Grasshoppa

Surprise, surprise. As expected, the

Surprise, surprise. As expected, the UN called for the withdrawl of Israeli forces from Palestinian areas. Notice the lack of mention of the cause of the invasion, the Passover Massacre. It's particularly ironic to see the Russians, who are busy raping Chechnya, and the Chinese, who are currently occupying Tibet, vote for this resolution.

Someone (I forget who) once said, "Israel, a nation of Jews, is a Jew among nations." Never has that been more true.

Escalation? The network correspondents are

Escalation? The network correspondents are all in a tizzy...escalation of violence in the Middle East. The UN security council is meeting in an emergency session, concerned over the escalating violence. But I have to ask, is this an escalation? Over the past 3 days, about 30 Israelis have been murdered and now during this pointless incursion into Ramallah, a total of 7 Palestinians have been killed. This is an escalation? Please.

And I described the invasion of Ramallah as pointless because it will accomplish nothing. Despite what Stephen Den Beste may think, Israel won't kill Arafat because they know he'd become a martyr that the Arab world could rally arround. Busting up his compound isn't going to do a thing, unless this is merely a prelude to the complete destruction of the Palestinian Authority. The Israelis need to hunt down and liquidate the leadership of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Al-Aqsa Brigades. Only when this can be done will the terrorism stop. Maybe.

More peaceful overtures. From Arutz

More peaceful overtures. From Arutz 7:

Three persons have been killed and others seriously wounded by terrorist gunfire in the Shomron community of Elon Moreh a short time ago. The situation has not yet been declared under control, with terrorists having taken up in a home in a central neighborhood of the Shomron community. Additional confirmed details will be published as they become available.

Time to go Hamat on their asses, Arik.

Happy Passover Indeed. Even if

Happy Passover Indeed. Even if you’re barely connected to current events, it’s almost certain that you are aware that yet another brave Palestinian soul blew himself to kingdom come, taking at least 20 Israelis with him. At least 100 others with injured, some very seriously, making this one of the most devastating suicide bombings to date. Of course, we’ve gotten the usual hand wringing from the UN and various heads of state condemning the attack and any deaths of innocent civilians. Big deal.

Conversely, many of those in the blogging world are on the warpath. Indeed, at some level it is heartening to read the posts of the Stolipundit and the minions of Charles Johnson but then I wonder to myself, are these people representative of America (and the world) at large, or are they, at least with regards to Israel, a semi-incestuous group, who only reinforce each other’s views. I tend to believe it’s the latter. After all, for every outraged Damian Penny there are probably 50 anti-Semitic and/or anti-Israeli imbeciles over at whatreallyhappened.com or indymedia.com (neither of which I deign to link). For every shocked and dismayed Asparagirl we have an anti-Semitic apologist for Palestinian terrorism. To further illustrate my point, one need only to peruse the Fray at Slate or read this Talking Point over at the BBC (pointed out by Glen Kinen).

Stephen Green says, “Be very afraid of the American street.” Why, because it’s chock full of gas-guzzling SUV’s that are symbolic of our oil addiction which makes us beholden to the craven dictatorships and thugocracies that permeate the Mideast? I suspect the large majority of the American street greeted this massacre with a collective yawn. Perhaps some were horrified by the graphic scenes being beamed into their living rooms over CNN, but in the end, Israel is just another foreign country that is far away from their comfortable lives here in the US. Frankly, I don’t expect the average American to feel the outrage that I feel right now; Israel has no special meaning to them. It’s the foreign policy of the American government with which I take issue.

America is currently in the midst of a war on terrorism, rightfully striking back at those who attacked us and harbored those attackers. Yet, it will not let Israel do the same. When Israel invaded the Tulkarem refugee camp, it risked its soldier’s lives going door to door (or through the walls) trying to root out the terrorists while trying to minimize the number of civilian casualties. Yet, President Bush called this action “unhelpful” and sent in Anthony Zinni to try and mediate a ceasefire. What’s happened since? The Israelis pulled back, in an effort to facilitate Zinni’s mission and the Palestinians detonated 3 suicide bombers. This calculus doesn’t even include this aborted bombing attempt nor this attempt to smuggle in explosives using a Red Crescent ambulance. What does this all mean? Absolutely nothing. Bush gave his required “stop killing Israelis, Yasser” speech and meanwhile our cowardly Secretary of State declared Zinni will stay in the region to try and negotiate a ceasefire. After all, according to Powell, Zinni “… has made progress in recent days in bringing the two sides closer together toward the start of the Tenet plan.” I truly wonder what alternate universe Powell is living in.

It’s long past the time for the US to take the reigns off Israel, but it won’t happen. The US needs Israel to keep taking in on the chin (more like in the balls) while it continues its Sisyphean mission to garner support for an attack on Iraq. Memo to VP Cheney and the State Department: when Crown Price Abdullah and the Vice President of Iraq are seen kissing hellos at the Arab summit (as shown in the Reuters photo on the Ha’aretz homepage today), you’re not going to get any support from the Arab world for an invasion of Iraq. Besides, the US, like the rest of the world is enamored with the Saudi “peace plan” that was adopted by the Arab league, which is the same tired conditions dragged out like a set of home movies every ten years. I expect the next declaration from the Arab league will be of a really neat invention: it’s round and rolls on the ground, and by Allah, they’ve called it “the Wheel.”

But this grasping at the Saudi plan is just symptomatic of a larger problem of the Western World fooling itself about Arab intentions. The Arabs do not want peace with Israel, they want Israel in pieces until they get all of it. Don’t believe me? Just look at the words of the late so-called moderate, Faisal Husseni who described the Oslo peace process as a Trojan Horse. Take a look at the maps used by the Palestinian Authority that replace Israel behind the green line with “Palestine.” Listen to the words of Hamas and Hezbollah. They all say the same thing: Israel cannot exist.

As usual, Israel stands alone in it’s fight for survival against the Arab world. True, the United States has been a good ally, but the US has its own interests that it must pursue and those interests don’t necessarily align with those of Israel. And unless Israel decides to roll over and die, no country in the world will support her if she does what needs to be done. After a 50+ year hiatus, Jew hunting is in season again. If you don’t believe me, take a look at the debacle that occurred in Durban, the blatant anti-Semitism published throughout the Arab media, the more subtle anti-Semitism in the European media, or most telling, that Islamic Fundamentalists and David Duke can agree with each other. We even have European intellectuals comparing Ramallah to Auschwitz. Moreover, there’s been nary a peep from the Western world concerning Ken Layne ’s story about the $25,000 bounty provided to the families of those glorious suicide bombers by none other than Saddam Hussein. Not one country lifted a finger to counter the anti-Semitic diatribes at the recent UN Human Rights committee in Geneva. So I say to you, Ariel Sharon, do not worry about the reaction of the global community because they will hate you no matter what you do. Do not listen to the likes of those Jews who think that if we only give the terrorists what they want, they’d leave us alone. As yesterday's bombing showed, only the opposite is true. The Palestinians have no respect for the Israelis; they see them as soft and weak. The feel they can maim and murder Jews on the holiday that celebrates our freedom. But we are no longer free; we are prisoners of the fear caused by these terrorists, and unless the Israel government (and perhaps Jews all over) do something painful and decisive, we will remain prisoners...that is of course until we are all murdered.

