Alberto Nisman, The ‘Global Community’ & Anti-Semitism in Europe-Some Links & Thoughts

December 16, 2017December 17, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

A terrorist blows up a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires (85 dead) in 1994–>Prosecutor Alberto Nisman starts relentlessly investigating years later and eventually confirms evidence of an Iranian state-sponsored Hezbollah agent behind the attack–>Nisman also discovers that the President of Argentina (wonderfully corrupt) is involved in the cover-up of this fact for politics/money/trade/ideological reasons–>Alberto Nisman is murdered in 2015.

A little more on the murder here.

Dexter Filkins took a look at the death of Nisman:

Now it’s back in the news again:

From The NY Times:

‘On July 18, 1994, Ibrahim Hussein Berro, an operative of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah, drove a van filled with 606 pounds of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and fuel oil into the Buenos Aires Jewish community center, known as AMIA. More than 300 Argentines were wounded; 85 were murdered. It remains the bloodiest terrorist attack in Argentina’s history.

From 2004 until 2015, our friend, the prosecutor Alberto Nisman, tirelessly pursued the truth behind this crime. He knew from his investigation that the attack was an Iranian-planned operation. And he determined that Ms. Kirchner was behind a cover-up designed to whitewash Iran’s role.

What drove Ms. Kirchner? Argentina faced deep economic problems at the time, and the financial benefits of closer relations with Iran might have tempted her. Her government also had populist ties to Iran and the Bolivarian bloc of nations led by Venezuela. Whatever the reason, never has Ms. Kirchner been formally charged in the crime. Until now.’

This event demonstrates not only how criminally corrupt the Argentine government is (Don’t Cry For Me Argentina), but also the kinds of people, incentives and dangers out there in the world.

The thuggish regime in Iran really is seeking to expand its scope globally (murdering Jews on foreign soil). It really is seeking deliverable nukes while dipping into black-market activity, funding terrorism in a bid to the Mediterranean. It really is seeking supremacy over a quickly forming Saudi-Israeli alliance (Al Quds in Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, current ‘allies’ in Yemen).

It will do these kinds of ‘legitimate’ deals where it can too.

During the past administration, a decision was made in Washington to frame American relations with the Iranian regime as either war or a deal to include them in the ‘community of nations’ (perhaps what you might expect from a ‘peace’ activist).

It’s not clear these are the kinds of people with whom we can, nor should, be doing business (though I’m sympathetic to countering Saudi-funded Wahhabism).

Yeah it’s Vice (way radical and edgy), but at least they’re on-scene:

Addition: Argentinian politics are deeply charged, personal, corrupt and messy.

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Anti-Semitism runs deep, and there are plenty of people to reinforce their own standing/lack of standing by scapegoating Jewish folk. A lot of the time such differences can be explained simply by what happens in the schoolyard (he/she is different, isn’t like me, looks funny etc.) but dear Lord, can such sentiment be theorized into racial and genetic pseudo-science, justified by religious conviction, and mobilized into political violence.

More care is required than to leave freedoms in the hands of identitarians.

Jamie Kirchik’s ‘Last Night In Sweden‘:

‘The danger of governments and the press continuing to deny the reality of violent anti-semitism, and of the real dangers posed by large numbers of migrants from Muslim-majority countries without any real effort or ability to acculturate them to Western social and political norms, while blaming “the far right” and “neo-Nazis” alone for anti-semitism and attacks on Muslims, should be plain to any thinking person.’

Via Mick Hartley via Forward: ‘Take It From A British Jew: Anti-Zionism Leads To Anti-Semitism.‘

Israel, Iran, & Peace: Andrew Sullivan Responds To Charges Of Potential Anti-Semitism…

From Guernica: Bernard Henri Levy Interview On Anti-Semitism And Fascism

Repost-Henry Kissinger & George Schulz Via The WSJ: ‘The Iran Deal And Its Consequences’

Two Quotations From Kenan Malik & One From Ken Minogue

December 9, 2017December 10, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Via Mick Hartley-

Kenan Malik on ‘The Truth About Cultural Appropriation‘:

‘What is really being appropriated, in other words, is not culture but the right to police cultures and experiences, a right appropriated by those who license themselves to be arbiters of the correct forms [of] cultural borrowing.’

