Friday, May 29, 2009
Obama's Approval Poll
An internet site took a poll of President Obama's approval ratings. As a Christian, we are mandated to pray for our president (and I do), however, that must not be confused with a critical eye to important government policies which grate against our consciences.
Having lived over 20 years in the Middle East, foreign policy is A#1 to me.
Obama's snubbing of Israel's Army Chief of Staff, Gabi Ashkenazi, to the point that he packed it up and left the USA early, then the arm twisting of Bibi Netanyahu over Iran's nuclear program, topped off by pressure (residual from the last administration) from our Secretary of State to get used to the idea of a 'contiguous Palestinian State' say to me: Three strikes and you're out!
We need to pay careful attention to the upcoming June 4 address to the Muslim world from Cairo University. To be sure, 1.4 billion Muslims will be paying close attention. The choice of Cairo in and of itself is questionable since Hosseini Mubarak is serving his 5th six-year term in office. His administration has strong-armed, arrested, beaten and all but exiled his political opponents.
The Brookings Institute posted an astute analysis of the event that is well worth reading. http://is.gd/JtF8
One of their points well made is that of poor governance in many Muslim-majority countries. In an era of globalization, many of these governments have been unable to deliver economic growth or provide basic services to their citizens. A recent Brookings Index of Weak States categorized 40 of the world’s 48 Muslim-majority states as either “failed states” (2), “critically weak states” (8), “weak states” (11), or “states to watch” (19). The World Bank, in its ratings of governance performance (where countries are given a governance score ranging from -2.5 to +2.5), gave 38 of the 48 negative scores. This is the cause of much of the anger and frustration that extremists groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban have capitalized upon.
This Islamic blame-game is a no-win dead end. Historically, economic distress has been the earthquake that has made the wall of the city shake. Major change has ridden on the wake of economic disaster before. What will Obama be able to say that can turn the tide of militant Islam and make them our friends without castigating Israel over the Palestinian issue? Little I doubt.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Our Mandate
Since Carol and my salvation during the Jesus People Revival of the 1970s, the mandate to connect the modern Church with Israel has been top priority for us. The task is not only living the life of our Messiah amongst the people of God when we lived in the nation of Israel, but exposing the Church to her unique place in the commonwealth of God’s Israel. That job has taken us around the world, from South Africa to Japan, Wales to Mexico City, Brazil to Europe, Russia to the Holocaust camps of Poland and Germany, and so many more places where God has shown Himself still Sovereign Lord of the “Beautiful Land”—a euphemism for Israel.
When Israel gained sovereignty over her stolen capital city of Jerusalem in the 1967 Six Day War, the ripples of that heavenly victory touched every shore of every nation in the world: God reached out and herded masses into the Kingdom of Heaven in such great joy that the movement has taken its place in world history as one of the greatest outpourings of HIS Spirit of all time. Surely it is not hard to connect the dots.
Our ministry is on-going, the mandate still in effect, and the doors still open for us to portray Israel in the glorious light that we know her from over 20 years of on-site experience. The level of interest is not waning, but growing exponentially. What was a trickle of interest after the ‘67 War has become like Niagara Falls. To the furthest reaches of the globe, believing followers of a Jewish Messiah have heard His voice and responded.
To realize that even hermetically sealed empires like China have not only heard His call to action, but have made plans to become involved, even to the detriment of their own security and comfort, is humbling. Should we do less?
We live in unprecedented times. The beautiful message of Israel and our grafted place in the olive tree and Commonwealth has a dark and sinister counterpoint. That being the Evil One’s determination to destroy and discredit her. Turning nations against Israel is his top priority and we must stand against it at all costs. We, believers, constitute a nation within many nations, unified with purposes deeply embedded in God’s end-time plan - and may I say, with great reward.
However, the Genesis 12:3 blessing for those who bless Israel is no longer enough. Building on that foundation, we now support for the safety and security of our own existence against the spreading virus of militant Islamofacism. Israel suffered being the guinea pig, and now the world shares the malice of God’s enemies, just as in times of old: Esther, Nehemiah, Daniel, Jonah and more. I say, “We owe!”
Shavuot Pentecost
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Barak in Cairo: Noble Peace Prize or Anti-Christ?
Ron's Note: Obama is headed to Cairo in June '09 to detail a hard-sell peace program which is merely a take off on other peace plans that have failed. This one is spiced with Obama's new rude muscle. Do it or else is the message. No more fooling around, Obama wants a Noble Peace Prize and he means it! I have interjected comments in italics.
Abraham Rabinovich, Jerusalem | May 22, 2009
Article from: The Australian
US President Barack Obama is expected to outline a far-reaching proposal for a Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement in Cairo next month that will flesh out the Saudi-initiated Arab Peace Plan proposed in 2002 in a way that makes it more palatable to Jerusalem but also requires the Jewish state to make major concessions.
Under the Obama proposal, Palestinian refugees would not be permitted to return to Israel, but they would be permitted to return to the Palestinian state that would arise on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Those who continue to reside in Arab countries where they have been largely confined to refugee camps for 60 years would be given citizenship of those countries, ending their refugee status.
What will the 900,000 Jews who were driven from Islamic nations, having to leave their belongings behind between 1948 and 1953, be offered? Any remuneration? I doubt it will even be mentioned. That number is contrasted with the 400,000 claimed by Arafat to have fled Israel at the command of Jordan, Egypt, and Syria so they could obliterate Israel.
On the critical question of Jerusalem, Mr Obama will support the Arab demand that Palestinians be permitted to establish their capital in East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel in the Six Day War in 1967. However, the walled Old City at the heart of Jerusalem, where the principal holy sites of Christianity, Judaism and Islam are located, would become an international enclave and fly the UN flag.
Can we talk about the U.N.'s terrifying history in the Middle East: gunrunning using diplomatic immunity from Jordan and Lebanon; Arafat using the basement of the UN building in Southern Lebanon in 1982 as a terrorist training center and explosives repository; UN involvement in kidnapping IDF soldiers in both Lebanon and Gaza. What a great choice Obama!
The Palestinian state would be demilitarised, maintaining a significant police force to keep order but not an army that might pose a security threat to Israel.
Tell that to Hamas. However, this is good news because Hamas will tell Obama where to take his peace plan.
The pre-Six Day War borders between Israel and the Palestinian territories would be modified, but only by mutually agreed territorial exchanges, not unilateral annexation.
Condi Rice has been to Israel half a dozen times to bang the pulpit shouting "Contigious Palestinian State." That means the West Bank would be connected to Gaza by a land bridge, dividing Israel into north and south for the first time since Solomon's sons. What could we possibly be thinking?
The proposal was reported by the prestigious Arab-language newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi, which is published in London. The paper said the plan would be unveiled by Mr Obama when he gives his much-touted address to the Muslim world in Cairo next month.
According to the newspaper, Mr Obama's plan was drawn up in consultation with Jordan's King Abdullah, who was the first Arab leader to be invited by the President to Washington. The two had first met in Amman last year during Mr Obama's tour of the Middle East as part of his presidential campaign.
After returning from Washington three weeks ago, the king spoke to other Arab leaders in the region, including Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in a rapid shuttle.
Abbas, just this week told Palestinian Youth that he rejects the idea of recognizing Israel. He will never recognize Israel!
He then gave an interview to The Times of London in which he said Israel was in a position to win recognition from all 57 Muslim countries if it came to terms with the Palestinians.
He said that a peace deal to be brokered by the Americans would be the most comprehensive since the Madrid peace conference in 1991. To sweeten the deal, Israel would be offered immediate benefits such as entry visas to all Arab countries and the right of El Al, Israel's national carrier, to overfly Arab territory.
Oh my, Israelis have just been frothing to enter enemy territory, be spat upon, decapitated, tarred and feathered, and subjected to horrors not unlike Jewish treatment in the dark ages of Europe. Such a great gift.
