes, officials said.
The Foreign Employment Bureau is consulting the Attorney-General while the Sri Lankan External Affairs Ministry is to take the matter up with the Saudi government, officials said.
Erick Stakelbeck's excellent program this week features the Murfreesboro mosque segment along with a parallel development in Austria where the Turkish government is financing the building of large mosques in small Austrian towns. Stakelbeck believes this is all an expression of Islamic dominance.
Last night, I was on David Asman’s Fox Business Channel show, Scoreboard, debating Imam Dawoud Kringle of the New York State prison system, a GZ mosque supporter. Imam Kringle, who seems like a nice enough fellow, reeled off the usual talking points about how Islam forbids terrorism and, therefore, if someone commits an act of terrorism that act is, by definition, un-Islamic.
Then came the moment of truth: the very simple question, “Is Hamas a terrorist organization?” Have a look at the YouTube clip below. Like his friend Imam Feisal Rauf, Imam Kringle won’t answer the question. I pressed him, pointing out that it is a very simple question. And it is: Quite apart from the fact that Hamas is formally designated as a terrorist organization under U.S. law, Hamas’s own charter makes abundantly clear — indeed, wears like a badge of honor — that Hamas exists solely for the purpose of driving Israel out of Palestine by violent jihad. Yet the imam cannot bring himself to say Hamas is a terrorist organization.
This is a game that sharia-promoting Islamists like Feisal Rauf have raised to an art form. As I explain in the debate, it is why they can look you in they eye, claim in all apparent earnestness that they condemn “terrorism,” and yet excuse Hamas, call for the “one-state solution” for Israel, and support the Iranian theocracy — the leading terrorist state in the world. They do not consider the killing of non-Muslims whom they portray as opposing Islam to be terrorism — they call that “resistance.” They know if they merely say they deplore “terrorism,” the media and the Left will swoon and call them “moderates.” But what you think you’re hearing, and what they’re actually saying, are two very different things.
Muslim Soldier at Ft. Cambell believes Islamic standards would prohibit his service in the U.S. Army in any war
And the reason of course is that by the light of his faith, he views America as the enemy. Before he went on his own murderous rampage at Ft. Hood, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan warned that Muslim soldiers would engage in sabotage or other actions against their units. From The Tennessean:
A U.S. Army soldier wants to leave the military service as a conscientious objector based on his beliefs as a Muslim, but he says he's concerned he may be deployed to Afghanistan anyway.
Pfc. Naser Abdo, 20, an infantryman assigned to the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Ky., said Monday that if the military orders him to deploy, he will refuse to go despite the fact that it may result in a military charge against him.
Rick Rzepka, a Fort Campbell spokesman, said Abdo's deployment has been deferred, but the military could deploy him while a decision was being made on his request.
According to Army regulations, a soldier's submission of a conscientious objector application will not preclude the soldier from deploying. Abdo's unit, the division's 1st Brigade Combat Team, has already deployed to Afghanistan. He was assigned to the brigade's rear detachment, which remains at the installation during deployments.
"Obviously the unit is taking it very seriously," Rzepka said.
"They have decided to go ahead and let the process play out, and if he warrants status as conscientious objector, he will be treated as such. But for right now, his deployment has been deferred."
Abdo said when he joined the Army more than a year ago, he initially felt he could be a soldier and a Muslim at the same time. But he said he now believes Islamic standards would prohibit his service in the U.S. Army in any war.
According to documents provided to The Associated Press, Abdo cited Islamic scholars and verses from the Quran as reasons for his decision to ask for separation from the Army.
"I realized through further reflection that God did not give legitimacy to the war in Afghanistan, Iraq or any war the U.S. Army would conceivably participate in," he wrote.
A recommendation from the commander of his battalion's rear detachment based at Fort Campbell said if Abdo deployed to a combat zone, he could jeopardize the lives of fellow soldiers as well as his own because of his convictions as a conscientious objector.
Abdo also said he was harassed during basic training because of his religion, including hearing insulting comments about Islam and Muslims. He said that at times, he hasn't been able to make his daily prayers because of his military service.
White House counter-terrorism adviser John Brennan joined President Barack Obama and the rest of the First Family in Martha’s Vineyard, while the President and his family vacationed. As I wrote in my Friday post on Mr. Brennan, he described the release of Pan Am Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, who was expected to die of terminal cancer three month after his release last year by Scottish authorities, as "unfortunate, inappropriate and wrong.” Overseas press, however, reported in August, that the White House had supported the release of Megrahi.
