I Call Bullshit

Each time it happens we are told it is just an anomaly.  An aberration.  No pattern.  None whatsoever.  Just a lone wolf running outside of the pack.  Yes, that’s exactly what each jihadist or terrorist is, if I can even use the j-word or t-word.

A Muslim runs over people in Nice.  A Muslim hacks people with an ax on a train in Germany.  A Muslim stabs a mom and her three young daughters at a resort in the Alps.  All occurring this week.  But move along all you racist phobic’s.  There’s nothing to see here.  Nothing but a continued pattern that has been happening for years.

The attack in the Alps really set me off.  A man name Mohamed stabbed sisters, ages 14, 12, and 8, for reportedly being to “scantily dressed.”  Can I just say what a lot of warm-blooded, conservative women like me are thinking?  What a perverted asshole!  A perverted asshole that represents what Islam has done for a long time.  Subjugated women.  There.  I said it.

Subjugate: verb – to bring under domination or control, especially by conquest.

Like I said, it’s what’s Islam does to women.  I hate it.  And I hate that this religion is being promoted, especially by liberals who love to brag that they are the gallant fighters against the war on women, as “the religion of peace.”  Bullshit.

Okay.  I’ll pause.  Maybe take a shot of whiskey.  At least take a deep breath.  And tell you a little story.

I squirmed a little bit in my seat while riding on the train in India.  My squirming was not due to being uncomfortable on the 14-hour train ride.  It was due to delight.  Delight in hearing my 60 something year-old female travel companion, Ginger Burnside, give hell to a Muslim man about the way Muslim men treat women.

My companion’s normally sweet Southern accent had a little bite to it as she asked, “Why do you men force women to cover themselves when it is you who have the problem?  If you lust when looking at a woman you should cover your eyes.  It is wrong to make a woman cover her entire body.” 

It’s one of my favorite moments in life.  It happened about twenty years ago.  Back then there wasn’t as much danger in getting one’s head chopped off for questioning the religion of Islam.

Ginger was one woman trying to take on a beast, instead of feeding the beast through appeasement.  Not that it did any good.  But at least she tried. 

I recently read an article about the abuse of Muslim women in Bangladesh.  Ginger spent a lot of time in Bangladesh, as well as in several other Muslim countries.  She had seen with her own eyes the oppression and abuse done under sharia law.

A nation-wide survey conducted by the government espoused that 87% of married women in Bangladesh are abused.  Damn.  Of those, 50% had sustained serious injury. 

The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRITV) is a non-profit organization that monitors and translates Arab media, schoolbooks, and religious sermons.  If you value your sanity you won’t spend too much time watching or reading the translations.  It is hard to stomach to say the least.  But if one does watch or listen, he or she will quickly find out that the violence being perpetrated on Muslim women is sanctioned and taught.  One will also quickly find out that jihad is being called for from Muslim clerics and leaders around the world to subjugate and kill non-Muslims.  It’s nothing new.

Calls for violence against the West and against Israel have gone out for decades.  Americans and Europeans have just been too caught up in their own lives to notice.  And those who do notice now are quickly warned that evil does not exist outside of movies and television shows.  Zombies?  Vampires?  Aliens?  Yes, in the world of fantasy, all these things need to be stopped from destroying the human race.  But people in real life who systematically perpetrate killing all non-conformists?  Nah.  People like that don’t need to be destroyed.  We just need to learn to coexist with them.

Muslims gang-rape, capture and sell women as sex-slaves, burn people alive, behead, crucify, torture, disembowel, sexually abuse, cut off genitals of victims, ax people to death, run over people with cars and trucks, kill female members of their own family if the girl is too Westernized, kill females who try to get an education, hang homosexuals in public executions, throw homosexuals off buildings, blow-up people, and hijack planes.  Just to name a few.  This is what you, civilized citizen of the world, are expected to empathize with, per Hillary Clinton, and coexist with, per many liberals.

I’ll repeat; violence perpetrated by Muslims is not an anomaly.  It is systematic and it is increasing.  And it has a goal.  To establish a caliphate, i.e. subjugate the world. 

And just to cover all my bases, let me take this commercial break and say: if you are a Muslim who does not participate in the above carnage, or you know Muslims who don’t, good for you.  In fact, slow clap for being a normal human being.  And since you are a normal human being, then I’m going to assume that you care more about the atrocities being done in the name of your religion than you care about the reputation of your religion, i.e. you know who the real victims are.  Really, though, do those of us dialoguing about all the atrocities being done by Muslims really have to keep pausing to check on the feelings of non-violent Muslims?  Please.

Okay, I guess I'm done venting.  I do have faith that somehow this is all going to end well.  But in the mean time I worry some.  Worry for my loved ones who are Jews.  Although, they would say, "Don't worry about us.  It's you I'm worried about."  They have a point.  And I worry for those who don't carry guns.  And I worry for the over all well-being of mankind.  But really, it's all going to end well.  The darkness covering the earth was predicted.  But so was light.  I guess today was just one of those days, though, when it feels like "we got to kick at the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight."  My kicking doesn't amount to much though.  I realize that.  That's why I turn to and think about Isaiah 63.  It describes a day of vengeance when God reeks havoc against evildoers.  Guess what virtue Isaiah equates destroying evil with?  Kindness.  In the real world, calling out and destroying evil is one of the truest acts of kindness one can bestow on a fellow human being.    

