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March 31, 2008
Stop-Loss: Loser
Ryan Phillipe in Stop-Loss.
Hollywood's latest anti-Iraq war film has flopped badly at the box office. What a shock. Maybe Obama's, ahem, former Pastor, Jeremiah Wright, will give a sermon blaming it on, y'know, “Israel, that dirty word.” Oh wait, Hollywood is controlled by Jooz.
So confusing.
I’ve asked around and the scuttle is that Stop-Loss cost $30 to$40 million to produce. With its advertising budget you can easily add another $10-$15 million.
Gee, all that dishonest advertising on Fox News [translation for oh, so witty liberals: Faux Noise] and you still got yourself a stinker-roo.
Hey, I have an idea… Because that’s like twelve pro-defeat, anti-American box-office humiliations in a row, why don’t you stop making them…?
To read the complete article, go to Libertas.
And here's Dirty Harry's review of Stop-Loss. Which sounds like a public service announcement designed to save your hard-earned dollars.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 05:27 AM | Comments (8)
March 30, 2008
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere # 160
I keep telling people that Seven Samurai is a totally Jewish film.
Haveil Havalim #160, The Waffle Edition, is up and running, hosted this week by Life in Israel.
As always, there is much fine material to read and ponder.
We'd like to thank Life in Israel for including my meditation on motherhood, courage, and becoming a grandfather in Seven Samurai and Baby.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 03:18 AM | Comments (18)
March 28, 2008
Seven Samurai and Baby
A great warrior pays tribute to the power of maternal love.
One of the great moments in Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece, The Seven Samurai, 1954, takes place mid-point through the film, after the samurai have cleverly organized the perimeter defenses of the village and trained the peasants in the art of warfare. In truth, the training is mostly about discipline, unit cohesion, and convincing the uncertain farmers that they can do battle, that they must do battle because appeasement to the brigands—the terrorists of 16th century Japan—means rape, pillage and death for the entire village.
And now, in one of the early battles, an outlying grain mill has been attacked and set on fire by the brigands. Kikuchiyo, played by the great Toshiru Mifune, the drunken lout who's out to prove that he's as good as the real samurai, rushes to the grain mill in order to rescue the civilians who are being butchered.
It's a haunting battle scene as Mifune splashes through a waist deep stream toward the doomed windmill. Pillars of smoke climb to the sky—it's a night battle so the sense of dread is deeply compounded. Off-screen we hear swords clashing, brigands shouting, horses screaming and snorting like beasts from hell. Kurosawa nails the essence of grunt warfare from time immemorial: it is chaos.
And then a young woman comes staggering through the stream towards Mifune. Her eyes are wide open saucers, she's heaving shallow labored breaths.
Her knees buckle, it's almost certain that she's been mortally wounded.
She comes closer to the camera, struggling to bridge the short distance to Mifune.
And now we realize that she's cradling a baby in her arms.
The young woman is leaking blood, leaking life, but the love and duty she feels for her child drives her onward—so that finally, ever so gently she hands her baby to the stunned warrior.
And then, once safely in Mifune's arms, the mother collapses and dies.
Mifune stands there covered in mud and blood. He's lit from behind by the burning building, now a roaring furnace. It's a vision of hell on earth.
Mifune, this lice-ridden samurai, this drunken brawler, holds the baby tight in his arms and cries out to his comrades: ”You see how this mother forced herself forward, she wouldn't let herself fall until her baby was safe.”
It's a stunning scene.
The swordsman is paying homage to another warrior, to a mother who protected her child to her last breath. It's a great moment as a down and dirty warrior recognizes and pays tribute to the power of maternal love.
And then another layer of narrative deepens the image, motivates the Mifune character beyond the quest for status and glory and makes richer this greatest of great films.
Mifune breaks down and cries. His tears are not just tears of pain, but rage boils within as he confesses in the next choking breath that he is the child of peasants—he had boasted, though no one really believed him, of samurai lineage—that his mother saved his life when he was a baby and then she too was murdered by brigands.
This scene is a turning point in The Seven Samurai, from now on the other characters look at Kikuchiyo with new found respect—even if he is the son of lowly peasants. And Mifune's motivation, now solidly established, allows his character to mature as a warrior, as a man—ultimately as a true hero.
All this went through my head as I stood and watched my daughter holding her daughter. Already Offspring #2 has that fierce protective look that I recognize and remember when Karen held our children.
And all this went through my head in shul, synagogue, as our grandchild was given her name and welcomed into the community of Torah and Judaism: Maayan Ariel.
Karen and I wish all our friends a lovely and meaningful Rest in Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:20 PM | Comments (19)
March 25, 2008
New Seraphic Offspring
Mazal Tov!
With joy and gratitude to HaShem Karen and I are proud to announce the birth of a granddaughter to Offspring #2 and her wonderful husband.
May we all share only simchas together.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:36 PM | Comments (69)
March 24, 2008
Colleen Moore: The Stars and Stripes
Colleen Moore, studio portrait in the Stars and Stripes.
Colleen Moore's starring vehicle, Flaming Youth (1923) was an international hit. Moore, born Kathleen Morrison, (1900-1988) and her husband John McCormick embarked on a grand tour of Europe to simultaneously promote the film, Colleen's career, and enjoy a belated honeymoon.
Colleen's look, specifically her bobbed haircut, was now a global fashion rage. Where did Moore and her mother get the idea for this cubist cut, so markedly different than the opulent tresses in favor at the time? Moore explains that her mother copied the look from a favorite childhood Japanese doll. The new hairstyle sends a message: this young lady is independent, plucky, fiery one moment, down-to-earth the next, tom-boyish but completely feminine; she's the decent and adorable American girl next door who can be a boy's best friend when he's growing up and then magically blossom into the love of his life.
In Dublin, a celebrity starved crowd of 10,000 frantic fans broke through a police cordon and grabbed at Colleen who was wearing a stunning cape covered with intricately stitched tiny feathered plumes. Finally, John had to lift Colleen and carry her to the car where she arrived “looking like a plucked chicken.”
In Switzerland the mayor of Zurich arranged a dinner party in Colleen's honor. An orchestra was present to play the the American national anthem.
Colleen describes the scene in her fine memoir Silent Star:
We'd no sooner sat down than the mayor, with a small bow to me, signaled the orchestra, who started playing “My Country,'Tis of Thee.” We all got up and stood very silent. When we sat down again, I said to the mayor, “That was the English national anthem, 'G-d Save the King.'”
I should have kept my mouth shut. The mayor sent for the orchestra leader, spoke a few words to him in German, and no sooner had we started the soup course than the orchestra struck up again, this time with John Philip Sousa's “Stars and Stripes Forever.” The Mayor stood up, beckoning to all of us, saying excitedly, “Stehen sie auf, bitte—everybody please stand up.”
We all stood, the orchestra finished, we sat down, and the American consul and I burst out laughing. When the mayor asked what we were laughing about, like an idiot I said, “That wasn't our national anthem. That's a march.”
The mayor, red in face, sent for the orchestra leader, spluttering German at him. The leader turned to me and asked the name of our national anthem. I said, “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
He returned to the bandstand, the mayor watching him with an eagle eye. A few moments later the orchestra struck up “Yes, We Have No Bananas,” the mayor rose, saying, “Stehen sie auf, bitte,” and a tableful of by-now bewildered guests stood at attention once again. When we sat down, I smiled at the mayor and said, “That was lovely,”
In 1930 Soviet director Sergei Eisentstein came to Hollywood to set up several motion picture projects. The film genius who directed Potemkin met everybody in the business, partied like a pro, but, naturally, got stuck in development hell, and returned to mother Russia without a deal. Studio heads were baffled by his adaptation of Dreiser's An American Tragedy. Eisenstein said a great deal about Hollywood and the decadent capitalists he encountered. He judged Marlene Dietrich dull, Greta Garbo stupid. But Collen Moore, rhapsodized Eisenstein, was the only intelligent woman he met in Hollywood.
Colleen Moore, Desert Flower, 1925
Do check out the fine and valuable website, The Collen Moore Research Project. It is under constant construction. Among many other things there's substantial information about Colleen's first husband, studio executive John McCormick, who was, in many ways, responsible for steering the meteoric rise of her flapper film career. Unfortunately, he was also an alcoholic and a deeply disturbed man.
Director Mervyn LeRoy in his fascinating autobiography Take One, describes a terrifying night when McCormick, on a bender, tried to throw Moore out of a N.Y. hotel window. Leroy—from an assimilated Jewish San Francisco family—saved Moore's life by smashing McCormick over the head with a chair. The gallant and properly violent Leroy—at the time a top “comedy constructor” for Moore—remained as her protector the entire night, the two of them aimlessly walking the streets of New York. In Hollywood past and present, major movie stars have major tzuris.
In fact, Moore and McCormick's troubled relationship inspired George Cukor's insider Hollywood drama What Price Hollywood in 1932 as well as the three versions of A Star Is Born.
Colleen Moore, Her Wild Oat 1927.
Tragically, Flaming Youth, is presumed to be a lost film. Perhaps somewhere in an attic in middle America or in an archive in Eastern Europe, lies a decaying copy of this legendary motion picture. I wouldn't be at all surprised.