Mr. Brennan had visited the Washington Times Editorial Board on June 24 as a result of a June 11 Washington Times editorial he objected to. It did not take long for the White House counter-terrorism adviser to lose his temper with our editorial board’s questions regarding what he previously said about individuals who become terrorists (see transcript and video below).
Mr. Brennan cut the meeting short and stormed out of our offices thereafter following a question posed by senior editorial writer Jim Robbins (transcript and video below). Referring to a quote Mr. Brennan said in May, calling jihad a “legitimate tenet of Islam," Mr. Robbins looked to discuss the concept of jihad further with the Obama administration adviser. Fox News reported earlier in May:
The president's top counterterrorism adviser on Wednesday called jihad a "legitimate tenet of Islam," arguing that the term "jihadists" should not be used to describe America's enemies.
During a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, John Brennan described violent extremists as victims of "political, economic and social forces," but said that those plotting attacks on the United States should not be described in "religious terms."
He repeated the administration argument that the enemy is not "terrorism," because terrorism is a "tactic," and not terror, because terror is a "state of mind" -- though Brennan's title, deputy national security adviser for counterterrorism and homeland security, includes the word "terrorism" in it. But then Brennan said that the word "jihad" should not be applied either.
"Nor do we describe our enemy as 'jihadists' or 'Islamists' because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one's community, and there is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children," Brennan said.
TRANSCRIPT:
TWT: You mentioned jihad, for example, and would you agree with the lesser and greater and lesser jihad framework? I mean, that’s pretty standard.
BRENNAN: Sure, it is...absolutely.
TWT: Can you give me an example of a jihad in history? Like, has there ever been a jihad...an armed jihad anywhere in history? Has it ever existed for real, or is it just a concept?
BRENNAN: Absolutely it has.
TWT: Example?
BRENNAN: I’m not going to go into this sort of history discussion here.
TWT: But it’s important to frame the concept, because we want to say that what al-Qaeda is doing is not jihad. They say it is, and Abdul Azzam has said, in fact, ‘there’s not even a greater jihad.’ That that’s just a myth—that hadith didn’t even really happen. That there’s only armed jihad. Ayatollah Khomeini said ‘there is only armed jihad, and it would be useful to be able to characterize or to contrast what they’re doing and what they claim against a legitimate armed jihad in the past.
BRENNAN: I think we’ve finished. I have to get going.
Mr. Brennan left our offices immediately after that exchange.
Understandably, Feisal Rauf’s assertion that the U.S. has more innocent blood on its hands than does al-Qaeda is getting lots of attention (see, e.g., Keep America Safe). Something else caught my eye, though. Way down toward the end of the transcript, we find him endorsing the “one-state solution” for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (my italics):
We now have post-Zionism movements in Israel. We have a very broad spectrum of people in Israel who regard Israel as a nation state, as a secular state, as a multicultural state. The very fabric and demographic, and I would say even identity, of Israel has shifted enormously in the last 60 years since its founding. . . .
The differences, perhaps, may lie on whether the solution lies in the two-state solution or in a one-state solution. I believe that you had someone here recently who spoke about having a “one land and two peoples” solution to Israel. And I personally — my own personal analysis tells me that a one-state solution is a more coherent one than a two-state solution.
This is the “solution to Israel” preferred by the Muslim Brotherhood and the anti-Israel Left.
For the Islamists, the terror campaign of Hamas (which is the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestinian branch) is a method of keeping up the pressure. It is not something they believe will, by itself, destroy Israel. Terrorism is a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. The end in question here is the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. Hamas is pledged to use violent jihad, but the important thing is accomplishing the mission, not how it is accomplished.
As I’ve pointed out before (I’ve even written a book about it), the Brotherhood and al-Qaeda are after the same bottom line: Islamist rule. The Brotherhood, however, distinguishes itself by being willing to work through available political and legal processes. Al-Qaeda, by contrast, rejects this, reasoning that this approach legitimizes non-sharia processes and, in any event, takes too long. The terrorism and non-terrorism methods of advancing the sharia agenda are far from mutually exclusive; in fact, they reinforce one another. And the non-terrorism approach has, for practitioners, the added advantage that Western opinion elites will laud them as “moderates” even though their agenda is the very opposite of moderate.
