We Bought The Bullets

The bullets used to kill 19-year-old Furkan Dogan, a Turkish-American college student born in Troy, New York, were fired by soldiers in a foreign army -- but they were paid for with money extorted from U.S. taxpayers. 

A post-mortem documented that Dogan was shot four times in the head and once in the chest by the commandos of Unit 13, which assaulted the humanitarian flotilla attempting to break the Israeli government's blockade of Gaza. Dogan was one of nine Turkish nationals killed in the attack.

Of the incident in which this young American citizen was murdered, Vice President Biden -- an infinitely self-replenishing Artesian gusher of unfiltered foolishness -- had this to say: "What's the big deal here?"

Although Dogan was the only U.S. citizen to be killed, other Americans who protested the Gaza blockade suffered grievously at the hands of U.S.-subsidized Israeli soldiers.

Paul Larudee, a 64-year-old peace activist who was also involved in the flotilla, was severely beaten and otherwise abused during his two-day detention in Israel because he refused to defer to the "authority" of the Israeli hijackers. Emily Henochowicz, a 21-year-old from Maryland, lost an eye while taking part in a demonstration in Jerusalem protesting the attack on the flotilla, and the ongoing blockade of Gaza: She was shot in the face with a (U.S.-subsidized) tear gas grenade fired by an Israeli soldier.

Blinded eyewitness: Emily Henochowicz in the hospital.

By any rational definition, the attack on civilian ships in international waters was an act of criminal aggression.

Apologists for the Israeli government's actions insist that the commandos who invaded the Turkish-flagged ships were forced to defend themselves when they found themselves outnumbered by civilians armed with knives and pipes. But just as pirates and armed robbers have surrendered the right to self-defense, the commandos had no moral or legal right to continue their aggression through violent means once they met resistance.

The commando raid was simple piracy and murder. The blockade it was meant to enforce is a campaign of state terrorism.

Defenders of the Israeli government describe the blockade as (to borrow Charles Krauthammer's expression) a form of "passive defense." It is better described as a policy of collective punishment. Supposedly intended to deprive Hamas of war materiel, the Israeli blockade also interdicts many indispensable foodstuffs, along with building materials, medicines, and such strategically critical items as wheelchairs and children's toys. More importantly, the Gazans themselves are effectively penned in an open-air prison camp. It's doubtful that there is an approach more perfectly calibrated to cultivate terrorism, rather than dissuade it.

It is hyperbole to describe Gaza as a modern equivalent of the Warsaw Ghetto. It is no exaggeration, however, to say that the Israeli government is using, on a much larger scale, the same tactics against the 1.5 million Gazans that were used by the FBI against the Branch Davidians. One federal official who disapproved of the 51-day siege at Mt. Carmel -- during which time water and other necessities were cut off -- described it as an exercise in torturing children to force their parents to surrender.

The face of "Terrorism": Ekrem Cetin and his son, Turker Kaan

Appropriately, that tactic reportedly played a role in the assault on the Gaza relief flotilla. Eyewitnesses testify that Israeli troops seeking to commandeer the Mavi Marmara pointed their guns at the one-year-old son of ship engineer Ekrem Cetin, threatening to murder the child unless the captain stopped the ship.


Had the trigger been pulled and the child -- who, I'm constrained to point out, somewhat resembles my own one-year-old son, Justus --  been slaughtered, we would have been treated to another chorus of an increasingly familiar refrain: It wasn't the fault of the Israeli commandos that the child's parents brought him to a war zone.

 During the 2009 Israeli Defense Force "Operation Cast Lead" offensive in Gaza, one sniper platoon expanded that principle of collective responsibility to include pregnant mothers and their unborn children. A souvenir t-shirt distributed to snipers depicted a visibly pregnant Palestinian mother in the targeting scope of a rifle; the illustration bore the caption, "One shot -- two kills." 

The official t-shirt of the Lon Horiuchi Brigade?

Israeli officials insisted that those t-shirts were a product of bad taste, rather than a reflection of official policy. Those assurances are stoutly disputed by numerous Israeli veterans who have served in Gaza, who testify that indiscriminate attacks on civilians are passively encouraged by the IDF, and generally covered up by it after the fact.


