By Andrew L. Jaffee

They cheered and waved Iraqi flags, sharing, perhaps, the first such moment of national pride in recent years…

Which is precisely why the Islamo-fascists struck. They are not interested in liberty, national reconciliation, integrity, or evolution. The Islamists want absolute power based solely on terrorizing, subjugating, converting, or killing those they consider “infidels:”

Two bomb attacks have killed at least 50 people and injured 135 in Baghdad as crowds celebrated a famous victory by the national football team. …

…the football team’s win was a genuine moment of national pride and pleasure which had crossed the sectarian divisions between Iraq’s different communities.

Just as the Iraqi team has Sunni and Shia Muslims and Kurds playing alongside each other, the celebrations brought members of all those communities out onto the streets…

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… on anti-Israel material from MoveOn.org and Jeremiah Wright

by Bill Levinson

It is a matter of record that we e-mailed this material to the National Jewish Democratic Council on July 10, more than two weeks ago. As expected, the National Jewish Democratic Council has failed to reply either to us or via its Ministry of Truth. This underscores our long-held position that the National “Jewish” “Democratic” Council (there is nothing Jewish or Democratic about a hate organization that publishes derogatory pictures of Christians in a “this is the enemy” context while whitewashing hate speech from MoveOn.org) is totally lacking in character, ethics, and integrity.

We won’t hold our breaths waiting for the NJDC to respond to this, but we will remind it (and the voters) periodically.

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By Barry Rubin

Answer A: In political terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party which won 47 percent of the votes in Turkey’s July 22 elections and will have almost two-thirds of the parliament seats is a pragmatic, conservative, business-oriented moderate party despite its roots as an Islamic-oriented one.

Answer B: In societal terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party is probably transforming Turkey from a secular into a more Islamic society, with a big effect on the status of women, the situation of minorities, and Turkey’s foreign policy.

Both statements are true. And this is the point many observers are missing in the great change signaled by the election results.

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by Steven Shamrak

Israel has granted, for the first time, an amnesty to 178 wanted Fatah-affiliated terrorists in the West Bank. Additionally, 256 Arab terrorists have been released from jail.

It has also given extraordinary permission for several exiled officials of the PLO to attend a meeting of the group’s central council this week in Ramallah, in the Israeli-controlled West Bank.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Two hip-hop heavies — Ja Rule and Lil’ Wayne — were rapped last night in New York, both for possession of .40-caliber pistols, and just an hour and a few blocks apart from one another. …

- TMZ, 07/23/2007

Many of our children are listening to the “music” produced by gun-totting Ja Rule and Lil’ Wayne. Do parents even have a clue as to what their own children are tuning in to for “entertainment?”

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by Daniel Pipes*

Two positions dominate and polarize the American body politic today. Some say the war is lost, so leave Iraq. Others say the war can be won, so keep the troops in place.

I split the difference and offer a third route. The occupation is lost but the war can be won. Keep U.S. troops in Iraq but remove them from the cities.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Regardless of the “larger debate between scholars known as biblical ‘minimalists’ and ‘maximalists’,” this little clay tablet proves that the Babylonians knew about Jews and Israel in 595 B.C. Sorry to the historical revisionists: you cannot erase Jewish history. From Time Magazine:

… The tablet itself is certainly genuine. On July 10 the [British] Museum announced that a Viennese expert working his way through thousands of similar clay documents in its possession translated one dating from 595 B.C that described a gift of 1.7 lbs. of gold to a Babylonian temple by a “chief eunuch” named Nabu-sharrussu-ukin.

A museum official called it “a world-class find.” What makes the ancient but seemingly mundane receipt significant is that the book of Jeremiah in the Hebrew Bible (or Old Testament) mentions the exact same official — though under a different transliteration, Nebo-Sarsekim, and a different title, chief officer, as accompanying the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar when he marched against Jerusalem in 587.

According to some experts, that proves that whoever wrote Jeremiah wasn’t making it up. …

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By Linda Michaud-Emin and Heymi Bahar

Having won Turkey’s July 22 parliamentary elections, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is set once again to form a single-party government. This triumph is especially impressive as it is the first time in a half-century that a government party wins reelection. Ironically, this means that while the July 22 elections have taken place amidst so much controversy they are in fact producing the most stable government in many years.

In recent years, the Turkish government has been plagued by an on-going battle between Deniz Baykal’s opposition socialist Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the AKP on the issue of secularism. When it was time for parliament to choose a president on April 27, 2007, the AKP selected its number-two leader, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, for the post. In turn, the CHP boycotted the balloting, thus blocking it. As a result, parliamentary elections were moved up to an earlier date. With street demonstrations protesting AKP’s Islam-oriented program, it seemed as if the opposition might seriously challenge the government. Instead, the government did very well.

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A personal, historical vignette

By Cainnech O Sullibhain

Everyday, we go about our routine totally unaware of the lives of people around us. But sometimes our lives have been changed because of the circumstances.

