While PBS’ recent supposed documentary on antisemitism was farcical from top to bottom, the appearance of Bernard Lewis was not the worst of it. One did not expect people of the level of Gavin Langmuir and Leon Poliakoff to appear, but to have man-in-black Tony Judt and PLO-propagandist Rashid Khalidi (for that was how he got started back in Beirut, before getting that "degree" in Middle Eastern studies from Hourani's D. Phil. factory at St. Antony's) put in appearances was hard to stomach.
As for Lewis, he is a man more outwardly cultivated than wise. In his mass-audience "The Middle East: A History of the Past 2000 Years," he devotes exactly three paragraphs, on one out of a total of 400 pages, to the status of non-Muslims under Muslim rule. That is not distant from Le Pen's justifying his remark that the death camps were a "detail" of World War II by noting that in some histories of that war that "detail" is discussed in a few pages. In the documentary, he keeps up this nonsense about how antisemitism was non-existent in the world of Islam, and is essentially a European import.
But this is nonsense. The Qur'an and Hadith are full of anti-Jewish remarks. The Jews were held to have been the most adamant (the adjective "stiff-necked" comes to mind) of Muhammad's opponents. They were always the special victims of his aggression and violence: see the Khaybar Oasis, see the Banu Qurayza, see what happened to the family of his Jewish sex-slave girl, or to individual Jews who appeared to oppose him.
Had Lewis understood things better, had he understood how to frame them, had he been less intent on his self-appointed exculpatory task (perhaps influenced by his own mistreatment by English antisemites in the Foreign Office and his own memories of Europe during the War, compared with how much he was made of in Turkey and not only by fellow Ottomanists), he would have said the following:
"There is not one but many antisemitisms. That of Western Christendom, with which we are all familiar, is different in its origins from that within the world of Islam. In Islam there is a general inculcated hostility toward all non-Muslims, and a belief in Muslim or still more accurately, Arab supremacism. But it is true that within that general hostility special animus is reserved, in the canonical texts, for the Jews. And while Muslims in the 20th century found a natural affinity with Hitler -- let's not forget the role played by Hajj Amin el Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, in encouraging Hitler and in turn being encouraged by him, and his practical role in raising an all-Muslim S.S. force -- they did not derive their own antisemitism, rooted in the texts, from Hitler or any other European source."
That is what Lewis should have said. And he perhaps should have been, in the writing of his own book about "Semites and Anti-Semites," a bit more careful about his use of other Western scholars, beginning with Georges Vajda.
And surely what helps to promote antisemitism is the steady campaign of vilification of Israel, the decades of misreporting about the relentless Jihad against Israel, and the promotion of every myth, from that of the "ancient Palestinian people" to that of Israeli brutality. But there was no mention of any of that in the PBS documentary.
Some related questions: Who made sure that Peroncel-Hugoz, after he wrote Le radeau de Mahomet (you can buy it used, Englished as The Raft of Mohammed -- well worth whatever it costs), would no longer report on the Middle East for Le Monde, but would be prevented from doing so? Who has promoted Tariq Ramadan in the press? What keeps the likes of Jean Daniel at Le Nouvel Observateur, or the baby Daniel now adding her nonsensical mite? Who prevents mockery of the poseur Dominique de Villepin? Why do the French not know of Chirac's Muslim grandchild? Why does the French public not know the real figures on immigration, or on the differential in Muslim and non-Muslim birthrates, so that the truth is being completely hidden? Why are crime figures broken down into Muslim and non-Muslim not published? Why, in short, is everything done to protect the Muslim image, and at the same time to blacken, throughout the press, the image of Israel and of Jews?
The PBS documentary manifests the reality that there has been a seizure of power by Muslims and by their non-Muslim allies and supporters (some supporters only out of antisemitism) both in the press, and on radio and television. All are involved are acting, without prompting, as freelance agents of the Islamintern. The celebrated Willi Munzenberg, he of the earlier Comintern, never managed to achieve anything like what the members of the Islamintern have achieved.
