Comments

Whatever happened to those fearsome Israelis? — 60 Comments

1. There is a downside to any operation. Even with all the planning you do; going in is often like stepping through an open door into a dark room.

   Courageous Restraint? Well, that brings along with it a much higher level of Operational Risk. Case in point.

   In the Long War, as I still call it, no one has been engaged with the enemy longer than Israel. If faced with their situation, Israel shows restraint few other nations would. They voluntarily gave up land – their strategic depth – in order to get peace; peace that they do not yet have.

   They have to abide by rules that their enemy does not. Their enemy’s INFO OPS and PSYOPS are very good and assisted by a willing international community and still broad anti-Jewish bias in Europe – especially in the media and academia.

   The Israelis have to deal with a cultural difference as well. They, as we, wish to live and prosper. Their enemy has no problem with death and martyrdom.

   I won’t beat up too much on the Israeli tactical situation. They were given a tough set of ROE from the looks of it; stop the ship but don’t hurt anyone. Impossible, but they tried. In hindsight – using toys, paintball guns (yes, they were using paintball guns) against weapons, iron clubs and slingshots – when outnumbered and on the offensive against an aware and awaiting enemy – is foolish …. but that is in hindsight.
   You have to give it to the Turks and their fellow Palestinian supports – they got exactly what they wanted; blood soaked shirts and video of Israelis attacking followers of the Religion of Peace.

   There is a side issue here as well. Turkey used to be one Israel’s best friends in the Muslim world. They used to do exercises together on a regular basis – Israel gave Turkey’s F-4 fleet a new lease on life, etc.

   Slowly but surely, as Turkey has slid toward the Islamists – that connection has faded. It will only get worse with time as the modern, urban, European minded Turks whose world view is largely Western and Secular as ours is, are being out-bred and out-voted by the retrograde, rural, and Islamist Ottomans.

2. Bottom line: there’s no point in trying to win the favor of those whose favor cannot be won.

   Israel is never going to win the approval of anyone in the Islamic world, or in the Red-influenced world, so she should just do whatever she thinks appropriate and forget the world. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.

3. Pablo: when the rules of engagement are impossible and contradictory, missions will nearly always go wrong.

4. I made several observations about on your first post about the “peace” flotilla. The crux being that anything Israel does will be used as an excuse to hate it. But I noticed something else now. The expected levels of hate from Europe is not there. As i wrote in the earlier post, I attribute this to the recognition by the Europeans of a mutual Islamist enemy.

5. neo: Agree, and would add – very rarely do plans survive the first contact with the enemy.

6. the recognition by the Europeans of a mutual Islamist enemy.

   Maybe. I’d like to think so. More likely the Europeans are too focused on their impending financial implosion to worry about anything else right now.

7. Occam; Also a factor I’m sure.

8. This:

   http://www.weeklystandard.com/tws/daily/daily.asp#blog-459157

9. Pablo,

   “They have to abide by rules that their enemy does not.”
   No they don’t (we didn’t in WWII) but that is what they’re doing because they’ve bought into political correctness fully as much as we have and, in all the nuances of that PC meme, such as Just War Theory.

   “Their enemy has no problem with death and martyrdom.”
   No they don’t but they do have a problem with the death and martyrdom of Islam. The meaning of which, I’ll explain shortly.

   “the Religion of Peace”
   Therein lies the heart of the matter and only in understanding the theological foundations of Islam is it possible to explain why it is not and can never be… a religion of ‘peace’.

   Occam’s Beard

   “Bottom line: there’s no point in trying to win the favor of those whose favor cannot be won.

   Israel is never going to win the approval of anyone in the Islamic world, or in the Red-influenced world, so she should just do whatever she thinks appropriate and forget the world. “
   Quite so. How to most effectively embark upon that is the question to be answered.

10. Neo:

    I couldn’t agree more. Israel’s has allowed the court of public opinion to erode it’s self-assurance, competence and strength. PC poison has a way of toppling the powerful nad if not liked at least respected. Take a lesson, America. How much respect have Obama’s snivelling apologies garnered? None, I guarantee it. He someone for any and everyone to bandy about the shins and make a fool of.

11. Yes, the impression that Israeli operations as, fearsomely competent and bold, has evaporated in recent years.

    And arguably, you have traced the decline of the IDF to the loss of Netanyahu’s brother, Israel’s ‘Hector’ perhaps.

