thisisbabylon.net

Reuters reported on Monday a statement that I can't believe the President had the audacity to say:

Weakened by the unpopular Iraq war, President George W. Bush accused Democrats of lacking a plan to win it on Monday as he opened a weeklong drive to maintain Republican control of the U.S. Congress.

We lost. Either regroup and change goals, admit defeat, or continue in a lie which robs up to 3 Americans per day of their lives. Even to pull out quietly and let history rewrite the story would be preferable.

"The Democratic goal is to get out of Iraq. The Republican goal is to win in Iraq," Bush told a rally in a gymnasium at Georgia Southern University.

Accused by Democrats of refusing to budge from a stay-the-course policy, Bush insisted his commanders have the flexibility needed to adjust to enemy tactics and said the only way not to succeed is "to leave before the job is done."

"If you listen carefully for a Democrat plan for success, they don't have one. Iraq is the central front in the war on terror, yet they don't have a plan for victory," he said.

A "growing number" of American military officers are beginning to question Bush's central mantra, that "setting a hard deadline for troop reductions would strengthen the insurgency and undermine efforts to create a stable state."

Bush's "plan to win" has resulted in colossal death tolls and an extraordinary drain on the US economy. If getting out of Iraq is not what he calls a "plan to win", I am more than happy to live with that.

Posted by Y-Love at 01:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Again, Jews and Muslims are finding themselves on the same tragic dark page. Grabbing at the same short end of the racism stick.

Columnist Lee Suster, writing for the extremely left-wing Counterpunch.org reports:

European politicians from London to Moscow are bashing Islam and immigrants, legitimizing politics previously limited to the anti-immigrant extreme right...

There were violent attacks as well, including an October 21 assault carried out by three men on those attending prayers at a mosque in the city of Manchester. The same day, right-wing media amplified Straw and Blair's attacks on Islam, with the Daily Express tabloid running a front-page photo of a woman in a niqab under the massive headline "BAN IT!" ...

The backdrop for all this is a series of raids and arrests of Muslims since August involving an alleged plot to hijack British airliners--even though they had taken no action toward doing so.

Islamophobia has replaced anti-Semitism as the focus of the European far right, according to Glyn Ford, a British member of the European Parliament and author of a book on neo-fascism in Europe. "Europe is in danger of seeing its extreme-right parties move into the mainstream," he said, adding, "Islamophobia has become the prejudice of the day, but the threat from the extreme right is real and it is found across the European Union."

In Germany this was called the worst year for anti-Semitism since World War II. If Islamophobia is surpassing even that then I don't know what to think, but I can't help but fear for European Muslims. The culture of prejudice must come to an end, for the sake of the well-being of the entire EU.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Will you get a load of this? You wouldn't believe who a Norwegian-Danish coalition is calling "the example" for interfaith coexistence in the world.

Syria.

I'm serious.

The Syrian official state news agency SANA reports:

Receiving a joint Norwegian-Danish delegation that includes representatives of the Islamic communities in the two countries and headed by Chairman of Islamic-Christian Dialogue in Denmark Monk Lissie, Dr. Hassoun stressed that all religion doctrines came for the sake of human happiness and to plant amity and tolerance values among different nations and peoples.

For her part, Monk Lissie expressed admiration of the coexistence and tolerance she saw in Syria among all religions which proved that Syria still represents an example of tolerance and deepening the dialogue among civilizations.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

MSNBC (Reuters) reported today a tragic record that anti-racist NGOs warned was about to be set in Germany. The anti-racist group Gesicht Zeigen [in Deutsch] said on Tuesday:

"I wonder why we only find out in October that 2006 will probably become a sad, record year for right-wing attacks," Uwe-Karsten Heye, head of Gesicht Zeigen and once spokesman for former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, told a news conference.

Figures from Germany’s BKA federal police, released earlier this month, showed attacks by far-right groups rose 20 percent to 8,000 assaults in the first eight months of 2006 compared with the same period last year.

[Gesicht Zeigen] counted more than 1,000 incidents of an anti-Semitic nature in both June and July, Heye said.

In July, far-rightists in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt burned the diary of Holocaust victim Anne Frank, causing outrage among German politicians and anti-racist groups.

In another incident only two weeks ago, teenagers in the same state forced a 16-year-old classmate to parade around school wearing a sign with an anti-Semitic Nazi-era slogan.

8,000 attacks. Eight months. 1,000 attacks per month. They're alredy calling this the worst year since World War II? And they're going to fix that with $30 million?

Posted by Y-Love at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From today's Jerusalem Post, Agudath Israel Public Affairs Director Avi Shafran wrote his commentary and analysis to (lamentably, right-wing) National Review Literary Editor David Klinghoffer's column in the irreligious left-wing Jewish publication the Forward. Mr. Klinghoffer is a ger tzedek -- a righteous convert -- to Orthodox Judaism for some 15 years, and lamented the fact that:

...the "fundamentalist" label is regularly used to cast people who hew to foundational religious beliefs as "stupid," "obnoxious" or "backward."

Mr. Shafran says, inspirationally, at the end of the article:

Jews who might naturally assume, like Sullivan (and Jiminy Cricket before him), that our own consciences are our best guides would do well to listen closely to people like David Klinghoffer, and come to recognize that being a Jewish "fundamentalist" is no badge of shame but a deep and abiding privilege.

