Too much, so so much, to unpack before the totality of this article disparates into the sands of time once again. Except at an exponential speed compared to the original. So comment I must right now.
Rather than Who Knew? in this case it is You Knew! You knew far more than I ever did. But little did you know that 23 years later nothing would have changed. Except that rather than 5 million Jews, Israel now has over 9.5 million. Despite it having been ceded to the Palestinians half a decade earlier, in 1995, you made no mention of Gaza or Hamas. There is no recognition of Israel’s astonishing contributions to 21st Century technology nor any earlier or later peace negotiations aborted by the Arabs.
I recently wrote a theory trying to answer how we got to today. I may have to shelve it, at least until I digest yours and re-gestate mine.
It’s unfair. Your 2001 article beat me by two decades, then disappeared like cicadas, only to reemerge full throated today. I missed it, or didn’t recognize the need to remember it.
So much to unpack, but one superficial irony to observe. Are you contending this was commissioned by the New York Times?!! I’ll be surprised if today’s paper of record (remember that?) don’t come after you and the Free Press for copyright infringement. Well, screw ‘em. Let those corrupted bastards eat their own words today.
Dark and at times very pessimistic, but also interesting to read the machinations of his mind. Many of us Jews are feeling what our parents warned us about - "it is always different with the Jews" - always irrational, always outrageous - and now we are understanding for the first time what they knew and felt all along. I believe most of us will be Jews to our dying breath and defend our people and our place in history. The warnings are real - "first they came for the Jews". It always begins with the Jews but it never ends there. Maybe there is still a bit of time to rationally do what we know will turn this around.....maybe not - I pray Jews will see reality, unite and fight as they did on Oct 7. It is our only chance.
I have never understood the millennia-long ceaseless preoccupation with Jews. We are such a tiny percentage of the population wherever we live. We do not proselytize; to the contrary, we are vulnerable to decreases in number. We ask only to be allowed to live as citizens with equal rights. And yet nearly everywhere we have lived the mere existence of Judaism, and Jewish people, has been viewed as a “question” or a “problem.” It is becoming clear to me now that this goes beyond mere personal prejudice or discrimination, those can be addressed with education and exposure. What the author is describing is a belief that we DO in fact spread some sort of ideology or belief system, and that this ideology is dangerous.
Of course, being Jewish myself, I never knew this. I knew some people harbored prejudice against people who were different. But I never knew that some people believed that Judaism and Jews themselves were actually dangerous to the world as whole, I never learned about this alleged conspiracy. This is enlightening, and I wish I had understood it before. It seems as though some people believe “Judaism” is not a religion but is instead something that its adherents seek to impose on others, something more akin to communism, socialism, or fascism. That would explain why historically stamping it out has been seen as virtuous.
No amount of education in “bias” or “hatred” can counter such a belief. Education in “tolerance” or “diversity” is at best inapplicable and at worst harmful; by way of example, who would be sympathetic to a message of “tolerance” of fascism, communism, or any other harmful system of world control when those systems themselves are seen as intolerant?
In order to counter antisemitism, young people must be taught exactly what antisemitism is: a theory that Judaism is a pernicious ideological system of control and world dominance, and Jewish people are its adherents. People must be taught that this simply is not true, and to believe so is to believe the worst of conspiracy theories. All incoming college students should be required to take a course which unequivocally debunks this theory; if their professors believe it, they should be required to take the course or be fired. Until then, antisemitism, the real false, pernicious and toxic ideology, will persist.
In case anyone has any doubts about the straight line leading from 9/11/2001 to 10/7/2024, I'll let Hamas clear those up. A photo that is worth a thousand words was found in Gaza - of Muhammad Sinwar's kids (nephews of Yahyah Sinwar) gleefully posing in front of a giant poster of 9/11.
And in case anyone has doubts about the reactions to 9/11 in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority being any different, I'll let this contemporary report clear those up:
"The Foreign Press Association of Israel said the PA sent armed police to block camera crews from photographing Tuesday's rally in the West Bank town of Nablus -- where thousands filled the streets to celebrate. In addition, PA officials have reportedly phoned TV stations and other media to caution them their safety would be in jeopardy if they aired the segments."
Jonathan Rosen writes masterfully, but his idea about Islamic Jew-hatred needs work.
LOTS of work.
