The brilliant thinking award goes to the Iranians who would rather let their people die than to accept any help offered by the "Zionist" enemy. Good going...20-70,000 people are supposed dead by an earthquake -- but NO! we won't accept help from the Jews.
Anyone else notice that the Israeli offer for help that Iran turned down didn't make it to the mainstream news? Big surprise there.
Yup, another suicide bomber. I love it, the evening news tonight equated the death of a terrorist from the Islamic Jihad to the murder of civilians in Tel Aviv.
It has been brought to my attention that the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. quote I used in my “White Supremacy” article printed last week was made up. I quoted from another source that was not aware that it was not a true statement. I am certainly grateful that the editors and readers of The South End are checking the sources of my articles. I pride myself in doing research for my writing and it is very important that I give accurate information. I am quite disappointed in my error.
The excerpt I used was from a “Letter to a Anti-Zionist Friend” supposedly written by Dr. King. While we now know that this letter was never written, it is important to see in what other place this letter has shown itself. According to the media watchdog CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, www.camera.org), this letter is not found anywhere prior to 1999. On the other hand, they did find a copy of it in the book “Shared Dreams” by Marc Shneier whose preface was written by Martin Luther King III. Obviously Dr. King’s family was also unaware that this “Letter” was a hoax.
Actually, there is plenty of evidence to show that Dr. King was a strong supporter of Jews and Israel. In fact, when he spoke at Harvard University in 1968, he was quoted as saying “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews, you are talking anti-Semitism.” (“The Socialism of Fools: The Left, the Jews and Israel” by Seymour Martin Lipset; Encounter magazine, Dec. 1969, p. 24).
U.S. Representative John Lewis, a Democrat from Georgia worked directly with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. Lewis wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle January 21, 2002 about Dr. King and his relationship with the State of Israel. Lewis explained that Dr. King saw a strong connection between the Jewish and the African-American communities. He saw that both peoples had been oppressed and murdered just because of who they were. Dr. King was one of the first to bring attention to the persecution of Jews in the former Soviet Union. “I cannot stand idly by....For what happens to them happens to me and you, and we must be concerned.”
Dr. King saw the creation of the Jewish State in 1948 and the miraculous six day victory of Israel over its neighbors in 1967. He saw when Israel took the historic lands of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) back and was clear about his vision for the State of Israel. On March 25, 1968 he stated that, “peace for Israel means security, and we must stand with all our might to protect its right to exist, its territorial integrity. I see Israel as one of the great outposts of democracy in the world, and a marvelous example of what can be done....Peace for Israel means security and that security must be a reality.”
Again, I apologize for the mistake I made in last weeks article in The South End, and I appreciate the opportunity to correct that mistake. Dr. King was a great man, and it would be a dishonor to him to misquote his message of brotherhood between the Jewish and African-American communities.
(www.jewish-history.com/mlk_zionism.html)
On my way to class this week I noticed something being assembled in Gullen Mall, and went to check it out afterwards. It was an “apartheid wall” supposedly resembling the wall that is being constructed in Israel. What struck me was how it was called an “apartheid” wall. This brings to mind segregation and racism. In addition I was handed a flier explaining that “Israel has purposely decided not to stand in solidarity with the people of color in the Middle East, and instead sell itself white supremacy.” [grammar wrong in the flier] I think that this is quite funny, considering that if Israel had an apartheid system there would be no fear of bus bombings.
In addition, the flier also mentions that “In the last 30 years Zionists (people who support Israel) have played a powerful yet unnoticed role in combating civil rights.” It goes on to list several militant civil rights groups of the 1960s, but neglects to mention the key man that should be included in any civil rights discussion. Dr. Martin Luther King. Why is he not included? The group handing out the flier did not mention Dr. King because he was a strong supporter of the State of Israel. “You know that Zionism is nothing less than the dream and ideal of the Jewish people returning to live in their own land....The times have made it unpopular, in the West, to proclaim openly a hatred of the Jews. This being the case, the antisemite must constantly seek new forms and forums for his poison. How he must revel in the new masquerade! He does not hate the Jews, he is just ‘anti-Zionist’!...When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--make no mistake about it.”(From M.L.King Jr., “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend,” Saturday Review XLVII (Aug 1967) pg. 76) This letter was written in August 1967. Dr. King had watched the 6 Day War and was quite aware of the situation of the time.
I can assume by reading through this flier that anyone who is a supporter of the State of Israel is a white supremist. Wow! That means that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a white supremist. I guess that he would have been surprised to find that out. I can also assume that all Zionists (and Jews) would have to be white Europeans. Huh! I wonder about all those Jews in Israel that are not from Europe. I suppose that the Jews from the Arab countries, African countries, and South American countries would be startled to find out that they are all “white”. Especially the Ethiopian Jews. One day they’re black, the next they’re white.
Taking this a step further, one would think that white supremists are not interested in helping other people not like themselves. Surprise! Maybe they are. That is if we are talking about Zionists. Looking back into the last decade, Israel has been involved with humanitarian aid around the world. In 1990, Israel was in the Philippines bringing medical supplies because of an earthquake. The next year the Zionist white supremists were bringing medical aid to Turkey (helping the Iraqi Kurds), Zaire, China and Congo. Please notice the “people of color” that Israel deliberately ignores and chooses not to help. In 1992, Israel sent money to help the Somali refugees in Kenya that were starving. And until today, Israel - the Zionist entity, helped in the areas of: India, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Indonesia, Kosovo, Greece, Rwanda, China, Nepal, Papua New Guinea and Bosnia/Herzegovina. Here’s a game to play. How many of these countries have white Europeans who live there? (www.israaid.org.il/mda_print7.asp)
Wouldn’t it be great if all white supremists were as giving as the Zionists? The world would be a better place for you and me, you just wait and see...Put a little love in your heart... (Feel free to break into song...)
In commemoration of the end of the First World War, the United States, as well as European countries, established Nov. 11 as Armistice Day. The fighting ended at 11am on November 11, 1918 (the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month). In 1921, the United States buried an "unknown
soldier" from the Great War in Arlington National Cemetary. It was done to honor all who had died in the conflict. England and France did the same, each burying an unknown soldier in a most honored place. In England, it was Westminster Abbey. In France, the Arc de Triomphe. All three burials occured on Nov.11.
By the time the United States had gotten involved in the Korean Conflict, much time had passed since World War I, so it was necessary to expand Armistice Day to include all American veterans. This happened in 1954, when Congress changed Armistice Day to Veterans Day; it was now a day to honor all American veterans, dead and alive (in contrast to Memorial Day, when we honor the dead).
When we reflect on the number of volunteers who fight on our behalf, it is quite amazing to think about those lives that have been given to protect us. From the Revolutionary War through the Vietnam Conflict, approximately 626,764 Americans have given their lives to protect and defend our freedom. Another 1.5 million have been wounded.
These soldiers defended the ideals that the United States stands for. These ideals include freedom, equality, individuality, the ability to better your life, and the right to work for positive social change.
Whether fighting the Nazi war machine, stopping the spread of Communism (it was not simply an imaginary threat), or fighting the War on Terrorism, the soldiers who have sacrificed so much for us deserve our recognition.
I am proud to say that many members of my family have been part of the military tradition of defending the United States. My grandfather, was part of the "Greatest Generation". He so desperately wanted to help serve his country that at first he attempted to enlist in the Air Force. They turned him down because he was color blind. He decided to turn to the part of the service that would accept him - the Army Infantry. He served as a doctor in the South Pacific. He was also a sharpshooter, but only had the option of either carrying his medical bag or his gun. He chose his medical bag. No doubt that many of those who made it home alive had my grandfather to thank.
In Europe at this same time, was the destruction of a third of the Jewish People. Of all the Jews in Europe, the Jews of Poland were the most decimated. One of the few Polish Jews who was able to survive the Nazi concentration camps was my cousin Bernard. After WWII, my great-aunt was able to bring him to the United States. He was so grateful to this country, he did not want to wait the five years to become a citizen. The fastest way to his goal was to join the military. He volunteered and was sent to Korea.
My father served in the Army during a relative time of quiet. He was active the last half of 1960, and spent another five and a half years in the reserves. And last but not least, one of my uncles just retired from the U.S. Navy. No doubt he has stories to tell, but I don't know them yet. Every veteran has stories, but it is up to us to ask to hear them.
Unfortunately in today's world, our veterans do not always get the honor that they deserve. It is time to recognize their accomplishments and the great sacrifices they have made, and continue to make, for this country.
What are American troops doing in Iraq? This is the question of the day. Even as one who supports our involvement in Iraq, I have to say that the current administration has not done a great job explaining to us why we are there and why there are continuous attacks on American and coalition troops. So I did a bit of research to find out the reasons.
What I found is that Iraq is the new front of the War on Terror. While we are still tracking down al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, some of those terrorists are coming to Iraq to join in the fight against the United States. Coalition troops are not fighting discontented Iraqis who don’t want us there, we are fighting an international group of terrorists. Polls show that 70 percent of Iraqis are happy that we liberated them from Saddam Hussein's regime (nationalreview.com/comment/lerner200310270835.asp). These are not the people that are attacking us.
How are these international terrorists getting into Iraq? There are four routes into the country. First is the Pakistan-Iran route, where they cross over the Pakistan border into Iran. With more than a thousand members they have organized themselves into two units: Jund al-Allah meaning “The Soldiers of Allah”, and al-Usad, “The Lions”. These groups have already caused the coalition much trouble, and are responsible for the attack on the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad and other attacks in Mosul.