In search of a candid description of the doctrine of collective responsibility and indiscriminate warfare that prevails in both Jerusalem and Washington, we turn to the detestable Alan Dershowitz.

Unless he's being paid a sultan's ransom to defend a celebrity murder defendant, Dershowitz is a consistent defender of state power. He supports the institutionalization of torture, and endorses preemptive nuclear war against Iran. Four years ago, in his book Pre-emption, Dershowitz introduced a concept of collective punishment based on what he calls a "continuum of civilianality" in which protected civilian status "is often a matter of degree, rather than a bright line."

During the summer of 2006, Israeli troops invaded Lebanon following terrorist attacks by Hezbollah. In a July 22, 2006 Los Angeles Times column, Dershowitz insisted that those Lebanese who refused to abandon their homes when commanded to do so by an invading foreign army became retroactively "complicit" in Hezbollah's attacks, and were thus fair game. Those who were unable to leave, such as the elderly and infirm, were "innocent victims," he allowed -- but the IDF shouldn't be expected to spare them if doing so detracted from their military objectives.

Two weeks later, Dershowitz abandoned any pretense of proportionality, insisting that the only requirement to be considered a "terrorist" is to be a citizen of a country that has been invaded by the Israeli (or, presumably, the U.S.) Army.

"Lebanon has chosen sides -- not all Lebanese, but the democratically chosen Lebanese government," wrote Dershowitz. "When a nation chooses sides in a war ... its civilians pay a price for that choice.... Lebanon has chosen the wrong side and its citizens are paying the price. Maybe next time a democracy must choose between collaborating with terrorism or resisting terrorism, it will choose the right side."

Reading those words I was irresistibly reminded of a conversation I had with a self-described Holocaust skeptic in White Plains, New York during the fall of 2001. During our conversation, this fellow admitted that under Nazi rule German and other European Jews were branded like cattle, deprived of their property, and penned in concentration camps, but insisted that this was necessary because they constituted a "security risk."

Owing to the fact that a portion of the German Jewish population consisted of Marxist radicals who threatened the German state, that entire sub-population had defined itself as the enemy, and could be dealt with in any fashion necessary in order to preserve the Volkish state.

If there is a moral difference between that individual's view of collective punishment, and the one expressed by Dershowitz and other people of his ilk, I've yet to learn of an instrument capable of measuring it.

It's not at all surprising that Dershowitz invoked his concept of the "continuum of civilianality" to justify both the Gaza blockade and the attack on the relief flotilla.

"The act of breaking a military siege is itself a military act," pontificated the love-child of Lazar Kaganovich and Bozo the Clown. "It is a close question whether `civilians' who agree too [sic] participate in the breaking of a military blockade have become combatants. They are certainly something different than pure, innocent civilians, and perhaps they are also something different from pure armed combatants. "

The place assigned by Dershowitz to such people on his "continuum of civilianality" depends entirely on their response to aggression by people wearing state-issued costumes: If their reaction is anything other than immediate, unconditional submission, then -- according to Dershowitz -- those defending themselves become terrorists, and the costumed aggressors are the victims.

Where the use of aggressive force is concerned, the only serious moral question -- for Dershowitz and other high priests of statism -- is whether those committing it are swaddled in government-approved attire.

As Augustine pointed out, the key difference between a state and any other criminal gang is not the "renouncing of aggression" but rather the "attainment of impunity." Like the behemoth in Washington that lavishly underwrites it, nurtures its worst and most corrupt instincts, and shields its rulers from accountability, the Israeli government is a criminal band that acts with utter impunity -- not to protect its citizens, but to defend and enhance the state's power and the material advantages of those allied to it.


The Israeli government, like the one ruling us, thrives on crises and seems to go to great lengths to cultivate them. As I've pointed out before, there is a sick symbiosis between the Israeli regime and Palestinian terrorist chieftains, a relationship documented by Richard Ben Cramer in his valuable and infuriating book How Israel Lost.

