JERUSALEM - At the height of World War II, Khaled Abdelwahhab hid a group of Jews on his farm in a small Tunisian town, saving them from the Nazi troops occupying the North African nation.
Now, Abdelwahhab has become the first Arab nominated for recognition as "Righteous Among the Nations," an honor bestowed on non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews from Nazi persecution.
The nomination of Abdelwahhab, who died in 1997, has reopened a little-known chapter of the Holocaust in the Arab countries of North Africa.
Abdelwahhab was nominated by Robert Satloff, director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a U.S. think tank.
Satloff said that after the Sept. 11 attacks, he went to Morocco to research what happened during the Nazi genocide in hopes of countering Holocaust denial in the Arab world and tempering some of the sentiments he thought helped pave the way for the attacks.
"I asked, did any Arabs save Jews in the Holocaust?" Satloff said. "If they did, these are stories about which Arabs could be proud. It would also entail accepting the context, because it would mean there was something to save Jews from."
The search led to Abdelwahhab, the son of an aristocratic family who was 32 when German troops arrived in Tunisia in November 1942. The nation was home to some 100,000 Jews at the time.
According to Israel's Holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem, the Germans imposed anti-Semitic policies in Tunisia that included fines, forcing Jews to wear Star of David badges and confiscating property. More than 5,000 Jews were sent to forced labor camps, where 46 are known to have died. About 160 Tunisian Jews in France were sent to European death camps.
Abdelwahhab served as an interlocutor between the population of the coastal town of Mahdia and German forces, Satloff said.
When he heard that German officers were planning to rape Odette Boukris, a local Jewish woman, he gathered her family and several other Jewish families in Mahdia — around two dozen people — and took them to his farm outside town. He hid them for four months, until the occupation ended.
"Khaled is the finest example, though not the only one, of an Arab who saved Jews from persecution during the German occupation," Satloff said.
Satloff first heard Abdelwahhab's story several years ago from Odette Boukris' daughter, Anny Boukris, a resident of a Los Angeles suburb. An 11-year-old in 1943, Anny Boukris was also hidden by Abdelwahhab.
Satloff went to Mahdia and talked to Anny Boukris' childhood friends, who confirmed the story. Just weeks after Boukris recorded her 83-page testimony, she died at age 71.
Abdelwahhab still has to be approved by the Yad Vashem commission that grants the honor. Since the war, Yad Vashem has conferred the status on 21,700 people, including some 60 Muslims from the Balkans. But no Arab had ever been nominated.
"The commission will decide based on the strict criteria for recognizing the Righteous Among the Nations. We can't speculate on what the outcome will be," said Estee Yaari, a spokeswoman for Yad Vashem.
Tunisia was the only North African country to come under direct Nazi rule. Morocco and Algeria were governed by the pro-Nazi collaborators of Vichy France.
Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, a North Africa expert at Tel Aviv University, said Morocco's king at the time, Mohammed V, intervened to protect Jews in his country. "But the story in Tunisia was quite different, because there was a direct occupation by the German army," he said.
In this video Asghar Bukhari, spokesman for the Muslim Public Affairs Council of the UK, says that Bin Laden gave angry, young Muslims a blueprint for how to effect the changes they want to see.
Bin Laden’s blueprint, however, ends up in the complete abolition of democracy, in favor of shari’a law. If involvement in the democratic process is intended to achieve the destruction of that process, is it correct to call that “democracy at work?”
And what kind of “ethical foreign policy” is Bukhari talking about, if the model for that policy is Osama bin Laden?
I think everyone should post this on their blog. This is up there with the Undercover Mosque video in terms of importance, in my opinion.
Frank Miller, the creator of the Batman comic books, is making a film adaptation of his comic book on the Spartans miraculous triumph over the Persian army. The Spartans, somehow, defeated a Persian force of over a million men, with just 300 men of their own.
UPDATE: I stand corrected. Reliapundit tells me the Spartans did end up losing the battle.
(Filed from a Muslim country in the Middle East) -- For the last several days, I've been meeting with Arab and Iranian pastors and Christian leaders, briefing them on the latest threats to the region, the prophecies of Ezekiel 38 and 39, and the implications of a coming political war or a prophetic one for each of their countries. More on that when I get home. But it's certainly been an interesting environment from which to watch President Bush's State of the Union address and answer Middle Easterners' questions about it.
Since I've been in the region, for example, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has renewed his vow to annihilate the United States, as well as Israel. North Korea, we learned, is working hand-in-glove with Iran on its nuclear weapons program. Syria’s foreign minister, while meeting with Ahmadinejad this past week, accused the U.S. of trying to carry out a “massacre of Muslims.” Yet President Bush chose not to use his State of the Union address to lay out a clear and convincing plan to stop Iran from going nuclear.
Why?
The threat could not be more clear. “Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad…assured that the United States and the Zionist regime of Israel will soon come to the end of their lives,” reported the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting company (IRIB), the official Iranian state run news agency, after Ahmadinejad met with Syria’s foreign minister. So why President Bush seem to hedge on the Iranian issue in his speech to the nation? It's a question many are asking.
Here are three possible scenarios:
SCENARIO #1: President Bush just doesn’t get just how serious the Iranian nuclear threat really is. He sees Iran the way Speaker Pelosi and her leadership team do – as an annoyance, not a would-be annihilator.
SCENARIO #2: The President believes that while the Iranian nuclear threat is very serious, it is not yet urgent, and thus there is no need to prepare Americans immediately for a new war in the Middle East in 2007 or 2008. Recently declassified CIA assessments say Iran won’t have the Bomb until 2010 or 2011. That could suggest the President believes his job is to lay the groundwork of diplomacy and military planning and that it will be the job of the next President to act if diplomacy fails.
SCENARIO #3: President Bush believes the Iranian threat is extremely urgent and is actively preparing for a major offensive against Iran this spring or summer, but he is not ready to tip his hand. He feels the wisest course of action is to keep the public, the media and fellow world leaders focused for the moment on the need to win decisively in Iraq, while he orders the Pentagon to preposition more military personnel, warships, missiles and supplies into the region for the coming war with Iran.
Let me be clear: I don’t buy the first scenario for a moment. This President gets it. Let there be no doubt about that. He told us Iran is part of the “Axis of Evil” four years ago and he has seen all the evil the Iranian leadership has done since then.
Thus, the real key to understanding his State of the Union address lies in either Scenario #2 or #3. If it’s #3, then the President is doing a masterful job at keeping everyone in this part of the world off balance. Rumors of an American strike against Iran – coming as soon as this spring – are running rampant throughout the region.
On the one hand, Bush orders a second carrier battle group to the Persian Gulf. On the other hand, the State Department denies any attack is being contemplated. No one is quite sure what to believe, but they are getting nervous, that’s for certain. If it’s #2, then let’s pray to God that the President is right. After all, there is no margin here for error.*
IN A move widely seen to be bowing to Muslim pressure, Bolton Council has scrapped its Holocaust Memorial Day event.
The council is to replace it with a Genocide Memorial Day in June. This is in line with the policy of the Muslim Council of Britain, which continues to boycott HMD and is asking for a Genocide Day, which will also mark “the ongoing genocide and human rights abuses of Palestinians” by Israelis.
Just for the record, in case anyone is not yet clear on this, there is no genocide going on against the Palestinian people. A genocide is an organized effort by one group of people to kill everyone in another group of people. Palestinians are not being killed en masse. If the Israelis wanted to do that, they could simply bomb the hell out of the Palestinian territories. Clearly, they have superior firepower.
The truth of the matter is that the population in the Palestinian territories continues to rise, so if the Israelis are attempting a genocide of the Palestinian people, they are proving to be a miserable failure at such an endeavor.
* "Some governments will be timid in the face of terror. And make no mistake about it: If they do not act, America will. Our...goal is to prevent regimes that sponsor terror from threatening America or our friends and allies with weapons of mass destruction. Some of these regimes have been pretty quiet since September the 11th. But we know their true nature....Iran aggressively pursues these weapons and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people's hope for freedom...."
* "States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic."
* "We will work closely with our coalition to deny terrorists and their state sponsors the materials, technology, and expertise to make and deliver weapons of mass destruction. We will develop and deploy effective missile defenses to protect America and our allies from sudden attack. And all nations should know: America will do what is necessary to ensure our nation's security. "
* "We'll be deliberate, yet time is not on our side. I will not wait on events, while dangers gather. I will not stand by, as peril draws closer and closer. The United States of America will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons."
UN Approves A Resolution Condemning Holocaust Denial
This is an appropriate response to Iran's Holocaust Denial Conference. In my opinion, a person, organization, or government who participates in such nonesense ought to be condemned, not brought up on charges. They ought to be shouted down, derided and laughed out of decent socieyt, but not thrown in jail.
Unanimously except for Iran, of course. (Although I’d wager that several other OIC countries would have objected too, if they thought they could avoid the political fallout.)
The UN General Assembly approved unanimously a bill to condemn Holocaust denial, with only Iran rejecting it as an attempt by the United States and Israel to exploit the atrocity for their political interests.
The bill was proposed by the US delegation to the UN. No vote was taken on the bill as no objection by any member of the UN was registered in the council.
“Only by studying objectively what happened in the past, can we ensure that such crimes will never be repeated again,” said Iranian delegate Hossein Gharibi. “The seriousness and sincerity of this endeavor would be indeed undermined by rendering political judgments on such events and closing the door to any inquiry on their characteristics, scope and extent.”
The Israeli delegate to the UN Dan Gillerman responded to the Iranian delegate’s comments, saying that Iran was in the process of acquiring weapons of mass destruction at the same time the rest of the world was concerned that events like the Holocaust would not reoccur.
“While the nations of the world gather here to affirm the historicity of the Holocaust with the intent of never again allowing genocide, a member of this assembly is acquiring the capabilities of carrying out its own,” said Gillerman. “The president of Iran is in fact saying, ‘There really was no Holocaust, but just in case, we shall finish the job.”’
VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran has demanded the removal of the U.N. official overseeing nuclear inspections in the country, accusing him of breach of trust, and barred all inspectors from nations behind sanctions, diplomats said on Friday.
Tehran's moves, following a ban on 38 inspectors from four major Western nations announced on Monday, appeared aimed at testing Western resolve over its disputed nuclear activity while stopping short of violating the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The United Nations slapped preliminary sanctions on Iran last month for refusing to stop enriching uranium, the pathway to fuel for atomic energy or bombs, and impeding International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) probes into the nature of its program.
Iran's official news agency IRNA quoted an unnamed Iranian diplomat as saying it had asked the IAEA to "delete a Belgian inspector from the list" of those allowed to work in Iran.
"Both Iran and the (IAEA) are informed that this inspector has passed confidential Iranian nuclear information, which was supposed to be kept between Iran and the IAEA, to inappropriate countries and their media," the diplomat said.
Now, doesn't that make it sound like the IAEA has an secret agreement with Iranian officials to hide certain information?
A number of Christian families have finally decided to break their silence and talk openly about what they describe as Muslim persecution of the Christian minority in this city.
The move comes as a result of increased attacks on Christians by Muslims over the past few months. The families said they wrote letters to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, the Vatican, Church leaders and European governments complaining about the attacks, but their appeals have fallen on deaf ears.
According to the families, many Christians have long been afraid to complain in public about the campaign of "intimidation" for fear of retaliation by their Muslim neighbors and being branded "collaborators" with Israel.
But following an increase in attacks on Christian-owned property in the city over the past few months, some Christians are no longer afraid to talk about the ultra-sensitive issue. And they are talking openly about leaving the city.
"The situation is very dangerous," said Samir Qumsiyeh, owner of the Beit Sahur-based private Al-Mahd (Nativity) TV station. "I believe that 15 years from now there will be no Christians left in Bethlehem. Then you will need a torch to find a Christian here. This is a very sad situation."
Qumsiyeh, one of the few Christians willing to speak about the harsh conditions of their community, has been the subject of numerous death threats. His house was recently attacked with fire-bombs, but no one was hurt.
Qumsiyeh said he has documented more than 160 incidents of attacks on Christians in the area in recent years.
"I pledge allegiance,to the flag, of the United States of America, and to the ...."
The United States of America is a Republic.
In a democracy, a majority of the people can vote to take away the rights of a minority; fifty-one percent of the people can vote to take away the "rights" of the other forty-nine percent because, in a democracy, these "rights" are not established, except by a vote.
In a republic, certain rights are established, and those rights cannot be voted away by a majority; they can be changed only by changing the republic's fundamental laws, its constitution. So, in a republic, ninety-nine percent of the voters cannot legally take away the rights of the other one percent (depending upon the peculiars of the fundamental laws).
Reality, however, is that in the United States, many people don't know the difference. They use the term "democracy" and mean "republic" as we have established ours. Consequently, we Americans let our inalienable rights get infringed by democratic processes.
Article IV, Section 4 of the US Constitution states:
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.
"The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government"
The United States of America is a Republic with democratic principles. The United States of America is a constitutional republic that relies on representative democracy. The majority rule is tempered by legal protection of minority rights; Constitutional safeguards exist to prevent a tyranny of the majority.
