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June 17, 2013

Rabbi Simcha Weinstein: Black to the Future: American Apparel Gets Biblical

Patrik Jonsson: Minnesota Nazi: How did Nazi hunters miss Michael Karkoc?

Kate Irby, Ali Watkins, Trevor Graff and Kevin Thibodeaux: All the ways you're being watched
Don Lee: G-8 meeting will test NSA leaks' effect on U.S. influence

Patrik Jonsson: Fort Hood shooting: Judge nixes Nidal Hasan defense strategy. What now?

Stacey Burling: Why the stigma for migraine sufferers?

The Kosher Gourmet by Lisa Abraham: Does it work? 5 new kitchen gadgets put to the test

June 14, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: A spiritual budget: Religious economics and being a ruler

John P. Martin: Hitler insider's missing diary found

Matt Pearce: NSA surveillance disclosure could affect court cases
Peter Tinti: US bounties changes strategy on (Wild, Wild) West African jihadis

Daniel Pendrick, M.D.: Memory loss? Old age may be the least of it

Lauren F. Friedman: But it's all natural! Should we have an instinctive preference for herbal remedies?

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Streisand and Alicia Keys in Israel; "Girls" Stuff; Mel Brooks, Another TV special; Superman (who is Jewish) returns --- Israeli plays his mom

The Kosher Gourmet by Sharon K. Ghag : Bored with salad? Bling it up a bit (4 effortless recipes that will result in a 'WOW!')

June 12, 2013

Stephanie Hanes: Little girls or little women? The Disney princess effect

Fred Weir: In tweak to US, Russia would 'consider' asylum for Snowden

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: What's so special about Omega-3 supplements?
Morgan Housel: What newspapers were saying when you should have been buying

Pete Spotts: How cockroaches evolved so as to bypass 'roach motels'

The Kosher Gourmet by Anjali Prasertong: Deep-dish cookie: Warm, gooey and a little over the top

June 10, 2013

Joseph A. Slobodzian: Faith healing and third degree murder: Thorny legal case
Lindsay Wise: Few options for online users to avoid spying, experts say

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: There are plenty of nutritional food bargains out there
Harvard Health Letters: Can bariatric surgery control diabetes?

Zach Murdock: Superglue helps doctors save infant's life

The Kosher Gourmet by Celebrated chef Mario Batali : As good as grilling gets: Rib eye with dry mushroom spice rub

June 7, 2013

Rabbi David Aaron: Beating jealousy

Caroline B. Glick: Wounded . . . and dangerous

Clifford D. May: Al Qaeda vs. Hezbollah
Harvard Health Letters: Fighting back against allergy season

Kimberly Lankford: Grandparents who use FSA to cover grandkid's braces and other must-know info

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom:J ewish Tony Nominees/Tony Awards; Jewish Teen Actor In Sci-Fi Flick; Jewish singer in "Voice" finals

The Kosher Gourmet by Anjali Prasertong: A tart filling so good it might not make it to the crust

June 5, 2013

John Rosemond: Mom, Dad: Talk More and listen less

Kristen Chick: Egypt court sentences 43 pro-democracy workers to prison

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: Mushrooms Have Medicinal As Well As Culinary Value
Morgan Housel: Why you never learn from your investment mistakes

Don Lee: In China, kindergarten rivalry takes deadly turn

The Kosher Gourmet by Sara Kate Gillingham-Ryan: 30-Minute Coq au Vin isn't a dream

June 3, 2013

Molly Hennessy-Fiske: Military judge to consider letting Fort Hood shooting defendant represent himself

Richard A. Serrano: Pvt. Bradley Manning's WikiLeaks trial also a test for government

Mark Trumbull: Have degree, driving cab: Nearly half of college grads are overqualified
Kim Lankford: What to do when long-term care insurance premiums rise

Deborah Netburn: Study: Adults' mouth bacteria may help babies

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Contestant on 'The Voice'; Will Smith's 'Jewish movie family'; Bravo Gives Long Island Jews the Jersey Shore Treatment; Magicians and More

The Kosher Gourmet by Bill Ward: How to be as refined as the wines at a wine tasting

May 29, 2013

Andrew Connelly and Helene Bienvenu: The Little Synagogue that Refused to Die

Dennis Prager: The 'Muslims-Killed-by-the-West' Lie

David Clark Scott: Open war on teachers?
Morgan Housel: If you know only five things about investing, make it these

Sara Reardon: AGenome detectives change the donation game

Deborah Netburn: A one-way ticket to Mars? 78,000-plus and counting apply by video

The Kosher Gourmet by Bev Bennett: CHEDDAR AND CHERRY MUFFINS --- your mouth is already watering

May 24, 2013

Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb: When I didn't so 'humbly disagree'

Caroline B. Glick: Thank you, Hafez al-Assad

Diana West: From the Brooklyn Bridge to London
Morgan Housel: Why spotting bubbles is so much harder than you think

Environmental Nutrition editors: NuVal labeling to the rescue?