And as an example of how a lost film suddenly shows up—in this case Czechoslovakia—a Colleen Moore movie, Her Wild Oat, long considered gone, gone, gone, has now been rediscovered and expertly restored. This article is an interview with archivist and historian Joseph Yranski who met Colleen Moore in the early 1970s, and remained friends with her until her death in 1988. Yranski was indirectly responsible for the rediscovery of Her Wild Oat.
Colleen Moore and the six-year-old Mickey Rooney in Orchards and Ermine, 1927
On DVD you can see Colleen Moore in Orchids and Ermine, 1927. Colleen plays a shop girl, a flapper, who's looking for a sugar daddy. But she's got to remain a Cinderella at heart, meaning she has to fall in love for the sake of love—not money. There's romance, mistaken identity, and of course true love triumphs in the end. It's a screwball comedy before screwball comedies were invented in the 30's. Moore is brilliant as a gold digger who's not as avaricious as she should be. A classic.
Here's The Scarlet Letter, starring Colleen Moore and Alan Hale, 1934. This is a sound film, late in Colleen's career. Moore was primarily a comedian but here she was trying to broaden her horizons as an actress. I haven't yet seen this film so I'm clueless. But anything with Colleen Moore is interesting.
Broken Hearts of Broadway, 1923, this is just before Moore broke through as a major star. Colleen plays the role of Mary, an aspiring actress who arrives in New York all young and wholesome. Will she betray her friends for fame and fortune? This is a charming show-biz morality tale, and Moore, as always, is genuine, vivacious, and utterly magnetic.
Reel Baseball/The Busher is a collection of baseball-themed silent movies. Colleen Moore co-stars with Charles Ray in The Busher, 1919, about a small town pitcher who is brought up to the big leagues but can't quite make the grade. Colleen plays Mazie, his local sweetheart. Charles Ray was briefly a star of the silent era who specialized in playing rural heroes. On screen Ray was a one dimensional performer who relied on an aw', shucks grin and a standard check-list of hick mannerisms which appealed to audiences—for a short window of time.
Off-screen Ray possessed a massive ego, was difficult to work with, spent his fortune lavishly, and went bankrupt when he produced and financed his own pictures. In 1935 Ray published a collection of short stories titled Hollywood Shorts, Compiled From Incidents in the Everyday Life of Men and Women Who Entertain in Pictures. Anthony Slide, in his seminal volume Silent Players, reports that, “an undercurrent of anti-Semitism is evident in a number of stories, suggesting that Ray blamed his downfall on the Jewish studio bosses such as Adolph Zukor, who came along replacing the earlier gentile producers such as Thomas H. Ince.”
Sigh.
I saw The Busher on TCM—I have a TCM addiction and I am powerless to control it—a few months ago. Moore, just 19-years old, was not yet a star, just another feature player trying to claw her way from the middle ranks. But as soon as she appears on-screen—behold!—a refreshing, exuberant presence. The petite and vivacious Moore just blows the grinning, eager-to-please Charles Ray right off screen without even trying.
Fortunately for Colleen, the camera never picked up that she had one brown eye and one blue one.
Colleen Moore as Mazie in The Busher.
John Gilbert, who rose to be the first million dollar contract matinee idol at MGM, has a supporting role in The Busher film as the spoiled rich kid who's vying for Colleen's affections over Charles Ray's salt of the earth country hero. Tragically, Gilbert, hugely talented but self-destructive, would have a tortuous love affair with the great narcissist Greta Garbo—she left him stranded at the altar—and then, with the coming of sound his career crashed and burned in a terrific orgy of booze and babes.
After her retirement from motion pictures in 1935, Colleen Moore dedicated herself to an ongoing project: building the world's most dazzling and elaborate doll house, actually a fairy castle. She toured with the doll house to raise money for children's charities.
The house is an engineering marvel. It has its own miniature sophisticated lights and wiring, a self-contained plumbing system, and a miniature library with books signed by some of the greatest authors of our time. Every single detail of the castle is simply breath taking.
The fairy castle is on permanent exhibition in Chicago's Museum of Science of Industry. Here's the homepage.
Colleen Moore was Mervyn Leroy's champion in Hollywood. She mentored the luminous teen-age Loretta Young and cast an inexperienced but jaw-droppingly handsome Gary Cooper in his first starring role opposite her in Lilac Time. Moore believed that Leroy, an incredibly bright and creative young man, could develop into a fine director. And she was right. So let's close with Leroy's warm words about this important actress and icon of the silver screen:
Colleen Moore was a remarkable girl who grew into a remarkable woman... and became, next to Mary Pickford, the biggest silent film star of them all.
Later, she would retire from the screen at the height of her fame, marry well, and spend the rest of her life doing important civic works in Chicago, writing books, raising her stepchildren, and doting on her grandchildren. She was never anything but a lady, throughout her career and her postcareer life.
Her fame, however, never went to her head in any way. Perhaps because of her affluent background, she was never spoiled by her wealth., never seduced by her notoriety, never changed by her success. She was always sweet—in the best sense of the word—and kind and pleasant to everyone she met. I doubt that there was a man who worked on her pictures who was not platonically in love with her.
Links:
Carmel Myers: The Rabbi's Beautiful Daughter
Colleen Moore's Wedding Night
One Hairstyle, Three Memoirs: Alma Rubens, Colleen Moore, Louise Brooks
Theda Bara: The Vamp Adopts the Troops
Movie Magazines: They Don't Print 'em Like They Used To
Alma Rubens: Dope Fiend, But Not a Jewess
Wallace Reid: Hollywood Shooting Star
Olive Thomas: Hollywood's First Suicide
Mary Pickford: The Greatest Movie Star
Seraphic Secret Chats with Actress Coleen Gray about John Wayne, Howard Hawks, and Stanley Kubrick
Susan Peters: The Great Unknown and Tragic Actress
The Blond Machine Gun: Jean Harlow
Peg Entwistle & The Hollywood Sign
Brigitte Bardot & Sean Connery in Shalako—Sorta
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:08 AM | Comments (1)
March 23, 2008
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere # 159
One of the women in my shul dressed up as Brigitte Bardot for Purim.
Great costume, huh? And totally modest.
Haveil Havalim #159, appropriately titled The Purim is Over Edition, is up and once again Jack of Random Thoughts has done a fine job.
We'd like to thank Jack for including two of our articles in this week's round-up: Our piece, with You Tube visual aid, Obama's Pastor: Israel That Dirty Word.
The outrageous thing is that Obama—after 20-years passively listening and never once protesting to his racist, Jew-hater Pastor, whoops, ex-Pastor—now believes, along with the, ahem, liberal establishment, that he has the credentials to lecture the American people about race. That's called cynically playing the race card.
But, you know, I'm just a “typical white person”, like Obama's grandmother.
What happens if Obama fails to secure the White House? I can see the headlines in the N.Y. Times: “Angry & Frustrated Progressives Youths Rampage in Inner Brooklyn Heights.”
We also wrote a piece about The Lessons of the Great Syrian Raid. We pointed out that appeasement never pays, that deterrence can be established—and after the Mercaz Massacre Israel needs to hit back at the enemy more forcefully than ever before.
As always, Jack provides his beloved—well, we at Casa Avrech love it—audio introduction where we learn that Jack has a cold. Poor ba-by. Quick, send Jack some chicken soup. But wait, Jack can't be too ill because, yup, there's that old reliable Friday the 13th cackle.
Refuah shlemah, Jack.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:55 AM | Comments (14)
March 21, 2008
Purim 2008
The Malbim on Megillat Esther, translated and adapted by Rabbi Mendel Weinbach. This was one of Ariel's ZT'L favorite commentaries. It is, dare I say it, a real page-turner.
Mordechai's letter detailed the motivations of Haman. It was not hatred towards him personally that sparked him but the ancient hatred of his Amelekite forebears for Jewry. The miracle of his failure was even greater because the particular time was terribly unfavorable to the Jewry. Although his very first idea was to merely destroy them spiritually, the lots he cast indicated such an opportune period that he decided on physical genocide.
Seraphic Friends Sigmund, Carl & Alfred, analyze Purim with accurate and frightening historical accuracy:
Adolph Hitler once said that there would be ‘no Mordecai and Esther to save the Jews.‘ His remarks were met with great laughter. He went on to say, in a speech delivered on January 30, 1944, that, if the Nazis went down in defeat, the Jews could celebrate ‘a second Purim.’
To read the complete post, please click here.
Karen and I wish all our friends a happy and meaningful Purim.
And do purchase my friend J.T. Waldman's brilliant graphic novel, Megillat Esther. Here are some preview pages that will give you a sense of the richness of Waldman's artistry.
Michael Yon has a new website. You must go there.
Karen and I wish all our friends a lovely and meaningful Rest in Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:31 AM | Comments (1)
March 20, 2008
Obama's Pastor Worships Hamas: What a Shock
Barack Obama with spiritual mentor Reverend Jeremiah Wright.
From BizzyBlog comes evidence that Obama’s church not only has anti-white, anti-American feelings, but may also have a pro-Hamas bias. The July 22, 2007 Trinity United Church of Christ bulletin reprinted an article written by Mousa Abu Marzook, deputy of the political bureau of Hamas. Originally printed in the LA Times as Hamas’ Stand, Pastor Wright added a new title, “A Fresh View of the Palestinian Struggle”. The Times was criticized for giving a Platform To Genocidal Terrorist. Where does that leave Obama’s church? Marzook is a known terrorist and created an extensive Hamas network in the United States.