Posted by Y-Love at 01:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As if anyone is still giving creedence to Bush Administration assessments of "how we are doing" in the Iraq War. CNN reported today an interview with Dan Bartlett, senior White House adviser. Mr. Bartlett, as the U.S. death toll in Iraq reached 86, the highest monthly total this year, stated that we should not set a timetable for a troop drawdown, and instead, that "[j]ust because we have taken some serious sacrifices this month and that the fighting has been remarkably violent, that doesn't make it any less necessary for us to be there and make sure we prevail."

Mr. Bartlett also said that "[m]ost people would argue we are part of the solution in Iraq, not part of the problem," Bartlett said.

Oh really? (Or perhaps, O'Reilly?)

The quite progressive web journal Electronic Iraq.net, billing itself as "a supplementary news portal committed to providing a uniquely comprehensive look at Iraq and the violence that has engulfed it," printed an article from yesterdays London Independent with a quite blunt title: "We have done as much harm to Iraqis as Saddam".

In the article, columnist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown makes quite powerful -- and audacious -- statements:

As the land they say they freed runs red, Blair and Bush don't notice the stain either. Besotted with themselves and each other, what these leaders have done to the people of Iraq is at least as bad as what Saddam Hussain did to his own citizens.

This month, our Army head, General Sir Richard Dannatt, expressed doubts about the mission;

• over 70 US soldiers were killed;
• the former US Secretary of State James Baker said the situation in Iraq is dire;
• a 43 per cent increase in attacks was reported in Baghdad;
• and Amara was vanquished by the Mahdi army of the Shia hardliner Muqtada al-Sadr.

Worst of all were the results of a survey in The Lancet which revealed that the death toll for Iraqis is over 600,000.

Not a single new hospital has been built since 1986. Thousands of children are dying of treatable diseases. Childhood morfrom 5.5 per thousand to 13.5 since the invasion. Foreign contractors are making millions when they do shoddy work or make off with precious Iraqi resources.

Laurie King, of the website Electronic Iraq, writes: "Reality is starting to push through the resilient layers of denial, illusions, lies and wishful thinking that have insulated official Washington and London from the consequences of an illegal and immoral war."

I hope she is right, but as the warniks wake up, it is already too late. Options have closed off. If we withdraw, civil war breaks out; if we stay, the country haemorrhages - and our credibility and the world's security with it. Blair and Bush should to be in the dock in The Hague, answering for these crimes against all our futures. But that can't happen in an unequal world which they own. So we watch helplessly as they storm into their next theatre of action.

Good thing we didn't say "stay the course".

Posted by Y-Love at 01:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

British Chief Rabbi Rav Sir Jonathan Sacks, head of the British Chief Rabbinate of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, spoke to the Australian Jewish News in an interview published today. Rav Sacks spoke about various topics including the Pope's Islam comments and interfaith relations when seen through a macroscopic historical lens, as well as Muslim-Jewish relations in the UK today.

Much of what he said would shock many of the right-wing Orthodox Jewish communities in America today, especially here in New York.

AJN: How are relations between the Muslim and Jewish communities in Britain?

Rabbi Sacks: We have to lead the way in good community relations, what we call darchei shalom. We are reaching out to Muslims, to Hindus, to Sikhs, establishing bonds of personal friendship.

That sometimes pays dividends. We saw the impact of this on 7/7. The British Home Office established that the risk of a major terrorist incident in Britain made it more or less inevitable but what they really feared over and above the casualties of the terrorist attack were those that might emerge from an enormous backlash against Muslims not unlike that in Holland after the murder of film-maker Theo van Gogh. But there was no backlash in Britain.

Crisis tests the underlying health of the organism and the underlying health of Britain was evident because we'd put the work in and we keep putting it in.

AJN: Is it the duty of rabbis and Jewish leaders to defend the rights of Muslims to the Jews?

Rabbi Sacks: I have appointed a rabbi specialising in Jewish-Muslim relations. If we get left out, that will leave our community very vulnerable. I see inter-faith as something that should be a rabbi-led initiative.

On other subjects, Rav Sacks was equally enlightening vis-a-vis his point of view. Regarding gender relations:

AJN: Certain streams of Orthodoxy have gradually tried to increase the participation of women in shul services and other aspects of Orthodox life. Where do you feel the line should be drawn in terms of women's role in Orthodoxy?

Rabbi Sacks: We have done everything we can within the parameters of halacha to enhance the position of women in shul life. We have girls celebrating their bnei mitzvot in synagogues after the main Shabbat service, we have women on shul boards, things that never happened before.

Very early on in my chief rabbinate, together with the London Beth Din, we laid down the parameters for women's prayer groups.

The most important thing we have achieved is in the area of the agunah (chained woman). We have gett legislation and pre-nuptial agreements. Any family law judge can refuse to grant a civil divorce until a Jewish divorce has been given.

At least I know I'm at least a little in line with da'as Torah. I can breathe a bit easier now :)

Posted by Y-Love at 12:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Just seeing this article from George Washington University's Daily Colonial is enough to make me start beaming:

President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg, a handful of ambassadors and over 300 students filled the Marvin Center Grand Ballroom Thursday night for the fifth annual interfaith celebration of Iftar.

