Palestinian Jokes

 
So this Palestinian walks into a bar and sits down.

The bartender says, “What’ll it be, pal?”

The Palestinian goes, “BOOM!”

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An American, an Israeli, and a Palestinian are marooned on a desert island.

The American goes to one side of the island and builds a church.

The Israeli goes to the other side of the island and builds a synagogue.

The Palestinian goes, “BOOM!”

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   * A Palestinian travelling salesman is driving through the countryside when his car breaks down in the middle of the night.

He goes up to the nearest farmhouse and knocks on the door.

The farmer comes to the door and says, “What can I do for you, mister?”

The Palestinian…

Aw, heck! So you heard that one already, huh?

Quote of the Day

 
Minh-Duc, from the excellent blog State of Flux, commenting here on the Mohammed cartoons and related issues:

It cannot be secularism is one religion is granted special privilege and status. I am incensed at the bullying. I am incensed at the cowardice by our State Department. I did not escape Communism to live under Sharia.

Tolerating the Intolerable

 
Neo-neocon has weighed in on the Great Mohammed Cartoon Affair. Drawing on earlier posts, she discusses the inherent contradiction in open-ended tolerance. Those who would tolerate the behavior of others, no matter how intolerant those others are, will tolerate away their freedom, their wealth, and ultimately their own lives.

As she puts it in her concluding paragraph:

The bottom line is that members of a society must adhere to the rules of that society or face the consequences. Islamicist fanatics in Europe see their opportunity to remake the rules, and see a chink in the armor of Europe’s Enlightment secularism. How Europe chooses to respond will help to determine the course of its own future, and perhaps much more.

But she also asks a question that some regular readers here at Gates of Vienna might want to address:

What percentage of European Moslems is represented by the fiery protesters, the ones calling for death and destruction? (Please take a look at these photos to see the sort of thing I’m talking about). I don’t know, and I don’t think anyone knows. I tend to think most people lack a natural bent for fanaticism, so my guess is that they are not in the majority.

We have some Europeans who stop in here frequently. What do you think? And Mr. Eteraz: do you know enough about your co-religionists in Europe to offer an opinion?

I’m throwing it open as a forum.

The Opposite of “Salafist”

 
Gates of Vienna has recently acquired a new reader. Ali Eteraz, who came to this country from Pakistan, has been commenting here during the past week. Having visited his blog, Unwilling Self-Negation, I recommend him to our readers.

There is a link to one of his essays, Because Allah Wills It, which was published in Killing the Buddha (“a religion magazine for people made anxious by churches”) in 2003.

Mr. Eteraz’description of his experiences as a child in Pakistan within the traditional fatalism of Islam is powerful:

Dera Ghazi Khan, Pakistan, is one of those continually endangered communities where outrageous fortune visits often in the form of drought, disease, and heat. Life is unchanging and tedious… Parents worry that their youth will join the new “Islamic Organizations” — which, in Dera Ghazi Khan, are words that refer to any group of divinely sanctioned extortionists intimidating the shop owners.

This is one of those cities where the harshness of life has made the exterior of its citizens tough enough to withstand the heat of the desert. The spirits of its people, on the other hand, are not as taut and unbending as their bodies suggest…

The type of man borne from the sermons in Dera Ghazi Khan welcomes sorrow, relishes pain, and exalts suffering. For him there is no value in the success of his relationships unless they add to one's misery; there is no value in tears because they would mitigate the sorrows — and that is not wanted. The irony is that even if one comes to realize the unhealthiness of such a way of life, the impractibility of always being life’s martyr, one dares not let go of it, because being happy now, in this life, means being damned tomorrow. After a life in Dera Ghazi Khan, no one wants an even worse afterlife.

[…]

By 1993, the militant Islam that had helped to drive out the Soviets from Afghanistan had been imported to Dera Ghazi Khan. It acquired its legitimacy by a backwards reading of Islamic texts; and it supported the imposition of Islamically sanctioned public stonings, floggings, amputations, and crucifixions. Such Islam was made to pander to cruelty. Consider the paradox: the same Islam which in passage after passage of the Koran promises its believers green gardens in exchange for their moral lives now promised them satisfaction by sanctifying cruelty upon other men.

The intervention of the Pakistani government has prevented the spread of such punishment-based religiosity. The impulse, however, remains unsatisfied. Thus, it occurs that the desire to see cruelty in action simmers into the general populace and creates two sub-cultures. First, there are the sort of people like my cousin Tazir. To him, to be Muslim is to be nothing more than to be someone who must support the expansion of the flags of Islam throughout the entire world. He has no conception of the consequences. Second, there are people like my aunt Bushara. Her husband took on a second wife without her consultation and then moved said second wife into the same house as her. Instead of rising in resistance, she simply went to pray.

