We are talking about secular Muslims, sophisticated people; politics was not being discussed, nor was Israel or Judaism. Yet, out of such alcoholic depths—warriors sometimes spring.
This was a turning point for Pierre. He vowed not to remain a bystander, minimizer, denier, or appeaser. A few years ago, Pierre was quoted on this very point. He said:
“I believe that Israel is the miracle of the 20th century. It is also the result of the worse injustice that has ever been visited upon a people. No other people but the Jews have been exterminated, non-stop, for 20 centuries.” He cautions fellow Jews by reminding them how 470,000 Jews were deported from the Warsaw Ghetto before the remaining 30,000 realized what was happening and decided to (fight for their lives.) “How many Jews are going to be killed before we wake up and decide to fight back? I don’t want to be among the last 30,000 to start fighting. I’m starting to fight right now.”
Brave words—soon followed by even braver deeds.
Pierre told me that “Jews are not allowed to pre-emptively attack. Sometimes, they even get blamed when they dare to defend themselves.”
When the Intifada of 2000 broke over Israel’s head, Pierre was ready. He was the first person who challenged the Al-Dura Blood Libel. This horrific, fake child murder was first aired on and promoted globally by France’s Channel Two. Pierre sued Channel Two; he even persuaded the French B’nai Brith to back his lawsuit because only an organization, not an individual, could bring such a suit. Pierre spent eight months researching the matter—only to see his case dismissed in six weeks—with no explanation given. (Such cases usually take two years to be resolved).
Philippe Karsenty, another hero, and also a friend of Pierre’s and mine, was sued by Channel Two for defamation because he, too, continued to insist that the Al Dura matter was a hoax, a fakery. Had Karsenty lost, he could have been jailed. Pierre told me that “The French hired the very best lawyers. They really wanted to win the case against him. They did not want Charles Enderlin, a veteran French journalist, and a Jew, to have to admit that he’d been ‘had’ by his Palestinian cameraman. Even now, Enderlin refuses to apologize or to admit any wrongdoing.
After seven hard years, Karsenty was finally vindicated in a French court—a victory which Channel Two is still appealing.
Both Pierre and Philippe worked against the tide. The Islamic jihadists and their western collaborators, including the French government and world media, fought against them. But, at the same time, neither man was supported, (or even believed), by most Jewish and Israeli organizations. There were a handful of exceptions, including the Zionist Organization of America in Karsenty’s case. These two heroes were sometimes sabotaged by Israeli and American-Jewish organizations. Karsenty has recently criticized David Harris and the American Jewish Committee for having utterly sabotaged his efforts in France.
Pierre believes that the Arab-friendly French government, especially under Chirac, is partly responsible for the enormous harm caused by the Al-Dura Blood Libel. For example, in his view, the fact that valuable footage was immediately given away to the world media for free is a dead giveaway. “Suddenly, Channel Two tells us that it can’t make money on the death of a kid.” Pierre is incredulous. “This is precisely what the media makes money on.”
We may recall that Arafat and his family were treated like royalty in Paris. This is where Arafat came to die his mysterious death, long rumored to be of AIDS. (Arafat allegedly liked boys, not girls). Arafat died in November of 2004. As I recall, the French military Honor Guard held a funeral for Arafat at a military airport near Paris. President Jacques Chirac stood alone beside Arafat’s body for about ten minutes. He described Arafat as “a man of courage.” The French national anthem, followed by the Palestinian anthem, followed by Chopin’s Funeral March were then played.
Even dead, Chirac was still in Arafat’s back pocket.
After the staged theatrical shooting of Mohamed Al-Dura in the fall of 2000, Israel was demonized all over the world. Riots and anti Semitic rallies broke out. Immediately thereafter, the carefully orchestrated Al-Aqsa Intifada was unfurled. It was to become a global, possibly permanent Intifada against Israel. Pierre says: “The first Intifada was spontaneous, the second one was prepared. They had 30,000 guns ready to use.”
Meanwhile, Pierre tried to rally French Jewish organizations to hold the French government responsible, legally, for having defamed the Jewish state. (Channel Two is a government-owned station). Then, he went to Israel, (he holds an Israeli passport), to further research the Al-Dura case. A German filmmaker, Esther Schapira, made a film in which she raised all the issues. Pierre persuaded a Jewish organization to buy the rights so that they could distribute it widely.