Off to Long Island. I'm

Off to Long Island. I'm leaving for Long Island tomorrow for Passover, so I won't be blogging as much. I want to wish a Happy Pesach to my Jewish readers and an advanced Happy Easter to those who celebrate Easter.

Thanks! To the generous anonymous

Thanks! To the generous anonymous person who bought off my blogger ad, I offer you many thanks. It's heartening to think that someone thinks that what I have to say is worth reading.

Chomsky lies (again). In a

Chomsky lies (again). In a somewhat dated interview with Noam Chomsky, Chomsky says:

"Even simple facts are not reported. For example, as soon as the current fighting began last September 30, Israel immediately, the next day, began using U.S. helicopters (they can’t produce helicopters) to attack civilian targets. In the next couple of days they killed several dozen people in apartment complexes and elsewhere. The fighting was all in the occupied territories, and there was no Palestinian fire. The Palestinians were using stones. So this is people throwing stones against occupiers in a military occupation, legitimate resistance by world standards, insofar as the targets are military." [Emphasis mine]

The emphasized portion of that paragraph is the lie: Palestinians were already shooting back on Sept. 30, 2000. How do we know? Because that's when little Mohammed Dura was killed in a crossfire between the IDF and Palestinian gunmen. In fact a German documentary said it was much more likely that the boy was killed by his fellow Palestinians. Those sure are funny looking stones, aren't they, Noam?

Besides, those aren't the only incidents. I can't dig up the actual AP and Reuters articles but you can read the intros to some of them here. One of the more telling Reuters articles starts off with:

Palestinians stormed an Israeli army post in the Gaza Strip Monday and battled Israeli forces in the West Bank, as international concern grew over five days of violence in which at least 34 people have died

No doubt they stormed the army post armed only with rocks, right Noam?. Or better yet, lest anyone thinks these reports are pro-Israel biased, try reading this October 2, 2000 account written by none other than Deborah Sontag:

"During several exchanges of live ammunition with Palestinians sniping at them from rooftops and inside abandoned buildings, Israeli troops fired antitank rockets, lobbed grenades, shot from combat helicopters and maintained positions nearby in tanks."

The sniping must have been done with super-accurate slingshots, right Noam?

(Noam interview link via Middle East Realities.)

I wonder what Mary Robinson

I wonder what Mary Robinson will say. Two Norwegian international observers were killed by Palestinian terrorists in Hebron. No doubt the UN will find a way to blame Israel for this, probably for not providing adequate protection for the observers.

A Passover Joke

A British Jew is waiting in line to be knighted by the Queen. He is to kneel in front of her and recite a sentence in Latin when she taps him on the shoulders with her sword. However, when his turn comes, he panics in the excitement of the moment and forgets the Latin. Then, thinking fast, he recites the only other sentence he knows in a foreign language, which he remembers from the Passover seder... "Ma nishtana ha layla ha zeh mi kol ha laylot." Puzzled, Her Majesty turns to her advisor and whispers, "Why is this knight different from all other knights?"

Ha!

Send your friends into conniption

Send your friends into conniption fits. Wear this T-shirt.

Hosni's staying home.

Citing "Domestic committments", Egyptian President (for life) Hosni Mubarak has decided not to attend the Arab Leauge summit in Beirut.

I don't know the real reason behind his decision. Perhaps it's his way of protesting Israel's decision not to let Arafat attend. Or perhaps he doesn't want to attend yet another Arab League summit which, like all of its predecessors, will end up producing lots of anti-Israel/pro-Palestinian rhetoric but little else. Or maybe he's just worried about airport security.

Just add milk. I'm sorry,

Just add milk. I'm sorry, but Ghaddafi's idea of Isratine just sounds too much like Ovaltine. Except that Isratine is hazardous to your health.

Cowardly CNN. I was watching

Cowardly CNN. I was watching Crossfire last night and the first two guests were Congressman Anthony Wiener (D-NY) and Hasan Abdel Rahman, chief Palestinian representative to the U.S. The topic of discussion of course was the violence in the Middle East (duh). At the end of Bob Novak's smarmy Q&A session with Wiener (could Novak make his obvious dislike for Israel any clearer?), Wiener said the following:

"I'm saying that, frankly, he [Arafat] is, for all intensive purposes, we should treat him the same way we should treat Mullah Omar. Someone responsible for terrorism should be treated like a terrorist. You asked a hypothetical question. Is he a president or a prisoner? He should be a prisoner. The guy has committed crimes."

The camera turned to Bill Press, who then said to Rahman:

"Mr. Rahman, I want to disassociate myself from the last remark, but I do want to say I certainly believe that Vice President Cheney should meet with Chairman Arafat. I don't think the United States can be an honest broker if we only meet with one side."

To which I say to Bill Press, BAWK BAWK BAWK. Arafat hasn't committed crimes? Well even if Press thinks that the murder of Israelis is hunky dory, how about the assassination of US diplomats?

Look at me, look at

Look at me, look at me! Well since Asparagirl and Pejman can reveal themselves to the world, so can I. Check it out:

P.S. Hey Pejman, are you jealous of my glasses?

Too much free time. Someone

Too much free time. Someone obviously has it. Check it out. I think I'm going to have nightmares for awhile.

Links! Links! Links! I've added

Links! Links! Links! I've added several new permanent links over to the right. They are:

The Alley Writer: the blog world's angry white trash.

Makura No Soshi. Anyone who thinks I'm articulate definitely deserves a link back!

Yes, we have No Watermelons

The Opinion Native: a great resource for keeping up with current editorials regarding the Middle East.

Middle East Realities. Hey this guy put me on the same level as Damian Penny AND Andrew Sullivan.

Kyle Still. Someone thought he was good; someone bought off his banner ad...

Nazis nazis everywhere

Nazis nazis everywhere (nor any drop to drink?). If you read the rolls of blogdom lately, you'd think we've time warped back to 1939. After all, the Arabs think the Israelis are Nazis, Ted Rall thinks that Alan Keyes (and anyone else who dare criticize his work) is a Nazi, and now it seems, Libertarian Samizdata poster girl, Natalija Radic, thinks that the EUrocrats are a bunch of Nazis too. If poor Godwin were dead, he'd be rolling over in his grave.