The website of the governmental Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) has posted a lengthy document titled "The World toward Illumination." The document is a transcript of an IRIB series on the imminent arrival of the Mahdi, the Twelfth or Hidden Imam, awaited by Shi'ites as the Messiah. [1] The program describes in glowing terms the messianic age to be inaugurated by the Mahdi. He is to begin his uprising in Mecca, and then march on Iraq, where he will establish his "seat of world government" in the city of Kufa and subjugate the current world powers. This will be an age of unparalleled happiness; there will be completely new technologies at mankind's disposal, and "corruption, war, and rebellion will no longer exist." Neither will "liberal democratic civilization." Various days of the year are mentioned as being propitious for the appearance of the Mahdi, though the program says that the precise date cannot be known. The series also includes, in parts not reproduced here, a lengthy polemic against the West, focusing on Evangelical Christians, Zionism, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Hollywood. It also gives a historical survey of Western thinking, from Saint Augustine to Francis Fukuyama. The following are excerpts from the transcripts of the World Toward Illumination program from the IRIB website, in the original English: [2] (1): "Miracles of the Messiah Will Soon Be Here" "…Where is man moving to? What will happen in his future? What fate will today's nations and civilizations have in the future? Will they destroy one another? Will a power, nation or civilization prevail? And finally to what direction will the speed of technology and modernity take man?... "In the current era new interpretations of happiness and prosperity for man have been brought up. In these interpretations there is talk about welfare and worldly tranquility. Some believe that science and material progress automatically bring about prosperity, and man can attain sublimity on earth… But the world's reality shows that man more than any other time is searching for prosperity and tranquility. The daily increasing production of destructive weapons, domineering tendencies, racist wars, genocide and instability of world markets, all threaten the world's security and tranquility. Now western rulers under the slogan of liberal democracy are tyrannically and oppressively looting the capital of oppressed nations. The weakness of the family foundation, crime, violence, narcotics, human trafficking, anxiety and depression have faced the world's future with serious danger… "…We invite you to tune in to our next programs to see how the future will turn out to be. And we invite you to listen to an inspiring poem. "Be joyous my heart, miracles of the Messiah will soon be here "The scent of breaths of the One we know comes from near "Grieve not of sorrow and melancholy, as assured I was… last night "That a Savior will come, it's clear." (3): "How Beautiful and Auspicious Will Be the Day when the World is Cleansed of Deceit" "How beautiful and auspicious will be the day when the world is cleansed of deceit and mischief and the government of justice is established throughout the world. On that day the perfume of life will begin to circulate within humans and the aroma of narcissus, irises and chrysanthemums will fill their soul. Undoubtedly such a day is nigh. "Seeking pure water so thirsty am I, "Moonlight surely appeals to my eye "Oh bright dawn I desire you as I sigh "The luminous sun I seek or I die…" (6): "We Must Get Ready to Search for the Liberal Democratic Civilization in History Museums" "…The West due to a lack of spirituality and morality is not able to respond to man's needs. Lack of attention to man's sublime needs in these societies has created social and cultural crises. Thus this civilization like those of many other Western theoreticians is just an unreal theory. It seems that in the same way that the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini predicted the fall of communism we must get ready to search for the liberal democratic civilization in history museums." (12): "Everything Will Be New and Fresh Like Spring" "Undoubtedly, history will not end with the memory of man's failures; man's ultimate fate is not weakness and inability; and the sun will undoubtedly not spare its vital rays from anyone. Many Iranian poets have spoken of the rise of the sun at dawn and consider man to be worthy of living in a bright and beautiful world full of the aroma of spirituality, where there is justice and equality… "Contrary to the views of western theoreticians, who usually depict an ambiguous and dark future for mankind, Muslim experts believe human history, despite its many ups and downs, has a very auspicious fate, and with the appearance of the Imam of the Age, Hazrat Mahdi (may God hasten his reappearance), finally the world matters will gain order. Muslims believe hopes for the realization of such a happy ending for the world, are called 'Awaiting Redemption', and means waiting for man's problems to be solved by the Savior at the end of time. This awaiting influences many, and inspires them with activity and enthusiasm in confronting darkness and oppression for changing the existing situation… "When that Promised Person who is the direct descendent of the Prophet rises up, the sun of justice and freedom will shine on the hearts and he with his kind hands will extend friendship throughout the world. His face will be attractive and his look charismatic. He is humble before God's greatness. He is a manifestation of God's glory and beauty. Imam Mahdi is the perfect human being. His behavior is praiseworthy and his manners immaculate. He is the embodiment of justice. His torch of guidance is for all mankind… "In short, when he reappears, peace, justice and security will overcome oppression and deceit and one global government, the most perfect ever, will be established. He will make the earth prosper in a way in which no ruins will remain. Man's maturity will reach its height, full equality will be established among the people, and no one will be arrogant toward the other and will not try to dominate others. Finally, corruption, war and rebellion will no longer exist and everything will be new and fresh like spring." (13): "Pure and Sincere People Must Be Trained to Help the Savior in His Implementation of Global Justice" "Sometimes incidents that occur in the world are like an insignificant but infectious pimple that suddenly explodes. Some theoreticians support this view and believe that nothing should stop this volcanic explosion and we should allow corruption to extend so much that the prevailing system would disintegrate. But the uprising of Imam Mahdi… is not like this. This uprising is like a fruit that must pass through stages till it is ready to be picked. Thus, if the Savior has not yet appeared it is not because the world is not full of oppression, but because the time must come for the people to be wise enough and ready to accept justice. Pure and sincere people must be trained in order to help the Savior in his implementation of global justice…" Monday November 20, 2006: "The Seat of the Mahdi's Global Government Will Be the City of Kufa" in Iraq "He will appear as a handsome young man, clad in neat clothes and exuding the fragrance of paradise. His face will glow with love and kindness for the human beings and because of this reason a famous hadith from the Prophet of Islam… has referred to him as Inn-al-Mahdi Tavous ahl al-Jannah, which means 'Indeed the Mahdi will be like a Peacock among the People of Paradise.' He has a radiant forehead, black piercing eyes and a broad chest. He very much resembles his ancestor Prophet Mohammad… Heavenly light and justice accompany him. He will overcome enemies and oppressors with the help of God, and as per the promise of the Almighty the Mahdi will eradicate all corruption and injustice from the face of the earth and establish the global government of peace, justice and equity. "Imam Mahdi (may God hasten his reappearance) will appear all of a sudden on the world scene with a voice from the skies announcing his reappearance at the holy Ka'ba in Mecca. The cloak and other special belongings of Prophet Mohammad… will be with him. He is the essence of all good and the mirror reflecting the characteristics of the 124,000 Prophets sent by God for the guidance of mankind since creation. He calls on all and says I am Baqiat-Allah or the Repository of God on earth. The Prophet had said: Mahdi will appear with a cloud moving above his head. From the sky it will be announced that the hands of the oppressors have been cut and the best of men from the progeny of Mohammad has taken over the leadership. Then the birds will lay abundant eggs and the fish will exceedingly reproduce, the rivers will flow in all their glory and the springs will gush forth from the earth, and the fruits will be multiplied." "In our discussion of the world in the last days of the earth we had said in our previous editions of this program that no source has pointed to the exact date when the Savior will appear and only God knows about the exact timing of the reappearance of Imam Mahdi... The Prophet had said: He will certainly appear and if only a day were to be left to the end of the world God will make that day so long for Mahdi to appear and rise. There are various versions of the exact day of his reappearance. Some say it would be Friday and the date will be Ashura or the 10th of Moharram, the heart-rending martyrdom anniversary of his illustrious ancestor, Imam Husain… Others say the date will be the 25th of the month of Zil-Qa'dah and may coincide with the Spring Equinox or Nowrooz as the Iranians call [it]. A saying attributed to the Prophet's 6th infallible heir, Imam Ja'far Sadeq… says the Mahdi will appear on the Spring Equinox and God will make him defeat Dajjal the Impostor or the anti-Christ as the Christians say, who will be hanged near the dump of Kufa…. "Then he will be joined by 313 of the most devoted believers, equivalent to the number of those that had accompanied the Prophet at the Battle of Badr, the first armed encounter imposed by the infidels on the Muslims. Imam Mahdi and steadfast devotees will gather in Mecca; the people of Mecca will be surprised at the presence of so many faithful. These enlightened individuals will pledge allegiance to the Mahdi… "After his appearance the Imam would remain in Mecca for some time, and then go to Medina. According to narrations, Sofyani, a descendant of the Prophet's archenemy Abu Sofyan, will seize Syria and attack Iraq and the Hejaz with the ferocity of a beast. The Sofyani will commit great crimes against humanity in Iraq, slaughtering people bearing the names of the infallible Imams, and his army will lay siege to the city of Kufa and to Holy Najaf. Of course, many incidents take place in this line and finally Imam Mahdi sends troops who kill the Sofyani in Beit ol-Moqaddas [i.e. Jerusalem], the Islamic holy city in Palestine that is currently under occupation of the Zionists. Soon a pious person from the progeny of Imam Hasan Mojtaba… meets with the Imam. He is a venerable God-fearing individual from Iran. Before the Imam's appearance he fights oppression and corruption and enters Iraq to lift the siege of Kufa and holy Najaf and to defeat the forces of Sofyani in Iraq. He then pledges allegiance to Imam Mahdi. "Another beautiful moment of the Savior's appearance is the coming down of Prophet Jesus… from heaven. Hazrat Mahdi receives him courteously and asks him to lead the prayers. But Jesus says you are more qualified for this than me. We read in the book Tazkarat ol-Olia, 'the Mahdi will come with Jesus son of Mary accompanying him.' This indicates that these two great men… complement each other. Imam Mahdi will be the leader while Prophet Jesus will act as his lieutenant in the struggle against oppression and [for the] establishment of justice in the world. Jesus had himself given the tidings of the coming of God's last messenger and will see Mohammad's ideals materialize in the time of the Mahdi. The seat of the Mahdi's global government will be the city of Kufa, where his headquarters will be the Sahla Mosque, presently outside the city that was the home of Prophet Idrees or Enoch long before the great deluge of the times of Prophet Noah. From here he will dominate the east and the west to fill the earth with justice… "God will enliven the earth through the Mahdi after the corruption and vice wrought by the oppressors and sinner[s]. Thus his appearance will take place when morality and humanity have reached a dead end. The people's yearning for justice in the midst of all the oppression allows him to carry out his mission. In our time, many pray for his appearance and each day they renew their allegiance to him. "O God, make me one of his companions, show me his respected and bright visage, and hasten his reappearance." Monday November 27, 2006: "After His Uprising from Mecca, All of Arabia Will Submit to Him, and Then Other Parts of the World as He Marches on Iraq" "When the sun of freedom and justice shines, the sounds of a rider coming from afar will be heard. The winds obey him, and in his presence the turbulent seas and fiery storms will reach the shore of calmness. The appearance of the Savior will make the fragrance of eternal justice embellish the soul of the earth. The Mahdi… himself will say, my existence is the cause of security and peace for the world people. "There are various narrations on the global government of peace and justice of Imam Mahdi (may God hasten his reappearance and cleanse the Planet of all vestiges of sin and corruption). Narrations on the global government of justice, the universal government, the government of the deprived, the government of welfare and security, and each of these indicates one aspect of the Savior's government. The justice-spreading universal government encompasses all these. Prophet Mohammad… has been quoted as saying: I give you the good tidings of the Mahdi. He will rise in my ummah [i.e. the Muslim nation], while my ummah is entangled in differences and deviations. He will fill the earth that is immersed in oppression, with justice. And all those in heaven and earth will be content with him… "…One of the first measures of Imam Mahdi… is fighting all centers of domination and power-mongering. In this way, Global Arrogance [i.e. the West headed by America] and its minions puffed up by their economic and military might will try to create problems but they will not be able to change anything in their favor. The Mahdi considers his programs within the framework of conventional criteria, and says: Fear God and surrender to us and hand over the affairs to us. It is up to us to quench your thirst from the spring, as we are the one[s] who take you to its source. "The Mahdi's far-sightedness and firmness in the face of mischievous elements will strike awe. After his uprising from Mecca, all of Arabia will… submit to him and then other parts of the world as he marches upon Iraq and established his seat of global government in the city of Kufa. Then the Imam will send 10 thousand of his forces to the east and west to uproot the oppressors. At this time God will facilitate things for him and lands will come under his control one after the other. The Prophet's 5thinfallible successor, Imam Mohammad Baqer… says: It is as if I see the Mahdi who has taken control of the east and the west, and all obey him. "Thus, as is clear, in the justice-seeking government the clouds give way to bright sunshine, as the Promised Savior spreads his radiance on the earth. God's infinite kindness will give refuge to mankind and the brightness of truth and justice will be seen in all dimensions of life." Monday December 11, 2006: "The Idea of Placing Humanity Under One Religion… is a Gift Given by Islam to Humanity" "… Regarding the Islamic goal of the perfect and ideal state, it should be noted that the world desired by Islam is not a far-fetched idea like the utopia of the West in which the realities of today's society have no effect. Since the natural growth of man is toward sublimity, dedicated Muslims in each and every era strive to materialize the characteristics of the promised society to the best of their ability… The Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (may his soul rest in peace) used to emphasize this and would say: We, of course, cannot fill the world with justice now. If we could we certainly would. But since we cannot, he, the Savior must come. The world is full of oppression and if we can prevent oppression we will have carried out our part of the duty…” "With the reappearance of Imam Mahdi… conflicts, differences and discriminations that stem from lack of faith and atheism in the society will be eliminated. The shortcomings of religions and schools of thought will be clarified and Islam will prevail as the perfect pinnacle of faith. In other words, methods will become one and oneness will appear in people's beliefs. The Mahdi will materialize the call of the holy Qur'an, which throughout its text has urged mankind to unite and worship the One and the Only God without associating partners to him. The writer of the book Imamate and Mahdaviyat, says: the idea of placing humanity under one religion irrespective of their color, gender, language, class and ethnicity is a gift given by Islam to humanity…" Monday December 25, 2006: "The Unjust System of Distribution and Denial of the Rights of Nations Will End with the Reappearance of Imam Mahdi" "… In the weird system of today's powerful count[r]ies, moral and spiritual values have no place and are seen as undesirable liabilities that prevent these powers from reaching economic welfare and what they call true prosperity. However, the exploitation of the weak, the unjust system of distribution and denial of the rights of nations, will end with the reappearance of Imam Mahdi… "One of the characteristics of the global government of the Mahdi is the astounding growth of science and technology. There will be an explosion of science. As we said last week, knowledge is made of 27 letters and up to now whatever man has discovered is within the confines of only 2 letters. But when the Mahdi appears the other 25 letters of knowledge will be at the service of mankind, which is something not imaginable with the limited knowledge that we have today despite the seemingly great progress in science and technology. The Mahdi will correct man's scientific mistakes and bring up new and astonishing methods that had never occurred to man before… The Mahdi will also regain the wealth and properties that have unrightfully been usurped by invaders and oppressors and distribute divine blessings among the people. Imam Baqer… says he will divide them with such equality that there will no longer be any poor person. In Islam's logic justice and good relations among people will lead to the flow of abundant divine blessings from the sky. Since people will have the best of qualities vital rains will pour down and all the earth will be filled with greenness and freshness. The Prophet had said in this regard: in my ummah, the Mahdi will rise and people will gain such welfare as never seen before. The sky will repeatedly rain and the earth will hide none of the things it can grow."
Sorry if it seems morbid, but I really do love Jaco, and I really do miss him. Here is a video made by a guy who went to his grave in Fort Lauderdale, FL. The music is Okonkole y Trompa by Jaco; one of my favorites.
