Even Thomas Friedman gets it these days…

America vs. The Narrative  

NY Times

November 28, 2009

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

Here's my take: Major Hasan may have been mentally unbalanced — I assume anyone who shoots up innocent people is. But the more you read about his support for Muslim suicide bombers, about how he showed up at a public-health seminar with a PowerPoint presentation titled "Why the War on Terror Is a War on Islam," and about his contacts with Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric famous for using the Web to support jihadist violence against America — the more it seems that Major Hasan was just another angry jihadist spurred to action by "The Narrative." What is scary is that even though he was born, raised and educated in America, The Narrative still got to him.

The Narrative is the cocktail of half-truths, propaganda and outright lies about America that have taken hold in the Arab-Muslim world since 9/11. Propagated by jihadist Web sites, mosque preachers, Arab intellectuals, satellite news stations and books — and tacitly endorsed by some Arab regimes — this narrative posits that America has declared war on Islam, as part of a grand "American-Crusader-Zionist conspiracy" to keep Muslims down. Yes, after two decades in which U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny — in Bosnia, Darfur, Kuwait, Somalia, Lebanon, Kurdistan, post-earthquake Pakistan, post-tsunami Indonesia, Iraq and Afghanistan — a narrative that says America is dedicated to keeping Muslims down is thriving.

Although most of the Muslims being killed today are being killed by jihadist suicide bombers in Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan and Indonesia, you'd never know it from listening to their world. The dominant narrative there is that 9/11 was a kind of fraud: America's unprovoked onslaught on Islam is the real story, and the Muslims are the real victims — of U.S. perfidy. Have no doubt: we punched a fist into the Arab/Muslim world after 9/11, partly to send a message of deterrence, but primarily to destroy two tyrannical regimes — the Taliban and the Baathists — and to work with Afghans and Iraqis to build a different kind of politics. In the process, we did some stupid and bad things. But for every Abu Ghraib, our soldiers and diplomats perpetrated a million acts of kindness aimed at giving Arabs and Muslims a better chance to succeed with modernity and to elect their own leaders. The Narrative was concocted by jihadists to obscure that. It's working.

As a Jordanian-born counterterrorism expert, who asked to remain anonymous, said to me: "This narrative is now omnipresent in Arab and Muslim communities in the region and in migrant communities around the world. These communities are bombarded with this narrative in huge doses and on a daily basis. [It says] the West, and right now mostly the U.S. and Israel, is single-handedly and completely responsible for all the grievances of the Arab and the Muslim worlds. Ironically, the vast majority of the media outlets targeting these communities are Arab-government owned — mostly from the Gulf."This narrative suits Arab governments. It allows them to deflect onto America all of their people's grievances over why their countries are falling behind. And it suits Al Qaeda, which doesn't need much organization anymore — just push out The Narrative over the Web and satellite TV, let it heat up humiliated, frustrated or socially alienated Muslim males, and one or two will open fire on their own. See: Major Hasan. "Liberal Arabs like me are as angry as a terrorist and as determined to change the status quo," said my Jordanian friend. The only difference "is that while we choose education, knowledge and success to bring about change, a terrorist, having bought into the narrative, has a sense of powerlessness and helplessness, which are inculcated in us from childhood, that lead him to believe that there is only one way, and that is violence."

What to do? Many Arab Muslims know that what ails their societies is more than the West, and that The Narrative is just an escape from looking honestly at themselves. But none of their leaders dare or care to open that discussion. In his Cairo speech last June, President Obama effectively built a connection with the Muslim mainstream. Maybe he could spark the debate by asking that same audience this question:"Whenever something like Fort Hood happens you say, 'This is not Islam.' I believe that. But you keep telling us what Islam isn't. You need to tell us what it is and show us how its positive interpretations are being promoted in your schools and mosques. If this is not Islam, then why is it that a million Muslims will pour into the streets to protest Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, but not one will take to the streets to protest Muslim suicide bombers who blow up other Muslims, real people, created in the image of God? You need to explain that to us — and to yourselves."

IMPACT-SE

Institute for Monitoring Peace And Cultural Tolerance-School Education

In doing some research on recent statements by Salaam Fayad, the prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, I came across this NGO. Their sole job is to monitor textbooks and educational curricula around the world.

They have done studies in many places, from around the middle east and Asia. Their latest report is about Tunisia.

Their concept is to determine how a society's educational institutions deal with the idea of the "other" i.e. those who are either political enemies, or foreign sources of conflict socially.

Not surprisingly, they have done recent reports on both Israeli, and Palestinian schools.

One of the reasons that I supported Hillary Clinton in the primaries was a speech she gave some time ago discussing the preconditions for any Two state settlement. She was the first politician on a national level that I had heard discuss the necessity of changing the culture of violence that permeates Palestinians society. And to begin that process of change she said, we need to demand a change in the way Palestinians treat, and educate their children.

These poor youngsters are indoctrinated from birth in a culture of hate and death, and while I have been talking about this for years, I had never heard it recognized before by someone in the position to do something about it.

