When a celeb dies, the media world usually gets into a frenzy, milking the sad event for all it is worth. Every quality of the dear departed gets highlighted, for better or for worse. Many details, rather insignificant, when compared to the celeb's real achievements, fall under scrutiny and get inflated - thanks to that milking.
Muhammad Ali is no exception. For everyone who (like I for some years) was more or less interested in boxing, Muhammad Ali remains forever a uniquely gifted man, whose talent made him an impossible to reach example for generations of boxers to come. Nothing less - and nothing more.
But of course, this alone wasn't enough for the media. I don't want to go into details, boring or hysterical as they are, save the scrutiny Muhammad Ali's "up-and-down relationship with the Jewish world", borrowing from the headline of this JTA article. And if you doubt that remark about scrutiny, just google for "Muhammad Ali and Jews", you shall see what is going on.
What can I say? It is rather sad, when people, who have so many ongoing problems to solve, many of them to be resolved yesterday, find so much time and energy to discuss whether a professional boxer likes or dislikes them. A man whose chosen profession, I have to add, usually doesn't produce brilliant thinkers. That due to the said profession's tendency to have a rather negative and repeated impact on the brain.
So, to all my Facebook and otherwise Jewish friends: please relax. Yes, the great boxer has said these or other things about Jews. Forget it. Chill.
He was a boxer.
Noam Chomsky is a linguist. Some say he is not as good a linguist as others say, but I wouldn't know.
Norman Finkelstein is a political scientist. Of a dubious quality, but still.
Hassan Nasrallah is a sheikh. Which title is a questionable matter, but let it go.
Etc.
P.S. I am going to watch a movie about another of my (very few) sports icons - Pele. Now should I check first whether Pele was anti-Semitic? Hm...
Kaliningrad (Russian: Калининград), (former German name: Königsberg). In the Middle Ages, the locality was the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement and fort Twangste. In 1255, during the Northern Crusades, a new fortress was built on the site by the Teutonic Knights and was named Königsberg (König = "king") in honor of King Ottokar II of Bohemia, who led two crusade expeditions against the pagan Old Prussians. The town was successively part of the monastic State of the Teutonic Order, enfeoffed to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, then part of Prussia and Germany (the latter until 1945).
This government of ours, together with the tame Knesset and overactive Justice Minister who, in her infinite wisdom, totally relaxed the reins on the lawmaking frenzy, has really got too far this time.
Days after the state comptroller released a critical report of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s actions, Knesset House Committee Chairperson David Bitan—also from Netanyahu’s party—submitted a bill seeking to curtail the state comptroller’s authority.
... The initiative came the same week that the current state comptroller, Yosef Shapira, published a scathing report on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife, Sara. Knesset House Committee Chairperson David Bitan (Likud) submitted the bill, which aims to create a mechanism that would oversee the comptroller’s conduct—in essence acting as a comptroller to the comptroller. Bitan then exercised his authority as house committee chairperson to waive the 45-day deliberation period, creating the possibility instead of bringing it before the Ministerial Committee for Legislation within four days.
When the leaders start to bend and to customise justice to suit their personal quirks, it goes way too far. It has gone too far, in fact.
Bibi should go.
Correction: The headline of the post "Hey, Sara, wasn't that a bit too much?" should read "Hey, Bibi, wasn't that a bit too much?", but due to being late to press, there wasn't enough time to enter the correction.
Some people criticise Malia Bouttaia, who is, according to them "also a Black Students’ Officer known for “Political Blackness” – despite being from Algeria, and not actually a black woman at all". These people also say:
“Politically Black” is a term adopted by non-black people of colour who identify with the struggle against racism and oppression. It has been repeatedly criticised for being used for political gain while silencing actual black voices within the movement.
I reject these insinuations. If people could identify themselves as dogs, cats, dragons, not to mention the proliferation of gender self-identification, why can't a person identify self as carrying any color?
Now I can get to my own problem. On one hand, I identify myself as Warren Buffett, so far without the resources this worthy gentleman possesses, but I am sure it's only a matter of time. But on the other hand, I increasingly feel the need to come out of the closet and to confess that for many years I have been Antique Fuchsia, as far as my skin color is concerned.