Unfortunately for Mr. Eteraz, coming to America did not guarantee that he would leave all this doleful religious baggage behind in Pakistan.

So I became fatalistic and apathetic like Aunt Bushara. I remained within the folds of Islam because it gave me a framework in which to be submissive; and in being submissive, remain static. It let me believe that my inertness was tolerable, if not altogether ideal.

I always chuckle when I hear the political pundits calling people like me, us placid pools of personality, the “saving force” of Islam simply because we are not firebrands like Bin Laden. I’m also amused when I see some of those who share my faith, from places not unlike Dera Ghazi Khan, strutting around and considering themselves the highest of Muslims in the world simply because they are removed from the difficulties of “the old country” even though they live a life of silence.

Many pundits, both inside and outside the community of immigrant American Islam, have rested their hopes upon us muted ones. They expect us to free global Islam from the Tazirs and Bin Ladens of the religion. Somehow we cows, chewing on the cud of our paranoia-stricken life, have been labeled “moderate” as if we offer a counterweight to the extremists. We don’t.

So don’t expect any optimistic outlook from this particular Muslim. He does not hold out much hope for his side of Islam as a force of change.

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In the comments section on my Flight 93 post, Mr. Eteraz and I got into a discussion about “moderate Muslims” and the appropriate terminology for them. One of his comments is worth reproducing in full:

hi baron,

thanks for the acknowledgment. as far as classifications go, you should call all ‘moderates’ simply “Muslim” and when you come across the violent/nut-job Muslims, call them Islamists or Wahhabi. But if you do this, this way of speaking would have to spread to everyone who wants to see changes in Islam and holds out hope for the ‘moderate’ element winning.

Here’s why. Right now ‘moderates’ like me have to spend *way* too much time defending Islam from those people who want to put all Muslims in one box. As a consequence of this, we have very little time left to actually go and confront the Islamists and Wahhabis. I engage in a lot of debunking of Wahhabis and Islamists, mostly because I have consciously chosen to forego making non-Muslims aware of all these distinctions. Most moderates, though, are not that brave (or thick-skinned). Yeah you can say they are a little timid. In other words, they are like those insecure girls you had in high school who would only do something unless you were totally on their side.

Also, the BIGGEST reason that Wahhabis and Islamists get so much clout is because non-Muslims don’t distinguish Wahhabis and Islamists from “normal” Islam. In other words, critics of violent Muslims simply call the perpetrator “Muslim” while reserving the more specific “moderate Muslim” for the peaceful Muslims. It needs to be the other way around. It is the Wahhabis who need to be called “extremist Muslims” or “violent Muslims” and the moderate Muslims who need to be called “Muslim.” Language is powerful and it is not on the side of the ‘moderates.’

See, when you call us “progressives” or “reformists” you undermine our authority against the Wahhabis who consider themselves “traditionalists.” At this point in time, the fight within Islam isn’t about who is the most forward looking. It is about who best reflects Muhammad’s name. In other words, its a fight about who controls history. For ‘moderates’ to win, we need to be able to demonstrate that we are the better and correct representatives of the era of Muhammad’s life.

Fair enough, Mr. Eteraz. But I still need a separate term for the “moderate.” After all, the extremists consider themselves simply “Muslims” and use the word to describe themselves. To avoid confusion, we need another word or phrase. Any suggestions?

After all, the Mormon religion is based in Christianity and Mormons worship Jesus Christ. But their religion differs significantly from Christianity, so we call them “Mormons” to distinguish them (and it’s shorter than “members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”).

We already have a term for the Islamists, for the violent extremists. The Wahhabis and their South Asian cousins, the Deobandis, are known collectively as “Salafists”.

What’s the opposite of “Salafist”?

I can list the characteristics of the hypothetical anti-Salafists:

1.	They acknowledge freedom of religion, including the right to practice any religion, to convert to or from any religion, or to practice no religion at all and live as an atheist. They insist that no one has the right to coerce anybody into any religious practice, or prevent them from practicing their faith.
2.	They acknowledge freedom of speech, including the right to insult, ridicule, denigrate, and demean the religion of others. They insist that no one has the right to coerce silence or “correct” speech from anyone.
3.	They acknowledge that women have full rights, equal to those of men, and that those rights include the freedom to marry or not marry anyone they like, to be subject to a dress code no more restrictive than that applied to men, and to have a full and equal rights in a court of law.
4.	They acknowledge the existence of the rule of law. This means that they accept that the acquisition of political power, through democratic means or otherwise, does not confer impunity upon political leaders; that those leaders are subject to the same laws as everyone else.
5.	They acknowledge that the above conditions may not be violently abridged by groups working inside or outside of state control; that those who do act violently will be punished to the full extent of the law.