The smoking gun is here in Obama’s church bulletin. Was Obama there? Does he support Hamas? Expect Obama and his supporters to simply ignore this tacit if not direct support of a terrorist organizaton.
Via: Free Republic
Again: Seraphic Secret maintains that Barack Obama's character and judgment are severely impaired. The proof is his 20-year association with Reverend Wright and his black separatist church, a church that espouses “a pledge of allegiance to a black value system.” Whatever that means. Reverend Wright is a bigot, an anti-American demagogue, a spinner of paranoid fantasies, and obviously a Jew-hater and pathological anti-Zionist.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 01:06 PM | Comments (0)
Join the Worldwide Online Rally For S'derot
S'derot under missile attack
Join The Worldwide Online Rally For S'derot
Rabbi Marvin Hier—Thursday March 20, 2008
LOG ONTO THE BIGGEST EVER VIRTUAL SOLIDARITY RALLY FOR ISRAEL!
Join Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean and founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, actor Jon Voight, and human rights activists across the globe on Thursday, March 20th to help make history while showing your solidarity with Israel by logging onto:
http://www.together4israel.org
Seven solidarity rallies on four continents, live on the web, with one million people coming together.
Join us for this historic occasion with Jews and friends from all over the world as we come together for the largest ever online rally. Show your support for our brothers and sisters living under the constant threat of terror.
Alan Dershowitz, renowned American international lawyer and author of, "The Case for Israel," and Irwin Cotler, MP and former Canadian Minister of Justice, will kick off the event broadcasting live from Sderot, Israel at 11:00 pm local time.
From S'derot, there will be live webcasts of rallies in Jerusalem, South Africa, London, New York, Los Angeles and Australia.
Invited speakers include Yisroel Meir Lau, Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv; Israel's Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger; former Knesset member and Soviet Refusenik Natan Sharansky; former First Minister of Ireland David Trimble; Beverly Hills Mayor Jimmy Delshad; Los Angles City Councilman Jack Weiss, actor Jon Voight and Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom, Sir Jonathan Sacks.
View Mercaz Harav Rally at Young Israel of Century City.
P.S. Barack wants to have a national dialog about race. Okay, here it is via Dirty Harry's Place: Barack Collapses in Polls.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:30 AM | Comments (14)
March 19, 2008
Lessons of the Great Syrian Raid
A new poll shows that an overwhelming majority of Palestinians support the attack this month on a Jewish seminary in Jerusalem that killed eight young men, most of them teenagers, an indication of the alarming level of Israeli-Palestinian tension in recent weeks. The survey also shows unprecedented support for the shooting of rockets on Israeli towns from the Gaza Strip and for the end of the peace negotiations between Palestinian and Israeli leaders. The pollster, Khalil Shikaki, said he was shocked because... never before, he said, had a majority favored an end to negotiations or the shooting of rockets at Israel... His explanation for the shift, one widely reflected in the Palestinian media, is that recent actions by Israel, especially attacks on Gaza that killed nearly 130 people, an undercover operation in Bethlehem that killed four militants and the announced expansion of several West Bank settlements, have led to despair and rage among average Palestinians who thirst for revenge. Mr. Shikaki’s poll also showed that the militant Islamist group Hamas, which Israel and the United States have been trying to isolate, is gaining popularity in the West Bank.
In short. It's all the fault of the Jews.
Let me point out the one recent military action in the Middle East that should have had far reaching lessons for Israel and for all major counter terrorism operations, but it seems to have been overlooked.
In 2007, the IAF mounted Operation Orchard, a brilliant and completely successful raid deep into Syrian territory when the IAF bombed a Syrian, North Korean, Iranian facility—probably nuclear.
This raid was so far reaching, so technically advanced that the Syrian ground defenses went dark. The Israelis hacked into the enemy network and rendered them useless. The Syrians had no idea that the IAF was in their airspace. And when they finally became aware of the Israeli incursion they were so intimidated they didn't scramble one single fighter to engage in a dog fight. They knew it was suicide.
But here's the lesson: The Syrians never retaliated.
The Syrians didn't even protest in the U.N. Security Council.
The Syrians and the Persians were so cowed by Israel's overwhelming military and technological capabilities that they just hunkered down and shut the hell up. For they know that if Israel gets riled Israel can annihilate them.
Israel and the world should have taken notice of the Syrian and Iranian reaction. Instead, Israel retreated to her old patterns of appeasement. S'derot and now Ashkelon suffer daily from missile attacks.
One could argue that the Syrian raid was mounted, most certainly, because of an existential threat.
But I will argue that Hamas, Fatah, Hizbullah, and the slow, grinding, wearing down of Israel's national will by being conditioned to accept daily bombardment is also an existential threat.
The lessons of the Syrian raid are obvious: When Israel uses her military might—not pin-point assassinations—the terrorists and their state hosts crawl back into their holes and cower in fear. They are, at the core, bullies who hide behind the skirts of women and children. They cannot fight against Jews as equals.
And now, after the Mercaz Massacre, when common sense informs us—we don't need polls—that the Arab street supports and glorifies this and all atrocities, it's time for the Israeli government to hit the enemy, wherever he resides, with overwhelming and crushing force.
All else is national suicide.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 02:16 PM | Comments (10)
McCain in Israel
Republican Presidential nominee John McCain at the Kotel,
the Western Wall.
Meanwhile, in America, Barack Obama lies and lies and lies some more and then plays the old reliable race card. And Hillary Clinton finally releases about 11,000 pages of documents, with major redactions, that she really doesn't want to see the light of day.
Since Obama and Clinton do not disagree about anything of substance ideologically; they are both in favor of the endless expansion of the federal government—a polite form of socialism—the Democratic slug-fest is about style, fashion, and of course what's always at the heart of liberal politics: race and gender. Liberals are obsessed with skin color, blood, identity politics, much like the KKK, but without the uncool robes. Currently, the Arab keffiyeh is the preferred totalitarian adornment for the chattering classes.
Yup, for your Official Judeosphere Checklist for the Aspiring Anti-Zionist Protester ™ click here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:51 AM | Comments (7)
March 18, 2008
Obama's Pastor: “Israel, That Dirty Word”
Here's Barack Obama's religious adviser, whoops, excuse me, former religious adviser, former pastor, on Israel.
Hey, when did Wright become Barack's former pastor?
Wow, that was fast.
And where's Wright?
In Africa.
That's convenient. Barack's handlers don't want the old bigot and anti-Semite shooting off his mouth. He might be quoted, ahem, out of context.
But Barack wasn't in Church when Wright made these comments. He was never in Church when Wright made any of his hateful racist, anti-white, anti-American, Jew-hating comments.
In 20-years he was never in Church when Wright was spouting his incandescent lies. As Jay Leno quipped: “Obama must have been in his Mosque.”
In fact, the great uniter was present during Wright's most hateful and bigoted speeches.
I'll bet he's going to tell us that he wasn't applauding.
Uh-huh.
Obama said in his speech this morning that some of Wright's comments were incendiary.
Hellooo, it's not incendiary. It's a series of blood libels, one crude lie after another. Cheap race hustling.
It's also clinically paranoid speech.
But Wright performed Obama's wedding ceremony to the patriotic Michelle.
Wright baptized Obama's children.
I'm pretty careful about which synagogue I join. I'm extremely cautious about which Rabbis I associate with. If ever I heard any Rabbi deliver a sermon with rhetoric like Wright's I'd head for the hills, and I'd report him to the FBI for seditious speech. I'd certainly resign my membership and I'd write a letter explaining why. I would not continue to sit in shul week after week—for 20 years.
And I certainly wouldn't remain in a shul if it honored, oh, let's say David Duke, the white equivalent of Louis Farrakhan.
I would not sit in a shul where a Rabbi screeched: “No, not G-d bless America, G-d damned America.”
I'd denounce such a Rabbi as a traitor. And anyone who cannot denounce such a man does not deserve to be President of the United States. Does not deserve to be in the U. S. Senate. Does not deserve to be local dog catcher.
There are two Rabbis in my own community who I avoid like the plague, their politics are toxic, politics of appeasement and surrender and I won't have anything to do with them.
Whom you associate with says a great deal about your character.
The New York Times spilled gallons of ink on a non-story about John McCain's non-relationship with a female lobbyist. The point of the non-story, I presume, was that McCain's character and judgment were in question because of this non-relationship.
Barack Obama has had an extremely close relationship with Reverend Wright for over 20-years. Thus, it is quite legitimate to question Senator Obama's character and judgment.
But I have no doubt that many liberal Jews will vote for Obama:
1. Because he transcends race.
2. Because he's a uniter.
3. Because he's beyond poliitcs.
4. Because he's good looking.
5. Because they are the people they have been waiting for.
6. Whatever that means, beyond the obvious narcissism.
Actually, Obama's just another liberal/leftist/progressive/greenie/whatever, who believes in the endless expansion of a crushing government bureaucracy, and who yearns to turn our health care systems into a massive and inefficient DMV.
Bobby Kennedy once characterized liberals as suicidal.