The dinner is the traditional breaking of Muslims’ daily fasts during the month of Ramadan. Thursday’s event was sponsored by the Muslim Students Association, the Jewish Student Association and Program Board, in conjunction with Trachtenberg and the University.

Guests enjoyed free Kosher and Halal cuisine – food that has been specially prepared under the guidelines Jewish and Islamic laws, respectively – during some brief comments by the university’s president and representatives from MSA, JSA and PB.

The event began with a joint speech by Fawzi Hindi ‘08, president of the MSA, and Adam Broms ‘09, president of the JSA, welcoming attendees. Representatives from both groups then recited their respective prayers accompanied by English translations.

“With all that’s going on in the world, we need to show we can and must get along and live in harmony,” said Saif Inam ‘08, MSA’s vice president. “What’s going on in the world doesn’t reflect our faiths.”

Inam, like many attendees, sampled food from both the Jewish and Muslim tables. Though not all preparation guidelines are the same in the two faiths, there are many similarities. Much of the food could be eaten by those practicing either diet.

These people saw that, on both sides, here were G-d-fearing people who want to do the right thing. People who are adverse to killing and who do eschew violence. On all sides of the room and spectrum. They used this as a vehicle for peace and unity.

Baruch Hashem w'alhamduliLl-h!!

The event was also attended by the Ambassador from Chad, Mahamoud Adam Bechir, who said:

“I hope this initiative will even further interfaith dialogue,” said Ambassador Mahamoud Adam Bechir of Chad. “And that will lead us to a better world.”

Posted by Y-Love at 08:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Alberto Fernandez, director of public diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department, officially apologized for his public comments criticizng the Iraq War, the Washington Post reported today. Speaking to the pan-Arab television station Al-Jazeera, Mr. Fernandez said our actions in Iraq reflected "arrogance and stupidity":

Speaking in Arabic, Fernandez discussed topics such as the United States' willingness to talk with insurgent groups in an effort to advance national reconciliation in Iraq.

"We tried to do our best," he said during the interview, which aired late Saturday. "But I think there is much room for criticism because, undoubtedly, there was arrogance and there was stupidity from the United States in Iraq."

"Upon reading the transcript of my appearance on Al-Jazeera, I realized that I seriously misspoke by using the phrase 'there has been arrogance and stupidity' by the U.S. in Iraq," Fernandez said in the statement. "This represents neither my views nor those of the State Department. I apologize."

Posted by Y-Love at 04:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

From The Jerusalem Post:

With a vision in their hearts of an Israeli state run in accordance with Jewish legal tradition, a group of leading religious Zionist rabbis and experts in Jewish law met in Jerusalem Tuesday evening for the official launch of a chain of rabbinic courts that aspires to replace the civil court system.

Gazit men (women cannot be rabbinic judges) aspire to reach all walks of Israeli society. These rabbis and Jewish legal experts want Israelis - religious and secular, male and female, Jewish and gentile - to settle their monetary disputes and torts the Jewish way. Turning to civil courts, they say, shows a lack of Jewish pride...."It is a shame that a nation with such a rich legal tradition turns to English law and Ottoman law instead looking to its own profound culture," said Be'eri in a telephone interview before the conference.

Be'eri agreed that Gazit was part of a much larger cultural war being waged by religious Israelis to strengthen the state's Jewish character.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

In The American Muslim, Dr. Robert D. Crane, former Deputy Director for Planning for the White House National Security Council and Director of Da’wa at the Islamic Center on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington, D.C., explains a Qur'anic dictum in the light of so much Islamophobia post-multiculturalism.

I do love America and its many diverse peoples, but above all I love what America was created to mean. We have accomplished a lot, have worked mightily to overcome the blot of slavery and of genocide against the Native Americans (my father’s people), and now we must work equally hard to overcome the more recent projection of our original failings onto the entire world.

America, Pakistan, and Israel are the only three countries deliberately created to embody and carry out the higher objectives of justice and freedom, and all three so far have failed to live up to our joint calling. All three of us have followed a rocky road and have a long way to go. The road seems to be getting rockier, but Allah tells us in the Qur’an that those who choose the upward path when all roads get rocky are the favored ones.

So then, what is the "upward path"? I wholeheartedly believe we can find the truth in the eternal words of Scripture, in the concepts expressed in the book of Amos, in 5:4-5:5, and 5:14:

5:4. For so said the L-rd to the house of Israel; Seek Me and live.

5:5. But seek not Bethel, neither come to Gilgal, nor pass Beersheba, for Gilgal shall be exiled, and Bethel shall become nought.

5:14 Seek good and not evil in order that you live, and so the L-rd G-d of Hosts shall be with you, as you said.

5:15. Hate evil and love good, and establish justice in the gate; perhaps the Lord God of Hosts will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.

The words G-d uses in 5:4, "dirshuni v'chyu", "seek Me and live", imply a soul searching, searching not only outside of oneself, but also within oneself. Dirshu es ha'melech b'himatz'o, "seek the King when He can be found", Jews are taught, is the central theme of the time between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. These 10 days are also referred to as the "10 days of Repentance", which, according to Jewish Law, involves confessing one's sins to G-d, regret over having sinned, and making a resolution not to sin in the future.