These are the basic rules common to what is known as Western Civilization. If some “moderate” subset of Islam, as yet unnamed, were to publicly embrace them and incorporate them in its political structure, than that group would join the West and leave the East to the Islamists, the Chinese, and Kim Jong-Il.

I doubt that you or anyone else expects something like this to happen anytime soon. These principles contradict what is written in the Koran and what has been practiced by the vast majority of Muslims since Mohammed entered Mecca. A Muslim who embraced these principles would find himself forsaking his own religion.

But I won’t rule it out. Christianity and Judaism went against some of their own religious scriptures when they produced secular modernity, so anything is possible.

And here’s where I take issue with you. You say:

Right now ‘moderates’ like me have to spend *way* too much time defending Islam from those people who want to put all Muslims in one box. As a consequence of this, we have very little time left to actually go and confront the Islamists and Wahhabis… Also, the BIGGEST reason that Wahhabis and Islamists get so much clout is because non-Muslims don’t distinguish Wahhabis and Islamists from “normal” Islam.

The behavior of non-Muslims does not cause Muslims to do whatever it is they do, or give any particularly group of Muslims more or less power.

The West has historically had no more knowledge or understanding of Hindus than it has had of Muslims. Yet that did not turn some subset of Hindus into radical bomb-throwers, nor empower any one Hindu group at the expense of any others.

One of the chronic conditions of Islam, moderate or otherwise, is to blame non-Muslims for the problems afflicting Islam. It’s like the alcoholic who blames his wife’s behavior for his drunken binges.

It’s time for Islam to live with the hangover and sober up. And, perhaps, go to an AA meeting and start on the first of the Twelve Steps.


UPDATE: Mr. Eteraz has responded in the comments, and points out that his essay in Killing the Buddha was primarily literary, and that the conclusions about his own fatalism here in America were meant ironically.

He says, “In short, your statement, ‘He does not hold out much hope for his side of Islam as a force of change.’ is patently *wrong.* I am *precisely* the kind of creative and subtle thinker that gives Islam its hope. We who are conversant (and in my case, in love with) Nietzsche; and Rousseau; and Montesquieu; and Aquinas; and irony; and the surrealists. The fact that sometimes I choose to make my points in satirical ways should be a sign of intellectual maturity; not hopelessness. I encourage you to revise your views.”

And so I have. Mr. Eteraz is a subtle writer, and I am re-reading his essay with that in mind. I urge other readers to do the same.

Is the U.S. State Department Being Run by Robert Fisk?

 
According to Yahoo,

The United States backed Muslims on Friday against European newspapers that printed caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad in a move that could help America’s battered image in the Islamic world.

Strike that. The Department of State is backing the Muslim outrage. The United States is not.

“These cartoons are indeed offensive to the belief of Muslims,” State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper said in answer to a question.

State Department, you don’t speak for me, or for millions of other Americans who think this orchestrated tantrum is nothing but a ploy to distract us from Iran’s nefarious plans, plans which will bear fruit in March.

This latest announcement reaches a level of stupidity that far surpasses the many other jaw-dropping gaffes that Foggy Bottom — or should I say Fiskie Bottom? — has stumbled into previously.

My disappointment in Dr. Rice’s department is boundless. She was going to make a difference, right? Well, she’s a difference without a distinction. It’s disgusting.

Really, is Foggy Bottom taking its marching orders from Robert Fisk?

It’s amazing how closely his pronouncements and theirs resemble one another.


IMPORTANT UPDATE: According to Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs, this story, at least in the form given in this news account, may be a hoax.


Hat tip: commenter AndyS.

Cartoons? We’re Going to War Over Cartoons?

 
Is this the tipping point? I’d wondered in the past if there would be some serious event — the accidental burning of a mosque in a war zone, the death of children in a freak accident, a plane downed for mechanical reasons with some important imam among the dead — that would send the infamous Arab Street howling into the night, declaring revenge on the infidels.

That’s how I thought the end would begin. But who could dream how easily led, how corruptly used the Arab Street would be? Twelve cartoons. Not serious works of art, just cartoons.

