Mel Gibson & the Jews

The Movie Mel Should Have Made...

by Gerald A. Honigman

Mel Gibson has a new movie out, “Edge of Darkness.”

I like Mel Gibson as an actor and director.

I have enjoyed much of his work, and one movie, in particular, was truly amazing.

“They may take our lives, but they may never take our freedom!” Thus, allegedly, spoke William Wallace, a.k.a. Mel Gibson’s Braveheart. No doubt, the movie was hauntingly spectacular and led me to admire the Scots even more than I did already. Questions regarding the historicity of the movie, nonetheless, caused quite a commotion. Ronald Hamowy of the Department of History at the University of Alberta summed it up this way in his June 28, 1995 comments:

Frankly, this movie has about as much merit historically...as one of the countless dubbed Italian films about Hercules battling the tyrants…

Regardless, William Wallace was a true 13th century Scottish hero, and Mr. Gibson’s passion for the freedom of this people and sympathy for their cause shined through. And, as we read the above words of Braveheart, we’ll soon turn to another quote--but, this one by a leader of another oppressed people (one which Gibson obviously hates) fighting, over a thousand years earlier, yet another conqueror of much of the known world.

The Roman-sponsored historian, Josephus, detested his fellow Judaean countrymen who took up arms against the Roman Empire. He saw them as fighting a war that could not be won, leading their nation to ruin. He aligned himself with the future Emperor instead. So he wrote what he wrote not out of admiration. Keep this in mind as we progress here…

Indeed, the situation Josephus feared was the same as if Lithuania had taken on the Soviet Union in the latter’s heyday of power.

Yet, the Judaeans (Jews) did just that--and kept the struggle going on for about two hundred years. Judaea Capta coins can now be found in museums all over the world and were issued by Rome to commemorate its victory. The Arch of Titus stands tall in Rome to this very day as well and, among other things, displays Romans carrying away spoils of the Temple and Judaean captives.

So, the historicity of the Jews’ struggle is beyond reasonable doubt and is highlighted by the Romans themselves.

We’ll examine some of the speech of Eleazar ben Yair, leader of the last major band of Judaean warriors to hold out after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 C..E., gave to his band of fighters and their families atop the fortress of Masada overlooking the Dead Sea just prior to the final Roman assault. Let’s turn first, however, to another brief but telling quote from the contemporary Roman historian, Tacitus, who, like Josephus, also lived during the time of the Jews’ struggle and had lots to say about it as well:

It inflamed Vespasian’s resentment that the Jews were the only nation that had not yet submitted (Vol.II, The Works Of Tacitus).

After Masada fell in 73 C.E., when the Emperor Hadrian decided to turn the Temple Mount into a pagan shrine, it was the grandchildrens’ turn to take on their mighty pagan conquerors. And, again, Roman historians, such as Dio Cassius, recorded the second revolt (132-135 C.E.) as well.

Among other things, the entire Twelfth Roman Legion was wiped out before the leader of this second major quest for freedom by the Jews, Shimon Bar Kochba, fell at Betar. Detailed letters from him to his troops have been discovered as were the famous Dead Sea Scrolls. One of the latter is the War Scroll which speaks of the conflict between..."the Sons of Light vs. the Sons of Darkness,” and so forth.

Let’s listen now to Josephus, Book VII, Wars Of The Jews:

“Now as he (Eleazar) judged this to be the best thing they could do in their present circumstances, he gathered the most courageous...and encouraged them ....by a speech: ‘Since we, long ago...resolved never to be servants to the Romans, nor to any other than G_d himself...the time is come that obliges us to make that resolution true in practice...’”

Gibson should now listen very carefully. Here’s Eleazar ben Yair...

“We were the very first that revolted from them, and we are the last that fight against them (see Tacitus’ quote above); and I cannot but esteem it as a favour that G_d hath granted us that it is still in our power to die bravely, in a state of freedom...”

