News and Views

Islam’s Coming Crusade

by Martin Kramer
Jerusalem Report - Mar. 20, 2006

The Crusades began with a rumor of defilement. In 1095, Pope Urban II denounced the Muslims as "a race utterly alienated from God." Among their many offenses, Muslims had seized the churches of Jerusalem: "They circumcise the Christians, and the blood of the circumcisions they either spread upon the altars or pour into the vases of the baptismal font." Such false rumors were already widespread in Christendom. Urban tapped them to launch the First Crusade.

Almost a millennium later, Muslim leaders and clerics are using the same language to stir the Muslim masses. They accuse the godless West of defiling the Prophet of God. Khaled Mashal, the leader of Hamas abroad, has demanded that Europe repent for the Danish cartoons. "Tomorrow, our nation will sit on the throne of the world. . . . Apologize today, before remorse will do you no good. . . . Since God is greater, and He supports us, we will be victorious." Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad struck the same note, in a speech marking the 27th anniversary of Iran's revolution: "The Iranian nation is telling you now that although you have Mammon, you do not have God. But God is with us."

"A race utterly alienated from God" -- this is how Pope Urban II demonized the Muslims in the 11th century. This is exactly how Islam's leaders are demonizing the West in the 21st. The secular West had flattered itself, believing it had pulled the Muslim world into modernity. Yes, Islam has sent forth suicide bombers and terrorist insurgents. But they and their sympathizers were in the minority -- so the pollsters and analysts told us: "Don't judge Islam by the acts of a misguided few." This faith in the pragmatic Muslim majority has underpinned every Western policy, from the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process" to the Bush administration's democracy promotion. The Muslim masses, the assumption goes, will choose peace and freedom, if given the chance. But they haven't. 9/11 could be attributed to a fanatic minority. Not so the Danish cartoon protests: Millions have taken part.

A Disturbing Invitation

by Richard Cohen
Washington Post - Feb. 16, 2006

In 1812, Napoleon invaded Russia with what was known as the Grande Armee. The French captured Moscow before the harsh winter and a stubborn Russian resistance forced them to turn back, leaving behind only the inspiration for a bombastic Tchaikovsky overture and the seeds for an irrational foreign policy. Now, both countries -- France and Russia -- agree on Hamas.

Their stance is foreboding. Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was considering inviting the leaders of Hamas to Moscow for talks and almost immediately, and predictably, the French pronounced this a wonderful idea. Putin, I don't think, would have been quite so quick to extend a welcome to the Chechen rebels he considers to be terrorists, but the murderers of Jews are apparently a different matter. This, after all, is a long Russian tradition.

The French, too, have their traditions. One of them -- in fact their sole animating foreign policy objective -- is to make life difficult for the United States. This has been the case since Charles de Gaulle, a man of fixed fixations who resented the fact that France was no longer a great power, just a cuisine or, in some years, a good runway show. It is not surprising that France supported this Russian initiative, although it itself will refrain from such a meeting. Still, you can see which way the French are going.

Why Terrorism Works

by Alan M. Dershowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com - July 8, 2005

Within a day of the horrific multiple bombings in London, the G8 announced a $3B grant to the Palestinian Authority.  The symbolism of this connection may be lost on some Westerners, but it clearly sent a powerful message to terrorists and potential terrorists:  namely, that  terrorism works.

There were no grants announced to the Tibetans, who have been occupied more brutally and for a longer period of time than the Palestinians.  The Tibetans, however, have never resorted to terrorism.

The Palestinian Authority, and its leaders, are the godfathers of international terrorism.  They developed airplane hijacking into a high art.  They invented the high-profile murder of athletes and other prominent public figures.  Were it not for their employment of terrorism, the Palestinian cause would today be regarded as the fifth-rate human rights issue that it rightfully is.  But because the Palestinian leadership has always used terrorism (from the 1920's on) as the tactic of first resort, their cause has received worldwide recognition.

The primary cause of terrorism is not occupation, humilitation or desperation.  If it were, the Tibetans would be the greatest terrorists.  The primary cause of terrorism is that it works.  And it works because the craven international community gives into it and rewards it.  It also works because too many Islamic leaders praise it and too few condemn it.  Terrorism will continue as long as potential terrorists believe they will benefit from using that tactic.

When Pictures Lie

A TV report that helped fuel the deadly Palestinian intifada appears to be false. So how is truth supposed to compete with a video fraud?
by David Gelernter
Los Angeles Times - Sept. 9, 2005
(See also: Myth, Fact, and the al-Dura Affair - Commentary and Who Killed Muhammad Al-Dura? - JCPA)

A 55-second video report, produced in 2000 by a French TV station and distributed free of charge around the world, has caused untold injury and grief to Israeli civilians. This month, the French author Nidra Poller analyzes the evidence in Commentary magazine and shows that the video is a fraud — "an almost perfect media crime," the retired French journalist Luc Rosenzweig calls it. That Poller's piece is conclusive is merely my own judgment, of course. But we are all required to make such judgments, in the light of such reports.

There is a wider story here also. We are vulnerable to video lies. Against purposeful lies, truth has never been so helpless, so weakly defended.

Arabian Shame

Editorial
Washington Post - August 12, 2005


Some Remain skeptical of President Bush's concern for Africa, and there's no doubt that the United States could and should do more. But the latest report on Sudan from the United Nations offers a snapshot of an issue on which Mr. Bush has been a leader. So far this year the United States has given $468 million in foreign assistance to Sudan, mostly for humanitarian relief in the western region of Darfur. The U.S. contribution comes to 53 percent of all outside donations -- a proportion about twice the size of the nation's weight in the global economy.