And how sensible they were to begin with the press, and television, and the universities. Quietly, relentlessly, here fabricating some facts, and there obscuring others, as in this PBS documentary. And always, always, working unseen, flying under the radar.
"And surely what helps to promote antisemitism is the steady campaign of vilification of Israel, the decades of misreporting about the relentless Jihad against Israel, and the promotion of every myth, from that of the "ancient Palestinian people" to that of Israeli brutality. But there was no mention of any of that in the PBS documentary".
Ain't that the truth. At this point I'm almost baffled that Israel isn't as casually referred to as Nazi Israel in the same way Hitler's Germany is called Nazi Germany. And if I hear any more about how noble those two legged, hornless unicorns called the ancient palestinian people were I might have to behead myself-I just can't stands no more!
We, who visit here, become educated..and reminded..
Thanks to one and all who participate....
"Why, in short, is everything done to protect the Muslim image, and at the same time to blacken, throughout the press, the image of Israel and of Jews?"
Philosopher Alasdair C. MacIntyre, (After Virtue; A study in Moral Theory) might suggest it's because we are living in a moral wasteland (where moral reasoning has been for so long unemployed we have lost the basic abilities/capacity to deal with real virtue). It's a wasteland where people blindly use others as means to the ends of their purely subjective arguments .. creating a vast alienation from truth as a moral objective. (I'm carefully plowing my way through his book .. this is what I've understood - or misunderstod - thus far).
Others might call it practicing (or settling for) Truthiness.
RE: Barnard Lewis. I think there is probably something going on, not related to academics (probably related to personal experiences) which does seem to be playing a factor in his assessments of Muslim vs Christian antisemitism. Not that this should come as any surprise in the field of academics (the back-stabbing, the personal animosities, the petty squabbles, etc., etc., are rife throughout academe, not just in the field of Middle Eastern studies -- although the M.E. department does seem to arouse more than a normal share of passion). It does sometimes appear that Lewis wishes to minimize Islamic antisemitism while elevating Christian antisemitism. With regard to the former Lewis refuses to use the term "genocide" to describe what the Turks did to the Armenians...(there's something more going on here -- but Lewis will not discuss it). Conversely, I've heard that Lewis was branded a "racist" (that's by the Christian Edward Said) and an "orientalist" and run out of the academy. Ironically, it was then Said's job to venerate Arabs (the biggest apologist for Arab atrocities on the planet...Said far exceeded Lewis's meager contributions).
Forgot to add, I do like Lewis -- I think he's far and away a superior scholar to many, many others in the field. (So long as one avoids certain questions -- but we all know where the sore points are -- ie, antisemitism).
This jaw dropping PBS paeon to Islam, and pander-fest to Muslim lies and the Palestinian propaganda machine was on my local PBS station last night -- I watched in utter disbelief and feeling nauseous the whole time.
Never once was the fact that the Koran is replete with Jew hatred mentioned -- never once was Islamic doctrine mentioned or implicated in the Jew hatred which spans the entire Muslim world, from Indonesia and Malaysia to the heart of the Arab sewer.
We were told to believe in ever more fantastic constructs that the introduction of antisemitism can be tracked back to Europe, that anti-Semitism is a unique feature of "Christian Europe" and that such impulses never existed among Muslims until the Europeans tainted their pristine Islamic culture with such filth.
This convoluted fairy tale was retailed by every Muslim liar who spoke on the film -- Only the most twisted logic and apologetics could paper over the fact that Muslims were and are always receptive to ANY form of anti-semitism (whether from "Christian" Europe, or Russia) because they themselves have always been abject haters of Judaism.
Next we will be told that their abject hatred of Christians and their rabid hatred of all 'Godless" non-believers in Islam is somehow the West's fault too.
