RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://mosaicmagazine.com/supplemental/2013/10/before-pastor-hagee/

The following comments are a historical footnote to Robert Nicholson’s splendid essay, “Evangelicals and Israel.” Addressing himself to American Jews, he rebukes them for being distrustful of the millions of evangelical Christians who have been staunch supporters of the Jewish state and the Jewish people. But he also rebukes the growing minority of evangelicals who have recently withdrawn that support and are now actively hostile to Israel and Jews.

Two years ago, I was provoked to write The People of the Book: Philosemitism in England from Cromwell to Churchill, in a similarly critical mode, reproaching the present-day English (not English Jews) for betraying their own evangelical tradition, which was so respectful of the Jewish religion and people and so enthusiastic in favor of a Jewish state, and for succumbing to an anti-Israel fervor very nearly indistinguishable from anti-Semitism.

Evangelicalism was at its height in England in the early 19th century, with Lord Ashley (later the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury) its most prominent and vigorous champion. “An Evangelical of the Evangelicals,” he described himself. It was evangelicalism that prompted both his zeal as a social reformer (of factories, education, and child-labor practices) and as a “missionary,” as he saw it, to and from the Jews. “Who will be the Cyrus of Modern Times,” he inquired in his diary in 1826, “the second Chosen to restore the God’s people?” (Cyrus, king of ancient Persia, permitted the exiled Jews to return from Babylonia to the land of Israel.)

Ashley was all of twenty-five and a newly elected member of Parliament when he took upon himself that role. A decade later, he helped organize the London Society for Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews (the Jews’ Society, as it was known), one of whose aims, and soon its principal aim, was “encouraging the physical restoration of the Jewish people to Eretz Israel—the Land of Israel.” Two years later, he persuaded Lord Palmerston, then the foreign secretary, to appoint a British vice-consul to Jerusalem. “What a wonderful event it is!” he exulted. “The ancient city of the people of God is about to resume a place among the nations.”

http://spectator.org/archives/2013/10/21/zombie-republicans Needed: A light bulb strategy to pour light into our caves. Staggering, without direction, not quite dead and in search of brains, the Republican Party is giving a really good performance as the Zombie Party. According to the media’s current narrative, it has to rid itself of the Tea Party’s influence or die. That […]

Here is a vow. I will not give a plug nickel to any candidate that wants to “reach across the aisle and work with democrats.” That is a frequent mantra of the legislators that want to put their hands in my wallet. Why would anyone want to reach out to those who have slandered and libeled Republicans with accusations of racism, metaphorical “rape”, indifference or hostility to the poor, women, trees, animals and the whole planet?

I want legislators who adhere to true conservative/liberal policies on social, economic and defense issues, not clones of Dick Durbin such as John McCain, and not mindless parrots who spread the lies of climate change which hamper business and economy while doing nothing for humanity or our planet.

And here is a reminder to the weak and dispirited Republicans. Forget Karl Rove. Remember this. The path to the presidency of Ronald Reagan was paved by Senator Barry Morris Goldwater- a man whom I disliked for his overt hostility to Israel. Nonetheless Goldwater, an early incarnation of the Tea Party rejected the legacy of the New Deal and inspired a conservative revolt.He emphasized states’ rights and opposed interference by the federal government in state affairs. While Goldwater was called extreme and alien, his voting records prove otherwise . He lost big to Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and dragged a few Republicans down with his loss. In 1971 he fought to stop funding of the United Nations. He said…”I suggested on the floor of the Senate today that we stop all funds for the United Nations. Now, what that’ll do to the United Nations, I don’t know. I have a hunch it would cause them to fold up, which would make me very happy at this particular point. I think if this happens, they can well move their headquarters to Peking or Moscow and get ’em out of this country.”

He lost big to Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and took quite a few Republicans down in the process. However, he enrgized the conservative movement which culminated with the election of Ronald Reagan.

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/richard-l-cravatts/moral-incoherence-in-the-call-for-academic-boycotts-against-israeli-scholars/print/ This month, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), the most largest and most significant organization of academic faculty members in the United States, with over 47,000 members dedicated an entire issue of their online Journal of Academic Freedom to examine the feasibility and appropriateness of an academic boycott of Israel. Given the AAUP’s […]

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/liberalisms-war-on-women/print/ As Bob Filner, San Diego’s former progressive mayor, pleads guilty to charges stemming from his attacks on women, his essay, “Why I am Pro-Choice” still decorates the website of Planned Parenthood. A year ago, Filner had appeared at a Planned Parenthood rally while running for mayor of California’s second largest city to accuse his […]

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/requiem-for-a-bloody-phony-peace?f=puball

“Oslo has failed, it’s finished, it’s dead,” concluded Deputy Speaker of the Knesset Danny Danon (Likud) while speaking from Israel online to a Washington, DC, audience at the law offices of Jones Day.

Danon spoke as part of the Oct. 3, 2013, Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET) panel “20 Years since Oslo: Time to Reassess Paradigms” offering an expert, sober anniversary postmortem of the failed Arab-Israeli Oslo peace process begun on Sept. 13, 1993, and its lessons for the future.

Although “it is very hard to tell people the truth,” Danon saw no “viable partner for peace” among Palestinian leaders. Further “land for peace” Israeli territorial concessions to the Palestinians were thus pointless. Israeli withdrawal from Judea and Samaria/West Bank, for example, would simply “copy and paste” the aggression faced by Israel from Hamas since its 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip onto territory even closer to Israel’s population centers.

In discussing Israel’s Oslo negotiating partner, the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), former Israeli ambassador Yoram Ettinger in person at Jones Day stated that “leopards do not change spots,” but rather “they change tactics.”

Muslim Arabs like Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas have an understanding of the entire region including Israel as a “waqf…divinely ordained to be a Muslim area.” For such Muslims “it has never been the size, but the existence of Israel” ruled by the “infidel Jew” that is a source of conflict. This intransigence manifested itself in a “constant and steady stream of incitement” of hatred and terrorism against Israel from Palestinian media, EMET founder and President Sarah Stern noted.

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/361725/print Even for the most cultivated people, the 19th-century humorist Josh Billings quipped, “it ain’t ignorance causes so much trouble; it’s folks knowing so much that ain’t so.” Ideally, Plato’s promise that the process of learning would teach us how little we know would apply universally, thus encouraging not only humility but caution, too. Yet […]

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/361717/print Turkey’s autocratic prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who last made international news in June when he brutally suppressed street protests against his rule, can’t understand why Obamacare has any critics. “It’s such a beautiful step, and, to tell the truth, Mr. Obama should be supported,” Erdogan said in a speech in Ankara. “There are […]

http://pjmedia.com/victordavishanson/the-democratic-disasters-to-come/?print=1 The defunding wars are over. The accusations are fading. We are back to reality. Of course, America’s long-term prospects, at least in comparison with other countries’ futures — whether in terms of demography, military power, food-production constitutional stability, energy sources, or higher education — are bright. But short term, we are walking over landmines […]

http://pjmedia.com/blog/exodus-migration-of-jews-out-of-france-begins/?print=1 Some fifty years ago, a mass migration transformed Judaism in France and in other countries of Western Europe. Algeria, a French colony in North Africa, was granted independence in 1962. Over one million French residents — European settlers and natives that had opted for French citizenship and culture — had no choice but to flee […]