Bravo, Prime Minister Rasmussen!

I wonder why we haven't seen more things like this.
There should be a Mohammad cartoon series. Why
hasn't a successor to Monte Python's troupe taken
on mohammadanism? Or Mapplethorpe done a "Piss Koran"?

OK, I don't really wonder, and that is why the
mockery needs to be stepped up.

Posted by: American at October 25, 2005 1:17 PM

'It is a basic principle of our democracy that a prime minister cannot control the press.'

To be fair to these verminous Muslim "ambassadors" -- the notion that a leader abjures the right to quash that which a Muslim finds "offensive" is alien and incomprehensible... There never has been, is not now, and sadly never will be a similar corrollary in the imagination of the Muslim --

I have suggested recently at this site that readers take a look at a site like "Ask The Imam" -- a site in english dedicated to fatwas about all manner of things Islamic by various "reverend Imams..." I make this suggestion to help acquaint the reader with the utter lunacy of the Muslim mindset, and to familiarize those who may not know -- This is an UTTERLY ALIEN and IRRATIONAL MINDSET...

A recent inquiry at "Ask-The-Imam" went like this:

Q: "I am distressed by the hate and calls for destruction of the West by some Muslim leaders. Please reassure me that this is not supported by Muslim teachings...."

A: "The term 'West' is very broad. Are these Muslim leaders calling for the destruction of the entire 'west', or only of those who themselves are antagonistic towards Islam and desire
the destruction of Islam?

and Allah Ta'ala Knows Best

Moulana Imraan Vawda
for: FATWA DEPT. "

For those interested in perusing this lapse into inanity, go to:

http://www.islam.tc/ask-imam

This site is no joke! For a mind blowing tour de force of what obsesses the average Muslim mind, enter a term such as "wudu" in the search area, and then scroll through the Q & As... It is endlessly entertaining, and endlessly frightening to read...

Posted by: jsla at October 25, 2005 1:20 PM

Rasmussen's reply, Rasmussen's attitude, ought to be the model all over the Infidel world. No apologies. No earnest explanations or discussions of why we are as we are, or do what we do. No "explaining" ourselves in the "Public Diplomacy" mode of the gushing, naive, and chuckle-headed Karen Hughes, or all those like her, or in support of such nonsense.

We owe Muslims no explanation, no justification, no nothing. Quite the contrary.

It is they who owe the world's Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus, Buddhists, and all others persecuted or treated with contempt as Infidels (and that includes some Muslim sects, including the Ahmadiyas, and even the Shi'a if Sunnis continue to regard with bland indifference the attacks on Shi'a, regarded as Infidels and fair game, in Iraq) an explanation of the Qur'ani passages, the stories in the Hadith, the details of Muhammad's life, that represent, if taken in and followed, a mortal threat, by all Believing Muslims, against all those who are not Believers in Islam.

Posted by: Hugh at October 25, 2005 1:24 PM

why do I have to sign in everytime, even when I check the 'two week' thingy

anyway

Good for Rasmussen, its about time some EuroPEONS showed some cahones

Posted by: ploome at October 25, 2005 1:26 PM

"(Moslems) who felt offended by the tone of the public debate should bring their grievances to the courts."
-- PM Rasmussen

Based on what? Do the Danes have one of those awful Hate Crime laws, too?

Posted by: Chaz MarteL 732 at October 25, 2005 1:44 PM

"We owe Muslims no explanation, no justification, no nothing."

Now, where I have to get off the bandwagon is when you say "no nothing."

That is not right: We owe Moslems our deep, abiding, and unqualified disrepect of Islam.

Posted by: Chaz MarteL 732 at October 25, 2005 1:47 PM

Chaz: They do have "racism" laws, yes. But I just heard they would pass new laws strengthening freedom of speech, and giving harsher punishment to those who attack it.

Ploome: I am considering writing a post in support of both Jyllands-Posten and PM Rasmussen, where people can send in emails in support. They probably get tons of emails from Muslims, so we shouldn't remain silent.

Posted by: Fjordman at October 25, 2005 1:51 PM

But what will muslims do NOW, I wonder?

Posted by: Voltaire at October 25, 2005 2:14 PM

Greetings Fjordman

Do you know thier email addresses?

Please post them if you do

Thanks

Albion

Posted by: albion at October 25, 2005 2:19 PM

"But what will muslims do NOW, I wonder?"
-- posted by Voltaire

Whine. Threaten. May throw in a dash of gang rape over here or sprig of kindapping or murder over there.

Re: Fjordman

Those Hate Crime laws always were a slippery slope, but are even more so now in this the Century of Islam.

Posted by: Chaz MarteL 732 at October 25, 2005 2:20 PM

At last there is one European leader who has the guts to stand up to this vermin, parasites who have 'invaded' Europe and wants their evil ideology to be enacted in Europe.This is a timely warning to the citizens of all western countries to wake up from their slumber, that the Muslims do not want to live in the West by our rules. Let them all go back to where they came from or send them back forcibly if they dont like it in the Secular/Christian West.
Mohamed was a pedophile and a terrorist so what are they objecting to?

Posted by: faqi at October 25, 2005 2:24 PM

jsla,

I found the Islamic Finder site, which intends to be a directory of Islamic related organizations and business in the U.S. It is searchable by zip code, so you can easily find the mosques, community service organizations, businesses, restaurants and groceries in your own neighborhood.

There is also an "Articles" section that, while not containing fatwas per se, is something like an advice column, such as how to react should a pop-up ad with a scantily clad vixen appear on your computer screen while researching your Islamic studies (the advice seeme to be directed to teenage boys, because the solution is to think of your mother!). Another article was a list of 60-some characteristics of what makes a good Muslim. One characteristic was "sneeze in the Islamic way." Another characteristic proscribed the imitation of women, it seems Dame Edna and Geraldine are so un-Islamic.

There is a program that one can install that gives the call to prayer at the correct time of day. Note that the time is not uniform within a single time zone, thereby defeating one argument that the call to prayer serves the same function as churchbells, which in any event is purely secular and temporal. It also defeats the other argument that the call to prayer must occur in the public square.

Last, but not in the very least, was one advice article: "Can Human Reason Do Without Revelation? This was truly frightening, as it deals with countering arguments a Muslim may face from secularists and those of other faiths that mankind has a natural instinct or common sense for distinguishing that which is good or right from that which is evil or wrong. From the Muslim perspective, that which may appear to be inherently good and right is nonetheless evil and wrong if Allah's revelation has said so. That proposition in itself is justifiable in many instances. The article also makes the converse statment stating that which may appear to instinct and common sense to be inherently evil and wrong is nonetheless good and right if Allah's revelation has said so.

Thayt very last bit of advice makes life for Islamic parents so much easier when little Mohammed or little Aisha asks "Why do we have to kill all the infidels?" If young minds need not be burdened with philosophical thought, why should Mommy's and Daddy's?

Posted by: Lisa at October 25, 2005 2:44 PM

How very refreshing for a change.

Posted by: epg at October 25, 2005 2:49 PM

At the site to which a link is given above, the IslamicFinders.com, one will also find a list of Muslim-owned businesses. This should come in handy as you decide to whom to give your business, and what businesses you will be careful to disrecommend.

One of those listed as Muslim-owned is the "Boston Language Institute." This deserves looking into. It should be obvious that such a place would be the perfect kind of operation, were those running it so inclined, to fudge about hiring teachers -- some would no doubt be teaching Urdu, Arabic, Farsi, and Turkish, but for how many hours a week? And what about keeping people on the staff who are not really teaching, but who "pay back" their salaries to the school, in order to continue to remain here on working visas. And the same goes, of course, for those who want "student" visas to be arranged, and then extended, and who may be taking one course, but seem to be on the books for 3 or 4 courses, or are not even taking any courses, but have paid tuition so as to remain here.

In other words, language schools can be places where Muslims, both teachers and students, can find a way to obtain both working and student visas.

One trusts that the INS, along with the police and the FBI, is well aware that this is one of the most obvious ways to keep people legally, though fraudulently, in this country.

The fact that only a very few Islamic-owned businesses would advertise, given that some owners are perfectly aware of the likely affect on their businesses, means that those that did choose to advertise are, can afford to be, somewhat indifferent to any possible Infidel clientele.

There are three possible reasons for that.

The first is that the owner or owners are such True Believers in Islam that they don't care if they lose money.

The second is that the business relies almost entirely on a Muslim clientele, like those who sell phone cards for calling Libya or Egypt, or halal butchers, or those involved in shipping to the Muslim countries.

The third is that the business is largely a front -- even if before it was not -- and that as a front, it receives sums of money in order to stay in business, and provide both jobs to Msulims so that they can obtain working visas, even if some of those jobs are for a few hours a week (but the pay is given for the requisite number of hours to be full-time, the assertion is made that there are students in those classes in, say, Arabic -- such study presumably being a Good Thing for Homeland Security), and students who never appear, but are enrolled (and pay tuition), can similarly use their phantom studenthood to remain in the country when, for our own safety, they should be expelled as violators of the immigration laws and as conductors of Da'wa among the most vulnerable members of our society, the psychically and economically marginal.

One hopes that police and FBI are figuring out that language schools, if they appear to be places where either students, or the teachers, have through their connection with that school obtained either working or student visas, need to be investigated.

Possibly they might start with IslamicFinders.com, and go systematically through the names listed as being "Muslim-owned."

That is one way to limit the threat. Check up on these places. See if there are matters of fraudulent courses and students, or revenues that are really kickbacks.

Look into it.

And keep checking.

Posted by: Hugh at October 25, 2005 3:35 PM

Hugh says above:
"One trusts that the INS, along with the police and the FBI, is well aware that this is one of the most obvious ways to keep people legally, though fraudulently, in this country."

I don't trust the INS or FBI, not after reading Paul Sperry's book, Infiltration: How Muslm Spies and Subversives have Infiltrated Washington, especially the Translation department of the FBI and the inner circle of the White House.

As regards Hate Speech Laws, a slippery slope indeed, an activity that has adverse unintended consequences. The first such laws were enacted in Germany during it's allied occupation, part of the deNAZIfication process, then Canada has enacted such laws, which were used to extradite Ernst Zundel. Britain also has Hate Speech Laws, which a little pressure and money from the Muslims was able to be broadened to include "Incitement to Relgious Hatred".

That which was first intended to protect Jews and other minorities from the vile bile of NAZI's and racists, is now used to protect Muslims and give them legal cover for their unrelenting campaign of Jihad and Da'wa.

A common sense solution (other than laws) is needed, maybe it is time to rescind all such laws.

Posted by: Nariz at October 25, 2005 3:56 PM

ploome:

The two-week check box may be about trying out TypeKey, not signing in to comment. I think the comments section is set up to "time out" commenters to prevent malicious postings under someone else's ID.

BTW, you posted something on another thread last week that got me thinking -- the full Quoranic version of the famous "Who soever saveth one life." I thought it might be interesting to compare the Jewish version to the Quoranic version. The Mishnah Sanhedrin IV, 5, which dates at least several hundred years earlier than Mohammed & Co., reads accordingly:

"One person was brought forth at the time of creation, in order to teach us that one who destroys a human soul is regarded as though he had destroyed a whole world, while one who preserves one soul within humanity is regarded as if he had preserved a whole world."

No reference or justification to go out and slay the unbelievers or their equivalents, but then I'm no bible scholar. If anyone has more to contribute on this, great.

Posted by: waterdragon52 at October 25, 2005 4:14 PM

FYI:

Administration
Siri Karm Singh Khalsa, President: ext. 200
Behnaz Rezaei, Vice President: ext. 225
Gurumeet Singh Khalsa, Controller: ext. 226
Dima Arenkov, Systems Administrator: ext. 234
Francesca Caligaris, Marketing/Communications: ext. 244
George Imirzian, Marketing/Communications: ext. 224

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Department of Foreign Languages
Li Jian Zhao, Sr. Program Coordinator: ext. 229
Tina Hammers, Program Coordinator: ext. 222
Despina Pitsis, Program Coordinator: ext. 221

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

English as a Second Language/TEFL
Kym Perkins, Director, English Programs: ext. 228
Michael Balger, Coordinator, English Programs: ext. 237

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Translation and Interpreting Services
Muneebur Rahman, Sr. Project Manager: ext. 238
Gail Zhang, Project Manager: ext. 230

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

E-mail for Additional Information Back to Home Page

The Boston Language Institute
648 Beacon Street
Boston, MA 02215 USA

Tel: +1 617 262-3500
Fax: +1 617 262-3595 or +1 617 247-3919

Posted by: jhl952 at October 25, 2005 4:16 PM

As for the story, let's hope this is a sign that the Danes are refinding the spines they had when they were occupied by Germany. Bravo, Denmark.

Posted by: waterdragon52 at October 25, 2005 4:18 PM

Good points made above, Lisa:

The prohibition against common sense seems FUNDAMENTAL in Islam: To whit:

The mother 'asks-the-imam':

Q: "What to do? Mufti belittles & hits my son, (6) Now he hates madressa..."