The Muslim "genocidal hatred of Jews and Jewish autonomy" was NOT "absorbed" from the Nazis. It was spawned in the 7th century by their 'perfect man' and can be found in the Quran, which he supposedly dictated.
Imams the world over (including in the USA) preach from the Quran that the Jews are the "worst of all creatures", the "offspring of apes and pigs", and the source of "world corruption".
Not "the Zionists". "The Jews."
The Arab world has NOT "adopted the generalized antisemitism of the European world." The teachings in the Arab world predate not only modern Israel, and the WW 2 Nazis, but the existence of most European nations.
Israelis with family roots in the Middle East have always known this. Now since Oct. 7, even the Westernized Israelis know it. The sooner the American Jews recognize it, the better, because purist Islam is already embedded in the USA.
Listen, Jonathan, to the broadcasting of 'calls to prayer' in major American cities. Look at what happened to liberal European cities that smiled benignly. They are now unable to ban the closing of streets for Muslim prayer. The footage is from Paris, London, Malmo, Cologne. Now recently it's from Minneapolis and NYC Times Square.
Your "darker Jewish component" knows what that means.
What is the exact statement in the Quran? I have seen it quoted as "all infidels must die" meaning any non-Muslims living near them (i.e. Jews, Christians, all Westerners, Europeans, Americans,...). If that's the core of Muslim education and development efforts, then how could those populations ever thrive in the modern world?
"Indeed, those who disbelieve [kafaru] from the People of the Book and the polytheists will be in the Fire of Hell, to stay there forever. They are the worst of all creatures." (98:6)
People of the Book are the Jews, polytheists are the Christians and pagans.
There are apologists on the Muslim side who claim that this merely condemns "People of the Book" who don't believe their own Book. But the verse before it says: "And they [the People of the Book] have been commanded no more than this: To worship Allah..." So the imams are honest who teach that verse 6 means the Jewish people - because in holding onto the Jewish Bible, they "disbelieve" in Islam and withhold the worship that Allah demands.
--------------
BTW those who claim this obnoxious and murderous viewpoint is not 'real Islam' are practicing what devout Muslims consider a necessary deception, Taqiyya, based on these verses:
“Let believers not take for friends and allies infidels instead of believers. Whoever does this shall have no relationship left with Allah – unless you but guard yourselves against them, taking precautions.” (Quran 3:28; see also 2:173; 2:185; 4:29; 22:78; 40:28.)
Islamic expert Raymond Ibrahim explained how Islamic scholars interpret "taking precautions":
"Al-Tabari’s (838-923 AD) Tafsir, or Quranic exegeses, is essentially a standard reference in the entire Muslim world. Regarding 3:28, he wrote: 'If you [Muslims] are under their [infidels’] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them, with your tongue, while harbouring inner animosity for them... Allah has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels in place of believers – except when infidels are above them [in authority]. In such a scenario, let them act friendly towards them.'”
In answer to your last question:
Faithful Muslims don't WANT to "thrive in the modern world" - they want to use it to further their world domination goals. The few who do assimilate into European and American culture are regarded by Islam as either apostates or practitioners of Taqiyya.
Thank you for the detailed reply. Unfortunately, it gives me less hope for world stability ahead. Clearly, self-serving mass media promotes simple-minded, less/non-productive solutions to populations that have little interest in understanding the necessary complexities of any functioning civilization. Islam appears to be incompatible with any modern egalitarian civilization.
This is a great essay. Thank you for reprinting it.
Without detracting from that at all, I'd like to point out that the statement "The occupation of the West Bank by Israel... has been... a disaster for Israel morally, politically, and spiritually" is false. It's the kind of thing that people say because everyone says it, because it would be gauche to not. One would think that after 55 years of a morally-corrupting policy one would see a lot more moral corruption. Not that there isn't any, but it'd be hard to show that there's more than there was before, or more than one would expect absent that policy. In the political and spiritual realms as well, Israel has tended to thrive. None of that proves that Israel's policies are good, it merely undermines the predictions based on the assumption that they're bad.
I just came here to post something like this. The settlements are protecting Israel, not just because they contribute more combat soldiers to the IDF than any other segments of society, but also because without them rockets would be fired from just a few miles from Tell Aviv. Just look at the map and see how close the borders of the West Bank are to major cities! Few people think about the fact that the residents of Tell Aviv can party without much worry because the "occupation" of the West Bank.