So we see that by examining our actions to see what our sins are, confessing them to G-d and expressing our regret and intent to do better to Him, we are, in effect, "seeking G-d". To do this takes a certain level of humility -- we are not the ones running the rules, dictating what we can or cannot do, G-d is. Seeking G-d implies this recognition.

From this point of recognition, one is almost behooved to seek "good", good being defined either as that which brings us closer to G-d (R' Tzadok ha'Kohen) or that which is a manifestation of G-d's Will (Nachmanides). In addition, we are told not to seek "good" from or desire things from points external to G-d's Will (here in the book of Amos, idolatrous faiths), for they will "become naught", become nothing when paling in comparison to the Creator of the Universe.

It is time for America to take a long look at itself. How many lives have been extinguished for oil? How many lives have been ruined -- in violation of Scripture -- in the pursuit of "morality" with no Scriptural basis?

The upward path becomes obvious once one realizes that there is an "up".

The upward path becomes a possibility once one realizes that 21st century America is not the pinnacle of human achievement. Were we to realize -- without pointing fingers -- precisely how we (and Israel and Pakistan) have failed ourselves and other nations, if we could admit our own injustices, then and only then can we truly move towards "establishing justice".

Otherwise, if we continue with incessant justifications as to why it's acceptable to offend person X, kill family Y, and alienate and marginalize person Z, we have no hope. We will continue to give nothing more than lip service to the foundations on which America was built. Opportunity does not exist in the face of virulent racists, one can never achieve a dream -- much less the "American" one -- in the nightmare of class-based oppression.

"G-d, bless America."

America, give Him a good reason to.

Posted by Y-Love at 05:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Aycan Demirel, a German man of Turkish origin, has decided to build bridges and to attack anti-Semitism he sees as emanating from within the Middle Eastern communities there. As Ha'aretz reports:

BERLIN - When Aycan Demirel looks out his office window onto the main street of the Kreuzberg neighborhood, center of the Turkish community in Germany's capital, he is unimpressed by the diverse human mosaic for which "Little Istanbul" is famous. Businesses along Oranienstrasse are populated by young Germans eating shwarma to the sounds of Turkish music, but Demirel pointedly recalled the darker side of the neighborhood experience. "The residents here love to treat this neighborhood as a model of multiculturalism and tolerance, but that image is fraudulent," he said.

"The Jews have no place in this multiculturalism," Demirel said. "If you wear a kippa or a Magen David, there's a big chance you'll be cursed at and even assaulted. Anti-Semitism is rearing its head in Germany, only now the anti-Semites are young Muslims."

Demirel, 38, is not Jewish; he emigrated from Turkey 16 years ago.

The article continues:

According to Demirel, the recent expressions of anger by radical Muslims in Germany are just the tip of the iceberg of what he terms the "culture of hate" in Muslim communities. Daily exposure to a "barrage of anti-Semitic Islamist propaganda" led him two years ago to found KIGA (Kreuzberger Initiative gegen Antisemitismus), whose local activists - of German, Turkish and Arab origin - work with schools and youth centers to fight anti-Semitism, primarily in Muslim communities.

KIgA e.V.
Oranienstrasse 34
D-10999 Berlin

Tel.: +49 (0)30 - 695 65 865
Fax: +49 (0)30 - 695 69 266
Mail: mail@kiga-berlin.org

Posted by Y-Love at 04:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

This is apparently the face of the most frightening thing in the UK right now.

Niqaabi, veiled Muslim females. Apparently. Their choice to cover their faces is completely ruining British race relations and the veil needs to be done away with as a part of British society.

So were the words around British parliament this week as the row over British pol Jack Straw's veil comments continues to expand.

Straw said that at all official meetings, he expected Muslim women to remove their niqab veils. His statement was "Muslim women should not have to cover their faces".

While I'm sure he believes this is a wonderful sentiment and I'm sure he's brimming with gender egalitarianism, was this his place to say? At all? To the niqabi, she is fulfilling the words of a verse in Qur'an.

Perhaps this is just meant to be putting stronger pressure on immigrants to "conform to Western values". Of course, this means that pluralism and diversity have now officially gone down the drain and that multiculturalism is being tossed out as something that doesn't even work in theory. Once you start legislating people's values and outlooks as a condition of citizenship, you are headed on a slippery slope towards nothing but forced assimilation.

Jemima Khan, a convert to Islam and campaigner for Muslim women, said: "My belief also happens to be that covering the face is completely unnecessary in Islam... That said, while the sight of a woman in a veil may be shocking to the average Westerner, there are many Muslim women who will argue that a skeletal 14-year-old on a catwalk is equally disturbing."

Harriet Harman of the British Labour Party:

On Islamic dress, for example, she makes Jack Straw's remarks on the niqab seem minor quibbles. Harman would prefer to see the veil gone from British society. "Because I want women to be fully included. If you want equality, you have to be in society, not hidden away from it."

The abolition debate, she says, should be led by Muslim women, but there are none in the Commons. "You get there [to veil-free societies] by mobilising so that it doesn't seem anti- Islam . . . How can you stand as an MP when men's faces are on posters, and voters can't see yours? How can you [live an equal life] if you can't get a driving licence or a passport? The veil is an obstacle to women's participation, on equal terms, in society."

