Bibi Grows Up and Other Thoughts from the United Nations
I haven’t always been the biggest fan of Benjamin Netanyahu. He seemed something of a careerist with the capacity to talk out of both sides of his mouth. In other words, a politician. But who could decry anyone with the guts to stand in the belly of the United Nations — as he did last Friday — and define that paleo-corrupt institution precisely as it is — a “house of many lies”?
Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress back in May was also widely applauded by a friendly audience. But this address — before a body that welcomes Iranian President Ahmadinejad for the so-called Durban III conference against racism, an inversion of human rights not even Orwell could have imagined — was in the least collegial of atmospheres.
And yet his talk was extremely eloquent and well-delivered. In an atmosphere former NY Mayor Koch describes as a “cesspool,” Netanyahu was the only man, the only statesman, genuinely to stand up for the principles of guilt-ridden Western civilization.
Noteworthy too is that the Israeli PM speaks (and no doubt writes) the English language far better than any of our presidential candidates, not to mention our cliche-ridden liberalist incumbent who is even loath to appear before children without a teleprompter.
Bibi Netanyahu has grown up and grown into the kind of statesman the world and, alas, this country needs. (Can you imagine how he would rout the field in one of the Republican debates?) In Israel he is accused of being “too American,” and indeed he is very American. He represents the best of our tradition –a true liberal in the classical sense, not the false kind currently dominating our culture. Everyone should read his speech — or, better yet, watch it.
Even more important, however, is the question of what to do about that former repository of our hopes and dreams known as the UN. I am writing this on the plane back from NY where I was supervising PJTV coverage of The Perils of Global Intolerance: The United Nations and Durban III. That was a counter-conference to the UN’s Durban III and featured a number of magnificent speakers from Jon Voight to the Sudan’s Simon Deng. (You can watch them all at the link.) And when I say “magnificent” I am not in this instance being hyperbolic. I am not one who normally enjoys speeches at conferences. I guess I have too much of my own kind of ADD. But these speeches were riveting. Have a look.
Luckily for Israel, there is no Nelson Mandella to surrender to. If there were, I suspect many Israelis would be very relieved to do so.
Why would anyone want someone like Nelson Mandela as the head of a neighboring state when he has failed miserably to speak up publicly against the brutal rule of Robert Mugabe and his supporters in Zimbabwe? Chuck would do well to read The Fear by Peter Godwin (2010). It is shameful when the same loud voices protesting against the situation of Palestinians are so silent when it comes to Zimbabwe. Can one really have respect for someone who has pussyfooted around Mugabe and other African dictators?
Unlike the writer of this column, I have always admired Benjamin Netanyahu.
But I do agree with the writer that the Prime Minister has grown in his years in public service and emerged as the single most eloquent and intelligent voice among world leaders on the subjects of human rights and human dignity.
Alas, that says as much about the paucity of courage and eloquence among world “leaders” in 2011 as it does about Prime Minister Netanyahu’s brilliance, but so be it.
If he ran as a presidential candidate in the United States in 2012 there is simply no way he could lose.
What many in this country don’t know is that, in addition to presiding over a country that is the refuge of tens of thousands of Sudanese escaping death in their native land, and being the leader of a country whose legislature includes democratically-elected Arab members, he has also presided over an economic miracle that has Israel in the top tier of technological inventiveness because the Prime Minister knows what is necessary to encourage economic growth, and he has accomplished this legislatively and through economic freedom unknown in the United State under our current president who knows nothing about the private sector and encouraging economic miracles such as those enjoyed by Israelis everyday.
Mazel tov, Mr. Prime Minister. You stood head and shoulders above every nation’s representatives, including, alas, our own. Shalom to you and to the brave people of the State of Israel.
As long as the current Palestinian “leadership” is alive, they will do their level best to commit genocide on Israel. They will settle for absolutely nothing less, and this is as obvious as the Sun on a hot day. The ONLY reason they have not done this (including using several nukes) is they have been kept too weak to pull it off. Their leadership does not want to negotiate with you. Instead, they want to shoot you, your family, and the rest of the Jews in the face, NOW.
Because the current Palestinian leadership will eventually die, they have ensured that the next generation of leaders will also be absolutely obsessed with genocide, by institutionalizing fierce, mindless hatred of Jews in the schools and in TV shows, books and magazines.
Therefore, I would like to make a suggestion for the Prime Minister’s consideration. Stop with the talking, already. Instead, invade the Palestinian regions and take out all who resist, especially their leadership. Confiscate all weapons. If some leaders escape to other countries, then hunt them anywhere on Earth until they are dead from your agents, or from old age.
