The Meforshim tell us this is talking about the Goyim, the דעת זקנים tells us:
כי גוי אובד עצות המה. אותם האויבים שמסרתי ישראל בידם אבדה עצתם ואין בהם תבונה:
And from this Passuk onwards for the next few Pessukim, the Torah is talking about the Goyim. From this point the tide seems to have turned against the Goyim, according to the Pessukim, and according to what we have seen with our own eyes.
About this years Passuk, the דעת זקנים tells us (about the Goyim):
. . .
היה להם להבין כי מאחר שלקו ישראל שהם בניו של מקום על רוע מעלליהם יש להם לישא ק"ו בעצמם ועתה מפרש והולך מה אחריתם
Is this Passuk hinting to us that Hashem’s retribution against the Goyim (that appears to have started in 5780/2020) is now going to escalate?
As is well known, the Geulah is often compared to the sprouting of a seed. The outer shells of a seed are there to protect (and hide) the inner parts of the seed and when the seed begins to germinate the outer shells begin to whither and fall away so that the plant may sprout, grow and mature.The shells eventually completely rot and disintegrate when their job is done.
If however, for some reason, the outer shells do not wither and fall away at the correct time, the inner part of the seed and eventually the whole seed will die.
So it is with the Geulah, the kedushah of the future kingdom of the Mashiach is initially contained within an entity who’s only purpose is to create an environment for the Kedusha to sprout and grow.But soon that entity starts to whither and rot in order that the sprout of the Mashiach can shoot forth.
With the creation of the recent new “government” in Israel we have witnessed a great “withering” of the klippah.When we saw what new destructive policies the new minister of religious affairs, Matan Kahanah (interestingly enough, from the party that was once the Mafdal party), was trying to enact we saw an even further rotting of the klippah. Such that if “germination” does not start soon, it will cause great damage to the seed of Kedusha within.
Sprouting out of the Klippah
These recent events have caused a great new unity between the Chareidim and the Chardalim or the Torani part of the Dati Leumi community.
The Rav of Be’er Sheva, HaGaon Rav Yehuda Deri, said: “I’m a member of the Moetzes HaRabbanut for already 22 years and it was never so united with Rabbanim from all eidos as it is now. The key of all the ikarei emunah, of all the ikarei Yahadus is the kashrus of foods.”
And a determination and resolve within the Rabbanut to stand against the government.
(Natural News) The Wisconsin Senate has approved a new bill that allows for dead bodies to be dissolved in a chemical bath, disposed of like sewage, and spread all over food crops as “biosludge.”
Senate Bill 228 authorizes a practice known as “alkaline hydrolysis” that essentially liquefies corpses through “water cremation” using a mixture of water, heat and chemical agents. The only thing left behind are the bones, reports indicate.
Once liquefied, these human remains are then dumped into the sewer system or boiled off, while the bones are crushed and deposited into an urn.
The Republican-led Senate passed the legislation without debate, despite objections from the Catholic bishops of Wisconsin, who say that deceased humans are not to be treated in such a disrespectful and disgusting manner.
“Catholic teaching is centered on the life and dignity of the human person because each person is created in the image and likeness of God,” says Kim Vercauteren, executive director of the Wisconsin Catholic Conference.
“The heart, mind, flesh, and bones of a human person are all elements of a unique creation, down to the DNA, which must be honored even after death.”
Vercauteren and other Catholics are concerned that the alkaline hydrolysis process treats human remains as if they were never actual people who were created by God. In essence, water cremation treats a deceased person as if he or she never existed.
“Wastewater does not honor the sacredness of the body, nor does it allow the grieving to honor the dead after disposition,” Vercauteren added in an email to the senate health committee.
America gets exponentially more disgusting and depraved with each passing day
As we reported in the past, some of America’s wastewater is converted into “fertilizer” for food crops, which means liquid human remains will now be spread all over food crops in Wisconsin and possibly elsewhere.
There is also the risk that the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) and other elements will pass through the sewer system and end up on cropland as well, polluting farms and the food that grows there.
The whole thing is simply repulsive, but according to Sen. Patrick Testin, a Republican from Stevens Point, it is necessary to promote “consumer choice.”
“Wisconsin funeral directors are receiving more and more requests for flameless or water cremation,” Testin is quoted as saying.
“I believe in allowing consumers choices. And if a consumer chooses flameless cremation, I would like to empower Wisconsin funeral directors the means to fulfill that choice.”
Catholics, however, object to all of Testin’s claims. They say respect and reverence for human bodies “must not be sacrificed for a cheap, quicker disposition.”
“We must treat the remains of all human beings, no matter how long they lived or how they died, with dignity, charity, and respect,” the Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops stated two years ago after numerous attempts were made to legalize alkaline hydrolysis in the Lone Star State.
“Chemical digestion of the human body fails to follow this simple principle.”
As you might expect, leftists are in favor of alkaline hydrolysis because they claim it is “greener” than normal cremation or traditional burial. They claim this despite the fact that large amounts of dangerous chemicals are necessary to liquefy human remains before pumping them into the sewer system.
“If you’ve been paying attention, and connect the dots, it’s very likely states and the freemasons and Jesuits who rule our lives are expecting mass death,” wrote one LifeSiteNews commenter about this sudden push for legalized alkaline hydrolysis.
“It shouldn’t be surprising to anyone considering Doctors and scientists have been predicting mass death in the coming months and years. What a wonderful way to eradicate any evidence of humanity.”
To learn more about toxic biosludge and how it is spread over food crops, visit Biosludge.news.
Which means that all the nations of the world Praise Hashem because of His kindness to the Jews.
Why do the nations of the world praise Hashem because of His kindness to us? Because they are always plotting against the Jews in ways that even we do not know about and Hashem always saves us from them. Most of the times we never even find out about these plots. So we can’t even marvel at the way Hashem has saved us, but the goyim themselves know.