Some Muslim women see niqab as a mandatory part of their religious practice, some of whom are professional women who adopted the practice voluntarily. (See, for instance, The Niqabi Paralegal or these organizations.) These are the women who will now be told that they, by writ of Parliament, MUST take off their veils.

To borrow an American ideal, you now have a mix of church and state taking place in the UK with a macabre twist. The state is pushing ideals of one church to regulate another. This is the worst type of endorsement.

But of course, it's being done under the guise of feminism -- as if giving women equal choice as to what to wear isn't feminist, and as if saying men's Muslim religious attire IS acceptable but women's ISN'T does not reek of sexism -- and therefore will be more palatable to the left, but make no mistake. This is the same neocon Islamophobia which is sweeping Europe (and of course, as we know already, comes hand-in-hand with neo-fascists and anti-Semites).

So now a piece of cloth becomes an obstacle to British race relations, but anti-Semitic college rallies, rising hate crimes, Nazi-aligned soccer fans, and dentists with rocket launchers and right-wing propaganda aren't?

This is Babylon.

Posted by Y-Love at 01:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

American Muslim "convert" (he said it, I didn't) Abu Sinan left a Yom Kippur card for all his "Jewish brethren" and wished us a "gut Yontif". A belated thank you for your wishes, and 1,000 kudos for building bridges when they are sorely needed.

Abu Sinan is a "white convert to Islam" who maintains a blogspot quite critical of the military, the neocons, and the splits dividing the modern Muslim world. Another living proof that terrorists -- and not "Islam" -- are the problem.

Posted by Y-Love at 07:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In case anyone was wondering what Hamas' position is on the official recognition of the State of Israel, Page A18 of today's Washington Post clues us in:

In case there was any doubt, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh spelled out Hamas's position at a rally last weekend: "I tell you with all honesty, we will not recognize Israel, we will not recognize Israel, we will not recognize Israel."

[Palestinian President Mahmoud] Abbas responded by threatening, as he has before, to dissolve the Palestinian government or order a referendum. But he lacks the legal authority either to remove Hamas from power or to schedule a vote of any kind.

Just FYI.

Posted by Y-Love at 06:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

By now everyone in the area has gotten the news: the plane crash that happened today on the Upper East Side of Manhattan is presumed to have involved Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle. Lidle's passport was found among the wreckage on East 72nd Street, and the Cirrus SR20 plane which crashed this fateful day had registration number N929CD, registered to Cory Lidle (though he had requested a 180 day extension to file government paperwork).

As I noted on the MySpace Current Events blog, Mr. Lidle got the plane at a discount, if NBC 4's report of a purchase price of $187,000 was correct. A search for the plane on Google returns sale prices as high as $199K. I had initially hypothesized that this was a tragic example of "you get what you pay for" -- and would also explain the lack of an initial official response from the plane's maintenance people.

Lidle has since been proclaimed dead by the Medical Examiner's Office.

Today's crash was a horrible accident and there is no link to terrorism. Watching the live video at NBC4.com, they say that Lidle had only 75 hours of flight time as of the crash, and report accounts of experienced pilots who say that conditions in Jersey were "marginal" for visual flying, which was the only type of flight Lidle was qualified to do -- he was not yet experienced enough to fly on instrumentation alone. But was this solely to blame?

Surely he must have been at least a bit distressed over the Yankees playoff defeat. In the Albany Times Union: "Did Torre manage his best playoff series ? No. He shouldn’t have started Jaret Wright instead of Cory Lidle in Game 4, particularly against a lineup that thrives on fastballs as much as the Tigers." Kevin Cooney of PhillyBurbs.com: "Only Cory Lidle (Yankees) and Carlos Silva...were starters on post-season rosters and neither one of them made starts in the division series."

But then when Cory Lidle did come in, one (obviously biased) news sourced called him unimpressive. MLB.com:

Cory Lidle appeared to calm things down by retiring the first four hitters he faced, but the Tigers struck him for three runs in the fifth, breaking the game wide open.

It's certainly disappointing, and everyone in that locker room is disappointed," Torre said. "They outplayed us. They outpitched us. There's not much else you can say."

And now, four days later, Lidle is dead. Dead on what looks like just a simple tour of Manhattan -- after all, he apparently loved to "fly around and gamble."

No one's saying he was suicidal. This was a simple, tragic accident. But perhaps the combination of marginal flying conditions and whoever else was on the plane made him zone out and not realize that he was flying in a well-known no-fly zone.

He was married with a young child. There is no reason for him to kill himself. Unless he had completely lost his mind. However, even in driving school, teenagers are told -- "don't drive when you're angry, it'll take your mind off the road" and other exhortations reminding that emotional state can affect one's driving status.

Was he trained -- or is there any way to gauge pre-emptively -- as to what to do in case of an engine failure? Why didn't he pull the parachute? Sheer inexperience? If he descended from below radar range at around "the 59th Street bridge area", were there any other alternatives as to crash landings?

While we may never know for sure, it must have been at least on his mind as an "I told you so". I feel sorry for his family and I pray that they make it through this harsh time with all of their emotional faculties. Everything being said by those familiar NTSB "probable cause" findings are saying it will most likely be pilot error which caused the crash, NBC4 is reporting. All fatal accidents involving Cirrus SR20s have been the fault of pilot error, as the plane is very fast and similar to a sportscar. There was a distress call moments before it crashed, NBC4 said.

