Rael Jean Isaac

THE OSLO SYNDROME

In this issue, we have assembled excerpts from Kenneth Levin’s excellent new book The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People Under Siege (published by Smith and Kraus), which weaves together all the strands to explain the terrible suicidal course upon which Israel embarked in 1993 and continues to pursue. A psychiatrist, Levin focuses on the psychological mechanisms that shaped the way Jews responded to hatred and oppression in the centuries of Diaspora living, the extent to which they brought these dysfunctional attitudes with them to Israel and, confronted with relentless Moslem and growing European hostility, reenacted those responses. But the book is much more than a psychological exploration. It is also a history of the Jews and an in depth study of the Oslo years, clearly written, absorbing – and absolutely devastating. This book, like Bat Ye’or’s Eurabia, which can be ordered from AFSI, is essential reading.

TURKEY OVERBOARD

We have warned in these pages that the influence of Ataturk (with his policies of secularization) has steadily eroded in Turkey, which has more and more succumbed to Islamist influences. Up to now this extremely serious development has received little attention in the media; indeed there have been obvious reasons why politicians have been eager to downplay it. European populations have been uneasy in the face of their leaders’ plans (promoted by the U.S.) to incorporate Turkey into the European Union: the prospect of admitting a radical Islamist Turkey (and flooding Europe with potential shahids) could mobilize them.

But now Robert Pollock in The Wall Street Journal (Feb. 16) breaks the silence with a vengeance: U.S.-Turkey relations have collapsed, he writes, “And what a collapse it has been. On a brief visit to Ankara earlier this month with Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith, I found a poisonous atmosphere – one in which just about every politician and media outlet (secular and religious) preaches an extreme combination of America-and-Jew-hatred that voluntarily goes far further than anything found in most of the Arab world’s state-controlled press. If I hesitate to call it Nazi-like, that’s only because Goebbels would probably have rejected much of it as too crude.”

Pollock reports that the intellectual climate in which Eric Edelman, the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, is operating “has gone so mad that he actually felt compelled to organize a conference call with scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey to explain that secret U.S. nuclear testing did not cause the recent tsunami.”

In the face of the most incredible media slanders, writes Pollock, “Turkish politicians have been utterly silent. In fact, Turkish parliamentarians themselves have accused the U.S. of ‘genocide’ in Iraq, while Mr. Erdogen (who we once hoped would set an example of democracy for Moslems) was among the few world leaders to question the legitimacy of the Iraqi elections. When confronted, Turkish pols claim they can’t risk going against ‘public opinion.’”

BEYOND SATIRE

IMRA (Independent Media Review and Analysis) sends the following item with the preface “Not a parody.” “About 350 Palestinian gunmen will be incorporated into the Palestinian Authority security forces soon as part of a deal reached between PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and leaders of all the Palestinian factions.” All of these men are on Israel’s list of wanted terrorists, a number of them part of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. According to the PA’s Minister of Agriculture, “the move is designed to protect them against Israeli assassination attempts….They are entitled to join the security forces because of their involvement in the resistance.”

And this is the security force Sharon expects to “protect” Israel from terror and outright warfare in the years ahead?

Meanwhile, in abject appeasement mode, the Israeli government not only is set to release at least 500 terrorists (including, for the first time, those found guilty of murdering Israeli civilians) but, as Carolyn Glick reports, in a separate agreement, is allowing “the terrorists deported from Bethlehem in 2002 – after they took over, desecrated and laid siege to the Church of the Nativity for 39 days – to return to the city and face no charges for their crimes.” The Christians of Bethlehem, writes Glick, are “in a blind panic” for in 2002 members of this group summarily executed more than a dozen Christians, raped Christian girls, took over Christian homes, extorted money from Christians and expropriated Christian lands.

FROM MOSHE DAYAN 1965

“The essence of Israel’s security in this region is deterrence. When we formed the State in 1948-9, we were very weak… Had the Arabs mounted another major invasion, we could have lost. We devised a solution to this problem. It was deterrence. Think about
being lost in a forest and surrounded by hostile animals. If you light a torch, boldly approach them showing no fear – they will retreat. But if you show fear – they will attack and you are lost. We used this principle to save Israel during those early years.”

WARD CHURCHILL

It can come as no surprise that prior to likening the 3000 people murdered at the World Trade Center to “little Eichmanns” Churchill had gone after the Jews. As Edward Alexander reports in the New York Sun (Feb. 8) “Prior to this incident, Mr. Churchill’s scholarly reputation was based mainly on a squalid tract called A Little Matter of Genocide (1997) in which he argued that the murder of European Jews was not a “fixed policy objective of the Nazis.” Churchill complained that Jewish scholars stressed the Holocaust in order to ‘construct a conceptual screen behind which to hide the realities of Israel’s ongoing genocide against the Palestinian population.”

The President of Hamilton College, forced to rescind the invitation to Churchill to speak amid a hullabaloo from alumni, provides an explanation on the college’s website: the gist is praise of Churchill’s courage under fire (he offered to come in a flak jacket), sympathy for what he has been forced to endure, and sorrow for the school body, who will not be enriched by exposure to the ideas Mr. Churchill had to offer.