Three nuclear weapons constitute a second Holocaust. Enemies are explicit in their desire to destroy us. We are sleepwalking through this as if diplomatic engagement will create a fiesta where we will all love one another," Newt Gingrich, Former US Speaker of the House of Representatives, told the Herzliya conference on Tuesday via satellite.
According to Gingrich, "Israel is facing the greatest danger for its survival since the 1967 victory. Israel maintained its dominance since 1967 even after the 1973 failure. In 1984 I wrote that WMD and terrorism would pose a threat for US national security. If two or three cities are destroyed because of terrorism both the US and Israel's democracy will be eroded and both will become greater dictatorial societies."
"We lack the language and goals to address the new environment along with the speed and intensity to counter the contemporary threats. If we have no strategy we will need to be intellectually honest to consider the next step once two cities have been destroyed. My grandchildren are in greater danger than I was throughout the Cold War.
"What stages are you in Israel going to take if tomorrow morning Jerusalem, Haifa and Tel Aviv would be destroyed? Similarly the US needs to consider what policies it would advance if in twenty-four hours, Atlanta, Boston and San Francisco were destroyed. These threats will become even more imminent in two or five years time," he added.
Gingrich believes the US should have as an explicit goal - regime change in Iran. "In 2006 even the Department of State which seeks to deny the nature of reality, noted that Iran is a leading sponsor of terror. What I need is something that will be similar to Reagan's Replacement strategy in Iran. The current unrest in Iran will facilitate this," he said.
The former House Speaker concluded by calling on the Department of Homeland Security to conduct two nuclear exercises and one biological exercise in major cities such as Philadelphia or Dallas. "This has to be carried out to determine how many causalities would occur and whether hospitals could accommodate the casualties."
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday he did not expect a U.S. attack on Iran because there were plenty of “wise people” in the United States who would not let it happen.
Iran and the United States are at loggerheads over Tehran’s nuclear program, which Washington says is a cover for making bombs, and over Iraq, where U.S. officials say Iran is fuelling sectarian violence. Tehran denies both charges.
Washington says it wants to solve the nuclear standoff by diplomacy but has not ruled out strikes if that fails.
“They are not in a position to carry out that measure although they may like to ... because there are many wise people in America who will not let this happen,” the president said in an interview on Iranian television.
Israel and the United States will soon be destroyed, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday during a meeting with Syria’s foreign minister, the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) website said in a report. “Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad... assured that the United States and the Zionist regime of Israel will soon come to the end of their lives,” the Iranian president was quoted as saying.
The MEMRI Blog reports a disturbing statement from an Iranian “Expediency Council” official:
The Iranian news agency Mehr reported that in light of the increasing U.S. presence in the Persian Gulf, and the continuing Iranian nuclear crisis, Iranian Expediency Council Secretary Mohsen Rezai has said that “the Iranian nation will strike 10 slaps to the face of America, in such a way that it will no longer be able to get up on the stage.”
A new paper issued by an influential Dubai think tank suggests that Gulf states may be prepared to back a US military strike on Iran.
The paper, written by GRC program director, Dr. Christian Koch, makes it clear that the Gulf States view Iran as an existential threat and the paper warns that:
Instead of trying to position itself as the main power in the Middle East that is set on challenging and bringing down US dominance, Iran should truly begin to engage the region and seek broad-based solutions to the region’s urgent problems. Unfortunately, Iran refuses to provide its neighbors with any sort of confidence concerning its ultimate ambitions. From the Arab Gulf perspective, Iranian actions simply look as replacing one bully with another.
At a time when the Arab Gulf states are looking for reassurances, Iranian pronouncements of its military capabilities and ability to send thousands of suicide bombers to the other side of the Gulf in response to any US military campaign represents an attempt at intimidation in the least. It is little wonder then that the Arab Gulf states continue to request and depend on US protection given that “export of the revolution”? represents a real threat to their existence.
I am no more than an ordinary man who has been spending life as if knowing nothing. I was born in a wealthy Muslim family in Pakistan, but when I was a few months old, I was carried to Saudi Arabia by my father. When I was about six, my mom passed away. As I grew older I had so many questions like almost everyone experiences at some point in life. Why am I here? Where did I come from? Is there really a God and if so where is He? Why doesn't He talk?
I have been studying the Quran since I was around 12. Later I also started reading other kinds of Islamic books like the Life of Prophet Mohammad, Hadiths, etc. I have been Wahabi or Ahlae Hadiths like most of the Saudi Muslims are. (Osama Bin Laden is also one of them.) They are very extreme and I have been one also.
I had been taught that Islam is the only way to Heaven. I was told, "If you do this, you'll get so and so blessings in Heaven," and "if you do that, you'll get so and so blessings in Heaven." I became an extremist for the religion Islam.
Well, I believed what I was doing was right, and if it is right, then there is no risk in digging. I had read about the prophets in the Quran and Hadiths, but Jesus Christ was the only personality that really touched me more than any others. I found out that Christians believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I very much wondered why they believe that. I started searching for Jesus Christ more and more.
I had a Christian friend who used to study with me. I asked him one day if I could have his Bible. He was surprised and said "Sorry, you cannot have it." I assured him no one would ever know, "It will remain between me and you." But my father came to know that I read the Bible and that it was in our home. He was very angry and he knew I have only one Christian friend. So he took me with my uncle to this friend's home and warned them saying, "If you do this again and try to preach Christianity to a Muslim child, you'll have to suffer a lot and you know it. We will complain about it to Islamic Police (Mutawa) and you could be exiled from this country forever." I was a bit worried. I shouldn't have done this to my friend's family.
My father warned me, and so did my uncle, to pray five times a day as I used to pray, and one time in the mosque. I kept going, and many times when there was no one in the mosque I used to cry and ask God to show me, "who is this Jesus and who are you?" Often while the Imam (leader) of the prayer was praying in Arabic (as it's compulsory to pray in Arabic only), I did not give much attention to what he was saying. One day I was praying in the Mosque, during Zuhar's prayer (noon prayer). I wasn't thinking of Jesus Christ that time. I saw an image of a handsome person on the floor where we bow our heads in prayer. I was shocked. I never saw such a thing before. It was kind of an image on water. I heard in myself that this is Jesus Christ. This is the Lord!
I was worried what and how could that be, as I have learned in the Quran that God is only one, yet Christians take Jesus as the Son of God and also call Him God. This is the greatest sin which God can never forgive. I could not leave without completing my prayer just for this reason. So I completed it and began thinking about it later. My hunger to know about Jesus Christ grew more and more.
The Associated Press never uses the word “terror” without enclosing it in quotes; they don’t use it to describe beheading videos, they don’t use it to describe Palestinian suicide bombings, and even Osama bin Laden is now regularly labeled a “Saudi dissident.” This is a deliberate policy; as they have explained on several occasions, to the AP one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.
But here’s a case where the AP shuts off the Acme T-Quote Generator and flashes the word TERROR right in the headline—and the article itself tells a very different story. Can you guess why?
Why did George Bush refuse to sign the Kyoto Protocols? You will remember he was called everything from evil to stupid for his refusal. Well, check this out:
Europe's latest folly, the purchase of Kyoto Credits from Putin's Russia.
The mystery deepens. Turning the newspaper page, we find that, under demented Kyoto arrangements, Germany’s Dresdner Bank is now brokering an arrangement by which European companies will pay 15 billion euros to the corrupt and autocratic Russian state monopoly, Gazprom, in return for “carbon credits” to continue selling oil and gas to European customers on the open market.
This money in turn will help Russia’s dark, authoritarian regime to invest further in its ability to hold Europeans who depend on Russian heating oil through the winter to ransom when it has political demands.
... here's some more information about this ridiculous situation.European nations agreed to the "Kyoto" process, and have set carbon emissions limits for themselves. In order to exceed those limits, they are going to buy "credits" from Russia.
The "credits" are a fictional device. The Europeans are buying permission to pollute -- from Russia, the most polluted country in Europe.
You gotta love your enemies, when they tell the truth. Muslims are so in love with their sick, stupid philosophy that they will say the darndest things.
Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said Saturday that his Hamas group would be willing to accept a temporary Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in exchange for a 10-year truce with Israel.
His comments, reiterating Hamas policy, came as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was to meet exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Syria to discuss ways to form a coalition government and end international sanctions on the Palestinians.
Haniyeh’s proposal has previously been rejected by Israel and the international community, which demand that Hamas recognize Israel’s right to exist and renounce violence.
“We are with liberating any inch of Palestine,” he said in a televised address. “But we will not close the door for the next generation, because the weak don’t always stay weak, and the strong won’t stay strong.”
Charles at Little Green Footballs comments:
We need to understand that they’re still going to wipe out the Jews. He figures it will take about 10 years.
In that last quote, Haniyeh is referring to the Islamic concept of a temporary truce to rest and regain strength, as exemplified by Mohammed’s treaty of Al-Hudaybiyya, an agreement made with the Meccan tribe of Quraish—which Mohammed broke as soon as his armies were strong enough to attack and conquer the Quraish.
Yes, the Arabic word for "truce" is hudna. The idea is that the Jihad never ceases, because it is inevitable that eventually the whole world will be Islamic territory. However, Muslims are allowed to grant a hudna, or temporary halt to the Jihad in order to regather themselves and gain strength.
Hamas is telling us everything we need to know here. We are fools if we go on with this media-inspired idea that we can negotiate peace with the Palestinians. It isn't going to happen.
A guy wrote to me yesterday and said that when he spent time in Bavaria he noticed that there was an almost unnatural emphasis put on pork. There were photos of pork, restaurants called Boar's Head, or Pig's Head, celebrations of sausage, etc.
He asked if it could be that this is a leftover from a time of Moorish incursions into Norther Europe. Could it be that the Infidels responded by doing what they believed would piss off the Muslims, and then, over time, as the threat subsided they simply carried on the tradition and forgot how it started?
I don't know history well enough to be able to say whether this may be true, or not. Does anyone else know?
The Muslim Brotherhood front group calling itself the Council on American Islamic Relations is engaged in a major push to force Fox Television to apologize for depicting Muslims as terrorists: Hit US television show ‘24’ under fire from Muslim group.
They’ve been spending a lot of their Saudi money on this campaign today; CAIR shills have been all over the media, seething and complaining and lying.
Hit US television show “24” came under fire from a Muslim group, which accused the program’s makers of fuelling anti-Muslim prejudice with its latest storyline.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said “24’s” season premiere, in which Islamic terrorists detonated a nuclear bomb near Los Angeles, risked stoking racial hatred.
The criticism was swiftly rejected by the show’s network Fox Broadcasting, which said the series did not single out ethnic groups to be villains.
“The raw emotional impact of fictional scenes that include widespread death and destruction in America may adversely affect the public’s attitude toward civil liberties, religious freedom and interfaith relations,” the CAIR statement said.
“The program’s repeated association of acts of terrorism with Islam will only serve to increase anti-Muslim prejudice in our society,” it added.
Representatives of the award-winning series responded by pointing out that during the show’s five seasons villains have included Americans, Baltic Europeans, Germans, Russians, Islamic fundamentalists and the fictional president of the United States.
Yeah, because everyone knows that there are plenty of other kinds of terrorist. Look at all the Presbyterians carrying out acts of terror. And, the Buddhists. Those damned Buddhists.
Hilary Ready To Play The Muslim Card On Barack Obama
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! (I'm gonna get your Muslim ass, Barack.)
Barack Obama was born to a Muslim father, who left his mother and he high and dry when little Barack was only two. Obama's mother then married an Indonesian Muslim man, and Obama received his first formal schooling in a Muslim academy.
This makes him a Muslim in the eyes of Islam. And yet, Barack Obama proclaims he is a follower of Jesus Christ. And that makes him an apostate in the eyes of Islam. The punishment for apostasy according to the Koran, and according to Islamic scholars the world over, is death.
One does have to wonder if we will see a fatwa called down on Obama eventually.
An investigation of Mr. Obama by political opponents within the Democratic Party has discovered that Mr. Obama was raised as a Muslim by his stepfather in Indonesia. Sources close to the background check, which has not yet been released, said Mr. Obama, 45, spent at least four years in a so-called Madrassa, or Muslim seminary, in Indonesia.
“He was a Muslim, but he concealed it,” the source said. “His opponents within the Democrats hope this will become a major issue in the campaign.”…
“The background investigation will provide major ammunition to his opponents,” the source said. “The idea is to show Obama as deceptive.”
In Indonesia, the young Obama was enrolled in a Madrassa and was raised and educated as a Muslim. Although Indonesia is regarded as a moderate Muslim state, the U.S. intelligence community has determined that today most of these schools are financed by the Saudi Arabian government and they teach a Wahhabi doctrine that denies the rights of non-Muslims.
Although the background check has not confirmed that the specific Madrassa Mr. Obama attended was espousing Wahhabism, the sources said his Democratic opponents believe this to be the case—and are seeking to prove it. The sources said the opponents are searching for evidence that Mr. Obama is still a Muslim or has ties to Islam.
I have to wonder if this story is really true. Could Hilary believe she could get away with such creed-oriented mudslinging given our current climate of political correctness?
Well yes, I think she might think she'd be able to do so. After all, she has the liberal credentials which would make any charges of racism slide off her.
SANTA CLARITA, Calif. -- Snow fell on the palm trees of West Los Angeles and Malibu Wednesday afternoon as Jack Frost visited the Southland again.
NBC4 forecaster Fritz Coleman said the mixture of precipitation in West Los Angeles at about 3 p.m. included a dusting of snow. Residents in West Los Angeles said the snow accumulated in parking lots, on cars and around palm trees near Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards and other areas.
Most of the snow fell south of Sunset Boulevard and just east of the 405 Freeway. Residents told NBC4 that several inches of snow fell in their yards.
Snow fell earlier Wednesday in Malibu and caused traffic problems on the area's winding and narrow roads. Sleet made driving treacherous on Kanan Dume Road, a steep route through the Santa Monica Mountains where it's more typical to see beach-bound cars loaded with surfboards than a snowplow.
"One of our sergeants said he hadn't seen anything like this in 20 years," said California Highway Patrol Officer Leland Tang at the West Valley Station.
A probation officer at a juvenile camp in the Santa Monicas said he was traveling down Kanan Dume when it began to snow.
"It was snowing pretty good," said Officer Oscar Cross. "The road was covered in ice and slush, and I saw one car slide into a ditch. Everyone seemed scared to drive."
