European cultural superiority

Posted on 05/25/2008 by Meryl Yourish

The next time someone tries to tell you how culturally superior Europe is to us, send them to YouTube to see the entries in this year’s Eurovision contest.

Pay particular attention to the Russian entry. It won.

Snoopy, if you can enlighten me as to what on earth the ice skater is supposed to represent, I’d be grateful. If you want to see the Russian entry in its entirety, feel free. I’m thinking there isn’t a single straight man in that video, but hey, book, cover, etc.

As for the rest, well, check out Estonia and Belgium. Oh. My. God.

I’ll be discussing the Eurovision contest in my upcoming Shire Network News contribution.

Oh, I almost forgot: I have something in the recent SNN, which is actually hosted from the Shire this week. I’ll split out my essay later this weekend.

Posted in Juvenile Scorn, Podcasts, Pop Culture | 4 Comments

Amy Winehouse in, Norman Finkelstein out

Posted on 05/24/2008 by SnoopyTheGoon

The Shin Bet security service detained and deported an American Jewish professor who is a prominent critic of the Israeli occupation when he landed at Ben-Gurion International Airport on Friday.

There are some official reasons for booting the creep out, but the real one is:

Grammy Award winning recording artist Amy Winehouse is due in Israel “within weeks” to undergo a drug rehabilitation program, according to the London-based Jewish Chronicle newspaper.

We have a small place here, Norm, and two of you will be just one too many, you see. But you can always visit your Hezbollah buddies instead.

This is close enough for us, I suggest. And the place is fitting.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews.

Posted in Israel Derangement Syndrome | 2 Comments

Briefly

Posted on 05/24/2008 by Meryl Yourish

Things for you to look at this weekend, which is a three-day weekend for us ‘Murricans.

Toldja so: Syria wants the Golan, not peace.

A Syrian government paper rejects Israel’s demand that Damascus should cut its ties with Iran and Arab militant groups as a condition for peace agreement with the Jewish State.

The state-run Tishrin says in Saturday’s editorial that any preconditions to a deal would “put the carriage before the horse” and Syria’s relations with other nations were not on the bargaining table.

That’s why it’s all for show: Mad Mahmoud is not really mad. I don’t believe this report at all. It’s all part of the plan to make it look like Syria is on the peace track.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has expressed his surprise and displeasure at Syria’s “violation of its commitment to Iran” by holding talks with Israel, the London-based pan-Arabic daily Asharq alawsat reported Friday.

Proof that Syria’s not syrious: It’s playing the Iran/IAEA game. Funny, you’d think that if Syria has nothing to hide, they’d welcome the IAEA investigation. Which makes it even more likely that Syria was building nukes. (Like I needed any more proof than there’s already been.)

Syria has not yet accepted a request by the International Atomic Energy Agency to visit the site bombed by the IAF on September 6 – which Washington says was a nuclear reactor, Reuters reported Friday.

The news agency quoted diplomats in Vienna as saying Damascus was stalling its approval of the UN delegation, demanding more details on the proposed inspection.

Yeah, tell me again how it wasn’t a nuclear reactor being built. Because why on earth would Syria care if it wasn’t?

Gaza bombardment continues: No, not the bombardment of Gaza. The bombardment by Gaza. Of course.

Israeli Double Standard Time: Egypt shot another Sudanese refugee at the Egypt/Israel border. The UN will not issue any statements about this, nor will most newspapers even pick up the story. So, are we all shocked yet? Of course not. Today is a day that ends with a “y”, which is the only time that Israeli Double Standard Time occurs.

And I’m outta here. Talk amongst yourselves. Really.

Posted in Gaza, Iran, Israel, Syria | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Oh, c’mon, he’s not that bad

Posted on 05/23/2008 by Meryl Yourish

The British papers are having a field day with this one: The IAF threatened to shoot down Tony Blair’s jet Wednesday.

Two Israeli fighter aircraft threatened to shoot down a private jet transporting Tony Blair after coming under the misapprehension that the aircraft was staging a potential terrorist attack.