These imams calling for holy war, for a worldwide day of anger, are trivial, trifling people. They are deliberately stirring the cinders in order to get a conflagration going. They are like those nut-job arsonists who set fires in forests just to see the raging flames destroy everything. And don’t forget, arsonists are seriously disturbed people. Ask any psychiatrist.

And ask yourself: just how fragile are these people, whose psyches are collapsing over the prospect of some cartoons? Surely Mohammed deserves more robust representatives than these opportunistic sad sacks.

This is no clash of civilizations, this is a bunch of dirty old men playing with matches and encouraging a younger generation to go along with it. This is the wall against which the corpse of a putrefying culture is collapsed.

The call for a Day of Anger is disgusting beyond words. It is obscene and death-dealing. The man who calls for it ought to be incarcerated. Those who respond with similar rage ought to be jailed also.

I never thought we’d see the personification of the adage about someone yelling “FIRE!” in a crowded theater. And I never stopped to think how utterly deadly such an action would be.

Someone stuff a sock in Sheikh Yussef al-Qaradawi’s mouth before this homicidally irresponsible “leader” does any further damage…and all over some cartoons.

Ask yourself: what would this joker recommend if the incident were actually serious?

Prophet Cartoons Hit the MSM in the USA

 
The controversy over the Jyllands-Posten cartoons of Mohammed has reach the MSM here at last; the story is on CNN.

But no images -- yet.

There’s a photo of someone reading a newspaper with the offending cartoons thoughtfully cropped out.

UPDATE 6:18pm EST: Fox has the story now, too, but still no pics.

Come on guys, grow some nads!

The Meaning of Flight 93

 
On Monday night I watched the made-for-TV movie Flight 93 on A&E. For those of you who missed it, I recommend picking up the DVD when it comes out. It was very well-done, a low-key treatment based as far as possible on available documents and testimony. Avoiding the two extremes of Hollywood flash and jerky-frame TV “re-enactment”, it portrayed the heroic response of ordinary people suddenly confronted with unimaginable evil.

We watched the passengers gradually come to the realization that they were going to die, and that their only choice was to stop the thugs in the cockpit from attaining their goal. We saw the hijackers arguing with each other in Arabic, with the subtitles informing us that they believed they were carrying out Allah’s will. We saw Todd Beamer say the Lord’s Prayer (the Lord’s Prayer! Right there on TV!) with the operator over the phone, and then we heard, “Let’s roll!”

What was all that religious stuff doing in there? This is the 21st century, and religion is something that intelligent and well-informed people have left behind, along with other forms of superstition and irrationality.

But with Flight 93 we were confronted by twin irrefutable facts: the men of Al Qaeda believed that Allah called them to do what they did, and the passengers who fought back believed that their response was right in the eyes of God.

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Yesterday I read an essay in the Jerusalem Post by rabbi Berel Wein (hat tip: reader OS). Rabbi Wein contends that the pious secularism of the Zionists has made coping with the likes of Hamas that much more difficult:

We are accustomed to think of the secular-religious divide that exists in Israel today as relating to denominational pluralism, conversions, civil marriage, Sabbath observance and other matters of ritual and budget allocations. All of this may be true, but it ignores the basic divide, which is one of values, world view and perception of ourselves and others.

The recent success of Hamas in the elections for the Palestinian parliament should serve to focus the attention of our leaders and public on a hard fact that Israel has always chosen to ignore until now: that the Arab-Israeli struggle is at its core a religious dispute. Only by appreciating and understanding this unpleasant but very real truth does the struggle take on a somewhat rational and understandable, and perhaps even predictable, pattern.

What is true in Gaza and the West Bank is true wherever Islam confronts the infidel along its bloody borders. Our enemies are fighting a religious war, and arguing with them that we do not believe in our religions any more is not going to help. Our renunciation of our own beliefs is simply more evidence of our corruption and inferiority.

The Arabs view us as the latter-day reincarnation of the Crusaders of the Middle Ages. The struggle and triumph over the Crusaders was a victory of Islam over Christianity, pure and simple. It reinforced in the Muslim mind the exclusivity and superiority of Islam over all other faiths. It strengthened the concept of dhimmi in the Muslim world, whereby non-Muslims could exist in their society solely in a subservient, second-class state of being, and even then only at the sufferance of the Muslim rulers themselves.

Religion was the motivating force in that struggle. It remains so in our current struggle.

This is an inconvenient fact that our leaders and our media are reluctant to confront. In fact, there is a virtual taboo against mentioning it in public; the word “Islamofascist” passed George W. Bush’s lips only with great reluctance and after the passage of four years. The elites must maintain the fiction that Islam was “hijacked” by evil opportunists who do not represent it.