A former U.S. Justice Department official disclosed to Arutz-7 that former U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s advocacy extended beyond the Palestinians, when he interceded on behalf of a Nazi SS man.
Neil Sher, a veteran of the U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigation, described a letter he received from Carter in 1987 in an interview with Israel National Radio’s Tovia Singer. The letter, written and signed by Carter, asked that Sher show “special consideration” for a man proven to have murdered Jews in the Mauthausen death camp in Austria.
“In 1987, Carter had been out of office for seven years or so,” Sher recalled. “It was a very active period for my office. We had just barred Kurt Waldheim – he was then president of Austria and former head of the United Nations – from entering the U.S. because of his Nazi past and his involvement in the persecution of civilians during the war. We had just deported an Estonian Nazi Commandant back to the Soviet Union after a bruising battle after which we were attacked by Reagan White House Communications Director Patrick Buchanan.
“Also around that time, in the spring of 1987, we deported a series of SS guards from concentration camps, whose names nobody would know. One such character we sent back to Austria was a man named Martin Bartesch.”
Bartesch, who had immigrated to the U.S. and lived in Chicago, admitted to Sher’s office and the court that he had voluntarily joined the Waffen SS and had served in the notorious SS Death’s Head Division at the Mauthausen concentration camp where, at the hands of Bartesch and his cohorts, many thousands of prisoners were gassed, shot, starved and worked to death. He also confessed to having concealed his service at the infamous camp from U.S. immigration officials.
“We had an extraordinary piece of evidence against him – a book that was kept by the SS and captured by the American armed forces when they liberated Mauthausen,” Sher said. “We called it the death book. It was a roster that the Germans required them to keep that identified SS guards as they extended weapons to murder the inmates and prisoners.”
An entry in the book for October 10, 1943 registered the shooting death of Max Oschorn, a French Jewish prisoner. His murderer was also recorded: SS guard Martin Bartesch. “It was a most chilling document,” Sher recalled. The same evidence was used by the U.S. military in postwar trials as the basis for execution or long prison sentences for many identified SS guards.
“We kicked him out and he went back to Austria. In the meantime, his family – he had adult kids – went on a campaign, also supported by his church, to try to get special treatment. In so doing they attacked the activities of our office and me personally. They claimed we used phony evidence from the Soviet Union – which was nonsense. They claimed he was a young man of only 17 or 18 when he joined the Nazi forces, asking for some sympathetic treatment and defense from our office, which they claimed was just after vengeance.”
The family approached several members of Congress. “The congressmen would, very understandably, forward their claims over to our office and when they learned the facts they would invariably drop the case,” Sher recalled.
But there was one politician who accepted the claims without asking for any further information. “One day, in the fall of ’87, my secretary walks in and gives me a letter with a Georgia return address reading ‘Jimmy Carter.’ I assumed it was a prank from some old college buddies, but it wasn’t. It was the original copy of the letter Bartesch’s daughter sent to Carter, after Bartash had already been deported.
“In the letter, she claimed we were un-American, only after vengeance, and persecuting a man for what he did when he was only 17 and 18 years old. “I couldn’t help thinking of my own father who returned home with shrapnel wounds after he joined the U.S. Army as a teenager to fight the Nazis and hit the beaches at Normandy at that same age on D-day.
“On the upper corner of the letter was a note signed by Jimmy Carter saying that in cases such as this, he wanted ‘special consideration for the family for humanitarian reasons.’
“I didn’t respond to the letter – the case was already over and he was out of the country – but it always stuck in my craw. A former president who didn’t do what I would expect him to do - with a full staff at his disposal – to find out the facts before he took up the side of this person. But I wasn’t going to pick a fight with a former president. We had enough on our plate.”
Now, following Carter’s book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, Sher has decided to go public with the hope that a public made aware of Carter’s support and defense of a Nazi SS man will help illustrate why the arbiter of the Camp David Accords came out with a book defending the Palestinians after the landslide election of the Islamist Hamas terror group.
“It always bothered me, but I didn’t go public with it until recently, when he wrote this book and let it spill out where his sentiments really lie,” Sher said. “Here was Jimmy Carter jumping in on behalf of someone who did not deserve in any way, shape or form special consideration. And the things he has now said about the Jewish lobby really exposes where his heart really lies.”
AllahPundit questions, "Does anyone seriously believe Jimmy Carter is pro-Nazi, or at least so anti-Israel that he’d go to bat for an SS guard for political reasons?
No, I don't think he does this because he is pro-Nazi, or even because he is anti-Israel.
The reason I think this story is important and indicative that Jimmy Carter does indeed, have some problem with Jews is because if he did not he would be completely repulsed by a Nazi SS Jew-murderer, as I am, and as I would hope any friend of mine would as well.
I won't go to bat for any murderer. There is a murderer within my own family. I won't associate with him in any way. I won't even have his direct family members in my house, because they support him.
To me this is decent, this is morality, this is basic goodness, as opposed to evil.
And, that is what Jimmy Carter has trouble with, making a distinction between good and evil.
Look, I don't know how to bring this up gracefully, but something is wrong with Paula Abdul. Last night on American Idol, poor Paula looked like she was out of control of her facial and body muscles. Her face contorted in seemingly involuntary grimaces and smiles. Here arms waved around, and she kept bending this way and that at the torso.
She looks like she's drunk, but I don't think she is, because, if she is, then she's been drunk for the past week straight.
Any speculation? It's very sad. She seems like such a nice lady, but whatever has hit her has not been very nice to her. Whatever it is, is has caused her to deteriorate very quickly.
Here's a video of her from several days back. Note the slurred speech and the odd movements. Very sad.
COPENHAGEN, Denmark - An editor of a Danish newspaper that published the controversial prophet Muhammad cartoons said Wednesday he expects the debate about self-censorship in the media and artists' fear of offending Islam to continue for years.
The Jyllands-Posten daily in 2005 published 12 drawings — one of them showing Muhammad wearing a turban shaped as a bomb with a burning fuse. Another portrayed him with a bushy gray beard and holding a sword.
The cartoons, which were reprinted in a range of Western media, triggered international protests across the Muslim world and attacks on Danish embassies in January 2006.
Flemming Rose, the culture editor of the newspaper — one of Denmark's biggest — had asked Danish cartoonists to draw Muhammad. He reiterated that the decision to print the drawings was meant as a challenge to a perceived self-censorship, not to insult Muslims.
"The drawings have started a very important debate that will last for many, many years," Rose told a news conference, ahead of the one-year anniversary of the cartoon crisis. "In the coming years, this will become a bigger discussion."
Rose said he "felt provoked when I heard institutions, media and people in Western Europe were putting reins on themselves because they were afraid of offending Islam."
He gave several examples, from art removed from exhibitions to standup comedians saying they didn't want to poke fun at Islam. In 2004, Danish writer Kaare Bluitgen complained he could not find an illustrator for his children's book about Muhammad, for fear of retaliation for depicting the prophet.
"It reminded me of what I had seen in the Soviet Union, where I saw a society where people were intimidated by the system," said Rose, a correspondent in Moscow in the 1980s and 1990s. He reiterated that he regretted if the cartoons had offended Muslims and apologized to them but stood by the decision to print them, saying it was within Danish law.
This is a program which ran yesterday on England's Channel Four. Channel Four sent a reporter on an undercover assignment to find out what goes on in one of the country's most touted "moderate" Mosques.
This is a stunning and damning video expose. Check your preconceptions at the door.
It is CRITICAL to realize that Benny Morris is a revisionist, somewhat anti-Zionist historian who has now 'seen the light', which is, that while zionist actions have never been anywhere near perfect, the perfect is not the enemy of the good.
On the day Iran gets the nuclear cycle down, their people, the average people are DEAD. I do not believe Israel, having already suffered the death of more than half all jews living on the planet, will wait for the the moral high ground of being struck first.
Israel exists because ALL OF HUMAN HISTORY (i.e racism) makes its existence compulsory.
With that in mind, read this:
"Benny Morries believes that the Iranian regime will annihilate Israel withnuclear weapons, and nobody will stop it in doing so. Morris used to have the reputation of being an Anti-Zionist, but he rejects the accusation that he questions Israel's right of existence. In this article written for DIE WELT,Morris explains why he is convinced that sometime in the future millions ofIsraelis will be murdered." (DIE WELT, translated by Ursula Duba)
The following is the original text in English provided by Benny Morris.-------------------------------------The second Holocaust will not be like the first. By Benny Morris
The Nazis, of course, industrialized mass murder. But still, the perpetratorshad one-on-one contact with the victims. They may have dehumanized them, over months and years of appalling debasement and in their minds, before the actual killing. But, still, they were in eye- and ear-contact, sometimes in tactile contact, with their victims. The Germans, along with their non-German helpers,had to round up the men, women and children from their houses and drag and beat them through the streets and mow them down in nearby woods or push and pack them on cattle cars and transport them to the camps, where 'Work makes Free', separate the able-bodied from the completely useless and lure them into 'shower'halls and pour in the gas and then take out, or oversee the extraction of, thebodies and prepare the 'showers' for the next batch.
The second Holocaust will be quite different. One bright morning, in five or ten years' time, perhaps during a regional crisis, perhaps out of the blue, aday or a year or five years after Iran's acquisition of the Bomb, the mullahs inQom will covoke in secret session, under a portrait of the steely-eyed Ayatollah Khomeini, and give President Ahmedinejad, by then in his second or third term, the go ahead. The orders will go out and the Shihab III and IV missiles willtake off for Tel Aviv, Beersheba, Haifa, and Jerusalem, and probably somemilitary sites, including Israel's half dozen air and (reported) nuclear missilebases. Some of the Shihabs will be nuclear-tipped, perhaps even with multiplewarheads. Others will be dupes, packed merely with biological or chemicalagents, or old newspapers, to draw off or confuse Israel's anti-missile batteries and Home Guard units.
With a country the size and shape of Israel (an elongated 8,000 squaremiles), probably four or five hits will suffice: No more Israel. A million ormore Israelis, in the greater Tel Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem areas, will die immediately. Millions will be seriously irradiated. Israel has about seven million inhabitants. No Iranian will see or touch an Israeli. It will be quite impersonal.
Some of the dead will inevitably be Arab. 1.3 million of Israel's citizensare Arab and another 3.5 million additional Arabs live in the semi-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. Jerusalem, Tel Aviv-Jaffa and Haifa have substantial Arab minorities. And there are large Arab concentrations immediately around Jerusalem(in Ramallah-El Bireh, Bir Zeit, Bethlehem), and outside Haifa. Here, too, many will die, immediately or by and by.
It is doubtful whether such a mass killing of fellow Muslims will trouble Ahmedinejad and the mullahs. The Iranians don't especially like Arabs, especially Sunni Arabs, with whom they have intermittently warred for centuries.
And they have an especial contempt for the (Sunni) Palestinians, who, after all, though initially outnumbering the Jews by more than 10 to 1, failed during the long conflict to prevent the Jews from establishing their state or taking overall of Palestine. Besides, the Iranian leadership sees the destruction of Israel as a supreme divine command, as a herald of the Second Coming, and the Muslims dispatched collaterally as so many shuhada (martyrs) in the noble cause.
Anyway,the Palestinians, many of them dispersed around the globe, will survive as a people, as will the greater Arab Nation, of which they are part. And surely, to be rid of the Jewish state, the Arabs should be willing to make some sacrifices.
God, I love YouTube. In my whole life, I've never gotten a chance to see Anthony Braxton in action. And, here what do I come across? A video of Braxton playing with a cavalcade of my favorite musicians:
Jack DeJohenette - Drums Miroslav Vitous - Bass Chick Corea - Piano
Wow, what a group. Damn. And, I had never heard Braxton play like this before.
One is willing to commit ANY atrocity, kill any number of people using any means they have at their disposal. And they are willing to accept any number of casualties - even use suicidal attackers willing to commit genocidal murder. And, they are willing to fight for decades if not centuries. No matter the costs.
The other side is not willing to commit any unnecessary collateral damage, and even warns the other side before a counter-attack. This side has much more powerful weapons, but will not use them. And they are not willing to accept comparatively low numbers of casualties, nor accept a number of casualties which is historically low. And they don't want to fight in any one location for more than a few years. And they expect to win and then change centuries old ethos of their foes in the same period of time.
So, i a war between these two side...
WHICH SIDE WILL WIN?
The other side. The enemy. The jihadoterrorists are gonna win unless the entire West adapts its ethos of war - and decides it's gonna stop fighting this war using half-measures and GO ALL-OUT FOR VICTORY.
Half of the West has rejected war since WW1. (More on this HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE.) The costs of WW1 were so high and so demoralizing that many people came to reject modernity and seek a post modern ethos - one which rejected capitalism, nationalism, and Judeo-Christian traditionalism - because they were blamed for WW1.
These people - post modernists - embraced transnational multi-lateralism, cultural and moral relativism, and pacifism. These are the people of the Left. They are Fifth Column for the enemy because they make it nearly impossible for the ENTIRE West to unite and deafeat our utterly ruthless and totally committed foes.
WW2 would have been lost except for Churchill - who unlike the rest of post modern Europe - wouldn't surrender to Nazism.
Go read the whole thing. We are in big trouble, my friends, unless we drastically change how we are fighting this battle.
Everyone's resting easy thinking our civilization can't disappear. If you don't think civilization can disappear think of what happened in New Orleans last year. It does not take much for the scales to tip into complete chaos. One nuclear weapons detonated in one of our cities could turn the citizenry completely against each other.
And, if you don't think the Jihadoterrorists would use a nuclear weapon on us, then you are living in a dream world.
Our governments had better start fighting this war or the likelihood that multiple civil wars will break out across the West will continue to increase.
A bipartisan slate of lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives proposed a resolution calling on the Iranian president to face genocide incitement charges.
The non-binding resolution brought last week to the House’s Foreign Affairs Committee and initiated by Reps. Steve Rothman (D-N.J.) and Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), says statements by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad calling for the destruction of Israel amount to crimes according to the 1948 Convention on Genocide.
What does one say to a professed atheist when he demands proof that God exists? One could, of course, challenge him to prove that God doesn't exist—and to prove the preposterous scenario that the universe and even the human brain just happened by chance. In fact, since God is infinite, finite beings could never arrive at an indisputable proof either for or against His existence. Furthermore, "proofs" are really beside the point.
