"Always be ready to speak your mind and a base man will avoid you." "Opposition is True Friendship." -William Blake, Marriage of Heaven and Hell, 1796
The Augean Stables and The Second Draft
This blog takes its name from the Fifth Labor of Herakles, to clean the stables of Augeas, where thousands of cattle had left so much un-cleaned dung that the whole Peloponnesus smelled of it. At Second Draft, our discovery of both Pallywood and the Al-Durah Affair have led us to realize that — at least where the Arab-Israeli conflict is concerned — our MSM represent a veritable Augean Stables of accumulated misreporting. We dedicate this weblog to exploring the many aspects of our MSM’s problem, not only those concerned with the Middle East problem, but more broadly with the many ways in which our media’s errors and our media’s extraordinary resistance to admitting their errors, have contributed and continue to contribute to the serious problems that plague our globe in this young 21st century.
Pierre-André Taguieff sent me two links to articles that deal with the omerta of the French media about Taguieff’s book, « La nouvelle propagande anti juive ». I have already posted on this issue when Robert Redeker lost his position as book reviewer for a small Luxembourgeois paper for daring to review it favorably. Now two articles, including one in the Nouvel Observateur have taken up the cudgels for Taguieff.
Both point to Taguieff’s work on the Al Durah case as one of the main causes of the silence of the MSNM on his work. I reproduce the two passages on Al Durah below.
Note also an interesting incident in the French Senate during hearings for the new head of France2, in which a Senator put the appointee on the spot about the Al Durah story. This story is covered in still greater detail by the indefatigable Veronique Chemla in which she points out that a) the Senator in question (Plancade) gave the new head of France2 (Pflimlin) Taguieff’s book; and b) that none of the MSNM mentioned Plancade’s intervention. (HT/Eliyahu)
Par ailleurs il décrit et démontre la complicité des médias dans le processus précédent. En s’appuyant noatamment sur l’affaire Al Dourah qui lui permet de décrire par quels processus la classe médiatique, au mépris de toute déontologie, a manifesté sa solidarité avec Charles Enderlin, auteur du reportage contesté dans sa véracité (bien qu’il n’ait pas été présent au moment des faits). Israël ne pouvant être que coupable et les Palestiniens des victimes, il n’était en effet pas possible de revenir sur cette version des faits présentant les soldats israéliens comme des tueurs d’enfants palestiniens sans défense. Pourtant bien des éléments méritent qu’une enquête soit menée sur la validité de ce reportage. Ce qu’ont fait d’ailleurs des journalistes allemands demontant point par point la thèse d’Enderlin.
[Among other things he describes and demonstrates the complicity of the media in the preceding process (i.e., the alliance between the left and the islamists - rl). He emphasizes the al Durah affair to describe the way the “media class” (information professionals - rl), acting in violation of all professional ethics, showed its solidarity with Charles Enderlin, author of the contested report (even though he wasn’t present at the time of the events). Since Israel can only be guilty and the Palestinians only victims, it was impossible to revise this version of events in which the Israeli soldiers were killers of defenseless Palestinian children. And yet many aspects of the case indicate that an investigation be carried out on the validity of the report… which German journalists did, dismantling point by point Enderlin’s contentions.]
Les médias ne présenteront donc pas ce livre. Parce qu’il les met en cause et parce qu’il navigue à contre courant en démontrant que cette nouvelle propagande antijuive dont ils sont les porteurs constitue une arme de l’islamisme non pas contre Israël simplement, mais contre les démocraties. Ouvrage donc iconoclaste.
[The media will therefore not present this book. Because it questions them, and because it sails against the prevailing winds, dhowing that this new anti-Jewish propaganda of which they are the carriers constitutes an arm of Islamism not only aimed at Israel, but against democracies. Therefore, an iconoclastic work.]
Tarnero’s article is longer, published in a relatively new and iconoclastic publication, Causeur, which has taken on the Al Durah case already. Again, I only cite the segment directly concerned with Al Durah. (more…)
One of the key dimensions of global Jihad’s cognitive war against the West is the need to disguise the nature of the “weak” aggressor in this asymmetrical war. If the West knew what radical Islam wanted, they’d oppose it firmly, and they’d have no chance to position themselves favorably over time. Thus, while some of them play tough cop (violent Jihadis like Osama and other Salafi Jihadis), others play nice cop, and argue they would be “moderate” if only we treated them fairly.
Since this desire on the part of violent, fascist, even genocidal Islamic triumphalists who want to create a global Dar al Islam, is so ferocious and painful to contemplate, most liberals prefer to believe their demopathic pretences to moderation. As Barry Rubin points out, in some ways, the media tells us things that will pacify us, and keeps the bad news - news that might swell the voting ranks of (gasp!) conservatives and hawks — out of sight.
This approach has, by and large, dominated the approach of the MSNM for the last decade. The results: a president who thinks he can charm the Muslim world, even the radicals, and whose advisors think that it’s best not to even speak of “radical Islam” lest we offend “true Muslims” who know that any violence is against the “true teachings” of Islam - a useful infidel’s fatwa against Osama and his ilk, if you will. Shades of Grima Wormtongue literally sickening King Theoden of Rohan in The Two Towers.
(Note that I took this from a site which posted in 2008, suggesting that McCain was Theoden, and his advisors Wormtongue. I think that gets it exactly wrong. Tolkien, who had the Nazis in mind, had Wormtongue as a councilor of appeasement, in league with the warmonger Saruman, arguing that Rohen should not go to war.)