If it walks like a Muslim, and talks like a Muslim it's definitely not a Muslim

I heard President George W. Bush speak at a private event in the spring of 2014.  A comment he made took me by surprise.  He said as assuredly as saying the sky is blue that, “A global caliphate is trying to be established.”  That comment in itself did not surprise me.    

What surprised me was the comment he attached to it.  He immediately went on to say, “But it has nothing to do with Islam.” 

Noticing the crowd’s negative reaction, he said, “I know that’s hard to hear.”  Yes, it was hard to hear because it was so illogical and untrue. 

I shouldn’t have been surprised by his comment, though.  After all, Bush as a politician, along with many other politicians, has been pushing the narrative to disassociate Islam from terrorism for a long time. 

In case you don’t remember, six days after 9/11, speaking from the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C., Bush said, “The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That's not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace.”  He would continue to push that narrative throughout his presidency. 

But even knowing his past comments about Islam, the absurdity of Bush trying to disassociate a caliphate from Islam surprised me.  The very essence of a caliphate is Islamic.  It would be as inane as saying that the Pope has nothing to do with Catholicism, or as Obama has started saying, that ISIS has nothing to do with Islam.

Never mind that ISIS has declared, “We are soldiers of Islam and took on our responsibility to bring back the glory of the Islamic Caliphate."  As David Weigel at Bloomberg Politics said, “The terror group is practically begging the West to identify it and identify Islamic terrorism.”

Which believe it or not, at one point Bush did accurately identify the Islamic caliphate connection.  In 2006, speaking to the Military Officers Association of America he said, “We know what the terrorists intend to do because they've told us.  And we need to take their words seriously . . . they hope to establish a violent political utopia which they call caliphate, where all would be ruled according to their hateful ideology.  Osama bin Laden called the 9/11 attacks, ‘a great step towards the unity of Muslims and establishing the righteous caliphate.’  This caliphate would be a totalitarian Islamic empire.”

Yet, fast-forward a few years and Bush tells a crowd that a caliphate has nothing to do with Islam.  And of course, his successor President Obama and his administration have tried even harder to push the narrative of Islam not being associated with terrorism or a caliphate.

When John Brennan, current CIA director, was head of Homeland Security and Counterrorism in 2011, he shrugged off the establishment of a caliphate, saying, “That vision is absurd, and we are not going to organize our counter-terrorism policies against a feckless delusion that is never going to happen. We are not going to elevate these thugs and their murderous aspirations into something larger than they are.”   

After Brennan at least recognized that there was something, after all, to the rise of ISIS and their “feckless delusion” he still tried to separate them from any religious ties.  In March of 2015, he tried to explain on Fox news that although ISIS terrorists are Islamic terrorists, they represent an “ideology of violence,” not a religious ideology. 

In 2009, Obama clearly stated what he considered one of his main responsibilities as president to be.  While in Cairo he said, "I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear."  Even to the point, it seems, of claiming that ISIS has nothing to do with Islam. 

The most egregious changes made to push a narrative and protect Islam from negative stereotypes were made in the Department of Justice.  In 2011, Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Cole said, “I recently directed all components of the Department of Justice to re-evaluate their training efforts in a range of areas, from community outreach to national security.” This “reevaluation” included the removal of all references to Islam in connection with any investigation of jihadist terror activity perpetrated by adherents to Islam. 

Dwight C. Holton, former assistant U.S. Attorney in Oregon, met with then Attorney General Eric Holder after the 2010 “Christmas-tree bomber” incident involving Mohamed Mohamud (who believed he was going to maim and kill thousands by detonating a bomb in Oregon).  Holton stated that Holder was “firmly committed” to purging everything politically incorrect from FBI training materials, saying, “I want to be perfectly clear about this: training materials that portray Islam as a religion of violence or with a tendency towards violence are wrong, they are offensive, and they are contrary to everything that this president, this attorney general and Department of Justice stands for. They will not be tolerated.” 

Holton went on to say, “Before this effort, a lot of us didn’t understand that when we make an arrest in a high-profile terrorism case that involves someone who claims they follow Islam, it creates a mini-backlash against people in communities.”

Regarding the “Christmas-tree bomber” case, Holton proudly stated that, “In the 37-page complaint that laid out allegations against Mohamed Mohamud, he is never once identified as a Muslim.  We were very careful about that.  It’s not relevant from our perspective, what’s relevant is the violence.”

Sound familiar to the modus operandi in the San Bernardino shooting?  The government did everything possible to keep from having to identify the terrorists as Muslim.

Even more recently, a Muslim dressed in traditional Muslim clothing shot 13 times at a Philadelphia policeman.  When arrested, he said that he tried to kill the policeman in the name of Islam and as a show of allegiance to ISIS.  Yet, the Mayor of Philadelphia, Jim Kenney, quickly corrected the shooter’s own confession and said that the shooting “had nothing to do with Islam or the teaching of Islam.” 