So, the results of IMPACT's study? No surprise here. But I will let you read the conclusions about the Palestinian texts:

As it happened, the books for grades 1-10 were all prepared and published under YasirArafat, while the books for grade 11 were written under his successor, Abbas, and the books for grade 12, under the Hamas government. The PA schoolbooks for grades 11 and 12 were studied in the light of the educational fundamentals regarding the "other" and peace that existed in the PA textbooks for grades 1-10 published under the late Yasser Arafat. As shown in this study, these fundamentals deny the Jewish and Israeli "others" any legitimacy, demonize them, assign them exclusive responsibility for the Mideast conflict, avoid any expression that would openly advocate peace, and encourage instead violent struggle againstthem. These fundamentals, in their various manifestations, are spread throughout the Palestinian curriculum and are found in books for all grades, as is easily discernable in the quoted source material within this study.

 

AND:

This report covers the school textbooks of the last two grades of the PA educational system, which were published in 2005 and 2006, thus ending a seven-year process in which the PA replaced the old Jordanian and Egyptian schoolbook for all grades with its own ones. While the books for grades 1-10 were all written and published under the late PA Chairman Yasser Arafat, the books for grade 11 were written under his successor Mahmud Abbas and the books for grade 12 were written under the Hamas government, which may account for the changes therein.

In fact, the books of grade 11 provide us with several significant changes, compared to the guidelines governing earlier books. The fundamentals have not changed, to be sure, and they are as follows:

• Rejection of any rights the Jews might have in Palestine.
  
• Non-recognition of their holy places there, which are presented as Muslim holy places the Jews aspire to take over.
  
• The Jews themselves are presented in negative light both in the historical context and in the context of the present conflict.
  
• The Jewish national movement in modern times – Zionism – is presented as an expansionist movement created by Western Imperialism and striving to seize control of Arab lands between the Euphrates and the Nile rivers.
  
• Israel is not referred to as a sovereign state. Its establishment in 1948 is referred to as "occupation". The books consider Palestine the sole legitimate sovereign state between River Jordan and the Mediterranean.
  
• Regions within Israel's pre-1967 borders are presented as Palestinian.
  
• Israel is demonized by a long list of accusations presenting it as a source of evil, not as a neighbor with its own legitimate rights and interests. The list of its perceived crimes includes its very establishment, occupation of various parts of Palestine, expulsion of the Palestinian people from its homeland, massacres, assassination of Palestinian leaders, aggression against Arab neighboring countries, destruction of Palestinian economy, even responsibility for the meager participation of Palestinian women in economic activity, for Palestinian social ills – such as drug abuse and illiteracy, for cultural deficiencies, etc. The accompanying term "Imperialist" appears in
  

  this context for the first time, emphasizing Israel's illegitimate status in the books' view.
  

• The conflict is presented in a very biased way as a result of Jewish-British conspiracy against the Arabs. Israel is solely responsible for all its developments.
  
• The Palestinian refugee problem is presented as a result of Jewish aggression and its only solution is said to be the complete return of the refugees' descendants to their ancestors' former homes. The Palestinians' share of responsibility for the creation of this problem, the mass flight of Jewish refugees from the Arab countries to Israel and the obvious difficulty of the suggested solution are never discussed.
  
• Peace with Israel is never openly advocated. Even the discussion of the peace process – in some cases in great detail – is devoid of expressions of support. Israel, on its part, is presented as a party acting against peace.
  
• As before, terrorist actions against Israel are not openly encouraged or rejected but there are indications of implicit support represented by the positive reference to "martyrs", "prisoners-of-war" and "Fidais" (members of the Palestinian armed organizations).
  

 

The conclusions about Israeli textbooks? The conclusion here:

Despite the deterioration in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians since September 2000, no negative changes were noted in the new textbooks with regard to the image of the Arabs, the description of the conflict, the presentation of Islam, questions of war and peace and education to tolerance and conciliation. On the contrary, the positive trends noted in the earlier report have, if anything, been strengthened. There are some innovations, as in a textbook published by the Ministry of Education, which presents the pupils with information on an issue little known even to the majority of the Jews: those Arabs who are the "absent present"1. The textbook also deals with the Israel Lands Law, 5720-1960, and its implications for the Arabs of Israel. A number of textbooks have aroused public controversy by certain groups, who have accused them of "post-Zionism" and "self-hatred". These textbooks were reviewed in the previous report and with one exception2, are still included in the list approved by the Ministry of Education.

 

AND:

The new textbooks give information about the peace agreements between Israel and Arab countries and the Palestinians, in particular on the question of the borders between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

• Factual presentation of the Arab and Palestinian political position.
  
• The Palestinians' struggle is presented as that of a national movement whilst not identifying with their aims.
  
• The conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians continues to be presented as a clash between two national movements, thus legitimizing the existence of the Palestinian national movement. None of the new textbooks contains indoctrination against the Palestinians as a people.
  
• Islam is presented in a positive light and its doctrines factually explained.
  
• Information is provided about Muslim holy places and sites holy to both Muslims and Jews. Places holy to the Jews and also held holy by the Muslims or Christians are mentioned. Traditions that have developed around Jewish holy sites or personalities that are shared by both Jews and the Muslims are depicted in one of the textbooks.
  
• No instance of education to hatred of the Arabs or of any other people was found. In the new editions of literature readers, stories depicting Arabs in a positive light continue to appear. The textbooks approved by the Ministry of Education still include literature readers that contain stories written by Palestinian and other Arab authors.
  