Of course, it’s hard not to notice the raging bull behind the curtain. And Muslims are becoming increasingly aware that their “Islam is a religion of peace” mantra is wearing thin. So what do they do? Go to the UN and ask it to ban Islamophobia in the name of “human rights.”
Muslim states seek UN action on West’s “islamophobia”
16 Jun 2010 17:37:06 GMT
Source: Reuters
* Want investigation into West’s media on religion
* Say racism, xenophobia rife in Europe
* Part of majority group on U.N. rights council
By Robert Evans
GENEVA, June 16 (Reuters) - Muslim states said on Wednesday that what they call “islamophobia” is sweeping the West and its media and demanded that the United Nations take tougher action against it.
Delegates from Islamic countries, including Pakistan and Egypt, told the United Nations Human Rights Council that treatment of Muslims in Western countries amounted to racism and discrimination and must be fought.
“People of Arab origin face new forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related forms of intolerance and experience discrimination and marginalisation,” an Egyptian delegate said, according to a U.N. summary.
And Pakistan, speaking for the 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), said the council’s special investigator into religious freedom should look into such racism “especially in Western societies”.
Acting for the OIC, Pakistan has tabled a resolution at the council instructing its special investigator on religious freedom “to work closely with mass media organisations to ensure that they create and promote an atmosphere of respect and tolerance for religious and cultural diversity”.
The OIC — and its allies in the 47-nation council including Russia, China and Cuba — dub criticism of Muslim practices and linking of terrorism waged under the proclaimed banner of Islamism as “islamophobia” that pillories all Muslims.
Barry Rubin has written another valuable contribution to the discussion of how far off the MSNM and academia have drifted over the last years, to the point of destroying their own credibility. He doesn’t do much on academia. For that, see the article by Brendan Goldman, Middle East Studies Profs Usurp New Roles to Censure Israel over Gaza Flotilla.
Institutions are crumbling as the lies needed to uphold the Israel narrative become too much to bear.
June 15, 2010 - by Barry Rubin
The irrational slander and hatred of Israel is not destroying Israel. It is destroying the institutions — media and academic, especially — being driven to madness by this obsessive irrationality and decline from their own proper standards.
Like an oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico, the number of lies, logical fallacies, concealments, and strategic misconceptions necessary to make Israel look bad has grown so large that it threatens the health of the media and intelligentsia.
I’d say this has been happening for a decade, and begins with the enormous “oil-spill” of toxic contents into our information circulation systems represented by Al Durah, the Icon of Hatred.
For in their assaults on Israel, these particular news media — of course, not in all they do nor in the work of all who report for them — have left behind professional ethics, rationality, and their own credibility. Political correctness has eclipsed factual correctness, and the purpose of some newspapers has been redefined from reporting the news to merely reporting the news that furthers the political agenda of editors and journalists.
The above, of course, is strenuously denied by those who embody such behavior, though it is of no surprise to those who are reading these words. And in this growing gap, the former lose credibility and the latter lose respect for what should be one of the main pillars of Western democracy and defense against the ideologies of dictatorship.
Read the essay by George Orwell, “Pacifism and War,” (1942) in which he accuses the pacifists (appeasers) of being “objectively pro-fascist.”
There is no institution that is more clearly typical of this malady than the once-respected and now justly often-ridiculed New York Times. Only the Times could donate a huge space to Tony Judt, a man without qualification to discuss the Middle East, claiming that the idea Israel is being delegitimized was a propaganda myth created by the Netanyahu government … while Judt daily delegitimizes Israel.
For my fisking of Judt’s 2003 essay, “Israel: The Alternative” - one of the more astonishingly fatuous pieces on the conflict by an otherwise serious historian, written at the height of the anti-Israel hysteria provoked by - of all things - the suicide terror campaign against Israel.
The Times apparently views any statement made by Israel or its supporters to be false until proven true beyond its ability to think up some excuse for not accepting it.
I remember when I came to Israel during the second intifada, someone in the IDF Spokesman’s unit told me that they have storerooms of material they had put out for journalists who wouldn’t touch them because, as far as they were concerned, Israeli government information was hopelessly biased. Instead they believed what Palestinian stringers told them. As Shmuel Trigano said at the height of the wave of anti-Semitism in France around the same time, “Jews are not allowed to bear witness.” Indeed, one French group called it “the Glass Ghetto.” What good is it if you put your canary in a sound-proof cage? (more…)
In the story of the emperor’s new clothes, when the boy says, “Daddy, why is the emperor naked?” his father responds, “hush child.” It’s only when someone else in the crowd says, “No, listen to the boy,” that the spell is broken.
Is it possible that the absurdity of the knee-jerk response to the Flotilla ambush has actually begun the process, that anti-Zionism has reached such a level of absurdity and self-parody that people have begun to wake up, to shake off the bonds of self-delusion, to question the “halo effect” of the allegedly liberal, human rights advocates and media stars who have systematically poisoned us with their own delusions?
Here’s a (paraphrase of a) letter written to Barry Rubin, one of (if not the most) astute and prolific analysts of the current scene:
The author loves reading Rubin’s articles, e.g., Media, Academia Destroying themselves over Israel. He’s British, not a member of the Jewish community, and has been aware of the slant / bias in the media against Israel for a very long time. Now, however, he feels it’s gotten to a stage where it is actually dangerous. Quite a few people he speaks with willing to admit that they are upset with it. He points to the plummeting readership of the Guardian, and the difficulty of NGOs like Amnesty and Oxfam (for whom Israel is a “malign obsession”) to keep up their donations. He suspects that these organizations are probably looking for a Zionist conspiracy in the increasing troubles when, actually, it’s just the case that “most (thinking) people recognise hysterical propaganda when they see it and don’t approve.”