Here is an example I have just seen now that happened 20 years ago:
George Bush Jr. was planning on recognizing a ”Palestinian” state on the day of 911, but the 911 attacks put an immediate end to that:
Another more divine revelation came later in the interview when bin Sultan revealed that on September 11, 2001, Washington under the leadership of former President George Bush Jr., was supposed to sign an agreement to recognize Palestine. But after the Twin Towers were taken down, Bin Sultan admitted that it “was not meant to be.”
When 9-11 happened, “the Palestinian cause became the least concern for America and for much of the world” he said. Regarding the ‘Palestinian’ leaders, “it’s difficult to trust them” bin Sultan admitted after a long rant regarding their indignation of attempted peace negotiations between them and Israel by Bill Clinton.
Total: NINE proposals for establishing a Palestinian state, rejected by the Palestinians. . .
I have always wondered whether the arabs refusal of all peace offers corresponds with Paro's refusal to let Bnei Yisrael go.
So far - according to Michael Davison's count - we have 9. Does that mean that there will be one more (rejected) offer of land/"peace" to be immediately followed by Mashiach?
Does the pre-rejection of Trump's plan count as the tenth one?
We, the undersigned Jewish bloggers, hereby protest – in the strongest terms possible – the parading and glorification of an “alternative lifestyle”, one that is classified in the Holy Torah as an abomination, especially through the streets of the holy city of Jerusalem.
The Torah demands that we live by a certain code of sexual morality, and as such, we are forbidden from certain relationships that a moral society cannot tolerate. These include incest, adultery, bestiality, and homosexuality. All these are considered grave sins in Judaism and incur the punishment of Karet, or excision from the Jewish people. An act performed with witnesses during the time of the Sanhedrin would incur an even worse consequence – namely, capital punishment.
And this is only on an individual level. When the sin is committed on a societal level, it is much worse. The Torah and our sages record how these acts were catalysts for both the Great Flood during Noah’s lifetime and the destruction of the Five Cities of the Plain.
As such, we consider any attempt to glorify acts that the Torah vehemently forbids by parading any such lifestyle through the streets with horror and utter disdain. Such parades in New York and San Francisco would be bad enough, but through the streets of the Holy Land of Israel is a thousand-fold worse. The Torah specifically warns us not to act in sexually abominable ways lest we be vomited out of the land. One can only imagine how it is viewed in Heaven when people brazenly display to G-d how abominable one can be. And if the Land of Israel cannot tolerate such acts of utter gall, all the more so in the holy city of Jerusalem, a city that is overwhelmingly religious.
We in no way wish to minimize the struggles in temptation some may have in this area and view with positivity those who have such inclinations and bravely overcome them. But those are not the people irreverently parading through the streets with rainbow flags, who show utter contempt for the Holy Torah and all we hold dear.
We therefore vehemently protest the “Pride” Parade in Jerusalem and everywhere else in the world where they may occur. We hope and pray that those who take part in such parades do a complete Teshuva for their actions, and may we see a rebuilt Jerusalem, speedily in our days, Amen.
We heard in a lecture on Chanukah 5778 by Rabbi Dov Kook of Tiberius, who said that by Purim the war of Gog and Magog will breakout and that this Purim 5778 will be the last Purim before the revelation of Mashiach.
A few days ago, after services, a young student approached his Rabbi
in a certain village in Israel and asked if he could tell him about a
frightening incident. A true story that happened to a young man a few
days before that.
A young soldier got on a bus and sat at the back seat. An old man
came to sit next to him. The old man, without knowing him started to
speak to him and said: "You should know that the war of Gog and Magog
will breakout in Shvat"
The shocked young man asked him "How do you know this", the old man
said "It is hard to prove what I know, but in order for you to
understand that it is true, you can ask me any question you have about
any person you know and I will tell you everything about him".
The young man thought and said to himself I'll ask him about my
cousin who is very sick and we'll see what he'll tell me. And he told
the old man the name of his cousin. The old man told him exactly about
the difficult situation of his cousin, that she needs divine mercy and
everything about her without knowing her.
The old man continued and said that you should know that Hashem hates
licentiousness, and that what is going on in the army with male and
female soldiers is no secret. That they are committing sins of sexual
immorality, and that they are deliberately enlisting females into the
army in order to cause the young men to sin and any jobs that female
soldiers do in the army can be done by young men.
And also that it is no secret that one of the purposes of the army is to secularize young Israeli men. It will not continue, Hashem hates licentiousness.
He left the young man without another word and got off the bus. The
curious young man, who wanted to know where the old man lived, got off
the bus after him, and the old man disappeared. They say he merited a
revelation of Eliyahu HaNavi of blessed memory.
It is brought in the book "Davar B'ito" (Everything in it's time) about the month of Shvat, that on the 15th of Shvat there will be a full lunar eclipse. It is written in the book "Yalkut Moshe"
that a lunar eclipse in the month of Shvat [is a sign of] stringent
judgment on most of the world, and that day will be very dark.
We have to wake up, Hashem is dealing with us with great kindness and
is sending us faithful messengers that we may merit to wake up and
prepare ourselves for the Geulah.
We have a few days left to examine ourselves and to quickly
strengthen ourselves and to change our behavior. To swap our tight
clothing for modest clothing, for longer and wider skirts, long sleeves,
wider shirts that are not so tight.
Every married woman should cover her hair with a modest hair covering, not a foreign wig (foreign wig = foreign woman).
To get rid of our impure devices with forbidden images!!! And are also a Bitul Torah!!! They are unnecessary in a Jewish house .
To maintain our pure speech, to sit and learn Torah, to learn Halachot in order to be a Kosher person.
And to increase acts of kindness, and to judge everyone favorably. We must be Shomer Shabbat KeHilchatah.
May we all merit the revelation of Eliyahu HaNavi who comes to announce the arrival of Mashiach Tzidkeinu.
And may we all merit to be united and receive the Mashiach with great mercy and kindness.
When the Mashiach comes don't say we didn't know and don't say nobody told you. You have enough time to do Teshuvah before Yom Hadin HaNorah.