A few other countries have been even more generous relative to the size of their economies, notably Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Britain. But the contribution from many others has been embarrassing. How can France, which prides itself on its leadership in Africa, give only $2 million to this year's U.N. appeal for Sudan -- an amount that, when rounded, comes to zero percent of total contributions to the country? Even if one generously ascribed, say, a fifth of the European Union's donation of $90 million to French taxpayers, France's share of the total contribution to Sudan comes to a paltry 2 percent.

There are plenty of other culprits. Japan accounts for just 2 percent of total contributions despite the size of its economy; China has made no contribution to the U.N. effort, even though it has extensive investments in Sudan's oil sector. But perhaps the most striking absentees are the oil-rich Arab countries, which have more money than ideas on how to spend it, thanks to oil prices above $60 a barrel. Saudi Arabia has contributed a grand total of $3 million, according to the U.N. data; the United Arab Emirates and Qatar have given less than $1 million between them. No other Arab country even makes the list.

This Arab indifference is shameful. The victims of Sudan's worst crisis, in Darfur, are Muslim, and aid to non-Muslim southern Sudan is essential to shoring up the fragile north-south peace deal that would help Muslims as well. Sudan borders Libya and Egypt; only the narrow Red Sea separates it from Saudi Arabia. Arabs have every reason to care about Sudan, and yet they have done far less than remote non-Muslim countries such as Norway, which has an economy roughly the same size as Saudi Arabia's.

Writing on the opposite page last month, Joseph Britt noted, "We've heard a lot since Sept. 11, 2001, about how Arabs feel humiliated, ashamed, resentful at being regarded by the West as inferior in some way." Mr. Britt continued: "Perhaps it is time to say plainly that the way to earn respect is through deeds worthy of respect."

Europe Votes for Hezbollah

Wall Street Journal Online
March 30, 2005

Europeans attach quasi-mythical dimensions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Solve that, the thinking goes, and the region's problems will magically disappear.

So one would think that putting Hezbollah on the EU terror list would be a no brainer. The Lebanese-based terrorist group, bent on the destruction of Israel and the Middle East peace process, is now the main sponsor of Palestinian terrorists who've lost their support at home since the death of Yasser Arafat.

Yet, 22 years after the group pioneered suicide bombings by killing 251 U.S. marines and 62 French paratroopers in Lebanon, Europe can't bring itself to act on Hezbollah. France, together with Spain, Belgium and others, argues the group should be kept off the list because it is also a "political force."

Arafat Lives

by Efraim Karsh
Commentary - January 2005

No sooner was Yasir Arafat declared dead at the French military hospital to which he had been dramatically rushed in early November than a vast cohort of world leaders, from King Abdullah of Jordan to French President Jacques Chirac, began to voice hopes for a quick revival of the Middle East peace process. “The best tribute to President Arafat’s memory will be to intensify our efforts to establish a peaceful and viable state of Palestine,” declared the European Union’s foreign- policy chief, Javier Solana. At the same time, Solana unveiled a new plan to facilitate the so-called road map drafted in 2003 by the EU, the U.S., Russia, and the UN—but in “a less incremental manner”: that is, by deleting the proviso conditioning progress toward the creation of a Palestinian state on a cessation of violence and terrorism.

Arafat-mania

"There have been few more nauseating sights than the French fawning over the coffin of Yasser Arafat."
by Tom Gross
Jerusalem Post - November 14, 2004

For the Guardian, Yasser Arafat was to be compared to "Moses." On CNN, he was described as a "revolutionary romantic figure comparable to Ho Chi Minh and Nelson Mandela."

For USA Today, he "embraced" "sorrow and hope."

South Africa's City Press described him as a leader who "marshalled freedom fighters."

And in the Toronto Sun we were told he was "murdered" by Israel.

If anyone is still in any doubt that much of the Western media has been taken in by the Stalin-like cult of personality Arafat nurtured for himself over the past 40 years, they shouldn't be any more – not after hearing or reading the lies, half-truths and distortions that were served up in the 48 hours of virtually nonstop coverage on international news networks following the announcement of Arafat's death last Thursday.

Do as I say, not as I do

Why are Israeli soldiers forbidden to defend themselves the way French soldiers do?
by Evelyn Gordon
Jerusalem Post - November 16, 2004

For Israelis, last week felt rather like being in a funhouse: Familiar objects, viewed in international mirrors, were distorted beyond recognition.

The most glaring example was the worldwide amnesia over Yasser Arafat's 30-year career as a leading international terrorist. But the violence in the Ivory Coast also seemed like the funhouse reflection of an all-too-familiar scene.

French See Arafat As Hero

Jerusalem Post
November 9, 2004

The French regard Yasser Arafat as a hero rather than a terrorist, according to a new poll.

Asked to choose whether the Palestinian Authority chairman is a "hero of national resistance" or a terrorist, 43 percent chose the former and 27% the latter.

Ten percent said Arafat fit into both categories, while 9% said he was neither.

The poll, published Monday and commissioned jointly by the Lib ration newspaper and a national public radio station, also found that three times as many French people hold Prime Minister Ariel Sharon more responsible for Middle East violence than hold Arafat.

In addition, 34% said they had more sympathy for the Palestinians, as opposed to 13% for Israel.