So, I’ll begin my story. In early 1937, I was only four years old, and it was at lunch time that my father came home. Both my mother and father were sitting having lunch, and I was in the next room. The conversation between my mother and father was about the death of Sgt. M. Orchard of the Royal Artillery, 3rd Battery who had died in the British military hospital the night before. My father, an army doctor, had been responsible for that death. The colonel in charge had ordered my father to treat Sgt. Orchard for malaria, when in fact he had pneumonia. The reason for the misdiagnosis was that the colonel had been sweet on the wife of Sgt. Orchard and wanted him out of the way. My father had been forced to commit murder. I listened in to the whole conversation and was shocked. Little Jimmy Orchard was my friend. I was so angry that I could not even cry. So, I went out of the house and sat in the garden thinking about what I had heard. Being so young, I was not able to face up to the issue, so I blocked all of it out of my mind. One day in 1997, I awoke in the middle of the night. I was perspiring profusely and the whole story of what had happened on that day in 1937 came back with a bang. Everything in my life had been guided by an unknown hand.

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by Bill Levinson

We previously reported how the white supremacist Vanguard News Network and Stormfront.org are citing A Jewish Voice for Peace and the Rebuilding Alliance to show how Jews “murdered” the blonde, blue-eyed Aryan peace activist Rachel Corrie. We also discussed A Jewish Voice for Peace’s direct ties to the International Solidarity Movement, and its Form 990 tax returns. Now it is also a matter of record that A Jewish Voice for Peace is whitewashing and making excuses for Hamas, a Foreign Terrorist Organization as defined by the U.S. State Department.

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An Interview with Dr. Phyllis Chesler

By Fern Sidman

So, how does a nice Jewish girl from Boro Park become a prominent leader in the Second Wave feminist movement of the 1960s and an internationally renowned left-wing ideologue and icon? And more to the point, how does she renounce the falsehood and totalitarian thinking of those ideologies that were once such an integral part of her core being? How does she become a Bush supporter, a neo-conservative thinker who has the respect of the political and religious right?

Only Dr. Phyllis Chesler can answer that. Dr. Chesler, who also happens to be a Boro Park native, prolific author, psychotherapist and feminist dissident, is a person who does not mince words. And while we may or may not agree with her on all of her positions, she is one voice that is worth listening to. And as with all tenacious individuals who dare speak the truth, who sound a clarion call against injustice; comes a unique and fascinating personal story. Her curriculum vitae reads as a veritable cornucopia of academic and personal achievements:

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by Bill Levinson

Rob Lipton of A Jewish Voice for Peace and the International Solidarity Movement had the temerity to post “Lee Kaplan vs Yaman Salahi: Small claims court muzzling, how Kaplan makes up ‘facts’” at Muzzlewatch’s blog. Muzzlewatch is owned by A Jewish Voice for Peace. It seems that Jewish Voice for Peace and Rob Lipton are themselves quite creative about making up facts, and they are too inept to keep their stories straight in the bargain. To begin with, Lipton writes,

For example: Kaplan repeatedly and inexplicably calls JVP “The ISM’s “Jewish Voice for Peace”, a statement so strange its hardly worth addressing. ( Here, presumably, he is referring to the International Solidarity Movement.)

We have already produced Jewish Voice for Peace and International Solidarity Movement web sites that show that the two groups are working together. Now let’s take a look at Rob Lipton himself, who says the assertion that JVP is the ISM’s Jewish Voice for Peace is “a statement so strange its hardly worth addressing.”

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By Barry Rubin

News item: After suicide bomb attacks on London and Glasgow by Islamists were foiled, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown ordered ministers never to use the word “Muslim” when discussing terrorism.

It was a dark and stormy night in London, which is just as well since my arrival was supposed to be a top secret. I was picked up at Heathrow Airport by a limousine and driven immediately to Number 10 Downing Street. I had been called in by a government frustrated about what might well be the biggest mystery in British history. Gordon Brown was certainly glad to see me. “Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective! Just the man we need,” he said with a sigh of relief. “Quick, this is a major crisis. Let’s not waste any time but go straight to the briefing.”

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A personal, historical vignette

By Cainnech Ó Sullibhain

This story goes back to November 1966, when I met Fr. Franciscus Tadashi Hasegawa at the Peace Memorial Cathedral in Hiroshima, Japan.

A few days ago, while looking through some old books, a card fell out of one. I picked up the card and remembered that Fr. Hasegawa had given it to me in November 1966. My thoughts rushed back to the time and the place where I received it. It was with a heavy heart that I was unable to carry out the assignment that Fr. Hasegawa had given me, and felt that I now had to fulfill it in a very different way.

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by David Wenkel*

Many Palestinian Arabs, including such prominent figures as Yasir Arafat and Faisal Husseini, claim that Palestinians descended from the Canaanite tribe of the Jebusites.[1] Such declarations should not surprise. History is political. Many Middle Eastern cultures and states retroactively claim roots to the ancient tribes and empires in order to legitimize their modern nationalism. For instance, the Lebanese claim descent from the Phoenicians, Iraqis from the Babylonians, Kurds from the Medeans, and Turks from the Hittites.

How significant, then, is the Palestinian-Jebusite link? Connections between modern Palestinians and ancient Jebusites would trump the Jewish claim by predating it and legitimize the Palestinian claim to Jerusalem and Israel. The political and diplomatic impact is clear, especially as Palestinian leaders insist that Israel forfeit sovereignty over Jerusalem. Less clear are the religious implications not only for Jews but also for the evangelical Christians who believe in the Old Testament promises of God to the nation of Israel.

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