I have been saying for years now, that in the coming five to ten years, there will be an awakening in Europe (and the rest of the West), that independent minds who are not in the opinion-making elite will begin to realize how badly their leaders have misinformed them, and that when that happens, there’s a window of opportunity whereby we can suggest to them that the anti-Zionism of their elites has operated as a form of cultural AIDS, preventing them from taking self-preserving action.
I welcome any contributions from readers that suggest either a similar response, or (alas) evidence to the contrary. Here’s hoping that the second decade of the 21st reverses the terrible damage of the first decade.
In the following post, I’ll discuss two documents, both published in the Boston newspaper, the Jewish Advocate. One, by Charles Jacobs, criticizes the Massachusetts Governor Duval Patrick for his interaction with the Muslim American Society in Boston which ends with a short paragraph that mentions a Rabbi, whom Jacobs essentially accuses, along with Patrick of being (in my terminology), “dupes of demopaths.”
The Second is a response by a fairly long list of Rabbis and rabbinical students who find Jacobs criticism as unacceptable. This second piece offers a fascinating insight into the mind of earnest non-Muslims still deeply committed to believing that Islam (which sees them as infidels) is as capable of modern, tolerant reciprocity, just like most Christians and Jews in the USA.
And lest anyone consider me an essentialist for talking about Islam, let me anticipate myself by pointing out that these rabbis, not me and not Charles Jacobs, are the ones incapable of distinguishing various kinds of Islam, of essentializing Islam.
Just days before the Gaza flotilla, Jews were attending to a smaller but more proximate fight: State Treasurer Tim Cahill, who is campaigning as an independent for governor, charged that Deval Patrick’s May 22 visit to the Muslim American Society’s (MAS) Saudi-funded Roxbury mega-mosque was a case of “pandering” – and of not taking the threat of terrorism seriously.
In response, the MAS – which is called by federal prosecutors “the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in America” – gathered a few hundred people at the mosque and did what it does best when critics raise concerns about who are the trustees and what do mosque leaders teach Boston Muslims about Jews, gays, women, Christians and America. The mosque leaders ducked the questions and charged their critics with bigotry. The MAS lambasted Cahill.
As if on cue, media stenographers dutifully took down and reported the bigotry charge against Cahill as though it was obviously true. And, again as if on cue, prominently noted and photographed was kippah-wearing Rabbi Eric Gurvis, hugging Bilal Kaleem, who heads MAS.
The real story is what actually happened during the governor’s visit?
I have argued repeatedly that 2000 marks a catastrophic moral failure on the part of the “progressive” (and even the “liberal”) left. Nick Cohen again hits the nail on the head, this time about the moral collapse of liberalism in the past decade and the corresponding rise of a post-modern fascist sensibility which, like earlier forms of fascism, found the Jews a particularly choice target for post-modern scape-goating.
There is much to talk about in Ian McEwan’s Solar. As I say in today’s Observer, he makes a hat tip to John Updike and allows the great issue of global warming to be explained through the devious manoeuvres of a slobby and disreputable hero, Michael Beard. However, McEwan goes to some trouble to show that there are worse people in the world than Beard by sending him to meet a postmodern audience at the Institute of Contemporary Arts.
Like Lawrence Summers at Harvard, Beard had incautiously suggested that there may – just may – be evolutionary reasons for gender differences in the average intellectual aptitudes of men and women. The press denounce him as a Nazi and a eugenicist, and he agrees to appear at the ICA to defend himself. In an acid scene, McEwan shows that London followers of post-modernism are as contemptuous of the scientific method and as potentially racist as Alaskan followers of Sarah Palin.
“When he mentioned the metastudies reporting that girls’ language skills were greater on average than boys’, there was a roar of derision and a speaker on the platform rose fearsomely to denounce him for the ‘crude objectivism by which he seeks to maintain and advance the social dominance of the white male elite’. The moment the fellow sat down he was rewarded with the kind of cheers that might presage a revolution. Bewildered, Beard did not get the connection. He was completely lost. When, later, he irritably demanded of the meeting if it thought that gravity too was a social construct, he was booed, and a woman in the audience stood to propose in stern headmistressly tones, that he reflect on the ‘hegemonic arrogance’ of his question.”
Beard’s opponent is a Jewish academic who respects the scientific literature and explains nervously why he is misreading it. Even though she is against the hated Beard, the ICA turns against her, for reasons you may be able to guess.
Several years ago I was asked to write an essay on the progressive case for Israel. The editor did not like the essay — thought it too convoluted, I think. I just ran across it, and thought I’d put it here. Comments welcome.
The Progressive Case for Israel, the Arabs, and the Global Community.
2005
The following essay constitutes the groundwork for a discussion about globalization and fairness, with the Arab-Israeli conflict as the focus of a particular case study. It represents a progressive case that aims to benefit both Israeli and Palestinian peoples, and, in the longer run, hopefully, peoples all over the globe. It begins by making explicit progressive values and goals, and then considers how best to empower such values. Then the essay looks first at the ways in which these values play out in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and which forces on both sides of the ethnic conflict show commitment to those values. It then compares this analysis with the current Leftist consensus on the causes and possible solutions to the Middle East conflict, a contrast that suggests that current consensus actually undermines the progressive values it claims to promote. It concludes with the outline of a course of discursive actions which will hopefully lead to a progressive outcome for everyone in the Middle East and in this increasingly globalized world in which we live.