Protecting Muslim communities from a so-called backlash and protecting the reputation of Islam has become more important to politicians than correctly identifying and admitting why Muslims murder American citizens. 

Back in what seems like another lifetime, the rise of terror being associated with the religious tenants of Islam was spoken about plainly and truthfully, at least behind closed doors.  In 2002, the Senate held a hearing called The Intelligence Community's Response to Past Terrorist Attacks Against the United States from February 1993 to September 2001.

Notes from that hearing included phrases such as: a “new form of terrorism motivated by religious fanaticism,” “terrorist who favored an Islamic agenda,” and “an increasing prevalence of religious terrorist, in which violence first and foremost is a sacramental act or a divine duty.”   

In another 2002 Senate hearing, Dale Watson, from the Counterterrorism Division of the FBI said, “The single common element among these individuals is their commitment to the radical international jihad movement, which includes a radicalized ideology and agenda promoting the use of violence against the ‘enemies of Islam’ in order to overthrow all governments which are not ruled by Sharia law.” 

That is simply a spade being called a spade.  It’s been a long time.  American leaders haven’t just slipped hard and fast down the slippery slope of political correctness.  They’ve free fallen so far that one has to wonder if there is any leader who has the fortitude to end the age of narratives and instead identify terrorists without regards to who it offends. 

After all, the terrorists themselves keep saying exactly who they are and why they are terrorizing people.  When Army Pvt. Naser Jason Abdo, who was arrested and sentenced for plans to kill Ft. Hood soldiers, was asked by his incredulous mother why he was going to kill them he succinctly said, “The reason is religion Mom, there is no other reason.” And of course, the religion he was referring to was Islam.  

My Supposed Article of Incitement . . . Meanwhile 13 Boys Were Executed for Watching Soccer

I recently submitted the following article to be published on an American and an Israeli website.  I've had several articles over the last few years published on both sites.  This time, however, my article was rejected.  The American editor's reason -  because he felt that the article was an unnecessary attack on the students at Duke University.  The Israeli editor's reasoning - because the article went against their policy of inciting violence and hatred.

To the American editor, I quickly pointed out that my article was hardly an attack.  But after pondering his comment for a few days, maybe he's right.  It is an attack. An attack on the political correctness that has replaced logic and common sense across college campuses.  An attack on narratives and agendas that have replaced truth.  And an attack on the gullibility that has washed over campuses to the point that students believe Israel is an apartheid state and is the roadblock to peace in the Middle East.

After the rejection from the Israeli editor, I just wanted to cry.  While the intellectual elites worry about whose feelings are hurt, men, women, and children around the world are being murdered.  Never mind about the feelings of those who have been murdered since I first wrote this article a week ago.  Never mind how it felt for the gay man to be thrown from the top of a high building.  Never mind how it felt for the 13 boys, whose crime was watching soccer, to be executed.  So much for the victims feelings.  Instead, the messenger who reports to naive college students the hatred and violence happening under sharia law, is accused of hatred and violence.  Go figure.  

The article I submitted was based on the events at Duke University last week.  Duke is a bastion of multiculturalism just like most other universities across America.  You probably heard that Duke thought it would be a good idea to have the Islamic Friday call to prayer played from its bell tower.  Although they've reversed their decision for now, if Duke had its way, "There is none worthy of being worshipped except Allah," would ring from its tower.  Hello, is this mic on?  You just can’t make this stuff up.

I’m assuming Duke is a school that teaches history. But here’s a little history lesson that I’m also going to assume the liberal students at Duke have never heard.

My "attack" and "incitement to violence" goes a little something like this  – A Day in the Life of Dukistan:

Duke students, if you lived under sharia law, you would hear the call to prayer reminding you that there is no God but Allah and that Allah is great.  You know, the same words that are said by terrorists before they kill people or blow up things.  Five times a day you would be required to stop whatever you were doing and pray.

Simple enough, right?

This next part – not so simple.  Especially for all the sorority babes and liberal feminists on campus.

Forget shopping for that cute outfit to wear to Duke football games or to Duke men’s basketball games.  Just like the women in Iran, under strict sharia law, you would be banned from attending sporting events to watch men play.

But whether you could go to the sporting events or not, you still wouldn't need any cute outfits.  Under the most stringent, i.e. most religious, sharia law, you would be required to be covered from head to toe.  But chin up buttercup.  You can still have your Michael Kors purse hanging from your burqa-covered shoulder.  Oops, I take that back.  Michael Kors is gay.  Sharia law bans homosexuality, hence no MK products.

Oh, and here’s a biggie.  You probably wouldn’t mind too much being banned from Duke sporting events, because well, I’ll try to break this to you gently – you would be banned from Duke period.  Women under the most religious sharia law aren’t allowed to get an education. Remember that sweet girl from Pakistan who tried to get an education?  Her name is Malala Yousafzai.  For trying to get an education she got a bullet in her head by the enforcers of sharia law.  And even this week, women in Mosel who were described as "educated, professional women" were killed by enforcers of sharia law.

And forget about owning a sporty BMW or an environmentally friendly Prius.  What’s the point of having a car when you’re not allowed to drive.  In the many religious Islamic states, women are banned from driving.