Masada’s defenders committed mass suicide—families and all—rather than fall into Roman hands.

While a few scholars debate the details, practically everything else that has been excavated, discovered otherwise, and so forth testify to Josephus’ trustworthiness--so there is no reason to doubt him here.

Masada is an amazing place to visit. The Roman camps, ramp, etc. are all still all there just as Josephus described them 2,000 years ago. And remember, Josephus was no fan of those Jews atop the fortress.

So, let’s just say that if Mel’s Braveheart’s alleged quote about freedom can be taken as history,then there’s certainly no problem with Eleazar’s. Indeed, William Wallace has nothing over Eleazar ben Yair...or, Braveheart II, the movie Mel should have made. Indeed, he may have--if not for that “Jew thing” he has such a problem with.

So here’s the real reason for this update of my much earlier article...

Mel Gibson used his millions several years back to produce a film, “The Passion of Christ,” which deals with a topic which has caused millennia of suffering for Jews. Among other sore points, Gibson included the verse from Matthew 27:25, “His blood be upon us and our children,” whereby the Jews allegedly take blame for the death of Jesus. It has been used to justify Jewish suffering in the minds of many millions of Christians over the millennia.

The Pope, Reverend Billy Graham, and thousands of other Christian religious figures applauded the movie and saw no problems with it. “It is as it was” stated Pope John Paul II…

From a Christian theological perspective, those words are acceptable. But theology isn’t necessarily history, and there is now sound historical scholarship--with no theological agenda to promote either way--which puts much of what “it is as it was” in serious doubt. And much of it has been conducted by objective Christian scholars.

While I have admittedly not seen “The Passion of Christ” (I refuse to endorse or support the work of an anti-Semite), I have closely analyzed its topic through a scholar’s eyes while doing doctoral studies and later on as well. I have also watched the trailers to the movie and other clips which have shown me all that I need to see.

Let’s just say that what Mel claims to know as “historical truth” is, at the very least, debatable.

Jews, obviously, have theological differences with their Christian friends. Hopefully these differences can be discussed without fear of inquisitions, public disputations, forced conversions, and often much worse which accompanied those differences in the past.

Given those other “truths” which came out of a drunken Gibson’s mouth not long ago regarding Jews, however, I can easily see him participating in those above activities.

Jews could never deify any man, Messiah or otherwise. Roman historians wrote of this strange people who “worship a god no man can see and who refuse to even deify their caesars.” But this is a whole other debate.

The issue of the Jews’ alleged role as “G_d-killer,” which Gibson felt just had to be resurrected yet again in his film, has caused so much pain, suffering, and death to Jews over the centuries, that it’s hard to believe that this man, so sensitive to the plight of Scots, felt that there was nothing better to spend his wealth on. More theologically-based anti-Semitism was not needed out of Tinseltown.

While there are sophisticated ways of interpreting the New Testament’s Gospel of John, for example, when the average person reads him allegedly quoting Jesus calling the Jews (not just Pharisees, etc.) “sons of the Devil, doing your father’s deeds,” what impact can this sort of teaching have? Gibson evidently loves and endorses it. Indeed, he showed the devil incarnate weaving in and out of “his children” as they cried out for Jesus’s blood in his movie.

Is it also a surprise, therefore, that one of the first pictures in Europe of a Jew is entitled, “Aaron, Son of the Devil?”

Even the Renaissance sculptor, Michelangelo, put Devil’s horns on Moses’ head… regardless of the whitewashing some have tried to do with that as well, calling them “rays of light” instead. I’m sure that that’s what the average Gentile thought/thinks of when viewing that piece of artwork. And I’m also sure that Gibson will invite me to his Passover seder.

Is it, thus, really any stretch to next learn of untold thousands of Jews being massacred for “poisoning Christian wells” and causing the Bubonic Plague...and countless other tragedies committed in the name of the Christian “Prince of Peace” encountered as a result of such religious enlightenment?

