"ALL CAPS IN DEFENSE OF LIBERTY IS NO VICE."

Tuesday, March 28, 2023

Judicial reform process delayed

This was probably to be expected, sadly enough, all because some leftists in establishment took it upon themselves to do everything they could to bring the country to a standstill:
The head of one of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Coalition partners, Otzma Yehudit, said on Monday he had agreed to delay the government's overhaul of the judiciary in exchange for a promise it would be brought after the upcoming parliamentary recess.

"I agreed to remove the veto to reject the legislation in exchange for a commitment by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the legislation would be submitted to the Knesset for approval in the next session," National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said in a statement. The statement also said that Netanyahu vowed that Ben-Gvir would get to head a new National Guard unit that would complement that Israel Police, for which he has no official jurisdiction over.

The statement said the legislation would be pushed to the next session of Israeli parliament in order to "pass the reform through dialogue," the statement said. Parliament will go on recess next week for the Passover holiday.

[...] As opposition spread, the head of the Histadrut labor union called for a general strike if the proposals were not halted.

Take-offs from Ben Gurion airport were suspended, while Israel's main seaports, banks and hospitals, and medical services were set to strike. Branches of Mcdonald's were also closed
.
That the airport staff would allow this is severely disturbing. It just shows how the left has such astonishing influence here for the worst. One of the coalition MKs is furious over the situation:
MK Tally Gotliv (Likud) on Monday expressed outrage over the decision to pause the legislation of the judicial reform, but made clear she would not disband the coalition because of it.

"The decision to stop the legislation is shameful and disgraceful, it's shameful in several aspects," Gotliv told Israel National News. "Perhaps all my friends from the right should remember the words of the sages, 'Say little and do much' and not the other way around, and it is unthinkable that after we unilaterally surrendered last week [by agreeing to a softened version of the bill on the composition of the Judicial Selection Committee], and I said that the entire reform would be taken off the table, [that we agreed to postpone the legislation]. I also said that the demonstrations would not stop and I that it was a protection payment for violence and extortion through threats."

"After all, all that is on the agenda is changing the structure of the Judicial Selection Committee, which may affect the appointment of two judges in the next two years – 12 percent of the judges of the Supreme Court, and for that they are setting the Ayalon Highway on fire? So what do we say in response? That we surrender to domestic terrorism. We don't know how to govern," she added.

Gotliv is not convinced by the promise that this is only a short-term stoppage and claimed that it is a "one-sided surrender, a surrender to actual terror, to all this promiscuous anarchism. I prefer that they tell me that to my face and not shame the people of Israel."
She's right that it's not going to stop here. There will doubtless be more obnoxious demonstrations by the left, along with potential strikes to paralyze the country, and this cannot be allowed to go unopposed.

Update: David Harsanyi says the judicial system as it currently stands in Israel is exactly what the American left wants too. He also cites some of the country's unfortunate history:
But the nation’s judicial system is even worse. Israel’s political system was created by leftists who envisioned a one-party state. From its inception, the nation’s socialists suppressed — sometimes violently — political opposition. And in the 1950s, a ruling Labor Party preempted the opposition from infiltrating the courts by empowering judges to veto appointees to the bench. This created a self-perpetuating, generationally cocooned judiciary that functions without any set of cohesive legal principles or oversight.
That's the tragedy that's been around for much longer than one may think, and has damaged this country's modern inception, easily for years to come.

Sunday, March 26, 2023

Netanyahu fires defense minister Galant

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired Yoav Galant as his defense minister, because the latter decided to cause trouble for judicial reform, and even before that, he was underminining the army:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant following his opposition to the judicial reform, it was announced on Sunday evening.

Gallant made a dramatic declaration on Saturday evening calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt the judicial overhaul long enough to more deeply engage in negotiations with others to reach a compromise.

The prime minister told Gallant he lost his trust in the defense minister after he "went behind the government's back" on Saturday evening, while Netanyahu was visiting the United Kingdom. Netanyahu now has 48 hours to appoint a defense minister, as per Maariv.
It's for the best Galant goes out. It'll remain to be seen who the next defense minister will be. But Galant's decidedly no loss, and won't be missed in the role. If he tries to hurt the government further even outside the cabinet proper, that'll be wrong, so let's hope Galant will respect and come to terms with his dismissal.

Update: Ruthie Blum explains how Galant hurt military order by allowing air force reservists to take political stances at the expense of the country's security.

Saturday, March 18, 2023

With his sordid record, Andrew Cuomo has no business establishing a "pro-Israel" movement

Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, who led the state into an utter disaster 3 years ago during the Coronavirus pandemic, and was forced to resign following sexual misconduct scandals, is now establishing a supposedly pro-Israeli group meant to appeal to Democrats:
Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has a new project, a year and a half after resigning amid a flurry of sexual harassment allegations: a pro-Israel organization targeting Democrats.

Cuomo delivered the message via video on Monday evening at an event at Carnegie Hall hosted by the World Values Network, the organization led by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach — an author, television personality and onetime Republican congressional candidate. Boteach organized the event in honor of the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and in memory of his recently deceased mother.

The launch of the organization, to be called “Progressives For Israel,” was first reported by Matthew Kassel at Jewish Insider.

While Cuomo provided few details about the organization, he said that it would call on Democrats to stand with Israel, “because silence is not an option.”
Putting aside for a moment that many leftists today are more hostile than ever to Israel, how can one truly give backing to a movement formed by a man whose record consists of sexual harrassment/abuse, and even went miles out of his way to impose LGBT ideology, among other woke elements, upon a now collapsing state? Boteach should also consider how embarrassing it is to associate with somebody like Cuomo, who didn't do any true favors for Jews in New York either, unless it's the Satmar we're talking about.

If Cuomo still retains the far-left ideological perspective he had before on issues like LGBT ideology and appeasing high crime rates in NYC, that's reason enough to reject whatever he's doing now, and Boteach would do well to distance himself from Cuomo too. NY's former governor is just not worth wasting time with.

Update: it's important to note that as of now, many more Democrats side with Islamists against Israel. Even if Cuomo weren't as corrupt as he is, the movement he's formed is bound to fail miserably.

Monday, March 13, 2023

Those Jewish groups who push the US government to pressure Israel should be avoided

Irit Tratt's raised an issue that may be overlooked, of doubtlessly leftist Jewish movements who've pushed for the US government to pressure Israel for all the wrong reasons:
On Feb. 27, Israeli-American Elan Ganeles was fatally shot by Palestinian terrorists while driving by the town of Jericho on the way to a friend’s wedding. The horrific murder followed a tragic month in Israel during which 14 lives were lost to Palestinian terrorism.

After the attacks, American officials, including U.S. President Joe Biden and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Thomas Nides phoned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or issued expressions of “deep condolences” to the victims’ families.

While expressions of sympathy are a reassuring indicator of a stable alliance, there has also been a torrent of American criticism on a host of issues ranging from Israel’s strategy on Ukraine to internal Israeli debates over judicial reform.

The Biden administration’s pivot away from Israel became clear last month when the U.S. backed a U.N. Security Council statement condemning Israel’s legalization of nine “settlements” in Judea and Samaria.

Little attention has been paid to the Jewish leaders who are abetting this change in U.S. policy. It remains expedient to blame politicians for this shift but, in fact, American Jewish institutions have fostered an atmosphere favorable to cooling U.S.-Israel relations for decades.

In his 1998 article “Netanyahu and American Jews,” Jonathan Broder described a White House state dinner that took place the previous year honoring Israel’s then-President Ezer Weizman. Among those invited were ten senior representatives from U.S. Jewish organizations.

The article stated that President Bill Clinton went around the room and asked each Jewish dignitary if they agreed with the conclusions of a poll conducted by the Israel Policy Forum (IPF) that showed 84% of American Jews surveyed “favored U.S. pressure on both Israel and the Palestinians to save the faltering Middle East peace process.”

To Clinton’s surprise, the Jewish organizational leaders expressed unanimous agreement with the IPF study and rejected any attempt to dispute its findings.

