Israel v. New Jersey
I received this email from reader Captain H. I believe it makes an important point, and I have decided to post it in full. I was deeply moved reading your thread "Toulouse and the Park Hotel" and Giulio Meotti's article.Yes, we are a small country. There's no space here that's extra, and we are surrounded by hostile states. Adding another one can only make things worse, God forbid.
I was sitting at my PC, trying to absorb it all, with my very vivid imagination, a blessing/curse. Imagining all those people, gathered for the Seder, being killed in that terrorist bomb blast, and that picture of the beautiful little girl, one of the dead. Words fail me.
One of the reasons it's hard for Americans to understand Israel's vulnerability toArabMuslim terror is the small size of Israel. (Let's honestly narrow it down; Copts and Druze are Arabs too but don't have this murderous hate in their hearts. That's from Islam.) For Americans used to American-sized geography, it can be hard to grasp. I asked myself what would be a comparison to help Americans internalize this size difference and vulnerability. Going on Wiki statistics, I found the most apt size comparison is probably New Jersey vs. Israel. I searched and found these two about equally scaled maps of NJ and Israel that, as you can see from the scales, clearly show the relative size similarity. Using my Photo.net (the freeware "poor man's Photoshop" :-), I made the attached image that clearly shows this Israel-NJ size similarity.
Regarding Netanya in the narrow "neck" of Israel, what struck me was the great similarity to extremely narrow northern Delaware. Many years ago, I lived in Vineland, NJ and I often went via northern Delaware and the Delaware Mem. Bridge to visit my sister and her husband who then lived in West Chester, Pa, in the very southeast corner of Pa. It struck me that Wow! In a few minutes I'd gone from New Jersey, onto the Delaware Mem. Bridge, THROUGH Delaware and into Pennsylvania. One song on the radio as I drove would take me from the PA/Delaware border to the Delaware/NJ border on the Bridge or vice versa. Likewise, one song on the car radio would take an Israeli from Netanya to the "West Bank".
Anyhow, I thought you might like to have this image to use sometime, to give your American readers something they can see and relate to to realize the small size and geographic vulnerabilities of Israel.
Best regards,
Captain H
Labels: geography, Israel, Judea and Samaria
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:35 PM
15 Comments:
We're so small, we can't invite Chris Christie for a visit.
Not only is Israel as small as New Jersey, think NJ with a huge bite out of the waistline. And that the edges of that bite are high country overlooking the skinny coastal part of Israel. People need to go to Israel and drive from Jerusalem, down the eastern side into the Jordan Valley, and drive north to Beit el or Tzfat. Other than size, the topography is not like coastal New Jersey. It is more like the Rio Grande valley, with the Sangre de Cristos, the Sandias, the Manzanos, the Organ mountains looming over Israel's coastal high population centers. Rocket launching sites all.
Israel continues to be a fact free zone, with no linkable GIS layers showing actual western standard title search info by year, especially of the high land east of Jerusalem, where the "settlements" perch, blocking rocket launchers. Half the time, when Israeli consulate people speak, they never even mention pulling out of Gaza and the fact that the former "settlements" there have served as rocket launching sites for warcrime rockets onto Israeli civilians inside Israel.
Why is it this way, you may ask (and I ask almost every day)? It's all a mystery. Unfathomable inside baseball, along with the multi-decade RuthRejection project that Israel has undertaken in their public schools and public govt pronouncements, when, without Ruth, there would have been no King David. I think someday people will do their PhD dissertations evaluating what they were thinking.
Captain H - Thanks for doing the fabulous graphic. Do you mind if we use it all over?
Sunlight,
The reason they don't mention the Gaza withdrawal is that they are convinced that the worst thing Israel can do - worse than committing suicide! - is to 'occupy another people.' These people have so lost their moral compass that they will do ANYTHING to extract the country from the situation where we are 'occupying another people' (I actually saw an article yesterday where someone was seriously proposing that we should just up and leave Judea and Samaria, but I didn't have a whole lot of time to blog nonsense).