But that’s not the way many Muslims view the situation.

America can label Osama bin Laden an arch-terrorist, which again he certainly is; but in the Muslim world he is viewed as a religious leader, an accepted interpreter of the Koran and of Islamic principles. The Muslim world does not speak out strongly against him — not so much out of fear as out of Islamic faith.

And this is why victory for the secular West — even born-again Christian George W. Bush is pretty much secularized and, in any event, certainly an “infidel” — in Iraq or anywhere else in the Arab world is so difficult and problematic.

The Cold War was fought on a secular basis. The current terrorist war is a religious struggle between the true believers and the secular “infidels,” who do not seem to understand their enemy and its true motivation.

So we infidels, bound together in uneasy alliance by the enmity of our common foe, are required to defend ourselves against a religious enemy. Our enemy believes what he believes with a righteous zeal that is almost impossible to comprehend. He commits unspeakable evil in the name of his religion. His belief is strong and pure and sends him willingly to his death.

But what do we believe?

Christians believe in Jesus, Jews believe in Yahweh, and Hindus believe in Krishna. Even the atheists and secularists among us believe in… well, they must believe in something, otherwise they wouldn’t be here with “us”, they’d be over there with “them”, with Cindy Sheehan and George Galloway and the Unabomber, chanting “No blood for oil!” and visualizing industrial collapse.

Even if you’re an atheist, or someone who is uncomfortable with bringing God into the conversation, or don’t think religion has much point in the modern world, you must believe the West has something worth defending, otherwise you wouldn’t be defending it. There must be some core, some value of humane and civilized tolerance, that makes it worth it. Despite the tawdry fleshpot and narcissistic sump that modern culture has become, you believe something important is there.

So Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Mormons, Jains, Shintoists, Sikhs, Baha’is, Unitarians, atheists, and mushy-minded secularists all believe something.

And the Islamists certainly believe something.

But is our belief stronger than theirs?

Their belief straps on a bomb belt to destroy the believer and everyone around him. Their belief climbed into the cockpit of four passenger jets to carry the believers and thousands of others to a fiery death.

So I repeat my question: Is our belief stronger than theirs?

Well, is it?

We Have Friends In High Places

 
David Rennie reports from The Telegraph about the “Sound of Europe” summit, just ended in Salzburg. It had an unexpected shot in the arm for America. Or perhaps it would be better described as a warning shot over the bow of Old Europe by New Europe — mind your manners, Grandpa.

A lefty newspaper editor “drawlingly invited” Latvia’s president to agree with his assessment that the new EU members from eastern and central Europe was too pro-American to be considered proper Europeans.

Having listened to the anti- American cant and condescension, Vaika Vike-Freiberga was fed up:

The editor chose the wrong target to bully. Latvia may be small, but its woman president Vaika Vike-Freiberga survived wartime air raids, a childhood in refugee camps and five decades of exile, first in French Morocco, then more comfortably in Canada, as a psychology professor. Mrs Vike-Frieberga let rip.

[…]

Mrs Vike-Frieberga's words were spoken off the cuff, and they were not always polished. She began in German, then switched to English. I cannot improve on them, so here they are, in full:

"I am amazed by the speed with which Europe has forgotten that it was rescued during World War Two when the Americans entered the fight. The contribution of the trans-Atlantic link to European security is something that Europeans have long taken for granted. But since the corridor to Berlin [was secured] right after the war, right up to the great debates and conflict in Germany about having intercontinental ballistic missiles or not, Europe has felt quite comfortable under the umbrella of security that Nato offered, and that means the trans-Atlantic link.

"By the way I'd like to remind people here that when you see row upon row of white crosses in the fields of Flanders and North of France, those are also Canadians, thousands of Canadian soldiers who died for the freedom of Europe, for the freedom of the Netherlands, of France, and of Italy.

"The trans-Atlantic link is intrinsic, it goes back to Europe bringing its ideas and ideals to the North American continent - along with smallpox and the common cold and the extinction of the native peoples, naturally - they brought both destruction and ideals. North America has developed different models of the same European values that they inherited. The idea that we have somehow two systems that are inimical, I find extraordinarily strange.

"We have this division that was introduced between Old Europe and New Europe, talked about by Mr Rumsfeld. Well, when Mr Rumsfeld was asked about this at the beginnings of the second Bush administration, he said: 'That was the old Rumsfeld who made that distinction, the new Rumsfeld would like to leave it behind.’”

She offered a question of her own. "What is it that Old Europe is worried about, with respect to New Europe? That we are friendly with America? All that we have asked is to be part of Nato, and part of the security umbrella that Europe has enjoyed for half a century."