Moreover, not one Jewish attendee spoke favorably of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
. This left the task to Clinton, who suggested that Israel’s cabinet, rather than Netanyahu, was causing an impasse in the peace process.
While the organizations' attitude towards Israel is obviously bad, Clinton was still reprehensible in his own approach, considering he pushed through some very bad demands of his own, had a lenient view of Islam, and of course, let's not forget his record of sexual abuse allegations. Based on that, one must wonder if he really did find it surprising the Jewish organizations in question were hostile to Israel.

But that told, of course these organizations are a most repulsive lot, and no decent person should have anything to do with them. That's the vital lesson to consider in this whole affair, a tragedy that's been caused by people who've been taught to otherwise reject their heritage and history. Worst, they're sympathetic to Islamofascism, and that's one more reason why they should be avoided.

Friday, March 10, 2023

USA State Department funding anti-government movement in Israel

As reported by the Wash. Free Beacon (via Breitbart), it would seem the horrific anti-judicial reform demonstrations seen in the past few weeks are funded by State Department money:
The U.S. government has been funneling taxpayer money to the left-wing group bankrolling protests against Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to Israeli funding documents reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon.

The documents indicate that, since 2020, Foggy Bottom has sent over $38,000 to the Movement for Quality Government (MQG), the Israeli nonprofit stoking nationwide anti-Netanyahu protests that have seen protesters clash with police and target Netanyahu’s family members. MQG is seeking to takedown Netanyahu’s government over his support for major reforms to the Israeli supreme court that would significantly limit its power. The organization petitioned Israel’s Supreme Court earlier this year to oust Netanyahu, claiming he is unfit for office due to ongoing investigations into allegations of political corruption and bribery.

The State Department, which confirmed the funding, calls the group a nonpartisan organization, but its work opposing Netanyahu raises questions about how the group was able to obtain U.S. funding. The United States typically avoids funding foreign partisan groups to avoid claims of political meddling. Even before MQG emerged as the leading force behind the current wave of anti-Netanyahu protests, it made a name for itself as a leading critic of the Israeli right, which has long seen Netanyahu as its leader. Given the Biden administration’s chilly diplomatic relationship with Netanyahu—which includes repeated criticism of Israeli settlement construction and the decision to launch an unprecedented FBI probe into Israel’s anti-terrorism operations—the U.S. funding to MQG has come under new scrutiny.
So the US department is using taxpayer funds for harming Israel's government system, and they certainly have caused quite a bit of chaos, including for the aforementioned Sara Netanyahu. This is a disgrace that should be raised in Congress.

Since we're on the subject of the judicial reform, some new polls show 3 quarters of the Israeli public supports them:
A large majority of Israelis support Justice Minister Yariv Levin's judicial reforms, the Direct Polls institute reported yesterday (Monday), presenting a different picture from the polls suggesting the controversy surrounding the reforms are causing the coalition to lose support.

According to the institute, the polls cited by the mainstream media in Israel do not include specific questions on the content of the judicial reform, and respondents are much more supportive of the reforms when asked about specific aspects.

About 60% of Israelis support the vast majority of the judicial reforms when asked questions about the content of the reforms
, Direct Polls stated.

[...] In total, Direct Polls found that 78% of Israelis are in favor of reforming Israel's judicial system to at least some extent, while just 22% want to keep the judicial system as it currently is.
As a result, it's all the more offensive the "nonprofit" is engaging in such horrific behavior as they are, and Yair Lapid, lest we forget, is also a disgrace for opposing the reforms.

Thursday, February 16, 2023

Limor Son Har-Melech files complaint against Border Patrol officers who illegally restrained and sexually assaulted her

Otzma Yehudit MK Har-Melech has ideally filed a police complaint against 4 Border Patrol officers who acted like utter perverts against her in Samaria:
MK Limor Son Har-Melech (Otzma Yehudit) filed a complaint with the Department of Internal Police Investigations against four Border Police officers who formed a tight human chain around her to keep her from moving towards the site where the demolition of a Jewish-owned orchard in Samaria was taking place yesterday (Wednesday).

According to the complaint, MK Son Har-Melech accuses the officers of violating her parliamentary immunity as a member of the Knesset and of assaulting her.

She stated that she is also filing a complaint against the two officers who were in command of the demolition.

Yesterday, the MK accused one of the officers of sexually assaulting her when she attempted to get out of the human chain.
One of the most offensive things about the act was that the commanding officer involved acted like she was stupid. Which seems to be an open example of how male sexists think. None of these men belong in the positions they're working in. More to the point, they should not be on the police/army payroll in any way, shape or form, and they most definitely should be in prison.

What makes this incident additionally offensive is that it comes after a horrifying incident in Gedera, where a mother was raped by a Muslim, and Har-Melech proposed a law to deal with rape as a form of terrorism:
A bill to double the sentence for nationalistically-motivated rape will be submitted on Monday by Otzma Yehudit MK Limor Son Har-Melech following the brutal rape of a Gedera woman in front of her children on Thursday.

Son Har-Melech explained on Sunday that other politically motivated crimes in the penal code double the punishment. Victims are entitled to additional compensation for nationalistic crimes.

"The shocking case of rape that took place in Gedera joins the series of horrific cases of rape committed in recent years by Arab terrorists with a clear nationalistic motive, using rape as another tool in the war on Israel,"
said Son Har-Melech. "This is terrorism in all respects and should be treated as such."
So what those Border Patrol officers did added insult to injury, and suggests they sympathise with tyrants. As a result, they should be imprisoned, and ostracized by wider society. If they apologize, they'd do well not to ask for forgiveness simultaneously, because it doesn't help.

Wednesday, February 15, 2023

Samaria vineyard uprooted illegally, by an apparently leftist defense minister

A pure embarrassment occurred the other day, as defense minister Yoav Galant overrode finance minister Bezalel Smotrich's objections to uprooting a Samaria vineyard:
Following the uprooting of the vineyard established by the Ben Eliyahu family in the Shiloh Valley, MK Ohad Tal (Religious Zionism party) states that this is a continuation of the left's policy, and it will not contribute to the stability of the coalition.

"Just yesterday we sat down in Givat Harel with Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and he said that this destruction should be stopped. There is no moral or legal justification for carrying it out," says Tal. He adds that, unfortunately, it seems that the only reason for the destruction is a power struggle between Defense Minister Galant and Finance Minister Smotrich.

"It pains me to say this, but it seems that the Defense Minister is trying to show that he is in control on the ground. This is very sad. We cannot continue to promote the left-wing policies of the previous government. This should not exist in a government that promised the public a different policy," says Tal.

Regarding the videos showing the security force's violence against MK Limor Son Har-Malech (Otzma Yehudit), Tal says, "when I saw the photos, I cringed. That's illegal. After all, she has parliamentary immunity. She is allowed to go anywhere. But I also cringed because it was inappropriate and I don't want to use the word harassment. This is inappropriate and illegal and must not happen in the State of Israel."
On that note, what happened to Har-Malech was very offensive too:
MK Limor Son Har-Melech (Otzma Yehudit) accused one of the Border Police officers who blocked her from reaching the scene during the uprooting of a Jewish-owned orchard in Samaria Wednesday morning of sexually assaulting her.

"The police commander at the scene ordered three other policemen to form a human chain around me. When, after several minutes, I sought to leave the ring, he told me every time: "We are protecting and guarding you,"" MK Son Har-Melech told Israel National News - Arutz Sheva.

She said that when she attempted to get out of the circle of police officers, “one of them did something that is completely forbidden,” implying that the officer may have sexually assaulted her.

"When I manage to get out of the chain, the same policeman who gave the order to create the chain followed me. He realized that he had done something which is very serious and told me: 'You hit my policeman." At this point it became clear that he was trying to cover up what he had just done." she said.
All policemen who were involved should be fired immediately from their jobs and imprisoned for sexual violence. The one who was mainly responsible should be ostracized and made to pay serious compensation in addition to serving a prison sentence. This is certainly a serious issue, and will have to be addressed by Netanyahu himself. That somebody should have his vineyard business destroyed, and a woman her dignity, is absolutely obscene.