I. Progressive Values
The fundamental progressive commitment concerns the relationships between those with a hand on the technologies of power (elites) and those who labor (commoners). Put briefly, we might sum it up as the belief that elites should make the bounties of nature and culture available to all, commoners as well as elites, and hence dedicate themselves to programs that educate, empower and elevate commoners both to exercise freedom and participate in the deliberations of power. Correspondingly, all that seeks to prune back the excesses of power – opacity, arbitrariness, privilege, arrogance, violence, hierarchy and authoritarianism – find favor among progressives. (more…)
I recently attended the History conference of the Athens Institute of Education and Research. Even the organizers admit it’s something of an occasion to visit Athens. I decided to praise the ancient Athenians for their notion of parrhesia (despite their brilliantly self-destructive flaws) and criticize our current pusillanimous academic scene’s dhimmi behavior vis-a-vis Arab and Islamic efforts to bully us into curtailing our freedom of speech so we can “respect” their thin skin. No one challenged me, and later, singly, a dozen people came to tell me how glad they were I had spoken up. I wonder how deep the politically-correct consensus goes, or is it as fragile as the crowd’s praise of the emperor’s new clothes? Below, my talk.
Freedom of Speech and the Thrash of Globalizing Cultures:
Lessons from Ancient Athens for the 21st Century
The so-called “Democratic West” today faces significant challenges both from other cultures, and from critics generated from within. Some of these challenges involve typical competition from rival societies, and helpful self-criticism from members of our own societies. But some represent lethal attacks, both from the outside and from within, and we seem to have exceptional difficulty telling the difference between beneficent and malevolent discourse. This talk is both about the Athenian principle of Parrhesia (“free speech”), and an illustration of it.
Let’s begin with why speech is almost universally not free. In most cultures it is allowed, expected, even required that alpha males shed blood for the sake of honor… if not another’s blood, then one’s own blood (as in seppuku). If you criticize those in power, they will make you pay; if they do not, they lose face and their power immediately begins to wane. People self-censor to avoid suffering the inevitable consequences. In such cultures, violence and intimidation pervade; indeed in tribal warrior cultures, one is not a “man” until one has killed another man. And you’re surely not a man if another demeans you publicly and you do not respond.
But the free tongue is silenced not only by political violence, but by group solidarities. Here we also find the working of a deep-rooted solidarity that insists on silence: “my side right or wrong.” Here we have community pressures in punishing violators: failure to side with “one’s own,” brings shame, and effectively excommunicates the offender. If I do not avenge my relative, I am not a man. Thus any breaking of ranks, even if done on principle, will bring accusations of cowardice not only from the opposing clan, but more devastatingly, from relatives.
And finally we silence ourselves: if one will shed blood to counter unwanted criticism, how much the more will one not reveal embarrassing things about oneself. As a principle, one might describe public self-criticism – admission of fault, sin, failure – as something people avoid whenever possible. As a French friend of mine said, “in France no one admits they were wrong; it’s a sign of weakness.” Public self-criticism is like chewing broken glass; virtually no one does it voluntarily.
The overall point I want to make here is that given these cultural and personal dimensions, the principle of “freedom of speech,” or differently put, the art of giving and receiving public criticism, is actually opposed by an extraordinary array of forces. Its accomplishment, therefore, takes far more than merely legislating free speech or a free press. If the cultural dimensions, both individual and group, are not addressed, no legislation will make a significant difference. Obviously and thankfully, we all self-censor, but the degree of self-censorship, especially in political issues, makes a key difference in the cultural “atmosphere.”
Which brings me now to one of the crucial accomplishments of Athenian society in the middle of the first millennium BCE: the extension of the right of parrhesia, to the public as a whole, or isegoria. (more…)
A provocative, well-written and thoughtful essay by Benjamin Kertsein on Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize speech with some very sharp perceptions on the human condition and the necessary limits of messianism. Comments welcome. HT/oao (who’s not commenting much these days here)
There is a fairly well-known phenomenon among alcoholics referred to as the “moment of clarity.” It is the momentary lifting of the haze of intoxication and denial, giving the drinker a sudden and often shattering insight into the stark reality of their situation. There is a strong possibility that President Obama’s December 9 Nobel Prize acceptance speech has given us a glimpse into a remarkable and somewhat unprecedented variation on this phenomenon: a political moment of clarity — one taking place, or at least publicly announced, on a global stage.
It must be said at the outset that the speech was also unprecedented in the context of Obama and the Obama phenomenon. It was both the first time Obama has said anything of substance, and certainly the first time he has displayed anything resembling political courage. It should also be noted that much of the speech was all but guaranteed to alienate both the president’s far-left base (already incensed by his decision to expand the war in Afghanistan) and his bien-pensant Scandinavian hosts.
Indeed, a great many of Obama’s greatest admirers consider the war on terror to be a malicious imperial project whose purpose is to enforce American hegemony on the world. Obama, however, referred to Afghanistan, now once again the major front in that war, with refreshing accuracy as “a conflict that America did not seek,” and “an effort to defend ourselves and all nations from further attacks.” He also emphasized that “I — like any head of state — reserve the right to act unilaterally if necessary to defend my nation.” For a president who has often seemed disturbingly addicted to irrational adulation, this willingness to invite derision deserves, at the very least, some measured praise.