At this point, she turned to face the audience directly. "You lived in democracies for longer times than we," she began. Scattered clapping began to be heard. "Austria, by the way, came very close to being in the same situation as Latvia. Be grateful for your fate, don't complain," she said, this time to swelling applause.

She went on: "Throughout the years, in parts of Europe, intellectuals and even politicians were enamoured with the idea of Marxism and even some thought the Soviet Union was an embodiment of what Socialism and the protection of the worker was all about. America was more realistic. America looked on us as captive nations. We were captive nations, and we are now free."

Well said, Madame. And take that Ted Kennedy. And stick it in your ear, Nancy Pelosi.


Hat tip: Elaib Harvey, Brussels Journal

Is There Perhaps Some Hope for Europe After All?

If it weren't for the Brussels Journal, Europe would not be now growing a spine. Or at least some of the continent appears to be walking upright. In Germany, for instance, Die Welt and Berliner Zeitung finally showed some solidarity with Denmark's principled stand on freedom of the press by printing the twelve Mohammed cartoons.

France Soir, on the other hand, saw its editor fired for doing the same thing. As the Brussels Journal reported:

French Muslim leaders had announced their intention to sue the paper for the cartoons. They said the publication was a “provocation.” Raymond Lakah, a Franco-Egyptian businessman, is the owner of Angel Gate, a holding company that also owns the airline companies Air Horizons and Star Airlines. The only adequate response to Mr Lakah's decision is a consumer boycott of France Soir. While Mr Lakah has a right to sack Mr Lefranch, French readers have the right to boycott his paper.

Meanwhile, the frenzy in the Middle East continues. In addition to the Saudi boycott of Danish goods, and the various flag burnings across the area, the Brussels Journal reported hysteria in Gaza on Monday:

...armed Palestinians stormed the European Union office in Gaza City, threatening Danes and Norwegians and demanding that they leave. Two Norwegian aid workers are on their way out of the region. The Norwegian Foreign Ministry has warned Norwegian citizens against travelling to Gaza. The Danish Foreign Ministry warned Danes to be extremely cautious while travelling in the Middle East and North Africa. Yesterday the Danish national flag was burned in the West Bank...

Shall we call it stupidity or ignorance? Perhaps Carib Pundit puts it best:

Newspapers across Europe have reprinted caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad to show support for a Danish paper whose cartoons have sparked Muslim outrage.

Seven publications in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Spain all carried some of the drawings.

Their publication in Denmark led Arab nations to protest. Islamic tradition bans depictions of the Prophet.

Who knew Europeans had the balls?

Yeah. Who would have guessed? It only took them five months -- while the Brussels Journal carried the ball alone -- to finally decide to join hands with Denmark.

Meanwhile, Carib Pundit has two links that put things in perspective.

The first is a site by Tom Gross which has an exhibition of some of the Muslims' cartoons about Israel. As you can imagine, they're the bloody, creepy “humor” that we’ve come to expect from slashers. After all, the first person to die at the hands of Islam was the fellow who wandered by while they were praying and laughed to see all those rear ends in the air.

The second is the Mohammed Image Archive. Goes back centuries, folks. Yes, the old boy himself, in every medium you can imagine. This depiction was purchased from a street vendor in Iran in 1999, and taken back to Norway without a protest.

There's something rotten here, and it's not in Denmark. The ones who started this and kept it going have a strategy. As mentioned in an earlier post, The Astute Blogger has the scoop.

But these schemers who attempted to bully Denmark got more than they bargained for. This contretemps has served to galvanize Europe more than anything else has in the last few years. The Spanish trains, the London bombings, the car burnings in France: each incident seemed to send Europe sinking to her knees. So why now, why rally round Denmark for some cartoons?

Is this new courage born of the realization that this issue is about first principles, about the basics of free speech? Frankly, I'm surprised at this new-found energy, but it gives us all hope for Europe.

All of us, that is, but Bill Clinton -- who is beginning to sound like Jimmy Carter.

And the BBC, ever the nosy spinster at the scene of the accident, is reported by the Brussels Journal to have asked Flemming Rose, the culture editor of Jyllands-Posten whether the paper would still publish the cartoons today, knowing all the consequences. Mr. Rose responded: “That is a hypothetical question. I would say that I do not regret having commissioned those cartoons and I think asking me that question is like asking a rape victim if she regrets wearing a short skirt Friday night at the discotheque.”

By the way, the BBC is not among the media who have had the courage to show the cartoons.

