Fifth light

Posted on 12/05/2010 by Meryl Yourish

A couple of swingin’ Chanukah songs, courtesy of reader Michael J.:

And Ladino!

Virtual Menorah: Fifth light

Fifth light

Posted in Holidays | Comments Off on Fifth light

Time out for a religious controversy

Posted on 12/05/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Here is where I put up a post that causes a wildfire of its own in the comments section.

Shas’ spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef implied on Saturday night that the fire raging on Mount Carmel in northern Israel was a punishment from God for religious offenses committed by the area’s residents.

During his weekly sermon, the rabbi read a section from the Babylonian Talmud, which states that “the fire only exists in a place where Shabbat is desecrated.”

“A number of houses were destroyed, entire neighborhoods were lost – all under supervision,” the rabbi said. He recommended that people “study Torah, engage in good deeds, repent, observe Shabbat, and know the entire Halacha, and thanks to this God will apply a full recovery.”

On Friday, a day after fires began blazing on the Mount Carmel range, ultra-Orthodox newspapers called for self-scrutiny, saying the disaster was a sign from God.

I’m going to call bullshit on that theory. Make that: Incredible bullshit. Because by calling disasters a punishment from God for not being observant enough, you have to maintain constistency with that and say that people who get cancer are being punished by God for not being observant enough. And as extremely observant Jews also die of cancer and other diseases, I’m going to have to go with: Bullshit.

Here’s my interpretation of the fires: Although a great tragedy, they are also a blessing in that they alerted Israel’s government to a threat that there was not enough protection for: The aftermath of thousands of missiles raining down from Gaza and Lebanon. Fires will absolutely start in the event that there is a missile war. The IDF will not be able to prevent all, or even most, of those missiles from landing. And there are a lot of natural gas tanks in Israel. There will be fires. Now the IDF knows that it has an unprotected flank that needs protecting. And Israel is nothing if not responsive to new threats. As Israel’s enemies come up with new threats, Israelis come up with new ways to counter them. The terror war is over. There are no more suicide bombings (though not for lack of trying). The IDF and the security fence have defeated the suicide bombers that used to strike several times a day.

I am confident that Israelis will fix the problem. Just as I am confident that God is not punishing several dozen Israel prison guard cadets who perished trying to save prisoners from the approaching flames.

Posted in Israel, Religion | 9 Comments

Fourth light

Posted on 12/04/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Are you ready for the Chipmunk Hanukkah song? Yes, I had it a couple of years ago, but that was then.

Virtual Menorah: Fourth light

Fourth light

Posted in Holidays | Comments Off on Fourth light

Saturday things

Posted on 12/04/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Thing 1: The fire in Israel is easing up. Thank goodness. It’s not under control yet, but it’s likely to be there soon.

Thing 2: Is it really a flash mob if it’s obviously a well-trained choir meeting at a big place to sing the Hallelujah Chorus? (It’s still pretty neat. Wish they’d come to my mall.

Thing 3: How fast is Tig? Well, he was downstairs in the bedroom directly below mine. The master bathroom is upstairs, off my bedroom, which is in the back of the house. It’s big enough that I can keep the cats’ litter box and food dishes there, well apart, and still have a ton of room for me and my things. Yesterday, Tig was sitting in the window in the downstairs bathroom, which is all the way at the back of my condo. To get upstairs, he has to go across the entire condo. That’s through the bedroom, down the hall, through the dining room and Great Room, up the stairs, across the landing, down the hall, and into the master bathroom. Gracie was upstairs in the bathroom with me, indicating that it was lunchtime by staring at her food dish. So I picked up the container of cat food, started pouring it into the dishes, and before I could get to the second dish, Tigger was in the bathroom. I only pour about a handful into each bowl.

Yeah, he’s that fast. I may have to start calling him Flash.

Thing 4: I would just like to repeat my warning that if I ever, ever, ever hear about male menopause again, I will not be able to restrain myself from sticking something very painful into that man’s eye. You know what’s even more fun that hot flashes in the summer? Hot flashes in the winter, so that when they stop, you’re drenched in sweat in the freezing cold weather. Woo-hoo! Sleeping is so much more fun when your body mimics having a fever every single night.