    It’s not really the loss of one leader however but the adoption of PC thoughts and attitudes which has resulted in Israel’s loss of competence.

    The noted and fierce Israeli commentator, Caroline Glick has great insight into just this theme at, Ending Israel’s losing streak

12. Very excellent piece, Neo, and really says it all!

    Stuart Schneiderman, at “Shrinkwrapped,” (one of the best IMHO) talks about another aspect of PC: the dwindling of empathy among college graduates.

    How paradoxical life is: sometimes intuitive, sometimes counter-intuitive. Teach people “self-respect,” and the sucide rate goes up. Treat everyone like friends and watch your reputation go down. Renounce property and watch all your freedoms disappear.

13. Goeffrey Britain, be wary of Caroline Glick. She strikes me as a proponent of the “OMG the world is coming to an end” school of Israeli journalism. The school that predicts an unending series of disasters starting on Monday of the following week, always.

    When interpreting Israeli analysis recall the famous Jewish telegram, ‘start worrying, details follow”.

14. The old Israel would have sunk all the ships after a warning to turn back. Message sent.

15. The old Israel would have sunk all the ships after a warning to turn back. Message sent.

    Harsh, but effective, and what really needs doing. Once done, it won’t need to be done again for a long time.

    Sort of the WWNKD – what would North Korea do?

16. Bob of Va,
    I think highly of Glick finding her reasoning sound, as for any ‘chicken little’ tendencies she may have, I’d suggest that living in israel for a few months might bring a different perspective to the fore. Iran’s getting the bomb makes it arguably, now a rather moot point, wouldn’t you say?

    OK, I alluded to some recent conclusions I’ve reached and the resultant proposed solutions they imply in regard to Israel’s existential crisis, which BTW, I also believe apply to our confrontation with Islamic terrorism.

    I’ve reached the conclusion that Islamic radicalism is a symptom not a cause. Regrettably, I’ve been forced to conclude that the cause is Islam itself.

    I base this assessment upon Islam’s holiest and most fundamental theological tenet, which when fully appreciated inexorably leads to the logical conclusion that it is Islam itself, which makes war upon Israel and the West.

    That tenet compels Islam to do so and allows for no deviation from that path. It also allows for no internal reform of Islam, makes reformation impossible and accounts for the silence of ‘moderate’ Islam.

    That tenet is simply this; Muhammad didn’t write the Qur’an (Koran) GOD did…

    Muhammad made this most extraordinary theological claim in establishing his religion, which led to certain immutable assumptions from which Islam cannot retreat because to do so, would destroy Islam’s theological foundations and collapse the entire theological rationale and edifice.

    Muhammad claimed that the Archangel Gabriel physically visited him and directly transmitted God’s words directly to Muhammad for transcription. That Muhammad merely took dictation and that Gabriel was there to make sure that he got it exactly right.

    Thus, the Qur’an is the perfect word of God, directly from the ‘big guys’ mouth and therefore inviolate.

    Theologically, to change even one word, even one comma is to distort God’s own, perfect words and that, no man may do.

    Upon this claim by Muhammad rests his assertion that he is God’s prophet and because he brings God’s words directly to mankind, Muhammad is the final prophet.

    There are theological contradictions in the Qur’an but since Allah cannot be perfect if he contradicts himself and, as God’s perfect, final prophet, Muhammad can’t contradict himself either, by long settled Islamic doctrine, the later violent passages supersede the earlier, more peaceful passages. Moderate Muslims know this and that is why they are so strangely silent in the face of their culpability in the violence upon innocents.

    Quite simply, the radicals are on far firmer theological ground in their interpretation of Islam and because of the aforementioned foundational tenets of Islam, the moderates have no theological basis for opposing the ‘radicals’, who are simply following Muhammad’s dictates to follow the Qur’an’s dictates, i.e. to follow God’s dictates…

    This is also why Islam cannot reform itself, for to do so it must ‘reform’ the Qur’an, which is to reject Muhammad’s claim that the Qur’an is the direct word of God. Which logically destroys Muhammad’s claim to prophethood and his claim that Gabriel visited him. Literally begging the question; if Muhammad got something as basic as the Qur’an’s authorship wrong, what else did he get wrong?

    The inevitable theological result is that Islam’s theological foundation is removed and the entire rationale for Islam disappears, collapsing into dust.

    Thus the only way to avoid that, which is the existential struggle, medieval Islam is confronted with in its contact with the modernity of the West’s culture is, to engage in a fight to the death. Either the West is subdued or Islam will become extinct.