Acceptance of Israel by all Arab states would, the thinking goes, give Israel the confidence to make concessions to the Palestinians, something more difficult to do when it faces a sea of hostile faces around it.
If Obama can pull this off, let's go ahead and give him his Noble Peace Prize. This tops all other overtures that could gain him his historical limelight.
Should Israel choose, however, to procrastinate instead of accepting a two-state solution, it would be likely to find itself at war within 12 to 18 months, the king said.
There you have it. The noose. If you should choose not to accept this deal, we have cooked up for you a little war. And, since I've (Abdullah of Jordan) warned Obama about this, how could he protest when we do it?
Israeli officials said yesterday that the details of the Obama plan outlined in Al Quds Al Arabi had not been given to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he met Mr Obama on Monday.
Hey, I thought we were dedicated to the safety of Israel? I guess not.
But they did not deny the report's plausibility. It is a measure of the new relationship between Washington and Jerusalem since Mr Obama assumed office that such a far-reaching plan would be run by an Arab leader before it was shared with an Israeli leader.
No less noteworthy is Mr Obama's decision to visit Cairo on his first presidential trip to the Middle East, without visiting adjacent Israel.
Mr Obama has put more distance between himself and Israel than previous US leaders. But his moves are perceived in Israel as understandable - many would even say praiseworthy - attempts to restore US credibility in the Arab world.
Let the praises begin. He has already been deified by numerous photographers and artists.
A US administration acceptable to the Arab world has a far greater chance of using its good offices to bring about peace in the region.
Mr Obama's speech in Cairo on June 4 will be a major address to the entire Muslim world, and will not focus exclusively on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. It will aim to rebuild US relations with the Muslim world that were knocked askew following the attacks on September 11, 2001.
Mr. Obama, we can't wait. You've jumped in over your head and may have added the straw that broke the camel's back.
Barak in Cairo: Noble Peace Prize or Anti-Christ?
Ron's Note: Obama is headed to Cairo in June '09 to detail a hard-sell peace program which is merely a take off on other peace plans that have failed. This one is spiced with Obama's new rude muscle. Do it or else is the message. No more fooling around, Obama wants a Noble Peace Prize and he means it! I have interjected comments in italics.
Abraham Rabinovich, Jerusalem | May 22, 2009
Article from: The Australian
US President Barack Obama is expected to outline a far-reaching proposal for a Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement in Cairo next month that will flesh out the Saudi-initiated Arab Peace Plan proposed in 2002 in a way that makes it more palatable to Jerusalem but also requires the Jewish state to make major concessions.
Under the Obama proposal, Palestinian refugees would not be permitted to return to Israel, but they would be permitted to return to the Palestinian state that would arise on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Those who continue to reside in Arab countries where they have been largely confined to refugee camps for 60 years would be given citizenship of those countries, ending their refugee status.
What will the 900,000 Jews who were driven from Islamic nations, having to leave their belongings behind between 1948 and 1953, be offered? Any remuneration? I doubt it will even be mentioned. That number is contrasted with the 400,000 claimed by Arafat to have fled Israel at the command of Jordan, Egypt, and Syria so they could obliterate Israel.
On the critical question of Jerusalem, Mr Obama will support the Arab demand that Palestinians be permitted to establish their capital in East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel in the Six Day War in 1967. However, the walled Old City at the heart of Jerusalem, where the principal holy sites of Christianity, Judaism and Islam are located, would become an international enclave and fly the UN flag.
Can we talk about the U.N.'s terrifying history in the Middle East: gunrunning using diplomatic immunity from Jordan and Lebanon; Arafat using the basement of the UN building in Southern Lebanon in 1982 as a terrorist training center and explosives repository; UN involvement in kidnapping IDF soldiers in both Lebanon and Gaza. What a great choice Obama!
The Palestinian state would be demilitarised, maintaining a significant police force to keep order but not an army that might pose a security threat to Israel.
Tell that to Hamas. However, this is good news because Hamas will tell Obama where to take his peace plan.
The pre-Six Day War borders between Israel and the Palestinian territories would be modified, but only by mutually agreed territorial exchanges, not unilateral annexation.
Condi Rice has been to Israel half a dozen times to bang the pulpit shouting "Contigious Palestinian State." That means the West Bank would be connected to Gaza by a land bridge, dividing Israel into north and south for the first time since Solomon's sons. What could we possibly be thinking?
The proposal was reported by the prestigious Arab-language newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi, which is published in London. The paper said the plan would be unveiled by Mr Obama when he gives his much-touted address to the Muslim world in Cairo next month.
According to the newspaper, Mr Obama's plan was drawn up in consultation with Jordan's King Abdullah, who was the first Arab leader to be invited by the President to Washington. The two had first met in Amman last year during Mr Obama's tour of the Middle East as part of his presidential campaign.
After returning from Washington three weeks ago, the king spoke to other Arab leaders in the region, including Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in a rapid shuttle.
Abbas, just this week told Palestinian Youth that he rejects the idea of recognizing Israel. He will never recognize Israel!
He then gave an interview to The Times of London in which he said Israel was in a position to win recognition from all 57 Muslim countries if it came to terms with the Palestinians.
He said that a peace deal to be brokered by the Americans would be the most comprehensive since the Madrid peace conference in 1991. To sweeten the deal, Israel would be offered immediate benefits such as entry visas to all Arab countries and the right of El Al, Israel's national carrier, to overfly Arab territory.
Oh my, Israelis have just been frothing to enter enemy territory, be spat upon, decapitated, tarred and feathered, and subjected to horrors not unlike Jewish treatment in the dark ages of Europe. Such a great gift.
Acceptance of Israel by all Arab states would, the thinking goes, give Israel the confidence to make concessions to the Palestinians, something more difficult to do when it faces a sea of hostile faces around it.
If Obama can pull this off, let's go ahead and give him his Noble Peace Prize. This tops all other overtures that could gain him his historical limelight.
Should Israel choose, however, to procrastinate instead of accepting a two-state solution, it would be likely to find itself at war within 12 to 18 months, the king said.
There you have it. The noose. If you should choose not to accept this deal, we have cooked up for you a little war. And, since I've (Abdullah of Jordan) warned Obama about this, how could he protest when we do it?
Israeli officials said yesterday that the details of the Obama plan outlined in Al Quds Al Arabi had not been given to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he met Mr Obama on Monday.
Hey, I thought we were dedicated to the safety of Israel? I guess not.
But they did not deny the report's plausibility. It is a measure of the new relationship between Washington and Jerusalem since Mr Obama assumed office that such a far-reaching plan would be run by an Arab leader before it was shared with an Israeli leader.
No less noteworthy is Mr Obama's decision to visit Cairo on his first presidential trip to the Middle East, without visiting adjacent Israel.
Mr Obama has put more distance between himself and Israel than previous US leaders. But his moves are perceived in Israel as understandable - many would even say praiseworthy - attempts to restore US credibility in the Arab world.
Let the praises begin. He has already been deified by numerous photographers and artists.
A US administration acceptable to the Arab world has a far greater chance of using its good offices to bring about peace in the region.
Mr Obama's speech in Cairo on June 4 will be a major address to the entire Muslim world, and will not focus exclusively on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. It will aim to rebuild US relations with the Muslim world that were knocked askew following the attacks on September 11, 2001.
Mr. Obama, we can't wait. You've jumped in over your head and may have added the straw that broke the camel's back.
Monday, May 18, 2009
There Will Never Be A Palestinian State
Obama's quote from today's meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu is the death knoll for the Palestinian State.
"The Palestinians are going to have to do a better job of providing the security Israel needs to accept a two-state solution," Obama said. "The other Arab states have to be more supportive and be bolder in seeking potential normalization with Israel," adding that "I will deliver that message to" Mubarak and Abbas next week. http://digg.com/u13b7j
Thinking that the leopard is suddenly going to change his spots, and that other Arab States are going to follow suit is monumental naiveté. This lack of judgment, wisdom, and experience, particularly in foreign policy, must simply mock the office of United States President in the eyes of Israel's Prime Minister.