Such uses of Nazi analogies are really symptoms of the inability to think of the issue at hand beyond anything but in the simplest of terms. Now I wouldn't expect much else from those Arab statesman or Ted Rall, but I would expect better from a regular member of the esteemed Samizdata crew. Now to be fair, Ms. Radic didn't say the Eurocrats were Nazis, she just decided to finish her post about Margaret Thatcher with a picture of the EU flag with a swastika in the middle of it. Nevertheless, to liken the EU to the next incarnation of the third reich is just plain childish. One would think that a proud Croat would be more familiar with what exactly Nazism entails, n'est-ce pas? When I see Panzers rolling out from Brussels (ha!) and various minorities being rounded up for extermination, then we can use the Nazi analogy. Until then, I suggest finding a better one.

I’ve been Farbered. Gary Farber

I’ve been Farbered. Gary Farber over at Amygdala takes issue with my reaction to that evil advertisement placed in Ha’aretz the other day. As such, I offer the following explanations:

1. I was trying to be dangerous a la Andrew Sullivan so that some jealous professional pundit could savage my blogging, thereby radically increasing my number of hits.

2. My amygdala wasn’t quite functioning properly.

3. I let my anger get the best of me. I was truly incensed that a fellow Jew could call for the outright murder of other Jews. I believe that one should have the right to say what he/she thinks, but I also think that one must take responsibility for what one says. In this case, the person placing that ad wasn’t just espousing a pro-Palestinian view, he was espousing attacks on discotheques, pizza shops and toy stores. I am rather ignorant when it comes to legal matters, but surely there must be some repercussions for this. However after seeing this act of barbarism, I cannot in good conscience call for the execution of the man who paid for that ad and thus I hereby retract my statement. Perhaps we can put him in the boxing ring with Danny Bonnaducci, instead.

I'm going to play Ira

I'm going to play Ira Stoll for a minute. In this New York Times piece, James Bennet and Todd Purdim write:

"But Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades is connected to Fatah. Members insist that they respect Mr. Arafat but do not take their orders regarding attacks from him. But Israeli officials say Mr. Arafat controls the organization and has encouraged its violence."

Yet, if we look at this MSNBC report on the Al Aksa Brigades,
we see that

"The al-Aqsa members interviewed said they would stop fighting if Arafat mandated it. “But if the Israelis continue attacking us, we will continue.”

Interesting. One article which is based on an interview, says that the Brigades would stop if Arafat said so, while the other article which paraphrases some unknown "members" says the opposite. Who should we believe?

Geoff to the rescue.

Allow me to try and convinceEmily Jones to quit her smoking habit:

One of the beautiful results of smoking is an increased likelihood of contracting laryngeal cancer. (For those of the uninitiated, that's cancer of the voicebox). I don't know the exactly statistics, but for my Master's thesis, I worked with 10 laryngectomy patients (i.e. they had their voice boxes surgically removed) and all of them were smokers. Anyhow, while a combiniation of chemo and radiation can sometimes effectively treat the cancer, often surgical removal of the larynx (laryngectomy) is the way to go. What this means is that these laryngectomees can't speak normally anymore and have to find a new way of talking. Some possibilities include esophageal speech or tracheo-esophageal speech but the most common is electrolaryngeal (EL) speech.

The electrolarynx acts a substitute voice box; when you turn it on it buzzes and when you place it against your neck, the buzzing sound is transmitted into the vocal tract where the sound is shaped by your articulators (your tongue, lips and teeth) to produce speech. Now while this all sounds good in theory, the problem is that electrolarynx users sound like robots...and I'm not talking C-3PO with his dapper English accent.

I know about all this because my Ph.D. thesis is involved in trying to understand why EL speech sounds so poor and then to improve the speech via a signal processing approach. Anyhow, because I'm involved in this line of research, I thought I'd present a couple of sound files for Emily to listen in hopes it will motivate her to stay off the butts. So I present to you a female (not Emily) talking with her normal voice and then using an electrolarynx:

Emily's voice

Emily's voice on cigarettes

Any questions?

Bet you won't see this

Bet you won't see this in the New York Times. While a big to do was made over the 300 IDF reservists who refused to serve in the terrirtories, somehow, I don't think there will be as much hoopla over this. In response to those refusnik reservists, a reserve company is volunteering to serve in the territories. A commander in a platoon of the company said, "

"Our whole aim is to bring attention to the fact we are doing reserve duty and see it as a national mission, which is contrary to all this refusal that is to my regret getting a lot more legitimacy. We thought the best way to confront the refusers was not to speak out on some talk show, but to actually do this kind of deed.... We are offering our help to the standing army, which is bearing the brunt of the burden lately."

Perhaps this will send a signal to those refusing to serve.

The continued truce. Another suicide

The continued truce. Another suicide bomber, may he be eternally buttraped by 72 ayatollahs, blew himself up in Jerusalem today. So far only injuries have been reported. Seems to me that it's clear Arafat cannot and/or doesn't want to end the violence.

Update The Jerusalem Post reports that there have been 2 deaths now. My condolences go out to their families.

What are they thinking? I'm

What are they thinking? I'm as pro-Israeli as they come, but when I read this, I can only shake my head in shame. Granted I don't live in Israel, but it seems obvious to me that to perpetrate this kinds of acts which can only anger the Israeli Bedouin community is counter productive. Israeli needs less enemies and this policy is producing the opposite effect. Memo to Israel: if you're going to treat non-Jews like dirt, then they're not going to be very loyal.

Another suicide bombing. Demonstrating the

Another suicide bombing. Demonstrating the Palestinian version of a cease fite, another suicide scumbag (may he be eternally buttraped by 72 Ayatollahs) blew himself up on a bus in Israel today, killing 7 people and wounding 30 others. What is particularly interesting about this bombing is that the bus that was chosen despite the fact that many Arabs typically travel on it. Indeed, while I haven't found any info about 3 of the 7 dead (4 of them were Israeli soldiers) some of the injured were Arabs, one of them being the niece of an Arab MK:

"Every morning I travel with fear," Masalha said from a hospital bed after suffering burns in the bombing. She said bombers made no distinction between Arabs and Jews. "I know that they don't care who you are."

Nevertheless, this didn't stop Islamic Jihad from boasting about the attack in a local mosque, nor did it prevent Preventive Security Service chiefs Jibril Rajoub and Muhammad Dahlan from praising the attack. Groups of Palestinians were reported to have celebrated on the streets upon hearing the announcement of the attack.

Thus, the world expects Israel to negotiate a ceasefire with those who praise and glorify such blatant attacks on civilians. Yet, while Kofi Annan laces into Israel for its inadvertant killing of civilians, we see no forthcoming criticism of the Palestinians for intentionally targetting civilians. This yet another example of how the UN is (to borrow a commonly used phrase) morally bankrupt.