The collectivization of one’s own suffering, and politicization of the personal, doesn’t necessarily require the maturity, freedom and strength to think for one’s self. Self-love isn’t necessarily a virtue, after all, nor either is it honest self-reflection.

If an individual can’t persuade others with ideas and argument, they always have the recourse of grievance and collectivized victim-hood in which to retreat. It’s easy to melt back into the crowd and call others horrible names just for bringing up contrary ideas and arguments (declaring them violators of all that is right, true and good in the world, while declaring yourself closer to good intentions and the holy causes (‘-Isms’).

This taps into a pretty universal human desire: To gain as much as possible with minimal possible effort, and to view one’s self as virtuous, and one’s enemies not merely as lacking in virtue, but evil.

Whether such ideas are true is another matter, because there clearly are genuine victims suffering all manners of injustice in this world, but this particular set of doctrines far outstrips the possibilities of individuals to honestly self-reflect, learn from experience, and solve the kinds of problems which can be solved through politics.

Malik:

‘There is a difference between creating a society in which we have genuinely reduced or removed certain forms of hatreds and demanding that people shut up because they have to conform to other people’s expectations of what is acceptable. To demand that something is unsayable is not to make it unsaid, still less unthought. It is merely to create a world in which social conversation becomes greyer and more timid, in which people are less willing to say anything distinctive or outrageous, in which in Jon Lovett’s words, ‘fewer and fewer people talk more and more about less and less’…’

(Below):

-Minogue, Kenneth. Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. (Pg 111).

On the many dangers of political idealism, and using political theory as the limits of your field of vision:

‘We may sum this up by saying that the more the style of what used to be called politics becomes theorized, the more political problems come to be reintrepreted as managerial. Working out the least oppressive laws under which different and sometimes conflicting groups may live peaceably together is being replaced by manipulation and management of the attitudes different groups take towards each other, with the hope that this will ultimately bring harmony. In other words, in the new form of society, human beings are becoming the matter which is to be shaped according to the latest moral idea.’

Free speech and Muslimst From Kenanmalik.com: ‘Introduction: How Salman Rushdie Changed My Life’… Via YouTube: ‘Christopher Hitchens Vs. Ahmed Younis On CNN (2005)’… ‘Mohammad Cartoonist Lars Vilks Headbutted‘During Lecture’……From The OC Jewish Experience: ‘UC Irvine Muslim Student Union Suspended’…From Volokh: ‘”South Park” Creators Warned (Threatened) Over Mohammed’… More From Spiegel Online After The Westergaard Attacks Via A & L Daily: ‘The West Is Choked By F

Some Links On The Move Towards Kurdish Independence

September 24, 2017September 24, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Via Mick Hartley via the NY Times: ‘Israel Endorsed Kurdish Independence. Saladin Would Be Proud‘

‘Ties between the two have only grown warmer and more vital since the 1960s, as Israel and the Kurds — both minorities in an inhospitable region and ever in need of international allies — have repeatedly come to each other’s aid. The Kurds have long patterned their lobbying efforts in Washington on those of Israel’s supporters.’

On the realist vision, there are no true friends, rather alliances, common interests and threats; vectors of forces. There’s situational logic, and there are very real abstractions which matter (the character of a people, the ideas and core principles which guide them, the leaders that rise to power which can’t be too far in front of the coalitions which got them there…should they be elected).

There are also shared experiences, suffering, sentiment and sacrifices.

Relationships matter.

When the cold winds blow, however, you just may find yourself standing alone.

When survival is at stake, and war a necessity, urgency and expediency come to the fore, as does courage in battle, and cool under fire.

Barzani expects no conflict with Baghdad, but no going back for Kurds | Middle East Eye https://t.co/SWbRBcqNeB

— Hemin Hawrami (@heminhawrami) September 24, 2017

Not only does the Cold War and the backdrop of Russian/American power games still influence this region heavily, but the very split deep within the West itself does as well: There are Communist Kurdish militias, and there are Kurdish nationalist militias appealing to American patriotism, Constitutional Republicanism, and the liberation of peoples oppressed under unwanted authority.