More tellingly, Obama’s speech also included several statements that cannot be described as anything other than thinly disguised restatements of the Bush Doctrine. Assertions like “as a head of state sworn to protect and defend my nation…. I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people. For make no mistake: evil does exist in the world,” represent precisely the kind of unnuanced moral absolutism that the Bush Doctrine’s critics – including Obama himself – explicitly denounced and rejected.
I have yet to fisk Frank Rich, partly because he rarely deals with an issue in which I have some expertise, partly because, like Daniel Pipes, he so thoroughly links his comments to other literature, that I have not had the time or the energy to look them all up. But Rich is a former classmate (Harvard ‘71), and I’m on a class listserv where I posted David Brooks’ criticism of the psychological school’s approach to Major Hasan’s killing spree, and several classmates answered. So when Rich weighed in on the subject, I decided to call up all his links, read the material, and respond.
The result is long and sometimes circuitous. At times, following his logic is like trying to deal with a bucking bronco: easier to watch than to ride. But in the end, I think what a close look at how Rich dealt with problem reveals, is how bereft of serious thinking even the most intelligent and apparently well-read among the self-styled “liberal left” are on the subject of Islam and its extremist manifestations, and to what lengths they will go to belittle people who try to think clearly on the matter.
Nietzsche once likened serious thinking to diving into an icy river and grasping a stone lying at the bottom. Rich won’t get his feet wet, but he mocks those of us who are soaking from head to toe.
THE dead at Fort Hood had not even been laid to rest when their massacre became yet another political battle cry for the self-proclaimed patriots of the American right.
It also became a non-battle cry for the self-proclaimed progressives of the left, who far preferred the psychologization of the event — “pre-proxy-post-traumatic stress syndrome” — to any discussion of the problem with Islam. Will Rich have the courage to address the problem? Or will he just bash the “right”?
Their verdict was unambiguous: Maj. Nidal Malikan, an American-born psychiatrist of Palestinian parentage who sent e-mail to a radical imam, was a terrorist. And he did not act alone.
“Terrorist,” I think it’s hard to argue against. Did not act alone? That’s another matter. As for “unambiguous,” does Rich mean “unanimous”? I don’t know too many people who thought he acted in concert with anyone.
Indeed, the near-unanimous verdict was that he was a loner. If there’s any support group here, it’s some of the more radical members of his mosque, like Duane. So what does Rich mean here, other than suggesting that the “self-proclaimed patriots of the right” are conspiracy theorists? (Unlike the truthers who have come up with the scenario whereby Hasan’s been framed.)
His co-conspirators included our military brass, the Defense Department, the F.B.I., the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the Joint Terrorism Task Force and, of course, the liberal media and the Obama administration. All these institutions had failed to heed the warning signs raised by Hasan’s behavior and activities because they are blinded by political correctness toward Muslims, too eager to portray criminals as sympathetic victims of social injustice, and too cowardly to call out evil when it strikes 42 innocents in cold blood.
Oh, now I get it. Rich means that the vast range of responsible figures, hands tied by a political correctness that he, among others, plays a major role in enforcing, are, in the minds of the “right,” collaborators. Is this what, “didn’t act alone,” means? I thought it meant, “had co-conspirators.” Rich takes it to mean “enablers.” Intellectual integrity is not the first word that comes to mind here.
Is this clearly sarcastic summary of the “self-proclaimed patriots of the American right” suggesting that there’s no problem here with political correctness? Does it not matter that our intelligence services can’t talk about “honor-shame” culture because some people — Rich? — think it’s racist as Edward Said so urgently insisted? Does it matter that Hasan’s multiple flags never quite tripped a switch somewhere? Does it matter that all those doctors who heard his alarming presentation were too embarrassed to say, “something’s wrong?” (more…)
In his “debate” on Thursday November 5, at Brandeis, during question and answer, Goldstone got chummy with the audience and told them an anecdote about how he felt going into Gaza:
As far as conditions in Gaza are concerned, I must say that my visit to Gaza turned out very differently from what I had anticipated. Frankly, and I make no, no, no, and I’m not ashamed to say it, I was very nervous about being a Jew going into Gaza on probe by Hamas, especially when the first reaction to my appointment by Hamas was to reject a meeting with me because I was Jew.
And my wife sitting here will remember that three nights before I went, I woke up in the middle of the night after a terrible nightmare, with sweat on my brow, because I had a vivid dream that I’d been kidnapped by, by Hamas, and people in Israel were rejoicing. [laughter] That was the nightmare, based on real fears.
Now Goldstone clearly didn’t tell this anecdote in order to reveal the utter intellectual bankruptcy of both his Report’s methods and and conclusions. But that’s what he did. (more…)
Helena Cobban, who to her pacifist credit, expressed deep disapproval of Marc Garlasco’s unsavory hobby, despite the fact that she is on the board of HRW, and shares their attitude towards Israel, here gives us a fine example of how the “human rights” community think. It’s a stunning ride through the wild side of liberal cognitive egocentrism, the epistemological priority of the other, and masochistic omnipotence syndrome weaponized against those who dare defend themselves against sub-altern aggression. An excellent guide to what ails our chattering classes, including their chattering tone of self-confidence.