Hungry and want to run out for pizza or a burger?  Or want to go get a pedi or mani?  Okay.  As long as you are accompanied by a male relative.  But let’s say you did manage to go out by yourself, and God forbid, you got raped.  Your account of the story doesn’t matter.  Under the most religious sharia law, the witness account of a woman doesn’t count for much.

The vice president for public affairs and government relations at Duke, Michael Schoenfeld, gave a really good liberal sound bite when he said,  “Our Muslim community enriches the university in countless ways. We welcome the active expression of their faith tradition, and all others, in ways that are meaningful and visible.”  The only problem with this heart-warming sound bite is that it marginalizes all the other active expressions of the Muslim faith tradition that are visible around the world that include the diminishment of women, and the murder of people who do not live up to the standards of sharia law.

Back to your history lesson.  What does your iTunes playlist look like on your phone?  Anyone like J Lo, Katy Perry, Beyonce, or Carrie Underwood on your list?  Sorry, under the strictest sharia law, women are not allowed to sing in public.

There is a band in Iran called Mah Banoo.  Females are in the band, but they are banned from performing in public.  The leader of the band is a man named Majid Derakhshani.  When asked when women were banned from singing in public he said, “It started during the initial stages of the revolution, when they gradually started to change most aspects of our daily life. It began with issue of hijab. Then the issue of women’s singing was raised.”

Do you know what Derakhshani is referring to when he speaks of “the revolution” in Iran?  Of course you don’t.  You weren’t even born when the revolution happened.  So here’s a crash course.  In 1979 sharia law began to be enforced in Iran.  See, that’s the opposite of the revolution that happened in American.  The American revolution brought freedom.  The Iranian revolution brought sharia law.  I know, it's pretty iffy to assume you understand the difference.

On April 1, 1979 in Iran after a national referendum in which only one choice was offered (Islamic Republic: Yes or No), Ayatollah Khomeini declared an Islamic republic (there’s an oxy-moron for you) with a new constitution, i.e. sharia law, reflecting his ideals of Islamic government.

There was a woman who was a little younger than you are now who lived in Iran when this “revolution” happened.  She was a lot like you. She went to school.  She wore what she wanted to.  She listened to music.  She danced.  All that came to an abrupt end, though. She wrote a book about her experiences if you are interested in learning about real life.  Her name is Marina Nemat and her book is Prisoner of Tehran.

Ms. Nemat was raised as a Christian in Iran.  Her normal, peaceful childhood in Tehran was shattered when the Iranian Revolution of 1979 ushered in a new era of Islamic rule.  After complaining to her teachers about her math lessons being replaced by religious studies, Marina was arrested. She was taken to the notorious prison, Evin, where interrogation and torture were part of the daily routine.  She was a teenager.

I think that’s enough education for one day.  One last thing to remember, though.  If Duke does keep pushing for the Friday call to prayer to be played from it’s bell tower, and you hear it, please keep in mind all of the people, especially the women, around the world who hear this call to prayer in their country and the lack of freedom that it represents.

Catch and Release

Recently, during my trip to Israel, I had dinner with the IDF soldier who in 2001 captured Abdel Aziz Salha, the Butcher of Ramallah.  If you don’t remember the infamous animal, the picture might help jar your memory.

The Butcher of Ramalloah took part in the murder and disembowelment of two IDF soldiers who took a wrong turn and found themselves at a PA roadblock.  Instead of being allowed to turn around, a PA policeman took the soldiers to the police station in Ramallah, an Arab town in the heartland of Israel just a few miles north of Jerusalem.  It was there, at an Arab police station, that a mob of Arabs lynched and killed the soldiers while 1000 Arabs stood outside and cheered.  (Incidentally, U.S. tax dollars are used to buy weapons for and to train PA policemen.)

This friend, who captured the Butcher of Ramallah, is hands-down the toughest man I know.  At the same time, he is one of the kindest men I know.  And funniest.

I had the privilege of meeting his wife on this trip.  I tried my best not to stare at her the entire evening.  She was that beautiful.  The kind of beauty that, well, one just wants to stare at.  I was later told that she was a survivor of a terrorist attack.  When she was a student, the playground at her school was attacked.  Boys playing basketball were shot and killed by Arabs who hate Jews. She fell on the ground, played dead, and survived. 

This couple is a picture of all of Israel.  Tough.  A toughness that you and I will most likely never have to know.  Maybe.  They are kind.  A deep kindness, not just a sugarcoated kindness, but an authentic kindness that one could rely on with his or her life.  And they are survivors.  In so many ways.  Just like Israel.

By the way, the Butcher of Ramallah, who my friend risked his life to capture, was released in 2011 in a prisoner release deal along with 1026 other prisoners.  The insanity of politics.

Kerry continues to push Israel to release even more terrorists from prison in exchange for peace.  For some insane reason, Israel listened to Kerry and let more prisoners go free.  And of course, everyone knew exactly what would happen when killers are allowed to walk free and indeed it did.  On Passover eve, in Israel, a Jewish family was shot at by one of the terrorist who had been released from jail, killing the father. 