Posted in Cats, Life | 4 Comments

Third light

Posted on 12/03/2010 by Meryl Yourish

This one’s thanks to Sarah.

And: Virtual Menorah.

Third light

Posted in Holidays | 1 Comment

Wikileaks and Erdogan as Mini-Me

Posted on 12/03/2010 by Rabbi Kaufman

Our thoughts today continue to be with the people of Israel dealing with the horrific fire in the Carmel Forest.

I saw this morning that PM Netanyahu and PM Erdogan of Turkey spoke this morning for the first time. Netanyahu thanked Erdogan for sending planes to help Israel fight the forest fire. The Turkish assistance was among the first aid to arrive in Israel. Now, you may say, “Turkey needed to do something!” Yet, there was no expectation that they would. Relations have fallen to such depths in recent months that I doubt there would have been much surprise had Turkey sent no aid. In the JPost article, Netanyahu said, “I really appreciate Turkey’s help, we will find a way to express our appreciation” and that this action “will serve as an opening to improve relations between Israel and Turkey.”

This got me thinking about how the Wikileaks documents have affected Erdogan specifically. I am not saying that any change in attitude has resulted in assistance coming from Turkey. My friend, Barry Rubin, pointed out that Israel sent a lot of aid when Turkey was struck by a big Earthquake. Thus, it is unlikely that Turkey sending aid to Israel is the result of any new policy toward Israel as such.

That all said, for some time now, Turkey and Iran have been building a friendship. Erdogan has tried to become a player among the leaders of the Arab League nations and has had a view of the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the Israel-Arab conflict that is in line with Iran’s and Syria’s. One thing that the Wikileaks documents have demonstrated conclusively is that most of the Arab League’s leaders do not share this view, especially concerning the Israel-Arab conflict.  In fact, what they perceive is not an Israel-Arab conflict, but instead they see a conflict in which those Arab nations allied with the West are on the same side as Israel against Iran and its “emirates.”

In the Wikileaks documents, Erdogan does not come across well. He is described, among other things, as avoiding any sources of information that were not Islamist. One must wonder whether or not this reliance on Islamist sources, especially if any significant portion of them came from Iran, misled Erdogan into believing what he wanted to believe was true, reinforcing his anti-Israel and anti-Western attitudes and strengthening his pro-Iran convictions. It seems likely that this is the case. Erdogan may even have come to believe that by standing up for Iran against America and Israel, he would be seen as a hero in the Arab and Muslim world.

One may ask, how could he have come to believe this? The answer is simple. No one among the rest of the Western allied Arab leaders would tell him what they really believed because they worried it would get back to Iran. They didn’t trust Erdogan. They saw him, not as a leader of the Muslim world, but as a lackey of Iran, an assistant to the Islamist radical enemy. So Erdogan could go forth under a delusion that he was supported by more than Syria and Iran.

Fast forward a few months to the State Department Wikileaks. Suddenly Erdogan is confronted with the truth. The rug has been yanked out from under him and the blindfold removed from his face. He was not being respected for his pro-Iran anti-Western stance, but being disrespected. He was totally wrong about how most Arab leaders felt about Iran and for that matter, about Israel.

I’m not about to say that Erdogan is going to shed his Islamist underpinnings and become a lover of Zion, nor am I going to say that things are going to vastly improve between Turkey, America, and Israel overnight. Erdogan could decide to make a firmer stand with Iran. However, Erdogan believed himself to be the potential restorer of the Ottoman Caliphate, as the major leader of the Arab and broader Muslim worlds. It must be difficult to find out that most view him, not as a hero, but as Mini-Me to Ahmadinejad’s Doctor Evil even though in stature Ahmadinejad would give Napoleon a run for his money as shortest dictator.

Dr. Evil and Mini-Me

This is of course is unless they cast Assad of Syria (Baby Dorktator) in the role of Mini-Me in which case Erdogan becomes…wait for it…

–

–

–

–

–

Fat Bastard

Might make you reassess your political life a bit.

Chappy Chanukah!

Posted in Israel | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

Another Master of Juvenile Scorn

Posted on 12/03/2010 by Meryl Yourish

I think I already bestowed this title on Jeffrey Goldberg, but I’m going to point out again how he is, indeed, a Master of Juvenile Scorn on the same level as yours truly (and that is a rare, rare, rare honor given by me).