    Osama bin Ladin, the radical Imams and Mullahs know this and that is why they hate the West. To them, we are the great Satan and nothing can change that because the alternative is the philosophical abandonment of their religion’s theological foundations.

    Which is exactly what the moderates have done, while living in denial of the theological reality, simply ignoring the parts of the Qur’an that they find uncomfortable.

    Wherein the problem lies for the moderates is that participation in the ‘Ummah’ requires condoning of and compliance with, the violence of the radicals, which by Western standards and law, equates to criminal culpability in the violence.

    Thus, moderates are confronted with a fundamental paradox; to remain Muslim means to participate in the violence by fulfilling Burke’s dictum; “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing” but to reject the violence means to reject Islam and commit apostasy. So moderates have to decide, do they stand on the side of love or hate? “For a man cannot serve two masters”…

    This said, I do not propose to make war upon 1.5 billion Muslims, I propose to convincingly threaten to make war upon Islam’s holiest shrines and by doing so, deter Islam and allow it to slowly self-destruct.

    I’ll explain exactly how I propose to do that in my next post.

17. Q: Whatever happened to those fearsome Israelis?

    A: Too much image-consciousness.

18. I don’t see why Boot has to wring his hands.They whacked 10 terrorists,so what’s the problem?

19. Said very well, GB. Email that to John Brennan, Obama’s counterterrorism advisor.

20. ” I do not propose to make war upon 1.5 billion Muslims, I propose to convincingly threaten to make war upon Islam’s holiest shrines and by doing so, deter Islam and allow it to slowly self-destruct.”

    OK, here’s exactly how I propose to do that and while I’m speaking of a change in Israel’s strategy and doctrines, eventually I thin a nuclear terrorist attack upon a US city will force us to confront the same reality that confronts Israel. We are after all the ‘Great Satan’.

    It is time for the politically correct fantasies to be put aside and for reality to be faced, for otherwise a ‘nuclear realty’ will sooner or later be imposed upon Israel and the US.

    If Israel acts as the proverbial ‘canary in the coal mine’ for the West, then it can also act as the ‘way-shower’.

    The primary obstacle to Israel fulfilling that function is its own left, which has fully bought into the narrative of political correctness.

    Israel’s back is against the wall, which the recent anti-Israel resolution passed last Friday at the UN’s Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference demonstrated. Virtually every nation, ALL 189 voted to deny Israel the right to self-defense.

    That is the first of many realities Israel must face.

    Obama isn’t going to lift a finger to stop Iran, he’s already decided that he can live with a nuclear Iran.

    Which means Iran is going to get the bomb.

    So, Israel is going to have to figure out how to live with it too.

    That’s the next reality Israel must accept.

    Israel has already proven that she can withstand conventional armies and conventional attacks.

    It is a nuclear attack upon Israel, direct or terrorist, which poses a mortal danger to Israel.

    It is virtually certain that Israel’s liberal left will stick their heads in the sand and, propose acceptance of conditions that would lead to Israel’s surrender and dissolution or genocidal extermination.

    Between the Israeli left and Islam, the left is the far greater threat because they are blocking the implementation of effective defensive strategies.

    That is the third reality Israel must accept.

    There is only one effective strategy for dealing with a nuclear Iran and a nuclear terrorist attack which would destroy Israel because there is only one thing that Muslims cherish more than they hate Israel.

    That is the fourth reality Israel must accept.

    That strategy recognizes that Islam will continue to throw logistical resources at Israel, if necessary for the next 1000 yrs.

    That strategy recognizes that Israel is under assault from Islam, that ‘rogue’ nations and terrorist organizations are merely Islam’s agents in its war with Israel. This is because Islam’s holiest of holies the Qur’an, proclaims that armed struggle to establish Islam over the entire world is the absolute duty of every Muslim.

    That is the fifth reality Israel must accept.

    That strategy recognizes that Muslims do not value their nation’s, tribes or individual survival and, that there is only one thing that Muslim’s cherish more than Israel’s death…the survival of Islam itself. Not Muslims who, in Islam have no individual value but Islam itself.

    Therefore, the only strategy that has a prayer of deterring a nuclear attack upon Israel, is to make Islam itself accountable.

    That strategy would consist of a new doctrine that would declare that any nuclear or WMD attack upon Israel, by any nation or terrorist organization… will bring a nuclear response; the utter destruction of Mecca, Medina and a complete conventional attack leveling the Dome of the Rock.