The IDF continues to search for the Arab men who recently killed the three Jewish teenagers.  My prayers are with the soldiers.  Not just to be strong and to be protected.  But to survive the insanity of their government.  As I’m sure they, and sane people in Israel wonder, if the terrorists are captured, how soon will they be released? 

 

My Grandmother Was an Amalek Slayer

My grandmother, Sue Campbell, was the epitome of a southern lady.  If she wasn’t wearing something pink, she was decorating something in her house pink, she had a propensity to wear gold lame house slippers, and it was worth calling her just to hear her pick up the phone and say “hello” in her southern accent.  She was one of the sweetest ladies to ever walk the planet.  She was also an Amalek slayer.

You’ve most likely read the Bible story of how Amalek attacked the Israelites soon after they had escaped Egypt.  The Israelites fought back, and as long as Moses had his arms lifted during the battle the Israelites won.  After the battle with Amalek, God gave a perpetual command to His people – in every generation kill Amalek.  As with all stories in the Bible, besides the literal interpretation, there are deeper meanings.  If we dig deeper in this story, via the Hebrew alphabet, we will discover that one of the meanings of the word “Amalek” is doubt.  So in other words, God gave the perpetual commandment to kill doubt.

Easier said than done.  Doubt usually shows up like an uninvited guest, sometimes not even having the courtesy to knock, but barging in like it owns the place.  Doubt is rude.  It kicks us when we are already down and tired, like it did to the Israelites just after they left Egypt.  They were beginning a new life.  They were experiencing their first taste of freedom.  They were literally walking in the promises of God - from bondage to freedom.  And doubt stopped them in their tracks. 

Doubt doesn’t play nice.  It preys on our fears.  It likes to parade our past failures before us.  It likes to highlight our shortcomings and weaknesses.  Whether whispering in our ears, or screaming in our faces, it likes to taunt us by saying, “Who do you think you are?  You can’t do that.  You can’t overcome.  You can’t succeed.  You. Can’t. Do. Anything. Right.”  Sound familiar?  And even if we don’t invite doubt to sit down at our table with us, sometimes we don’t feel like we have the strength to kick it out our door.  So it stays, following us around, as we try not to listen to its voice.  If doubt is anything, it is persisitent.  That’s why God said to kill it. 

My grandmother had a secret to killing Amalek/doubt.  The sweet pink-clad Southerner could instantly morph into a superhero Amalek slayer.  All someone had to do to activate this metamorphisis was ask her to pray. 

Hundreds of people throughout her lifetime, did just that.  They asked her to pray.  If someone was experiencing a problem, was going through a hard time, or needed a miracle of some sort, my grandmother was the go-to prayer warrior.  She was known as the woman who called upon God and got results.

She always began her prayers the same way.  “Now, Father,” she would say in an authoritative tone, and then she would pause.  And during that pause one could almost swear a sword could be heard coming out of its sheath.  It was about to get good. 

“Now, Father . . . Your Word says,” and then she would commence to tell God exactly what He had promised in His word.  She was not arrogant in her telling.  She was confident.   A master at swinging the double-edged sword of the Word of God, she knew how to fight.  With each swing of the sword, Amalek/doubt was reduced to nothingness.  The giants of fear, doubt, and impossibility were reduced to the mirage they really were.  Amalek was literally vaporized as faith took its place.  It was truly something to behold.

My children don’t hear the sound of my sword being unsheathed enough.  I myself don’t hear it enough.  I’m sad to admit that I don’t use the double-edged sword of the Word of God nearly enough when I pray.  How could I so often forget the precious, powerful, beautiful weapon that has been passed down to me?    

When doubt reduces my faith, confidence, and moxie to almost nothingness, I need to immediately reach for the sword my grandmother used with such skill and accuracy.  I need to remember my legacy.  Sword yielding should be automatic.  When I can't find my own words, I need to remember His Word.  When doubt shows up at my door and insists on staying, I need to say, "Fine!  But if you stay, you are going to get an earful.  And it is going to hurt," and then commence giving a good old-fashioned slaying, just like any proper Southern Bible-yielding woman would do.

New Book

"Life and death are in the power of the tongue." My new book, Think Before You Speak, is short and to the point. It is a simple, yet powerful reminder how we can transform our lives when we guard our mouths. 

http://www.amazon.com/Think-Before-You-Speak-Becoming/dp/1496152239/ref=sr_sp-atf_title_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1398088957&sr=8-1&keywords=camie+davis+think+before+you+speak

How Communists Helped a Terrorist Revise History

originally posted at American Thinker

By Camie Davis

Arafat’s life is a tale of a remarkable image makeover and an example of how history can be twisted to fit a terrorist’s narrative.  With the help of communists, Arafat became known as a legitimate statesman.  The “Father of Modern Terrorism,” whose goal was to destroy Israel, morphed into a Nobel Peace Prize winner who signed peace accords in the Rose Garden. 

Before Arafat began to revise history, Israel was mostly regarded in the public eye as an underdog struggling for survival.  When the United Nations presented partitioning Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state, the Jews said yes and the Arabs said no.  The Arabs turned down statehood because statehood was also offered to the Jews.  In 1948, five Arab countries attacked Israel literally the minute modern-day Israel was born.  Israel was attacked again by Arab nations in 1967 and 1973. 

