Home
In this issue

Dec. 2, 2008

Melanie Phillips: The Mumbai atrocity is a wake-up call for a frighteningly unprepared world

Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report: Strategic Motivations for the Mumbai Attack

Dec. 1, 2008

Max Freidlander, as told to Jacklyn C. Wadler: India Inkings

Mark Steyn: Whodunit!?

Nov. 28, 2008

Rabbi Ahron Rapps: An evil seed that didn't have to be

Melanie Phillips: Carpe diem --- or can we all relax now?

Nov. 26, 2008

Michael Feldberg: Meet the Orthodox Jew who laid groundwork for scientific development of ordnance that undergirds America's current world leadership

Andrea Simantov: Shades of life

Nov. 25, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Getting Emotional For Influence

The Kosher Gourmet by Ethel G. Hofman : Thanksiving feast!

Nov. 24, 2008

Rabbi S. Binyomin Ginsberg: 'I just Became a grandchild!'

Barry Rubin: Don't flatter your enemies, protect your friends

Nov. 21, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: Money matters?

Caroline B. Glick: Civilization walks the plank

Nov. 20, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: Bronfman's blindness

The Kosher Gourmet By Linda Gassenheimer: Portobellos add a hearty flavor to pasta with pesto

Nov, 19, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Spread the wealth? Jewish tradition and income equality

Elliot B. Gertel: 'Mad Men': Tackling prejudices or reinforcing them?

Nov, 18, 2008

Dr. Debby Schwarz Hirschhorn: The End of the Age of Reason

Jonathan Tobin: Does Barack + Bibi = Disaster?

Nov, 17, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The End of the Age of Reason

Diana West: Gulling Americans into making terror legit?

Nov, 14, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: The Power of Spiritual Inertia

Caroline B. Glick: The perils ahead

Nov, 13, 2008

Stratfor Intelligence Briefing: How Bush and Obama together could change the Middle East dynamic

The Kosher Gourmet by JeanMarie Brownson: Sweet and savory, crispy and meltingly tender bestilla

Nov, 12, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Tyrannical Co-Workers

Michael Doyle: High Court to consider today donated monuments that may have religious messages in public parks

Nov, 11, 2008

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Will Obama stop government officials considering institutionalizing financial jihad?

Jonathan Tobin: They Will Decide Their Own Fate

Nov, 10, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: $8 billion, modern-day Tower of Babel being built?

Barry Rubin: A letter to the president-elect from a Middle East realist

Nov, 7, 2008

Rabbi Francis Nataf: Of Children and Immortality

Caroline B. Glick: Livni's Obama strategy

Nov, 6, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: How I tricked a classroom of apathetic students into grasping the fallacy of moral relativism

The Kosher Gourmet By Gina Kim: Tips for making the perfect soup --- includes recipes

Nov, 5, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Destitute Debtors

Bruce Weinstein: 'Religulos': Bad title,even worse movie

Nov, 4, 2008

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Treasury Dept. submits to Shariah law

Frida Ghitis: A surprise for Obama in the Middle East

Nov, 3, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: Who says Jews are Smart?

Jonathan Tobin: Was He Wrong About Everything?

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review July 18, 2006 / 22 Tamuz, 5766

Understanding the temper of the times

By Cal Thomas


Printer Friendly Version

Email this article


Israel's enemies are all of the same piece by whatever name they call themselves. There are no "moderates," at least none who have the power to make peace. The idea of a "two-state solution" with a Palestinian state living alongside Israel was always a pipe dream concocted by secular Westerners. They accept a false doctrine that says the enemies of Israel (and America) can be placated by people they regard as "infidels."


http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | In chronicling the number of armed warriors who joined David at Hebron, there is this exquisite line: "All these men understood the temper of the times and knew the best course for Israel to take." (1 Chronicles 12:32, New Living Translation)


For roughly 4,000 years there has been "unrest" and war in the Middle East. It possibly began when the ancient Israelites drove out the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites and Jebusites. Modern Israel is attempting to drive out Hezbollah-ites, Hamas-ites, Islamic Jihad-ites and the rest.


Nothing has changed, except Israel may be in greater peril today than at any time in its modern history. That is because Israel, often under pressure from its "ally" the United States, has bought into the fiction that says giving Israel's declared enemies the land they demand will cause those enemies to suddenly beat their swords into ploughshares and study war no more. The more Israel gives, the more her enemies feel emboldened to take away. It's called appeasement and it never works.


When Israel pulled out of Gaza, I predicted terrorists would move in and begin firing rockets into Israeli towns. It doesn't take someone with the vision of a biblical prophet to forecast the obvious. The rockets hitting Israel from Lebanon are coming from territory previously occupied by the Israel Defense Forces, which the IDF had entered in response to earlier shelling. Too many, whether in Europe, the worthless U.N., or the U.S. State Department — even many Israelis — do not understand the temper of the times.


Israel's enemies are all of the same piece by whatever name they call themselves. There are no "moderates," at least none who have the power to make peace. The idea of a "two-state solution" with a Palestinian state living alongside Israel was always a pipe dream concocted by secular Westerners. They accept a false doctrine that says the enemies of Israel (and America) can be placated by people they regard as "infidels."


Hezbollah runs a television station in Lebanon. A visit to the Middle East Media Research Institute's Website (Memritv.org) found a number of interesting clips. Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah says, "We prefer death and martyrdom over American guarantees." Nasrallah survived an Israeli air strike on his headquarters in Southern Lebanon. He declared "all-out war" against Israel. There's a film for children that speaks of Jews turning into apes and pigs. Lebanese students at a Hezbollah TV symposium say, "we should fight the Jews and burn them like Hitler. Israel should be wiped off the map." The head of "Radio Islam" in Sweden said on Hezbollah TV, "The Muslims' war is with the Jews." In Europe, Islamic influence is growing due to the spinelessness of government leaders.


There is another danger and that is the fantasy that elections will produce leaders within Islamic fanaticism who will be committed to real democracy, pluralism and tolerance. Last Friday, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman wrote: "What we are seeing in Iraq, the Palestinian territories and Lebanon is an effort by Islamist parties to use elections to pursue their long-term aim of Islamizing the Arab-Muslim world. This is not a conflict about Palestinian or Lebanese prisoners in Israel. This is a power struggle within Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq over who will call the shots in their newly elected 'democratic' governments and whether they will be real democracies."


It's not only about "Islamizing" the Arab-Muslim world, but the entire world.


The turmoil in the Middle East will not stay in the Middle East. This is a world war and the first shots have already been fired in Europe and America. In an online story the London Daily Telegraph subsequently removed "for legal reasons," Dr. Patrick Sookhdeo warned that British Muslims could soon form a state within Britain. Dr. Sookhdeo, a former Muslim, said, "in a decade, you will see parts of English cities which are controlled by Muslim clerics and which follow, not the common law, but aspects of Muslim sharia law."


The latest upheaval in the Middle East may subside but the objectives of those whose aim is Israel's destruction will not. The enemies of Israel, Europe and America believe this is all-out war. The question is, do we understand the temper of the times?


Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and in the media consider "must reading." Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.



JWR contributor Cal Thomas is the author of, among others, The Wit and Wisdom of Cal Thomas Comment by clicking here.


Cal Thomas Archives

Up

© 2006, TMS