Segacs’s World I Know

Over two years ago, the British government pledged to highlight the issue of the “forgotten” Jewish refugees from Arab lands within the EU.

Well… nu?

I would like to know what has been done on this issue in the past two years. From the looks of it, not a whole lot.

Promises are easy to make. They’re a lot harder to fulfil. And post-Gaza disengagement, this issue may well be even more relevant than ever before.

Then again, I suppose the British government is just continuing its long tradition of broken promises to the Jews…

Meryl has Hamas’s answer to those who dared hope that the Gaza withdrawal would be a step towards peace:

Hamas leaders vowed to continue fighting Israel as tens of thousands cheered and waved the group’s green flags and masked gunmen hoisted assault rifles, rockets and anti-tank missiles.

“We will not rest and will not abandon the path of Jihad and martyrdom as long as one inch of our land remained in the hands of the Jews,” said Raed Saed, a senior Hamas leader in Gaza City, using the Arabic term for holy war.

“We are celebrating our victory in Gaza and now we are headed toward Jerusalem, Nablus, Akko, Haifa, the Galilee and all of Palestine,” he said.

“Sharon, you should know that we will win – the only language spoken will be the language of weapons. We are young people who aspire to die for Allah and for the weapons we are carrying.”

Catch that language? Jerusalem (not “East Jerusalem”), Nabulus, Akko, Haifa, the Galilee and all of Palestine.

For the uninitiated, that means Israel.

I was cautiously optimistic at the start of the pullout plan, figuring that Sharon had a strategy and that this could at the very least break the stalemate and get Israel out of a region it didn’t want in the first place. I have to sadly concede that those opposed to the plan were probably right – not for religious or ideological reasons, but because it set a very dangerous precedent in rewarding terrorism.

Just when the violence was starting to wane, just as the Palestinians were starting to believe that maybe their approach was a mistake, the Gaza pullout handed them a victory to re-energize their ranks and start up the bloodshed all over again.

I’d hoped I was wrong about that. It sadly appears that I was right.

That’s my sentiment about today’s announcement of an agreement in principle on the part of the world’s most despotic regime, North Korea, to abandon its nuclear weapons program:

North Korea promised to give up its nuclear weapons program on Monday, defusing a high-stakes crisis, but skeptics said the deal hammered out in Beijing was long on words and short of action.

South Korea, the United States, Japan, Russia and China — the other players in the six-party talks — in exchange expressed a willingness to provide oil, energy aid and security guarantees.

Washington and Tokyo agreed to normalize ties with the impoverished and diplomatically isolated North, which pledged to rejoin the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

The People’s Democratic Republic of Death Camps probably sees this as a golden opportunity to milk the West for all they’re worth, while pretending to give up weapons it has no intention of parting with. Or – worse – continuing to develop such weapons and then selling them to terrorist groups all over the world.

It’s important to give diplomacy a chance here, especially since there doesn’t seem to be any alternative. So I’ll try to be cautiously optimistic for now… or at least fake it. But with an unstable dictator like Kim Jong-Il at the helm, though, who knows what North Korea will do next?

The Expos may have departed to Washington, but the most beloved member of the team remained: the mascot, Youppi.

Now, it seems Youppi has found a new home with the Habs:

As reported by colleague Stephanie Myles this year, the Canadiens have bought the rights to Youppi!, the moth-eaten bastard Muppet who became a symbol of everything that was wrong with the Expos. Youppi! will be introduced as the Canadiens’ new mascot at a news conference this afternoon.

Does this mean Youppi will have to learn to skate?

No, not the Jews (despite what most of the Mideast believes)… the Islamists:

A suicide car bomber blew himself up outside a Shi’ite mosque north of Baghdad on Friday, killing 11 and wounding 24, the latest attack in a three-day surge of violence that has killed more than 200 people.

The blast came two days after Iraq’s al Qaeda leader, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, declared an all-out war on the country’s Shi’ite Muslim majority.

Iraqi police Captain Saed Ahmed said the bomb went off outside the Great Prophet mosque in Tuz Khurmatu, a mixed Sunni and Shi’ite town 160 km (100 miles) north of the capital, as worshippers were emerging from prayers on the Muslim holy day.

He said a Saudi wearing an explosives-laden belt, who was apparently working with the bomber, was arrested soon after.

Militants have frequently attacked Shi’ite mosques over the past 18 months in an apparent attempt to goad Iraq’s Shi’ite majority into retaliation and spark a sectarian civil war with the Sunni Arab minority, once dominant under Saddam Hussein.

The mass hysteria caused at the mere suggestion that a Jewish person dares to even set foot near a Muslim holy spot is enough to cause war. And yet, the terrorists frequently stockpile weapons in mosques, attack mosques of their enemies, and destory holy places belonging to pretty much every religion. Why is it that nobody even blinked at the torching of synagogues in former Gaza settlements by Palestinians… and yet could you even fathom the world’s outcry if a Jewish person so much as dropped a speck of dirt in a mosque?

The situation in Gaza post-pullout is pretty much what most rational people predicted, and is a shattering disillusionment for those who’d held out hope that the pullout would jump-start the peace process.

Meryl, of course, is all over the story – here, here, and here are a few recent postings. And Lynn had no illusions to begin with, but as she well knows, there’s no joy in this version of “I told you so”.

The Palestinians have been handed a huge opportunity in Gaza to prove to the world that they’re ready for a state. And of course, this opportuity is being squandered, just like all those that came before it.

There’s nothing better than satire done right. This week’s headline: Bush Nominates First-Trimester Fetus To Supreme Court:

WASHINGTON, DC — In a press conference Monday, President Bush named a 72-day-old gestating fetus as his nominee to fill the Supreme Court seat that opened following the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

“Already, this experienced and capable embryo has demonstrated during his or her in utero existence a deep commitment to the core principles of the Constitution,” Bush said. “It is with great pride that I nominate this unborn American patriot to the highest court in the land.”

If confirmed by Congress, the bean-sized vertebrate would be the nation’s first prenatal Supreme Court justice.

I bet if Bush could find a way to do it, he would.

Bush may be hoping that his mea culpa on the botched response to Katrina will lead to a jump in the polls, similar to what Martin experienced after apologizing for the sponsorship scandal on prime-time.

However, Bush might want to consider this: there’s a world of difference between the embezzlement of a few billion dollars and the loss of a few thousand lives.

I don’t think it’s right to directly blame Bush for the disaster that has emerged in Katrina’s wake. That’s reserved for people who want to politicize everything.

However, a true leader recognizes that the buck stops with him. In that sense, Bush’s move is the right one. That said, I suspect his words will ring hollow to the people who have lost their homes, families, communities, livelihood, and loved ones.

Yesterday, the Canadiens signed Michael Ryder to a one-year deal, just ahead of training camp.

While his signing is good news, the fact that the deal is only for one year is not. With the exceptions of Theodore and Kovalev, the Habs will have to re-sign most of their players before next season, or else risk losing them to free agency.

This season looks good. The future? Who knows.