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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/12/2002 6:28 PM (GMT -6) |   | Always a fan of Dennis Miller, I thought his take on the Middle East was worth repeating:
A brief overview of the situation is always valuable, so as a service to all Americans who still don't get it, I now offer you the story of the Middle East in just a few paragraphs, which is all you really need. Don't thank me. I'm a giver. Here we go:
The Palestinians want their own country. There's just one thing about that:
There are no Palestinians. Its a made up word. Israel was called Palestine for two thousand years. Like "Wiccan," "Palestinian" sounds ancient but is really a modern invention. Before the Israelis won the land in war, Gaza was owned by Egypt, and there were no "palestinians," then, and the West Bank was owned by Jordan and there were no Palestinians then. As soon as the Jews took over and started growing oranges as big as basketballs, what do you know, say hello to the "Palestinians" weeping for their deep bond with their lost "land" and "nation."
So for the sake of honesty, let's not use the word "Palestinians" any more to describe these delightful folks, who dance for joy at our deaths until someone points out they're being aped. Instead, lets' call them what they are: "Other Arabs Who Can't Accomplish Anything In Life And Would Rather Wrap Themselves In The Seductive Melodrama Of Eternal Struggle And Death."
I know that's a bit unwieldy to expect to see on CNN.
How about this: Adjacent Jew-Haters.
Okay, so the Adjacent Jew-Haters want their own country. Oops, just one more thing. No, they don't. They couldv'e had their own country any time in the last thirty years, esprecially two years ago at Camp David. But if you have you own country, you have to have traffic lights and garbage trucks and Chambers of Commerce, and, worse, you actually have to figure out some way to make a living. That's no fun. No, they want what all the other Jew-haters in the region want:Israel. They also want a big pile of dead Jews, of course. That's what the real fun is-but mostly they want Israel. Why? For one thing, trying to destroy Israel- or "The Zionist Entity" as their textbooks call it- for the last 50 years has allowed the rulers of Arab countries to divert the attention of their own people away from the fact that they're the blue-ribbon most illiterate, poorest, and tribally backward on God's Earth, and if you've ever been around God's Earth, you know that's really saying something. It makes me roll my eyes every time one of our pundits waxes poetic about the great history and culture of the Muslim Mideast. Unless I'm missing something, the Arabs haven't given anything to the world since Algebra and, by the way, thanks a hell of a lot for that one.
Chew this around and spit it out: Five hundred million Arabs: five million Jews. Think of all the Arab countries as a football field and Israel as a pack of matches sitting in the middle of it. And now these same folks swear that if Israel gives them half of that pack of matches, everyone will be pals. REally? Wow, what neat news. Hey, but what about the string of wars to obliterate the tiny country and the constant din of rapid blood oaths to drive every Jew into the sea?
Oh that? We were just kidding. My friend Kevin Rooney made a gorgeous point the other day: Just reverse the numbers. Imagine five hundred million Jews and five million Arabs. I was stunned at the simple brillance of it. Can anyone picture the Jews strapping belts of razor blades and dynamite to themselves? Of course not. Or marshalling every fiber and force at their disposal for generations to drive a tiny Arab state into the sea? Nonsense. Or dancing for joy at the murder of innocents? Impossible. Or spreading and believing horrible lies about the Arabs baking their bread with the blood of children? Disgusting. No, as you know, left to themselves in a world of peace, the worst Jews would ever do to people is debate them to death.
Mr. Bush, God bless him is walking a tightrope. I understand that with vital operations coming up against Iraq and others, its in our interests as Americans to try and stabilize our Arab allies as much as possible and, after all, that can't be much harder than stabilizing a roomful of supermodels who've just had their drugs taken away. However, in any big-picture strategy, there's always a danger of losing moral weight. We've already lost some. Adter 9/11 our president told us and the world he was going to root out all terrorists and the countries that supported them. Beautiful. Then the Israelis, after months and months of having the equivalent of Oklahoma City every week (and then everyday) start to do the same thing we did, and we tell them to show restraint. If America were being attacked with an Oklahoma City every day, we would all very shortly be screaming for the administration to just be done with it and kill everything south of the Mediterranean and east of the Jordan. (Hey, wait a minute, that's actually not such a bad id...uh, that is, what a horrible thought, yeah, horrible)...
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kerygma
Registered Member
Date Joined Aug 2002
Total Posts : 45
| Posted 8/13/2002 3:59 AM (GMT -6) | | I read somewhere that Dennis never said this. Evidently he did have the guy who did write it on his show sometime back. No word on whether or not he agreed with it.