It seems I might have been a little naive. The timing of Kerry's visit and the FAA ban does seem a little too convenient/suspicious. Otherwise what was the entire purpose of his little visit? From his point of view, without a subtle/not-so-subtle threat he didn't have anything new to bring to the region to 'persuade' Israel.
It is not as if he and Obama haven't tried something like this before.
Thursday August 5, 2010 10:27 AM
By Rabbi Yair Hoffman
There is a remarkable Malbim on the book of Yonah 2:4. The Malbim discusses how Yonah was caught in a river under the sea - where the waters of the river were separate from the ocean waters. Until this month - this was generally thought to be a physical impossibility.
Below, however, we find an article written by Richard Gray - the science editor of the British newspaper the telegraph. The results are striking. The reader is urged to see the Malbim with his or her own eyes. The term utilized by the Malbim - "Levav Yamim" clearly means sea bed.
"Researchers working in the Black Sea have found currents of water 350 times greater than the River Thames flowing along the sea bed, carving out channels much like a river on the land. The undersea river, which is up to 115ft deep in places, even has rapids and waterfalls much like its terrestrial equivalents. Coral reefs suffer mass bleaching If found on land, scientists estimate it would be the world's sixth largest river in terms of the amount of water flowing through it. The discovery could help explain how life manages to survive in the deep ocean far out to sea away from the nutrient rich waters that are found close to land, as the rivers carry sediment and nutrients with them. The scientists, based at the University of Leeds, used a robotic submarine to study for the first time a deep channel that had been found on the sea bed. They found a river of highly salty water flowing along the deep channel at the bottom of the Black Sea, creating river banks and flood plains much like a river found on land. Dr Dan Parsons, from the university's school of earth and environment, said: "The water in the channels is denser than the surrounding seawater because it has higher salinity and is carrying so much sediment. "It flows down the sea shelf and out into the abyssal plain much like a river on land. The abyssal plains of our oceans are like the deserts of the marine world, but these channels can deliver nutrients and ingredients needed for life out over these deserts. "This means they could be vitally important, like arteries providing life to the deep ocean. "The key difference we found from terrestrial rivers was that as the flow goes round the bend, the water spirals in the opposite way to rivers on land." The undersea river discovered by Dr Parsons and his colleagues, which is yet to be named, stems from salty water spilling through the Bosphorus Strait from the Mediterranean into the Black Sea, where the water has a lower salt content. This causes the dense water from the Mediterranean to flow like a river along the sea bed, carving a channel with banks around 115 feet deep and 0.6 of a mile wide. It is the only active undersea river to have been found so far. Scientists have long suspected they can form, after sonar scans of the sea bed have revealed meandering channels in many of the world's oceans, although none have been found before to have currents of water flowing through them. Among the largest of these channels is off the coast of Brazil where the Amazon enters the Atlantic Ocean. Most are believed to have formed when sea levels were much lower and the channels have been found to be up to 2,500 miles long and be several miles wide. The channel in the Black Sea, although much smaller, is the only one to be found still flowing and proves that these mysterious channels are formed by underwater rivers. Unlike ocean trenches, which are geological formations that form at the deepest parts of the ocean due to movements of the tectonic plates, the undersea river channels meander like rivers on land and form banks in the same way by eroding the silt from the bottom of the channel and building it up at the edges. Dr Parsons found that the Black Sea river is flowing at around four miles per hour with 22,000 cubic metres of water passing through the channel every second - 350 times greater than the flow of the Thames and 10 times greater than Europe's biggest river, the Rhine. The Black Sea river flows only for around 37 miles until it reaches the edge of the sea shelf and dissipates into the deep sea. Dr Parsons said data from the research will also be important for oil companies looking to drill in areas where these rivers exist. He said: "This is the first time we have been able to show that there is a flow through a natural channel system and take direct measurements of what the flow is like and how that is linked to the shape and morphology of the channel."
This article appeared in the August 1st edition of the Telegraph.
The Malbim, Rav Meir Leibish Ben Yechiel Michel Weiser passed away in 1879. The motif of his commentary was to prove the Divine origin of the Torah - as a counter measure to the rise of the Reform movement. The fact is that the commentary of the Malbim is filled with such gems. {The Five Towns Jewish Times} {Matzav.com Newscenter}
QUOTE: Europe is turning into nothing but a tourist trap, with museum attendants and gondoliers and the like preserving the past just to live off it. David Pryce-Jones quoting Walter Laqueur IT’S A CRAZY WORLD Hamas motto: We love death as much as the Jews love life. Reply: All who love death more than life should kill himself immediately. Denis Prager It recently emerged that British police had known for more than a decade that Muslim rape gangs were targeting young girls, but they ignored the evidence of rapes because "they were petrified of being called racist." Soeren Kern, Gatestone Institute In 1920 when the ban on the sale of liquor was implemented in the U.S, Jewish families were allowed to make and possess 10 gallons of kosher wine per year for religious purposes. The year 1924 saw the distribution of 2,944,764 gallons of "kosher wine." The periodical American Hebrew expressed amazement at how fast Judaism was growing. Lawrence J. Epstein, Jewish Ideas Daily DO YOU KNOW The International Olympic Committee turned down Israel’s request to have a minute of silence at this year’s Games in memory of the Munich massacre 40 years ago. The role of international organizations is to condemn Israel, not to remember or regret murderous violence against its citizens. Jay Nordlinger, National Review President Obama appointed Hannah Rosenthal as the special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism. She served with Americans for Peace Now, part of the boycott, disinvestments and sanctions movement that seeks to delegitimize Israel and believes Jews are to blame for anti-Semitism because of their support for Israel. Eileen F. Toplansky, American Thinker Israel’s Check-Cap has developed a tiny capsule that travels through the intestines, snapping 360-degree X-ray images and continuously transmitting information to a wrist-worn data receiver reporting on the prevalence of polyps, the precursors of colorectal cancer. All you’ll have to do is swallow a tiny capsule. No colonoscopy, no hospital visit. Daniel Ben Tal, Israeli 21c Claire Lomas, a paralysed woman (from the chest down) became the first person to complete a marathon in a bionic suit. She finished the London Marathon [42.195 km] 16 days after the race began. A number of celebrities lent their support by walking a mile alongside her. Although she did not receive a medal when she finished, a number of marathon runners donated their medals to her. Tom Gross THEY SAID IT Listening to a record [compared to a live symphony orchestra] is like kissing a photograph of Brigitte Bardot. Sergiu Celibidache, the late Romanian conductor, quoted by Jay Nordlinger It may be the hardest to solve, but the Middle East conflict is the easiest conflict in the world to describe. In a nutshell: Israel would like to exist and recognizes the Palestinians right to have a state. But the Palestinians, other Arabs and Moslems do not recognize the right of a Jewish State of Israel to exist. Denis Prager. Millions are spent by Arab interests on public relations campaigns. The owner of one of the 25 largest US PR agencies in America [not Torossian]explained why his firm would no longer work with Jewish organizations. He said there is simply too much money working for Arab interests and he was no longer working for pro-Israeli organizations. It’s a trend that will grow – and will see Arab interests even more positively portrayed in American media. Ronn Torossian, President & CEO of New York-based 5W Public Relations, Front Page ANTI-SEMITISM Anti-Semitism is like alcoholism. You can go for 25 years without a drink, but if things go bad and you find yourself with a vodka in your hand, you can't get rid of it. British novelist Iain Pears. It is a moral scandal that a few decades after the catastrophe that overtook the Jewish people in Europe, anti-Semitic themes and ruses are once again respectable, not just down there with the thugs, but also within polite society, and within the perimeters of a self-flattering liberal and left opinion. It is a bleak lesson to all but those unwilling to see. Norman Geras Professor Emeritus University of Manchester quoted by Rick Richman, A new survey commissioned by the BBC shows that the four least popular countries in the world are Pakistan, Iran, North Korea – and Israel. In America 50% took a positive view of Israel and 35 percent were negative: Russia 25-26%; Canada 25-59%; France 20-65, Britain 16-68, Germany 16-69, Spain 12-74. The Nigerians (54-29) and Kenyans (45-31) were far friendlier to Israel than any West European country. The country that was most hostile of all, even more than Arab countries, was Japan, where only 3 percent had a positive view of Israel. Bruce Bawer, Front Page BRIEFS Days after taking office, Putin's Russia staged the first successful test-launch of a new intercontinental ballistic missile capable of breaching defence systems now being developed by NATO. AFP Sixty countries, including 30 non-Nato members with no connections to NATO, attended the Nato meeting in Chicago. Israel was not invited. Did no one remember to invite the American ally that controls the Middle East’s most powerful military or did America succumb to Turkey’s veto? Omri Ceren, Commentary Magazine The new French cabinet will have three Muslim members, one will serve as Minister of Women’s Rights and spokesperson for the French government; another has been vocal in blaming Israel for France’s foreign affairs problems; the third has worked to perpetuate the myth that the problems caused by Muslim immigrants are due to French racism, rather than to Islam. In addition the new Justice Minister, who has no law degree, was one of only a handful of members of the National Assembly to have voted against the law banning hijabs in schools. Daniel Greenfield, Front Page SCANDINAVIA In June 2009 Swedish authorities took Domenic Johansson into custody because he was being home schooled. He was on an airliner waiting to fly with the family back to India where they were planning to resettle. Ever since, the Johannsons have been fighting the Swedish government for custody of their son. Bob Unruh, WND Søren Espersen of the Danish Folkeparti described his experience when visiting high schoolsin Denmark. “Talented and articulate” kids explained to him the history of Israel as it’s been taught to them. After the Holocaust, they informed him, the Western countries, led by the U.S. and Britain, flew “massive numbers of American, English, German and Polish Jews” to Palestine, where “they chased all the Palestinians out of their houses with gunpowder and cannons and other modern weapons, helped by the British and Americans, and sent them to refugee camps, where they have been ever since.” “ Daniel,”a 17-year-old Norwegian Jew told him how he was “ sitting at the library playing an Internet game that involves shooting the greatest possible number of people with bows and arrows. A kid walked in….’Pretend you’re shooting a Jew,’ he commented enthusiastically.’” Daniel recalls, “During the Gaza demonstrations, people went around with posters in Arabic saying ‘Kill all Jews.’ He points out that in school if he were to call for the murder of all Muslims or Christians, he would probably be sent to the principal or worse; but when people call for the murder of all Jews, it’s treated as a question of free speech. Bruce Bawer, Front Page THE LIGHTER SIDE A biker was riding by the zoo, when he saw a little girl leaning into the lion's cage. Suddenly, the lion grabbed her by the cuff of her jacket and tried to pull her inside. The biker jumped off his bike, ran to the cage and hit the lion on the nose with a powerful punch. The lion jumped back and let go of the girl. A reporter saw the whole scene, and said, 'Sir, that was a very brave thing you did.' 'Why, it was nothing,' the biker replied. The lion was behind bars. I just saw this little kid in danger, and acted as I felt right.' 'I noticed a patch on your jacket,' said the journalist. 'Yeah, I ride with an Israeli motorcycle club,' the biker replied.' Well, I'll make sure this will not go unnoticed. I'm a journalist with the New York Times. The following morning the New York Times had the following headline: 'ISRAELI GANG MEMBER ASSAULTS AFRICAN IMMIGRANT AND STEALS HIS LUNCH' IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: IRAN: During a presentation at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, a respected Israeli think tank, José Maria Aznar, former prime minister of Spain, recalled a “private discussion” in Tehran in October of 2000 with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who told him: “Israel must be burned to the ground and made to disappear from the face of the Earth.” Dore Gold, the former Israeli ambassador to the U.N. wanted to be certain there was no misunderstanding. He asked Aznar whether Khamenei was suggesting “a gradual historical process.“ He meant physical termination through military force,” Aznar replied. Khamenei also told Aznar that the goal of the Islamic Revolution of 1979 has remained constant. It is to rid the world of two evils: Israel and the United States Aznar also recalled a meeting he had with Vladimir Putin, in which he advised the Russian president against selling surface-to-air missiles to Iran. “Don’t worry — we can sell them everything, even if we are worried by an Iranian nuclear bomb,” Aznar quoted Putin as saying. “Because at the end of the day, Israel will take care of it.” Clifford May. Jewish World Review ECOFASCISM August Haussleiter, a former SS officer and a founding member of the Nazi Party, started the German Green Party based on 19th century writings that popularized a cult ideology of the old-fashioned German country people or Volk. The Volk derived their “genuine” souls from their “rootedness” in the land, shared ancestral kinship, and connection to nature. In contrast, Jews, represented corrupt urban modernity, lacked ties to the land, were soulless and thus could never be part of the German Volk. Although the existence, influence and consequences of the "green wing" on the Nazi movement has yet to be adequately researched, there is a theory put forward by Peter Staudenmaier, a professor of German history, that ecofascism played a big role in the search for the Final Solution. At the heart of this theory is that this “völkisch temptation” was a pathological response to modernity. Völkisch thinkers preached a return to the land, to the simplicity and wholeness of a life attuned to nature's purity. While "the Volkish movement aspired to reconstruct the society that was sanctioned by history, rooted in nature, and in communion with the cosmic life spirit," Jews had foisted on them the hostile milieu of urban industrial civilization. The most prominent top Nazi leaders who searched for a lost connection to nature were Heinrich Himmler, Alfred Rosenberg, and Walther Darré. Rosenberg wrote in his colossal The Myth of the 20th Century: "Today we see the steady stream from the countryside to the city, deadly for the Volk. The cities swell ever larger, unnerving the Volk and destroying the threads which bind humanity to nature; they attract adventurers and profiteers of all colors, thereby fostering racial chaos." Adapted from an interview between Jamie Glazov and Robert Zubrin; and Ecofascism byJanet Biehl and Peter Staudenmaier CHECK LIST FOR JOURNALISTS OF THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA 1, Israelis live in posh houses stocked with all the latest appliances. Arabs live in crumbling shacks that are always in danger of being bulldozed. 2. Israelis are fanatical and hate-filled. Arabs are passionate and embittered. 3. Be sure to call a terrorist prisoner in an Israeli jail a militant. Do not mention the sheer amount of food in the prison, especially if he is on a hunger strike. If you happen to notice that the prisoners live better than most Israelis, do not refer to it. Never ask them how many children they killed or how much they make a month. Ask them what they think the prospects for peace are. Nod knowingly when they say that it’s up to Israel. 4. Depersonalize Israelis, personalize Muslims. One is a statistic, the other a precious snowflake. A Muslim terrorist attack is always in retaliation for something, but an Israeli attack only feeds the “Cycle of Violence.” Quote some official who urges Israel to return to peace negotiations. 5. Frame all Israeli politics by asking whether a politician is finally willing to make the compromises that you think are necessary for peace. A vote for a conservative party means that Israelis hate peace. 6. Israeli soldiers should be depicted looming menacingly over children. Your stringers are already experienced at urging a child into camera range, then getting down on one knee and tilting the camera up just as an Israeli soldier walks into the frame. If there isn’t time to set up the shot, get what you can. The photo can be cropped afterward to show just the Israeli soldier and the Palestinian child, even if the two are not actually interacting in any way. 7. Checkpoint lines should consist entirely of old people and pregnant women waiting to visit their families. 8. Describe “settlers as “dogged” and “fanatical.” Convey to the reader that there is something disturbing about the tenacity with which they cling to the land, while making it clear that they will have to be evacuated from the land for there to be peace. 9. Palestinian politicians are always willing to make peace, even when they aren’t. Never ask them any tough questions, about the their support for terrorists or why they refuse to negotiate. 10. If an Israeli tells you that there is no such thing as Palestinians, that they’re gangs of Muslim militias who have no interest in running their own country, or that Jordan is the actual Palestinian State, ignore him. You’re here to tell a story. 11. Close with an old Arab man who expresses hope that one day peace will come to this troubled land. Daniel Greenfield, Front Page
In a related item, UNESCO declares Rashi an ancient "Palestinian Islamic Sage".
A special UN rapporteur condemned Israel yesterday for Judaizing the Talmud. "The Judaization of the Talmud is the new frontier of dispossession of the traditional Palestinian Religious and Intellectual Heritage" said Eva Nudnik, a special rapporteur appointed by the United Nations Committee for The Establishment of a Palestinian History.
She accused the government of Israel of collaborating with extremist rabbis in a effort to eradicate any traces of signs of the true Palestinian and Islamic claim to the Talmud. Nudnik was especially annoyed with the Artscroll Schottenstein edition which she said is a devious effort to establish and spread a false Jewish claim to the Talmud.
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas said on Sunday that the PA will never recognize any Jewish connection to the Talmud.
UNESCO declares Rashi an ancient "Palestinian Islamic Sage".
UNESCO last week declared Rashi to be an ancient Palestinian Islamic sage and called for the establishment of a fund to raze the "Rashi Shul" in Worms, Germany and to erect in its place a Mosque and a Museum in the memory of the ancient Islamic Imam.
Palestinian Minister of Culture, Mr Yahya Yaklef congratulated the UNESCO vote to forbid any Jewish access to Rashi's burial site in Troyes.
At long last the famous Israeli captive Gilad Shalit has secured his freedom from his Palestinian captors. Hamas and Israel have come to a prisoner swap agreement at a very dubious time to release Shalit in exchange for over a thousand Palestinian detainees. I bet millions, the world over, have heard of the Israeli soldier, who was captured by Hamas a couple of years ago to the extent that he has become, by all accounts, an international figure. He has been in the news for months and months on end. All American and European media have written extensively about his case.
Even the Arab press has given his ordeal huge coverage forgetting of course the ordeals of thousands of Arab “Shalloots” both at home and abroad. It is no wonder then that Hamas leaders have remarked sarcastically more than once that wherever they go in the Arab world, Arab officials ask them about Shalit with great enthusiasm. We have all seen how the deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and others worked for months on end to secure Shalit’s release, but to no avail.
I am sure some are asking now what is meant by “Shalloots”. Is it a derivative of “Shalit”. The answer is no. I am trying here to play on words to show how great the difference is between the Israeli Shalit and the so-called Arab “Shalloot”, which means in Arabic “shabby or seedy shoes”. This colloquial Arabic word is, in actual fact, a metaphor for run-down cheap things.
Why have the whole world including many Arab leaders been so busy trying to free Shalit when there are tens of thousands of Arab “Shalloots” languishing in Israeli and other prisons unnoticed? Why are they so cheap and unimportant?
It is not a secret at all that the value of an Arab person in the stock-exchange of Arab regimes is sort of nil. He is as valueless as an onion’s peel. One should not expect of regimes which treat their downtrodden people like dirt by torturing and starving them inside their countries to care about an Arab captive in Israeli or other foreign jails. Thousands of Arab detainees have been held all over the world for decades legally or otherwise, and some of them died abroad unheard of. Hundreds of Arabs might disappear at one point outside their countries, and nobody would care an iota. We have seen how hundreds of people die while trying to flee their countries in the so-called “death boats.
Have you ever seen an Arab government organising a campaign to release one of its nationals from a foreign jail? Probably a few such as the Kuwaitis who worked hard at one point to secure the release of their captives in Iraq. But this remains the exception and not the rule. Have you ever seen an Arab government trying to get one of its citizens out of Guantanamo Bay camp? Not really. Most of them have kept silent. And were it not for the pressure of western governments, no naturalised European Arabs would have got out of the infamous camp.
Have you ever seen an Arab regime trying to get its captives out of Israeli prisons? Forget about it. Most of Arab regimes have no problem at all letting their nationals die in Israeli jails. The Arab citizen is so cheap that Israel sometimes exchanges hundreds of Arab detainees for the remains of an Israeli soldier.
How would one expect Arab regimes to care about their citizens detained abroad if their security services are even collaborating with the Americans and others to kidnap Arab persons and torture them in the so-called ‘rendition prisons”? It is worth-mentioning also that some Arab states are hosting US prisons on their lands because American law prevents the authorities from torturing detainees on US soil. Have you ever seen an Israeli or American security apparatus collaborating with an Arab counterpart to arrest and torture an American or Israeli citizen? Not at all. It is quite funny and extremely painful at one and the same time that some Arab security apparatus have supplied western authorities with fabricated information to help condemn some Arab dissidents held abroad instead of helping them to get out of prison.
When will we see an Arab leader visiting the family of an Arab citizen arrested in Israel or somewhere else? When will we see an Arab official assuring a family that the government is doing its utmost to help secure the release of an Arab captive abroad as did Israeli prime ministers with Shalit’s family?
It is quite great to see over a thousand Palestinians released from Israeli prisons, but it is very sad that this huge number of detainees will be exchanged for a single Israeli soldier. Isn’t it very humiliating for all Arabs politically and morally?
It is no wonder at all that Israel is releasing a large number of Arabs for one person. It must have seen the Arab armies and security services opening fire randomly on Arab demonstrators as if they were a swarm of flies or a herd of livestock just because they went out clamouring for their basic rights. Have you ever seen an Israeli force shooting Israeli demonstrators with great ease? Of course not. In actual fact Israel sent its aircraft to Uganda years ago to help free Israeli citizens kidnapped by Palestinians there. And so, as long as we, Arabs, do not respect ourselves nobody will ever respect us, and we will always exchange thousands of Arabs for one single Israeli.
We are crossing our fingers that the new Arab revolutions might one day liberate Arab people from despotism and turn them from “Shalloots” into “Shalits”.
Dr Faisal Al Qasim is a Syrian journalist based in Doha
Seen on "The Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies" website:
Student Comments
"The learning at Pardes is exactly what I was looking for. As a liberal Jew, it was essential for me to find a place where I could explore the sources of my tradition in a coed environment that is neither coercive nor judgmental. I can incorporate what I have learned into my daily life in the way that suits me." Adam K New York Harvard University
Unlike many New Yorkers I know, I do not have an easy time listening to Michael Savage. I squirm when caught in a car in NY when the driver tunes in to his show. While appreciating his support for Israel, I find his manner over the top, and his content simplistic. All this makes his July 12 remarks more significant, for the pure genuineness of his observations.
Apparently invited to a leyl Shabbos dinner, he meets ten Chabad teenaged girls, and is overwhelmed by their purity. It leads him to contrast their life style with that of their non-religious peers, and to advise them not to be jealous of the lifestyles of cultural icons, because nothing that the beautiful people have holds a candle to what the G-d-fearing have. He notes how many belong in rehab – and can't stick it out. Why does their stardom fade and fizzle? Savage tells these girls quite simply: "Their souls are screaming out for what you have."
When to Doubt a Scientific 'Consensus' By: Jay Richards The American March 16, 2010
Link to Original Article
A December 18 Washington Post poll, released on the final day of the ill-fated Copenhagen climate summit, reported “four in ten Americans now saying that they place little or no trust in what scientists have to say about the environment.” Nor is the poll an outlier. Several recent polls have found “climate change” skepticism rising faster than sea levels on Planet Algore (not to be confused with Planet Earth, where sea levels remain relatively stable).
Many of the doubt-inducing climate scientists and their media acolytes attribute this rising skepticism to the stupidity of Americans, philistines unable to appreciate that there is “a scientific consensus on climate change.” One of the benefits of the recent Climategate scandal, which revealed leading climate scientists manipulating data, methods, and peer review to exaggerate the evidence of significant global warming, may be to permanently deflate the rhetorical value of the phrase “scientific consensus.”
Even without the scandal, the very idea of scientific consensus should give us pause. “Consensus,” according to Merriam-Webster, means both “general agreement” and “group solidarity in sentiment and belief.” That pretty much sums up the dilemma. We want to know whether a scientific consensus is based on solid evidence and sound reasoning, or social pressure and groupthink.
Anyone who has studied the history of science knows that scientists are not immune to the non-rational dynamics of the herd. Many false ideas enjoyed consensus opinion at one time. Indeed, the “power of the paradigm” often shapes the thinking of scientists so strongly that they become unable to accurately summarize, let alone evaluate, radical alternatives. Question the paradigm, and some respond with dogmatic fanaticism.
We shouldn’t, of course, forget the other side of the coin. There are always cranks and conspiracy theorists. No matter how well founded a scientific consensus, there’s someone somewhere—easily accessible online—that thinks it’s all hokum. Sometimes these folks turn out to be right. But often, they’re just cranks whose counsel is best disregarded.
So what’s a non-scientist citizen, without the time to study the scientific details, to do? How is the ordinary citizen to distinguish, as Andrew Coyne puts it, “between genuine authority and mere received wisdom? Conversely, how do we tell crankish imperviousness to evidence from legitimate skepticism?” Are we obligated to trust whatever we’re told is based on a scientific consensus unless we can study the science ourselves? When can you doubt a consensus? When should you doubt it?
Your best bet is to look at the process that produced, maintains, and communicates the ostensible consensus. I don’t know of any exhaustive list of signs of suspicion, but, using climate change as a test study, I propose this checklist as a rough-and-ready list of signs for when to consider doubting a scientific “consensus,” whatever the subject. One of these signs may be enough to give pause. If they start to pile up, then it’s wise to be suspicious.
(1) When different claims get bundled together.
Usually, in scientific disputes, there is more than one claim at issue. With global warming, there’s the claim that our planet, on average, is getting warmer. There’s also the claim that human emissions are the main cause of it, that it’s going to be catastrophic, and that we have to transform civilization to deal with it. These are all different assertions with different bases of evidence. Evidence for warming, for instance, isn’t evidence for the cause of that warming. All the polar bears could drown, the glaciers melt, the sea levels rise 20 feet, Newfoundland become a popular place to tan, and that wouldn’t tell us a thing about what caused the warming. This is a matter of logic, not scientific evidence. The effect is not the same as the cause.
There’s a lot more agreement about (1) a modest warming trend since about 1850 than there is about (2) the cause of that trend. There’s even less agreement about (3) the dangers of that trend, or of (4) what to do about it. But these four propositions are frequently bundled together, so that if you doubt one, you’re labeled a climate change “skeptic” or “denier.” That’s just plain intellectually dishonest. When well-established claims are fused with separate, more controversial claims, and the entire conglomeration is covered with the label “consensus,” you have reason for doubt.
(2) When ad hominem attacks against dissenters predominate.
Personal attacks are common in any dispute simply because we’re human. It’s easier to insult than to the follow the thread of an argument. And just because someone makes an ad hominem argument, it doesn’t mean that their conclusion is wrong. But when the personal attacks are the first out of the gate, and when they seem to be growing in intensity and frequency, don your skeptic’s cap and look more closely at the evidence.
When it comes to climate change, ad hominems are all but ubiquitous. They are even smuggled into the way the debate is described. The common label “denier” is one example. Without actually making the argument, this label is supposed to call to mind the assertion of the “great climate scientist” Ellen Goodman: “I would like to say we’re at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Let’s just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers.”
There’s an old legal proverb: If you have the facts on your side, argue the facts. If you have the law on your side, argue the law. If you have neither, attack the witness. When proponents of a scientific consensus lead with an attack on the witness, rather than on the arguments and evidence, be suspicious.
(3) When scientists are pressured to toe the party line.
The famous Lysenko affair in the former Soviet Union is often cited as an example of politics trumping good science. It’s a good example, but it’s often used to imply that such a thing could only happen in a totalitarian culture, that is, when all-powerful elites can control the flow of information. But this misses the almost equally powerful conspiracy of agreement, in which interlocking assumptions and interests combine to give the appearance of objectivity where none exists. For propaganda purposes, this voluntary conspiracy is even more powerful than a literal conspiracy by a dictatorial power, precisely because it looks like people have come to their position by a fair and independent evaluation of the evidence.
Tenure, job promotions, government grants, media accolades, social respectability, Wikipedia entries, and vanity can do what gulags do, only more subtly. Alexis de Tocqueville warned of the power of the majority in American society to erect “formidable barriers around the liberty of opinion; within these barriers an author may write what he pleases, but woe to him if he goes beyond them.” He could have been writing about climate science.
Climategate, and the dishonorable response to its revelations by some official scientific bodies, show that scientists are under pressure to toe the orthodox party line on climate change, and receive many benefits for doing so. That’s another reason for suspicion.
(4) When publishing and peer review in the discipline is cliquish.
Though it has its limits, the peer-review process is meant to provide checks and balances, to weed out bad and misleading work, and to bring some measure of objectivity to scientific research. At its best, it can do that. But when the same few people review and approve each other’s work, you invariably get conflicts of interest. This weakens the case for the supposed consensus, and becomes, instead, another reason to be suspicious. Nerds who follow the climate debate blogosphere have known for years about the cliquish nature of publishing and peer review in climate science (see here, for example).
(5) When dissenting opinions are excluded from the relevant peer-reviewed literature not because of weak evidence or bad arguments but as part of a strategy to marginalize dissent.
Besides mere cliquishness, the “peer review” process in climate science has, in some cases, been consciously, deliberately subverted to prevent dissenting views from being published. Again, denizens of the climate blogosphere have known about these problems for years, but Climategate revealed some of the gory details for the broader public. And again, this gives the lay public a reason to doubt the consensus.
(6) When the actual peer-reviewed literature is misrepresented.
Because of the rhetorical force of the idea of peer review, there’s the temptation to misrepresent it. We’ve been told for years that the peer-reviewed literature is virtually unanimous in its support for human-induced climate change. In Science, Naomi Oreskes even produced a “study” of the relevant literature supposedly showing “The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change.” In fact, there are plenty of dissenting papers in the literature, and this despite mounting evidence that the peer-review deck was stacked against them. The Climategate scandal also underscored this: The climate scientists at the center of the controversy complained in their emails about dissenting papers that managed to survive the peer-review booby traps they helped maintain, and fantasized about torpedoing a respected climate science journal with the temerity to publish a dissenting article.
(7) When consensus is declared hurriedly or before it even exists.
A well-rooted scientific consensus, like a mature oak, usually needs time to emerge. Scientists around the world have to do research, publish articles, read about other research, repeat experiments (where possible), have open debates, make their data and methods available, evaluate arguments, look at the trends, and so forth, before they eventually come to agreement. When scientists rush to declare a consensus, particularly when they claim a consensus that has yet to form, this should give any reasonable person pause.
In 1992, former Vice President Al Gore reassured his listeners, “Only an insignificant fraction of scientists deny the global warming crisis. The time for debate is over. The science is settled.” In the real 1992, however, Gallup “reported that 53% of scientists actively involved in global climate research did not believe global warming had occurred; 30% weren’t sure; and only 17% believed global warming had begun. Even a Greenpeace poll showed 47% of climatologists didn’t think a runaway greenhouse effect was imminent; only 36% thought it possible and a mere 13% thought it probable.” Seventeen years later, in 2009, Gore apparently determined that he needed to revise his own revisionist history, asserting that the scientific debate over human-induced climate change had raged until as late as 1999, but now there was true consensus. Of course, 2009 is when Climategate broke, reminding us that what had smelled funny before might indeed be a little rotten.
(8) When the subject matter seems, by its nature, to resist consensus.
It makes sense that chemists over time may come to unanimous conclusions about the results of some chemical reaction, since they can replicate the results over and over in their own labs. They can see the connection between the conditions and its effects. It’s easily testable. But many of the things under consideration in climate science are not like that. The evidence is scattered and hard to keep track of; it’s often indirect, imbedded in history and requiring all sorts of assumptions. You can’t rerun past climate to test it, as you can with chemistry experiments. And the headline-grabbing conclusions of climate scientists are based on complex computer models that climate scientists themselves concede do not accurately model the underlying reality, and receive their input, not from the data, but from the scientists interpreting the data. This isn’t the sort of scientific endeavor on which a wide, well-established consensus is easily rendered. In fact, if there really were a consensus on all the various claims surrounding climate science, that would be really suspicious. A fortiori, the claim of consensus is a bit suspicious as well.
(9) When “scientists say” or “science says” is a common locution.
In Newsweek’s April 28, 1975, issue, science editor Peter Gwynne claimed that “scientists are almost unanimous” that global cooling was underway. Now we are told, “Scientists say global warming will lead to the extinction of plant and animal species, the flooding of coastal areas from rising seas, more extreme weather, more drought and diseases spreading more widely.” “Scientists say” is hopelessly ambiguous. Your mind should immediately wonder: “Which ones?”
Other times this vague company of scientists becomes “SCIENCE,” as when we’re told “what science says is required to avoid catastrophic climate change.” “Science says” is an inherently weasely claim. “Science,” after all, is an abstract noun. It can’t say anything. Whenever you see that locution used to imply a consensus, it should trigger your baloney detector.
(10) When it is being used to justify dramatic political or economic policies.
Imagine hundreds of world leaders and nongovernmental organizations, science groups, and United Nations functionaries gathered for a meeting heralded as the most important conference since World War II, in which “the future of the world is being decided.” These officials seem to agree that institutions of “global governance” need to be established to reorder the world economy and massively restrict energy resources. Large numbers of them applaud wildly when socialist dictators denounce capitalism. Strange philosophical and metaphysical activism surrounds the gathering. And we are told by our president that all of this is based, not on fiction, but on science—that is, a scientific consensus that human activities, particularly greenhouse gas emissions, are leading to catastrophic climate change.
We don’t have to imagine that scenario, of course. It happened in Copenhagen, in December. Now, none of this disproves the hypothesis of catastrophic, human induced climate change. But it does describe an atmosphere that would be highly conducive to misrepresentation. And at the very least, when policy consequences, which claim to be based on science, are so profound, the evidence ought to be rock solid. “Extraordinary claims,” the late Carl Sagan often said, “require extraordinary evidence.” When the megaphones of consensus insist that there’s no time, that we have to move, MOVE, MOVE!, you have a right to be suspicious.
(11) When the “consensus” is maintained by an army of water-carrying journalists who defend it with uncritical and partisan zeal, and seem intent on helping certain scientists with their messaging rather than reporting on the field as objectively as possible.
Do I really need to elaborate on this point?
(12) When we keep being told that there’s a scientific consensus.
A scientific consensus should be based on scientific evidence. But a consensus is not itself the evidence. And with really well-established scientific theories, you never hear about consensus. No one talks about the consensus that the planets orbit the sun, that the hydrogen molecule is lighter than the oxygen molecule, that salt is sodium chloride, that light travels about 186,000 miles per second in a vacuum, that bacteria sometimes cause illness, or that blood carries oxygen to our organs. The very fact that we hear so much about a consensus on catastrophic, human-induced climate change is perhaps enough by itself to justify suspicion.
To adapt that old legal aphorism, when you’ve got decisive scientific evidence on your side, you argue the evidence. When you’ve got great arguments, you make the arguments. When you don’t have decisive evidence or great arguments, you claim consensus.
Jay Richards frequently writes for the Enterprise Blog and is a contributing editor of THE AMERICAN.