Now what happens if Mr Buffett doesn't share my color identity?
The story about Harambe, a 17-year-old western lowland 450-pound gorilla, which was shot to save the life of a 4 years old boy that fell into the gorilla's enclosure, was dramatic enough for anyone. Of course, some grumps said something about their preference of saving the gorilla by any means, why tranquilizers weren't used etc. But frankly, I haven't dreamed about the discussion turning in the direction described below by several (out of many) tweets on the subject.
The author, Isa Ibn, is a member of Nation of Islam, by the way...
The author of the tweet above, mgpablo, will appear below again, with a surprise notice...
The next commenter, one DiddyTheGoat, was especially verbose, so I have chosen only two outstanding statements:
Well, the joke went far enough, and it will be fair to discharge the electricity doubtlessly collecting in the air. Here comes the promised surprise from mgpablo:
The Salafi movement has claimed responsibility for a rocket launched into Israel on Wednesday night from the Gaza Strip. According to its statement, they fired in retaliation against the Hamas mass wave of arrests made against members of the Salafi organization in the Gaza Strip.
To start with a disclaimer: I have never been particularly enamored with our cops, being a normal citizen, inoculated by a healthy dose of that wariness toward the best and finest, shared by all citizens all over the world. The wariness tends to be at its peak where our border policemen are considered, knowing their special brand of sensitivity, compassion and gentleness.
To continue with a confession: this previous post of mine re our worthy new chief of police, Roni Alsheikh, was written as a byproduct of my search of material for this here post. I was searching for corroboration of my suspicions and just stumbled upon Roni Alsheikh's story.
So, when the story about a team of border policemen ganging up and beating to a pulp a defenceless Israeli Arab hit the media, I was incensed and revolted, together with all (not an exaggeration) the 99,9999 % of the Israeli population. I couldn't say it better, of course, than one of our best journalists, Ben Dror Yemini did:
Police brutality against a person - first of all a person - in the center of Tel Aviv. We've become Ferguson 2015. No need to jump to Germany 1936. It is a disgrace to Israel when she turns into United States. It's not happening only in central Tel Aviv, and not only to an Arab. And there's no comfort here.
Instead of joining the chorus, though, I've decided to wait for details. It seems that I was right at that. But first to the initial story, as it has appeared in all Israeli media sources of note. It sounds very simple and, border cops being how they are, believable:
The man was stopped by two undercover police officers who asked him to identify himself; they allegedly failed to present badges, and security footage shows multiple police officers striking the man.
This in a nutshell, allegedly supported by the security camera's recording:
And here is a clip (In Hebrew), where the innocent victim tells the story of unprovoked assault by a gang of 8 (eight) cops, savage beating and subsequent arrest.
The first clip comes courtesy of Haaretz and the second from the Israeli Broadcasting authority. No reason to doubt the sources, is there? Still, I have decided to stay away from the apparently clear cut evidence, for two chief reasons:
The incident occurred in Rabin Square, one of the most popular areas of Tel Aviv, where hundreds of people walk around at any time of the day (or night, for that matter). No matter how bloodthirsty the specific team of border cops was, it is kind of difficult to see them choosing this mighty conspicuous spot to do the dirty deed.
The recording of the event: I don't know about you, but without the ability to view the clip frame by frame, all I am able to see is a quickly escalating melee of unidentified folks going one at another in high spirit. Very inconclusive, to say the least.
One point has to be explained - the border police checking the identity papers. It happens to be one of the missions of the border police - to catch and expel any Judea and Samaria citizens of Palestinian Authority who are found to be here illegally (without a work permit). It is one thankless task, needless to say. Not that it justifies beating a man to a pulp, mind you...
OK, to make the story short: here comes a blow-by-blow analysis of the same recording you have seen above. Since the explanation comes in Hebrew, I'll have to go through the salient points:
The approach to the beating victim, Maysam Abu Alqian, was peaceful. Two cops approached him, one other (a female) remained in the background (checks out).
The cops both presented their police IDs or badges (check).
