Submitted Comments RSS Feed Comments by BRUCE
Posted in: Jews in Palestine
Interesting idea. And the corollary should also be considered, such that the Arab population currently living in Israel become citizens of "Palestine," but continue to be welcome to live in Israel as legal residents, but without Israeli citizenship. Wouldn't that be the natural counterbalance, and a blessing to Israel?
Posted in: Carter replies to Abram's reply-UPDATES
When did the West Bank become "Palestinian land"? The West Bank was part of the original land given to the Jews by the Balfour Declaration during the British Mandate after the end of World War 1, and then codified by the League of Nations in 1922. The land was offered to the Arabs in 1948 but they rejected it, because they preferred to attack Israel in an attempt to "drive the Jews into the sea." The original mandate giving the land to Israel has never been abrogated or reversed legally. So, when did it automatically become Palestinian land? Answer: it's not Palestinian land. It's really Israeli land. If the Palestinians want to live there, they are free to negotiate for an autonomous zone. But let's understand once and for all the underlying truth of the situation.
Posted in: Jews, evangelicals get together
Rather than being insecure about being proselytized by Christian evangelists, all Jewish people should read the book "Twenty-Six Reasons Why Jews Don't Believe in Jesus" by Asher Norman. This book should be required reading in Jewish education. It gives a clear and convincing description of why Jesus is not the messiah, and why Jews must not believe in such misguided folly. Once Jews have the knowledge contained in this book, then they can proselytize the Christians right back, by showing them the false and flimsy foundation of their own religion.
Posted in: Mass converts pose dilemma for Latin American Jews
Dear Robin Margolis, You are totally correct. Of course, there must be a mechanism to ensure that the converts' motivation is sincere. But along those lines, I think we should make a huge push into countries like China and India, whose inhabitants do not have the burden of a past experience with Christianity and Islam, and who might find Judaism very appealing and alluring. Just think: if just a few percent of those billions of people converted, the number of Jews in the world would explode. What's wrong with that? It could only be good. If just 2% of Indians and Chinese converted, the number of Jews in the world would increase by 40 million. Who could complain about that?
Posted in: Roger Cohen's wishful thinking
Roger Cohen is an Englishman. The British, even the liberal Jewish elite from that country, are anti-Semitic to the core. That has been the way with the British for many centuries. Great Britain is currently the leading purveyor of anti-Semitism of any country outside the Arab world. Roger Cohen fits right in. They will always side against Israel regardless of the issue. The British Jews have assimilated to the point that they actually believe that they are an accepted part of the upper crust of British society. That has been a sad pattern in Jewish history (think of the assumptions made by the Jews in Germany in the 1930's). Jews are often their own worst enemies.
Posted in: Roger Cohen reality check
Dear Roger, I'm sorry, but I had to respond to your article in the New York Times, Middle East Reality Check. Why do I have the unsettling feeling that you're the one who needs the reality check? You say, "The 1988 Hamas Charter is vile..." Vile? That's it? The Hamas Charter calls for genocide and the total destruction of Israel. I suppose when viewed with your inches-thick rose-colored glasses the Nazi Final Solution was "vile" as well? "Perhaps Hamas is sincere in its calls for Israel’s disappearance..." Perhaps? Why perhaps? It couldn't be clearer and more forthright. Has Hamas acted in contradiction of any part of its Charter? Has there been any sign that Hamas "doesn't really believe" what's in the Charter? "The Obama administration should also look carefully at how to reach moderate Hamas elements..." Roger, who might they be? I don't recall hearing about "moderate" people in Hamas. If anything, Hamas is very disciplined and unbending in their beliefs. Perhaps you meant the Hamas men who threw their Fatah competitors off the roofs of high buildings. Perhaps some of them were thrown off only "moderately" high buildings, like from the third or fourth stories? Perhaps you had a picnic with them, and they assured you that they are really moderate? The Hamas Charter states plainly that peaceful methods to resolve the conflict are not acceptable, only militant jihad (see Article 13). "Israel has the right to hit back when attacked, but any response should be proportional and governed by sober political calculation." Proportional? The most proportional response would obviously be to fire rockets back to where they came from, rocket for rocket. That would be an exactly proportional response. But wait! That would kill civilians indiscriminately, wouldn't it? So a precisely proportional response is really not acceptable, is it? Roger, a proportional response is exactly what would perpetuate this military conflict. No one ever wins a war or battle with proportional responses. When we defeated Nazi Germany, we did not use proportional responses. In fact, we destroyed whole cities, civilians and all. When we defeated Japan, we used carpet bombing of the entire country and nuclear weapons. In both Germany's and Japan's case, that approach ended the conflict, and now both countries are at peace with us and with the world. In order to defeat a fanatical and determined enemy, one must use overwhelming force, specifically way out of proportion. The problem that has perpetuated the Israel Palestinian conflict is exactly that