Free Republic

Garrison Keillor has always struck me as mean-spirited, wrapping a fundamentally smug and condescending world view in a fondant of cutesy-poo irony. Now, thanks to Glenn Reynolds‘ posting of Marissa Brostoff’s TABLET MAGAZINE column, “Garrison Keillor Doesn’t Like Jews Writing Christmas Songs,” others may also reassess their opinion of NPR’s favorite son. Brostoff describes Keillor’s recent Baltimore Sun column, in which he complains about “all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year, Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write ‘Grab your loafers, coma along...

The "Arbeit macht frei" sign stolen from Auschwitz in southern Poland has been found in the north and five men have been arrested, police say. They said the metal sign from the main gate, which symbolises for many the atrocities of Nazi Germany, had been cut into three pieces. A major search was launched after the sign was stolen before dawn on Friday. Its theft, the motive for which was not being reported, caused outrage in Israel and among Polish politicians. Five men in their 20s or 30s were detained and were being taken to Krakow for questioning, a police...

<p>"NatWest handed Al Qaeda terrorist 100% mortgage to buy £93,000 home he turned into a bomb factory"</p> <p>SNIPPET: "A bank has sparked outrage by handing over a 100 per cent mortgage to an Al Qaeda terrorist who smuggled himself into Britain.</p>

At a time of year when faith is celebrated by most Americans, it may surprise some to learn that many students of faith and history believe we are living in a post-Christian age. It is not apparent at the local malls now so festively decorated, but it can be seen in some telltale cultural indicators. One of those is the number of attacks on people of faith, particularly Jews. Throughout much of the world today, where Christianity is in decline attacks on Jews are on the rise. In post-Christian Europe, Jews are often victims of a deeply entrenched anti-Semitism. Synagogues...

The dollar's role in world trade is declining almost as rapidly as the federal government is conjuring fiat money out of thin air. The latest blow comes with the creation of a Gulf Monetary Council, with the aim of establishing a multinational petro-state currency. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard reports: "The Arab states of the Gulf region have agreed to launch a single currency modelled on the euro, hoping to blaze a trail towards a pan-Arab monetary union swelling to the ancient borders of the Ummayad Caliphate. 'The Gulf monetary union pact has come into effect,' said Kuwait's finance minister, Mustafa al-Shamali, speaking...

A prospective juror who is a priori prejudiced will, as a matter of course, be dismissed from serving on a jury pool. Many use this knowledge to be excused from jury service. Israel finds herself in the most peculiar position of always being found guilty before deliberations even begin. The World, itself Judge and Jury, stands and applauds: the harsher the treatment, the stronger the clapping. Israel’s Prime Minister decided to freeze all construction within Jewish settlements for ten months. This created an uproar, first because of the manner which it was done (decided in a cabinet meeting and implemented...

Suspected Jewish settlers today attacked a mosque in the northern West Bank, burning holy books and spraying threatening graffiti in Hebrew on the building, Palestinian officials and Israeli police said. Extremists broke into the mosque in the village of Yasuf, near the city of Nablus, and burned Muslim holy books and prayers carpets, while sprayed slogans on the floor reading “Price tag – greetings from Effi.” The so-called price tag is the Jewish settlers’ policy of attacking Palestinians and their property in retribution for any Israeli government curb on settlement expansion. Effi is a Jewish name. The dawn attack appeared...

One of the most extraordinary features of Barack Obama's victory over John McCain was his capture of 78% of the Jewish vote. To be sure, there was nothing extraordinary about the number itself. Since 1928, the average Jewish vote for the Democrat in presidential elections has been an amazing 75%—far higher than that of any other ethno-religious group. Yet there were reasons to think that it would be different in 2008. The main one was Israel. Despite some slippage in concern for Israel among American Jews, most of them were still telling pollsters that their votes would be strongly influenced...