I sooooo hope the Dems nominate Obama.
I smell McGovern.
Check out Bookworm's fine analysis of Obama's deceitful speech.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:24 AM | Comments (31)
March 17, 2008
Crushing Tibet
Now that the Chinese are hosting the next Olympics and the Tibetans are starting to make some noise about the cultural genocide that the Chinese have committed in Tibet, maybe the Palestinian-obsessed media will start paying attention to the true horrrors in Tibet.
From Joshuapundit:
For those of you who don't know, Tibet was an independent country for centuries, until the Communist Chinese regime invaded and occupied them in 1950. The Dalai Lama was forced to flee the country, along with thousands of other Tibetans, many of whom settled in neighboring India and Nepal. The ones who stayed were subjected to harsh rule which was concentrated on dispersing the Tibetans, destroying their national and religious culture and subjecting them to what amounted to ethnic cleansing. Tibetans were forcibly removed from their homeland and settled in neighboring provinces while ethnic Chinese were brought in to settle in Tibet.
Due to the nature of Mao Tse-Tung's regime, the Tibetan's Buddhist religion was singled out for special repression. Something like 6,000 monasteries, nunneries and temples, and their contents were partially or fully destroyed from the period of the Chinese invasion and during the Cultural Revolution, and literally thousands of Buddhist monks were killed or driven out of the country. Human rights groups have confirmed the identities of over 700 Tibetan political prisoners in Tibet, although there are likely to be hundreds more whose names simply aren't known or confirmed. It's quite common for such people to be detained without charge or trial for up to four years through Chinese regulations calling for "re-education through labor."
It's interesting to compare the attention paid to the Tibetans, a truly oppressed and occupied people with the attention paid to the Palestinians, who are neither.
To read the complete article, please click here.
And this from the brilliant Yaakov Kirschen, Dry Bones:
Hat Tip: Soccer Dad
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 11:28 AM | Comments (11)
Planet Berkeley vs. The Marines
The Marines have fought Arab slavers in Tripoli, Japanese fascists on Iwo Jima and Okinawa, Arab jihadists in the streets of Fallujah. Yes, in every American war The Marines have bravely charged into the buzz-saw of enemy fire.
But now the few, the proud, The Marines face their greatest enemy: assymetrical warfare in Planet Berkelely.
These people are not only stupid but hilarious.
Hat Tip: Seraphic Chaver, Kishke.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:36 AM | Comments (2)
What Really Happened in Israel
Hassan Nasrallah: “The Jews are a cancer which
is liable to spread again at any moment.”
Here's a fine and sober video presentation What Really Happened in the Middle East from The David Horowitz Freedom Center.
It's a straightforward account of the Arab-Israeli conflict that's rooted in historical fact, not the poisonous propaganda of the Arab world, nor the post-modern delusions of the chattering classes.
As we at Seraphic Secret have pointed out many times, the conflict with the Arabs is not about land, not about boundaries, but about the presence of Jews in the land of Israel, in fact, the existence of Jews on the planet, and of course the very existence of the State of Israel—an affront to Islam.
A Palestinian State, and Palestinian nationalism are merely excuses for Islamic terrorism. The Arabs have no interest in establishing a state. They could have done so on several occasions, certainly in 1948 and in 2000. No, the Arabs are far more interested in destroying a state—Israel.
Click here to view the video.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:30 AM | Comments (2)
March 16, 2008
Carmel Myers: The Rabbi's Beautiful Daughter
Carmel Myers (1899-1980).
Pearl has identified the Jewish movie star correctly as Carmel Myers.
D.W. Griffith hired Rabbi Isadore Myers as the Jewish technical consultant on his great epic, Intolerance, 1916. Griffith was so happy with Rabbi Myer's expert advice and attention to detail that he said to the good Rabbi:
“How can I ever repay you?”
Rabbi Myers replied: “I have a daughter who would like to get into pictures.”
Carmel appears fleetingly as a dancing girl in Intolerance, and afterwards was signed as a contract Griffith player a few months prior to Colleen Moore's arrival. They became close friends.
In her book Silent Star, Colleen Moore remembers that a a club for young actresses—Our Club—was organized as a means of mutual support. The young actresses would lunch on Sunday, discuss movies, books, “boys” and generously feed one another tips on what roles were available at which studios. Myers was an active member. A typical meeting included: Anita Stewart, Patsy Ruth Miller, Helen Ferguson, Billie Dove, Virginia Zanuck, Gertrud Olmsted, Julanne Johnston, Clara Horton, Ruby Keeler, Loretta Young, Aline MacMahon, Ruth Roland, Carmelita Geraghty, Pauline Garan and Ann Harding. Mary Pickford was Godmother to this extraordinary gathering of up and coming stars.
Carmel's biggest break came when she was chosen to play Iras in the huge MGM production of Ben Hur, 1925.
Carmel Myers and Ramon Novarro, Ben Hur, 1925
The Rabbi's beautiful daughter was frequently cast as the sexy vamp in silent films. She starred and worked with some of the best known stars of the time: John Barrymore, Mary Astor, Rudolph Valentino, Norma Shearer, Adolph Menjou, Eleanor Boardman, Lon Chaney, and Joan Crawford. Carmel made the transition to sound quite nicely, and as she grew older eased gracefully into character parts. But when the roles got too small she shifted into real estate—always a smart bet in Los Angeles—and launched her own perfume company. In 1951 Carmel had her own TV show for one season. She was married three times, each man was Jewish. This reveals Carmel's deep sense of commitment to Judaism, at a time when intermarriage was almost expected among the Hollywood Jewish elite.
Carmel Myers enjoys humiliating H.B. Warner,
Sorrel and Son, 1927.
A lost Carmel Myers film was recently rediscovered and restored. From Senses of Cinema.
Among the recent discoveries and restorations this year, Herbert Brenon's Sorrel and Son (1927), previously thought lost, proved strong enough to transcend the poor print material. James Wong Howe's camerawork unfortunately could not be properly appreciated, but this is an excellent example of the kind of quality production Hollywood made at the time, and Brenon was nominated for an Academy Award. H.B. Warner gives a moving performance as a gentleman soldier trying to raise his son through hard times, and Carmel Myers especially stands out as a sluttish tavern owner, leading Variety to single out a scene in which she sadistically makes Warner wash the floors: “The manner in which Miss Myers handles this scene is great, and for that reason it is doubtful if it will pass uncensored.”
Almost entirely forgotten now, Carmel Myers was a fine actress and a great star of the silent screen.
Carmel Myers, The Rabbi's Beautiful Daughter
Colleen Moore's Wedding Night
One Hairstyle, Three Memoirs: Alma Rubens, Colleen Moore, Louise Brooks
Theda Bara: The Vamp Adopts the Troops
Movie Magazines: They Don't Print 'em Like They Used To
Alma Rubens: Dope Fiend, But Not a Jewess
Wallace Reid: Hollywood Shooting Star
Olive Thomas: Hollywood's First Suicide
Mary Pickford: The Greatest Movie Star
Seraphic Secret Chats with Actress Coleen Gray about John Wayne, Howard Hawks, and Stanley Kubrick
Susan Peters: The Great Unknown and Tragic Actress
The Blond Machine Gun: Jean Harlow
Peg Entwistle & The Hollywood Sign
Brigitte Bardot & Sean Connery in Shalako—Sorta
Carmel Myers, MGM Photo, The Ship From Shanghai, 1930.
Carmel Myers IMDb
Carmel Myers Photo Gallery
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 04:06 PM | Comments (4)
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere # 158
Haveil Havalim: The Almost Purim Edition, is up.
If you want to know what's going on in the Jewish blogosphere, this is the place to go.
We also love Jack's nifty audio intro with his signature cackle.
We'd like to thank Jack for including Seraphic Secret's Getting Stoned in Israel in this week's superb round-up.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:50 AM | Comments (7)
March 14, 2008
Colleen Moore's Wedding Night
Moore's image of carefree flapper was at odds with reality.
Flaming Youth was a huge hit and propelled Colleen Moore to international stardom—as she knew it would.
Colleen was smart about her career, but like so many young, inexperienced Hollywood actresses, when it came to men her choices were based on on gauzy, romantic notions that were limited to idealized Hollywood images. The hard work of marriage, and the importance of shared values were distant shores that for too many never entered the calculus of love and marriage.
In 1923, Moore, 22, married John Emmett McCormick, 29, a brilliant but highly unstable studio executive who was obsessed with Moore's image and career. Moore was a staunch Catholic who believed in the sanctity of marriage.
During their engagement, McCormick would, without a word, disappear for days at a time, then show up, gaunt, hollow-eyed, shaking, reeking of liquor, begging forgiveness, and pledging his undying love.
Moore's mother counseled Colleen to break the engagement. A wise mother, she warned her vulnerable daughter that marrying McCormick would ruin Colleen's life. But Colleen, like so many young and innocent women was convinced that with time, love and proper nurturing she would change her husband.
Colleen and John were married while Flaming Youth was in production.
In her superb autobiography, Silent Star, Colleen describes the wedding supper. In screenplays we call this foreshadowing:
John proposed a toast to my dad and mother for having given me to him—a funny, sentimental, beautiful toast. Then he downed his champagne in one gulp. Downed a second glass the same way. I remember watching him and thinking what bad table manners.