It is impossible to "prove" philosophically one's own existence—but who doubts it? Then why is a philosophical "proof" of God's existence demanded? Who needs "proof" that one's husband or wife or parent or child exists? If God really is, then He should be able to make Himself known. And if He can't do that, then whether He exists or not would be irrelevant to practical concerns.
Of course, the problem may not be that God isn't making Himself known, but that mankind fails to recognize Him when He does so. Even the natural world suggests such a probability. For example, although the entire universe is composed of energy, mankind was for thousands of years unaware of its existence—not because energy didn't manifest itself and its power, but in spite of that fact.
Could it not be the same way with the God who created energy? Surely He would be far more mysterious than anything He made—and thus even more difficult to comprehend. God is not an impersonal force like energy. He must be a personal Being with emotion, intellect and will, or He could not have created us. The intricately organized universe God made adequately reveals His infinite intelligence and power. But it is something else for God to manifest His love and His will for mankind. To do so, He would have to make Himself known personally in such a way that a finite man would realize beyond a shadow of doubt that the infinite God was revealing Himself. How could He do so?
Suppose God thundered from the sky with an audible voice. How could one be certain that it was God who had spoken? Suppose He made some supernatural display of power. How could it be known that God had done it and that it was not a natural phenomenon? If He came as a man, who would believe that He was God? Yet how could He reveal Himself to mankind without becoming one of us? Suppose God manifested Himself in some transcendent form. How could anyone know that it was God and not some highly evolved extraterrestrial visiting earth? How, indeed! Miracles would not suffice, for skeptics could argue that highly advanced technology seems miraculous to those who don't know how it works. Of course, each religion claims to offer the revelations of the true god or gods. Yet even in their basic concepts of deity there are sharp contradictions, which can't all be right. Hinduism, for example, embraces multitudes of gods and worships idols that supposedly represent them, since everything is god. By contrast, Islam denounces idol worship and pantheism/polytheism and it claims that its Allah is the only true god. Buddhism, on the other hand, needs no god.
Allah was, in fact, the name of the chief god in the Kaabah, the pagan temple that Muhammad "purged" by destroying the more than 300 idols it contained. Muhammad likely kept the name of this ancient, pagan moon god because it would help to convert idolaters to his new religion if they could be offered something familiar. Yet today's Muslims see no contradiction in this strategy. The God of the Bible states unequivocally, "[B]efore me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no saviour" (Is 43:10-11). Nor does He simply ignore the gods of other religions. He denounces them all, including Allah, as imposters who actually represent Satan or his demons: "they sacrificed unto devils, not to God" (Dt 32:17); "the things which the Gentiles [non-Jews] sacrifice [to their gods], they sacrifice to devils" (1 Cor 10:20).
It is not kindness, but cynicism and a denial of the meaning of language, to suggest that all religions are the same. It is an affront to Muslims to suggest that Allah is the equivalent of the many gods in Hinduism; or to tell a Christian that his God, who gave His Son to die for our sins, is the same as Allah, of whom it is specifically stated that he has no son. In fact, Christianity stands on one side of a theological chasm, with all other religions on the other side—a chasm that renders any ecumenical union impossible without destroying Christianity itself.
One cannot deny, for example, the irreconcilable conflict between the belief that Christ died for our sins and was resurrected (which is the very heart of Christianity), and the Muslim claim that someone else died in Christ's place. To sweep such differences under an ecumenical rug (as Roman Catholicism is attempting to do) is not kindness but madness. Nor is it possible to reconcile the claim of all non-Christian religions that sin is countered by good works with the Bible's declaration that works can't save, but that only Christ, because He was sinless, could pay the penalty for sin by dying in our place. And of course Christ's claim, "I am the way, the truth and the life: no man cometh unto the Father except by me" (Jn 14:6), is the strongest possible rejection of all other religions as counterfeits. Jesus Christ stands absolutely alone, without rival, in His perfect, sinless life, His death for our sins, His resurrection. The promise of His second coming is also unique to Christianity and separates it from all of the world's religions by a chasm that cannot be bridged by any ecumenical sleight-of-hand. Muhammad never promised to return, nor did Buddha. Only Christ dared to make this promise. Nor would such a claim by anyone except Christ be given any credence, for the decayed remains of all of the others occupy graves. It is Christ alone who left behind an empty tomb. That undeniable fact is reason enough to accept His claim to Deity and to take seriously His assertion that He would return to this earth in power and glory to execute judgment upon His enemies.
That the Bible, which provides the historical account of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, is unique for this and many other reasons becomes obvious from even a superficial comparison with all other sacred scriptures. The Hindu scriptures, for example, are obviously mythological. There is no historical evidence that the characters ever existed or that the fantastic tales refer to real events that actually occurred.
The same is true of much that is recorded in other sacred writings, including the Book of Mormon. Not one pin or coin or tiniest shred of evidence of any kind has ever been found to verify that the peoples, much less the events, to which the Book of Mormon refers were real. Not a mountain, river or any piece of topography or geography described in the Book of Mormon has ever been located. In contrast, the world's museums contain vast stores of evidence of all kinds confirming the accuracy of the Bible.
The Bible does not waste its time, as philosophers so foolishly have for centuries, in any attempt to provide some philosophical "proof" for the existence of God. The God to which the Bible bears testimony is capable of communicating with mankind and promises to reveal Himself to all who sincerely desire and seek to know Him. "Ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart" (Jer 29:13), says the Old Testament; and the New echoes the same promise: "He [God] is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him" (Heb 11:6).
In communicating Himself and His will, God provides both subjective and objective evidence. The Bible is full of accounts of God having given tangible "signs" to those who wanted to know Him and His will. To "put out a fleece" is a common expression that is understood worldwide. It comes from Gideon's use of a sheep's fleece as a sign: asking God for dew on the fleece and not on the ground one morning, then dew on the ground but not on the fleece the next (Jgs 6:36-40).
God has, in fact, given a "sign" to the entire world for all generations. That sign is the land and people of Israel. God refers to "Israel my glory" (Is 46:13) and says of her, "in whom I will be glorified" (Is 49:3). How would this come about? By God's specific dealings with Israel before a watching world, after having prophesied precisely what would happen (2 Chr 7:20). Referring to the rescue of Israel at Armageddon, the subject of many Old Testament prophecies, Ezekiel 38:23 declares, "Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I am the Lord."
The Bible declares that the prophecies it provides concerning Israel supply the irrefutable evidence for God's existence—and for the fact that He has a purpose for mankind. History is not merely happenstance. It is going somewhere. There is a plan. Biblical prophecies declare it irrefutably.
Prophecy, which reveals God's plan in advance, is the missing element in all sacred scriptures of the world's religions, because false gods cannot provide it. Prophecy is not to be found in the Koran, the Hindu Vedas, the Bhagavad-Gita, the Book of Mormon, the sayings of Buddha, the writings of Mary Baker Eddy. In contrast, prophecy comprises about 30 percent of the Bible. Significantly, the God of the Bible identifies Himself as the One who accurately foretells the future and makes certain that it happens as He said it would. In fact, God points to prophecy as the irrefutable evidence of His existence and the authenticity of His Word: "For I am God, and there is none else. ...Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand..." (Is 46:9-10).
There are two major topics of prophecy, both of which must be studied if one is to have any understanding of the Bible: 1) Israel; and 2) the Messiah, who would come to Israel and through her to the world. These two major topics involve specific fulfillments of prophecy that cannot be denied and which prove God's existence.
Exactly as His prophets foretold, because of their sin God scattered His people, Israel, throughout the entire world (Lv 26:33; Dt 4:27; 32:26; 1 Kgs 14:15; Neh 1:8; Jer 9:16; 49:32, etc.). Yet, amazingly, they remained an identifiable ethnic and national entity. That is miraculous. Moreover, for 2,500 years since the Babylonian captivity, and for 1,900 years since the Diaspora at the destruction of Jerusalem in a.d.70, in fulfillment of other prophecies, the scattered Jews have been hated and persecuted as Satan has sought to destroy them. Yet they survived—another miracle.
Furthermore, and just as the Bible declared (Jer 30:3,10-11; 31:8-10; Ez 11:17; 28:25, etc., etc.), the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob have been brought back to their own land after all these centuries. Such an incredible event has never happened to any other people and certainly has no natural explanation. The Bible prophecies are so specific and numerous that no one can deny Israel's rebirth as a miracle of God. But that is not all!
The prophets also declared that in the last days Jerusalem would have a special importance for all nations. Not only would this occur during the Millennium when Christ was reigning there on David's throne, but just prior to His return. Zechariah 12:2-3 declares, "Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about....I [will] make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people...." God was saying that the eyes of the entire world would be upon Jerusalem for fear of what would occur there.
At the time of this prophecy, about 2,500 years ago, Jerusalem was in ruins and surrounded by desolate desert and swamp. Nothing could have been more ludicrous than to suggest that one day the concerned attention of a modern world of more than 5 billion people would be focused upon this unlikely place. Yet that has been fulfilled precisely as foretold!
Whether atheist or believer, Hindu, Muslim or Jew, all mankind knows that the next world war, when it occurs, will break out over Jerusalem! Israel comprises only one-sixth of 1 percent of the land occupied by the Arabs. Why the great concern today over this tiny piece of arid real estate that lay abandoned for centuries? Yes, Jerusalem is sacred to Catholics, Muslims and Jews. But that doesn't explain why the whole world is concerned with establishing peace in the Middle East. Moreover, neither Catholics nor Muslims existed when these prophecies were made.
The Bible's prophecies concerning the Jews, Jerusalem and Israel are specific, preposterous, and impossible—yet fulfilled. There is no other explanation than that God is the author of the Bible, the Jews are His chosen people, and Israel is their land—and Jesus is the Christ.
In view of this great "sign" that God has given to the world, can anyone honestly be an atheist? Or can anyone deny that Jesus Christ is the only Savior? His advent was prophesied, as well, by the same prophets and is intimately connected to Israel. All that the prophets foretold concerning the coming Messiah was fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth—and the early church used that fact in proclaiming the gospel (Acts 2:22-36). So should we.
The Muslim takeover of Europe is happening more quickly than people think. In my column below from the Jerusalem Post, I highlight the demographic decline of traditional Europe and contrast it with the rapid growth of the continent's Muslim population.
This trend has far-reaching consequences for the US and Israel, and it is time that our decision-makers start taking it into account as they plan for the future.
If you ever wanted to see Paris or Rome before you die, but haven't had a chance to do so, you might want to hurry. Soon enough, most of what we now think of as Western Europe will be transformed into a branch of the Muslim world, which is sure to make it an even less welcoming place for Americans, Israelis and for Jews.
That, at least, is the unpleasant, yet entirely unavoidable conclusion to be drawn from Europe's headlong demographic drive toward oblivion.
Think I'm exaggerating? Consider a few cold hard facts.
According to a recent report by the Rand Corporation, "Across Europe, birth rates are falling and family sizes are shrinking. The total fertility rate is now less than two children per woman in every member nation in the European Union."
Needless to say, demographers consider a birthrate of 2.1 children per family to be the replacement level at which a society's population size remains stable. Barring large-scale immigration, anything less means decline and dissolution.
A research study published last year in the International Journal of Andrology found a similar trend, concluding that, "Fertility rates have fallen and are now below replacement level in all European Union (EU) Member States. In the 20-year period since 1982," it noted, "most EU Member State countries have had total fertility rates continuously below replacement level."
At the bottom of the list are Spain, Italy and Greece, where birthrates hover around just 1.3 per couple, leading some forecasters to suggest, for example, that Italy's population could shrink by one-third by the middle of the century.
Others, such as Germany's 1.37, the UK's 1.74 and Sweden's 1.75, aren't all much better. The figures are so bad that in many European countries, the total number of deaths each year has actually begun to exceed the number of births.
Indeed, the Council of Europe's 2004 Demographic Yearbook warned that, "for Europe as a whole, more people died in 2003 than were born." In 1990, said the yearbook, "three countries - Germany, Bulgaria and Hungary - had negative natural growth for the first time. By 2002, it was negative in fifteen countries."
LAST YEAR, after the publication of statistics revealing that 30 percent of German women have not had children, Germany's family minister, Ursula von der Leyen, caused a stir when she said that if her nation's birth rate did not turn around, the country would have to "turn out the light." And while Europeans may be busy everywhere but in the bedroom, the Muslim populations in their midst are proving far more expansive.
As columnist Mark Steyn points out in his must-read new book, America Alone, "What's the Muslim population of Rotterdam? Forty percent. What's the most popular baby boy's name in Belgium? Mohammed. In Amsterdam? Mohammed. In Malmo, Sweden? Mohammed."
Last month, the UK Daily Telegraph reported that, "Mohammed, and its most common alternative spelling Muhammad, are now more popular babies' names in England and Wales than George."
This, said the paper, using typically British understatement, "reflects the diverse ethnic mix of the population."
But that "mix," so to speak, is rapidly changing - and not in traditional Europe's favor.
ISLAM, BY all accounts, is the fastest growing religion in Europe, spurred by immigration and high fertility rates. According to projections by the US federal government's National Intelligence Council, the continent's current Muslim population of 20 million will likely double by 2025.
And as Bruce Bawer noted last year in While Europe Slept, "Already, in most of Western Europe, 16 to 20 percent of children are Muslims…within a couple of generations many [European] countries will have Muslim majorities."
A leading mosque in London is selling DVDs that proclaim the coming mass extermination of Jews around the world on a "day of judgment." It also attacks Christian groups and the United Nations. The London Central Mosque, also known as Regent's Park Mosque, is "the spiritual focal point for Muslims" throughout Great Britain, the European Jewish Press reported. It is also home to the Islamic Cultural Center, which educates Muslim children.
The report said that a British television station will air on Monday a documentary on Muslim extremism in Britain, and will report the selling of the DVD.
The DVDs are being sold at the London Central Mosque Shop. One excerpt shows a preacher, Sheikh Feiz, imitating the sounds of a pig and referring to the Jewish people who will be killed on the "day of judgment."
Just in case you thought the Jews were the only ones targeted.
Another preacher, Sheikh Yassin, states that United Nations missionaries and Christians conspired to inject an AIDS virus in inoculations against diseases in Africa.
My friend Epaminondas, from the excellent blog Villagers With Torches, postulates that, perhaps, George Bush has something up his sleeve vis a vis Iran:
Is something up?
Before the speech, additional naval forces head to the gulf.
We raid a building in Irbil and take away equipment and 6 Iranians, and the Iranian foreign minister goes whacko over it, two weeks after arresting 6 more Iranians in the house of Az Al Hakim, some of whom turn out to have diplomatic immunity, but found there with some unsavory items, leading to uncomfortable conclusions.
