Showing posts with label terrorism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrorism. Show all posts

Saturday, October 21, 2023

Are Pro-Palestian College Kids Antisemitic?

Several years ago I worked with a Jewish professor at a Texas university. I recall he had a sign on his office door that said: “ Anti-Zionism is antisemitism.”

At the time, I disagreed with my colleague. I thought it possible for Americans to be sympathetic to the Palestinians and critical of Israel’s policies toward them without being anti Semitic. Now I am not so sure.

I am shocked by the. anti-Israel demonstrations taking place on college campuses all over the nation--protests supporting terroristic thugs. And I am apalled by the cowardly stance of university administrators, who refuse to denounce these demonstrations.

The Hamas raid out of Gaza on October 7 killed 1400 Israeli citizens, including children, women, and the elderly. Reliable reports have established that Hamas terrorists raped women, slaughtered babies, and kidnapped over 200 people. Some Israelis were burned alive in their homes.

As incredible as it seems, the Hamas terrorists committed acts of savagery against the Jewish people that are equal to the Nazi barbarism of the Holocaust.

It may be true that most Palestinians do not support Hamas and are helpless bystanders to Hamas atrocities. It is certainly true that innocent Palestinians have suffered and died during the latest round of fighting in Gaza.

Nevertheless, Israel holds the moral high ground in its long- running conflict with the Arab world. The United Nations made an eternal commitment when it recognized Israel as a sovereign state in 1948. The world’s obligation to Israel can never be canceled or annulled.
The college students who are demonstrating against Israel are either antisemitic or ignorantly dismissive of the unspeakable atrocities that have been committed against European Jews. I suggest they do a little research. There are hundreds of books about the suffering of the Jewish people during the twentieth century.

They might begin by reading two books of fiction by Leon Uris: Exodus about the founding of modern Israel, and Mila 18, which is a tale about the Warsaw uprising during World War II. 

University leaders must denounce the anti-Israel protests on their campuses. Harvard University, arguably the most prestigious education institution in the United States, is a hotbed of antisemitic rants. Yet its motto is Veritas, the Latin word for truth. Unless Harvard firmly and unequivocally rebukes the idiots who are celebrating or defending anti-Jewish terrorism, it needs to change its motto to “Cowardly Appeasement.” I believe the Latin translation is Inertia Placatio.







Monday, January 30, 2017

Senator Charles Schumer cries bitter tears over Trump's travel ban on people coming to U.S. from countries that export terror: Where are the grownups?

I knew in my heart that President Trump had done a bad thing--a terrible thing--when he imposed a temporary ban on people traveling to the U.S. from countries that export terrorism. But I did not grasp the enormity of his iniquity until I saw Senator Charles Schumer break down in sobs over Trump's foul deed.

After all, as President Trump admitted, Senator Schumer is not a crier. He has witnessed some truly awful things during his long political career. Yet he never broke down--not once.

Senator Schumer was dry-eyed after the San Bernardino shootings and the Orlando massacre. I don't think he shed a single tear after the Russians shot down that airliner in Ukraine. As far as I know, Senator Schumer kept a stiff upper lip after the terrorists killing sprees in Paris, Brussels, and Nice.

So why did President Trump's executive order--his ill advised and poorly implemented executive order--cause Schumer to go into near hysterics?

I do not; I honestly do not know.

But this I do know. This country has some serious problems, and only grownups can solve them. And here are just a few of them:
  • The number of Americans on food stamps grew by almost 20 million people over the last eight years.
  • Accumulated student-loan debt has reached $1.4 trillion, and 8 million people are in default.
  • Mortality rates for working class Americans have spiked upward, driven by suicide and deaths related to drug and alcohol abuse.
  • Suicide rates among middle-aged people have gone up alarmingly, and crushing personal debt may be a factor.
But let's not cry about this sad news. Let's do something about it. So please, Senator Schumer, treat yourself to a nice long cry and then go back to work.

I assure you, Senator Schumer, if you begin acting like a grownup and start working on the nation's problems, you will feel much better. On the other hand, if you break down in tears every time President Trump does something you don't like, you're going to need a lot of handkershiefs.

People acting like grownups after the San Bernardino shooting

References

Alan Bjerga. Food Stamps Still Feed One in Seven Americans Despite Recovery, Bloomberg.com, February 3, 2016.

Jillian Berman. When your Social Security check disappears because of an old student loanMarketWatch, June 25, 2015.  Accessible at: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/when-your-social-security-check-disappears-because-of-an-old-student-loan-2015-06-25

Anne  Case and Angus Deaton. Rising morbidity and mortality in midlife among white
non-Hispanic Americans in the 21st century.  Accessible at: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/10/29/1518393112.full.pdf

Editorial. Death AmongMiddle Aged Whites. New York Times, November 5, 2015.