• No illustrations or caricatures depicting Arabs in a negative light are to be found in the books.
  
• New elements are introduced to heighten the pupils understanding of the Arab point of view concerning the conflict.
  
• Textbooks approved by the Ministry of Education continue to present the Palestinian point of view both with regard to the unfolding of the conflict and responsibility for therefugee problem. Some textbooks blame the Arab leadership for bringing about the flight of the Arabs. A new dimension is the reference to towns of mixed Jewish and Arab population and the chain of events that led to the flight of the Arabs from these towns.
  
• Civics textbooks present the pupil with details of the debate over the national character of the State of Israel: Israel as a Jewish state vis-à-vis Israel as a state for "all its citizens".
  
• The national and cultural identity of the Israeli Arabs is discussed in detail.
  
• The main atlases provide information on Palestinian Authority areas. The atlas most commonly used in the State and State Religious schools continues to include a map which shows the area of the West Bank with its division into Areas A, B and C. In the 2002 edition the map of the areas of the Autonomy is updated to include the latest changes. (see Appendix I)
  
• In the other atlas the "Area of the Palestinian Autonomy" is colored gray within the map of Israel. On the physical maps in both atlases the political borders with Jordan and Egypt are marked, without any indication of the green line.
  

 

 

 

If world war III starts in Yemen and no one covers it, do you hear it fall?

Almost incredibly, one of the most important stories of the last century is getting no coverage in the American press. The Saudis resumed their bombing of Shiite rebels in Yemen yesterday.

These rebels are sponsored by the same folks who sponsor Hamas, Hezbullah and the insurgency in Iraq. That's right, our favorite "little Hitler" Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Iranians.

Now, this may be a surprise to you, but the fact that it is a surprise to our President, his foreign policy team, and the crack press we have here in the country, is truly frightening.

First, some new facts. As a result of the renewed bombing, the Iranians responded with two unprecedented moves this week. The first was to call for the overthrow of the Saudi monarchy.

The second is far more serious in the eyes of the Muslim world. They called for terrorist activity to disrupt the "Haj". For those that don't know, the Haj is the required pilgrimage that Muslims are supposed to make by visiting Mecca. You may have seen in the past the images of hundreds of thousands of Muslim Pilgrims in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, doing their revolutions. The idea of Muslims disrupting this most important rite of passage, not to mention calling for the deaths of fellow Muslims….

But what are the larger implications of what is happening? Well, this too, should be obvious, but apparently it isn't to those in charge here in the US.

It has been the stated goal of the Iranian Revolution since it's inception in 1979 to export it wherever and whenever it can. Now, this is a fundamental tenet of Islam anyway, and particularly of Shia Islam.

However, the Ayatollah took this to a new level. As we speak, Iran control an arc in the middle east extending from their own nation, to Syria, Lebanon, the Gaza Strip, and now Yemen.

The Egyptians are desperately afraid of the Iranian influence in Gaza which is why have supported a blockade of their own, in addition to cutting off power and water.

The Jordanians are also worried, as Saudi Arabia has served as their buffer until now.

In fact, it was fear of the Iranian terrorist machine that cause the Saudis and Egyptians to meet with Bibi Netanyahu in advance of his first meeting with Obama. Not to mention having the Saudis agree to allow Israel to fly through their air space in order to reach Iran on a bombing mission

The dange of any action against Iran is multi pronged. The best that can be expected is a major disruption of the world's oil supply. Can you imagine waiting on lines even longer than those of the 1970's.

 

More catastrophically would be that the Iranians would unleash a major terrorist war using Hezbollah and Hamas in the forefront, of course, with Israel the main target.

"We are at war, and we will use every instrument of national power - civilian, military, law enforcement, intelligence, diplomatic and others - to win,"

This was from attorney general Eric Holder today in regard to the decision to try KSM in NY. If so, how to explain his decision and the official policy of the Obama administration to NOT use the term "war on terror" or the official policy to not regard attacks as terrorism, but as the absurdly named "man made disasters"?

The mullahs' big week

Caroline Glick

 Posted: 06 Nov 2009 07:29 AM PST
At first glance, this past week seems like a week that Iran's mullahs would very much like to forget. Early Wednesday morning, IDF naval commandos boarded the merchant ship Francop and diverted it to the naval base at Ashdod. There the IDF displayed its cargo of 3,000 rockets and various and other sundry ordnance useful only to terror forces.

The Francop originated in Iran and was intercepted en route to Iran's Hizbullah proxy force in Lebanon via Iran's Arab toady Syria.

As Israel's political leadership noted, this shipment constitutes hard proof that Iran is actively sponsoring terrorist armies in Lebanon, and doing so in full breach of binding UN Security Council resolutions. The commando raid also exposed the depth of Syria's collusion with Iran in arming Hizbullah. After Israel's seizure of the Francop, voices claiming that Syria is but a bit player in the terror game can be laughed off the international stage.

Israel's interception of the Francop came a week after Yemeni forces seized an Iranian ship transporting armor-piercing weapons to Houthi Shi'ite rebels in northern Yemen. As Saudi Arabia's Al-Watan reported over the weekend, Iranian Revolutionary Guards are training Houthi rebels in Eritrea and sponsoring their insurgency against the Yemini regime.