Update: more on the subject here, and also here.

Update 2: it says over here now that the commissioner in charge, Major-General Amir Cohen, suspended 4 officers, but refuses to apologize to Har-Melech for the repellent treatment she received. In that case, he must voluntarily resign too.

Friday, February 03, 2023

Congress ousts Ilhan Omar from foreign affairs committee

It's good to see the GOP's done something right here, banishing antisemitic Omar from a committee she doesn't belong on, any more than the rest of the modern Democrats:
The House voted Thursday along party lines to remove Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) from her seat on the Foreign Affairs Committee through a resolution that cites her past derogatory remarks about Jewish people and anti-Israel posture.

The vote passed 218 to 211, with all Democrats voting against the resolution and one Republican, Rep. David Joyce (R-OH), voting “present.”
If Joyce didn't support the resolution, it demonstrates how the GOP still has problems of its own with bad apples.
The vote is a win for House Republicans, who hold a slim majority in the chamber, after a few from their conference initially objected to the resolution. The three who had vocally opposed it, Reps. Victoria Spartz (R-IN), Nancy Mace (R-SC), and Ken Buck (R-CO), had flipped their vote by Thursday morning.

Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN), a key player in the successful whip operation, told Breitbart News in an exclusive statement that Omar, a fellow Minnesotan, had “no place representing American interests” on the Foreign Affairs Committee.

“There is no debate that Ilhan Omar, the face of antisemitism in the Democrat Party, has no place representing American interests on the Foreign Affairs Committee. Ms. Omar is an embarrassment to Minnesota and our country,”
Emmer said.

[...] Republicans’ opposition to Omar serving on the committee comes after the two-term Minnesota Democrat gained a reputation for promoting antisemitic tropes, such as claiming Israel had “hypnotized the world” and that support for Israel was “all about the Benjamins.”

Omar later apologized for the remarks but continued to take anti-Israel positions.

In 2019, Omar introduced a resolution that supported the anti-Israel “boycott, divestment, sanctions” (BDS) movement. In 2021, she lumped “atrocities” supposedly committed by the U.S. and Israel in with those committed by the Taliban and Hamas. Equating the U.S. and its Middle East ally to the two terrorist groups led to condemnation from her own party’s leadership and again resulted in Omar apologizing. Later in 2021, Omar was one of just nine members of the House to vote against a $1 billion investment in Israel’s defense system.
The harm she caused on her part is considerable. And her "apologies" were entirely false, seeing how she continued with the same behavior long after. Sadly, she could still be reelected to Congress in the next election, and that's why efforts are still needed to make sure people like her aren't allowed to continue working in Congress.

"Hijab Day" is a disgrace and harms women

Robert Spencer's discussed how Newark, New Jersey is celebrating Hijab Day, at a time when Iran's women are suffering horrifying oppression by being forced to wear it:
Back on Sept. 16, 2022, in Tehran, the Iranian morality police arrested Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman, for not wearing her hijab properly. Amini later died in a hospital in Tehran, and numerous Iranians charged that she had been tortured to death while in custody. All over the country, protesters took to the streets to protest not against the hijab laws, but against the repressive and brutal Islamic Republic itself. Other women, and male protesters as well, were killed as the Iranian regime ruthlessly applied the Qur’anic injunction to “strike terror in the enemies of Allah” (8:60). The protests went on for months until the regime began summarily executing protesters, and even then some indomitably courageous Iranians continued to take to the streets to demand their freedom.

It is against that backdrop that the Newark World Hijab Day resolution will be introduced. For innumerable women in Iran, the hijab is the most visible sign of their second-class status, and of the brutality of the regime that will imprison them for years or even kill them outright for daring to venture out in public without wearing it. The Iranian authorities call their morality police the “Guidance Patrol,” an Orwellian name that makes them sound like a bunch of benign, avuncular individuals selflessly dedicated to helping young Iranians avoid moral pitfalls and stay on the straight and narrow. A more accurate name, however, would be the Terror Patrol, for the morality that these officials enforce is not the virtuous person’s free choice of the good, but the enforced obedience of those who are frightened into submission.
In a Democrat-run area like NJ, this is sadly no shock they'd give this insult to the fairer sex their approval. But it does serve as a tragic example of where the USA is headed today.

And how mysterious nobody wants to organize a World Hat Day, which could serve as a way to celebrate headware that does honor humanity and dignity.

Saturday, January 28, 2023

7 murdered in Neve Yaakov by Islamofascist from east Jerusalem, and 2 injured near City of David

A tragedy's struck the Jerusalem neighborhood of Neve Yaakov, leaving 7 murdered:
At least seven people were killed and several others were injured, including one critically, in a shooting attack on the Ateret Avraham Synagogue in the Neve Yaakov neighborhood of Jerusalem on Friday evening.

Magen David Adom paramedics evacuated five injured people to hospitals, including three who were evacuated to Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus, and two who were evacuated to Shaare Zedek Hospital. These include a man about 30 years old in critical condition and a woman about 60 years of age in moderate condition.

Initial reports indicate that a terrorist got out of a vehicle and opened fire at people who were gathered outside the synagogue, opened fire at them, and then continued to pursue frightened worshipers who were fleeing the scene.

The terrorist eventually fled the scene in a white Toyota and was met by police officers who shot him dead.

The terrorist has been identified as Alkam Khairi, a 21-year-old resident of eastern Jerusalem.
He should go to hell. Now we have to contend with terrorist attacks in neighborhoods like these that could've been prevented. And to make matters worse, there was another terrorist attack near the City of David area:
A father and son were injured in a shooting terror attack near the City of David archaeological site in Jerusalem.

The attack to place this morning, the shooter, reportedly a 13-year-old resident of east Jerusalem, was shot by two civilians.

MDA EMTs and Paramedics treated and conveyed two patients to the Shaare Tzedek Hospital. A 23 year old male in serious condition and his fatger, a 47 year old male, in moderate to serious condition, with gunshot wounds to their upper bodies.

MDA paramedic Fadi Dekidek: "We were quickly on scene and saw two gunshot victims. A 47 year old male and 23 year old male. They were fully conscious and had gunshot wounds to their upper bodies. We quickly moved them to the MICUs and conveyed them to Shaare Tzedek Hospital, with the young male in serious condition and the other male in moderate to serious condition."
So this one appears to have been the doing of a young teen. Which shows even younger kids indoctrinated with the Religion of Peace can be extremely dangerous, and that it's possible for them to be trained with firearms. Utterly horrific.

Update: the way the White House press secretary spoke about this, laced with moral equivalence, is also atrocious.

Tuesday, January 10, 2023

Neturei Karta demonstrate loyalty to jihadists

The most corrupt Haredi clan met with representatives of the Islamic Jihad in the town of Jenin:
A group of Jews who belong to the ultra-Orthodox and anti-Zionist Neturei Karta group arrived in Jenin on Monday to visit the refugee camp. They stayed at the home of the senior leader of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in Judea and Samaria, Bassam al-Saadi. The members of the delegation met with senior PIJ officials and declared their support for the Palestinians.

In addition, the delegation from Neturei Karta met with the secretary general of the Fatah party, Ata Abu Ramila, and the head of the PIJ, Maher al-Akhras. The delegation met with al-Saadi's wife as well, and discussed "his steadfastness despite the occupation operations." They said that the visit to the camp is a symbol of rejection of the Israeli occupation.

Statements from both sides

One of the members of the group stated that "we are Palestinian Jews, we want to live under the Palestinian flag and not the Israeli flag, in one country which is the Palestinian state. Hundreds of years ago and before the occupation began, we lived together in the Old City of Jerusalem and there was no difference between Jews and Muslims. We all came From one father, Abraham, and we lived happily together.

"Later, the Zionists came and created pressure to separate us, but we [have rejected] it. We want peace and not the racist Israeli law, which is a threat to the lives of Jews and Muslims. No matter how much time passes, we will continue to stick to our dreams and common goals. We want Palestine with its capital Jerusalem and the Palestinian Authority so that we can live happily."