"Things are not as they seem," writes Cramer. "The [Palestinian Authority's] business intersects with Israeli business at the highest levels of Israeli political life." This explains the tacit "arrangement" in which Israeli and Palestinian rulers sustain each other through carefully timed incidents of lethal violence.

Before Yasir Arafat died, he would be regularly "rescued" by Israeli military strikes against Palestinian targets, Cramer observes. The same was true of Arafat's supposed arch-enemy, Ariel Sharon: "If his polls dropped, something terrible happened -- dead Jews all over the TV" -- and Sharon's political fortunes would dramatically improve.

One reason Israeli intelligence helped create Hamas in the first place was to provide a hunting preserve of Palestinian radicals who could be killed in this ongoing charade. Now we're told that the establishment of a Hamas-dominated political regime in Gaza justifies the starvation blockade and the slaughter on the high seas of anyone -- including American citizens -- who tries to run that blockade.

All of this is necessary, we are incessantly told, in order to ensure the survival of the Jewish State. But self-defense is an individual right. No state, Jewish or otherwise, has the "right" to exist, and all of them -- the Israeli state emphatically included -- prosper at the expense of those they supposedly protect.

We can't guarantee Israel's security and have no authority to do so even if we could, but we'd do both ourselves and the inhabitants of that country a tremendous favor if we were to stop paying for the Israeli government's bullets.

Be sure to tune in for Pro Libertate Radio each Saturday night from 8:00-11:00 Mountain Time on the Liberty News Radio Network.

Dum spiro, pugno!

Flesh For War Fantasies

One significant problem with being an Empire: Everything is supposedly "our" business.

To my considerable shame, I just realized that it had been a long time since I had thought of Angola. In fact, it occurs to me that I really don't have a feeling toward that country one way or another.

How utterly scandalous this is. I obviously suffer from a severely parochial worldview, if not outright bigotry. All decent people are required to take an interest in Angolan affairs, and to work on behalf of that nation's survival.

Whoops – I made a mistake. It was Austria I had forgotten, not Angola – an easy mistake, I suppose, given that the names of those countries are similar, if little else about them is. Austria is the nation that is supposed to hold captive all of my waking thoughts, and dominate the dreams that come once my eyes surrender to weariness at day's end.

Oh. Sorry. My bad.

It turns out that the small foreign country I'm morally obliged to care about is Guatemala, where I lived for a little more than a year in the 1980s --

Now, this has become simply obnoxious. Sierra Leone, that tragic land, scene of some of the most horrific atrocities of recent memory, is the country that should always be uppermost in my thoughts, lest I be accused of indifference to genocide.

Admittedly, it's difficult to keep track of which distant, unfamiliar country should by the focus of my concerns – to such an extent that I would be willing to surrender the blood of my children in its defense.

Perhaps the issue could be clarified if the regime running that country could stage a PR campaign in which its government shamelessly pimps several young female military veterans by having them pose in borderline pornographic photo spreads for Maxim magazine.

We have a winner! The nation in question is, of course, Israel.

Like much of the evil done in this world, the idea of a Maxim photo feature on Israeli women (starring former Miss Israel Gal Gadot) originated in New York, more specifically at the Israeli consulate, “where research showed that Israel meant little to young American men” in the all-important 18-35 demographic, reports the AP.

Former Miss Israel Gal Gadot, featured in the Israeli regime's quasi-porn propaganda campaign, seen here in suitable attire.

“Males that age have no feeling toward Israel one way or another, and we view that as a problem, so we came up with an idea that would be appealing to them,” explains an Israeli government media adviser named David Dorfman. Thus Maxim was contacted by the Israeli consulate and asked to take part in “reshaping Israel's public image.”

What neither the Dorfster nor any of his allies in this effort would explain is this: Why is it obligatory for American males of any age -- let alone those in an age bracket targeted for military recruitment -- to have feelings of any sort about a country to which they have no organic connection or moral responsibility?

Israel can expect the allegiance of its citizens, and for understandable reasons Jews in every nation take an interest in its survival. But I cannot think of a compelling reason why the typical American should take a greater interest in Israel than he does in Angola, Austria, Guatemala, or Sierra Leone.