Blair, who has served for 11 months as the Middle East “quartet” envoy, was en route to Israel from a World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting at Sharm el Sheikh, in Egypt, on Wednesday morning when the warplanes were scrambled to intercept the jet, according to a report in the Times.

It is understood air traffic controllers noticed what they thought was a suspicious aircraft heading into Israeli airspace from the Sinai peninsula and tried to make contact.

Receiving no response, Israel sent out two fighters which flew above the civilian aircraft to indicate to the pilot he was being considered a suspect target.

It was only after the warplanes were positioned in attack mode that the aircraft’s crew made contact, informing air traffic control that Blair was on the flight.

Look, we know he’s really not the most pro-Israel of people, and he’s interfering trying to help negotiate some kind of deal between Israel and the PA, but he’s not that bad. No need to shoot his plane out of the sky.

Heh.

Posted in Israel | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Palestinian terror at the crossings

Posted on 05/23/2008 by Meryl Yourish

Once again, Palestinians are the cause of the crossings into Gaza closing. Once again, the UN is telling Israel that even though Palestinians are trying to kill soldiers and civilians via terror attacks from the crossings, Israel should not close them. Unbelievable.

A potentially disastrous terror attack at the Erez Crossing into the Gaza Strip was averted on Thursday when a Palestinian suicide bomber driving a truck loaded with four tons of explosives tried ramming his way into Israel, killing himself but causing no other casualties.

Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack on Erez, which is the main crossing point for international aid workers and Palestinians traveling to Israel for medical treatment.

The explosion created a huge ditch in the ground and caused serious damage to the surrounding buildings, forcing the IDF to shut down the crossing. As a result, 31 Palestinians who had permits to enter Israel for medical treatment had to return home.

The attack also caused power outages throughout northern Gaza, in Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun and Jabalya. Officials said that Erez would remain closed for several days until the damage was repaired.

So, let’s recap: Palestinians seeking medical treatment could not get it because of the terror attack. Power was cut because of the terror attack. And the crossing was closed because four tons of explosives damaged it heavily enough that it will take days to fix. And what does the UN representative have to say?

John Ging, the Gaza director of the UN organization in charge of Palestinian refugees, urged Israel not to let attacks like the one on Erez halt the flow of goods into Gaza. “If you hand the agenda over to the extremists, then they are very happy about it. If it only takes one rocket to derail everything, then that’s massive power,” Ging said.

Really? I would say that four tons of explosives, followed by heavily-armed terrorists in jeeps ready to kill and kidnap more Israeli soldiers, is pretty massive power. But hey, I have a brain in my head that’s untainted by whatever you need to have in order to work for the UN.

And here’s the best part of it all: The terrorists say they attacked Israel in order to force Israel to agree to the truce. You know, from the “Take the truce terms or we’ll kill you” school of negotiations.

Abu Ahmad, the Islamic Jihad spokesman, linked the attack to the failed ceasefire talks and said the bombing was meant to “send a message” to Israel that if it did not accept a truce “Gaza is not going to be a place where you will enjoy stability.”

Yeah. That’s the way to get a truce accepted.

Posted in Gaza, Israel, Terrorism | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Negotiating in the dark

Posted on 05/23/2008 by Soccerdad

When reading about the Israeli-Syrian negotiations it’s easy to dismiss them on account of Olmert’s legal trouble or because it isn’t even clear that Israel stands to gain anything from ceding the Golan to Syria. It’s also reasonably clear that Syria’s positions cannot be reconciled with Israel’s.

Even the past has shown that every once in a while (even with Assad Sr.) news would leak out about a “Syrian track” and then fade to nothing.

Asad’s goal, then, is not peace but a peace process. He participates in negotiations without intending that they reach fruition. Engaging in apparently serious talks wins him improved relations with the West without having to open up his country. He can wink at us while maintaining his ties to Iran and hosting a wide range of terrorist groups. He offers the occasional flourish (such as his call last week to Mr. Clinton as the latter was eating lunch with Shimon Peres) but does not change the substance.