Maysam Abu Alqian still doesn't agree to show his ID card (check).
Another supermarket employee (white T-shirt) joined Maysam Abu Alqian, protesting something or other (check).
At this stage the White Shirt pushes one of the cops (check).
Maysam Abu Alqian pushes one of the cops (check).
At this point I have to stop the report and ask you a question: what do you expect would happen if and when you push an American/French/British/German/[choose your preference] cop? You know, don't you?
Well, nothing much to add to the story: several new cops appear on the scene, six new employees of the supermarket appear on the scene, the melee starts in earnest and the end of the affair is clear now.
To conclude, follows a summary of the whole event, by the same good old Ben Dror Yemini:
I was wrong. I apologize. Immediately after the incident between the young Bedouin and the cops in the center of Tel Aviv, I published a short post blaming the police. Except the video, frame by frame, from Avi Ashkenazi's website, shows that the cops, apparently, have presented badges and they didn't start the pushing that led to violence. I demand that others refer to the facts. Facts prove me wrong.
That's it, I would say. However, there is another point to make, and rather an important one. It so happened that all Israeli main media sources bar none picked up the story without any fact checking. And when I say "main media sources", I don't mean some anti-Zionist ones like +972, far from it. Both left-wing and right wing media simply jumped on the initial story and published it as is, varying only the headlines. Of course, a special mention is richly deserved by Haaretz, whose headline for their editorial (that I partially borrowed) was "When Israeli Cops Lynched an Arab Supermarket Worker, They Exposed the Government’s Brutal Face". Only after a while somebody high up in Haaretz' hierarchy chickened out and the word "Lynched" was replaced by "Assaulted".
I have made a few screenshots of the headlines and posted them below for your enjoyment.
One last thing: three days after the avalanche of publications not a single news source that published its incendiary article(s), came out with a reference to the above discussed analysis or its own analysis of the story. No scoop value, I guess...
Around 1,000 Israelis responded to the beating of Bedouin teen Maysam Abu Alqian by police by raising over NIS 100,000 for his tuition fees.
Yeah...
Afterword: A less important but still telling item I missed at first: the third article link on the first page. It starts with the following sentence:
Controversial CCTV footage allegedly shows plainclothes Israeli police officers pouncing on an “Arab-Israeli” next to a Tel Aviv supermarket.
So, "controversial" and "allegedly": RT, the Russian traditionally anti-Israeli, anti-Western, pro-conspiracy theory and otherwise deplorable media outfit is being more careful and moderate than Israeli media. Something to think about, I would suggest.
The man in the picture, the one in the uniform amidst the pair of civilians, is our (relatively) new police chief, Roni Alsheikh. His ascent (?) to the new throne from the post of Shin Bet's deputy head wasn't easy due to resistance of the police hierarchy to appointment of an outsider, and I guess his life is not easy right now. Besides, who likes a cop?
Yep, no one likes a cop, but nothing would have prepared an innocent reader to the histrionics displayed by local ultra-lefties at the sight of the following scene. In the recording, Roni Alsheikh and a group of other cops and border policemen are dancing with the Torah scroll in Auschwitz, on the last Holocaust memorial day.
I have several examples here and here, but all this in Hebrew and I wouldn't bother with translations for now - just believe me that the fury at the "senseless, insensitive, expensive, ultra-religious, callous, [add your adjective] ritual" is simply overflowing. And the bile eruption is simply remarkable.
I might personally not find it in me to dance anywhere, Auschwitz included - that besides being an incorrigible atheist. But I do understand what Roni Alsheikh was up to there. Affirming our right and our love of life and sticking a finger into the eye of the Nazis (dead or alive) isn't something I would object to, the opposite is rather true. You can and even should dance in Auschwitz, see another example of doing just that (with explanation, too):
And this is definitely related to the subject of Alsheikh's appointment to his position. The said appointment was met by a similar eruption of bile. A short version could be seen here:
To make things short - the take over of the goverment [sic!] by fundamentalists.
a longer version belongs to the baron of deceit industry, our incomparable Gideon Levy.
