Augean Stables

This appeared today in the WSJ. (hat tip Anti-Dhimmi). It is a fascinating case study of a Europe torn apart by it’s incipient awakening to its danger. Some people are still playing conventional “post-modern” roles of appeasers and apologists who get nasty with people on their own side for offending people on the other side. Others are beginning to speak out. For those of you who think this is a sign of how bad things are, having worked on the al Durah affair in France, and the wall of homertà that descended there, this is a half-full cup.

Tying Down Academic Freedom
By PIETER W. VAN DER HORST
June 30, 2006

Earlier this month, after 37 years of teaching, I retired from the chair of Early Christian and Early Jewish Studies at Utrecht University. In my valedictory speech, “The Myth of Jewish Cannibalism,” I intended to trace the accusation that Jews eat human flesh from its Greco-Roman origins through the Christian Middle Ages and the Nazi period to the present-day Muslim world. Much of the Islamic vilification of Jews has its roots in German fascism. Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” has been on the best-seller lists in many Middle Eastern countries. The sympathy for Nazism goes back to the Führer’s days. Palestinian leader Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, even closely cooperated with Hitler. He spent the war years in Berlin and visited Auschwitz, a trip that inspired his plans to build a concentration camp in Palestine.

In the Middle East of today, the demonization of Jews has reached unprecedented levels. Jews are accused of every evil under the sun, from cannibalism to the attacks on the Twin Towers, to causing the tsunami, the bird flu, AIDS and so on. At the end of my lecture I wanted to point out that it is our shared duty to combat this kind of anti-Jewish propaganda in the Muslim world. Nothing too controversial for a speech at a European university — or so I thought.

Much to my surprise, though, the dean of the faculty asked me to delete the passage on Islamic Jew hatred. When I refused, she referred the matter to the highest university administrator, the rector magnificus, who summoned me to his office to appear before a committee of four professors (including the rector himself). The committee presented three reasons for removing the Muslim passages.

They claimed it was too dangerous to give the complete lecture because it might trigger violent reactions from “well-organized Muslim student groups” for which the rector could not take any responsibility. The committee also said it feared my speech would thwart efforts at bridge-building between Muslims and non-Muslims at the university. Finally, they claimed my lecture was far below the university’s scholarly standards, especially because of some sarcastic remarks about Dutch public figures (whom I criticize for their anti-Jewish position). “We feel we have to protect you from yourself,” I was told. The rector said I had 24 hours to drop the controversial section. If not, he would have to assume his “rectorial responsibility.” I wasn’t sure what this meant, but it sounded very threatening.

I went home in a state of total confusion. I sensed the committee had exaggerated the dangers to make me toe the line of political correctness. At the same time, I could not independently assess the risks. And so I decided to submit an expurgated text because I did not want to expose myself and others to potential danger.

But since the committee also challenged my academic reputation, I decided to ask several scholars for their opinion, including three professors of Islamic studies, history and philosophy. They all praised it as an excellent piece of work, well documented and eminently relevant. They agreed that my polemical remarks about the tenacity of this anti-Jewish myth are wholly appropriate and did not in any way diminish the academic value of my work. Most importantly, they concluded that the text would definitely not infuriate Muslims because I do not say anything offensive about Islam as such, the prophet or the Quran. When I informed the rector of the conclusions of my peers, his sole reaction was: “Yet my solution is the best.”

Only a day after my farewell lecture in its castrated form, the news about this case of academic censorship was on the front pages of many Dutch newspapers and broadcast on radio and TV. Without my knowledge, the colleagues who had reviewed my lecture had contacted the media.

The university soon launched a counterattack. The rector first suggested that my account of censorship was untrue, that no one had exerted any pressure and that I voluntarily adopted the university’s advice. When I insisted that the meeting I remembered was much more of a nightmarish nature than the friendly chitchat the university portrayed, a second, nastier line of attack ensued. I was suddenly pictured as someone who could have disgraced the university with a lecture that was supposedly beyond the pale. In the meantime, though, several newspapers had published the uncensored text so that everyone could form their own opinion. The expressions of support and gratitude I received were overwhelming and came from many academics at Dutch universities and prominent members of the Jewish community in the Netherlands. I did not receive a single negative, let alone threatening, Muslim reaction, although some of them said I could have spoken in less general terms, which is fair enough.

Fortunately, there are signs that the debate is gradually moving away from my incident toward the important issues at stake: academic freedom and Islamic Jew-hatred. If for fear of violence, real or imagined, academic freedom is curtailed, it bodes ill for our universities. If something as serious as Islamic Jew hatred cannot be subject of public debate, it bodes ill for society at large.

Mr. van der Horst is professor emeritus for Early Christian and Early Jewish Studies at Utrecht University.

MEMRI posted selections from a remarkable article by an Iraqi reformer. The article is remarkable for its forthrightness, saying things I would hesitate to say if only because it’s so harsh. But it connects closely with much of what I was led to think as I wrote my paper on conspiracy theory. Now we need an analysis of why moonbats like Arab schizophrenics.

Special Dispatch-Iraq/Reform Project
June 21, 2006
No. 1190

Iraqi Reformist on Arab Society and Social Schizophrenia

In an article titled “Arab Society and Schizophrenia,” Iraqi reformist Dr. Abd Al-Khaleq Hussein, who writes on several reformist websites, argues that Arab society suffers from “social schizophrenia,” — the symptoms of which are similar to those of individuals suffering from actual schizophrenia. He further argues that the Arab governments must immediately launch social and political reforms which will gradually lead to democracy in the Arab world. If significant reforms are not carried out, he says, disasters will continue to strike the Arab word, and democracy will ultimately be imposed upon it through violent upheavals, as occurred in Iraq. In the article, he also called upon the Arabs to accept the help offered to them by the West - and especially by the U. S. - with the aim of facilitating positive change that will permit them to integrate into the international community.