Michael Goldfarb, who was the deputy communications director for John McCain’s campaign, worked for a while in that temple of neoconservative organizing, the Project for a New American Century, and is a kind of scuzzy attack-dog for the pro-settler hard right, has now decided to come after–poor little moi.
(Yay! I made the big leagues of this guy’s ‘enemies’ list’! Oops, suppress that childish thought, Helena.)
HT to Richard Silverstein, co-rabbi of our “off-broadway” bloggers’ panel at J Street, next Monday noon-time, for having read Michael Goldfarb’s blog so the rest of us don’t have to…
For those who don’t know, “the rest of us” means, it’s, in Amira Hass’ proud phrasing, the global hamoulah [clan]” of leftists/progressives who know they’re at the cutting edge of global morality, leaders of the fight for a truly just and peaceful world, by identifying with the oppressed. And they’ve gathered, somewhat comically, at the JStreet conference in force. (more…)
I recently posted a satirical piece by the Onion on Obama negotiating with a forest fire — we have common interests — which I’ll replicate below. At the time it was part of making fun of Obama for the Nobel Peace Prize. Now we have the tale of his diplomacy with Iran which is unraveling before our eyes. Liberal cognitive egocentrism, politically correct paradigm, dupes of demopaths… you couldn’t write a script more tailored to the follies of the age.
First the satire:
Now, alas, the real live “peace-process” with Iran. From John Hinderaker at Powerline:
This morning, I noted that Iran’s government is telling the Iranian people that the Obama administration has consented to Iranian enrichment of uranium, thereby dismaying our European allies. I linked to, but did not discuss in detail, a Time article that appeared today. The Time article was based on interviews with Obama administration officials and was intended to put a positive spin on the administration’s effort to engage with Iran. Now, news from Vienna, where representatives of Iran, the U.S. and other nations are meeting, allows us to put the whole story together.
The Time article is the best place to start. It breathlessly describes President Obama’s personal involvement in negotiations with Iran, and the genesis of what the administration considered to be a brilliant plan:
President Barack Obama has a personal stake in the outcome of Monday’s meeting in Vienna between Western and Iranian nuclear experts on the future of Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium. That’s because, Administration sources tell TIME, Obama personally weighed in three times during secret, multiparty negotiations with the Iranians over the last four months….
The backroom talks began in June, when Iranian officials told the International Atomic Energy Agency their country was running out of fuel for an aging research reactor built for the Shah in 1967 by American technicians….
“We very quickly saw an opening here,” says a senior Administration official involved in the multiparty negotiations that ensued, speaking on condition of anonymity. The U.S. realized it could arrange for the manufacture of the specialized plates from an unorthodox source: the stash of low-enriched uranium Iran has produced in violation of U.N. Security Council demands at its massive Natanz uranium-enrichment plant over the past several years. The U.S., Israel and others had estimated that the Iranian stockpile was enough — if Iran kicked out inspectors and repurposed its enrichment facilities to enrich uranium to weapons grade — to produce material for a single atom bomb. So, the idea that Iran might agree to send most of it abroad to be turned into harmless plates for the research reactor seemed an opportune way to defuse tensions.
CA: Even some Israelis who feel that unless they investigate they’re going to get an international investigation. In the Jerusalem Post shortly after the report was made public one writer wrote that the kind of report that came out closed down what could be or should be a vital debate even before it got started because of the heightened nature of this precise report. He said, for instance a debate about, when does negligence become recklessness, when does recklessness slip into wanton callousness, and then into deliberate disregard for innocent human life.
This Israeli writer basically said that this is an area of legitimate debate, but because of the heightened feelings it’s probably not going to happen.
She’s talking about David Landau, famous for his “Oh Condi, it’s been my wet dream to tell you to rape Israel into making concessions to the Palestinians” remark, whose reflections on the Goldstone report I fisked here.
The point that both he and now Jessica Montell made is that, no matter how critical they are of the Israeli army, the notion that the IDF targets civilians is beyond the pale. Not for Goldstone though (see below).
RG: Well, you know, it seems now at least of the prospect of it happening and certainly there has been an active debate, if one reads, and I have been trying to keep up with to the best of my ability with the Israeli media, the report has opened a huge debate within Israel, and that’s a very good thing, and I think its opened a debate internationally and its certainly my hope that the effect of the report will have consequences in the future for the protection of innocent civilians in many places of the world.
On the contrary, the reaction in Israel — even on the Left — is almost across the boards sense that Goldstone blew it by going so far over the top. As for the international scene, only the far-far-left (i.e., someone who thinks the NYT is a warmongering paper) sees what Goldstone sees.
Contrary to his pious wishes, as a number of people have pointed out, the report stands every chance of making things much worse. But Goldstone, as shown in the report he produced, and somewhat like his epigone, Gideon Levy, has a prodigious ability to hear only what he wants to hear. (more…)
Melanie Phillips has a must-read analysis of the problem with the human rights community as it now stands. In so doing she has an interesting (and probably controversial thesis about both the biblical origins of human rights and the reasons why today’s “human rights advocates” have made Israel a major target.
I don’t have time to comment now, but will in the coming days. Meantime, I leave it to my readers to comment.
As readers may know, I have had my differences with the American civil liberties lawyer Alan Dershowitz – specifically, over how American Jews can continue to support Barack Obama given his acute hostility towards Israel and appeasement of the Arab and Islamic world. Nonetheless, all credit to Dershowitz for mounting a devastating onslaught upon Richard Goldstone and his shocking travesty of justice masquerading as judicious analysis for the UN Human Rights Commission on Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza. In this piece, Dershowitz accuses Goldstone of conducting a ‘kangaroo court’ in which he
abandoned all principles of objectivity and neutral human rights.