The second route is through Syria. Approximately 1,000 al-Qaeda terrorists have traveled to Iraq in this way. The region between Syria and Iraq is known for their allegiance to Hussein and his family. Saddam had sent money to families and tribes living in this area to keep their loyalty strong. There are two million tribesmen in this area loyal to Saddam Hussein. On an interesting side-note, the terrorist groups of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, located in Syria, get their funding from Iran and in receive additional money for each al-Qaeda they train.
The final two routes are Saudi Arabia-Iran, and Saudi Arabia-Syria. Approximately 1,500-2,500 al-Qaeda have come the Saudi Arabia-Iran route, with an unknown amount through Syria by way of Saudia Arabia. (debka.com/article_print.php?aid=548).
These terrorists are not just coming for the fun of shooting American troops. They are being paid and paid well. They are being recruited from all over the Middle East and are being trained in the latest in the terrorist art of murder. At this point, most are coming from the countries of Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Al-Qaeda is offering these new recruits hundred of dollars a month which is 10 times the amount that they would be making back at home. (World Tribune, http://216.26.163.62/2003/me_terror_09_29.html)
It is now time to be clear about what is happening in Iraq. We won the war with Saddam Hussein. But we are not done. It isn’t time to go home. We need to be aware that this not a local war anymore. Terrorists from across the Middle East are all joining the fight, and we cannot ignore that this is part of the larger War on Terror. It’s time that the President realizes this and gives us the truth.
What do the states of Michigan, Indiana, Mississippi have in common? According to a report put out by the Center for Immigration Studies, these three states lost seats in the United States House of Representatives because of the huge number of illegal immigrants that have arrived on our shores.
How did this happen? First we need to look at how states get representation in the House of Representatives in the first place. The House of Representatives has a total of 435 seats that are given out to the fifty states. Each state gets at least one seat in the House. After that, it is dependent on the population of each state how many more seats they will receive. If the state’s population has gone up in the last 10 years, they may get another seat. If the state’s population has gone down, the state may lose a seat. (This is unlike the Senate, where it is not dependent on state population. Each state gets two senators, no more, no less).
The next question to tackle is how does the government know how much the population has shifted between states over the past ten years? The answer is the Census form that families fill out across the United States giving the Census Bureau an idea of who lives where and all sorts of other details. So based on this Census taken every ten years, the House seats are redistributed between states, with some gaining and some losing seats. Most of us are under the impression that illegal and legal residents (green card holders) are not counted toward the redistribution of House seats. We would be wrong.
Who cares if the illegal immigrants are counted in the Census and toward redistribution of those House seats? We should care, and especially as Michigan citizens. According to the United States Census Bureau there were near 7 million illegal aliens and 12 million other non-citizens that were counted in the 2000 Census. The Center for Immigration Studies looked at the impact of these non-citizens on state representation in the House of Representatives. They found that it was because of the non-citizen population that 9 seats ended up being redistributed between states. Where were these seats taken from and where were they given? The states that lost a seat were: Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Utah, and Wisconsin. Which states gained seats? California gained six seats while Florida, New York and Texas each gained one apiece.
What this means is that states such as Michigan, which is not known for its immigration, lost a House seat to states such as California, which is known for its huge immigrant population. This would not be such a big deal if the difference in population was because of a population shift of citizens between states. However, what is being shown here is that states like California are getting unequal representation because of their non-citizen populations. This is the main point of the problem. There is supposed to be equal representation in the House of Representatives between states, but it does not work when you throw non-citizens into the mix.
While these non-citizens do not gain anything by being counted in the Census, the citizens living in the same state are. They are gaining an unequal advantage of representation in the House. California residents have more representatives than Michigan in the House of Representatives only because of their non-citizens.
This also makes a difference when it comes time to choose a President. The President is chosen by the electoral college. The number of electors that each state has is the total number of Senators and Representatives they have in Congress. When a state has more representatives, they have more electors, which in turn gives that state a larger voice in who the next President will be.
To sum up, states that are low in non-citizens and general immigration, such as Michigan, are losing representation to those states that have a population of immigrants, like California. Since these non-citizens do not have the same rights as Americans in general it would make sense that they would not be counted in the representation in Congress. But they are, and Michigan is losing out.
To read the Center for Immigration Studies report:
www.cis.org
Imagine I invited you and a bunch of friends to a party where the focus was devil worship and we wore costumes while we burned people and animals alive. You may think that I was crazy to even suggest the idea. (At least I would hope so.) However in reality this is what we are celebrating every October 31st in the guise of the holiday of Halloween.
Where did Halloween originate? Originally it was a pagan Druid holiday called “The Vigil of Saman” or Samhain where they celebrated death. In 800 CE/AD the Roman Catholic Church decided to Christianize the pagan holiday by moving All Saints Day from May to November 1st. All Saints Day was a day where the saints that did not get their own special day on the calendar were honored by the Church and when Christians would pay respects to the dead. The new Christian holiday was supposed to be called “All Hallow’s Day”. The evening before became known as “All Hallow’s Eve” which eventually got shortened to Halloween. A problem occurred when this “Christianization” of the pagan holiday never took hold, and the pagan rituals became incorporated into mainstream society.
You may be asking what the big deal is. Today Halloween is a secular holiday celebrated by people of different faiths across the United States. This is true, but the question to ask yourself is if you want to be celebrating a holiday of death and pain throughout the centuries.
Where do the costumes fit into this picture? On the evening of October 31st, the Druids built a huge bonfire of sacred oak trees where they burned animals, crops and PEOPLE as sacrifices to their gods. During this ritual, they wore costumes of animal heads and skins. The Druids also looked for omens in the struggle of the victims being burned to death. They even sang and danced as part of the ritual. This was all in order to scare away the evil spirits. They also dressed up as evil spirits themselves to confuse the evil spirits that were supposed to be coming to attack them.
What I find most interesting is where the word “bonfire” comes from. You would never guess. It is a contraction of the words bone-fire, where bones were burned. There were two main festivals where the Druids burned humans and animals as sacrifices to their gods. One was the evening of April 30th, the other Halloween. The next day the Druids would examine the bones and try to prophesize the future.
In case you were not able to dress up and confuse the evil spirits, you could bribe them. If you treated them with food and made them happy, the spirit would not trick you - or cast an evil spell on you. Another example of the house to house blackmail would be when the Druids would ask for an offering to Saman and if the household was not forthcoming with the treat, the Druid would attack the homeowner with a sharp stick and castrate them. How’s that for fun? Trick or Treat!
There are a couple explanations dealing with the pumpkin. People used to hollow out pumpkins as well as turnips putting a candle inside to scare away the evil spirits. The pumpkin was also used as a symbol that the family inside was sympathetic to the Saman rituals and should not be attacked on the evening of Halloween.
It is no surprise to every cat owner that they should keep their pets indoors on Halloween night. Black cats especially were seen by the Druids as witches in disguise and burned. Black cats are still seen as evil and horrible things have been done in the past and even today black cats have been tortured in Satanic rituals. The Humane Society in many cities will not adopt out black cats around Halloween time with the fear that the cats may be hurt, tortured or killed. How disgusting.
Halloween is approaching next week and everybody is getting excited about getting dressed up, going to parties and having a good time. But while it may be a secular holiday, Halloween has a terrible, murderous history that we need to take into account before celebrating. Ask yourself - do you want to be celebrating the Holiday of Death and Murder?
After the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were both interested in hiring more Arabic speaking translators to help find any clues that may hint toward another attack. This is a great idea, the only problem is that these agencies may be hiring the wrong people.
We have been watching the debacle unfolding in Guantanamo Bay where the United States is holding Afghani prisoners, and using Arab translators to gain information about al-Qaeda. Up until now we have seen three different arrests of Arab translators working for the United States in Guantanamo.
Army Captain James Yee, an Islamic chaplain based in Guantanamo, is charged with disobeying a direct order for improperly handling classified information, but not espionage. Air Force Senior Airman Ahmad al-Halabi, a translator in Guantanamo, has been charged with collecting more than 180 messages from prisoners with plans of delivering them to an enemy in Syria. Ahmed Mehalba, an Egyptian born US citizen, another translator, had improperly in his possession a list of suspected terrorists mentioned during interrogation sessions.
How is this happening? Senator Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, made a good point when asked about these cases. “The presumption is that everyone at Guantanamo...went through some sort of background check. But it is baffling that a chaplain [Army Capt. Yee] who spent time in Syria, a country on the terrorist watch-list, and was trained by a group with ties to terrorism, would be allowed to serve as a cleric to a bunch of Taliban and al-Qaeda.” The question remains, does the United States military do a proper job when looking into the backgrounds of these translators? The answer is obviously no. [The Washington Times 10/13/03]
Another question that can and must be asked is: is the United States government looking into other avenues of recruiting Arabic translators? The answer to this question as well is no. The FBI’s New York office in October 2001 asked a Jewish social services organization to send them applications of Jews who were fluent in Arabic. Approximately 95 applications were sent. Some were asked back for a second and third interview, but none were hired. Many of these Jews who applied for the translating jobs had immigrated from Middle East countries, such as Israel, Syria, Egypt, and Sudan, and had background in translation, working for the Israeli media as well as the Israeli military.