The following are excerpts from the article:

This Split Personality Disorder Characterizes Not Only Specific Sectors of Arab Society, But [Also] the Governments, the Institutions of Civil Society, and the [Political] Parties

Schizophrenia’ is a word in ancient Greek that means ’split personality’… but it is also used in the social sciences to describe societies afflicted by severe duality in their behavior and their [moral] standards. In fact, if we carefully compare the medical and social forms of this disorder, we will find that the symptoms are very similar…

Iraqi social scientist Ali Al-Wardi was the first to characterize the Iraqi people as suffering from this severe social illness, which he labeled ’split personality.’ According to his theory, Iraqis suffer… from a conflict between the Bedouin values that have been passed down through the generations and the cultural values that the Iraqi society has acquired…

As an illustration, he presents the example of a young Iraqi who wishes to choose his own wife, just like an enlightened Western man, and to exchange love letters with her,… but when he hears that some other man has similar relations with his sister or cousin, he immediately turns into a ‘Bedouin’ and murders his beloved sister and her lover…

This split personality disorder characterizes not only specific sectors of Arab society, but [also] the governments, the institutions of civil society, and the [political] parties, especially the Islamic ones…

The social and medical forms of this disorder have similar symptoms. The most important of these is delusions from which the patient suffers… For example:

“Delusions of Grandeur”

A [schizophrenia] patient believes that he is exceptional and that others should treat him as though he is an important person. The Arabs also believe that they are more important than others in every respect. They [believe that they] are the best among nations…, and regard other nations with contempt. They acknowledge no religion [but their own] and are unwilling to coexist peacefully with other religions. [They believe] that their faith is the only faith that mankind should embrace, and that whoever fails to embrace it is an infidel.

In other words, all other religions are heathen, heretical and fabricated, and their followers should abandon them and embrace the Arabs’ religion — Islam. If they fail to embrace Islam, the Muslims are entitled to wage war upon them, to kill their men or convert them by force, to take their women hostage, to sell their children in the slave market and to plunder their property…

This disparaging view applies not only to non-Muslims, but also to other schools of thought within Islam. Each Islamic school of thought is full of contempt and hostility towards the others. The Salafis and Wahhabis, for example, are convinced that the Shiites must be killed, and that whoever kills them will be rewarded in the world to come…”

Paranoia

A schizophrenia patient believes that others are plotting against him with the aim of harming and killing him, even though he hasn’t a shred of evidence to prove this. This is exactly what happens with the Arabs, who are addicted to conspiracy theories. Whenever a disaster befalls them, they claim that it was brought about by a ‘hostile Western Crusader-Zionist’ conspiracy. They [say this] without bothering to think rationally and determine the true causes for their defeat...

A schizophrenic imagines that people have nothing better to do than to talk about him, gossip about him, and plot against him. Consequently, he lives in a constant state of intense doubt and suspicion towards others, including the people closest to him, such as his wife, whom he suspects of cheating on him… The patient believes that even broadcasts on TV or on the other media are directed personally at him.

This is exactly what happens in the Arab society with respect to foreign ideas and books. No society places books and ideas under siege the way Arab society does. Arab airports and sea ports are known for seizing books from the passengers. The Arabs are famous for translating the fewest books and for showing the greatest hostility towards the foreign sciences, to which they refer contemptuously… as ‘imported ideas.’ In addition, no people burn books and persecute intellectuals with more gusto than the Arabs.”

Somatic Delusions

“The patient imagines strange and illogical things, for instance that foreign bodies are moving inside him, even though there is no evidence to suggest this. Similarly, Arab societies and governments suffer from the illness of [constantly suspecting] espionage by foreign agents. This is why the Arab jails are full of political prisoners and oppositionists accused of spying for other [countries]. In the eyes of the Arab governments and societies, the political opposition and the liberal intellectuals are traitors and agents of foreign intelligence [apparatuses]…

Disorganized Speech

A [schizophrenic] patient’s speech makes no sense. There is no connection between the sentences, and the hearer or reader cannot understand what [the patient] means to say. The Arab societies display the same symptom - [it is] even [displayed by] people who present themselves as intellectuals and writers. We read them with the hope of understanding what they mean to say, but to no avail… And when you dispute [their claims], they say that the problem lies not with the writer but with the reader, since he is shallow and insufficiently educated, and that is why he fails to understand the ideas of the important writers and intellectuals…

Loss of Human Feeling

This is another phenomenon spreading through the Arab societies. Unrestrained terrorism and cold-blooded butchering of innocent people in front of the TV cameras provide [further] indisputable proof that Arab society is afflicted with this dangerous disease. It should be noted that the famous religious scholar Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi advised to refrain from showing the killings on TV. This means that he supports these acts, but advises not showing them in this manner, since they give Islam and the Muslims a bad reputation. In the eyes of some, this makes Al-Qaradhawi a moderate cleric.

The Patient Loses the Ability to Enjoy Activities He Enjoyed in the Past

This is also true of the Arab society today. During the course of their history, the Arabs used their powers of reasoning and exercised independent judgment in religious ruling [ijtihad]… in order to find rational solutions for existing problems. But a few hundred years ago… the gates of ijtihad were shut, the mind was shut down, and [clerics] began to rely exclusively on what was said by the founding fathers [of Islam] over 1,400 years ago, even if their solutions were inapplicable to contemporary problems…

Inactivity and Lethargy

Schizophrenia patients spend most of their time in idleness or slumber. Laziness,… sleepiness, fatalism and lack of productivity are also widespread in the Arab countries. A study published a number of years ago found that a Western worker is five times more productive than an Arab worker…

Loss of Zest for Life

This is a well-known tendency in Arab society. As bin Laden said in his address to the West, ‘you love life, while we thirst for death.’ This is an integral part of Arab heritage… This is why preachers in the mosques glorify death [in their sermons] to young people, [teach] them to hate life, and encourage them to carry out jihad terrorist operations…

Isolation From the World

Schizophrenia patients prefer to live in isolation from the rest of the world, and spend most of their time alone, detached from other people. They are uninterested in the company of friends and relatives, are unable to form friendships with other people or to maintain previous friendships, and do not care that they have no friends.

All these symptoms are also prevalent in the Arab society, and are due to faulty education from an early age. Most textbooks for children and youth teach hatred towards others, and [encourage the reader] to avoid the company of non-Muslims. More than that, [they instruct the reader] to avoid greeting a non-Muslim, and, if greeted by a non-Muslim, to reply in an aloof and contemptuous manner. [They also teach that] if you shake hands with a non-Muslim, you must afterwards wash your hands. Directives of this sort are published by all religious schools - even by moderate clerics, and certainly by extremist ones.