Pointing out what a failure the Gaza expulsion was and what happened to Gaza when we left ensures that we will never expel the Jews of Judea and Samaria and up and leave those areas. Despite their nominal title as government representatives, most of the foreign ministry personnel are extreme Leftists, because the foreign ministry was under Leftist control for so many years (Peres, Ben Ami, Livni, and even David Levy and Sylvan Shalom of the Likud, are all to the Left of the political map and the national consensus). They will not say anything that would result in discrediting the 'land for peace' illusion.
So their extreme Leftism (e.g., Mr. Peres out schmoozing with the Facebook people) could also be why they are willing to have the American Constitution eliminated as America's basic law, in favor of Marcuse/Alinsky New Left Marxism? Do they realize that the stellar markets and collaborations that have resulted in Israel's Start Up Nation position will be gone? And I won't even ask where they think Marxism is called for in the Torah... you guys have always thrown the spotlight onto the lib U.S. Jews as non-Torah following, but I'm seeing now that it is just as much Israel doing this. Ugh.
CaptH's argument is flawed and ignorant, and shows his selective cherrypicking, and hypocritical pretence that size matters, when Israel has the largest army in the Middle East.
He also tries to project Christian sins onto Islam, as if it was Islam that tried to snuff out Jews.
He also pretends that a struggle over land is about religion.
The idiot exhitibs the crass ignorance that has led the US led by these type buffons into trillion dollar wars that has put into third world country status.
The US is cursed by God. Bankrupt, and on it's way down. Thanks to the likes of CaptH.
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Some of CaptH's nonsense
Copts and Druze are Arabs too but don't have this murderous hate in their hearts. That's from Islam.)
Sami Kuntar is a Druze, and George Habasah a Christian, CaptH is one hypocrite, proportionally, there are few christians or Druze in Israel or the Mid East at large, so if what CaptH said were even remotely true, Sami Kuntar and George Habash, would not have been terrorists. I can bring more examples.
Could CaptH for example, explain why American christians who pretend Israel is a victim do not do anything for oppressed Christians around the world who do not have a military the size Israel has?
Terrorism's Christian Godfather
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1707366,00.html
By Scott MacLeod/Cairo
George Habash attacks a U.S.-sponsored Israeli-Palestinian peace plan during a speech in Beirut, March 11, 1979
You could call George Habash, a Palestinian leader who died in Amman on Saturday at the age of 82, the godfather of Middle East terrorism. If you assumed that Palestinian or Arab extremism somehow sprung entirely from Islam — from the puritanical Wahabbi intolerance and so forth — take a close look at Habash's first name. He was a Greek Orthodox Christian, who sang in his church choir as a boy back in the Palestinian town of Lydda. Habash's life tells us a lot about the long Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which seems as intractable as ever, and prompts reflection on the Middle East's seemingly unstoppable whirlwind of violence.
Habash's group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), pioneered the hijacking of airplanes as a Middle East terror tactic — one eventually employed by the al-Qaeda hijackers on 9/11 — way back in 1968 when three PFLP armed operatives commandeered an Israeli El Al airliner enroute from Rome to Tel Aviv. Checking in for a flight has never been the same since.
The dunce CaptH, pretends that the Palestinian cause is soley Islamic.
Can he explain why the worlds Christians support Palestinians...
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The Episcopal Church?s Anti-Israel Media Campaign
http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=7&x_issue=45&x_article=1194
September 6, 2006 by Dexter Van Zile
The Episcopal Church has approximately 2 million members and 7,200
churches in the U.S. and is part of the 77-million member Anglican Communion. Because of its presence in the U.S., the relative wealth of its members, and its connections to Anglicans throughout the world, the Episcopal Church is in a strategic position to influence attitudes toward Israel on both a national and global scale.
Support for Sabeel
Another salient aspect of the Episcopal Church?s anti-Israel stance is the pattern of links between it and Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center
headquartered in Jerusalem (Sabeel) and its sister organization, Friends of
Sabeel North America (FOSNA).