A tragic loss. What could have been done?

Posted by Y-Love at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This is one of the main reasons that I decry the infernal linking of anti-terrorism activities and Islamophobia. While chasing innocent law abiding Muslims under the rallying cry of "racial profiling is necessary", one misses actual terrorists with the largest stockpile of explosive chemicals in the nation.

From the Black Information Link, a black news service in the UK:

A FORMER British National Party member has been accused of possessing the largest amount of chemical explosives of its type ever found in the country. Robert Cottage, 49, of Talbot Street, Colne, appeared before Burnley magistrates last week charged with possession of an explosive substance.

Officers claim that their find is the largest haul of chemicals of its kind discovered.

The case has attracted little publicity as the national media continue to focus on Muslims.

Aaron Haworth, 23, who lives next door but one with his partner Marie and two children, added: "The police have been here since Thursday and we are still none the wiser as to what's happened.

"It's ridiculous really. I have two young children and if there is bomb making equipment at the house I want to know about it because I have my children's safety to think about. There's been all sorts of rumours flying around, I don't know why the police are being so cagey, that's what's making everyone so worried."

A valid question, no? (Hat tip to Isa)

Posted by Y-Love at 04:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The far-right wing Belgian political party Vlaams Belang, headed by one of the most successful extreme-Right leaders in Europe, Filip Dewinter, recently called on the Jewish public to join his campaign against radical Islam and support his party, Ynet reported today.

Dewinter heads Belgium's Vlaams Belang party, which advocates strict limits on immigration and has been denounced as xenophobic.

The politician called Antwerp’s large Jewish community a natural partner “against the main enemy of the moment, radical Islamic fundamentalism,” according to a report in The Independent....

"If they won't accept our way of life, if they won't accept those principles which are very clear and very necessary for Western democracy, I don't think we have to recognize Islam as an official religion in our country,” Dewinter said recently.

It must be made clear to aliens and immigrants in Flanders that they are expected to comply with our laws, and also to adapt to our values and morality, to our habits and to important traditional principles of European civilization, such as the separation of church and state, democracy, freedom of speech and the equal status of men and women.

For those aliens and immigrants who reject, ignore or contest the above, a policy of repatriation will be implemented, through appropriate legislation regulating political asylum, nationality, security and expulsion. Illegal and criminal aliens must be repatriated. Voting rights are reserved for citizens.

The Vlaams Belang strives for the secession of Flanders from the artificial Belgian state. Our aim is to dissolve Belgium and establish an independent Flemish state.

Concerts against Racism in Belgium were billed by Vlaams Belang as anti-them.

Vlaams Belang is already the darling of prejudiced websites like MajorityRights.com whose extensive blogs contain many Vlaams Belang statements. Among them this, from an interview with the New York Jewish Week:

Jewish Week: There are those who fear that first you will go after the Moroccans and then the Jews. How do you respond?

Dewinter: This is ridiculous. You could say the same about president Bush or Tony Blair: “First they are going after radical Islam, then they will go after the Jews.” As if Judaïsm were an extension of Islam. In our view, Judaïsm and Islam are absolute not two of the same kind. On the contrary, they are foes. One has to choose sides. Which side are you on in the “war on terror”? The side of western democracy and western civilization, with its Judeo-Christian roots, or the side of radical Islam? The side of Great Britain, America and Israel, or the side of Iran, Sudan and the Taliban?

Jewish Week: There are those who say Jews should not be voting for a party that espouses xenophobia. Your reaction?

Dewinter: “Xenophobia” is not the word a would use. If it absolutely must be a “phobia” let it be “islamophobia”. Yes, we’re afraid of Islam. The islamisation of Europe is a frightening thing. Even distinguished Jewish scholars as Bat Ye’or and Bernard Lewis warned for this. If this historical process continues, the Jews will be the first victims. Europe will became as dangerous for them as Egypt or Algeria. So, I return your question. Should Jews vote for a party that wants to stop the spread of Islam in Europe? ...

Second of all, I make the following assertion: The entire 'Judaism vs. Islam' lie is being invented by Christians. Not only are two ideologies rarely in conflict, the entire premise is a lie (see the Ramba"m, see Rav Shlomo Amar, see the Shulchan Aruch).

Third of all, there is no line-item vote. You get what you vote for. All of it.

Posted by Y-Love at 02:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, well, well.

As if anyone was surprised. A new study, commissioned by the religious-secular coexistence organization Tzav Piyus which seeks to increase religious-secular dialogue in Israel, just released the results of a new study today to Israeli daily Ma'ariv's NRG.co.il (link is in Hebrew). The study found, among other things:

• 90% of Charedi people would buy a car from a secular or traditional person, 42% of secular people responded that they would not buy a car from a Charedi person;


• 62.3% of Charedi people would live in a place which was majority secular; 57.7% of secular people said they "would not" do the converse;


• 50.2% of secular respondents said that the statement "Charedim are oppressing the country" was true; when asked a similar extreme question, "Are secular Jews only half-Jews?" only 6.8% of Charedim said it was true (granted, this is a biased question)

Posted by Y-Love at 03:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today at Palestine Chronicle.com, a blog/electronic journal chronicling life in Palestine, Israeli peace activist Nurit Peled-Elhanan speaks about what she considers to be the root cause of the lack of interfaith dialogue in the Middle East.