A: "We suggest you approach the Ustaadh and talk to him that by his attitude, the child is becoming negative for studying. This may deter him from his attitude.
However, respect and honour of the Ustaadh will have to be upheld at all times. .

and Allah Ta'ala Knows Best

Mufti Ebrahim Desai"

Message: Studying Islam is far more important than your little boy's feelings -- respecting the imam who belittles and "hits" your little boy is more important than your little boy's feelings --
And then there's the notion that the "Ustaadh's" sadistic abusive inclinations can possibly be redirected when he is made aware that his sadism is interfering with the indoctrination of the 6 year old into Muslim thralldome -- Nothing mentioned about the sadist's inappropriate behavior -- not even on the radar screen -- his actions are only deplorable to the extent that his actions impede the indoctrination... And the poor little chap's feelings in the matter are deemed utterly irrelevant, except to the extent that he too has departed from the path of indoctrination... Interesting religion...

Posted by: jsla at October 25, 2005 4:20 PM

Maybe the Danes won't have to name their newborn Prince "Mohammed" after all? Maybe he will be king of a Danish country and not an Islamic one.

But then again, I will believe it when I see it. Eurabia is to liberal, too apathetic, too PC for this to last.

Posted by: 3rdtimelucky at October 25, 2005 4:43 PM

"More than any time in history mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly."
- Woody Allen

Posted by: otterfisher at October 25, 2005 5:06 PM

According to the Hadith, Muhammad took special offense at the poets who ridiculed him in their verse. He pardoned many who fought against him and killed his followers, but showed no mercy to the poets. There were at least three that I could find that he had murdered.

Deconstructing the life and mind of the Prophet is an essential facet of exposing Islamic intolerance. His conspiratorial solicitation of murder, his order to mutilate renegades, the massacre of the Bani Qurayzah, his usurpation of his adopted son's wife, his relationship with his child-bride Aeysha...are all vividly detailed in the Hadith.

How effective the exposition of the Prophet's moral failings will be in inducing the apostasy of Muslims is hard to say; religious beliefs tend to be the most entrenched of all. But non-Muslims afflicted by our cultural ignorance and obseqiueousness towards Islam will undoubtedly be surprised to find out what kind of man Muhammad really was.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 25, 2005 5:08 PM

Otterfish,

I remember a magazine interview Woody was doing in which he was lamenting the prospect of aging and eventually dying. The interviewer was perplexed by his attitude, asking:

"Doesn't it mean anything to you that through your work, you will live on in the hearts and minds of people?"

Woody responded in his inimitable way:

"I'd rather live on in my apartment."

Posted by: Cornelius at October 25, 2005 5:13 PM

The ask-imam site referenced by jsla is indeed edifying.

Here's a question on Islam and Democracy: http://www.islam.tc/ask-imam/view.php?q=15522

The response won't be a surprise to most here, and it brought to mind Dinesh D'Souza's comments on virtue. See his answer to the last query on this page http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/pubaffairs/newsletter/02071/qa.html

Posted by: saturnine at October 25, 2005 5:16 PM

Sorry for posting twice (I didn't realize I posted on an old entry).

Hi,

I'm a Hindu (Balinese), part of an (in the closet) islamic country [Indonesia]. I'm 28 years old, and still not sure about my sexual orientation (I had slept with some guys, though only oral sex was as far as I went). Maybe I'm a gay, but not sure, because I don't feel a thing when having sex with guys. But I'm not very much interested in girl either. I'm not frigid either. I'm still trying to figure out the kind of relationship I want to have with guys (esp. older guys).

Ok, enough psychology stuff.

My question is: if -- god (not allah) forbid -- Indonesia applies shariah law, what would happen to me? [a -- possibly -- gay non-moslem guy]. Can I live happily and peacefully?

I need to know some fatwas.

Thanks

Posted by: Hindu Guy (of course, I'm a KAFIR) at October 25, 2005 6:07 PM

Hindu guy, if you don't feel anything when having sex with guys, but you're not interested in girls either, you could be asexual.

There ARE people who aren't sexually interested in either gender.

But then if you're gay,

Posted by: Voltaire at October 25, 2005 6:43 PM

Hi Hindu Guy,
Here is a post by Mentat a regular poster here at JW/DW, it is a summation of Sharia Law. Maybe you can find your answer there.
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/002082.php#c19663

Posted by: Carolyn2 at October 25, 2005 6:46 PM

Sorry Hindu guy, I posted before I finished the rest of what I meant to say.

If you are gay, then I would be worried about living in a country with a muslim majority. Why don't you contact gay groups in Australia, so that if anything does happen, there will be people who might be able to offer you refuge.

Posted by: Voltaire at October 25, 2005 6:47 PM

jsla,

I too had a run in with islamonuttiness the other day. A Muslim who goes by the moniker Yusef Smith runs a site called Blogistan. Its ostensibly a moderate site,but the vile and vitriol that seeps out of it is really disheartening, more so because I can tell most of these guys are British-born South Asians. (Except Yusef, who describes himself as a revert, my guess he was an unchurched Englishman) Anyway, we got into a discussion about the age of Aisha, the massacre of the Jewish tribe Banu Quraiza, and the general unscrupulousness of their prophet. And you know what! They defended his every action, every murder, rape and outrage, no denial at all. One 'brother' even called Muhammad’s rape of Safiyah, "a beautiful thing." and the Jews "Had it coming" It really is hard to believe, my innocence has taken another blow.
The interesting thing was their Michael Moore and Chomsky-style writing, their really is an unconscious alliance between the Islamists and the gutter left.
Moreover, I asked rhetorically why can’t Christians proselytize freely in the dar-al-islam, whereas in the West its allowed and sometimes encouraged (prisons) where was the quid-pro-quo? One little shit that goes by the name Brownwonder answered with this piece of nonsense.

"The only religion with Allah [azawajal] is Islam. False religions cannot be spread among Muslims. The Quran and the Sunnah makes this clear and we don’t change for democracy. There is nothing about that system of religion that promises Jennah. Muslims should in fact fear for their religion. Call it insecurity if you would like, but if Shaytan threatened to take your eman (faith) away from you and drag you into the fire you would feel a little uneasy as well.
Now, if Christian’s societies allow Muslims to give dawah than we will take advantage of it, in the event that Christian societies don’t allow Muslims to give dawah, we will be patient and allow our adab (manners) to spread Islam."

East is East, West is West…indeed.

Posted by: spencerd at October 25, 2005 9:48 PM

Hindu Guy...LOL...your a dude, dude, get out of here with that stuff. No one here is a sex therapist(well, maybe Kingky tolerance). Try Dr Laura on the radio or Rush maybe. If your 28 and still not sure, no one here can help you. Well, maybe kingky Tolerance, he knows a lot about that kind of thing, but he is not here at the moment. Keep checking back, when you see him posting direct your sexual orientation questions to him. I'm sure he would be willing to help...he's that kind of guy...

Posted by: duh_swami at October 25, 2005 10:10 PM

Holy Shi'ite, jsla.

That's some link. I can't believe how many muslim organizations there are within 5 miles of my office. Obviously, I missed a few.

Looks like I have some more surveillance to do over the next few weeks.

Posted by: texan at October 25, 2005 10:11 PM

spencerd:One little shit that goes by the name Brownwonder...

There was a Brownwonder posting here a while back. A female I think. Same kind of rhetoric...

Posted by: duh_swami at October 25, 2005 10:21 PM

Spencerd and swami:

Yeah, I remember that racist freak. She was something else; said all the posters here "reminded her of Jews" or something and that "kufr" wasn't a bad word. Reminded me of posters on jamaat.net, another sicko-hole.

What a facist idiot. Nary a word against her from Shirki or Ia, of course.

Prophet Geoff
BBUH

Posted by: Geoff at October 25, 2005 10:40 PM

Be great to see a politically incorrect comic comic book novel about the life of Muhammed. But a serious and balanced one that, without covering up any of his atrocities or lowlife behavior, bends over backward to be fair. The center-left and left need to be convinced Islam poses great threats to freedom, but the center-lefties will be most easily won over to that point of view if they have the impression that a writer is of gentle, benign temperatment and is really trying to adjudicate fairly between the various opposing viewpoints of Islam.

Posted by: eduardo odraude at October 25, 2005 10:58 PM

Thanks for the Islamic Finder site Lisa. I took a look around my neighborhood and, just as I supected, more Islamic cultural baggage I could live without. It's hurts me that any animal should die with a final embrace of terror, being carved alive. Where's PETA?

Muslim Owned Businesses City Miles
Rumi Restaurant (All Halal) Houston 5.3
Jerusalem Halal Meats Houston 5.3

I thought the "Jerusalem" touch was nice. One would not suspect a thing.

***

I've had words with Browndowner before. If it's the same one, he's a TRUE believer. Truth matters not when one walks the path of the pseudoprophet. I hope someone is watching him.

Posted by: butterfly at October 25, 2005 11:49 PM

Way to go Scandanaivia---This from a norsk way over in the us of a. Please keep our country clean!
Scandahooovia I mean.....
Send islamers back home....airline tickets won't cost much........
Rid Europe of filth....please.
Greg Habenchaknosonski.
And I live in WESTERN US. !!!!!

Posted by: el greco at October 26, 2005 12:14 AM

Three cheers for the Freedom of Speech, enshrined in the Supreme Constitutions of all secular democratic countries!

And three cheers for Denmark for giving us kuffar some hope for the future!

As it is, I can't say anything, be it the Truth, about Islam or Muslims. Nothing even alluding to that, without fear of being killed a la Van Gogh. And this, in these United States of America, the beacon of Freedom!? As they say, it's "mortally incorrect".

This story, and the one about the Dutch minister refusing to entertain Iranian demands for an alcohol -free meeting ("Well, mon Dieu, you can't expect the Dutch to have a lunch meeting without wine!") gives me Hope that the traditions and sentiments of the Kuffar will be safeguarded in future.

We need to continue to show them by these little ways that they aren't the only ones that can be intolerant about other's beliefs, to the supremacy of their own.

Meetings with Iranians and other such self-important nuts need to be held in nightclubs, because our *sentiments* make us comfortable holding such meetings only in such places, where pork and wine are on the menu, where the musics loud, and where the women are dancing away showing their legs and more! Now, about that aid deal..

Posted by: kufr at October 26, 2005 12:14 AM

Yessss!!!

Way to go Denmark !

Posted by: Pom Pom at October 26, 2005 12:24 AM

The word is getting around.

Draw a cartoon about Mohammed and you must die.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,17034954%255E7583,00.html

Jyllands-Posten was also included on an al-Qa'ida website listing possible terrorist targets. An organisation [that] calls itself the Glorious Brigades in Northern Europe is circulating pictures on the internet which show bombs exploding over pictures of the newspaper and blood flowing over the national flag of Denmark. "The mujaheddin have numerous targets in Denmark -- very soon you all will regret this," the website says.

Moral: Don't say anything ever about Islam or Muslims or Muhammed in public that can be traced to you, if you value your life and your country's wellbeing. It's "mortally incorrect".

Posted by: kufr at October 26, 2005 12:52 AM

Lisa, thanks for the Islamic Finder site.

Posted by: texan at October 26, 2005 2:40 AM

Let me dream that, both the newspaper and the Danish P.M.'s decisions, are the first sign of self respect, the real beginning to defending our civilization from islamic necrotization.

Jylands-Posten's editor-in-chief is Carsten Juste, and the paper's e-mail is jp@jp.dk

I wanna buy Danish right now, Danish anything.

Lisa, thanks for the islamic finder site; and others for other sites.

Hindu guy, good luck.

Posted by: dby at October 26, 2005 3:36 AM

I trust the 11 ambassadors were swiftly expelled for interfering in their host country's affairs?

Posted by: Kim Hartveld at October 26, 2005 5:03 AM

SpencerD - I'm Old Pickler on that site.

Posted by: Interested at October 26, 2005 5:28 AM

The Nordic countries always were that much more advanced than any others in Europe.

Posted by: londongirl at October 26, 2005 6:55 AM

Old Pickler/interested,

I promised myself that I wouldn't post there anymore. It's just so bloody annoying that half my posts are deleted by Yusef. Although I did recognize that Yusef never went to the gutter level that the other members of the Ummah did when talking about about Muhammad’s past. Maybe there is hope for his deluded soul yet.

Posted by: spencerd at October 26, 2005 7:07 AM

I'm actually surprised how many of my posts he allows. But the comments on that site are fascinating in the insight they give into the Muslim mentality. They seem to be torn between denying the reality of Islam, its cruelty, its incompatablity with modern democracy, and justifying the same on the grounds that 'Allah knows best'.

Yusuf is articulate, and by no means stupid. I wonder why he picked Islam.