Roni Alsheich is a man with a very dubious past. In a law-abiding country, no one would even imagine appointing him police commissioner. In Israel, they place a crown on his head. The national chorus sings his praises.
The two main elements on which Mr Levy builds his attack are: the [past] residence of Alsheikh in a settlement; and his service in Shin Bet. If you want to buy this logic, it is up to you. Then we should descend a bit more into the cesspool, where Richard Silverstein aka Doucheblogger resides:
And when we get to the bottom of that pit (or the gutter, if you will), you shall find there one Uri Avneri. If there ever was a pretendent to the title of the king of yellow journalism (with pink stripes in this case), here is one. And here comes his article on a site called Redress Information & Analysis. That site willingly hosts authors like Mr Avneri, Gilad Atzmon and other Holocaust deniers, with other Jew-hating rubbish. I don't provide a link in this case, you can easily find the article by its telling headline: "Roni Alsheikh, Israel’s ultra-primitive chief of police". And why does the esteemed yellow journo call Roni Alsheikh "ultra-primitive"? Here it goes:
So, unlike his younger colleague Mr Levy, the attack here is three-pronged:
His father is of Yemenite descent, his mother is Moroccan.
He is the first police chief to wear a kippah, or skullcap.
Also the first who was once a settler.
If you don't detect a strong stench of the good old-fashioned lefty Ashkenazi racism and/or the innate and totally undeserved superiority complex here, you have to check your sinuses asap... 'nuff said.
Now, compare all of the above to the demented response of an ultra-right-winger to the appointment of an Arab police officer, Jamal Hakroush, to the post of Deputy Inspector-General. Here it comes, in all its glory:
Granted, in this case the writing style and content might indicate a need for a chemical intervention, but how is this screed, in its essence, different from Mr Avneri's racist rant and Mr Levy's hatchet job?
All in all, without any prior prejudice against (or for) Roni Alsheikh, now I feel myself rather invested in the success of his stint as our chief cop. Good luck, Mr Alsheikh!
“However stupid a fool's words may be, they are sometimes enough to confound an intelligent man.”
― Nikolai Gogol, Dead Souls
I don't know how many Western readers are familiar with Dead Souls**, but I would venture a guess that there is no Russian above age of, say, 15 that isn't (of course, seeing as how Gogol was an Ukrainian and how Russia and Ukraine are apart today... oh well, no matter). The reason I am mentioning the popularity of the book is that I was sure that no Russian could be so stupid as to give birth to the modern version of that story. However...
Academician Alexander Ageev
In a conference "Faith and deeds: social responsibility of businesses in the time of crisis", being conducted in the framework of Anti-crisis Forum, Academician Alexander Ageev came up with an original idea. Thinking [aloud] about the Great Patriotic War as a point of consolidation of [Russian] society, he proposed to consider the possibility to grant the right to vote in elections to 27 million Soviet citizens who died during the Second World War. Explaining his thought to a journalist, he said that in this way the dead could affect the current affairs in the country, in development and salvation of which they were directly involved. For example, their families could vote for them, said Ageev. Academician Ageev also believes that the right to vote may be possibly granted to several previous generations, not only to those who died in the war. The reason is the same: they must be able to influence current events, as these events are a continuation of their own lives.
For your reference and admiration: Doctor of Economics Alexander Ageev is the director of Institute of Economic Strategy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, a member of the Writers' Union, the head of the department of business management projects of MEPhI, a member of Izborsky club, and also a nobleman (he was entitled by Maria Romanova's decree). At the end of 2015 he ran for post of the the director of Institute of Economy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, but hasn't gathered the necessary votes.
Well, what can I say (not that anything has to be necessarily added to the above)? Maybe just a technicality, a humblest proposal for a minor improvement. Why bothering with establishing the family connections of the dear departed, which in many cases might lead nowhere, on account of Stalin's perfectionism in getting rid of some people? Wouldn't it be simpler all around to pass all these votes to the direct representatives of the owners? I mean the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Chief Mufti, the Chief Rabbi etc. They will surely know how to vote.
And in case of a doubt, I bet that Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin will be there to advise them and to lead them from the darkness to the light.