No Zionist State = No Palestine

 
...and now, a sad but succinct analysis from the history master, El Jefe:

Nobody can deny that the Palestinian people are in an unenviable position. But they were offered half a loaf, in 1948. They scorned it, gambled on arms, and lost. The Palestinians learned nothing, and in 1967 they blustered like Mr. Mish'al [the chief of the terrorist organization/political party Hamas’s “political bureau” -- ed.] today and blundered themselves into another war, and lost again. Now, the Palestinians, by choosing Hamas, have again chosen war. If Mr. Mish’al is serious about Hamas’s stand, they will get it in spades.

Mr. Mish'al proclaims that Hamas is "immune to bribery, intimidation and blackmail." Maybe, but how will it do against F-16's, 5.56 mm ball, and 155 mm H.E.? Do the Palestinians, and the Arab nation, really have a death wish? Israel has nuclear weapons. It really is double or nothing this time, and I know how I'm betting. If there is going to be no Zionist state in Palestine – there is going to be no Palestine, period.

The Palestinians are cheerfully, heedlessly, gleefully driving Israel to the far right, and ensuring that the US and Europe will regretfully avert their glances while the Israelis turn the West Bank into a giant prison/abattoir. The Palestinians have taken off the mask, and Hamas, like Chancellor Hitler for the Germans in the Reichstag, can bleat about the "legitimate rights of the Palestinian people" and can proclaim the impending suicide of Palestine to the skies if it wants. A Netanyahu government – certainly a good possibility now, is going to, in Mr. Kelly’s words again, take off the gloves.

By all means, read the whole Palestina Irredenta essay at Kingdom of Chaos.

In this case, enlightenment does not bring peace of mind.

Auctioning Images: "Piss Christ" vs. Mohammed in Drag

 
Peaktalk is comparing this latest Islamic hysteria over the Danish cartoons with the fiercely defensive position American liberals took when “Piss Christ” appeared on the horizon.

Remember how offended the Christians were to see a crucifix suspended in a container of urine?

Remember how the avant-garde intelligentsia vigorously defended this piece of crap objet d’art against the outrage of these philistines who were too ignorant to see the value of Mr. Serrano's creation?

So where are these defenders of art now that twelve Danes need their help? Have the Christians ripped out their tongues? Did they get religion themselves in the intervening twenty years? Hmmm…that’s a long time. Perhaps they’re all a bit long in the tooth and dribbly now. Too deaf to hear the racket, perhaps?

In May, 2000, Christie’s auctioned off this effort of Andres Serrano:

"Piss Christ," by Andres Serrano, Lot 51, Cibachrome print mounted on Plexiglas,40 by 30 inches, 1987


The notorious "Piss Christ" by Andres Serrano (b. 1950), Lot 51, is a beautiful image of the crucifixion that seems to float in blood, which caused a great deal of controversy because the liquid is urine and many people felt the image and concept was therefore sacrilegious. While the use of urine was provocative, the resulting image is very powerful and memorable and fine. This lot is numbered 4 of an edition of 10. It had an estimate of $30,000 to $40,000 and sold for $105,000.

“Memorable”? Sure. “Fine”? Hardly. If this is worth one hundred five thousand dollars, then those cartoons are obviously priceless. And since the American taxpayer footed the bill for the creation of this idiocy, certainly the Danish government can go them one better.

Let’s see if Christie’s is brave enough to auction those “memorable” Mohammed images. When you go, be sure to save me a catalogue. I, however, plan to do my bidding by phone.

And do let me know when the building explodes.

Gulf News Prints Letters to the Editor About Sinful Denmark

Gulf News is posting Letters to the Editor on the Danish brouhaha. Some of the suggestions are quite…vacuous.

There has been a furore over the publication of 12 caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) by Denmark's biggest-selling newspaper Jyllands-Posten.

Gulf News has been tracking the developments closely. On January 29, we asked our readers a question: "Do you think Denmark should apologise over the cartoons?" In response, we received hundreds of letters and e-mails from around the world, including Denmark. We publish here a selection of the letters.

This mess has been going on since September of last year and this news organ gets around to a public question four months later. This is what they consider “tracking developments closely”? MSM mediocrity is certainly a world-wide phenomenon, isn’t it?

Following this breathless announcement they put up letters from Dubai, Belgium, the US, India, etc. A real cross-section. My favorite letter is the first:

We all believe that the Almighty is the ultimate authority to punish the guilty. Therefore, we, being the servants of God, have no right to punish other humans. However, drawing cartoons or making disrespectful comments on any faith is unacceptable. Freedom of expression and democracy are meant to ensure expression of feelings, comments and suggestions in a respectful and healthy manner. It is high time the Danish government punished the guilty and apologised to the world in general, and not Muslims alone. Also, I wish the UN come out with a uniform code to punish offending individuals, publishers and nations.