To wit: racist eduction.

No one can doubt that this is the case, however, Ms. Peled-Elhanan, in the opinion of this author, is just a little too critical of Israel in blind oblivion to anti-Semitic messages in Palestinian schools and children's programming:

The western world today is infected with fear of Islam and of the Muslim womb. Great France of liberte egalite and fraternite is scared of little head-scarved girls, Jewish Israel calls in public speeches and schoolbooks the Arab citizens of Israel a demographic nightmare and the enemy from within. As for the Palestinians refugees living under occupation, they are defined in Israeli History schoolbooks as a 'problem to be solved". Not long ago the Jews were a problem to be solved.

Despite the facf that the paragraph prior to this one sounds borderline anti-Semitic, one thing Ms. Peled-Elhanan says, I find particularly incensing:

Not only American soldiers but also Israeli soldiers who actually perform massacres of 'Arabs' - Palestinian or Lebanese - may never see an Arab human face until they are drafted to the army, but they learn, for 12 long years, that these people are primitive, bear children in order to send them to the streets and throw stones at our peace-keeping soldiers, uneducated because they don’t receive our education, conniving and dirty because they have different notions about politeness, they dress differently and cover their heads with different pieces of cloth.

Well, from my experience there are many more Kafiehs in the camp of peace lovers than there are kippas. Israeli children are deprived from knowing their immediate neighbours, their history and their culture and their merits. Israeli children are educated to see their neighbours as an unwanted element. This is not education, this is mind infection.

First, someone wearing a kippa ostensibly has a connection to Judaism and may even be dati. Please let it not be forgotten the discrimination against Charedi and dati people in Israel, and many of these soldiers who have "never seen an Arab face" also pejoratively refer to dosim in conversation. Many Israeli children are taught that Charedim are parasites, siphoning endless resources from the government, and antithetical to everything Israel stands for. Israel legislates anti-Torah measures to no end, and the Education Ministry said flat out that yeshivot weren't as important as public schools.

The kippa-wearing Israeli may feel a bit alienated by a movement which, almost preferentially for Jews, preaches secularism uber alles and that halacha is a backward mindset to be freed from. Chief Sephardic Rabbi Rav Shlomo Amar initiated interfaith dialogue with a Sunni sheikh in Qatar, and Rabbi David Rosen's Intefaith dialogue council has long been doing notable actions. The pro-coexistence mindset exists under many kippot, but who is going to shlep all the way from yeshiva to a pork-eating kibbutz?

Ms. Peled-Elhanan writes angrily about "[ultra-]Orthodox Jewish children who have never left Brooklyn know that to kill Arabs is a 'mitzva' (holy commandment) for they are 'vilde hayeths' (wild beasts)," but fails to remember that the same Central Rabbinical Congress whose word on kashrus goes unquestioned on Pesach is backing the Neturei Karta, or that 19 different Hasidic sects are listed on jewsnotzionists.org. Ms. Peled-Elhanan writes a thinly veiled j'accuse against Yad L'Achim, referring to "racist laws that separate mothers from fathers and children...when they lose a child, even if it is one of 12, their pain is equal to mine," as if this were based on racism.

The girl who was taken from Tulkarm was taken for religious reasons. Justified or not, right or wrong, this was not based on blind racism like the article would imply.

The Israeli peace movement can often be rabidly secular, and groups which promote peace and coexistence often do so by extricating G-d from the Jewish side of the picture, if not both sides. One can not expect kippot in a room where any mention of the word tzniut has one compared to a mullah or where even the suggestion of a restful Shabbat is an infringement on one's "human rights."

While there are many ways in which Jewish education could stand to be improved, what Ms. Peled-Elhanan is speaking of is not taking place in a vacuum. The peace movement could stand to learn a bit from its religious like-minded brethren.

And let us not forget that the government of Israel is a secular government with loose ties to an ever-diluted Rabbinate. That must be kept in mind any time "Jewish schools" or the "Jewish state" is blamed for anything.

Posted by Y-Love at 02:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I felt that, among all my writing about current (and past and future) events, my actual viewpoint on interfaith relations -- primarily with our Muslim counterparts -- often gets taken for granted. The Chief Sephardic Rabbi of Israel, HaRav Shlomo Amar, wrote to Sheikh Yusuf Kardawi of Qatar, an influential Sunni imam, after the row erupted over anti-Muhammad comments Pope Benedict quoted in his recent speech. In his letter, Rav Amar says:

In a letter in Arabic to Yusuf Kardawi, Amar wrote that "we must respect all faiths and the ways of all peoples and nations, as... [Mohammed] said: 'That each nation will go as instructed by their God. Even when there is a struggle between nations this must not be turned in a struggle of faiths.'"

"Every Jew who studies the writings of our great rabbis ¬ most prominent among them the Rambam [Rabbi Moshe Maimonides], peace be upon him ¬ knows that our great thinkers wrote in Arabic and lived among the Muslim countries and participated with the great thinkers of Islam in the effort to explain the words of God, on the basis of wisdom ..."

