Forget Athens and Jerusalem, the new dialectic is between Mecca and Jerusalem. On one side is support for the spread of a repressive theocratic ideology across the region and around the world through violence and intimidation, on the other side is the rise of indigenous states from the pre-Islamic era employing technology and ingenuity to transform the region.
Every time a politician pays tribute to Saudi Arabia, a journalist endorses the Arab Spring and a diplomat goes on about how Israel must make concessions to Islamic terrorists or it will destabilize the region, you see a man used to raising his arse and bowing his pate to Mecca.
It has become mainstream to speak of the Saudi royals as reformers and allies, while denouncing Israel as a reactionary backward state that's always causing trouble. The Saudis and their Gulf pals can pony up the Riyals to slam planes into the White House and the Pentagon, slowly behead women for witchcraft and promote an ideology so vicious that it gives Nazism an even run in the 100 meter genocide dash-- and come away with applause. But when an Israeli Prime Minister goes to the negotiating table with his worst enemies, he's greeted with a chorus of boos.
There was a time when Western capitals aspired to be the new Jerusalem, now they are turning into the new Mecca, the new Riyadh, the new Beirut and the new Cairo. Paris and London and a dozen other capitals have turned their back on Jerusalem and are quickly turning into meccas for Muslim immigrants and their Saudi funded mosques where bearded speakers hiss hate into hand-held microphones.
On the foreign policy chessboard, their more upscale versions do the same. Scratch one of those dispassionate critics of Israel and you more often than not find a man with his head bent low toward Mecca.
Take Thomas Friedman whose vitriol finally boiled over into the lowest kind of Israel bashing even by New York Times standards. Good old Tom had been swanning around with the Saudi royals for a while now and when he writes that congressional standing ovations for Netanyahu were paid for by the Israeli lobby (were all the standing ovations that the King of Jordan received paid for by the Jordanian lobby?) he's just another poodle in his hairy master's arms barking on command.
Consider Chas Freeman, who was literally on the Saudi payroll (not to mention that of the People's Republic of China) and whose failed appointment occasioned a lot of headlines about a talented fellow being kept away from drawing up the National Intelligence Estimate because of those Jews. But Freeman, Dennis Blair's boy, walking papers might have been more accurately stamped as, "Saudi royal family employee nominated by collaborator in Muslim Indonesian genocide of Christians fails to secure vital national security position."
When Walt and Mearsheimer's The Israel Lobby article was first published in the United States, the publication that featured the screed was Middle East Policy, a generically named journal put out by the Middle East Policy Council, an organization presided over by Chas Freeman and funded by our friends in Saudi Arabia. It was ironic to see a paper attacking the influence of the Israeli lobby appearing in a journal put out by the Saudi lobby, but also completely predictable.
The Muslim world is ground zero for conspiracy theories about the Jews and the Saudi royals along with their other Gulf counterparts fund much of the hate. What they don't do is advertise. Like one of those nightclubs that's so exclusive that it doesn't have a name, they work behind the scenes. And when they have names, there are about ten thousand of them and they're as generic as possible.
The Middle East Policy Council, formerly the slightly more truthfully named American Arab Affairs Council, founded by two American diplomats who worked in the Middle East, is typical of how the Gulfies do things. Saudis and Emiratis don't do their own laundry or build their own buildings or pump their own gas, they hire foreigners to do it for them. The Saudi Lobby is their equivalent of the Filipino maids, British architects and Indian construction workers. Want someone to spread the smear that the Jews control America. Hire that boy who took our messages to the president, give him a budget and let's see what he can do.
You won't find politicians stopping by the American-Saudi Political Action Committee. Instead a whole bunch of former American ambassadors to Saudi Arabia, like Chas Freeman, explain their position to influential people, which just happens to be the position of the House of Saud.
That goes double when the target is the general public. In 2003, the Alliance for Peace and Justice ran a bunch of radio ads attacking Israel and calling for an end to the occupation. The "Alliance" was the end of a long tail that led through an ad agency to a public relations firm and to the Saudis. Qorvis Communications, founded a year before September 11, acts as the House of Saud's PR firm. Raided by the FBI back in 04, it's still out there and working hard for the kingdom, and has its own political action committee. Much like the way the Kuwaiti government used the law firm of Shearman and Sterling to run a campaign against Guantanamo Bay.