Of course today, the negotiation, unlike what Pipes is describing seem to be intended for Israel, not the United States. Or perhaps to drive a wedge between the two countries.

So despite the record and Olmert’s political weakness, which convince some that nothing will come of these talks, Ethan Bronner of the NYT, thinks that there might be more going on.

A senior government official, who said he could not speak for attribution on such a politically delicate topic, agreed in part. He said that what Mr. Olmert was doing with the Palestinians “is much less than meets the eye.” Nonetheless, he, like others, contended that the new Syrian talks could prove significant.“This seems bigger than any one individual,” he said. “Olmert is, in a way, committing his successors who, by the way, may be coming in soon. I don’t think he will be the one to complete this. His motives may be suspicious. But something has happened here that will probably go beyond this prime minister.”

The idea that a lame duck could obligate his successor in a deal that he’s making in secret is one that’s very frightening.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

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

Syria does the expected; blames Israel

Posted on 05/23/2008 by Meryl Yourish

Just as I told you: Syria doesn’t want peace. Syria wants the Golan. And that’s about it.

Syria said on Thursday it had received guarantees from Israel via Turkey for a full withdrawal from the occupied Golan Heights and rejected conditions put by the Jewish state for concluding a peace deal.

Israel and Syria on Wednesday announced that they had begun indirect talks in Turkey, the first of their kind in eight years. But Israeli officials on Thursday said Damascus must distance itself from Iran and stop supporting Palestinian and Lebanese militants.

“We received commitments and messages from the Israeli government and the Israeli prime minister that guarantee, via the Turks, that he knows what the Syrians want,” Syrian Information Minister Muhsin Bilal told al-Jazeera television.

“He knows that the whole of the Golan Heights will be returned to Syria and that Israel will withdraw to the lines of June 4, 1967.”

Shyeah. Right. They’re called the 1949 Armistice Lines, and that ain’t happening. Because Syria refuses to give up on trying to destroy Israel by proxy (since they’ve failed every time they’ve tried themselves).

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, echoing US comments, said Syria should distance itself from groups such as Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, some of whose leaders it hosts, as well as Lebanon’s Hizbullah terror group.

“When they make these demands, they are setting conditions and the issue of peace, the peace process does not require prior conditions,” Bilal said.

And get this:

“These conditions have already been rejected as is the phrase ‘painful concessions’ since what the Syrians are demanding is their right.”

Bilal said there was no painful concession involved in Israel returning land that belongs to Syria anyway.

Not anymore it doesn’t. And it may never again. That’s what happens when you use the land to bombard civilians.

Posted in Israel | 2 Comments

Pissing off the neo-Nazis: I’m doing something right

Posted on 05/23/2008 by Meryl Yourish

So my post yesterday appears to have pissed off the neo-Nazis so much, that they copied me on a sock-puppet email conversation about some Jew converting to Christianity. I expect they wanted me to join in, or be hurt, or curl up and cry over the fact that someone converted from Judaism to another religion. Gee, like that never happened before.

Maybe they thought I’d get mad or something. Nah. I think I’ll just back up yesterday’s post with numbers. 155 Jewish Nobel prize winners since the prize began. Let’s see, 49 in biomedical science, 23 in economics, 27 in chemistry, 44 in physics, 12 in literature.

And gee, there are basically no Jews giving out the prizes, so there goes that conspiracy theory. 155 prizes out of a total of 797. Gee, what’s that percentage? Carry the one, subtract the—wow, that’s nearly twenty percent given to the Jews.

So, how many Nobel prizes have British neo-Nazis won over the years?

None. That’s right. A great big goose egg.

Have a nice day, boys. Try not to let those penises get any smaller.

Posted in Anti-Semitism, Juvenile Scorn | Tagged , | 6 Comments

Life is good

Posted on 05/22/2008 by Meryl Yourish

I’m in my office, working. It’s been a very busy day. But right now, Tig3.0 is asleep on my lap. Can’t get you a picture, because the camera is downstairs—but life is good.

