By Beryl Wajsman, Institute for Public Affairs of Montreal
Sunday, February 18, 2007
The propaganda front in this Third World War against Islamo-Fascism has been characterized by the incessant bombardment of Islamist agitprop about the evils of the "little Satan" Israel and the "big Satan" America. To our peril too many are becoming too immune. But this young year of 2007 did not even make it to Caesar's ides of March before we witnessed betrayal through a choreographed pas-de-deux of infamy of European hypocrisy and Arab lies. Valentine's Day, the ides of February appropriately enough, was high noon. One can only hope these special "gifts" will rouse more in the west from their lethargic slumber.
The European parliament, representing a continent twice saved from destruction by America, decided to condemn the United States for its policy of rendition – returning terrorists and their allies to their home countries. The excuse used was that it was "uncivilized" to return anyone to any nation where they might face threats to their safety while in custody. America should just keep these models of international citizenship at their cost, and comfort them with American due process.
Overlapping this display of expedient hypocrisy that has sadly become the defining feature of EU response to international Islamist butchery, were the Israel Apartheid Week manifestations of the usual collection of Islamo-Fascist gauleiters from the Arab world and their fellow-travellers in academic and diplomatic circles in the west. These events sought to portray Israel as an apartheid-era South Africa in relation to its Arab citizens. They took place in eight cities from Oxford to New York to Montreal.
The "business-as-usual" response of so many western elected officials too cowardly to bear the responsibility of liberty; ever hungry for more Arab petrodollars; and always ready and willing to succumb to the most outrageous biases in exchange for a sound-bite of false "security" that can be peddled to voters has brought us to the brink of a cataclysmic rendezvous with destiny. It must be answered at every turn, for these submissions cannot be dismissed as tactical retreats that will be overcome later. These anti-American and anti-Israeli political and propaganda campaigns are the psychological and intellectual germ warfare of the Islamo-Fascist aggression. They have already wiped out much of the historical and institutional memories of many in one generation of citizens in the free world, and are well on the way to infecting another, younger, generation.
The fifth-columnists who perpetuate this are not just reflecting uninformed bigotry. They are engaging in conscious politics. And for a price. Academics benefit from the cornucopia of Arab oil money fuelling Arab study programs in western universities. Allegiance to the party line gives budding "scholars" the funding to advance their academic careers. Diplomats in chancelleries around the globe just read maps. And the sheer number of Islamist capitals makes it clear to them how they will advance their bureaucratic grade and maybe someday make Ambassador. Even Prime Minister Harper's brave new world vision may not have penetrated the calcified prejudices of our Department of Foreign Affairs bureaucrats. B'nai B'rith's Institute for International Affairs recently reported that the 19th Annual Assembly between the DFA and Canadian NGOs witnessed, among the expected criticisms of America and Israel, an apologia for Iran's Ahmadinejad from one official who thought the west was "over-reacting".
This blitz in this new World War creates an enormous challenge for those still dedicated to the fate of freedom in the world. For it is not merely that the enemy is engaged in an effort to destroy the legitimacy of specific nations and their policies. They, and their western lap-dogs, mirror in their purposes and practices Hitler's promise to "Rid mankind of the false chimera of conscience." The aims of the attacks we have seen this week, as before, seek more than the demonization and de-legitimization of sister democracies. They seek to make free peoples believe that the sovereignty and supremacy of the individual; expressions of moral choice through democratic institutions; and lives grounded in foundations of liberty are inconsequential and unnecessary in the face of the sheer brute force of the "new world order" they want to impose. Only by unmasking their hypocrisy and lies can we hope to maintain the resolve of the west to marshal the necessary courage to loathe those who would imprison us in their theocratic tyranny.
It is time to ask hard questions of our Europeans "allies". How dare they assume the moral high ground on the treatment and incarceration of terrorists and war criminals? Are we to so quickly forget that Slobodan Milosevic died after five years imprisonment at The Hague with just fifty hours of testimony left before the conclusion of his trial that had dragged on so long? Milosevic was known to suffer from chronic heart ailments, high blood pressure and diabetes. He died of a heart attack brought on by circumstances still unclear. His death followed on the heels of the supposed suicide of Croatian Serb leader Milan Babic, also held in a European detention center. There have been no such incidents at Guantanamo. Few in Europe said much about these deaths. But then supporters of Milosevic and Babic did not have crazed armies of millions wrecking havoc across western Europe and ready to die for 72 virgins if it meant the creation of an Islamic Caliphate over the continent.
Whatever one's position may be on capital punishment, compared to the Milosevic and Babic cases, the trials of Saddam Hussein and his "colleagues" by the Iraqis, after American tutelage, were models of international jurisprudence.
Victor Davis Hanson, of Stanford University's Hoover Institute, has pithily pointed out that many Europeans question the American war effort because Osama bin Laden and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi have not yet been captured though many of their leading henchmen have been taken prisoner or killed including this week's targeted killing of Al-Qaeda's commander in Iraq. Few note however that it has been years since the collapse of the Serbian rogue regime, and still no one seems to know where either Radovan Karadzic, or his military commander, Ratko Mladic, are hiding inside Europe. Europe, as Hanson points out, "…is not exactly the Sunni Triangle or the borderlands of the Hindu Kush."
