Gaza Peace Flotilla exposed

 

The MSM will no doubt run the usual line against Israel and for their pals in Islamic Sociopaths Inc.,telling anyone who will listen of the noble (savage) Islamic cause to simply offer supplies to their and the MSM’s Islamic brothers (in arms) in Gaza.

Full report at Atlas Shrugs

I Stand with Israel: I Stand with the Jews

SodaHead

By: Oriana Fallaci
A French court on Nov. 20, 2002, dismissed a request to ban "The Rage and the Pride," the best-selling book by [leftist] Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci that critics say incites hatred of Muslims. Oriana Fallaci, 73, is a former Resistance fighter and war correspondent best-known for her uncompromising interviews with world leaders.
I find it shameful that in Italy there should be a procession of individuals dressed as suicide bombers who spew vile abuse at Israel, hold up photographs of Israeli leaders on whose foreheads they have drawn the swastika, incite people to hate the Jews. And who, in order to see Jews once again in the extermination camps, in the gas chambers, in the ovens of Dachau and Mauthausen and Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen et cetera, would sell their own mother to a harem.

I find it shameful that the Catholic Church should permit a bishop, one with lodgings in the Vatican no less, a saintly man who was found in Jerusalem with an arsenal of arms and explosives hidden in the secret compartments of his sacred Mercedes, to participate in that procession and plant himself in front of a microphone to thank in the name of God the suicide bombers who massacre the Jews in pizzerias and supermarkets. To call them "martyrs who go to their deaths as to a party."
I find it shameful that in France, the France of Liberty-Equality-Fraternity, they burn synagogues, terrorize Jews, profane their cemeteries. I find it shameful that the youth of Holland and Germany and Denmark flaunt the kaffiah just as Mussolini's avant garde used to flaunt the club and the fascist badge.

I find it shameful that in nearly all the universities of Europe Palestinian students sponsor and nurture anti-Semitism. That in Sweden they asked that the Nobel Peace Prize given to Shimon Peres in 1994 be taken back and conferred on the dove with the olive branch in his mouth, that is onArafat.
I find it shameful that the distinguished members of the Committee, a Committee that (it would appear) rewards political color rather than merit, should take this request into consideration and even respond to it. In hell the Nobel Prize honors he who does not receive it.
I find it shameful (we're back in Italy) that state-run television stations contribute to the resurgent anti-Semitism, crying only over Palestinian deaths while playing down Israeli deaths, glossing over them in unwilling tones. I find it shameful that in their debates they host with much deference the scoundrels with turban or kaffiah who yesterday sang hymns to the slaughter at New York and today sing hymns to the slaughters at Jerusalem, at Haifa, at Netanya,
at Tel Aviv.

I find it shameful that the press does the same, that it is indignant because Israeli tanks surround the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, that it is not indignant because inside that same church two hundred Palestinian terrorists well armed with machine guns and munitions and explosives (among them are various leaders of Hamas and Al-Aqsa) are not unwelcome guests of the monks (who then accept bottles of mineral water and jars of honey from the soldiers of those tanks).
I find it shameful that, in giving the number of Israelis killed since the beginning of the Second Intifada (four hundred twelve), a noted daily newspaper found it appropriate to underline in capital letters that more people are killed in their traffic accidents. (Six hundred a year).
I find it shameful that the Roman Observer, the newspaper of the Pope - a Pope who not long ago left in the Wailing Wall a letter of apology for the Jews - accuses of extermination a people who were exterminated in the millions by Christians. By Europeans. I find it shameful that this newspaper denies to the survivors of that people (survivors who still have numbers tattooed on their arms) the right to react, to defend themselves, to not be exterminated again.

I find it shameful that in the name of Jesus Christ (a Jew without whom they would all be unemployed), the priests of our parishes or Social Centers or whatever they are flirt with the assassins of those in Jerusalem who cannot go to eat a pizza or buy some eggs without being blown up.
I find it shameful that they are on the side of the very ones who inaugurated terrorism, killing us on airplanes, in airports, at the Olympics, and who today entertain themselves by killing western journalists. By shooting them, abducting them, cutting their throats, decapitating them. (There's someone in Italy who, since the appearance of Anger and Pride, would like to do the same to me. Citing verses of the Koran he exorts his "brothers" in the mosques and the Islamic Community to chastise me in the name of Allah. To kill me. Or rather to die with me. Since he's someone who speaks English well, I'll respond to him in English:
"f**k you."