Arab culture also encourages isolation from the world. The world is divided into two camps: ‘believers’ and ‘infidels’… Sheikh Al-Islam ibn Taymiyya encouraged [the Muslims] to hate the unbelievers, saying: ‘When you spend time in the camp of the unbelievers - for purposes of medical [treatment], study or trade - harbor hostility towards them in your heart.’…

Denial of the Disease

Schizophrenia patients deny that they are ill, and believe that they are completely well. They are hostile towards anyone who tries to treat them or wishes to help them. Similarly, the Arabs are unaware of the duality in their behavior and standards, and do not realize that they are backward and require immediate treatment in order to overcome their backwardness and [to avoid] the disasters that befall them. Anyone who tries to draw their attention to their own backwardness… is accused of treason and of being a foreign agent, usually [an agent of] the ‘imperialists,’ ‘Crusaders.’ or ‘Zionists.’ Consequently, intellectuals have been persecuted in Arab countries throughout the ages…

Mental Paralysis

A [schizophrenia] patient is utterly convinced that his notions are correct, to the point of [mental] paralysis… The same [phenomenon] is also widespread in the Arab society, which believes that only its own culture and notions - which have been handed down from generation to generation - are valid, and tries to eliminate those who think differently… [Schizophrenia] patients are unable to understand abstract ideas according to their context, and take everything literally….

A similar situation exists in Arab society, which cannot differentiate among various situations. Occupation of one country by another is a vile thing, but there are exceptional cases in which the occupation is necessary since it is for the good of the occupied country. This is true for Iraq, and for Europe during the Second World War. But Arab society regards the liberation of Iraq from an extremely vile, fascistic regime as an [act of] colonialism aimed at plundering [Iraq’s] treasures and killing its people…

Al-Zarqawi, bin Laden, and Al-Zawahiri Could Not Have Perpetrated Their Atrocities Without Extensive Popular Support

Some may object [to my arguments], asking why I take the behavior of a single individual, a handful of people, or a group, [and present it] as the behavior of entire nations. Why do I ascribe the behavior of Al-Zarqawi, bin Laden or Al-Zawahiri to all Arabs? Why do I present the sin of one cleric as the sin of all clerics?

[But] the truth is that what happened in Algeria and what is currently happening in Iraq and in other parts of the Arab world does not result from the deviant behavior of individuals, but from general behavior that is inevitably caused by [our] culture.

Barbaric acts of mass murder were rampant in Algeria, with the number of victims reaching a quarter of a million. School girls were murdered for not wearing the veil. The murders carried out by ‘jihad fighters’ in Iraq have come to symbolize [the general situation there], which is condoned by Arab societies.

Needless to say, Al-Zarqawi, bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri could not have perpetrated all these atrocities without extensive popular support, without constant recruitment [of new jihad fighters], and without the cultural and ideological support that is [ingrained] in the [Arab] heritage and education. Surveys conducted in a number of Arab countries showed that the majority supports the Al-Qaeda terrorist organization, and that bin Laden himself enjoys great popularity, especially in the Gulf countries…

If Arab Governments Do Not Begin to Lead Their Peoples Towards Democracy, History Will Force it on Them

Based on the above, I believe that Arab societies… suffer from duality in their standards, their views, and their behavior, and require immediate treatment if they want to heal, to overcome their backwardness, and to live in peace with the international community…

Obviously, it is difficult to change the people’s entire outlook overnight, especially when the governments constitute an obstacle to reform. The process is difficult and will take a long time, but there is nothing to prevent it from starting today… The ball is in the court of the Arab governments, who must understand the reasons for their backwardness and the backwardness of their people.

The problem with these governments is that they have always objected, and still object, to gradual and peaceful development… [which occurs naturally] in the course of history. Democracy is the order of the day, and if the Arab governments do not begin to gradually lead their peoples towards democracy, history will force it on them through violent [upheavals], as occurred in Iraq…

It should be noted that over 200 years ago, the Western peoples went through what the Arab peoples are experiencing now. They managed to resolve their problems, to build an advanced civilization, and to make economic, social, scientific and technological progress — but [this happened] only after reason was liberated from [the shackles of] fairytales and lies, [and after they] separated religion and state, established regimes that were secular, liberal and democratic, and gave freedom of speech and thought to [their] intellectuals.

I guess most Arabs and western “progressives” would consider this man the Arab equivalent of an Oreo. I, of course, think he’s right on. What we need now is a) an analysis of the relationship between humiliation and schizophrenia, and b) an explanation of how our “progressives” could find this schizophrenic personality so attractive.

Der Spiegel ran a piece on Hamas that indicates that at least some people are waking up… and not a second too soon.

The Ongoing War against Reality

By Henryk M. Broder

Many are treating the apparent recognition of Israel by Hamas as a sign of hope. It’s not. Indeed, the Palestinians have no such intention — and have left Israel with only military options.

Once again the Palestinians are in the process of shattering the Israeli dream of peace. The building of a tunnel under the border, the attack on an army post and the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier haven’t just served to stir things up in the stagnating Middle East war. The attack also served to bring the Israelis face to face with the limits of their power. And to provide the Palestinians with a short-lived though uplifting feeling of superiority. It’s difficult, after all, to categorize an assault on an army unit as an act of terrorism.

Recent history has seen the Palestinians firing homemade, short-range Kassam rockets from Gaza into Israel and Israel responding with “targeted assassinations” — which have often resulted in civilian deaths. That was, though it may sound cynical, Middle East business as usual — and also mirrored the situation in the north where Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon has hardly resulted in instant peace there.
All or nothing

Now, however, the conflict has reached a new level. The Israeli withdrawal from Gaza last summer has more than anything motivated militant Palestinians to demonstrate to Israel that the conflict is not primarily about territory, the end of the occupation and the return to the 1967 borders. Rather, it’s about all or nothing. It’s about the control, not the division, of the region between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Were the Palestinians to invest only a tiny percentage of the energy they consume in internal conflict and resistance against Israelis into the reconstruction of the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and Gaza would be much better off.

And the Israelis? Those who believed that unilateral action and the construction of a fence would result in the security that negotiations have been unable to provide are now being confronted with the bitter reality. Fences and walls cannot provide absolute security — and no matter how high such barriers are, they can still be dug under. The question they are asking themselves is this: “What is cheaper: ending or continuing the occupation?” What’s the point of military withdrawal when those Palestinians who want a peaceful resolution are unable to assert themselves — and those Palestinians who want to continue fighting merely feel vindicated and encouraged?