As posted:

Ofra Bengio At The American Interest: The Kurds’ Proxy Trap

Independent Kurdistan-A Good Outcome For American Interests?

In his book Where The West Ends, Totten describes visiting Northern Iraq briefly as a tourist with a friend, and the general feeling of pro-Americanism in Kurdish Northern Iraq that generally one can only feel in Poland, parts of the former Yugoslavia etc.

An Excerpt From Paul Bowles’ ‘Allal’ & A Strange, Schlocky Scene From ‘Conan The Barbarian’

June 21, 2017June 21, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

From Paul Bowles ‘Allal,‘ found within this collection of short stories.

I recall musical and deeply rhythmic English (Bowles was a composer who lived in Morocco for most of his life), along with a recurrent theme of Western innocence, ignorance and arrogance meeting ancient North African realities and brutalities.

‘Moments passed with no movement but then the snake suddenly made a move towards Allal. It then began to slither across Allal’s body and then rested next to his head. He was very calm at this moment and looked right into the snake’s eyes and felt almost one with the snake. Soon his eyes closed and he fell asleep in this position.’

What have you done with your I/Eye, dear Reader?

Something tells me the kind of fantastical savagery and imaginative schlock of Conan the Barbarian doesn’t quite capture the deeply moral, frighteningly real and lushly imagined Bowlesian world…

But maybe it does highlight some themes Bowles’ drew into relief:

You know, maybe I’d just better put this up:

Via A Reader-Douglas Murray Speaks At ‘The Danish Muhammad Cartoon Crisis In Retrospect’ Conference

June 17, 2017July 1, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

~39:00 min speech with some questions at the end. Most of what Murray says strikes this blog as factual and true, and in the face of many beliefs and incentives created for politicians and authorities, those facts and truths remain mostly unaddressed as the years roll on (the cartoons were published in 2005).

It’s unfortunate that people only seem to gather after each violent murder and attack, such as Charlie Hebdo, as a relative minority, and that many in positions of authority display such cowardice in addressing the issue.

Most on the British Left, liberal-Left, and near center seem to accept the logic that Islam is one of the minority groups which must be identified and protected as oppressed on the way towards an ideal, inclusive vision of the good society (under the extended logic that the world and all things in it can, to some extent, be explained as people who have either seen the light against those who are merely ignorant, intolerant, oppressive, racist, xenophobic etc).

What about the differences between Islam and Islamic civilizations and the post-Enlightenment West? Point them out at your own risk.

Violate the secular humanist conventional wisdom and be ignored. Stand against the oft radically driven causes of the Left and possibly be threatened with violence. Draw cartoons insulting the central figure in Islam and maybe be murdered.

Those aren’t great options, but the underlying defense of Western institutions such as the freedom of speech (to criticize and mock) are happening right now.

================

Salman Rushdie at about minute 57:00: ‘This idea of separate treatment for separate cultures…I think essentially if we follow that to its conclusion…destroys our ability to have a really moral framework for society.’

Six writers apparently know what is acceptable speech and what isn’t, and thus don’t think the folks at Charlie Hebdo engaged in acceptable speech.

Christopher Hitchens (nearly a free speech absolutist, railing against many of his former friends on the Left) discussing the Yale Press, which was genuinely afraid that publishing this book could lead to violence in the Muslim street:

“…Yale had consulted a range of experts before making its decision and that “[a]ll confirmed that the republication of the cartoons by the Yale University Press ran a serious risk of instigating violence.”

Cartoons here. The cartoonist is still in some danger.

Food for thought.

A British Muslim tells his story, suggesting that classical liberalism wouldn’t be a bad idea…as a more entrenched radical British Left and Muslim immigration don’t mix too well: From Kenanmalik.com: ‘Introduction: How Salman Rushdie Changed My Life’… Via YouTube: ‘Christopher Hitchens Vs. Ahmed Younis On CNN (2005)’…

Free speech (used both well and unwell) meets offended Muslims: ‘Mohammad Cartoonist Lars Vilks Headbutted‘During Lecture’……From The OC Jewish Experience: ‘UC Irvine Muslim Student Union Suspended’…From Volokh: ‘”South Park” Creators Warned (Threatened) Over Mohammed’

See Also: If you thought the cartoons were bad, more on the Fitna movie here. From The NY Times: Review Of Christopher Caldwell’s Book “Reflections on the Revolution in Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West” Libertarians love this issue: Repost-A Canadian Libertarian Making Noise: Ezra Levant

Repost-Roger Scruton Discusses Islam And The West

June 5, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

A few key arguments Scruton makes:

1. The drive to expunge religion from public life in America is, in some cases, being pursued with a zeal that is not un-religious. It is a largely unreasonable interpretation of the no-establishment clause.

