Face it, to a good part of the Western and non Western world, any Israeli (or for that matter American) attempt to defend itself against Islamic aggression will be denounced as “disproportionate” so the best thing for them to do is to ignore the carping critics and vigorously go after those who seek to harm you. Winners never make apologies and only those who have doubts about the rightness of their cause seek to constantly explain and plead for understanding.
For whatever shortcomings he may have, Benjamin Netanyahu is everything that Obama is not. He is a capitalist, a patriot, and resolute in the face of his nations enemies. No wonder he makes Obama uncomfortable.
by Isi Leibler
A recent editorial in Haaretz reprimanded the IDF for cutting down a tree inside Israeli territory near the Lebanese border on the absurd grounds that the authorities should have been more restrained and sensitive to the political tension in Lebanon.
If this approach were adopted by our government, it would result in a total collapse of Israel’s deterrence. Rather than discouraging our enemies from conducting acts of aggression and terror out of fear of reprisal, we ourselves would become reluctant to take any defensive measures out of concern that they could be construed as aggressive acts or provocations by our hostile neighbors. In such a bizarre climate, we would be failing to carry out the minimal steps required to maintain the security of our borders and the welfare of our citizens.
A FEW days before the unprovoked attack by the Lebanese army, a grad rocket had been launched from the Gaza Strip which could easily have led to major loss of life in the heart of Ashkelon. Subsequently, missiles were launched on Eilat, again fortunately not resulting in Israeli casualties but killing an innocent Jordanian.
These terrorist attacks took place shortly after we agreed, under enormous pressure from the Obama administration, to participate in a UN investigation of May 31’s flotilla incident when Turkish Islamic extremists sought to break our legitimate naval blockade of Gaza.
Ironically, that took place simultaneously with widespread media coverage of classified documents released by WikiLeaks about the inadvertent killing of civilians by US and allied forces in Afghanistan.
Needless to say, there were no calls from UN Secretary General Ban Ki- Moon for an inquiry or any suggestion that the death of these innocent civilians were war crimes.
[....]
OVERALL, IT would seem that we have still not internalized the lessons of the past. We live in a region of scorpions, in which compromise and goodwill extended in the face of aggression has time and again encouraged our enemies to intensify their acts of terror until a full-scale war erupts.
We should surely have absorbed the lessons of the Kassams. Those who belittled their impact and derisively referred to them as primitive “Kassam Shmassams,” failed to appreciate that our failure to respond vigorously allowed the world to view such attacks as part of the Middle East routine.
Had we responded initially with vigor, the attacks would not have escalated and we may well have avoided the Gaza war.
[...]
If we respond swiftly and demonstrate that Hamas and Hizbullah will pay a major price if they attack us, we will almost certainly incur the wrath of the UN, Europe and regrettably, probably also the US. Yet the lessons of the past decade demonstrate that Hamas and Hizbullah are afraid of being held responsible by the people they rule for any suffering inflicted on them as a result of unprovoked aggression against Israel. This is a brutal area in which alas, paradoxically, might and swift reprisal against terror attacks are far more likely to avert a full-blown war than vacuous dialogue and restraint.
Our deterrent policy should be spelled out.
Netanyahu must avoid repeating the hollow threats of reprisals that transformed us into loudmouthed bluffers and a regional laughing stock over the past decade. He must proclaim that we will respond vigorously to any threats against our civilian population and, unlike his predecessors, commit himself to implementing such a policy.
We no longer have any illusions. The world does not accept our right to defend ourselves, but we cannot afford to await intervention or retribution from third parties when our civilians are endangered. It will represent a continuation of former government follies if we stand by with folded arms and fail to immediately respond to acts of terror. On the other hand, if we convey a strong message to our foes that if they deliberately spill Israeli blood there is a major price to pay, we may in fact avert the worst scenario of another brutal all-out war.
Read the rest here: Restraint or deterrence
George Will notes that Benjamin Netanyahu is the anti-Obama
by George F. Will
Two photographs adorn the office of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Together they illuminate a portentous fact: No two leaders of democracies are less alike — in life experiences, temperaments and political philosophies — than Netanyahu, the former commando and fierce nationalist, and Barack Obama, the former professor and post-nationalist.