As usual in such moments — with the tunnel at the end of the light coming ever closer — those who have a stake begin to clutch at whatever straw they can. The Europeans are once again trying to whitewash things. One hears a lot these days about the so-called “prisoners’ document” — that mysterious paper in which representatives from Hamas and Fatah have agreed on a common position on Israel. It is said to be nothing less than an “indirect recognition” of Israel.

Ignoring the rules of democracy

Leaving aside for a moment what exactly an “indirect recognition” means in practice — no attacks within the 1967 Green Line? No attacks on Saturdays and holidays? No attacks on women and children? — one salient fact is being forgotten. Israel and the PLO have already long since recognized each other in the Oslo Accords and all the agreements that have come since.

One of the basic rules in any democracy is that a new government accepts the treaties made by the old. Germany’s Christian Democrats, for example, didn’t annul the agreements struck by Social Democrat Chancellor Willy Brandt with East Bloc countries in the 1960s even if, when in opposition, they did everything in their power to torpedo the policy.

For Hamas, however, such rules don’t seem to apply. The “prisoners’ document” is a paper that is supposed to re-establish and solidify the “national unity” of the Palestinians. Inferring therein a recognition of Israel — no matter how indirect or implicit it may be — merely shows a tendency toward self-delusion. Nobody has yet seen the entire paper, but those bits that have been released are just as incoherent as they are explicit. And everything is discussed. Indeed, the only thing that doesn’t appear is any mention of a recognition of Israel — neither in pre nor in post 1967 borders. Only one conclusion can be drawn: Even after 40 years of occupation, the Palestinians have still not accepted reality and still dream of a return to the way things used to be.

Indeed, if there is a clear message provided by the paper, it is this: The Palestinians do indeed want a two-state solution. One in those regions — the Gaza Strip and the West Bank — occupied in 1967. And one in that region that is today known as Israel. One shouldn’t forget that the PLO was founded in 1964 with the goal of freeing Palestine from the Zionists — three years prior to the Six Day War when Gaza was still under Egyptian control and the West Bank was a part of Jordan.

Either complete victory or utter defeat

Back then, talking about the “Occupied Territories” meant Haifa, Tel Aviv and Beer-Sheva. And in this respect nothing has really changed to this day. The only difference between Hamas and Fatah — which is overlooked by “the document” — is the question of how Israel should be defeated: either militarily or through the implementation of a “right of return” policy. Israel therefore has the choice as to whether it is wiped from the map either in battle, or by peaceful means. Whoever hopes Israel will embrace these two alternatives is kidding themselves: there is no third possibility.

Israel has no other choice but to stand tough because every climb down and withdrawal is interpreted as weakness. Furthermore the word “compromise” is a foreign word in the Arab world. You either prevail or go down in a blaze of glory.

For this reason a “ceasefire” is the most Hamas is prepared to offer Israel, which the Europeans insist on misinterpreting as the first step towards recognition. Rather, it’s merely a tactical pause in the war against Israel.

News about the new confrontation on the border between Gaza and Israel has largely displaced reports of the looming “humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza. It’s also important to find out how a government that can’t even provide for its own people is getting the means to assemble, clothe and arm a new 3,000 man force. And who is arming and paying the salaries of these masked, hyper-agile young men who are storming the streets wielding bazookas? Is that what a “humanitarian catastrophe” looks like?

Hamas, though a problem for Israel, is a catastrophe for the Palestinians. It’s a difference that no document can set aside.

Wow. I’d only add that supporting Hamas is a catastrophe for the Europeans.

I have always marveled at the notion that these suicide terrorists do this so they can go to heaven and get their 72 virgins. Now aside from the possibility that it may be 72 white grapes that await them, I must confess that as a notion of heavenly delight, 72 virgins strike me as strange to say the least. I would imagine that if one’s idea of heaven was sexual delight — itself a fairly carnal vision, especially for those who claim to despise this world — the last thing one would want would be a virgin. Wouldn’t one much prefer a woman of experience?

The comedian B.J. Novak has a very funny routine on this which you can see here on the 72 virgins. It reminds me of the joke (which I’ll try and make short):

Three guys go to heaven and are told not to step on the ducks. They think, “no problem,” but when they get to heaven it’s full of ducks. They’re careful, but after a while one of them does. Immediately an angel appears and chains him to an extremely ugly woman naked whose talking a mile a minute. “She is your punishment,” the angel explains.

The other two are verrrry careful, but after a while the second one slips too. The angel appears with an even uglier, more verbose woman and chains him to her. “But why a worse punishment?” “Because you knew better and you still did it.”

The third one shuffles around barely lifting his feet for what seems and eternity when, all of a sudden, the angel appears and chains him to a quite attractive woman. “But wait,” he says, “I didn’t step on a duck.” “I know,” replies the angel, “she did.”

It’s what one might call a post-modern joke: there are other narratives than those of (already or future) dead white males.

But alas, this is not really a laughing matter.

Why virgins? I suspect it’s because, unlike women of experience, virgins have no point of comparison. Whoever deflowers them and owns them need not worry that his performance might get a lower score than some other alpha male. I do not want to belittle that concern. It is unquestionably one of the great worries of all men, spoofed quite nicely in the person of Hector Gorganzolo at the end of American Sweethearts. There are few things that can shame a man more thoroughly and permanently than to have his sexual performance demeaned in public. The anxiety alone can cause impotence.

But it’s one thing to worry about these things (what male does not, at least at some point?), and quite another to build your social structure and religious dreams around them. And yet, in honor-shame culture, the gender relations largely turn around this testosteronic sexuality: men gain honor by seducing and mastering women, women preserve their honor by remaining a virgin till they are married. In some senses this emerges from evolutionary pressures: males want to spread their seed far and wide, females want to find and keep a good provider.

According to evolutionary evidence (apologies, Ann Coulter), one of the key things that allowed humans to emerge, was the ability to care for their babies, with their exceptionally long period of infant helplessness and childhood immaturity, over an extended period of time. This made the increasing intimacy between couples, and the choice of long-term partner for the woman and the man, an increasing priority, an evolutionary advantage. Marriage, and even more, monogamy, represent the cutting edge of a transformation of human sexual behavior that defines human evolution. Not coincidentally, the growing intimacy of human sexuality – coupling from the front, the tenderness of hairless skin and sensitive palms, lips with which we speak – all of this mark our emergence as humans, apart from the animal world and from the dominance of alpha male behavior in sexual relations. Intimacy, trust, mutual interdependence… these are the specifically human traits that bring out our greatest potentials.