***Update***
OK, this was bothering, so I checked it out. This is not Dennis Miller's monologue, but curiously enough another humorist by the same last name, Larry Miller. You may read the original here:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/161yaihr.asp
Now, if you want an honest to goodness Dennis Miller rant on the same subject go here:
http://www.hbo.com/dml/
and click on "Past Rants"..."Middle East"
Another urban legend bites the dust.
Kerygma
"And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus" Philippians 4:19
Edited by - kerygma on 08/14/2002 4:23:57 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/13/2002 8:02 PM (GMT -6) | | Perhaps he did, perhaps he didn't. Regardless, I thought it had many valid points and am hoping he did, just because I like Dennis Miller.
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 8/14/2002 1:44 AM (GMT -6) | | Miller's view is pure, untreated, still-warm human waste. I lived on the West Bank too many years to believe it.
Sorry Harold.
Tom
"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde
Edited by - TGB on 08/14/2002 06:46:57 AM | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 8/14/2002 1:45 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Miller's view is pure, untreated, still-warm human waste. I lived on the West Bank too many years.
Sorry Harold.
Tom
Wow. Did I say that. I've never come close to anything like that in two years. Starkman, just pretend I didn't say it.
Tom 
"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 8/14/2002 7:48 AM (GMT -6) | | Someone (whomever the "comic" writer) wrote: There are no Palestinians. Its a made up word.
Then Bethelehemite. Nazarene.
And lets be sectarian for a moment -- "PC" or not. Christian Bethelehemite. Christian Nazarene.
Those are fast shrinking minorities. Going extinct.
And I'm not talking about he foreign-passport-holding monks who argue ancient jurisdictions to decide who's lawn chair gets to be in the shade next time. I'm talking about the classes that apparently convenient to leave out in the above "comic" post.
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/14/2002 10:55 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom: since (I assume) that you are not sorry for disgreeing with the "Dennis Miller," tirade I posted, I can only assume that you feel sorry for the words you used. If so, you should save the sorrow for yourself. If one is sorry for words posted, then one should not post them. If one is sorry that one disagrees with a person, maybe they shouldn't disagree with them. I certainly am not sorry that I hold beliefs that are in conflict with others. I am only sorry they don't hold my beliefs, because I believe I am right.
Regardless, I would prefer you show me why you disagee with the post. Yet, alas, I expected such responses. It reminds me of Modes' response in the "Brutality" post. Both Brandon and Terry gave statistics and valid reasons why they didn't believe racism was the primary cause of whites being CEOs, yet Modes seemed to feel that the simple fact that whites are predominantly CEOs should alone be evident of racism, given the fact that he has never attempted to refute them.
I respect your opinion from having lived there. But it is simply that. A personal experience. I believe you would agree that living there doesn't make you an expert. It is my experience that when people answer as you do they it is because they dislike what is said, not that it is neccessarily untrue. Hopefully, there will be better reasoned responses than yours. Harold
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/14/2002 10:56 AM (GMT -6) | | POW: its too bad you totally missed the comics point...
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/15/2002 8:41 AM (GMT -6) | | Actually, an urban legend usually contains no truth. This was simply a case of giving credit to the wrong person. By the way, Larry's is much better in the full version...props to him!
Edited by - writerdad on 08/15/2002 1:45:57 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/15/2002 12:57 PM (GMT -6) | | Don't know as much on this subject as I would like, and I will confess that most of what I know is from the news...ewww. But here's my question.
Aside from Isreal settling on certain pieces of land that their Palestinian neighbours don't want them to be on? What the hell is wrong with Isreal existing as a nation?
Dennis Miller is right on this. You start doing your suicide bomber BS? You just cut off all communication. I don't give a rat's behind who's in the right about now. You just short-circut yourself bud.
Now get this. Isreal is not a saint (a problem I have with dispensationalists who think they deserve US backing on everything), but suicide bombing is not the way to settle disputes over what? Land? You've got a problem with government policy? Don't be taking it out on little children standing by some fruit stand in the market place. You got that?
Couple of weeks ago, I was watching "Dateline" or 60 Minutes or sum'tn like that. These two guys who went to a "peace" camp for Jewish and Palestinians kids were on the show and they were no longer friends as grown ups. The Palestinian man did not want his former childhood Jewish friend to live on a particular piece of land he thought the Isrealis were swallowing up. Though they met after years apart, the Palestinian man advocated violent means to oust the Jewish settlers, even if it took suicide bombers.
What an idiot.
That is not "controlled violence," that's anarchy, because of hate.
Hey does anyone out there think we should blow up ourselves and little kiddies with Blues Clues back packs in crowded open spaces to make a point and possibly see goals reached?
Call 1-800-GET-A-LIFE.
Brandon
"Sharing a prison cell unites you much more powerfully than sharing a conference table."--Ecumenical Jihad: Ecumenism and the Culture War | | Back to Top | | |
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Starkman
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1747
| Posted 8/17/2002 3:41 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom, Tom, Tom . . .