    Islam would now face a choice; a nuclear or WMD attack upon Israel will result in all of Islam’s holiest shrines, ceasing to exist within moments of that attack upon Israel.

    That is the reality with which Israel must confront Islam.

    Announcing such a doctrine with its identification of Islam as Israel’s enemy, will necessitate Israel acknowledging its possession of nuclear weapons and Israel accepting the consequences of telling the US to-go-pound-sand. The ending of US aid to Israel.

    That is the sixth reality Israel must face.

    To neutralize the predictable response of the left through the EU, the UN and the hostile Obama administration, that doctrine must also state that in the event of any blockade, embargo or aggression against Israel by the West, the Saudi and Iranian oil fields and the Strait of Hormuz will be targeted for nuclear attack.

    That is the reality with which Israel must confront the West’s leftists.

    Israel must make clear to both Islam and the West that any attack upon Israel, nuclear or otherwise that threatens the existence of Israel… will result in the unthinkable happening, for them.

    That is the reality with which Israel must confront the world.

21. Geoffrey Britain,
    Islam and its tenets have been around a long time. It only looks more destructive and menacing because WE’VE changed our approach to them.

22. A (semi-serious) modest proposal: drop pig shit on one of Islam’s holiest shrines.

    Let’s use their collective psychosis against them. If and as necessary, we get harder-nosed.

    One other thing we have to do: abandon political correctness and point out the gross inferiority and backwardness of their cultures and societies, all a direct result of Islam.

    Religion is not a license to do whatever one wants. We wouldn’t tolerate the Aztec religion, we didn’t tolerate polygamy by the Mormons, and we don’t need to tolerate the more repellent aspects of Islam.

23. GB, 1) if Iran gets the bomb 25% of the Israeli population said they will leave the country. Immigration will cease as will tourism. If Iran gets the bomb Israel dies without a shot being fired.

    2) The Arabs are recognizing that Iran is a bigger threat than Israel. Remember that during the 2006 Lebanon war the Arab leadership supported Israel against Hezbollah for 2 days before public pressure made them change their tune.

    3) We can agree that Obama is the biggest fool that ever walked the planet because his stance concerning the Iran nukes. If the world can deal with Iran without millions of dead in NYC it will be a miracle, no thanks to Obama.

    4) The enemy is nebulous. You say Islam is the enemy but the Bahraini ambassador to the US is a Jewish women. I used to say the war against terror is a war against the political culture of the middle east, now I would say against the political hate culture of the middle east. Defining it as Islam is rather broad, especially since Israel is selling Islamic Indonesia weapons systems and was developing good relations with many north African states before the second intifada.

24. Occam i agree. A little covert caucasion creativity would relegate our exposure to islam to quaint little stories in National Geographic. Right next to a story about pygmies in New Guinnea. Which is about all their oddball existence deserves.

25. GB here is my view of Israeli journalism from the pre-Iran days. I posted elsewhere but I going to repeat here:

    When I first arrived in Israel, the papers were all predicting some sort of catastrophe for the following week, so I braced myself for the worse. The following week not only was there no catastrophe there was not even a mention of the prediction, but there was a prediction of another disaster coming the following week. Of course that didn’t happen either, but there was another prediction for the next week of a new more horrible disaster. By that time I was only interested in the comics.

    Of course now there is the Iranian bomb. We can only hope Netanyahu acts quickly. This is the last year he can, it may already be too late. The only reason I can imagine it that he wants to give Obama time for some reason, perhaps to do nothing about Iran so that his ineptitude will be all the more apparent to the electorate in November. But to do nothing is to die and he knows it.

26. SteveH, I thought that on watching the video clip of the feral Muslims attacking a speaker in Sweden. Why rassle with ’em? Brandish a piece of bacon in front of ’em. Get some!