The road to Auschwitz was indeed very carefully paved over the millennia.

After the famous “Passion Plays” throughout Europe, it was common for Christians to get drunk and next go after the local “G-d Killers.” Deadly massacres and pogroms were especially common around Easter time. Was/is that what Mel missed/misses?

While he claims to not share the anti-Semitism of his father, after that drunken episode with the policeman in which the most obnoxious of anti-Semitism spewed forth from his vocal cords, please forgive me if I call him a liar. One could argue that Jews have too long been the Suffering Servant of G_d ( there’s more than one way to interpret Biblical passages) to remain silent over this filmed passion play.

Think of the zeal Gibson showed for the struggle of an oppressed people in Braveheart. Now contrast this with his willing ignorance (and much worse) regarding this subject vis-a-vis the Jews--a struggle in which Jesus (Joshua) of Nazareth, regardless of how one views him, was caught up in and was crucified for--like thousands of Judaeans both before and after him--in his people’s fight for freedom against their Roman tormentors.

Yes, Gibson is a fine actor and a talented man. And any Jews who support him and his newest movie deserve whatever he wishes for them.

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Obama's Old/New "Peace" Plan

President Obama’s Old/New Plan: Resolution To Kill The Resolution

by Gerald A. Honigman

The headline of Avi Yellin’s article in January 22, 2010’s Israel National News/Arutz Sheva read , “Mitchell Pitches a New 5-Point Plan for Middle East Negotiations.”

The story reported that, according to Arab sources linked to alleged “moderate” Mahmoud Abbas’s latter-day Arafatians of Fatah and quoted by the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat, President Obama’s Special Middle East Envoy, George Mitchell is unveiling a five-point plan to force parties back to the negotiating table and press Israel to retreat back to the ‘49 armistice line--not border-- which existed between Israel and Jordan until Israel was attacked by the latter in 1967.

Recall that President Obama had previously endorsed the earlier Saudi “Peace” (of the grave) Plan prior to his election and afterwards as well. He repeatedly stated that Israel would be crazy to reject such “peace.”

In a nutshell, that plan calls for Israel to retreat to its ‘49 armistice lines on all fronts (think the Golan Heights, from which Syria bombarded Israeli civilians for decades, as well as Judea and Samaria--aka, only as of the 20th century, the “West Bank), making it 9-15 miles wide in its strategic waist, where most of its population and industry are located, again. Additionally, it must next accept millions of allegedly “returning” jihadi Arab refugees raised on murderous Jew-hatred for decades. Recall that more Jews fled from “Arab” lands than vice-versa after a half dozen Arab states attacked a resurrected, microscopic Israel in 1948. In return, Israel supposedly will get a vague “normalization"--after giving up all the concrete tangibles minimally required just to be able to exist if the Arabs renege for whatever reason they will surely find.

While I didn’t see mention of the returning refugees in the short, new article mentioned above, recall that this stipulation was at first played down years ago as well. Nonetheless, it remains an integral part of that plan to this very day--one which Abbas insists he will never retreat from.

The reality, of course, is that this allegedly “new” Obama initiative is nothing more than the same old Saudi version of the Arabs’ well-known, openly admitted destruction-in-stages “Trojan Horse” schemes as described in direct quotes from earlier Arab “moderates” themselves.

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane to see how we got to where we are today...

At a State Department briefing on January 9, 1992, spokesperson Margaret Tutwiler was asked about accepting the word “Palestinian” when referring to the territories of the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem. She replied that the U.S. had accepted this usage since 1979, but that it was for “descriptive” purposes only...Typical Foggy Folk gobbledygook.

When later asked, “if it’s a long-standing policy, why wasn’t the word ‘Palestinian’ used in Security Council Resolution 338...or in 242 which underpins the current peace process?,” Tutwiler replied,” I do not know… I’ll be happy to ask somebody for you.”