One Qorvis alum, Judith Barnett, another former diplomat, sits on the advisory board of J Street, the left-wing anti-Israel lobby. And the Finance Committee of the Democratic National Committee. Not to mention Amideast, formerly American Friends of the Middle East, originally the Committee for Justice and Peace in the Holy Land, an organization created to oppose the creation of Israel. Its co-founder Kermit Roosevelt Jr had come out of the board of the Institute of Arab-American Affairs, which was headed by the same man who headed the Arab League's office in the United States-- proving that the Saudis were still playing the same game as far back as the 1940's.
Ms. Barnett's political activism aligns neatly with her business in The Barnett Group, which helps Middle Eastern companies overcome "trade and governmental regulatory barriers" to do business in the United States. This line of work isn't particularly unusual for her ilk. Barnett was formerly the VP of Georgetown Global Investments Corporation, which specialized in Middle Eastern investments. GGIC was started up by Marc Ginsberg, another former ambassador to the Arab world, who blogs at the Israel Policy Forum, yet another left-wing anti-Israel group.
Tying them all together is Ambassador Robert Pelletreau, another J Street advisory board member, the original contact man for the PLO and a member of the Board of Governors of the Middle East Institute, (funded by a collection of oil companies and the Sultan of Oman) and on the advisory council of the Israel Policy Forum-- and is also the treasurer of Amideast. In addition to all that, he's a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and on the boards of the National US-Arab Chamber of Commerce and the American-Iranian Council. The latter is part of the Iranian Lobby and has arranged meetings with Ahmadinejad. His former law firm, Afridi, Angell & Pelletreau is based out of the United Arab Emirates.
All this is the tip of a very large iceberg that points toward Mecca. It's an organization the scope of which makes AIPAC look small and ridiculous. Politicians may show up to pander to AIPAC voters, but they listen to the diplomats who lobby for the Muslim world without appearing to do it and using organizations with innocuous names and deceptive purposes.
Mecca and Jerusalem then. Demographics is on the side of Mecca. If you don't want your new Muslim immigrants blowing themselves up, then you had better bow to the east. If you want good relations with the oil sheiks, then you bow in the same direction, while on your knees. And if you want to live out the dream of a world government, then you need the Muslim world to play along in exchange for getting some of what it wants. Like a ban on criticizing Islam or mocking Mohammed.
And what of Jerusalem? As far as Mecca is concerned, it owns Jerusalem. It conquered it a few times and expects to conquer it again with the help of its Western allies. Jerusalem, London, Paris, Washington, Moscow and anywhere else it can reach. Most of the leaders of the former Athens agree. Certainly Jerusalem belongs to Mecca, as do London and Paris. Mecca multiculturalism is the new order of things. It doesn't matter what your skin color is, so long as you're not a woman and you bow in the right direction.
As the West drifts father and farther from its heritage and traditions, it doesn't reach some progressive rational order, instead it finds itself in the desert sands and faced with stark choices. It can either give up its reason or its ideals. Like a maddened beast it chews off its reason to save its progressive ideals and when the day comes that forces it to realize that its progressivism can no more survive in Mecca than a fish in the desert, it will be much too late.
While Mecca grows, its arrogance stirring up wars around the world, as Riyadh, Dubai and Kuwait City have their day, the cities of the West crumble and Jerusalem stands besieged on all sides. The choice between Mecca and Jerusalem has civilizational implications, it is the choice between slavery and freedom, between ignorance and knowledge, and between darkness and light.
It has become mainstream to speak of the Saudi royals as reformers and allies, while denouncing Israel as a reactionary backward state that's always causing trouble. The Saudis and their Gulf pals can pony up the Riyals to slam planes into the White House and the Pentagon, slowly behead women for witchcraft and promote an ideology so vicious that it gives Nazism an even run in the 100 meter genocide dash-- and come away with applause. But when an Israeli Prime Minister goes to the negotiating table with his worst enemies, he's greeted with a chorus of boos.
There was a time when Western capitals aspired to be the new Jerusalem, now they are turning into the new Mecca, the new Riyadh, the new Beirut and the new Cairo. Paris and London and a dozen other capitals have turned their back on Jerusalem and are quickly turning into meccas for Muslim immigrants and their Saudi funded mosques where bearded speakers hiss hate into hand-held microphones.
On the foreign policy chessboard, their more upscale versions do the same. Scratch one of those dispassionate critics of Israel and you more often than not find a man with his head bent low toward Mecca.