I haven’t had a lapcat in eleven years. It’s nice.

Posted in Cats | Tagged | Comments Off on Life is good

Dear Mr. Hoyt

Posted on 05/22/2008 by Soccerdad

Dear Mr. Hoyt,

In her valedictory from the Middle East, Deborah Sontag wrote “Quest for Mideast Peace: How and Why it failed.” In it she tells a story:

But Palestinians drove away from that dinner with something else on their minds — Mr. Sharon’s coming visit to what Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary and Jews know as the Temple Mount. Mr. Arafat said in an interview that he huddled on the balcony with Mr. Barak and implored him to block Mr. Sharon’s plans. But Mr. Barak’s government perceived the planned visit by Mr. Sharon, then the opposition leader, as solely an internal Israeli political matter, specifically as an attempt to divert attention from the expected return to political life by a right-wing rival — Benjamin Netanyahu, the former prime minister. On the heels of very intricate grappling at Camp David over the future status of the Old City’s holy sites, Mr. Sharon’s heavily guarded visit to the plaza outside Al Aksa Mosque to demonstrate Jewish sovereignty over the Temple Mount set off angry Palestinian demonstrations. The Israelis used lethal force to put them down. The cycle of violence started, escalated, mutated and built to a peak between mid-May and June 1 with the Israeli use of F-16 fighter jets in Nablus and the terrorist bombing outside a Tel Aviv disco.

Let’s go back to September 27, 2000 and see another report also written by Sontag, Arafat’s Visit to Barak’s Place Broke the Ice, Both Sides Say:

It was just a little suburban dinner party, nothing fancy. The host and his guest of honor cracked jokes. They strolled in the garden for an intimate chat. And then the host kissed his guest goodbye, walked him to a waiting Israeli military helicopter and waved as the guest, wearing his trademark kaffiyeh, flew back to Gaza City. A senior adviser to Yasir Arafat said the late-night supper, at Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s private home in Kochav Yair on Monday, was the single best meeting ever between the Palestinian and Israeli leaders.

Does that sound like Arafat “implored” Barak to prevent Ariel Sharon’s walk on the Temple Mount? Or put differently, if Arafat had expressed such a concern and Barak had ignored it, would Arafat have described the meeting as the “best” one he ever had with Barak?

Of course not. The later account was Arafat’s revisionism. Sontag reported it uncritically. Sharon’s walk on the Temple Mount wasn’t a concern. In retrospect it became an alibi for Arafat. The so-called “Aqsa intifada” wasn’t a spontaneous response to the Sharon walk, but an organized war (or mini-war) against Israel organized by Arafat. His historical revisionism, abetted by the New York Times reporter was his way of evading the blame for his responsibility.

Do you remember Tuvia Grossman? Tuvia Grossman was a young man who at the beginning of the “Aqsa intifada” was set upon by an Arab mob and beaten. Yet when his picture appeared on the front page of the Times, he was identified as a Palestinian. The picture seemed to show a young man who had just been beaten by an Israeli policeman. In fact, it was Tuvia Grossman and the policeman had been chasing off his attackers. Once one of Grossman’s relatives recognized him and informed media outlets a correction was made. Still the initial impression of most news organization led to an erroneous caption. The organization HonestReporting was founded in response to this journalistic error.

In both these cases, a narrative governed the reporting of the Times. The narrative in short was: the violence of the “Aqsa intifada” started in response to Ariel Sharon’s walk on the Temple Mount and Israel responded with disproportionate an lethal force.

There was another event that marked the early days of the violence. That was the killing of Mohammed al-Dura by Israeli troops. Al-Dura’s death became a focal point of much of the violence and tension. Or as Ms. Sontag’s husband, William Orme reported, he became A Young Symbol of Mideast Violence.

A few hours later Muhammad was dead, shot in the stomach as he crouched behind his father on the sidelines of an intensifying battle between Israeli and Palestinian security forces. The father, shouting that his boy had been killed, was also hit, taking four bullets in a volley that he later said had come from Israeli soldiers. A local ambulance driver, Bassam al-Bilbeisi, who was trying to come to the aid of the wounded father and son, was also killed by the gunfire. The entire horrific scene was filmed at close rage by a France 2 television crew.