Abu Ramila described the group's visit to the city, saying that "they entered waving Palestinian flags, carrying a message [of] support [to] us, oppose the occupation and annexation and support the Palestinian state." Abu Ramila called on the group to continue the struggle and expose the crimes of the occupation, within both the Israeli Jewish community and worldwide.
No doubt, this was planned all in advance, and the Karta kreeps have definitely proven where their loyalties lie, which is not with Israel, but rather, an anti-Israeli fabrication of a palestinian state populated by Muslims. The Karta kreeps are truly disgusting, and symbolize much of what's wrong with insular ultra-Orthodox clans.

Thursday, December 29, 2022

37th Israeli government, and Netanyahu's 6th term as premier, is sworn in

Israel's 37th government has been sworn in at the Knesset, and this also marks the beginning of Benjamin Netanyahu's 6th term as prime minister:
Israel's 37th Government was sworn in on Thursday, with Benjamin Netanyahu beginning his sixth term as prime minister.

The swearing-in ceremony began at 11:00 a.m., during which Netanyahu presented his agenda to the Knesset plenum. These include stopping the Iran nuclear program, developing state infrastructure and restoring internal security and governance.

During his address, which was interrupted by members of the opposition, Netanyahu said "Losing elections isn't the end of democracy – it's the essence of democracy. In a democracy, we don't climb the fences of the Capitol, and we don't climb the fences of the Knesset."
Unfortunately, this is something the current leftist opposition in the Knesset no longer seems willing to respect, and likely never did. I guess that's why the sad part is how Yair Lapid, upon leaving office, refused to shake Netanyahu's hand:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was the first to take the oath of office. Most of the heads of the opposition parties were present out of respect for the ceremony, but opposition leader Yair Lapid left the plenary hall even before Netanyahu was sworn-in without shaking his hand as is customary.
What really makes this sad is that it hints at where things are headed with the left, which is bad for democratic relations. It could take years to mend the damage Lapid's causing with his ostracizing approach. But, this does demonstrate why it's good he's now out of office. He was causing all the harm he's going to cause, even in the opposition.

So let's hope Netanyahu can handle all the trouble the left's already causing. What if they intent to do everything they can to sabotage his efforts to make peace with Saudi Arabia, for example? Regrettably, that's something they're more than willing to do, if reality says anything about their conduct.

Wednesday, December 28, 2022

Israel's LGBT activists have no issues with Islam's hostility to their ideology

As explained by Ruthie Blum, following a whole questionable controversy where the left assailed Avi Maoz for wanting to put a stop to LGBT propaganda being pushed in Israeli schools. First, here's what Orit Strook said on Twitter to clarify:
"You can calm down over the much ado about nothing," she tweeted on Sunday. "No one intends to discriminate against LGBT people because of their identity or identification – not in medical care or any other service. LGBTs are human beings who deserve respect and love just like everyone else … It's not at all about the identity of the patient, but about the essence of the treatment."

The idea, she added, is that "a religiously observant doctor will not be forced to provide a medical treatment contrary to halacha [Jewish law], regardless of the identity of the patient. Because in the State of Israel, which was established after 2,000 years of exile, thanks to Jews who gave their lives (who were literally slaughtered, hanged, burned at the stake and tortured to death) for observing the Torah, a believing Jew should not be forced to violate [its laws]."

She went on, "I'm sure a huge majority of the nation agrees with this simple truth and identifies with it, certainly on Hanukkah, the holiday that began with a rebellion against anti-religious coercion."

In conclusion, she suggested wryly that "those who still find it difficult [to accept] do a simple visualization exercise: apply this principle to your [coalition] partners from the Shura Council [the Islamist Ra'am Party]. You'll find that, suddenly, religious and faith principles become somehow easier to swallow."

Her dig at the double standard brings us to the second element of the distortion-hypocrisy couplet that characterizes Lapid's shaky, disparate bloc: the "do as I say, not as I do" practice at which Lahav Hertzanu has demonstrated exemplary skill.

Indeed, the gay parliamentarian denouncing the RZP for "homophobia" is more than tolerant of Ra'am, which labels LGBTQs as "perverts" with an "unnatural lifestyle."

When asked in July 2021 about Ra'am MK Walid Taha's statements to this effect, he replied, "Walid Taha is a member of Knesset who represents a sector. He's legitimate. He's a member of [our] coalition."

Pressed further on Taha's stance, he answered, "I understand it; I can't accept it."

Mere weeks later, he abandoned even that pretense of disapproval. Upon Taha's appointment to the chairmanship of the Knesset Internal Affairs and Environment Committee, the Yesh Atid "progressive" was positively effusive about and toward his Ra'am colleague, lauding him as a "sensitive, caring, committed elected official," and saying, "I'm very happy for your election and very much looking forward to working with you."

A few months after that, Taha attacked Labor MK Ibtisam Marana – also a coalition partner – for her efforts to establish a shelter for Israel's LGBTQ Arab citizens. His method of putting her down was to question whether she was really an Arab, after all.

He proceeded to point out to her that Ra'am follows Islamic law, "which considers same-sex relations to be [among] the most serious crimes in the eyes of Allah, because it is a violation of man's nature and a blatant defiance of Allah himself."

The Koran, he added, "recounts the case of Lot and the heavy punishment that Allah inflicted on the sinners, through their complete destruction with fire and brimstone. [And] the consensus among Muslim scholars [of Sharia] is that the punishment for those who have homosexual relations is execution."

Nary a peep from Lahav Hertzanu, Lapid or the rest of their liberal fellow travelers now carrying on about Strock
. If they think that their behavior and bigotry of low expectations do the rainbow flag – or democracy – proud, they've got another thing coming.
So Yesh Atid's openly homosexual MK apparently has no genuine opposition to what Ra'am goes by. Which proves he's only following his lifestyle for the sake of harming the values of a civil society. This should be pointed out repeatedly to all the public who're being constantly told only Maoz and Strook are a problem.

Now, when it comes to healthcare exams, of course LGBT practitioners should be able to see doctors to check if they're suffering from illnesses, and also go to the dentist. But if it's businesses like bakers, they shouldn't be forced to do services for homosexual ideology any more than this Christian baker who was persecuted for years. If LGBT practitioners want services for their ideology, they must prove they can establish their own. If there's one part of being a doctor that religious or otherwise shouldn't have to adhere to, it's the horrific gender reassignment surgeries that're ruining children's lives, along with adults, in the USA and elsewhere now. That's something that should practically be barred from practice, because it risks hurting many people with the awful elements involved. Maybe that's what Strook was referring to? In which case, she'd be making an important case in defense of women and girls. That's something to think about.

Thursday, December 22, 2022

New Israeli government formed

At nighttime, Benjamin Netanyahu announced his new coalition to president Isaac Herzog:
Israel has a right-wing government: Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu phoned President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday evening and proclaimed, “I have succeeded in forming a government”.

The phone call took place 18 minutes before the extension granted to Netanyahu from Herzog was set to expire at midnight.

Netanyahu told Herzog, "Dear President, thanks to the enormous public support we received in the last elections, I am informing you that I have been able to establish a government that will act in the interest of all the citizens of Israel."
And since we're on the subject, it was shameful how the New York Times predictably assailed Netanhahu and disrespected the electorate, even if it wasn't shocking. The Jerusalem Post editorial said in response that Israel's democracy is vibrant:
It is now bon ton to forecast the demise of Israel’s democracy.

Everyone is doing it: from august forums such as the New York Times editorial board, to blogs run by North American ex-pats now living in Israel, to Facebook groups set up by disgruntled Israelis encouraging emigration.

For instance, the web headline to a Times editorial on Saturday warning of the dangers of presumptive Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government read: “The Ideal of Democracy in a Jewish State Is in Jeopardy.” And the headline adequately reflected the spirit of the editorial.

The editorial said that Netanyahu’s government “is a significant threat to the future of Israel – its direction, its security and even the idea of a Jewish homeland.”

