The Pope’s recent visit to Bethlehem was one of the most blatant displays of capitulation to terrorism that has been seen in recent years. How well I remember the way Christians were treated by Arafat’s henchmen, including Mahmoud Abbas his right hand man, during the Intifada. The Christian community was decimated, and is now only twenty percent of the population, when it was once the majority. Christian girls were kidnapped, raped, and forced to convert to Islam. Christians were kicked out of their homes by gunmen, who used Christian neighborhoods to set up sniper nests from which they shot into Jewish homes in Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood, and passing cars on the road (Dr. Shmuel Gillis, on whom I patterned the hero of my book, The Covenant, was killed on his way home from treating cancer patients at Hadassah Hospital by such a sniper.)

And then there was the siege of the Church of the Nativity. The priests and children held hostage by Arafat’s gunmen. The church desecrated. Priests holding up signs at the windows to Israeli soldiers “Please help us!”

The Pope, standing side by side with Abbas, chose to forget these things.

His words:

“Mr. President, the Holy See supports the right of your people to a sovereign Palestinian homeland in the land of your forefathers, secure and at peace with its neighbors, within internationally recognized borders.” Read more >

Spain has been fighting against Basque separatist terrorism for decades and especially against the “ETA” organization, which seeks secession of the Basque territories from Spain. ETA is considered responsible for the deaths of more than 800 people in Spain, a number that pales in comparison with Palestinian barbarism. (And Spain has a population almost six times that of Israel.)

Spain’s anti-terror campaign made a mockery out of any concern for human rights. Collateral damage and injury to innocent bystanders were regular and common features of the campaign. Anti-terror paramilitary fighters and forces routinely engaged in torture of captured terrorists. Numerous death squads sought out the terrorists and their supporters, quietly exterminating them behind the scenes. The government pretended to have no knowledge of their actions. Government anti-terror personnel kidnapped terrorists and held them without any regard for habeas corpus. Anti-terror militias routinely crossed the borders and snatched terrorists hiding in neighboring countries or killed them there. Bombs were planted in order to kill the terrorists. Many of those killed or tortured were in reality not even members of or connected with any terrorist groups. Many of the anti-terror operations took place in violation of international law and even of national laws. To suppress the terror, the government threatened and pressured other countries to crack down on the refugees and to deport them. Read more >

Life is short, but art is enduring. If it is true that artists have special insight and that art opens a window to the soul, then this piece is a Rembrandt. It is a simple plot, great character development, unexpected twists and then the climax.

To belabor the point of our previous post, Chosen Idiots of Academia, check out these Jewish-American dolts. They so desperately want to be NICE Jews that they are prepared to sacrifice the Jews of Israel to the Islamofascist  sword. That is their peace plan. They are right, in a way. Surrender and prostration is the fastest path to peace. If these schlemiels’ scheme hatches, there will be Islamic peace in the Holy Land. There will be no Jews to slaughter. No Jewish children to traumatize. Peace. Read more >

Great analogies take many paragraphs to develop so here is a peak at the end.

For 16 years now, Israel’s elites have been living in a make-believe world in which Jews are to blame for nearly everything and Arabs are merely expressing “frustration” at being “mistreated” for so many years by Jews.

And the psychological war mounted by Israel’s elites against national pride, dignity and self-respect – indeed against national existence – has been accompanied by a set of diplomatic policies expressing little more than self-loathing – policies that in effect allow no act of Arab violence to go unrewarded.

A TALE OF TWO BEGGARS

Steven Plaut

Once upon a time, somewhere in the steppes of Eastern Europe, in the Pale that contained many a Jewish village, there roamed two beggars. One of the hobos was a Jew, the other a gentile.

The two transients were friends and far too lazy to hold any job or do any real work. So they wondered carefree, aimlessly and uselessly from village to village, begging for food, sometimes collecting discarded things to sell, here and there stealing some eggs or fruits off farm trees. It was a hard life and they often found themselves on the brink of starvation.

One day, as the two were looking for someone from whom they could shnorr some food, they came upon a shtetl whose residents were all buzzing about, hurrying, scouring pots and pans, cleaning their homes and cooking.

The Jewish beggar suddenly realized it was but a few hours before Passover was to begin.
Read more >

We have questions. Why would 150 PLO members rather be “tortured” in Israeli jails then stay in Gaza or Egypt? Does Hamas hunt and shoot Fatah terrorists like dogs? When they catch them alive, what does Hamas do to Fatah terrorists? Why, groom their mustaches, of course. Ed Morrissey comments on the Fatah gang’s close shave.

Steven Plaut discusses the “kill them like dogs” part, Fatah’s escape to Israeli jails and Haaretz’s dilemma. Read more >

Grover Norquist enables Islamists in the Republican party and the US government. He is a close friend of President Bush and Karl Rove, as well as one of the most prominent leaders of the modern conservative movement.

Lat week, in Hot Air, Ed Morrissey wrote a glowing post about Norquist and his work with Americans for Tax Reform. Norquist delivered a great line, “The Left is not made up of friends and allies, but of competing parasites. If we don’t let them feed on us, they will gnaw on each other.”

Unfortunately, Morrissey failed to include information about Norquist’s other activities. Robert Spencer remedied the error with a succinct comment and an article in Front Page Magazine.
Read more >

Let’s see. We are under attack by an enemy whose stated goal is to kill us or assimilate us into his “superior” civilization. Should he be successful, our civilization, the freest and most prosperous the world has ever seen, will come to an end. This enemy is not the hapless dreamer he is made out to be by Liberal academic, media and political classes. Other civilizations crossed his path in the past with devastating consequences. Are there many Assyrians or Zoroastrians in your neighborhood?

From a thriving empire, the Assyrians have been reduced to a tiny persecuted minority in their homelands. They have endured much hardship throughout their recent history as a result of religious and ethnic persecution by Muslim majorities – Arabs, Persians and Turks. Estimates of the total number of Syriac Christians alive today vary greatly, between one and three million.
Read more >

Wouldn’t it be fascinating to trace the lives of the Jihad kids in this video? Why don’t a couple of sociology professors, from let’s say Harvard, do a study? They don’t actually have to go to Gaza themselves – that would be dangerous. Just send some graduate student flunkies.

What you are about to see is a TV show partially funded by the USA State Department. That funding continued during the entire tenure of the Bush administration. Sadly, Rice and Bush are responsible for more dead Jews in Israel than Osama Bin Laden.

Back in the 60s, the CIA was feared by hostile regimes everywhere. Its reach and ruthlessness were legendary. Agents were tough, like Mossad agents, but with lots of cash. Today, the CIA is a place of employment for International Studies graduates from Ivy League universities. Those who do not get an offer from State join the CIA. Read more >