One photograph is of Theodor Herzl, born 150 years ago. Dismayed by the eruption of anti-Semitism in France during the Dreyfus Affair at the end of the 19th century, Herzl became Zionism’s founding father. Long before the Holocaust, he concluded that Jews could find safety only in a national homeland.
The other photograph is of Winston Churchill, who considered himself “one of the authors” of Britain’s embrace of Zionism. The Balfour Declaration of 1917 stated: “His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” Beginning in 1923, Britain would govern Palestine under a League of Nations mandate.
Netanyahu, his focus firmly on Iran, honors Churchill because he did not flinch from facts about gathering storms. Obama returned to the British Embassy in Washington the bust of Churchill that was in the Oval Office when he got there.
[...]
The Cairo speech came 10 months after Obama’s Berlin speech, in which he declared himself a “citizen of the world.” That was an oxymoronic boast, given that citizenship connotes allegiance to a particular polity, its laws and political processes. But the boast resonated in Europe.
The European Union was born from the flight of Europe’s elites from what terrifies them — Europeans. The first Thirty Years’ War ended in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia, which ratified the system of nation-states. The second Thirty Years’ War, which ended in 1945, convinced European elites that the continent’s nearly fatal disease was nationalism, the cure for which must be the steady attenuation of nationalities. Hence the high value placed on “pooling” sovereignty, never mind the cost in diminished self-government.
Israel, with its deep sense of nationhood, is beyond unintelligible to such Europeans; it is a stench in their nostrils. Transnational progressivism is, as much as welfare state social democracy, an element of European politics that American progressives will emulate as much as American politics will permit. It is perverse that the European Union, a semi-fictional political entity, serves — with the United States, the reliably anti-Israel United Nations and Russia — as part of the “quartet” that supposedly will broker peace in our time between Israel and the Palestinians.
Arguably the most left-wing administration in American history is trying to knead and soften the most right-wing coalition in Israel’s history. The former shows no understanding of the latter, which thinks it understands the former all too well.
[....]
No one is less a transnational progressive, less a post-nationalist, than Binyamin Netanyahu, whose first name is that of a son of Jacob, who lived perhaps 4,000 years ago. Netanyahu, whom no one ever called cuddly, once said to a U.S. diplomat 10 words that should warn U.S. policymakers who hope to make Netanyahu malleable: “You live in Chevy Chase. Don’t play with our future.”
Read the rest here: Netanyahu, the anti Obama
Guys I LOVE the share button for facebook!!!! Thanx!!!!!!!
Great post speranza.
And btw, that act of zero shipping the bust of Churchill so rudely back to Britain, continues to be is undoing in the British press. He insulted the Brits so badly, they are pulling no punches as they print the ugly facts abt. him, all the information abt. his major fck ups and ineptitudes, that the mfm here ignores or tires to spin as a positive.
The Brits are piling on this marvelous god like lightworker citizen of the world pos.
They are delivering the truth abt. him.
Not only the worst president evah but the most anti Israel one as well.
chickadee wrote:
Thanks. How ironic that in 2008 the dumb Brits were drooling all over him!
@ Speranza:
They were only drooling over him because it was the “proper” thing to do. Bunch of tight asses. Also, they were so damn happy to see that us racist colonials FINALLY got past our racism.
Speranza wrote:
We ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Wait until he has his back to the wall without a supermajority Congress and starts governing by executive fiat even more than he has already.
Speranza wrote:
So true.
But the Brits have a wicked sense of humor. Now that they see the folly of their ways, he is paying through his arrogant snoot. LOL
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
The COP wanting to win in 2012, they will confront his anti-Israel policies. Dumb Jews may support Obama but so many Christians support Israel.
chickadee wrote:
Yeah but the price that the UK and the rest of the world is paying for this jokers mistakes is going to be steep. Elections have consequences.
Speranza wrote:
PIMF -- The GOP
@ Speranza:
I’m just sayin’—we’ve seen his good side, his friendly side, his conciliatory side up to now.
Hard to believe, I know—but he’s been as “bipartisan” as he’s ever gonna be, because he was able to pretend that “bipartisan” meant “my-partisan.” Wait’ll he gets some real opposition; it’ll get ugly, fast.
@ NoThreat2U:
You’re welcome!! Thank you!
NoThreat2U wrote:
A bunch of naive, short sighted fools!!!
@ Speranza:
Did you see That there are rumors of Turkey planning to arm Hizballah.