Take Thomas Friedman whose vitriol finally boiled over into the lowest kind of Israel bashing even by New York Times standards. Good old Tom had been swanning around with the Saudi royals for a while now and when he writes that congressional standing ovations for Netanyahu were paid for by the Israeli lobby (were all the standing ovations that the King of Jordan received paid for by the Jordanian lobby?) he's just another poodle in his hairy master's arms barking on command.
Consider Chas Freeman, who was literally on the Saudi payroll (not to mention that of the People's Republic of China) and whose failed appointment occasioned a lot of headlines about a talented fellow being kept away from drawing up the National Intelligence Estimate because of those Jews. But Freeman, Dennis Blair's boy, walking papers might have been more accurately stamped as, "Saudi royal family employee nominated by collaborator in Muslim Indonesian genocide of Christians fails to secure vital national security position."
When Walt and Mearsheimer's The Israel Lobby article was first published in the United States, the publication that featured the screed was Middle East Policy, a generically named journal put out by the Middle East Policy Council, an organization presided over by Chas Freeman and funded by our friends in Saudi Arabia. It was ironic to see a paper attacking the influence of the Israeli lobby appearing in a journal put out by the Saudi lobby, but also completely predictable.
The Muslim world is ground zero for conspiracy theories about the Jews and the Saudi royals along with their other Gulf counterparts fund much of the hate. What they don't do is advertise. Like one of those nightclubs that's so exclusive that it doesn't have a name, they work behind the scenes. And when they have names, there are about ten thousand of them and they're as generic as possible.
The Middle East Policy Council, formerly the slightly more truthfully named American Arab Affairs Council, founded by two American diplomats who worked in the Middle East, is typical of how the Gulfies do things. Saudis and Emiratis don't do their own laundry or build their own buildings or pump their own gas, they hire foreigners to do it for them. The Saudi Lobby is their equivalent of the Filipino maids, British architects and Indian construction workers. Want someone to spread the smear that the Jews control America. Hire that boy who took our messages to the president, give him a budget and let's see what he can do.You won't find politicians stopping by the American-Saudi Political Action Committee. Instead a whole bunch of former American ambassadors to Saudi Arabia, like Chas Freeman, explain their position to influential people, which just happens to be the position of the House of Saud.
That goes double when the target is the general public. In 2003, the Alliance for Peace and Justice ran a bunch of radio ads attacking Israel and calling for an end to the occupation. The "Alliance" was the end of a long tail that led through an ad agency to a public relations firm and to the Saudis. Qorvis Communications, founded a year before September 11, acts as the House of Saud's PR firm. Raided by the FBI back in 04, it's still out there and working hard for the kingdom, and has its own political action committee. Much like the way the Kuwaiti government used the law firm of Shearman and Sterling to run a campaign against Guantanamo Bay.
One Qorvis alum, Judith Barnett, another former diplomat, sits on the advisory board of J Street, the left-wing anti-Israel lobby. And the Finance Committee of the Democratic National Committee. Not to mention Amideast, formerly American Friends of the Middle East, originally the Committee for Justice and Peace in the Holy Land, an organization created to oppose the creation of Israel. Its co-founder Kermit Roosevelt Jr had come out of the board of the Institute of Arab-American Affairs, which was headed by the same man who headed the Arab League's office in the United States-- proving that the Saudis were still playing the same game as far back as the 1940's.
Ms. Barnett's political activism aligns neatly with her business in The Barnett Group, which helps Middle Eastern companies overcome "trade and governmental regulatory barriers" to do business in the United States. This line of work isn't particularly unusual for her ilk. Barnett was formerly the VP of Georgetown Global Investments Corporation, which specialized in Middle Eastern investments. GGIC was started up by Marc Ginsberg, another former ambassador to the Arab world, who blogs at the Israel Policy Forum, yet another left-wing anti-Israel group.
Tying them all together is Ambassador Robert Pelletreau, another J Street advisory board member, the original contact man for the PLO and a member of the Board of Governors of the Middle East Institute, (funded by a collection of oil companies and the Sultan of Oman) and on the advisory council of the Israel Policy Forum-- and is also the treasurer of Amideast. In addition to all that, he's a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and on the boards of the National US-Arab Chamber of Commerce and the American-Iranian Council. The latter is part of the Iranian Lobby and has arranged meetings with Ahmadinejad. His former law firm, Afridi, Angell & Pelletreau is based out of the United Arab Emirates.