Meanwhile, build up the invaded Palestinian areas and modernize those areas. Clean up their overwhelming and disgusting corruption. Stop all shows, articles, school classes and Mosque lectures that teach hatred of Jews and Israel. Raise their education and living standards. Then gradually allow democratic elections.
They do not have to love Jews, they just have to stop working intensely for their mass extinction. I know this suggestion is aggressive, but pointless additional discussions with murderous, pathologically lying, corrupt thugs for yet another 40 years are not going to get anybody anywhere.
Ummm…Not aggressive enough. Wink
I’ve liked him for a long time too, but without following the ins and outs of Israeli politics.
He can also be pithy. As in (paraphrased):
“The Middle East doesn’t hate the West because of Israel. They hate Israel because it’s of the West.”
Absolutely spot on Gloria.
It was an impressive speech. Perhaps that was inevitable. When your very existence is at stake, as is Israel’s, you finally get down to brass tacks and speak the simple truth, as Netanyahu did.
I especially appreciated Netanyahu’s gesture to negotiate with Abbas right there, right then, if it would bring about a real peace. It won’t happen of course because Netanyahu showed the Palestinians for what they are: profoundly insincere about wanting peace on any reasonable terms.
The media should hound Abbas with this and ask him when he is meeting with Netanyahu and, if he is not, WHY he won’t meet with him. They won’t, of course, because they aren’t sincere about peace either. They simply want to find angles to embarass Netanyahu and Israel and make them look insincere and give the impression that the Israelis are the primary roadblock on the road to peace.
The whole lot of them, Palestinians and all their enablers, especially the media, should be profoundly ashamed of themselves for not making peace when so many opportunities abound to achieve it. They have only themselves to blame for the continuing hostilities.
Why should they be ashamed? They’re getting what they want – no peace and a never ending, propagandized attack on Israel.
The reason the media won’t go after the Palestinians the way you want them to is quite simply that each individual reporter as well as his or her editor wants to go on living. It’s also possible a lot of them, maybe most, are not really ready yet to admit to themselves — let alone outsiders — that they have been cowed by the terrorists, so there’s little point asking whether they are afraid of what would happen if they annoy the Palestinian “leaders”.
“A house of many lies?”
How can Mr. Netanyahu use that characterization of an historically August Body that, in significant part, was designed and brought to life by none other than that famous convicted perjurer (whose defense was that his accuser was a homosexual with bad teeth): Alger Hiss.
@4 wins the Grand Prize for non-sequiturs!
Wish we could swap with Israel and get Bibi in return for Obozo and a player to be named later
I understand the sentiment, but Israel (where I live half the year) says “thanks but no thanks”.
Israel has had its own farcical version of Barack 0bama, a former trade union leader with an ego to match 0bama’s. Liberal Ashkenazi guilt (he’s of Moroccan-Jewish origin) catapulted him to the Defense Ministry . During the 2nd Lebanese War he ran around like a headess chicken, and was sent into the political desert. In one poll, his approval rating ran two (2) percent, those 2% presumably being the members of his extended family.
I’m sure some clown like 0bama could have become PM of Israel, but his gov’t would have been toppled within the year by a “motion of non-confidence’.
It’s truly a shame that so many Jews in the US, most notably NY liberals and wealthy Hollywood crazies, support and fund an incompetent president who bows to Arabs and barely tolerates Israel. Their silence on dangers in the middle-east speaks volumes, while their shrill leftist whining on domestic social and political issues sends a different but equally disgusting message. Thanks for standing up and being counted among the sane, Roger.
These JINOs are members of the New Class first, second, and last. In the “social [perversion of] justice” society they dream of the New Class (gov’t bureaucrats, mediots, and the “helping” professions) just conveniently happen to get their beds feathered. Their opinions and voting patterns reflects short-term class interests, not national or even ethnic ones.
To the extent that they have a Jewish identity at all it’s an affectation, or looney-liberalism with a Jewish sauce.
Jews of an older generation may not be on board with the agenda of today’s Deemocrats [sic], but are stuck in a time warp where Democrats were the party of urban ethnics and Republicans the party of “restricted” WASP country clubs. (Never mind that the biggest racists in US political history were Southern Democrats: the South was not a major Jewish population center, historically.)
JINOS? – I like that. I think I’ll start using it. Thanks.
Please don’t. It is as offensice as JAP or any other derogatory term; and who are you (or New Class Traitor) to tell any Jew how to be one? Even (especially) if one is Jewish oneself?