Posted by: Interested at October 26, 2005 7:21 AM

Rasmussen and Howard, great unfaithful couple, long live freedom!

Posted by: Franze at October 26, 2005 7:27 AM

So I'm not the only one who remembers Brownwonder. I'm glad to hear that. For a minute I though I had hallucinated the whole thing. If I'm going to hallucinate, I got to do better than that...

Posted by: duh_swami at October 26, 2005 8:32 AM

If a single bomb goes off as a result of these cartoons, then the Danish government should announce plans to end all Muslim immigration, to promptly expel not all aliens but all aliens who are Muslims, and to take other measures to limit the power of Islam, including ending any foreign money that is used to build or maintain mosques or madrasas. Then turn on the screws, the police, the tax deparmtents, everything -- life can be made as difficult as possible for those who have businesses, no doubt with all sorts of fudging of books and tax records. Schools that refuse to give an inch on Muslim demands, local governments that refuse to permit mosques to open, the private boycotting of Muslim goods and services, can be a salutary lesson. And let there be closer inspection in the universities as well, as to what is being taught about Islam, and how closely that corresponds to reality. Even in tiny Denmark, there must be a local brigade of the vast army of apologists who, have over the past few decades, have so carefully infiltrated, almost as if all were under orders from some central command except that no central command is necessary, into the Middle Eastern studies departments of universities all over the Western world.

Denmark will then be a model -- or at least give other countries in Western Europe some ideas.

Posted by: Hugh at October 26, 2005 8:53 AM

Brownwonder is a female Salafi convert, right here in the good old US of A.

Posted by: CGW at October 26, 2005 9:09 AM

Spencerd,

That quote from Brownwonder is a perfect example of the mindset of a supremacist. I had my own real life experience that I'd like to share with you.

It was the mid 90s. I had already become privy to the realities of Islamic intolerance. I had a Muslim neighbor from Palestine who was a nice enough guy but who, because of brief conversations about Islam which I had initiated, had become somewhat wary of me.

One evening, I suppose in an effort to win over my friendship, he brought over a new dress for my then-infant daughter as a present. I thanked him appreciatively...whereupon he invited me up to his apartment for a visit.

His wife prepared sweets and fruit. She had always been veiled outside but on this occasion, she wasn't. In the course of the conversation I was having with her husband, she remained silent...even when I once solicited her opinion.

Anyway, the most poignant segement of the conversation, which became very heated, was when we were discussing the Islamic penalty for apostasy...

MYSELF: "If a Christian converted to Islam...and he or she was subsequently killed by other Christians, would you consider that barbaric?"

MUHMUD: "Of course, of course!"

MYSELF: "Then why is it any less so when Muslims kill other Muslims for converting to Christianity?"

MAHMUD: "You have to understand, for a Muslim, our faith is the most precious thing to us..."

MYSELF: "I understand. But that doesn't change the simple fact that you want two sets of rules...that it's ok for Christians to convert to Islam, but not ok for Muslims to convert to Christianity. Don't you see the hypocrisy in this? How can you call it fair?"

And then he said what he said in a way that I can still hear...that sent chills down my spine...

MAHMUD: "Because OURS is the one TRUE faith!"

I realized at that moment that this man - so moderate by all outward appearances - could not be reasoned with, that his concept of fairness was so thoroughly corrupted by his supremicist mindset that he was absolutely beyond the pale.

I continued to smile and say hello every time I bumped into him or his wife, but I knew from that day on that they were the enemy.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 26, 2005 9:23 AM

"I had a Muslim neighbor from Palestine"
-- from a posting directly above

What is, where is, "Palestine"? It was the toponym invented by the Romans (or possibly the Greeks before them), Syria palaestinorum, or Syria palestina, "Palestine" Syria, after the long-extinct seagoing "Philistines" (made famous by Samson and Delilah). When one,uses the word "Palestine" and takes it seriously, one is reifying the idea, nowadays, that there is this place called "Palestine" that is somehow distinct from Israel (it isn't, and never was -- it has its origins in the Roman attempt to efface the placename "Judea" and the Jewish connection to the land), and that, furthermore, there is this "Palestinian people."

No doubt the affable but essentially malevolent neighbor described himself as being from "Palestine," but one need only indicate that to avoid inadvertently giving the idea legitimacy. As in: a neighbor who claimed to be "from Palestine." (And that was the first, but not the last, thing that gave him away).

Incidentally, whenever someone tells me that so-and-so, or so-and-so tells me himself, that he is "Palestinian," I need to show at once that I have heard the word, and do not accept that designation. So I ask, just as sweeetly as I can, "Are you a Muslim Arab or a Christian Arab?" That always makes things perfectly clear -- they know exactly what I mean, and if third parties are present, they too have learned a lesson.

Enemies have been allowed to fashion and employ the vocabulary that suits their purposes. They have created historic fictions by sleight-of-word,and those who accept, and do not reject or protest, their phrases, their words, unwittingly collaborate in the mysthical histories that the Muslim enemy, or islamochristian Arab collaborator, would have the world bellieve.

This can be undone. Eternal vigilance about everything -- including the choice of such words as "Palestine" and "Palestinian people" -- will go a long way.

Posted by: Hugh at October 26, 2005 12:40 PM

Excuse my thought crime Hugh.

I meant to say he was Palestinian...of I forgot, you apparently don't think there is such a people. I suppose I should have said he's a "former Arab Muslim resident of the disputed territory on the West Bank of the Jordan River"...but I wanted to get out the door sooner than later.

In point of fact, discovering his origins was an interesting aside. Before his wife came over from the Middle East, he was living with a Philipino woman. One day, I crossed paths with two of them walking to the local micromarket.

After saying hello, I inquired where he was from. There was an awkward silence until she finally said "Jordan"...after which he quickly interjected "I'm from Jerusalem."

I understood immediately that he was Palestinian, which was precisely what both were trying to obfuscate. It was around '96, when Palestinian suicide bombers were slaughtering Israeli women and children after Oslo became stalemated.

When I later broached that subject with him, he disavowed the terrorism, insisting it was against Islam. But as is often the case with Muslims, when you get past the talking points and probe a little deeper, the actual sentiments emerged.

He decried that lack of progress in the peace process and then said something to the effect that if Israel was not forthcoming in negotiations, then it was natural that they would have to "face the fire."

Posted by: Cornelius at October 26, 2005 2:05 PM

Palestine was a fake name invented by the Jihadists to market their fake cause.

It's wondrously disturbing how important new names (and the concepts they carry) are introduced and uncritically adopted without review.

The first day State Dept. personnel began trading in Palestine and Palestinians was a day of self-defeat.

So too was September 11, 2001 a day of self-defeat, where the awful and misleading term War on Terrorism was introduced.

When you're too fearful to even name your enemy, what kind of fight can you wage? What kind of fight have we waged over the last five years, the kind of fight a fearful combatant would?

Posted by: Chaz MarteL 732 at October 26, 2005 2:22 PM

Good God!

I just visited Islamicfinder.org and searched the country finder. I Clicked St. Kitts and Nevis (Where my family is from) thinking their was no way in hell there was a Muslim community on those two unspoiled islands. Well guess what, there's an MSA, a couple of organizations both in Basseterre and Charlestown and even an offshore bank named Global financial Associates. My day is ruined. I will keep this information from my father.

Posted by: spencerd at October 26, 2005 3:00 PM

"I will keep this information from my father."
-- from a posting above

No, see if he can find out what is going on, or at least give you some leads. How is Da'wa being conducted down there? Remember, every Muslim is duty-bound to act as a missionary, to increase the recruits to the Army of Islam. Any Muslim presence must, therefore, be monitored by those who regard such an expansion of Islam as a threat.

Posted by: Hugh at October 26, 2005 4:01 PM

Way to go Denmark!! This is the best way of dealing with men who have nothing better to do with their lives than whining about what someone has done to upset their sensibilities.

I live in Australia, (hey that new prince is part Australian) and I feel very reassured that there is in Europe a Prime Minister who is willing to not act like a dhimmi to these Muslims.

A long time ago Europe was able to recognize the threat that Islam posed. Pope St. Gregory organized the first of the crusades in response to that threat. These crusades in recent years have been unfairly represented in yet another attempt to bring about dhimmitude. Even if I do not agree with everything that happened in the crusades (the Germans went too far) I do believe that they were a necessary response to the threat that was being posed at the time.

Also, I do not frown upon the actions taken by Isabella of Spain in instituting the Inquisition. What a pity that the Spanish monarchy has been reduced to nothing and now the Spanish government is reducing Spain into total irrelevance as they continue to bend over backwards to Islam who always wanted to get control of Spain, France, Holland, Italy, Germany.... and the list of European nations continue.

We need to awaken to the threat that is posed and we need to say No to this stupid attitude that has arisen. Atheists are using the Muslims to prevent Christians from being able to worship. In the past it was the Jews who funded the Muslims with their push into Spain (that is why Isabella took action against them - it was not about conversion to Christianity but it was about politics and the dirty tricks of a few Jews in that country).

Even as we consider anti-terror laws we have to remember that not everyone who is a Muslim will fit the Middle Eastern profile. However, there is one distinguishing feature that will tell you that the person is a promoter of Jihadi terror - they wear white clothing. These are the people who should be watched very carefully.

At the same time I think that we need to disabuse ourselves of the notion that it is acceptable for Muslims to act with terror against those who allegedly offend them. We should not excuse acts of terror by claiming that perhaps the Muslims who did such a thing were offended by the sexual laxity of the people who had been hit. I am speaking of Bali. The main target is not the foreigners who also died, but the Hindu Balinese are the real targets. I do not accept that this group are sexually immoral and therefore what happened is ok. That kind of attitude from anyone is wrong.

No more Michael Moore and his ilk. They have no idea about the real intention of Islam.

Posted by: Maggie4Life at October 26, 2005 6:35 PM

"you apparently don't think there is such a people"[as the "Palestinians"]
-- from a posting above

No, I don't. Those claiming to be such did so only after the Six-Day War. The phrase was never used prior to that war, not by anyone, least of all by any Arab spokesmen. There is no distinguishing feature of religion,language, or culture that distinguish a "Palestinian" from an Israeli Arab, or for that matter from an Arab in Jordan. Why should I believe what the Arabs want me to believe? Because lots of people have decided to agree to believe in the farce, should I go along?

Count me out.

Posted by: Hugh at October 26, 2005 9:38 PM

OK then, Israeli Arabs are Arabs living inside Israel...what does one call the non-Jewish inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza?

Arab Muslims perhaps?

That term applies to Jordanians, Syrians, Egyptians and Muslims throughout the Arab world. But every other "Arab Muslim" in the Middle East has a designated nationality from which to derive identity.

But not these people. They exist, but only in limbo. They're not Syrian, for they don't reside in Syria. They're not Jordanian, for they don't reside in Jordan.

For the record, "Palestine" is the name of the British colonial mandate, a very contemporary (in historical terms) political/geographic entity.

But you go ahead and play your word-games Hugh. You're very good at it.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 26, 2005 10:10 PM

There is a short, but unanwerable discussion of this whole "Palestinian" nonsense, called "The Palestinians: A Political Masquerade" which you might read.

The term "Muslim Arabs" does just fine. The nation-state means less for Muslim Arabs then it does for any other group in the world. That some are citizens of Jordan, and others of Syria, and others of Iraq or Saudi Arabia, does not mean we have to go along with the charade and name as "Palestinians" a particular group of local Arabs if, by so doing, we are not merely describing them, but participating in furthering a political goal -- which is to make everyone in the world think that there is merely a struggle for the "legitimate rights of the 'Palestinian people'" and not, as the discerning will realize, simply a classic Jihad to eliminate, by Slow Jihad or by Fast Jihad, by military attack or by diplomacy, or by an alternation of the two, the Infidel (and therefore intolerable, unacceptable) state of Israel. We have no difficulty in Iraq talking about Arabs and Kurds, or in Egypt talking about Arabs and Copts, or in the Sudan talking about Arabs and blacks. Why then, and only then, when it comes to Israel and the territories it not only won in a war of self-defense, but is entitled to possess by the very terms of the League of Nations' Mandate for Palestine, do we call some of the Arabs "Arabs" and some of them, so carefully, the "Palestinians" which is not a lingustic, cultural, religious, or ethnic designation, but one having only to do with the Arab attempt (and the mental laziness of some Israelis and many non-Israelis) to create this fiction, endow it with life, and then to make political demands on the basis of this verbal fiction.

Why do "these people" exist "only in limbo"? Do they not exist unless we agree to call them "Palestinians," and then out of limbo they suddenly come? Of course the word "Palestine" has been used, but it was used in Western Christendom to refer, precisely, to the Land of Israel, or what had been known as Judea when the Romans renamed it "Palestine" and for that matter renamed Jerusalem as "Aelia Capitolina."