The question remains. Why were none of these applicants hired for the job? One FBI source stated that the FBI was worried that the applicants were “too close to Israel” and may not be objective when translating the Arabic recordings and writings of terrorists. A question can be asked, is this a real reason for not hiring a Jew who could properly do the job. Perhaps an Army Chaplain who was trained by a terrorist group in Syria could do a better job.
Another angle to this Guantanamo case is the issue of possibly offending the Arab community in the U.S. The head of the FBI New York office invited a Muslim cleric to speak to agents about the peaceful side of Islam. FBI director Robert Mueller has done the same since after the attacks of 9/11. Are Jews not being hired in order not to offend Arab citizens? It would seem that the best translators should be hired regardless of their backgrounds as long as they were not a security risk.
The United States must not relax its standards when looking for translators. By just trying to fill the ranks without regard to serious background checks, we are only setting ourselves up for disaster. [World Net Daily 10/9/03]
Why are the Palestinian refugees so special? What makes them any different than any other refugee? Why do they have their own United Nations organization dedicated to their well being when no other refugee group does?
This past Tuesday, Wayne State University had Peter Hansen, Commissioner General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) as a guest speaker. Hansen spoke about what his agency does and does not do as well as fielded questions from those who came to hear him. One of the problems that I had with his presentation was his idea that resettlement of the Palestinians into the surrounding countries was not a “natural solution”. Mr. Hansen went on to say that the Lebanese did not want the Palestinians, and the Jordanians did not want these refugees either. Hansen did not go further into the subject of Arab countries refusing to help. Yet, this is the crux of the problem.
Past UNRWA directors have made clear what the problems are with resettling the Palestinian refugees, some of whom are refugees by their own accord. In August 1958, Ralph Garroway said, “The Arab states do not want to solve the refugee problem. They want to keep it as an open sore, as an affront to the United Nations and as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders don’t give a damn whether the refugees live or die.” Dr. Elfan Rees who worked with refugee resettlement, assumed in 1959 that the Arab refugee problem should have been easy to solve considering the economic development of several Arab countries of the Middle East at the time. But he found that “the organized intransigence of the refugees and the calculated indifference of the Arab states concerned have brought all its [UNRWA’s] plans to nought.” We can see the truth of these statements since we still see no action on the part of the wealthy kings of the Middle East to resettle their brothers in their own countries.
When Mr. Hansen said that it was not a “natural solution” for people to be resettled in another country to continue their lives, has he taken into account the 900,000 Jews that were thrown out of their homes after living 2000 years in Arab countries? Between 1946-1962 these Jews had billions of dollars in property confiscated and were then made refugees. Israel took them in no questions asked.
The world has forgotten that most refugees are resettled outside of their original homes and do not return to the homes which they left. No one remembers the 3 million North Koreans who ran to South Korea. No one remembers the 1.6 million Vietnamese who have been integrated into the different countries that let them establish new lives. No one remembers the 12 million Germans that were expelled after World War II from the different European countries such as Poland and Czechoslovakia, who saw them as a threat to the country’s security. No one remembers that even today, 12,000 African refugees are being integrated into American society each year, possibly never returning to Africa.
No one remembers the population exchanges between countries that ended up promoting peace. Under the Turko-Bulgarian Convention of 1913, two and a half million people were forced to change countries. Muslim Bulgarians were resettled in Turkey and Christian Turks were transferred to Christian Bulgaria. In 1923, Christian Greece and Muslim Turkey signed the Treaty of Lausanne agreeing to exchange the 150,000 Christian Greeks living in Turkey, and the 388,000 Muslim Turks living in Greece. They did this in order not to go to war again and there has been no bloodshed since. In the 1940s, there was an enormous population exchange with the creation of Pakistan. 8,500,000 Hindus left Pakistan for India, while 6,500,000 Muslims left India for Pakistan. While there is still conflict in that region, imagine the amount of violence that would be occurring today if the population exchange had not been carried through.
While resettlement is not a “natural solution” for Mr. Hansen, it may be one to be considered to end this conflict. Israel has accepted the 900,000 Jews thrown out of the Arab countries. It is time for the Arab countries to accept their brothers as well.
This article was never published by The South End due to the amount of responses from the article published before this one. This was written while I was in Israel July 27, 2003.
It is only in Israel that I am lucky enough to travel in a bulletproof bus. This week I went to visit a good friend and her very cute children in the city of Beitar. This trip took me into the Arab occupied territory of Judea/Samaria (aka West Bank).
I decided not to take my car into the occupied territories because I was afraid that my rental car would not be able to make the trip due to unforseen circumstances ie. molotov cocktails, snipers, and other "problems". Instead I took the bulletproof bus.
On my 15 minute trip out of Jerusalem to Beitar I thought about being under "occupation". Occupation is another word for being held hostage. Jews living here in Israel are being held hostage by the Arabs living in this country. We are
afraid to ride the buses, afraid to go shopping, and afraid to drive the roads.
I have been doing a lot of traveling while here in Israel. When I first arrived, I was getting directions to a outlying suburb of Jerusalem when the woman giving me directions gave me a shocker. She said to make sure not to miss my exit
because I would end up in the Arab city of Ramallah. This means sure death.
As I was driving that evening I made sure to pay attention to all the signs pointing me to that particular suburb, I was scared to miss my exit. I was scared to be murdered because I am Jewish.
We saw the blood frenzy several years ago when two Jews made a wrong turn into Ramallah. The Arab police there picked them up and took them to the police station supposedly for their own safety. News traveled quickly and the entire city
showed up at the station. The police did not bother doing their human duty - to protect innocent lives. They instead beat the two Jews to death, then threw their bodies out the window to the crowd outside. There was almost nothing left to identify the bodies with when the Arabs later returned the bodies to Israel. Instead we see the inhumanity of it all when one of the Jews cellphones rang while all this was happening. One of the murderers answered the phone and found that it was the wife of one of the Jews. He told her that he was busy murdering her husband. Occupation means that you cannot travel your own land for fear of making the wrong turn on the highway. I cannot assume anything different if I should G-d forbid make a wrong turn.
On the other hand, we need to keep in mind that Arabs can walk freely in any city in Israel without a worry of being murdered in the street. Every day I see Arabs going anywhere they want in any city going along their business. They are
still allowed to ride the buses, still allowed to go shopping and drive the roads. There have been no instances of Jews lynching Arabs like was done to the Jews in Ramallah. Who is under "occupation" here?
How did we come to such a situation here in Israel? Israel won a defensive war against her Arabs neighbors in 1967, when they announced to the world that they were going to drive her into the sea. In the span of a week, Israel won the eastern half of Jerusalem as well as Judea and Samaria. There has been no other country that hands back the land that it wins in war. Especially not back to the enemies that tried to destroy her in the first place. Especially if doing such a thing would make your country an indefensible 9 miles wide.
As a result of winning this war, Israel has inherited the Arabs living in these areas. Of course none of these Arabs wanted their own state when they were occupied by Jordan before 1967. Only when under Jewish control does it become
important. We can see Arab priorities clearly here. Arab statehood becomes a must when it comes to displacing the Jewish identity with the Land of Israel and not before.
I am glad that I have come to visit in the Land of Israel. It is only here that I can understand what it means to be a people under "occupation".
America is founded on the principles of equality, tolerance and acceptance of others with different ideas and religions than our own. Schools have whole curriculums based on “diversity” and “cultural awareness”. We look for common aspirations between groups of people in order to build our communities and better ourselves and our families. We assume that everyone around the world is also working toward these same goals of equality, tolerance and acceptance. We are wrong.
Islamic fundamentalists are not interested in any of these goals and certainly do not promote them. We need to understand their world view in order to see how it was possible for the tragedy of 9/11 to occur.
Fundamentalist Muslims believe that the Jews received a Revelation from God, the Torah, but then corrupted that Revelation. Christians received a Revelation, the New Testament, but corrupted their book too. According to them, the Koran is the final, uncorrupted word of God.
To these Muslims, the world is divided into two parts. The first part is the Dar al-Islam, the House of Islam. This is the area that, according to the Koran, is under Muslim rule. The second part is called Dar al-Harb, the House of War. This refers to the area of the world that is under non-Muslim control. Between these two parts there will always be a perpetual state of war. They believe that this will continue until the non-Muslims either accept Islam, or submit to being second class citizens to Muslim rulers.
This state of war can be seen around the world where fundamentalist Muslim are only interested in recreating the world in their image. In Indonesia, the fundamentalist Muslims are fighting the Christians. The mastermind of the Bali bombings shouted out in court, “We are ready to win the crusade against Christians! We will win!” Indonesian police also found church service schedules in raids on terror organizations indicating their interest in murdering Christians during prayer. (www.domini.org/openbook/ind20030820.htm).
In India, the fundamentalist Muslims are fighting the Hindus. In February 2, 2001, one of these Muslims, Shri Gopal Godse, is quoted as saying, “Islam is the mission of spreading Arabic culture by killing original Hindu culture” (www.hinduunity.org/indexold.html). Thousands have been killed.
In addition to the suicide bombings murdering and maiming of hundreds of Jewish men, women and children in Israel, Christians have an additional problem. An example of their problem is obvious with the body of the Muslim who converted to Christianity. His body had been chopped into four parts and was returned to his family as a warning to other possible converts (www.domini.org/openbook/pal20030729.htm).