In an embarrassingly condescending statement Obama expressed confidence in Netanyahu's "political skills as well as his historic vision." The experience of Netanyahu casts a giant shadow over Obama's 'Johnny-come-lately' spot in the world political limelight.
This thinking will have the Arab states laughing through their teeth at America's lack of political savvy in foreign policy matters. Years of diplomacy have been sacrificed to "Change We Can Believe In." The Arabs are happy at the developments, and like the Israeli statesman Abba Eban said, "The Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity." Now, knowing that the USA has backed up to square-one, they will forge ahead full speed with their self-defeating agenda.
Good show Obama. You have just chiseled in stone (a tombstone) the epitaph of the Palestinian State.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Israel has determined to exist!

Editor's Note:
This article is not for everyone. The graphic material here is difficult to process. The information is important for those trying to understand Israel's strong stand against her enemies. I am warning, but hoping that the right people will read, process, and put their feelings into action on behalf of a beleaguered nation with few friends in the world. I have pushed this article to the back burner for 9 years. However, my January journey to study at the International Shool for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem changed my mind. Ignoring horror assures its return. Edmund Burke, a British Statesman said, "All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing." (cont'd).
After posting Sarit Hadad's haunting song, Sh'ma Israel Elohai, on my Facebook site, replies told me people were sensing the spirit behind the song. Some cried when listening, most were very moved. I posted a note telling that the song was written after two Israeli soldiers were brutally 'lynched' in the West Bank city of Ramallah in 2000. The dictionary explanation for lynch is lost in the Middle East. There, the term is used for what will be described below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJ0KAtGsoLU
It was disturbing to me that news media from the West only briefly covered the incident. The inhumane brutality of the killings should have incited a worldwide outcry. Certainly the United Nations should have gotten involved. They did not, and the real story faded from the news . . . but not from the hearts and minds of Israelis and Jewish people who knew what really happened.
The horrors of the Holocaust came boiling back to the surface, only this time in the Jewish homeland, where security and safety should reign. The dark presence of evil had manifested itself again. It was the kind of evil seen by soldiers who liberated the death factories of Hitlers SS. It was unexplainable hatred from deep inside the realm of evil. In 1945, liberators stood in horror, paralyzed by the sights around them. Some of them, though war hardened, vomiting involuntarily—the body's attempt to expel that which cannot be processed—the rude reality that projecting niceness upon others because you cannot imagine such wickedness does not work.
Media that as a rule is pro-Palestinian responded, but much like the reality-denying German press as Hitler's death machine really got rolling. Italy responded as such:
A representative of Italian Television apologized to the Palestinian Authority for screening the video of the lynching of the two Israeli soldiers - his press card was suspended by Israel for issuing the following apology. Riccardo Christiano, Italian TV's representative in Israel wrote to the PA:
"To my dear friends in Palestine, we bless you, and feel that we must clarify that the photos of the events in Ramallah were taken by a private Italian station, and not by official Italian TV. We emphasize to you that we respect the proper journalistic work guidelines with the Palestinian Authority. Be sure that we would never do something like that."
The two Israeli soldiers entered Ramallah by mistake, and were detained by the Palestinian police. After they were brought to the police station in central Ramallah, a crowd of between 1,000 and 2,000 Arabs broke into the building, overcame the police, and murderously beat and killed the Israelis. Some of the Palestinian police took part in the lynch.
The body of one of the Israelis was dragged around the city chained to a car. Television pictures show Arabs in the window of the station, alternately beating and stabbing someone inside and gleefully making a V sign out the window.
The soldiers were viciously beaten all over their bodies. Military officials who handled the bodies told news media that they were "deliberately tortured and abused... The bodies were mutilated and torn to pieces. There was great difficulty in recognizing them..."
The two soldiers heads were split open and the mob tore their brains out. Literally hundreds of hate drunken members of the Islamic mob that day took turns beating the soldier's bodies beyond recognition.
Hayman Zaben and Aziz Salha (the man displaying his bloody hands out the window), are two of the ringleaders who were arrested for the lynching. However, the shocking story is that of terrorist Nasser Abu Hamiyad. He had been released from an Israeli prison as a good-will gesture in the context of the Oslo Accords and then took part in the Ramallah lynch. The West pressures Israel into handing over such prisoners on a regular basis, returning animals loose back into society to repeat their crimes.
Two years later Hamiyad also organized an attack on Jerusalem’s northern most neighborhood of Neve Yaakov, murdering a female police officer and wounding 10. On March 5, 2002, he orchestrated an attack on the Seafood Market in Tel Aviv, murdering Israelis Eliyahu Dahan and Yossi Havi, and wounding 31. This Western pressure is the "New anti-Semitism." The dictate to restrain yourself, when your neighbors are commiting atrocities against your population.
The growing numbers of Israel positive activists will make a difference in their respective nations. The majority of staunch supporters of Israel happen to be evangelical Christians who know the pain they have suffered and have said, "Enough!" We will not stand by quietly and let Israel stand alone.
(cont'd) I will post the photos (extremely graphic) for which the warning at the top of this post applies. You may view the photos on my web site with a password.
The web site is: shalom-shalom-jerusalem.org
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Iran's Ahmadinejad's New Tirade Against Israel
DAMASCUS (Agencies)
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad slammed Zionism as "occupation" and "aggression" Tuesday as he delivered his latest diatribe against the Jewish state on a visit to key Middle East ally Syria.
"The Zionist occupiers are destructive microbes, because Zionism itself is occupation, aggression, the use of assassination and annihilation," he told a joint news conference with President Bashar al-Assad in the Syrian capital.
"Zionism was created to threaten us. To support the Palestinian resistance is a humanitarian and popular obligation," Ahmadinejad said in remarks in Farsi that were translated into Arabic.
Zionism was created to threaten us. To support the Palestinian resistance is a humanitarian and popular obligation
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
The Iranian president's comments came barely two weeks after he sparked a European walkout from a U.N. anti-racism conference in Geneva by equating Zionism with racism.
Ahmadinejad asked why it was the Islamist Hamas movement which controls Gaza that is blacklisted by the European Union and the United States, and not Israel after its devastating offensive against the territory at the turn of the year.
"They've attacked Gaza, killing people in their own land and massacring women and children... and yet it's the Palestinians they accuse of terrorism," he complained.
Ahmadinejad, whose visit to Damascus came as Defense Secretary Robert Gates toured U.S. allies in the region to reassure them about overtures to the Tehran regime by President Barack Obama, hit out at the continuing U.S. military presence on Iran's borders.
"They weren't invited in. They're unwelcome visitors who should leave Afghanistan and the borders of Pakistan," the Iranian president said.
"We don't want honey from bees that sting us. Efforts must be made to rid the region of the presence of foreigners... and to reform the unjust global political and economic system."
Circumstances are changing rapidly in our favor. We are on the road to victory
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - Standing together
Ahmadinejad said Iran and Syria were standing together to "resist foreign intervention and the major powers trying to impose their hegemony over the region."
The United States "has put pressure on Syria and Iran, but it needs us and wants to develop relations," he said.
"Circumstances are changing rapidly in our favor. We are on the road to victory."
Syria's President Assad in turn defended his country’s long-standing alliance with Iran on Tuesday and said a "strategic" relationship between the two countries contributed to Middle East stability.
Syria has re-enforced its alliance with Iran in recent years after they came under pressure from the United States for suspected nuclear programs and providing backing for armed groups in the Middle East.
"We have strategic ties ... which don't constitute an axis as some suggest, but serve the stability and strength of this region," Assad said.
"Our duty is to strengthen these kinds of ties."
The two countries, which are under different levels of U.S. sanctions, support the Lebanese movement Hezbollah and the Palestinian movement Hamas, whose exiled leaders live in Syria.