We continue to learn the same lessons we ignored with the Kobar Towers and the bombing of the Marine barracks - ignorance leads to disaster leads to ignorance leads to disaster.
We learn the same lessons but willfully ignore the drivers and, thus, never even consider any viable solutions.
We hamstring ourselves, then demand excuses for losing the race.
Dear neighbor Jonathan... shalom aleichem to you are your house. Anti-Semitism is a direct work, campaign, onslaught of evil since Abraham. Jews are persecuted because they are the flesh and blood proof, the living, evidence for the God of the Bible, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses. David...the one and only God, of Israel. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is why anti-Semitism has persisted for 3800 years +=-. And will continue until the end of this age. See Revelation 20-22 for the final eternal outcome.
You were quite right after 9/11 to say that Christian Europe failed catastrophically. The Shoah could have been prevented.
In our time, both Judaism and Christianity are in spiritual warfare with two great sources of evil, Marxism and all its derivatives and affiliates, and the deep darkness within Islam, which is not in command over all Muslims but at work in a sizeable faction. Neither can tolerate the existence of Judaism and Christianity. The reason why so many people cannot understand anti-Semitism over the last 3800 years os that they are blind to the spiritual warfare.
The Jewish people have survived these 3800 years because they are the sign and witness of Hashem, Adonai Elohenu. As are their true believing Christian neighbors. As the Scriptures say repeatedly, the day of the Lord is coming when God will vindicate His people. We, the living stones, stand on the promise.
"I was critical of the Holocaust Museum in Washington. I didn't want ancient European antisemitism enshrined on federal land. But now everything has come to American soil."
To diverge from the context in which you wrote that last sentence and also from your personal perspective, as I'm a Gentile --
I think we can say that the persecution of good Arabs in the US of those days, on account of an atrocity for which they were not responsible, led to a fateful overcorrection. Soon everything Arab and everything Muslim was to be defended. The secularism of many on the American Left did not prevent them from crediting followers of Islam with a moral purity unknown in Christendom and insisting on a thoroughly benign interpretation of the Qur'an. (Having read it in its entirety, I can't go so far.) Fifteen years later, Donald Trump's antipathy to Muslims set the seal on their standing with progressives. If Trump was against them, progressives would be for them. No questions asked, no distinctions made.
All people -- good, bad, or indifferent -- with roots in the Arab world became beneficiaries of the reverential goodwill which modern-day Americans reflexively extend to immigrants with stories of hardship and persecution to tell. The stories may be corrupted by ancient prejudices, but it's bad form to notice; one must be a cooperative listener. In this way, undissipated antisemitism pursued Jews from the old world to the new, where it assumed a sympathetic new identity in the environs of elite universities, progressive NGOs, and even the US Congress.
The struggle ahead which you mention in closing must include American intellectuals' self-liberation from the thrall of the Magical Other and their recognition that there is such a thing as an exotic bigot.
I think we in the West, also continue to practice apologism with respect to our immigrant communities. We are not multicultural in the US, we were founded as a plurality "Out of many One". I say this repeatedly, immigration brings with it certain obligations. The immigrant chooses a host country that has its own culture. That choice comes with the immigrants entry into the social compact with its host. Reap the benefits and protections and opportunities of that host country. In return, you are required to assimilate into your new country. It is not the requirement of us to accommodate you, you must now accommodate for us and become one of us. This is true in every country in the world, Western or not. You are not a mere visitor, you are a citizen or future citizen. That comes with obligations and requirements for you. If you move to a country with a Judeo-Christian culture, then that is the culture you must live in. You can worship as you wish, that is our law and protection. You may dress as you wish, eat the foods you wish, and the list goes on. But you have NO RIGHT to force that upon the rest of us. That is not the way our culture, country, or laws work.
First, ALL JEWS KNOW WHO THEIR ENEMIES IN THIS NATION ARE. They are not hard to identify. They carry signs in public saying “Death to the Jews.” They create areas where no Jews are allowed. They chant FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA.
And they are all Democrats—although many are angry Democrats are not more openly hateful with regard to all things Jewish; and are all at least tacitly—through silence—directly supported by Democrats in Congress, and by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, although her handlers have never let her talk much.
Second, in an obvious point I make annually, TOWER 7 WAS BROUGHT DOWN BY EXPLOSIVES. No second option.