In Sudan, for the past twenty years, Muslims in the north have been fighting to control non-Muslims in the south. Over a million non-Muslims have been murdered. This number doesn’t include the thousands of kidnapped and enslaved non-Muslims in the north.
Until the late 1990s there was dictatorial rule in Nigeria and fundamentalist Islam was held under control. Now there are thousands of Christians killed trying to resist fundamentalist Islam.
In Egypt, ten percent of the population are Coptic-Christians. These Christians live in constant fear since the Egyptian government lifted restrictions on fundamentalist Islam. Thousands of Christians have been murdered.
In Australia, concerns are being raised about possible al-Qaeda connections with the Islamic Youth Movement in Sydney (www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2003/s876582.htm). In the Philippines, the fundamentalist Muslims are a small minority, but are attempting to move their Christian neighbors from their homes. This includes murder to accomplish their goals. In the Balkans, when the fundamentalist Muslims are in power, they persecute the Christian population. Saudi Arabia outlaws the practice of any other religion except for Islam. Anyone caught can be beaten and thrown into jail. Even in China, fundamentalist Muslims are attempting to disrupt the political system (www.tibet.ca/wtnarchive/1993/10/17_1.html).
In can be seen from these examples that it does not matter to the Islamic fundamentalists what religion you are or where you live. The rest of the world knows this. It is only now after the attacks of 9/11 that the United States has learned.
If not all Muslims are fundamentalist, where are the condemnations of murder by the moderate and liberal Muslims? If religious persecution of other religions is not acceptable to Islam why hasn’t the Islamic leadership and communities come out against such atrocities which occur daily across the world? Are they afraid that they will be targeted and removed from power? Many times, these condemnations of murder are qualified. “Of course we are against the attack on 9/11, however, it is because of this that or the other thing that that country did.” It is the “yes-but” excuse. There is a denial of responsibility for their co-religionists actions. The world is waiting to hear from a moderate Muslim.
Women have finally achieved equal rights in the Arab World. Women are now officially allowed to blow themselves up on homicide/suicide missions. Congratulations to all! One of the leading Muslim scholars has issued a ruling permitting women to carry out homicide attacks.
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the dean of Islamic Studies at the University of Qatar, has issued this statement in response to the suicide bombing last week in Israel by a Muslim woman. “Women’s participation in the martyrdom operations...is one of the most praised acts of worship. Also, the act is a form of martyrdom for the cause of Allah, and it entitles them, inshallah, to the same reward earned by their male counterparts who also die in the cause of Allah....This obligation reaches the extent that a woman should go out for jihad even without the permission of her husband, and the son without the consent of his parents.” Qaradawi also added that Muslim women can violate Islamic traditions by traveling without a male relative and without having to wear a veil while carrying out an attack if without it she will be able to blow people up more effectively.
Let us analyze this wonderful statement of equality. The issue here is the question about what women will receive in the afterlife. According to this scholar, she will receive what her male counterpart suicide attacker gets. As we know from the Hadith (Islamic tradition) the afterlife caters to male fantasies. So what is it again that the female homicide bomber will get?
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi allows for Islamic tradition to be broken in order for a homicide bombing to go forward. Look at the exceptions to the rule: A woman can go out without a male relative escorting her, and she can remove her veil in order to carry out an attack. Wow, good for her. I wonder if the Sheikh will allow her to even drive a car in order to carry out the attack. Hey, it’s a start. Let us not impede progress.
If this is the beginning of the Equality for Women movement in the Middle East, we should probably look into other issues such as: the right to free speech, the right to marry who the woman wants (not only who the father wants her to marry), the right not to be murdered by a family member to save family honor, the right to have an education, the right not be handled like a piece of property, and maybe just maybe the right to vote (but perhaps we are looking too far ahead).
It is about time that equal rights for women creep into Middle Eastern culture. We need to keep in mind that equal rights for one means death and terror for others, but let us not be spoil sports about all of this. Let us cheer on Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi and support him in his struggle for equality. Women homicide bombers are one small step forward for Arab women and one giant leap backward for mankind.
Jerusalem Post, Women May be Terror Suicide Bombers, Muslim Scholar Rules, by Khaled Abu Toameh May 25, 2003
Now that it seems that the “peace process” is on the road no doubt the issue of the Arab refugees will be back on the negotiating table. But there is another piece to this refugee puzzle that must not be forgotten, and that is the Jewish refugees.
Jews lived in what are now the Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa since the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem in 586 BCE (BC). When the Muslim Arabs swept through the Middle East and North Africa, Jews were one of the few indigenous peoples that resisted conversion to Islam. As a result, they were reduced to second class citizens, otherwise known as dhimmis. This meant the Jews were tolerated but could never achieve equal status of a Muslim.
Caliph Omar, who succeeded Muhammed, created a set of codes by which a dhimmi had to live. The degradation of Jews under the Charter of Omar depended on the individual ruler. From Time Immemorial, documents some of these actions. In Yemen “life was abject slavery...where one of the Jews’ tasks was to clean city latrines and another was to clear the streets of animal carcasses-without pay, often on their Sabbath.” Albert Memmi, a Tunisian Jewish newspaperman wrote: “What have we been for centuries if not dominated, humiliated, threatened and periodically massacred?”
When dhimmis laws were not being strongly enforced, there were times that Jewish community would flourish. The response to that success would be a wave of harassment or massacre of Jews, instigated by the government or the masses. Once the Jewish community was weak again, they would be temporarily left alone.
This is the backdrop to the tragedy of the forgotten Middle East refugees. In 1948, nearly 900,000 Jews lived in the Middle East and North Africa, some having lived there for 2500 years, such as in Iraq. Today, 99% of these communities no longer exist and less than 8,000 Jews live in the Arab countries of the MidEast and North Africa.
The rise of Arab nationalism in the mid-20th Century led to the destruction of these communities. Hajj Amin al-Husayni, an Arab nationalist leader, and the Mufti of Jerusalem went to Nazi Berlin in 1941 and asked Hitler to “resolve the problem of the Jewish elements in Palestine and the other Arab countries in the same way as the problem was resolved in the Axis countries.” A few years later, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Yemen drove out most of their Jewish citizens through government action and physical attacks. In Iraq, 150,000 Jews were forced to leave their bank accounts and life savings, and only allowed one suitcase. Libyan Jews were allowed to leave with no more than twenty dollars apiece.
In 1947, before the creation of the State of Israel, the Arabs were offered a state of Palestine alongside that of a Jewish State. They refused, declared war on Israel, told the Arabs living in pre-state Israel to leave their home temporarily until Israel was destroyed. The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha proclaimed on May 15, 1948, “This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”
When the Arab states lost the war, two refugee situations were created. The first was the Jewish refugee problem of almost a million people. Israel welcomed them and integrated them into the newly formed State. The second refugee problem was the one of the Arabs who were waiting to go back to their homes after Israel was destroyed. While Israel had taken in the Jews from the Arab countries, these displaced Arabs were placed into refugee camps to be run by the United Nations, paid for by the world.
The Arabs that were told by the Arab commanders to temporarily leave their homes are now being used as a propaganda tool against Israel. These Arabs could have been easily resettled in any Arab country. Zuheir Muhsin, executive member of the PLO wrote in the Dutch daily newspaper, Trouw: “Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity serves only tactical purposes. The founding of a Palestinian state is a new tool in the continuing battle against Israel...”
As it stands today, the concept of compensation for the Jews thrown out of their native Arab countries has never made the headlines of any newspaper. They lost what is the equivalent of billions of dollars. It’s time to talk about compensation for these forgotten Middle East refugees.
For more information: Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa. (www.jimena-justice.org)
Is this microphone on? (tap, tap, tap) Obviously not. Student Council passed a resolution last week to push the University to divest from companies doing business in Israel. What a brilliant plan! Like the university hasn’t lost enough money so far. Did someone say “budget cuts” and “program cutting”? I guess Student Council didn’t hear anything like that. And we know that the United States economy is doing so well that we can afford to ask universities and private business to stop doing business in Israel. Why didn’t we think of this before? Because this is a stupid idea, that’s why.
The reason that Student Council passed this divestment resolution was because they felt that the situation in Israel is one of apartheid. Guess who didn’t do their homework? What a funny accusation to make against the only democracy in the Middle East. I didn’t hear a peep of complaint from Student Council about Wayne State’s agreement with Syria.
Syria, as we know, is one of the biggest cocaine distributors in the world as well as number one in the Middle East. Go Syria (hard work pays off)! Let’s forget about those 40,000 men, women and children of the city of Hama that were wiped off the face of the Earth by past president Hafez el-Assad (his son now runs the country) because they disagreed with his politics. Too bad for them, huh. Oh, and let us not forget that Syria is called home by many different terrorist organizations such as Hamas, which perpetrates the murder of hundreds of Israeli civilians, and the al-Qaeda connected Hizbullah. Over the last 30 years, Hizbullah has been busy. Their resume includes the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut murdering 215 American soldiers, as well as the Kohbar towers bombing which murdered another19. Was that a sound of complaint from Student Council? Nope, I was mistaken, someone stepped on the cat’s tail.