Earlier in October, the Hansa India, which sailed from Iran to Germany, fell under suspicion as it made its way to Syria. It was diverted from Egypt to Malta, where its cargo of bullets and industrial materials intended for weapons production was removed.

On Wednesday morning, just as Israel was announcing the capture of the Francop, scores of thousands of Iranians in cities throughout the country took advantage of the regime's planned demonstrations celebrating the 30th anniversary of the seizure of the US Embassy in Teheran to protest against the regime. These regime opponents willingly placed themselves in front of the batons, tear gas cannons and guns of Iranian regime goons to protest June's stolen presidential election and to call for the overthrow of the mullahs' regime of tyranny and its replacement with a democracy.

The protesters turned regime supporters' calls for "Death to America," and "Death to Israel" into big, deadly jokes by calling out, "Death to the Dictator" (that is, supreme ruler Ali Khamenei) and "Death to Russia."

Far from embracing the regime's 30-year war against the US and the nation-state based international system, representatives of the "Green Revolution" asked the US to forgive Iran for taking 52 US Embassy personnel hostage in 1979.

Back in Israel, for the past two weeks some 1,400 US military personnel have been deployed throughout the country for the biennial Juniper Cobra missile defense exercise with the IDF. Although Juniper Cobra is a routine maneuver, this year's exercise was unprecedented in size and scope. Observers claim that there have never been so many American generals in Israel at one time.

No previous Israeli-American joint exercise has been conducted with such a high profile. And Israeli leaders did not hesitate to name the enemy in this year's exercise. This year's Juniper Cobra exercise, they said, was part of the two nations' preparations for a joint response to a potential Iranian strike against Israel. The obvious message Israel and the US hoped to transmit to Teheran was that the strategic alliance between the two countries remains strong.

ALL IN all then, on the surface, this past week seemed like a horrible week for the mullahs. But appearances can be deceiving. Unfortunately and counterintuitively, the past week has been one of the best weeks the mullahs have had for a long, long time. Certainly, it was the best week the Iranian regime has had since it falsified the results of the June 12 presidential elections.

In January 2002, the IDF commandeered the Iranian Karine A weapons ship en route to Gaza. The Karine A was carrying a 10th of the weapons that the Francop was carrying. But the impact the Israeli commando mission then had on Israel's political position was more than 10 times greater than the political impact of this week's successful operation.

The exposure then of Iran's support for Palestinian Authority-backed terror forces caused the Bush administration to abandon its previous acceptance of Yasser Arafat as a legitimate political leader. That in turn paved the way for Israel's launch of Operation Defensive Shield three months later. In that operation Israel wrested military control over Judea and Samaria away from Palestinian militias and terror cells.

Wednesday's raid has had no discernible impact on American policy. The US did not denounce either Syria or Iran for breaching the UN Security Council resolution barring Iranian arms shipments as well as the Security Council resolution prohibiting nations from arming Hizbullah. The US did not state that in response to what Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu called a "smoking gun," it will reconsider its decision to send an ambassador to Damascus or its commitment to appeasing Iran through its nuclear talks in Geneva. The only thing a State Department official could bring himself to say was that the US is concerned about "Hizbullah's efforts to rearm in direct violation of various UN Security Council resolutions," and remark that the groups remains, "a significant threat to peace and security in Lebanon and the region."

Despite the government's energetic efforts to use the Francop interception as a means to convince the nations of the world to unite against Iranian-backed terror, no one seems willing to acknowledge the clear strategic implications of Iran's exports of terror weaponry. Today no one is any more willing to treat Iran as the enemy of the international system it has been for 30 years than they were before Israel exposed the Francop cargo of terror for all the world to see.

And the US-led international community's refusal to take any action against Iran in response to this latest evidence of its rogue behavior is a great victory for the mullahs. Thirty years after their first criminal challenge to the US and the free world as a whole, no one seems to care when their criminality is so graphically exposed.

WITH THE international community making clear its unwillingness to confront Iran for its support of global terrorism, the greatest single threat to the Iranian regime today is the Iranian people. Since the likes of Khamenei and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stole the June 12 presidential elections, the Iranian people have daily risked death in their desperate and courageous bid to overthrow the regime.

The Iranian opposition movement announced weeks ago that its members would be out in force at the anniversary rallies on Wednesday. And on Wednesday, the protesters begged the world for support. They called out to US President Barack Obama, "You're either with us or with them."

But Obama - in full appeasement mode - issued a statement ahead of Wednesday's "Death to America" rallies announcing, "We do not interfere in Iran's internal affairs." That is, when asked to choose between Iran's freedom riders or their oppressors, he chose the oppressors. The US is with the mullahs against the Iranian people.

No doubt Obama's statement brought contemptuous smirks to faces of the illegitimate leaders in Teheran.