I like Bibi and have what my Isreali cousins might call a “cowboy” mentality- so even if I agree with your political points, please make them ad raz, not ad hominum. We have enough problems w/0 more nasty language, no matter how justified or cute you might feel the terms might be.
I hit submit before proofing my typing:
Corrections: Offensive, not offensice, Israeli; not Isreali (although I would like to think that Israel is real!); and w/o, not w/0
Sorry.
Tevagirl,
I like “JINO”. It is funny, effective and descriptive Jewish rehotoric.
With all due respect, who are you to say Jews can’t “nudge” each other? “Kol Yisrael Arevim Zeh Lazeh (“All Jews are responsible for one another”) – Shavuot 39a.
I don’t see anything “ad hominum” in JINO but”clarity of expression” as Roger puts it.
We could go for Howard Jacobson’s “Finklers” or “AsAJew”or some other 21st Century adjectives to aptly describe that type of person’s excuse for their political alignment with the Left’s anti-Zionist agenda. Amazing how their excuse is applied when they are giving credence to the Arab’s lies.
“AsAJew” is priceless
I like JINO too.
So who the heck are YOU to tell me, goy or Jew, that I can’t use a truly descriptive expression — as descriptive as “hard shell” Baptist, for instance?
“Democrats were the party of urban ethnics and Republicans the party of “restricted” WASP country clubs. (Never mind that the biggest racists in US political history were Southern Democrats,,,”
We southern democrats worked hard for that title, but modesty precludes our acceptance of it. When southern blacks migrated north to the land of milk, honey, and well paying factory jobs, they discovered an immovable obstacle, northern unions comprised of lily white, WASP, urban ethical democrats that refused admission to them. The migration back to the south has been occurring steadily for about two decades now.
A Palestinian State!
There is an Arab State in Palestine, it is Jordan, and the Hashemites should be returned to the deserts of Arabia from whence they came, and belong.
Let the Arabs of Gaza and the West Bank migrate to the East Bank to be with their cousins.
Incidentally, Quisling was Norwegian..
Given the current behavior of the Norwegians, I expect the reference to quisling was quite deliberate.
The only present Western Leader even remotely in his league today is Canadian PM Steven Harper.
Time to quit the UN and start a United Democratic Nations. Keep out nations headed by authoritarian regimes.
Excellent idea.
Thanks Eric R. – I agree that Harper is a guy that calls it as it is. Proud to have him as my PM.
Listened to Netanyahu’s speech this morning. Wow. The man is eloquent and poised. He painted the whole issue in clear terms. He had me googling maps of Israel. Only nine kilometres? That is the distance between me and my closest grocery store! His line about Hamas was brilliant. A brave, stand up guy.
BTW, one reason Netanyahu’s so articulate in English is that he grew up half in Israel, half in Philly, and had his entire higher education in the US. His father, historian Benzion Netanyahu (still alive at age 101, ad meah ve’esrim) was a professor at Dropsie University (later at Cornell, from where he retired). After his service in the IDF’s famed General Staff Reconnaissance Unit (sayeret matkal), Netanyahu got a BA in architecture and an MA in management from MIT (taking classes in political science at Harvard on the side).
I’m also sure that growing up in a historian’s house helps one to take the long view on things.
He was a hack politician during his 1st term as PM, later did a much better job at the finance ministry, and now is the least bad PM available (having much matured). In every position having to do with foreign affairs (ambassador to the UN 1984-1988, deputy FM afterwards, FM much later, and now PM) he’s done a sterling job explaining Israel’s perspective (even his political opponents acknowledge his skill at that).
Netanyahu’s speech was the speech our president should have made, but didn’t. And THAT is why he needs to be thrown out of office in 2012. If an American president can’t stand up to this house of tyrants and call it what it is, a toilet, then that just makes our president look small and insignificant. And to abdicate that responsibility to Netanyahu is just plain embarrassing. I was thoroughly ashamed to be an American that day, because Netanyahu did what an American president SHOULD HAVE DONE years ago.
As the President goes, so goes America.-re. small and insignificant.
Few months back PJM had an article- “The incredible shrinking President”.
And as I mentioned before-for Obama -everything is a
“lose/win” situation. He wins -by losing…
– seems like his “Wilderness Years”, i.e., period between his last time in the office of PM and now, were longer than Churchill’s between the great wars.
Israel’s Ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren, is another uniquely articulate and perceptive statesman, whose like we haven’t seen since Jeanne Kilpatrick, or perhaps Josh Bolton.