For the Brotherhood, Hamas’s jihad (and Fatah’s terrorism, and Israel’s responses) create international pressure for a political solution. In that political solution, the idea is to turn the West’s democracy infatuation and rhetoric against Israel, so that Israel is browbeaten into putting its character as a Jewish state up for a democratic vote. In the interim, the Arab population in Israel (now over a million) is swelling, and Palestinians insist on the “right of return” as part of any political settlement. Between this push for ever-higher Palestinian numbers in Israel and support from secular Israeli Jews who would be willing to trade Israel’s Jewish identity for “peace,” the Brotherhood is moving toward what it expects will be an electoral majority.
The idea is that once Israel’s status as a Jewish state is delegitimized and democratically overturned, the Palestinian territories can be formally joined to Israel, and it will soon become a Palestinian Islamic state — at which point there will be no further need for democracy. That’s the one-state political solution. It just happens to be the same as Hamas’s terrorist solution: No more Israel.
For anyone who has studied how the Brotherhood operates, taken note of Rauf’s Brotherhood associations, and listened to the imam’s slippery answers to simple questions such as Do you believe Hamas is a terrorist organization?, none of this is surprising. But it does raise a question for the Obama administration as it pressures Israel to return to the negotiating table: If the official policy of the United States is that Hamas is a terrorist organization and that the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is “two states living side-by-side in peace,” how can the State Department be using, for diplomatic missions to Arab states, an emissary who doesn’t believe Hamas is a terrorist organization and who favors a one-state solution in which the Jewish state is disappeared?
Joseph Bottom explains the tension between religion and secularism in America in First Things:
“Think not that I am come to send peace on earth,” Christ declares in the Gospel of Matthew. “I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.”
The Bible is full of hard sayings like this—too many, too hard, to be entirely exegeted away in historical criticism, or eased with gentler passages in antidote, or shrugged off as the overstatement of prophetic rhetoric. From the Pentateuch to the Prophets, from the Gospels to the Book of Revelation, something there is in both testaments that has no patience for political compromise, or moral casuistry, or conventional prudence, or philosophical judiciousness.
It’s not the only thing in the Bible, of course, but without it, we have no Bible. “A fire is kindled in mine anger,” as Deuteronomy puts it, “and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.”
There is something in America, as well, that has always burned against the world. From Cotton Matther to William Lloyd Garrison, from John Brown to Martin Luther King, there has been here a hunger to speak with lips touched by burning coals, a blessed rage for the apocalyptic lessons taught only by tongues of fire.
A nation formed by political geniuses—masters of compromise, philosophers of prudence, judges of wisdom—we are also a nation with another theme. Something here has, from the beginning, disdained political order and sought not to be brilliant, wise, and learned, but only true, though the heavens fall as a result. “I am come to send fire on the earth,” Christ says in the Gospel of Luke, “and what will I, if it be already kindled?” It’s not the only thing in America, of course, but without it there is no America.
Sen. Kerry: 'Very active' efforts under way to reach settlement with Taliban
The effort to change Islamic societies has been a fool's errand from the beginning, but nevertheless, there should be no negotiation with the Taliban. It isn't necessary and it shows weakness. We can withdraw whenever we want to without negotiations. Get out, leave them nothing and bomb them is they cause mischief in the future. This comes from The Hill:
Sen. John Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Friday that there is a "very active" effort under way to reach a negotiated political settlement with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Kerry (D-Mass.) acknowledged that "efforts" have begun after visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan this week, meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and other officials.
"I can report without being specific that there are efforts under way. They are serious and I completely agree with that fundamental premise — and so does General [David] Petraeus and so does President Obama — there is no military solution," he told NPR. "And there are very active efforts now to seek an appropriate kind of political settlement."
U.S. officials have acknowledged that some sort of political settlement must be reached with the Taliban -- a loosely affiliated group of Islamic insurgents that control large swaths of territory in Afghanistan -- in order to bring an end to the almost nine-year-long U.S. war there.
The beginning of settlement negotiations represents a significant development in terms of Western involvement there.
Kerry was asked if negotiations are underway between either between the Afghan government or NATO and a specific portion of the Taliban.
Allied forces in Afghanistan have fought Taliban insurgents since 2001, when the war began. The group, which once governed the mountainous Central Asian nation, was booted from power, but has since regained control of several key areas of the country.