That is why the phrase "Palestine/Israel" is not a neutral phrase, but one which seeks to create, before there exists -- and one hopes there never will exist -- another Arab Muslim state, this one called "Palestine." For "Palestine" is really Israel, and always was an alternative name, the name used by the Romans to efface the Jewish connection to the land, and then later used, for less obvious political purposes, by those in Christendom as a way to refer to what, for Christians, was and is the Holy Land.

Words matter. The Arabs and Muslims understand this. Others naively have not. Vigilance about words is not, as you suggest, mere "word-play," and your remark is foolish, for words matter very much, not least as an instrument of the political and diplomatic Jihad (indeed, that the phrase "Palestinian people" never been invented, or never been accepted, the world would see much more clearly not only the nature of the Jihad against Israel, but also the nature of Jihad in general -- and a different, more wary Europe might not have taken so long to realize the folly of allowing in so many Muslim immigrants). And the tone, by the way, that nasty little tone, of your last remark -- "But you go ahead and play your word-games Hugh. You're very good at it." -- is inexcusable.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 12:04 AM

Cornelius, Hugh,

To some small extent I agree with Cornelius' points, but its not just a word game.

As Hugh points out, "words do matter". Conscious thought in humans is done in spoken language words. When no words are available to express a thought, a thought cannot be expressed (e.g. I am completely unable to conjure up thoughts, concerning snow, which are available to Inuits, through their language. Also, note my use of the word Inuit...). That is how newspeak really works; and that is what is behind the word, "Palestinian": the elimination of Israel and the elimination of any Jewish right to the historical land of Israel, by its replacement with the manufactured, "palestine", in as many minds as possible.

And Hugh is quite right that the Israeli-Arab conflict is more insightfully viewed as a subset of the muslim jihad against the kafir. But you (Cornelius) are quite right that several million people do exist, in limbo. Perhaps when they and their erstwhile arab brethren decide and demonstrate that they truly want a just peace, I will put some mental effort into solutions, for whatever that would be worth. Right now, it seems to me that no solution exists, aside from the obliterative, which solution is just unacceptable.

For several months I think I have watched you both (Cornelius, Hugh) snipe at each other, both explicitly, and sometimes snidely. The "you're very good at it" line by Cornelius was certainly snide (and yes, Hugh, your tendency to refer to other commenters by something like, "from a posting above", sometimes strikes me as snide).

Please stop, eh?

But keep posting the good stuff. Thanks, both.

Posted by: del at October 27, 2005 2:07 AM

your tendency to refer to other commenters by something like, "from a posting above", sometimes strikes me as snide

Isn't just a kind of shorthand because

blockquotes

Posted by: Interested at October 27, 2005 5:24 AM

Interested:

What's wrong with simple quotation marks and "posted by so-and-so"? At least it gives credit where it's due.

Posted by: CGW at October 27, 2005 7:37 AM

Nothing. But it isn't always necessary. Sometimes, here and elsewhere, if I'm reading a long thread of comments and come across something I want to quote I just cut and paste it for later. I tend these days to put things in italics, because I have to do all these fiddlly little html tags at work and I want to practise them so it gets quicker.

My point was that I don't think there is anything significant in Hugh's way of signalling that he is quoting somebody. But I can't speak for him, and perhaps there is serious malevolence in it. Who knows? If he were to use blockquotes or italics the sky might fall in.

Posted by: Interested at October 27, 2005 8:01 AM

Del,

You're quite right about my comment, it was snide. I like to think Hugh understands I'm human and occasionally get a little testy...and I hope he can look past it. I've tried to do so on the odd occasion when he takes a swipe at me.

Hugh's reluctance to refer to the individual by name is a well-worn rhetorical device designed to avoid conferring equality of status to his interlocutor. But it could also be a legitimate means to avoid overt personalization during debate. Since he is the VP here at JW/DW and therefore bares a degree of responsibility for atmospherics, it probably makes sense to do so... particularly in a medium where you don't exactly know who you're dealing with.

As for the issue at hand, I personally feel the attempt to delegitimize the existence of the Palestinians is every bit as vile as the strategy of the other side to deny Israel's right to exist. Hugh makes scornful reference to ancient 'Philistia'; what is Israel but the modern incarnation of an ancient kingdom.

The Philistines are a people going back to biblical times. If one looks at maps of ancient Israel, one sees Gaza ruled by the 'Philistines.' Why try to deny their existence now? Because it suits the purposes of our ideological battle? Reminds me of the bizarre denials and re-writing of history that characterizes the other side.

The British ruled the Mandate of PALESTINE from the end of WWI to 1948. That is 3 decades. Had Hitler not come to power in Germany and proceeded with his genocidal aspirations, there is every reason to believe that PALESTINE would have been born right alongside Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq.

The Western world carved up the region and, as in Africa and the rest of Asia, these colonial boundaries were destined to be the borders of independence. It could be argued this was a great injustice and a source for much of the problems afflicting the third world. It could also be argued this made perfect sense; that other paradigms used to draw boundaries would have been just as arbitrary or worse.

Personally, I'm glad the Arab/Muslim world was carved up into a constellation of states. I think it would have been fool-hearty for the West to have encouraged the re-establishment of an Arab super-state (which would have inevitably morphed into the Calpihate). But let's not be hypocritical and say that while Syrians and Lebanese and Jordanians exist as people, the Palestinians do not.

HUGH: "We have no difficulty in Iraq talking about Arabs and Kurds, or in Egypt talking about Arabs and Copts, or in the Sudan talking about Arabs and blacks."

Both Arab and Copt recognize themselves as "Egyptian." Perhaps the Kurds of Iraq and the Christians of Sudan might see themselves as something other than Iraqi or Sudanese, but the Arabs of those two countries identify themselves by nationality, just as the Palestinians do.

HUGH: "Why do "these people" exist "only in limbo"? Do they not exist unless we agree to call them "Palestinians," and then out of limbo they suddenly come?"

The "limbo" I spoke of is statelessness. There are 3 million souls living in the West Bank and Gaza. What do you propose we do with them Hugh? Deny them the status of citizenship for perpetuity? Or perhaps you're an enthusiastic supporter of mass expulsion?...(wouldn't surprise me).

Well folks, I am a proponent of Palestinian statehood...just as the UN partition, which all of us rightly use to legitimize Israel's existence, envisioned.

I agree with Del that the Palestinians themselves are the greatest obstacle to the realization of their own stated goal. But if they can be induced, by stick, carrot or both, to forgo their love affair with terrorism, then either give them Israeli citizenship (which we all agree would be a disaster for Israel) or let them have a state of their own.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 9:26 AM

"UN partition, which all of us rightly use to legitimize Israel's existence, envisioned.."
-- from a posting above

The UN Partition plan has nothing to do with legimitizing Israel's existence. In a moment of utter desperation, with Jews still in DP camps in Europe, and with the armies of Iraq, Jordan, and Egypt being supplied with weaponry and training by the British, the Zionist delegation (there was no Israel to vote in the U.N.) made clear that, despite the clear violation of the Mandate for Palestine's provisions, it would be willing to accept the partition plan in the November 29, 1947 resolution. However, the Arab states all, without exception, voted against the Resolution. The state of Israel did not come into being because of that resolution. That resolution has no moral or other effect. It never did. It was dead in the water. The state of Israel came into being because Jews had bought land from Arab absentee landlords and a few locals, and inherited the nearly 90% of the land which had always been state-owned (by the Ottomans, and then inherited by the mandatory authority, and then to the intended and legal sucessor to the mandatory authority, the state of Israel).

The state of Israel owes its legitimacy not to a resolution that was voted down by every Arab state, and never had any effect on anything, but by the recognition of the League of Nations (and the mandates of the League of Nations were officially and formally recognized, do not forget, by the United Nations when it came into being) that the Jews had a right to their own state, that the legal, historic, and moral claims (a decade before Hitler even came to power, so this nonsense about Israel being brought into being "because of the Holocaust" is one more deliberate bit of insidiousness) of the Jews were strong, and that all they were asking for was the right to immigrate and to buy land, unhindered. Even that, as we know, was too much for the British, the Administration both in Mandatory Palestine, and back in London, save for a handful (Wyndham Deedes, Colonel Meinertzhagen, Major Orde Wingate) being almost completely unsympathetic to the very enterprise -- the Jewish National Home -- which the British, as the mandatory authority, had solemnly committed themselves to furthering.

Though in 1921 the British had high-handedly simply decided that the provisions of the Mandate about Jewish immigration would simply not apply to any part of Eastern Palestine - which then was promptly renamed (and western desert places added) the Emirate of Transjordan, and handed over to the Emir Abdullah as a consolation prize for not having received the Kingdom of Syria as his younger brother, Feisal, had received the Kingdom of newly-created Iraq.

That U.N. partition resolution has had no effect, no bearing, on anything -- except for the fact that the Arabs, hoping that everyone will forget about history, and ignore that it was they who refused to accept it, they who voted it down -- like to bring it up from time to time to fool the credulous, those who do not bother to read the documents, understand what prompted the Mandate for Palestine, what its precise provisions were, and what, in fact, led to the State of Israel. It was not the abortive resolution of November 1947. It was only one thing -- force of arms, and the ability to withstand the onslaught of five Arab armies, three of them well-equipped by the British, even as the Jews had to suffer, and somehow smuggle in a few arms despite, a total arms embargo. Were it not for a few smuglled arms -- from France, from the United States, from Czechoslovakia, three years after the death camps had been fully exposed, the world was entirely prepared (just read what Ernest Bevin wrote) to see those Arab armies destroy Israel, and of course, everyone in it.

Now the same situation seems to be developing. And to the mix one must add one more thing. The Christian world will have no access, or very limited access, if Muslims yet again control Jerusalem. Either the Israelis will control it, or the Muslims will control it. There is no indication that the Americans or other non-Muslim powers are willing to permanently put into or near Jerusalem a half-million men to permanently protect it, and keep it open as the Israelis now do. So it is either Israeli control, or Muslim control? Which do you prefer? Which do you think makes more likely continued free and unfettered access by all religious groups? Which do you thnk makes more or less likely a sense of Muslim triumphalism, which will have obvious consequences in Europe and even in North America?

We all know the answer.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 9:56 AM

Interested,

Its not the use nor lack of use of blockquotes, nor italics. Its the non-use of a commenters name, which seems snide. Nevertheless, Cornelius makes a good point that it makes sense to avoid personalization in debates, here. That's it. I've said my piece on the subject.

Cornelius,

The ancient Philistines were neither arab nor, of course, muslim. Nor were they canaanites. They were sea-people, immigrants, who probably came from the Greek isles, during or slightly prior to heroic age Greece. Between the Egyptians, Babylonians, Persians, Macedonian Greeks, and to an extent, the Hebrews, they were obliterated, before the arrival of imperial rome. The current people who call themselves palestinians have no connection to the ancient philistines, except a manufactured name-label. That is not revision. That is, in a few sentences, what happened, as best as can be determined.

Posted by: del at October 27, 2005 11:22 AM

Hugh,

I'll digest and get back to you.

Del, you wrote:

"The current people who call themselves palestinians have no connection to the ancient philistines, except a manufactured name-label."

You're wrong my friend. The Philistines inhabited the coastal strip of Gaza in Bilical times. Unless you can document an event in history where they were exiled or exterminated, they lived there through history.

The Arabs came in the 7th century. Through the brutalities of conquest and its aftermath (the inevitable mixing of blood), the Philistines became Arab/Muslim, adopting the religion, langauge and in some cases, the genetic heredity of their conquerers...no differently than the Syrians, Egyptians, and others (minus the ever-shrinking indigenous peoples who maintained their original identities) in the Middle East and North Africa.

By the way, many European Jews who migrated to Israel were descendents of the Khazars, who had no lineal connection to the ancient Jews. They had converted en mass to Judaism in the 11th or 12th century at the command of their ruler who wanted to maintain his independence from both the Orthodox of Russia and the Muslims of Central Asia. Should we disqualify all of them as Jews connected to ancient Israel because of the absence of lineage in their identification as Jews?

The Palestinians are the Arab/Muslim people who inhabit the West Bank and Gaza. Call them something different if it suits your ideology or strategic vision. I prefer not to play that game.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 2:28 PM

Hugh,

Interesting how you confer such a mantle of legitimacy on the resolutions of the defunct 'League of Nations' but totally disregard the superceding UN resolution calling for the partition of Israel/Palestine. The fact that the Arabs voted against it does not for a minute mean that the vote never took place or that the resolution didn't pass.

Jews who bought land deeds from the Ottomans certainly have legal ownership to those properties. But what of Arabs who have Ottoman-era land deeds? Is the validity of their ownership automatically voided just because they're not Jews?

So what do we do with the inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza, Hugh? Continue to deny them the rights of citizenship? Force them off of their homes and property en mass? You haven't answered my question.

But I'll answer yours. I think there are different scenarios that could adequately resolve the status of Jerusalem. It could be re-divided between Jew and Muslim as it was from 1948 to '67, so that both have access to their respective holy sites. Or it could be administrated by the UN or other international entity as an 'open city' housing the holy sites of the three great monotheistic faiths.