Honestly, I don't know what Israel's response should be. I know that the emotional response is to hit back and hit back hard, but what good what it do? Israel will not hit back hard enough until it decides to ignore world opinion and do what needs to be done. It's time to take a cue from the King Hussein manual on dealing with Palestinians terrorists.

Bibiblog! Well not quite, but

Bibiblog! Well not quite, but Benjamin Netanyahu has his own website. I just thought the word "Bibiblog" sounded funny. (via Kesher Talk).

That's some shot. In a

That's some shot. In a freak accident, a young girl was killed when a puck hit her in the head while she was watching an NHL game. It's not all that surprising that a shot to head could kill someone, but what is surprising is that the puck hit her after deflecting off another fan. My condolences go out to the girl's family.

Palestinian willingness for a ceasefire.

Palestinian willingness for a ceasefire. According to the Jerusalem Post, Israel pulled it's troops out of the Palestinian Authority controlled areas to demonstrate that they are ready for a cease fire. Now let's take a look at the other side, to see how ready the Palestinians are:

1. An IDF officer was killed and three other soldiers were wounded, one seriously, when Palestinian gunmen opened fire in the Jordan Valley around 2:30 a.m.

5. The police and Border Police prevented a potentially deadly terror attack in the North yesterday when they apprehended two Palestinians armed with an automatic rifle, hand grenades, and other explosives.

Seems to me that the feeling is not mutual, but somehow, I don't think that General Zinni will see it that way until some real Jewish blood is spilled.

New Design. Well, I've changed

New Design. Well, I've changed the template on this thing, and while I'm happy with the overall design, I'm still working on the color scheme. More updates are sure to come.

Apologies.

Sorry for the lack of posts, but I am currently trying to renovate this site, plus I'm currently immersed in the (not so) arcane topic of MELP (Mixed Excitation Linear Predictive) Speech coding. Expect more in the next couple of days.

Stuff for sale. For those

Stuff for sale. For those that are interested, I have a bunch of stuff for sale that I'm trying to get rid of. The items range from a PalmIIIx that needs a new digitizer to a pair of ice hockey skates. See the whole list here. Thanks.

This is just sick. If

This is just sick. If there's any reason to believe that Israel won't survive this war, it's because Jews are their own worst enemies. As an example, take this ad in the Israeli paper, Ha'aretz:

". . .It must be understood that just as Menachem Begin, the commander of the Irgun, stopped his terror against the British only after achieving an arrangement to end the occupation, Arafat also must continue the terror until the problem of the Israeli occupation is resolved, since a cease-fire today on his part would be considered giving legitimacy to the settlements. . ."

Prof. Danny Gur

Although I'm all for freedom of speech, this man should be arrested and in my opinion, unceremoniously shot. Here is a Jew calling for the Palestinians to continue to slaughter and maim other Jews, adding more fuel to the terrorist fire. And shame on Ha'aretz for publishing this ad. Is this something the paper really wants to present to the public? It's not censorship to refuse to carry an advertisement.

You know, I read stories about this, and then I wonder why I even bother to care.

More splinters for Fisk.

According to Arutz Sheva, the terrorists who gunned down 6 Israelis in the Galilee crossed over from Lebanon. I wonder if Robert Fisk considers these injuries and fatalities to be mere splinters as well.

The question then is, assuming this assessment is true, how should Israeli respond? A terrorist group crossed a UN recognized border and shot up a bunch of civilians. Can anyone seriously ask Israel not to respond?

I suppose the Jews were

I suppose the Jews were behind this too. An investigation of EgyptAir Flight 990 by the NTSB has concluded that the crash was due to the actions of the pilot. Meanwhile, EgyptAir and Egyptian investigators steadfastly have rejected that one of the crew would have brought down the plane. They have pressed U.S. investigators on possible mechanical problems, particularly with the 767's flight-control system.

I remember hearing all the cries of outrage from the Arab world about how no religious Muslim would ever purposely crash a plane like that. Well, I think that after September 11, that claim just doesn't hold any water, does it.

New link added. Many thanks

New link added. Many thanks to the War Liberal for permalinking me. I have returned the favor.

Speaking of links, fellow Mudder, Paul Orwin finally updated his links and linked my humble blog. You know, Paul writes quite a bit in each entry which must take a decent amount of time..yet, it took him months to update his links which takes about 30 seconds. Anyhow, go read Paul, he's got some interesting things to say, especially about science.

More on France. Douglas over

More on France. Douglas over at the Beauty of Gray responds to my defense(!) of France. He defends his exclusion of Norman conquest because the Normans were actually Scandanavian immigrants, something I didn't know until Perry de Havilland of Libertarian Samizdata fame pointed out in the comments section. So his point is taken, but I do have another question. From my initial research on the Normans so far, I've read that they adopted much of the native French culture and language, just as many American imigrants do. So does this mean that those 1st or 2nd generation Americans who have made great contributions to society shouldn't be counted as American? Just wondering.

Douglas also feels that the German composers are better than the French, but concedes that this is a matter of taste. I can't argue there. I do thoroughly enjoy Beethoven, but I'll take Debussy, Ravel, or Bizet over Bach any day.

Suffice it to say, France has contributed a great deal to the world, but when it comes to modern times, it's time to realize that the era of French hegemony has ended.

Bawk bawk bawk. A leader

Bawk bawk bawk. A leader of the Tanzim was killed earlier today when a missile from an Apache helicopter stuck a chicken coop in which he and 2 other Palestinians were hiding. Imagine, a terrorist thug killed in a chicken coop...so ignoble yet so fitting.

Bombs away. Ben Sheriff says

Bombs away.
Ben Sheriff says we can kill the Marc Herold Afghan casualties meme by Googlebombing it. For the uninitiated, “Googlebombing” takes advantage of the fact that Google gives a high ranking to regularly updated sites; this means that if a lot of bloggers link to, say, Iain Murray’s take-down of the Herold Afghan casualties study, using relevant search terms like Afghanistan civilian casualties and Herold collateral damage and Marc Herold Afghanistan study, we can move Iain’s article to the top of Google’s search results.

Always happy to help.

Ah!! The secret ingredient! You

Ah!! The secret ingredient! You know, I've always claimed that my mother's Hamentashen (pastries that Jews eat on Purim) were the best I've ever tasted. But now, alas, those infernal Saudis have informed the world of my mom's secret ingredient: human blood!!

"I chose to [speak] about the Jewish holiday of Purim, because it is connected to the month of March. This holiday has some dangerous customs that will, no doubt, horrify you, and I apologize if any reader is harmed because of this."

As opposed to the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha which required the ritual slaughter of animals and Jewish journalists.