So the world in which predatory males deflower obedient virgins à volonté is an obvious throwback to some of the deepest but least considerate drives in the male psyche. In that sense, if we could characterize this fantasy of 72 virgins as the promise that drives the jihadi’s dream, it would rank among the most primitive, male chauvinist fantasies imaginable.

Nor is this fantasy restricted to the twisted imagination of suicide terrorists (as if that were not enough). We find it in the disastrous collapse of civil society and the protections it offers women in the Muslim-dominated neighborhoods of Europe where infidel women are treated as sex-objects of the most degraded and degradable kind, and Muslim women are trapped in a world of enforced virginity and honor-killings. Ou pute ou soumise. [Either a whore or subject.] This terrifying article by Rose George about the conditions in France’s “sensitive zones” (the lost territories of the Republic) discusses one of the most revolting aspects of “suburban” culture in France — tournantes (gang rapes). There we find a world in which honor-shame rules straight from the Mediterranean, as old as time, juiced up with neo-Islamic hatreds, have turned the life of young women into a nightmare from a post-apocalyptic Hollywood movie.

Forged from traditional cultural prejudices about the inferiority of women, and a street code based on survival of the strongest, the law that rules the banlieue is brutal and inviolable. “Women are the guardians of honour,” says Bellil. Girls have to be virgins. They have to study at home, look after the men, never go out. That makes them filles biens (good girls), and out of danger. Anyone else is a slut. “Once you’re in the projects, you follow the rules. If you want a ‘French’ life, if you want to go out, wear make-up, you get a reputation.” The reputation is irreversible.

And you can expect to be treated, not as an outcast, but as gang-rape prey.

“Usually, it goes like this - a boy approaches a girl with his gang behind him.” He might buy her a drink. He might persuade her to kiss him. “It’s all premeditated. It’s a hunt.”

The girl will be fragile, or unprotected, or a runaway. Or she’s just broken the rules of the banlieue. (One teacher reported his pupils as saying, “Nightclubs are full of slags because if they’re in a club, they must be a slag.”) She gives in, and the boy says, “Be nice or I’ll tell your parents/friends/the neighbourhood.” Then he says, “Be nice to my friends, too.” “The trick is to isolate the victim,” Genestal says. “Once she’s seen as easy, no one will help her, not even the girls.”

This is the code of the banlieue. At a family planning class, a teenage boy says, “French girls are for fucking and Arab girls are for marrying.” The woman who told me this was shocked, not only because the boy was white and “French”, but because all the girls in the class applauded. Being more macho than the lads is an escape route, explains Deflaoui. To the extent that girls act as touts. Nadia was delivered to her rapists by two girls she knew, who had been asked to find a “dick-sucker”.

Of course the politically correct will insist that this isn’t Muslim, just like the riots aren’t Muslim, because other boys also do it. And that’s about as true as the riots aren’t Muslim. We’re dealing here with the intersection of honor-shame culture and neo-Islamic identities.

[tr. by editor] Nonetheless, the links between afro-maghrebin immigration, hatred of whites — or the West — and the resurgence of this phenomenon, is undeniable: statistics, facts and testimony all confirm it. Furthermore, the phenomenon of gang rapes recurs in identical conditions in other Western countries, committed by delinquents of the same ethnic and cultural origins as their French counterparts. People desiring to know more in these matters can click on the links under the menu “viols en réunion” (collective rapes) to the right of this page.

The presence of free riders — including “Gaulois” — does not represent a fundamental alteration of the landscape, although there are sociologists ready to argue, based primarily on court records (which do not take into account pervasive intimidation) that this is neither a new nor an increasing problem, and newspapers — surprise! Le [Im]monde Diplomatique — ready to praise them for their courage in opposing the use of denouncing tournantes as a way to “stigmatize” the banlieues. (I’d like to see M. Gresh, author of the piece, a proud anti-Islamophobe and firm supporter of France’s Eurabian foreign policy, send his daughters to school in those neighborhoods.)

For a further article by George on the same problem in France (part II), and two in England (where it seems to be more a problem of race than ethnicity), see here and here. Note: George’s articles on France date from 2003! If anything, I would guess things are worse.

Post-modern moral equivalence tells us we can’t judge these cultural traits as inferior, that we dare not speak of primitivity or evolutionary retardation; or, alternatively, that there really is nothing there and all this brouhaha is just the creation of an Islamophobe media. This is worse. It’s an assault on everything that civil society strives for by a predatory culture that has contempt for our “understanding”, hatred for our ways, and indulgence for everything that makes man into an animal… or worse. As for the authorities’ reluctance to tackle this problem — from law enforcement to school authorities to journalists — I can tell you how it registers on the screens of the people who inhabit honor-shame cultures: People who can’t protect their women from predatory packs of alpha males out to spread their seed (and STDs), especially their daughters, are beneath contempt.

On this one, I’m with them.

******
Next: Why Women become Suicide Terrorist when they’re not promised 72 anything.

[Lest anyone think I only report the stuff that supports my point of view…] (Hat tip: Solomonia,)

Avi Issacharoff, co-author of an important book on the second Intifada, The Seventh War, and journalist for Ha-Aretz (a cross between the NYT and the Guardian), has seen the full tape from the Gaza Beach. His report:

The harshest images were edited for TV

By Avi Issacharoff

GAZA - When Zakaria Abu Arabid, a journalist with the Ramatan news agency, arrived at Al-Awda Hospital in Gaza’s Jabalya refugee camp two weeks ago on Friday to photograph casualties of an incident in the Beit Lahia area, a staff member told him that Israel had shelled the Lahia beach. He headed to the spot.

Two weeks later, Abu Arabid and Haaretz view the now-famous tape of Huda Ghalia as she runs along the beach and finds the body of her father. The most gruesome images, it turns out, were censored for television.

The camera starts rolling during the trip. A narrow road, then a left turn onto a dirt road. On the horizon, the sea and then growing awareness of the horrific sights. When Abu Arabid, 36, from Beit Hanun, gets out of the jeep the camera shows an ambulance and people standing around.