Ultimately, it's not for me to say. Jerusalem's status should be decided in negotiations between the parties themselves.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 3:12 PM

"Unless you can document an event in history where they were exiled or exterminated..."

"The Arabs came in the 7th century. Through the brutalities of conquest and its aftermath (the inevitable mixing of blood), the Philistines became Arab/Muslim, adopting the religion, langauge and in some cases, the genetic heredity of their conquerers...no differently than the Syrians, Egyptians, and others (minus the ever-shrinking indigenous peoples who maintained their original identities) in the Middle East and North Africa.

"By the way, many European Jews who migrated to Israel were descendents of the Khazars, who had no lineal connection to the ancient Jews. They had converted en mass to Judaism in the 11th or 12th century at the command of their ruler who wanted to maintain his independence from both the Orthodox of Russia and the Muslims of Central Asia. Should we disqualify all of them as Jews connected to ancient Israel because of the absence of lineage in their identification as Jews?

The Palestinians are the Arab/Muslim people who inhabit the West Bank and Gaza. Call them something different if it suits your ideology or strategic vision. I prefer not to play that game.

-- from a posting above

The poster above needs to do some homework. The Philistines were a sea-faring tribe who settled in five small "cities" near Gaza and who like so many ancient tribes and peoples, simply disappeaed; possibly they intermarried with others, possibly they got back on their ships. All sorts of things. But in any case they had nothing whatever to do with the local Muslim Arabs (and some not Arabs at all, but if one reads carefully the history of in-migration to pre-statehood Israel, one learns of the various 19th and early 20th century arrivals, from those who had fought with Abd el-Kader in Algeria, to troops of Mehmet Ali, even to Muslims from Bulgaria and other places where the Ottomans were forced to relinquish power, and Islam no longer to dominate. (See "The Myth of Dispossession"). No scholar of the period believes that there is any connection between the inhabitants of ancient Philistia and the modern soi-disant "Palestinian people." This is just one more bit of Arab propaganda that the naive swallow whole.

As for the rest of it, including the business of the Khazars, this has been a staple of Arab propaganda which no one in his right mind, or with the slightest knowlege of either the Khazars, or the Philistines, or the demography of the area (start with Moshe Gil's "The History of Palestine" which ends in 1054 A.D.), could conceivably believe in any more than the claim that Arafat and company, redoing all of history, that the Arabs were the original "Canaanites" and Jesus was an "Arab" and so on -- good god, do we have to deal here with stuff at this level?

No, we don't.

As for the other statements by the same poster, who seems not to understand that the United Nations was not free to not accept the provisions of the Mandate for Palestine. It was required to accept the terms of that Mandate, as it was required all the other terms of the other League of Nations as-yet-unexpired mandates. The partition resolution had no effect, and could have had no effect, on the terms of that Mandate, which as a matter of the United Nations' own Charter, cannot be fiddled with or changed -- no more than our Congress can pass a law deemed unconstitutional. Oh, they can pass it alright, but once a case or controversy arises, and the Supreme Court has declared it unconstiutional, that's it. At the moment, and for the past few decades, the U.N. General Assembly could pass a resolution (non-binding, of course) that Israel never existed, the Jews do not exist as a people, and the Arabs have a divine right (see the Qur'an) not only to Israel, but to Italy or Iceland. So what?

You are confusing the U.N. Charter, the U.N. as a successor to the League of Nations, the terms of the Mandate, and whether or not those who had or have political power have the right to ignore the terms of the Mandate. They don't.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 3:31 PM

The more I look at the posting above, the more I see the poster has been reading, and accepting uncritically, the most absurd Arab propaganda. Beginning with dating the "Philistines" some 1400 years after their disappearance, and with mention of the Khazars (that staple of Arab propoaganda), all the way up to those Ottoman "land-deeds" (I presume he is referring to the far less than 10% of the land that was owned, and bought at exorbitant prices by Jews, from the large absentee Arab landlords, and not to the nearly 90% of the land that was never privately owned, but remained in possession of the Ottoman state, or to that which had remained in the possession of Christian churches and institutions), and so much else, including a misunderstanding of the U.N. as the inheritor of the League of Nations' Mandates system, and the mandates that had been granted for specific purposes and goals.

There is free and unfettered access to all religious sites in Jerusalem now. There never was in the long history of Muslim control. Never. Do you need to know about the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and other Christian sites by Muslims? Or, from 1949 to 1967, the fact that Jews were completely banned from the Old City, that Jewish tombstones were uprooted from the cemetery on the Mount of Olives and used to line the floors of Jordanian army latrines, or that all of the synagogues, every single one of the nearly 40, in the Old City were dynamited and destroyed? Do you not know this? And do you not know that now, every religious group has a right to worship freely (no, that right does not include the right to throw large stones, carefully brought up long flights of stairs for the purpose, on the heads of Jews worshipping at the Western Wall -- sorry, that's not yet a right of Muslim worshippers).

Your complete indiffernce to history, and the way in which you now reveal yourself to have been a patsy either of some Arab propagandist or some silly book of Arab propaganda -- was it something Edward Said wrote? Something of Rashid Khalidi perhaps? -- makes one wonder what you can possibly understand, not about that history, but about other matters, including Islam and what its history has been, not merely in Israel, but all over the Middle East, in North Africa, in Spain, in Iran, in India, in East Asia. Perhaps you are inclined to swallow, along with Arab propaganda about Israel and Jerusalem (for god's sake, why not just buy Karen Armstrong's "City Holy to Three Faiths" and be done with it) what the Arabs put out about Islam as well, in which case Jihadwatch is, for you, apparently quite unnecessary.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 3:43 PM

Well Hugh, I'm no scholar of either the League of Nations, the UN or their respective Charters. I'll do some research. I'll find out if the plans for a Jewish State by the League was any more binding than the resolution of the UN partitioning Palestine/Israel.

Meanwhile, I've made the point that the inhabitants of the Middle East were Arabized after the Islamic conquests; they were not replaced. This applies to the inhabitants of the future British mandate of Palestine.

The remnants of the Khazars are a component of European Jewry...not the main component by a long-shot, but they do exist and their existence is instructional. They had no ethnic kinship with the ancient Hebrews. But nobody here denies their descendents the right to Israel.

Hugh seems incredulous by introduction of the issue. I do so only as a means to discredit the "insidiousness" of the game he and others are playing by pretending the inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza have no historic claim to the land they live on.

Some of these inhabitants have undoubtedly lived in the region from time immemorial - descendents of the Philistines whom you concede inter-married with newcomers...(just as descendents of the ancient Hebrews have lived on the land from time immemorial).

Others came in waves of migration through the centuries and particularly in the late 19th/early 20th...(just as the main body of Jews in the Holy Land came from Europe during that time frame).

So why is the Jewish experience legitimate but the Arab experience not? Why is the Ottoman-era title deed legitimizing for the Jew who owns it but not for the Arab?

Still waiting Hugh. What do you propose to do with the 3 million inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza? Keep them stateless in perpetuity? Expel them en mass? Still waiting....

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 4:08 PM

"Still waiting Hugh. What do you propose to do with the 3 million inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza? Keep them stateless in perpetuity? Expel them en mass? Still waiting...."
-- posted by Cornelius

Simple. Forcibly remove them to the western Siani. Plenty of elbow room down there.

Then, build a fence bifurcating western Siani from eastern Siani, except for a one-way conveyor belt people mover tunnel heading straight into the new nation of Western Siani, Egypt's fine new Sunni neighbor.

Posted by: Chaz MarteL 732 at October 27, 2005 5:36 PM

"...complete indifference to history..."

"...patsy to Arab propaganda..."

Hugh, you earlier referred to my own tone as "inexcusable"...and in the interests of fairness, I conceeded my remark was snide. Now you descend into this kind of emotionalism. Get a grip.

I've never bought into Said or Armstrong and their propaganda...any more than I'd buy into yours.

My point about the Khazars is absolutely legitimate. They had no ethnic tie whatsoever with the ancient Hebrews.

Does that delegitimize the presence of their ancestors in modern Israel? No, not in my mind. Even the Ashkenazis of Germany and Poland were/are far removed ethnically from their cousins in Palestine, due to distance and the passage of centuries. The physical differences are visible for all to see. But that's not the bottom line.

The religious and historical link of Jews to the land of Israel is good enough for me.

It is your own indifference to history that is so striking here...the attempt to dispossess 3 million people because of your animus for their religion and culture.

I despise Islam myself. But I'm not so frenetic in my feelings that I'm willing to contort history and say that 3 million people who live where they live and have for generations don't deserve the right of citizenship in their own land.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 6:28 PM

PS - Still waiting Hugh. What do we do with the 3 million souls who live on the West Bank and Gaza? You're the man with all answers...yet, you're conspicuously silent here.

Hmmmmm....

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 6:32 PM

There are all sorts of people, and groups of people, all over the world, deserving of varying degrees of sympathy. Of all of them, last on my list are that group of Arab Muslims, many of them the descendants of Arabs who arrived between 1910 and 1935, and others the descendants of various kinds of Arab and non-Arab Muslims who arrived, and simply settled, without any land-deeds whatsoever, wherever they felt like it, from about 1840 on. And who proceeded to make life hell for the Jews, starting with the terrorist attacks that began during the first decade of the last century. And who, in pressuring the English, caused them to seal off any possibility of escape for the Jewish refugees who might have made it (throughout the war, the Black Sea ports of Rumania, such as Costanta, remained open), had they been allowed to enter Mandatory Palestine, which they had every right to do so, but were prevented by the British hell-bent on accommodating the Arabs. Of course, during World War II, the Arabs were pro-Nazi (Sadat was sent to jail for such activities, Rashid Ali in Iraq set up a short-lived pro-Nazi regime, Alois Brunner, the world's most wanted Nazi warcriminal, like so many of them, found refuge in the Arab lands and he is to this day believed to be living in Damascus. As for Haj Amin el Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem (sometimes incorrectly referred to as the "Grand" Mufti which is a meaningless term), he offered his services to Hitler, helped raise a Bosnian Muslim S.S. Force, and supported in any way he could the so-called Final Solution. The Jews of Palestine, however, volunteered for the most dangerous tasks -- from preventing Iraqi oil installaations from falling into pro-German hands, to deeds of derring-do in Syria and in North Africa (on the latter, see A. J. Liebling's famous account of the volunteers for the Free French, a report entitled "Molly"). Just as Jews were so important in the Resistance in Europe, 200,000 of them volunteered to serve with the Allies in the Middle East.

One last point: having issued rifles to the Jews of Palestine, the British right after the war went out and seized them all back, in what was called Operation Agatha. Why? Because the war was over, and the Jews were not to be allowed to defend themselves against the well-armed Arabs.

The demography of "Palestine" during the last few centuries, as it fell into ruin and desolation (read what Mark Twain, or Melville, or other Western travellers, described) needs to be understood. Before the Jews began to return (there had always been a permanent Jewish presence in Jerusalem, in Hebron, in Safed, and perhaps even in Tiberias) the population of the area had been steadily declining. In 1850 the total population of all of the area of Western Palestine could not have exceeded 100,000, and some believe it was closer to 50,000. In 1850 the total population of Jerusalem was 15,000.

In addition to the Moshe Gil book about the history of "Palestine" up until the Muslim conquest (which includes the story of the massacres and forced conversions), other books to consult would be: Elie Kedourie, "The Angl-Arab Labyrinth," (diplomatic history), Samuel Katz, "Battleground" (good one-volume summary, but Katz did not understand, nor take account, of Islam), James Parkes, "Whose Land?" (an Anglican clergyman), and especially, "The Claim of Dispossession: Jewish Land Settlement and the Arabs, 1878-1948" which must be closely read, including all its notes and footnotes. If you cannot find it, it can be ordered from Amazon.

Without the last book, in particular, and detailed examination of the demographics and land ownership, one cannot commment either on "Palestine" or Mandatory Palestine, or on the plausibility of the "Palestinian people" -- a phrase which, by the way, appears NOT ONCE in any of the records of any of the U.N. meetings, not from any Arab spokesman, not from anyone, prior to the Six-Day War.

How do I know? Because I have gone systematically through all of those records. That's how I know. Why don't you ask yourself why not a single Egyptian, Jordanian, Saudi, Syrian, Iraqi, or any other U.N. representative or ambassador, why didn't Arafat's predecessor Ahmed Shukairy, ever use that phrase "Palestinian people"? Can you guess?

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 6:50 PM

One last thing. If you are unwilling to do the research, it is unfair of you to mislead others, and force me to waste my time dealing with you, by presenting the most absurd PLO-ish analyses. This isn't the place for that. There are many websites for which that would be just the ticket. Why not take those coals to Newcastle?

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 6:51 PM

Nothing you just wrote changes anything...except for your willingness to preface it by saying that you have no sympathy for the people inhabiting the West Bank and Gaza.