Ecclesio-Leninists of John Hagee's ilk would insist that Christians have a God-prescribed duty to support the Israeli government, to the point of mass bloodshed, if necessary. Since Hagee considers it just and meet to kill on Israel's behalf, I wonder if he would consider it appropriate to peddle quasi-porn, and consume the same, in that cause. (I'm suddenly afflicted with a mental image of Hagee poring over the pages of the July installment of Maxim, his wattles quivering and his eyes distended as he succumbs to a combination of sanctimony and salacity).

Hagee is precisely the kind of "friend to Israel" whose preferred policies would kill a lot of Israelis and other innocent people. He really should pause and ask himself if a government that would exploit prurient interests in this fashion (not to mention sponsoring "Gay Pride" parades) is really the Zion longed for by prophets and saints of ages past. From where I sit, that government appears no better or worse than any of a dozen others I could name, our own most definitely included.

While the Israeli consulate in New York prepares to fire the Maxim gun in its propaganda arsenal, the War Party is pursuing a somewhat subtler approach in preparing the public for a US/Israeli attack on Iran. Yesterday (June 20) the House of Representatives passed a resolution demanding that the UN Security Council “charge Iranian President Maumoud Ahmadinejad with violating the 1948 Convention on the Prevention of the Crime of Genocide,” and that the Council consider unspecified “measures” to “prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons....”

The resolution regurgitates the claim, which has been canonized through repetition although patently and demonstrably false, that Ahmadinejad “called for Israel to be `wiped off the map'.” While the Iranian president is a certifiable maniac guilty of many crimes against decency, that phrase was not uttered by him: He was, in fact, calling for what is now “regime change” by calling for an end to the Israeli government, not the annihilation of the Israeli people. If calling for “regime change” is now to be considered an incitement to genocide, the entire staff of the American Enterprise Institute should be seized and extradited to stand trial before the UN International Criminal Court in the Hague.

Only two congressmen, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), voted against the resolution. Kucinich “attempted to have read into the record alternate translations of Ahmadinejad's remarks that suggest the Iranian leader was calling Israel to come to an end through democratic means, and not through violence,” reported the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

While describing himself as “unequivocal in my support for the security and survival of Israel” and possessed of “serious concerns with the remarks made by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,” Kucinich denounced the resolution, correctly describing it as an attempt to “lay the groundwork for an offensive, unprovoked war” -- one in which Israelis, as well as Americans and Iranians, would be killed, and that will probably ignite a broader conflict lasting for years or even decades.

And that is an obscenity far greater than anything available in the pages of Maxim.

Please be sure to visit The Right Source.

"True Faith And Allegiance"?

Entangling alliances: Senator Kyl at this weekend's meeting of the U.S.-Israeli Joint Parliamentary Committee

I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.” (Emphasis added.)

Oath of office for US Congressmen and Senators

Over the weekend, a small delegation of American legislators was shuttled by military plane to Israel to take part in meetings of “a joint Senate-Knesset committee headed by Senator John M. Kyl, who is close to President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney." In addition to Senator Kyl, the group included Representatives Jane Harman (D-California), Gabrielle Giffords (D-Arizona), and Steve Pearce (R-Arizona).

Yuval Steinitz, the Likud Party parliamentarian who hosted the American delegation, defined the purpose of the two-day visit in startlingly brazen terms: “We think that it is important that the members of the delegation feel the connection and understand Israel better. They are mostly non-Jewish and we want them to feel some obligation to the country.” (Emphasis added.)

The oath that these elected representatives took, invoking the holiest of Names, precludes them from feeling an “obligation” of any sort to any country other than our own – however laudable, or however infamous, that foreign nation may be.

I hope he's seeking forgiveness for perjuring himself in God's name: Kyl at the Western Wall

Steiniz boasts that the joint committee “has had major achievements and we hope that this visit will lead to additional feats.” The specific “feat” he has in mind is war with Iran, which was to be the focus of briefings the US legislators would receive from the head of the Mossad, Meir Dagan.