Arafat hated that the Arab promise to “throw Israel into the sea” failed, so he intensified his own efforts to destroy Israel.  He realized though, after Arab losses in conventional wars against Israel, that another tactic had to be employed more -- terrorism.  He had a problem though.  Many Arabs leaders hated him.  Since he couldn’t garnish their support for his Fatah terrorist organization, he needed support from the West.  Yet, when one’s goal is to destroy Israel, the West, at least publically, isn’t prone to rally around that cause.  

Perhaps Arafat would have fallen into the dustbin of history if he hadn’t gained the support of the Soviet KGB.  Arafat’s success in organizing and motivating terrorists caught the KGB’s attention, which during the 60’s was developing “liberation fronts” throughout third-world countries.  With the KGB’s help, Arafat became the leader of the PLO.  He intensified his terrorist activity and became a pioneer in hijackings, kidnappings, and other modes of terrorizing civilians.

So why would a leader like Mandela, along with many other world leaders, become a mouthpiece for someone like Arafat?  Because Arafat rebranded himself and his cause to destroy Israel into a humanitarian crisis.  And the world fell for his trick. 

The KGB knew that Arafat would never get the additional support he needed to destroy Israel if he kept saying that he wanted to destroy Israel. So they sent him to the “reform school” of the Romanian dictator Nicolai Ceausescu, a master of propaganda.  According to David Meir-Levi in History Upside Down: The Roots of Palestinian Fascism and the Myth of Israeli Aggression, Arafat initially resisted being molded into a statesman that the West would receive:  Arafat railed against Ceausescu’s injunctions that the PLO should present itself as a people’s revolutionary army striving to right wrongs and free the oppressed: he wanted only to obliterate Israel. Gradually, though, Ceausescu’s lessons in Machiavellian statecraft sank in. Arafat developed propaganda tactics that would allow him to create the image of a homeless people oppressed by a colonial power.

While Arafat was being molded into a statesman that the West would openly embrace, he sent one of his top men in the PLO, Abu Jihad, to North Vietnam to study the strategy and tactics of Ho Chi Minh.  Again, according to Meir-Levi: Arafat was particularly struck by Ho Chi Minh’s success in mobilizing left-wing sympathizers in Europe and the United States, where activists on American campuses, enthusiastically following the line of North Vietnamese operatives, had succeeded in reframing the Vietnam war from a Communist assault on the south to a struggle for national liberation. 

While in North Vietnam, it was made clear to Abu Jihad by Ho’s chief strategist, General Giap, that if Arafat wanted to gain support, he had to redefine the terms of his struggle.  Meir-Levi gives a quote that is a bombshell in a nutshell: General Giap said, “Stop talking about annihilating Israel and instead turn your terror war into a struggle for human rights. Then you will have the American people eating out of your hand.” 

Hence, the “Palestinian Cause” was born.  Arafat manufactured a humanitarian crisis to detract attention from his goal to destroy Israel.  And Arafat’s bloodstained hands did indeed become a trough that the masses -- including American presidents, activists like Mandela, teachers, professors, Christians, and even some Jews -- ate from.  World-leaders pushed the terrorist turned humanitarian as a viable peace partner upon Israel, brushing aside the fact that Arafat admitted that his overtures for peace were mere Trojan Horses. 

Arafat’s propaganda turned the underdog Israel fighting for survival against Arabs since the day of its modern-day inception, into what the public would perceive as a brutal oppressor and occupier who employed Nazi regime tactics against Palestinian Arabs. 

Mandela furthered Arafat’s narrative in 1990 when he said, “We do not regard the PLO as a terrorist organization. If one has to refer to any parties as a terrorist state, one might refer to the Israeli government because they are the people who are slaughtering defenseless and innocent Arabs in the occupied territories.”  

The public became enablers of Arafat’s propaganda too.  School teachers and college professors push Arafat’s narrative by telling students that Israel is a “bully” and an “apartheid state.”  Churches push Arafat’s narrative by boycotting companies who invest in Israeli companies and boycotting Israeli products in protest of Israel’s “brutal occupation, oppression, and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.”  And even liberal Jews push Arafat’s narrative by believing that Jews living in Judea and Samaria are mere “settlers occupying Arab land.”

Each time world-leaders and the public support the manufactured “Palestinian crisis,” it lends legitimacy and justification to Arabs to continue their violence against Jews.  For instance, it fed the justification of an Arab teenager who recently stabbed to death a Jewish teenage soldier while he slept on a bus.  The New York Times furthered the justification by posting a picture, not of the mother of the boy who was murdered, but of the mother of the killer, hoping to elicit empathy for the supposed victims of the Israeli occupation.  It fed the justification of two teenage Arab boys who cut through a fence surrounding a Jewish town and then cut the throats of a Jewish family.  The media’s minimal coverage portrayed the murdered family as settlers basically getting what they deserved. 

Mandela called Arafat “one of the outstanding freedom fighters of this generation.”  Since Arafat was labeled a freedom fighter by a public figure like Mandela, Arab terrorists equivocate their actions as nothing more than freedom fighting too.