Why harp on Syria when we can talk about the entire Middle East? In 1948 when they weren’t able to destroy the reborn Jewish state, they decided instead to kick out the Jews that had been living in the Arab countries minding their own business. Some of those Jews had been living there 2500 years, but never mind. 900,000 Jews were thrown out and billions of dollars of private property was stolen from them. Where did they go? Did they stay in refugee camps paid for by the world and ignored by their brothers in Israel? Did they ask for a right of return to their Arab homelands? No, they did not. These Jews were integrated straight into Israeli society which was less than 10 years old. I wonder how you integrate almost a million people into a society with a less than stable economy in under ten years, but you can do anything if you care about your brothers.
Enough, let’s get back to Israel, and what a terrible place it isn’t. Israel is a democracy. Surprised? Most would have you believe that Arabs are not allowed to vote or participate in the election process. There are several Arab parties included in the Israeli Parliament. I wonder how that happened in an “apartheid” state such as Israel? Actually, there was some controversy in the last Israeli election when two Arab ministers were banned temporarily from running for office. What a terrible thing, how could that happen?
Well it seems that those two ministers, Ahmed Tibi and Azmi Bishara were running around calling for the destruction of the State of Israel. They were what? Ahmed Tibi is both a minister on the Israeli Parliament but also is an advisor to Yasser Arafat who hasn’t lifted a finger to stop Arab attack on Jews. Tibi is also quite vocal in his praise of violence against Jewish Israelis.
Minister Bishara has been even busier than Tibi. He travelled to Syria, went on Syrian television with Bashar Assad (the current president), the head of Hizbullah and praised Hizbullah for all their good work in killing Jews. Wow! I want these guys in my government. And if you were concerned if they were allowed to run for office in the last election don’t worry your pretty little head about it. Of course they were. You are allowed to call for the murder of your fellow citizens and run for a ministerial position. Did someone say something about Arabs not having equal rights in Israel?
The last Student Council obviously needed to have its collective head examined. By condemning Israel and not Syria, they showed themselves ignorant of reality. This new Student Council should take a strong stand behind Israel and repeal the divestment resolution.
This winter break I spent 10 days in England. I had a great time. It was quite a cultural experience. People driving on the left side of the road, trying to cross the street without getting killed, strange accents, and video cameras every where you look.
Why the video cameras? It's to help the police. Crime is rampant in England. According to the English newspaper, The Telegraph, violent attacks, sexual offenses and car theft have all increased. Crime overall has increased 9.3%, domestic break-ins rose 7.9%, violence against people increased by 19%, sexual offences by 18.2%, car theft by 3.5%, and robberies by 14.5%. (news.telegraph.co.uk 1/10/03)
The crazy part of this story is not only the increases in crime across the board, but the fact that "police have been ordered not to bother investigating crimes such as burglary, vandalism and assaults unless evidence pointing to the culprits is easily available" (news.telegraph.co.uk 1/12/03). They have new guidelines ordering them to focus on "serious" crimes such as murder, rape or hate crimes. Oliver Letwin, Conservative home affairs spokesman stated, "This news will be regarded as the final nail in the coffin of this Government's policy on crime. Instead of zero tolerance it seems that we are to be faced with total tolerance" (news.telegraph.co.uk 12/1/03.
What is interesting about all of this is that England has such strict gun laws, that a person is not allowed to own any kind of gun, they are even considering outlawing airguns. One would think that guns are the cause of crime. In other words, more guns equals more crime, the fact is just the opposite. According to the United Nations, England and Wales have the highest crime rate among the world's leading economies. The report shows that people are more likely to be mugged, houses burglerized, robbed and assaulted in England than in the United States, Germany, Russia, South Africa, or any of the world's 20 largest countries
(news.telegraph.co.uk 1/12/02).
Even with all its gun control laws in effect gun violence is a major issue for England. Gun ownership was banned in 1996 following a shooting in Dunblane, Perthshire hoping to reduce the amount of guns available to criminals. However the opposite has been proven true. According to England's Internal Home Office Statistics, handgun crime is now at its highest since 1993 (news.telegraph.co.uk 2/24/02).
Gun control does not control criminals, it onlystrips law abiding citizens of the right to defend themselves. Subjects of her Royal Highness are sick and tired of being victims. In an editorial to The Telegraph Simon Heffer makes my point. He assumed that the people had a contract with the government. The government would protect the citizens from crime. However, "..it must, though, be clear that the state has broken that contract....The Government absolutely lacks the political will to deal with the violation of one of the most fundamental liberties of the people it governs: their right to feel safe in their own homes...it is time for the Government to confer a new right on the people: the right to bear arms. Gun control in this country is in any case a joke" (opinion.telegraph.co.uk 2/24/02)
We in the United States must learn from others. Gun control is not the answer, it hasn't worked anywhere. We need to learn from our friends in England whose police force is told to focus on "serious" crime. Like the Home Office in England said "The Government did not believe that banning handguns by itself would eradicate gun crime..." (news.telegraph.co.uk 7/15/01) So by disarming the citizens, what did they believe would happen? It's open season on the man on the street.
I must be missing something. A brutal dictator is being removed from power, yet there are people who are upset about this. How strange.
Saddam Hussein became president of Iraq in 1979 and since then his specialty has been in torturing and massacring his own people.
“Iraq under Saddam’s regime has become a land of hopelessness, sadness, and fear. A country where people are ethnically cleansed; prisoners are tortured in more than 300 prisons in Iraq. Rape is systematic...congenital malformation, birth defects, infertility, cancer, and various disorders are the results of Saddam’s gassing of his own people...the killing and torturing of husbands in front of their wives and children...Iraq under Saddam has become a hell and a museum of crimes.” - Safia Al Souhail, Iraqi citizen, Advocacy Director, International Alliance for Justice.
Tens of thousands have disappeared under Saddam’s rule. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International put the number of disappeared between 70 and 150 thousand persons. According to the United Nations, the second largest targeted group are the Shi’a Muslims. “Ahmed” an anonymous current Iraqi citizen told The Christian Science Monitor (10/31/02) that “If you are arrested, your life is over.”
Saddam has poison gassed his own people. Between 1983 and 1988, he murdered more than 60,000 Iraqi citizens with mustard gas and nerve agents, including women and children. Against the Kurdish population, he used these chemical weapons against more than 40 villages. These weapons not only murder the population, but disfigures, causes cancer and other medical nightmares.
Women and children have no chance in having a normal life under Saddam’s rule. Women are raped and tortured if someone in their family is thought to be disloyal. In another instance, an obstetrician was arrested for criticizing the corruption in the health services. She was then beheaded under the guise of being a prostitute.
Since the last Gulf War Saddam has built himself 48 beautiful palaces, using the money in the oil-for-food program which was supposed to go toward the betterment of the people of Iraq. Pharmaceutical supplies have been exported for resale. Medicine for children is unable to get into the country due to the fact that the government officials expect bribes from medical suppliers. He obviously doesn’t care about the children.
Let’s not forget those non-existent Weapons of Mass Destruction. Saddam has not only already sent those non-existent missiles against the American forces, but on Sunday afternoon, the U.S. 3rd Infantry captured a non-existent chemical weapons plant. How about that?
While it seems that all this information is well known, why is it that France, Russia, Germany and China are against the United States action? Self-interest is the key.
The Heritage Foundation has documented the billions of dollars that has been made off of Saddam Hussein. France is Iraq’s largest European trading partner handling more than 22.5% of Iraq’s imports. They are interested in Iraqi oil. France’s largest oil company Total Fina Elf, negotiated a deal to develop the Majnoon field in western Iraq which contains up to 30 billion barrels of oil. If Saddam is removed, this contract may go to another company, possibly non-French.
Russia is also a good friend of Saddam with Russia controlling 5.8% of Iraq’s annual imports. Their total trade with Iraq was between $530 million and $1 billion for the 6 months ending in December 2001. Iraqi oil seems to be the main issue here too. Russia’s LUKoil currently holds a $4 billion, 23 year contract to rehabilitate the 15 billion barrel West Qurna field in southern Iraq. In 2002, Russia and Iraq signed an agreement worth $40 billion, allowing oil exploration throughout western Iraq. Iraq is also owes Russia $8 billion due to arm sales during the Iran-Iraq war. They too are worried if a new leadership is installed in Iraq.
Germany is next on the list doing 350 million dollars annually in direct trade with Iraq, with another $1 billion through third parties. Next is China. China controls about 5.8% of Iraqi annual imports. They also have a contract to negotiate a 22 year long deal for future oil exploration in the Al Ahdad field in southern Iraq worth billions.
We have seen the terror that has controlled the lives of everyday Iraqis. They live in constant fear of saying the wrong thing to the wrong person and ending up being tortured and murdered. If they are Kurdish or Shi’a they may be removed from their homes or gassed. Those non-existent WMD are now in the open to see. The United States has taken the moral high ground in eliminating the monster of Iraq and creating a democratic system. It’s too bad that France, Russia, Germany and China can’t see past their financial interests in order to do the right thing.
The United States was founded on certain principles 226 years ago. These principles form the basis of our country’s identity, and to a certain extent our own individual outlook on life. While we continue to live our lives without thinking about these principles, it is important from time to time to consider how they impact us today.
This country was founded on the ideals found in the Declaration of Independence, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these, are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” As we know, these ideals were not able to be realized by some portions of the American population, and over time we have been able to correct our failings by using these ideals as a framework for these corrections. An example of this was the African-American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Using the rhetoric of “all men are created equal” and that all people have “inalienable rights”, Dr. Martin Luther King was able to attach the Civil Rights Movement to the Greater Good to which America’s ideals are a foundation. Today we see other corrections being made to on our path by using these same ideals as a foundation to the cause at hand.