Last week the Republican Jewish Coalition joyfully issued this press release: Jewish support for Obama continues to tumble Wednesday, December 09, 2009 By: RJC Press OfficeAccording to a Quinnipiac poll released today, Jewish support for President Obama has tumbled to 52%. In January, Obama’s approval rating among Jews was 83%; by September it had fallen to 64%, according to a Gallup poll.The Quinnipiac poll asked respondents whether they approved of President Obama’s handling of specific issues. Only 52% of Jewish respondents approved of the way President Obama is handling the economy, and 49% approved of his handling of health care....

December 4, 2009 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- It must have seemed odd to FBI agents that Chicago terror suspect David Coleman Headley carried a book with him called How to Pray like a Jew. Mr. Headley isn't Jewish. He is an Islamic fundamentalist. Headley, a Pakistani native whose birth name was Daood Gilani before he changed it, was using the book of Jewish prayer tips as part of an elaborate cover, according to federal authorities. Now, the reason for the alleged cover may be surfacing. Headley is under investigation by India's counterpart to the FBI in connection with a plot to...

“Danny Dayan, who serves as chairman of the council for Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, said the decision was the ‘latest hostile step’ from Britain against the Jewish towns and villages in the area.”

TV character Nassour: “There won’t be any Jews or Zionists, Allah willing. They’ll be erased. “We want to slaughter them so they will be expelled from our land, right?”

Here is another example of the voices against Islam being on the rise. This time the target is NY Muslim Yousef al-Khattab, who has is very open with his hatred of Israel and America. This will be interesting. Woodside Islamist says he’s left the country by Peter C. Mastrosimone, Editor-in-Chief 12/10/2009 A Woodside convert to Islam who openly sympathizes with al-Qaeda and the Taliban says he has left the country.

Critics of Cynthia McKinney may dismiss her as a loose cannon and a rabble-rouser, but to her supporters, the former Georgia congresswoman is someone with the courage to challenge convention and speak the truth. McKinney, 54, represented an Atlanta-area district as a Democrat from 1993-2003 and 2005-07. A vigorous critic of President George W. Bush, she gave voice to a theory, widely circulated on the political fringes, that Bush knew in advance of the Sept. 11 attacks but allowed them to happen because they would prove profitable to the global investment firm his father was associated with. In her final...

This Jerusalem Post article is sure to raise eyebrows, and perhaps tempers, among Jews, Catholics, and anyone else who thinks it's wrong and ugly to spit at someone because of his religious beliefs. This report says that Catholic and Orthodox priests and religious are regularly assaulted by Orthodox Jews who spit at them in a show of contempt. . . .

An Arab university lecturer and writer is hiding underground out of fear for his life after shocking the Palestinian Authority with a book that links Jews with the Temple Mount. The Arab world has been conducting a campaign, including removal of tons of dirt containing archaeological evidence, to try to eliminate historical Jewish links with the Temple Mount. Dr. Sari Nusseibeh, of Birzeit University in Ramallah, threw acid on the propaganda campaign that tries to convince Arabs that the First and Second Temples never existed. He wrote in a book, “The legendary Temple of Jerusalem may be the place of...

Brazilian Jewish teenagers this week protested what they called their "exclusion" from a national exam for high school graduates set to take place on Shabbat, after a Brazilian court said providing Jews with an alternative date would "undermine equality." "In some areas in Brazil, such a Rio de Janeiro, observant Jewish students cannot apply to some of the leading universities," said Alex Kingel, 17, from Sao Paulo, who will not be taking the test. Kingel explained that because Rio de Janeiro's leading university is a federal one - funded by the central government - applicants must take the test, known...

(IsraelNN.com) First response to the government's construction freeze: A Palestinian terrorist attacked Jews with a knife at the gas station in Kiryat Arba, near Hevron, wounding a man, 45, and a girl, 16. The terrorist was shot and killed by a soldier and a guard; the soldier is of the Nachshon Regiment, which was in the news recently for signs waved by some of its members against being used to remove Jews from their homes. The woman and man are reportedly in light condition. A Magen David Adom emergency crew arrived quickly on the scene, as did police and army...