27. Bob From Virginia says :” 2) The Arabs are recognizing that Iran is a bigger threat than Israel. Remember that during the 2006 Lebanon war the Arab leadership supported Israel against Hezbollah for 2 days before public pressure made them change their tune. ”

    Reminds me of this : “13 Sheba and Dedan and the merchants of Tarshish and all her villages will say to you, “Have you come to plunder? Have you gathered your hordes to loot, to carry off silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods and to seize much plunder?”‘ Ezekiel 38: 13 (NIV)

    Sheba and Dedan are Saudia Arabia, in the verse above asking a large multinational group of invaders of Israel those questions. (The Gog and Magog war as it is known)

    Though there is great debate about the timing of this prophetic invasion of Israel. Though it is identified as after Israel is regathered, which really accelerated in the 20th century, “In future years you will invade a land that has recovered from war, whose people were gathered from many nations to the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate. They had been brought out from the nations, and now all of them live in safety.” Ezekiel 38 : 8b (NIV)

    perhaps “safety” is relevant, or maybe not….

28. “Geoffrey Britain,
    Islam and its tenets have been around a long time. It only looks more destructive and menacing because WE’VE changed our approach to them.” SteveH

    Yes, those tenets have been around a long time. What’s changed is technology. Had Islam had nukes in the 11th century, we’d all be Muslim. I can’t agree that Islam looks more menacing because we are now taking them more seriously. It’s not our buying their oil or our presence in the M.E. that’s a smokescreen,
    it’s our culture to which they object because Islam cannot survive contact with freedom and democracy.

    Al Qaeda and Iran’s theocracy represent Islam’s last gasp before being swept into the dustbin of history.

    Just their misogyny alone makes that certain. The Qur’an itself, (God’s word) declares the second-class citizenship of women, that is fundamentally incompatible with the modern world and abandoning it, means abandoning both the concept that the Qur’an is God’s word and that Muhammad is the final prophet.

    Islam can’t survive under those conditions.

    As soon posit that Jesus never lived but maintain that Christianity can survive.

29. BoV,

    You may be right about #1, especially if the Israeli’s don’t figure out an effective strategy for dealing with a nuclear Islam.
    #2, that is part of why a nuclear arms race in the M.E. will erupt with Iran’s acquisition of nuclear capability. Nuclear proliferation will greatly increase and multiple unstable third-world regimes being nuclear capable is a guaranteed formula for nukes finding their way into the hands of fanatical terrorists.
    #3, we do agree.
    #4, I said that Islam’s unique theological tenets make them the enemy of the West and that the left is the far greater enemy. One Jewish, female ambassador from Bahrain proves exactly what, in regard to the larger Islamic world? Israel sells weapons for revenue to sustain its weapons program, evidently it views Islamic Indonesia as a distant threat.

30. The first thing Americans and Israelis must do is to stop all PC re Islam. It’s time for people to learn that Islam is an evil and stupid religion.

    For the evil part, read Andrew Bostom’s “The Legacy of Jihad.” This work of collected writings shows just how Islam spread–through the most vicious kind of mass murders possible. The reason why Islam is so prevalent in previously Christian and Hindu areas is that Islamic rampagers killed millions and enslaved millions more.

    For the stupid part, forget everything one learned about the wonderful Islamic civilization. It was based on the work of others. The Islamic civilization is parasitic. When the host dies, the parasite can no longer function. That’s the Islamic world today.

    It’s interesting that as soon as Turkey becomes Islamist, it starts attacking Israel. Hmmm. That’s sounds like what President Obama is doing too. Alliances and contracts mean nothing to devout Muslims when made with infidels.

31. I don’t believe Obama is actually a devout Muslim. I do believe that he hates us. He hates Western Civilization, Israel, and the United States. He’s also a very limited thinker so I don’t think he can get much out of on-the-job training.

32. I believe we are very close to a major league conflict. Iran has now gone too far in bomb development and the arming and incitement of “allies” to pull back or much less stop. Signaling the presence of nuke capable subs in the Gulf was probable a last warning. I am not jewish, but Israels’ cause is righteous and may God be with them.

33. It was based on the work of others. The Islamic civilization is parasitic. When the host dies, the parasite can no longer function. That’s the Islamic world today.

    Exactly. In an earlier time, Islam borrowed heavily from the older advanced civilizations that surrounded it–Byzantine, Zoroastrian Persian, and Indian, mostly–to jump-start its own rise to prominence. The original contributions of Islam itself to the cultural legacy of the world are comparatively trivial.

    After the Arab Muslims ran out of gas around the 11th Century or so, replaced first by the Seljuk Turks and later by the Ottomans, Islam’s high-water mark as a civilization had been reached. It still had a few centuries to run before it started to recede, beginning in earnest before the gates of Vienna in 1683. By that time, Islamic culture had already become reactionary and stultified, and had been left in the dust by the Europeans of the Renaissance, Reformation, and early Enlightenment. No equivalent to these movements ever took place in the Islamic world. And, as Mr. Britain suggests, Islam may in fact be incapable of surviving them.