Hezbollah, the lynchpin of the relationship between Tehran and Damascus, is also the main opposition party contesting Lebanon's parliamentary elections next month. The two countries want to see the Shi'ite group fare well in the poll.
The sustainability of their alliance, however, is under some doubt as Syria pushes for a resumption of peace negotiations with Israel and the United States talks to Damascus after boycotting Syria for several years.
Ahmadinejad was also due to meet exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal during his Damascus visit.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
How Outsiders View Americans - Canada Free Press on Obama
The President Who Hates His Country
In the last century, the impassioned words and actions of patriots like Winston Churchill – along with America’s heroic help and sacrifice – saved Europe. The eloquence and actions of “I’ve been to the mountaintop” Martin Luther King Jr. brought America to an unprecedented level of social justice.
The peerless oratory and tireless diplomacy of the man who would become Israel’s Foreign Minister, Abba Eban convinced the entire world that after the wanton murder of six-million Jews in the Holocaust its straggling survivors deserved their own state of Israel. The inspiring words and decisive actions of President Ronald Reagan ended the Cold War, tore down the Berlin Wall, and restored economic prosperity to America. The efforts of these towering figures resulted in a more highly-evolved world.
We have also seen the opposite in totalitarian leaders like Hitler, Mussolini, Fidel Castro, Pol Pot, Mao, and Saddam Hussein, among others, who exploited their masses, destroyed their economies, brought havoc, turbulence, grief and massive death within and outside of their countries, and made the world a more dangerous and threatening place.
The one thing all of these virtuous and evil men had in common was love for their respective countries, in fact a burning passion that superseded all else. The virtuous believed in freedom and democracy. The evil believed in subjugation of their peoples and lifetime tenures for themselves in order to actualize their goals of conquering their eternal enemies – Americans and Jews.
Today, we have a new crop of inveterate America- and Jew-haters, among them the Marxist leader of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, Nicaragua’s president Daniel Ortega, Iran’s “death-to-America-and-Israel” study-in-abnormal-psychology Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and the ever-sabotage-America and anti-Semitic “leaders” of the 22-Arab states that surround Israel.
I have either read about or observed firsthand all of these people. Yet in my decades of commenting on the political scene, I cannot recall a single leader of any country or regime who has ever spoken negatively of his country or tolerated others speaking ill of the land or the people he represented
Until now
Bizarre and, yes, repugnant as it is to our essentially centrist country, America now has a president who has broken that time-honored tradition. Barack Obama, on the campaign trail and as the leader of the free world is the first U.S. president to proclaim to anyone within earshot that he, like his wife, is not proud of his country, and is all-too-willing to offer serial apologies – for America! – to Americans and foreigners alike.
As Ed Lasky writes: “We know that during the campaign [Obama] warned that criticism of his wife was `off-limits’. But criticism of America – well, that is fine.”
We also know that during his run for the presidency, Obama expressed sneering condescension towards all those bible-clasping, gun-owning yahoos who “cling” to those silly things, and that in Europe he consistently gave voice to America’s supposed “sins.” But all that pales in comparison to the clear contempt – looks more like hatred to me – that Obama feels for the United States of America and for its most revered founding document, the U.S. Constitution.
In just the first 100-days of his tenure, Obama’s words and actions have demonstrated that he is no friend of the country he leads. This is only a smattering of what happened on his recent three-continent trip abroad and to Mexico:
- In France, Obama told his audience that America “has shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive” toward Europe.
- In Prague, Obama – in true utopian-kindergarten fashion – pledged “with conviction” that America will “seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” In other words, destroy big bad America’s ability to defend itself!
- In London, Obama made clear that the world’s financial wealth was no longer made by those inferior leaders Roosevelt and Churchill, effectively ceding America’s leading role in creating and sharing wealth to nations that have never measured up to our country’s bountiful generosity or spirit of free-market entrepreneurship.
- In Venezuela, Obama sat passively while the Marxist Chavez handed him an American-bashing book and delivered another revile-America speech, while never once rising to defend our country.
- In Nicaragua, Obama again sat passively while the Marxist Ortega blamed the United States for a century of what he called terroristic U.S. aggression in Central America, again emitting not a whisper of defense on our country’s behalf.
- In Turkey, Obama said – incredibly and inaccurately – that America was not a Christian nation.
- And in his recent trip to Mexico, Obama said that the escalating border violence was essentially America’s fault.
Scan you memory. Can you think of any other leader in world history who so consistently badmouths his own country, or fails to defend it? I can’t.
Wall St. Journal writer Dorothy Rabinowitz notes that Obama “had gone to Europe not as the voice of his nation, but as a missionary with a message of atonement for its errors. No sitting American president had ever delivered indictments of this kind while abroad, or for that matter at home. When [our allies] see Obama’s moral equivalence, they realize they are on their own and must cut their own deals to survive – understanding that multicultural trendiness is now a cynical cover for moral laxity and ‘can’t we all get along?’
Historian Victor Davis Hanson also noticed something odd about Obama’s apology tour. “Despite this fresh climate of atonement, there was a complete absence of a single apology from any other foreign leader…not a word came from Britain about colonialism…nothing from Germany on the Holocaust…not a peep from France about Algeria or Vietnam. Turkey was mum on the Armenian killings…Russia said nothing about the 30 million murdered by Stalin…Nothing came from China about the 70 million who perished under Mao…Mr. Medvedev said nothing about Putin’s brutish rule…We saw no concrete evidence of any help — or hope and change — from any foreign leader. Zilch.”
In addition, Hanson continues, “We hear nothing about our Gettysburg, or our entry into World War I. Iwo Jima and the Bulge are never alluded to. Drawing the line in Korea and forcing the end of the Soviet monstrosity are taboo subjects. That we pledged the life of New York for Berlin in the Cold War is unknown. Liberating Afghanistan and Iraq from the diabolical Taliban and Saddam Hussein is left unsaid. The Civil Rights movement, the Great Society, affirmative action, and present billion-dollar foreign-aid programs apparently never existed. Millions of Africans have been saved by George Bush’s efforts at extending life-saving medicines to AIDS patients — but again, this is never referenced.”
Blogger James Lewis says that Obama’s “obsessive need to put down his own country shows a stunningly ignorant man who has evidently never spoken to a concentration camp survivor, a Cuban refugee, a boat person from Vietnam, a Soviet dissident, or a survivor of Mao’s purges.”
And Media Research Center’s Brent Bozell adds, “Obama `gets’ the America-haters.”
Abandoning allies, Embracing enemies
“If you are a longtime enemy of the United States, count on a grand reception from the Obama administration. All is forgiven and, worse, forgotten,” write Dick Morris and Eileen McGann. “But if you have a track record as an ally or friend, you won’t get the right time of day.”
Of course apologists for Obama & Co. point to “progress” in our foreign policy, ignoring, as Caroline Glick points out, that “America’s betrayal of its democratic allies makes each of them more vulnerable to aggression at the hands of their enemies – enemies the Obama administration is now actively attempting to appease.” Glick lays out the cold hard facts:
- Obama abrogated America’s strategic commitment to the defense of our ally Japan when his administration reacted to North Korea’s ballistic missile test by saying the U.S. would only shoot the missile down if it targeted U.S. territory.
- Obama slapped our ally India when he refused to make ending Pakistan’s support for jihadist terror groups attacking India a central component of its strategy for contending with Pakistan and Afghanistan.
- Obama failed to assure our ally Iraq that democracy and freedom will be secured before U.S. forces are withdrawn next year.
- Obama de facto abandoned our allies in Eastern Europe when he announced his intention to forge a new alliance with Russia. “The Czech, Polish, Georgian and Ukrainian governments,” Glick says, “were quick to recognize that Obama’s strong desire to curry favor with the Kremlin and weaken his own country will imperil their ability to withstand Russian aggression.”