Shown repeatedly on the Saturday evening news programs in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Israel, and throughout the Middle East, the shooting turned the 12-year-old boy into a potent new symbol of what angry Palestinians contend is their continued victimization by Israeli occupiers.

Though 11 other Palestinians were killed in the day’s fighting — most of them while taking part in the rock-hurling clashes with Israeli troops — the enduring image of the violence was a terrified Muhammad al-Durrah trapped by Israeli gunfire and then slumping lifeless into his father’s lap.

But now the narrative of Mohammed al-Dura has been called into question. A media watchdog named Phillipe Karsenty alleged that the whole scene was staged and didn’t happen. He was sued by the station that taped the scene and first reported the shooting, France 2. Karsenty was found to have libeled France 2 and its reporter Charles Enderlein. But yesterday, Karsenty’s appeal was accepted and a Paris court threw out the judgment against him.

There’s a lot to this case, not just its implications to the Middle East. For one thing, Karsenty showed during his appeal that France 2 had lied in court. There is plenty in this case that is newsworthy. And yet the New York Times has not seen fit to report on it except in its blog, even though the paper’s current Paris correspondent just completed his tour in the Middle East.

The Times’s oversight is troubling. As I’ve shown above the Times accepted a narrative that shaped a lot of its reporting at the time. One piece of that narrative was exposed quickly. In another case a Times reporter used a highly suspect statement of an interested party to support the narrative. Now another part of the narrative has been shown to be suspect. At least in the name of accuracy one would hope that the Times would look into the case and what it implies.

In addition to the immediate issue of the origins of the “Aqsa intifada“, the case calls into question the widespread use of local stringers who may be more interested in promoting an agenda than in accuracy. The Times’s lack of curiosity in this case reflects poorly on its commitment to getting the story correct.

Sincerely,
David Gerstman

ps I have posted this on my blog. If I receive a substantive response, I will post it unedited.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Posted in Israel, Media Bias | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Dear Mr. Hoyt

The Syrian “peace” talks

Posted on 05/22/2008 by Meryl Yourish

I’m only a tiny bit worried about the talks with Syria, because they’re going to fail. And they’re going to fail, because I doubt Syria will cut ties with terrorists and Iran, which is a deal-breaker for Israel.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni commented Thursday on the renewed negotiations between Israel and Syria and said any peace process hinges on Damascus’ renouncement of its support of terror.

“Israel’s primary goal has always been peace with its neighbors. The Syrians have to understand that it entails giving up their support of terror (elements), namely Hamas, Iran and Hizbullah,” Livni said at the onset of her Jerusalem meeting with French counterpart Bernard Kouchner.

There’s one interesting piece of news I didn’t know: Olmert obviously fears Livni’s chances of taking over his position. Why else would he not have her in the loop on this?

The Israeli FM did not comment on the fact that she was kept in the dark on the renewed peace talks by her fellow “Kitchen Cabinet” members – Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who led the initiative. Olmert updated Livni on the joint statement drafted by Jerusalem, Ankara and Damascus just an hour before it was issued.

Remember the last time it looked like Olmert was going to fall, Livni was announcing she was ready to take over Kadima. He bought her silence then. Looks like he’s playing politics with her future as well as Israel’s. Not that I think she’d be much better than Olmert. She’s too ready to give away the farm as well.

Meantime, the Syrians are showing the typical Arab mentality about bargaining with Israel: No concessions, no deals, just give us what we demand and STFU.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem told the newspaper “There will not be a situation in which Syria advances even one step (in the peace process) without a full withdrawal from the Golan Heights. This is not a prerequisite; it is our right.”

And oh yeah—we’re talking full withdrawal to the 1949 Armistice lines.