In that they simply and parasitically exploit another schism in our pluralist Western culture -- that is the self loathing for the legacy of the West held by many of our leftist citizens. They too embrace a kind of "blame the West first" and especially "blame the White Christians" for all the ills, corruption, poverty, and despair in the world. Muslims eat this crap up, and simply heap it on top of their already towering mountains of bigoted xenophobic and paranoid Islamic doctrinal hatreds.
paean?
"Why, in short, is everything done to protect the Muslim image, and at the same time to blacken, throughout the press, the image of Israel and of Jews"?
That's easy-Israel has the reputation of kicking Muslim butt so in this day and age that makes it the horrible aggressor. The Muslims are protected because those who scream the loudest usually get what they want-and nobody screams louder and plays the victim card better than the Islamaniacs.
Muslims do scream:
profiling!!
Death to Jews!
Death to America!
Death to Great Britain!
Death to Christians!
Death to Catholics!
Death to Non Muslims
Death to India
Death to Budda
Death to cartoonists
Death to journalists
Death to teachers
Death to policemen
Death to infidels
Death to apostates
Death to Muslims who work with infidels
Death to Muslims who refuse to attack infidels
Death to other religious clerics
Death to garbagemen
Death to Muslim children watching soccer on tv
Death to Muslim children playing soccer
Death to filmmakers
Death to market owners and shop keepers
Death to dogs and pigs
Death Death Death Death Death Death!!!
Yes Muslims do scream.....
I second Hugh's recommendation of the book Le Radeau de Mahomet, by J-P Peroncel-Hugoz. It's very informative, and if it's in English, anyone on DW can read it. The French is very colorful and well-written, and the book is fast-moving, imho. Peroncel-Hugoz has another book, this one on Lebanon that is also helpful, Une Croix sur le Liban. This book explains, among other things, the loathing of the Syrian Sunnis for the Alawites, who just happen to run the govt in those parts.
Someone on this or an earlier thread wondered if Bernard Lewis had access to a good translation of the Qur'an. In fact, he reads and speaks both Arabic and Turkish. This does not excuse of course his failing to deal with the dhimmi problem, or his denial of Islamic Judeophobia as a part of Muslim tradition. In this vein, I suggest that the interested check up Ibn Hazm, a Spanish-Arab-Muslim philosopher who was intensely Judeophobic.
Carlo Panella published a book in 2005, Il 'Complotto Ebraico,' that traces Islamic Judeophobia to the early days of Islam. Sunnis often blame the Shi`ah schism on Jews, while some Shi`ites blame the sevener-twelver schism among the Shi`ites on Jews. You can't win.
"Why does the French public not know the real figures on immigration, or on the differential in Muslim and non-Muslim birthrates, so that the truth is being completely hidden?"
Ah, but some EU minister assures us that there is no significant difference:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory?id=2798728
"Charpin noted that the fertility rate among France's immigrant population was slightly higher than among the population at large, but said the difference was minimal."
Don't you feel better now?
This is, quite simply, wrong. There is a huge body of evidence, a vast body of evidence, to indicate that although anti-semitism existed prior to Western European contact with the barbarian moslem world it was very rarely acted upon, or expressed openly, in day-to-day life by the huge majority of the lay population of Western European and, indeed, only by a very tiny minority of the clerics in that society.
It wasn't until after the First Crusade that people generally started to express anti-semitism in concrete ways. In other words, contact with the barbarian moslem horde prompted Western Europe to remember its early theories of anti-semitism and, more importantly for the poor Jews concerned, act upon them. Even so, if we trace the rise of modern anti-semitism to 1100AD, which most scholars do, then we find that that completely co-incides with the First Crusade and, therefore, with the first substantial Western European contact with the uncivilised islamic world. It took a further 190 years before the Jews were expelled from England (1290AD).