(*) "Academician" - rather a Russian term for a full member of Russian Academy of Sciences (PAH).
(**) And if you are not familiar, it will do you only good to get familiar. The old anti-Semite surely did know how to write them sentences.
"Tell me, o wise Confucius, what is the difference between polygamy and polyandry?", she asked.
Confucius put on the table five kettles and five teacups.
"Now, woman, fill all the teacups from one kettle. Do you like it?"
"Yes, I do like it," was the answer.
"Fine, now fill one teacup from five kettles and tell me how you like it".
"I like it even more," the woman answered.
"Wretched woman!" cried out Confucius, "now you have gone and destroyed a perfect parable!"
That post, King Bibi - the one-eyed man in the land of the blind? was written a bit more than a year ago. To make it clear, it wasn't about the eternal right vs left issue - only about a politician losing some elemental moral scruples when his chair is endangered.
This year the same problem raised its ugly head again. Concerned above all by the stability of his government, Bibi has done dirty by one of his most stable supporters and partners. Again, I am not going into the rights or wrongs of the story that served as a fuse that exploded the smelly political bomb. I mean the story of the Hebron shooting of the already wounded and largely incapacitated terrorist. No, this is about the lack of common decency and more, about something already described in the post linked above: Bibi's inability to stand up to pressure. And I totally believe to what the outgoing minister of defense and the victim of Bibi's politicking has to say on the subject:
When the Hebron shooting affair just happened, Netanyahu had agreed with me that we needed to let the military prosecution investigate and handle this," Ya'alon told the website. "And then, when he noticed the public mood, he changed his mind. As a minister, I had to back the IDF chief, but I felt like Netanyahu abandoned me.
Emphasis mine. Notice - what drives Bibi is not the truth of the matter at hand, not the opinion of the army, not the ongoing court process - just "the public mood". The supposed leader of a supposed democracy bowing to the mood of the street... what could be added to that?
But this is not exactly new - just extremely sad.
"Not everything is politics," added Ya'alon in his parting speech. Bibi will do himself no end of good trying to remember that.
While the tragedy of the quasi-socialist regime, built chiefly on cheap slogans and once booming oil revenues, continues to strangle the life out of Venezuela, the gurus of Salon.com still find the spirit and the energy to produce some unbelievable crap hailing the illusory achievements of the late Comical Hugo.
When a country goes socialist and it craters, it is laughed off as a harmless and forgettable cautionary tale about the perils of command economics. When, by contrast, a country goes socialist and its economy does what Venezuela’s did, it is not perceived to be a laughing matter – and it is not so easy to write off or to ignore. It suddenly looks like a threat to the corporate capitalism, especially when said country has valuable oil resources that global powerhouses like the United States rely on.
I bet that David Sirota, the author of this article, will be received like a savior by the people dying in Venezuela's hospitals for lack of basic medicines (but surrounded by cohorts of willing Cuban doctors).
"harmless and forgettable cautionary tale"...
Go boil your stupid head, Mr Sirota. Maybe some compassion will seep in, although I tend to doubt it.
Update: it was an article from 2013. Nevertheless...
UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer in testimony before the U.S. Congress on May 17, 2016.
We meet on the 70th anniversary of the UN Commission on Human Rights, whose creators gathered this week, in May 1946, one year after the Nazi atrocities. Eleanor Roosevelt became the founding Chair, and René Cassin, the eminent legal philosopher, the Vice-Chair. The founders had a dream: to reaffirm the principle of human dignity, and to guarantee fundamental freedoms for all. Over time, however, dictatorships hijacked the Commission—even electing the murderous regime of Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi as Chair; 1946, Eleanor Roosevelt; 2003, Colonel Qaddafi. Two years later, UN Secretary-General Annan called for scrapping the commission, identifying its politicization, selectivity, and credibility deficit—all of which “cast a shadow on the reputation of the United Nations system as a whole.” By contrast, the UN promised that the new body would elect members committed to human rights, and address the world’s most severe abuses. Ten years later, we ask: Is the new body living up to the UN’s promise of reform, and to the original dream, from 70 years ago, of Eleanor Roosevelt?