The picture zooms in on a pile of bodies, uncovered and blasted apart. The people urge on Abu Arabid with calls of, “Shoot it, shoot it.” The injured are loaded onto stretchers, including a girl without an arm. A Palestinian man carried the remains of the body of a young girl and runs toward the ambulance. An earsplitting siren wails in the background.

Abu Arabid’s camera shoots the removal of the dead and wounded, near where the three bodies had lain earlier. He focuses on a young girl with black hair wearing sweatpants: Huda, who takes a few steps and then starts running while calling for her father.

She throws herself on the ground and the camera shows the body of her father. She cries out for him and hits herself. The camera pans to a pot filled with food and then returns to Huda. A young man tell her her father is okay although he knows the man is already dead. Huda, in wet clothing, sand stuck to her pants, pleads with the paramedics: “Take him to the hospital, he’s alive.”

Abu Arabid photographs the body parts being collected into bags, plastic beach toys strewn on the sand, an Israeli Navy ship off the coast.

“No one can remain indifferent to the pictures, the pain of the children,” Abu Arabid says. “I looked at the tape afterward and broke into tears, how can one not?”

The German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung cast doubt on the authenticity of the picture and made its own determinations without checking the facts: Why were bodies covered with sheets?, it asked - although they were not. Why were Huda’s clothes dry? - although they were actually wet. Mohammed Salman, Abu Arabid’s boss, is considering a suit against the German paper.

“If a foreign photographer had taken the pictures, no one would have had doubts. Because we are Palestinian journalists they immediately claimed we staged it,” Salman said, adding, “How can one stage such horror?”

Of course, if a foreign photographer had taken the footage there would have been fewer doubts. Palestinian cameramen have a deservedly bad reputation as propagandists from a society of fear and intimidation with an unfree press. And of course one can stage not the horror itself (unless, God forbid, Hamas actually planted a mine and wanted Palestinians blown up), but the footage of the horror.

I would like to see these tapes.

That there was an explosion, everyone agreed. That there would be body parts, one would have expected.

What roused the suspicion of many, was that there was something staged about this footage, and that its pathos might have been aimed at covering up the possibility that this explosion was not Israeli but Palestinian. Issacharof shows no sign of understanding what to look for and what to ask (unlike the reporter from Suddeutsche Zeitung, who got the admission from Arabid that Houda had asked to be photographed).

Did he ask Arabid what he would feel if these were Palestinian bombs that did this damage? Would he have photographed it? Would he be expressing the same horror? If he did, his article shows no trace of it.

And had Houda thought that it was a Palestinian mine that killed her family? What would she have done?

The Gaza Strip scandal has had its secondary fallout. Enderlin, the journalist without whose credulity or dishonesty the Muhammad al Durah affair would never have seen the light of day, and with whose expert help it lit up the world of anti-semitism and Jihad, ran this latest Pallywood footage with his usual professional negligence. One viewer, Emilie Dorra, 23, a close reader of Philippe Karsenty’s Media Ratings, a (rare) media oversight organization in France which has taken on the Muhammad al Durah affair with great courage, immediately sensed something was wrong. She called France2 to complain and they promptly invited her and another citizen critic, Michel Cohen, to come take on Charles Enderlin and Eric Mounier, two France2 professionals, in the studio. (For the francophones who read this blog, you can see the debate here, and the transcription here. I recommend watching the emission since everyone should see Enderlin prevaricating in action.)

The problems for Enderlin started when Michel Cohen, another critic, mentioned the al Durah affair. The comments are Emilie Dorra’s posted at Media Ratings:

Once we were live, everything went well, except for when, at a certain point, M. Cohen began to speak of the affair al Durah. A friend behind the scenes told me later that the producer of the show exclaimed, “No! why is he speaking of the al Durah affair? We have a court case in process, it shouldn’t be mentioned.”

[Note, this is one of the ways that France2 has protected itself from any controversy — while the case is in court, nothing can be said.]

At that point, Enderlin responded, as he often does, not by dealing with the issue, but by invoking the opinion of others, often by distorting their meaning if not their content. Here, he recalls a court decision last month in a Tel Aviv court.

Now, Mr. Cohen evoked the Mohammed al-Dura Affair from the beginning of the Intifada. Well let me remind you that last mongth a Tel Aviv court produced a judgment according to which the Israeli army investigation [which argued that the Israelis could not have shot the father and son), after the death of the “little Mohammed,” well this investigation was not scientific, not professional, started with with preconceived ideas. Therefore, we consider the Israeli army’s investigations as having the same credibility as other investigations. We are journalists, not scientists. We act in function of the reactions of one to the other. [Here Enderlin is claiming that the NGO spokesman Marc Garlasco’s investigation is as credible as the Israeli one, so who knows what’s going on?] When the Israeli army starts by saying, “yes it’s an Israeli shell” [which no Israeli army spokesman ever said], and then says, “it’s not us,” then launches an investigation, we follow such things with a great deal of caution [i.e., skepticism].

As the transcriber of this debate, Menahem Macina, wrote in his multiple and extremely interesting notes, this reference to the Israeli court case seems highly suspicious and worthy of investigation. Another news agency in the forefront of the Al Durah affair, the Metulah News Agency (MENA) did just that. Their findings reveal the characteristic ways that Enderlin spins his comments dishonestly. At MENA’s request, the Israeli army issued the following statement:

“The court did not call into doubt the Israeli army’s investigation but declared that the inquiry undertaken by Mr Duriel — who was a member of the team conducting the research, but was dismissed from his functions by general Yom Tov Samia who was in charge of the team — was unprofessional. For this reason [the court] declared that Mr Hauptman’s assertions concerning Mr Duriel did not constitute defamation.

In no way did this court consider the quality of the definitive investigation undertaken by the Israeli army [in the Al-Dura case] and, moreover, it specifically rejected a proposal requesting it to examine this inquiry, even though it was requested to do so by the defending party.

The court only gave its decision concerning the subject that was limited to Mr Duriel’s inquiry.”