Some five years later, in a May 21, 1997 briefing, spokesman Nicholas Burns focused on the “settlements” issue...a harbinger of things to come.

Is it not “interesting” that in numerous State Department briefings over the decades--and in all the discussions and elaborations which have ensued to this very day with the Obama/Clinton foreign policy team running the American show--the ties never seem to be made between those settlements and the spirit and intent of UNSC Resolution 242, the basis for peace making between Arab and Jew in the region?

Perhaps a coincidence...most probably, not.

It seems to have taken Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to remind his State Department counterparts in an August 6, 2002 speech, “If you have a country that is a sliver and you can see three sides of it from a high hotel building, you’ve got to be careful what you give away and to whom you give it to.”

Much has been written about 242. Some claim it’s ambiguous...It’s not.

Adopted in the wake of the June 1967 War, started when Arabs blockaded Israel at the Straits of Tiran--a casus belli--and other well-documented hostile acts, 242 is as famous for what it did not say as for what it did.

As anyone who has studied this subject knows, among other things (and besides the references above), there was no mention of a total withdrawal by Israel to the 1949, U.N.-imposed armistice lines...lines which were never meant to be final political borders. This was reinforced by a call for the creation of “secure and recognized”, defensible borders to replace those lines...lines which turned Israel into a 9-15 mile wide sub- rump state--forever at its neighbors’ mercy, an easy target for terror, invasion, and prone to be sliced in half.

A reading of Lord Caradon, Eugene Rostow, Arthur Goldberg, and other architects of the final, accepted draft of 242 (not the French and Russian version) clearly shows that Israel was not expected to return to the deadly, absurd status quo ante.

As Ambassador Dore Gold and others have pointed out, President Lyndon Johnson summarized the situation this way on June 19, 1967:

“A return to the situation on June 4 (the day before outbreak of war) was not a prescription for peace but for renewed hostilities.”

Johnson then called for “new recognized boundaries that would provide security against terr
or, destruction, and war. He was then backed up by General Earle Wheeler of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and many others as well.

Recall that on the West Bank, Israel took these lands in a defensive war from an illegal occupant--Transjordan--which subsequently renamed itself Jordan as a result of its 1949 illegal acquisition of non-apportioned lands of the original 1920 Mandate west of the Jordan River that Jews, as well as Arabs and others, were legally entitled to live on.

Indeed, Jews have thousands of years of history connecting them to these lands and owned property and lived there up until their massacres by Arabs in the 1920s and 1930s. Additionally, many, if not most, of the Arabs themselves were also relative newcomers, pouring in--as the Minutes of the Permanent Mandates Commission of the League of Nations, Colonial Secretary and later Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s writings, and other documentation show--from Syria, Egypt, and elsewhere in the region.

General Wheeler’s document also envisioned Israel acquiring an adequate buffer zone atop the West Bank mountain ridge, in command of the high ground, giving it at least some semblance of in depth defense.

During President Richard Nixon’s term in office, official U.S. policy seemed to erode somewhat vis-a-vis Johnson’s position. Whether this was due to Nixon himself or the State Department’s Arabists (who fought President Truman and opposed Israel’s rebirth in the first place) reasserting themselves, on December 9, 1969 Secretary of State William Rogers allowed for only “insubstantial alterations” regarding the 1949 armistice lines. This is echoed by the Obama White House and the Foggy Folks today.

After having to answer to the late Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson and others as well, soon afterwards--until recently--the U.S. refrained from such deviation from both the wording and intent of 242.

Moving ahead, and once again utilizing Ambassador Gold’s useful summary, here’s what President Ronald Reagan had to say about all of this on September 1, 1982:

“In the pre-1967 borders, Israel was barely 10-miles wide...the bulk of Israel’s population within artillery range of hostile armies. I am not about to ask Israel to live that way again.”