The credibility of the editorial was cast in doubt further down in the piece when the renowned paper inexplicably left out Palestinian terrorism as a reason why “hopes for a Palestinian state have dimmed,” writing instead that the reasons are “the combined pressure of Israeli resistance and Palestinian corruption, ineptitude and internal divisions.”
On this, why doesn't anybody call for a boycott of the NYT, and save a lot of money by not subscribing or buying them? They've been such an insufferable paper for decades on end, and are one of the worst of the USA's most dishonest media sources. What's the use? They insult the Israeli electorate along with the USA public, and it's time to stop buying them in any way.

Not improving matters is that fraud-in-chief Joe Biden's pseudo=administration wants to hold Netanyahu accountable for any directions they oppose:
Netanyahu’s successful welding together of Zionist and orthodox parties into a solid Right-Wing coalition was completed two days after Washington wired a warning, via Politico among other media outlets, that it would hold the Israeli leader personally answerable for any decisions or actions his new government might take that the US doesn’t like.

President Joe Biden and his secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, have not hidden their alarm over the political platforms of the most significant coalition partners – the Jewish Strength Party of Itamar Ben-Gvir, who will come in as Minister of National Security, and the Religious Zionist Party of Bezalel Smotrich, slated to receive ministerial authority over Judea and Samaria.

The two men’s combined goals are to strengthen Israel’s character as the Jewish state by taking steps, among others, to increase security against terrorism, as well as criminal violence, open the Temple Mount to Jewish worship and increase and consolidate the presence of Jewish residents in the towns and cities of Israel’s biblical heartland – Samaria and Judea.

All these aims fly in the face of America’s political intent which, along with that of the rest of the world, is to see the Jews removed from the “West Bank” and the Israel-hating Arab populace enabled to establish in their place a new state called Palestine: the “Two State Solution”.
Not just removed from Judea/Samaria/Gaza, but also from Israel entire. To remove Jews from the main biblical areas is just the beginning of the anti-Israelists' twisted goals. And it's shameful as it's repulsive. This is exactly why the Likud was elected.

Sunday, December 18, 2022

Antisemitism Is Rising at Colleges, and Jewish Students Are Facing Growing Hostility

Yes, and it ain't "right-wing" antisemitism.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Some students report being spat upon and harassed, while some campus groups have forced out those who support Israel":


Adina Pinsker commutes to Rutgers University in Newark, N.J., to study supply-chain management. She is also active in Hillel International, the nation’s largest collegiate Jewish organization.

When she arrives on campus, she takes an indirect route to class and tucks inside her shirt the silver Star of David she wears around her neck. These are precautions, she said, to avoid harassment from students who dislike Israel, the people who support it, or both.

“We have basically been shunned,” said Ms. Pinsker, who said she has been subject to derogatory remarks about her beliefs.

Ms. Pinsker’s actions are emblematic of rising fear among some Jewish college students around the country, who have begun shrouding their religious identity and political beliefs to avoid growing ostracism and harassment, according to interviews with dozens of students.

College campuses have long hosted heated debates about the Israel-Palestinian conflict. But now, students say anti-Jewish antagonism is on the rise: Antisemitic incidents have increased, and a growing number of campus groups bar students who support Israel from speaking or joining.

Hostility, including vandalism, threats and slurs toward Jewish students on college campuses increased more than threefold to 155 incidents in 2021 from 47 in 2014, according to the Anti-Defamation League, a New York-based Jewish civil rights organization which has tracked reports of such behavior since 2014. The group counted 2,717 antisemitic incidents in the U.S. overall last year, up 34% from 2020 and the highest number in its records dating to 1979.

Students at schools including the University of Vermont, Wellesley College and DePaul University have ejected Jewish students who support Israel from clubs and study groups, according to interviews with affected students.

Students at Tufts University, University of Southern California and University of California, Los Angeles tried to prevent Jewish classmates from serving in student government or attempted to remove them from positions in student government because of their support of Israel, according to students, administrators and campus news reports.

The uptick in incidents and tension on some campuses comes amid a string of recent high-profile controversies that have drawn renewed attention to antisemitism. This month Twitter suspended the account of rapper and entrepreneur Kanye West—who now goes by the name Ye—after he tweeted to his 32 million followers an image of a swastika merged with the Star of David, weeks after he tweeted: “I’m going death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE.”

On campus, students say that stereotypical antisemitic slurs are directed at Jews, but that much of the hostility derives from growing criticism of Israel’s handling of its political and military conflict with Palestinians over land rights. Jewish students say harassment often compounds when criticism of Israel increases.

Most American Jews feel an attachment to Israel, though many are critical of the Israeli government, according to a 2021 survey from the Pew Research Center.

Some of the conflict on campus stems from competing definitions of antisemitism and anti-Zionism and whether they overlap.

Anti-Zionism is a political position distinct from antisemitism, which is a prejudice, said Dylan Saba, an attorney with New York-based Palestine Legal, which works to support the civil and constitutional rights of people in the U.S. who advocate for Palestinians. The two are conflated by supporters of Israel to discredit critics, he said.

Condemning Israel may make some Jewish students feel uncomfortable, but that doesn’t mean it is antisemitic, he said. “All we are asking for is equal rights,” he said...

Bullshit. 

Anti-Zionism is anti-Israel is antisemitic. Full stop. "From the desert to the sea, Palestine will be free" means wiping Israel --- and all its Jewish citizens --- off the face of the map.

It's easy to prove, too. Just walk up to any pro-Palestine student organization --- literally in any college campus in America --- and ask its leaders if they support Hamas. In my experience they will not answer. Not only that, in my case, they'll call the police on you. 

Ohio elects Muslim woman with extremist connections to state legislature

Benjamin Baird informs us of the sad news that another Muslim's been elected to political office in Ohio, and possibly to Congress:
As the first Somali Muslim woman elected to the Ohio state legislature, Munira Abdullahi is expected to bring “diversity” and “new perspectives” to the Ohio House of Representatives, according to her supporters. What they don’t tell you is that the 26-year-old belongs to a radical Sunni Islamist organization that uses youth indoctrination, charity, and social work to grow its political power and spread theocratic, often illiberal views.

Based on her background and career trajectory, Abdullahi could feasibly become the next Ilhan Omar — Minnesota’s far-left congresswoman known for expressing radical, antisemitic opinions and consorting with various Islamist groups. Indeed, the Ohio legislator shares striking similarities with Omar, the first Somali Muslim elected to her state’s legislature in 2016 and the first Muslim woman elected to Congress.
But what's really chilling about her associations is whom she's worked for when it comes to activists:
Omar, who will soon be a third-term congresswoman, works closely with American Islamist organizations and is known to advance legislation on their behalf. For her part, Abdullahi doesn’t just associate with extremist groups — she is a card-carrying member of the Muslim American Society, a notoriously extreme Islamist group that the United Arab Emirates designated as a terrorist organization in 2014.

In fact, MAS is the “overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in America,” according to federal prosecutors, or the U.S. branch of a global, pan-Islamic organization known for its violent history in the Middle East. Since 2012, Abdullahi has worked part-time as a youth director at MAS-Columbus, and she was promoted in March to the role of program manager at the national office.
One must wonder how many extremist Muslims live in Ohio now, along with their sympathisers, and how badly it'll affect a state that's said to be Republican-led. This is seriously bad news.

Thursday, December 08, 2022

Jewish doctor in USA warns Israel will be next victim of transsexual disaster

Ariel Kahana interviewed a Jewish medical professional in New Jersey, who explained the sad obsession that's broken out with getting gender reassignment surgery to seemingly resemble the opposite sex, and warns that Israel is facing this horror too. Over in the USA:
Q: What is the explanation for this wave?

"The figure who formulated the sixties' theory that a person's biology – his body and his chromosomes – are completely separate from his subjective feeling as to whether he is male or female, was a professor of medical psychology named John Money. His research was eventually shown to be a failure and it was scientifically proven that the opposite was true. Nevertheless, the ideas of Money – who was later deemed to have sexually abused children – were adopted by the worlds of medicine, mental health, and psychiatry in the USA, and later on the education system too. Today, from kindergarten age, children already learn that their body might not necessarily reflect their gender." She is quoting a survey published in the New York Times, according to which more than 60% of those questioned in the 30-plus category said they believe that a person's sex is defined by his biological sex at birth. In contrast, 61% of those questioned in the 18-29 age group said they believe that their gender identity is separate from their biological sex.