MENA goes on to comment:

The readers of the Ména will appreciate the fact that Charles Enderlin, not content with voluntarily confusing the army’s commission of inquiry with Mr Yossef Duriel, a civilian that it dismissed for serious professional misdemeanor, [ed: he gave a premature interview with 60 Minutes in which he argued that the Palestinians shot al Durah on purpose which was not the conclusion of the investigation], establishes, on the basis of his own untruth, the reason for which journalists should place the credibility of Tsahal’s inquiries on a par with other inquiries. That means on the same level of reliability as inquiries undertaken by the Palestinian Authority, by Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the PFLP — which are, is it necessary to remind France 2, considered to be terrorist organizations by the USA, the United Nations and the European Union — as well as those made by any NGO that call into doubt the conclusions of the Israeli experts.

At this point both MENA and the participants in the program should have added that, given the history of Pallywood, the most suspect of all sources in the Middle East conflict are Palestinian, and now given what we know about Mr. Garlasco, so are the “independent” NGOs in the area. Enderlin, however, has not processed the existence of Pallywood, even though he admits “they do it all the time.” As a result he can just plunge forward into the thicket of error from which uninformed viewers could not possibly find their way out:

“Therefore we consider the inquiries of the Israeli army with the same credibility as other inquiries ; we are journalists, we are not scientists. We react according… we react according to each others’ reactions.”

This is precisely the kind of Alice-in-Wonderland logic that he used with me about trusting the Palestinians on al Durah (who did no investigation) “as much as” the Israelis. When journalists like Enderlin are as skeptical of Israeli sources as they are credulous of Palestinian sources, we all have a problem because the filter that the media should use to rid the system of poisons works exactly in the opposite way. More AIDS infected needles plunged into the body social of an unsuspecting European public.

The Economist, reportedly one of the most level-headed of European weekly news journals available, tackles the problems of Eurabia. The results are pretty astounding. Economist in blockquote bold. (Hat tip: LGF)

Contrary to fears on both sides of the Atlantic, integrating Europe’s Muslims can be done

THIS week George Bush was in Vienna, doing his best to mend relations with his allies. The list of disputes between the United States and Europe remains long and familiar: Guantánamo, Iraq, Iran, the common agricultural policy. Less easy for Mr Bush to talk about, let alone fix, is the equally long list of different attitudes from which so many transatlantic tensions seem to spring—opposing prejudices on everything from capitalism and religiosity to Mr Bush’s “war on terror”.

These underlying emotions—what a British historian, Sir Lewis Namier, once called “the music to which [political] ideas are a mere libretto”—occasionally converge around a particular issue, such as Guantánamo Bay or Hurricane Katrina.

I have identified one of the key elements of this music, the one that explains much of the European anger over Guantanamo, Iraq, Iran, outsourcing torture, etc., namely ressentiment of the most self-destructive kind, disguised as moral indignation.

This can be unhelpful: Katrina made America look like a failed state, Guantánamo is not a typical example of American justice. Now a similar caricature—this time about Europe—is forming in America (see article). It is known as “Eurabia”, and it represents an ever-growing Muslim Europe-within-Europe—poor, unassimilated and hostile to the United States.

No, hostile to the West… including Europe.

Two years ago, the White House’s favourite Arabist scholar, Bernard Lewis,

That’s quite a way to describe one of, if not the most prominent scholars of the Middle East (definitely more than an “Arabist”) alive today.

gave a warning that Europe would turn Muslim by the end of this century, becoming “part of the Arab West, the Maghreb”. Now there is a plethora of books with titles like “While Europe Slept” and “Menace in Europe” (see article). [ed: and Eurabia?] Stagnant Europe, goes the standard argument, cannot offer immigrants jobs; appeasing Europe will not clamp down on Islamofascist extremism; secular Europe cannot deal with religiosity (in some cities, more people go to mosques each week than to churches). Europe needs to study America’s melting pot, where Muslims fare better.

That’s a fair description. Why do I get the sense that it’s about to be dismissed rather than elaborated?

Londonistan calling

Such advice gets short shrift from European leaders, who often blame Muslim militancy on American foreign policy.

Isn’t that just what European Muslims do? See the debate between Melanie Phillips and Asghar Bukhari of the MPACUK: Bukhari explains how the terrorism is the product of English foreign policy, as if terrorism is an appropriate way to express dissent in such matters (in which case one would imagine that the house of Parliament should have been blown up by Jews sometime between 1945-48 when Britain prevented survivors from Hitler going to Palestine, and sandbagged the creation of Israel, wouldn’t one?).

This argument that terrorism is a response to foreign policy is a staggeringly contemptuous comment about civil society, as if anyone who has a complaint has, if not a right, an understandable indulgence to engage in this kind of morally abhorrent violence aimed at innocent civilians. The moderator tried to take on Bukhari’s argument himself, rather than letting Melanie Phillips do it (mistake), but surely one response is to say, “Sir, if you can make this argument, you have no idea what democracy is about. Surely you can’t expect me to take your arguments seriously.”

But the British (and Europeans, and our “left”) are astoundingly vulnerable to this argument. Why so, is puzzling. But I suspect that part the appeal of the idea that Muslim militancy is a response to American foreign policy is a brilliant way to scapegoat the USA for hatreds that derive far more from the infinitely more brutal and intrusive imperial adventurism of 19th and early 20th century Europe. At this point the hostilities are so deep and so systemic that the idea that a “nicer” foreign policy can have any real impact on them is close to delusional. It’s also, in conditions of Eurabia (which the Economist is trying to dismiss) suicidal.

But something similar to Eurabia scares many Europeans too. Terrorism is part of it, thanks to the Madrid and London bombings (as well as September 11th). But it goes wider than that: the past two years have seen riots in France’s banlieues, the uproar about Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, the murder of Theo van Gogh, a Dutch film-maker, and now the virtual exile (to America) of his muse, Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

Oh that…

Pretty short list of worries. How about honor-killings, and mosque hate preaching, and plans to take over Europe… for starters?

Fears about “Londonistan” and so on have helped Europe’s far right;

I think that a great deal of the reluctance of the media — including the Economist — to let people know how bad it is, to, for example consult and cite the kind of horror show MEMRI and PMW reveal about the media in the Arab and Muslim world derives from a fear that if people knew how bad it was, then they would vote right wing. One French media moghul said as much during the riots last November: “Politics in France is heading to the right and I don’t want rightwing politicians back in second, or even first place because we showed burning cars on television,” says M. Dassier, owner of France1 TV.

on the other side of politics, a bizarre alliance has sprung up between the anti-war left and Islamic hardliners.

