American Anti-Semitism Alive and Flourishing

 

What happened to Pamela Geller with her being raked over the coals for provoking the attack by a pair of ISIS wannabes by insulting Muslim sensitivities and asking to be assaulted as she had invited people to draw the prophet Mohammad and was honoring those instigators from Charlie Hebdo who also provoked an assault by Islamic enforces of the Sharia. Pamela Geller had gone beyond accepted speech and had all but yelled “fire” in a crowded theater or its equivalent which was unprotected speech. After all, did not Ms. Geller have this coming as she had been tweaking the noses of Muslims everywhere at every opportunity with her support for the Apartheid State of Israel and its genocidal policies towards the Palestinians whose lands they occupied. She had been a defender of the indefensible, a stick in the eye of every sensible person, an itch which just had to be scratched out of existence and came close to finally getting her just rewards there in Garland, Texas. The real problem with these provocative actions of Pamela Geller was the fact that she always had innocents who she would inevitably place in danger and this time one of the guards who checked the invitations of the participants who received a bullet to the leg before the off-duty traffic cop who managed to shoot and kill the two ISIS wannabes in a flash of an exchange of bullets where the two would-be jihadists were encased in full body armor armed with AK-47 .30-calibre high powered rifle rounds capable of penetrating straight through the light chest-protector armor worn by the officer who was shooting back with the Glock version of a M-1911A-1 semi-automatic pistol firing .45 caliber pistol rounds which was incapable of doing more than leaving the smallest of indentations to the heavy body armor and would only prove effective by a shot to the head or a number of shots to the exact same location fired at close range. The wannabe-Jihadists likely thought they were invulnerable against the handgun used by the officer who, unbeknownst to the world, was probably the highest scoring officer in his department every year during qualifying as he placed head shots, the only place the officer could strike the assailants and do any damage, on both assailants as they moved towards the entrance dispatching both to Allah within fifteen seconds from the first shot. Pamela Geller is so absolutely fortunate that the officer at the front entrance was so cool under distress and engaged in a lethal firefight with all the odds stacked against him yet he calmly set his aim at the one place the assailants were vulnerable, a target of less than a square foot on each attacker and struck them both while under a hail of bullets fired from the two AK-47s which would have proven lethal if any round had struck the officer in the torso or head; yet he remained uninjured and saved the day for all inside the event, a real and perfect hero whose name must remain unspoken such that he does not become a target for other Jihadists but who knows he is a hero.

 

The above is the gist of the coverage Pamela Geller has received from the mainstream media from both ends of the political spectrum. She has been berated by both those on the left and those on the right though a few brave individuals on the right have bothered to place the blame where it belonged, to the two heavily armored jihadists who came guns blazing with ineffective fire and were put down by very effective and well placed shots which put an end to their assault almost before it began. So few, Fox News’s Megyn Kelly and CNN’s Piers Morgan both proved the exception and stood with Pamela Geller and the First Amendment guarantees of the freedom of speech, all speech, especially political and controversial speech as popular and easy, uncontroversial and uncontested speech needs no protection, only that speech which is likely to draw opposition or hatreds with threats of violence to silence one is the speech which requires protection from the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. How soon we forget that the speech which requires protection is solely such speech which is most likely to ruffle some tail-feathers which requires protection such that freedom of speech is one of the five protected items in the First Amendment and the officer at the front entrance used the Second Amendment for the exact reason it is the Second Amendment and the enforcer of the First Amendment freedoms and the rest of the rights listed within the Bill of Rights and those from without but still guaranteed free men everywhere though some will face the scorn of their governments and its peoples who, like the majority of the United Stated mainstream media, refuse to step-up to protect the very Amendment which guarantees their very existence and rights to deliver the news, all the news and not just the light news of flower shows and other events having no controversies, having no enemies of freedom who will always attempt to silence those who brace the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and outrageous speech needful of the protection of the Second Amendment and the willingness for the rest of us to protect by echoing their words loudly bringing them into the light where the haters fear to tread.