After the wedding party, Colleen and John drove to their new house where John carried his bride across the threshold.
Ah, romance.
Colleen Moore, studio portrait before she bobbed her hair.
Inside their home, John cracked open a bottle of champagne:
I took only a sip or two, afraid it would make me sick. John drained the entire bottle. His voice got louder. He became glassy-eyed. His mouth hung loose. He no longer looked like himself, but like some caricature of him.
Seeing the bewilderment on my face, he said to me, “It's our wedding night, and I am drunk.”
Then he started to cry—a sloppy, maudlin, drunken berating of self. I stared at him, shocked beyond words at this unknown creature groveling there.
I burst into tears and ran upstairs to our room. Sitting there crying, I wondered if I should go home. I shook my head. How could I face running home to mother on my wedding night?
I went out to the hall to the top of the stairs and, looking down, saw that the living room was dark. A light shone from the guest room. I went down the hall to it and looked in. There was John in his pajamas sprawled on the rug with a nearly empty bottle of Scotch beside him, a large stain on the rug where some of the liquor had run out of the bottle.
I stood there for a moment staring at him. Then I ran back to our room and locked the door and crawled into the big double bed and buried my face in the pillow, sobbing my heart out.
The next morning, Moore unlocked her bedroom door and discovered that John was gone. Moore drove to the studio where everyone crowded round and offered congratulations on her marriage. The crew and actors asked where her husband was—for McCormick had been on location every day, making sure that the studio PR machine was functioning smoothly, promoting Colleen Moore as the next great Hollywood star.
Moore, a thorough professional and a disciplined actress, told cast and crew that her husband had gone to the train station to see his parents off.
Then she went to her director and asked to start the day's shooting.
In Hollywood, then and now, it's all about illusion.
Colleen Moore, Photoplay Magazine.
One Hairstyle, Three Memoirs: Alma Rubens, Colleen Moore, Louise Brooks
Theda Bara: The Vamp Adopts the Troops
Movie Magazines: They Don't Print 'em Like They Used To
Alma Rubens: Dope Fiend, But Not a Jewess
Wallace Reid: Hollywood Shooting Star
Olive Thomas: Hollywood's First Suicide
Mary Pickford: The Greatest Movie Star
Seraphic Secret Chats with Actress Coleen Gray about John Wayne, Howard Hawks, and Stanley Kubrick
Susan Peters: The Great Unknown and Tragic Actress
The Blond Machine Gun: Jean Harlow
Peg Entwistle & The Hollywood Sign
Brigitte Bardot & Sean Connery in Shalako—Sorta
Karen and I wish all our friends a lovely and meaningful Rest in Shabbat.
This Jewish movie star from the silent screen also wishes you
a good Shabbos. Can you identify her? Hint: Her father was a
Rabbi. Answer on Sunday.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:57 AM | Comments (3)
March 13, 2008
One Hairstyle, Three Memoirs: Alma Rubens, Colleen Moore, Louise Brooks
Alma Rubens, Motion Picture Magazine,
Sept 1925.
I don't know about you, but I needed some relief from the endlessly grim news out of Israel.
So: I took a break, bounced around the internet looking for some new information about Alma Rubens, subject of our popular profile: Alma Rubens: Dope Fiend, But Not a Jewess, and found this magazine cover featuring Alma Rubens when she was still a Hollywood star—before her tragic spiral into addiction and self-destruction.
Notice Alma's modern hairstyle: The Bob. This “modern” cut was first popularized in Hollywood by the great silent star Colleen Moore in her film Dinty, 1920. But it wasn't until Flaming Youth, 1923 that The Bob swept the nation.
Colleen Moore and director Mickey Neilan on location, Dinty, 1920.
Until then, the long elaborately curled tresses of Mary Pickford and Lillian Gish and every major Hollywood star were viewed as the desired American look, certainly a Victorian ideal of purity and innocence celebrated in the films of D.W. Griffith and all his imitators. It was Griffith who gave Lillian Gish and Collen Moore their first jobs in motion pictures.
Moore, fifteen-years old, came to Hollywood in 1917 under a six month contract to D.W. Griffith—as a favor to Moore's uncle, Walter Howey, a powerful newspaper editor with the Chicago Examiner. Howey had been able to get Griffith's The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance past the local city censors. When Griffith asked Howey how he could repay him, Howey answered: “Well, I have a niece who wants to get into pictures.”
An obscure Hollywood factoid: In 1928 two of Uncle Walter's reporters, Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, wrote a play about him called The Front Page. The play became the basis for four motion pictures, the best adaptation being His Girl Friday 1940, starring Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant as Walter Burns the charming but hard-boiled Chicago newspaper editor who will do and say anything to get a story. Hecht and MacArthur went on to become the two best Hollywood screenwriters—ever.
Anywhoo, back to hair.
Colleen Moore, in her fine autobiography, Silent Star, describes the hard work young female stars went through in order to maintain their elaborate tresses.
Griffith Studios, as well as the others, was strictly do-it-yourself. That included fixing our own hair—washing it, drying it (by hand—hair driers hadn't been invented yet), and putting it up in curlers and rags to make those beautiful long curls that were the current style.
Hairdressing at home and at the studio was arduous enough. On location it was a trial. You had to round up a washtub from somewhere, get a pitcher for rinsing (many, many rinsings to get the bar-soap out of your hair and the shine back in—shampoo hadn't been invented yet, either) and, if you were lucky, someone to help you. Also, plenty of towels. And, of course, on the dusty desert it was not only a trial but an oft-repeated one.
The desert did have one advantage. It was dry. Mary Pickford used to tell me about the problem she had once when she was making a picture on location in a humid climate. Her hair, which was as straight as mine was naturally, would start to droop after a while, so shooting would stop, Mary would put her hair up in curlers and rags, and then the whole company would just sit there for an hour while it dried, so she could go before the camera once again in those famous curls.
Mary Pickford, her cascading curls defined her image.
Lillian Gish, the Victorian ideal. Birth of a Nation, 1915.
Moore felt trapped in the demure ringlets and gingham dresses that she sensed were quickly going out of fashion. When Moore read the sizzling novel Flaming Youth, then learned that it had been optioned for film, she clearly saw her route to stardom.
I begged for the role, but the New York office said I wasn’t the type, I was better in costume parts. I was frantic for fear they’d give the part to someone else.
Colleen’s mother came to the rescue with a simple but brilliant idea, a makeover:
She said, ‘Why don’t we cut your hair?’ I was elated. She picked up the scissors and, whack, off came the long curls. I felt as if I’d been emancipated. Then she trimmed my hair around with bangs like a Japanese girl’s haircut. Five days later I had the part.
And a star was born.
After screening Flaming Youth, F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote:
“I was the spark that lit up Flaming Youth, Colleen Moore was the torch. What little things we are to have caused all that trouble.”
Colleen Moore
Three years later, Louise Brooks took The Bob to the next level, molding the cut into a sleek, futuristic black helmet.
Louise Brooks
Here's a short clip of Colleen Moore in “Ella Cinders,” 1926. Ella wants to be a Hollywood star, thus she follows eye exercises in a self-help book. Notice the split-screen special effects. Moore is magnetic, lively and absolutely charming.
At the height of her career she was making $12,500 a week.
Louise Brooks in her most famous role as Lulu in “Pandora's Box,” 1928, produced in Berlin and directed by G.W. Pabst. Whereas Moore danced lightly across the silver screen, an all American girl, desirable but decent, Brooks smoldered, relentlessly burning with amoral sensuality. Brooks made two great films, then self-destructed,
a dipsomaniac, a nymphomaniac and, um, a misanthropomaniac.
Recommended Reading:
Moore's autobiography is one of the best Hollywood memoirs I've ever read. She writes beautifully and articulately about every aspect of her long and incredibly successful career. Moore was smart. She saved her money and wrote a best-selling book for women about investing in the stock market. Moore also devoted herself to building the most elaborate, exquisitely detailed doll house in existence.
You can pick up used copies of Silent Star here.
Louise Brooks authored a fascinating book of essays about her life and Hollywood. Frequently illuminating, often infuriating, it's nevertheless a captivating memoir that reveals Brooks as a brilliant but undisciplined woman. Her fall from grace—she was never a big star—is vividly etched between every line. In life, Brooks lacked all remorse, empathy, or ability to love. Brooks claimed that she never read any of her film scripts. Of course not. She didn't have to. Brooks played Brooks. Plot didn't matter.
You can order used copies of Lulu in Hollywood here.
Alma Rubens: Silent Snowbird was originally serialized in 1931 as a lurid true confession in newspapers as “This Bright World Again.” Probably ghost written, suffering from some melodramatic touches, and Ruben's stuttering desire to cast herself in the best light, this is still an absolutely fascinating document. It's filled with horrifying details of Ruben's narcotic addiction and her penchant for violence. The most powerful section—clearly authentic—is devoted to her forced eight month confinement in a California mental institution. This is a vivid portrait of hell on earth where patients are routinely beaten and sexually abused, where nurses sell liquor to alcoholic patient-prisoners, and where corrupt physicians peddle narcotics to their addicted patients. It's a snake pit, pitiless and horrifying. Seraphic Secret writes about this book in detail here.