And in this terrific piece he excoriates Goldstone’s ‘wilful and deliberate’ refusal to hear the other side of the story – Israel’s side: the most elementary precondition of justice and fairness. As I wrote here, the mandate Goldstone was given by the UN required him to be thus one-sided and unjust, singling out Israel alone for investigation and thus merely collecting the evidence to uphold the prior verdict of guilt – an utter negation of legal and ethical principles which he sought to conceal by presenting a dubiously revised version of his mandate which bestowed a veneer of even-handedness, while delivering precisely the rigged verdict that the UN had required of him. Dershowitz tears him to shreds by showing how he refused to take evidence from Col Richard Kemp, Britain’s former commander in Afghanistan who had previously stated that during Cast Lead Israel had behaved with globally unprecedented ethical care to avoid killing Palestinian civilians — evidence which would have holed below the water-line the blood-libel Goldstone was assembling from overwhelmingly partisan sources that Israel had deliberately targeted civilians.
Dershowitz has written countless powerful articles and books attacking the Israel-bashers. Yet his onslaught upon Goldstone has a different quality. It is a cry of anguish. He has clearly set out not just to destroy Goldstone’s report but to destroy Goldstone. Thus he states:
His name will forever be linked in infamy with such distorters of history and truth as Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein and Jimmy Carter.
The reason for this all-out attack is surely that Goldstone personally embodies the two most nightmarish, perplexing and agonising aspects of the witch-hunt against Israel: that a malevolent campaign based on bigotry, falsehoods and injustice marches mind-bendingly under the banner of ‘human rights’; and that so many of its leading proponents are Jews.
Two articles today exemplify the vast differences between sanity and masochism in Israeli journalism, one by Gideon Levy of Ha-aretz expressing sheer contempt for Netanyahu’s speech at the UN, another expressing sheer contempt of Richard Goldstone for being the tool of “the dark side.” I link to the beginning of Levy’s (which I don’t have the time to fisk, but welcome your suggestions), and the full text of Yemini’s which appeared originally in Hebrew in Ma’ariv.
First, the arsonist who, in his glorious ability to “self”-criticize, spews his venom where all who hate his people can come and draw sustenance:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cheapened the memory of the Holocaust in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Thursday. He did so twice. Once, when he brandished proof of the very existence of the Holocaust, as if it needed any, and again when he compared Hamas to the Nazis.
If Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust, Netanyahu cheapens it. Is there a need of proof, 60 years later? Or, the world might think, is the denier right? A Advertisementnd it is doubtful that any historian of stature would buy the comparison the prime minister made between Hamas and the Nazis, or between the London Blitz and the Qassam rockets on Sderot. In the Blitz, 400 German bombers and 600 fighter planes killed 43,000 people and destroyed more than one million homes. Hamas’ Qassams, perhaps the most primitive weapon in the world, have killed 18 people in eight years. Yes, they sowed great terror - but a Blitz?
And if we can compare a poorly equipped terrorist organization to the horrific Nazi killing machine, why should others not compare the Nazis’ behavior to that of Israel Defense Forces soldiers? In both cases, the comparison is baseless and infuriating. Netanyahu began the speech as if he were chairman of the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial - Holocaust, Holocaust, Holocaust; his family and his wife’s family…
Let’s start at the end. Richard Goldstone perpetrated a moral crime. Not against the State of Israel but against human rights. He turned them into a weapon for dark regimes. Goldstone was not negligent. He did this with malice.
The criticism that was made in the first days following the report was on the basis of preliminary study. But time passes. And the more that the details of this report are revealed, the more it becomes clear that it is a libel. A libel with legal cover. A libel that was prepared in advance to incriminate the State of Israel, in the service of Libya and Iran. Goldstone willingly took up the loathsome role. He supplied these countries with the goods. The claim that “the discourse of rights” has become the dark forces’ most effective tool is a familiar one. The Goldstone report is the supreme expression of this. Its legal terminology is exemplary. It gushes about international human rights treaties. But it cannot hide the result: It is a libelous indictment of the State of Israel, in the service of the axis of terrorism and evil. Yes, there is marginal – very marginal – lip service regarding criticism of Hamas. Goldstone’s ilk is a sophisticated lot. They now reiterate from every stage, and Goldstone does it well, that they were actually objective. Here, they also leveled criticism at Hamas. How enlightened of them!
Goldstone sold his soul for an endless series of lies. Even Mary Robinson, who is not known as an admirer of Israel, understood that, “This is unfortunately a practice by the [UN Human Rights] Council: adopting resolutions guided not by human rights but by politics. This is very regrettable.” She refused to take the post. Goldstone took it and carried it out with excessive enthusiasm. If international law worked as it should, if the representatives of dark regimes did not have an automatic majority in it, Goldstone would have to stand trial. But this is impossible. And therefore, not only Israel but every moral person, every person for whom human rights are important, must declare Goldstone a criminal. Here is the proof.