These two organizations demonize Israel and wrap Palestinian violence against Israelis in the mantle of innocent suffering.
Sabeel is itself a creature of the Anglican Communion and has received substantial institutional support from the Episcopal Church and substantial financial support from Episcopalians in the U.S. When Sabeel?s sister organization, FOSNA was founded in 1996 the Episcopal Church was one of its
primary sources of support. In the intervening years, both Sabeel and FOSNA have been able to reach out to other denominations for financial and logistical support, but the Episcopal Church remains a significant backer.
Mainline churches such as the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Disciples of Christ and the United Methodist Church routinely send missionaries who work in Sabeel?s office in Jerusalem.
As a result of the Episcopal Church?s financial and institutional support to
Sabeel and FOSNA, anti-Israel activists have had the resources and credibility necessary to convince other mainline Protestant churches in the U.S. to approve resolutions that condemn Israel while giving short- shrift to the motive and impact of Palestinian violence against Israeli civilians.
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Christians began to take positions of leadership in the newly formed Palestinian Liberation Organization. Christian George Habash was the leader of nationalist-Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Christian Nahif Hawatme was the leader of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Later, other Christians including Hannan Ashrawi, Elias Frej, Faisal Husseini and others served as delegates to the 1991 Madrid Peace Conference and as close advisors to Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat. Columbia professor Edward Said, also a Christian, is the main voice of the Palestinians in the Western world.
Their main voice nowadays is the East-Jerusalem -based Sabeel Institute. The Sabeel?s members are the organic intellectuals of Palestinian Christianity and they are the major group that effectively influences the positions of the mainline Protestant stablishment on the Middle East and the Arab/Israeli conflict.
What does the Sabeel Institute say? The Sabeel Institute, whose leader is the Anglican cleric Naim Ateek, argues that the Arab/Israeli conflict is the result of an intentional occupation of Arab lands in 1948.
CaptH's lies exposed:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3611828,00.html
Notorious Lebanese Druze terrorist Samir Kuntar, who was recently released in exchange for the bodies of two kidnapped IDF soldiers as part of an Israeli deal with Hizbullah, told Agence France-Presse on Wednesday that the organization would continue to seek the destruction of Israel. "As long as there is an entity called Israel in the region, we must continue the resistance," he said.
More on CaptH's lies, and Capt, this from Debbie Schlussul an Islamophobe, so you can't accuse her of being pro Islam
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October 21, 2011, - 3:00 pm
HAMAS’ (& Fatah’s) Christian Terrorists: Meet Chris Al-Bandak of the Shalit Trade
By Debbie Schlussel
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/43630/hamas-fatahs-christian-terrorists-meet-chris-al-bandak-of-the-shalit-trade/
It’s important to note that there were Christian terrorists for Islam involved in this week’s HAMAS terrorist trade for Gilad Shalit. And as one Christian Fatah murderer was set free, another was captured planning an attack in Jerusalem.
While the majority of Arab terrorists are Muslim, it’s important to note that there is a not-so-small contingent of Christians who not only openly support HAMAS and Fatah and other Islamic terrorist groups, but take part in their terrorist attacks and mass murders. I’ve written about these people before. HAMAS has had Christian leaders. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group, which murdered Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze’evi and perpetrated several deadly homicide bombings in Israel, was founded and headed by George Habash and deputy Dr. Wadih Haddad, both Greek Orthodox Christians. Greek Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox, and Coptic Christians are among the most anti-Semitic, anti-Israel fanatics there are. In many cases, such as with Egypt’s Copts, they led the Muslims in pogroms against the Jews.
