Friday, July 28, 2006

why defend Israel


What I believe to be the most influencial Portuguese blogger writes in his ABRUPTO about the present Israeli-Helzbollah conflict. I will translate hoping that he won't mind. Thank you J. P. Pereira.
A few days ago he posted a map as did other bloggers. Just to situate us.
Today he writes: (Blame my rough transation for any innacuracies or plain bad writing.):

It has been written that anti-americanism is the actual antisemitism. It is a different anti semitism, but very much alike. Israel is being the victim of that peculiar form of anti semitism.
History does not teach as much as we would like, but it does give us useful comparisons. Israel's case is very interesting in the analysis of the ideological and political evolutions of the 20th century. When the state of Israel was born, against the vehement unwillingness of the English and those siding with the great Mufti of Jerusalem, friend of the Nazis, the Zionist cause was felt as a leftist issue. The USSR was the great promoter of the UN resolutions for the division of the area of Palestine, and the first state to recognise Israel. At the time, the portuguese clandestine communist newspaper Avante, greeted the Israeli struggle against "the feudal Arab monarquies" that were warring against it and the socialist saga of the kibutz was part of the utopian imaginary of the left and not just communist. Socialists and their International gave great political support to the newly formed state.
Well, from the first minute, the "cause" of Israel was dependent on winning wars against the countries by which it was surrounded and even some that were far. I remember visiting Argelia a few years back and verifying with some surprise that they were still in a state of war against Israel, many years after the last military conflict that oppsed the jewish country against other countries and not against guerrilla or terrorist groups.
Well, in its wars, always defensive - it's useless to explain to those in bad faith that the offensive character of some military operations has nothing to do with the defensive caracter of the conflict-, today's Israel is no different than that of the end of the 40's. At the center of those wars was the pure survival of the state of Israel, from one side or the other. The refusal in recognizing the existence of Israel was always at the center of the arab wars, now more and more Muslim, and only years later did "the palestinian question" arise.
The inflexion of the left against Israel kept pace with Krutchev's political support of arab nationalism, that in the long run shifted alliances in the region. Supporting Nasser, reacting to the last hold out of colonialism, the Suez conflict, the USSR openned the way to the progressive isolation of Israel from its supporters on the left. In the 60's 70's and 80's, until the end of the Soviet Union itself, it (the Soviet Union) became one of the main logistical and political supporters of the guerrilla movements and of palestinain or pro palestinian terrorists, although its control was never complete, due to the complex emeshement of nacional intrigues and of the clans that have always been around the Middle East and North Africa. Having to deal with Libia, Siria, Iraq, and Iran, the net of international terrorism that spanned the globe from Germany to Japan was hard, but nevertheless the Soviett Union was always present in that world and sub world.
It was the Americans, not always very volunteeristic in the region, (as seen in the Suez war), that ended up becoming the main allies of Israel. For that to happen there were motives of cold war and important jewish pressure in the US, but it was in this context that the the actual reality of alliances was created. Therefore the Isrealis ended up also being the target and in some cases more than that, of the central pretext of the contemporary anti americamisn.
European paralysis in a part of the world that is part of its geopolitical sphere comes from that anti americanism , wherein Europe, in part due to a post Gaulist France, let itself get caught up in such a way as to turn it irrelevant. To see a state that was a french creation like Lebanon, giving vassalage to Siria and to assist to the complete political and military impotence of France is only a bigger symptom of the same impotence of the European Union and its separation from the US.
All of this is a by line of sorts. For Israel very little has changed since May 15th of 1948, in that immediatly after the formalization of its independence by the UN, the arab League states declared war on Israel, which was attacked by Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The league's secretary of state, Azzam Pasha, invoqued a jihad and appealed for a war of "extermination". Since that day, some things have changed, some for the better, but for Israel it continues to be a question of pure suvival. That is why in Israel, the left and right have never divided themselves in the essencial, that is the military operations conducted to defend the state of Israel.
Thank you Pacheco Pereira @ ABRUPTO

I state again: I support Israel

moral bearings?