In 1988, Secretary of State George Shultz declared, “Israel will never negotiate from or return to the 1967 borders.” A rare exception to the State Department’s typical attitude, Shultz fought his own crew to give Israel a fair shake.

In the 1990s, during the Clinton years (despite the later pressure brought to bear on Prime Minister Ehud Barak to sweetin’ the pot by offering Arafat far more than 242 called for at Camp David and Taba in 2000), official policy, as expressed by Secretary of State Warren Christopher in 1997, was that, “Israel is entitled to secure and defensible borders,” a la 242. Yet Clinton undermined Israel from this point forward. While Arafat rejected the offers, the latter became the expected starting point for any future “negotiations”… i.e., Jew arm-twisting.

So, what happened between the days of Reagan and his latter day successors and son of his vice-president?

From Reagan’s 1982 statement that Israel would never be expected to return to its former vulnerable existence, we later came to President George W. Bush’s May 26, 2005 White House statement that the 1949 armistice lines must be the basis of peace between Israel and the 22nd Arab state--second Arab one in “Palestine"-- which Bush and his new successor plan to create. Yet, just a year before, he echoed Reagan himself, stating virtually the opposite of his May 26th statement in a much publicized letter he gave to Prime Minister Sharon.

As Rogers and Hammerstein’s King of Siam said, “Tis a puzzlement!”

Indeed.

Yet, there was one constant ingredient that seemed to have constantly been at work for the erosion of support for both the vision and the spirit of 242: James A. Baker, III.

During Bush II’s dad’s days in office, best pal Secretary of State Baker promised the butcher of Damascus, Hafez al-Assad, a total Israeli withdrawal from the strategically important (and once part of the original Palestine Mandate) Golan Heights...his personal idea about what to do with 242.

Baker has been in the background for decades, especially since his close friends, the Bushes, gained ascendancy in American politics. His law firm represents Saudi and other Arab interests in this country and typifies how people move through the revolving doors of businesses tied to Arab interests back and forth into government positions--especially those in Foggy Bottom. Baker’s law partner, Robert Jordan, was appointed ambassador to Saudi Arabia by President Bush in 2001. Casper Weinberger and many others have been through these lucrative doors as well. Most often, their influence has spelled trouble for an Israel trying to get a fair hearing and has been involved in eroding such positive developments as Resolution 242 and so forth.

In a Time magazine article back on February 13, 1989, Baker spoke of Israel as being a turkey to be hunted and carefully stalked. He has referred to Jews working for him and doing his bidding (including the recent American Ambassador to Israel) as his “Jew boys.”

But Baker is best known for his following piece of wisdom: “ F _ _ _ the Jews, they don’t vote for us anyway!”

And if you believe that Baker is alone among the power brokers with these attitudes, I have two bridges to sell you.

The team running President Obama’s current foreign policy is a Democratic clone of the above when it comes to such issues. Obama’s admiration, friendship, key appointments, and so forth of the likes of Farrakhan, Rezko, Prof. Khalidi, Rev. Wright, Jessie “Hymietown” Jackson, Zbig Brezinski, “Apartheid Israel “ Jimmy Carter, Robert Malley, George Soros, General McPeak, Khalid al-Mansour, etc. and so forth have to be beyond the coincidental.

That, indeed, says it all regarding what Israel can expect from such circles. If you wonder why the vision of justice in 242 has been replaced by a constant bickering over settlements instead--never tying the two together--look no further.

President Bush’s winning a second term in office and his appointment of Baker as his Special Middle East Envoy combined with the recharged influence of the State Department’s old and new generation Arabists and the Bush family’s massive oil connections to negate any alleged influence of Evangelical Christians seeking justice for Israel. And since Bush II couldn’t run again, he had nothing to lose.

Things took a turn for the worse with the election of President Obama.

Under his watch, and with Hillary Clinton as his appointed Secretary of State, the assurances regarding key issues such as the return of refugees and no withdrawal to the ‘49 armistice lines that George W. Bush gave to Prime Minister Sharon several years back ( in that famous letter which accompanied the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza) have now either been denied as even existing or considered simply as a joke.