- Obama “is sacrificing the U.S.’s alliance with our ally Israel “in a bid to appease the Arabs and Iran by supporting the immediate establishment of a Palestinian state,” which, Glick warns, “requires Israel to commit national suicide in exchange for `peace.’” Obama also made clear “that from the administration’s perspective, an Israeli strike that prevents Iran from becoming a nuclear power is less acceptable than a nuclear-armed Iran.” In addition, Obama sent Hamas $900 million of foreign aid, “channeled through the UNRWA, a United Nations front filled with Hamas operatives”
- Obama slapped our ally England when he returned the bust of Winston Churchill to Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
- Obama slapped our ally Colombia and its president Alvaro Uribe when he refused to submit the free trade deal with Bogota to the Senate.
“What a great time to be our enemy!” Glick exclaims. “What a terrible time to be our friend!”
And speaking about appeasing Iran, the Obama administration recently asked a federal judge to throw out a $6.6-billion class-action lawsuit against Iran filed by 52 American diplomats and military officials held hostage for more than a year at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran 30 years ago. Nothing like selling out Americans to make brownie points with a bloodthirsty dictator!
Barry Rubin explains: “Friends, especially in Europe, are pleased, applaud, but then add that they don’t have to give this guy anything because he is all apologies and no toughness. They like the fact that he is all carrots and no sticks. If, however, they are states more at risk…they worry that they cannot rely on the United States to help and defend them. Enemies or potential rivals…say that this guy is weak and defeated. He apologizes, offers unconditional engagements, and promises concessions…they’ll eat the carrots and, if possible, their neighbors as well.”
NY Post writer Ralph Peters, a former military intelligence officer, sums up the hate-America core tenets of the “Obama Doctrine” as follows:
(1) We’re to blame,
(2) Problems can be negotiated away,
(3) Problems that can’t be talked out can be bought off,
(4) Islamist terrorism doesn’t exist,
(5) It’s all our fault,
(6) Israel’s the obstacle to Middle East peace,
(7) Our nukes threaten world peace and we need to get rid of them,
(8) Our military is dangerous,
(9) Our intelligence services are even more dangerous than our military,
(10) It’s only torture if we do it, and
(11) Blame President George W. Bush.
Obama is clearly not satisfied with threatening the safety of our tried-and-true allies abroad. He is also determined to undermine the bedrock foundation of America’s security – our military and intelligence agencies. By disclosing interrogation memos – and planning to release photographs associated with military probes into prisoner abuse – he has betrayed every heroic person who risks his or her life for our country, and unforgivably given aid-and-comfort to enemies who seethe with virulent anti-Americanism and lust for our demise. And in the Department of Homeland Security’s infamous memo, he has called members of our military, among others, potential domestic terrorists!
“After September 1th, the general outcry was, ‘Why don’t we have better overseas capabilities?’” said Porter Goss, director of the CIA from September 2004 to May 2006. “I fear that in the years to come, this refrain will be heard again. It is certainly not trust that is fostered when intelligence officers are told one day ‘I have your back,’ only to learn a day later that a knife is being held to it.”
How horrifying to contemplate that it is the President of the United States himself who is wielding that back-stabbing knife!
Questioning Obama’s patriotism
Before the November election, legal scholar Henry Mark Holzer wrote – and scrupulously documented – a stunning indictment of Obama in which he stated that Obama’s repeatedly professed claim to be a patriot is “a fraud on the American people – and an insult to the countless true patriots who, for over two hundred years, have loved and loyally and zealously supported the United States of America.”
“Patriots,” Holzer concluded, “don’t associate with and derive sustenance from terrorists, America-haters and anti-Semites; they don’t countenance fixed elections; they don’t keep secrets from voters; they don’t intimidate their enemies; they don’t denigrate and degrade our military; they don’t gratuitously interfere with their government’s efforts to protect our country; and they don’t disdain the symbol of this great nation, which for over two centuries men and women have fought and died: the American flag. Whatever Barack Obama is, we can be certain that he is no patriot!”
The events that have followed Obama’s election, Holzer says, “have compounded the proof of the president’s lack of patriotism,” which he has recently spelled out in a follow-up article. A few of the many examples he provides of what “a patriotic American president does not do include:
- Bankrupt this country and court massive inflation in order to implement his vision of a fascist/socialist nation.
- Sit on his hands with a straight face while a South American thug insults his country.
- Appoint America-haters to his cabinet.
- Cozy up to a soon-to-be-nuclear-armed Iranian madman.
- Impotently watch the probably-already-nuclear-armed North Korean Stalinists lob a ballistic missile across the Pacific.
- Fail to stanch the flow of illegal aliens across the Mexican-United States border.
- Cut the defense budget.
- Strangle innovation during a serious recession by raising taxes.
- Close Guantanamo Bay without a clue of how to handle the enemy combatants incarcerated there.
- Publicly announce what measures military and CIA interrogators can use to extract information from terrorists.
- Apologize to the world for what has made America great and grovel to persons, nations. and institutions unfit to shine our shoes!
- Cede American sovereignty to the American-hating United Nations.
- Defy the Second Amendment and a Supreme Court decision by making an end run that substantially reduces the supply of certain ammunition.
- Repudiate the policy and practice of missile shield installation.”
Some dare call it treason
It is one thing to question a president’s patriotism, but even more serious to accuse him of treason. In an open letter to Obama on Treason, Walter Francis Fitzpatrick, III (U.S. Naval Academy, Class of 1975) minces no words in accusing the president of sending Army forces to Samson, Alabama, and Boston in violation of the Constitution. Here are excerpts of his letter:
“I have observed and extensively recorded invidious attacks by military-political aristocrats against the Constitution for twenty years. Now you have broken in and entered the White House by force of contrivance, concealment, conceit, and deceit. Posing as an imposter president and commander in chief, you have stripped civilian command and control over the military establishment…
“We come now to the reckoning. I accuse you and your military-political criminal assistants of TREASON. I name you and your military criminal associates as traitors. Your criminal ascension manifests a clear and present danger. You fundamentally changed our form of government. The Constitution no longer works….“I identify you as a foreign-born domestic enemy. You are not my president. You are not my commander in chief.
Fitzpatrick is not alone. John Smith – a blogger on Townhall.com, titled a recent article “Obama Is a Traitor.” Commenting on the president’s release of the “torture” memos, Smith says:
“Given the actions of Barack Obama in recent days, one has to wonder how many soon-to-be released State secrets have been gathered by radical left-wing traitors and hidden in the dark recesses of Washington, awaiting the Manchurian Candidate’s command to publish them…
“The motivation for Obama’s recent intentional disclosure of Top Secret CIA memoranda…was an act committed solely to increase his own political power through appeasement of the radical left…or was it …guided by the twisted moral imperative uniquely embraced by the Left, which dictates that only those actions that serve to limit individual liberty, punish patriotism, and destroy the traditions and culture of the United States of America are good?…
“Were Obama’s actions motivated by a deeply rooted desire to harm this Nation?…
“Article III of the Constitution defines Treason against the United States as “… levying War against them or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort…”.
“Top Secret information is the highest level of classification that we have on a national level. By definition, such material, if made public, will cause “exceptionally grave damage” to national security…
“The willful disclosure of Top Secret information is an act of Treason against the United States….A sitting President of The United States of America has committed Treason.”
Fitzpatrick and Smith are among a rising tide of voices – in and outside of the military – who have observed with growing horror Obama’s proclivity to destroy our capitalist economic system, subvert the U.S. Constitution, endanger our military and intelligence services, and obsequiously embrace America’s sworn enemies.
Dr. Jack Wheeler, a consummate Washington insider, goes one step further. “The evidence that the President of the United States is a traitor is mounting. The evidence that the President of the United states is a mortal danger to America’s national security is mounting. The evidence that the President of the United States will not defend America from threats and insults from every two-bit fascist dictator in the world …is not only mounting, it is overwhelming.”