"During this holiday, the Jew must prepare very special pastries, the filling of which is not only costly and rare - it cannot be found at all on the local and international markets.Unfortunately, this filling cannot be left out, or substituted with any alternative serving the same purpose. For this holiday, the Jewish people must obtain human blood so that their clerics can prepare the holiday pastries. In other words, the practice cannot be carried out as required if human blood is not spilled!!"

I must say I am very impressed with my mom's wilyness. I mean I always thought she filled her Hamentashen with strawberry preserves or cream cheese or even prune jelly (ick). Now I know the truth: she's really a cleric who drains the blood of goyim so that she can send me such pleasing treats once a year.

"For this holiday, the victim must be a mature adolescent who is, of course, a non-Jew - that is, a Christian or a Muslim. His blood is taken and dried into granules. The cleric blends these granules into the pastry dough; they can also be saved for the next holiday. In contrast, for the Passover slaughtering, about which I intend to write one of these days, the blood of Christian and Muslim children under the age of 10 must be used, and the
cleric can mix the blood [into the dough] before or after dehydration."

Oh my, this man is obviously clued in to the most arcane of Kashrut laws concerning the age of children required for our ritual holiday sacrifices. Now I understand why both my parents work in public schools: they need sacrificial kids!

"Let us now examine how the victims' blood is spilled. For this, a needle-studded barrel is used; this is a kind of barrel, about the size of
the human body, with extremely sharp needles set in it on all sides. [These needles] pierce the victim's body, from the moment he is placed in the barrel."

"These needles do the job, and the victim's blood drips from him very slowly. Thus, the victim suffers dreadful torment - torment that affords the Jewish vampires great delight as they carefully monitor every detail of the blood-shedding with pleasure and love that are difficult to comprehend."

Oh for crying out loud!! Now we Jewish vampires are going to have to keep an eye out for Buffy. We're doomed now!

There's a bit more to read, and it would be laughable if it weren't so painfully obvious that this shit is actually believed to be true. Does anyone trully believe that Prince Abdullah really wants to make peace with Israel when his official news outlet is publishing this? If you do, then I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. Oh wait, Michael Bloomberg is already doing that.

Testing...glad to see that Blogger

Testing...glad to see that Blogger is working again.

A defense of the French...sort

A defense of the French...sort of. France has always been a source of congnitive dissonance for me because while I've always had great experiences in France, and have make some good French friends, the actions of the French government, and thinly veiled anti-Semitism which has permeated France has always infuriated me. In fact, I can think of no other group of people short of the Palestinians who have angered me more than the French. That being said, I feel the need to respond to Douglas Turnbull's "Fuck France" rant (as the Vodkapundit put it) over at the Beauty of Gray. So here goes:

Douglas makes several good points; the one's regarding France's disasterous history of colonialism and aftermath, as well as the one discussing its current craven foreign policy are particularly damning. Nevertheless I have to respond to a couple of specific sections:

Douglas writes:

"France has, with one or two exceptions, been a second rate country militarily its entire history. Thirty years under Charlemagne and fifteen under Napoleon, and that’s pretty much it during 1000 years of history. In most of the major engagements during the Hundred Years War, small English expeditionary forces annihilated larger and better equipped French armies."

That may be true, but you've neglected to mention a major French victory which was recorded famously on the Bayeux Tapestry: the Norman Conquest of 1066. The crowning of William the Conquerer as King of England ended the Anglo-Saxon rule of England and forever changed the culture and language of the English.

"Despite French cultural hegemony in Europe for several centuries, the French contribution has been notable more for its lack of genius and inspiration rather than its brilliance. There were no French composers to match Germany, no painters to match Italy or the Netherlands, no engineers to match England or the US, no novelists to match Russia, no poets to match England. In each field, France has produced one or two major figures, if that, a remarkable lack of achievement given her large population and central position in Western Europe."

This is obviously a matter of opinion and neglects the rise and fall of different nations' dominance in different areas of culture. So, for example, Italy may have dominated Renaissance painting (c.f. Michangelo, DaVinci, Raphael, etc.), and the Dutch painters (Rembrandt, Vermeer) dominated the Baroque period, French painters (Manet, Monet, Degas, Renoir, etc.) sparked an artistic revolution with the advent of Impressionism. You can raise me German composers Brahms, Beethoven, and Handel, and I'll see you French composers Ravel, Debussy, Saint-Saens and Berlioz. Indeed the French weren't famous for their novelists (save for Flaubert and his Madame Bovary), but their philosophes, Votaire, Rousseau, Diderot, etc. had a great imact on European culture. It was in fact Diderot who helped direct the creation of the first Encyclopedia. And while France may not be well known for its engineers, it has produced several important mathematicians: Pascal, Descartes, Cauchy, Poisson, Fourier, and even de Fermat, whose cute little theorem remained unproven until only a couple of years ago.

The point is that despite France's many short comings throughout its history (and there are many), they have produced a great deal that have contributed to the advancement of Western Civilization. There is no reason to alter and ignore history in order to minimize those contributions.

Edited on 3/12/01 for typos

Wow. I am thoroughly impressed

Wow. I am thoroughly impressed and moved by the Towers of Light memorial in NYC. I will be sure to check it out when I'm in New York in a couple of weeks.

More fun with the French.

More fun with the French. An interesting little tid bit that I stumbled upon: Recently, the esteemed French university, the Sorbonne, granted Mustafa Talas a doctorate in history. For those of you who are unfamiliar with "Dr." Talas, he is the Syrian Defense Minister who not only blamed the Mossad for the September 11 attacks, but also wrote "The Matzah of Zion" which rehashes the Damascus blood libel. In 1840. the leaders of the Jewish community in Damascus were accused of murdering a Christian priest and his servant, in order to use their blood in the baking of Passover Matzah.

I'm glad to see that the Sorbonne has such high standards for its doctoral students. I wonder if David Irving should apply.

Bad Samizdata history. In discussing

Bad Samizdata history. In discussing the "What if?" idea of human history, the folks atLibertarian Samizdata write:

"Or what of the Assyrian army that was just about to obliterate Jerusalem and strangle the Jewish religion at birth, in 701 BC? It caught a plague and died. The Jews, instead of ceasing to exist as a coherent people, regarded themselves from then on as chosen ones whose God had made a particular point of saving them, unlike all the other gods in the area who had proved useless against the Assyrians. Take away that plague, and western civilisation turns out just a bit different, doesn't it?"

By the time the Assyrian conquest of Israel occured, the Jewish religion was already well established (in its pre-rabbinical form). The Israelites had already lived a couple hundred years under the rule of the Judges (you'd think a libertarian would be very familiar with a period of living under a de-centralized government), and under the rule of three kings: Saul, David, and Solomon. The Hebrews had already thought of themselves as "chosen" by vitue of the Exodus from Egypt and the conquest of Canaan.