Only time will tell how this will all play out.

But, at this point, Israel will have to depend on the integrity, courage, and fortitude of its own leaders, expecting them to act as the leaders of any other nation faced with the same circumstances would act.

Only they can insist that Israel gets the justice Resolution 242 promised it.

And, while it would be nice to have support from elsewhere, that’s the way it should be anyway. Let’s hope Prime Minister Netanyahu is up to the task.

http://q4j-middle-east.com

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Mr. Prime Minister, Make Your Decision...

Mr. Prime Minister, Make Your Decision...

by Gerald A. Honigman

An Iranian professor who teaches at a local major university and I have become good friends. I had earlier been invited to speak at his institution, where numerous students from the Middle East attend classes.

We have been discussing the recent events going on in his native land--events which especially pose a very harsh dilemma for Israel. Indeed, things happening in Iran right now make Israel’s choices only that much more difficult...


While the courage of millions of Iranians (with tens of thousands taking to the streets despite brutal repression) may eventually lead to the collapse of the current regime, the latter still has enough support with the folks with the weapons--who have a stake in the Islamic Republic--to also make that possibility very “iffy” as well. So, if Israel waits it out--hoping for an internal solution--who knows when or if that might even occur?


Meantime, Iran is getting closer than ever to becoming a nuclear power--with Israel as its primary target--and openly stated as such. When folks repeatedly and openly speak in terms of another final solution, Jews (many, at least) take them very seriously.


What especially complicates matters is that if Ahmadinejad and the Mullahs think they’re going to collapse via an internal revolt and they have become a nuclear power--or even if they “just” have numerous biologically and chemically-tipped missiles (which they surely have...those other weapons of mass destruction that Iraqi Arabs already used on Kurds and probably also on Iranians during their war primarily over Iran’s Khuzestan/"Arabistan” province’s oil in the ‘80s)--they will very likely launch their strike against Israel before they collapse to help bring about their deeply rooted Shi’a belief that the chaos that will next ensue will, at long last ( after the massive Israeli retaliation, and so forth), bring their Hidden Imam--the Mahdi--out of hiding, ushering in their own version of the Christian Armeggedon (from the Hebrew, Har Megiddo) and the return of their own Shi’a Messiah.


Now, Iran is a big country with about 73 million people. Geographically, about seventy-five Israels would fit into Iran, and the former’s population is about one tenth of the latter’s.


The Mullahs have already shown they are willing to sacrifice millions of their own people for their cause--as displayed when young boys were used as living mine detectors and such in fighting Saddam’s then Sunni Arab-controlled Iraq.


Waiting, thus, is far more dangerous for Israel than many other folks realize or give a hoot about. Some --myself, for example--could make a good argument showing that Israel has already grossly endangered itself by caving in to outside pressure to not striking earlier while the targeting would have been easier, etc., and so forth.


While no one wants to see innocents on either side die as a result of the Mullahs’ deadly, genocidal games, Israel can’t afford to take a first hit for both geographic and demographic reasons described above.


Iran will survive a retaliation by the Jewish State--especially because the latter (unlike all of its Arab and Iranian enemies) will try its very best to zero in on military and political targets.


On the other hand, Iran will try its very best to destroy the entire Jewish State and will primarily and deliberately target Jewish population centers...as their Arab soul mates--when it comes to this subject, at least--do.


Alright, my friends. Each of you is now the Prime Minister of Israel. Recall that in 1938, Czechoslovakia was sold out in Munich by its “friends” for an alleged “peace for our time.” The world was soon at war anyway, because Hitler had his sights set far beyond the Czechs’ Sudetenland.


Given all of this, Mr. Prime Minister, now decide on your course of action for your own sole, resurrected nation--one which requires a magnifying glass to find it on a world globe.


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