Here’s a fact that might astonish Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, whose book, “The Israel Lobby,” posits the existence of a nefarious, all-powerful Jewish lobby that works in direct opposition to American interests: The “Lobby” (they love to capitalize the word, to accentuate its alleged uniqueness) has failed to convince two successive American administrations, one Republican and one Democratic, to attack Iran’s nuclear sites. So much for Jewish power.

Here’s another fact that might astonish Walt and Mearsheimer: It turns out that the Jewish lobby wasn’t even the main lobby working to bring about an attack on Iran. It was, according to the treasure trove of State Department cables released by Wikileaks, the Arab lobby — whose lead lobbyist is, by the way, the King of Saudi Arabia (which is a big job, since he’s also in charge of the world’s oil supply) — that was at the forefront of an intensive, even ferocious, anti-Iran lobbying effort. For Walt and Mearsheimer to acknowledge that the Arab lobby, and not the Jewish lobby, was the prime mover of this issue would mean that they would have to recall their book, and somehow stuff back into a bottle all of the anti-Semitic invective they unleashed in the book’s wake. So don’t expect an apology anytime soon.

In sum, what we have here is a situation in which all of the Semites in combination have been proven impotent in their attempt to move American foreign policy. Which suggests that American foreign policy might actually be made by Americans. This is definitely a tough week for the neo-Lindberghians.

He should be a regular read for us all.

I think we were separated at birth. I’ve found my long-lost brother. Welcome to the family!

Posted in Anti-Semitism, Juvenile Scorn | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Friday fire briefs

Posted on 12/03/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Pray for rain: Jameel is live-blogging the fire again.

Tragedy trumps posturing? Netanyahu and Erdogan talk. If only Erdogan keeps this attitude after the disaster is over, because NFW is Israel going to apologize to Turkey.

Just how old is Israel’s fire equipment? Seriously? Israel isn’t prepared for large fires? Because fires never occur in a hot, dry climate. Hey, you may not agree with Aluf Benn’s premise about Iran, but his point about the fires cannot be argued. Netanyahu said as much: Israel can’t fight this fire alone. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg sent a 747 filled with fire retardant chemicals.

Only in Israel: A “quiet frequency” exists for religious Jews. It will broadcast only emergency instructions, remaining quite the rest of the time, so that observant Jews can leave their radios on during Shabbat and receive warnings if need be.

One last note: On this Shabbat, Jews around the world are praying for divine help with the fire in Israel. Non-Jewish prayers will be very, very welcome, too.

Posted in Israel, Turkey | Tagged | Comments Off on Friday fire briefs

Delegitimizing Israel, one sentence at a time

Posted on 12/03/2010 by Meryl Yourish

It’s not my imagination, it’s a real anti-Israel bias. The AP put out an update on the Israeli fires, and the overnight editor appears not to hate Israel at all. (H/T: Y from the comments.)

“Fire extinguishing planes were on their way from Britain and Cyprus as well as aid from the U.S., Russia, Egypt, Spain, Azerbaijan, Romania and Turkey — which put aside recent tensions to lend a hand”.

But when the morning update went out, it was changed to this:

Some 100 firefighters from Bulgaria arrived as well as fire extinguishing planes and crews from Greece and Britain, Israeli officials said. More aid was on its way from the United States, Russia, Egypt, Cyprus, Jordan, Spain, Azerbaijan, Romania and Turkey – which put aside tensions over Israel’s deadly raid on a Turkish Gaza-bound flotilla in May to lend a hand.

Notice that in the update, the spin is back to the AP boilerplate about the “deadly raid,” without any balance, although it’s better than the version from yesterday.

Once close allies, Israel-Turkish relations have been in a crisis since Israel’s bloody attack May 31 on a Turkish flotilla trying to break Israel’s blockade on Gaza.

But this shows that there is no Israel article that cannot be spun against Israel by an AP editor, even in the most minor of ways. And why am I picking out this single change in the AP updates on the Israeli fire stories? Because this is the way a nation is delegitimized—by putting constant negative portrayals out in everything you possibly can, even stories about the worst fire in Israel’s history.

Impressions count, after a while. Look at the polls in Europe that say that Israel is a greater danger to the world than Iran. They are fueled by editing like this.