I would even suggest that the argument allows that if such secularists are successful, they could open the door to government bloat (after all, welfare is given out for moral and moralistic reasons) if the church were gotten out of the way. It is a key platform for most on the Western left to sacralize Muslims as the latest victim group against the forces they seek to overthrow within the West itself. This makes them blind to many facts. Most people up-top in the Western liberal world are not as attuned as they should be to the potentially incompatible elements of Islamic civilization and the dangers of the radical and activist Left.

Against this, I think many reasonable people would say that they just want to keep religion out of politics for the sake of both, and that they’re not attacking religion per se, but merely adhering to a reasonable interpretation of the no-establishment clause. Scruton is casting light on the zealots here. Religious belief however, especially Christian belief in the U.S., really isn’t going anywhere.

2. Scruton also argues that under the banner of secular multiculturalism, the extremely intolerant views of some Muslims, and the religious idealism of most Muslims (and all true religious believers) has found too free a home in Britain. For Scruton, the development of secular society and the rule of law is perhaps a uniquely Christian phenomenon (he makes the argument here). The Christian doctrines that laid such groundwork are conveniently bashed while Muslims pour in from societies without such rule of law and a pretty frightening idealism (how much of this is due to being an immigrant is worth examining, but the separation of church and state is conspicuously absent in Muslim societies).

One of the most dangerous consequences of this approach by is the idea of concurrent Sharia law for Muslims, and British law for British subjects. This is basically an admission of many in British society that they can’t fully integrate many Muslims and they don’t have a way forward to include them either. Many wanted cheap labor, felt guilty at the colonial past, and apparently desire to see their country as a kind of way station on the way to a global, one-world superstate and home for refugees. Scruton points out that human nature, the locality and practicality of politics, and the reality of these universalizing, Western ideals directing politics and policy is unable to account for much reality on the ground.

Any thoughts and comments are welcome.

Ayan Hirsi Ali in The NY Times: Lee Harris’s ‘The Suicide Of Reason’

Free speech and Muslims From Kenanmalik.com: ‘Introduction: How Salman Rushdie Changed My Life’… Via YouTube: ‘Christopher Hitchens Vs. Ahmed Younis On CNN (2005)’… ‘Mohammad Cartoonist Lars Vilks Headbutted‘During Lecture’……From The OC Jewish Experience: ‘UC Irvine Muslim Student Union Suspended’…From Volokh: ‘”South Park” Creators Warned (Threatened) Over Mohammed’… More From Spiegel Online After The Westergaard Attacks Via A & L Daily: ‘The West Is Choked By Fear’

Incentivized Otherwise-A Few Thoughts On The Manchester Bombing

May 24, 2017May 24, 2017 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Pretty tough to watch those videos.

If one’s political and social institutions, with the authority they wield, aren’t able to protect some of the most innocent they serve (pre-teen and teen girls at a pop concert), then such a basic, underlying truth, I suspect, will manifest itself in other ways.

Some people may not change their thinking much at all, while others will curtail their own behavior to some degree (maybe I won’t go out tonight). Others still will probably start thinking about bigger picture issues differently. Maybe security becomes a hot button issue next election, or maybe alternative personal and political arrangements are re-examined, seriously and unseriously. Respect and trust for the authorities currently on watch, and authority more generally, must probably ebb away.

This blog has been watching the terrorism threat enough, for long enough, to not be very surprised at the Manchester attack (even the savagery and the targets), but is still shocked and saddened nonetheless at the loss of life and innocence.

These issues are hard to think about and harder to confront, but the more honestly they are dealt with now, the better the likely outcomes. A lot of people in authority are incentivized otherwise.