I believe that the right wing GOP neoconservative platform is hijacking actual Torah hashkafah. There is never a commandment to hate anyone based on ethnicity -- even the seven Cana'anite nations weren't to be hated, even if they were to be killed, but we still, on Mt. Sinai, in the Oral Torah, were given laws of what to do with Cana'anite slaves, etc. -- and unfortunately, the "war on terror" being fought in Iraq gets translated into often ugly Islamophobia here in the West.

In Tikkun magazine, the illustrious writer Jonathan Schorsch writes lamentably about something that I would consider a milestone worthy of reciting a blessing over:

An article in Haaretz last week announced that several ultra-orthodox rabbis will seek to dialogue with their Islamicist Palestinian counterparts, since both face and fear the threat of multicultural liberal democracy.

I think that anyone who would say such a thing -- if they have a shred of connection to religiosity in their hearts -- must say so selectively.

If Israel "has become a morass of individualist competitiveness and materialism", like the Tikkun article says, this is not the natural outgrowth, or that which "free-market worshipping (neo)-conservatism leads to", it is not the Enlightenment ideal that is going to get Israel out of it. The exploitation and materialism are a sui generis manifestation of Israel's departure from Torah observance.

I'm really not just talking about Shabbos licht over here. Though I support those 100 percent, and would love to see only tznius in the Holy Land, there are other issues.

Were Israel truly manifesting kol Yisra'el areivim zeh la zeh - all Jews are responsible for one another by virtue of our being one inseparable entity, would one be able to import a Jewish Russian sex slave via the UAE or Gaza? Conversely, were we loath to say "my father is better than your father" -- the seed of racism -- as exhorted to all Jews by Rabbi Akiva in the Mishnah in Sanhedrin, would we ever hear a slogan like "a good Arab is a dead Arab" (Aravi tov, Aravi met)? Would the Torah not want us to speak to leaders of the only other exclusively monotheistic religion on the planet for the sake of peace?

If we are precluded from making peace by virtue of being at war, where was the mandatory call for peace at the beginning of this war? Who is leading us into war? Chilonim? Who is our Melech and where are our trumpet blasts? Israel fought Hezbollah (and Syria and Jordan and and and...) -- concrete enemies.. To fight an amorphous ethnicity or faith is not Jewish conduct, or Torah-sanctioned.

The values of the Torah is what we should try to uphold. Not the values of some secular Enlightenment.

And I think you'll find they sound -- with some minor (in the big humanity-wide picture) tweaks -- a lot like progressivism. (Except the whole modesty thing. But you'll just have to get over that. Thanks.)

Posted by Y-Love at 12:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

This was the scene at a Dubai shopping mall this past week. Last week -- synchronous with the second day of the Jewish New Year -- began the Muslim holy month of Ramadhan, marked by fasting and penitence, culminating in Laylat al-Qadr, the night Muslims believe the Qur'an was revealed.

The UAE, as Brigadier Abdul-Jaleel Mahdi, head of protective safety of the Dubai police department, noted, has no specific law requiring modest dress during Ramadan. However, as one reader of the Emiri 7 DAYS blog noted, dressing in short skirts and revealing tops is just plain disrespectful to religious residents:

One Muslim reader, Anas Zurkiyeh wrote to 7DAYS yesterday of “inconsiderate ladies who wear skirts, shorts and all those revealing items in malls and on the streets during our fast.”

And a non-Muslim reader, Carla, told us yesterday: “I am shocked at how some people completely ignore the modest dress code during Ramadan. Women were doing their shopping in shorts, miniskirts and skimpy tops. It’s not intentional, but just plain ignorance.”

Dubai is now a major player among the cities of the world and tourism is highly promoted here. Tourist don’t want to come to Dubai to find themselves restricted from doing simple things like wearing the clothes they like just because it is Ramadan....you must understand that for the U.A.E. to thrive or rather survive in a multi ethnic setting freedom is a very important initiative for people who reside here & tourist alike. I’m not saying that all laws should be abolished, just that the laws should be reasonable.

This, however, begs a bigger question: Why is it an inalienable right of every single bi-pedaled human to expose 80% of their flesh? A request like "don't show your breasts" is abhorred like FGM throughout the secular media. Dubai's shari'a based dress code is actually, in the opinion of this author, not so restrictive as to cause a drop in UAE tourism:

A: MEN’S DRESS CODE

Indecent Dress or Behavior:
Very short pants in public or commercial places like malls and public offices.
Chest nudity.
Ezar in public places (Ezar is the local Emirate male underwear).

B: WOMEN’S DRESS CODE

Indecent Dress:
Clothing that exposes the stomach and back.
Short clothing above the knee.
Tight and transparent clothing that describes the body.

No one wants a scene like they used to have in Zanzibar, Tanzania:

In the past, women who have dressed in short skirts or swimsuits inside Zanzibar's main city have been attacked. Two other Islamic groups have also called on tourists to respect Islamic practices, though none has threatened any direct action.

But the UAE is a Muslim country (come ON, what does the A stand for?). Western secular societies have no such framework -- absolute personal freedom is an ideal, if not an actuality.

While I find the music to be completely cheesy (4), perhaps Dubai malls would be well served by playing this little video for their shoppers:

Posted by Y-Love at 05:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)