To put that date into context it has to be remembered that the Jews were not expelled from Castile, Aragon and Sicily until 1492AD and from Portugal in 1497AD and Navarre in 1498AD. It is not co-incidental that the various persecutions of the Jews in Western Europe closely mirrors Western European contacts with the crude and cruel world of barbarous islam. Such contact served to give Europe not only a sense of self but also a sense of 'the other'. Initially 'the other' was perceived to be the mohammedans but such a simple version of 'the other' could not long survive in the face of the all embracing hatred of everything non-moslem which the Crusaders imbibed in the Holy Land and transmuted into Christian terms - a process not unakin to brainwashing and a demonstration of just how pernicious and evil the crudity moslem attitudes can be at any date in history - and Western European anti-semitism was re-awakened.
The nine crusades against the forever accursed mohammedan (may the Great Curse forever be upon them) are:
The Crusade of 1101
Second Crusade 1145–1149
Third Crusade 1189–1192
Fourth Crusade 1201–1204
Fifth Crusade 1217–1221
Sixth Crusade 1228–1229
Seventh Crusade 1248–1254
Eighth Crusade 1270
Ninth Crusade 1271–1272.
(Of course there was also the Albigensian Crusade launched in 1209AD and the so-called Childrens' Crusade of 1212AD.)
However, the sense of 'the other' that contact with the with the Damned of the East introduced into Western Europe was to have far reaching effects. This sense of 'the other', the loss of innocence, as it were, was possibly the defining moment for a Western Europe standing on the brink of the renaissance. It was to colour everything which came after, and the event of Tuesday, May 29, 1453 (the fall of Constantinople to the hellhounds of islam) only served to confirm the worst fears about 'the other'.
This strong sense of 'the other', first introduced into the thoughts of our modern age by the Crusaders because of their contact with the brute mohammedan, coupled with the example of what the mardy martexts of islam could do to civilisation really led to the consciousness amongst people in general of belonging to a nation state. Such an institution as a nation state and its ability to exclude, or, at the very least, control, 'the other', was perceived to be the only way of keeping 'the other' at bay.
It is in this context that modern Western European anti-semitism should be viewed - not as some home-grown aberration but as a direct consequence of our exposure, almost one thousand years ago, to the peurile hatreds and savage doctrines of maleficent islam.
It is, of course, a matter of regret that many of our fellows today cannot grow out of the primitive hatred of the Jews and continue to harass and persecute them. Would such people be so eager to do so, I wonder, if they knew that they were doing that hellhound called mohammed's bidding. I hope not.
Dominic.
jsla/
I think you want 'paean' in this case, meaning, as I am sure, from context, you intended, a song or a shout of triumph or exultation. It comes from the Greek paian which was a hymn of thanksgiving made to the god Apollo.
On the other hand a 'paeon' is a metrical foot (again of Greek origin) containing one long syllable and three short syllables.
Just thought that you might like to know.
Oh, and by-the-way, you try getting any criticism of the savagery of the koran into any of the mainstream media. It's not possible. Channel 4 have not accepted a single one of my posts about what's in the koran as a response to that 'Dispatches' programme.
Naughty, naughty. Not allowed to mention the bad bits in the koran - only those in the Bhagavad Ghita, or the Bible or the Tao-te-Ching or the Tipitaka (Pali Canon), but not in the koran - because that would offend the PC multi-culturalist ruling class.
Shame on me. I'm obviously not PC so therefore silenced. Great stuff this internet censorship, isn't it. Thank God, the real one that is not the savage idol of islam, for JW/DW.
Dominic.
Next we will be told that their abject hatred of Christians and their rabid hatred of all 'Godless" non-believers in Islam is somehow the West's fault too.
We have been told that already. This Dinesh guy was talking how they hate us for our "immorality".
Funny world we live in.. giving disaster aid to your enemies is seen as less moral than to proclaim your avowed intent to murder, convert or subdue the Native Populations of entire countries - all of them completely at peace until the menace came along. Most of them are still - treacherously so and at their own peril - at peace.
If only I were a better speaker. I'd move to London and hang out in Speaker's Corner all day!
I wonder if it's still legal to completely speak one's mind there!!??!!