Writer Amy L. Geiger-Hammer states: “I do wonder if Obama should be called a traitor or just incompetent…does he ever talk about what a great country America is?”
And UK journalist Gerald Warner echoes that rising tide: “If al-Qaeda, the Taliban and the rest of the Looney Tunes brigade want to kick America to death, they had better move in quickly and grab a piece of the action before Barack Obama finishes the job himself. Never in the history of the United States has a president worked so actively against the interests of his own people - not even Jimmy Carter. Obama’s problem is that he does not know who the enemy is. To him, the enemy does not squat in caves in Waziristan, clutching automatic weapons and reciting the more militant verses from the Koran: instead, it sits around at tea parties in Kentucky quoting from the US Constitution. “
Is America Lost?
Multiple lawsuits to find proof that Obama is Constitutionally ineligible to be president are ongoing and will ultimately determine if he is an American or Kenyan or Indonesian or UK “natural-born” citizen. To this date, he has spent over a million dollars blocking the suits about his still-missing birth certificate, and there is increasing evidence that the birth certificate attested to by FactCheck.org, FightTheSmears.org, and DailyKos.com are forgeries. And of course we still have not seen Obama’s Selective Service record, medical records, multiple visas, college transcripts, et al.
If Obama is proven to be the fraud and interloper many suspect, every one of his edicts, bills, laws, dictates, Supreme Court selections, et al, will be overturned , leaving America to cope with serious problems – under the leadership of the incomprehensible Joe Biden – but nothing approaching this hate-America president’s far-left socialist domestic programs and appease-our-enemies foreign policy.
The huge national turnouts at the Tea Parties of April 15 were only the beginning of a movement that was spurred by ordinary Americans waking up to Obama’s destruction of our economy, his attempts to reshape America into a banana republic, the grave damage he’s inflicted on our military and intelligence services, and his unsavory predilection for embracing our enemies and apologizing non-stop for the most magnificent nation on earth.
In short, they are waking up to the president who hates his country.
Editor Charlotte Baker predicts that “the Tea Parties and other, more aggressive, protests will grow exponentially, and that the Obama juggernaut can and will be stopped.” It’s crucial, she says, “for all Americans to recall the history they learned in school – at least before the Left hijacked what used to be known as `education.’ The Europeans, Japanese and Russians were all taken over by one form or another of totalitarianism because their combined history was one of absolute rulers – kings, czars and `divine’ emperors. They were totally conditioned to tyranny.
“But the monstrous anti-American gang that rigged the voting system on November 4, 2008– as they do routinely in Obama’s Chicago Machine politics – to push Obama into We-the-People’s White House, have shown – even before his inauguration – the kind of overreaching that arrogant tyrants always demonstrate. Hitler, Mao, Tojo and Stalin all got away with overreaching, but they weren’t brutalizing Americans.
“Tolerating totalitarianism is simply not in the genetic code – the DNA – of Americans!” Baker adds. “Freedom and Liberty run in our blood!”
Indeed!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Double Standard Watch: Confronting evil at Durban II

Last week I came face to face with evil, as I stood just a few feet away from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. We were both staying in the same hotel in Geneva. He was there to be the opening speaker at Durban II, a review and reprise of Durban I, the United Nations sponsored conference on racism that had turned into a racist hate fest against the Jewish people and the Jewish state. I was there - along with Elie Wiesel, Irwin Cotler and others who have devoted their lives to combating bigotry - to try to prevent a recurrence of Durban I.
I first set eyes on Ahmadinejad when he walked into the hotel and waved in the general direction of where my wife and I were standing. We looked back contemptuously as my wife let out an audible hiss. He was about to be welcomed to Geneva by the Swiss President who made a special visit to the hotel in order to greet a man who denies the Holocaust while threatening another one, this time with nuclear weapons.
When the Swiss President was widely criticized for his warm and uncritical embrace of one of the world's most evil and dangerous tyrants, he offered two justifications. First, because Switzerland was the host nation for the conference, he was obliged, as the president of the host nation, to greet a fellow head of state. This is patent nonsense. American presidents do not greet heads of states invited by the United Nations, unless they have also been invited by the United States. No American president has greeted Ahmadinejad when he spoke at the UN. Nor would President Obama - certainly without publicly and privately expressing disdain for his bigoted and dangerous views.
This leads to the Swiss President's second purported justification, namely that Switzerland represents the United States' interests in dealing with Iran, with whom it has no formal diplomatic relations. In other words, when the president of Switzerland extended a hand to Ahmadinejad, it was not only the hand of Switzerland, but also the hand of the United States. This too is nonsense compounded by overreaching.
The United States had no interest in extending a hand of legitimacy to Ahmadinejad. Indeed the Obama government - along with many other democratic governments - refused to legitimate this conference by its attendance. Other democracies, which chose to attend, publicly walked out of Ahmadinejad 's bigoted tirade.
The Swiss president had no authority or right to act on behalf of the United States in the way that he did. The US should find another government - one that understands the difference between good and evil and knows how to confront the latter - to represent it in its dealings with Iran. By his craven actions, the Swiss president has disqualified himself from serving in this important role. Neutrality should not be confused with legitimating evil and being complicit with bigotry, as the Swiss have been accused of since they allegedly served as Hitler's banker during World War II.
Not only did the Swiss president legitimate, the Swiss security services protected him from the media. It was certainly appropriate for security to protect Ahmadinejad from physical threats, but they also sought to protect him from being embarrassed by difficult questions from the press, as evidenced by the following incident.
A bank of television cameras and reporters were waiting to interview Ahmadinejad after his meeting with the Swiss president. He was still in the meeting, and so I approached the reporters and suggested that they put several specific questions to him. The press was anxious to hear from me, but the security services physically removed me from the hotel, even though Ahmadinejad was nowhere to be seen.
Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, center, is led away after declaring he planned to challenge Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad about his views on the Holocaust and Israel minutes before the meeting with Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz and Iranian President Ahmadinejad in Geneva, Switzerland, Sunday, April 19, 2009 PHOTO: AP
My second encounter with evil occurred on the day of Ahmadinejad's speech. We, who were there to respond to Ahmadinejad's bigotry, were told that we could listen to his speech in a special room set aside for those who could not enter the actual room in which he was speaking. Several hundred people watched on a television screen as he walked up to the podium to rousing applause by many of the delegates. But the UN purposely decided not to translate his speech into English. All other speeches were translated but we were required to listen to Ahmadinejad in Farsi.
I complained that the right of free speech goes both ways: it not only includes Ahmadinejad's right to express his horrendous opinions, it also includes his critics' right to listen to his words so that we can rebut them in the marketplace of ideas. When the UN authorities refused to translate his speech, I led a walkout from the overflow room toward the room in which he was speaking. I entered the room and took a seat several rows away from where he expressed some of the most horrendous views I had ever heard. To their credit, many of the European delegates walked out in disgust. I joined them, urging other delegates to leave as well and telling them that "silence in the face of evil is complicity." But most of the delegates remained and applauded Ahmadinejad when he made his extreme statements calling not only for the end of Israel but the end of all liberal democracies around the world.
It was then that I understood better how Hitler had come to power. Hitler rose to a position where he could commit genocide not as the result of anti-Semites, but rather because otherwise decent people put their own self interests before the need to condemn his bigotry. As Edmund Burke observed many years ago, "all that is required for evil to succeed is for good men [and women] to remain silent." In that room, on that day, I came face to face with Ahmadinejad's evil. I expected that, but I also came face to face with a different kind of evil: the president of a great nation extending a hand of friendship to Ahmadinejad; and the delegates of many nations applauding some of the most bigoted statements ever uttered from a United Nations lectern.
In the end, the forces of hate and bigotry were confronted by students, professors and political figures who stood against Ahmadinejad and everything he represents. Ahmadinejad and the conference that reflected his world view lost this round, but the battle against bigotry never stays won.