Most European parliamentarians did not like George Bush's use of phrases, like "smoke 'em out" and "dead-or-alive" when talking about Al-Qaeda or Hussein and his top brass. But few said anything about Jacques Chirac's boast that France would consider a nuclear response to any country sponsoring a terror attack against it. I could go on, but I'll end this examination of Europe's hypocrisy with this reminder. Few European leaders had any compunction about the "rendition" of dozens of terrorist butchers from the executioners of Munich on down when they released them to go back to their home countries under Arab pressure.
Perhaps the most eloquent testament to the fact that Israel may be many things (and one can disagree with it on many policies) but an apartheid state it is not, is that Jamal Zahalka, an Israeli Arab Muslim Member of the Knesset, Israel's Parliament, could travel freely to the U.K. and Canada (including an appearance in Montreal) and spout his poison about the "myth" of Israeli democracy. Zahalka is not just any ordinary MK. He is a member of the Balad Party.
Balad was founded by Azmi Bishara, also a member of Israel's parliament, who started his political life as a communist. On the 8 of February 2004 the High Court sitting in Nazareth found that members of Balad were "…guilty of having put in place a Hezbollah proxy terrorist cell inside Israel in order to carry out suicide bombings…" Bishara himself declared in Beirut's "L'Orient-le-jour" on the 13th of June 2001 that, "I do not consider Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization."
Despite this, Balad has not been banned in Israel nor have its members, like Zahalka, been stopped from traveling. Indeed, Israeli diplomats in the various cities he is speaking in cannot criticize him because Israeli protocol demands respect for a Member of the Knesset. Meanwhile Jews from anywhere in the world still cannot obtain visas to most Muslim countries. One more thing. Zahalka obtained his B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. in pharmacology at Hebrew University. Hebrew University's student body is some 25% Arab.
Zahalka is not a rare case. There are about a dozen Arab Muslim members of the Knesset. They represent several Arab political parties including two who expressly support terrorism. Those two had been disqualified by Israel's election authority but re-instated by order of the Israeli Supreme Court. Apartheid huh?
Additionally, Israeli Arabs turn out to vote in greater percentage numbers than Canadians do. Arabs serve in the diplomatic corps with no glass ceiling. Israel's Ambassador to Greece is Arab. It was Prime Minister Ariel Sharon who appointed the first Israeli Arab, Salah Tarif, to the Cabinet. In May 2004 Salim Jubran was appointed to the Supreme Court of Israel.
Arabic is an official language in Israel, even posted on all road signs which is more than we can say for English here in Quebec. And Israel does not require a measurement of the size of Arab and Hebrew letters. More than 300,000 Arab children attend primary and secondary schools in Israel. In 1948 there was only one Arab high school in Israel. Today there are hundreds. There is of course one "discrimination" in relation to Arabs in Israel. They are not obligated to perform military service though there are many, - particularly Bedouin, Druze and Circassians - who volunteer.
Though discrimination in employment and social services is outlawed, there are certainly many cases of individual friction. But a 2000 study published in the Jerusalem Post shows just how close the living standards are between Arabs and Jews in Israel. Unemployment among Jews stood at 6.8%; among Arabs it was 10.4%. The average Jewish household had 1.80 persons for every room; the average Arab household 2.30 persons for every room. Life expectancy for Jews averaged 75; for Arabs 73.
Political participation is strong as well for Israeli Arabs. Though making up some 18% of Israel's population, 22% of the membership of the Israeli Labour Party that ruled Israel for most of its existence was Arab as of May 2005.
One of the big issues in this year's Israel Apartheid Week was that the Jewish National Fund and Israeli government agencies control 93% of the land in Israel and won't sell to Arabs. Well the fact is that the number is actually 92% and land is not sold to anyone. It is leased. And there are no religious or ethnic restrictions whatever on who can lease it. A reality affirmed in an Israeli Supreme Court judgment written by Chief Justice Aharon Barak himself.
The real story of "apartheid" is on the flip side. The "Waqf", the Muslim Religious Authority, has the protection of Israeli law to possess land and the Waqf – with no Israeli interference - has openly issued proclamations that its lands are strictly reserved for sale or lease to Arab Muslims only.
1997 saw a telling example of the real face of the Arab "big lie" on this issue. Arafat's Justice Minister in the Palestinian Authority, Freih Abu Middeim, announced that the death penalty would be used against anyone convicted of selling even " …a square centimeter…" of land to an Israeli. Several days after that announcement two Arab real estate agents were murdered. In fact the Palestinian Authority has from its inception enforced the Jordanian law in place since the Jordanian occupation of the West Bank that no land be sold or leased to anyone other than Arab residents of the West Bank on pain of death.