Have you ever seen a tree fall straight into its own footprint? Of course not: the rest of tree is in the way. The tree has to be REMOVED for the rest to fall straight down, and nearly instantly.
Had you been standing on Tower 7–a 47 story steel skyscraper NOT HIT BY A PLANE—and droppes an apple when it started falling, you would have hit the ground within a second of the apple. Only controlled demolition does that.
Who planted the explosives and how? I dont know. But the facts WERE covered up by our own government, NIST specifically.
Satan himself is the reason for Jew hatred. The scriptures call Jews God's chosen people and it's exactly why parts of the world are so riled up about Jews and Israel. Satan himself is behind the hatred. Even liberal Jews in America are fooled into siding with anti-semitism. Abraham was given the land by God himself. In 1948 it became recognized as a sovereign country. The enemy is pissed and has never been more evident since the holocaust. Netanyahu is a character right out of scripture and this world had better pay attention to the dynamics playing out. This is a war between good and evil and the final outcome has already been determined. Word to the wise: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."
If all the Jews disappeared tomorrow...who would the Muslim world turn their hate and love affair with violence upon? My guess is Americans would be the new Jews. They would be lost without an all-abiding enemy to hate and fight against.
Absolutely could not have said that better. Israel has been called the "Little Satan", and America the "Big Satan". This is not a guess, the message is being clearly telegraphed. And after that? Who is the most righteous sect of Islam, the "true" Muslim? They will tear each other apart in a return to the world of the 7th century. Where are the moderate Muslims? They will be next.
@Irshad Manji has written about the ‘moderates’ in her book “Allah, Liberty & Love”. I laughed when she got to the ‘moderate’ but passive terrorist supporters: They’re the ones who always start out, “I don’t support terrorism but….” in which they of course go on to defend terrorism in some way. Just like the not-a-racists here who say, “You know I’m not a racist but…..”
Hamas isn't waiting for the Jews to disappear. They have been announcing for 10 years or more that they intend to "rule the world", literally, for their god.
Jews are not the only infidels, they are merely the most viscerally hated infidels.
The National Socialists haven't gone away, nor have they given up on their goal of saving the world from 'Jewish domination'....
As we can see in social media, they are getting a tailwind from joining forces with those who have the same goals: Islam on one side and Theosophy on the other.
This was a tour de force in many ways. But the main threat to Jews and the rest of us in the west is not crazy Imams. It is critical social justice theology embraced by midwit degreed youth, mostly white and female. It stops here when we stop them. Do we have the will?
It's not mostly white and female. There are scads of Arab, Hispanic, Black, and White academic theorists of social justice who are male. All of these religious leaders (the imams) are male, as are the race-baiting social justice Reverends who stoke racial enmity in the United States.
If you add Marxist to that list, it would be more descriptive. At it's heart, Marxist is all about 'social justice'. There is no such thing. It's just Marxism. Period.
"'None of us has ever liked the World Trade Towers very much,' he said."
I'm a fan of Vincent Scully. But here he's wrong. Those of us snobs who had never liked the towers got used to them, and grew to see them with new eyes when Philippe Petit, high up, danced back and forth between them. Then when they came down, we mourned for them and the lives inside them.
It is impossible for me to remember September 11 and not compare it to October 7. I'm not Jewish, but I have eyes to see.
Today, the Jihadists aren't from over there, on visas: They're here, they're teaching our kids, they're running our city governments, they're in Congress cheering on the savaging of our monuments and streetscapes.
"None of us has ever liked the Word Trade Towers very much."--- Vincent Scully
Setting aside the mass spillage of innocent blood, or even of big time evil---the Trade Center towers were the two most gargantuan, unoriginal, aesthetically moronic globs of banality ever to be inflicted on the citizens of this country.
Hitler would have loved them.
Stalin would have plumped for something more soul-crushingly ugly.
But, actually, who cares. After all: "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American people." --- H.L.M.
Too much, so so much, to unpack before the totality of this article disparates into the sands of time once again. Except at an exponential speed compared to the original. So comment I must right now.
Rather than Who Knew? in this case it is You Knew! You knew far more than I ever did. But little did you know that 23 years later nothing would have changed. Except that rather than 5 million Jews, Israel now has over 9.5 million. Despite it having been ceded to the Palestinians half a decade earlier, in 1995, you made no mention of Gaza or Hamas. There is no recognition of Israel’s astonishing contributions to 21st Century technology nor any earlier or later peace negotiations aborted by the Arabs.