As for the Juniper Cobra exercise, far from being a cause for concern for Teheran, it is a cause for celebration. As Iran's centrifuges churn on, by loudly voicing its determination to defend Israel if Israel is attacked by Iran, the US signaled that it is willing to take its chances with a nuclear-armed Iran. More than anything, Juniper Cobra demonstrated that the Obama administration has abandoned its previously stated pledge that it will not accept a nuclear-armed Iran. Rather than working with Israel to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, the US is using Juniper Cobra to noisily demonstrate that it merely hopes to deter Iran from using nuclear weapons once it acquires them.

While this was perhaps the mullahs' greatest reason for rejoicing this week, three additional developments no doubt also warmed the cockles of their hearts. First, Obama's pledge not to support the anti-regime protesters was part of a larger message in which the president of the United States effectively groveled at the mullahs' feet and begged them to allow the US to enrich uranium for them.

Obama said, "I have made it clear that the United States of America wants to move beyond this past, and seeks a relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran based upon mutual interests and mutual respect... We have recognized Iran's international right to peaceful nuclear power. We have demonstrated our willingness to take confidence-building steps along with others in the international community. We have accepted a proposal by the International Atomic Energy Agency to meet Iran's request for assistance in meeting the medical needs of its people. We have made clear that if Iran lives up to the obligations that every nation has, it will have a path to a more prosperous and productive relationship with the international community."

And when Khamenei responded to Obama's obsequious bowing and scraping by saying that negotiating with the US was a "naïve and perverted" enterprise, the Obama administration had nothing to say.

The White House won't even acknowledge that the Iranians have already rejected the IAEA-brokered deal to have the US, France and Russia enrich uranium for them. Indeed, rather than accept that the Iranians are playing them for fools, administration officials were furious at Israel for Defense Minister Ehud Barak's announcement early last week that their proposed deal with Iran would have little impact on Iran's nuclear weapons program.

According to Channel 10, the White House demanded that Netanyahu applaud their efforts. They threatened Israel with unspecified sanctions if he failed to announce his support for their pathetic attempts at appeasement. And so he did. And about five minutes after Netanyahu applauded the Americans for their brilliant offer to enrich uranium for Iran, the Iranians rejected their offer as insufficient.

Finally, Obama has threatened that if Iran rejects his nuclear appeasement offer the US will move swiftly to enact painful sanctions against it. But with the UN the only international institution the administration believes can legitimately initiate sanctions, and with the UN currently busy discussing the Goldstone Report accusing Israel of committing war crimes in its campaign against Iran's Hamas proxy in Gaza, no one can expect any movement on yet another sanctions resolution against Iran any time soon. (And as to Gaza, neither the US nor anyone else had any significant reaction to Israel's revelation Tuesday that Hamas successfully tested an Iranian missile capable of reaching Tel Aviv.)

Today we are in a waiting period. At the end of this period, either Iran will emerge as a nuclear power or Iran will see itself disarmed of nuclear power, its regime humbled and its terror proxies deterred.

Through their actions again this week, the US and the international community as a whole have demonstrated their preferred outcome. It must be fervently hoped that like the brave Iranian people themselves, Israel will not bend to their cowardly will.

Silencing dissent in America

Caroline Glick
Posted: 02 Nov 2009 09:38 AM PST
Former ambassador to the UN Dore Gold should probably buy himself a flak jacket. Gold is scheduled to debate Richard Goldstone at Brandeis University next Thursday and the anti-Israel forces are organizing quite a reception for him.

Goldstone, who chaired the UN Human Rights Council's commission charged with accusing Israel of committing war crimes in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead, has become a darling of the anti-Israel Left in the weeks since his report accusing Israel of committing both war crimes and crimes against humanity was published last month. And anti-Israeli leftists don't like the idea of someone challenging his libelous attacks against Israel in a public debate at a university.

In an e-mail to a campus list-serve, Brandeis student and anti-Israel activist Jonathan Sussman called on his fellow anti-Zionists to disrupt the event that will pit the "neutral" Goldstone against Gold with his "wildly pro-Zionist message." Sussman invited his list-serve members to join him at a meeting to "discuss a possible response."

As the young community organizer sees it, "Possibilities include inviting Palestinian speakers to come participate, seeding the audience with people who can disrupt the Zionist narrative, protest and direct action." He closed his missive with a plaintive call to arms: "F**k the occupation."

Apparently the aspiring political organizer never considered another possibility: listening to what Gold has to say.

It seems rather unfair to pick on a small fry like Sussman. A brief Web search indicates that Gold's would-be silencer divides his time fairly equally between publishing rambling, Communist verses to paramours and calling for the overthrow of the US government.

The problem is that Sussman's planned "direct action" against Gold is not an isolated incident. On college campuses throughout the US, Israelis and supporters of Israel are regularly denied the right to speak by leftist activists claiming to act on behalf of Israel's "victims," or in the cause of "peace." In the name of the Palestinians or peace these radicals seek to coerce their fellow students into following their lead by demonizing and brutally silencing all voices of dissent.

This, by the way is true regardless of where the speaker fits on the pro-Israel spectrum. Earlier this month former prime minister Ehud Olmert - who during his tenure in office offered the Palestinians more than any of his predecessors - could barely get a word in edgewise above the clamor of students at the University of Chicago cursing him as a war criminal.