I've read all about the "flowering of the desert" in the late 19th century due to the efforts of Jewish immigrants and how Arabs from the region subsequently came seeking work. I can accept it as a premise.

Can you accept that these Arabs set down roots the same way the Jews set down roots...and that generations have since lived on the lands? Can you also accept that there were SOME Arabs living in Israel/Palestine for centuries?

Though I don't agree with it, I can understand your opposition to the creation of a Palestinian State based on strategic considerations. But to use any argument to further that opposition...including the willful delegitimizing of the Palestinians as a people, is the worst kind of demagoguery. It is a vile replication of Arab-Muslim efforts to delegitimize the Israelis right to exist.

I submit that whatever you choose to call these 3 million inhabitants living on the West Bank and Gaza, THEY EXIST. What should be done with them?

You continue your prevarication Hugh. You come off here like you're the fountain of all wisdom, expressing an opinion on every facet of Jihad/Dhimmitude. Yet, you're hiding from one of the most pertinent questions of our time.

Tell the world Hugh Fitzgerald, what should be done with the 3 million souls currently residing in the West Bank and Gaza?

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 7:54 PM

HUGH: "...the plausibility of the "Palestinian people" -- a phrase which, by the way, appears NOT ONCE in any of the records of any of the U.N. meetings, not from any Arab spokesman, not from anyone, prior to the Six-Day War."

How is it the PLO was founded in 1964, 3 years before the six-day war?

HUGH: "If you are unwilling to do the research, it is unfair of you to mislead others, and force me to waste my time dealing with you"

Calls to mind something about glass houses and stone-throwing.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 8:04 PM

"How is it the PLO was founded in 1964, 3 years before the six-day war?"
--- from a posting above

What does that have to do with the appearance, or non-appearance, of the phrase "Palestinian people" in any of the records, the tens of thousands of pages of records, at the U.N.?

Please bring me the evidence that the phrase "Palestinian people" was used prior to 1967 by the infamous Jamal Baroody, for example?

Or for that matter -- go to the PLO documents not from 1969, nor 1968, but from 1964. Find me, and present me, with NOT such phrases as "the Palestinian Arab" people or the "Arab people of Palestine" but rather the "Palestinian people." I repeat: do not quote to me from the English version of the post-1967 Palestine National Charter, where once or twice, along with continual reference to the "Arab people of Palestine" and the "Palestinian Arab people" there are also beginning to appear, just here and there, the phrase -- it was just getting off the ground in those days -- "Palestinian people." But that is AFTER the 1967 war.

Just to refresh your memory, here are the firs five "Aritcles" of that PLO Charter from AFTER the war, in 1968. Note how the defining phrase is "Arab Palestinian people" and "Palestine" is an "indivisible part of the Arab homeland" (no emphasis as yet on the separateness of this supposed "Palestinian people"):

THE PALESTINIAN NATIONAL CHARTER:
Resolutions of the Palestine National Council, July 1-17, 1968
Text of the Charter:
Article 1: Palestine is the homeland of the Arab Palestinian people; it is an indivisible part of the Arab homeland, and the Palestinian people are an integral part of the Arab nation.

Article 2: Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is an indivisible territorial unit.

Article 3: The Palestinian Arab people possess the legal right to their homeland and have the right to determine their destiny after achieving the liberation of their country in accordance with their wishes and entirely of their own accord and will.

Article 4: The Palestinian identity is a genuine, essential, and inherent characteristic; it is transmitted from parents to children. The Zionist occupation and the dispersal of the Palestinian Arab people, through the disasters which befell them, do not make them lose their Palestinian identity and their membership in the Palestinian community, nor do they negate them.

Article 5: The Palestinians are those Arab nationals who, until 1947, normally resided in Palestine regardless of whether they were evicted from it or have stayed there. Anyone born, after that date, of a Palestinian father - whether inside Palestine or outside it - is also a Palestinian.

Article 6: The Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians.

Article 7: That there is a Palestinian community and that it has material, spiritual, and historical connection with Palestine are indisputable facts. It is a national duty to bring up individual Palestinians in an Arab revolutionary manner. All means of information and education must be adopted in order to acquaint the Palestinian with his country in the most profound manner, both spiritual and material, that is possible. He must be prepared for the armed struggle and ready to sacrifice his wealth and his life in order to win back his homeland and bring about its liberation.

Article 8: The phase in their history, through which the Palestinian people are now living, is that of national (watani) struggle for the liberation of Palestine. Thus the conflicts among the Palestinian national forces are secondary, and should be ended for the sake of the basic conflict that exists between the forces of Zionism and of imperialism on the one hand, and the Palestinian Arab people on the other. On this basis the Palestinian masses, regardless of whether they are residing in the national homeland or in diaspora (mahajir) constitute - both their organizations and the individuals - one national front working for the retrieval of Palestine and its liberation through armed struggle.

Article 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine. Thus it is the overall strategy, not merely a tactical phase. The Palestinian Arab people assert their absolute determination and firm resolution to continue their armed struggle and to work for an armed popular revolution for the liberation of their country and their return to it. They also assert their right to normal life in Palestine and to exercise their right to self-determination and sovereignty over it.

Article 10: Commando action constitutes the nucleus of the Palestinian popular liberation war. This requires its escalation, comprehensiveness, and the mobilization of all the Palestinian popular and educational efforts and their organization and involvement in the armed Palestinian revolution. It also requires the achieving of unity for the national (watani) struggle among the different groupings of the Palestinian people, and between the Palestinian people and the Arab masses, so as to secure the continuation of the revolution, its escalation, and victory.

Article 11: The Palestinians will have three mottoes: national (wataniyya) unity, national (qawmiyya) mobilization, and liberation.

Article 12: The Palestinian people believe in Arab unity. In order to contribute their share toward the attainment of that objective, however, they must, at the present stage of their struggle, safeguard their Palestinian identity and develop their consciousness of that identity, and oppose any plan that may dissolve or impair it.

Article 13: Arab unity and the liberation of Palestine are two complementary objectives, the attainment of either of which facilitates the attainment of the other. Thus, Arab unity leads to the liberation of Palestine, the liberation of Palestine leads to Arab unity; and work toward the realization of one objective proceeds side by side with work toward the realization of the other.

Article 14: The destiny of the Arab nation, and indeed Arab existence itself, depend upon the destiny of the Palestine cause. From this interdependence springs the Arab nation's pursuit of, and striving for, the liberation of Palestine. The people of Palestine play the role of the vanguard in the realization of this sacred (qawmi) goal.

Article 15: The liberation of Palestine, from an Arab viewpoint, is a national (qawmi) duty and it attempts to repel the Zionist and imperialist aggression against the Arab homeland, and aims at the elimination of Zionism in Palestine. Absolute responsibility for this falls upon the Arab nation - peoples and governments - with the Arab people of Palestine in the vanguard. Accordingly, the Arab nation must mobilize all its military, human, moral, and spiritual capabilities to participate actively with the Palestinian people in the liberation of Palestine. It must, particularly in the phase of the armed Palestinian revolution, offer and furnish the Palestinian people with all possible help, and material and human support, and make available to them the means and opportunities that will enable them to continue to carry out their leading role in the armed revolution, until they liberate their homeland.

Article 16: The liberation of Palestine, from a spiritual point of view, will provide the Holy Land with an atmosphere of safety and tranquility, which in turn will safeguard the country's religious sanctuaries and guarantee freedom of worship and of visit to all, without discrimination of race, color, language, or religion. Accordingly, the people of Palestine look to all spiritual forces in the world for support.

Article 17: The liberation of Palestine, from a human point of view, will restore to the Palestinian individual his dignity, pride, and freedom. Accordingly the Palestinian Arab people look forward to the support of all those who believe in the dignity of man and his freedom in the world.

Article 18: The liberation of Palestine, from an international point of view, is a defensive action necessitated by the demands of self-defense. Accordingly the Palestinian people, desirous as they are of the friendship of all people, look to freedom-loving, and peace-loving states for support in order to restore their legitimate rights in Palestine, to re-establish peace and security in the country, and to enable its people to exercise national sovereignty and freedom.

Article 19: The partition of Palestine in 1947 and the establishment of the state of Israel are entirely illegal, regardless of the passage of time, because they were contrary to the will of the Palestinian people and to their natural right in their homeland, and inconsistent with the principles embodied in the Charter of the United Nations, particularly the right to self-determination.

Article 20: The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.

Article 21: The Arab Palestinian people, expressing themselves by the armed Palestinian revolution, reject all solutions which are substitutes for the total liberation of Palestine and reject all proposals aiming at the liquidation of the Palestinian problem, or its internationalization.

Article 22: Zionism is a political movement organically associated with international imperialism and antagonistic to all action for liberation and to progressive movements in the world. It is racist and fanatic in its nature, aggressive, expansionist, and colonial in its aims, and fascist in its methods. Israel is the instrument of the Zionist movement, and geographical base for world imperialism placed strategically in the midst of the Arab homeland to combat the hopes of the Arab nation for liberation, unity, and progress. Israel is a constant source of threat vis-a-vis peace in the Middle East and the whole world. Since the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence and will contribute to the establishment of peace in the Middle East, the Palestinian people look for the support of all the progressive and peaceful forces and urge them all, irrespective of their affiliations and beliefs, to offer the Palestinian people all aid and support in their just struggle for the liberation of their homeland.

Article 23: The demand of security and peace, as well as the demand of right and justice, require all states to consider Zionism an illegitimate movement, to outlaw its existence, and to ban its operations, in order that friendly relations among peoples may be preserved, and the loyalty of citizens to their respective homelands safeguarded.

Article 24: The Palestinian people believe in the principles of justice, freedom, sovereignty, self-determination, human dignity, and in the right of all peoples to exercise them.

Article 25: For the realization of the goals of this Charter and its principles, the Palestine Liberation Organization will perform its role in the liberation of Palestine in accordance with the Constitution of this Organization.

Article 26: The Palestine Liberation Organization, representative of the Palestinian revolutionary forces, is responsible for the Palestinian Arab people's movement in its struggle - to retrieve its homeland, liberate and return to it and exercise the right to self-determination in it - in all military, political, and financial fields and also for whatever may be required by the Palestine case on the inter-Arab and international levels.

Article 27: The Palestine Liberation Organization shall cooperate with all Arab states, each according to its potentialities; and will adopt a neutral policy among them in the light of the requirements of the war of liberation; and on this basis it shall not interfere in the internal affairs of any Arab state.

Article 28: The Palestinian Arab people assert the genuineness and independence of their national (wataniyya) revolution and reject all forms of intervention, trusteeship, and subordination.

Article 29: The Palestinian people possess the fundamental and genuine legal right to liberate and retrieve their homeland. The Palestinian people determine their attitude toward all states and forces on the basis of the stands they adopt vis-a-vis to the Palestinian revolution to fulfill the aims of the Palestinian people.

Article 30: Fighters and carriers of arms in the war of liberation are the nucleus of the popular army which will be the protective force for the gains of the Palestinian Arab people.

Article 31: The Organization shall have a flag, an oath of allegiance, and an anthem. All this shall be decided upon in accordance with a special regulation.

Article 32: Regulations, which shall be known as the Constitution of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, shall be annexed to this Charter. It will lay down the manner in which the Organization, and its organs and institutions, shall be constituted; the respective competence of each; and the requirements of its obligation under the Charter.

Article 33: This Charter shall not be amended save by [vote of] a majority of two-thirds of the total membership of the National Congress of the Palestine Liberation Organization [taken] at a special session convened for that purpose.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Leila S. Kadi (ed.), Basic Political Documents of the Armed Palestinian Resistance Movement, Palestine Research Centre, Beirut, December 1969, pp. 137-141. itself. Be careful -- you may confuse the "Palestinian Arabs" with the phrase "Palestinian Arab."

Okay, I'm going to wait here, all night, and for the next few days. I'm going to wait until you produce for me your proof that the founding of the PLO in 1964 has relevance here. Of course, the founding of the PLO three years before there was a single Israeli soldier in either the West Bank or Gaza does show up one thing -- the utter phoniness of the claim that if the Israelis leave Gaza and the West Bank there is the slightest reason to believe that the Arabs, with the shock troops of the "Palestinian Arabs," would ever accept Israel.

They can't. They won't. It would go against Islam. If all the world, ultimately, belongs to Islam -- according to Muslims -- then in the first place those areas where Muslims once ruled, as present-day Israel, Spain (Andaluz, which does NOT for the Arabs mean only southern Spain, but nearly all of Spain), most of India, Sicily, most of south and central Europe (including Greece, Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia).

Why don't you take a week or two, read widely in the history of the MIddle East, beginning even with those travel writers of the 19th century, such as Twain, Melville, and so on (quoted at the beginning of "Battleground"), and then we'll talk.

But not before you have presented me with documents from that 1964 founding of the PLO with, of course, mention of the "Palestinian people."