Bush announces the departure of Patriot missile batteries...to where, and why?
Israel, KSA, and others in the gulf HAVE Patriots to shoot down ballistic missile attacks? Does Iraq? And there is only ONE source from which we need to protect against ballistic missile barrages.
Someone leaks an IDF plan to nuke Iranian underground nuke facilities to the Times of London, WHY?Are we about to begin a strategy to provoke Iran?
Young women opt for abortionMore than half of ethnic Norwegian women under age 25 choose abortion if they get pregnant, according to a new study. The professor behind the study calls the statistic "surprising" and "worrisome."
This group of student advocates understands why young women often opt for abortion if they get pregnant.
A woman's right to choose abortion is deeply engrained in Norwegian society, but it's only most common among young women and women with little education, says Professor Anne Eskild of Akershus University Hospital.
Eskild's study marked the first time that researchers tracked the incidence of abortions and births among ethnic Norwegian women. Results showed major differences between those who chose to abort and those who chose to give birth.
More than half of pregnant women under 25 chose abortion, a rate double that for pregnant women over 40. The abortion rate for women under age 20 was nine times higher than that for women over 40.
"It's very surprising that it's more common for women under 25 to have an abortion than it is to carry out their pregnancy," Eskild told newspaper Aftenposten. She was responsible for the study that been published in the medical journal Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica.
Bye bye. It's closing time. I know who I want to take me home.
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) has issued a call for Palestinians to refrain from internal fighting and turn their guns against Israel: Abbas: Aim guns against occupation. (Hat tip: LGF readers.)
“When Fatah was established, it was accused of treason and we were chased in every place,” Abbas told the crowd. “But with the will and determination of its sons, Fatah has and will continue. We will not give up our principles and we have said that rifles should be directed against the occupation.”
Appealing to Palestinians to avoid civil war, Abbas said: “We are all one people regardless of differences of opinion. My top priority is to preserve national unitybecause Palestinian infighting and blood are a red line that must not be crossed.”
Defending his call to use weapons against Israel, he added: “We have a legitimate right to direct our guns against Israeli occupation. It is forbidden to use theseguns against Palestinians. The occupation has perpetrated brutal attacks in Jenin, Bet Hanun and Ramallah.”
Mainstream media keep insisting that Abbas represents the “moderate” side of the Palestinian leadership. And to maintain this fiction, evidence to the contrary must be ignored.
Case in point, this account of the same speech by Palestinian Associated Press writer Mohammed Daraghmeh, which makes no mention whatsoever of “moderate” Abbas’ call for attacks on Israel: Abbas calls for respect at Fatah rally.
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told a large rally of his Fatah movement Thursday that he won’t allow fighting with their Hamas rivals to continue and called on opposing factions to respect each other.
Thousands of Fatah supporters waved the movement’s yellow flags and chanted slogans against the Islamic Hamas group and its Iranian backers. Several Fatah activists briefly carried Abbas on their shoulders. “Go, go, until liberation,” they chanted. Others fired in the air.
The rally in the West Bank city of Ramallah was organized as a show of Fatah’s strength against Hamas — which is powerful in the Gaza Strip — but Abbas aides said the moderate Palestinian leader would also give coalition talks with Hamas another chance.
ATLANTA — Fourteen members of an advisory board at the Carter Center resigned today, concluding they could “no longer in good conscience continue to serve” following publication of former President Jimmy Carter’s controversial book, “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.”
“It seems that you have turned to a world of advocacy, including even malicious advocacy,” the board members wrote in a letter, a copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. “We can no longer endorse your strident and uncompromising position.
This is not the Carter Center or Jimmy Carter we came to respect and support. Therefore it is with sadness and regret that we hereby tender our resignation from the Board of Councilors of the Carter Center effective immediately.”
Melvin Konner, physician and professor at Emory University, declined an invitation to be part of a group advising President Carter and The Carter Center on Carter’s recent book on the Mideast.
Konner notes especially that “President Carter has proved capable of distorting the truth about such meetings and consultations in public remarks following them. In particular, he mischaracterized the meeting he had with the executive committee of the Board of Rabbis of Greater Phoenix, saying he and they had positive interactions and prayed together, when in fact others present stated that the meeting was highly confrontational and that the prayer was merely a pro forma closing invocation.”
Konner says also that “in television interviews I have seen over the past week, President Carter has revealed himself to be so rigid and inflexible in his views that he seems to me no longer capable of dialogue.”
UPDATE at 1/11/07 9:48:55 am:
Brandeis University has invited Carter to speak, accepting his “no debate” rule: Carter agrees to speak at Brandeis. (Hat tip: davesax.)
Jimmy Carter, after weeks of controversy, has agreed to speak and field questions on his new book about Israel at a forum at Brandeis University, administrators and a spokesman for Carter said yesterday.
Last month, the former president told the Globe he had declined an invitation from a university trustee to speak at Brandeis, because it came with the suggestion he debate Alan Dershowitz, a professor at Harvard Law School who has criticized Carter’s book, “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.”
Carter’s original decision set off a furor on campus and sparked a petition of more than 100 students and faculty members, who said Carter should be invited to speak without debating Dershowitz. Others contended that inviting Carter to speak without a debate would violate the university’s responsibility to promote free speech.
The invitation to Carter also triggered questions about how open the predominantly Jewish campus is to views critical of Israel.
In the end, Carter is slated to speak for 15 minutes and answer questions for 45 minutes, campus officials said. The forum is scheduled for Jan. 23, but the date may change, they said. Notice the Boston Globe’s use of turnspeak in the quote above; they imply that Brandeis is not open to “views critical of Israel,” when in truth it’s Jimmy Carter who is not open to debating his so-called views.
Votez: Le Pen !LE PEN! Don’t let yourself be deceived by the propaganda of Jewish liars that want to fight France to the last "beur" [Arab]! LE PEN was the only French politician who was clearly opposed to the war which the américano-Zionists carried out against Iraq, the cradle of Arab civilization.
Only difference is the "anti-war" crowd leaves out the word "Jewish".
The stock market is at a new all-time high and America's 401K's are back. A new direction from there means what?
Unemployment is at 25 year lows. A new direction from there means what?
Oil prices are plummeting. A new direction from there means what?
Taxes are at 20 year lows. A new direction from there means what?
Federal tax revenues are at all-time highs. A new direction from there means what?
The Federal deficit is down almost 50%, just as predicted over last year. A new direction from there means what?
Home valuations are up 200% over the past 3.5 years. A new direction from there means what?
Inflation is in check, hovering at 20 year lows. A new direction from there means what?
Not a single terrorist attack on US soil since 9/11/01. A new direction from there means what?
Osama bin Laden is living under a rock in a dark cave, having not surfacedin years, if he's alive at all, while 95% of Al Queda's top dogs are eitherdead or in custody, cooperating with US Intel. A new direction from there means what?
Several major terrorist attacks already thwarted by US and British Intel,including the recent planned attack involving 10 Jumbo Jets being explodedin mid-air over major US cities in order to celebrate the anniversary of the9/11/01 attacks. A new direction from there means what?
Just as President Bush foretold us on a number of occasions, Iraq was to bemade "ground zero" for the war on terrorism -- and just as President Bushsaid they would, terrorist cells from all over the region are arriving fromthe shadows of their hiding places and flooding into Iraq in order to gettheir faces blown off by US Marines rather than boarding planes and headingto the United States to wage war on us here. A new direction from there means what?
You'll remember that a while back, six Imams were carted off a plane and detained in a Minnesota airport because their loud prayers and other odd behavior scared their fellow passengers. CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations) jumped to their defense, but then, when facts started coming to the light of day, it turned out those Imams were hardly innocents themselves.
Well, now we have the Miami Port incident. The other day, three Muslim men were detained at the Port of Miami because their papers and story didn't make sense when questioned by security. The whole Port was closed for a period of time, and airspace was restricted over the port when authorities found traces of esplosives.
As of yesterday morning, unfortunately, the men--two Iraqis and a Lebanese man--were released and the charges against them dropped by Judge Gerald Klein, one of the many members of the not-so-exclusive "Stupid Judges and the Terrorists Who Love Them" club.
But now we know their names, Amar Al-Hadad, Hussain Al-Hadad, and Hassan El-Sayed. And we know a lot about their history. And it suggests incarcerating and investigating them, NOT releasing them and dropping all charges.
I mentioned the work of private investigator and terrorism analyst Bill Warner of South Florida. His work on terrorist group Al-Muhajiroun and Islamic Thinkers Society (and their presence in New York) is unmatched.
Warner has also exposed many used car rings around the country and their ties to Islamic terrorism and various forms of fraud involving used cars, as well as their use in car bombs. Bill has linked prominent Islamic terrorists, like Sami Al-Arian, with the used car business, a fact that prosecutors in the case confirmed (but, unfortunately, did not use in the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink case against him).
Bill looked into the Dearbornistan-Miami Three and cannot believe they were released. I agree with him. It's incredible, but leave it to our "law enforcement" to do the PC thing and let these "poor souls" go.
Here's what Bill tells me about the men:
THESE GUYS IN MIAMI ARE INTO SHIPPING USED CAR PARTS AND SALVAGE VEHICLES OUT OF THE USA, ONE OF THEM, HASSAN MOHAMMED EL-SAYED HAS AN ARREST FOR Motor Vehicle CD, False Certification.
Motor Vehicle CD, False Certification MEANS THAT THE GUY HAD A FALSE CERTIFICATE OF DESTRUCTION (CD) ON A SALVAGE VEHICLE THAT WOULD BE SHIPPED OUT OF THE USA AND THEN YOU USE THE VIN ON THAT CD VEHICLE TO MAKE A "BLACK CAR" OUT OF A STOLEN VEHICLE OF THE SAME MAKE AND MODEL, THESE GUYS ARE INTO IT.
EL-SAYED DID AT LEAST THREE YEARS IN PRISON - THESE GUYS ARE EXACTLY WHAT I HAVE BEEN TALKING ABOUT FOR THE LAST 3 YEARS!
YOU DO NOT DRIVE FROM DEARBORN TO THE PORT OF MIAMI IN A 18 WHEELER TO SHIP CAR PARTS!THEY LET THEM GO, WHAT IDIOTS!
Charges dropped and at least one guy is an ex-con linked to the stolen car racket?
Is there something wrong with the Sea Ports in Michigan or New York State that would cause these goons to drive an 18 wheeler loaded with car-parts, 1,386 miles to Miami's Sea Port?
There's much, much more where that came from. Isn't it interesting that seemingly everyone CAIR chooses to defend turns out to be some sort of shady character?
I'm a big David Bowie fan, and today is his 60th birthday. So, let us celebrate with a Bowie tribute video. (Oh, by the way, when you're watching this video, ask yourself if such a man would be allowed to exist in any Islamic country on Earth.)
By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which appear. --- Hebrews 11:3
One of the greatest mysteries of the universe is about to be unravelled with the first detailed, three-dimensional map of dark matter - the invisible material that makes up most of the cosmos.
Astronomers announced yesterday that they have achieved the apparently impossible task of creating a picture of something that has defied every attempt to detect it since its existence was first postulated in 1933.
Scientists have known for many years that there is more to the universe than can be seen or detected through their telescopes but it is only now that they have been able to capture the first significant 3D-image of this otherwise invisible material.
Unlike the ordinary matter of the planets, stars and galaxies, which can be seen through telescopes or detected by scientific instruments, nobody has seen dark matter or knows what it is made of, though calculations suggest that it is at least six times bigger than the rest of the visible universe combined.
A team of 70 astronomers from Europe, America and Japan used the Hubble space telescope to build up a picture of dark matter in a vast region of space where some of the galaxies date back to half the age of the universe - nearly 7 billion years.
They used a phenomenon known as gravitational lensing, first predicted by Albert Einstein, to investigate an area of the sky nine times the size of a full moon. Gravitational lensing occurs when light from distant galaxies is bent by the gravitational influence of any matter that it passes on its journey through space.
The scientists were able to exploit the technique by collecting the distorted light from half a million faraway galaxies to reconstruct some of the missing mass of the universe which is otherwise invisible to conventional telescopes.
"We have, for the first time, mapped the large-scale distribution of dark matter in the universe," said Richard Massey of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, one of the lead scientists in the team. "Dark matter is a mysterious and invisible form of matter, about which we know very little, yet it dominates the mass of the universe."
One of the most important discoveries to emerge from the study is that dark matter appears to form an invisible scaffold or skeleton around which the visible universe has formed.
Although cosmologists have theorised that this would be the case, the findings are dramatic proof that their calculations are correct and that, without dark matter, the known universe that we can see would not be able to exist.
"A filamentary web of dark matter is threaded through the entire universe, and acts as scaffolding within which the ordinary matter - including stars, galaxies and planets - can later be built," Dr Massey said. "The most surprising aspect of our map is how unsurprising it is. Overall, we seem to understand really well what happens during the formation of structure and the evolution of the universe," he said.
The three-dimensional map of dark matter was built up by taking slices through different regions of space much like a medical CT scanner build a 3-D image of the body by taking different X-ray "slices" in two dimensions.
Data from the Hubble telescope was supplemented by measurements from telescopes on the ground, such as the Very Large Telescope of the European Southern Observatory in Chile and the Japanese Subaru telescope in Hawaii.
Details of the dark matter map were released yesterday at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Seattle and published online by the journal Nature. The map stretches half way back to the beginning of the universe and shows that dark matter has formed into "clumps" as it collapsed under gravity. Other matter then grouped around these clumps to form the visible stars, galaxies and planets.
"The 3-D information is vital to studying the evolution of the structures over cosmic time," said Jason Rhodes of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
Astronomers have compared the task of detecting dark matter to the difficulty of photographing a city at night from the air when only street lights are visible.
Scientists said the new images were equivalent to seeing a city, its suburbs and country roads in daylight for the first time. Major arteries and intersections become evident and a variety of neighbourhoods are revealed.
"Now that we have begun to map out where dark matter is, the next challenge is to determine what it is, and specifically its relationship to normal matter," Dr Massey said. "We have answered the first question about where the dark matter it, but the ultimate goal will be to determine what it is."