Still, neither the Israeli government nor world-wide Jewish organizations wanted to make a fuss. Perhaps they just wanted the world to forget the Blood Libel. In truth, once the image or the Big Lie is out there, the truth cannot make a psychological dent. People are instant-believers—and then they move on. Anything, including the facts, which might disturb their first impression or their long indoctrinated beliefs is simply rejected.
This did not stop Pierre. With his French passport in hand, Pierre assembled a crew and took his digital camera to extremely dangerous places in the West Bank and Gaza. In one film after the other, he exposed the Palestinian propaganda-and-hate machine as both non-stop and exterminationist in intentionality–and this was before Israel evacuated Gaza and Hamas was voted into office. Rehov documented the truth about the Palestinian refugees; the abuse of Arab Jews and Christians in the disputed territories and in the Muslim world; the training of suicide killers; the real story of the Palestinian takeover of the Church of the Nativity and the non-massacre in Jenin; the “silent exodus” of 800,000 Arab Jews, etc.
Guess what? He could not persuade a single channel to show any of his films in France. (I failed to interest HBO and PBS in airing his films here as well—even though they aired other films with very opposite points of view). And then, Pierre ingeniously used the French freedom of expression laws in order to distribute his films. He created a political magazine which he called Contre Champs, (Reverse Angle), and inserted a copy of his documentaries in each magazine. His magazines sold like hotcakes.
Pierre is now working on a new film script—this time, not a documentary, a feature film. If he can get it produced, it may indeed influence the course of events. I can say no more about it at this time.
I asked Pierre why he had chosen exile, yet again. He is not as young as he once was, none of us are, he has expended a fortune to get this work done. This is what he said.
“My daughter was very friendly with Ilan Halimi, the poor Jewish boy who was lured to his death after three weeks of torture by Muslim barbarians. The whole neighborhood took part in the torture or came to watch it. My daughter knew that he’d been kidnapped before it made the newspapers. She could not live in France anymore. I also came here to be with her.”
I sighed. First, I told him that America was also undergoing an Islamification process and it remained to be seen as to whether or not we will stand up to jihad.”
He said: “I am afraid that no one will understand this until there is another terrorist attack on American soil.”
Said I, mournfully: “That might wake up the Christians but not the Jews.”
And so we sat with each other, sipping coffee and enjoying his enchanting little dog, Nougat, a Yorkie. We remained together in the den until it was time to joyfully welcome the Sabbath and my other guests.
Great stuff! Thanks for writing about this important man! I linked to you in today’s blog:
http://susankatzkeating.blogspot.com/2009/04/phyllis-chesler-independent-thinker-who.html
I hadn’t known that the Karsenty verdict was being appealed. I believe there has been a German documentary about how lip readers said that al-Dura’s father was telling the cameras to move to the side, or something like that. The information has to be publicized (I can’t imagine how it will ever make the Main-Stream Media at this date) in order to protect Karstenty from a reversal of the verdict.
perhaps he will join with others here who are willing to say the truth about what is happening and the virulent anti-semitism in europe and on our college campuses here. jewish leaders here are court jews and those in congress and in the media, too craven to speak out. that of course, includes our president who is a supplicant of the dirtbag in iran, who is funding the very ones who are threatening to attack the white house. go figure.
Thank you so much for introducing us to this wonderful & courageous man! Unfortunately, I was NOT surprised to hear that he had no backing from the Jewish/Israeli community. As you all may remember my own past experience of 3/21 in San Francisco after the ANSWER rally can attest to that. When will our Jewish communities wake up? I don’t know if Jews have become “too comfortable” and don’t want to rock the boat. Or if it’s a carryover from the shtetl mentality…”shhhush be quiet and maybe they won’t notice us & will go away”. Whatever it is…we must start speaking out and supporting each other, even if that means taking to the streets. We must save our people and our country from rabid anti-Semitism and Islamism.
Wake up, wake up, Jews of the Diaspora – we must stand together or we shall surely fall.
Dear Phyllis
Thanks for the wonderful information and all the associated links. It’s a pity that such a great French thinker must feel compelled to leave his own country and its language.
We must all do our best to work together and provide a strong, welcoming Diaspora community–not just in America–for men like Pierre Rehov. A community, too, with the proper resources for intellectual and ethical life.