34. Promethea, you mentioned “books”; a great book about the Mideast and Arab society, and oddly it is a novel, is “The Haj” by Leon Uris, the author of Exodus. This was the first book that stated up front that there is something fundamentally wrong in Arab-Islamic society, years before 9/11. People who lived in the Arab world that I spoke to praised its accuracy. Another hard to put down book is Nonie Darwish’s book “Now They Call Me Infidel”. That book exposes the rotteness of Islamic Egyptian society.
    Those two books should give anyone a strong insight into Arab society. The Truth about Syria by Barry Rubin should be mandatory for anyone who wants who understand the culture of tyranny in the ME.

    Do you think Obama’s security team, like Brennan or the Anointed One himself ever heard of any of these books? (rhetorical question and bad joke, sorry)

35. Promethea

    You’re very weird, dude.

36. I am suprised someone did not point out that “Sheba” may also be in Africa.

37. Bob from Virginia . . .

    Yes, I agree. “The Haj” by Leon Uris is one of the best books to read to try to understand Arabs and their mindset. It covers a lot of early 20th century history. Another terrific book is Raphael Patai’s “The Arab Mind.”

    MDL . . .

    Very incisive comment. I’ll bet you’ve read a lot and can speak for hours without notes or teleprompter.

38. Promethea, you’re right on. Islam appeals to Obama because it is simple, authoritive, and he was programmed into it. But ultimately, for Obama, there is no god but Obama. Which is another reason why Islam appeals to Obama. Its less a religion than a political device.

    Read your Uris.

39. Curtis
    You’re a bit odd as well.
    The same thing can be said about any politician from any political party on this planet if you are wedded to rhetoric rather than logic. Talk about simplistic.

40. Good exposition on Islam, GB, which I second wholeheartedy. God’s dictation, indeed.

41. Promethea, I happen to disagree with you about Islamic civilization. I once decided to do research on Samuel Ibn Nagrela, a Jewish warrior poet in Islamic Spain. In his time the Caliphate of Cordova had just been torn apart by various centripetal forces. But it had a legacy of learning that was unmatched in Europe until the Renaissance. In fact it could be called the first European Renaissance. After that civilization fell it’s Jewish and Christian scholars fled to Christian Europe and became wandering scholars, like Abraham Ibn Ezra, and increased the level of education there.

    But here is a question you can try and help me with. That civilization was helped by the freedom caused by constant turmoil, as was Renaissance Italy, it was stifled by religious orthodoxy, also as happened in Italy (note Islam was a far more open minded religious culture in Cordova than now), but I cannot figure out how it arose in the first place.

    But I have to stress the civilization of Cordova was a center of enlightenment. Bibliophilia was the national obsession, arguments were answered with arguments not executions. So be careful when you generalize about Islam, there truly were times and places of greatness. Of course, today’s Islamist, the ones who always hope for a return of the Caliphate, would try to destroy those very things that made it great and replace them with those that ruined it.

    Just rambling.

42. Just had a horrible thought, suppose this Gaza boat BS turns into a what Natalie Hathaway was for Fox News. Echhh!

43. Bob from Virginia . . .

    I don’t feel like doing the research right now, but there may have been a few enlightened Cordoban rulers during the centuries that Muslims ruled in Spain.

    However, as I recall, the Muslims in Spain also had very repressive periods. So, if some Muslim ruler somewhere does something right, that doesn’t wipe out the millions of people repressed by the Muslims in Spain and elsewhere.

    For example, some people think that a Muslim ruler had the Library of Alexandria burned to the ground, thus wiping out untold amounts of learning. I wonder if the new Library of Alexandria has an open policy, or does it carefully censor items that it includes in its collection.

44. There was relatively short period of forming Islam orthodoxy when different schools of philosophers and theologians compete with each other in discovering or inventing “true” meaning of Quranic verses. They were free in their search, because there were no established canon yet. Naturally, this led to general florish of culture and poetry, not only in purely religious realms. But one should remember one thing often forgotten: most of the creators of this Islam Renaissance were not Arabs, but Persians, Tajiks and Usbeks: they used milleniium long cultural traditions of ancient agricultural civilizations. Arabs were rulers, but artists were from all countries conqured by Arabs. This led to fusion of very different cultures – Persian, Hindus, etc. These artists and philosophers were like Greeks under Roman rule: teachers, architects and so on.