"The difference between the younger and the older groups stems from the propagation of gender ideology. Children until the age of five undergo indoctrination at school. The result is a social phenomenon of young boys and girls who want to make the change, and on occasion even come to do it together as a group trend. In many cases, these are children who in any event are on the autistic spectrum or suffer from negative social attitudes, so that joining this trend provides them with the attention that they so dearly crave.

"The phenomenon is subject to broad coverage and immense popularity on social media. You might be taken by surprise, but in 2007 there was one clinic throughout the entire USA providing treatment for minors under the age of 18, who were contending with the issue of gender identity. Today, as far as I know, there are 300 of them. And here is one more statistic – the number of mastectomies carried out for gender reassignment more than tripled between 2016-2019. These are data provided by Vanderbilt University in Nashville."
It's devastating so many have been indoctrinated, but not shocking at all. And it's surely not even shocking that one of the advocates of this atrocity came to Israel as well:
In order to validate her claim that this involves experiments on humans, Grossman refers me to things said recently by Dr. Marci Bowers, a biological man who underwent gender reassignment surgery to become a woman and today serves as a leading physician in the field of medical transitioning in the US. According to Bowers, she and her associates work using a trial-and-error method: "Anybody who underwent surgery as a child and received 'blockers' [tablets to suppress the hormones responsible for sexual development] will never have testosterone (the key hormone in sexual development). So that we do not know if they will ever experience sexual satisfaction... I know that the feeling of proximity and intimacy is extremely important, so that a lack of this raised a red flag for me. We need to keep our eyes open and talk about this... Let's see what will occur... There are questions that do not have an answer... Is it possible to prevent the processes of puberty and then attain good results as adults? How can we guarantee that they will have a sexual response? Maybe we need to remove the blockers at a certain stage? Perhaps, to delay a little bit, here and there? Perhaps." By the way, Bowers visited Israel several years ago to provide instruction for physicians here how to conduct the gender reassignment surgery.
Needless to say, any "medic" who's willing to work in such abominable practice is unfit for the job, and should be ostracized if they do. For now, that Bowers paid a most unwelcome visit here should be warning enough of what Israel faces by extension.
The concern shared by Grossman and others is that financial interests combined with a radically progressive agenda are the driving force behind the wave of transgenderism that is sweeping across America. According to this assumption, the drug companies are promoting this gender confusion or "dysphoria" as it is termed in the professional jargon, as this generates mass dependency on their products, often for life.

"This is not the situation everywhere in the West. In London, the authorities closed down a clinic treating gender problems due to concern that it was providing inappropriate treatment for children. In Sweden, Finland, New Zealand, and other countries too, they are no longer prescribing blockers as there is no research data to prove that their use is safe. It is important to remember that from the outset, the blockers were never actually developed for use in gender reassignment."

Just before we part company, Grossman gives me several books she has written, including "You're Teaching My Child What?" and she also puts me in contact with a number of women in Israel who are trying to stem this tidal wave. Only two of them – Roni Sassover and Alix Aharon – are prepared to come forward and do so while being named. The rest prefer to remain anonymous.

As Grossman anticipated, this wave is indeed on its way to Israel. The Minister of Education, Yifat Shasha-Biton, has recently published guidelines relating to transgender students at school. In essence, the guidelines stipulate that a student should be treated according to his or her declared gender, and this of course also relates to sleeping arrangements in boarding schools, access to toilets, sports lessons, etc. According to the new guidelines, the parents might not necessarily be a part of this overall process. Outgoing Prime Minister, Yair Lapid, has welcomed this move.

Grossman: "The most important thing that Israelis need to know, is that those people promoting this agenda will intentionally approach children with a view to the long-term outcomes entailed in this process. When parents discover that their children have been brainwashed, it is already too late to do anything. Consequently, I say to anybody reading this article: please keep an eye on your children.
She's absolutely correct. It's unlikely you'll see most other news sources on the left reporting about this, unlike alleged complaints of religious coercion for Judaism. Of course, LGBT ideology has long come to represent a religion in its own way, and a lot of homosexual advocates practically copied from more common religions in their own approach.

Saturday, November 19, 2022

While Ukraine can use aid, their president is no "Jewish hero"

While Russia's assault on Ukraine is offensive in the extreme, Josh Hammer and Jonathan Bronitsky explain why Volodomyr Zelensky, the latter country's president, is not the "Jewish hero" he may want everybody to think he is:
Volodymyr Zelensky is a lot of things — including, to be sure, a “hero” to many. But to anyone who takes Jewish identity, Jewish tradition, and, especially, Jewish survival at least somewhat seriously, he certainly should not be considered a “Jewish hero.”

Zelensky was born to Jewish parents. Like that of most Jews from behind the Iron Curtain, his upbringing was markedly secular. As Beckerman rightly points out, “Jewish identity didn’t exist in the Soviet Union, because it couldn’t.” That said, there were Soviet Jews who found their way to some form of Jewish identity after the breakup of the communist empire. Indeed, more than a million immigrated to Israel in a wave that started in earnest at the beginning of the 1990s.

But Zelensky did no such thing. “Zelensky and his family,” Beckerman concedes, “were part of the few hundred thousand Jews who stayed, content to assimilate in a post-Soviet world.” Zelensky has never even shied away from making light of this reality. For instance, in a 2019 interview with the French newspaper Le Point, Zelensky quipped, “The fact that I am Jewish barely makes 20 in my long list of faults.”

Not Jewish

Zelensky married a non-Jewish woman who was baptized, and he and his wife baptized their two children in the Greek Orthodox tradition, according to press reports. Boleslav Kapulkin, the spokesman for Chabad Lubavitch in Odessa, Ukraine, was even under the impression that Zelensky himself had converted to Christianity. Eduard Dolinsky, executive director of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee, went further. He attested that Zelensky is “a Ukrainian with Jewish ancestry; he’s not a member of the Jewish community, he’s not religious, doesn’t keep Jewish traditions and never speaks of himself as a Jew.”

There’s a long-running and complex debate over what constitutes Jewish identity. But there’s no question that Zelensky’s life choices have been inimical to the survival of the Jewish people and the Jewish faith.
It may be disappointing enough Zelensky's the gazillionth person of ethnic Israeli/Jewish descent who won't promote the Judaist faith as one worthy of following/converting to. But as the following makes clear, it's even worse than you think:
Recently, Zelensky has started to make a habit of referring to his Jewishness in conjunction with pleas for international backing of Ukraine. He blasted Henry Kissinger for calling for a diplomatic solution to the Russia-Ukraine War, likening the plea of the former secretary of state and national security adviser to Neville Chamberlain’s infamous appeasement of Hitler in Munich in 1938. He also slammed, of all nations, lo and behold, Israel for refusing to arm Ukraine. (Israel hasn’t armed Russia either.) Now there is reporting that Zelensky is pushing the White House to pressure Israel.

Worse still, Ukraine, under Zelensky, has been rather hostile to Israel at the United Nations, the international forum where the Jewish state has been under sustained assault for decades. According to UN Watch, in a total of 122 resolutions involving Israel, Ukraine has voted against Israel in 95 and abstained in 27. That means it did not vote in favor of Israel once. Yet Zelensky continues to make demands of the Jewish state, which must deal with a Russian presence in neighboring Syria, where Israel conducts counterterrorism operations against Islamic extremists.
Now that's a very valid reason for concern. Ukraine's government, even under Zelensky, acts hostile to Israel at the worst global forum that's no freedom-lover's paradise, and so far, hasn't made any genuine efforts to clean up this act. Of course that's reprehensible. Certainly, it would do some good to provide aid to the country for defense against a country that's still severely influenced by communism, but that doesn't excuse Zelensky's hypocrisy. And why couldn't he show the courage to practice the Judaist religion in any way, and encourage the Ukrainian public to try it as well? This is all something the new Netanyahu government should make a point of, why, if Israel is to aid Ukraine, they must prove they can repay the deed by ceasing all hostility at the UN, in example.