Nick Ronalds, perhaps you and others will find this of interest:
http://www.pjtv.com/?cmd=mpg&mpid=174&load=3080
I would have a bit more respect for Michael Oren if he had made it known to his people in California that he strongly disapproved of prosecuting the students who disrupted his speech. His influence could have put a stop to that nonsense. The students deserved to be, and were disciplined by the university. That was enough. This prosecution looks, and is a petty exercise of power.
The elegant Mr. Oren also penned the latest fairy tale about Israeli’s attack on the USS Liberty. Just what I would expect from someone who renounced his U.S. citizenship.
Why should he stand up for the trash?
The citizens of California, who fund the university, wanted them prosecuted.
It is our facility, and the taxpayers have had their fill of this nonsense occuring at Irvine.
You think a foreign diplomat should try to influence the American judicial system?
“You think a foreign diplomat should try to influence the American judicial system?”
Israel has already murdered American sailors. What makes you think it would stop at a little judicial meddling?
If you believe that the prosecution of those students did not result from a great deal of pressure from Israel’s supporters, you are naive in the extreme.
Read up on the Lavon Affair(Operation Susannah)and get an inkling of what Israel has been capable of doing to its loyal ally.
We are fools.
The man you are all excited about said this:
The Israeli newspaper Ma’ariv on Wednesday reported that Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu told an audience at Bar Ilan university that the September 11, 2001 terror attacks had been beneficial for Israel.
“We are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq,” Ma’ariv quoted the former prime minister as saying. He reportedly added that these events “swung American public opinion in our favor.”
http://www.haaretz.com/news/report-netanyahu-says-9-11-terror-attacks-good-for-israel-1.244044
“Israel has already murdered American sailors.”
You lie like Jew-hating, terrorist-loving scum.
Probably because you are Jew-hating, terrorist-loving scum.
No offense.
– and I miss the urbane Abba Eban.
I never thought I’d live to see the day when I await a presidential candidate with the guts to propose our discontinuance of all funding to the U.N. When I was a child, we all had great respect and hope for the U.N. Now “Cesspit” is an accurate description of it.
Various Republican politicians have made noises about doing just that for many years. They’ll get around to it when they get done shutting down the Dept of Ed and the NEA, and right after they shut down AMTRAK. Translation: it will never happen.
“He represents the best of our tradition –a true liberal in the classical sense, not the false kind currently dominating our culture.”
I like how Roger Simon’s come over to our side. Horowitz and Radosh, too. Converts are welcome, so I politely turn away to roll my eyes when when they wax nostalgic for what never was.
Prager moons over JFK, the dope who bumbled us into the Bay of Pigs then Vietnam. Small-gov’t Reagan praised bloat-gov’t FDR. Radosh thinks Scoop Jackson was some-kinda-wonderful.
Liberal Democrats were and are Democrats, part of FDR’s Jim Crow Coalition. If your parents were voting Dems in the 30s, 40s, and 50s, they were voting for Jim Crow. (Where’s that put Scoop?) Uber-lib Adlai Stevenson confessed to being physically uncomfortable in the presence of Blacks – too much Darwin, maybe.
You guys used to vote for what was the party of slavery and apartheid and what still is the party of eugenics. They didn’t leave you, you left them.
Sorry, the above sounds curmudgeonly. Just bought PEKING DUCK to make up for it. (Gotta try not to visualize Richard Dreyfus as Moses.)
Thanks for this Bibi post. Likud guys who dislike him seem to say he’s always been a good talker, just not a reliable “accomplisher”.
The UN in Resolution 242 and subsequent resolutions made promises to Israel that apparently it has decided are inconvenient. Why should Israel have any trust in the UN, while land for peace should no longer be the operative phrase. Israel gave up Sinai for peace with Egypt. I suspect, within short order it will have neither. Also, BTW, when I’m in Jerusalem, I see cars marked with the letters, UN, on them zipping around. It behooves Israel to ask them to zip into Abbas’ territories and stay there.
I watched the speech. At least truth still has an occasional airing on this planet. To my mind the American Left’s antisemitism Is the greatest proof that their minds and hearts are enslaved to the devil. Any 12 year old can know the history of the Jews and the founding of Israel as well as comprehend the duplicity and murderous intent of the Israeli Arabs. That adults turn these truths on their ear and blame the Jews just tells me a great war and a massive killing is near to hand. The earth must be cleansed.