More filth over at mybarackobama's website. No matter how many times I expose it, they keep it up, providing a forum for and the cultural acceptance of this incitement to Jewish genocide. Such vile hate would never have been allowed in polite and decent society 15 years ago. We are no longer decent? Hope and change folks, hope and change. Do you think calls for end of Islam would stand? Racism against blacks? Would that stand? During the 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama’s website, Organizing for America, hosted a series of vile anti-American, Jew-hating posts and pieces. The onslaught was...

During a recent speaking tour in Canada, MK Nahman Shai (Kadima) shocked some of his hosts when he said that his primary goal in politics today is to bring down the Netanyahu government. Although indelicate, Shai's comment was not surprising. Kadima is in the opposition. And like all opposition parties in all parliamentary democracies, the primary goal of its members is to bring down the government so that they can take power. Given that this is the case, it is unsurprising that until this week, Kadima leader Tzipi Livni tried to blame Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for US President Barack...

In another in a long series of swift kicks to Israel and American Jews, the Obama Administration has announced that it is slashing the guest list and budget for its 2009 Hanukkah celebration. According to the Jerusalem Post the guest list is being cut in half causing some American Jews to wonder if Obama is giving them the cold shoulder... again. In case no one has been paying attention, President Obama has been slighting Israel and American Jews since before he became president. His pick of Samantha Power, the Palestinian apologist, for his Mid East policy team was a fine...

Former US vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin disagrees with the Obama administration's demand that Israel halt settlement construction, although her reason for that opinion is puzzling to some (or at the least demonstrates she's not familiar with the term "natural growth" that much of the debate has revolved around). Palin debates Biden in St.... She told Barbara Walters on ABC's Good Morning America this week that she disagrees with the White House because all the Jews moving to Israel need a place to live. "I disagree with the Obama administration on that," Palin told Walters. "I believe that the Jewish...

A British appeals court has ruled that a Jewish school unlawfully discriminated against an applicant who was not a Jew according to the British chief rabbi’s definition of Judaism. The applicant is the son of a Jewish father and a mother who converted at a Reformed synagogue; according to Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, a child of a mother who converted to Judaism is Jewish only if the mother converted at an Orthodox synagogue. Whether this definition of Judaism is “benign or malignant, theological or supremacist … the requirement that if a pupil is to qualify for admission his mother must...

Satchmo and the Jews Terry Teachout From issue: November 2009 In addition to being the greatest jazz musician of the 20th century, Louis Armstrong was also the most beloved. “I never met anybody that didn’t love him that ever saw him work or ever has encountered him, had any connection or any business with him,” said Bing Crosby. The secret of Armstrong’s charm lay in the straightforward openness of his character. Though his personality was more complex than his fans realized, his public and private sides were essentially identical. One of his friends described him as “down-to-earth, natural, completely...

SNIPPET: "A 90 year old man, identified only as Adolf S., was indicted on Nazi war crimes in Germany. The former member of Hitler’s SS is charged with 58 counts of killing Jewish slave laborers in Deutsch Schuetzen, in Austria. According to prosecutors he, along with other members of the fifth SS Tank Division "Viking,” devised a plan to rob and murder the Jews. The following day they made good on their plan, taking 57 Jewish slave laborers into the woods, stealing their valuables, and firing bullets into their heads from behind. The final indictment comes from the allegation that...

Escaping the Nazis By: JOHN MULLANE Bucks County Courier Times The memories haunt Danny Goldsmith. Chill night. Nazi troopers storming his street in Belgium, pounding on doors, smashing them. He, his mother and baby sister, Lillian, hid on a rooftop as the beam of a German soldier's flashlight swept past them. It was 1942. He was 10. "At one point, I peeked over the cornice and saw our Jewish neighbors being dragged into the street in their night clothes and put in trucks," he said to a packed room this week in Arlington, Va. His parents' wedding photo was on...