While many commentators claim that the situation on college campuses is unique, the fact is that the attempts of leftist activists on campuses to silence non-leftist dissenters regarding Israel and a host of other issues is simply an extreme version of what is increasingly becoming standard operating procedure for leftist activists throughout the US. Rather than participating in a battle of ideas with their ideological opponents on the Right, increasingly, leftist activists, groups and policy-makers seek to silence their opponents through slander, intimidation and misrepresentation of their own agenda.

CASE IN point is J Street. The 18-month old, multi-million dollar American Jewish political action committee held its inaugural convention this week in Washington. J Street seeks to present itself as the representative of a silent majority of American Jews. However, its signature positions - while in line with the Obama administration's policies - are deeply discordant with mainstream American Jewish views.

J Street asserts that Israel must freeze all Jewish construction beyond the 1949 armistice lines; that Israel should withdraw to the 1949 armistice lines, including in Jerusalem and expel all Jews now living beyond the 1949 armistice lines; that the absence of peace is due to the absence of a Palestinian state; that Israel used excessive force in Operation Cast Lead and the Goldstone Report is legitimate. J Street also opposes both sanctions on Iran and military strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Just how profoundly out of synch these positions are with the American Jewish community was made clear with last month's publication of the American Jewish Committee's 2009 Annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion.

According to the survey, a majority of US Jews oppose the Obama administration's call for the prohibition of Jewish construction in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem. Similarly, the vast majority of US Jews rejects the call for Israel to surrender parts of Jerusalem to the Palestinians; believes the cause of the Palestinian conflict with Israel is the Arabs' desire to destroy Israel rather than the absence of a Palestinian state; and supports Israel's right to defend itself against Palestinian terror. A whopping 94 percent of American Jews believe the Palestinians should be required to accept Israel's right to exist as a precursor to any viable peace. Finally, a solid majority of American Jews supports either a US or an Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear installations.

But no matter. Facts are no obstacle for J Street. Just as Sussman smears his opponents to discredit dissenting views, so J Street has not only misrepresented its own place on the American Jewish ideological spectrum. It has misrepresented the position of mainstream American Jewish groups on the ideological spectrum. Owing no doubt to the fact that most American Jews self-identify as liberals, J Street condemns organizations like AIPAC and the ADL as right-wing or conservative or hawkish to try to make American Jews feel uncomfortable supporting them.

At its conference this week J Street's radicalism was on full display. According to the JTA account, one panel discussion featured members of Congress debating the proposition that American Jewish money controls US foreign policy. Congressman Bob Filner (D-California) was reportedly the darling of the crowd for arguing that indeed, Jewish money exerts inordinate and destructive influence over US foreign policy.

Filner related how in 1994 he was one of the few members of Congress who refused to sign onto a resolution condemning an anti-Semitic speech given by Nation of Islam lieutenant Khalid Abdul Muhammad. Filner claimed that by refusing to condemn a public figure's calumny against the Jewish people he lost some $250,000 in electoral contributions in each subsequent election cycle. "That kind of money is an intimidating factor. I raised a lot less in succeeding years, but my conscious was cleared," he bragged.

Filner went on to condemn pro-Israel lobbyists in general. Indeed he insinuated that the act of lobbying on behalf of Israel is inherently treacherous. Filner argued that unlike labor lobbyists who provide some public benefit, pro-Israel lobbyists are dangerous because they convince legislators to take "positions that can lead to war."

Then there was the self-professed "pro-Israel, pro-peace" group's panel discussion on Iran's nuclear program. As James Kirchick reported in The New Republic, the panel included two of Iran's most outspoken apologists in Washington. Both former National Security Council staffer Hillary Mann Leverett and National Iranian-American Council head Trita Parsi asserted a moral and security equivalence between Iran, Israel and the US. Leverett accused opponents of Iran's nuclear program of racism. In her words, those calling for Iran to be denied nuclear weapons are "reinforcing stereotypes of Iranian duplicitousness," and their warnings are "fundamentally racist."

Here we see how just as Sussman seeks to demonize dissenting views, so J Street gives an open forum to radicals who castigate their opponents as illegitimate, racist and treacherous.

Perhaps the most outstanding feature of the far-left's behavior is its trenchant refusal to acknowledge that it is the far-left. Just as J Street fatuously claims to represent the American Jewish majority, so it claims to be the American Jewish equivalent of the Kadima Party. J Street's Executive Director Jeremy Ben-Ami told The Jerusalem Post, "The party and the viewpoint that we're closest to in Israeli politics is actually Kadima."

This of course is pure nonsense. Kadima - like every other Zionist political party in Israel - supports strong sanctions on Iran. Indeed, Kadima supports taking whatever steps are necessary to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Beyond that, Kadima waged two wars while it was in office. Both Operation Cast Lead and the Second Lebanon War were opposed by the far-left. J Street was outspoken in its criticism of Cast Lead. Moreover, Kadima's leaders have emphatically opposed the Goldstone Report.
So other than its support for the rapid establishment of a Palestinian state, Kadima shares none of J Street's positions.

THE FACT that J Street represents neither mainstream Israeli thinking nor mainstream American Jewish thinking is of little concern to its leadership. J Street represents the Obama administration. In his keynote address before the conference, National Security Adviser James Jones told his cheering audience that J Street has a friend in the Obama White House. As he put it, "You can be sure that this administration will be represented at all other future J Street conferences."