Kerry said that any "appropriate" settlement would have to include "a renunciation of al-Qaeda," a "reduction of violence," a "recognition of the constitutional rights of both Pakistan and Afghanistan and greater efforts to reduce sanctuaries for insurgency."
Petraeus, commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan, said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press" that he thought "there is a prospect for reconciliation with some of the groups," specifically citing HIG (Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin) insurgents who have squabbled with the Taliban and have made overtures to the Afghan government to agree to the conditions laid out.
"It doesn't mean that Mullah Omar is about to stroll down main street in Kabul any time soon and raise his hand and swear an oath on the constitution of Afghanistan," Petraeus said, citing the Taliban leader.
"But every possibility, I think, that there can be low- and mid-level reintegration, and indeed, some fracturing of the senior leadership that could be really defined as reconciliation."
Real or not, this is quite funny. From Maggie's Farm:
Paleoanthropology Division
Smithsonian Institute
207 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20078
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your latest submission to the Institute, labeled "211-D, layer seven, next to the clothesline post. Hominid skull." We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination, and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that it represents "conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man in Charleston County two million years ago." Rather, it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu Barbie". It is evident that you have given a great deal of thought to the analysis of this specimen, and you may be quite certain that those of us who are familiar with your prior work in the field were loathe to come to contradiction with your findings.
However, we do feel that there are a number of physical attributes of the specimen which might have tipped you off to its modern origin:
1. The material is molded plastic. Ancient hominid remains are typically fossilized bone.
2. The cranial capacity of the specimen is approximately 9 cubic centimeters, well below the threshold of even the earliest identified proto-hominids.
3. The dentition pattern evident on the "skull" is more consistent with the common domesticated dog than it is with the "ravenous man-eating Pliocene clams" you speculate roamed the wetlands during that time. This latter finding is certainly one of the most intriguing hypotheses you have submitted in your history with this institution, but the evidence seems to weigh rather heavily against it. Without going into too much detail, let us simply say that:
A. The specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog has chewed on.
B. Clams don't have teeth.
It is with feelings tinged with melancholy that we must deny your request to have the specimen carbon-dated. This is partially due to the heavy load our lab must bear in its normal operation, and partly due to carbon dating's notorious inaccuracy in fossils of recent geologic record. To the best of our knowledge, no Barbie dolls were produced prior to 1956 AD, and carbon dating is likely to produce wildly inaccurate results.
Sadly, we must also deny your request that we approach the National Science Foundation's Phylogeny Department with the concept of assigning your specimen the scientific name "Australopithecus spiff-arino." Speaking personally, I, for one, fought tenaciously for the acceptance of your proposed taxonomy, but was ultimately voted down because the species name you selected was hyphenated, and didn't really sound like it might be Latin.
However, we gladly accept your generous donation of this fascinating specimen to the museum. While it is undoubtedly not a hominid fossil, it is, nonetheless, yet another riveting example of the great body of work you seem to accumulate here so effortlessly. You should know that our Director has reserved a special shelf in his own office for the display of the specimens you have previously submitted to the Institution, and the entire staff speculates daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site you have discovered in your back yard.
We eagerly anticipate your trip to our nation's capital that you proposed in your last letter, and several of us are pressing the Director to pay for it. We are particularly interested in hearing you expand on your theories surrounding the "trans-positating fillifitation of ferrous ions in a structural matrix" that makes the excellent juvenile Tyrannosaurus Rex femur you recently discovered take on the deceptive appearance of a rusty 9-mm Sears Craftsman automotive wrench.
Yours in Science,
Harvey Rowe, Curator, Antiquities
This interview comes from INN (with thanks to Dan Friedman). Jerry Gordon did an interview with Dr. Aryeh Eldad in New English Review in November 2008. It is still very relevant.
MK Knesset Aryeh Eldad (National Union) has no illusions about the upcoming talks between Israel and the Palestinians. He spoke frankly about these talks with Israel National News in an exclusive interview Sunday.
INN: What is your opinion of the upcoming talks?
MK Eldad: I think that Netanyahu put himself into a trap when he insisted on direct talks with the Palestinians. These are talks about everything, as was defined by the people invited to participate in them. These are talks about Jerusalem, about the demand to return refugees, about borders--everything. Even if Netanyahu was the strongest man on earth, which he is not, he is trapped. He is bound by some of his predecessors' commitments on previous talks.