A letter appealing for the support of the Goldstone report's findings was articulated by the leftist Jewish organization "Jews say no!" and signed by hundreds of Jews worldwide on Wednesday. "When it comes to Israel, hard-core censorship and intimidation by those claiming to speak in the name of the Jewish people have been the order of the day," the letter said regarding Israel's response to the Goldstone report findings. The letter also accused the worldwide Jewish community of unsuitably attacking Justice Goldstone and said "when those within a community try to "excommunicate" and dishonor truth-tellers, it is our obligation and...

Isi Leibler has written a fierce denunciation in the Jerusalem Post of Britain’s Jewish community leadership for their supine and craven response to the way Britain’s political and intellectual class is throwing Israel ever more brazenly under the bus. I agree with all that he says. However, I fear that his hope that British Jews get rid of these leaders and replace them by individuals who are prepared to mount a proper defence of Israel in the face of this verbal pogrom is tragically unrealisable.

It seems that lately most of my critics have been Jews associated with the paleoconservative right: Paul Gottfried, Robert Weissberg (see my reply after Weissberg's comment), and Lawrence Auster. Takuan Seiyo’s critique rehashes familiar arguments in a particularly nasty way, speaking, for example, of my "malice and brain-dead stupidity." Such characterizations must be understood as nothing more or less than attempts to draw boundaries of acceptable political discourse in a way that is acceptable to Jewish interests. It's exactly the sort of thing that Jewish neoconservatives did to vitiate the American conservative movement by excluding people like Pat Buchanan and...

The first time I became aware of leftist Jews was when, as a reporter for The Daily Cardinal, the student newspaper, at the University of Wisconsin, I was assigned to cover a meeting of the Committee Against the War in Vietnam. This was around 1965” — reminisced the evolutionary psychologist Kevin MacDonald in “Memories Of Madison — My Life In The New Left”. Professor MacDonald has won fame and a following on the far right for having “explained the Jews,” particularly in his book The Culture of Critique (pdf). And one has to respect him for the courage and sheer...

This is a brief post scriptum to Part 4, warranted by a series of most interesting comments thereto by a Mr. W. Lindsay Wheeler, and counter arguments by other readers, for whose positive comments I am thankful. It is strange indeed that the Roman Catholic faith still harbors such a high percentage of Antisemites, particularly on the periphery of Europe bracketed by Ireland on one side and Poland on the other. Part of it has to do with the limited teaching of the Bible in Catholic education – at least the kind I know from Europe. Many traditional Catholics have...

Benito Mussolini has an infamous place in modern history, as well he should. Nearly everyone knows Mussolini as the dictator of Fascist Italy and the ally of Nazi Germany in the Second World War. But that is only part of the story.  Mussolini began his political career as an avowed Marxist (defined as the atheist philosophy which holds that capitalism is bad because it enriches a few capitalists to the detriment of masses of laborers and that laborers should take control of all means of production — in order, in theory though not in practice, to be fair to the...

In his new suburban American home, Shaker Yakub, a Yemeni Jew, folded a large scarf in half, wrapped it around his head and tucked in his spiraling side curls. "This is how I passed for a Muslim," said the 59-year-old father of seven, improvising a turban that hid his black skullcap. The ploy enabled Mr. Yakub and half a dozen members of his family to slip undetected out of their native town of Raida, Yemen, and travel to the capital 50 miles to the south. There, they met U.S. State Department officials conducting a clandestine operation to bring some of...

Los Angeles police say two Jewish men in their 30s were shot in the legs as they were about to enter a synagogue in the North Hollywood section of Los Angeles Thursday morning. A man described as an African-American with a handgun entered the Adat Yeshurun Valley Sephardic synagogue at about 6:20 a.m. Thursday and opened fire. The victims were taken to a hospital in stable condition. Police are investigating the shooting as a hate crime. The Los Angeles Times says police arrested a man near the synagogue, but the sources say they don't believe he was the gunman. The...