Various experiments on Earth are under way to try to find out what dark matter is made of. One theory is that it is composed of mysterious sub-atomic particles that are difficult to detect because they do not interact with ordinary matter and so cannot be picked up and identified by conventional scientific instruments. Comparing the maps of visible matter and dark matter have already pointed to anomalies that could prove critical to the understanding of what constitutes dark matter.
France Gets It - The Rest Of The World? Not So Much
Ok, so the Baker Commission's Iraq Study Report insisted that solving the Middle East Conflict was the key to solving the problems in Iraq. The whole Arab world insists that the Middle East Conflict is the reason for terrorism. Much of Europe believes this. Much of America believes it too.
An official report published recently by the French government says that resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will not bring an end to the threat of global terrorism.
The report, named “Internal Security vs. Terror Threats” is an official publication of the French government. The report says that “since Europe is closer and more accessible to the Middle East than the United States, it serves as an alternative to anyone seeking to attack the “distant enemy.” Europe contains a variety of appropriate targets, some of which are connected with the United States and with Israel, and a strike on one or more of these targets would draw huge international attention.”
In addition, the report says, Europe has a large population of Muslim immigrants which creates an area where there is direct contact with the conflict areas.
The report also says that “some of the conflicts in the Middle East are mentioned extensively in the rhetoric uttered by the Islamist terrorists. However, the resolution of these conflicts would have no effect on ending global terror, which is functionally disconnected from these conflicts.”
For a long time I have been convinced that the people who come up with most of the commercials we see on Television have got to be under the influence of hallucinogens of some sort or another. Watch this and tell me what you think.
PS: I thought that was 'nuff said, but R. Davis writes in and tells me he's decided he's calling Ms. Pelosi Nurse Ratched from now on, because she reminds him of the sadistic nurse who ruled over the insane asylum in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.
UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 5 (UPI) -- Iran's ambassador to the United Nations says there is no truth to reports his nation's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Hoseini-Khamenei, has died.
Reports had surfaced on the internet Friday the 67 year-old Khamenei died. There were reports last month he was seriously ill.
But, Javad Zarif, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations, told United Press International, "There is no truth to that" when asked about the reports.
Khamenei has been Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran since 1989.
If you don't know what a bad human being Cat Stevens is, then read this:
But then she raises the obviously still touchy issue of attempts abroad to link him to funding various extremist groups, including Hamas. He had just said he still sells about 1.5 million albums a year netting him a small fortune. What does he think of Hamas?
“That’s an extremely loaded question,” he replies. Pressed further, he says, “I have never supported a terrorist group or any group that did other than charity and good to humankind.”
Solomon responds by saying, fine, but many Americans would like moderate Muslims, such as himself, to denounce the extremists. Wouldn’t he at least say he has “contempt” for Hamas?
“I wouldn’t put those words in my mouth,” he complains. “I wouldn’t say anything on that issue. I’m here to talk about peace. I’m a man who does want peace for this world,” says the man who wrote “Peace Train,” adding, “and I don’t think you will achieve that by putting people into corners and asking them very, very difficult questions about very contentious issues.”
If you still don't know what a bad human being Cat Stevens is, then you are naiive, at best.
The new year may not be so happy if Iranian leaders have their way. The Islamic messiah known as the “Twelfth Imam” or the “mahdi” may come to earth in 2007 and could be revealed to the world as early as the spring equinox, reports an official Iranian government news website. The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) website says the world is now in its “last days.” It claims that the mahdi will first appear in Mecca, and then Medina. He will conquer all of Arabia, Syria, Iraq, destroy Israel, and then set up a “global government” based in Iraq, interestingly enough, not Iran.
Such Islamic eschatology is driving the Iranian regime and helps explains why Iran has no interest in helping the United States and European Union create peace in Iraq or the region, much less in ending its bid for nuclear weapons, the Iraq Study Group Report notwithstanding.
Anticipation of the imminent arrival or “illumination” of the Islamic messiah has been steadily intensifying inside Iran since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad emerged as president of the country in June of 2005. An Iranian television series called The World Towards Illumination has been running since last November to help answer the many questions Iranians have about the end of the world as we know it. The series explains the signs of the last days and what to expect when the Islamic messiah arrives. The program also says that Jesus is coming back to earth soon as a Shiite Muslim leader and it denounces “born again Christians” for supporting “the illegal Zionist state of Israel.”
An Israeli news site was the first to pick up the story and its significance to Israeli national security, noting that the mahdi will soon “form an army to defeat Islam’s enemies in a series of apocalyptic battles” and “will overcome his archvillain in Jerusalem.”
Some intelligence analysts are growing concerned by Ahmadinejad’s announced plans “to hold the big celebration of Iran’s full nuclearization in the current year.” Iran’s calendar year ends on March 20, which is the usual date of the spring equinox.
Is Ahmadinejad signaling that Iran will have nuclear weapons by then? Is he suggesting that a messianic war to annihilate Israel could come in 2007, perhaps as early as this spring or summer? It is not yet clear, though Ahmadinejad today vowed to “humiliate” the U.S. and Israel soon.
Too many Western analysts are missing the central importance of Shiite eschatology in Iranian foreign policy. They mistakenly believe that Iran’s current leadership can be somehow cajoled into making peace with the West. Nothing could be further from the truth. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his cadre of loyal mullahs are not being driven by the same goals and aspirations as are the diplomats in Washington, Brussels, or at the United Nations.
The president of Iran and his team fervently believe the Islamic messiah is coming soon. They are convinced that their divine mission is to create the conditions for the mahdi’s return. As a result, they are committed to instigating more anti-American violence in Iraq, not less. They are determined to obtain nuclear weapons at all costs, not negotiate away their atomic research and development program. What’s more, they are deeply committed to building political and military alliances with anti-Western powers, not finding accommodation with the West.
Bottom line: The leaders of Iran are preparing for an apocalyptic war with the U.S. and Israel. It’s not a question of “if” but “when.” The sooner the White House and our new congressional leaders realize this and take decisive action to stop this nuclear nightmare, the better.
People love to call America an "Imperialist" nation. But, they seem to have no idea what imperialism truly looks like. I predict America will in the relatively near future, become a truly Imperial Power. The American Thinker tells us how this happened with Rome:
Much in the way of criticism of the United States comes in the form of accusations of imperialism. According to this view, echoed by everyone from Harold Pinter to Noam Chomsky to the Arab press, the U.S. has for decades run roughshod over the globe, in defiance of agreements and civilized norms. Enforcing its policies unilaterally and always for its own benefit, the U.S. has effectively colonized huge swathes of the planet, if not through direct military action, then by economic exploitation or diplomatic chicanery. No one dares raise a hand against this; any show of independence is met by cruise missiles at the very least, if not armored divisions or carrier battle groups. Today it's Iraq, tomorrow... who knows? America is the third-millennial Rome, brutal, implacable, infinitely corrupt.
Domestically, this takes the form of hegemonism, with the U.S. viewed as the primal source of global iniquity. Internationally, it's a major component of anti-Americanism, in which the U.S. is taken as the embodiment of an overpowering modernity, in whatever form - economic, political, cultural -- the onlooker finds most threatening.
In such a context, anything and everything can be labeled "imperialist", from military bases to McDonald's fast-food joints to tourism. Intent and results are meaningless; all U.S. actions are evil, since all are viewed through the lens of imperialist activity. It's difficult to match any of this with the actual record. The America that takes on the dirty jobs, the jobs no one else will touch - Serbia, Kuwait, Somalia - the country that comes to the rescue when disaster strikes, as with the Indian Ocean tsunami or the Pakistan earthquake, either goes unmentioned or has its actions attributed to somebody else (as in Kofi Annan's taking credit for tsunami relief operations in his farewell speech).
Regarding defiance, within certain limits crossed only by the Taliban and Saddam Hussein (and not yet by Ahmadinejad or Kim Jong-Il), it comprises one of the safer bets for any ambitious third-world demagogue, as Chavez and Morales plainly reveal. It's a solid career move -- there is no danger of any comeback (as long as you don't actually act on your rhetoric), and you gain plenty of sympathy and support from the international left, including its American branch. The myth of the U.S. as Rome has proven useful on all sorts of levels.
But the world's anti-Americans should take care that their fantasies don't catch up with them. Myths have a way of coming true. If believed in long enough, and hard enough, and by enough people, they can come to pass, if only by limiting the possible responses of the subject in question.
Tell someone they're an oppressor often enough, and they may become an oppressor, out of spite, or anger, or simple weariness. Useful the Roman stereotype may be, but it can prove very dangerous.
How did Rome get that way in the first place? The Rome we know is seen through the lens of the later, corrupt empire -- brutal, heartless, and tyrannical. We see the Romans as dour, arrogant, living off the intellectual capital of older civilizations, slowly falling victim to their own worst impulses. But was Rome always like that? Did Rome start out that way? Was Rome ever young?
It must have been at one time. Rome was once a republic, and must have possessed a republic's virtues. How could it ever have accomplished so much otherwise?
So what happened to change things? Wars, in a word - Rome's early history is that of a state with its back to the wall, sacked by the Goths, at constant sword's point from neighboring states. Livy's histories are a chronicle of endless strife -- wars with the Etruscans, the Social Wars, at last the Punic Wars.
And with each conflict, another layer of republican virtue was scraped off.
At some point, perhaps during the Second Punic War, with Italy all but under occupation by Hannibal's forces for a decade, it effectively vanished, destroyed not only by the fear and strain of constant struggle, but what the Romans felt compelled to do in response. Consider that terrible image of Scipio gazing on the blazing ruins of Carthage and seeing Rome itself in the flames.
That's what they lived with, that's what made them what they were. It was part of the price they paid for survival as a state and society, a price that eventually bankrupted them, that utterly sapped their will to go on. There must have been something in the Roman soul that welcomed the barbarians when they came.
The U.S. has never paid that high a price. The wars fought on our soil were limited by distance and the country's immense interior spaces. The Indians, skilled warriors though they were, offered no overwhelming threat after the 17th century. Neither the French nor the British were able to field massive armies in their North American wars. The sole major bloodletting since the colonial epoch was the Civil War, which ended, thanks to the sheer quality of the men involved, in such a way that it strengthened the country rather than weakened it. Few regions are more patriotic than the South (or, for that matter, few ethnic groups than most Indians). Our other wars were fought overseas, often (as in the Spanish-American War and WW I) at our discretion. The U.S. has never feared for its existence the way the Romans did - not even during the Cold War.
But that may have changed. 9/11 represented an event unseen since 1814 - willful destruction of American lives on American soil.That threat still exists, constantly hanging over us. If anything, it's magnified - when the Jihadis return, they will return with weapons of mass destruction, of one kind or another.
Soon Americans may well see what we were spared for centuries by geography and distance - casualties to match or exceed those suffered by European and Asian nations in their many wars.
What effect might this have on the American character? It's hard to say. America is still a young nation, retaining much of its resilience and vigor. But there have been signs that the national spirit is being stretched.
There's a sense of weariness at international ingratitude, irresponsibility, and hostility. It has not gone unnoticed that sympathy for the U.S. effectively evaporated within days of 9/11, that support for necessary responses has been grudging and hedged with conditions, that, time and again, Western states have been caught under the table with corrupt UN officials and even the terrorists themselves, that, with a few notable exceptions such as India and Japan, our sole dependable allies against a universal threat have been our cousins, Great Britain and Australia.
The classic U.S. response to such provocations has been isolationism. When betrayed in the international sphere, we go home and mind our own business. But that's no longer a viable option. In this millennium, we can't isolate our troubles overseas.If we turn our back, they'll come right after us.
There have been rumblings, comments on the Net, voices on talk radio, arguing another alternative. That we owe the rest of the world nothing. That an effective response to terror is simply to start vaporizing cities, beginning with Tehran and working our way down until attacks cease. That, quite simply, the United States should transform itself into Rome.
There's something to be said for taking on the role of a third-millennial Rome.Antiochus IV Ephiphanes, Seleucid ruler of Syria, long had his eye on Egypt. Finally, in 169 B.C., he crossed the Sinai with a conquering army.
He took everything but Alexandria, and then decided to move against the city. The Romans had no legions in the area. But they did have an official, G. Poppilius Laenas, an older gentleman of the equestrian class, Rome's ancient nobility. He met the Syrian army as it reached the city and was shortly speaking to the king himself, telling him that the Senate of Rome forbade him to remain, and to take his army back home. "I'll think about it," Antiochus told the envoy, "And I'll have an answer tomorrow."
Leanas then took his walking stick (some accounts call it a "staff", in an attempt to make it more convincing, but it was a walking stick), and drew a circle around Antiochus. "Sonny," he said. "You'll answer me before you step out of that circle."
Antiochus gave his answer, and the next day the army was on its way back to Syria.
It would be pleasant to wield that kind of power, to draw a circle around Assad, or Ahmadinejad, or Kim, and demand the correct answer. But how many Carthages would have to burn before we gained it? How much would it cost? Hiroshima and Nagasaki failed to impress for long. Would it take a dozen Hiroshimas? A hundred?
And what price would we pay? Part of it would be abandoning forever our vision of what the U.S. is and could be. No longer the City on the Hill, no longer the last best hope, the nation that has for so long pioneered a new method of wielding power. Did the Romans themselves have such a vision? Did aged senators lie awake nights recalling an ancient dream washed away in the blood of innumerable imperial victims? We don't know. That's lost to us.
But we had better know this: if the U.S. ever does take on the trappings of imperium, if we, out of despair or terror, turn to Roman methods, then, like Scipio, we will be witnessing our own fate in the cities we set ablaze.
Fate is by definition unavoidable. Nations are often forced into roles they might not have chosen, the way Britain found itself an empire "in a fit of absentmindedness". For now, we - the Americans, despised and envied across the world -- still stumble along, doing the best we can, taking our licks and looking for solutions while living up to our image of ourselves. But the critics should be wary of screaming too loud, of conspiring too well, of undermining us too thoroughly. Because if they succeed, if they do get what they insist they want, then the result may well be something they never conceived, and it will be their desolation, and our peace.
In my opinion, we don't have to beat that many enemies in order to wield the power of Rome. Instead, we simply have to prove we have the will to do so.
And, I don't agree wtih the American Thinker's definition of "imperialism" here. Imperialism is when a nation beats the army of another nation, and then takes over the country, seizing its assets, and then proceeds to run the country as a profit-center for the Imperial leader.
That is the kind of Imperialist mantel I believe America will force to take on.