General Accounting Office. Older Americans: Inability to Repay Student Loans May Affect Financial Security of a Small Percentage of Borrowers. GAO-14-866T. Washington, DC: General Accounting Office. http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-14-866T

Katherine A. Hempstead and Julie A. Phillips. Rising Suicide Among Adults Aged
40–64 Years: The Role of Job and Financial Circumstances.  American Journal of Preventive Medicine 84(5):491-500 (2015).

Gina Kolata. Deaths Rates Rising Middle-Aged White Americans, Study FindsNew York Times, November 3, 2015.

Betsy McKay. The Death Rate Is Rising for Middle-Aged WhitesWall Street Journal, November 3, 2015. 


Sunday, April 12, 2015

Janet Napolitano, President of University of California, writes a hollow review of a book about the Tsarnaev brothers


Janet Napolitano, President of the University of California and former Secretary of Homeland Security, recently reviewed Masha Gessen's book about the Tsarnaev brothers for the Times Book Review section. Napolitano's review is remarkably shallow and self-serving, but we should reflect upon it nevertheless because Napolitano's vapid analysis of the Boston Marathon bombing is an apt example of the intellectual hollowness of America's governmental and educational leadership.


Janet Napolitano was Secretary of Homeland Security when the Boston Marathon bombing occurred, and she begins her review by slyly patting herself on the back for doing such a great job in catching the bumbling Tsarnaev brothers after their terrorist attack. Let's read what Napolitano said:
As secretary of homeland security, I immediately mobilized the department to assist Boston emergency responders and to work with the F.B.I. to identify the perpetrators. Because the Boston Marathon is an iconic American event, we suspected terrorism, but no group stepped forward to claim credit. Massive law enforcement resources--local, state and federal--had to be organized and deployed so that, within just a few days, we had narrowed the inquiry from the thousands of spectators who had come to cheer on the runners to just two, who had come to plant bombs.
She acknowledges that the Russians tipped off the F.B.I about Tamerlan, the older Tsarnaev brother, before the attack occurred; but, hey, the Russians are so unreliable. After all, Napolitano writes, "Russia routines presumes all young urban Muslim men to be radical."

Napolitano then goes on to debunk Gessen's theory that Tamerlan Tsarnaev may have been an F.B.I . informant and that the Bureau delayed telling local law enforcement authorities about his identity because they wanted to get to him first and kill him.  Such a theory, Napolitano maintains, is "laughable."

Finally, Napolitano points out that Gessen's book failed to answer some basic questions such as "How
and why did the two brothers shift from living somewhat aimless young lives to bombing the marathon?" But Napolitano herself offers no answer to that question, in spite of the fact that she was Secretary of Homeland Security when the attack occurred and should have some insight about the Tsarnaev's bizarre turn toward murder.

Napolitano ends her puff piece with a rhetorical salute to the people of Boston for turning out as spectators for the annual Boston Marathons that followed the 2013 bombing. "People there call it 'Boston Strong,'" she concludes with a flourish, "[but] I call it resilience, that enduring strand of the American fabric that, in the end, will outlast the most dastardly plot against it." Blah, blah, blah.

Janet Napolitano: blah, blah, blah
Personally, I found Napolitano's comments about the Boston Marathon bombing to be about as substantive as a rice cake. It is disturbing to me that the president of the University of California has nothing interesting to say about a major act of terrorism that occurred on her watch as Secretary of Homeland Security.

And now I will share my own theory about the Boston Marathon bombing. Personally, I don't believe the Tsarnaev brothers were radicalized in Chechnya or Dagestan or seduced by the Internet as some commentators theorize. I think the brothers were turned toward murder by the culture of Boston and Cambridge. Cambridge in particular, where Dzhokhar went to high school, is the epicenter of postmodern nihilism--the studied belief that there are no ultimate truths and that life is to be lived purely for the pursuit of power, recognition, and self-gratification.

For affluent young people like the ones who attend Boston's many elite colleges, nihilism can have a cheerful, even jaunty, aspect. Indeed, cheeky cynicism is expected of the young, and Boston's intelligentsia cultivate feigned world-weariness as a substitute for thought.

But nihilism has an ugly aspect when it is embraced by outcasts, by people who know they will never be insiders, will never have the opportunities that beckon to all the affluent young people who casually attend classes in Boston's many elitist colleges and universities.

Who can doubt that these two brothers, seeing nothing around them but affluent arrogance and easy self-regard, turned bitter; and turning bitter, they plotted their revenge.

It is a shocking thing to say, but I believe that the terrorism that the Tsarnaev brothers embraced was nurtured and metastasized in the culture that many Americans mistakenly think is the very acme of liberalism and tolerance--the culture of Boston and Cambridge.


Radicalized in Cambridge


References

Janet Napolitano. Blood Ties. New York Times Book Review, April 12, 2015, p. 1.