Monday, April 27, 2009
The Joy That Conquers Sadness
Israel is still dancing as the nation remembers those miracle days. Enjoy as Israel is dancing in the streets.
We Won! Painting Not To Be Revealed.

Artist Keeps Obama Painting Under Wraps After Public Outrage
2009-04-27 04:28pm
An American artist has cancelled the public unveiling of his controversial painting of US President Barack Obama due to a massive public outcry.
Michael D'Antuono's artwork The Truth depicts President Obama appearing much like Jesus Christ on the cross, with a crown of thorns atop his head, while behind him a dark veil is being lifted, or lowered, onto the Presidential Seal.
Publicity surrounding the planned unveiling of the painting at NYC's Union Square Park on Friday to mark President Obama's 100th day in office was picked up by newspapers across the United States, and photos of the artwork became one of the most emailed pictures on the internet.
However, D'Antuono says the unveiling has been cancelled, "in part on thousands of emails and phone calls; online blogs and other public commentary received in the first 48 hours following its release" last Friday.
The artist insists that the work was intended purely as a political piece.
"The religious reference was used metaphorically and not to insult anyone's religious beliefs. If that is the effect that my art has had on anyone, I am truly sorry," says D'Antuono.
(c) NewsRoom 2009
Oh, Here We Go!!!
WorldNetDaily
100 days in office, coronated Messiah
Arms outstretched, he wears crown of thorns on his brow
By Drew Zahn
"The Truth" by Michael D'Antuono
On his 100th day in office, President Obama will be "crowned" in messianic imagery at New York City's Union Square.
Artist Michael D'Antuono's painting "The Truth" – featuring Obama with his arms outstretched and wearing a crown of thorns upon his head – will be unveiled on April 29 at the Square's South Plaza.
According to a statement released about the portrait, "The 30" x 54" acrylic painting on canvas depicts President Obama appearing much like Jesus Christ on the Cross: atop his head, a crown of thorns; behind him, the dark veil being lifted (or lowered) on the Presidential Seal. But is he revealing or concealing, and is he being crucified or glorified?"
Even the title of the piece, "The Truth," suggests a play on biblical themes, as Jesus said in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me."
"More than a presidential portrait," writes D'Antuono on a website touting the painting, "'The Truth' is a politically, religiously and socially-charged statement on our nation's current political climate and deep partisan divide that is sure to create a dialogue."
Like others in the news who have depicted Obama in Christ-like imagery, D'Antuono insists he isn't claiming the man is Messiah, but only inviting "individual interpretations."
"'The Truth,' like beauty, is in the eyes of the beholder," claims the exhibit's press release.
D'Antuono even invites the public to email him with reactions to the piece, answering his posed question, "What's your truth?"
As WND has reported, D'Antuono follows others who have cast Obama in messianic imagery.
Clark's Obama sculpture,
Riding a donkey at the Iowa Capitol
In January, artist Matthew J. Clark paraded a sculpture of Obama riding a donkey and preceded by waving palm fronds, reminiscent of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem in the 21st chapter of Matthew as foretold by the prophet Zechariah: "Behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass."
Like D'Antuono, Clark was also unclear about whether his piece was proclaiming Obama to be the Christ or making some social commentary. Clark's website described the sculpture in vague terms:
"This project was inspired by my thoughts about 'icons' and religious symbols and whether they represent truth or merely represent," Clark's website reads. "The sculpture poses a question that relates to social conventions, metaphysics, and the collective response of society in reaction to fearful and uncertain times, but doesn't impose an answer. For me, it has much more to do with the general public as followers than any leader granted power."
Others, such as Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, have been far clearer in their nearly religious adoration of Obama. As WND reported, Farrakhan declared last year that when Obama talks, "the Messiah is absolutely speaking."
Addressing a large crowd behind a podium with a Nation of Islam Saviour's Day 2008 sign, Farrakhan proclaimed, "You are the instruments that God is going to use to bring about universal change, and that is why Barack has captured the youth. And he has involved young people in a political process that they didn't care anything about. That's a sign. When the Messiah speaks, the youth will hear, and the Messiah is absolutely speaking."
Farrakhan pointed out that the man Nation of Islam followers refer to as "the Savior," Fard Muhammad, had a black father and a white mother, just as Obama did.
"A black man with a white mother became a savior to us," he said. "A black man with a white mother could turn out to be one who can lift America from her fall."
WND previously reported a website called "Is Barack Obama the Messiah?" capturing the wave of euphoria that followed the Democratic senator's remarkable rise.
The site is topped by an Obama quote strategically ripped from a Jan. 7 speech at Dartmouth College just before the New Hampshire Primary in which he told students, "… a light will shine through that window, a beam of light will come down upon you, you will experience an epiphany, and you will suddenly realize that you must go to the polls and vote" for Obama.
WND also reported on near-religious experiences surrounding Obama on the campaign trail, as supporters who came to hear him speak on several occasions fainted in the middle of the candidate's speeches. As WND reported, some compared the fainting to fanatical swooning in the midst of a mesmerizing preacher; others, like radio host Michael Medved, thought the collapses were staged moments; and still others believed it was simply a matter of people standing in the crowds too long and growing dehydrated.
P.J. Gladnick of NewsBusters, in an article about D'Antuono's painting on the eve of the Obama administration's 100-day-mark, notes that the messianic parallels begun early in the presidential campaign don't seem to be stopping:
"The artist quite clearly portrays Obama as a latter day Christ-like figure, considering the outstretched arms and the crown of thorns. Obama worship, complete with halo images, has been noted before," writes Gladnick, "but it was nothing compared to current expressions in awe of 'The One' as we approach his hundredth day in office on Wednesday."
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Dueling Messiahs: Jesus vs the Mahdi in Iran
“I believe in Jesus—just as a prophet, not as the Son of God.”
I’ve had this discussion numerous times over the years—at Starbucks, in college faculty offices, online with old friends who had “fallen away.” So the subject wasn’t novel; what was new, however, was the location and the speaker: the dining room of Hotel Laleh in Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran, and a friendly Iranian studying to become a mullah (Islamic cleric).
I was in Iran for the fourth annual conference on Mahdism in August 2008. Mahdism is the Islamic belief in al-Mahdi, “the rightly guided one” who will come before the end of time to make the entire world Muslim. Both major branches of Islam, Sunni and Shi`i, hold this Mahdist belief, despite his absence from the Qur’an. The Mahdi appears, rather, in the Hadiths, or “sayings,” attributed to Islam’s founder, Muhammad (d. A.D. 632). Sunnis, the majority of Islam’s 1.3 billion adherents, believe that the Mahdi has not yet appeared; Shi`is, about 15 percent of the world’s Muslims, believe that the Mahdi has already been here, as one of Muhammad’s descendants through his son-in-law and cousin Ali. The largest branch of the Shi`a, the “Twelvers” of Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon, believe that it was the 12th descendant—also named Muhammad—who did not die but “disappeared” in A.D. 874 and who will return as the Imam al-Mahdi, of whom President Ahmadinejad of Iran speaks constantly.
Ahmadinejad was the keynote speaker at the opening session, but rather than harping on purely political grievances against the West (Palestine and Iraq, for example), he emphasized the imminent coming of the Twelfth Imam and how the process of globalization was Allah’s way of preparing the world for it. The various sessions of the conference all echoed this theme of the Mahdi’s impending arrival, and how the Islamic Republic of Iran was in the vanguard of paving the way for his
coming.
This included some unsettling topics: For example, one Iranian presenter discussed the future status of Jews and Christians under the Mahdi’s rule—would we all be converted or killed? It was not overly reassuring to hear that “most likely, the Mahdi will simply convert Jews and Christians.” There was little or no differentiation between religious and political (or even military) topics: thus panels discussed issues such as the Islamic “anti-christ” (al-Dajjal, “the Deceiver”); the role of jihad, or “holy war,” in Mahdism; and the type of governors the Mahdi will appoint to rule over non-Islamic lands.
