Today’s cake (Strictly Kosher) goes to Yaakov Litzman, Israel’s Ultra Orthodox Deputy Health Minister who has said that The outbreak of swine flu should be renamed "Mexican" influenza in deference to Muslim and Jewish sensitivities over pork.
Never mind about offending Mexicans, then.
Tuesday 28 April 2009
Monday 27 April 2009
Seven Jewish Children –A play for Gaza
Short Play, By Carole Churchill
The Guardian has decided to show on its website a performance by actor Jennie Stoller of the controversial (performable by) one woman short play, written hastily in response to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza, earlier this year.
The play, just nine minutes long, is a series of seven short vignettes, of an anxious Jewish (grand)mother agonising over; what and what not to tell, and how and how not to explain; to her (grand)daughter, events in Jewish life over seven decades from the 1930s to the present.
It starts pre-Holocaust with a family in hiding and a mother unsure how to explain to her daughter their predicament so that she will keep quiet and not give away their location, but without causing terror in the child. It ends with a mother deeply disturbed by the recent campaign in Gaza, but determined to Justify it to her daughter through an unjustified demonisation of the Palestinians hemmed in Gaza. In between, we have a mother and daughter who have no other family left, settlers in the newly declared state of Israel living in a displaced Arab family’s home and an Israeli mother sharing in the triumph of the Six Day War.
Artistically, the play is poetic, tightly written and powerful, giving it definite artistic merit.
However it also produces a powerful propaganda message: a picture of a people who moved swiftly from being victims to oppressors and we are forced to draw comparisons between Israeli Jews since 1948 and the Nazis. We are encouraged to see Israelis, in a pseudo-psychological way, as damaged, abused children who have grown up to become abusers themselves.
A slight shift of balance in the text and it could form a worthwhile basis for introspection and thought in any Jewish, Israeli or wider discussion group. However, in its crude form, the play with its grotesque sentiments and historical inaccuracies , conjures up unfair images of a people culpable of terrible crimes and yet in denial and defiance of them.
Clearly, Churchill intended to use the play to instil Jewish guilt and Gentile anger. It is provocative inflammatory and bordering on anti-Semitic; and therefore it was either brave or sad of Jennie Stoller, who is presumably Jewish, to have performed the part for the Guardian.
The Guardian has decided to show on its website a performance by actor Jennie Stoller of the controversial (performable by) one woman short play, written hastily in response to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza, earlier this year.
The play, just nine minutes long, is a series of seven short vignettes, of an anxious Jewish (grand)mother agonising over; what and what not to tell, and how and how not to explain; to her (grand)daughter, events in Jewish life over seven decades from the 1930s to the present.
It starts pre-Holocaust with a family in hiding and a mother unsure how to explain to her daughter their predicament so that she will keep quiet and not give away their location, but without causing terror in the child. It ends with a mother deeply disturbed by the recent campaign in Gaza, but determined to Justify it to her daughter through an unjustified demonisation of the Palestinians hemmed in Gaza. In between, we have a mother and daughter who have no other family left, settlers in the newly declared state of Israel living in a displaced Arab family’s home and an Israeli mother sharing in the triumph of the Six Day War.
Artistically, the play is poetic, tightly written and powerful, giving it definite artistic merit.
However it also produces a powerful propaganda message: a picture of a people who moved swiftly from being victims to oppressors and we are forced to draw comparisons between Israeli Jews since 1948 and the Nazis. We are encouraged to see Israelis, in a pseudo-psychological way, as damaged, abused children who have grown up to become abusers themselves.
A slight shift of balance in the text and it could form a worthwhile basis for introspection and thought in any Jewish, Israeli or wider discussion group. However, in its crude form, the play with its grotesque sentiments and historical inaccuracies , conjures up unfair images of a people culpable of terrible crimes and yet in denial and defiance of them.