My gosh! Why didn’t we think of this sooner? Call in the UN, they’ll handle it.

Be still, my eyebrows.

When The Sky Over Taybeh Turns Green

 
Taybeh (also variously spelled "Taiba" and "Taibeh") is a Christian village east of Ramalla. The fifteen hundred people who live there are Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, or Greek Catholic. It is an ancient town: in the Christian tradition, back when the place was called Ephraim, Jesus retreated here after raising Lazarus from the dead and before he made the journey into Jerusalem to be crucified.

Taiba made the news last September. Back then we posted on the episode when Taiba was overrun by a mob of Muslim men bent on destruction in order to restore their “honor.” How rampage and mayhem restore honor has always puzzled me, but then I’m not multi-culted enough to appreciate these nuances. What happened in September was a Romeo and Juliet story with a fundamentalist Muslim toxic twist:

What triggered the event? Oh, the usual: an Islamic rage-reaction meltdown to the idea of their women’s sexuality. These people really do bear some behavioral resemblance to yellow jackets. Unfortunately, one cannot simply take medicine to counteract their poisonous sting.

A thirty-year-old Muslim woman from the nearby village of Deir Jarir was discovered by her family to have been romantically involved with a Christian man from Taiba. Their solution to this treason was to make her drink a dose of lethal poison and then bury her body. When the Palestinian authorities began an investigation of this crime, including the exhumation of the victim's body, the result was a rampage by the Muslim men of Deir Jarir against the Christian village of Taiba.

Had the Palestinian Authority ignored the situation, the people of Deir Jarir would have left it at that. But they started poking around and so the Muslim town used the Muslim solution: further restoration of honor by the application of mayhem and vandalism. Of course, the PA didn't show up for the event until it was all over.

As we remarked at the time:

The Palestinian Authorities took their time arriving. Is this a surprise? By the time they got there, cars had been torched, sixteen houses burned, and the whole village terrorized. The PA did manage to prevent the mob from harming the Khoury Beer Factory. Evidently, Taiba beer is famous in the area. Not partaken of by the Muslims, of course, since the Koran forbids it and these are Allah-fearing men.

Their protection of the brewery may be moot now. With the election of Hamas, alcoholic beverages will go the way of the any other kafir custom.

The owner hopes to save his brewery, though he isn't hopeful about his chances. According to the Times Online, the owner, Nadim Khoury, has been watching the winds of change sweep through Palestine. Like any other businessman, he is attempting to move with those changes:

At the only brewery in the Palestinian territories they believe they can see the future. And under the government of the Islamic movement, Hamas, it is alcohol-free and green.

The Taybeh brewery in the West Bank is alarmed that the administration could impose its strict vision of Islam, banning alcohol and ending the unique decade-old business.

But the bosses had already seen the winds change and four months ago began developing a non-alcoholic beer to be ready for the summer. For good measure they gave the bottle a green label, the colour of Hamas.

“We’re definitely considering this non-alcoholic version of our beer. It’ll have a green label, since the sky’s green now,” said Nadim Khoury, general director of Taybeh, in a wry reference to the ubiquitous Hamas flags. “Everybody’s concerned about what might happen.”

What do you think "might" happen? You already know what I think: the good people of Deir Jarir will return one night, incensed over some magnified slight on the part of Taybeh's citizens. Only this time there will be no Palestinian Authority to arrive in time to save the brewery.

The Times spouts the party line, though:

But Hamas is not the Taleban. Its leaders are fiercely proud that their daughters are highly educated and emphasise that there are no plans to impose sweeping social change or the religious ideology of Hamas — despite its long-term commitment to Islamic law — through parliament.

The West Bank spokesman for Hamas, Mahmoud Ramahi, who has just been elected, said that the movement’s policy was not to force any social change on an unwilling population.

“We’ll not interfere with Palestinians’ liberty or freedoms,” Dr Ramahi said. “Girls won’t be separated from boys in schools. Women won’t be forced to wear hijab. We won’t close restaurants that serve alcohol.”

Of course they won't close them. They'll simply bomb them out of existence, as they did with the UN Beach Club. There aren't any restaurants left that serve alcohol, and Ramahi knows that. And he knows that we know that.

Such is the nature of taqiyya. Think of it as a variant of diplomat-speak -- sans the nuance, of course.


Hat tip: Ringo the Gringo, commenter at LGF.