In recent weeks we have discovered that like its agent J Street, and indeed like Sussman at Brandeis, the Obama White House is also dedicated to silencing opposing voices by marginalizing and demonizing dissent. In fact, the White House's modus operandi is startlingly similar to theirs.

There are six national television networks in the US. Five of them support President Barack Obama. One - Fox News - does not. Rather than rejoice in what is an overwhelmingly favorable state of affairs for it, in recent weeks, the Obama White House has gone to war against Fox News. Obama's senior advisers have castigated the network as "the research arm of the Republican Party," and claim daily that it is "not a news organization."

Obama as well as top administration officials boycott Fox programs and are seeking to intimidate friendly news organizations into joining them in isolating Fox. In a spate of recent statements on the subject, Obama's top advisers have warned the other networks not to follow Fox's lead on any of the stories it reports, lest they discover they have allowed themselves to become the tool of the Republicans.

A straight line connects Sussman's rants, J Street's lies and the Obama administration's attempt to destroy a news organization. In each case, actions aimed at silencing debate are falsely characterized as the brave moves of an underdog seeking to confront the evil powers that be. Sussman writes of the need to overthrow the "oligarchs." J Street claims to be breaking the "right-wing stranglehold" on US Israel policy. And Obama's adviser Valerie Jarrett claims that by attacking Fox News, the White House is "speaking truth to power."

Luckily, the falseness of all of these claims has not been lost on the American public. Despite the actions of the likes of Sussman, "wildly pro-Zionist" voices still resonate on college campuses just as they do throughout the US. J Street has been unable to convince American Jews that its anti-Israel positions are the true expression of American Jewish Zionism. And Obama's approval ratings now stand at a mere 51%.

But the fact that these views have not become dominant in America is no reason to be sanguine about the future. That opponents of free speech today occupy the top echelons of power in Washington and are represented at all levels of American society constitutes a critical challenge to the continued vibrancy of American democracy.

When the Saudis bomb civilians, no one hears about it.

FROM YAHOO NEWS (if you can believe it!!)

 

Nov. 5, 2009 6:19 pm ET SAN'A, Yemen – Saudi Arabia sent fighter jets and artillery bombardments across the border into northern Yemen Thursday in a military incursion apparently aimed at helping its troubled southern neighbor control an escalating Shiite rebellion, Arab diplomats and the rebels said. The Saudis — owners of a sophisticated air force they rarely use — have been

increasingly worried that extremism and instability in Yemen could spill over to their country, the world's largest oil exporter. The offensive came two days after the killing of a Saudi soldier, blamed on the rebels. Yemen denied any military action by Saudi Arabia inside its borders. But Yemen's president is a key ally of the Saudis, making it highly unlikely the kingdom would have

launched the offensive without tacit Yemeni agreement.

 

A U.S. government official said the Yemenis were not involved militarily in the fighting. The official spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. The offensive immediately raised concerns of another proxy war in the Middle East between Iran and Saudi Arabia, a key U.S. ally. Shiite Iran is believed to favor the rebels in Yemen while Saudi Arabia, which is Sunni, is Iran's fiercest regional rival. The same dynamic has played out in various forms in Lebanon, where Iran supports the Shiite militant Hezbollah and Saudi Arabia favors a U.S.-backed faction, and in Iraq, where Saudi Arabia and Iran have thrown support to conflicting sides in the Sunni-Shiite struggle. A top Saudi government adviser confirmed "a large scale" military operation underway on the Saudi-Yemeni border with further reinforcements sent to the rugged, mountainous area. "It is a sustained operation which aims to finish this problem on our border," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. He said Saudi troops were coordinating with Yemen's army, but Yemen's defense ministry denied the Saudis were inside the country.

 

The northern rebels, known as Hawthis, have been battling Yemeni government forces the past few months in the latest flare-up of a sporadic five-year conflict. They claim their needs are ignored by a Yemeni government that is increasingly allied with hard-line Sunni fundamentalists, who consider Shiites heretics. The rebels said the Saudi airstrikes hit five areas in their northern stronghold Thursday but it was not possible to independently verify the reports. They said there were dead and wounded, and that homes were destroyed. The rebels' spokesman said people were afraid to get near the areas being bombed, making it difficult to count the casualties. "Saudi jets dropped bombs on a crowded areas including a local market in the northern province of Saada," Hawthi spokesman Mohammed Abdel-Salam told The Associated Press. "They claim they are targeting al-Hawthis, but regrettably they are killing civilians like the government does." He said the attacks were followed by hundreds of artillery shells from the border. "So far, three killed have been pulled out of the rubble, including a woman and a child who perished when their houses were bombed and burned down," said Abdel-Salam. The fighting is more than 600 miles from Saudi Arabia's oil fields on the kingdom's eastern Persian Gulf coast.