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
He is intellectually and tempermentally incapable of bipartisanship, political moderation, and dignity.
@ m:
I have been waiting for them!!!
@ Speranza:
They can’t see past royal protocol to ever get angry. lol
Rodan wrote:
Rumors, who knows? Hezbollah understands that another war will be fought very differnetly thenthe one that puke Olmert fought. Netanyahu is not Olmert or Obama. What Israel would do is go for speed (get behind them) and massive firepower.
@ Speranza:
http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=184538
Ha…Ha…
Speranza wrote:
Don’t forget courtliness, grace, generosity of spirit, magnanimity, compromise, and—what’s the word I’m looking for?—leadership.
Testing, is this thing on???
@ doriangrey:
Shhh, you will wake the lurkers…
/awww nuts…
Peace comes only from defeating the enemies of Israel, at least for a time. Islam is a work of the devil, and the devil cannot be killed, only held at bay through eternal vigilance.
The war that can NEVER end
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
Yup. I’ve been saying that. Without the congress, he’s going to go passive-aggressive, and start throwing executive orders and agency policies like Clinton after 96, on speed.
@ buzzsawmonkey:
Worse yet, a divided Congress that can exercize no restraint on him whatsoever. Withough a Legislature to censure him, what will he be capable of? Restraint isn’t in his lexicon…
And don’t think that he can’t do a hell of a lot of damage without appropriations.
That Nobel is looking more absurd than it did when it was bestowed upon him. A reasonable person might even be embarrassed.
vagabond trader wrote:
A bunch of Norwegian leftists handed it to me for not being Bush.
vagabond trader wrote:
Anybody with functioning synapses would be embarrassed.
The Nobel Peace Price has become a badge of infamy.
@ vagabond trader:
A less narcissistic person would hasve declined…
George Will’s article is great.
zero is like a spoiled 6th grader using real money to play Monopoly games with the America economy.
Netanyahu is a Statesman trying to keep his country safe in the face of a growing dangerous world wide barbarian rumbling.
There’s a photo of zero poking his finger in Netanyahu’s chest and glaring so petulantly at him. You can tell by the look on Netanyhu’s face that he knows the score. He knows that zero is a lucky nothing pos, someone he has to put up with for the moment. Netanyahu knows this and that is why he tolerated the rudeness of the fop who would never have the balls to be so belligerent if he wasn’t totus.
zero is uncomfortable in the presence of real men.
Iron Fist wrote:
The question is whether, faced with opposition, his cowardly side or his tantrum-prone side will come out.
Both, I think—the trick will be to see which manifests itself where. He is already prone to whining about how little he can do despite his supermajorities; faced with opposition, he will on occasion fold. However, like the spoiled child he is, he will also lash out and try to force his way.
Drink your way through the remainder of the Obama years with genuine Tant Rum™!
It’s the booze to choose when you hear the boos!
Styrofoam Greek theater,a faux presidential seal,the world apology tour,what is he going to do for an encore? It won’t be pretty,just hope they keep blaming Bush. A sure winner./
@ buzzsawmonkey:
He has no leadership ability, none. I guess we should count our blessings. I had been afraid of a reign of terror for his first two year, but, while he has robbed the treasury blind, nationalized the auto industry, and devistated the Gulf with his ineptitude it could have been much, much worse had he had leadership ability to live up to his hype. As it is, he is incapable of leading a Girl Scout troop to sell cookies. I don’t think we have to worry about the Second Coming of Stalin. Louis XVI, OTOH? Only with the temperment of a three year old…
Iron Fist wrote:
I do. He’s a prop, and he has some very nasty people using him as a blind.
Actually he has been quite successful in achieving his goals. Auto industry,banking,healthcare,student loans,off shore drilling,radical scotus appointments and the alienation of our allies. In less than 2 years,impressive.We have to regain the house.
@ buzzsawmonkey:
I expected something along those lines using his super-majorities to steamroll all opposition, but it didn’t materialize. Instead, he barely dragged his premier piece of legislation across the finish line. If we can just take the House, the danger of that is past. He can, no doubt, still be destructive, ands I have no doubt that he wants to wreck this country. I am under no illusion about his benevolence or about him being merely misguided. He is a nasty piece of work. With a divided Congress, he will be able to function with few limits. But he will no longer be able to demand that the Legislature pass laws and have any reason to expect them to comply.