It's a terrible shame how Jews living in foreign countries would rather be part of an establishment mindset than promote certain aspects and customs as worthy of emulation for outsiders. Zelensky's regrettably one of those.

Thursday, November 03, 2022

Jerusalem Post editorial is right: left-wing must respect right-wing's right to govern

With Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud and much of the right-wing factions in the Knesset having won an impressive victory during the Israeli election, the Jerusalem Post's editorial division says the leftists should respect the success and let the right run a government:
Israel went to the polls on Tuesday and in rather uncharacteristic fashion rendered a clear decision: Benjamin Netanyahu.

No hung jury this time, no tie, no waffling: The country wants Netanyahu back as the head of a very right-wing and religious government. The nation has spoken, and now it is time to honor its decision.

What does that mean? It means letting Netanyahu form a right-wing, very religious coalition. That is what the people want, that is what they voted for.

Israel voted for Netanyahu. Let him govern

And this is not meant to say to the country, as a parent might to a misbehaving child: “You made your bed, now lie in it.” Rather, this is just acknowledging that in a democracy, the will of the people should be respected, and the election results have made this country’s wishes known unequivocally.
It should also be noted that left-wing parties who campaigned on an "just not Bibi" slogan only hurt their campaigns even more, proving how out-of-touch they were with the public's interest in meaty platforms. That's why Netanyahu ultimately proved successful with the Likud's campaign, and the right-wing found success.

In related news, Amnon Lord explains why Meretz, one of the most reprehensible left-wing movements in history, is now out of the Knesset, and why it's best their run came to an end:
The origins of Meretz, as the party has come to be known in recent years, hail back to some point in the first Intifada (Palestinian uprising) that began in late 1987. A newspaper report appearing in the Hadashot daily in May 1989 tells of the arrest of demonstrators from an elitist left-wing movement that arose during the Intifada, named the "21st Year" (an allusion to the results of the 1967 Six-Day War).

They held a procession in Qalqilya, "threw stones at IDF vehicles... disturbed the soldiers from carrying out their activity and incited the local population in Qalqiliya to rebel. Among those detained was Zehava Gal-On, the director of the B'Tselem human rights organization, along with a group of theater actors and students", so the report claimed.

On occasions, Ratz was to turn into the parliamentary political front for anti-Israeli movements. Thanks to it, Israel became more and more tolerant of acts of cooperation with various forces operating against the state.

Only a week ago, an extremely important article was published in this newspaper by Hanan Greenwood, revealing the handbook of radical left-wing organizations that are essentially involved in acts of espionage against the IDF and the security forces in Judea and Samaria. Under the veneer of its public respectability, Meretz granted legitimacy for the overall activity of these organizations: B'Tselem (which was established at the beginning of the Intifada in 1988), Shovrim Shtika (Breaking the Silence), Yesh Din, Zochrot (Remembering) and other similar organizations that are routinely funded by various foreign organizations.
Their associations with enemies of Israel are definitely disturbing, and explain perfectly why they're no loss to the Israeli political scene in the Knesset proper. A most shameful movement indeed.

Anyway, with all that told, India's premier has congratulated Netanyahu on his electoral success:
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulates “my friend” Benjamin Netanyahu for his election win.

“I look forward to continuing our joint efforts to deepen the India-Israel strategic partnership,” he says.
There's somebody who knows how to maintain political relations without applying PC to them. My thanks to Modi for his alliances with Israel. Let's hope that with the current right-wing victory in the election, there'll be more promising directions to come.

Monday, October 24, 2022

Black Adam movie's screenplay builds on left-wing metaphors

Overrated wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne Johnson's new Black Adam movie, last time I looked, fell to 40 percent on Rotten Tomatoes' approval ratings. But that aside, when I looked at the reviews so far, Vanity Fair had quite an eye-opener for the political metaphors turning up in screenplay, which surely were to be as expected as what turned up in Wonder Woman 1984. First:
Kahndaq, you see, is a stand-in for not-Iraq/not-Afghanistan under longtime occupation by not-America, but a band of villainous swine called Intergang who plunder the nation’s resources and make the people wait at long checkpoints. They also zoom around on sci-fi skiffs that glow blue (just like Eternium!) and really want that crown.

Soon Adrianna summons the trapped hero, Teth-Adam, who is the gargantuan Johnson wearing a superhero suit and a scowl. Bullets and missiles and grenades can’t stop him, and a mere touch of his hand can turn someone into a skeleton. He goes on a wild PG-13-style kill spree, flinging bodies thousands of yards in the air and ripping off limbs, but without any blood, terror, or agony. [...]
Ah, so that's there excuse for the violence: they didn't add any blood spilling out of severed limbs. Sorry, but doesn't make it any more acceptable, and children shouldn't have to be subject to this kind of mayhem any more than what you see in a Mortal Kombat game. Whether the film lacks terror and agony, however, doesn't really matter when disgust and insult could sum up the proceedings much better. According to the UK Independent, the filmmakers had to remove at least 5 scenes to avoid an R-rating, which confirms just how blatant their vision truly is. And as for the hints given in the above regarding the leftist metaphors, here's that part of it from VF:
There’s not really much to stew on with Black Adam once you’ve left the theater, except to be somewhat amazed at how the story comments-but-doesn’t-comment on the actual political situation in the Middle East. An early checkpoint sequence is clearly meant to mirror the struggles of everyday people crossing from the Palestinian Territories into Israel, and Adrianna’s fed-up line about world powers not doing much for the people after a decades-long presence could be about Iraq or Afghanistan or both. And while there is much reverent talk of Khandaq’s indigenous cultural heritage, there are no Muslim signifiers center stage throughout the picture. Indeed, the Hollywood staple of the muezzin call to prayer is nowhere on the soundtrack, probably a first for a movie set in this part of the world, even when it’s a fictional country. One must marvel at how this massive international project goes out of its way to be even remotely apolitical, taking its cue, perhaps, from the famously politically-unaffiliated Dwayne Johnson. It takes a special kind of movie where the most interesting thing is what’s not in there. During its two-hour runtime, you won’t be asked to exert yourself, either with backstory or political reads. Viewers can just sit back in their cushioned seats, silence all brain functions, and enjoy the CG fireworks.
Oh my, why am I not shocked they could resort to these kind of metaphors, building as they do upon anti-Israel propaganda to boot, with Intergang as the stand-ins? And that's something that'll have to be considered by all concerned when it comes to past and present movies based on DC properties: they may have more leftist metaphors, stealthed or out in the open, than we think. The Marvel movies too, lest we forget. One more reason they're not aging any better than the overload of special effects accompanying the "actors". I hesitate to think what'd a screenplay containing a metaphor for opposing war with Iran's brutal regime would be like, because it's not impossible for these obsessed ideologues to go that far too.

Interesting how the reviewer here seems disappointed specifically because there's little or no serious allusions to Islam, as though this movie couldn't be bad enough. The filmmakers, who should be ashamed of themselves, are already doing enough harm with the metaphors they've injected as it is. The following reviewer from Buzzfeed seems disappointed for similar reasons, and is much more blatant:
It’s too bad that Black Adam ultimately punts on most of the big questions it attempts to raise, because the movie does have something sorely lacking in much of its peers: a willingness, however slight, to engage with the world around it. It’s hard to miss the similarities between Kahndaq, a Middle Eastern country occupied by white military personnel, and a variety of real-world analogs, ranging from the American occupation of Iraq to the ongoing occupation of Palestine. [...]

It’s pretty jarring to see a major superhero movie that even gestures at treating America as the bad guys in anything beyond a “there are a few bad apples in the military” sense. After all, the genre entered its modern era with 2008’s Iron Man, where a weapons contractor is kidnapped by terrorists and escapes captivity in Afghanistan. Black Adam isn’t the movie that’s going to continue exploring that territory, but it’s refreshing to see it try.
So here, the writer is much more hostile to Israel in the sense he won't even mention the country, replacing it as he does with the Roman era name for Israel that's been distorted in modern times for the sake of delegitimizing Israel's claim to Judea/Samaria, by fabricating the lie that there was ever an Islamic/Arabic country there? Now that's even sicker, as is the strong hint his opinions on the USA are extraordinarily hostile too. (Interestingly, the Boston Herald says movie co-star Mohammed Amer is a "Palestinian-American". Could such casting have been intentional, coinciding with the filmmakers' politics?)