Also On This Site: What map are you using to understand this conflict: From The American Interest Online: Francis Fukuyama On Samuel Huntington

Ayan Hirsi Ali at the New Criterion: ‘In Defense Of Dissidence:’

‘In many ways I think it’s comical that I’m being recognized for saying men and women should be equal before the law. That’s what I’m being recognized for, pretty much. That’s what it amounts to. And that idea that men and women are equal before the law is blasphemic to Islamic law.’

As posted: Here’s a debate from Intelligence Squared with Ayan Hirsi Ali on one side, arguing that Islam is the problem (the same absolutism in Islam that will not tolerate questioning of its tenets, its many violent passages, and its unreformed worldview which has a prescription for pretty much all aspects of the culture and public square). A member of the opposing side suggests that Muslim alienation in British life, combined with a European influenced fascist inspired-Islamism is the problem, not Islam itself (yes, it’s colonialist Europe’s fault).

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Ayan Hirsi Ali in The NY Times: Lee Harris’s ‘The Suicide Of Reason’

Is Islam incompatibile with freedom as we define it here in the West: From YouTube: Roger Scruton On Religious Freedom, Islam & Atheism…

Michael Moynihan jihad.com.

-Yes, terrorism’s still a thing: 12 dead in Berlin after a truck drives through a mall

–Why I Focus This Blog On Islamic Terrorism, Among Other Things-A Few Links And Thoughts In Response To A Friend

A tense relationship: Fareed Zakaria At Newsweek: ‘Terrorism’s Supermarket’…Christopher Hitchens At Vanity Fair: ‘From Abbotabad To Worse’…Repost-’Dexter Filkins In The NY Times: The Long Road To Chaos In Pakistan’

From Slate: ‘In Aleppo, Syria, Mohamed Atta Thought He Could Build The Ideal Islamic City’…From The NY Times: Review Of Christopher Caldwell’s Book “Reflections on the Revolution in Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West”

Repost: Kenan Malik In The Spiked Review Of Books: ‘Twenty Years On: Internalizing The Fatwa’-Salman Rushdie’Paul Berman At The New Republic: ‘From September 11 to the Arab Spring: Do Ideas Matter?’…From Foreign Affairs: ‘Al Qaeda After Attiyya’….From The AP: ‘Al-Awlaki: From Voice For Jihad To Al-Qaida Figure’From Slate: ‘In Aleppo, Syria, Mohamed Atta Thought He Could Build The Ideal Islamic City’…From The NY Times: Review Of Christopher Caldwell’s Book “Reflections on the Revolution in Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West”And: Philip Bobbitt Discusses His Book ‘Terror And Consent’ On Bloggingheads

Repost-David Rohde At The NY Times: ‘Inside The Islamic Emirate’

October 31, 2016October 31, 2016 / chr1 / Leave a comment

I was just looking over the archives…worth another look after 7 years?:

Full article here. (The second in a series)

Rohde was the NY Times reporter kidnapped for months inside Afghanistan and Pakistan. He is writing a series of articles about his experiences. Let this be a lesson to young journalists…risking your life can be worth it…

Also On This Site: Dexter Filkins Book On Afghanistan And Iraq: “The Forever War”

-Really? You don’t say? I Was an ISIS Jihadist-Until They Arrested And Tortured Me

Which map are you using to understand this conflict: From The American Interest Online: Francis Fukuyama On Samuel Huntington

Ayan Hirsi Ali has used the ideals of the West (especially women’s rights) to potentially confront Islam; which has served her politically as well: Repost-Ayan Hirsi Ali At The CSM: ‘Swiss Ban On Minarets Was A Vote For Tolerance And Inclusion’

Is Islam incompatibile with freedom as we define it here in the West, or is this a false choice?: From YouTube: Roger Scruton On Religious Freedom, Islam & Atheism…

Michael Moynihan jihad.com.

At Google-Lawrence Wright’s Discussion Of Al Qaeda In ‘The Looming Tower’

August 31, 2016September 1, 2016 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Lawrence Wright offered a decent profile of many Al Qaeda top-men in ‘The Looming Tower.‘

They tended to be smart, educated sorts away from home. Ambitious men with deep grievances and wounded pride. Men seeking purity and strength of purpose, as well as a lost kingdom.