Posted in AP Media Bias, Israel | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Fire in Israel

Posted on 12/02/2010 by Meryl Yourish

The largest forest fire in Israel’s history has already taken dozens of lives. Turkey is actually offering to help. The AP still can’t resist inserting its boilerplate about the flotilla (of course, never adding that the “bloody attack” was due to Turkish “activists” attacking soldiers before their feet touched the deck).

Netanyahu’s office said Turkey was offering assistance, in a positive gesture after months of tensions. Once close allies, Israel-Turkish relations have been in a crisis since Israel’s bloody attack May 31 on a Turkish flotilla trying to break Israel’s blockade on Gaza.

Pray for rain. Failing that, send fire-fighting planes and helicopters.

Update 10 p.m.: Jameel is liveblogging, or was—he’s gone to bed by now.

Posted in Israel, Media Bias, World | 2 Comments

Second light

Posted on 12/02/2010 by Meryl Yourish

I stopped too soon while watching this video when I first found it. Sabba Hillel emailed me about it, so I decided to watch the whole thing. Singing, dancing, ice skating, men, women, Greeks who look like Romans, and some kind of furry monster in a cage. Also, that creepy-looking nutcracker. Really, if I’d grown up with those things in my home, I’d have had nightmares every Christmas. (The nutcracker gets clonked in the head, which makes things much better for me.)

Also, Virtual Menorah:

Second light

Posted in Holidays | Comments Off on Second light

When a rise in unemployment is not a rise in unemployment

Posted on 12/02/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Observe the AP spinmeisters explaining how a more than 5% rise in unemployment is not a rise in unemployment:

More Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week, but the broader trend in layoffs points to a slowly healing job market.

The Labor Department says new claims for unemployment aid rose last week by a seasonally adjusted 26,000 to 436,000. The previous week’s claims were revised up slightly to show applications had tumbled by 31,000 to 410,000. The figures are often volatile during the weeks around the Veteran’s Day and Thanksgiving holidays.

Oh, so it’s a “slowly healing job market”? Does that mean that unemployment figures are falling?

Even so, the longer-term trend has shown a downward drift.

Um—what?

The four-week moving average of claims, which smooths volatility, fell to 431,000 last week, a two-year low.

Oh, the average number of claims fell over the last four weeks. Well, that’s good, right?

Employers have been reluctant to ramp up hiring this year, even as the economy grows modestly.

The economy added 151,000 jobs in October, the first increase in total payrolls in five months. Private companies were responsible for all of the new jobs. But the increase in hiring still wasn’t strong enough to lower the unemployment rate, which has been stuck at 9.6 percent.

Uh-huh. So, unemployment is unchanged.

Overall, 8.9 million people are receiving jobless aid, including 4.9 million that are doing so through the federally funded extended benefit programs. Those provide up to 99 weeks of benefits.

Yep. Unchanged. And here’s another story that explains our current non-recovery better than the AP could. Charlie Brown’s is my all-time favorite restaurant chain. I started going to the one in Montclair when I was in college. If you wanted to have dinner there on Saturday night, you could expect a minimum 30-minute wait, which is why they developed call-ahead seating. It was busy much of the rest of the week as well. I was a bit worried the last time I was there, because it was a Saturday night and they weren’t that busy. I was right to be worried.

The New Jersey company that operates Charlie Brown Steakhouse restaurants announced today the closure of 20 restaurants, including 13 in New Jersey.

CB Holdings, based in Mountainside, said the New Jersey closures would include restaurants in Alpha, Blackwood, Clifton, Green Brook, Hackettstown, Highland Park, Hillsborough, Matawan, Montclair, Piscataway, South Brunswick, Tenafly and Union.

The company is also closing two Charlie Brown’s in New York and five in Pennsylvania. CB Holdings also announced the closure of 10 Bugaboo Creek Steak House locations in Atlanta and Massachusetts.

The closures would affect 1,400 employees throughout the company, according to a report on NorthJersey.com.

The company is citing higher food costs and the recession as it enters bankruptcy proceedings. And it couldn’t get enough credit to cover the nut during the bad times—partly due to the continuing reverberations of the economic meltdown of the last three years.