You can order used copies of Silent Snowbird here.
Colleen Moore, Motion Picture Magazine.
Louise Brooks, Motion Picture Classic Magazine.
Theda Bara: The Vamp Adopts the Troops
Movie Magazines: They Don't Print 'em Like They Used To
Alma Rubens: Dope Fiend, But Not a Jewess
Wallace Reid: Hollywood Shooting Star
Olive Thomas: Hollywood's First Suicide
Mary Pickford: The Greatest Movie Star
Seraphic Secret Chats with Actress Coleen Gray about John Wayne, Howard Hawks, and Stanley Kubrick
Susan Peters: The Great Unknown and Tragic Actress
The Blond Machine Gun: Jean Harlow
Peg Entwistle & The Hollywood Sign
Brigitte Bardot & Sean Connery in Shalako—Sorta
Let's not forget Anna May Wong, a great actress in silent
and sound films—with a great Bob. Photo circa 1929.
And of course the magnificent Dutch actress Truus van Aalten,
who was enormously influenced by Colleen Moore.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:03 AM | Comments (10)
March 12, 2008
Iran Places Bounties on Israeli Leaders
The latest annual Israeli Intelligence Report, compiled by the IDF Intelligence Branch, with the help of the Mossad and the Shabak (General Security Service) has just been submitted to the government and it is a bit more forthright than the convoluted American NIE. The authors sum up the major threats to Israel in this way:
1) Lebanon is crumbling and falling into the hands of Hizbullah.
2) Syria remains a threat.
3) Israeli-Arabs are joining the fray.
4) Gaza and the world-wide Jihad movement are threats to Israel.
5) But the most significant danger of all lies in Iran's nuclear program.
Not mentioned is this latest bit of blood-lust from the Holocaust denying Islamic Republic of Iran.
Iran has placed a bounty on the heads of Israel's security establishment via its state-supported Islamist student union.
Students offered rewards totaling one million dollars for the execution of Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Mossad Director Meir Dagan and IDF Military Intelligence Chief Amos Yadlin, the state-run Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA) reported Monday.
The group has requested that Iranians wishing to increase the bounties donate their kidneys. The bounty for Barak is currently 400,000 dollars, while the murders of Dagan or Yadlin would earn the would-be killers 300,000 each. "These sums will be given to any person, or their families, who could punish these individuals in any part of the world," the Islamist group announced.
Banners announcing the bounties feature the quote by Islamic Revolution Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini that "Israel must be wiped off the map." The line has become a rallying cry for Iran's President Mahmoud Ahamdinejad in his bid for nuclear capabilities.
But by all means, let's allow this terrorist Islamic state, proudly reaching for the genocide of the Jewish people, to acquire nuclear weapons. What could possibly go wrong?
Via: Arutz Sheva
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:01 AM | Comments (15)
March 11, 2008
Israel: 1938
Neville Chamberlain proclaims “Peace in our time,” after signing
an agreement with Adolph Hitler. Obviously, that didn't quite work out.
World War II ensued. Hitler could have been stopped right then
and there in 1938 and fifty million lives would have been spared.
Not to mention six million Jews. But gee, let's give appeasement
another whirl. What could possibly go wrong?
If the reports of a cease fire are true then Israel has been betrayed by her government. After the Mercaz Massacre the Arabs understood that a red line had been crossed and the Jewish people demanded a proper military response.
Thus the Arabs offered a hudna—not a cease-fire—to Olmert and Livni.
Being reflexive appeasers and cowards, Olmert and his gang took the bait.
Now, Hamas will build up her rocket capabilities to an even greater strength than ever before. Iran will ratchet up her training of Hamas terrorists, and the Egyptians—leaky vessels at best—will make a show of putting extra troops on the Gaza border, but in reality is only looking to appease the Muslim Brotherhood. Thus massive arm shipments and money will be smuggled into Gaza via Egypt. Mubarak and his cronies stay in power through one simple dictum: Let the crazies loose in Gaza not in Cairo.
Hence: More Jews will die.
Hence: More Israeli cities will fall under terrorist missile range as technical capabilities improve. They've already hit Ashkelon. Obviously, Tel-Aviv will be within range in the not too distant future. The Iranians are working furiously on the next generation of Grad missiles. It's not a complex engineering problem. Don't forget, the Persians are building a nuclear facility, so missiles with a range of 30 to 40 miles is just a matter of political and military button pushing. The technical knowledge is already there.
It's just a matter of when and where the missiles fall; how many Jews die and how many are mutilated.
We're certain that the elegant and reasonable liberals sipping latte in Tel-Aviv will urge restraint when the steel rain falls on Dizengoff. As they do when they sit back and sigh: “Golly gee, poor S'derot.”
Hellloo. Do you think the Gazans are going to build an infrastructure in their terrorist statelet during this so-called cease-fire? Two words: No. Way. They are going to do what they do best: planning the murder of more Jews.
And in the meantime you can bet that Olmert and Livni are giving away chunks of Jerusalem to Fatah. That'll help, right? The Arabs will be able to set up sniper hides in East Jerusalem and launch rockets from just a few blocks away. Talk about, er, painful concessions.
Oh, I forgot, they just want to live in peace.
Like they did after we made Gaza Judenrein.
But this time it'll be different, right?
No wonder liberals/progressives /leftists/global greenies—whatever the fashionable label du jour—is now indistinguishable from mental illness. A condition brought on by moral relativism—the rotten core of multiculturalism.
Ehud Olmert is not the Prime Minister of Israel, he's the Prime Minister of the Palestinian terrorist entity.
Let's review the lessons of the Mercaz Massacre:
1. It's okay to slaughter Jewish children.
2. The family of the butcher is treated with all due respect by Israel, even as the family honors Hamas, a proudly genocidal organization. Great state. Ripe for destruction.
3. The Israeli government immediately return to so-called peace negotiations even before her Jewish children are buried. Olmert & Co. don't give a crap about their own people. They're just running scared.
4. Fatah celebrate the terrorist murderer as a holy martyr. Conclusion: Israelis are delusional or just plain cowards.
5. There is no payback when Jewish children are slaughtered. Open season on Yids.
6. In fact, the Arabs are rewarded with a hudna, which only benefits the terrorists.
7. Israel promises not to get all mean and violent in Gaza in exchange for:
8. Empty promises not to launch missiles from a bunch of lying terrorists.
9. Gee, what a bargain.
10. Final lesson: Arabs can keep killing Jewish children, preferably Orthodox yeshiva students. The left wing press blames the children for their own deaths because their yeshiva is, y'know, the “backbone of the settler movement.” Serves them right, is the subtext of the oh-so-compassionate left.
Now it's official: Despite Olmert's denials, defense official confirms agreement between Hamas, Israel worked out via Egyptian mediation; Israel to refrain from massive Gaza attacks in exchange for end to rocket fire.
To read the complete story, click here.
Hat Tip: Seraphic Friend, Lance Fogel
Update: An Israeli 4th grader in Ashkelon is smarter—tactically, strategically and morally—than Olmert:
However, during a visit to an Ashkelon school, one of the students shared an idea for curbing the rocket fire.
"My dad said that we should have some sort of button, so every time a Qassam is fired, it will fire back at them," the fourth-grader told Olmert, putting a smile on the faces of the adults in the classroom.
"Well, I think we're going to have that patented," answered the PM, trying to convey a sense of self-assurance in the face of the children's obvious distress.
To read the complete story, please click here.
Hat Tip: Seraphic Friend, Gregg
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:17 PM | Comments (11)
Getting Stoned in Israel
This letter from a close friend who lives in Israel:
Well Robert, tonight your clean-cut friend got “stoned,” as did his wife, married daughter, and 9-year-old son. Before you think I went off the deep end, I don't mean stoned in the Hollywood sense but rather in Middle Eastern terms.
That's right, while traveling from the airport on Road 443 between Israel's fastest growing city, Modiin, and Jerusalem, Israel's capital and largest city, we were attacked by bloodthirsty Arabs.
The highway was shrouded in fog so there was no warning. My wife suddenly caught a glimpse of a “youth,” atop the not so secure, security wall (at least 15 feet high) hurling a good-sized rock at our car, cruising at about 60mph. Thanks to Hashem, the rock didn't hit our windshield but knocked out the headlight and dented the hood.
If the rock had hit a few inches higher we could have been killed.
We continued driving to the Machsom checkpoint which was less than a minute away.
There I was surprised to learn that ours was just one of a number of cars—our daughter counted at least eleven—that had fallen victim to this ambush. More surprising was the army's reaction, or more accurately inaction.
The officer in charge casually informed us that we could just continue on our way.
I insisted on filing a report which the officer told me I would have to do at the police station. That would have meant driving past the site of the ambush. I told him if the police refuse to come the Machsom, I will block the checkpoint until they do. The Police reluctantly agreed to come, and wouldn't you know it their vehicle was stoned on route.
What a shock.
I asked the commander of the checkpoint why they allow Jews to be sitting ducks. He muttered under his breath that we live in a Medina Metumtemet, a wacky country.
I told him to give me his gun and I will take care of the problem. Seriously.
We are handcuffed by a government that is leading us like sheep to the slaughter—no exaggeration. We are on a suicidal path and change must come soon or many, many more Jews will die. We are facing our greatest threat since the Holocaust. I am not an alarmist. I see, live and breathe the facts on the ground and matters are getting worse every day.