And that’s why, as I’ve noted before, I don’t shed any tears for the Copts being attacked by Muslims in Egypt. They and their religious leader, Pope Shenouda III, are, in many cases, even more anti-Semitic than their Muslim countrymen in Egypt, and they’re big supporters of HAMAS, as lead by their pope. And so it goes with the Greek Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox Churches in Israel. Their religious leaders, including Jerusalem Greek Orthodox Church spokesman Atallah (a/k/a Theodosios) Hanna, frequently and openly attack Jews and call on congregants to support HAMAS. Just as the many Islamic terrorists–and one Christian pan-Muslim terrorist among them–were released, this week, Israelis captured Dmitri Dalyani a/k/a Dmitri Diliani a/k/a Dimitri Diliani, a Palestinian Orthodox Christian and a Fatah terrorist, in Jerusalem. Dalyani is part of the Fatah Revolutionary Council. Fatah claimed Dalyani was “protecting” Jerusalem and its holy sites. Ah, a not-so-new euphemism for terrorism: “protecting.” And despite the fact that he’s suspected in terrorist attacks, Palestinian Christians backed him and threatened more anti-Israel terrorism a/k/a “Christian resistance”:
Christian groups in Jerusalem condemned the arrest of Dalyani, describing it as “a barbarous operation” and said it would only increase the strength of Christian resistance in Jerusalem.
And that brings us to Christian “Chris” Al-Bandak, one of the murderous Fatah terrorists released in the trade for Gilad Shalit. Like, Dalyani a/k/a Diliani, Bandak is an Eastern Orthodox Christian and a cold-blooded killer. He was arrested at the Church of the Nativity after he killed at least two Israelis and seriously wounded a third in 2002. He is a member of the Fatah Tanzim, arguably the most brutal and deadly segment of the Fatah terrorist group. In 2003, he received four life sentences from an Israeli court. And, now, he is free, and using his freedom from justice to invoke Christianity in his attacks on Jews and Israel in interviews with the Muslim media. Remember that HAMAS, not Fatah, fought for his release. He’s one of them. But same difference, anyway.
more for the Captain and his poor little Copt and Druze who exemplify everything not found in Islam, (according to what he said)
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Anti-Semitism and the Coptic Orthodox Church
http://seismic-shock.com/2010/06/20/anti-semitism-and-the-coptic-orthodox-church/
Even before the arrival of Islam in 639 CE in Egypt, the Coptic community was subject to periodic persecution at the hands of their Byzantine governors and their local Egyptian minions.
Unsurprisingly, then, the arrival of the Islamic armies was welcomed by many Copts as a relief from Byzantine inspired persecution.
Indeed, their Pope at the time, Benjamin I, was recalled from hiding to Alexandria by the victorious Arab general, ‘Amr ibn al-’As, and made quite comfortable.
One would have thought that given this long history of persecution and oppression, the Copts should sympathise better than most in the Middle East with the Jewish people’s own oppression and travails over the centuries. Unfortunately, this is not so. Copts have a dark and long history of the crudest anti-Semitism sanctioned at the highest levels of the Church – and it continues to this day.
The immensely courageous, dissident Coptic blogger, Samuel Tadros points out that
Some people might think that ongoing Anti Semitism in Egypt is a phenomena that is restricted to Muslims. That is not really the case. Statements by Muslim religious leaders have been covered by the press, but little attention has been given to the Coptic Church, which has had its share of Anti Semitism.
Christian books are filled with Anti Semitic remarks and stories especially the “Sineksar”, the official Church book of Saints in which you can find stories that include Blood Libel.
Is not just that the Coptic Church continues to peddle ancient Christian anti-Semitism as the God’s Honest Truth in some sort of haphazard manner, the Coptic Church actively promotes such vileness even to this day. Samuel Tadros comments:
Pope Shenouda III, the leader of the Coptic Church has made statements in the past that included many Anti Semitic views.
In an interview on the Egyptian Television on the 8th of April 2007 he said: “the Western Churches were wrong to exonerate Jews for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and criticized recent statements apologizing for Christian anti-Semitism.”
“Asked whether Jews were “Christ-killers”, responsible for the crucifixion, Shenouda stated, “The New Testament says that they are,” and asked rhetorically whether the Vatican was “against the teachings of the New Testament?”