All this is the tip of a very large iceberg that points toward Mecca. It's an organization the scope of which makes AIPAC look small and ridiculous. Politicians may show up to pander to AIPAC voters, but they listen to the diplomats who lobby for the Muslim world without appearing to do it and using organizations with innocuous names and deceptive purposes.
Mecca and Jerusalem then. Demographics is on the side of Mecca. If you don't want your new Muslim immigrants blowing themselves up, then you had better bow to the east. If you want good relations with the oil sheiks, then you bow in the same direction, while on your knees. And if you want to live out the dream of a world government, then you need the Muslim world to play along in exchange for getting some of what it wants. Like a ban on criticizing Islam or mocking Mohammed.
As the West drifts father and farther from its heritage and traditions, it doesn't reach some progressive rational order, instead it finds itself in the desert sands and faced with stark choices. It can either give up its reason or its ideals. Like a maddened beast it chews off its reason to save its progressive ideals and when the day comes that forces it to realize that its progressivism can no more survive in Mecca than a fish in the desert, it will be much too late.
While Mecca grows, its arrogance stirring up wars around the world, as Riyadh, Dubai and Kuwait City have their day, the cities of the West crumble and Jerusalem stands besieged on all sides. The choice between Mecca and Jerusalem has civilizational implications, it is the choice between slavery and freedom, between ignorance and knowledge, and between darkness and light.
Comments
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteDG wrote an ideology so vicious that it gives Nazism an even run in the 100 meter genocide dash-- and come away with applause.
ReplyDeleteBeen saying so for a long time. Islam is totalitarian in not just the political and religious sphere, but enforces its regime on the personal level, even to toilet etiquette.
When it come to the erasing the past, Islam has no equal. We will lose all the works of art, literature and music, if Islam ever gained a power in the West. It will be the end of civilisation and the start of a new Dark age, from which there will be recovery, as what the legacy of the past would have been erased.
So even discounting the multiple genocides that Islam has conducted over ages, from a purely civilisational and recovery from the Dark Age POV, Islam makes Nazism look liberal.
And those who hold the power chose darkness.
ReplyDelete@HermitLion
ReplyDeleteThey are not confused; they know what’s happening vey well. They are simply afraid. They can not stop Iran from getting nuclear capability. They can not stop the Saudis from developing their own nuclear capability as a response. They lost Iraq. They cannot stop Pakistan from working with terrorist groups. They cannot defeat the Taliban. The afghan government will be unable to finance its security forces for another 20 years. And the Administration chose to go the European way, the dhimmi way.
The alternative is a Cold War with the Muslim World, and this is considered too costly by the current elites.
There are 3 basic demands by the Muslim World that America must meet in order to be left alone.
1 Witdraw from Muslim Lands and do not interfere there. Interference will only be accepted if it helps Islam (against secular regimes).
2 Do not side with non-muslims against muslims, especially with India and Israel.
3 Remove obstacles to the spread of Islam in America, including free speech.
These demands were already accepted by Europe after the 1973 Oil Embargo. It appears that historical shift is taking place, and american elites are gradually choosing dhimmitude as well.
Passer by,
ReplyDeleteI did not say they were confused. Fear is a common reason for choosing darkness, but that does not make it the right choice, or an acceptable choice, for that matter.
They chose death and slavery not for themselves, but for the many millions whom they were supposed to lead and protect.
There is a word to describe that, it starts with a T, and ends with a noose.
As for the ability to stop islamic regimes from achieving their deadly goals, that was always a matter of will. Without will, a tiger cannot defeat a rat.
Sultan Knish: as brilliant as ever!
ReplyDeleteHere is, perhaps, *one* solution ;):
http://sheikyermami.com/wp-content/uploads/Nuke-Mecca.jpg
@ HermitLion:
ReplyDelete"...There is a word to describe that, it starts with a T, and ends with a noose."
Perhaps my question is stupid, but I really want to know: what is this word?
"There was a time when Western capitals aspired to be the new Jerusalem"
ReplyDeleteIf it's any consolation, The New Jerusalem figures prominently in The Book of Mormon and The Doctrine and Covenants, albeit in the Western Hemisphere. Despite the temple tempest in a teacup, the Mormons have always been ardent lovers of Israel and always will be since they are not about to abandon their foundational texts.
Actually it's possible to keep bot reason and ideals.
ReplyDeleteIdealism, as I recall, never involved succumbing to psycopaths or giving up Western society, or for that matter, lying about the purposes of those pretending to be victims instead of bullies.
