Durban II: Professor Dershowitz Explains What He Did at Durban II

Take a look at Professor Dershowitz's explanation of his encounter with Durban II. It's quite revealing. http://cgis.jpost.com/Blogs/dershowitz/entry/confronting_evil_at_durban_ii

The United States Will NOT Participate in Durban II

According to the JTA, the United States will not be participating in the Durban II conference. This is the right move. Durban I was an festival of antisemitism and hatred of Israel. Durban II promised to be more of the same.

When I was in London last week at an International Conference of Parliamentarians on Antisemitism, the Italian Foreign Minister said that if Durban II promises to be like Durban I, Italy would probably pull out.

This move by the United States probably means that Italy and other European nations will follow suit.

Canada long ago announced it was not going.

Here's Another Example of Racism

Edited 3:58 p.m.
So some commenters have been asking "What's racism?" Here's another example provided in an email sent out by the Mayor of a Orange Country, California town.

The title of the email was "No Easter egg hunt this year."

The mayor claimed he did not know of the stereotype of Blacks and watermelons. That's reason enough for him not to be mayor. And he was dense enough to send it to a Black woman.

[Added: so if he did not know of the stereotype why did he put watermelons on the lawn of the White House. This guy is so dumb that his lies only dig his hole deeper.]

He apologized and resigned [more than we can say for so-called Bishop Williamson].

NYPost Apologizes... Sort of

The New York Post has apologized for the cartoon... sort of. Here is what the paper had to say:

Wednesday's Page Six cartoon - caricaturing Monday's police shooting of a chimpanzee in Connecticut - has created considerable controversy.

It shows two police officers standing over the chimp's body: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill," one officer says.

It was meant to mock an ineptly written federal stimulus bill.

Period.

But it has been taken as something else - as a depiction of President Obama, as a thinly veiled expression of racism.

This most certainly was not its intent; to those who were offended by the image, we apologize.

However, there are some in the media and in public life who have had differences with The Post in the past - and they see the incident as an opportunity for payback.

To them, no apology is due.

Sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon - even as the opportunists seek to make it something else.

New York Post Prints Blatantly Racist Cartoon

The New York Post has published a blatantly racist cartoon showing two policemen shooting a monkey and then saying, "They will have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."

Whether the NYPost meant it to be racist or not is almost irrelevant. The fact that Blacks have been regularly stereotyped with images of apes and monkeys is undeniable. It is as fundamental part of that stereotype as large noses and money bags are of the Jewish stereotype.

The fact that it was juxtaposed with a picture of President Obama signing the bill did not help the NYPost's claims that the monkey did not mean Obama. [There was a pet monkey shot in NY a few days ago but that does not explain away or excuse the racist elements of the cartoon.]

This is what the editor of the paper said in trying to justify the cartoon:

"The cartoon is a clear parody of a current news event, to wit the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut. It broadly mocks Washington's efforts to revive the economy."

The explanation does not fly and NYPost, which even if it did not mean it to be racist [I know it is a long shot but just maybe], rather than try to justify itself, should apologize.

And those folks who are rightfully sensitive to use of antisemitic stereotypes should make their voice heard.

Spike in Antisemitism in the UK in January

I am currently in London at a international Parliamentary conference on antisemitism. More on that later.

But this BBC report on what is happening here in the UK is relevant.

The So-Called "New" Antisemitism: How New? What's New?

See Patterns of Prejudice for an interesting analysis of the topic by Jonathan Judaken.

The Rise of Antisemitism: The Collusion of the Left

One of the comments I received on the post about Jonathan Freedland's article was "1300 Palestinians were killed."

[Has anyone verified these numbers? Remember the initial reports of a massacre in Jenin? The results of a check was that approximately 50 Palestinians and 26 Israeli soldiers were killed. The out of proportion was on the Israeli side.]

My response was to ask if this justified antisemitism.

Now from Michael Trapido in South Africa comes a similar critique.

Rise of Antisemitic Incidents in the UK: The Facts are Stark

The Community Security Trust, a group which monitors security for the UK Jewish Community, reports a steep rise of antisemitic incidents in the past month in the UK.

European Antisemitism: Ominous Signs and Silence from the Left

In my attention to the Bishop Williamson matter I have really been negligent about addressing another more important topic: the rise of antisemitism in Europe.

There has been a survey by ADL which finds that a significant portion of Europeans blame the financial mess on Jews. I have no idea who conducted the survey and how the questions were structured [this would impact the outcome] or if one can draw a conclusion about an entire Continent from surveying 3,500 people.