I recently wrote a theory trying to answer how we got to today. I may have to shelve it, at least until I digest yours and re-gestate mine.
It’s unfair. Your 2001 article beat me by two decades, then disappeared like cicadas, only to reemerge full throated today. I missed it, or didn’t recognize the need to remember it.
So much to unpack, but one superficial irony to observe. Are you contending this was commissioned by the New York Times?!! I’ll be surprised if today’s paper of record (remember that?) don’t come after you and the Free Press for copyright infringement. Well, screw ‘em. Let those corrupted bastards eat their own words today.
Dark and at times very pessimistic, but also interesting to read the machinations of his mind. Many of us Jews are feeling what our parents warned us about - "it is always different with the Jews" - always irrational, always outrageous - and now we are understanding for the first time what they knew and felt all along. I believe most of us will be Jews to our dying breath and defend our people and our place in history. The warnings are real - "first they came for the Jews". It always begins with the Jews but it never ends there. Maybe there is still a bit of time to rationally do what we know will turn this around.....maybe not - I pray Jews will see reality, unite and fight as they did on Oct 7. It is our only chance.
I have never understood the millennia-long ceaseless preoccupation with Jews. We are such a tiny percentage of the population wherever we live. We do not proselytize; to the contrary, we are vulnerable to decreases in number. We ask only to be allowed to live as citizens with equal rights. And yet nearly everywhere we have lived the mere existence of Judaism, and Jewish people, has been viewed as a “question” or a “problem.” It is becoming clear to me now that this goes beyond mere personal prejudice or discrimination, those can be addressed with education and exposure. What the author is describing is a belief that we DO in fact spread some sort of ideology or belief system, and that this ideology is dangerous.
Of course, being Jewish myself, I never knew this. I knew some people harbored prejudice against people who were different. But I never knew that some people believed that Judaism and Jews themselves were actually dangerous to the world as whole, I never learned about this alleged conspiracy. This is enlightening, and I wish I had understood it before. It seems as though some people believe “Judaism” is not a religion but is instead something that its adherents seek to impose on others, something more akin to communism, socialism, or fascism. That would explain why historically stamping it out has been seen as virtuous.
No amount of education in “bias” or “hatred” can counter such a belief. Education in “tolerance” or “diversity” is at best inapplicable and at worst harmful; by way of example, who would be sympathetic to a message of “tolerance” of fascism, communism, or any other harmful system of world control when those systems themselves are seen as intolerant?
In order to counter antisemitism, young people must be taught exactly what antisemitism is: a theory that Judaism is a pernicious ideological system of control and world dominance, and Jewish people are its adherents. People must be taught that this simply is not true, and to believe so is to believe the worst of conspiracy theories. All incoming college students should be required to take a course which unequivocally debunks this theory; if their professors believe it, they should be required to take the course or be fired. Until then, antisemitism, the real false, pernicious and toxic ideology, will persist.
In case anyone has any doubts about the straight line leading from 9/11/2001 to 10/7/2024, I'll let Hamas clear those up. A photo that is worth a thousand words was found in Gaza - of Muhammad Sinwar's kids (nephews of Yahyah Sinwar) gleefully posing in front of a giant poster of 9/11.
https://youtu.be/AfP_Ubj4jSM
And in case anyone has doubts about the reactions to 9/11 in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority being any different, I'll let this contemporary report clear those up:
"The Foreign Press Association of Israel said the PA sent armed police to block camera crews from photographing Tuesday's rally in the West Bank town of Nablus -- where thousands filled the streets to celebrate. In addition, PA officials have reportedly phoned TV stations and other media to caution them their safety would be in jeopardy if they aired the segments."
https://web.archive.org/web/20110505074246/http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,34346,00.html
Jonathan Rosen writes masterfully, but his idea about Islamic Jew-hatred needs work.
LOTS of work.
The Muslim "genocidal hatred of Jews and Jewish autonomy" was NOT "absorbed" from the Nazis. It was spawned in the 7th century by their 'perfect man' and can be found in the Quran, which he supposedly dictated.
Imams the world over (including in the USA) preach from the Quran that the Jews are the "worst of all creatures", the "offspring of apes and pigs", and the source of "world corruption".
Not "the Zionists". "The Jews."