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Memorial Day: Jews Serving and KIA in War on Terror; Liberace Bio-Pic; Jew Wins "Survivor"; Shalom, Dr. Brothers; More

The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen: HIDE THESE FROZEN TREATS FROM THE KIDDIES!: Sangria pops; Irish cream pudding pops; mango Lassi pops

May 22, 2013

John Thorne: They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman

John Rosemond: 'Disciplinary math' adds up to parental successl

Warren Richey: Are prayers before public meetings OK? Supreme Court to decide
Rick Montgomery: Use of ADHD drugs as study aid raises concern on campuses

Brierley Wright, M.S., R.D.: 6 convincing reasons you should keep carbs in your diet

Eoin O'Carroll: Scientists examine nothing, find something

The Kosher Gourmet by Carole Kotkin: This soup is made from one of the great pleasures of spring: A wonderful pairing of rosy color and earthy tang

May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting


Jewish World Review Feb. 5, 2007 / 17 Shevat 5767

The message in the Boston bomb scare

By Jeff Jacoby

Jeff Jacoby
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Suppose for a moment that the harmless Lite-Brites that threw Boston into such pandemonium last week hadn't been so harmless after all. Suppose that the 38 illuminated devices attached to highway overpasses and other public spots around the city hadn't been "guerrilla art" intended to promote an animated show on cable TV, but the terrorist bombs that authorities at first feared they were. Suppose the individuals behind this operation in Boston and nine other cities had been devotees not of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, an inane cartoon about talking fast food, but of Al Qaeda and its violent, totalitarian version of Islam.


Suppose the worst had very nearly come to pass, and had been averted only by the grace of G-d and the nick-of-time intervention of the police department bomb squads. What would we be doing now? Patting ourselves on the back for winning a round in the war against terrorism? Hardly. We would be gasping at how close we had just come to suffering a devastating attack.


In the wake of last week's bomb scare, public discussion seemed to divide into two camps: those who were enraged at the perpetrators of the stunt and the massive chaos is led to, and those who mocked city officials for overreacting hysterically to something many younger residents knew at once was a marketing gimmick. But the police weren't wrong not to take any chances; even before 9/11, thousands of people around the world wound up in early graves because something that appeared to be innocuous — a suitcase, a toy, a man's bulky coat, a yellow Ryder rental truck — had turned out to be a terrorist's bomb.


Still: If public safety depends on a timely and effective police response to the appearance of every suspicious object, the public had better not count on being very safe. Spotting a bomb in time to defuse it is the *last* line of defense against a terrorist attack — the one we're left with when everything else has failed, or when nothing else has been done.


Sharp-eyed passersby calling 911 will never be numerous enough to flag every anomaly that might be hiding a bomb. The most adroit and agile sappers can never be 100 percent sure that a lethal booby-trap isn't ticking somewhere, unnoticed. However skilled first responders and security officials are at reacting to dangerous *things,* it is not the things themselves that pose the greatest danger to us in the war against militant Islam. It is the people behind those things, and the radical jihadist ideology that motivates them. We cannot be secure unless we pre-empt such people before they can act, and discredit that ideology before it poisons new minds.


Vast resources were marshaled in Boston last week to address what turned out to be a nonexistent threat. "At the peak of the alert," Reuters noted, "authorities mobilized emergency crews, federal agents, bomb squads, hundreds of police and the US Coast Guard. . . . Roads, bridges, and even part of the Charles River were closed." A stunning amount of manpower, time, and money was thrown at the mere possibility of a "danger" that no one had even known about a day before. But what about the dangers that we know are only too real? How much energy and expense do local authorities devote to monitoring the circles in which radical Islamists indoctrinate and recruit their followers? Are state and local government pulling out all the stops to expose and counter the jihadist message that we know can transform peaceful Muslims into implacable Islamists?


It is too easy to focus government attention on specific objects — shoes and liquids at the airport, knives and metal objects at the entrance to public buildings, mysterious Lite-Brites on the undersides of bridges. It is tougher to keep a sustained focus on human beings who share certain beliefs, a form of surveillance from which most Americans instinctively recoil. Ideological and religious profiling goes against our civil-liberties grain. Infiltrating Islamic groups, keeping tabs on mosques, applying heightened scrutiny to Muslims in order to track the extremists among them — we tend to find such activities distasteful, awkward, even un-American.


But if we intend to win the war the jihadists have declared against us, they are unavoidable. The chaos in Boston last week was absurd and expensive and truly much ado about nothing. But it was also a warning: Societies at war cannot wait for bombs to be phoned in to 911. We must stop the Islamists before they strike. That in turn means knowing who they are, what they say, and where they are. Even if we would rather not.

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

Jeff Jacoby is a Boston Globe columnist. Comment by clicking here.

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