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Islam(ism)=Nazism, Hitler says so... Update

I just finished a chilling review by Professor Omer Bartov in the recent New Republic (and now available here) of the English edition of Hitler's unpublished sequel toi Mein Kampf. In it, Bartov shows that while Hitler may be dead, his ideas are alive and well in the anti-globalization movement, on the European Left and especially among Muslims (he calls them Islamists. I don't think there's a big difference).

His bottom line is that it's time to call a spade a spade. There is a tide of genocidal anti-semitism threatening the Jewish People throughout the world. Furthermore, it's time we stopped deluding ourselves.

What we are witnessing today is a broad front of opinion, spanning the entire spectrum of the political and religious scene, whose criticism of American and Israeli policies, and whose fears and phobias about present conditions, utopian dreams of a better future, and nostalgic fantasies of a mythical past, all converge in a bizarre and increasingly frightening way on a single figure, a single cause: "the Jew." I have long believed that it is pointless, and dishonorable, to debate anti-Semites. Such an exchange of "ideas" only confers legitimacy upon them. But there are times when absurdities become political facts and cannot be ignored. They must, instead, be directly challenged--not by explaining their violent ideas and feelings away, but by putting limits to them through all available means, political, judicial, and, if necessary, by the use of legitimate force. For these are people who mean what they say. If you do not destroy them, they will destroy you. There are precedents for this.

He closes his piece with an important warning:

So Hitler is dead, but there is a Hitlerite quality to the new anti-Semitism, which now legitimizes not only opposition to Zionism but also the resurrection of the myth of Jewish world domination. And those who foolishly think that doing away with Israel, not least in a "one-state solution," would remove anti-Semitism had better look more closely at the language of these enemies. For they--I mean the enemies--insist that the Jews are everywhere, and so they must be uprooted everywhere. Their outpost may be Israel, but their "power center" is in America, and their synagogues and intellectuals are in Germany and France, and their academics are in Russia and Britain. Since they are the cause of all evil and misfortune, the world will be a happier place without them, whether it is dominated by the Aryan Master Race or by the ideological soldiers of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Hitler taught humanity an important lesson. It is that when you see a Nazi, a fascist, a bigot, or an anti-Semite, say what you see. If you want to justify it or excuse it away, describe accurately what it is that you are trying to excuse away. If a British newspaper publishes an anti-Semitic cartoon, call it anti-Semitic. If the attacks on the Twin Towers were animated by anti-Semitic arguments, say so. If a Malaysian prime minister expresses anti-Semitic views, do not try to excuse the inexcusable. If a self-proclaimed liberation organization calls for the extermination of the Jewish state, do not pretend that it is calling for anything else. The absence of clarity is the beginning of complicity.

This Land is MINE...

My Obiter Dicta published a quote from the book of Maccabees ((IMacc. 15, 33-34) that deserves to be noticed. This is his posting:

When Antiochus VI demanded that Simon hand over territory to the Seleucid Crown, Simon replied:

"We have neither taken foreign land nor seized foreign property, but only the inheritance of our fathers, which at one time had been unjustly taken by our enemies. Now that we have the opportunity, we are firmly holding the inheritance of our fathers."

Irrespective of what happens practically and what policy is adopted for the future of the Jewish State, it behooves all sides to remember that the point of departure is that noted by Simon. If he's not right, then Jews have no right to live anywhere in Eretz Yisrael.

To Shoah or Not to Shoah....

All of Israel is churning over the plan to have opponents of Sharon's 'disengagement from Gaza' wear orange Jewish Stars. (Orange is the color of the pro-Gush Qatif campaign.) Some are formany supporters of Gush Qatif are against. Personally, I oppose the use of Holocaust imagery in political debates. That having been said, the prospect of Jews driven out of their homes under Jewish guns while the low lifes ( check that, the self-hating bastards) on the Israeli Left (which is really the Palestinian Right) cheer is downright traumatizing. Someone forwarded the following to me from one of the lists serving Yesha. It makes the point very well. Wake up Israel!

Unless the evil decree is averted, we will all be subject to horrific scenes in a few months time of Jews being carried out screaming from homes thathave been the centre of their lives for many years; children and babies whohave never known any other place as home will be traumatized by having theirparents loaded into vans to be incarcerated in some far-off detentionfacilities, while they are being separated from them; Jewish furniture,Judaica, artworks will be carried off by soldiers and police to be stored"somewhere"; the loudspeakers will blare messages in the middle of the nightgiving Jews one final opportunity to come out peacefully or face theconsequences; bulldozers will be parked with their engines running waitingfor the order to wipe out traces of Jewish physical and spiritual life. Electric saws will be busy cutting through chains that tie Jews to poles,trees, concrete blocks. And the scenes of temporary homeless Jews, housed in makeshift camps, Jews who refused or were unable to make plans for their lives after disengagementwill haunt us all.Wake up all.Whether or not the orange badge is worn or utilized now, all the above willevoke Holocaust-type trauma in our nation. The Holocaust was not only gaschambers and extermination camps. The Holocaust was also all of the above -the degraded Jew, the evicted Jew, the humiliated Jew, the uprooted Jew. TheJew who believed that in the national home of the Jewish people he would besafe.

My Obiter Dicta on the Supreme Court

At the suggestion of Hatshepsut, I checked out a blog called My Obiter Dicta. The blog is run by a lecturer at Bar Ilan University, and has some interesting stuff. His latest posting is about the Israeli Supreme Court, a dictatorial institution that's been going further and further to turn this country into whatever the radical chic think it should look like (if it has a right to live at all.)

Anyway, this guy has some interesting articles to suggest. He forgot to mention the books and articles by Prof. Ruth Gavison. She's Aharon Barak's biggest critic (and someone he works VERY HARD to keep off of the bench.)

Pogo Was a Patriotic Israeli!

Of all the Pogo cartoons, this is the one I remember best. It is also the one that haunts me everyday of my life in Israel. The Rabbis punned on a verse from Isaiah that 'Your Destroyers and Demolishers will come from within you.'

Pogo says:

Pogo Lives!

Thanks to Six Day War for publishing it.

Hatshepsut's Birth Day

My buddy Hatshepsut has asked the world to figure out her Hebrew Birthday. Happily, she was born on April 10, 1979. Using the HebCal Date Converter it was a cinch. Hatshepsut was born on the 13th of Nisan 5739 (or the 14th, if she was born after sunset). A Pesah Baby! Mazal Tov!

Hatshepsut: Contemplative Mode