The uncut video of Prime Minister Netanyahu-
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Government/Speeches+by+Israeli+leaders/2011/Remarks_PM_Netanyahu_UN_General+_Assembly_23-Sep-2011.htm
Something just occured to me. Could it be that one of the reasons for liberals’ hostility to Netanyahu is that, by providing an example of the real thing, he undermines their absurd belief in Obama’s eloquence?
“,,,guilt-ridden Western civilization”
It was a guilt ridden Western civilization that created the mess in Palestine. The Palestinians, who had their homes confiscated or destroyed by the establishment of Israel and were made refugees, did not murder 6 million Jews. The Palestinians should not have been made to pay the price for that crime. And please do not tell me they all voluntarily left because the Arabs told them to do so. Israeli historians have put paid to that fairy tale.
I’ll consider Benjamin Netanyahu a statesman when he actually gets serious about negotiating a fair settlement.
“The Palestinians, who had their homes confiscated or destroyed by the establishment of Israel and were made refugees, did not murder 6 million Jews.”
Not for lack of trying, though. Read up on Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem at the time of the British Mandate, and his deep collaboration with Nazi Germany.
To be fair, not all of the Palestine Arabs opposed Jewish settlement at the time, and the an-Nashishibi family represented their position. But the al-Husseinis used enmity for the Jews to gain popular support, and finally vanquished the an-Nashishibi family to reign supreme over the Arab community—which gives you a picture of where the prevailing sentiment lay. Yasir Arafat and many of his subordinates were from the al-Husseini family, so don’t imagine this to be ancient history either.
“It was a guilt ridden Western civilization that created the mess in Palestine.”
No, it was Arab Muslim imperialists and colonialists who created the problem centuries ago when they took our lands by naked force.
Not to worry…we’re going to fix that by taking it all back.
Who are, “we”?
“We” is any Jew/Christian interested in recovering lands stolen by Muslim imperialists and colonialists and reestablishing Judeo-Christian political control over said lands.
And just who will do the fighting to regain all that land? American young people?
That depends.
In the past it’s been Spanish Christian kingdoms driving the Moors out of Spain, crusaders from all over Europe fighting in the Levant, Norman adventurers in Sicily.
Right now it’s the IDF.
Tomorrow, who can say?
Two things are for sure though, bit by bit we’re driving the Muslim imperialists out, and we have a legitimate claim to control the lands in dispute (including Eretz Israel) and they don’t.
The only claim the Arab Muslim Pals have to Israel is that at one time they were strong enough to take it by force. Too bad for them, they aren’t strong enough to keep what they stole.
C’est la vie, Muzzies.
Here’s a short vid about refugees, Hester.
http://pajamasmedia.com/andrewklavan/2011/09/23/the-palestine-lie/
“the slavering terrorists of Palestine over the free, parliamentary democracy of Israel.”
If it were not so tragic, this stuff would be funny. Evidently, you guys buy this stuff as whole cloth.The truth is somewhere you do not dare to go. If you did, you would be ashamed of what you have blindly supported, and where your tax dollars, BILLIONS of them, have been squandered.
I do not want to see the end of Israel. I do not want anything bad to happen to Israel. BUT, the Palestinians did not deserve to be kicked out of their homes and lands just because Zionists claim it as their biblical homeland, and the Europeans and the U.S. had a guilty conscience. It was wrong then, and it is wrong now for Israel to keep on grabbing more and more land.
Do you even bother to inform yourselves of what the settlers are doing to Palestinian farmers and villagers?
“…just because Zionists claim it as their biblical homeland, and the Europeans and the U.S. had a guilty conscience.”
I don’t feel the least bit guilty about driving the remnants of Muslim imperialists and colonialists off of lands that rightfully belong to Jews and/or Christians.
Why should I?
“‘the slavering terrorists of Palestine over the free, parliamentary democracy of Israel.’
“If it were not so tragic, this stuff would be funny. Evidently, you guys buy this stuff as whole cloth.The truth is somewhere you do not dare to go…”
Your scorn isn’t much of an argument, Hester, but it looks like fun. Mind if I have a go?
“the sky is blue and the grass is green.”
Pshaw! What fools these mortals be!
When rockets fired from Gaza land in Israeli neighborhoods and kill Jewish children, is it intemperate to think of those who fired them as terrorists, even slavering terrorists? And when the news that Jewish women and children going about their business have been murdered, and it causes Palestinian women and children to dance in the streets and pass out sweets in celebration…what is a temperate person to think then?
Israel isn’t a parliamentary democracy? What is it, then?