While I don't dispute the fact that things would have been different had the Assyrians conquered Jerusalem, I do take issue with say that the Jewish religion was nascent at the time.

Damning photos. The BBC is

Damning photos. The BBC is publishing 5 photos which appear to show Israeli police "executing" an attempted suicide bomber. These photos, captured by an amateur photographer, have caused a furor throughout the Arab world. Surprisingly, the BBC describes the photos as inconclusive, but it won't stop those anti-Israeli folk from pointing this incident out as indicitive of Israeli brutality. I tend to agree that the photos are inconclusive, since it's difficult to tell what exactly is going on. The 4th photo shows a policeman aiming his gun at the terrorist, but it's impossible to tell if he is firing, has fired, or will fire his gun.

Frankly, other than the fact that this incident is going to damage Israel's public image (although I don't see how it could get much worse at this point), I don't have a problem with what happened. The man wanted to die; the police merely helped him out.

Gun fire on Israel's northern

Gun fire on Israel's northern border. I wonder if Robert Fisk considers this to be just a few "splinters."

Comment testing, bear with me...

Comment testing, bear with me...

It works, master, it works!

Dershowitz gets nasty. Noted conservative

Dershowitz gets nasty. Noted conservative warmonger Alan Dershowitz has a couple idea of how to combat Palestinian terrorism. The gist of it is that Israel announce a unilateral cessation of hostilities for a short period of 4 days or so. However, Israel also announces that every time there is terrorist attack committed during that moritorium, she will give the residents of one Palestian village 24 hour notice that their village will be destroyed. Moreover, everytime there is a terrorist attack Israel will confiscate more of the territories and render them non-negotiable.

It's an interesting idea, but I don't know that Sharon would have the cajones to follow though with it. Dershowitz claims that Israel shouldn't be criticized if she indeed does destroy a village or two, but somehow I can't see the Palestinian sympathizers in Europe keeping their mouths shut. It's plainly obvious that as long as Israel does anything short of rolling over and playing dead, she will be the target of harsh critcism from the rest of the world.

Slow blogging days. To those

Slow blogging days. To those of you who read this, especially the nice person who made a donation to my cause, I apologzie for the lack of posts. It's been so beautiful here in Boston that I feel the need to be outside. Besides, I don't have the will to comment on the latest suicide bombing in Jerusalem.
I'll be back tomorrow.

He is our president? Here's

He is our president? Here's a funny story reported in the Washington Post:

"Here's a vignette we're dying to see on the ABC broadcast of Sunday's Ford's Theatre Presidential Gala: When Stevie Wonder sat down at the keyboard center stage, President Bush in the front row got very excited. He smiled and started waving at Wonder, who understandably did not respond. After a moment Bush realized his mistake and slowly dropped the errant hand back to his lap. 'I know I shouldn't have,' a witness told us yesterday, 'but I started laughing.'

I wonder what GWB ass-kisser supreme, Andrew Sullivan would have to say. Actually, I know that Sullivan has been critical of Bush's decision to impose a steel tariff, but if you notice, he assigns most of the blame to Karl Rove. Sorry, Andrew, but Bush is the president, and as such he chooses his advisors and the advice he follows. If he gets your unending praise for the way he's handled affairs after Sept. 11, then he deserves to take the criticism when he makes boneheaded decisions.

Some quick hits: Things are

Some quick hits:

• Things are going to get even nastier in the West Bank. According to the Jerusalem Post, the IDF has surrounded 300 Palestinian gunmen in Tulkarem and is deciding what do with them. Expect a bloodbath.

• If you want to know the difference between IDF doctrine and Palestinian terrorist "doctrine," look no further than this quote from a leader of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs brigade concerning his choice of targets:
  "Many of us know Israel very well and know the restaurants, cinemas and theaters"
  

Take Frank Herbert's advice. In

Take Frank Herbert's advice. In one of my favorite novels of all time, Dune, during the Harkonnen invasion of Arrakis, they use artillery pieces to seal in the Atreides army that ran into caves to hide. Now I realize that my knowledge of things military and the terrain of the area where operation Anaconda is taking place are limited, but why not bring in some howitzers and seal in those Al-Qaeda/Taliban fighters. Let them die a slow death sealed in those caves.

More on raisins. There's been

More on raisins. There's been some mention in blogworld about NY Times story about how Islamic martyrs are really promised 70 white raisins and not 70 virgins in heaven. (Note that I blogged about this long ago...). Then I looked at the official menu of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay when I spotted this:

Lunch – Pasta/vegetable stew, dry cereal, box of raisins, two granola bars, bag of chips, bag of peanuts, bottle of water

Ah ha! They got their raisins and they didn't even have to die. The nerve of some people to call the prison camp the "Real Auschwitz". They should call it "Heaven."

(menu found via the Expatpundit)

Star Wars coming to a

Star Wars coming to a (war) theatre near you According to an article in the World Tribune, the US military is now going to arm those AC-130 gunships with laser cannons. I'm skeptical of this, but i'd love to see this scene unfold:

". I ask those people to picture this typical scene playing out in some dusty terrorist-friendly land like Somalia, Yemen, Iran, Palestine or Iraq: A radical mullah preaches violence against the western democracies to a crowd of thousands in a busy downtown plaza. The crowd chants and cheers as the mullah describes the atrocities committed by the bloodthirsty western pagans against the pious people of God. The crowd agrees that God is with them and that He would smile upon their acts of vengeance against the infidels.

Now tell me: When you saw your preacher telling the crowd “God told me it is okay for us to kill people for Him” suddenly vaporize in a flash of light, wouldn’t you know that God isn’t really on your side after all? Ask anyone and they’ll tell you that whole “thunderbolt from the skies” thing is God’s patented Modus Operandi...

Priceless. (via Banana Counting Monkey)

Where there's a Will... You

Where there's a Will... You know Bush pissed off conservatives when George Will (George Will!!) writes this:

Proving himself less principled than Bill Clinton regarding the free-trade principles that are indispensable to world prosperity and comity, President Bush has done what Clinton refused to do. [Emphasis mine]

More Footing. I received the

More Footing. I received the following email from John Farren giving some background on the aforementioned John Foot:

"As a Brit used to Mr Foot's vile version of right-on moral blindness, I can assure you that he did feel pretty much the same about the IRA. He has a long term association with the Socialist Workers Party which is a Trotskyite party with a long running campaign for unilateral British withdrawal from N.Ireland, political status for IRA prisoners, etc. "

Enjoy your raisins Another suicide

Enjoy your raisins Another suicide bomber blew himself up, this time in the settlement of Ariel on the West Bank, injuring 5 Israelis, one critically. When asked to describe the event, a policeman was quoted as saying:

"It's a suicide bomber and he's dead."

I just hope he didn't have the chance to reproduce.