They [the PA] will not start with him from the beginning, but rather with the Camp David agreement, with the Clinton plan, with what Olmert offered Abu Mazen [Mahmoud Abbas] in their direct talks. He is far beyond everything that the people who voted for him wanted him to be. So he is starting these direct talks in a very bad position, and I am sure that not only is he wrong in his claim that there will be no preconditions, but rather also the opposite; Obama and Clinton are making all efforts to have the talks begin with a de facto freeze on building in Judea and Samaria.
INN: Will the talks succeed in making the building freezes continue?:
MK Eldad: I think that Netanyahu will face and accept the demand to continue the building freeze. He will continue with no building in Jerusalem, which he has done from the first moment he was elected as Prime Minister. He did not build a single house in Jerusalem since elected, he did not hire a single contractor to build in Jerusalem, and he is doing nothing in Judea and Samaria either.
INN: Why are you so sure that Netanyahu won't stand strong?
MK Eldad: There are early signs for the collapse of Netanyahu. He has agreed to give land for the very acceptance of the Palestinians to sit with him. The ticket price he paid for direct talks was his agreement to build the road to a new Palestinian city called Roabi, near Ramallah. Netanyahu already promised that if they [the PA] would come to direct negotiations, then at the beginning of the talks, he will pass a decision in the Cabinet about changing the status of the land on which the Arabs want to build the road to this city. This he promised to the Americans and Palestinians. And it is amazing that he thinks he can give up the Land of Israel without the decision of the Knesset, not to mention any large-scale national referendum. To imagine that he will give land just for the agreement to talk to him.
These are early signs that Netanyahu is very, very weak and that he can't take a stand on points that he defines as major points for Israel. Once he said "no" to a Palestinian state, now he says "yes" to a Palestinian state. Once he said Jews can always build, now he says Jews cannot build. Once he said Israel will hold onto the Jordan valley, now he says he will accept an international body there. This is a total collapse.
All this will happen unless the Arabs will save us from our own Prime Minister, by breaking off from the talks, by not accepting the offer to go back to '67 borders, and to give them a capital in Jerusalem.
INN: Isn't Netanyahu better than the alternatives, Kadima and Labor?
MK Eldad: If you want to discover the differences between Likud, Kadima, and Labor, you need an electron microscope. There are no differences, it's all in the rhetoric. Once Netanyahu is at the discussion table, his rhetoric won't help him and he's going to give up everything.
INN: What can the Israeli public do to stop these things from happening?
MK Eldad: The public in Israel can demand from their representatives in the Likud, Shas, Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home), and Yisrael Beteinu (Israel Our Home), to remain faithful to their election promises. They were not elected to build a Palestinian state; they were alected to prevent one from rising. The ministers will not rebel against Netanyahu unless the public demands it. This is the duty of the public of Israel.
We have a Knesset Lobby for the Land of Israel comprising 41 Members of Knesset, and we can draw a very red line to Netanyahu and explain to him that he won't be able to pass any decision without losing his government. But if we want to trust every one of the 41 MKs, we need public pressure on them that they will remain faithful to the Land of Israel lobby. Public pressure is needed on Netanyahu and all the MKs and Ministers, who in their term will have to prevent a Palestinian state from becoming a reality.
INN: Many Jews, especially American Jews believed that Netanayu was different, stronger than other Israeli leaders. What happened to him?
MK Eldad: Nothing happened to Netanyahu; he was always very weak. He could speak very nicely but he could perform nothing. On political issues with the Palestinians, he is one of the weakest Prime Ministers we ever had.
Ehud Olmert talked to the Palestinians very nicely but gave them nothing in the end. Netanyanu has talked tough but is offering them a lot. Netanyahu was always good on theory, but always fails on the practical test. Land for Talks - that is what he is going to do. People still trust his image and not his real performance. They are going to be deeply disappointed.
Netanyahu was elected to prevent the creation of the Palestinian state, to produce something utterly different. But right away, he collapsed under pressure from Obama and declared his support for a Palestinian state. This is a complete collapse.
In contrast, the signs and chants of public-school-educated counter-protesters contained deep, mutually exclusive messages, cleverly calculated to confuse their opponents and create enough cognitive dissonance to send them running away in panic, scratching their heads to the bone and rolling their eyes out of their skulls.