In fact, there's reason to believe that this committee – a constitutionally impermissible and morally reprehensible blending of our legislative branch with that of a foreign state – was created for the express purpose of agitating for a war with Iran. It was created in 2003, and since then has left an almost imperceptible paper trail.

One of the few references to the Committee's work that Google was able to scrape up was a Christian Science Monitor account of testimony delivered before the Committee in September 2003 by State Department official Paula DeSutter, who insisted that a nuclear-armed Iran “cannot be allowed to happen.”

The Committee has been stealthily efficient: “In the past, the joint Knesset-Senate Committee helped make hundreds of millions of dollars available for Israel's missile defense shield, Arrow, which is produced in cooperation [with] Boeing in the US. In addition, according to Steinitz, the committee has in the past prevented arms sales to Arab states that would have threatened Israel's unique edge in the region; it also initiated the Iran sanctions law, which makes it illegal for governments to provide arms or aid Iran's nuclear program....”

So the Committee's work has (arguably) been beneficial to Israel, profitable for Boeing, a minor inconvenience to Arab states (who, alas, have the money and means to get arms elsewhere), and an insult to foreign governments that must find it peculiar to be told they have to obey restrictions imposed on them by a law that began as the bastard offspring of an illegitimate bi-national committee.

The question is: What benefit, if any, has this arrangement provided for the people who sent those legislators to Washington, the ones whose taxes have purchased Israel's missile shield, and whose children would likely die in the wars that are being propagated in the Middle East?

That's a question that should be posed – bluntly, forcefully, and often – to Kyl and his companions when they return from their junket.

The Bush Regime has claimed the power to take our country to war with Iran without legislative action of any kind. The Democratic congressional leadership is doing nothing about this, except to trip over its own feet and stumble over its collective tongue in its eagerness to condemn Tehran as a world-historic menace.

Iran's demented executive figurehead, and his American equivalent: Am I the only one who detects a certain ... resemblance?

It says a great deal about our predicament that now, after the public mood has turned decisively against the war in Iraq, and with little public support for expanding the war to include Iran, congressional leaders and presidential aspirants from both branches of the Establishment Party have turned to Israel for support.

This week's visit by Kyl and Company comes just a few weeks after this year's “Edmond Benjamin de Rothschild Herzliya Conference on `The Balance of Israel’s National Strength (hosen) and Security,'” which is billed as a summit of “the most influential Israeli and international leaders.” This year's edition included presentations from presidential aspirants Mitt Romney, John Edwards, and Newt Gingrich, all of whom focused on the “existential” threat posed by Iran.

Ironically, the most sensible thing said to the conference was said via satellite by the execrable Alan Dershowitz, to whose tongue and pen truth and wisdom had previously been total strangers.

Alas, to get to Dershowitz's kernel of wisdom we had to pick through the predictable pile of, well, Dershowitz.

Acting as spokesman for the League of the Perpetually Aggrieved, the Dersh played the victim card, insinuating that General Wesley Clark (a Democratic presidential hopeful) was dealing in anti-Semitic stereotypes by hinting “at Jewish involvement in U.S. foreign policy by saying `New York `money people are pushing the U.S. into war with Iran.'”

First of all, given that General Clark is Jewish, the anti-Semite label rubs right off. Secondly, given that there are millions of Jews who are loyal Americans, it's unavoidable that there will be “Jewish involvement” in American foreign policy. What is at issue is Israeli involvement in U.S. Foreign policy – and in light of what we've seen about the blatant co-mingling of legislative power between Washington and Tel Aviv, that case is utterly airtight.

(While we're on the subject of foreign influence on U.S. Foreign policy, somebody should corner General Clark and ask him about the role played by the Saudis in promoting NATO's 1999 terror-bombing of Serbia on behalf of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army.)

In defiance of all expectations, Dershowitz somehow came to a sensible conclusion:

“Israel must be prepared to lose American support in the coming years both diplomatically and economically....My message to Israel is ‘be strong’ and be prepared to go it alone.”

Irrespective of its origin, this is splendid advice, for both Israel and the United States. Israeli legislators should look after their nation's best interests, and American legislators should look after ours. At present, neither nation is being well served.