Samuel Tadros shows how this virulent anti-Semitism runs as a filthy thread through the Coptic Orthodox Church’s world view and couched in expressions straight from the Protocols:
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thus the Masonic Movement was the secret Zionist hand to create revolution against the clergy. The Zionist Ideology has kept its conspiracies a secret buried in silence.”
He then added that the Zionist Movement has tried to work in Egypt through Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Seventh Day Adventists and that those organizations are merely a cover that has American Zionists behind it.”
and CaptH
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_Arab_world
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Arab antisemitism is believed to have expanded since the 19th century. Jews, like other minority groups within the Muslim world, were subject to various restrictions long before that (see Dhimmi). However, despite its restrictive nature, dhimmi status also afforded the "People of the Book" relative security against persecution and welfare most of the time—a protection that was missing for non-Christians in most of Europe until the institutionalization of equality under a secular idea of citizenship after the French Revolution—and allowed them to enjoy their respective religious laws and ways of life.
Antisemitism in the Arab world has increased greatly in modern times, for many reasons: the breakdown of the Ottoman Empire and traditional Islamic society; European influence, brought about by Western imperialism and Christian Arabs;[1] Nazi propaganda;[2] and the rise of Arab nationalism. The rise of political Islam during the 1980s and afterwards provided a new mutation of Islamic anti-Semitism, which gave the hatred of Jews a religious component.[2]
For most of the past fourteen hundred years, according to Bernard Lewis, Arabs have not been antisemitic as the word is used in the West. In his view this is because, for the most part, Arabs are not Christians brought up on stories of Jewish deicide. In Islam, such stories are rejected by the Qur'an as a blasphemous absurdity. Since Muslims do not consider themselves as the "true Israel", they do not feel threatened by the survival of Jews. Because Islam did not retain the Old Testament, no clash of interpretations between the two faiths can therefore arise. There is, says Lewis, no Muslim theological dispute between their religious institutions and the Jews.[3]
While there were antisemitic incidents in the early twentieth century, antisemitism has certainly been heightened by the Arab-Israeli conflict. After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the Palestinian exodus, the creation of the state of Israel, Israeli victories during the wars of 1956 and 1967 served a severe shock to the Arabs.[4] The situation of the Middle Eastern Jews worsened and almost all fled or were expelled from their native countries. By the 1980s, according to Bernard Lewis, the volume of antisemitic literature published in the Arab world, and the authority of its sponsors, seemed to suggest that classical antisemitism had become an essential part of Arab intellectual life, considerably more than in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century France, and to a degree that has been compared to Nazi Germany.[5]
In their 2008 report on contemporary Arab-Muslim antisemitism, the Israeli Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center dates the beginning of this phenomenon to the spread of classic European Christian antisemitism into the Arab world starting in the late 19th century.[6]
LMAO at Shy Guy's comment at top! :-)
Re Sunlight's request, I don't mind but I gave the graphic to Carl for his use. You'll need his permission.
As for the other, um, commentor, I'll follow Lincoln's advice, "Never argue with a fool. Somebody else might not be able to tell the difference."
CaptH
I am no fool, and I posted facts. What's the matter? No condemnation for George Habash whose tactics were copied by Al Qaeda? No condemnationf for Sami Kuntar or your poor little copts?
No explainations as to why you lot do not speak up for your Christian bretheren, nor fight for them, nor lift a finger for them, all you can seem to do is bomb, murder, kill, do everything you blame us of doing, your nation is the most cursed on the planet,
You are reaping your own harvest Mister
Don't you ever try to distort our great history again. Nobody has a history like ours. English Curriculum speaks in awed tones of the Islamic civilisation.
Chayma
From yours babling i understand that there are also xtians antisemite. WOW, what a revelation.
Besides you try to advocate the "Islamic Civilization" (quotes means right there) ????!!!!! whatever that means, can you en-light us all why always when someone try to blame something on yours peaceful and civilized islamic world, yours simple answer is ... others do it too ... centuries ago?. Why always try to forward the blame on others, when easier is to correct yourself?