Clearly, Churchill intended to use the play to instil Jewish guilt and Gentile anger. It is provocative inflammatory and bordering on anti-Semitic; and therefore it was either brave or sad of Jennie Stoller, who is presumably Jewish, to have performed the part for the Guardian.
Tuesday 21 April 2009
Loony Jews
I was shopping for bagels and smoked salmon at the deli this morning so picked a copy of this week's Jewish News. There is a letter from Dr. Levi Sokolic, a complete meshuggener if there ever was one, so I've replied as follows:
Dear Sir,
It seems that we have our very own Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sound-alike, in the form of the bigoted Dr Levi Sokolic of Golders Green (letters 17th April). Not content only to separate Jew from Gentile he seeks to divide Jew from Jew, with his contempt for those he sees as deriving their “values, morality and worldview from the delusional viciousness and moral and intellectual degeneracy of the progressive left.”If you want delusional viciousness, there’s plenty of that in the Torah, the rest of the Old and New Testaments and the Qur’an. Therefore any decent human being in the modern world, whatever his core beliefs, will study these texts critically.Dr Sokolic should remember that the majority Zionists who created the State of Israel were practical, leftist and predominately secular Jews who got on with things and did not cling on to ancient superstitions.
Minik.
Friday 17 April 2009
Time to join the Euro
It makes good economic sense for Britain to join the Euro as soon as possible, with Sterling's now competitive rate against the overvalued European currency.
1. Firstly, we would be able to join the European currency at a rate at which British costs are low compared with our competitors in France Germany and the Benelux countries.
2. Secondly, sooner or later the Euro is going to fall substantially relative to the US Dollar, helping the Eurozone's competitive position against other major currencies.
Therefore, a double bonus for Britain and a boost to the economy when we need it most.
The downside of this will be inflationary pressure in the UK after the adoption of the Euro, cost-push brought about by higher commodity and import prices and demand pull, due to people abroad actually wanting to buy British goods and services again.
The government and Bank of England (wrongly in my opinion) are more worried about deflation. So they should not be put off by this.
So, what then when our Euro UK inflation does start kicking ass.
Then is the time for some hard pruning of government expenditure, starting with the social security budget.
1. Firstly, we would be able to join the European currency at a rate at which British costs are low compared with our competitors in France Germany and the Benelux countries.
2. Secondly, sooner or later the Euro is going to fall substantially relative to the US Dollar, helping the Eurozone's competitive position against other major currencies.
Therefore, a double bonus for Britain and a boost to the economy when we need it most.
The downside of this will be inflationary pressure in the UK after the adoption of the Euro, cost-push brought about by higher commodity and import prices and demand pull, due to people abroad actually wanting to buy British goods and services again.
The government and Bank of England (wrongly in my opinion) are more worried about deflation. So they should not be put off by this.
So, what then when our Euro UK inflation does start kicking ass.
Then is the time for some hard pruning of government expenditure, starting with the social security budget.
Computer says, "No".
My wife had an appointment at our local branch of HSBC this morning, to open a couple of accounts.
They are offering a regular savings account at an extremely attractive 8% interest provided your salary get paid in to a current account with them.
However, she was refused, apparently because of a poor credit rating. We checked this ourselves, which needless to say was pretty well exemplary and then went back to the silly little girl in the bank.
However she claimed to be powerless to do anything about it and we would have to go through their complaints procedure, which incidentally she didn't know correctly herself.
I am waiting for a call back from the branch manager, but am not holding my breath.
They are offering a regular savings account at an extremely attractive 8% interest provided your salary get paid in to a current account with them.
However, she was refused, apparently because of a poor credit rating. We checked this ourselves, which needless to say was pretty well exemplary and then went back to the silly little girl in the bank.
However she claimed to be powerless to do anything about it and we would have to go through their complaints procedure, which incidentally she didn't know correctly herself.
I am waiting for a call back from the branch manager, but am not holding my breath.
Monday 6 April 2009
Libel! cries the MCB.