Another issue for the "Apartheid" Jihadis this week has been that Israel does not allow Palestinian men under the age of 35 and women under 25 who marry Israelis citizens from automatically acquiring Israeli residency and citizenship. Well, the same is true in many western countries that have done away with marriage as a way into a country. Those countries include Canada and the United States. There is a waiting period for spouses that can last from 9-12 months. Every nation in the free world now has a watch list for countries of origin of potential immigrants. That's the state of security concerns caused by the Palestinians own Islamist allies. And Israel has special cause for concern. When the Palestinian Authority was organized it was Israel that supplied 150,000 arms for the PA's militia only to see many of those arms used against Israel's citizens by both Fatah and Hamas factions. Arms to your enemies. Some apartheid.
"Apartheid" week has of course railed against the security wall calling it an "apartheid" wall. Speakers at various events always point to the World Court decision demanding that Israel change the route of the wall. What is always neglected of course is that the Israeli Supreme Court demanded the same thing months before the World Court and the Israeli government complied. Where in the Arab world would you ever see the Supreme Court ruling against its government?
The final big issue of the week for the Apartheidniks was that Israel has created in the West Bank a regime of separation based on discrimination, applying two separate systems of law in the same area and basing the rights of individuals on their nationality. This is the classic half-truth. Residents of the West Bank can choose the legal jurisdiction they want to have recourse to. Including religious courts if they like. Part of the reason West Bank Arabs choose Israeli justice is the abject failure of the Palestinian Authority in implementing not only a constitution, but a functioning court system with legislation it can act on. What legislation there is, is nothing but a remnant of the Jordanian occupation from 1947-1967.
A December 2002 study by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research of residents of the West Bank and Gaza showed just how mistrustful they are of Palestinian justice. To the question "How would you evaluate the state of democracy and human rights in the Palestinian Authority?" 19.1% said good; 28.4% said satisfactory; and 50.5% said bad. When that question was asked of these same residents about Israel 65.5% said good; 11.9% said satisfactory; and only 17% said bad. 2% had no opinion to the first question and 5.6% had no opinion to the second.
The fact is that whatever one may think of the occupation, Israel is exercising the same rights in international law as France and the United States did after the Second World War of holding onto territory acquired in its own defense after surviving an aggressive attack until peace is achieved. And under Israeli occupation, Palestinians have the highest percentage of university students; the lowest infant mortality and the longest life expectancy of any front-line Arab state. All that due to the assistance from the Israeli social service system.
The intellectual godfather of Palestinian nationalism Edward Said once wrote that "Israel is not South Africa" As Irshad Manji has pointed out, he could have stated nothing less since an Israeli publishing house translated his seminal work "Orientalism" into Hebrew. Israel is not so much the Jewish state as a state of Jews. The only preferential legislation that exists is the "Law of Return" that gives a Jew automatic citizenship while other prospective immigrants must wait three years. That law reflects the reality of a world that butchered millions of Jews and no country would take any in. Israel was a haven for many Vietnamese boatpeople when Saigon fell, but there was no haven for the Jews of Europe.
Had the early socialist Zionists had their way there would have been a secular bi-national state. But even before Hitler, the Palestinian Arabs' religious and political leader Haj Amin al-Husseini of Jerusalem encouraged the wanton slaughter of Jews in Palestine under the British mandate. He spent the years between 1941 and 1945 as Hitler's personal guest in Berlin broadcasting Nazi propaganda in Arabic and helping raise two Muslim divisions for the Wehrmacht. He was to be tried at Nuremberg as a war criminal, but with the help of the French and British obtained "rendition" back to his home and continued his bloodlust even after Israel became the only nation to recognize the Arab state of Palestine by accepting the UN's partition plan. Al-Husseini's frontline Arab cousins' response was to invade Palestine and hold the West Bank and Gaza prisoner for twenty years. His nephew Feisal was a member of Arafat's inner circle.
These are the real facts. Facts that the Palestinians must reconcile with their history if they are ever to achieve maturity as a people and as a nation. Facts that the Europeans who seek to reverse their own deflowering need to admit particularly this week. A week when insult was added to injury when a Polish member of the European Parliament, Maciej Giertych, published a booklet branding Jews as unethical; obsessed with separateness and a "tragic community" because they don't accept Jesus as the messiah. Giertych, an extreme right-wing parliamentarian of the nationalistic, Catholic-based, League of Polish Families, released his booklet at the European Parliament headquarters in Strasbourg on the ides of February – Valentine's Day – the same day the Europeans were so hypocritically censuring the Americans. Giertych's son, Roman, is Poland's education minister, deputy prime minister, and also heads the League of Polish Families.
And so it continues. A sad, sick, full circle.
As for the Apartheidniks…well, we know what they are. It is only their price that we need to seasonally adjust.
There will be time enough to contemplate the harm that this past week's events have done to the cause of freedom and justice. For the moment, it is important to stand our guard against the great evil that is loose in the world. And, to paraphrase Daniel Patrick Moynihan, to keep faith with truth by never acknowledging; never abiding by and never acquiescing in these infamous acts.
Pursuant to Title 17 U.S.C. 107, other copyrighted work is provided for educational purposes, research, critical comment, or debate without profit or payment. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for your own purposes beyond the 'fair use' exception, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. Views are those of authors and not necessarily those of Canada Free Press. Content is Copyright 1997-2024 the individual authors. Site Copyright 1997-2024 Canada Free Press.Com Privacy Statement