I find it shameful that almost all of the left, the left that twenty years ago permitted one of its union processionals to deposit a coffin (as a mafioso warning) in front of the synagogue of Rome, forgets the contribution made by the Jews to the fight against fascism. Made by Carlo and Nello Rossini, for example, by Leone Ginzburg, by Umberto Terracini, by Leo Valiani, by Emilio Sereni, by women like my friend Anna Maria Enriques Agnoletti who was shot at Florence on June 12, 1944, by seventy-five of the three-hundred-thirty-five people killed at the Fosse Ardeatine, by the infinite others killed under torture or in combat or before firing squads. (The companions, the teachers, of my infancy and my youth.)

I find it shameful that in part through the fault of the left--or rather, primarily through the fault of the left (think of the left that inaugurates its congresses applauding the representative of the PLO, leader in Italy of the Palestinians who want the destruction of Israel)--Jews in Italian cities are once again afraid. And in French cities and Dutch cities and Danish cities and German cities, it is the same. I find it shameful that Jews tremble at the passage of the scoundrels dressed like suicide bombers just as they trembled during Krystallnacht, the night in which Hitler gave free rein to the Hunt of the Jews.

I find it shameful that in obedience to the , vile, dishonest, and for them extremely advantageous fashion of Political Correctness the usual opportunists - or better the usual parasites - exploit the word Peace. That in the name of the word Peace, by now more debauched than the words Love and Humanity, they absolve one side alone of its hate and bestiality. That in the name of a pacifism (read conformism) delegated to the singing crickets and buffoons who used to lick Pol Pot's feet they incite people who are confused or ingenuous or intimidated. Trick them, corrupt them, carry them back a half century to the time of the yellow star on the coat. These charlatans who care about the Palestinians as much as I care about the charlatans. That is not at all.

I find it shameful that many Italians and many Europeans have chosen as their standard-bearer the gentleman (or so it is polite to say) Arafat. This nonentity who thanks to the money of the Saudi Royal Family plays the Mussolini ad perpetuum and in his megalomania believes he will pass into History as the George Washington of Palestine. This ungrammatical wretch who when I interviewed him was unable even to put together a complete sentence, to make articulate conversation. So that to put it all together, write it, publish it, cost me a tremendous effort and I concluded that compared to him even Ghaddafi sounds like Leonardo da Vinci. This false warrior who always goes around in uniform like Pinochet, never putting on civilian garb, and yet despite this has never participated in a battle. War is something he sends, has always sent, others to do for him. That is, the poor souls who believe in him. This pompous incompetent who playing the part of Head of State caused the failure of the Camp David negotiations, Clinton's mediation. No-no-I-want-Jerusalem-all-to-myself.
This eternal liar who has a flash of sincerity only when (in private) he denies Israel's right to exist, and who as I say in my book contradicts himself every five minutes. He always plays the double-cross, lies even if you ask him what time it is, so that you can never trust him. Never! With him you will always wind up systematically betrayed. This eternal terrorist who knows only how to be a terrorist (while keeping himself safe) and who during the Seventies, that is when I interviewed him, even trained the terrorists of Baader-Meinhof. With them, children ten years of age. Poor children. (Now he trains them to become suicide bombers. A hundred baby suicide bombers are in the works: a hundred!). This weather*** who keeps his wife at Paris, served and revered like a queen, and keeps his people down in the squalor. He takes them out of the squalor only to send them to die, to kill and to die, like the eighteen year old girls who in order to earn equality with the fate of their victims. And yet many Italians love him, yes. Just like they loved Mussolini. And many other Europeans do the same.

I find it shameful and see in all this the rise of a new fascism, a new n-a-z-i-s-m.
A fascism, a n-a-z-i-s-m, that much more grim and revolting because it is conducted and nourished by those who hypocritically pose as do-gooders, progressives, communists, pacifists, Catholics or rather Christians, and who have the gall to label a warmonger anyone like me who screams the truth. I see it, yes, and I say the following. I have never been tender with the tragic and Shakespearean figure Sharon. ("I know you've come to add another scalp to your necklace," he murmured almost with sadness when I went to interview him in 1982.) I have often had disagreements with the Israelis, ugly ones, and in the past I have defended the Palestinians a great deal. Maybe more than they deserved.