Iron Fist wrote:
I worry about emergency decrees, and what can be done under their cover.
Saudi Cleric Muhammad Al-Arifi: The Desire to Shed Blood, Smash Skulls, and Sever Limbs for the Sake of Allah Is an Honor for the Believer [Video]
@ buzzsawmonkey:
For that we have to hope to the health of the five Supreme Court Justices who would be inclined to stand against him. I’m not trying to minimize the risks ahead of us. We havenearly two and a half more years to get through. The Lame Duck session scares me the most, because they can pass nearly anything that they dream of, with the assent of one RINO in the Senate. As there are several that the Democrats can bid on, I have no doubt that they’ll be able to find one suited to their purpose. Once that daner is past, there are, as you say, executive orders that can do most anything. He might not be bale to create a huge, new sweeping beaureaucracy simply for lack of funding, but he could order the IRS to make Republicans lives hell on earth and there isn’t much that could be done to stop him. We’ve never had a President simply cast aside all bounds of decency and try and become a dictator. But Obama won’t control the Legislature. He won’t be able to command all of the machinery of the State the way it seemed he would be able to 18 months ago.
Of course, I am counting on us getting the House. God help us if we don’t, because the Democrats will see it as a mandate to dismember the country.
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
(*** cough offshore drilling ban cough ***)
This is the caliber of enemy we are fighting?
@ Philip_Daniel:
These people are so big on humiliation. Maybe if you didn’t suck and try to destroy the human race, people would have some respect for you. But Nooooo, yinz got to try and subject the whole entire planet to your warped “religion”. Are they really surprised why no one likes them. Damn, it’s like talking to children.
Glen Reynolds apparently thinks as highly of Dick Durbin (D-al Qaeda) as I do. In response to Durbin’s tumor Reybnolds quipped:
APPARENTLY, THEY TOOK OUT THE ONLY PART OF HIM THAT WASN’T MALIGNANT. Indeed.
He is becoming so unpopular, so toxic that dems running in Nov. do not want to be seen with him.
In fact the dem candidates are not running on all the zero “accomplishments” they voted yes to. They are downplaying all the zero shit they helped to ram down our throats. That tells you everything.
I think the wind is out of his sails. I think he will soon be shunned as a paper tiger who got away with murder because people were too polite to stop him. There is going to be some blowback on him.
Even dems may not be so happy to go along with his b.s. anymore.
@ vagabond trader:
They are trying to intorduce some civility into the discussion with us barbarians. Me, I’m tempted to remind them of how barbaric I can be…
NoThreat2U wrote:
They’re the true believers, we’re the heathens, thus we must be subjugated and legally humiliated and they must prosper at our expense…
al-Adawi
@ The Osprey:
Now, that was rousing.
Rodan wrote:
I wonder if chemical weapons are part of the order?
Turkey Accused of Using Chemical Weapons against PKK
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,711536,00.html
@ Iron Fist:
Save it. We may need to impose a civilizing influence in the next two years.
This is what scares me most:
I expect that the Democrats will be in a vengeful mood. I think we can also count on the Porkzilla to eat all other Porkzillas. The only question is which RINO will sell out to make it al;l possible…
@ Philip_Daniel:
The religion of peace.
refugee000 wrote:
Kurds aren’t Arabs, so atrocities against them, according to Progressives, are not worthy of condemnation…
@ refugee000:
I’ve read Hizballah has chemical weapons.
@ Philip_Daniel:
Well I see that the other way around. They are worshippers of Satan. Everything to do and believe in revolves around blood shed. God does NOT operate that way. They are like little children. Waaaa we don’t have indoor plumbing like the evil Jooos. They are retarded. It is no one’s fault but their own that their countries are hell holes. I say bring our kids home and let these animals kill each other. As for the women, one day they need to get pissed enough to rise up against this misogynistic culture and start kicking some ass.
Spoken like a true western woman
I will not submit.
@ Philip_Daniel:
Plus Kurds are apostates. They are Muslim in name only many of them.
@ Iron Fist:
Very ominous,not unexpected.Intoxicated with power and control.
@ NoThreat2U:
I concur.
@ NoThreat2U:
They say the world isn’t big enough for the both of us. I am inclined to agree.
@ Philip_Daniel:
What’s your take on this?