 

But speaking to protect Israel and her people, the Jews, is no longer affordable speech and has been relegated to the darkness hidden in the shadows where it is spoken only in whispers for to do otherwise brings forth those who would slay us for less. On numerous college and university campuses whenever there is a counter protest in response to a pro-Israel rally, the pro-Israel rally is more often than not made to pack up and end their rally even if the pro-Israel rally had been set and received all the required approvals and the counter rally was apparently an impromptu response which occurred as a popular response. These counter rallies are often just as planned and have even been known to have approached the administration of the college or university demanding that when their demonstration begins it would be wise to close down the pro-Israel rally before anybody was injured as to allow the pro-Israel rally to continue would be an affront to their demonstration and a provocation to violence. A study performed by the Louis Brandeis Center in Washington resulted in findings that over half of Jews had been subjected to or witnessed an anti-Semitic act in the past year with a sizable number having witnessed or suffered multiple such acts. In the majority of instances the student was advised to let it pass rather than file a complaint. It is becoming more common on American university and colleges for Jewish students to be forced to prove their disapproval of Israel or face what can only be described as hate actions which will only be terminated once they have performed a mia-culpa and satisfactorily renounced any pro-Israel feelings. Student body election candidates have been requested to sign agreements whereby they promise to refuse any trips to Israel offered them by numerous Jewish organizations which have Zionist support but they are not made to sign any similar promise against Israel tours offered by pro-Palestinian or Muslim outreach organizations. When such petitions are brought to the attention of the administration there is often a lax attitude claiming such petition demands of the candidates cannot be turned away as such is simply freedom of speech issue. One can only wonder what their reaction might be if the petitions were made from the opposing viewpoint. Many of the anti-Israel campus efforts are well-organized, well-financed and often work in partnership with one or more parent organization which will arrange for additional support for any counter-rally in order to force the termination of any pro-Israel rallies. These coordination of events are mostly occurring on major universities and have turned particularly disconcerting in California university systems. The America college and university campus is rapidly becoming a hostile environment for Jewish students, especially any who are religious or particularly pro-Israel. One can only wonder how much longer before Jewish students are simply found unacceptable to attend college or university in many of the mainstream campuses in the United States. Another item to keep in mind and this is an item of great foreboding, or at least should be taken as such, what one witnesses on the university or college campus today will be main-stream in society a decade later. Imagine the average large sized company being slowly forced to let every Jewish employee go if they hope to keep order in their company and avoid unrest and potentially rioting at their front door threatening all their employees not to cross their demonstration lines and those who refuse the warnings find their vehicles damaged or destroyed when leaving that day. How many vehicles need be damaged before their employees are afraid for their lives and inform their superiors they will be unable to return to work until the demonstrators’ demands are satisfied? Whatever you so please do not make the same mistake the Jews in Germany during the Weimar Republic and even the initial two years after the Nazis initially took power and tell yourself, “It cannot happen here. We have an advanced and open culture where everybody is treated equally.” This is not true on many college and university campuses right now, how much longer before it invades the society when sufficient numbers of students have been so conditioned at their university or college? It most definitely can happen in the United States and has already started in Europe. How much longer before the United States society and governance is demanded to turn on Israel and then soon followed by demanding they turn against their Jews? Twenty years? Ten years? Five Years? Watch your local university and college campuses and see what happens should a pro-Israel individual be invited to give a presentation and see if they are permitted to speak freely. There was one instance last year where one such speaker was permitted to give his speech he had prepared but was told there might not be anyone attending their lecture. This was almost the case but a couple dozen students braved all opposition and the event was transferred at the last minute to a classroom and not the school’s auditorium. The even more frightening question is how long before these activities and hate campaigns move to the high schools and permeate the entire school curriculum. Think this is impossible? Check your school board or the textbook committees in your state and see what choices they have made for history and other course books. These school boards and particularly the state committees that choose the textbooks are often being infiltrated by people who choose books which omit mentions of Jews from their history lessons and show Jews in a dark light when they are mentioned. The history lessons and often the reading assignments in English classes include subtle anti-Semitic phraseology and in some cases outright anti-Semitism. This is an insidious creeping infestation of the secondary school curriculum and is slowly moving into earlier and earlier levels of education. Do not simply think that this is impossible and cannot happen in the United States as that has been the response throughout history and in just about every case it did happen here and the people eventually accepted it as an inevitability and would make the excuse simply asking, “What could I do against the whole of society?” It would do well for every person of good faith to remember and be mindful of the warning which was initially sounded by John Stuart Mill though also often credited to Edmund Burke which stated, “Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.” The variant most often heard and probably more familiar goes something like this, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” So, when you see this evil approaching do not rely on your neighbors to launch into action, take the charge and lead them to action, the feeling of empowerment to have acted and thwarted such evils is reward in and of itself, the gains of society are immeasurable.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