In his WasPost op-ed Charles Krauthammer claims that the world has lost its "moral bearings" in relation to the latest conflict in the Middle East. I ask, what moral bearings? What planet did he come from that the habitual blame of Israelis, (blame the Jews, really) is not an incitement for further violence against the people that Europe as an example try to destroy so many times in history. Israel, now as if a gigantic ghetto, is not sittting passively as the Jewish people did for centuries. Israelis are doing what they did in the Poland Ghetto uprising. They are fighting for their lives and for their land. One just hopes the outcome is radically different. The world does not run on moral or ethical bearings. The world runs on economic priorities and has the weight of "tradition" and history on its shoulders. And tradition and history have shown again and again that those who don't stand up for themselves will likely be crushed, as Jews were for centuries both in their homeland and successive diasporas.

Monday, July 24, 2006

I support Israel




I support

Because they have the internationally recognized right to be there.

Because they have been a country since 1947.

Because the Jews as a people have as much claim as anyone else to that land and certainly more than any Islamic state.

Because they took a barren inhospitable land and made it what it is today with the sweat of their brows and the blood of their people.

I support Israel, not because of some messianic rapturistic fantasy, but because they, like most other countries that have been created in the last 70 years have been recognized by the UN, have a right to exist and no other country, near or far, has the right to deny them their existence or threaten them without expecting any response.

I support Israel because it is a country with human beings that is surrounded by hate mongers who feed on anti semitism to press on with their agenda.

As has been over and over stated, this is not about Palestinians, whom nobody not even their Islamic brothers want, but about the pursuit of the Jihad, the holy war started by Mahomed in the 7th century.

In fact, the Israelis did not go into the Middle East at some remote time as the Moors did when they invaded the Iberic Peninsula. They have been there as long as any other people and there are plenty of records, jewish and otherwise to prove it.

I support the Israeli people in their struggle to defend themselves. Just as there was a movement to support Denmark, I hope that there is a movement in the blogosphere to support Israel.

Monday, July 10, 2006

sun and stars...

Our sun
back from the land of illusions...
"Suum Cuique"
On Van Gogh's Stary Night :
"Now a mathematical analysis of his works reveals that the stormy patterns in many of his paintings are uncannily like real turbulence, as seen in swirling water or the air from a jet engine."
Top 50 science blogs
Back to immigration, the illegal kind...Colorado, that schitzofrenic state, whre you're either a Boulderite bleeding heat liberal or a Durango red neck cowboy has been busy toughening up the laws on the immigrants. Business says they have to stay, state says that they don't have a right to any state supported services. Maybe said businesses should cover those costs. After all, they're the interested parties. Hypocrites, all of them.

I sure like the new Tattered Cover bookstore on Colfax. It's big, it's comfy, it's well worn, although new. I just wish I had the many bucks it takes to leave with a grin of satidfaction. So much and I have so little. But that's o.k., 'cause they let me sit there and read...
The red paper clip guy finally got a house in some little town in Saskatwuan in Canada. I wonder if he's moving there...I think it's pretty cool...
But not as cool as Warren Buffet's decision to give away most of his fortune. More on that later. A definite shift in paradigm, I say...
Eugene Robinson plays with the idea of Ken Lay on some paradisiac island, after faking his onw death. Is it true that there is a KenLayisalive.org site? You bet there is and it is hysterical.
How drugs turn human beings in highly efective working drones. After all didn't opium and evil gin fuel the industrial revolution?
Anyway, I'm back to my blogging and I'm happy!

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

BOA SORTE PORTUGAL

Monday, July 03, 2006

back to Earth

The new economic tiger and their optimism: Indian. Different perspective on the old stories of homeless children roaming the steets of Calcutta and women being thrown of their husband's funeral pyre. Mahatma Ghandi is truly dead. And conspicuous consumption is all the rage.
"Most Britons see America as a cruel, vulgar, arrogant society, riven by class and racism, crime-ridden, obsessed with money and led by an incompetent hypocrite." It takes one to know one.

Words of wisdom from the 1981 Nobel winner in chemistry, Roald Hoffman: believe in the middle. Extremes may make a good story, but the middle satisfies me. Why? Perhaps because I’m a chemist…. The middle is not static… my psychological middle as well as the chemical equilibrium. I like that. Yes, of course I also want stability. But I believe that extreme positions — the things you start out with in a chemical reaction, the things you finish with (all people A, bad, all people B, good; no taxes at all, taxed to death) — all of these are impractical, unnatural, boring: the refuge of people who never want to change. The world is not simple, though God knows political forces on every side want to make it so. I like the tense middle and I am grateful for a life that offers me the potential for change.