Norman
I remember reading about Rehov when Suicide Killers opened in New York city.(2006)
Eventually a thesis kicks in: Suicide bombing is a spectacular manifestation of sexual repression, enforced by a neurotic clergy on libidinous young men all too eager to sacrifice their loveless existence for the virgin orgies of paradise.— Nathan Lee, The New York Times
Having heard a description of their own motives from the lips of would be suicide killers, this strikes me as acurate.
the fact these people are forcefed a strict and castrating religious dogma that makes them buy the Virgin dream, part and parcel
“The entire country has been invaded by six to ten million Muslims who do not want to adapt.”
The problem with this statement and the crude anti-French statement proceeding it is that Jewish France overwhelmingly supported this mass immigration, not to mention hate speech laws, and multiculturalism in general.
I’m curious to know if Mr Rehov ever worked with French patriots to end its insane immigration policy over the past five decades?
Thanks for the great article.
I really want to be positive, and believe in the chances of survival for Israel. However, it does not look very good.
Many evangelical Christian support Israel. India should be a natural ally to Israel, and both countries are getting closer.
The hateful pronouncements of Hitler-the-2nd Admadhinejad (o whatever his name is), and the Iran Ayatollahs (Komeini, Komino, Komehere or whatever) may result in a type of Karmic boomerang, for if you play with fire, you can get burnt, and such inflammatory language usually backfires.
Before it is too late, Israel must force their hands, and Obama’s in the process, first by attacking the Iranian facilities that are trying to produce a nuclear bomb. That mad dog Amadi… will surely retaliate, and probably try to hit Dimona, then Israel MUST NUKE THEM. This is the only language they understand. The blast may finally bring peace and probably prevent another holocaust.
Short of this, it may well be the Jews in Israel may have to start packing again and leave the neighborhood.
Pierre is a FANTASTIC storyteller and videographer… I look forward to seeing MANY more stories from him…
Mr Wolf
I had my children, then in high school, watch Isräel et la Guerre des Images, and Trojan Horse, and it innoculated them against the propaganda and prepared them for the Jew hatred that followed when they went to college. I think his films must be seen by young people before they go to university.
Along with Tsafrir Ronen, may he rest in peace, Pierre is one of my heroes.
His efforts should inspire all those who have a conscience to have hope for the future. NOT Obama kind of hope-all style and NO substance-but real substantial hope.
Phyllis, Thank you for this fantastic piece. I met a young Jewish French businessman in Tokyo a few years ago at a Chabad Shabbat dinner. I asked whether he was concerned about anti-Semitism in France. He thought that the Jews, who primarily live away from the Muslim banlieus, were relatively safe. I pressed on about concern for the safety of future generations of Jews in France. He seemed ok with it, but mentioned that his brother was emigrating to Israel. Reminds me of Rehov’s Warsaw Ghetto story.
While I am not a religious Jew, I choose to attend services at a local Orthodox synagogue because the more religious tend to vote conservative. It is the Reform, assimilated Jews who voted for Obama. Torah-observant Jews see through him and regard him as a threat and a danger…of which is he both.
“The French non-Jews are scared, they are happy to sacrifice their Jews and all of Israel if it means they will be safe.”
Israel is not THEIRS to “sacrifice”. In this case the more appropriate term would be “murder”.
Well aware of the important and brilliant work Pierre Rehov has been doing, Librarians for Fairness long ago established a link to his website.
Nougat looks particularly dangerous. That doggy will scare any terrorist.
God bless you, Phyllis, for your sweet and strong spirit and telling the truths that need to be told. I truly admire you.
Many of your articles are heart-wrenching and tear worthy and NOT propaganda but the plain and simple RAW truth.
I pray for you often and I thank GOD for your courage and your efforts for women, men and children.
Blessings be with you now and always.
Love,
Delia
This guy is priceless! I agree with a commenter that his works should be shown in high schools and colleges as a preemeptive education to counteract the faux reportage that is occuring in the Muslim world, particulary in the so-called “victim territories” that constantly harrass and threaten Israel.
Ms. Chesler, your prose is vibrant and nuanced. Reading between the lines, I can feel your pain/concern as well as Mr. Rehov’s over his decision to move to America (may we welcome him with open arms). Yet, the fact such a risk taker,(I have seen several of his films, he’s in the trenches) has retreated to our shores is pause for reflection!
Where and When will the push back occur? Our President, let’s not even talk about the Prime Minister that Pierre left behind, does not seem to realize, acknowledge or be aware of “the war of masses” that is occuring in Europe and now, in America as well. Your profile is a wake up call which I fear will remain under the radar!