What the Post Ferguson Riot’s Commentaries Taught Me

 

After having the unpleasant experience of reading a small number of articles through which the reactions from numerous American Jewish rights groups officially released statements, amongst these groups included two statespersons from the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) plus spokespersons from JCPA (Jewish Council for Public Affairs) and AJWS (American Jewish World Service); the commentary from these and other rights groups were virtually interchangeable. The only addition to the Jewish rights groups’ commentary was the addition of mentioning how Jews should be more sensitive to racial injustice due to the historic injustices the Jewish people have faced over the dozens of centuries, an addition which probably was more destructive than it was informative. It is not that the Jews have not suffered from injustices since the times of slavery in Egypt to the current problems facing Jews across many European cities, on campuses throughout the world including within the United States, across the Arab and Muslim worlds, and even within the borders of Israel from terrorist groups and oft even from fellow Jews who have joined those for whom the simple existence of Jews in Israel is sufficient offense in their hearts and minds; it is that such prefacing is unnecessary and even more-so if it is being implemented in order to spur an emotional response from other Jews, as these were general statements which would be published throughout the United States and potentially beyond and as they appeared to separate the Jews from the rest of society and place within them a special ability to be the adjudicators of social justice, an ability based on offenses which the majority of Jews have never experienced, especially in the United States. But what was also a basis for most of these commentaries was the implication that there had been a miscarriage of justice by the grand jury not deciding to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting of Michael Brown on that fateful day in Ferguson, Missouri.

 

What struck me about these virtually identical reactions to the grand jury’s verdict was not so much their refusal to even consider any of the evidence from the investigation but their ability to automatically side with the rioters cause and complaints even as they claimed that the rioting was not an appropriate answer. Then came their broadening their convictions of American society for not having actually made any real progress over the past half a century since the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964 and the presumption that racism was still rampant across American society. They then went on in many cases to point to particular evidences that such racism was still prevalent which included such items as that black students are suspended or expelled from our public schools at a much higher rate than white students, a higher rate of arrests and convictions and longer jails sentences for black Americans over white Americans, and, as was stated in one commentary, “there are many other examples that show the continuing racial divide.” These cited perceptions give away the progressive liberal perspective which shapes the lens with which these rights groups view the world and how they simply accept every canard which paints American society with a broad brush of having made no progress over the last fifty years despite the glaring evidence that shows a world of change has taken place transforming American society into a virtually post-racial America. The reason these groups refuse to credit the average American and the society they collectively produce with having made any progress is because if progress has been achieved then they have less of a cause celeb with which to bludgeon the social fabric and demand continued funding in huge proportions in order to continue to collect their over bloated salaries and pontificate ponderously at great length about the ills of society which their social engineering will eventually lead the way to an enlightened society. These are the same people and the same perspective which looks across the United States and continues to believe that there has been no progress in combating pollution and feel that the air quality, water quality and the general levels of pollution are identical to what is was fifty years ago. They continue to believe that Los Angeles is smog bound, Denver sits in a brown dome of polluted air, Lake Erie is still choked with nitrates and no fish live within and the Cuyahoga River still catches fire every summer. I guess the correct concept here would be for these people to wake up and smell the roses, even on the banks of the Cuyahoga River which if it is flashing anything it is the bright sunlight through the crisp clean air sparking off the scales of the tiny fish living in that once polluted river.

 

The main realization that came over me was how these same Jewish organizations could continuously protest that they knew best how to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict if only those Israelis in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s ruling coalition would listen to their sagely wisdoms. These were the same American Jews who agreed with one single idea from the entire eight years during President George W. Bush’s administration; and that was the idea for Israel to pull up every last single Jewish resident, every last IDF and other security forces, every single Jewish business, farm and factory from within the entirety of the Gaza Strip and turn it all over to Arab rule trusting that Mahmoud Abbas would then transform the areas freed of any Jewish influences into the Arab version of Hong Kong or Shanghai. Well, as we all know, that worked out just exactly as predicted, just not how they had predicted and instead became the Hamas run rocket launching and tunnel headquarters financed and armed by Qatar and Iran and dedicated to wiping out Israel and then murdering every Jew on the planet. Now many of these same geniuses are the ones in the fore calling for Israel to repeat this disengagement this time with Judea and Samaria so that the rest of Israel can enjoy the same horrors as Sderot and the Gaza Strip kibbutzim and towns with twenty-four/seven rockets raining down on their lives except this time the rockets will be falling on the most densely populated and industrial heartlands of Israel as well as onto Ben Gurion International Airport really giving President Obama reasons to ban all commercial flights into Israel as well as most of the world joining in on that boycott. Simply put, such an idea would be the fastest way to guarantee either the death of Israel or the final war between Israel and any Arab presence between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Such a move would lead within a few short months to an us or them situation leading inexorably to a final war.