But I stand with Israel, I stand with the Jews. I stand just as I stood as a young girl during the time when I fought with them, and when the Anna Marias were shot. I defend their right to exist, to defend themselves, to not let themselves be exterminated a second time. And disgusted by the anti-Semitism of many Italians, of many Europeans, I am ashamed of this shame that dishonors my Country and Europe. At best, it is not a community of States, but a pit of Pontius Pilates. And even if all the inhabitants of this planet were to think otherwise, I would continue to think so.

The Religion of Peace 

Technorati Tags: Israel,Gaza,Peace Flotilla,Assassins,Terrorists,Islam,Religion of Peace

Keep this Islamic THUG out of Australia,Useless Islam aka Cat Stevens.

 

Yusuf Islam, not Cat Stevens, defined a generation

ABC  Michael Gordon-Smith

Yusuf Islam, the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens, plans to perform concerts around Australia in June. I have liked his music, but I won't attend.
I cannot forget watching an artist saying another deserved to die because of his art.
Peter Kavanagh, a Victorian state MP goes further and suggests we deny him a visa unless he publicly recants from that view. Whatever the Immigration authorities decide, it's worth being clear on what he stood for.

The publicity for his Australian tour trumpets: "As Cat Stevens he defined a generation". It's a big claim, even as marketing puff. Yusuf may indeed have done so, but not the way his promotion suggests. If one moment defines the cultural history of Yusuf's generation, it's Valentine's Day 1989. In Christopher Hitchens words: 'this was not just a warning of what was to come. It was the warning…For our time and generation, the great conflict between the ironic mind and the literal mind, the experimental and the dogmatic, the tolerant and the fanatical, is the argument that was kindled by The Satanic Verses.' Every time I hear a Cat Stevens song, or see a mention of Yusuf, my first thought is to remember his part in that argument.

He was famous. As Cat Stevens he'd been a very popular singer songwriter. He wrote and sang lyrical songs full of concern for personal freedom and kindness and peace. By 1989, after a decade as Yusuf Islam, he'd been described as Britain's most famous Muslim convert.
It was natural that he would be asked his opinion about Ayatollah Khomeini's call and promise of reward for Salman Rushdie's death. Yusuf agreed to join the panel of Geoffrey Robertson's Hypothetical to discuss the issues on television.

I watched the program when it was shown in Australia in October that year. I'm still dismayed by the memory:

More on this story at Winds of Jihad

Geoffrey Robertson: You don't think that this man deserves to die? Yusuf Islam: Who? Salman Rushdie? Geoffrey Robertson: Yes. Yusuf Islam: Yes, yes.
Yusuf's website includes a variety of clarifications and justifications for his comments about Mr Rushdie on that program and elsewhere:
- he never called for Rushdie's death or supported the fatwa;
- his remarks in the Hypothetical were an attempt to lighten the moment and raise a smile, British dry humour; and
- he's been tricked, misquoted and misinterpreted by the media.

He uses a Nina Simone song he covered as a headline, '…please don't let me be misunderstood", and complains that no matter how many times he tries to explain, journalists bring it up 'as if it was the only memorable thing I was reported to have done in my almost sixty years living on this planet (yawn).' Recent articles say he now refuses to talk about the issue. Some postings of Hypothetical on YouTube say 'This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Yusuf Islam.'
You may for the moment be able to judge for yourself here whether his comments were dead pan or in deadly earnest.

Those who heard him at the time were in no doubt. Writer Fay Weldon, not unfamiliar with British dry humor, took him so seriously she wished the police superintendent on the panel would "come over and arrest this man here for inciting on television, people to violence implicitly and otherwise".
Mr Rushdie certainly didn't get the joke. He later wrote to the Sunday Telegraph saying that however much Yusuf may wish to rewrite his past, he was neither misunderstood nor misquoted and recalled that asked what he'd do if Mr Rushdie turned up at his doorstep looking for help, he'd said 'I might ring somebody who might do more damage to him than he would like. I'd try to phone the Ayatollah Khomeini and tell him exactly where this man is'.