Chaos is the only term that can describe the events taking place in Jerusalem these past few days and it doesn’t look like the mayhem will subside anytime soon. Israeli police are in an all out battle with masked Palestinian protesters as stun grenades, stones, petrol bombs and plastic chairs are raining from the sky. The fact that this World War III type of scene is happening outside one of Jerusalem’s most holy shrines shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to those who are familiar with the history between these two enemies. As Israeli riot police tried to extinguish...

(IsraelNN.com) The self-proclaimed pro-Israel J Street lobby opened its nationwide conference this week, trying to survive a growing tide of American Jews who oppose its anti-Israeli government policies. Speaking at the opening of its three-day conference this week in Washington, the group's director, Jeremy Ben-Ami, declared that J Street is “defining support for the creation of a Palestinian state as a core pro-Israel position.” He claimed wide backing for its policies despite the boycott of the conference by Michael Oren, the Israel Ambassador to Washington. Also absent were dozens of Congress members, concerned with the organization’s pro-Arab position and its...

Never since the mid 1970s when the Watergate Congress insisted on abandoning our South Vietnamese allies after the war had been won have I seen defeat snatched from the jaws of victory in such a bold and decisive manner. As I survey the scene in America today I’m beginning to wonder if we would be in any worse shape if we’d lost the Cold War. From sea to shining sea Americans watch as the once greatest industrial nation on earth board up our factories and ship our manufacturing capacity to other countries. It seems like every other day the last...

Apparently it more important to keep the Israelis out, then obtain their knowledge on such a serious issue. This fits right in with the recent day of hatred towards Israel that Cleric Yusuf Al Qaradawi called for. US Org. Hosts Cancer Meet, Israelis not Welcome by Maayana Miskin (IsraelNN.com) A United States-based organization's conference on breast cancer awareness, to be hosted in Egypt, has been touted by international news networks as an example of “unprecedented cooperation” in the region. However, according to Channel 2 news, the celebration of unity may be premature, as Israeli doctors were told at the last...

Yes, you’ll tell me that there are such organizations as the Jewish Defense League that sometimes make noise when acts are inappropriately done against Jews. Fine, I hear you, but no specific Jewish leader has the name recognition that gets called onto media programs following anti-Semitic related events. Nor does any Jewish leader have the clout that forces politicians to stand with them at press conferences the way NYC boss Mike Bloomberg stood with Al Sharpton following the shooting death of Sean Bell, which was not even a racial incident. So, why is that? Why don’t Jews have such a...

Hi guys, instead of the usual hate mail, I recently received this very touching letter along with pictures from a very loving family in Israel. This made my day. May God bless this family and Israel! Shalom I thank GOD for the love he put in your heart for Israel. May he use us for his glory and will make us more and more like Him and his SON JESUS

A record number of people - 1.5 million visitors - came to the Western Wall during the Hebrew month of Tishrei, according to figures from the Western Wall Heritage Foundation and the Israel Police. The rabbi of the Kotel (Western Wall), Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitz, commented that "these figures are evidence that the Western Wall is the spiritual home for Jews from all around the world, regardless of their background."

There have been some phony arguments put forth for another "surge" in Afghanistan. We need not a surge of troops, we merely need to let our forces there do what needs to be done - kill the enemy. There is this misconception about Afghanistan in particular (and Islam in general) that somehow we can bring Central Asia (and the rest of the Islamic world) kicking and screaming into the 21st Century through good will. This is simply not the case. There is no amount of money to spend, infrastructure to build, schools to provide, hospitals to heal, or good will...