Israel's responses have been too proportional. If they used totally overwhelming force, this entire conflict would most likely have ended a long time ago, and the two entities would have arrived at a form of peace. You may not understand that, being in your ivory tower, but history has proven that again and again. The wars that drag on and ultimately kill the most people are the ones in which both sides are "too evenly" matched. For example, the Iraq-Iran war dragged on for eight years, and millions of people died, or our Civil War. Hamas' will to fight must be totally defeated such that their own Charter will be understood by them to be hopelessly unachieveable. And since you appear to have read the Hamas Charter, then you must realize that this conflict is not about settlements, expansion, Gaza blockade, etc. It's about something much more overarching, the Islamic tenet never to give back land that was at any time ruled by Muslims. "They try to paint Hamas as irrevocably absolutist. Why should Arabs be any less pragmatic than Jews?" Well, the Palestinians were offered a state in the West Bank and Gaza by Ehud Barak and Bill Clinton, but Arafat refused. Why? It's because that would have ended the conflict, and that's not part of the Arab plan. The Arab plan is much deeper than that. "...but then it’s also possible that Israel in reality has no desire to see a Palestinian state." OK, let's see, now. We offered the Palestinians a reasonable compromise in 1999, and the Arab response was the second intifadeh, suicide bombings, missiles, rockets, and ongoing anti-Semitic incitement, continuing to this day with persistent rocket attacks on civilian centers and constant attempts at infiltration of suicide bombers. We withdrew totally from Gaza, and their response has been constant terrorism. Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's keep going by giving them a state of their own in the West Bank! Since it's only 9 miles from East Jerusalem to the Mediterranean, essentially all of Israel will be within range of rockets and missiles, and since their Charter calls for our extermination, that will appease them so much that they will set aside their Charter and become peaceful neighbors. After all, the thing that Arabs respect the most, the thing that most effectively convinces them to become peaceful, is surrender and retreat. Sounds great! "West Bank walling-in?" Don't you have that backwards? The West Bank is not walled in. Israel is walled in. The Palestinian suicide bombers are walled OUT. Roger, why do I have the haunting feeling that you just don't get it?
Posted in: Israel Apartheid Week kicks off
When the American Nazi Party held numerous rallies in support of Hitler in the 1930's, in several instances the Jewish Mafia personalities Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky attended the rallies with a bunch of their "boys." They beat the daylights out of several leaders of the pro-Nazi groups with lead pipes and brass knuckles, accompanied by the warning that if they gather again, the next time the beatings would be much worse. The rallies soon faded out. Whatever happened to guys like that? Whatever happened to the JDL?
Posted in: Cohen misses the point -- again
To Michael Several, You said: "This could end today if Israel opened the border to Gaza and allowed goods, such as pasta, in at the same level it was three years ago." Don't lose your sympathy for Israel yet. Hamas was blowing up buses, pizzerias, and discotheques full of civilians and young kids long before the issue of rockets and border closures appeared. Hamas' terrorism did not start with the border closures. In fact, it has nothing to do with it. Read their charter. That says it all. *****
Posted in: Obama reviewing policy on U.N. rights council
Close down the UN. It's a sad joke.
RSS Feed Breaking News
Updated 11/22/09 @ 05:02PM EDT
- Hundreds of Jewish and non-Jewish Brazileans protested in Rio de Janeiro on the eve of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit.
- "Real progress" has been made in negotiations to release a captured Israeli soldier, President Shimon Peres confirmed.
- The online auction Web site eBay said it took down an ad offering biological samples from Benito Mussolini before anyone could bid on them.
- Turkey has given Israeli defense contractors 50 days to deliver 10 promised drone aircraft.
- Iran began an air defense drill designed to protect its nuclear program, Iranian state television reported.
- Brazileans protest Ahmadinejad visit
- Peres: ‘Real progress’ in Shalit talks
- The Mofaz plan—state now, ask questions later
- eBay removes Mussolini brain, blood samples
- Turkey demands delivery of Israeli drones
- Iran begins air defense drill
- More Israeli recruits seeking to join combat units
- Haredim return to protest Jerusalem Intel factory
- Female Orthodox scholars helping women talk about sex
- Obama half-brother has Jewish roots
- Lieberman: Fort Hood could be terror attack
- J Street confab shows generational divide on Israel
- What really happened at the Reform biennial in Toronto
- Pro-Israel fliers confiscated at campus speech
- Rubashkin convicted on 86 charges
- Obama shifts to Israel’s corner, but tries not to show it
Posted in: Roger Cohen: The Israelis are the problem
11/18/09 12:50 AM
Dear Kevin Kamberg, What did you mean by "Palestinian lands"? When did the West Bank become Palestinian land? I assume you know that the area of the West Bank was included in the Balfour Declaration in 1919 for the Jewish state, and codified by the League of Nations in 1922; that mandate has never been legally abrogated. The Arabs were offered that part of Israel in 1947 but rejected the offer. So, I ask again, how and when did the West Bank become Palestinian? If anything, this land is occupied BY the Palestinians, not the other way around.