45. It’s true that at times Islamic rulers and even entire kingdoms–whether Arab, Persian, Turkic, or Mogul–were open to new ideas and permitted a good deal of free inquiry. But almost invariably, when things started to go badly, the Islamic religious establishment demanded a return to strict orthodoxy as the solution to the problems. This impulse is by no means unique to Islam. Just Google the name “Savonarola” if you want an example from Renaissance Florence. But, lacking a Renaissance or Reformation, or any other long-lasting change in the foundation of their culture, Muslims perforce look backward to their supposed “golden age” instead of forward to a better future.

46. GB: See today’s Powerline re Andrew McCarthy, which supports your thinking 100%.

47. Sergey and others; The Cordovan Renaissance included almost a whole society, Arabs, Christians, Jews. As far as I know the only intellectual outsiders were the Moors. Good monarchs followed the crowd and became part of it, but did not create that enlightenment. Alas, it was the Moors who were the warriors and who also held a grudge against the state. Also as noted it was the religious establishment combined with power politics that crushed intellectual pursuit.

    Back to the blanket labelization of Islam as the enemy; I wonder if GB is aware there are Moslem soldiers in the IDF, both Bedouin and Circassian?
    As for the doomsday scenarios, don’t worry, we may be six months away from that point.

48. Sure doesn’t help Israel that even its formerly staunch supporters (US) are enabling the Islamo-funds, and that 42% of the American Jews that voted for Obama would vote for him again.

49. 42% as of 15 April…got anything more recent?

    http://www.zoa.org/sitedocuments/pressrelease_view.asp?pressreleaseID=1853

50. My apologies to Stuart Schneiderman. His blog is “Had Enough Therapy,” not “Shrinkwrapped.” Both are great.

    One issue that is very real for me is how to treat Muslims. I’ve worked for two and both were excellent men. Both I trusted and respected more than most managers and bosses I’ve have worked with. Especially so with the one who was more observant. I would not deign to lecture them on their beliefs, but having recently received a better education on the nature of Islam, I wonder what they might say to some of my questions. I can’t imagine that either really support the full meaning of the Quran.

51. Whatever happened to those fearsome Israelis?

    Well, if you are in the habit of actually doing things, instead of merely talking and threatening to do so, not everything you do is going to go as planned.

    The only folks who never blunder now and then are the ones who never do anything.

    That such inaction can be a major blunder in itself is another deal altogether, and one usually ignored in postmortem discussions.
    –

52. I just saw how the UK paper The Sun covered the “peace flotilla”. The facts that the Israelis had the whole thing on video was not mentioned and the Hamas lovers taken at their word. Claire Berlinski was right, to hell with Europe.

    Mentioned here was the power of orthodoxy to destroy enlightenment. IMHO left wing orthodoxy has already done that in the UK, by popular demand.

53. The sad fact is that most of the world are more likely to identify with Israel enemies rather than with Israel. In a sense, they are right: they really are more like these enemies in their moral instincts and psychology that like Jews. The only notable exception is American public, as I can judge by comments on various British and US blogs. America still has enough Biblical spirit in it to identify with Chosen People, believing herself being one.

54. I agree that the Israeli takeover of the flotilla included several serious blunders. (Foremost among them, I would argue, was intelligence, which has long been one of Israel’s strengths. The Israeli sailors boarding the vessels deserved to know more about whom they were facing.)

    On the other hand, it’s important to look behind the scenes as well. Have a look at this, by James Lewis, offering the opinion that Israel needed to send a signal — from here on in, the gloves are off.

    Neo, I would disagree that the Israeli military’s competence has been on a downward slide, or that Israel’s failures were due to a recent overdose of political correctness. Israel has had some important victories AND some important setbacks in the past few years. In spite of all the screaming in the newspapers, the invasion of Jenin some years ago was very successful for Israel, as was Operation Cast Lead. So too was the destruction of the Syrian nuclear-reactor-in-the-making from the air.

    In re political correctness, I would argue that the IDF holds itself to impossibly high ethical standards — but it doesn’t do so in order to be fashionable, or to appease armchair critics. Discussions of military ethics in Israel are firmly rooted in Biblical commentary; to Israelis, their military ethics are part and parcel of being the strong arm of the Jewish state.