Thanks for mentioning that.

But the respectable centre is split between France’s strict integrationist approach (banning Muslim children from wearing head-scarves in state schools) and the more tolerant multiculturalism of Britain and the Netherlands. The debate about Turkey (and its 71m Muslims) joining the European Union is increasingly a Eurabian one. Meanwhile, at the centre of all this fuss Europe’s Muslims are themselves riven by inter-generational arguments on everything from whether there is a European version of Islam to which cricket team to support.

Ah, so here’s the payoff to first mentioning the far right and far left. Then you can present the vapid center as “respectable.” The lamentable situation, that this brief summary gives you no clue to, is that both the integrationist and multiculturalist approaches have failed for similar reasons. At least in both the French and Dutch case it comes from a profound indifference and lack of engagement with these immigrant communities — they do their thing we do ours — which has ended up transporting the culture of the southern Mediterranean, with its tribal patterns (including honor killings and turf battles) to the North.

The British case, however, is even more worrisome. They actually have — America-like — succeeded in integrating many of their Muslims. And still that hasn’t worked. The blokes who blew up the London subway last July were highly successful members of British society. And the latest Pew Poll finds that hatred of the West is highest among British Muslims and non-Muslim distrust of Muslims correspondingly lowest in Britain, something that may just be related to Britain’s exceptional multi-culturalism and tolerance.

As Melanie Philips says (this is reason #2 of 3):

Britain’s grievance culture, which holds that minorities cannot be blamed for any wrong they may do because they are all victims of the majority, has lethally reinforced the sense of paranoia and victimisation which fuels the jihad.

This goes deeper than we want to imagine.

Take for example, the last line of the last paragraph in question:

Meanwhile, at the centre of all this fuss Europe’s Muslims are themselves riven by inter-generational arguments on everything from whether there is a European version of Islam to which cricket team to support.

Wow. You wish. Not a mention of the debate about whether to denounce terrorism, reports on which are deeply disturbing.

Dutch Muslim rapper Yassine SB wrote a song about his anger over Van Gogh’s murder but scrapped plans to perform it out of fear of being ostracized by the Islamic community. He also turned down requests by a popular Amsterdam radio station to sing a song against terrorism.

“If you sing that, it’s like you choose the Dutch, not Muslims,” said Yassine SB — the initials stand for his surname Sahsah Bahida — who is popular among Dutch North African youths like himself for his songs against racism.

“People will say ‘you are a traitor,’” said the 20-year-old musician…

But there is another reason for the silence — one that for many overrides all others.

Why, many Muslims ask, should they have to speak out against, or apologize for, actions of radicals who do not represent them — people they do not even regard as true Muslims?

Many find the very idea of being asked or expected to denounce such acts “extremely offensive and insulting,” said Khurshid Drabu, a senior member of the Muslim Council of Britain.

Nice piece of demopathy, Mr. Drabu. We Muslims are insulted by being asked to denounce Muslims who, shouting Allahu Akhbar, blow themselves up in the midst of infidel civilians. And they successfully address this kind of indignation to the same audience that won’t allow Israelis in the country without denouncing their government’s “apartheid policies.” They know their target audience.

Note that the composer of this article introduces this last remark with the comment that “for many” this overrides all others, even as it contradicts the previous rapper’s deeply disturbing comment on how if he were to criticize, he’d be ostracized by the Muslim community which Mr. Drabu claims to represent. Given the choice between the two contradictory explanations — fear of the Muslim consensus in support, or sense of indignation at being asked to denounce people who do not “represent” them — I’ll go with the former in a minute, and so, apparently, will Big Pharaoh, who knows “bullsh*t” when he reads it. The reporter, however, gives us the demopaths explanation as overriding for many Muslims. After all, that’s probably what she heard most often.

Is Eurabia really something to worry about? The concept includes a string of myths and a couple of hard truths. Most of the myths have to do with the potency of Islam in Europe. The European Union is home to no more than 20m Muslims, or 4% of the union’s inhabitants. That figure would soar closer to 17% if Turkey were to join the EU—but that, alas, is something that Europeans are far less keen on than Americans are. Even taking into account Christian and agnostic Europe’s lousy breeding record, Muslims will account for no more than a tenth of west Europe’s population by 2025.

It doesn’t take a majority for a mafia to take over an area. The idea that you can a) calculate how many Muslims are in Europe now (French estimates vary from 3-7 million — a gap of 4 million!), b) know how many there will be in 20 years, and c) draw any intelligent conclusions from those numbers based on past experience with other minorities, is unworthy of serious intellectual discussion.

Note that there is no mention in this perfunctory analysis of the demographics of the stunning age differential.

The ratio of Muslims to the total population of the EU countries ranges between 3.5 and 5.5%. However, the ratio of Muslim youth (between 45 and 50% of the Muslims) to EU youth is between 16 and 20%. In other words, in a few years Muslims will constitute 16 to 20% of the European workforce, and could therefore influence policies and decision-making.

And this doesn’t address the issue of the newest school cohorts, starting in kindergarten, with upwards of 25-30% Muslims. Does this matter? Or, in the words of a Dutch reporter to whom David Pryce-Jones commented that in a generation Holland would be a majority Muslim, “So what?”

Well, Muslim students are in fact problematic to say the least, and when they hit a critical mass, you get school meltdown. For those who don’t know, a tournante is a gang rape, a specialty of the “lost territories.”

But not to worry, these demographics of youth appear below in the Economist’s editorial as “good” news.

Besides, Europe’s Muslims are not homogenous. Britain’s mainly South Asian Muslims have far less in common with France’s North African migrants or Germany’s Turks than they do with other Britons.

Now here’s a pretty piece of cognitive egocentrism. Part of what is so terrifying about the latest developments is the emergence of a new, global Islamic identity that has enormous appeal to the second generation of immigrants to Europe from the Muslim world. This new identity has a large component of Salafi and Wahhabi traits which, even as they unite and give a Muslim identity to those who adopt it, inject ferocious hatred towards the West in its adherents. So this “Europeanization” of the younger generation of immigrants, many of whom do not even know their native tongues, does not mean they’ve been converted/seduced by the consumer paradise of tranquil, post-testosteronic suburbia. And to think that it does, ignores some vital evidence.

Arguments about alienation are also more complicated than they first appear. Many European terrorists were either relatively well-off or apparen