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http://www.city-journal.org/2013/bc0131ss.html

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WILL THEY GIVE OSCARS FOR BASHING ISRAEL? LORI LOWENTHAL MARCUS

http://www.mideastoutpost.com/archives/will-they-give-oscars-for-bashing-israel-lori-lowenthal-marcus.html

Two of the five films nominated for Best Documentary by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences this year are Israeli films. Let’s hope one of the other films wins.

Missing a Chance at Greatness
A riveting examination of Israeli counterterrorism, The Gatekeepers stacks the deck, denying viewers their own judgment.

Zero Dark Thirty is not the only Academy Award–nominated film that raises profound moral questions about how democracies can strike back at terrorism without abandoning their own liberal values. Also up for an award this year is The Gatekeepers, a searing documentary in Hebrew with English subtitles, featuring revealing interviews with six former heads of the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security service, who testify about the methods they used in combating Palestinian terrorism.

Civil libertarians and some liberal politicians have excoriated Zero Dark Thirty’s director, Kathryn Bigelow, and screenwriter, Mark Boal, for purportedly justifying torture of captured al-Qaida operatives as a means of extracting leads that might have led to finding Osama bin Laden’s safe house in Pakistan. Because the movie seems to suggest that “torture works,” says Senator Dianne Feinstein, it “has the potential to shape American public opinion in a disturbing and misleading manner.” (Michael Totten has written a vigorous defense of Bigelow.)

The Gatekeepers, on the other hand, has won praise from liberal critics, here and in Israel, for arguing that Israel is in danger of “losing its soul,” and its democracy, because it employs similar brutal methods against Palestinian terrorists. The film’s director, Dror Moreh, is a 40-something Jerusalemite who previously made a well-received documentary about former prime minister Ariel Sharon’s decision to withdraw the Israeli army and uproot Jewish settlements from Gaza. For The Gatekeepers, Moreh was able to convince the six Shin Bet chiefs to spill their guts about the measures they authorized to combat Palestinian suicide terrorism. They’re also asked whether these operations contributed to a solution of the conflict. Their collective answer, in one word, is no.

It may seem astonishing to non-Israelis that former spy chiefs in that security-obsessed country would be willing, or even allowed, to reveal undercover operations they directed and to criticize government policies publicly. In fact, such outspoken criticism from Israeli security officials is hardly unprecedented. In 2003, four of the same ex–Shin Bet chiefs publicly warned Sharon’s government that its harsh policies in the Palestinian territories were leading the country to “near-catastrophe.” Partly because of their warning, Sharon eventually decided to withdraw troops from Gaza.

http://www.prudenpolitics.com/newsletter?utm_source=P&P%20Auto%201&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=5998

“The cruelest con in the schemes of Mr. Obama and the senators is the so-called “earned citizenship.” This would give “undocumented immigrants” a way to “come out of the shadows” and “play by the rules” by passing a background check, learning English and “civics,” paying their back taxes and penalties, and going to the back of the line to apply for citizenship. These are requirements almost no one could meet. The pointy-headed intellectuals (to use an apt phrase from the past) who dreamed up this scheme apparently never met anyone without tidy savings on which to draw “back taxes” and “penalties.”

The righteous cheers and applause for the latest amnesty schemes from the U.S. Senate and the White House recall the famous gathering of mice convened to deal with the cat. The cat was devouring the mice in alarming numbers.

“What we need,” said a wizened little gray fellow who looked a lot like an overstuffed senator, “is a bell for the cat. We can put it on his collar along with his identification tag, though it beats me why anyone would want to help a cat find his way home. Then we can hear the tinkling of the bell when the cat’s around. Then we can hide.”

All the mice cheered and squeaked. “What a great idea,” said one lean little mouse whose fur had gone gray around his ears. He looked something like John McCain. “Yes, yes,” echoed a mouse with a certain Carolina accent. “Let’s do it now.”

The chairman, a fair-minded fellow, asked for further comment.

“No, no, no” a mouse shouted from the back row. “No more talk. No more delay.” Another mouse, an editor from the Mall Street Journal just arrived from a two-hour business lunch at Chez Dumpster, with tiny crumbs still lodged in his whiskers, cried out: “Vote! Vote!”

And so they did, with only one dissenting vote. All the little mice screamed and cheered, mightily pleased with themselves. All but one, a plump, noisy mouse, a curmudgeon who looked like he might be a famous radio talker. He shook his head sadly. “You’ve got an interesting idea,” he said, “but who will bell the cat?”

No one spoke up. Silence fell across the room. Finally, one by one, the mice drifted away, back to their holes in the wall under the kitchen sink. The cat, from his perch on the sofa, licked his lips, and smiled true to the instincts of his Cheshire grandfathers. Lunch would soon be served.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/01/the_path_to_saving_the_republic_just_say_no.html Our nation is in crisis. The Obama administration is centralizing power at a level unmatched in American history with grave consequences for our future liberty and freedom. Of that there is not much debate among conservatives. Conservatives, however, are always waiting for the next Ronald Reagan, wondering if Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan or someone […]

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3569/palestinian-youth-movement-jihad More disturbing is that only a few of the dozens of Western-funded human rights organizations that operate in the Gaza Strip have raised their voice against Hamas’s abuse of children. Even the United Nations Children’s Fund [UNICEF], which was created to work for children’s rights, their survival, development and protection, has yet to condemn […]

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3561/europe-hijab A member of the Kuwaiti delegation of the UN Human Rights Council, Malik Al-Wazzan, said France should revoke the ban [on full-face Islamic veils] to “protect the human rights in discrimination and inequalities toward foreigners and those with different beliefs.” This comes as the Kuwaiti Parliament considers a draft law banning the construction of […]