Shame! I'll have my people call your people and scold you!!!
First, I've read research on the Palestinian issue. Chuck Missler has done some research (www.khouse.org), and Lambert Dolphin's web site (www.idolphin.org). At the moment, I'm unable to find what I wanted at Missler's site, but here's a very good link for Dolphin's: http://www.ldolphin.org/islamclaims.html. THIS IS A VERY GOOD BIT OF INFORMATION!
(I searched for "such thing as a palestinian state" [without the quotes] and I set the search for Find All Words. Other searches for "Islam and the Holy Land" and such will produce similar results. I HIGHLY encourage you folks to read the one article I've noted.)
Well, breakfast is cooking, and so will my butt be if I don't get off this computer!
For the land of Israel,
Starkman | | Back to Top | | |
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kerygma
Registered Member
Date Joined Aug 2002
Total Posts : 45
| Posted 8/19/2002 2:45 PM (GMT -6) | | Not to say that the Jews in Israel are guilt free, but here are a couple of pieces about the dishonesty of Palestinian claims by Joseph Farah regarding the existence of Palestine for those who asked.
Myths of the Middle East
Joseph Farah
I've been quiet since Israel erupted in fighting spurred by disputes over the Temple Mount.
Until now, I haven't even bothered to say, "See, I told you so." But I can't resist any longer. I feel compelled to remind you of the column I wrote just a couple weeks before the latest uprising. Yeah, folks, I predicted it. That's OK. Hold your applause.
After all, I wish I had been wrong. More than 80 people have been killed since the current fighting in and around Jerusalem began. And for what?
If you believe what you read in most news sources, Palestinians want a homeland and Muslims want control over sites they consider holy. Simple, right?
Well, as an Arab-American journalist who has spent some time in the Middle East dodging more than my share of rocks and mortar shells, I've got to tell you that these are just phony excuses for the rioting, trouble-making and land-grabbing.
Isn't it interesting that prior to the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, there was no serious movement for a Palestinian homeland?
"Well, Farah," you might say, "that was before the Israelis seized the West Bank and Old Jerusalem."
That's true. In the Six-Day War, Israel captured Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem. But they didn't capture these territories from Yasser Arafat. They captured them from Jordan's King Hussein. I can't help but wonder why all these Palestinians suddenly discovered their national identity after Israel won the war.
The truth is that Palestine is no more real than Never-Never Land. The first time the name was used was in 70 A.D. when the Romans committed genocide against the Jews, smashed the Temple and declared the land of Israel would be no more. From then on, the Romans promised, it would be known as Palestine. The name was derived from the Philistines, a Goliathian people conquered by the Jews centuries earlier. It was a way for the Romans to add insult to injury. They also tried to change the name of Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina, but that had even less staying power.
Palestine has never existed -- before or since -- as an autonomous entity. It was ruled alternately by Rome, by Islamic and Christian crusaders, by the Ottoman Empire and, briefly, by the British after World War I. The British agreed to restore at least part of the land to the Jewish people as their homeland.
There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians (another recent invention), Syrians, Lebanese, Iraqis, etc. Keep in mind that the Arabs control 99.9 percent of the Middle East lands. Israel represents one-tenth of 1 percent of the landmass.
But that's too much for the Arabs. They want it all. And that is ultimately what the fighting in Israel is about today. Greed. Pride. Envy. Covetousness. No matter how many land concessions the Israelis make, it will never be enough.
What about Islam's holy sites? There are none in Jerusalem.
Shocked? You should be. I don't expect you will ever hear this brutal truth from anyone else in the international media. It's just not politically correct.
I know what you're going to say: "Farah, the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem represent Islam's third most holy sites."
Not true. In fact, the Koran says nothing about Jerusalem. It mentions Mecca hundreds of times. It mentions Medina countless times. It never mentions Jerusalem. With good reason. There is no historical evidence to suggest Mohammed ever visited Jerusalem.
So how did Jerusalem become the third holiest site of Islam? Muslims today cite a vague passage in the Koran, the seventeenth Sura, entitled "The Night Journey." It relates that in a dream or a vision Mohammed was carried by night "from the sacred temple to the temple that is most remote, whose precinct we have blessed, that we might show him our signs. ..." In the seventh century, some Muslims identified the two temples mentioned in this verse as being in Mecca and Jerusalem. And that's as close as Islam's connection with Jerusalem gets -- myth, fantasy, wishful thinking. Meanwhile, Jews can trace their roots in Jerusalem back to the days of Abraham.