Obiter Dicta

Antiwar.com has linked to my most recent piece for The American Conservative, "Terrorists Chip In," which describes the dangers of the new RFID-"enhanced" passports.

Mark Dankof of the Republic Broadcasting Network informs me that Monday morning's interview will be posted to RBN's website as soon as their archives are up and running again. He was a gracious and very interesting host, and I really appreciated the opportunity to be on his fine program.

Next Monday (how's that for sufficient notice?) I'll be on Chris Arzen's program "Iron Sharpens Iron," on WNYG in New York, from 2:00-3:00 CST.

Last of all, and apropos of nothing, if you have about eight minutes to kill witnessing the casual virtuosity of a living master of his craft, please check this out. It's worth waiting to the end of the clip to hear his rendition of a Marty Robbins tune -- even if classic country ain't your bag.

Be sure to visit The Right Source for news, commentary, Kevin Shannon's daily radio program, and other valuable information.

A Genocidal War to "Prevent" Genocide?

-- if by "the job" one refers to demolishing what remains of America's liberty, prosperity, and international reputation.

If the Bush regime, which clearly lusts for war with Iran, isn't able to confect a casus belli out of dubious claims about Teheran's nuclear program or its role in fomenting insurgency in Iraq, it may embrace a justification for aggressive war: An attack on Iran would be necessary in order to arraign its president on a charge of incitement to genocide.

Last December 14, the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations held a symposium to inaugurate an “international effort to prosecute President Ahmadinejad for violating the 1948 Genocide Convention provisions of the UN Charter and other international conventions.”

For "international effort" we should read: "A campaign involving the familiar cast of war-intoxicated neo-Trotskyites from North America and Israel."

The roster includes former Israeli prime minister Bienjamin Netanyahu, Natan Sharansky, General Staff Lt. Gen. (ret.) Moshe Ya'alon, the IDF's former chief of general staff, former Israeli UN ambassador Dore Gold, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton, former Canadian Justice Minister Irwin Cotler, and, of course, Harvard's Alan Dershowitz (who never met a guilty, rich murderer he couldn't exonerate, or an innocent Arab he wouldn't obliterate).

According to this “august” group, an indictment should be submitted to the UN's International Criminal Court at The Hague accusing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of violating the Genocide Convention by making public statements allegedly calling for the obliteration of Israel.

For Cotler and Dershowitz, a trial would be a mere formality, since Ahmadinejad's guilt is apodictic.

“Ahmadinejad’s genocidal criminality is as clear and compelling as any I’ve ever seen,” insists Cotler. “This is advocacy of the most horrific of crimes, genocide; embedded in the most virulent of hatreds, anti-Semitism; propelled by a publicly avowed intent to acquire nuclear weapons for that purpose, and dramatized by the parading in the streets of Teheran of Shihab-3 missiles draped in the emblem `Wipe Israel Off the Map.'”

The execrable Alan Dershowitz: The love-child of Shylock and Bozo the Clown? (Actually, this is entirely unfair; Bozo has much more charisma, and Shylock -- who, along with his daughter, was treated horribly -- wasn't a cynical grievance-peddler like Dershowitz).

In an address that unambiguously called for military action – up to an including nuclear strikes – against Iran, Dershowitz insists that Iran has actually “succeeded at the beginnings of genocide” through its alleged role in the bombing of an Argentine synagogue in 1994.

Given his eagerness to cultivate favor with the Israel-centric Evangelical Right, it's not surprising that Mitt Romney has eagerly enlisted in this campaign. A position statement issued by the Romney campaign calls for “an indictment of Ahmadinejad for incitement to genocide under the Genocide Convention. The United States should lead this effort.”

In an argument almost certain to become a mantra chanted by Bu'ushist media mullahs, Romney suggests that the Genocide Convention not only permits, but requires, pre-emptive war.

"The full title of the Genocide Convention is the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,” observes the Romney campaign's position statement. “Remember that word: Prevention. Article III of that treaty establishes that 'public incitement to commit genocide' is a punishable crime. Every signatory to this treaty, including the U.S. and most European countries, shares an obligation to enforce it. So do human rights groups that care about international humanitarian law.”