Two Goals
It was clear that the conference—and the sponsoring, government-funded Bright Future Institute—had a dual aim. On one level, it was an attempt to spread Mahdism among Sunni Muslims, to convince them it’s acceptable to believe in the Mahdi; for despite the existence of Mahdism in Sunni circles, a minority therein has always rejected the belief because of (1) the lack of Qur’anic support for the Mahdi; (2) the near-heretical divinizing of the 12 Imams practiced by many Shi`is; (3) the history of bloodshed between Sunnis and Shi`is, going back to Islam’s earliest days in the Seventh Century. Still, Shi`i Iran is hoping to rival Sunni Saudi Arabia as the leading Islamic nation, and is trying—with some success—to use belief in the Mahdi as leverage to do so. But the ayatollahs who rule Iran are also trying to gain influence in the non-Muslim world by pushing Mahdism among Jews and particularly Christians, claiming that the messianic hopes of both religions will be fulfilled in the Twelfth Imam, the Mahdi.
For example, several Americans (both lay and ordained) courted most aggressively by the Iranians were representatives of Christian denominations whom we might refer to as “ecumaniacs”—pursuing “interfaith dialogue” for its own sake. Mahdism is thus being used as both a political and religious “evangelism” tool by Iranian Shi`is.
But evangelism attempts can cut both ways. I befriended several of the conference organizers, in particular a mullah-in-training (mullahs are rather like priests, whereas an ayatollah is similar to a bishop or archbishop). He and I began by discussing ways of interpreting the Qur’an, good-naturedly arguing whether the strict literalist Sunnis or the more allegorical-minded Shi`is had the correct approach to issues such as jihad. As the week progressed, our periodic conversations turned to Jesus in Islam and Christianity, and what the Bible and Qur’an say about Him. What my colleague knew was what Islamic propagandists had taught him: for example, that the Counselor, or Advocate, Jesus promised to believers in John 14:16 refers to the eventual coming of Muhammad. Islamic apologists argue that the Greek parakletos (“advocate, helper”) should be read periklutos (“praised”)—because the Arabic root hamada, whence comes the name Muhammad, means “praised.” As former Anglican Archbishop of Jerusalem, and Islam scholar, Kenneth Cragg says: “This charge and the Muslim alteration have no basis exegetically. Nor does the sense of the passage bear the Muslim rendering. . . . However painful the necessity, the Christian must cheerfully shoulder the task of distinguishing clearly between Muhammad and the Holy Spirit, and of appreciating how it comes that the Muslim can be so confidently confused at this point” (The Call of the Minaret, 1964, p. 285).
The Jesus We Believe In
I’m not sure how cheerful I was, but I did try to follow Archbishop Cragg’s advice. Mid-week of my stay in Iran I asked my Muslim friend if he’d ever read the Bible. “No,” he wistfully explained. “Wait here,” I told him. I went to my room and came back with my small volume of the New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs—U.S. Army-issue, with a camouflage cover, ironically—which I gave him. He tucked it away, no doubt knowing full well that while the official government position is that Iranians have complete religious freedom, the reality is quite different. I don’t know if he’d had time to read any of it, but a few days later as the dinner dishes from my last meal in Iran were being cleared to make way for coffee and tea, the conversation again turned to Jesus, and my colleague repeated the line about Jesus being a great prophet and how Muslims and Christians could rally around that belief. “No, my friend,” I told him, “that is not the Jesus we believe in. We believe He was the Son of God, crucified and resurrected to atone for our sins.” I was seconded in this by a French Catholic scholar sitting at our table. My Iranian colleague then asked, “How could one man’s sins take care of another’s?”
“Because,” I replied, “He was not just a man—He was God’s Son.” We discussed this for a few minutes, until some ayatollahs sat down near us—at which point we decided discretion might be the better part of valor. But I encouraged my Muslim friend to read the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament and compare them to what the Qur’an says about Jesus. Who knows? Maybe someday at least one member of Iran’s clerical leadership will have a true view of Jesus as Messiah, or who at least, like Nicodemus, can come to Jesus by night.
Iran is funding and supporting a worldwide effort to spread Shi`i messianic beliefs among Christians, even in the United States, via organizations such as the Islamic Information Center in Washington, D.C. We need to be aware of this, and prepared to share with them “the faith once for all entrusted to the saints” (Jude 3) in the true Messiah, Jesus Christ.
A writer, editor, and teacher, Timothy R. furnish (above) received his M.A.R. from Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, in 1989 and a Ph.D. in Islamic history from Ohio State University in 2001. He is the author of Holiest Wars: Islamic Mahdis, their Jihads and Osama bin Ladin (Praeger, 2005) and an elder at Rivercliff Lutheran Church in Sandy Springs, Ga. He operates a Web site dedicated to studying Mahdism: www.mahdiwatch.org.
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Islam: A Time Line
Islam is the youngest of the monotheistic religions, developing some six centuries after jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Because both Christianity and Islam claim to be God’s true revelation to mankind, and because of the geographical proximity of the states where each was the dominant religion, the two faiths have often been in armed conflict.
for the first millennium of Islam’s existence, it was expansionist and often militarily successful (with notable exceptions such as the first Crusade and the Ottoman failures to conquer all of Europe). But starting in the 18th century, Western powers (Russia, Britain, france, and eventually the United States) became militarily and politically dominant over the Islamic world, a status that still exists today.
A.D. 622/1 AH (after hijra) “Flight” of Muhammad and first followers from Mecca to Medina.
632 Death of Muhammad.
661 Murder of Ali, Muhammad’s son-in-law and first in line of Shi`ite imams.
632–1000 Islamic conquests across Middle East, Persia, North Africa, and Spain.
732 Invading Islamic army defeated at Tours, France.
874 Death (disappearance, in Shi`ite belief) of 12th Shi`ite Imam, who will return as al Mahdi to Islamize the world.
1099–1291 The Crusades.
1453 Conquest of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turkish Empire.
1492 Last Moorish (Islamic) kingdom in Spain falls. Muslims (and Jews) expelled from Spain. Columbus discovers the new world.
1501–1524 Iran/Persia forcibly converted to Shi`ism by Safavid Shah Isma’il.
1529 Ottomans besiege Vienna.
1571 Battle of Lepanto: combined European Christian fleets defeat Ottoman navy.
1798–1936 British and French imperialism in Middle East.
1918–22 Ottoman Empire collapses after World War I.
1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran.
Timothy R. Furnish
Friday, April 24, 2009
Support for Israel . . . not just for blessing now
With Sharia Compliant Finance already in place with groups like AIG, Citigroup, Bank of America, and Harvard's 7th annual Sharia Compliant Finance symposium having happened, not to mention Wall Street's panel of Sharia Compliant advisors from the United Arab Emirates and Dubai, we are in trouble. Our own country can now offer Sharia mortgages, credit cards and health programs. Our lack of funds and their abundance puts us in a bad place when financial scruples are second to success at any cost.
Sharia Compliant Finance means that 'zakat' tax, the Islamic loophole around collecting interest on loans (forbidden in Islamic law), must be used for programs that make the funds 'halal' (pure acc. to Islamic law) and one of those categories is jihad. Holy war against unbelievers.
Our President bowing to the Saudi King, and buddy shaking Hugo Chavez's hand then receiving Hugo's book on "How I Hate the U.S.A." are things Israel would just not put up with. The present administration snubbed Israel's Army Chief of Staff, Gabi Ashkenazi when he came here in March to discuss the dire situation of Iran and what must be done.
Do we have to repeat Britain's faux pax when Chamberlain thought he had peace with Germany in the bag?
It is time to wake up America!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
The following is a section of Martin Gilbert’s book Holocaust Journey used in his |
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