Like many Muslim men relative to those in the West, they’d spent most of their lives segregated from women, with many fewer opportunities to have their educations match a deeper sense of purpose and vocation. These were men, who in that rush of youth, perhaps saw little purpose in merely dedicating their lives to family, work and being connected to others through the kind of civil society and associations we have here in the West.

Of course, some men are pretty sadistic to begin with, but certainly not all.

There was righteous glory to be had, and bloody battles to be fought in driving the infidel from the Arabian peninsula, and eventually Afghanistan and Pakistan.

In fact, most of these men were often exposed to political oppression and brutality within the kinds of States common throughout the Muslim world these days.

As for the new recruits: Some of them had a bomb strapped to them same day. Not much room for franchise growth…in this life!

Wright piece on Al Qaeda’s number two man, Ayman Al-Zawahiri.

Some of Roger Scruton’s essays here. Interesting quote in this video, which may line-up with Wright’s observations about the pursuit of purity, and how it tends to end:

‘Universal values only make sense in a very specific context…the attempt to universalize them, or project and impose them…just leads to their appropriation by sinister forces.”

Any thoughts and comments are welcome.

Feel free to highlight my ignorance.

[Addition]: Of course, what do we do in defense against people who want to kill us where we live, whose ideals are fairly deluded and corrupted from the start?

Roger Scruton At The WSJ: ‘Memo To Hawking: There’s Still Room For God’

Why I Focus This Blog On Islamic Terrorism, Among Other Things-A Few Links And Thoughts In Response To A Friend

July 22, 2016August 9, 2016 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Apparently, not all ‘individual humans’ as defined by Western intellectual traditions and Western secular humanists/idealists see themselves as Westerners do.

In spite of the last American administration, not everyone wants to be a member of a global Anglo-capitalist trading and legal order, forced to create some kind of functioning Western-style democracy, backed by American military power and guided no doubt, by some Christian belief from afar. Nor do many people perhaps even want a Westphalian state (which means having to keep-up appearances at NATO gatherings and maintain some basic founding documents/Constitution and a minimal standing army).

In spite of the current American administration, not everyone wants to join into a state of perpetual progressive protest and activism, living under ever-growing social-democratic bureaucratic States promising their own visions of the ideal society, justifying some violence and righteous revolutionary activity in the process, exerting their will through international institutions, looking for human rights and new classes of victims.

Not everyone prefers such ideals, say, over immediate relief, money, advantage, and leverage in their relations with American interests.

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There are many other models which are NOT a part of the traditions and institutions to which I am responsible, from the old Persian empire to the modern Islamic/Islamist hybrid State (or as many would prefer, a functioning, secure Islamic order like the good ol’ days).

From the ancient Han Chinese core/Mandarin system to the big-chief tribal setup found in various regions of what we’re calling the modern world.

On that note: When ISIS holds territory, ISIS is able to amplify its reach and scope. Some ISIS folks apparently want virgins and/or slaves, guns, blood and power. Others have a slightly bigger picture in mind, settling for a brutal enforcement regime in Raqqa…for now.

I have some concern for these lower risk, higher consequence events happening where I live, and I tend to favor cold-eyed realist leaders who will focus on such threats enough to balance my/your/our freedoms with a lighter hand.

In fact, some consideration of the above is one the main reasons on which I consider my vote, even for the two unpleasant choices currently facing me and you (candidates who both seem to consistently put themselves, and their images of themselves, above most other considerations…most of the time).

Continuing on that note: Some links

–Attack In Nice Exposes Strains In Policing A Constant Threat (terrible headline). Yeah, it probably wasn’t just a ‘lone wolf.‘ Like Bataclan. Like Orlando. Like San Bernadino. Like….

What’s the plan here with the whole ‘global village’ thing?

-Really? You don’t say? I Was an ISIS Jihadist-Until They Arrested And Tortured Me

Also On This Site: What map are you using to understand this conflict: From The American Interest Online: Francis Fukuyama On Samuel Huntington

Is Islam incompatibile with freedom as we define it here in the West, or is this a false choice?: From YouTube: Roger Scruton On Religious Freedom, Islam & Atheism…

Michael Moynihan jihad.com.