Wilma!

It’s an old Flinstones commercial, back when they were sponsored by Winston.

Longtime readers will know that I utterly loathe scientology, the faux religion that got its tax-exempt religious status by being the only organization in the world that managed to out-harry the IRS. A little reading up on the so-called church will show you a history of bullying, lawsuits, illegal activities, and attempts to shut down all criticism of scientology. It is one of the only religions in the world that copyrights its holy books. I defy you to find the copyright owner of the Torah, the New Testament, or even the Koran. If you and I wanted to reproduce an entire Bible on a blog, we could do so freely and without penalty. Scientology has a long history of shutting down websites and message boards that use its materials to criticize it.

Keith Henson was arrested and convicted in California of a heinous “hate crime” law: “Interfering with a religion.” He was picketing scientology. In fear of what would happen to him if he went to jail, he fled to Canada instead, but left Canada some time ago (which explains why I could never find an update beyond his arrest in Canada).

The police in Arizona caught him a few days ago, and he was arrested and is now out on bond. He is fighting extradition to California, but it seems the scientologists have already caught up with him in Arizona: He was mistreated by the police while in prison.

There is a Keith Henson Legal Support Fund to which you can donate. But please, click those links above and read up on the history of this “church.”

Every so often, particularly after I write something about scientology, one of their lemmings writes me an email pretending not to be from the group, asking me about scientology and what I’m writing. They are the most paranoid people this side of Kim Jung Il. They are schooled in deception and misrepresentation (let us never forget Tom Cruise’s little appearance on the Today Show, where he opined that he is more knowledgeable about antidepressants than the entire medical industry). They shout down all criticism as “bigotry” (count the number of times “bigot” comes out of Cruise’s mouth when talking about scientology). Germany refuses to recognize them as a church. Our country should take another look at this cult that masquerades as a church, and strip it of its tax-free status.

Free Keith Henson, the blog devoted to news of his fight against the cult, is now a permalink on this blog. It’s going to remain there until Keith goes free for good.

The palestinians were allowed to completely desecrate Joseph’s Tomb (as well as murder Israelis who tried to stop them, or simply protect the Torah scrolls from the mob). They have destroyed precious artifacts from the Temple area, specifically from Solomon’s Stables. They constantly accuse Israel of destroying the mosque (that was deliberately built on top of the Temple Mount after the Muslim conquest, which is what Muslims do), and of “judaizing” Jerusalem—in the lies they tell that Jerusalem has no Jewish history, in spite of mountains of archeological proof to the contrary.

So now they’re trying to start another lie, that archeologists are trying to destroy the mosque from underneath. They are trying to riot.

Palestinian organizations threatened on Tuesday to respond with attacks inside Israel if its Antiquities Authority continues works to reinforce the Mugrabi Gate, which leads to the Temple Mount and is in danger of collapsing.

Several Arab youths hurled rocks at security forces Tuesday afternoon in protest at the works.

And Jordan, which is desecrating the Temple Mount by adding another minaret to the mosque, is helping the riots along by jumping in and accusing Israel of causing—wait for it—tensions that could “derail” peace talks. Uh-huh. The nonexistent peace talks are going to fail because Israeli architects are trying to repair a damaged bridge.

“Israeli excavation works near the al-Aqsa mosque in the holy city of Jerusalem have led to a dangerous rise in Middle East tensions and could derail revival of Arab-Israeli peace talks,” Jordan’s King Abdullah said on Tuesday.

“What Israel is doing in its practices and attacks against our sacred Muslim sites in Jerusalem and al-Aqsa is a blatant violation that is not acceptable under any pretext,” the monarch was quoted by the state news agency Petra as saying.

And let’s hear from the “moderate” king of Jordan:

“This is a dangerous escalation we have seen in the last few hours … These works and excavations pose a threat to the foundations of al-Aqsa (al-Sherif),” the monarch said.

Liar.

Yuval Baruch, a Jerusalem district archeologist, said that the reinforcement works at the Mugrabi Gate are nowhere near the Temple Mount.

The Antiquities Authority intends to insert support columns for the Mugrabi Gate after the original pathway collapsed during a snow storm in 2004 and the temporary bridge constructed at the site was deemed dangerous.

The Mugrabi Gate is used by Jews and tourists to reach the Temple Mount. It is also where police prepare to break into the Mount on Fridays when riots develop at the site.

Watch for Israel to cave to the pressure. Countdown to Ahmadinejad’s accusation in three, two….

There is something unfair in sitting home during a rainy day in your favorite armchair with your favorite cat purring near the keyboard (in expectation that you will go away for a few moments, forgetting to close the laptop’s lid and he will be able to rip out a few keys at his leisure then), while doing an easy fisk of another Fisk. But a man must do what a man must do.

Fisk, you see, decided to declare a war on the word “terror”. He obviously does not like it when applied to his Hezbollah friends and to their more distant Hamas brethren.

Lebanon is as good a place as any to find out what a load of old tosh the “terror” merchants talk. For here it is that the hydra-headed monster of Iran is supposedly stalking the streets of Beirut, staging a coup against Mr Siniora and his ministers.

That’s a quote so loaded with sarcasm that one wonders about the state of the author’s liver. Probably some irregularity that causes a sarcasm overload where none is due. Not if one reads, even inattentively, the interview given by Hezbollah founder and ex leader Sheikh Subhi Al-Tufeili:

Al-Tufeili: “Yes, Hizbullah is a tool, and it is an integral part of the Iranian intelligence apparatus. Unfortunately, all the elements in the [Lebanese] arena have become tools, and take orders from outside [Lebanon]…”

But a small fact like this cannot and does not interfere with Fisk’s eruption of bile. And of course, being so confused that being consistent is already beyond his obviously impaired facilities, he contradicts himself a bit later:

Of course, the crisis in Lebanon is also about Iran and Syria, especially Iran’s determination to damage or destroy any Middle East government which has earned America’s friendship.

Go figure what passes through his feverish brain when cobbling words together. Must be tough on him, no doubt. But the main thrust of the article is about trying to persuade the reader that the putsch attempt that is going on in Beirut and is financed by Iran, as it is widely reported even by Hezbollah sympathizers, is no more and no less than a social revolution. Not an open and blatant attempt of a coup, financed by Iran and lead by Hezbollah chiefs, but a grass-root attempt by the downtrodden Shia masses to put right everything that is wrong in Lebanese society.

Everything we see, read and hear about Lebanon for the last several months notwithstanding. And you were not confronted yet with this astounding pearl of wisdom:

“…Washington still doesn’t seem to understand that sectarian politics mean that Lebanon cannot have a normal democracy.”

No, there isn’t a lot to fisk. Back to the cat who is hell bent on destroying that laptop.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews