The US has announced the capture of “Chemical Ali”, as Ali Hassan al-Majid is known. A cousin of Saddam Hussein, al-Majid may have information about weapons, or about Saddam’s whereabouts.
These captures are far more than symbolic. To the Iraqi population, each is reassurance that the Ba’ath regime won’t be coming back . . . and hopefully each arrest of one of the “most wanted” people will help them have more confidence in their future.
Still reading your horoscope daily? Well, you can stop now. 40-year-long research has concluded that astrology is a load of bunk:
Extensive scientific research over more than 40 years has finally confirmed what many always believed: that astrology is rubbish, and that it is based on the principle of deception. The research began in London in 1958, and has just been published in the current edition of the respected Journal of Consciousness Studies.
[ . . . ]
In the course of the study, researchers tracked more than 2,000 people over several decades – most of them born within minutes of each other. According to astrology, the subjects should have had very similar traits. The babies were originally recruited as part of a medical study into how the circumstances of birth can affect future health. More than 2,000 babies born in early March that year were registered and their development monitored at regular intervals.
Researchers looked at more than 100 different characteristics, including occupation, anxiety levels, marital status, aggressiveness, sociability, IQ levels and ability in art, sport, mathematics and reading – all of which astrologers claim can be gauged from birth charts. The scientists failed to find any evidence of similarities between the “time twins”, however. “The test conditions could hardly have been more conducive to success… but the results are uniformly negative,” the research report said.
Yeah, we know that you never really believed in it in the first place . . . but hey, if the scientific community wanted to fund such a large-scale study to prove something that everyone already knows anyway, then I’m all for it. Keeps people employed.
I guess we’ll just have to return to more solid and accepted methods of predicting the future . . . like religion. (I’d love to see the results of the scientific study that takes that one on . . .)
I am in complete agreement with Jean Chretien (for once) that the majority should not decide the fate of the minority. Chretien has stated that he thinks a referendum on gay marriage would be a bad idea:
“I’ve done some referendums. I’m not keen on that,” he said, speaking to reporters in North Bay in the middle of a Liberal caucus meeting this week.
He said the reason Canada has a Constitution and the Charter of Rights is to protect the rights of minorities.
As well, he feels the job of elected officials is to make important decisions on issues such as gay marriages and to defend the rights of minorities.
“To have a referendum on these things, there would be no protection anymore.”
In my opinion, this is the correct interpretation of the role of government, and anyone who is a minority in any way (which, I suppose, we all are in a sense) should defend this role.
A suicide bombing on a Jerusalem bus has killed at least 20 people – including small children – and wounded over 80 others:
The bomb exploded aboard a double-length city bus in the crowded, largely ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Mea Shearim near the border between east and west Jerusalem. The explosion damaged a second bus, Israeli police spokesman Gil Kleiman said. The bus was mainly filled with religious Jews on their way home from praying at the Kotel.
Ambulance services said at least 30 people had been carried away from the scene. An Israeli spokesman said 26 people were seriously and critically injured in the bombing. Another 43 people sustained minor injuries.
Fifteen children between 2 weeks and 15 years old were taken to Hadassah Ein Karem Hospital, according to Mor Yosef, the hospital’s director-general.
They’re killing our children again. And gloating about it. Hamas and Islamic Jihad were falling all over each other to claim “responsibility” for this attack.
The news media are all focusing on the death of the (fictional) truce. But a lot more died than an agreement that was never honoured in the first place. Innocent men, women, and children had their lives stolen.
The world was feeling pretty relaxed lately – quiet on the Mideast front and all that. The Israelis knew better. Their news media was warning people to expect the worst in the coming days. The Israelis knew that this so-called cease-fire was just an excuse for these guys to regroup and plan their next attack.
I almost don’t know what to say anymore. All the screaming about how bad an idea it is to keep making “concessions” that will encourage terror fall on deaf ears. I can’t say I’m disappointed, either.
Just saddened. And angry as hell.
No.
There’s a very simple response to palestinian claims of a “right of return” (ROR) to the pre-1948 homes of their ancestors or themselves in Israel.
No.
That’s the answer and that will always be the answer. It’s time the rest of the world made this perfectly clear and stopped leaving it to Israel to spell it out, time and time again. Despite the screaming, shrieking, ranting and raving, the claim has no basis, no legitimacy, no historical precedent. And no such “return” is going to happen while the State of Israel still exists.
She makes the point quite well that Israel cannot – and never will – accept a so-called “compromise” that effectively negates its right to exist as a Jewish state. It’s a point underscored by this Ha’aretz editorial:
The Palestinian leadership would be well advised to take very seriously the united front in Israel that opposes a right of return. The most committed supporters of the Oslo Accords believe that a concession of refugees’ right of return to Haifa can be traded fairly for a concession of Jews’ right of return to Hebron. Israel, just like the PA and Arab states, should have an interest in the search for a just solution for hundreds of thousands of stateless, disenfranchised people who live in, and outside, refugee camps. But this solution cannot include a return of refugees to the State of Israel; instead, the return should be to the Palestinian state that will arise alongside Israel.
Virtually all Palestinian leaders have poorly served their own people by cultivating among refugees the illusion of a right of return to Israel, rather than courageously encouraging them to recognize that the establishment of a Palestinian state entails the relinquishing of hopes of returning to Israeli territory. With his irresponsible remarks, Sha’ath throws dust in Palestinians’ eyes, and spoils prospects of forging an agreement, even with those in Israel who believe in compromise.
And that of course is the crux of the issue. Because even those in the Arab world who speak about lofty principles like recognition of Israel don’t mean the Israel that we know. They really mean that they’d accept an Arab, Islamic Israel – renamed Palestine, of course, and where the Jews would live as a minority. To them, the notion of Jewish nationalism is an illegitimate one, even as they prop up Palestinian nationalism by funnelling millions to terrorist networks.
The so-called “right of return” was invented as a Plan B, in case Plan A (military annihilation of the “Zionist entity”) failed. Plan A has been attempted over and over, and each time Israel has emerged victorious. So it’s no surprise that Plan B has been taking centre stage lately.
It’s the same old song and dance. And anyone who doesn’t recognize it as such is either willfully ignorant or just blind.
The bombing of the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad is proof of just how bad things have gotten on the ground in Iraq. At least one person was killed and over 30 injured, including some high-level U.N. officials.
Logic would dictate that the Saddam-loyalist factions still active in Iraq would want to direct their anger at the Americans, not at the United Nations. So this, of course, begs the question of who was responsible for today’s attack? And why? After all, the U.N.’s role in Iraq has been humanitarian, not military.
Was the HQ attacked because it was a “soft target”? Because it was a way to attack foreigners? Was the attack by a group angry with the U.N.’s resistance to Iraqi intervention? (That last seems highly unlikely). Was it all a big mistake?
Details may emerge in the coming days that clarify it . . . but don’t count on it. Iraq is in a state of mess right now, and it will probably take some time to get all the threads sorted out.
Isi Lieber, the senior Vice-President of the WJC, writes a glowing editorial singing the praises of Israel’s new friends, Evangelical Christians:
Now it has suddenly dawned on us that there are probably 60 million Evangelical Christians in the United States and that they represent our staunchest supporters and friends. In fact, in recent years concern and devotion for Israel have become one of their highest priorities.
While I realize the sensitivity of looking a gift horse in the mouth, let me be candid about how uncomfortable – and that’s putting it mildly – the whole thing makes me.
Here is a story that is hardly new and that has been developing for a while. Some people, like Lieber, are from the “who cares about their motives, they’re helping us, and we sure could use all the friends we can get” school of thought. I see where they’re coming from. But that doesn’t mean I have to agree, or to like it.
Evangelical Christians are, of course, as free to practice their brand(s) of religion as anyone else. That doesn’t mean I have to like it when they start preaching to me about being “saved”. Nor do I have to overlook the fact that most of these millions of supporters of Israel are only doing so because they believe that the second coming of the Messiah will result in the conversion of all of us Jews to Christianity.
Frankly, the kowtowing and compromising of the principles of Israel – and indeed of Judaism – to these so-called “new friends” reminds me of the kid in the schoolyard who’s so lonely that he’ll attach himself to anyone willing to show the least bit of attention, even if he’s the laughingstock of the group.
The pragmatic approach would say that Israel can’t afford to dismiss the friendship of perhaps the most powerful lobby group that can influence the American government to see things in a favourable light. However, conscience would dictate that Israel can’t afford to overlook other things. The power of the religious right in the US means that other items on the Evangelicals’ agendas, aside from support of Israel, include encouragement of school prayer (Christian of course), denying homosexual rights, and trying to change the law to outlaw abortion, to name a few. And I can’t help but wonder if, sooner or later, Israeli lobbyists will realize that when you sell your soul to the devil, so to speak, it comes at a very steep price.
Never go to the hairdresser on a bad hair day with the instructions “I’m sick of my hair, do something different”.
Ah well, I suppose it’ll grow back . . . eventually.
Whoever else was inconvenienced by the big blackout, Jean Chretien was making damn sure that Shimon Peres made it home for his birthday celebrations:
Former Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres made it home to celebrate his 80th birthday despite the huge power cuts in North America after Canadian premier Jean Chretien sent his personal jet to rescue him, reports said.
I wonder if Chretien would have been so quick to send his private jet to rescue, say, Ariel Sharon or Benjamin Netanyahu?
Latest Comments