The latest round of violence in Israel erupted when Likud Party leader Ariel Sharon tried to visit the Temple Mount, the foundation of the Temple built by Solomon. It is the holiest site for Jews. Sharon and his entourage were met with stones and threats. I know what it's like. I've been there. Can you imagine what it is like for Jews to be threatened, stoned and physically kept out of the holiest site in Judaism?
So what's the solution to the Middle East mayhem? Well, frankly, I don't think there is a man-made solution to the violence. But, if there is one, it needs to begin with truth. Pretending will only lead to more chaos. Treating a 5,000-year-old birthright backed by overwhelming historical and archaeological evidence equally with illegitimate claims, wishes and wants gives diplomacy and peacekeeping a bad name.
Palestinian People Do Not Exist
Joseph Farah
A provocative headline? It's more than that. It's the truth.
Truth does not change. Truth is truth. If something was true 50 years ago, 40 years ago, 30 years ago, it is still true today.
And the truth is that only 30 years ago, there was very little confusion on this issue of Palestine.
You might remember the late Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir making the bold political statement: "There is no such thing as a Palestinian people."
The statement has been a source of ridicule and derision by Arab propagandists ever since. They love to talk about Golda Meir's "racism." They love to suggest she was in historical denial. They love to say her statement is patently false – an intentional lie, a strategic deception.
What they don't like to talk about, however, are the very similar statements made by Yasser Arafat and his inner circle of political leadership years after Meir had told the truth – that there is no distinct Palestinian cultural or national identity.
So, despite the fact that conventional wisdom has now proclaimed that there is such a thing as the Palestinian people, I'm going to raise those uncomfortable quotations made by Arafat and his henchmen when their public-relations guard was down.
Way back on March 31, 1977, the Dutch newspaper Trouw published an interview with Palestine Liberation Organization executive committee member Zahir Muhsein. Here's what he said:
The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.
For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.
That's pretty clear, isn't it? It's even more specific than Golda Meir's statement. It reaffirms what I have written on this subject. And it is hardly the only such statement of its kind. Arafat himself made a very definitive and unequivocal statement along these lines as late as 1993. It demonstrates conclusively that the Palestinian nationhood argument is the real strategic deception – one geared to set up the destruction of Israel.
In fact, on the same day Arafat signed the Declaration of Principles on the White House lawn in 1993, he explained his actions on Jordan TV. Here's what he said: "Since we cannot defeat Israel in war, we do this in stages. We take any and every territory that we can of Palestine, and establish a sovereignty there, and we use it as a springboard to take more. When the time comes, we can get the Arab nations to join us for the final blow against Israel."
No matter how many people convince themselves that the aspirations for Palestinian statehood are genuine and the key to peace in the Middle East, they are still deceiving themselves.
I've said it before and I will say it again, in the history of the world, Palestine has never existed as a nation. The region known as Palestine was ruled alternately by Rome, by Islamic and Christian crusaders, by the Ottoman Empire and, briefly, by the British after World War I. The British agreed to restore at least part of the land to the Jewish people as their ancestral homeland. It was never ruled by Arabs as a separate nation.
Why now has it become such a critical priority?
The answer is because of a massive deception campaign and relentless terrorism over 40 years.
Golda Meir was right. Her statement is validated by the truth of history and by the candid, but not widely circulated, pronouncements of Arafat and his lieutenants.
Israel and the West must not surrender to terrorism by granting the killers just what they want – a public relations triumph and a strategic victory. It's not too late to say no to terrorism. It's not too late to say no to another Arab terror state. It's not too late to tell the truth about Palestine.
"And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus" Philippians 4:19 | | Back to Top | | |
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Modes of Thought
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817
| Posted 8/22/2002 6:54 AM (GMT -6) | | I was in Palestine/Israel/whatever for a month or so and from what I saw I'd have to agree with Tom. But that is just silly ol' me as a dumb little "eye-witness". What really counts is brilliant people like Harold quoting comedians-turned-sports announcers. I think its because they are the ones who pay the most attention to the objective facts. The rest of us are just spouting off opinions, particularly if we disagree with them.
LOL!
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/22/2002 8:38 AM (GMT -6) | | Modes: I bet you are really cute when you are attempting to be self-righteous...
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Modes of Thought
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817
| Posted 8/22/2002 9:47 AM (GMT -6) | | Careful Harold or you might work up my homophobic anxieties 
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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writerdad
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 448
| Posted 8/22/2002 12:24 PM (GMT -6) | | Modes: THAT was a very funny comeback...thanks!
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BBBCanada
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 8/22/2002 12:35 PM (GMT -6) | | Will you two just ssssstop! (said with a lisp)
Brandon
"Sharing a prison cell unites you much more powerfully than sharing a conference table."--Ecumenical Jihad: Ecumenism and the Culture War | | Back to Top | | |
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