But it is still disturbing. I hope others use this finding to do more research.

On this issue, I strongly recommend Jonathan Freedland's article in the Guardian.

In it Freedland notes that after 9/11 and 7/7 [the date of the London bombings] the British liberal left massed and strongly protested any hostility to Muslims. They were saying to European Muslims and particularly those in the UK: you do not stand alone. They called upon their fellow Britons to be "careful in their language, not to generalise from a few individuals to an entire community, to make clear to Britain's Muslims that they were a welcome part of the national life."

Freedland believes this was the right reaction. Yet he notes that, in the wake of the Gaza operation [which he opposed from the outset], liberals have remained eerily silent even as "British Jews have indeed come under attack."

In the four weeks after the Gaza operation began there was an eightfold increase in antisemitic incidents in Britain compared with the same period a year earlier."

There were "attacks on synagogues, including arson, and physical assaults on Jews. One man was set upon in Golders Green, north London, by two men who shouted, 'This is for Gaza', as they punched and kicked him to the ground."

There has been "Blood-curding graffiti" including slogans such as "Slay the Jewish pigs", and "Kill the Jews", to "Jewish bastardz."

Jewish schools are on high alert.

In the face of this real threat the British left has been virtual silent.

But, Freedland goes on, this is more than a sin of omission.

Take last month's demonstrations against Israel. Riazat Butt, the Guardian's religious affairs correspondent, describes in a joint edition of the Guardian's Islamophonic and Sounds Jewish podcasts how at one demo she heard the cry not only of "Down with Israel" but "Kill Jews". An anti-war protest in Amsterdam witnessed chants of: "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas."

At the London events, there were multiple placards deploying what has now become a commonplace image: the Jewish Star of David equated with the swastika. From the podium George Galloway declared: "Today, the Palestinian people in Gaza are the new Warsaw ghetto, and those who are murdering them are the equivalent of those who murdered the Jews in Warsaw in 1943."

Now what, do you imagine, is the effect of repeating, again and again, that Israel is a Nazi state? Even those with the scantest historical knowledge know that the Nazis are the embodiment of evil to which the only appropriate response is hate. How surprising is it if a young man, already appalled by events in Gaza, walks home from a demo and glimpses the Star of David - which he now sees as a latter-day swastika - outside a synagogue and decides to torch the building, or at least desecrate it? Yet Galloway, along with Livingstone, who was so careful in July 2005, did not hesitate to make the comparison (joined by a clutch of Jewish anti-Israel activists who should know better).

For liberals those Jews who dissociate themselves from Israel are acceptable. Those who don't are "fair game for abuse and attack until they publicly recant."

But they don't ask Muslims to explain jihadism or renounce Islamic extremism. Asking them to do so is seen as unenlightened.

Bishop Williamson is a gnat -- if not lower than that -- compared to this.

Father of Slain Wall Stree Journal reporter, Daniel Pearl on Contemporary Terorism

Stop Making Excuses for Terror

By JUDEA PEARL

Wall Street Journal 2/3/09

This week marks the seventh anniversary of the murder of our son, former Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. My wife Ruth and I wonder: Would Danny have believed that today's world emerged after his tragedy?

Reuters/Corbis

Jimmy Carter.

The answer does not come easily. Danny was an optimist, a true believer in the goodness of mankind. Yet he was also a realist, and would not let idealism bend the harshness of facts.

Neither he, nor the millions who were shocked by his murder, could have possibly predicted that seven years later his abductor, Omar Saeed Sheikh, according to several South Asian reports, would be planning terror acts from the safety of a Pakistani jail. Or that his murderer, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, now in Guantanamo, would proudly boast of his murder in a military tribunal in March 2007 to the cheers of sympathetic jihadi supporters. Or that this ideology of barbarism would be celebrated in European and American universities, fueling rally after rally for Hamas, Hezbollah and other heroes of "the resistance." Or that another kidnapped young man, Israeli Gilad Shalit, would spend his 950th day of captivity with no Red Cross visitation while world leaders seriously debate whether his kidnappers deserve international recognition.

No. Those around the world who mourned for Danny in 2002 genuinely hoped that Danny's murder would be a turning point in the history of man's inhumanity to man, and that the targeting of innocents to transmit political messages would quickly become, like slavery and human sacrifice, an embarrassing relic of a bygone era.