 

One might think that there would be a name for people who no matter the evidence they refuse to alter a single iota of their perfect little plan to right all the wrongs in the world. Those who constantly will point out the obvious truth which makes their presentation of these tried and failed ideas worth another go around, that being that they were not the ones entrusted with the reins of power and if they would be trusted, then this time it will work as it should in a perfect world. Never mind that their promise sounds remarkably like the promise made by those who have tried these exact same ideas before when they were the ones promising they could make it work. I think I have figured out what the appeal of making such ridiculous and absurd claims has to be; they have noted that those who made this claim before and failed just as miserably as every other attempt at righting the ills of human societies, those leaders lived extravagantly with every opulence and overindulgence imagined by man and never suffered for want of any sort and were completely removed from the squalor and degradations that they were causing. Perhaps that is their hope for getting it right, that it will be right from their viewpoint and not so much the rest of us. Whatever Pollyannish thinking they try to pass off as eternal wisdom they are selling as the solution, be it for the rioting resulting from the correct verdict reached by the Ferguson grand jury or their solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, be assured that any prudent and wise person should steer well clear of their suggestions and take a more reasoned route which has proven prudential and workable in the past rather than trust those who claim that if only we let them take charge this time all will be well. Somehow calling these people progressive is almost as absurd as when we referred to them as liberals as they are about as close to libertarian as they are to progress, true and real progress.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Anti-Semitism Rising to Newer and Uglier Heights

The obvious and very public acts of anti-Semitism are on the increase throughout much of the world and have closed in on being an epidemic infecting Europe. In Rome, Italy this past week an act of anti-Semitism hit a new level of crassness bringing to mind memories of the desecration of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem during the period of the Second Temple. The historic insulting and crass act was perpetrated by the priests and governing oppressors of the Jewish people during the Cyrenaic Greek occupation. Boxes containing pigs’ heads were recently delivered to the Israeli Embassy, the Synagogue in the Parioli neighborhood and the Jewish Museum of Rome which is currently hosting an exhibit on the Holocaust. This act goes beyond any simple hatred due to its historical implication of the sacrifice of pigs and other non-kosher animals to the pagan Greek gods which was committed over two thousand years ago and was declared to be being performed by the occupying Cyrenaic Greeks as an intentional desecration and insult intended to belittle the Jews and demonstrate the falseness of the Jewish faith and against G0d. This act now perpetrated in the modern times exemplifies the depth of the depravity of those who hate the Jewish people today with all the raw and unbridled spite as was on display in the ancient world where civility by presumably today’s standards was not generally practiced. The Repubblica daily reported that a letter was inside the boxes contained derogatory comments about the Holocaust and references to Theodor Herzl, the founder of modern political Zionism. This was not the only sign of the growing anti-Semitism as there was fresh graffiti in one of Rome’s suburbs Saturday which read “Holocaust fake” and “Anne Frank liar”.

 

Reaction by officials was immediately forthcoming denouncing the barbarous acts with Rome Mayor Ignazio Marino stating, “Those who insult the Jewish community offend Rome. We reject the intimidation outright.” Integration Minister Cecile Kyenge was also quoted declaring, “I want to express my full support to the Jewish community for what has happened. We will do everything possible to find the person behind this unspeakable act.” He further promised to track down those responsible as police are analyzing fingerprints and DNA traces found on the boxes and following up on the lead that all the boxes were delivered by the same postal company. Making these acts of bigotry even worse is their timing coming just three days before an international memorial day for Holocaust victims which falls on Monday, January 27.