Spare us your concern about our tax dollars, Hester. I’d rather see them carpeted onto Israel and Egypt than poured into the pensions of gov’t union creeps to buy more votes for Dems.
“Do you even bother to inform yourselves of what the settlers are doing to Palestinian farmers and villagers?”
Imagine Jews settling on vacant land in Judea and Samaria. The Arabs insist those places must be – what’s the word? – ah, yes, “Judenrein”. So if you break into a settler’s home and torture the family to death, they’ll name a street after you in Hebron.
Why must the new Palestinian state be Jew-free, Hester?
No, I will not spare my concern since they are my tax dollars, too.
Not all Palestinians are terrorists. You mention only the extremes of the Palestinians, but depict the settlers as innocents simply settling on
uninhabited land. Sorry, you are painting an incomplete picture.
I have no tolerance for extremists of any kind whether they are Palestinians or Israelis. Again, take the time to inform yourself of what some settlers are doing to Palestinian farmers, their land, their olive trees, their wells, their livestock.
“but depict the settlers as innocents simply settling on
uninhabited land.”
a little slow on the uptake are we?
Jewish settlers are settling on lands that rightfully belongs to Jews and Christians, and that were stolen by Arab Muslim imperialists and colonialists centuries ago, and that are (unfortunately) STILL partially occupied by Arab Muslim imperialists and colonialists…and violent, murderous imperialists and colonialists at that.
Like I said…we’re going to fix that little problem, though. Just like it’s already been fixed in Spain, Sicily, Greece and a few other places the Muslims stole once upon a time.
“I have no tolerance for extremists of any kind…”
Ever seen Gaza’s version of Sesame Street, Hester? “And how many Jew pigs did your martyred mother kill, little Abdul?” Smiling child holds up seven fingers and smiles sweetly.
The hand that’s been rocking the cradle in the West Bank and Gaza for the past 20 years has been an extremist hand. Opinion polls show the great majority of Palestinian Arabs want all Jews dead, dead, dead.
“Not all Palestinians are terrorists.” A pathetic strawman – nobody said they were. But, again, the majority of them seem to support terror against Israel.
I’ll ask again, Hester: why must the new Palestinian state be Jew-free? Why? Is this the soft bigotry of low expectations at work in you, Hester? Brown-skinned tribesmen shouldn’t be held to standards that white civilized people like you must uphold?
“I have no tolerance for extremists of any kind…” What about the ones who shout down ambassadors on American campuses? That’s extreme, and I hope they get some jail time.
So when are you going to demand that the Arabs stop occupying Kurdistan? And while you are at it, get the hell out of North America as you are occupying some Indian’s land.
I replied to you once, but it mysteriously disappeared.
Your heart is in the right place Hester but your brain isn’t!
When it comes to suffering the Jews leave the Palestinians far behind, this was in fact the reason for the Balfour Declaration and the San Remo Treaty which granted all of Palestine, the ancestral home of the Children of Israel, to the Jews. This Treaty still stands. It was the colonial designs of the French and British that promoted Arab dissent for the rebirth of Israel, and the British failure to carry out the terms of the League of Nations Mandate to them will always be a source of shame.
The Arabs population of Palestine increased with the opportunities for work created by the early Zionists and had the colonial powers ceased their greedy power struggles, the Semitic peoples of the Middle East would be living in harmony today.
Israeli revisonist historians are now doing u turns just like Mr Goldstone. Meanwhile the Arabs continue to shoot themselves in the foot when dealing with Israel and will continue to do so as long as they feel their PR is going to influence people like you.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is catching all kinds of hell for her U.N. bill simply because it implies accountability; something that drives the Left insane. She’s already getting smeared by the Obama administration because by extension it holds them accountable too.
Benjamin Netanyahu is a Godsend for Israel and for us too. The “truth” made all those Jew-haters at the U.N. look like mental midgets. I’m willing to bet that it launched Obama into a fit of rage because he was chastised soundly along with the others for interfering with something extremely precious – the only tiny democracy in the middle-east and historical homeland of the Jewish people. Bibi brought us back to the reality of the situation and described their enemies in one word – Islam. THAT took more gonads than most men dream of having.
Now, I hope Obama puts politics aside and stops playing around with a dangerous enemy (Islam) and that he gets over himself and resigns. He has been handed a vote of “no confidence”.