    Nor is this new. When I did my basic training in the IDF in 1986, we were given specific orders to avoid live fire, and to avoid shooting to kill, as long as possible. (I still remember it vividly: when dealing with an unknown potential threat, I must shout “who goes there?” twice; I must shout “halt or I’ll shoot” twice; only then may I fire, first into the air, THEN at the enemy’s legs, and only THEN to kill. The press accounts I’ve seen suggest to me that the basic structure of these regs have not changed.)

    Israel has repeatedly shown a willingness to put her own soldiers at risk, in order to avoid collateral damage. This extraordinary regard for the lives of others will have its setbacks, as we saw this past weekend. (Keep in mind, though, that Israel did in fact commandeer all six boats and bring them to port. It seems Israeli military actions can be deemed a failure if there are any casualties at all.)

    Please keep in mind, also, that Israel’s many phenomenal military victories have happened with this high code of ethics in place. The wording has changed, but not the substance, since 1948 and before. One could therefore argue that, from a purely historical perspective, this code of ethics has NOT been a military liability; quite the opposite.

    Israel has never relinquished the moral high ground to her enemies, or to her critics. God willing, she never will.

    respectfully,
    Daniel in Brookline

55. Daniel in Brookline: thanks for offering a truly interesting perspective. It is especially ironic, however, given what you say about the Israeli ROEs from way back, that Palestinian/Arab/leftist propaganda has fostered the exact opposite impression.

56. A must-read:
    http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2010/06/ldquothe-horror-the-horrorrdquo-on-the-high-seas

57. MDL – Wow, another stunning, fact-filled tour de force of an argument. How do you do it, time after time?

58. Bob from Va: Yes, the IDF has Muslim soldiers, but in small numbers. Bedouins are employed almost exclusively for their skill as desert trackers. The Circassians are non-Arabs who make up a tiny minority of the Israeli population, and who generally don’t have much affinity for Palestinian Arabs. More significant in terms of numbers are the Druze, who also serve in the IDF and especially in the Border Police. They’re the mirror image of the Circassians: Arabs who follow an offshoot of Islam, but are considered heretics by most orthodox Muslims.

    Quick, think of an Arab state where Jews vote in meaningful elections, are elected to parliament, and serve under arms in the military or police. I can’t either. The dirty little secret of the Middle East that Arabs, and especially Arab governments, hate to admit is that Arabs and Muslims have more rights and freedoms in Israel than they do in Arab states.

59. Neo: I couldn’t agree more.

    It’s a very strange situation, to say the least. On the one side, we have a national army in defensive mode, trying to protect its civilians, and going out of its way — FAR out of its way — to protect noncombatants on the other side as well. On that other side, we have terrorists in offensive mode, who care not a whit about protecting their own people (and who routinely commit war crimes on both sides).

    Yet it is the terrorists, in an amazing feat of psychological projection, who accuse the protectors of their people of war crimes… and most of the world, it seems, is all too ready to swallow the story whole.

    (Yes, I just called Israelis “the protectors” of the Palestinian people. True, the Palestinians haven’t received all the independence they claim to want. On the other hand, they have had better treatment at the hands of the Israelis than by anyone else — better than Jordan and Egypt, better than Syria, better than Kuwait and Iraq — and those countries didn’t have to deal with daily murderous terror attacks.)

    I wish I could say this is a unique phenomenon, but I don’t believe it is. Sometimes the heroes are painted as villains, by the real villains, and it’s that story which is remembered.

    Read up on Richard III sometime, for example.

    Or to take a more recent case: we once had a Presidential election during wartime. One candidate had prosecuted the war relentlessly, suggesting and championing a winning strategy that no one thought could succeed, including the sitting President… but, when adopted, proved enormously successful. (The candidate’s opponent had been anti-war from the start, voted against the new strategy, and castigated it publicly right up until he started taking credit for it.)

    One would think that would have decided the election, but paradoxically, by the time of the election, the war had receded in people’s attention, because of that winning strategy. Now people were focused on an economic crisis, brought on by bad loans (and banks that had been forced by the government to issue those bad loans). So the choice was now between the candidate who had spoken out against the bad loans, and the candidate who had enthusiastically supported them.

    Guess who won? (And guess who has received no credit for being on the right side of both issues?)

    respectfully,
    Daniel in Brookline

60. Everyone has to see this; it is amazing that it was turned out in such short time.
    http://hotair.com/archives/2010/06/03/video-we-con-the-world/

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