Why always muslim world looks like a bunch of looser's for not assuming their fault?
And as always, the only way to defend the "Islamic civilization" is to not stay on the subject. Did you get the point of article?. Al least, did you read it?. If not, or even if yes, please read it again, and again, and again ... meabe you should read it more than koran.
You know why?. Coz have more teachings then the whole "Islamic civilization" ever produce from the beginning of time till to the end.
And to answer to yours facts, in the same way you answer CaptH, is that no one condamne the GH and SK becouse ... Mohamed was a pedophile murderous liar, who injected he's cursed personality into a book who later infected the mind and hearth of poor uneducated muslim people.
That's why no one care about few exceptions when 1.3 bilion crazy nutjobs filed with crap from that pedophile mentioned above, make that personality a way to follow.
Don't bother to answer. It takes more then 1 sec to undestend for a normal decent person, and never for brainwashed "Islamic civilization".
Unknown
From yours babling i understand that there are also xtians antisemite. WOW, what a revelation.
Another ignorant moron, comes out of the woodwork. It's 'babbling' and not 'babling'.
Unknown, why don't you read the blog post then my responses before spewing nonsense. I didn't say others do it so it's OK. You cannot read. My response was to CaptH who said, and read this
Copts and Druze are Arabs too but don't have this murderous hate in their hearts. That's from Islam.)
I proved all that wrong above. George Habash was copied by Al Qaeda. CaptH is a liar. That is evident when you read his response, and the fact that he didn't condemn Habash or Kuntar, means he does what Christian Zionists do, whilst ignorning the plight of their truly oppressed Christian bretheren, they pretend that Israel is a victim.
It's an excuse to cover their real agenda.
As for the rest of your post, it only proves your ignorance. The Prophet is the greatest man in history. Most of what you have is based on what we gave you. Your religous codification (Talmud) came from us.
When Abraham looks down he must be grinning at the influence of his greates son (Mohammed) theGreatest of all the Prophets
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Michael H. Hart
(1932 -) Professor of astronomy, physics and the history of science. 'The 100, A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons In History,' New York, 1978.
"he was the only man in history who was supremely successful on both the religious and secular level."
Jules Masserman in 'Who Were Histories Great Leaders?' in TIME Magazine,July 15, 1974
Perhaps the greatest leader of all times was Mohammad, who combined all the three functions. To a lesser degree Moses did the same.
Alphonse de Lamartine
(1790 -1869) French poet and statesman.
"Philosopher, orator, apostle, legislator, warrior, conqueror of ideas, restorer of rational dogmas, of a cult without images; the founder of twenty
terrestrial empires and of one spiritual empire, that is Muhammad. As regards all standards by which human greatness may be measured, we may well ask, is there any man greater than he?"
[Translated from Histoire De La Turqie, Paris, 1854, vol.II, pp. 276-277]
Reverend Bosworth Smith
(1794 -1884) Late Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford.
".. if ever any man had the right to say that he ruled by a right Divine, it was mohammad; for he had all the power without its instruments and without itssupports.
.....we have a book absolutely unique in its origin, in its
preservation....on the Substantial authority of which no one has ever beenable to cast a serious doubt."
[Mohammad and Mohammadanism, London, 1874, p. 235]
Edward Gibbon
(1737-1794) Considered the greatest British historian of his time.
"The greatest success of Mohammad's life was effected by sheer moral force without the stroke of a sword."
[History Of The Saracen Empire, London, 1870]
John William Draper
(1811 -1882) American scientist, philosopher, and historian.
"Four years after the death of Justinian, A.D. 569, was born at Mecca, in Arabia the man who, of all men exercised the greatest influence upon the human race . Mohammed."
[A History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, London, 1875, pp.
329-330]
J.W.H. Stab in 'Islam and its Founder'
Judged by the smallness of the means at his disposal, and the extent and permanence of the work that he accomplished, his name in world's history shines with a more specious lustre than that of the Prophet of Makkah.
Judged by the standards to human renown, the glory of what mortal can compare with his?
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