"Charpin noted that the fertility rate among France's immigrant population was slightly higher than among the population at large, but said the difference was minimal."
Don't you feel better now?
Posted by: Infidel33
And how many French are "immigrating" to France??!!!
Merde alors con bête!!
MeanieMo/
"...hang out in Speaker's Corner all day! I wonder if it's still legal to completely speak one's mind there!!??!!"
Yes, it is. But I, and many others, wonder for how much longer it will be! There are only two subjects which are off limits at Hyde Park Speakers' Corner: the Royal Family (because they cannot, by precedent and law, answer back) and the overthrow of the British government (for that is treason).
Recently (over the last hundred or so years), Finsbury Park, near to the barbarian Finsbury Park moskue and its devilish and mysterious outbuildings, has also been asserted, chiefly by the treasonous and maleficent mohammedans of the said moskue, as having the same rights as Hyde Park Speakers' Corner. There is some historical precedent for this claim, but it is weak and not recognised in the Common Law of England.
However, the crude and evil mohamedan propaganda based, as it is, on the vicious texts of the mohammedan's so-called holy book, the koran, that is usually heard there is, by and large, ignored by the local population and usually curtailed, quite rightly, by the park authorities.
Technically there are also Speakers' Corners on Clapham Common, in Kennington Park and in Victoria Park. However, I doubt that the Common Law of England would uphold, if push came to shove, the rights of these places to such a freedom of speech and expression as is allowed at Hyde Park Speakers' Corner.
I doubt that such freedoms as we currently enjoy at Hyde Park Speakers' Corner can survive for very much longer. Indeed, I understand that our Government is already moving to control what it is permissible to say there. I expect legislation within the next eighteen months.
When such legislation is enacted it will be a sad day indeed for freedom of speech in the UK.
Dominic.
Hugh/
Excuse me. Am I missing something about my sixth cousin M. Dominique de Villepin. I seem to remember the following quotes:
"L'option de la guerre peut apparaître a priori la plus rapide. Mais n'oublions pas qu'après avoir gagné la guerre, il faut construire la paix." (For those of you who don't have French that means "The choice of war might seem a priori to be the quickest. But let us not forget that having won the war, one still has to build the peace.")
and
"We need a strong policy to combat radical Islam. It is used as a breeding-ground for terrorism. We cannot afford not to watch them very closely."
and
"With the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, a dark era is drawing to a close. And we welcome it."
Simply because he opposed the invasion of Iraq is not ground enough to villify him in such a way. Remember that after a stint as foreign minister at the Quai d'Orsay, M. de Villepin was appointed Interior Minister (in March 2004 if memory serves me correctly) and attempted to take on radical Islam head-on.
His crackdown on militancy included tighter security controls and making it a requirement for France's imams to take courses on the language, laws and customs of France.
"We need a strong policy to combat radical Islam," he said in December 2004.
"It is used as a breeding-ground for terrorism. We cannot afford not to watch them very closely." (Emphasis added by me.)
He instituted a huge number of anti-immigration measures, which proved popular in France, including an "Immigration Police Force" and much tighter visa regulations.
Exactly how is this man, a somewhat close and respected relative of mine, not an ally of ours?
Please explain.
Dominic.
Hugh/
Of course I appreciate that you may not like M. Dominique Galouzeau de Villepin simply because he was born in Rabat in Morocco, but it was a French protectorate at the time and he is not a savage moslem, you know. Perhaps you don't like him because he passed some of his childhood in the USA - that somehow smacks of cheating, doesn't it?
However, he also passed some of his childhood in Venezuala and in Africa. Perhaps you don't like him because he studied at 'le Caousou' - an elite establishment, I'm sure, but run by Jesuits - so, maybe not that elite. Maybe you object to the fact that he was an officer on the 'Clem'; perhaps you would rather that he served on the 'Foch'. Who knows?
Perhaps you dislike the fact that one of this extremely civilised man's first postings was to the USA (First Secretary to the French Embassy in Washington, I think)? Who knows?
