By Phyllis Chesler

So, there I am, sitting in what I had hoped might be an escape movie when I realized that I was watching one more extended Hollywood commercial against the war in Iraq. Alright, it’s a free country for those who’ve got money to burn and this movie, “The Valley of Elah,” was brilliantly acted by three Academy-Award winners: Tommie Lee Jones, Charlize Theron, and Susan Sarandon.

War is hell and it wounds both the victims and perpetrators; this is the film’s focus. War robs human beings of both their humanity and their sanity. Soldiers and combatants become less-than-human; many can never recover from this infernal assault. What war makes people do is something they cannot easily, if ever, recover from. This is the film‘s major point. At film’s end, Jones hoists the American flag upside down to signify that American foreign policy and the armed forces are “upside down,” screwed up, and that we need to be rescued from ourselves.

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By Lee Harris

“THE AGE OF illusions is over,” the historian Walter Laqueur wrote recently, referring to the illusions the West continues to entertain about the confrontation with radical Islam. Needless to say, Laqueur did not mean that we in the West no longer have any illusions on this subject; those still abound. He meant, rather, that we can no longer afford to harbor them and that the time has come to shed them. Yet human beings have great difficulty in freeing themselves from illusions — even quite dangerous ones — as long as they offer comfort and provide peace of mind. The best place to start the freeing process is by heeding those who are willing to tell us disturbing truths. Barry Rubin, the distinguished scholar of the Middle East, falls into this tiny minority. His brilliant and provocative new book, The Truth about Syria, not only challenges the illusions of those naturally inclined to prefer lovely daydream over harsh reality; it also challenges the illusions of those in the West who, by their own definition, are hard-nosed realists and wily pragmatists.

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By Barry Rubin

Working on new material for the seventh edition of the Israel-Arab Reader, a documentary work that I edit along with Walter Laqueur, reminds me that there is nothing like examining old material as a way to gain new insights.

This edition updates the book whose current contents ended in 2000 with the failure of the peace process. The most important developments since then are basically the renewed intifada; Israeli withdrawals from southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip; the growing direct involvement of Hizballah and Iran, including the 2006 war; and Hamas’ triumph over Fatah in the 2006 elections and in seizing control of the Gaza Strip.

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By Phyllis Chesler

For years, feminists — myself included — focused on women as victims. We argued, correctly, that women were not only being discriminated against economically but were the objects of horrific psychological, sexual, and physical violence.

In North America and Europe, women are still being raped, incested, battered, trafficked, tortured, and murdered. However, after forty five years of feminist activism, such acts are increasingly viewed as crimes, and are increasingly reported and sometimes punished. Rape as a weapon of war, (think Bosnia, Rwanda, Sudan, Congo) is now seen as a crime against humanity.

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by Daniel Pipes*

“We are all Keynsians now,” Richard Nixon famously asserted just as the economic theories of John Maynard Keynes fell into disrepute. Likewise, one could have said with similar confidence in 1989, as Israel’s existence reached wide acceptance, “We are all Zionists now.” No longer.

Count the ways Israel is under siege: from Iranians building a nuclear bomb, Syrians stockpiling chemical weapons, Egyptians and Saudis developing serious conventional forces, Hizbullah attacking from Lebanon, Fatah from the West Bank, Hamas from Gaza, and Israel’s Muslim citizens becoming politically restive and more violent.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Hero. Rebel. Revolutionary. These are words one often hears in association with Ernesto Che Guevara. …

- BBC

These are words one often hears about Che from historical illiterates and wannabe, middle class “revolutionaries.” You know, the ones who walk around wearing Che t-shirts; the ones whose entire belief systems are solely based on the t-shirt they are wearing. Yesterday, Cuba “officially” commemorated the 40-year anniversary of Che’s execution. This sham pageantry was in reality a commemoration of dictatorship; a reminder of the prison in which most Cubans live. Here’s a historical reminder of what Guevara really stood for:

…Che himself admitted to ordering “several thousand” executions during the first year of the Castro regime. Felix Rodriguez, the Cuban-American CIA operative who helped track him down in Bolivia and was the last person to question him, says that Che during his final talk, admitted to “a couple thousand” executions. …

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by Daniel Pipes*

Question asked of Jerusalem Post columnists: “Do you believe that a significant renewed peace process has begun? Who do you think will make a significant concession at Annapolis: Israel, the Palestinians, both or neither?” For all replies, see “Burning Issues #41: Has a renewed peace process begun?“

No significant peace process exists now, nor has it ever. Israel’s signing of a diplomatic agreements with Egypt (1979), Lebanon (1983), the PLO (1993), and Jordan (1994) all proved ineffective at best and counterproductive at worst.

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By Jonathan Spyer

Sitting in the best bar in Jerusalem about four months ago (it’s called Sira, in case you’re interested), I entered into conversation with a tall, ginger-haired young man who turned out to be a member of the Swedish contingent in the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH). Our conversation ranged over the trials and tribulations of the life of a member of TIPH, the very large amounts of money he seemed to be making, and the merits of Jerusalem when compared with other cities in the region.