But somehow, barbarism, often cloaked in the language of "resistance," has gained acceptance in the most elite circles of our society. The words "war on terror" cannot be uttered today without fear of offense. Civilized society, so it seems, is so numbed by violence that it has lost its gift to be disgusted by evil.

I believe it all started with well-meaning analysts, who in their zeal to find creative solutions to terror decided that terror is not a real enemy, but a tactic. Thus the basic engine that propels acts of terrorism -- the ideological license to elevate one's grievances above the norms of civilized society -- was wished away in favor of seemingly more manageable "tactical" considerations.

This mentality of surrender then worked its way through politicians like the former mayor of London, Ken Livingstone. In July 2005 he told Sky News that suicide bombing is almost man's second nature. "In an unfair balance, that's what people use," explained Mr. Livingstone.

But the clearest endorsement of terror as a legitimate instrument of political bargaining came from former President Jimmy Carter. In his book "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," Mr. Carter appeals to the sponsors of suicide bombing. "It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear that they will end the suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism when international laws and the ultimate goals of the Road-map for Peace are accepted by Israel." Acts of terror, according to Mr. Carter, are no longer taboo, but effective tools for terrorists to address perceived injustices.

Mr. Carter's logic has become the dominant paradigm in rationalizing terror. When asked what Israel should do to stop Hamas's rockets aimed at innocent civilians, the Syrian first lady, Asma Al-Assad, did not hesitate for a moment in her response: "They should end the occupation." In other words, terror must earn a dividend before it is stopped.

The media have played a major role in handing terrorism this victory of acceptability. Qatari-based Al Jazeera television, for example, is still providing Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi hours of free air time each week to spew his hateful interpretation of the Koran, authorize suicide bombing, and call for jihad against Jews and Americans.

Then came the August 2008 birthday of Samir Kuntar, the unrepentant killer who, in 1979, smashed the head of a four-year-old Israeli girl with his rifle after killing her father before her eyes. Al Jazeera elevated Kuntar to heroic heights with orchestras, fireworks and sword dances, presenting him to 50 million viewers as Arab society's role model. No mainstream Western media outlet dared to expose Al Jazeera efforts to warp its young viewers into the likes of Kuntar. Al Jazeera's management continues to receive royal treatment in all major press clubs.

Some American pundits and TV anchors didn't seem much different from Al Jazeera in their analysis of the recent war in Gaza. Bill Moyers was quick to lend Hamas legitimacy as a "resistance" movement, together with honorary membership in PBS's imaginary "cycle of violence." In his Jan. 9 TV show, Mr. Moyers explained to his viewers that "each [side] greases the cycle of violence, as one man's terrorism becomes another's resistance to oppression." He then stated -- without blushing -- that for readers of the Hebrew Bible "God-soaked violence became genetically coded." The "cycle of violence" platitude allows analysts to empower terror with the guise of reciprocity, and, amazingly, indict terror's victims for violence as immutable as DNA.

When we ask ourselves what it is about the American psyche that enables genocidal organizations like Hamas -- the charter of which would offend every neuron in our brains -- to become tolerated in public discourse, we should take a hard look at our universities and the way they are currently being manipulated by terrorist sympathizers.

At my own university, UCLA, a symposium last week on human rights turned into a Hamas recruitment rally by a clever academic gimmick. The director of the Center for Near East Studies carefully selected only Israel bashers for the panel, each of whom concluded that the Jewish state is the greatest criminal in human history.

The primary purpose of the event was evident the morning after, when unsuspecting, uninvolved students read an article in the campus newspaper titled, "Scholars say: Israel is in violation of human rights in Gaza," to which the good name of the University of California was attached. This is where Hamas scored its main triumph -- another inch of academic respectability, another inroad into Western minds.

Danny's picture is hanging just in front of me, his warm smile as reassuring as ever. But I find it hard to look him straight in the eyes and say: You did not die in vain.

Mr. Pearl, a professor of computer science at UCLA, is president of the Daniel Pearl Foundation, founded in memory of his son to promote cross-cultural understanding.

Pope Benidict Reinstates Holocaust Denier: Not Just a Jewish Thing

Pope Benedict has reinstated as a Bishop a Holocaust and 9/11 denier. To put it succintly: this is far more than tacit support for an antisemite. It makes the Vatican look utterly stupid.

Up until now Benedict, as a German who served in the German forces during the war, has been exceptionally senstitive about all things related to antisemitism. He certainly was not here.