BIBI NETANYAHU AT THE UN: A PROPHET SPEAKING IN A HOUSE OF LIES
Friday’s contest at the UN was between a hate driven, bloodthirsty, Palestinian pigmy and a peace loving, civilized, larger than life Jew, the glory of his people and the Western World. Israel and the Middle East have never had a greater voice for moral clarity than this man; a voice inspired by the ancient Prophets in a region of lunatics twisted by bigotry, fear and intolerance tottering on destruction. Netanyahu spoke the truth to insanity in a house of lies; and his speech will be remembered long after he dies-after more war and calamity engulf the region to awaken it from the delusions of Islam.
Yes,a very impressive man and leader.Unfortunately, there appears to be very few men made from that mold around these days.He could use some major support but where is it to be found ?
I was pleasantly surprised to hear the Netanyahu’s remarks drew some significant applause on several occasions. Unfortunately, since the camera was fixed on Netanyahu, I have no idea which delegations and individuals were applauding him or even how large the audience was.
It would be interesting to see footage of the audience at those key moments to see just who was applauding and how numerous they were. Maybe we’d see that Netanyahu and, by extension Israel, had more support than we usually see. It’s probably just wishful thinking but I’d like to believe that a really good speech will sometimes make someone “see the light” and change their thinking.
Hank, millions were applauding him, you and I among them.
For all Bibi’s words in the UN the MSM are bowdlerising it and letting Abbas’ lies get away.
Thank you Mr. Simon.
I’ve always been a fan of Bibi’s. He has the education and experience to qualify for the job he holds.
Bibi earned 2 degrees from MIT Sloan School of Management and studied political science at Harvard. He did his time in the IDF in one of the elite special forces units, and left the IDF with the rank of captain. He has also served in many other posts of the Israeli government. And finally, he is here because he wants to be and because he loves Israel. These are the reasons why I voted for him.
My only question has been: to be so smart, why would he want to be the Israeli Prime Minister?
Yo Menashe
Akko, Israel
I just wish we had more adult leadership in our Nation and throughout the world at this time.
Roger, was it BiBi that grew up or YOU.
Moving your perspective from traitorous hard left as it was to reasonably right as it is now has perhaps altered your view of BiBi, not BiBi himself.
Good point, pelaut. On reflection, it’s probably a bit of both. Of course, my change has altered my views of a lot of people, not just Bibi. And he’s grown up as well. None of this is a bad thing.
Fake-enstinian unemployment Is 99% and growing, but they will never move to find work in their Jordanian homeland. The sweet smell of the Israeli Shekel has them paralyzed, Fake-enstinians believe if they sniff long enough their wallets will become full of Jewish honey.
For all the kvelling inspired by Bibi’s speech at the UN Friday, it broke no new ground. He simply reaffirmed his determination to pursue the “peace process” fairytale. Israel’s leader is still in the Oslo rut. Evidently, bloody wars and intifadas have yet to break Oslo’s spell. But the Arabs and Islam never disappoint and before long Israel will have one or the other or both again. That will provide Israelis yet another opportunity to stop chasing fantasies and demand their vanquished enemies surrender instead. All of which may sound outré to an “international community” that can’t get the Oslo obsession out of its mind. But dear “friends of Israel,” the Jewish people owe their life and merit to Abraham, an upright man who smashed his father’s idols and brought G-d in the heavens down to earth. It will take another act of Jewish defiance to lift His Holy Land out of the miserable morass it finds itself in today.
God has to be sent back to his home in the sky before there can be a homeland for anybody on Earth. A home has to be paid for and the homeless need a job. Borders in the Middle-East have to be opened to refugees seeking employment. Only the insane believe that a roof over their head is supplied by god.
Before Bibi stood up to speak after Abbas’s tiring list of Israel’s “crimes”, I prayed to G-d that he, Bibi would counter the lies in a way that made sense, hoping it would make sense to so many of those against Israel and the Jews. And I wasn’t disappointed. I do believe in the long run that good will prevail over evil, but unfortunately it will probably be with a lot of suffering, destruction and misery, as history has shown because we humans simply don’t heed the lessons that come up again and again and tell us to change
“Bibi Netanyahu has grown up…”
AND
“…that former repository of our hopes and dreams known as the UN.”
Mr. Simon, your article suggests that it is not Mr. Netanyahu who has grown up. Perhaps it is YOU who has grown up.
Well, I have always been a Bibi fan, but I agree, he’s really come into his own in this current stint as PM. The two speeches you reference were truly outstanding.
I suppose the UN, on occasion, serves a useful purpose and NYC loves having it in session (ca-ching). But any organization built on the premise of multi-culturalism is doomed to failure (like a very wise British anthropologist, whose name escapes me, once observed: it’s ridiculous to equate going to the moon with putting a bone through your nose). I don’t see why we have to keep footing the lion’s share of the bill, however, and I would take a leaf from Strom Thurmond’s book. When he was in a position to do so, Strom would hold UN dues until it corrected whatever egregious situation he was agitated about at the time.