Yusuf was quizzed repeatedly about his views, and he issued a statement on 2 March 1989 to clarify. [The statement is quoted in full as a footnote here.]
He says that when asked questions he couldn't tell a lie and was just trying to describe Islamic law, and points out that there are 'similar harsh laws' in the Bible, and that 'Muslims are bound to keep within the limits of the law of the country in which they live'. This is disingenuous.
Whether ancient legal codes prescribe violent physical punishment was never at issue. The question repeatedly asked of him was what place he thought such laws should have in a contemporary heterogenous world. It's clear he thinks English law deficient, and regretted that there was little chance of Islamic Law being applied in Britain in the near future.

When he gave an extended interview to the US cable TV news program World Monitor, he reaffirmed his support for Mr Rushdie's death. His statements leave no doubt. He supported capital punishment for blasphemy and the killing of Salman Rushdie.
We all make mistakes. There are constant reminders of the problems a few ill-chosen words in public can cause, including recent examples from Gordon Brown, then Prime Minister of the UK, to Nick Sowden, now expelled from the Queensland Liberal National Party.

It's possible to interpret Yusuf's comments simply in terms of his own life, even to make light of them or to feel sorry for him, like his former fiancee Lucy Johnson, a stripper known as Princess Cheyenne, who was reported in the Boston Globe as saying at the time: "He's really a sweetheart; he just lost it. Obviously, he's gone through a lot of changes. He used to be an extremely fragile person. When he embraced Islam, it was like do or die. It was an all-encompassing thing for him. He goes by the protocol. If it's protocol, he's all for it. He's a very serious man. You've got to feel sorry for someone like that. Of all people to be for censorship, a writer. He wrote 'Peace Train' about an orgasm."

Ultimately, however, it's not something to be made light of. It's not a yawn. It mattered then and it matters now. Yusuf supported killing a man because someone took offence at what he had written.
Beyond the deaths and threats of violence that still continue, a generation whose legacy of cultural freedom allowed the young Cat Stevens to pursue his spiritual journey and to choose for himself was infected by self censorship and hate. Opportunities for mutual tolerance and accommodation have been diminished in favour of a readiness to take offence and contagious gangland demands for respect.

The marketing puff for Yusuf's tour says when he was last here he was given books on Rumi and numerology - all part of his "Road to Findout" and promises he will his return will deliver "the result of an extraordinary spiritual journey." In his own life he has changed his name and changed his mind, and he makes much of his quest. Last year he unveiled a musical that he describes as 'a metaphorical mirror of my own journey.'
One might hope that a man with such a life might be tolerant of the quests and questioning of others, however confident he was with his present position. But Yusuf had no sympathy for Mr Rushdie's artistic quest. He would look for juridical uncertainty when his son brought home a guitar, but not for Mr Rushdie's questioning.
You don't think this man deserves to die? Yes, yes.

In many cases, as then Prime Minister Brown desperately hoped, a ready apology and an acknowledgement of harm can lessen a mistake. But 20 years on Yusuf seems to think all the wrongs were done by others. Journalists asked him loaded questions. His replies were misinterpreted. It was the book, not the call for violence that "destroyed the harmony between peoples and created an unnecessary international crisis". At worst, his remarks were silly but they were dry English humour.
He defined a generation but not as the young Cat Stevens enjoying and celebrating the fruits of freedom and searching for answers. He did it in a few words on television as a rigid man convinced he now had the answers, denying that freedom to others.

He will probably sing Peace Train at his concerts:
Now I've been crying lately,
thinking about the world as it is
Why must we go on hating,
why can't we live in bliss?

It's time he stopped singing the question and answered it. He had an opportunity to stand for peace and tolerance when the need for such a voice was critical. Instead, when Geoffrey Robertson asked the question, he found no room for tolerance or doubt, but with dogmatic certainty took the side of violence and tyranny.
For me, it remains the most important thing he ever did. Unless he revisits the issue and finds room for difference, in my mind he's forever defined by the choice he made in those weeks in 1989. The only message I hear from him is the echo of Khomeini's threat not just to Salman Rushdie but to every free thinker in the world: If you speak your mind we may kill you.
Michael Gordon-Smith is a Sydney-based management consultant. He used to be a public servant.

Technorati Tags: Yusef Islam,Cat Stevens,Salman Rushdie,Geoffrey Robertson,Peter Kavanagh,The Satanic Verses.Christopher Hitchens,Princess Cheyenne,Hypothetical