The 1,400 people in those 20 stores being shuttered may or may not be counted on the unemployment rolls in the above report, because they are waitstaff, kitchen staff, part-timers, college kids looking to pay their way through school, and probably some illegals working tables. And yet, another 1,400 people lost their jobs.

But the AP tells us that on the average, unemployment is falling. Kind of. Sort of. A little bit. Maybe. If you average things, and estimate this, and count that.

Yeah, that’s not gonna put food on these people’s tables.

Posted in American Scene, AP Media Bias | Tagged | Comments Off on When a rise in unemployment is not a rise in unemployment

There is referendum and then there is referendum

Posted on 12/02/2010 by SnoopyTheGoon

There is a good referendum:

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh says group will back formation of Palestinian state with 1967 borders, Jerusalem as capital and resolution of refugee issue if approved by referendum, despite group’s differing ideology.

And then there is a bad referendum:

The Arab League on Wednesday slammed a new Israeli law mandating a national referendum ahead of any withdrawal from annexed east Jerusalem or the Golan Heights.The League’s deputy secretary general, Ahmed bin Helli, said the law “showed clearly the hostile nature of the Israeli government and the fact that it does not take international law and the foundations of the peace process seriously.”

Now, how could a regular person figure out in advance what is a bad referendum and what is a good one? I am real confused here. Time for a confusion sign:


Cross-posted on SimplyJews

Posted in Hamas, Israel, Politics | 1 Comment

Thursday, briefly

Posted on 12/02/2010 by Meryl Yourish

Behold, the awesome power of Zionists! A Turkish tool is blaming—who else?—Israel for the Wikileaks cables about his boss’ Islamism. The little Islamist is also saying that the entire reason for Wikileaks was to harm Turkey. Egocentric much?

Speaking of nutjobs: Muammar Gaddafi, he of the thousand-spellings-name, is proposing “Isratine” to the UN, and hilarity ensued. This is my favorite part of the story:

The proposal also managed to confuse African and Arab member states, which did not know whether to object, abstain, or just leave the venue.

Wait, what? You’re confusing the narrative! Make it stop!

What’s happening at the Oxford Union? First the Israeli position wins a debate, and now the audience is respectful of an Israeli speaker. And this is an awesome quote:

He also fielded a number of poignant questions on subjects such as West Bank settlements. Jerusalem was the capital of Israel when London was just swamplands, he remarked in answer to one student.

There is no story that the AP can’t spin anti-Israel: This one is on Hanukkah. What does the AP put out on the first night? A warning that menorahs can cause house fires. Eff you, AP, and all your anti-Israel writers and editors.

Pay attention, anti-Israel pundits: You’re all wrong. No, really. Wikileaks proved it. The Arab world hates and fears Iran. And there is no linkage between Iran and peace with Israel.

Posted in Iran, Israel Derangement Syndrome, Turkey, United Nations | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

The Last American Gladiator

Posted on 12/01/2010 by Meryl Yourish

If you’re in the Richmond area on Friday, you should attend Slash Coleman‘s performance of The Last American Gladiator.

When: Friday, December 3, 2010

Time: 6:00 – 8:00

Where: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA)

200 Boulevard

Richmond, VA 23221

Price: Free

Slash comes up to the DC area to perform as well, and you won’t regret spending a couple of hours in his presence. He’s a performance artist—storytelling and singing—and I was marveling at the writing as well as at the acting. It’s all autobiographical, but as a writer, I knew that while all of his stories held kernels of truth, I wondered how much extra Slash was putting in. Then he told the story of his nephew’s bar mitzvah, the pintele yid, and “Rabbi Shmuley,” and I figured out exactly how much was added. Because that’s the part of the story that I know personally, having taught his nephew’s brother during that time. Yep. There’s a lot of extra thrown in.

It’s a marvelous show. It’s all about growing up Jewish in the Capital of the Confederacy. This show utterly deserves to be given in front of an audience in the biggest JCC in the nation. (I wonder how I go about getting that to happen. If I have any influential readers out there in JCC-land, seriously, go see the show. You’ll agree with me.)

Oh, the crowd tonight? I got the feeling that if I’d yelled out “Sarah Palin!” half of them might have fainted. (Don’t worry, I know when not to stir people up.)

Posted in Jews, Life | 1 Comment