I'll wait. Right here. And I invite others to keep coming back here over the next few days, while we are supplied with the evidence that was so prematurely, and triumphantly, announced by this poster in his last posting above.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 9:22 PM

One more thing.

Is it accident, or is by design, that when most of us, including the Arabs, speak about the Sudan, we speak of Arabs and blacks. When we speak of Egypt, we speak of Copts and Arabs. When we speak about Iraq, we speak about Kurds and Arabs. When we speak about Algeria or Morocco, we speak about Arabs and Berbers. When we speak about the province of Khuzistan in southwestern Iran, we speak about the Arabs and Persians. When we speak about those assorted people who came to fight with Bin Laden, and joined forces with the local Taliban, we speak of Arabs and Afghans. When the Arabs talk about themselves, they constantly emphasize their "Arabness" and hardly mention, or give weight to, the particular nation-state to which they may belong. Does it matter that Bin Laden was the son of a Yemeni Arab who became a Saudi Arab? Why? Does it matter that Al-Zarqawi calls himself a "Palestinian Arab," has a passport that identifies him as a "Jordanian Arab," that is an Arab citizen of the Arab Kingdom of Jordan (and that word "Arab" in the title is important -- remember how much fighting there was in Iraq over whether to call it the "Arab Republic of Iraq" or leave out, as the Kurds wished, that designation?)?

But when it comes to a little sliver of land, for the most obvious of political purposes, all of a sudden those Arabs -- go back and read the U.N. reports for 1948, please -- have suddenly metamorphosed so carefully, so insistently, into the "Palestinian people."

The obvious political reason behind the invention of the "Palestinian people" was long ago forthrightly explained by the head of As Saiqa (one of the many Palestinian "Liberation" Groups), Zuheir Mohsen, in an interview with James Dorsey of the Dutch newspaper "Trouw" after the whole "Palestinian people" business had taken off:

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a
Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle
against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality
today there is no difference between Jordanians,
Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and
tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of
a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand
that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian
people' to oppose Zionism.

"For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state
with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa.
While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa,
Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we
reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even
a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."

(PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein, in a 1977
interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw.)

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 9:42 PM

Started a moslem cartoon myself a few months back, entitled Koranimations, but just never kept up with it. The fact that I can't draw for beans might have had something to do with it, but anyway, GO-DANES.

Posted by: GunnyBob at October 27, 2005 10:08 PM

Cornelius,

you wrote, "You're wrong my friend. The Philistines inhabited the coastal strip of Gaza in Bilical times. Unless you can document an event in history where they were exiled or exterminated, they lived there through history."

On the contrary, you are wrong, as you later seem to admit with finesse in saying, "The Palestinians are the Arab/Muslim people who inhabit the West Bank and Gaza." To which I say, BINGO. They are exactly that: Arab/Muslims who have recently been given the name-label, "Palestinian", as an act of revisionist history and propaganda.

A couple of historical events contributing to the disappearance of the ancient Philistines:

1) Assyrian conquest of a large portion of what is now Israel. This resulted in the destruction of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, and the disappearance of the 10 ("Lost") northern Hebrew tribes. Assyrians were shortly defeated by the Babylonians...

2) Babylonian conquest of the Kingdom of Judah, which resulted in the exile of the southern Hebrew tribes (Benjamin and Judah). It was Babylonian policy, throughout their empire, to forcibly deport and resettle whole populations to the far reaches of their empire. That is how they "managed" their conquered subjects. Several generations later, the Persians, who themselves conquered the Babylonians, allowed the (now) Jews (from "Judah") to return from exile...

A small portion of the Arab/Muslim population of the area which is known as the Holy Land probably descends from (horrors:) Crusaders (after the Latin Kingdoms were crushed by the Muslims), Jews (dhimmified and coerced into islam), Byzantines (see Jews, immediately previous), etc., who were arabized into becoming for all cultural purposes, Arabs. An almost literal handful are Samaritans, an offshoot (or the mainshoot, from their perspective) of the Israelites from Babylonian/Persian conquest times.

It has always been interesting to me that the arabs do not discuss, nor "admit" to this "impurity of descent", but rather have manufactured the fantasy of "filastin".

This minor phenomenon is another example of their self-perpetuating cultural pathology.

The major portion of the Arab/Muslim population of the area descend from arab migrants from Egypt, Syria and other portions of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th, 20th centuries, along with arab in-migration, during the British Mandate. There are even Circassian/"Palestinians", if I recall correctly.

Posted by: del at October 27, 2005 10:20 PM

Well Hugh, you may interpret the difference between "Palestinian Arabs" and "Palestinian people" as something profound. Personally, I'm not in the habit of arguing over semantics.

My point is that the very creation of the PLO BEFORE the six day war is proof of an evolving Palestinian national consciousness that preceded the Israeli capture of the West Bank and Gaza.

As for Zuheir Mushein's interview, if this is your basis for the denial of the Palestinians their national identity - the musings of a single official in a single interview - well, I rest my case.

Nothing you've written changes the fact that 3 million quasi-pseudo-non-Palestinians are living as stateless human beings on the West Bank and Gaza. Most families have been there for generations. Some for centuries.

I ask again, what shall we do with them Hugh?

We're all waiting...

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 10:26 PM

That's it? It's merely a "matter of semantics"? But the whole issue, or much of it, is exactly about the fabrication, for obvious political purposes, and the careful Arab effort to disguise the real impulse (that of the Arab Muslim refusal to countenance an Infidel state on land once possessed by Arabs) as instead, merely some plausible movement of "national liberation" which, of course, requires the development of a phony "people." You do not rise to the challenge, nor even try to. I would have expected you to have gone away and at the very least have produced for our inspection the founding documents, in 1964, of the PLO. You did no such thing, and lamely answer that the very thing we have been arguing ove is merely a "matter of semantics."

As for your tears over the "Palestinians" -- I can give you a list of people who come first on my list for tears and tea and sympathy, beginning with any of the non-Muslim and non-Arab peoples in the world who have suffered from the Muslim Arabs. Let's see: the blacks in the southern Sudan, the blacks in Darfur, the Berbers in the Kabyle, the enslaved blacks in Mali (what shall we call them?), the enslaved blacks in Mauritania, the Copts in Egypt (what good is it for them not to be stateless but hold an Egyptian passport -- it was originally their country, after all, -- if they are tormented or persecuted or forced to live in permanent insecurity, the Chaldeans and Assyrians in Iraq, the Maronites in Lebanon (where Christians were once 60% of the population, and are now down to 35%), and so on. You go on feeling your sympathy for the Muslim Arabs who have made war on the Jews, who made war on them even in their tiny settlements, who conducted war throughout the 1930s, who helped prevent perhaps as many as a million Jews from being able to flee, through the Rumanian ports, from the Nazis becuase the Mandatory Adminsitration danced to the Arab tune, and appeased them by cutting oDonaldff immigration (see the plan of September 1939, the one proposed by the Colonial Secretary, Macdonald, the one that Winston Churchill denounced as a "betrayal" by the British government of the Mandate, and that limited Jewish immigration to a measly 15,000 a year for five years, and after that, it would, by being subject to an Arab veto, end altogether). There's more, but the last forty-one years of terrorism by the PLO in my view puts paid to any slight sympathy that anyone should feel for these self-barbarized, self-primitivized people, wallowing in lies, victimhood, hate, and murder. I'll stick with the mass murder of blacks in the southern Sudan, the Copts, the Berbers, the Kurds, and every other non-Arab or non-Muslim group subject to discrimination, persecution, cultural and linguistic imperialism, and not least, sometimes mass murder, at the hands of Arab Muslims.

You didn't bother to read the texts I offered; you won't study the demography of modern Palestine, you haven't bothered to look into the Ottoman cadastral records. You apparently think you can make all kinds of trouble, waste all kinds of time, and simply breezily come back with "its just a matter of semantics" and you are hereby absolving yourself of any need to do any work.

That's it, buster. Never again a single reply to you from me, about anything. I have been a fool to have taken you seriously, to have offered you fact after fact, cut-and-pasted relevant quotes and documents. No more.

You are hanging, here, by a thread--just.

Posted by: Hugh at October 27, 2005 10:41 PM

Del

You wrote nothing about the fate of the Philistines during the Babylonian conquest.

Is it beyond the realm of possibility that some of their descendents live in Gaza to this day?...probably with mixed blood of immigrants, but descendents nontheless...

The larger point is something we agree on:

"The Palestinians are the Arab/Muslim people who inhabit the West Bank and Gaza."

The British mandate was called PALESTINE. The Zionists in Europe in the 19th and 20th century referred to the land of their dreams as PALESTINE. Why is it historical revisionism to refer to the local inhabitants of this land as Palestinians? They certainly aren't Israelis? They're not Jordanians?

Don't tell me you're buying into Hugh's nomenclature? I refer to Egyptians only as Copts and Arabs after I've established that they are Egyptian. Same with Sudan, Iraq, etc.

If someone from Egypt identified himself as an "Arab Muslim"...I wouldn't have a clue about his nationality.

Let's all get real here.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 10:44 PM

HUGH: "...which, of course, requires the development of a phony "people."

This is another example of the flight from reality that afflicts Hugh Fitzgerald. All his tiresome cut-and-pasting does nothing to account for the 3 million people living in stateless limbo in the West Bank and Gaza. These are his "phoney people." Rootless, worthless, non-existent.

Except that they do exist.

I don't shed tears for the Palestinians folks. I mearly acknowledge the reality of their existence.

Did you notice how Hugh cut me off..."never" to respond again. His timing was quite propitious... he never did answer my question, "what to do with the 3 million souls inhabiting the West Bank and Gaza."

Why couldn't Hugh Fitzgerald, the man who knows EVERYTHING, answer a simple question?

Either he suddenly draws a blank - hard to believe with someone as astute as Hugh - or he wants these people to live in a perpetual stateless limbo...or perhaps he's a proponent of mass expulsion but is too much of a coward to reveal the extent of his extremism to his benefactors.

You see, he has a reputation to protect...(and he accuses David Horowitz of empire-building!)

Posted by: Cornelius at October 27, 2005 11:01 PM

Cornelius,

"I ask again, what shall we do with them"

Well, I'll jump in.

We wait until THEY come to THEIR senses and decide for a true and just peace, for themselves and for Israelis, and for Samaritans and Druze, or whatever subgroupings, the various identities decide matter. Based upon their, and their fraternal arab brethren's behavior, I'm not holding my breath.

In the meantime too bad for them. It sucks to be pathological, but there is no magical technology to cure them. They have to figure out reality, and history, for themselves, and suffer the consequences until they do.

Most conflicts are about identities. Everyone has multiple identities, some of which are more central than others to any particular individual.

A basic concept (but not most basic) that they need to absorb is that they are either arab-not-palestinian, or palestinian-not-arab. If they choose to absorb the first, they have Jordan, which was the majority of the mandate. If they choose to absorb the second, they would, (effectively by definition in my discussion herein) essentially renounce participation in the identity conflict: Arab vs. Israeli, and they would sincerely accept a two-state solution west of the Jordan (which they do not now). A very large problem is that the identity conflict of muslim vs. kufr tangles the web of other identity conflicts. And to describe it as "tangles the web" is an understatement, because the the muslim vs. kufr conflict is even more intractable than the "national" identity conflict and is interwoven into the arab identity. So, I realize an expectation of their escape from pathology is unrealistic. This is why there is no solution at present. So we wait.

Coddling them, or imposing a "solution" are neither of them real solutions, nor is deportation, although that is a "management" approach with a huge downside.

As for coddling, which is what UN/UNHCR/UNRWA have done for decades, that is part of what has permanently institutionalized the conflict and helped intensify the muslim vs. kufr conflict. The UN is the most ironic organization in history. Really.

As for Hugh's response to you: I understand him. You keep shifting goalposts and do not acknowledge your factual errors. Perhaps he is overreacting, and that is probably out of some disappointment. But the foregoing is entirely speculation by myself, a (truly) anonymous no-one-in-particular who has never met nor communicated with anyone here except through Jihadwatch/Dhimmiwatch, or perhaps, anonymously in some other blog comment section.

But here is a question for you: What do you think we (the world/the US/or any subgroup) should do? And why does whatever you offer make sense?

Why don't you cogitate and proffer some realistic insights into the conflicts on your own?

Here's a start: The perpetual stateless limbo is of their own choosing. The perpetual stateless limbo is their own choosing...

Posted by: del at October 27, 2005 11:47 PM

This is not a reply to the poster above. Even if he somehow could refrain from posting in the vein immediately above, he and I will not be communicating. Whether or not he appears here at all in the future will depend upon his ability to so refrain.