An interesting row has been brewing between the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) and the Department of Communities and Local Government culminating in a threatened libel action against Secretary of State, Hazel Blears by the MCB’s deputy general-secretary, Dr. Daud Abdullah.
Ms. Blears has alleged that Dr. Abdullah attended a conference earlier this year where he signed a declaration that calls for violence against British and other troops as well as Jewish communities all around the world. Although Dr. Abdullah admits that he attended and signed the Declaration, at the misleadingly named Global Anti-Aggression Campaign conference in Istanbul, earlier this year, he denies the claim made by Ms. Blears.
In support of him, the MCB’s general secretary Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari has stated “All our office bearers without exception stand resolutely against all forms of indiscriminate violence. We are completely opposed to all forms of prejudice including Anti-Semitism.....”
These are some of the most disingenuous words I’ve heard in a long time. The Declaration, essentially one of support for the Hamas terrorist organisation in Gaza, is saturated with paranoia, delusion and anti-Semitic bile.
But, has Dr Abdullah been defamed?
On the call to support violence against British and other troops, there can be no doubt that clause 8 of the affirmation of legal judgments within the declaration sanction violence against any military force sent, even if by the United Nations, to the Eastern Mediterranean for the execution of peacekeeping duties. At the time the declaration was made, Dr Abdullah will have known that the British government was considering this option.
Clearly on this point, there is no case to answer.
The call to support violence against Jewish communities is however, more indirect, but it is there.
Clause 8 of the affirmation of legal judgments, effectively declares that anyone who supports the State of Israel, puts himself in the same position as the State of Israel itself. The vast majority of Jews who are among State of Israel’s supporters are therefore in the same position as the “usurping entity”. However this clause in itself is not a call to arms against the “usurping entity.” This is to be found elsewhere in the document.
The first is the support given to Hamas throughout the declaration. Hamas is a terrorist organisation that regards the entire state of Israel as Muslim land and is committed to its destruction through violent means.
The second, but most crucially is in the conclusion of the declaration which calls for “seizing control of the instruments of power that will make possible its supremacy and the preservation of its holy places and provisions.” This is effectively is a declaration of war against Israel by virtue of its annexation of East Jerusalem, which includes the site, the third holiest in Islam, where according to tradition the Prophet Mohammed ascended to Heaven.
If Dr. Abdullah is hell bent on the publicity his libel action will generate, it is his right, one he won’t have in most Muslim countries around the world and certainly not in the Sharia super-state or Ummah that he appears to yearn. But, if he wants to promote good community relations at home in the UK, he had better shut up, put up and hope that the police don’t come knocking on his door carrying questions about suspected terrorist and hate related crimes he may have committed.
Extracts from the declaration
Praise to Allah who strengthened His troops, aided his servants and alone routed the Zionist Jews.
We congratulate the whole family of Islam on the manifest victory which Allah has granted us in the land of Gaza over the Zionist Jewish occupiers.
We affirm that this manifest victory has clearly disclosed the volume of international and local military and political conspiracy against the jihad and the mujahidin in Gaza, as represented by:
· The aggressive pressure put on the mujahidin to break their will and force them to agree to the conspirator’s terms and the stipulation of the Zionist enemy.
· The attempt to present the Hamas government as the cause of this malicious Jewish Zionist war over Gaza
Affirmation of legal judgments:
7. The obligation of the Islamic Nation to regard everyone standing with the Zionist entity, whether countries, institutions or individuals, as providing a substantial contribution to the crimes and brutality of this entity, the position towards him is the same as towards this usurping entity.
8. The obligation of the Islamic Nation to regard the sending of foreign warships into Muslim waters, claiming to control the borders and prevent the smuggling of arms to Gaza, as a declaration of war, a new occupation, sinful aggression, and a clear violation of the sovereignty of the Nation. This must be rejected and fought by all ways and means.
To conclude: WE remind the Islamic Nation of the necessity of... seizing control of the instruments of power that will make possible its supremacy and the preservation of its holy places and provisions.
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