What would “enforcement” of an indictment against Ahmadenijad look like in practical terms? To answer that question we turn to Dershowitz, a comprehensively loathsome figure who seems to have made acting out the worst anti-Semitic caricatures his mission in life.

“If the international community fails, if this challenge is not met, we reserve [the] right of self-defense,” brayed Dershowitz at the December 14 symposium. “We pledge to do everything it takes, and anything it takes, to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. We will stop at nothing in satisfying that pledge.”

When Dershowitz says “nothing,” that is exactly what he means. As I pointed out several months ago, during the most recent Israeli-Lebanese war, Dershowitz declared that the entire nation of Lebanon could be liquidated if the Israeli government deemed such action necessary. So it's reasonable to believe that “everything it takes, and anything it takes” to forestall Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons, as defined by Dershowitz, would include nuclear genocide of the Iranian people.

So here's the reasoning (if that word can be tortured into applying here) being followed by Dershowitz and his comrades:

The President of Iran has given speeches endorsing the destruction of Israel with theoretical nuclear weapons. This entitles Israel and/or the United States to use their very real nuclear arsenals to annihilate the entire Iranian population. And this unprecedented atrocity would not only be compatible with the UN's Genocide Convention, it is all but mandated by it.

If we're going to get into the business of dragging people off to The Hague to stand trial for incitement to genocide, Dershowitz really should be among the first in the dock. Another suitable defendant would be Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the Baghdad-born, Cairo-educated Rabbi who serves as “spiritual leader” to the Shas Party, the third-largest in Israel.

Among the reasons Iran's president Ahmadenijad is being depicted as an avatar of Adolf Hitler are the Iranian figurehead's skepticism about the Holocaust. Rabbi Yosef, from the perspective of at least some who survived that episode, has committed what could be considered an even more serious offense by denying the humanity of those who were killed at the death camps, insisting that they "were reincarnations of the souls of sinners, people who transgressed and did all sorts of things that should not be done. They had been reincarnated in order to atone."

Genocide advocate Rabbi Ovadia Yosef meets with Israeli President (and accused rapist) Moshe Katsav (left) and British Prime Minister Tony Blair (right).

Yosef has also called for Israel to “annihilate” Arabs as the opportunity presents itself. “It is forbidden to be merciful to them,” insisted the Rabbi in a Saturday night sermon broadcast by radio in 2000. “You must send missiles to them and annihilate them. They are evil and damnable.”

Much attention (in my view, hardly enough) has been paid to the growing efforts of Saudi Arabia to propagate Whabbi Islam in the United States and Europe. But Rabbi Yosef is easily the match of any Whabbist Mullah in propagating genocidal doctrines – not necessarily among his Israeli followers and Jewish disciples in other nations, but among a large and growing community of Dispensationalist Christians. His most effective emissary has been Benny Elon, an Israeli Knesset member and former Israeli Minister of Tourism.

Joel Rosenberg, a former Israeli government adviser turned “novelist” (his books are ineptly written and badly plotted war propaganda) points out that Elon “was at the forefront of Israel's campaign over the last several years to team up with Evangelical Christian supporters around the world.” In the Knesset Elon heads the “ increasingly influential Christian Allies Caucus, which was established nearly two years ago and now has 14 parliamentarians from across the political spectrum, [and which] aims to garner the support of pro-Israel Christians around the world.”

At last December's Jerusalem Summit, Elon presented an award to San Antonio preacher John C. Hagee, founder of the Christian Lobby for Israel – a self-described “Christian AIPAC” devoted to representing the interests of the Israeli government. Like Rosenberg, Hagee is an indefatigable advocate for war; rather than novels, however, Hagee prefers to use religious tracts as his propaganda delivery system.

The people seeking a UN "genocide" indictment of Ahmadenijad are conjuring up yet another Golem that they believe -- with entirely unwarranted confidence -- will always be under their control. They really need to refresh their memories regarding the way most versions of that story ended.

Make sure to visit The Right Source -- the news portal of choice for the freedom-fixated!