I also noticed this review by NPR's terrible writer Glen Weldon, who surprisingly enough actually panned the movie, but, he really screwed up on just who reintroduced Black Adam:
In the early 2000s, writers Geoff Johns and David S. Goyer — with art by Stephen Sadowski and many others — introduced to the comics pages a new version of Black Adam. The character had been around since the 1940s as a supervillain who dogged the family of superheroes that, like him, had been given powers by the wizard Shazam. As such, he came factory-installed with the basic supervillain-threats package: I'll destroy you, I'll rule the world, etc.
Man, is this sloppy, but to be fully expected from such a charlatan who's not a comics fan, no matter how much he insists otherwise. Black Adam was first reintroduced to the DCU proper in 1994, in Jerry Ordway's GN, The Power of Shazam, which later led to an ongoing monthly series for Billy Batson that ran at least a few years. And reprehensible Weldon would rather rob Ordway of the credit, and bestow it upon some of the least deserving of DC's overrated modern writers, Johns and Goyer, instead. As disappointing as I find Ordway's leftism these days, this is still too much. So shame on far-left Weldon for this deception as well.

Now, one more review I checked is from Midwest Film Journal, and in addition to panning the movie, they also make an eyebrow raising note regarding a certain 2013 movie whose star is brought back in this new movie as a special guest for Teth-Adam to clash with:
Man of Steel, which launched the whole misbegotten DCEU in 2013, introduced the world to a darker and more “grounded” take on these heroes. It had its flaws but feels like a masterpiece compared to Black Adam. The two have some very direct points of comparison, too, as supposed launching points for future films. Zack Snyder’s Steel, for example, featured a breathlessly cool prologue on Krypton whereas Adam features an extended sequence narrated by an annoying child. In Snyder’s film, the violence of two Kryptonians battling is destructive and purposely reminiscent (however wrongheadedly so) of 9/11. Here, Adam’s supposed brutal fighting is nowhere near as destructive and, 10 years later, considerably worse-looking. Steel’s fights still inspire awe; Adam‘s are nauseating at best.

Of course, Adam also invites comparison because it delivers on what “fans” have been supposedly clamoring for — the return of Henry Cavill to the role of Superman, a half-decade after his experience filming Justice League turned him off the role and turned Warners off of the franchise he headlined. Bringing Cavill in for a post-credits tease is a Hail Mary by a studio desperate to garner interest in a movie that they clearly know has no interest to any sort of general audience. It’s kind of pathetic, particularly because there’s a blatant joke about Superman being an empty role early on in this film. I’m a fan of Cavill in that role, but there’s no part of me that thinks he deserves to be thrown into more shitty iterations of the character, if Black Adam is any indication of where it will go from here.
Well, like I said, if this new DC movie could be so blatant in its political metaphors, chances are there'd be earlier ones going that route too, and looks like Man of Steel had one that was bound to be troubling. If Batman vs. Superman could boast a scene alluding to protests against illegal immigrants in real life that was insulting to the intellect, we can't be shocked if any 9-11 metaphors Snyder's Man of Steel attached to its screenplay could be just as tasteless. That's why I for one am not pleading for Cavill to resume the role, even in a stand-alone movie for Superman proper, because what if more blatant leftist metaphors seep in? This whole "franchise" of the past decade was decidedly never worth looking forward to in the first place, and the dark angle didn't help matters.

So now, if the above descriptions say anything, I have far less reason to admire Johnson, whom I recall was among several far-leftists who created controversy for the sake of attacking podcaster Joe Rogan over distorted reasons (and Johnson himself wrote extremely crude comments years earlier). And recalling Rogan was just as critical of Hollywood for romanticizing violence as Bill Maher was, he might want to take issue with the Black Adam movie next, because physical/sexual violence has tragically been glorified in Hollywood too over past decades, and this new film is no improvement with its portrayal of Teth-Adam. A most shameless embarrassment it decidedly is, and I wish WB would stop making superhero movies already if this is what it's all coming down to.

Saturday, October 15, 2022

French teacher was subjected to death threat over Mohammed cartoons

In France, another teacher had death threats made against him, and it's fortunate the Muslim daughter and father who committed the crime were arrested:
A teacher in a French high school was subjected to death threats after discussing freedom of expression and cartoons of the Islamic prophet Mohammed, leading to the arrest of a student and her uncle, in a case redolent of the death of Samuel Paty.

The teacher addressed his class in Éragny, in the Val-d’Oise department near Paris earlier this month on the subject of freedom of expression and cartoons of the prophet Mohammed which allegedly angered a 15-year-old female student in his class.

The teen later spoke to her uncle who arrived at the school in the late afternoon and verbally attacked the teacher, invoking teacher Samuel Paty who was beheaded in the street by a Chechen refugee in October of 2020 after showing cartoons of Mohammed to his class, Le Figaro reports.

The teacher later reported the thinly veiled death threat to police, who arrested the teen and her uncle and a judicial investigation was opened into the pair last Friday.

Since then the teen has been accused of apology for terrorism and her uncle has been indicted for death threats, according to the prosecutor of the Republic of Mulhouse, Edwige Roux-Morizot.
This would not be acceptable in the USA either, and tragically, there are monsters in north America who've committed similar behavior to the Muslim father and daughter over in France. Those who commit such acts should not be allowed to continue in public schools, or any public square, for that matter.

Wednesday, October 05, 2022

Marvel's Sabra comes under assault by Muslim activist group with terror ties

The Council of Islamic-American Relations (CAIR), which has documented connections to terrorist organizations like Hamas, recently ran the following podcast on Facebook, where they attacked Bill Mantlo/Sal Buscema's Israeli character, Sabra, who first debuted in the Incredible Hulk in the early 1980s:
Join us today at 3:00 p.m. ET for a discussion on the Marvel superhero Sabra, Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism with American Muslims for Palestine's Outreach Director Taher Herzallah.
From this alone, it's pretty easy to guess where they went with this. No matter how left-leaning Mantlo was in his time as a writer, and no matter how much that influenced his comics writing by extension, it makes zero difference to anti-Israeli sources like these. Whatever they say isn't worth the bytes it's produced on, considering their offensive platforms, for which the FBI later cut off contact with them. It's not too difficult to guess what they think of Gal Gadot as well.

One commentor said:
The Jewish people have so few representatives in comics, do take her away from us
And:
Sabra's young son was killed in a terrorist attack
Yes, it was established, possibly in New Warriors by Fabian Nicieza, that Sabra had a young son who'd been murdered in a terror attack, and that these anti-Israeli movements would invalidate even that viewpoint is definitely reprehensible. The commentor also said:
Did you read Union Jack: London Falling?
In that miniseries, the whole clash-on-the-side between Sabra and Arabian Knight is regurgitated, and Islam is otherwise whitewashed. It's another pathetic example of failure to provide an Israeli with a better depiction. Mostly because in the 2nd part, Sabra gets shot in the eyes, blinding her. Next:
You need to do more research on the character. Your knowledge of her is incorrect
Worse, their standings are entirely deliberate. And all coming from a movement that was an unindicted co-conspirator in terrorism. One more comment made was:
The plot for Captain America: New World Order has not even been released. How do you even know how her character will be portrayed?
Of course, if the screenplay comes within even miles of portraying Israel negatively, that'll be abominable, but not a surprise. Disney and Marvel studios have long been sellouts to anti-Israeli campaigners, and even Steven Spielberg did this almost 2 decades ago with Munich.

So now, another, far more notorious activist movement's damning Mantlo and Sal Buscema's creation for being Israeli, and being written with a background they believe illegitimate. Naturally, you have to wonder why these ideologues want anything to do with publishers that were originally founded by Jewish businessmen, whose viewpoints were anything but aligned with what phony pop culture critics think. It's practically laughable.