Senior Syrian officials were quoted by London-based Arabic-language newspaper Al-Hayat as saying that the renewed talks with Israel were aimed, among other things, to set a timetable for Israel’s withdrawal to the June 4, 1967 (pre-Six Day War) borders.

Full withdrawal without Syria’s total shutdown of terror operations and breaking off ties with Iran is not going to happen. Even if Olmert wants to agree to it, his country will refuse to follow. Even now, the Golan communities are balking. They point out that every time Olmert has been investigated for corruption and things look extremely serious, he offers up some kind of peace deal to take attention away from his crimes. They’re calling him an “interogee” publicly, a reference to the ongoing investigations.

“The Israeli public will not allow such a strange and irresponsible act that will transfer strategic and settled land to the Arab axis of evil,” he added.

Malka and Katzrin Council head Sammy Bar-Lev issued a combined statement saying that “the Prime Minister’s Office’s declaration which is presently trying in every way possible to pull Olmert away from the prongs of investigation, is a cynical and dangerous act and places personal interests above national ones.”

Meantime, Israeli analysts agree: Olmert can’t possibly pull this one off. It’s a cynical move on both their parts.

Golan residents can relax. The Golan Heights will apparently not be handed over to the Syrians in the coming years, if at all. Syria has no interest in peace with Israel, just like Israel has no interest is handing the Golan over to the Syrians.

Syria cannot deliver the minimal goods required of it; that is, severing its ties with terror organizations and the Iranian influence in favor of normalization with Israel. Meanwhile, Israel has no desire to provide the Syrians with military positions on the Golan, which would again threaten Israeli communities, or to allow the Syrians access to the Sea of Galilee.

[…] The question which many Israelis must ask themselves is not how much peace we shall receive in exchange for the Golan, as if the Heights were a tradable commodity with a set price, but rather, does Assad really want peace? Would such peace serve his supreme goal, which is the safeguarding of his regime?

The answer to that is negative of course. The hatred for Israel, the external enemy, enables him to maintain absolute power in his country despite the economic and social repression suffered by the masses. The connection with terror groups, Iran, and the Palestinians enables Assad to get along with the Arab world and with his own citizens under the umbrella of hostility to Israel.

I like this part of the analysis the best:

When Assad’s people say that they are willing to engage in negotiations with Israel without pre-conditions, they only mean no Israeli pre-conditions, of course. The Syrians, on the other hand, are taking the pre-condition of getting the Golan for granted.

Of course, the AP does its best to spin the issue anti-Israel by ignoring the fact that the Syrians don’t really want peace. They just want the Golan back. Witness the headline, and angle, to the latest AP story:

Israelis express skepticism on Syria peace talks
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s dramatic announcement that he is negotiating a peace deal with Syria was greeted Thursday with overwhelming skepticism in Israel.

Many Israelis appear to believe the embattled leader made the declaration to divert attention from the corruption allegations that threaten to end his term in office, and opinion polls showed Israelis remained wary of withdrawing from the strategic Golan Heights — even in return for peace with one of Israel’s most bitter enemies.

Notice the emphasis on Israeli skepticism, rather than insincerity on the part of Syria. You have to read down to the last two or three paragraphs to find this information:

The nations have fought three wars, their forces have clashed in Lebanon, and more recently, Syria has given support to Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon and Palestinian militant groups.

The sides’ demands in any peace deal are well-known. Syria wants a full Israeli withdrawal from the Golan, and Israel wants Syria to end its support for militants, curb its ties with Iran, and establish full diplomatic relations.

There is not one word about the eighteen years that Syria used the Golan Heights to shell northern Israeli communities. The vague “end its support for militants” supplants facts about Syria hosting and protecting terrorist leaders in Damascus, as well as utterly ignoring the Syrian colonization and subjugation of Lebanon. These are not minor issues. These are what Syria must stop in order to achieve peace with Israel, yet they all fall under the vague phrase “end its support for militants.”

As I said above, the only positive thing about all of this is that I know Olmert can’t carry it off—because the Dorktator dosn’t really want peace. He wants a distraction for his people, and he wants to make it look like the Israelis are the ones refusing to make peace. The AP is already helping him achieve that goal. Count on seeing more of the same from the rest of the non-Israeli media.