The best that I can do, is echo your warnings Dr. Chesler and recommend that people view the films of Pierre Rehov. Maybe, just maybe, then, we can start to see the truth!
The story of Pierre Rehov is an important one, but what is more important, and frightening to Jews around the world,is what the last commenter said: “BL”
“I can feel your pain/concern as well as Mr. Rehov’s over his decision to move to America…Yet the fact such a risk taker has retreated to our shores is pause for reflection!
Reflection? No. Total outrage and an awakening to the second European “judenreit” is what we should be pausing for.
Many Jewish leaders fled Nazi Germany and Austria but most stayed and died (including members of my family).
Look at the Islamitization of Europe today, including the communist/Moslem alliance of violence in Malmo, Sweden (where the police did damned little), and you can see the slow death of ages old Jewish communities there.
The Arab world is largely free of Jews, and Europe is next. Communist countries in Latin America are on their way too – Venezuela, Nicaragua and if there are Jewish communities in Bolivia, Ecuador, and El Salvador, they will be attacked in the future. Cuba speaks for itself, except to liberal Jews who think that Castro and Che are the coolest things next to Ice Cream Sundays.
Meir Kahane lived in the US, then lived in Israel, and was assassinated by a Moslem killer in New York.
Where can Jews go where they are safe? There are only a few countries that might be safe-havens for Jews, and even there, they are not safe.
US – Kahane killing; attacks on Jewish offices and the El Al Airlines in California. Bombings of synagogues; Moslem hate mobs in the streets and on campuses, where violence is rising against Jewish students.
Obama is oblivious to the threat despite his mealymouth speeches. So is Eric Holder, who pardoned communist terrorists who fought against the US right here at home.
Canada – there is a rising Moslem militancy and unless the Canadian Left is soundly defeated, they will continue to gain a foothold in western Canada and Quebec. The communists are their allies in these places.
Australia – got a liberal leader but the people of Australia are gaining awareness of what the militant muslims are up to, and want limitations on immigration.
New Zealand – iffy.
Israel: Surrounded by enemies, soon to be nuclear armed. A good place for a final stand. Just hope that Israel takes out all the main cities/centers of the Arab world before dying.
There are no other places where Jews are safe (Japan might be a refuge for a few), and that is the shame of Western Civilization which is collapsing as I write.
If you didn’t notice Obama’s bowing to the Saudis, you missed the Dhimmi/Dummy bowing to the slavemaster of Africans, the Moslems of Mecca. The Chinese have a term for this Master-Servant relationship – Kaotowing.
Obama is good at at, like Neville Chamberlain was at Munich.
Need I say more? Yes, one more thing. Turn around in the world and ask who can you trust to stand with world Jewry. Then count them off on your two hands, putting one behind you because the count won’t get that high.
Then you know what is really happening.
America, under Obama, will no longer be the safehaven for Jews, and many other ethnic/religious groups, as time goes by.
Appeasers,cowards, and traitors are always ready to sell-out someone in the name of appeasement (Chamberlain), cowardice (the French), or to further the revolution, i.e. the Communists.
We’ve got them all in Europe and a lot in America. Remember, half the country voted for Obama and Biden. Remember how many Germans voted for Hitler and the Nazis.
If history is being repeated, we’d better wake up and start the resistance now, or we will be dhimmis within the next generation, or nuked.
Next time you speak to Pierre, Dr. Chesler, welcome him to America on my behalf. America, at least, still loves liberty…well, outside of academia most of us do. As I thought when Aysan Ali moved here, it is Europe’s loss and our gain.
I wish I could remember who said this, but it’s such a good remark that I’m hesitant simply to steal it: Europe used to have a minority that was, on the whole, law-abiding, hardworking, and creative. They killed that minority and now they have the minority they deserve.
Miamiman has some good ideas. There are a lot of excellent reasons why the Israeli government doesn’t ask me for advice. If they did I’d suggest they let it be known that if Israel is attacked with nuclear weapons Muslims in the future will have a hard time fulfilling the injunction of making pilgrimages to Mecca when Mecca is a cloud of radioactive dust.
Most of the rest of the world doesn’t really give a hoot about “Never again.” Perhaps they might if it were amended: “Never again. But if again, this time not just us.”
Wake up, wake up, Jews of the Diaspora – if you listen to the lies of the Sionists Dementia you shall surely fall.