...How can we forget this? We who remember over three and a half thousand years of our personal history. Our Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Our Matriarchs Sarah, Rebecca, Leah and Rachel. The twelve Tribes from whom we are descended. The Torah, our Code of Laws, which was given to Moses on Mount Sinai. The Words of our Prophets more than 2500 years ago which still resonate today. The building and destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem. Exile, persecution, expulsion, inquisition, settlement, temporary acceptance. All this we remember but an event of the magnitude of the Holocaust...

On Dec. 20, 1998, in the midst of his murderous speculative rampage against the currencies of Malaysia, Indonesia, South Korea, and other targeted Asian nations, George Soros appeared on CBS-TV’s “60 Minutes,” to explain and defend his behavior. Confronted by interviewer Steve Kroft about his experiences as a youth in Hungary, under the Nazi occupation, Soros freely admitted that he posed as the “adopted godson” of an official of the Nazi-occupation government, and helped in the confiscation of Jewish properties. “Kroft: And you watched lots of people get shipped off to the death camps. “Soros: Right. I was 14 years...

Recently, tragedy struck Samoa in the South Pacific Ocean in the form of a tidal wave triggered by an earthquake. American Samoa is an unincorporated state southeast of independent Samoa. As I heard the reports come in, I couldn't help but ponder the irony here. We just let those words roll right off of our tongues...American Samoa. In case you didn't know, the various Polynesian peoples living on those islands and others as well didn't ask to be invaded, converted, conquered, given offers they couldn't refuse, and so forth. Yet the French, Germans, and Americans wound up dividing the islands...

I’ve seen the future, and it’s black and white. It was a sunny Sunday morning in our Lower East Side community playground, animated by a frenetic blur of whooping kids, my own included. Alone on a bench, I’d neglected to bring a book from home and wasn’t in the mood to socialize with the parents nearby. I opted instead to subject the ad-hoc collection of children to an informal Jewish identity census. Before disclosing the outcome of this thoroughly unscientific survey, it’s important to recall that this neighborhood was once the beating heart of Jewish life in America and the...

Croatian extreme right-wing NGO The Croatian Cultural Movement (HUP) has announced plans to erect a monument in honor of former Croatian president Ante Pavelic in Zagreb, Croatia, this December. Ante Pavelić visiting Hitler at Berghof. SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region | World HUP president Tomislav Dragun has been quoted as saying that the monument will stand adjacent to the capital's central square. Pavelic, the president of Croatia during World War II, was known for his state-organized terror campaign against Jews, Serbs, Gypsies and anti-fascist Croats. He was installed as the president of the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) in 1941, a...

Here is what the Islamocreeps of RevolutionMuslim had to say today. Keep in mind that Yousef al-Khattab is an ex-Jew. Ahhh.....the beauty of Islam. Allah(oh God) Kill The Jews That Occupy Palestine & Their Supporters A Prayer to My God Ya Allah(Oh God) I beseech You to carry out your wrath on the Jewish occupiers of Palestine & their supporters.

As I suspected, this Honduran news director was a supporter of the would-be usuper Mel Zelaya. Who is buddies with Chavez. Who is buddies with Iran's Ahmadinejad. Who wants Israel wiped off the map. From Ynet News: "The US Ambassador in Honduras has condemned anti-Semitic remarks by a local radio news director who has been an outspoken opponent of the coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya." [NOTE, it was not a coup!] "Ambassador Hugo Llorens sent a letter to Radio Globo owner Alejandro Villatoro expressing "astonishment and incomprehension" over the September 25 remarks by station director David Romero." "Commenting on...

It took a long time for anyone to point out an obvious phenomenon about the $60 billion Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme, the largest in history. It was that Madoff victimized thousands upon thousands of his fellow American Jews. By the time that phenomenon was recognized, it was too late for Americans to properly digest the intellectual nutrients it offered. The story was over. But now it turns out that another Madoff-like Ponzi operation, this one the world’s second largest, also laid financial waste to Jews. This clearly is no one-off phenomenon. As a story, the Stanford Financial Group of banks...