Posted in AP Media Bias, Israel, Syria | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on The Syrian “peace” talks

Distractions

Posted on 05/21/2008 by Meryl Yourish

I think it’s time for some different news items.

You’ll never get me to talk, Copper: A lost parrot wouldn’t talk to the cops, but he talked to a vet.

Police rescued the African grey parrot two weeks ago from a neighbor’s roof in the city of Nagareyama, near Tokyo. After spending a night at the station, he was transferred to a nearby veterinary hospital while police searched for clues, local policeman Shinjiro Uemura said.

He kept mum with the cops, but began chatting after a few days with the vet.

“I’m Mr. Yosuke Nakamura,” the bird told the veterinarian, according to Uemura. The parrot also provided his full home address, down to the street number, and even entertained the hospital staff by singing songs.

Get your ass out of jail: In America, we jail Mexicans. In Mexico, they jail donkeys.

A Mexican donkey has been freed from jail after doing time for assault and battery. The Televisa network on Wednesday showed “Blacky” gobbling food from a bucket after spending three days in a jail that normally holds people for public drunkenness and other disturbances.

Blacky was jailed for biting and kicking two men near a ranch outside Tuxtla Gutierrez, the capital of Chiapas state.

Officials freed the donkey after its owner paid a fine of $36 and the $115 hospital bill of the men, who suffered bites to the chest and a broken ankle. Authorities say he also must pay $480 to each man for missed work days.

Zimbabwe economics: How to get a million the wrong-way. Ready for this? Inflation in Zimbabwe is now at one million percent. How do you even manage to set prices when inflation is that high? Can you imagine being the price-setter in a grocery store? Talk about your nightmare job!

Now there’s a headline you don’t see every day: Kasparov silenced by unidentified flying penis.

Yes, really.

While making a public plea for unity against nemesis Vladimir Putin, a mysterious dangling object from the ceiling distracted the room: an airborne penis with a helicopter attached to its testicles .

Pictures at the link.

Yes, really.

Penis museum gets new members: Hey, don’t blame me. They wrote the headline. Apparently, you can find a lot by putting the word “penis” into the search box at Google News. Hell, I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a penis museum. Pictures at the link.

Yes, really.

Posted in Humor, Miscellaneous, World | 1 Comment

They hate me! They really hate me!

Posted on 05/21/2008 by Meryl Yourish

The Jew-hating bastards on yet another Holocaust denial site (based in the U.K., there’s a surprise) have linked to one of my old teaching posts (and not in a good way). And they don’t like my No Israel-Bashing Zone policy, either. Aww. My heart bleeds. Jew-haters are unhappy because I won’t let them pour out their filth on my blog.

The Purim mentality is not confined to Zionist opinion formers, but would seem to be shared (and passed on) by many ordinary Jews such as teacher and blogger Meryl Yourish, who under the heading Teaching Little Jews to be Big Jews, tells us:

I’m a Jew-hater’s worst nightmare: I teach little Jews to be big Jews. I may not have children of my own, but I’m doing my part to propagate the Jewish nation. That knowledge gives me great satisfaction.
…I pass it on to my students. I’ve taught them that one way to piss off a Jew-hater is to chant “Am Yisrael Chai” (“The people of Israel live”). I’ve noticed that if you start that chant at an anti-Israel protest, it really torks off the anti-Israel protesters. This always leads my students into chanting the phrase for a minute or two in class, which they love. They also like it when I say things like “Purim is the holiday where the Jews kicked the crap out of the Persians.”

Don’t even think about debating with the like of Ms Yourish, since she tells us that her website is a No-Israel Bashing Zone.

I’ve no doubt that she and her students will be cheering on the bombs and missiles, if and when they start falling on Tehran.

So, should I consider it an honor that I’m on the front page of a Holocaust-denying, Jew-hating site? Or should I just laugh at them and continue to do what I’m doing, as it’s obviously working.