 

But northern Yemen overlooks the Red Sea, the world's busiest route for oil tankers. Two Arab diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Saudi Tornado and F-15 warplanes had been bombarding targets inside Yemen since Wednesday afternoon, inflicting significant casualties on rebels. The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not allowed to talk to the media. They said army units and special forces also had been sent to northern Yemen, and that several Saudi towns on the border had been evacuated as a precaution. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters he had no information about whether the conflict had spread across the border but expressed Washington's concern over the situation. "It's our view that there can be no long-term military solution to the conflict between the Yemeni government and the Hawthi rebels," Kelly said. "We call on all parties to the conflict to make every effort to protect civilian populations and limit damage to civilian infrastructure." The weak central government of Yemen, which has little control outside the capital San'a, is fighting on multiple fronts including the northern rebels and a separatist movement in the south. But the most worrisome is a lingering threat from al-Qaida militants.

 

The U.S. also fears any Yemeni fighting could spill over into Saudi Arabia and is concerned that Yemen could become a haven for al-Qaida militants hiding out in the nation, at the tip of the Arabian peninsula. The Yemeni government openly accuses Iran of arming the Hawthis rebels, but there has been no public evidence to back those claims, said Joost Hiltermann, deputy program director of the Middle East program for the International Crisis Group think tank in London. "I think Iran is probably pleased with what is happening, but that is not the same as saying they are supporting the Hawthis," Hiltermann said. Simon Henderson, director of Gulf and energy policy at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in Washington, agreed that there is no clear evidence that Iran funds the rebels. But he said there is a wide assumption that Iran favors the Hawthis and the Saudis are backing Yemen's Sunni president. "So it is a Saudi-Iranian proxy war," he said. Saudi Arabia, rich in oil, has one of the world's most sophisticated air forces but rarely uses it. The bulk of its air power, with more than 350 combat aircraft, derives from squadrons of F-15s and British-supplied Tornados, according to the military and intelligence analysis group GlobalSecurity.org.

 

The kingdom also for decades has received U.S. military assistance in the form of training. The Saudi incursion marks the first time since the 1991 Gulf War that the country has deployed military might beyond its borders. In that war, Saudi forces assisted the U.S. Marine Corps, providing staging grounds for airstrikes and in joint operations targeting Iraqi positions in Kuwait with artillery fire and ground offensives. The incursion is not, however, Saudi Arabia's first involvement in internal Yemeni conflicts. During Yemen's 1962-70 civil war, sparked by a military coup that overthrew Yemen's royalist government, Saudi Arabia supported the royalists against the Egyptian-backed government. When civil war erupted again in 1994, it was widely believed that the Saudis sided with southern secessionist rebels against the central government. A security official told Saudi Arabia's state news agency that the soldier died when gunmen infiltrated from Yemen and attacked security guards patrolling the Mount Dokhan border area Tuesday. Rebels said that area was among the bombing targets Thursday.

 

The Gulf Cooperation Council, the region's main diplomatic forum, condemned what it called the "violation and infiltration" of Saudi Arabia's borders. "Saudi Arabia is capable of protecting its lands," it warned in a statement.

 

____

Nasrawi reported from Cairo. Associated Press Writers Omar Sinan and Ben

Hubbard in Cairo and Pamela Hess in Washington contributed to this report.

“He leapt on the desk, began shouting ‘Jesus saves’ and killing everyone in sight”

Need I say more?

Tonight’s election results

Not surprisingly, both sides are interpreting the results of the election tonight totally incorrectly.

First - the Democrats. The idea that the elections mean nothing about Obama and his policies is simply silly. Of course it does.

But it means less about his policies, which every poll, including those done at the time of his election, indicated were NOT supported by a majority of the country, than it does about confirming that he won for 2 primary reasons.

First, he won because of the rock star quota. That is borne out by the failure of those who voted for Obama, to come out in big numbers for the Democratic gubernatorial candidates.

Second, he won because he was viewed as the "out" of favor party.

And that is the principal force for the Republican victories tonight.

No better example of that can be seen than in New Jersey.

While John Corzine has been far from good, he certainly cannot be blamed for a ALL of NJ's problems - loss of manufacturing base, the national recession, etc.

But he has been a statewide officeholder for 10 years now. 4 as governor and six as US Senator.

This was a rejection of the incumbent.

And the same can be said of the Virginia race, which was not an explicit rejection of an incumbent, but clearly a call for the out of favor party.

But what is overriding for all the races is screaming for tax relief.

Here in my home county, Westchester, NY, the incumbent, Andy Spano, who was deemed unbeatable, was absolutely crushed by the Republican challenger based on a tax relief platform.

This was Chris Christie's platform in NJ as well.

I saved the NY mayor's race for last because it was very interesting. Mike Bloomberg polls the way every politician wishes they would. Virtually every organization, every newspaper, union, religious group, citizens organization, etc. all say he has done an amazing job as our mayor and endorsed him.

Voter polls showed overwhelming support of his track record.

He outspent his rival, NY Controller Bill Thompson, more than 10:1.

However, his victory was, while not narrow, far closer than anyone predicted.

This was an anti incumbent vote again, and with more bite, because of Bloombergs usurping and overturning of the term limit laws voted on by NY voters only a few years ago.

The bottom line, though, for the Democrats is actually good. The Republicans lost the House seat in the upstate New York district because of the conflict between the conservatives and the moderate/liberals.

But the bottom line was a loss of a long term Republican House seat to the Democrats.

So, for Obama, it means he actually, despite what seemed to be a bad night, GAINED an increased majority in the House.