My very own google bomb.

My very own google bomb. Well not exactly. It was completely unintended, and I'm sure that given the amount of verbiage dedicated to lambasting Ted Rall that I'm not the only one experiencing this, but looking at my site meter, it amazes me how many people have hit this site for the search "Ted Rall widow cartoon." Frankly I hope that from now own, all searches on Ted Rall go here and here, and here.

More on that Foot (in

More on that Foot (in mouth disease) piece. Dr. Frank has a more subdued response.

What's that you say, Mrs.

What's that you say, Mrs. Robinson? After meeting in Beirut in 3 days with elightened tolerant Lebanese officials, UN high commissioner for human rights, Mary Robinson said that anti-Arab and Muslim Xenophobia must be combatted in the West.

"What I underestimated is the extent of the kind of broad prejudice and xenophobia that now manifests itself," Mary Robinson told reporters in Beirut. "It worries me greatly and everything must be done to combat it."

"I have heard many people say how it hurts them to hear the word Islamic terrorism, ... but you don't talk about Christian terrorism," she said.

My understanding is that 19 Arabs flew 3 planes into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. I understand that based on a recent survey, most of the Arab/Muslim world doesn't like the United States. Moreover, I understand that while there have been calls by leaders, journalists and pundits throughought the United States and Europe not to lash out at innocent Muslims and Arabs, the Arab press has been busy whipping up anti-American sentiment. Must I mention the curricula taught in the schools of our Saudi "allies?" And finally, while I'm being so understanding, I feel the need to once again point out that Arabs and Muslims, of whom we understand so very letting, have been busy in Europe calling for the death of all Jews, torching synagogues, beating up rabbis and making death threats to children who want to watch a movie. Frankly, Mrs. Robinson, I understand quite a bit.

The truth can be ugly.

The truth can be ugly. Sgt. Stryker says what needs to be said about the deteriorating situation in the Middle East. I've been thinking along the same lines, but I've been reluctant to articulate my thoughts on this matter.

Go figure. Of course, the

Go figure. Of course, the one time (ok, one of the very few times) I actually use profanity in my blog posts, I get noticed by none other than Matt Welch. I guess I truly lived up to that dorm award I got back in college for "most likely to use the word "fuck" in a sentence."

Well, welcome to all you newcomers, I hope you keep coming back.

All talk, no action. Pejmanpundit

All talk, no action. Pejmanpundit claims the mantle of the surrogate Instapundit for today since the Professor is off talking to a legislature. But, as of 3:50 pm EST, the Instapundit has made 4 posts, and Pejman has written nary a word. Show us the love, Pejman!

Update. I spoke too soon, since now Pejman has given us mad love in the form of 11 posts.

Wow! I guess my little

Wow! I guess my little riff has gotten some attention from Charles Johnson and Damian Penny. Thanks for the links guys, and welcome to all the new visitors.

By the way, I fixed the glaring typo in that thing. Ugh.

Update. I see that Jay Zilber also likes it.

Proof of the World Zionist

Proof of the World Zionist Conspiracy Apparently, Jews have taken over the Onion. (via USAJewish.com)

Take it back. Not that

Take it back. Not that it will do much good, but go here anyway.

This is sure to get

This is sure to get Andrew Sullivan in a tizzy. Our favorite Egyptian columnists react to a protest led by French composer and multimedia artist Jean Michel Jarre over the Egypitan treatment of homosexuals. Some pithy quotes:

Al-Akhbar columnist Suniya 'Abbas addressed Jarre directly: "Who are you to protest [the treatment of homosexuals in Egypt]? Who told you that perverts have rights in Egypt, that you should defend them?! Who told you we would accept your protest, or the protest of the entire world, and defend the perverts?! Who told you this protest would be echoed by any [Egyptian] official?!

Al-Akhbar columnist Wagih Abu Zikra wrote: "With nausea and repulsion, I have followed the news of the perverts arrested in the Al-Bouhayra district, and how the pathological report determined their guilt. What moral debasement has this group reached? What kind of people are they, with no religion, moral values, or honor? And yet there are people in the West who defend them - even hold a march in Paris in their honor, claiming human rights. What human? What rights?!

Your tax dollars at work.

But he still got 38%.

But he still got 38%. Gary Condit lost the Democratic primary for the 18th Congressional District, yet for some unknown reason 38% of the public voted for him. Why?

Just another ignorant fucktard from

Just another ignorant fucktard from the Guardian. Normally, I try to refrain from using profanity in my posts, but after reading this pathetic excuse for a column by Paul Foot (up his ass), which is probably better suited to be published in Arab News I couldn't help myself. I apologize in advance for those of you with sensitive eyes.

In short, this article is nothing short of an apology for Palestinian terrorism. Simply put, Israeli violence is bad, Palestinian violence is good. But let's dissect this thing as if it were the decayed caracass of a pig whose stench it mimics:

"The cycle of death goes on and on. Nearly 50 Palestinians dead in the Israeli army attacks on refugee camps over the past couple of days; 10 Israeli soldiers dead at an army checkpoint near Ramallah. In the west there is a universal shaking of sophisticated heads and a weary, liberal sigh."

No, 7 of those murdered were soldiers; the other 3 were civilians. I realize that this doesn't resonate with you, Mr. Foot, since in your mind, all Israelis are legitimate targets because they're all "oppressors." Furthermore, albeit not surprisingly, you seemed to have conveniently neglected to mention the 9 civilians murdered by a suicide bomber in Jerusalem. Oh and in case you didn't notice, the Jews that were murdered are decidely non-Zionist.

The refugee camps invaded by Israeli troops last week are inhabited by people whose parents or grandparents were flung out of their homes and their lands more than half a century ago and have had to watch those lands being occupied and confiscated by Israelis. The reason Israeli troops have the audacity to invade those camps today is that their predecessors, by means of entirely illegal military invasions, conquered the West Bank of Jordan, divided it up into cantons or bantustans and imposed on them equally illegal and ludicrously privileged "settlements".

Of course we won't mention that the reason their ancestors were "flung" out of their homes was because 5 Arab nations tried to annihilate Israel and push all those damn Jews into the sea, will we Mr. Foot? Or we won't mention that it wasn't an "illegal military invasion" that led to Israel's conquest of the the West Bank from Jordan (not the Palestinians). Jordan attacked Israel despite warnings not to do so. And before you accuse Israel of starting the 6 Day War, I must remind you that Nasser's blockade of the Straits of Tiran was a casus belli under the international law which you claim to hold so dearly.