The Arab world has NOT "adopted the generalized antisemitism of the European world." The teachings in the Arab world predate not only modern Israel, and the WW 2 Nazis, but the existence of most European nations.
Israelis with family roots in the Middle East have always known this. Now since Oct. 7, even the Westernized Israelis know it. The sooner the American Jews recognize it, the better, because purist Islam is already embedded in the USA.
Listen, Jonathan, to the broadcasting of 'calls to prayer' in major American cities. Look at what happened to liberal European cities that smiled benignly. They are now unable to ban the closing of streets for Muslim prayer. The footage is from Paris, London, Malmo, Cologne. Now recently it's from Minneapolis and NYC Times Square.
Your "darker Jewish component" knows what that means.
What is the exact statement in the Quran? I have seen it quoted as "all infidels must die" meaning any non-Muslims living near them (i.e. Jews, Christians, all Westerners, Europeans, Americans,...). If that's the core of Muslim education and development efforts, then how could those populations ever thrive in the modern world?
Here is the main one:
"Indeed, those who disbelieve [kafaru] from the People of the Book and the polytheists will be in the Fire of Hell, to stay there forever. They are the worst of all creatures." (98:6)
People of the Book are the Jews, polytheists are the Christians and pagans.
There are apologists on the Muslim side who claim that this merely condemns "People of the Book" who don't believe their own Book. But the verse before it says: "And they [the People of the Book] have been commanded no more than this: To worship Allah..." So the imams are honest who teach that verse 6 means the Jewish people - because in holding onto the Jewish Bible, they "disbelieve" in Islam and withhold the worship that Allah demands.
--------------
BTW those who claim this obnoxious and murderous viewpoint is not 'real Islam' are practicing what devout Muslims consider a necessary deception, Taqiyya, based on these verses:
“Let believers not take for friends and allies infidels instead of believers. Whoever does this shall have no relationship left with Allah – unless you but guard yourselves against them, taking precautions.” (Quran 3:28; see also 2:173; 2:185; 4:29; 22:78; 40:28.)
Islamic expert Raymond Ibrahim explained how Islamic scholars interpret "taking precautions":
"Al-Tabari’s (838-923 AD) Tafsir, or Quranic exegeses, is essentially a standard reference in the entire Muslim world. Regarding 3:28, he wrote: 'If you [Muslims] are under their [infidels’] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them, with your tongue, while harbouring inner animosity for them... Allah has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels in place of believers – except when infidels are above them [in authority]. In such a scenario, let them act friendly towards them.'”
In answer to your last question:
Faithful Muslims don't WANT to "thrive in the modern world" - they want to use it to further their world domination goals. The few who do assimilate into European and American culture are regarded by Islam as either apostates or practitioners of Taqiyya.
Thank you for the detailed reply. Unfortunately, it gives me less hope for world stability ahead. Clearly, self-serving mass media promotes simple-minded, less/non-productive solutions to populations that have little interest in understanding the necessary complexities of any functioning civilization. Islam appears to be incompatible with any modern egalitarian civilization.
Great essay. I hate that it is referred to as "the Jewish Problem". We are all just people.
This is a great essay. Thank you for reprinting it.
Without detracting from that at all, I'd like to point out that the statement "The occupation of the West Bank by Israel... has been... a disaster for Israel morally, politically, and spiritually" is false. It's the kind of thing that people say because everyone says it, because it would be gauche to not. One would think that after 55 years of a morally-corrupting policy one would see a lot more moral corruption. Not that there isn't any, but it'd be hard to show that there's more than there was before, or more than one would expect absent that policy. In the political and spiritual realms as well, Israel has tended to thrive. None of that proves that Israel's policies are good, it merely undermines the predictions based on the assumption that they're bad.
I just came here to post something like this. The settlements are protecting Israel, not just because they contribute more combat soldiers to the IDF than any other segments of society, but also because without them rockets would be fired from just a few miles from Tell Aviv. Just look at the map and see how close the borders of the West Bank are to major cities! Few people think about the fact that the residents of Tell Aviv can party without much worry because the "occupation" of the West Bank.
Essential reading. Thank you!
We continue to learn the same lessons we ignored with the Kobar Towers and the bombing of the Marine barracks - ignorance leads to disaster leads to ignorance leads to disaster.
We learn the same lessons but willfully ignore the drivers and, thus, never even consider any viable solutions.