I believe we will find that it is the only way we can avoid simply vaporizing all the major cities in the Islamic world. We have been shown that Muslim culture is not Democratizable. Therefore, it will be on to Plan B, as soon as we find the will within ourselves, and unfortunately, that will be in the days after we have a city vaporized ourselves.
A source close to Pajamas Media has learned that Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has apparently succumbed to the cancer that hospitalized him last month, as exclusively reported by Pajamas Media, at age 67. He has been Iran’s most powerful figure since replacing Ayatollah Khomeini in the role of Supreme Leader in 1989.
Whether the danger is religious extremism, drugs or crime, those involved are largely third-generation Muslims who are so integrated into white society that they are emulating its worst characteristics. Integration did not save them, it created them.
Nuclear weapons are, in some sense, unstable; they are said to decay over time, and become ineffective, if not properly maintained.
Now, I would imagine that not all the parts of a nuclear weapon decay at the same rate. For instance, we can assume the shell - which is probably made of metal or plastic - does not decay rapidly. So, it is something within the bomb which decays.
Of course, heavy metals themselves are unstable and emit radiation, so it could be that more uranium or plutonium needs to be added to the core periodically. But, I don't have enough information to know if this is the case.
Here's what I do know, from what I have read about the Litvinenko case. Polonium 210 is the trigger that starts the chain reaction within the uranium or plutonium core in a nuclear weapon. In other words, you have a core of plutonium or uranium and you need a trigger which is packed around the core, which itself explodes with enough force to compress the plutonium to the point that a chain reaction will ensue.
Could it be that Polonium 210 is the unstable element of a nuclear weapon which needs maintanence? Could it be that our Muslim friend Litvinenko was smuggling polonium into Britain so that they could bring an already existing nuclear device back into working form?
Now, when I wrote that post, I received some negative comments about my seemingly wild flight of fancy. Turns out that I am, more than likely, correct in my speculation. From Terrorism expert, Paul Williams (written December 6, 2006) whom I will be interviewing on my radio show this coming week:
The death of Alexander Litvinenko by radiological poisoning points to the possibility that the former Soviet spy may have been involved with Islamic terrorists in the preparation of tactical nuclear weapons for use in the jihad against the United States and its NATO allies.
Litvenenko, a former KGB agent, died in London on November 23 after ingesting a microscopic amount of polonium-210. In a deathbed statement, Litvinenko blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for the poisoning - - an accusation which the Kremlin has vehemently denied.
Litvinenko, who was born an orthodox Christian, was a convert to Islam with close ties to the Chechen rebels. His last words consisted of his desire to be buried “according to Muslim tradition.”
In recent years, considerable attention has been paid to suitcase nukes that were developed by U.S. and Soviet forces during the Cold War. Reliable sources, including Hans Blix of the United Nation, have confirmed that bin Laden purchased several of these devises from the Chechen rebels in 1996. According to Sharif al-Masri and other al Qaeda operatives who have been taken into custody, several of these weapons have been forward deployed to the United States in preparation for al Qaeda’s next attack on American soil.
This brings us to the mysterious case of Litvinenko.
The neutron source or “triggers” of the suitcase nukes are composed of beryllium-9 and polonium-210. When these two elements are combined, the alpha particle is absorbed by the nucleus of the beryllium causing it to decay by emitting a neutron. Such “triggers” were a feature of early nuclear weapons in the U.S. and Soviet stockpiles.
Polonium-210 has a half-life of 138 days, necessitating the replacement of the triggers every six months. (Read the rest.)
But, the thing about "dirty bombs", or, in other words, radiological bombs is that as awful as they sound, they are simply a regular bomb with radiological material wrapped around the explosion device. So, in other words, the blast area of a radiological bomb would be no bigger than that of a regular bomb, which, in turn means that it is highly unlikely that any more people would die from a radiolical bomb than would from a conventional non-nuclear bomb.
In fact, if one compares them to Palestinian bombs which uses nails as shrapnel, it is possible that people would simply die a slower death after getting hit with the radiological material, than they would having gotten hit with nails.
A radiological, or "dirty bomb" would likely only cause a few hundred deaths, so why is Britain preparing for many thousands?
Now, to heap even more paranoia on you, please understand that the past few weeks, some rather alarming warnings have been coming out of the various parts of Britain's intelligence community. For instance, London's Chief of Police, Ian Blair recently was quoted saying:
‘It is a far graver threat in terms of civilians than either the Cold War or the Second World War,’ he said. ‘It’s a much graver threat than that posed by Irish Republican terrorism.’
ABC News has learned that al Qaeda operatives in the greater London area are being encouraged to “strike during the Christian holidays,” according to intelligence and law enforcement sources…
ABC News sources in North America and the U.K. say that British authorities are constantly on the run, breaking up plots on a near weekly basis that have reached the pre-operational phase. Sources in Britain add that at least one “pivotal…al Qaeda U.K.” operative has been detained during the past two weeks, and others may — at least temporarily — be in custody.
Police are trying to trace a gang of British Muslims who are thought to have returned to plot terror attacks in Britain after being trained abroad for more than a year by al-Qaeda, Nine Britons, all said to be in their twenties, were among a group of 12 Western recruits groomed by al-Qaeda at a secret camp near the Afghan border to set up new terror cells in London and other Western capitals.
Police do not know the real identities of this gang, who are known as the “English brothers” because of their shared language. As well as nine Britons, they include two Norwegians and an Australian who were smuggled into the Waziristan tribal region in Pakistan in October 2005. They are believed to have been under the command of an al-Qaeda veteran suspected of training some of the Britons accused of the alleged plot to blow up passenger planes flying to the US from Heathrow airport in the summer. ...
Intelligence sources in Pakistan said that the men are reported to have joined Taleban and al-Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan in attacks on Nato troops. The sources told The Times that the “brothers” were given religious indocrination as well as lessons on how to assemble suicide bomb vests and improvised explosive devices.
The sources are reported to have been escorted to the al-Qaeda camp by Adam Gadahn, a Californian indicted by the US authorities as an al-Qaeda terrorist, who introduced the “brothers” to their tutors.
When police release such specific information about potential suspects, we can assume it means they have lost control of the investigation and are, instead, attempting to scare the suspects into not acting by appearing to be within striking distance. Simply put, they would not release the information, if they knew where the "English brothers were, both physically and in terms of their ongoing terror plot.
Here are some questions to ponder: What date did Litvinenko bring that Polonium into Britain? And, when is 138 days after that?
I would say it looks like the UK is in a heap of trouble.
Is it me or is the news becoming more disgusting and at lightening speed? The jihad is out of control and the West is out to lunch. AhmadJihadmidget's "advisor" is claiming Hitler's muhtuh was a Jewish whore ...hmmmm, was she a titty blogger too? Just askin. Apparently, the Jew haters have delivered their latest Jew hating fiction to the Muslim world -Adolf Hitler's parents were both Jewish and that Hitler himself was one of the founders of the State of Israel. More here.
Is all this fiery bile, Iran vows to 'humiliate' U.S. here, the preamble to the mahdi's return this Spring perhaps? Here is the Iran website heralding the 'Mahdi' by springtime .
State media: Shiite messiah to kill archenemy in Jerusalem, may arrive during next equinox. "The World toward Illumination," that the Mahdi will form an army to defeat the enemies of Islam in a series of apocalyptic battles, in which the Mahdi will overcome his archvillain in Jerusalem.
Mohammad Ali Ramin, Advisor to Iranian President Ahmadinejad: "Hitler Was Jewish" In a December 28, 2006 interview with the Iranian website Baztab, which is affiliated with Iranian Expediency Council Secretary Mohsen Rezai, Iranian Presidential Advisor Mohammad Ali Ramin said that Hitler was Jewish, and that Hitler's policies were aimed at bringing about the establishment of a Jewish state. Ramin added that Hitler acted under the influence of his powerful Jewish associates and in cooperation with Britain, since the latter shared his desire to force the Jews out of Europe.(1)
Ramin was recently appointed secretary-general of the new "world foundation for Holocaust Studies" established at the Iranian Holocaust Denial Conference in December.(2) The following are excerpts from the interview:(3)
Adolf Hitler... Developed an Aversion to Judaism Because His Mother Was a Jewish Whore "The Bolshevik Soviet government in Lenin's time, and later, in Stalin's – both of whom were Jewish, though they presented themselves as Marxists and atheists... – was one of the forces that, until the Second World War, cooperated with Hitler in promoting the idea of establishing the State of Israel. A book that was published about this... – titled Adolf Hitler, Founder of Israel by Hennecke Kardel, a German born in 1922 – proves that Hitler was Jewish, and that his grandmother was a Jewish prostitute. [Hitler's] father went by his mother's Jewish name until he was 40, and later changed his surname to Hitler.
"Adolf Hitler himself developed an aversion to Judaism because his mother was a Jewish whore. He first received [negative] information about the Jews in an Austrian monastery, (the book presents details and pictures of it), and from then on, he [tried] to escape his Judaism. "Thus... Hitler simultaneously developed both feelings of solidarity with Judaism and feelings of hatred towards it, and this emotional ambivalence shaped his behavior towards the Jews.
On the one hand, his entire family, the people who shared his views, and his associates who brought him into power and stood by him to the last – including his lovers and his personal doctor – were [all] Jewish.
On the other hand, he welcomed the policy of expelling the Jews from Central Europe for two other reasons: Firstly, the establishment of a Jewish government in Palestine was an aspiration of the rich and influential Jews who surrounded him. Secondly, exiling the Jews from Europe and Germany was a general and historical demand of the Western Christian nations. With the full support of the British, and in coordination with them, Hitler addressed this general demand and [thereby] managed to gain widespread popularity in Europe. Obviously, publishing writings and information of this sort is forbidden in Germany and in the West...
"The Zionists recently... destroyed many documents and papers pertaining to the period before the war, which contained authentic statistics and figures regarding the Jews, such as how many Jews there were, where they [lived] and how they operated. One of the places that was destroyed completely and burned [to the ground] – and which... contained the most valuable documents pertaining to this matter – was the [building of] the newspaper Pravda, which had been published in Moscow for 80 years. On February 10, 2006, the building was set ablaze, and its entire archive, with all its back issues and photographs, was burned and destroyed, and not a trace of it was left. Nobody – not a single news agency anywhere in the world – investigated this historical crime or discussed it extensively..."
Here's something I wrote in character for a piece of fiction. It is not a reflection of how I feel about life, but, at the same time, it is informed by my own personal feeling.
I'm rather proud of it:
I've always considered myself to be a "spiritual" person. What exactly I mean by that, I am not sure. I guess I mean, it seems to me I have a "spirit" and I am aware of it. But, I never really entertained the idea that my spirit connected to anything, except nature, and the odd woman.
I mean there were times earlier in my life, when I would meet a woman and it was as if a door opened in my soul. Kind of like those dreams you have where you're walking through your house, and you find rooms you didn't know were there. That's what it would be like. I'd meet a woman and I would find other rooms, more ornately adorned and frangrant places inside myself.
And when I would make love to a woman who opened these new rooms, I would feel as if she reached in to them and helped to decorate them with herself. I wasn't clear about it, though. It seemed as if, maybe, these new rooms in my soul were her rooms. Maybe they weren't rooms in my soul at all. Maybe they were the private, but infinite, amphitheatres of her heart.
Certainly, some women inspired in me a feeling of openess, within myself, which was larger than the spaces I had previously known myself to encompass. I feel as if I, -----, live in a small room with a window to an infinite view, a study, within which, one can read many books which look out into the sky. So, I have an infinite feeling within me, but I feel confined personally, if that makes sense.
When I say "infinite amphitheatre" for instance, I remember, literally, with one woman, of whom I was particularly fond, I felt as if I had enlarged exponentially. One time I was with her and it felt like I was dancing with her on the peak of a hill with a valley below, a 360 view of valleys and green hills and mountains.
Now, it could have just been the marijuana, but that was the image I got. Truth is, we were just talking, alone in a room, and I was holding her close.
I'm trying to be honest with myself here. I remember a time, when I was younger, when I felt these moments of profound peace. I called them "spiritual" experiences then, but I didn't give any thought to where they came from. These experiences I have had here in Maui the past few days have inspired a calmness and a contemplation which I find difficult to achieve in the frenetic environment of the city, as I'm sure you can tell.
I haven't felt like this for a long time. I really don't know what to think.
But, I feel as if I'm coming to some sort of clearing, like stepping out of a thick forest into, well, I don't know.
I can say this. There was a feeling of destiny or foreordination about the experiences I have had. But, here's the really strange thing. There was also a feeling of deja vu, like I had experienced all of this before. No, not even just experienced, but that I had participated in creation in some way. I don't know how to explain this.
Certainly, I know that the beach, and the mountains of Maui, are beyond my scope to imagine, let alone create. That is laughable. I am, absolutely, awed by their beauty, but I feel as if I have sat, somewhere, with someone, before, and had it all explained to me. That's what I mean by foreordination. I feel as if this beauty is written in me.
Now, I know I'm not being specific about anything here. I'm talking about the essence of my experience. I'm being abstract.
Truthfully, emotonally, it's hard for me to say that, when I was out walking with Ngude the other day, I was moved, almost to tears, just by looking at one large, veined, impossibly green leaf, which hung down from a tree, at a delicate and, somehow perfect angle, right in my path. It's hard to explain how it seemed so right to me. So excellent, and deserving of a loving, almost sexual adoration. But it's true. I looked at the web of it's veins. The liquid sheen of it, belying it's more sublte textures; it's fingerprint. A leaf I would have just thought to be in my way, on another day, if say, I were walking in Central Park.
Or, how do I say that the constant roar of a waterfall, we found hidden in a little cove, gave off a massive sense of stillness? How do I explain that I felt pinned, or rather struck immovable, by silence, while all raged furiously around me? And yet I was still fully under control of my will. I looked at the waterfall, and moved my hand up in front of my face, just to see if I could move. I could, but it was as if the stillness was a living being, born inside me, and once again, the deja vu.
These are very disjointed thoughts, perhaps. I'm sorry if I'm not making any sense to you. I'm trying to make these things make sense to me.
313 cars torched (plus 83 by ricochet) and 258 arrests despite a police presence of 25,000.
The French are getting so touchy about these statistics that they are "breaking out" a separate category of torched cars as in "cars accidentally exploding because they were too close to cars that were intentionally torched" (voitures brûlée par propagation).
French authorities (who seem to have much more authority over bean counting regulations than over their own territory) confide that such levels of violence are well within what is now considered to be acceptable inevitable.