America began as a haven for those who wanted religious freedoms, and has continued until today as a haven for those fleeing from political and religious persecution, as well as a place to build a financial future. We have yet to see a group of American citizens on a raft to Haiti seeking a better life.
While all this is true, we now see Americans looking to the rest of the World to determine our path. Recently this has taken the form of looking to the United Nations to be our guide.
Why is this? Is the United States unable to decide what our own best interests are that we are required to ask the rest of the World to check? We live in a new World that has never been seen before. The United States is the only superpower in the World today. We are unrivaled by any other country. According to Charles Krauthammer, a journalist for the Washington Post, “Today the American military exceeds in spending the next twenty countries combined...Its dominance extends as well to every other aspect of international life - not only military, but economic, technological, diplomatic, cultural, even linguistic...”
So here we are. The only Superpower of the World, and asking for directions. The United States has been told that in order to carry on the war on terrorism, we need World public opinion behind us. This is a thought based on a moral vision of how the world works. A nice thought but irrelevant. Krauthammer explains that “...it is impossible to understand the moral logic by which the approval of the Security Council confers moral legitimacy on this or any other enterprise. How does the blessing of the butchers of Tiananmen Square, who hold the Chinese seat on the Council, lend moral authority to anything...? On what basis is moral legitimacy lent by the support of the Kremlin, whose central interest in Iraq...is oil and the $8 billion that Iraq owes Russia in debt? Or to the French, who did everything they could to weaken the resolution, then came on board at the last minute because they saw that an Anglo-American train was leaving for Baghdad, and they didn’t want to left at the station?”
Since the end of World War II, the United States has taken the lead in World Affairs, in showing what a government should be. A government limited by the laws that formed it. A government of the people, by the people, and for the people. This is a government and country where citizen efforts can and do make a difference.
We will not be dictated to by governments looking after their own self interests at the expense of our own. We will not be dictated to by those countries that trade in human bondage and treat their women worse than animals. We will not be dictated to by those countries that run telethons to raise money for terrorist organizations. We will not be dictated to by those countries who have no moral compass. We will be the ones to decide what path to take by using the ideals upon which our country was created. We will not be asking for directions along the way.
As students here at Wayne State, we believe in education and the educational opportunities that arise. We also believe in open discussion of ideas and ideologies. However, there is a problem when there is an opportunity to do “educational business” with a terrorist country.
In the beginning of January, Wayne State signed an agreement of scientific cooperation and cultural relationship with the state controlled Damascus University in Syria. In any other case this would be a great opportunity to learn about another culture, but in this instance it is clearly wrong to have any connection, scientific or other, to the country of Syria.
Syria is one of the countries on the U.S. State Department list of states that sponsor terrorism. Syria supports and harbors terrorist organizations, including the al-Qaeda connected Hizbullah. Hizbullah is responsible for the murder of hundreds of Americans, in the bombings of the U.S. Embassy, and the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut - and probably the Kohbar towers bombing which murdered 19 American soldiers. Syria is also home to Hamas, a terrorist organization which has murdered hundreds of Israeli civilians as well as many American citizens in homicide bombings. We also must include Syria’s support for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Al-Jihad and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. All of these groups have been involved in murdering Americans around the world. (www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-horowitz102401.shtml)
What about Human Rights? Governmental Syrian security forces rule everyday life in Syria. They arrest and kill citizens for their political and religious beliefs. Not only do they murder individual citizens, they have already massacred thousands. In 1982, in order to end political dissent, Syrian security forces moved into the city of Hama. They proceeded to massacre between 30,000 and 40,000 Syrian men, women and children. In addition to this massacre, thousands of people were displaced. Nobody has ever been held responsible for these murders. In fact, Rifa’at Asad, the uncle to the present president of Syria, who was in charge of the massacre, was rewarded by being appointed to be vice-president of national security. Other officers were given higher ranks. Ever since the massacre in Hama, there have been no protests against the Syrian government. (www.shrc.org/english/99reports/18021999.htm)
As if all this were not enough, Syria is a major center for drug trafficking as well as forging Western bank notes. In November 1997, President Clinton told the Chairman of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee that he wanted Syria and Syrian-occupied Lebanon removed from the list of 30 countries who grow and distribute drugs worldwide. This was based on the fact that those countries had reduced the amount of poppy fields used in the production of opium. They had also reduced the amount of cannabis, used for hashish and marijuana production. However, Clinton failed to notice that Syria and Lebanon had increased production of harder drugs such as heroin and cocaine. These drugs are more profitable, harder to trace and more dangerous. Over the last two years, Syria and Lebanon have increased production of hashish and marijuana and are the number one drug trafficking country in the Middle East. (www.ict.org.il/articles/crime2.htm)
Bringing our focus to Syria’s business practices, Syria has a new program to bring foreign investments to the country. This includes free-trade zones and laws that make it easier to build the country’s economy. Unfortunately, although not surprisingly, this includes doing business with another repressive dictator in the region - Saddam Hussein of Iraq. This agreement was brought forward by the Syrian Ministry of Industry. Syrian and Iraqi officials have said that the value of the trade exchange is holding at about a billion dollars. (http://arutzsheva.com/article.php3?id=2010)
When we look over all these different areas that the Syrian government is involved in: everything from being a haven for and funding terrorist organizations, massacring tens of thousands of their own citizens, and being the number one drug producing and trafficking country in the Middle East, it is inconceivable how Wayne State University has decided to have any connection to the country of Syria. Who knows who the recipients of joint scientific projects will be. Iraq? Al-Qaeda?
Damascus University is not a public university like Wayne State. It is a university that is completely controlled by the state, without any chance of freedom of expression by the professors there. This agreement is being peddled to the students of Wayne as being part of “building bridges” between “equals” and “academic freedom” for those involved. Syrian professors and students do not have a concept of what “academic freedom” means, or even what “freedom” means. By creating such an agreement, we are legitimizing a murderous, terrorist, drug trafficking state. As far as “building bridges” between “equals”, this is not a bridge I in good conscience would like to help build.
Last week Thursday, Peace Through Knowledge, my student organization brought in Francis Bok, an escaped Sudanese Slave. It was amazing.
I've been working on and off more than 3 weeks on bringing him into Wayne State. I had other student groups on this also, which was also great. Association of Black Business students, Political Science Department, Hillel of Metro Detroit, and the Grosberg Religious Center. I'm so thrilled that it worked out in the end.
We had something like 80-100 people attend. It was a mixed crowd, black and white. It was a real opportunity to work together. Hopefully this was only the first time that we'll work with the Assoc. of Black Business Students. They were great.
The Muslims were upset and accused Hillel of being racist and using the ABBS to cover themselves. Whatever. It was my group that brought Bok in and had asked Hillel to sign their name on. They're welcome to get upset if they want. They were'nt happy that we said on the flier that it was Arabs who enslaved Bok. Besides the fact that I made the flier straight off his bio on his website, it's too bad they can't deal with reality. It was Muslims who enslaved him.
All in all, the point wasn't to point the finger at them, the point was that I thought this was a great opportunity to pull many different groups together behind something we could all stand behind as far as a humanitarian position - being against slavery. I thought everything went amazingly well.
The website to check out is: www.iabolish.com
Imagine you have been living in the same city that your parents, grandparents and even your great-great-grandparents have lived in for the last twenty five hundred years. Sounds incredible. Then one day, it’s all over. You are thrown out of your home and sent penniless hundreds of miles away with no chance of ever returning. This is the story of the Jews that were living in the Arab Middle East and North Africa.
Jews lived in what are now the Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa since the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE (BC). When the Muslim Arabs swept through the Middle East and North Africa, Jews were one of the few indigenous peoples that resisted conversion to Islam. As a result, they were reduced to second class citizens, otherwise known as dhimmis. This meant the Jews were tolerated but could never achieve equal status of a Muslim.
Caliph Omar, who succeeded Muhammed, created a set of codes by which a dhimmi had to live. The degradation of Jews under the Charter of Omar depended on the individual ruler. From Time Immemorial, documents some of these actions. In Yemen “life was abject slavery...where one of the Jews’ tasks was to clean city latrines and another was to clear the streets of animal carcasses-without pay, often on their Sabbath.” Albert Memmi, a Tunisian Jewish newspaperman wrote: “What have we been for centuries if not dominated, humiliated, threatened and periodically massacred?”
When dhimmis laws were not being strongly enforced, there were times that Jewish community would flourish. The response to that success would be a wave of harassment or massacre of Jews, instigated by the government or the masses. Once the Jewish community was weak again, they would be temporarily left alone.
This is the backdrop to the tragedy of the forgotten Middle East refugees. In 1948, nearly 900,000 Jews lived in the Middle East and North Africa, some having lived there for 2500 years, such as in Iraq. Today, 99% of these communities no longer exist and less than 8,000 Jews live in the Arab countries of the MidEast and North Africa.