We hamstring ourselves, then demand excuses for losing the race.
Dear neighbor Jonathan... shalom aleichem to you are your house. Anti-Semitism is a direct work, campaign, onslaught of evil since Abraham. Jews are persecuted because they are the flesh and blood proof, the living, evidence for the God of the Bible, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses. David...the one and only God, of Israel. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is why anti-Semitism has persisted for 3800 years +=-. And will continue until the end of this age. See Revelation 20-22 for the final eternal outcome.
You were quite right after 9/11 to say that Christian Europe failed catastrophically. The Shoah could have been prevented.
In our time, both Judaism and Christianity are in spiritual warfare with two great sources of evil, Marxism and all its derivatives and affiliates, and the deep darkness within Islam, which is not in command over all Muslims but at work in a sizeable faction. Neither can tolerate the existence of Judaism and Christianity. The reason why so many people cannot understand anti-Semitism over the last 3800 years os that they are blind to the spiritual warfare.
The Jewish people have survived these 3800 years because they are the sign and witness of Hashem, Adonai Elohenu. As are their true believing Christian neighbors. As the Scriptures say repeatedly, the day of the Lord is coming when God will vindicate His people. We, the living stones, stand on the promise.
"I was critical of the Holocaust Museum in Washington. I didn't want ancient European antisemitism enshrined on federal land. But now everything has come to American soil."
To diverge from the context in which you wrote that last sentence and also from your personal perspective, as I'm a Gentile --
I think we can say that the persecution of good Arabs in the US of those days, on account of an atrocity for which they were not responsible, led to a fateful overcorrection. Soon everything Arab and everything Muslim was to be defended. The secularism of many on the American Left did not prevent them from crediting followers of Islam with a moral purity unknown in Christendom and insisting on a thoroughly benign interpretation of the Qur'an. (Having read it in its entirety, I can't go so far.) Fifteen years later, Donald Trump's antipathy to Muslims set the seal on their standing with progressives. If Trump was against them, progressives would be for them. No questions asked, no distinctions made.
All people -- good, bad, or indifferent -- with roots in the Arab world became beneficiaries of the reverential goodwill which modern-day Americans reflexively extend to immigrants with stories of hardship and persecution to tell. The stories may be corrupted by ancient prejudices, but it's bad form to notice; one must be a cooperative listener. In this way, undissipated antisemitism pursued Jews from the old world to the new, where it assumed a sympathetic new identity in the environs of elite universities, progressive NGOs, and even the US Congress.
The struggle ahead which you mention in closing must include American intellectuals' self-liberation from the thrall of the Magical Other and their recognition that there is such a thing as an exotic bigot.
https://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-magical-other.html
https://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.com/2022/11/never-draws-near.html
https://thefamilyproperty.blogspot.com/2023/11/savagery.html
I think we in the West, also continue to practice apologism with respect to our immigrant communities. We are not multicultural in the US, we were founded as a plurality "Out of many One". I say this repeatedly, immigration brings with it certain obligations. The immigrant chooses a host country that has its own culture. That choice comes with the immigrants entry into the social compact with its host. Reap the benefits and protections and opportunities of that host country. In return, you are required to assimilate into your new country. It is not the requirement of us to accommodate you, you must now accommodate for us and become one of us. This is true in every country in the world, Western or not. You are not a mere visitor, you are a citizen or future citizen. That comes with obligations and requirements for you. If you move to a country with a Judeo-Christian culture, then that is the culture you must live in. You can worship as you wish, that is our law and protection. You may dress as you wish, eat the foods you wish, and the list goes on. But you have NO RIGHT to force that upon the rest of us. That is not the way our culture, country, or laws work.
100% correct!!!!!
I will make two comments.
First, ALL JEWS KNOW WHO THEIR ENEMIES IN THIS NATION ARE. They are not hard to identify. They carry signs in public saying “Death to the Jews.” They create areas where no Jews are allowed. They chant FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA.
And they are all Democrats—although many are angry Democrats are not more openly hateful with regard to all things Jewish; and are all at least tacitly—through silence—directly supported by Democrats in Congress, and by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, although her handlers have never let her talk much.
Second, in an obvious point I make annually, TOWER 7 WAS BROUGHT DOWN BY EXPLOSIVES. No second option.