But, please, why include this man in your list of villains? Tell me!
Dominic.
Hugh?
"Who prevents mockery of the poseur Dominique de Villepin?"
I DO. Because he is not a poseur, as you have it, but a genuine, troubled man with a deep sense of the value of our civilisation as opposed to all others. As I am!
Not everyone reacts as you do, but that does not mean that they do not feel as you do.
Dominic.
"Of course I appreciate that you may not like M. Dominique Galouzeau de Villepin simply because he was born in Rabat..."
-- from a posting above
I thought he was born in Sale.
And sixth or fifth or fourth cousin to you he may be, but neither you nor anyone else need endorse or defend him, or any relative or friend, right up to members of your immediate family -- or as my sister-in-law used to call it -- the nuclear-fallout family.
My dislike for D. de V. is prompted by the same things that make me dislike the differently souched Bernard-Henri Levy.
D. de V. is a poetaster a ses heures, and when he was at the U.N. he would be quick, for any adoring female reporter (Elaine Sciolino may briefly have been one of them), his leather satchel and take out his poems, and read one or two. He fancies himself something more than a mere government functionary. If a diplomat, or in the Foreign Office, they he will be more than a diplomat, but rather a poet-diplomat, on the model of St.-John Perse, or Octavio Paz or Pablo Neruda or some other Latin American. His literary pretensions are comical, in the High Napoleonic Vein, the same vein that didn't look good, though some people think it is just the thing, when offered up by Andre Malraux or De Gaulle.
His understanding of Islam and the menace to France is flawed. While he has opposed, curiously, suggestions about affirmative action for Muslims at the grandes ecoles (something which at one point even Sarkozy made approving noises about), his policies are mostly indistingusihable from those of his patron Jacques Chirac. He grew up as the son of a senateur ("mais moi aussi, je suis senateur" -- d'Anthes, speaking decades after he had been asked about his killing of Pushkin in a duel).
I think of D. de V. as a bonne-souche variant on publicity-hound Bernard-Henri Levy. Same desire to be approved of by adoring crowds of the "best" people, which best consist of self-described "intellectuals" -- that is, a we-happy-few adoring crowd. I find him comical. I have no difficulty finding some of my fifth or sixth cousins comical. Why should you?
Hugh/
Yes, but (as our antipodean friends would say).
If your dislike of my distant cousin rests entirely upon his talent, or lack thereof, as a poet rather than upon his stated policies and beliefs, then I would suggest that you revise your outlook - but, not necessarily, your opinion about his poetry. An ally is an ally is an ally. A politician who is prepared to go as far as he has gone in France today is a brave soul indeed, in my opinion. The statements that he has already made about the maleficent moslem threat to our civilisation, and to French culture, have already precluded him from ever holding the highest office in the Republic. He knows that and yet continues to go as far as he can without jeopardising that which remains of his influence and his career. You say "...his literary pretensions are comical, in the High Napoleonic Vein..." but many greater than you in the field of Lit. Crit. would disagree with you and I, personally, find nothing risible, or off the mark, in Elegies barbares or Sécession; but then, perhaps you have not read them and are merely relying upon others for you opinion, or, perhaps, you merely have a personal dislike, understandably, of the style - not every style suits every reader.
What, precisely what, do you have against Andre Malraux. Your viewpoint is beginning, to me, to smack of nothing more than pure prejudice against the French intellectual elite - hmmm, something I too am guilty of on occassions but not quite so grossly, I hope: and I hope that I can give credit where it is due to the forensic attainments of great men even though they are French. Anyway, M. Malraux, as France's first Minister of Culture (through most of the '60s) created the famous maisons de la culture throughout France, and worked extremely hard to preserve national monuments, amongst other things. And tell me, what is wrong with Les Conquérants or La Condition humaine or Les Chênes qu'on abat. What is more, I defy anybody, absent such a hardened Europhobe as you, not to be moved by Lazare.