The rise of Arab nationalism in the mid-20th Century led to the destruction of these communities. Hajj Amin al-Husayni, an Arab nationalist leader, and the Mufti of Jerusalem went to Nazi Berlin in 1941 and asked Hitler to “resolve the problem of the Jewish elements in Palestine and the other Arab countries in the same way as the problem was resolved in the Axis countries.” A few years later, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Yemen drove out most of their Jewish citizens through government action and physical attacks. In Iraq, 150,000 Jews were forced to leave their bank accounts and life savings, and only allowed one suitcase. Libyan Jews were allowed to leave with no more than twenty dollars apiece.
In 1947, before the creation of the State of Israel, the Arabs were offered a state of Palestine alongside that of a Jewish State. They refused, declared war on Israel, told the Arabs living in pre-state Israel to leave their home temporarily until Israel was destroyed. The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha proclaimed on May 15, 1948, “This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.”
When the Arab states lost the war, two refugee situations were created. The first was the Jewish refugee problem of almost a million people. Israel welcomed them and integrated them into the newly formed State. The second refugee problem was the one of the Arabs who were waiting to go back to their homes after Israel was destroyed. While Israel had taken in the Jews from the Arab countries, these displaced Arabs were placed into refugee camps to be run by the United Nations, paid for by the world.
The Arabs that were told by the Arab commanders to temporarily leave their homes are now being used as a propaganda tool against Israel. These Arabs could have been easily resettled in any Arab country. Zuheir Muhsin, executive member of the PLO wrote in the Dutch daily newspaper, Trouw: “Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity serves only tactical purposes. The founding of a Palestinian state is a new tool in the continuing battle against Israel...”
As it stands today, the concept of compensation for the Jews thrown out of their native Arab countries has never made the headlines of any newspaper. They lost what is the equivalent of billions of dollars. It’s time to talk about compensation for these forgotten Middle East refugees.
For more information: Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa. (www.jimena-justice.org)
When we hear the sounds of an ambulance siren behind us, there are usually two automatic reactions that occur. The first is that we pull over to the right side of the road. The second reaction is that we usually worry about the welfare of the person inside the ambulance that needs such
attention.
At the same time we are moving aside to let the ambulance through, we do not wonder if the ambulance is carrying a bomb or armed terrorists. On the other hand, this is a real concern for Jews driving down the street in Israel.
Last week I heard a passing comment about how terrible it was that an ambulance was delayed at a security checkpoint. I agree, this is a terrible situation. The fact that Israelis can not longer trust ambulances to be transporting people needing medical treatment is a horrible situation.
There have been many instances where Red Crescent ambulances have been used for terrorist activities. One such example was reported on in the Israeli newspaper, Ha'aretz, on June12, 2002. It reported that when Israeli soldiers stopped an ambulance carrying a woman and three children, they also found a 22 pound bomb sewn into a coat crammed into a stretcher mattress. The bomb was taken out of the ambulance and detonated in the presence of representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRP).
According to the Israel Defense Forces, the driver, Islam Jibril confessed to trying to smuggle in the bomb. He also admitted both that this was not the first time that an ambulance was used to transfer terrorists and bombs, and that Red Crescent workers are sent on terror missions. Jibril said that the bomb, assembled as a belt to be worn by a suicide bomber, was given to him by Mahmoud Titi of the Al Aqsa Brigade, a group associated with the Palestinian Authority.
In a statement, the Israeli Emergency Services of the Magen David Adom "requests the International Red Cross intervene immediately in order to ensure that its protege, the Palestinian Red Crescent, strictly observe and respect the protective emblems, for humanitarian purposes only."
The ICRP responded to the bomb incident by saying that it was "shocked and dismayed" and "condemns such use of an ambulance and of the Red Crescent emblem." (Journal of Emergency Medical Services www.jems.com/jems/news02/0415a.html) ICRP also stated that
it "understands the security concerns of the Israeli authorities, and has always acknowledged their right to check ambulances..."
This is only one situation out of many. In January 2002, Wafa Idris blew herself up on a crowded street in Jerusalem becoming one the first female suicide bombers. She was an ambulance driver for the Palestinian Red Crescent, as was Mohammed Hababa, the Tanzim (terrorist organization with ties to the Palestinian Authority) operative who sent her. She left the West Bank in an ambulance.
In October 2001, Nidal Nazal, a Hamas terrorist was arrested by the Israel Defense Forces. He was an ambulance driver for the Palestinian Red Crescent, and used the unrestricted travel to be a messenger between Hamas headquarters and different West Bank towns.
These terrorists have even boasted about using ambulances to news organizations such as Al-Jazeera and others in the Arab press. To see English translations go to www.memri.org.
It is a terrible state of affairs that the Israeli authorities must search ambulances in order to feel safe. What is even worse is that the Red Crescent has compromised its humanitarian role to be used by terrorists. Any injured people that are delayed at the checkpoints can thank the
Palestinian Authority and other terrorist organizations for destroying the trust that should go along with riding in the back of an ambulance.
Last week was incredibly insane. I was called a KKK member.
I was called a KKK member during an Arab divestment meeting. I guess that I'm now officially the first Jewish KKK member. He made the generalization that Jews think they're better than everyone else so therefore we're no better than the KKK. So I yelled at him that he wrong about the generalization and that I'd add the KKK idea to my resume.
How stupid. A friend of mine said that the whole concept was dumb. Since I'm Jewish, the whole burning cross thing wouldn't work, in addition if I wanted to burn a Jewish star that would be a problem. To begin with, Jewish stars are hard to bang into the ground, and they don't balance well anyway. The whole sheet over the head thing wouldn't work anyway - it would mess up my hair.
What can I say? How dumb. Divesting from Israel is a bad idea. It would hurt the United States just as much Israel. All the major American companies invest in Israel.
Obviously, we are not dealing with a thinking crowd. It's just another tactic to attack Israel disguised as a "peaceful" method to end the "occupation".
And I, of course, am the first Jewish KKK member.
I always say. Do the research!! Todays events are only the reflection of yesterday. In the next few articles the issue of the Palestinians and the Palestinian refugees will be addressed. These articles will be based in fact and not emotion. In order to be an honest researcher, put away what you have learned off of the evening news and do some thinking from facts.
The beginning of the Palestinian issue begins way back during ancient Roman times. When the Romans conquered the Jews in 70 CE (Common Era aka A.D.) and destroyed the Temple, the Romans still had problems with the Jewish People. The Jewish People were not willing to give up their Land without a fight. So finally in 135 CE, the Romans had had enough. They wiped out the stronghold of Masada, and gave the Holy Land the new name of “Palestine”, named after the Greek Philistines of Bible fame, and scattered the Jews across the known world. This new “slave name” was created to break the connection that the Jews had with their homeland and to destroy the Jews as a People. As 2000 years of history has shown us, Rome is gone and Israel is back. However, the “slave name” stuck. Although the Jews were the original “Palestinians” we now seem to have a “new” Palestinian people.
It’s time to skip ahead in history to post-WWI. The Ottoman Empire picked the wrong side and its Empire was split up among the victors of the War To End All Wars. Part of the Empire was called “Palestine” or Greater Syria, which included what is now Israel, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. The Palestine Mandate was the area given to Great Britain to administer. The Mandate included what are now the countries of Jordan and Israel.
Up and through this time of post World War I, there were small communities of Jews living in the Land. The Jews had never even attempted to establish another homeland anywhere in the world. At the same time, the Land of Israel had waited for them. The Land had exchanged hands many times over the centuries, from the Romans, to the Muslims, to the Crusaders, and to the British to name a few. Amazingly enough, no nation had ever established a capital city or independent country in the Land and it was always part of larger empire.
At this time, the majority of Arabs in the area considered themselves Syrian. Who considered themselves “Palestinians”? Strangely enough, both Arabs and Jews considered themselves “Palestinians”. Both people had this identification stamped in their passports. (From Time Immemorial, by Joan Peters) Since both pre-state Jordan and Israel were part of the Palestine Mandate they were free to travel back and forth between parts of the Mandate.
Now things get complicated. In 1917, the British promised the Jewish People a homeland in all of the Palestine Mandate - Jordan and Israel. There was even Arab support for this plan. Faisal Ibn Hussein, son of Hussein the Sharif of Mecca and King of the Hejaz, (and great grandfather of the current King of Jordan), was recognized as the legitimate leader of the Arab world after WWI. He was also the official head of the Arab delegation to the 1918 Paris Peace Conference, which most nations attended. Faisal recognized Jewish Palestine in London in February 1919 when he signed the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement with Chaim Weizmann, the officially recognized head of the Zionist delegation to the peace conference. Weizmann would later become the first president of Israel. This agreement formally recognized the Balfour Declaration, which called for the creation of a Jewish National Homeland in Palestine.
On March 8, 1919, Faisal sent a letter to Harvard Law School Dean and later Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter which shows the attitude that Faisal and most Arabs of his generation had toward Zionism. “Dear Mr. Frankfurter, ...We Arabs, especially the educated among us, look with the deepest sympathy on the Zionist movement...We will wish the Jews a most hearty welcome home...We are working together for a reformed and revived Near East, and our two movements complete one another...The Jewish movement is national and not imperialist; our movement is national and not imperialist; and there is room in Syria for us both...People less informed and less responsible than our leaders and yours, ignoring the need for cooperation of the Arabs and Zionists, have been trying to exploit the local difficulties...I look forward, and my people with me look forward, to a future in which we will help you and you will help us...”
What went wrong? Tune in next week.
Today is election day in Israel. No, it is not a farce like the Iraqi elections with 100% of the population voting for Saddam Hussein. We were all on the edge of our seats wondering who was going to win that election.