I think I’ll just laugh. Poor, pitiful people. Their feelings of inadequacy are so large, they have to blame someone for their failures. And hey, why not blame the people who have the largest per capita representation in Nobel prizes, in the arts, literature, and science in the world? Why not blame the people who have invented the cure for polio, instant messaging, drip-irrigation technology, and a thousand other things that helps humanity thrive? Why not blame the people who have defied the odds to remain not just in existence, but thriving in every nation they comprise a significant population?

Clearly, the Jew-haters have issues. Psychiatry might help. But their hatred is so deep, I suspect it’s incurable.

Like I teach my children: They tried to kill us. They failed. Let’s eat.

Am Yisrael chai.

Or, to put a more modern turn on it: In your face, assholes.

Posted in Anti-Semitism, Holocaust, Teaching | Tagged , | 6 Comments

Karsenty on his win over France 2 on the Al-Dura hoax

Posted on 05/21/2008 by Meryl Yourish

From an email I received today:

Philippe Karsenty gave the following statement regarding his victory:

“Today a French court ruled that I did not defame France 2 when I said that its news report was a staged hoax. Because I refused to be brainwashed, I was sued for defamation.

“Our victory today was a victory for freedom–the freedom to think and to speak one’s mind; the freedom to question what one is told; and the freedom to disbelieve the solemn pronouncements of others when the individual concludes that his reasoning is correct and that the state and the state-run media–and all of the institutions they represent–are wrong.

“The Al Dura lie is an assault on our ability to think, to criticize, to evaluate, and, finally, to reject information–especially the right to reject information on which we base our most cherished assumptions. One of Europe’s most cherished assumptions is that Israel is a viscious Nazi-like entity that deliberately murders Palestinian Arab children. Moreover, polls conducted in Europe have identified Israel as the greatest threat to world peace, greater than Iran and North Korea, Pakistan and Syria. The Al Dura hoax is one of the pillars on which these assumptions rely.

“It is ironic that I, a private individual, had to lecture one of France’s most influential TV stations in order to demonstrate that a child cannot move, lift his head, arm and leg, stare at the camera and still be considered “dead” a good 10 seconds after the newscaster tells us… ‘the child is dead.’ One need only look at France 2’s own footage to realize that the ‘death’ scene was faked.

“My only objective was to correct this error. However, on the part of the French media, it turned into a titanic battle against critical thinking and freedom of thought and expression. On my part, it became a battle for the right not to be brainwashed bythe French media. Only a few weeks ago, a French television station produced a documentary ‘proving’ that the Al Durah story is authentic. First, I was compared to a Holocaust denier, and then to the fringe elements that insist that 911 was an inside job. I, and others who share my opinion about the story, including Richard Landes, were labeled dangerous extremists and fanatics. All the while, viewers observed the ‘dead’ boy move exactly as I just described it. I can only conclude that, in France, it is critical thinking that is either dead or dying. Every French citizen should be complaining about this insult to our intelligence. In fact, very few complain because mass brainwashing works. Where are the angry letters to the station for its absurd documentary? Do the citizens of France now believe that a “dead” boy can move? Or have they merely forgotten how to think and draw their own conclusions?

The right to think, to speak, to evaluate, to accept and reject the conclusions of others goes to the very heart of what it means to be free.

Now it is time for France 2 to acknowledge that it created and is continuing to perpetuate the worst anti-Semitic libel of our era. It’s the responsibility of the French government and ultimately, the responsibility of the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, who is, for all practical purposes, the chief executive of French public television, to finally reveal the truth.”

I agree, but I don’t think the world media will correct their mistake. Ever.

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Update on the Al-Dura case

Posted on 05/21/2008 by Meryl Yourish

A source has told me that Philippe Karsenty has won his case against France 2. I’ll post further information when I get it, but this is a pretty well-connected source.

This is huge.

Update: Carl has more.

Posted in Israel Derangement Syndrome, Media Bias | Tagged , | Comments Off on Update on the Al-Dura case