We need American Jews to be strong, Don't let Olmert and his cronies tell you that it's not your business. Don't let American Jews make the same mistakes as they did sixty years ago.
On the political front, pressure must be placed on Shas to withdraw from the government. There are many influential people in the American Jewish community who can pressure Shas by threatening to withhold contributions to their organizations.
This must be done immediately.
Next, every Jew has to commit to Teshuva, repentance, becoming a better person, a better Jew. Prayer is extremely important—sincere prayer. Every reader of Seraphic Secret should commit to cease talking during davening and convince his friends and neighbors to do the same. Every Jew must commit to learning Torah every day—even for five minutes. Every Jew should pray for redemption and anticipate the imminent coming of Moshiach.
If things don't change soon, maybe I will get stoned.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:41 AM | Comments (22)
March 10, 2008
Arabs Celebrate Merkaz Massacre
This clip is from Israeli television. Even if you don't understand Hebrew, the pictures speak for themselves—Gazan and Jerusalem Arabs celebrating the terrorist massacre of eight young boys learning in Yeshiva Merkaz HaRav.
The world shouldn't forget the Arab response to Jewish murders. And neither should the Israeli government, who reflexively yield to appeasement in the face of every horror—a sure path to self-destruction.
When you look at the footage keep in mind that Israel is supplying these joyous people with electrical power, fuel, and humanitarian aid; and that the IDF does everything in its power not to harm these blood-thirsty civilians.
Also keep in mind that this is not an Arab-Israeli conflict. In fact, Hamas terrorists are now almost entirely trained by Iranian forces, and Hamas openly boast of the Sunni-Shia alignment against the Jews and the West.
In truth, the only language the genocidal Jew-haters understand is force, and until they are brought to their knees in unconditional surrender—as was Germany and Japan in World War II—these dysfunctional societies will be an existential threat not only to Israel, but to Western civilization.
Once again, Seraphic Secret's Five Steps to Victory:
1. Denying power and fuel to Gaza.
2. Cutting off all talks with Fatah. There's nothing left to talk about.
3. Declaring the boundaries of Israel final.
4. Including Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel.
5. Further, Israel must rid herself of the appeasers Olmert and Livni. They are a mortal threat to the Jewish State, to the Jewish people.
You Tube: via Seraphic Friend, Michael Makiri.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:12 PM | Comments (15)
An Unscheduled Bus Stop in Jerusalem
Names of the murdered students posted at Mercaz HaRav
This was in the comments section of the previous post, but it's so powerful, so emblematic of who and what the Jewish people are that Karen and I wanted to publish this deeply moving letter.
We thank Seraphic friend and shul companion Joe S. for sharing this with us.
An e-mail from Yerushalayim:
I thought the story below was pretty amazing, and emblematic of how connected we Jews are in this small country. Sharon Milendorf, writes:
"Every morning I take the 35 bus line to work. It's a quick ride and usually takes no more than 12 minutes. The third stop after I get on by the shuk is directly in front of Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav. This morning I found myself a bit anxious, unsure of what I was going to see as we passed by. As I looked around, I saw death notices pasted all over the street and flowers that had been brought lined the entrance to the Yeshiva.
When the bus pulled up to the stop, the driver shut off the engine and stood. With tears in his eyes he told everyone sitting on the bus that one of the boys killed on Thursday night was his nephew. He asked if everyone on the bus would mind if he spoke for a few minutes in memory of his nephew and the other boys that were killed. After seeing head nods all over the bus he began to speak.
With a clear and proud voice, he spoke beautifully about his nephew and said that he was a person who was constantly on the lookout for how to help out anyone in need. He was always searching for a way to make things better. He loved learning, and had a passion for working out the intricacies of the Gemara. He was excited to join the army in a few years, and wanted to eventually work in informal education.
As he continued to speak, I noticed that the elderly woman sitting next to me was crying. I looked into my bag, reached for a tissue and passed it to her. She looked at me and told me that she too had lost someone she knew in the attack. Her neighbors child was another one of the boys killed. As she held my hand tightly, she stood up and asked if she too could say a few words in memory of her neighbor.
She spoke of a young man filled with a zest for life. Every Friday he would visit her with a few flowers for Shabbat and a short d'var Torah that he had learned that week in Yeshiva. This past Shabbat, she had no flowers.
When I got to work, one of my colleagues who lives in Efrat told me that her son was friends with two of the boys who had been killed. One of those boys was the stepson of a man who used to teach in Brovenders Yeshiva and comes to my shul in Riverdale every Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur to be a chazan for one of the minyanim."
Last night, Rabbi Elazar Muskin, Rav of my shul the Young Israel of Century City flew to Israel to pay shiva visits to all the families of the martyred Yeshiva students.
May G-d comfort you among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.
And this is what the enemy are about: Denying that Jews are connected to the land of Israel, denying that the holy Temples stood on the Temple Mount, and, of course, that old reliable blood libel.
If Jews can be expelled from Gaza simply because they are Jews, and Muslims find their presence intolerable, well then, murderous Jew-hating jihadists within Israel should be expelled to Gaza or Damascus because they are a threat to national security and subservient to a foreign power.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 11:05 AM | Comments (0)
March 09, 2008
The Los Angeles Mercaz HaRav Rally: A Report
Councilman Jack Weiss
Karen and I have just returned from the Mercaz Harav Memorial Solidarity Rally and prayer service at our shul, The Young Israel of Century City.
All the speakers were excellent, Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, Israeli Consul General, Jacob Dayan; Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa; Rabbis Marvin Hier, Founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Rabbi Elazar Muskin, Young Israel of Century City.
But Councilman Jack Weiss was simply outstanding. He clarified the nature of the evil that committed this atrocity.
In essence this is what Councilman Weiss said:
“Far be it for me to tell the members of the Young Israel of Century City what Judaism is about, but this is my humble understanding.
“Judaism is about Torah and the transmission of Torah. The essence of Judaism is Torah, and its transfar from one generation to the next, “Medor le'dor.” And that's what Mercaz HaRav does, all day and all night, year in and year out.
“The attack on the students of Yeshiva Mercaz Harav had absolutely nothing to do with politics. The terrorist was not acting because of national grievances, it was not a dispute about territory—as if that would excuse such an atrocity—for it wouldn't.
“No, the terrorist was attacking Judaism.
“By murdering these eight pure students the terrorist was trying to eradicate the core of Judaism: Torah and the transmission of Torah.
“In addition, the rockets that fly from Gaza into S'derot may appear as if they are connected to a dispute about land, but that's a lie.
“The rockets are also an attack on Judaism. The rockets are an attack on Jews in Israel and on Jews in every corner of the world.
“The battle that Israel wages against the Muslim jihadists is not a local conflict, but just one front in a world-wide jihad.
“Make no doubt about it, this war is a genocidal attack against all Jews.
“The goal of the Islamic jihadists is to eradicate Judaism from the face of the earth.
“And that's why the eight Torah students were chosen for slaughter.
“If you don't understand this simple calculus, then you have no understanding of the true nature of the enemy.”
All the speakers received standing ovations, but Councilman Jack Weiss received the longest ovation, the most sustained applause. He was not parsing words, he was not being politically correct. No, he drilled to the core, struck truth and his words caused sparks to fly.
As we left shul, Karen and I spoke with others who attended the service and all, without exception, singled out Councilman Jack Weiss for his wisdom, for his astute analysis of transnational jihadism, and for his exceptional moral clarity.
In Israel, the Olmert government—like dogs lapping at their own vomit—have no such moral clarity as they allow the State of Israel to cower under a state of siege while negotiating with Fatah, who celebrate this slaughter, and Mahmoud Abbas, their Holocaust denying leader.
And of course, let's not forget that the official PA newspaper celebrates the Mercaz terrorist as a holy martyr.
An Iraeli government that considers this entity to be partners in peace is a band of delusional appeasers who are leading the Jewish state and the Jewish people into a bloody abyss.
There is no difference between Fatah and Hamas. They are both genocidal groups. Both must be crushed into dust and their supporters utterly destroyed—just as Germany and Japan were smashed into nothingness in defense of civilization.
An Israeli government that represents murderous jihadists and their citizens far better than the Jewish State and the Jewish army, must be replaced.
And this from Soccer Dad:
I am certain you are wondering how you can properly memorialize the victims of the Mercaz Harav terror attack. Yonadav Hirshfeld - Yedidya's roommate - was a grandson of Rabbi and Mrs. Aharon Batt. In addition to being involved in the Encyclopedia Talmudit, Rabbi Batt is one of the main sponsors of the Halacha/Mishna/Rambam Yomi calendar available in the Torah Tidbits and other places.
One of the aspects of Yonadav which his father mentioned is that he was always getting in an extra few minutes of learning.
In light of all this, a proper memorial for him and the other victims is to resolve to (Bli Neder - of course) add 5 minutes a day of Torah learning—in any of those few times during the day in which we find ourselves doing nothing.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 05:24 PM | Comments (17)
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere # 157
“This war differs from other wars in this particular:
We are not fighting armies, but a hostile people, and must make
old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war.”