Anyway, to return to M. D. de V. You say "His understanding of Islam and the menace to France is flawed." Certainly it is, but so is such understanding flawed amongst much of the political elite throughout Europe and the USA. I thought that that was one of the tasks that we have to address ourselves to - the educating of our ruling elite, that is, with regards to the threat posed by the mohammedan surge (to use a currently fashionable word). He is no worse, and, in my opinion he is a great deal better, than any other politician in the understanding of this threat. He is more culturally aware, more sensitive to the nuances of culture, than many others. He is, therefore, an ally or a potential ally. I suggest that you are viewing M. Dominique's stance through the American lense engendered by the the trauma induced by the events of 9/11 - those not 100% with us must be 100% against us.
Intellectually, I know that you know that this is not the case. M. de Villepin, undoubtedly, tried to constrain the USA to a different course than that which eventuated but that does not mean that my cousin is in any sense a hater of the USA, nor do such actions suggest that he is a lover of the barbarian moslem horde - they merely suggests that he has a different viewpoint. Perhaps not a viewpoint on action that is as robust nor as forceful as one might like but a viewpoint, none-the-less, born out of the experiences of France, and Europe, over the last sixty or so years.
I think that you do not see, nor appreciate, the cultural differences between us - those of us who live in the milieu of 'Old Europe' and those, like you, who live in the USA. We may share a language (to a certain extent) and a culture (again, to a certain extent) but our experiences as nations are vastly different and colour our responses to the threat against us. Whilst we can agree on the nature of the threat it can be very difficult to agree on a common course of action against the threat - in a way those posters who routinely post here that they wish the 'other shoe to drop' may be correct; perhaps it will only be 'the dropping of the other shoe' that cements a common course of action between the USA and Europe.
Also, I have to say, that there is a take different from yours on M. Bernard-Henri Levy. We do not all see him as a self-serving publicity hound (your words, I think). We, on this side of the pond, know him as one of the first French intellectuals to call for intervention in Bosnia; as the man who spared no effort to track down the murderers of Daniel Pearl; as the man who uncovered the links between Pakistan's secret service, Pakistan's nuclear scientists and the al-Qaeda network. But then, perhaps you are one of his detractors - the sort of person who would agree with the opinions (and what high - in at least two senses of the word - opinions they are) of Noël Godin, the shallow entarteur.
I prefer to think of M. Levy as one of the co-signatories of the letter entitled 'MANIFESTO: Together facing the new totalitarianism' which was published in response to the violent protests by, and in, the moslem world, and elsewhere, about the Jyllands-Posten cartoons of mohammed. Do you deny that this took some courage. I suppose you do. You obviously see such courage as mere dogging after publicity so poor old Bernard-Henri becomes, in your book, nothing more than a "publicity-hound".
You find him comical? You find my cousin risible and pretentious? Hmmm. It seems to me you are merely demonstrating some degree of post 9/11 Francophobia. Think again, please - and try to think outside the box this time.
Oh, and you are quite right, of course, M. D. de V. was born in Sla, but Sla, or Sala or Sale, is just a suburb of Rabat separated from the main city by nothing more than the shallow stream of the Oued Bouregreg. The difference? Simply that between the Barghwatian and the Almohads - and we care? I think not.
Dominic.
Hugh/
And yes, before you make a point of it, I am aware that Sla was one of the ports that the Barbary Corsairs operated out of and that probably the ships from there were amongst the targets for the USA Marines. We Europeans are not all under-educated about the history of the USA you know!
Dominic.
Hugh/
I cannot resist one final thought before heading off to the party at Morpheus's place.
Perhaps you wish my cousin to be a better poet. Perhaps, as I do, you harbour memories of the Chant Royale. Perhaps you wish that he would say, as Gosse, "...Borne up by song as by a trumpet's blare,/Leading the van to conquest, on they fare...".
However, such courageous sentiments are uttered only by a few and acted upon by even fewer - and most of those are in their cups!
Dominic.