David Irving boasts on his website that Williamson attended his last garden party. They deserve each other. Imagine their chit chat.

Leading Holocaust Denier Gives Up: We Won... Well Not Exactly

One of the leading Holocaust deniers claims he has given up the fight to persuade people there was no Holocaust.

Nobody would bite.

So this is good news, right?

Well not exactly. He is now going to focus his energies on fighting Jewish-Zionist power.

This, of course, proves what I and others have been saying for years. Holocaust denial is naught but a form of antisemitism. Weber could not spread antisemitism with Holocaust denial so he is going to try other methods.

Methinks he will have more success with his new track. Sadly so.

A Gift for the Antisemite: Bernard Madoff

Ever since I heard about this scandal and the degree to which it impacted philanthropies, particularly but not only Jewish philanthropies, I have been shaking my head in wonder.

How could this man do this to so many institutions which do good things? In addition he hit lots of people, some of them quite rich and some of them in far more modest circumstances. Many are left with nothing.

Madoff is a sociopath. That seems pretty certain.

He is an antisemite's dream. The worst of them could not have dreamt up such a story.

There seems to be no punishment strong enough for this guy.

Ha'aretz's Bradley Burston says exactly what I have been thinking: Christmas came early for the worst of the antisemites this year.

British Boycott of Israeli Universities: The End of this Antisemitic Action?

According to the JTA a threat of legal action by Anthony Julius, who was my lawyer in Irving v. Penguin/Lipstadt, has brought an end to the attempt by a small group of university academics to boycott Israeli universities.

Anthony promised free legal assistance to any academic affected by the threatened boycott, and wrote the union’s general secretary that he considered the union’s motion -- to “consider the moral and political implications of educational links with Israeli institutions, and to discuss the occupation with individuals and institutions concerned, including Israeli colleagues” -- to be both a boycott motion and anti-Semitic.

Last week the union, known by as the UCU, dropped its latest boycott call.

Anthony took this action despite the fact that many people -- including some within the UK Jewish community -- opposed it. He knew it was the right thing to do.

I am not the least bit surprised. He took the same stance in my case.

The rest, as is said, is history.

Bravo Anthony [and also to his cohort James Libson who played an equally important role here, as he did in my case].

Barukh Dayan Emet - Blessed is the Truthful Judge: In Memorium to R' Gavriel and Riki Holtzberg

Link to JTA coverage added 2:55 p.m.

Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his wife, Rivka, were murdered along with three other hostages in the terror attack on the Chabad house in Mumbai.

May their memory and the work they did be a blessing to those remain behind.

They were killed by terrorists who had to seek out the Chabad House.

CNN: "Militants"????

Some of the comentators on CNN persist in talking about militants. What does one have to do to be considered a terrorism? Kill more than 140 people? Take control of more than 3 places?

Tragedy in Mumbai: Why was the Jewish Center [Chabad] Attacked?

I am watching CNN discuss the attacks. The various anchors, reporters on the scene, and commentators keep asking, "But why did they attack the Jewish center?"

They keep asking yet it seems so self-evident to me....

The Emory Wheel and Other "Antisemitic" Incidents at Emory

EDITED 10:27 A.M. [EDITS IN ITALICS]

The editor of the Emory Wheel has an editorial in today's paper regarding the editorial board's decision to run the cartoon. It is written in a way that will allow people to interpret it as they wish, though it does seem to acknowledge that many people in the Emory community found the editorial distasteful. After posting this I heard from the editor. He said that, since there are still letters coming in to the paper, he did not want to shut down conversation by making a definitive statement one way or the other. [Or, at the least, that's how I understood him...]

Another Emory related item: Last week on a Sunday evening there was a fire set at the fraternity house a fire at the AEPi house. The fraternity is known as a "Jewish" fraternity. Many people linked this to the Emory Wheel cartoon and the excitement on campus over a demonstration about the West Bank fence/wall. For the Atlanta Journal Constitution coverage of the story see here.

There were those who assumed it was an antisemitic act. The police don't know if it is. The situation is complicated by the fact that at Kappa Alpha house this past Friday morning there was an incident of vandalism and one at the Sigma Chi house last Tuesday.

People should wait for the police investigation to be completed. Then they should look at it and decide if it is a fair and comprehensive effort rather than one that is designed to calm fears.

There is always time to yell, scream, and accuse. Now is the time to let professionals do their jobs.

A Cartoon that Says it All, No Explanation Necessary

With thanks to Bruce's Mideast Soundbites for finding this cartoon.