Have you ever seen a tree fall straight into its own footprint? Of course not: the rest of tree is in the way. The tree has to be REMOVED for the rest to fall straight down, and nearly instantly.
Had you been standing on Tower 7–a 47 story steel skyscraper NOT HIT BY A PLANE—and droppes an apple when it started falling, you would have hit the ground within a second of the apple. Only controlled demolition does that.
Who planted the explosives and how? I dont know. But the facts WERE covered up by our own government, NIST specifically.
Here is a video: https://youtu.be/4xN8lzBo9zY
Note the straight line and nearly perfect symmetry. You cannot get a symmetrucal collapse with asymmetrical damage.
Satan himself is the reason for Jew hatred. The scriptures call Jews God's chosen people and it's exactly why parts of the world are so riled up about Jews and Israel. Satan himself is behind the hatred. Even liberal Jews in America are fooled into siding with anti-semitism. Abraham was given the land by God himself. In 1948 it became recognized as a sovereign country. The enemy is pissed and has never been more evident since the holocaust. Netanyahu is a character right out of scripture and this world had better pay attention to the dynamics playing out. This is a war between good and evil and the final outcome has already been determined. Word to the wise: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."
Well said - thank you.
No idea why this comment has no likes, but it has mine. Amen!
If all the Jews disappeared tomorrow...who would the Muslim world turn their hate and love affair with violence upon? My guess is Americans would be the new Jews. They would be lost without an all-abiding enemy to hate and fight against.
Absolutely could not have said that better. Israel has been called the "Little Satan", and America the "Big Satan". This is not a guess, the message is being clearly telegraphed. And after that? Who is the most righteous sect of Islam, the "true" Muslim? They will tear each other apart in a return to the world of the 7th century. Where are the moderate Muslims? They will be next.
@Irshad Manji has written about the ‘moderates’ in her book “Allah, Liberty & Love”. I laughed when she got to the ‘moderate’ but passive terrorist supporters: They’re the ones who always start out, “I don’t support terrorism but….” in which they of course go on to defend terrorism in some way. Just like the not-a-racists here who say, “You know I’m not a racist but…..”
Hamas isn't waiting for the Jews to disappear. They have been announcing for 10 years or more that they intend to "rule the world", literally, for their god.
Jews are not the only infidels, they are merely the most viscerally hated infidels.
Reminds me of Hitler, who pledged much the same thing. How’d that whole thing work out, anyway?
The National Socialists haven't gone away, nor have they given up on their goal of saving the world from 'Jewish domination'....
As we can see in social media, they are getting a tailwind from joining forces with those who have the same goals: Islam on one side and Theosophy on the other.
This was a tour de force in many ways. But the main threat to Jews and the rest of us in the west is not crazy Imams. It is critical social justice theology embraced by midwit degreed youth, mostly white and female. It stops here when we stop them. Do we have the will?
It's not mostly white and female. There are scads of Arab, Hispanic, Black, and White academic theorists of social justice who are male. All of these religious leaders (the imams) are male, as are the race-baiting social justice Reverends who stoke racial enmity in the United States.
IMO "social justice" has become an oxymoron. Just another dog-whistle for antisemitic, anti-Western, personal grievance.
If you add Marxist to that list, it would be more descriptive. At it's heart, Marxist is all about 'social justice'. There is no such thing. It's just Marxism. Period.
"'None of us has ever liked the World Trade Towers very much,' he said."
I'm a fan of Vincent Scully. But here he's wrong. Those of us snobs who had never liked the towers got used to them, and grew to see them with new eyes when Philippe Petit, high up, danced back and forth between them. Then when they came down, we mourned for them and the lives inside them.
It is impossible for me to remember September 11 and not compare it to October 7. I'm not Jewish, but I have eyes to see.
Today, the Jihadists aren't from over there, on visas: They're here, they're teaching our kids, they're running our city governments, they're in Congress cheering on the savaging of our monuments and streetscapes.
And some are advising our feeble president.
Absolutely!!
"None of us has ever liked the Word Trade Towers very much."--- Vincent Scully
Setting aside the mass spillage of innocent blood, or even of big time evil---the Trade Center towers were the two most gargantuan, unoriginal, aesthetically moronic globs of banality ever to be inflicted on the citizens of this country.
Hitler would have loved them.
Stalin would have plumped for something more soul-crushingly ugly.
But, actually, who cares. After all: "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American people." --- H.L.M.