Sunday, March 31, 2002

posted 3/31/2002 05:48:00 PM by Daniel   0 comments

More support for Israel:

Asparagirl explains in her blog why she has now become an American Zionist, even though she previously was never too interested in her Jewish ancestry or religion. The Arab terrorists turned her into one.

I'm another non-observant fully-assimilated Jew who loves bacon and lobster tail, cohabits with a non-Jewish woman (for 25 years), and has never felt any particular kinship with Israel per se. Our daughter's closest brushes with Judaism have been through Hannukah parties, an occasional Passover Seder we dragged her to when she was little, and a brief stint of semi-Kosher dieting that she embarked on to circumvent the nearly-inedible college cafeteria menu.

Understand, I have nothing against Judaism. As religions go, it's one of the best. I just have better things to do with my time.

But I know how to differentiate between the good guys and the bad guys. The good guys in the Middle East are the democratic, progressive Israelis who want nothing more than to live in peace, and who have tried everything possible (short of suicidal surrender) to reach a reasonable accomodation with their neighbors. The bad guys are the Islamo-facists in the surrounding Arab countries who want nothing less than to kill all Jews, followed by Americans and western civilization and modern culture and every vestige of religious tolerance.

The suicide bombings and endlessly escalating terrorist attacks against Israel are ghastly foretastes of what America is in for if we fail to defend ourselves. I will not tolerate having our country succumb to the horror that today afflicts Israel. My daughter must not be placed in jeopardy of being snuffed out at any minute by hate-filled religious fanatics who glory in the number of innocents they can kill.

It's not enough to retaliate tit-for-tat against each individual act of terrorism. If ever there was a hopeless "cycle of violence" that is it. I will give President Bush full credit for recognizing and articulating that September 11th was a turning point in history, and that it is time to wipe the terrorists out once and for all, wherever in the world they may be. We need to crush the terrorists and their organizations and their infrastructure and any regimes that dare to harbor them.

And Israel needs to do the same. For years Israel has been on the front line against the same enemy. Neither Israel nor the United States can tolerate that enemy any longer.

I could care less how much our enemies may dislike us as a result, or how many martyrs we make in the process. I'm willing to make as many martyrs as it requires to achieve victory, whether that number be in the hundreds or thousands or millions.

It will probably only require thousands of martyrs, because I believe they are basically cowards. But whatever it takes...

Friday, March 29, 2002

posted 3/29/2002 01:31:00 PM by Daniel   0 comments

What should be done about Arafat? I've got a brilliant plan...

Right now I am so furious at the continuing and increasingly gory suicide bombings in Israel. On any relative scale you choose, it's worse for Israel than the 9/11 attacks were for us. Those attacks were ample justification for us to go after (and hopefully kill) Osama bin Laden and the Al Queda organization and the Taliban regime that sheltered them in Afghanistan. Israel would be at least as justified in taking out Arafat and the PLO organization, since he and his henchmen are either directly responsible for the suicide attacks or complicit in sheltering the actual attackers.

Unfortunately Yasser Arafat has been designated as untouchable by the double standards of the Bush Administration and by the hesitancy of the Sharon government. Israel is finally moving on Arafat's compound and arresting his bodyguards, but they don't dare kill or arrest him. What then should be done with him? Isolation? Exile? All the alternatives being bandied about are pathetic. He'll be back in business in no time, being courted by both the U.S. and Sharon as they futilely beg him to take more concrete steps to stop the neverending terrorism.

I suggest some heavy-duty psychological warfare: Capture him in his compound and temporarily isolate him there. Then give him a general anaesthetic to render him unconscious. Bring in a team of doctors, and make multiple small incisions all over his body. Into these insert tiny devices. Stitch him up and release him. Don't say what the devices are. Let Arafat and the Arab world speculate. Are they tracking devices? Listening devices? Homing devices? Remote-controlled bombs? Do they contain biochemical agents that can control or alter his mind? Can they be safely removed without killing him? If so, would all of them have to be removed simultaneously? Are some of them decoys? Or maybe all of them? What if other devices have been inserted in a less obvious manner so they can't be detected? Will any Arab ever again feel safe meeting with or talking to Arafat?

I think it's a great plan. Or at least it's better than the alternatives.

Monday, March 18, 2002

posted 3/18/2002 12:33:00 PM by Daniel   0 comments

I'm continuing to contribute elsewhere. Today's Zero-Tolerance Watch in the Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal "Best of the Web" contains an item I sent in about Lewis Elementary School in Barstow, CA, which outlawed kids from playing "Cops and Robbers" because they were shaping imaginary guns out of their fingers. Presumably they might have a hard time distinguishing those imaginary guns from the reality they see in movies and on TV.