 

This act comes amid rising anti-Semitism across Europe which has already reached levels high enough to be considered a threat to the Jews living in much of Europe and other places as well. This trend has a very long history beginning soon after the end of World War II. The initial wave washed across the Muslim world, particularly the Arab nations, after the founding of Israel in May of 1948. The Jews were dispossessed of their belongings, their businesses confiscated in many cases and sold for a pittance where time permitted. These actions occurred over more than a decade with some of the evictions of the Jews in these nations was committed by the government and was even incorporated into the laws making being Jewish a capital offense. In other instances the cleansing of the Jews almost completely was accomplished by pogroms, riots and other violence forcing the Jews to leave hastily and under duress. We are beginning to witness an increase in anti-Semitism which will likely result in an exodus of the Jews from Europe to the United States and Israel. The numbers of Jews who made Aliyah returning to their ancient homelands in Israel made a marked and significant increase in France by fifty-seven percent last year over the previous year and even larger increase over the average of the previous half a century. There have been reports of mayors of cities flat out stating that they are unable to provide for the safety and security needs of their Jewish citizens with the former Mayor of Malmo, Sweden, Ilmar Reepalu, who had served in that position for seventeen years, not endearing himself to the Jewish community as he laid the blame for the local anti-Semitism on the city’s Jews themselves. At an interview in January 2010 about growing anti-Semitism in Malmo, then Mayor Reepalu responded, “We accept neither anti-Semitism nor Zionism in Malmö.” On another occasion he had stated, “There have been no attacks against Jews, and if Jews want to leave for Israel that is not a concern for Malmo.” When confronted about his apparently anti-Semitic views and statements he blamed it all on the orchestrations by “the Israeli lobby.”

 

The Mayor of Malmo is far from alone as similar statements have been recorded from previous London Mayor Ken Livingstone. Mr. Livingstone’s hatred of Israel and the contempt he feels for the Jews in general is well documented. In Ken Livingstone’s case the documentation of both disdain for Israel and anti-Semitism removes all doubts that in his case, hatred for Israel is a result of his anti-Semitism. Unfortunately the rising anti-Semitism is not restricted to Europe. Anti-Israel, anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism is alive as growing on the campuses of numerous universities and colleges across North America. In some schools the epidemic has grown so serious as to require court orders to force school officials to address the problem and provide safety in the campus environment for its Jewish students. Two students at the University of California, Jessica Felber and Brian Maissy, filed a suit accusing the University of California system of failure to mitigate a hostile climate against Jewish students in March 2011. The lawsuit was settled out of court and instructed changes to the university’s campus policies regarding campus protests. Despite the settlement, the students’ lawyers, Joel Siegal and Neal Sher, filed a Title VI complaint Justice Department and the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, urging them to investigate what they describe as “a pervasive hostile environment toward Jews” on the campus. Additionally, acts of violence against Jews in particular have surfaced in major cities throughout the United States coming to be referred to as the “Knockout Game” or the more specific name of “Get the Jew.” There has been a marked rise in Nazi and other anti-Semitic graffiti in Jewish neighborhoods and on Jewish buildings including Synagogues, daycare centers, Yeshivas, Jewish owned businesses, and most alarming, Jewish homes. Despite these unarguable facts, most Jews in the United States continue to have a false sense of security claiming using the exact phrase used by assimilated Jews in the Weimar Republic in the early 1930s that, “It cannot happen here and not to me as I am accepted and am respected as I holding high office.” Those denials were soon to be regretted as the truth became obvious, no position, stature in the community or other presumed mitigating factor was of any worth towards saving any Jew as time progressed. The delivery of packaged pigs’ heads to numerous Jewish institutions in Rome has brought the rising atmosphere of anti-Semitism into shocking and immediate attention. This should act as the severe threat that it represents and imparts a strong message to Jews everywhere to examine critically and honestly their position and the growing and visceral hatred brewing within Western societies and address this phenomenon and make arrangements and plans with care and act decisively before the contagion spreads further and becomes unstoppable. Closing one’s eyes and pretending that these are disparate acts with nothing linking them together can only result in tragedy. The history of the Jewish people contains ample examples of similar episodes of dismissible hatred of Jews which inevitably grew accumulating disciples who spread the venom until it became an integrated part of the societal whole leading to tragedies waged against our forefathers. Unaddressed, the current seeds of anti-Semitism will slowly spread and engulf the entire world making victims of all of us. Wake-up please.

 

Beyond the Cusp