In an atmosphere former NY Mayor Koch describes as a “cesspool,”…
That’s nothing. Pat Moynihan called it a “desiccating corpse” and that was after he served as UN ambassador so he knew of which he spoke.
Now I’ll take your advice and check out the counter-conference just as soon as the Yankees complete their current drubbing of the Red Sox.
“Even more important, however, is the question of what to do about that former repository of our hopes and dreams known as the UN.”
You put your hopes and dreams into an organization that made a commie butcher like Joe Stalin a charter member (and, not only that, the Soviets were a charter member with special privileges!)???
No offense…but, that’s just plain crazy.
No offense, Dave. But you may have missed the irony here. It’s my stock in trade. In case you haven’t noticed, I spent forty years as a novelist and a screenwriter – much of it comedy.
Nevertheless, long ago and far away (the 1950s), as a young boy I believed in the idealism of the UN. But, as they say, was in another country, and besides the wench is dead.
Well, I do miss things from time to time.
As one of my ex-wives sagely observed “The only way Dave could be the sharpest pencil in the box, would be if he was the ONLY pencil in the box”.
Based on the Obama precedent of someone not a natural born citizen serving as President of the United States, can Netanyahu throw his hat into the ring? He’d get my vote. (No, his father was not a U.S. citizen, but neither was Obama’s, and I’m sure Bibi can create a birth certificate that looks more authentic than Barry’s.)
#24 Apollo Speaks. I have just one dissenting comment on your e-mail. Have you forgotten the purity of language and the witty and learned speeches and sayings of Abba Eban. I hope you are not too young to have been enthralled and impressed by him. Bibi is magnificent but Abba Eban was first.
I guess I am posting a dissident voice. Binyamin Netanyahu is a great speech maker. Before he was a politician, he was a salesman, and salesmen have to know how to pitch a product. His product? Phony nationalism.
His nationalism is what you overseas like to hear, but his activities at home is what you do not like to read. For example, a man was arrested on the Temple Mount for making a blessing over water on the Temple Mount. Imagine! A Jew arrested for blessing G-d on OUR Temple Mount! This is countenanced by the man you admire so much, Binyamin Netanyahu.
Every now and again, the police and the army go to some Jewish community in Judea or Samaria and destroy homes and synagogues. While this is under the direct aëgis of Ehud Barak, the Security Minister, the Prime Minister could order a stop to it. He never does.
But the killer in all of this was Netanyahu’s finding a way of making sure that Moshe Feiglin, who was #20 on the Likud list in primaries for the last election here, was demoted to a position #37, where he could never get elected to the Knesset. Feiglin is a real nationalist, not a phony nationalist like Netanyahu is. You see, Netanyahu does not want real nationalists, like Moshe Feiglin or MK Ya’akov Katz of the National Union party, to show him up for the phony he is.
Well, I can fix some of that, if you want to make me dictator of Israel for a brief period.
There won’t be any further problems on the Temple Mount because no Muslims will be allowed on it, and Al Aqsa and Dome of the Rock will be bulldozed within 24 hours of my assuming dictatorial powers.
As far as Judea and Samaria goes, there won’t be any more problems between Jewish settlers and Muslim squatters, because all the Muslim squatters will be deported to Arabia (whether the Saudis like it or not) in a very short period of time.
Just let me know if the job of dictator is open. I work cheap, btw.
Can you imagine what life would be like today had
1. The Arabs accepted the 1947 UN Partition Plan?
2. The Arabs had created a Palestinian State at any time between 1948-1967 in the West Bank,Gaza and East Jerusalem after they had driven out all the Jews who lived there during the 1948
3. The Arabs had accepted Israel’s peace offers in 2001 and 2008?
We might have been able to get the UN to focus on,Libya,Syria,Iraq,Iran,Myanmar,Tibet,the Kurds or the Basques to mention a few of the world’s pressing trouble spots.
I think it is time for Jordan and Israel to negotiate on the allocation of sovereignty in the West Bank for starters. They are the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine and together are sovereign in 95% of the mandate territory.They have a signed peace treaty – something that has been impossible to achieve with the PLO over the last twenty years,
Flogging a dead horse is really cruel.
A sinecure for those that third world dictators want out of their hair is the least harmful thing that the UN is.
The rot goes all the way down.