Israel erects fences and roadblocks to prevent terrorists’ infiltration and the slaughter of Jews.  Yet Arafat duped the world into perceiving these security measures as instruments of oppression instead.  Israel’s self-defense is portrayed as aggression.  When in reality, Israel tries to prevent civilian casualties during military operation against terrorists.  Before the most recent IDF operation in Gaza, over 100,000 phone calls were made to Arab homes and 2 million pamphlets were dropped into Gaza to warn of the impending military operation.  Yet often, terrorists will not allow their families to leave and instead use them as human shields.  These facts are disregarded though, and Jews are portrayed as wanton killers.

Unfortunately, the prediction of a North Vietnam communist general of how easy it would be to dupe the masses came true.  Arafat’s propaganda is still believed and pushed by a gullible public who continue to aid and abet Arafat’s real agenda -- to destroy Israel.

Chanukah - The Miracle of Resisting Cultural Normalcy

Camie Davis

My eleven year-old son loves learning about history.  The American Revolution and WW II have captured his attention for the moment.  For the next eight days though, I hope his attention will be captured by a time in history that is mainly celebrated by Jews, but that we, a non-Jewish family, will commemorate as well.

Chanukah commemorates a military victory.  That victory involved untrained Jewish farmers turning into soldiers, like minutemen, and battles against Greeks on elephants.  You know, the kind of stuff an eleven year-old boy finds fascinating.   And although I find underdogs and elephants fascinating too, the message of the Maccabees’ resistance resonates strongly with me for other reasons.  I’m a mother who wants to raise her children to be brave, strong, and to be people who don’t always follow the crowd, especially when the crowd is heading in the wrong direction. 

Unfortunately, that is what many Jews did centuries ago when the Greeks came to town.  They followed the wrong crowd.  During the Second Century BCE, the path of a Greek king of the Seleucid Empire named Antiochus crossed with Israel.  Antiochus changed his name to Epiphanes, which means “visible God.”  Yes, he had a few egocentric issues.   He liked to think that he and the god Jupiter were identical.  Because of little idiosyncrasies like that people called him “the Madman.”  And unfortunately the madman took out his “issues” on the Jews in Israel.

Antiochus had his sights set on ruling Egypt.  And the rode to Egypt went through Israel.  Hence, he wanted to conquer the Jews.  But he didn’t want to conquer them physically.  The madman was actually quite brilliant on one level.  He knew that the real way to conquer a Jew was to conquer him spiritually, for that is where the true power of a Jew resides - in his connection to God.  Bottom-line, Antiochus wanted to Hellenize the Jews.

He implemented his goal of Hellenization by forbidding the keeping of the Sabbath and Rosh Chodesh (the observance of the New Moon, hence the observance of life according to “Jewish time”), circumcision (the sign of being in covenant with God), and the study of Torah.  So, in essence, he banned the cornerstones of the Jews’ connection to God.  He also had the audacity to put up a statue of Jupiter in the Holy Temple because it resembled him, and more importantly he thought he was God, so as madmen go, he thought he should be worshipped.  And to add insult to injury, he slaughtered pigs on the altar of the Holy Temple too. 

Unfortunately, many Jews went along with everything Antiochus did.  They liked the Greeks modus operandi.  Though seen as extremely intelligent, the Greeks way of thinking was actually much more simplistic than Judaism.   A Greek mindset was often one-dimensional; a totally external approach to the world, emphasizing physical pleasure disconnected from anything deeper.  Sound familiar?  Hence, the Greeks elevated the physical to be of utmost importance.  The Greek’s glorification of the physical left little to no room for spirituality.  And this way of thinking made Judaism, or more aptly put, made Torah observance look rather foolish.  A Torah/Biblical outlook in life imbued godliness and spirituality into everything.   Greeks spurned that notion.   And sadly, many Jews joined the Greek’s way of thinking and shrugged off the fact that the most important things in life can’t be seen with physical eyes.  They traded in their spirituality for . . . drum roll please . . . cultural normalcy. 

And that, my friends, is why my family and I will light candles for eight nights.  Because we are right smack in the middle of that same kind of battle.  We are living in a culture that is anything but normal.  Yet everyday our culture would love for you and I to believe that being a person who includes spiritual insight in our day-to-day lives is not only abnormal, but also absurd.   We are in the midst of a battle of continuing to elevate the spiritual aspects of life while living in culture of materialism, self-gratification, and the glorification of  “if it feels good, do it.”   We live in a one-dimensional culture where the belief in, much less the implementation of spiritual values is often considered foolish.  And though it might seem unimportant, menial, or silly to some, lighting candles during Chanukah is a way of reminding ourselves to be light in a culture of darkness.

The Maccabees represented Jews who did not fall prey to the Greek mindset.  They stood up to the cultural normalcy that the Greeks tried to implement and said, “No!”  They stood up for their beliefs, because their beliefs represented the fact that there is a God in this world, and if they didn’t include Him in their world, their world would be nothing.