— General William Tecumseh Sherman
We'd like to thank My Shrapnel for including Seraphic Secret's profile of Jewish silent film star Theda Bara in this fine collection. Actually, we submitted War is the Remedy, and after the slaughter of the students at Mercaz Harav, our essay is more timely than ever—but, whatever.
We'd like to draw everyone's attention to Rabbi Daniel Gordis's superb essay: The Shame of it All. In which he argues that the morally bankrupt leaders of Israel, and the leftist, chattering classes cannot articulate the reasons for Jewish statehood beyond: “It's a fun place to live.”
Here's how he begins this important profile of the decline of the Jewish State:
There were days, and they were not that long ago, when Zionism was about something different. Days when Zionists could articulate what the purpose of Jewish Statehood was, days when Israelis understood that having a state was about changing the existential condition of the Jew. Not anymore.
Click here to read the entire article.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:17 PM | Comments (4)
March 08, 2008
Mercaz Memorial in Los Angeles
The Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Young Israel of Century City are holding a memorial service and solidarity rally for the eight righteous Jews—victims of an Arab terrorist. The program will be held in my shul, The Young Israel of Century City.
Scheduled Speakers: Israeli Consul General, Jacob Dayan; Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa; City Councilman Jack Weiss; Rabbis Marvin Hier, Founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Rabbi Elazar Muskin, Young Israel of Century City
WHEN: Sunday, March 9, 2008, 4-5 pm
WHERE: Young Israel of Century City
9317 W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles, 90035
(Between Rexford and Glenville Dr.)
We urge everyone to attend. Childcare will be provided.
The victims of the Merca Harav Yeshiva attack. Top row: Avraham David Moses, z'l (16), Ro'i Roth, z'l (18), Neria Cohen, z'l (15), Yonatan Yitzhak Eldar, z'l (16); Bottom row: Yochai Lifshitz, z'l (18), Segev Peniel Avihail z'l (15), Yehonadav Haim Hirschfeld z'l (19), Doron Maharata z'l (26).
Our son Ariel was learning the Book of Isaiah in the last year of his life. I found this verse annotated with Ariel's notes after his death. The words speak speak directly to the mystery of G-d's hand in man's joy and suffering.
Book of Isaiah, Chapter 45:
7. I form light and create darkness,
I make peace and create evil,
I am G-d, I do all these things.
9. Woe to the man who strives with his maker,
Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth.
Shall the clay say to him that fashions it,
“What are you making?”
Or shall it say
“Your work has no place?”
10. Woe to the man who says to his father,
“Why have you conceived me?”
or to his mother
“Why did you bear me?”
15. Surely, You are a G-d who hides,
the G-d of Israel,
the One who saves.
Baruch Dayan HaEmet.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:28 PM | Comments (5)
March 07, 2008
Gathered to Heaven
A Rav comforts his students at Yeshiva Mercaz Harav after Thurday's terrorist attack
(Menahen Kahana / AFP/Getty Images)
An Ethiopian Jew mourns during the funeral of yeshiva
student Trunoch Maharata, 26, in the city of Ashdod, Israel Friday,
March 7, 2008. Maharata was one of eight students
slaughtered Thursday night in a terrorist attack on
Mercaz Harav yeshiva in Jerusalem. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Family members of Jewish yeshiva student Trunoch Maharata,
26, surround his body at the funeral in Ashdod, Israel Friday,
March 7, 2008. Maharata was one of eight students slaughtered
Thursday night by an Arab terrorist.
(AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Jewish Ethiopian clerics attend the funeral of yeshiva student
Trunoch Maharata, 26, in Ashdod. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Jews mourn during the funeral
of Avraham David Moses, 16,
in the Jewish town of Efrat March 7, 2008.
Avraham David Moses,
a student at Meraz Harav, was murdered
by an Arab terrorist.
(Reuters/Gil Cohen Magen)
Jewish mourners carry the body of yeshiva student
Segev Paniel Avihail, 15, during his funeral at Mount Olives cemetery
overlooking Jerusalem's Old City, Friday, March 7, 2008.
(AP Photo/Dan Balilty)
Jewish mourners carry the body of yeshiva student Segev Paniel Avihail, 15, during his funeral at Mount of Olives cemetery. (Sebastian Scheiner / Associated Press)
A poster listing the names of the eight
Mercaz HaRav yeshiva students murdered by
an Arab terrorist. (AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
Jewish mourners gather around the bodies
of the eight yeshiva students, murdered in a terrorist
attack, during their funeral at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva
in Jerusalem, Friday, March 7, 2008.
(AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)
Bullet-riddled glass door from Yeshiva Mercaz HaRav.
(Yannis Behrakis/Reuters)
Mourners attending the funeral of the eight Jewish students.
(AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
Who Will Comfort My People
(AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)
Mourners attending the funeral of the eight
Mercaz Harav Yeshiva Students.
(AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
Thousands gather for the funeral of the eight righteous yeshiva
students butchered by an Arab terrorist. (AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
“Before Him the grave is naked, the consuming depths have no cover.”
Job: 26—6 (AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
Rabbi Yerachmiel Weiss, head of the Merkaz high school, spoke next, in a voice breaking with emotion and tears: "G-d is just, and His ways are just. We have questions; but the questions are so difficult, so difficult. How is it possible to eulogize one Torah scholar on Rosh Chodesh Adar? But two? and three, and four, and five? Your ways are so hidden, Master of the Universe! In Adar, we increase joy. Look how much joy You gathered to Heaven! They were in the midst of studying Torah, such joy, such purity. We have been left with such a hole. I just want to tell You, Master of the Universe, what great people You took: Yehonadav — he gave [nadav, in Hebrew] so much; what purity and simplicity. You took Yochai from us — he lives [chai] in G-d, what Torah study he did; even while they were setting up for the Purim party, he came to learn Torah. You took Segev Pniel of the Avichayil family — what a family, and what valour [chayil] in Torah! You took Yehonatan [meaning "G-d gave"] — what prayer, what Torah, what beauty. You took our dear Avraham David. Just two days ago I had a long talk with him in his room — what knowledge he had, what integrity, what music he gave us with his Torah reading. And the youngest, Neriah — the candle of G-d, his light will be missing from us..."
To read the complete story, please click here.
Baruch Dyan Ha-Emet
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:23 AM | Comments (8)
March 06, 2008
The Names
Kvittel, prayer-notes, in the Kotel, the Western Wall
The names of the victims have been released:
* Yochai Lipschitz, 18, of Jerusalem
* Yonatan Yitzchak Eldar, 16, of Shiloh
* Yonadav Chaim Hirschfeld, 19, of Kochav Hashahar
* Neriah Cohen, 15, of Jerusalem
* Roey Roth, 18, of Elkana
* Segev Pniel Avihayil, 15, of Neveh Daniel
* Avraham David Moses, 16, of Efrat
* Maharata Trunoch, 26, of Ashdod.
May Their Memory Be a Blessing.
Via: Israellycool
Seven of the ten wounded students remain hospitalized. The public is asked to pray for the recovery of: Naftali ben [son of] Gila from Sderot, Yonatan ben Avital, Shimon ben Tirza, Nadav ben Hadas, Reuven ben Naomi and Elchanan ben Zehava.
The funerals began at near the main entrance to the capital, at Merkaz HaRav Kook Yeshiva, considered to be the heart of the national religious movement. Rabbi Benny Eisner, a veteran Merkaz HaRav student and teacher in the high school, led the mourners in the recital of Psalms. At the conclusion of the eulogies and prayers, separate funeral processions will set out for the various communities where the boys are to be buried.
National Union MK Effie Eitam noted Friday morning that “whoever chose the Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva as a terrorist target knew it was the heart of national Zionism.” Virtually every religious-Zionist yeshiva in the country was founded and/or staffed by former students of the yeshiva.
Eitam, who learned at the yeshiva 30 years ago after living in the secular Ein Gev kibbutz, called the institution “the mother of all Zionist yeshivas” whose graduates serve in the IDF and have been at the forefront of development in Judea and Samaria. “The victims were murdered,” he declared, “but their hope and faith cannot be killed.”
Among the thousands of mourners at the funeral could be seen rabbis from around the country, as well as MK Ruby Rivlin, MK Zevulun Orlev, and former MK Ehud Yatom. Benches were set up at the entrance to the yeshiva for the families of the victims, surrounded by the large crowd of mourners.
Via: Arutz Sheva
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 11:17 PM | Comments (3)
Baruch Dayan Ha-Emet
Blood-stained sefer from the Beis Midrash of Mercaz Harav
Comforting a wounded friend
Unable to bear the images before his eyes
Israeli police secure the site
Baruch Dayan Ha-Emet, G-d is the Righteous Judge
And thousands celebrate in Gaza:
Sweets are handed out celebrating the Jerusalem massacre
Gazans thank Allah for the slaughter of innocent Jewish children
That's right, keep sending humanitarian aid to this genocidal state, keep supplying them with power and fuel so they can continue to wage war on Israel, Jews and the West.
Makes perfect sense.
The latest update about the massacre: Eight young men have been murdered, eleven wounded. Reports are that the terrorist carried a blue Israeli identity card and came from east Jerusalem.
And of course the U.N. is rushing to condemn this massacre.
You believed me?
Elder of Ziyon gathers together Arab reaction to the Jer