No, the following Public Service Announcement is addressed to others who might read this. Why? Because the poster above happens to have charged me with having "extremist" views which I must hide because they might be antipathetic "to my benefactors": Hugh is "too much of a coward to reveal the extent of his extremism to his benefactors." Further allusion is made to my expressed distaste for empire-builders which is deemed to be hypocritical because, you see, my failure to answer every single one of his remarks, no matter how jejune or fatuous, after I have provided a long series of carefully detailed replies to his posts, and then he offers nothing of substance but mere attitudinizing and name-calling, is due to my own empire-building: "he has a reputation to protect...(and he accuses David Horowitz of empire-building)."

So far am I from being an empire-builder, with an agent, and renaissance or for that matter reformation weekends, and book deals, and of course the campus circuit where, by lecturing on Islam and so on and so forth, some enterprising souls apparently take in a cool half-million a year, not to mention other departments of their empire-building. Well, let me admit to something. While Bright Young Conservatives are appearing on television, penning their columns, and consistently missing the point about Islam, I have kept by postings at one site, JW, yet somehow these postings often find there way all over the Web, and into Dutch or Russian or French or other languages and, I have reason to believe, are having an effect. There are now several thousand of these postings. Some have been put up, and catalogued, at other websites, with both subject and even word indices, the work of a kind and acute volunteer. Many of those postings repeat themselves for pedagogic purposes. Many of them do not. Some of them can be composed quickly. Others require some study, or offer the fruits of study conducted earlier. Knowledge of the Middle East, or of Islam, or of the world, does not just magically arrive, summoned up by a snapping of fingers, when needed. Constant study, of all kinds of things, is required.

The poster above mentions my "benefactors" because, in his world, no one would do all this without the kind of recompense that some of those he so admires are so good at getting. I'm not good at it. I'm terrible. Without giving exact figures I can testify that since JW opened for business, I have posted several thousand times. In that time I have received a total sum that is less than would be taken in, in a single year, by a 17-year-old illegal alien who spoke no English, and was working as the most junior busboy or dishwasher in an all-night diner. So no, I am not in the league of those whom the poster above thinks I have no business criticizing, because in his view I too am an "empire-builder," and must mind my words (!) because of fear of offending (non-existent) "benefactors."

Which raises another point. Despite the assumption by some, I do not have any trust fund or other source of income that is magically holding me, or dependents, up. I must at some point cajole something out of the JW audience, but of course I want to cajole only from those who can afford it. I have so far failed in all my sly or shy or awkward attempts. I find it hard to believe that everyone who visits JW continues to be convinced that I am the member of a London club, that I have an oast-house in Kent, that every winter I clip coupons at my villa in St.-Juan-les-Pins where I sit and look at the sea, though sometimes when bored with the Mediterranean I fly over to the Sandy Lane in Barbados and play golf, and every once in a while, just to amuse myself, I indolently compose a posting now and again. It is absurd -- this is an absurd situation -- that I should have to explain again that this has nothing to do with present reality.

One more thing. Possibly among those who visit JW, there are those who need to be made aware of that "little-noted provision in the tax releif package" (The New Duranty Times, Oct. 27, Page A23) which "allows donors who make cash gifts to almost any charity by the end of this year to deduct an amount equal to virtually 100 percent of their adjusted gross incomes, double the normal limit of 50 percent of income. The tantlaizing prosect has set off a financial scramble among some wealthy donors and charities vying for their dollars."

Well, if there are any potential "wealthy donors" who, having been apprised of of this special, one-time only change in the tax rules, so that the next few months are for them an ideal time to contribute, and they suddenly feel like doing so (thank god), I would urge them to send money to the JW address, and if you want it to go to me, then for god's sake kindly indicate that on whatever you send.

The universities with their gigantic endowments, already have too much money. So many of the other recipients of largesse, museums, orchestras, ballet companies, and so on, be utterly transformed, or put out of existence altogether, should Islam become more powerful, should Europe itself undergo irreversible islamization (think about that -- stop and think), should the United States itself be transformed as it surely in time would be.

It is not merely the usual appeal, the kind of thing that the unworthies of NPR ask of you -- but an appeal that would not be made, were I not convinced of the significance of the effort I make here to push out, into the ether, certain ideas, even phrases that if offered in a memorable way, or even with deliberate phrase-making so as to sum up or make a certain point as pithily as possible: The New Duranty Times, the "Light-Unto-the-Muslim-Nations," the "Muslim-for-identification-purposes-only" Muslims, and so on. By dint of repetition, certain ideas, even whole sentences that sum up a situation, can become memes that spread, and do.

So here is the pitch. If you are going to take advantage of that new tax law, if you are going to give to any 501(c)(3) this year, the most important one, in my view, the one that will do the most to educate and inform about the one matter which now should take precedence over all others, is JW. So much else -- everything else -- will stand or fall on the rapidity with which comprehension of Islam spreads among Infidels, despite the vast efforts made to confuse or fool them, despite the complications that result from the personal charm of individuals (the "good Muslim" problem), despite the army of paid apologists, despite the unwillingness to believe that the Idols of the Age -- Diversity, and Tolerance of Everything, and the deep conviction that People Are the Same the Whole World Over -- idols that stand in the way of civilizational survival. Despite all this, something, I am convinced, is getting through. It helps if the phrases are carefully fashioned, that there is a relentlessness to them, a constant reminder of what connects with what, a phrasinig that encapsulates the real situation -- such as that of the Lesser Jihad (against Israel) and the Greater Jihad (against all the rest). This takes preparation, study, re-study. One must be able to sum up pithily, to relate the tenets of Islam and the history of Islamic conquest, to the day's news, or the year's, to current policy failures, and possibilities that remain to be exploited.

Those who come to JW are self-selected. Few, one suspects, are about to spend their pennies endowing the Cornel West Chair of Self-Esteem Studies, or the Rashid Khalidi Chair of Constructing Palestinian Identity Studies. But even when you contribute to the kind of universities that countenance these and other examples of idiocy, you are not spending your charitable money wisely. Surely we all realize the uniquenss of this situation, one where there is a war but no Office of War Propaganda, and where the American and other Western governments do not dare to conduct the kind of war effort that has been left to individuals, to the private sector. Well, JW is that private sector, that non-profit private sector. It needs support.

So let me take the charges insinuated or stated in the posting above, and turn them to my own purposes. The poster above is so wrong about my own situation. I would be delighted to receive a third, and half would be paradise enow, of what the great Cornel West or the great Rashid Khalidi receive. It might then be possible to have a certain peace of mind which, in turn, might make other efforts, more durable than postings, possible.

Why don't I, in order to finish a book, simply apply for a grant from one of those foundations. Why, indeed? Ask yourself what foundation would dare to fund something about Islam based on the views stated here? Might as well imagine Ibn Warraq being given a prime-time television interview show, or even imagine him being interviewed, just once, on such a show. No, whatever support can be obtained will have to be obtained through the Direct Appeal Campaign of this, and previous, and no doubt future, postings.

The poster above apparently thinks I am a real money-maker fearful of offending my "benefactors," an empire-builder and a runner-away from a fair fight to boot. Read all the postings in the thread above. Read other postings by googling "Jihad Watch" and "Posted by Hugh." Decide for yourself whether it is all worthless, or worth something.

I don't think my request is unreasonable at this end-of-my-tether point. Do you?

Posted by: Hugh at October 28, 2005 12:40 AM

Cornelius,

you wrote: "You wrote nothing about the fate of the Philistines during the Babylonian conquest."

The Philistines were obliterated by the same imperial conquests which destroyed the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah, along with campaigns by the Egyptians. These were small buffer states between and adjacent to large and powerful empires. The Babylonians deported most of every group they conquered...

It is not beyond the realm of possibility that some of the arabs in the holy land have some philistine descent, genetically, but it is small. And they have, and have had, no cultural connection for, practically, eons. The arabs in the Holy Land likely have more Israelite and Jewish blood than Philistine.

you wrote: "Why is it historical revisionism to refer to the local inhabitants of this land as Palestinians"

Its a name-label with political baggage. In particular that baggage is arab revisionist propaganda. Anyone who uses that label should be aware of the origin of the label. You do not appear to be aware.

Personally I agree with you that they exist, now in 2005, as a group identity. However they deserve no benefit of historical legitimacy based upon a fraudulent claim to "Philistia". And in light of the evident fact that their claim to this identity is mostly in order to delegitimize another group's legitimate history, they (the "Palestinians") deserve even less legitimacy.

Around a month ago I wrote in a post, which no one responded to, asking, something like, What , in theory, does the world owe new national-identity groups? And what do other residents owe the new identity members (abstractly - imagine other planets, or other continents). Well?

As for nomenclature, I try to look at groups by their own identity-labels, but that doesn't mean I accept their claims without consideration. Also, group boundaries are always fuzzy: not everyone in any major identity-group has identical secondary identities. Also, people change their identities as their ideas change.

By the way, your apparent "model" of national identities is not necessarily a good description of how other people view themselves. My impression is that most Egyptians would describe themselves as first of a muslim identity and Egyptian as secondary, for example, not the other way around. Of course it can be difficult to ascertain a true response without a Vulcan mind-meld. Westerners and Europeans often look at the world as political nation states, and have imposed this model to a great extent. But there are other types of identities: ethnic, religious, skin color, body features, gangs, favorite sports teams (The vanquished Red Sox Nation comes to mind) (I'm trying to lighten things up a little)...

Posted by: del at October 28, 2005 1:02 AM

a poster wrote: ( :) ) "I don't think my request is unreasonable at this end-of-my-tether point. Do you?"

Umm, no, I don't. Its very reasonable. I'm not a big time benefactor, but will give something. Many, many people appreciate your writing. Thank you for doing it.

Posted by: del at October 28, 2005 1:09 AM

Well, Hugh has made it plain that I'm on the cusp of ex-communication.

If it happens, I've suffered worse indignities.

Hugh, I wasn't thinking about money when I used the word benefactors...I was thinking about those who are providing you with the audience to further your career as a writer. This forum is quite a nice-stepping stone. Lately, I've read your work published on Front Page Mag and other web-sites.

I'm just wondering if your inability to answer a simple question is because of a reluctance to sound too extreme and thus marginalize the possibilities for your future. Perhaps I'm completely off base and if so, I apologize.

DEL: "We wait until THEY come to THEIR senses and decide for a true and just peace, for themselves and for Israelis, and for Samaritans and Druze, or whatever subgroupings, the various identities decide matter."

Now I don't necessarily have a problem with this Del. I certainly don't want to reward the Palestinians for their murderous violence. But we're in a cycle now that is intractable. Palestinian violence provokes Israeli counter-measures....and the stalemate and killing just goes on and on.

This is what Sharon's Gaza withdrawal is all about...a desperate attempt to break the stalemate.

You asked what I would do. Here are some ideas:

The final objective would be the two-state solution envisioned in the so-called 'Road Map.' As imperfect as it is, it is the only solution that entails mutual concessions.

The methods would be multi-pronged, but if all else fails, unlike yourself, I would not be adverse to imposing the solution from outside. The Palestinians would have their rump-state on the West Bank and Gaza. Both would be demilitarized. Importation of any heavy weaponry would be tantamount to an act of war.

The terrorist groups must be disarmed as part of a final agreement. If Palestinian reluctance perpetuates the current stalemate as it has up to now, then at some point, we have to envisage the physical intervention of the "international community" (Hugh hates the term).

This conflict is a festering boil that is infecting the well-being of the entire planet. I happen to believe in a much more activist approach than that shown by the Bush Administration. We have to lance that boil and burst the bubble of the Muslim victimization psychosis.

Yes, I'm aware jihad is a permanant construct. But in reality, it has been practiced throughout history with an ebb and flow usually determined by Muslim strength or the lack thereof.

I'm acknowledging that we are at a peculiar and unprecedented stage in our planet's evolutionary development. Weapons of mass destruction have made hostages of every man, woman and child alive. We MUST work to resolve our differences. We have to break the Muslim world down, move it away from its pathological essence.

Part of this is acknowledging that some Muslim grievances have validity...and that one of them is that 3 million people living in the disputed territories are stateless. By doing so, we are not validating Islam as a creed. We are merely trying to solve a conflict between peoples.

These ideas are fraught with dangers and the possibility of failure. But enlightened statesmanship is sometimes required to leap-frog the everyday impediments of intractable conflict.

Anyway, at least I've shown the courage to offer my solution to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute...and have done so on these pages before, opening myself up to the sometimes strenuous criticism of those who disagree.

Del and anyone else interested, I'm not using this forum as a soapbox to vent like so many. I've tried to contribute to constructive debate and float ideas that are beyond the usual rants of uncompromising enmity towards 'the other.' I'm genuinely searching for answers.

I'm human and occasionally show it. For the record, I apologize for any unfair characterizations I've made of you Hugh, or anyone else.

I suppose I've warn out my welcome here. I'm going to do you good folks a favor and take a sabbatical from JW/DW. I think I need some time for a period of introspection. It's possible I'm wrong about things. I certainly don't have a monopoly on the truth.

Posted by: Cornelius at October 28, 2005 1:58 AM