"The violence of the Israeli army and police in those regions is the violence of the oppressor, and the consequent violence of the Palestinians is the resistance of the oppressed. Anyone who favours the Israeli occupation of the areas, or the settlements, or who denies the right of violent resistance to the Palestinians is siding unequivocally with the oppressor against the oppressed. "

Ah and here we have it, the pièce de résistance of moral equivalency. Actually this goes above and beyond the everyday moral equivalency put out by the media outlets and out and out justifies all Palestinian violence as the violence of resistance. In other words, blowing up discotheques full of teenagers, Sbarros full of civilians, shooting up restaurants, luring teenagers over the internet to be murdered, murdering and mutilating teenage hikers, putting a bullet in the head of an infant etc. etc. are all hunky dory. I wonder if Mr. Foot feels the same about the IRA.

If the reason for the violence is the illegal occupation of Palestinian territory, then the obvious solution is for the Israelis to get out of that territory and disband the settlements. If the Israeli government just won't budge on either withdrawal or the settlements, then the obvious answer is for the west to impose sanctions - to cut off the massive economic subsidies and arms shipments that have built up the Israeli economy and its military machine.

Oh yes, the simplistic, "just leave the territories and all will be ok" approach. Excuse me, but didn't we try this at Camp David a couple of years ago? What's that you say, the Israeli offer wasn't good enough. Fine, then make a counter offer. But no such counter offer was in the offing. Instead, the Palestinians took their ball, went home, packed it full of explosives and rolled it into discos, restaruants, and bus stations across Israel. Moreover, Mr. Foot seems to forget about that festering problem of all those "refugees" who were "flung" (remember?) from their homes in 1948 and now insist on their "right of return" back to Israel which was the major sticking point in the Camp David and later the Taba negotiations. And while we're at it, where does this "right of return" come from? It come from General Assembly Resoluion 194, and anyone as knowledeable as a Guardian columnist knows, General Assembly resolutions are recommendations and non-binding. Furthermore, in a great stroke of hypocrisy, while the Arabs insist on this right of return, the Arab nations actually voted against the resolution. I just thought you'd like to know that, Mr. Foot.

Especially pathetic on the part of our apologists for Israeli oppression is their bleating about anti-semitism. For the sort of oppression they favour is the seed from which all racialism, including anti-semitism, grows. There is a solution to the Palestine conflict. It depends on the withdrawal of Israeli forces and the disbandment of the settlements. Such a solution is easily within the grasp of western diplomacy, and would stop the killing.

Ah here we go, those of us pro-Israeli folk are really apologists for oppression and we just whine about anti-Semitism. Of course, the torching of Synagogues, beating up of rabbis, threating kids who want to watch the Harry Potter movie are all legitimate forms of critcizing Israel!! I had no idea. And I find it edifying to realize that printing a cover with the title "Kosher Conspiracy" is perfectly non-anti-Semitic as well. Well Mr. Foot, we're not all knee-jerk whiners (unlike your ilk) and prehaps if you read that comment published in your rag, you'd realize it. Suffice it to say, Mr. Foot, you are a hopeless ignorant schmuck and I wish upon you the fate of your compatriot, Robert Fisk during his Afghan tour. Truly, I do.

New link. I've returned the

New link. I've returned the favor and added a permanent link to Asparagirl

And they wonder why people

And they wonder why people make fun of Frats. Cock fights, strippers and drunk homeless people oh my!

More on Ted Rall's "comic."

More on Ted Rall's "comic." It appears Charles Johnson's campaign to contact the NY Times about that comic has led to its removal. At least when I click on the link, i get a 404 error.

Update. According to the AbsolutPundit, the NY Times has officially pulled the comic. Good. Now all we have to wait for is Ted Rall's inevitable whining about how his 1st ammendment rights were trampled. I suggest he read the Kierkegaard quote at the top of this blog.

Many thanks to Andrea Harris

Many thanks to Andrea Harris for her condolences on the passing of my aunt.

I feel so proud. This

I feel so proud. This blog came up on a google search for "john pilger falsehoods." Then again, it also came up on a search for "Mr. horny."

This is nothing short of odious

I know this Ted Rall Cartoon has been mentioned on every blog I've read so far, but it so disgusts me that I had to post it here. I cannot believe that the NY Times would have the gall to publish this thing. Picking on widows of terror victims, Ted? What's next, lampooning the children of Andrea Yates?

I sincerely think we bloggers ought to form a campaign against Ted Rall, hopefully ruining his career. The fact that he actually makes money producing this tripe boggles the mind.

It's gone far beyond a

It's gone far beyond a liberation movement when the Palestinians set off a suicide bomber in an anti-Zionist Jewish neighborhood. (via Vodkapundit.)

This is not good. IDF

This is not good. IDF kills six civilians in tank shelling
By The IDF apologized but somehow, I don't anyone is going to much care.

"A declaration of war." Israel

"A declaration of war." Israel has decided to halt construction of a mosque adjacent to the Basilica of the Annunciation church in Nazareth after the complaints of Christians both in Israel and abroad. Not surprsingly, the local Muslim population is angry, however, the statement of Arab MK, Abdulmalik Dehamshe, was nothing short of disgusting:

"This is a declaration of war on the Arab community in Israel. This mosque will be built, but beforehand there will be terrible days ahead."

Think about that statement for a minute. Dehamshe didn't say it was an "insult" nor an "affront", but a "declaration of war" Given the tinderbox atmosphere currently in Israel and the territories, is it at all responsible for a member of the Israel Knesset to make such statements? Is there any doubt that Dehamshe wants to open up another front against Israel by instigate another riot by Israeli Arabs. After all, he helped incite the violence after Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount which has brought us all to the present situation. With statements like the one Dehamshe made, it's hard not to see the leaders of the Israeli Arab community as a 5th column, bent on the destruction of Israel.

The reaction to Israel's decision is also symbolic of what appears to be the typical Muslim reaction to any decision that does not go their way. While Israel has halted the mosque construction on that particular spot, it has proposed 7 alternative sites to build the mosque. Moreover, because the site is claimed to be the grave of Shahib al-Din,a nephew of Saladin, the Israeli government has promised to restore the gravesite. Let's recap here: Muslims and Christians are arguing over a holy site, Israel tries to make an equitable compromise, the Muslims are unhappy and see the decision as tantamount to a declaration of war. How can one possibly reason with people with this kind of attitude? If they cannot compromise over a decidedly minor holy site, how can anyone expect them to compromise over the holy sites in Jerusalem?

Blog labels. There's been some

Blog labels. There's been some discussion as to what to call various blogs...warblogs, poliblogs, anti-idiotarianblogs, etc. etc. I simply vote for "smartblogs."

I'm back. I made it

I'm back. I made it back in from NY last night. Everytime I take a hiatus from blogging, all hell breaks lose in the Middle East. This is obviously a sign for me to blog continuously.

No posts Sorry for the

No posts Sorry for the lack of posts. I had to rush down to New York today for my aunt's funeral. I probably won't post anything new until Sunday.