More words of wisdom from Carry Tennis"... however absurd this world is, it places before us occasional opportunities to respond with unambiguous moral clarity. " "...I don't necessarily believe that. But I believe we must live life as if things happen for a reason. " "...What I mean is, we create meaning in our lives by responding with our highest selves. We try to do the right thing."

Saturday, July 01, 2006

anti football ..of sorts

In particular, to lose because Wayne Rooney got sent off was excellent. He is stupid, vicous thug, with no self-control at all, and thus, obviously, a role model for millions. He might have got away with kicking a prostrate opponent in the balls, and then shoving away the opposing team mate who complained. But when he saw he would be booked, he walked round to swear at the referee for this. Overpaid thugs get away with that kind of thing in almost every match I see. It made my heart sing to see him sent off for it. Makes him a real role model at last. Says the Helmintholog

anti football ..of sorts

In particular, to lose because Wayne Rooney got sent off was excellent. He is stupid, vicous thug, with no self-control at all, and thus, obviously, a role model for millions. He might have got away with kicking a prostrate opponent in the balls, and then shoving away the opposing team mate who complained. But when he saw he would be booked, he walked round to swear at the referee for this. Overpaid thugs get away with that kind of thing in almost every match I see. It made my heart sing to see him sent off for it. Makes him a real role model at last. Says the Helmintholog

resumos



Portugal emerged triumphant from a quarter-final clash that saw David Beckham leave the pitch injured and in tears, Wayne Rooney sent off after stamping on an opposing player and England’s spot-kick specialists lose their nerve. Times of London
Sore loosers:" the real villain of the piece becomes more apparent. Cristiano Ronaldo, who stroked home the winning penalty, appears to have had quite a large part to play in Rooney's sending off." Watch Rooney's hoof come down on the adversary's groin and tell anyone with a traight face that it wasn't intentional. The man kicks his leg backward.
"Portugal were far from their best but they at least caused some worrying moments at the back for England in a tense first half. "
"Ricardo, became the first player in World Cup shoot-out history to save three penalties. "BBC
Thank you SUN: SIR GEOFF HURST believes Wayne Rooney's suspect temperament cost England again.
England's 1966 hat-trick hero reckons the Manchester United striker failed to deal with the pressure-cooker atmosphere of a World Cup quarter-final.
Ricardo:"O inglês apontou ao lado forte – a esquerda – e o português agradeceu. O mais difícil já estava. Com aquela defesa, Ricardo ficou gigante e evocou tantos fantasmas quanto podia. Mas Hugo Viana afugentou-os a seguir com um remate ao poste e Hargreaves virou-os contra Portugal. Os adeptos ingleses ficaram loucos como nunca. Demasiado assustadores para um Petit nervoso, que nem na baliza acertou. Ricardo não viu, continuava de costas. Como em 2004, voltava a ficar com Portugal nas mãos. As mãos que nuas nos levaram à final do Euro e que ontem voltaram a brilhar mesmo dentro das luvas, após remates de Gerrard e Carragher (posto em campo só para os penáltis). Ricardo repetiu o feito e, desta vez, com um extra pessoal: ser o primeiro guarda-redes a defender três penáltis num Mundial.Correio da Manha
"Um beijo na bola, um olhar para a baliza, e Portugal entrou em delírio. Cristiano Ronaldo calou 47 mil ingleses e colocou uma nação a festejar a presença nas meias-finais do Campeonato do Mundo, 40 anos depois da primeira presença nacional na competição. O extremo do Manchester United marcou a quinta grande penalidade e correu para os abraços dos companheiros e técnicos. Diario de noticias
A fechar a festa nada melhor do que o hino nacional, cantado a plenos pulmões por uma multidão emocionada. Jornal de Noticias
Hoje, Portugal pode chegar a ser campeão do mundo, porque está numa meia-final. Portugal pode, mas é muito difícil e sabemos isso. Cada passo é muito importante para nós. Nós já estamos qualificados. Estamos entre os quatro melhores do mundo. Isso é que interessa. Diz Scolari no Publico

Sao estas as palavras que nao necessito repetir

portugal wins game with England



WE WON!!!

What Kind of Blogger Are You?