An offhand remark he made concerning the political balance of power in Hebron turned the conversation from mildly interesting to memorable. I asked him if Hamas was gaining ground in the city of Hebron. He replied wearily that the fastest-growing political force in the city was not Hamas, nor any of the other well-known Palestinian political movements. Rather, the most notable and noticeable development on the ground in Hebron was the sudden and rapid rise in support for the Islamist party Hizb ut-Tahrir.

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By Mark Krikorian*

There are two questions to consider when deciding whether to stop welcoming illegal aliens. First, do we even need the flow of labor that illegal immigration represents? And second, whatever immigration policy we do adopt, can it be enforced if we make it easy to live here illegally, as we do now?

The answer to both questions is No.

There is no economic need for foreign labor, legal or illegal. There are an estimated 12 million illegal aliens in the United States, with perhaps 7 million of them in the labor market — either working or actively looking for work. But contrary to myths about “jobs Americans won’t do,” there is no major job category that is dominated by these illegal workers. The Census Bureau groups all jobs in the country into 473 categories, and in 2003-2004, only three small categories had even the tiniest majority of immigrant workers, legal and illegal. The large majority of America’s taxi drivers, housekeepers, janitors, dishwashers, landscapers and construction laborers are native-born Americans.

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By Barry Rubin

Quick! Tell me. Who’s desperate to make a deal? Who acts as if they are the weaker party, eager to negotiate solutions in order to end their people’s suffering and the costs of conflict?

Certainly not Iran. It has been pushing ahead with its nuclear program for more than three years during a period of intense Western diplomatic effort, lots of talk about sanctions, and even the implementation of some. Iran is indifferent to threats of attack or warnings of isolation. To a large extent — but not completely — the regime thinks the West is bluffing. But if Tehran really sought nuclear energy, not bombs, it could easily cooperate and have power stations in operation far faster. And if Iran was really acting out of fear of being surrounded by American power, it could help resolve the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq — instead of inflaming them — in exchange for U.S. forces withdrawing more quickly.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

A prominent Palestinian Christian activist was found dead on a Gaza City street Sunday, sending a shudder of fear through a tiny Christian community feeling increasingly insecure since the Islamic Hamas seized control last summer. …

- Associated Press

Didn’t we hear the same thing two weeks ago?

An attack on an 80-year-old Christian woman in Gaza City has triggered renewed fears among the Gaza Strip’s 2,500-strong Christian community.

Claire Farah Tarazi was the latest victim of anti-Christian attacks that have increased in the Gaza Strip since Hamas took full control of the area in June. …

Can there be any doubt that Hamas, a fanatical, terrorist Muslim group, will do whatever it takes to scare the Christian “infidels” out of Gaza? Beating up old women?

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Iranian students today braved their county’s notoriously brutal “security” forces by demonstrating against the Islamist dictatorship:

An estimated 100 students staged a rare demonstration Monday against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, calling him a “dictator” and scuffling with hardline students at Tehran University.

Ahmadinejad, who was giving a speech to a select group at the university to mark the beginning of the academic year, ignored the chants of “death to the dictator” and continued with his speech on the merits of science and the pitfalls of Western-style democracy, witnesses said. …

Of course Ahmadinejad wants to avoid democracy, as it would put him out of a job and hold him accountable for his many crimes against humanity.

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By Salim Mansur

Public policy is generally judged on the basis of its intended effect.

But not infrequently the public is left to contend with the unintended consequences of a policy — for instance, the NEP of the Trudeau years or the Meech Lake Accord of the Mulroney years — long after the intended effects would have been consummated.

Politicians seek the glow of the intended effects of policies they initiate, and flee from the unintended consequences of those same policies that might leave the society worse off than the situation when a particular policy was proposed or enacted.

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by Gunnar Heinsohn and Daniel Pipes*

The Arab-Israeli conflict is often said, not just by extremists, to be the world’s most dangerous conflict – and, accordingly, Israel is judged the world’s most belligerent country.

For example, British prime minister Tony Blair told the U.S. Congress in July 2003 that “Terrorism will not be defeated without peace in the Middle East between Israel and Palestine. Here it is that the poison is incubated. Here it is that the extremist is able to confuse in the mind of a frighteningly large number of people the case for a Palestinian state and the destruction of Israel.” This viewpoint leads many Europeans, among others, to see Israel as the most menacing country on earth.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Barack Obama wants to be president of the U.S.A. but won’t wear an American flag pin? I’d say the man’s a tad bit confused.

Sitting here listening to my father-in-law’s WWII stories about fighting the Japanese in Burma, I realized the depth of his patriotism, and the commitment made by his entire generation — including my own father, who fought the Germans in Europe. (Both men volunteered for service.) I also realized how empty and soulless Barack Obama’s campaign is:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says he no longer wears an American flag lapel pin because it has become a substitute for “true patriotism” since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. …

“The truth is that right after 9/11 I had a pin,” Obama said. “Shortly after 9/11, particularly because as we’re talking about the Iraq war, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security.” …

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