Israel has a parliamentary system of government. The governing body is called the Knesset in which 120 members conduct business. There are 28 parties that fight each other every election for these seats. These include Liberals, Conservatives, Arabs, Greens, Marxists and Communists. There's even a party devoted to the legalization of marijana.
It needs to be remembered that while Israel is a democracy, it was created with a Jewish character as well. Paragraph 7a of the Basic Law in Israel gives a framework for the establishment of political parties. "The Knesset expressly disqualifies the candidacies of parties and individuals who negate Israel's right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state; engage in racist incitement; or support an enemy state or terror organization's armed struggle against the state."
In America we can understand this concept by looking at the oath of office for Congressional Representatives and Senators. "I, (fill in the name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same..." It is clear that in both countries only loyal citizens are wanted in government.
Last month there was some controversy when two Arab ministers were banned temporarily from running for Knesset office. These two Arab ministers, Ahmed Tibi and Azmi Bishara were disqualified from running for office based on Paragraph 7a stated above.
In one case, we find Minister Ahmed Tibi to be an advisor to Yasser Arafat, whose terrorist connections have been well documented. In addition to being an advisor he has been vocal in his praise of the violence against Jewish Israelis.
Minister Azmi Bishara seems to be even busier than Ahmed Tibi. He traveled to Syria, a well known terrorist nation committed to the destruction of Israel. On television, standing next to the President of Syria, Bashar Assad and the head of Hizbullah (a terrorist organization) praised Hizbullah and called on the Palestinian Arabs of Israel to continue to fight Israel and kill Jews. In June 2000, when Israel withdrew from Lebanon Bishara went to a celebration in northern Israel and told the cheering Israeli-Arab crowd: "Hizbullah has won...Hizbullah has every right to be proud of its achievement and to humiliate Israel."
The Central Election Committee, made up of representatives of the other Knesset parties decided to ban Tibi and Bishara from running in todays election based on Paragraph 7a. However, their decision was overturned when Israel's Supreme Court took on the case. Tibi and Bishara are free to run.
In the 1980s, there was a Jewish party that was banned from running. The party name was Kach, and the party leader was Rabbi Meir Kahane. Kahane's party was also banned based on Paragraph 7a that he spread "racist incitement". In actuality, his platform was one of a Jewish democracy and the policy of population exchange. The idea was since Israel had taken in the Jewish refugees that had been thrown out of the Arab countries in the 1940s and 1950s, it was time to return to the Arab countries the Arabs that lived in Israel. He did not promote violence against Arabs and even predicted the violence we are witness to today. The Israeli Supreme Court never overturned this decision.
The Jerusalem Post, a centrist Israeli newspaper, made an interesting observation based on these cases. "Unlike a growing number of Arab legislators, the Jewish far-right's aim is anything but the Jewish state's demise...A democracy is not supposed to be a suicide pact." What can be seen here is that those who are committed to the destruction of the state are allowed to run, while the other who believes in a democratic state is not. What can be seen is that the far-left is allowed free speech, and the far-right is not.
Having a difference of opinion and calling for the destruction of the state that you are meant to uphold as a legislator are very different things. Will the loyal citizens of Israel please stand up?
To learn more about Israeli elections and to vote in a mock election, check out the website: www.israelvotes2003.com
Yesterday we celebrated Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Wayne State gave us the day off, but did anybody think about his message? Every group uses his message to support the causes that fit their agenda. Arab groups use him too to argue against the existence of the Jewish State of Israel. However the opposite is true.
Most people would be surprised to know that Dr. Martin Luther King was a great supporter of the State of Israel. Dr. King was alive at the time the Jewish State was created in 1948, and around to see the amazing Six Day victory of Israel in 1967. His words stand on their own, and need no explanation. He stated what he believed in.
In 1967, Dr. King wrote to Adolph Held, the president of the Jewish Labor Committee after a meeting of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference that, “I would have made it crystal clear that I could not have supported any resolution ... calling for a condemnation of Israel and an unqualified endorsement of the policy of the Arab powers.”
In the same letter Dr. King stated, “Israel’s right to exist as a state is incontestable.” Instead of imagining what Dr. King believed about the State of Israel, it is very clear to anyone interested in finding out to read the words that he himself wrote.
In addition to his positive outlook toward Israel, he expressed his opinion about the Arab countries. “At the same time, the great powers have the obligation to recognize that the Arab world is in a state of imposed poverty and backwardness that must threaten peace and harmony.” He puts the blame for this poverty and backwardness on the people who created it. “...some Arab feudal rulers are no less concerned for oil wealth and neglect the plight of their own people.”
On March 25, 1968, two weeks before Dr. King was murdered in Memphis, Tennessee, he was at a Rabbinical Assembly and spoke clearly, “peace for Israel means security, and we must stand with all our might to protect its right to exist, its territorial integrity. I see Israel as one of the great outposts of democracy in the world, and a marvelous example of what can be done, how desert land can be transformed into an oasis of brotherhood and democracy. Peace for Israel means security and that security must be a reality.”
Dr. King was even more clear in his “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend,” (Saturday Review Aug. 1967) “...You declare, my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely ‘anti-Zionist.’... When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--this is God’s own truth....
“Why is this? You know that Zionism is nothing less than the dream and ideal of the Jewish people returning to live in their own land....
“The antisemite rejoices at any opportunity to vent his malice. The times have made it unpopular, in the West, to proclaim openly a hatred of the Jews. This being the case, the antisemite must constantly seek new forms and forums for his poison. How must he revel in the new masquerade! He does not hate the Jews, he is just ‘anti-Zionist!....”
Dr. King was aware of the situation of the world in which he lived. He watched the creation of the State of Israel. He watched the Jews win back and reunify Jerusalem. He watched the Palestinian Liberation Organization as it was founded in 1964, before there were any “occupied territories”. And after all this, he still claimed the territorial integrity of the Jewish State with no exception. The world would be a better place if we would listen to his message.
Tim Allen’s movie The Santa Clause 2 is the best political statement I’ve seen in a long time. Of course I don’t know if they meant to defend the Second Amendment but it is very well done.
For those who have not been to a Political Science class recently, the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution gives individuals the right to own guns in order to protect themselves and their families against a bad government and from intruders.
Santa Clause 2 demonstrates clearly why it is important that individuals need to have weapons to protect themselves against a bad government. Examine the movie carefully. There’s Santa Clause himself, the benevolent dictator. Since he is such a good natured fellow, the elves, the population, have no need to be armed.
As in any story, there arises a crisis. The wonderful, good natured, jolly Santa Clause is replaced by a mean, obnoxious Santa Clause who was terrible to the cute elves. This rude dictator empowers himself by having armed guards making sure the elves don’t mount a revolution. Since the population is unarmed, they are unable to do anything about the situation. This highlights the problem of the unarmed population against a bad government.
In addition to Santa, the Simpsons do a fine job in dealing with the second part of the Second Amendment, the right to protect ourselves from each other. You and I might be good people, but what about the zombies coming back from the grave? Do we trust them?
Lisa Simpson visits a graveyard and comes across a headstone that reads “I dream of a world without guns”, not realizing that this is the grave of Billy the Kid. Lisa begins a campaign against guns and is successful. Since this is a Halloween episode, Billy the Kid comes back from the grave to terrorize the town of Springfield. How is he able to do this? There is no deterrent when the citizens are unarmed. All criminals “dream of a world without guns”. When people are armed it makes criminals think twice before entering a home.
Since these are just movies and television shows, let’s check back with reality. We need to look at why the Second Amendment was put into place. The first reason was for the people to protect themselves against a bad government. Genocides have happened in country after country throughout the century. One of the first things the government does is to disarm the population so they cannot revolt successfully. Take a look back in history: Armenia, Nazi Germany, Cambodia, Rwanda are just a few examples.
The second reason for the Amendment is to protect ourselves against people who want to hurt us. Even if all gun owners hand in their guns to the government, do we honestly believe that the criminals will hand their guns in too? As things stand now, criminals don’t register their guns with the police, or get fingerprinted as part of the process of carrying a gun legally. What makes anyone think that even though criminals have not followed the rules until now, they will suddenly begin to do so?
The faulty logic begins with the false premise that less guns will lead to less crime. It may be a nice thought, but totally unsubstantiated in reality. Looking across the pond at the UK, we see that in 1997, England effectively banned all citizens from owning firearms. The result is that the balance of power has shifted to the criminals. England has already passed the United States in rates of robberies and burglaries even though the United States has five times as many people as the United Kingdom, never mind the fact that more people in the United States are owning and carrying guns. (Nat’l Center for Policy Analysis www.ncpa.org/iss/cri/2002/pd120202c.html). In addition, murder rates have hit an all time high in England since records began to be kept 100 years ago. (www.crpa.org/pressrls101502.html)
According to the Associated Press, Dave Rodgers, vice chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation in England said that the ban makes little difference to the number of guns in the hands of criminals. “The underground supply of guns does not seem to have dried up at all.” (www.crpa.org/pressrls101502.html) This should not surprise us.
The authors of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were well aware of the reasoning behind the Second Amendment. These were not words written for the sake of taking up space on paper. We also have to be aware of these reasons and not be caught up in anti-gun sentiments, not based in reality, such as Lisa Simpson who brought the downfall of Springfield with her idealized “world without guns.”
