The Hamas attack on Jewish settlers in Israel has evoked a cascade of sympathy around the world, for the victims and for Israelis and Jews generally, and rightly so. How could it not? But there are exceptions. One group of Israelis that deserves no sympathy is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
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Views from the Beltline: Jewish wisdom; Gentile folly
Reading The New York Times, as I do every morning (the world’s best newspaper), I have encountered a number of articles on the current hostilities in Palestine. I couldn’t help but notice that the articles with the most rational, most compassionate, and wisest analyses were written by Jews. This might
Continue readingViews from the Beltline: How races differ
Science has little use for the term “race.” Defining it is too problematic due to genetic variation among individuals and populations. To quote geneticist Kenneth Kidd, “Race is not biologically definable, we are far too similar.” To scientists, race is a social construct, not a biological attribute, and they prefer
Continue readingTrump and Israel—So Much for Separation of Church and State
The Trump administration has taken yet another step in its radical support of Israel. Having recognized Jerusalem as the Israeli capital, recognized Israeli sovereignty in the Golan Heights, cut off aid to the Palestinians, and abandoned the Iran agreement, it has now declared that Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land
Continue readingKersplebedeb: David Gilbert Interviewed by TREYF
For those of you who don’t know, Treyf is one of the best podcasts out there — “A debatably Jewish podcast. Recorded at CKUT in Montreal (on occupied Kanien’kehá:ka territory), in the shadow of the cross of secularism, Sam Bick and David Zinman reflect on the political discussions that are
Continue readingViews from the Beltline: Islamophobia—what’s in a word?
Words don’t always mean what they say. For example, anti-Semitism says “against Semites,” but it means “against Jews,” who actually only make up a small part of the Semite community. Yet confusion never arises because the word has become so firmly established as meaning anti-Jew. That is not the case
Continue readingViews from the Beltline: Islamophobia—what’s in a word?
Words don’t always mean what they say. For example, anti-Semitism says “against Semites,” but it means “against Jews,” who actually only make up a small part of the Semite community. Yet confusion never arises because the word has become so firmly established as meaning anti-Jew. That is not the case
Continue readingPostArctica: Marguerite Duras – The War, A Memoir
A friend recently told me that he likes to save texts, not quotes but texts, larger pieces, that he finds interesting. I am reading this book and thought this was a powerful passage. It is the end of the Second World War and she is wondering if her husband is
Continue readingLeft Over: The MSM Semantics of anti-Semitism…
ANALYSIS Has the activist left decided anti-Semitism doesn’t exist?: Neil Macdonald History, detail and nuance often ignored in modern political discourse By Neil Macdonald, CBC News Posted: Jun 14, 2016 5:00 AM ET Last Updated: Jun 14, 2016 6:28 AM ET … Continue reading →
Left Over: Don’t Send Us your Tired and Poor….
More than 30 U.S. states refusing Syrian refugees on ‘shaky legal ground’ In wake of Paris attacks, governors of at least 31 U.S. states announce plans to bar Syrian refugees By Matt Kwong, CBC News Posted: Nov 18, 2015 3:02 PM … Continue reading →
Left Over: Can’t Tolerate Bigotry…
Time to put the brakes on our slide to intolerance: Tim Harper A government which deals with only symptoms and refuses to look at root causes is part of the problem. By: Tim Harper National Affairs, Published on Sun Mar 01 2015 (with thanks to Montreal Simon’s blog for the
Continue readingFrench hold most favourable views of Jews and Muslims
How the French view their minority populations after the violent events earlier this month will probably take a while to sort out. But a poll conducted last year suggested they were about the most tolerant in Europe. Eighty-nine per cent of French men and women hold a favourable view of
Continue readingLeft Over: Keeping Remembrance Day in My Own Way….
Gap’s ‘Remembrance Day deal’ not appropriate, Toronto veteran says ‘The point is not to exploit and profit from this day,’ says Cpl. Chuck Krangle CBC News Posted: Nov 10, 2014 11:10 PM ET Last Updated: Nov 11, 2014 10:57 AM ET Have to agree with Cpl. Krangle, it is
Continue readingSettlers killed in Palestine—echoes of another colonialism
The killing of three Jewish teenagers from a West Bank settlement in Palestine brought to mind another colonialism—that of North America. As the Europeans swarmed across the Americas, the Native people found themselves overwhelmed. Sometimes they fought to keep the intruders out, but inevitably they found themselves outmatched by superior
Continue readingdrive-by planet: Israel, Harper back unelected Kiev government: anti-Semitism and far-right nationalism downplayed
Top: Svoboda leader Oleh Tyahnybok in group shot with Canada’s John Baird / Lower left: Tyahnybok in action / Lower right: Svoboda parade Stephen Harper’s visit to Ukraine this week is the first by any G7 leader since the coup that saw the overthrow of Yanukovych. Harper is a
Continue readingLeft Over: The Veil of Oppression?
Hair is the western woman’s veil The west is fixated on Muslim veils, but all women’s hair is bound in ideals of femininity, and a source of male judgment Arwa Mahdawi theguardian.com, Friday 10 January 2014 15.23 GMT Give me a head with hair Long beautiful hair Shining streamin’ steamin’ Flaxen
Continue readingBigCityLib Strikes Back: Quebec Mayor Stephane Gendron Hates Israel, Hippies, And Kittens
This time around its his cat hate getting him into trouble: According to reports, Huntingdon, Que., Mayor Stephane Gendron said that he tries to kill stray cats while driving his pick-up truck. The SPCA is on his ass the way Meir was when he bad-mouthed Israel. That protest set Stephane
Continue readingdrive-by planet: Groundbreaking genome research explodes ‘one people’ myth of Jewish history
Eran Elhaik, an Israeli-American geneticist working out of Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, recently had his research published in the prestigious journal Genome Biology Evolution. The groundbreaking study – The Missing Link of Jewish European Ancestry: Contrasting the Rhineland and Khazarian Hypotheses – explodes the commonly held belief that
Continue readingwRanter.com: Slicing through ignorant anti-circumcision rhetoric
Share this: Every once in a while, the subject of circumcising male newborns and boys rears its ugly head – no pun intended – and the discussion rarely takes long to veer into ethnocentrism, if not outright intolerance. With the best of intentions, and without realizing it, many people who
Continue readingNo more pecker snipping in Germany
With a ruling that circumcising boys constitutes grievous bodily harm, a German court has effectively outlawed the practice in that country. The case was brought against a doctor in Cologne who circumcised a four-year-old Muslim boy on his parents’ wishes. When, a few days after the operation, the boy was
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