@ Philip_Daniel:
Western woman aren’t such pushovers. lol Some of us wear the title “Bitch” very proudly. lol
@ Iron Fist:
Well then I guess they gotta go
@ Rodan:
Probably got hold of the stuff Saddam trucked into Syria.
@ vagabond trader:
There will be no effective restraint on them. None. What are you going to do? Vote them out of office? I think the Lame Duck session is an even bigger threat to liberty and the well-being of the country than Obama’s power of executive orders.
@ NoThreat2U:
Iron Fist wrote:
Does anyone remember the dems being such hardcore sell out commie scum before zero was elected?
They were libs but they weren’t full on communist bastards. I really wonder how many have been bought off by money from the puppet’s handlers. A few million here and there is nothing for soros to finally achieve his dream and destroy America.
This is why character matters.
@ Iron Fist:
You’re a scary man….I like that in a person. lol lol
Rodan wrote:
He’s an apartheid and genocide apologist…
@ chickadee:
Oh yeah all that porkulus dough being thrown around,how much has landed in crooked pockets. Plenty is my guess.And we get to foot the bill for our own destruction. How they must laugh at us.
chickadee wrote:
Yes, now they just get to be out of the closet about it.
@ Iron Fist:
I’m betting on McCain, if he’s defeated in November.
@ Rodan:
at the risk of repeating myself:
Ramadanny boy, the muezzins are calling
From minarets that sprout on every side
Unless you want consequences appalling
Under the laws of sharia you must bide
Subtle attacks on the concept of freedom
Will change the land from what you used to know
Imams demand constantly you appease ‘em
And that Mohammed’s line you toe
—to the tune of “Danny Boy”
Iron Fist wrote:
That’s going to be the November Surprise.
buzzsawmonkey wrote:
AOP got me started on the Sea Chanty theme the other night…now I understand the reference in the song to “15 men on a Dead Man’s Chest”…when I first heard that line I thought, how can 15 guys stand on one guy’s chest, or is it a treasure chest but even then it’s got to be a pretty big box…well, Dead Chest, also called Dead Man’s Chest is an island in the British Virgin Islands...Blackbeard marooned 27 of his crew there as punishment, and left them a single cutlass and a bottle of rum. When he returned a month later, only 15 of them were left alive…
Rodan wrote:
You mean religion of piss?
@ buzzsawmonkey:
Mo’Hammy Boy
Iron Fist wrote:
He is maasively incompetent.
The Osprey wrote:
Piss be unto him
Empire1 wrote:
If reelected McCain will revert to his Mavericky ways.
Iron Fist wrote:
The only restraint on them will be their own conscience.
I just can’t believe that Americans, even libs, will be so vindictive and insane to continue blindly following zero’s destructive lead after we have made it plain that we the people reject his agenda.
If the lame duck congress tries to punish us, we need to hunt them down. Expose them. humiliate them, destroy their reputations.
@ Rodan:
Next trick he’ll recite the koran backwards and disappear in a puff of smoke.
vagabond trader wrote:
Half of the porkulus money is unaccounted for.
@ Speranza:
And all those who worship him.
Philip_Daniel wrote:
Well, then I guess my bet of 10 cyberbucks that the UN will NOT be investigating, is a safe one.
BTW I wanted to wish all a very Happy Bombadan!
Bulgarian Muslims mark start of Ramadan with punch-up
Aug 12, 2010, 12:04 GMT
Sofia -- The start of Islam’s holy month of Ramadan was marred in Bulgaria when tensions among a group of Muslims escalated into a brawl in a mosque, local reports said Thursday.
The fist-fight, which involved some 200 people, broke out at evening prayer between the supporters of newly-elected head mufti Mustafa Hadzhi and those of his predecessor Nedim Gendzhev.
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1577175.php/Bulgarian-Muslims-mark-start-of-Ramadan-with-punch-up
@ Philip_Daniel:
Dr. Daniel… paging Dr. Daniel… Report to The Blogmocracy Radio.
@ refugee000:
It’s called Ramadanadingdong
m wrote:
All 1.3 billion of them.
refugee000 wrote:
Bulgaria not fully freed from Islamic occupation until 1908, folks…
Who is the uniformed smarmy cunt on Hannity with the green tie?
Sounds like an ACLU bitch
The Constitution is not a suicide pact