So no, my family won’t be celebrating Chanukah like our Jewish friends do.  I don’t know how to cook latkes or kugel.  But I do have a candleholder that has places for eight candles.  Eight for the number of days the great menorah in the Temple burned with the little oil that was found when the Temple was finally taken back from the Greeks.  Yet, what I will think about this year when I light the candles is not so much about the miracle of oil.  But the fact that in a culture that tried to suck the heart and soul out of spiritual people, there was still a group of people, though they be few in numbers, who remained spiritual.  And I will think of all the “miraculous” people I am privileged to know today.  Those who in the midst of darkness still shine God’s light.  Who in a one-dimensional culture, see beyond the material world.  And who are as abnormal as they come, in a cultural of "normalcy."   

An Idiot's Guide to Proper Behavior on the Temple Mount

Camie Davis

Jews, haven't you heard?  Propaganda is the new black.  Revisionist history has replaced history. Never mind that you have a few thousand years of bona fide history on the Temple Mount. That's nothing compared to a few years of Palestinian faux history.   And never mind that the God of Israel stated emphatically that the Temple Mount was the one place out of all the places in the world that He chose to place His name.  This is 2013.  Things change.  Or at least that's what the majority of the world wants you to think.  Didn't you get the memo?  The Muslims want the Temple Mount to be solely theirs; you know, Judenrein.  The Muslims have a hard time sharing.  And when they're told to share, they throw a fit.  So the world gives them what they want.  And because of that grown-up kind of logic, you can't exercise your rights on the Temple Mount.  In essence, the Temple Mount no longer belongs to you.  So quit acting like it does.

In order to help you let go of your desire, need, duty, whatever you call wanting to ascend the Temple Mount, I'm going to give you a head's up of what is now considered proper behavior on the Temple Mount.

1.  Do not, under any circumstances, wave a flag that is blue and white and has a star of David on it while on the Temple Mount.  Such audacious behavior will get you arrested.  However, it is perfectly fine to wave a green flag representing the terrorist organization Hamas, or a Palestinian flag representing a made up country.

These Jews were arrested this week for praying and holding a Jewish flag
while on the Temple Mount.

Hamas flags are frequently flown on the Temple Mount.

Palestinian flag draped over Dome of the Rock.

2.  If you are a Jewish male youth, do not pray while on the Temple Mount.  Why do young men like you want to spend your time praying anyway?  If you try such deviant behavior, your tuhkus will be hauled off faster than you can say, "But I have a right to . . . "  Instead, take up the world-wide popular sport of football, aka soccer.  In doing so, you will guarantee yourself hours of recreational time on the Temple Mount.  Or if you aren't skilled enough to play soccer, try rock throwing.

Jewish young man being arrested for praying on the Temple Mount.

Arab boys playing soccer on the Temple Mount.

Arab men throw rocks at Jews on the Temple Mount.
This often happens after the Friday Muslim prayers.  Go figure.

3.  If you are part of a Jewish group wanting to commemorate a special or holy event in your life on the Temple Mount, well good luck with that.  However, if you ever have the occasion to celebrate the release of a convicted Hamas terrorist, well then you are in luck.  The happy reunion between the terrorist just released from jail and the family can happen right smack on the Temple Mount.  Really!  No one will stop you.

Hamas terrorist released during Gilad Shalit deal hugs father on Temple Mount.

4.  If you are Jewish and want to commemorate a Jewish holiday on the Temple Mount, the answer is hell no!  However, if you want to hold a rally on the Temple Mount in support of the Muslim Brotherhood (you know, the group that calls for the destruction of Israel), knock yourself out.

Jews were locked off the Temple Mount during a recent Jewish holiday.

Recent rally for the Muslim Brotherhood on the Temple Mount.

5. Do not under any circumstances prostrate yourself in reverence toward the place of the Holy of Holies if you are Jewish.  If caught, you will be arrested.  However, if you are an Arab and want to cause an Israeli policeman to lay prostrated, chances are you'll get away with that.

6.  If you are a Jewish child who wants to ascend the Temple Mount on a Jewish holiday, expect nothing but a locked gate greeting your little faces.  However if you are an Arab child who wants to ascend on a Muslim holiday, cartoon characters will be waiting to greet you.  Woo hoo!

Jewish school children recently waited for hours to go on the Temple Mount during a Jewish holiday.
They were locked out.

Arab children during a recent Muslim holiday.

7. If you are an Knesset Member or a rabbi who was a paratrooper who helped liberate the Temple Mount in 1967 and you want to regularly ascend the Temple Mount, are you kidding?  Such unbefitting behavior will not be tolerated.  I mean, please, it would give the perception of Jewish sovereignty.  However, if you are a Muslim cleric, representing the "peaceful and tolerant" religion of Islam, you are allowed to give weekly hate speeches, i.e. sermons, on the Temple Mount.

MK Feiglin and Rabbi Ariel barred from going on the Temple Mount.

Muslim cleric's recent "sermon."

8. If you hold a youth rally in support of Jewish sovereignty of the Temple Mount you will be told by the Israeli police that posters with the words, "The Temple Mount is in our hands!" are not allowed. Silly kids.  What are you doing trying to cause a provocation?  What are you doing believing anything other than revisionist history and propaganda?  Get with the program!  Whatever you do, don't think for yourselves.  Ever.  At least that's what an idiot would do.

Israel's future.