Khaled abu Toameh has an interesting analysis of the dilemma that Obama’s lates “peace-making” moves have created for Mahmoud Abbas. Although I don’t agree with his analysis, he does point out the central dilemma of the Arabs in dealing with the world — one also highlighted in the response to the failure of Farouk Hosni to become the head of UNESCO. (HT/Lianne)
Sep 24, 2009 1:11 | Updated Sep 24, 2009 1:23 Analysis: Tripartite summit undermines Abbas
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
Talkbacks for this article: 5
Article’s topics: Mahmoud Abbas, Barack Obama, Binyamin Netanyahu, Palestinian Authority
Palestinian Authority officials in Ramallah have not hidden their disappointment with the tripartite summit that was held in New York and which brought together US President Barack Obama, Prime Minister Binymain Netanyahu and PA President Mahmoud Abbas.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.Photo: AP [file]
On Wednesday, the officials said they were not only disappointed with the outcome of the summit which, they noted, did not achieve any breakthrough in the stalled peace talks, but also with the circumstances under which the meeting was arranged.
Even many representatives of Abbas’s Fatah faction voiced their deep disappointment over his agreement to meet with Netanyahu unconditionally. Some went as far as accusing Obama of “humiliating” Abbas by forcing him to meet with Netanyahu against his will and contrary to his pledges.
Note here that anything the Palestinians insist on and is denied them they see as a humiliation. In this case, they want Israel to make major concessions just for the privilege of speaking with Abbas. Anything else — like meeting with no preconditions — they view as a loss. So the zero-sum game here is hard: they want Netanyahu to freeze settlements as a precondition to sitting down. Any compromise, in the honor-shame world, shows weakness.
Of course, Obama is strongly to blame for this situation, since he and his administrators acted at the beginning as if the settlement issue were nonsense that they could put an end to with a sweep of their hand (something like an intifada in the original sense), encouraging the Palestinians to dig in and watch Israel squiirm. When they realized how complex the issue (and hopefully how unbalanced their approach), they left Abbas stranded on a limb he had proudly gone out. (more…)
I’ve dealt with pomo before here, and will again. Meantime, one of the saner observers of the madness that pomo can induce in journalists (and diplomats), Barry Rubin, has an interesting column on the subject.
A reporter just wrote me a letter that contains a single sentence which I think reflects on why the Western world is in such trouble today. After understandably discussing such real problems of reporting as short deadlines, complex issues, and the duty of the reporter to report what people say, the letter concludes with this sentence:
“And when it comes to the Middle East, one man’s [obscenity deleted] is another man’s truth.”
Woe to us that a journalist thinks this way. Of course, this is very similar to the older version that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.
Recently, I heard that latter one from the Danish ambassador to the Council of Europe who said that Hamas and Hizballah were like the Danish resistance in World War Two. I replied, among other things, that I don’t remember the Danish or other World War Two European resistance movements bombing German kindergartens and glorying in getting Danish civilians killed as human shields.
I also don’t think that the Danes and other European resistance movements were attempting to commit genocide on the Germans. I do believe it was the other way around.
(PS: More Danes fought in the German army than in the Resistance, and that was true of other countries as well. Forgive me for remembering who was the main victim of terrorism and “freedom fighter” terrorists then and today. But I digress)
That a European country—and one of the more astute ones, to make matters worse–is represented by someone like that says something pretty sad about the state of the world today.
and finishes with a hilarious (to me at least) thought experiment: (more…)
I have often written here about the problem of demopaths” — people who have no respect for the human rights of others, but complain bitterly about others not respecting their human rights. Recently a the head of the radical Islamic Movement’s northern branch spoke at Haifa University at the bequest of the Muslim students there.
Sheikh Raed Salah, the leader of the Islamic Movement’s northern branch.
Photo: Ariel Jerozolimski
In order to prevent violence, Jewish students were excluded from the talk.
One student, however, slipped in unnoticed and reported back to the rest of the world. With his permission, I post his remarks. (HT: Steve Antler)
One of my father’s favorite jokes is the following. A man is driving down highway number one, when his wife calls and says in great concern, “darling, the news channel has reported that there is a crazy maniac driving in the wrong direction on highway One!” The man laughs and answers, “One maniac? I see at least a hundred!”
Listening to the ongoing criticism about Israel, I sometimes feel like the man on highway number one. While attempting to drive with its fellow nations down the road leading west, all Israel can see looking out the window in its warm and humid middleastern highway, is the license plates of countries racing by, turning their backs on every western value imaginable, and honking their horn towards the one country that at present time rejects the tendency in the Middle East to shoot protestors to death on the street or insist that women travel with a male guardian.
Sheikh Raed Salah, leader of the Islamic movement’s extreme northern branch spoke at the University of Haifa today, and toyed with this rather worn out mantra. The University that has learned its lesson from previous Jewish-Arab riots has raised concerns for the safety and peace of its students, and thus decided to separate the two camps. I must note that after witnessing the heated spirits on both sides, I found myself grateful for this rather superficial and seemingly absurd separation.
The result of the separation was the following. A large corridor filled with members of every political group from within the Jewish student body, waving flags, pounding on the floor and making every effort to disturb the speakers in the downstairs hall. One protestor told me, that if Salah has achieved one good thing in his speech, it was the momentary “shalom Bait”, peace and unity, between the Jews. Any other day, this student body would be divided into camps and parties identifying with Yisrael Beitenu to Chadash, and anything in between. Today they stood united. Amazing how far a slight delegitimization of one’s right to sovereignty can go.
I’ve taken down a post of alleged photos from the Air France crash last June 1, after reader Aviv sent me the link to Snopes — they were shot for the TV series Lost — (which I should have checked before putting them up).