Helping the weak means you need the means to perceive who really are the weak, and who are the standover men.
As far as the West goes, it would have been nice if politicians - often non-professionals - had been trained to spot a Marxists at ten paces and to understand a whole lot more about the political scene before entering it.
Personally, the political scene gives me the shivers. I was always a nasty game, but this Chicago element as well as the desetrt politics being played out turned it into just another death march for the voters.
Passerby - one simple method of defewnce would have been (and would be) to keep Muslims/Sharia out of the democracies!!!
ReplyDeleteDealing with them in their own countries would have been bad enough, but letting them emigrate freely to live amongst us !(and some are fleeing Islam too don't forget) makes things immesurably more complex, especially because the govts will not deport those who are a terrorist threat.
Rita, I believe the word is "treason".
ReplyDeleteTBS, thank you :)
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree very much with what you say too.
"The choice between Mecca and Jerusalem has civilizational implications, it is the choice between slavery and freedom, between ignorance and knowledge, and between darkness and light."
ReplyDeleteIf only more people would understand the truth in that single paragraph.
TBS--I agree, and you're absolutely right about people being able to spot Marxism. There's a definite whiff of Marxism becoming more obvious where I live.
The media is either ignorant of it or choses to ignore it.
@Rita,
ReplyDeleteLet's make it into a game. The (partial) word is T_AI__R, and it rhymes with waiter.
Now fill in the blanks :)
This has flaws, Daniel, big time.
ReplyDeleteHave you heard of Sabeel? This is why I left the right. They do not understand Esav.
True the oil money speaks, but it is not the reason, why Jerusalem is out and 'mecca' is in. You grossly underestimate the Sabeel influence. 'paliestinian' Christians are more influential in swaying the West, more than the Muslim Arabs are.
Moreover, the West's Christians, will side with the 'palestinians', when they read stuff like what you wrote above.
Or do you think Sabeel are more acceptable because you think they do not support terror? Don't be fooled. They see them as doing their dirty work, i'd say, for Hezbollah has the support of it's Christian lebanese too. And this very 'peaceful resistance' makes them more attractive to the west, than the suicide squads the Muslims have.
Read below and open your eyes. Sabeel endorsese suicided bombings, and while the West condemns Hamas and Islamic jihad and Hezbollah, they embrace Sabeel.
Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Sabeel.html
The Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, founded in 1989, is an Arab Christian non-governmental organization based in Jerusalem. According to its web site, the group is “an ecumenical grassroots liberation theology movement among Palestinian Christians...and strives to empower the Palestinian community as a whole and to develop the internal strengths needed for participation in building a better world for all.” Sabeel is an Arabic word meaning “the way” or “spring of life-giving water.”
The organization is also outspoken in its criticism of Israel and its government. It has been one of the main coordinators for anti-Israeli advocacy among U.S. churches, and has been a leading proponent of divestment (which the group calls “selective divestment”) from Israel. Several Protestant church groups that have expressed support for divesting from Israel, such as the World Council of Churches, the Anglican Church of Britain, and the Presbyterian Church, quote Sabeel publications in their divestment statements.
Sabeel was founded by Rev. Naim Ateek, former canon of St. George’s Cathedral in Jerusalem,
Ateek claims that Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands “continues to be the root cause of the violence and terror.” He also used classical anti-Semitic themes in his writings, such as labeling Jews as “Christ-killers.” In a 2001 Easter message, Ateek wrote, “it seem to many of us that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him...the Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily.”
In 2002, Ateek wrote that suicide bombings were the result of the despair caused by Israel’s occupation. Although he was quoted as saying suicide bombing was “a crime against God,” he also expressed understanding for Palestinians who “feel they have no options and very little to lose.”
While Sabeel masks itself as a pro-peace Christian group invested in the Palestinian cause, its publications, conferences, and group web site are actually platforms for espousing extremist anti-Israel views.
@Haim - American Christians know about liberation theology, though we most often associate it with the likes of Wright rather than Sabeel. Either way, it is disliked and Israel has vast support in the US. You write like you don't live in America, or live in an atypical community.
ReplyDeleteGood points you make Sultan. I will read you more often. Can we however try to stop wailing as if all is lost? When push comes to shove, our real enemy (our liberal "elites") will be brushed aside and the peoples of the western world will regain control. Islam will not then stand one chance. This monstrous scam can be destroyed in less than a week with (comparatively) little loss of life. It is only a question of will.
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