======================================
Subject: German demo
Leipziger Leitlinien, 25.1.2004:
Warum wir in Leipzig demonstrieren
1. "HEXENTANZ" in Deutschland: Am 1. Mai 2004 in der Heldenstadt der ehemaligen DDR - in LEIPZIG! Denn wie in keiner anderen deutschen Stadt bündeln sich in Leipzig die Probleme der Sozialen Frage in Deutschland wie in einem Brennglas: Eine tatsächliche Arbeitslosenquote von 30 % bzw. mehr als 75.000 deutsche Arbeitslose im Jahresschnitt, 26.000 deutsche Sozialhilfeempfänger, bröckelnde Häuserfassaden, Kinderarmut, Lehrstellenmangel, Jugendarbeitslosigkeit - Sozialraub, der soziale Verelendung zur Folge hat = Hochexplosiver sozialer Sprengstoff!
2. Denn der Erfolg der nationalen Idee wird dadurch erst möglich, dass dem gescheiterten parteipolitischen deutschen Nachkriegsnationalismus, der sich immer weiter in "gegenwartsbezogenen Entscheidungen" auflöst, keine Unterstützung mehr gewährt wird. Anstatt den verzweifelten Versuchen und gebetsmühlenhaften Bemühungen des Wortes "Einheit" gerade dieser Parteien auch nur noch einen Funken Glauben zu schenken, müssen wir uns vom fremden Geist dieser Parteien freimachen, um Platz für das fundamental Neue zu schaffen.
3. In Leipzig erfolgt der erste Schritt zur Darstellung dieses fundamental Neuen: Leipzig war die Stadt der Montagsdemonstrationen! Leipzig ist jene sächsische Stadt mit den absolut und relativ meisten Arbeitslosen, Sozialhilfeempfängern, Wohngeldbeziehern und Wohnungslosen. Selbst die PDS bescheinigt: "Die Arbeitslosenquote ist in Leipzig erheblich höher als in Dresden oder Chemnitz. Diese sozialen Problemlagen können ein Nährboden für steigende Kriminalität sein sowie Rechtsextremismus und Neofaschismus begünstigen. All dies sind Problemlagen, die sich nicht etwa aus der Hinterlassenschaft der DDR, wie von konservativer Seite immer noch behauptet wird, erklären lassen. Wir haben es hier mit Begleiterscheinungen der neuen gesellschaftlichen Verhältnisse zu tun, die sich aus diesen reproduzieren." - Wo also sonst, wenn nicht hier?
4. Denn wenn sich die nationale Idee aus dem unklaren Wollen von kompromißhaften Wahlvereinen aufrichten soll, um dann zu einem klaren Erfolg zu kommen, so können die Parteien mit ihren schwächlichen Halbheiten sich nicht anmaßen, irgendwelche Ansprüche zu erheben.
5. In Leipzig greifen wir bestimmte Leitsätze, die ihrem Wesen nach geeignet sind, eine breitere Menschenmasse auf sich zu verpflichten, heraus und binden mit der griffigsten Parole der Jetztzeit das aufbegehrende Potential innerhalb unseres Volkes an uns: "Wer hat uns verraten? - Sozialdemokraten! Und wer schaut zu? - Die CDU!"
6. Denn wir werden niemals wirksam werden, wenn wir uns als Füllmasse für die wegbrechenden Strukturen unfähiger, zu politischen Offensiven ungeeigneter Parteien ausnutzen lassen; sondern nur dann, wenn wir den deutschen Nationalismus des 3. Jahrtausends neu formieren. Aus Parteien, die in 40 Jahren Erfolglosigkeit ihre Unfähigkeit unter Beweis gestellt haben, ist kein propagandistischer Nutzen zu ziehen!
7. In Leipzig gilt es, die Offensivkraft und Ideenfaszination des deutschen Nationalismus voll zum Einsatz zu bringen. Die Devise lautet: Gnadenlose Sozialdemagogie! Zwingen wir dem Regime und dem System, das es trägt, das Gesetz des Handelns auf.
8. Denn 2004 ist KEIN Schicksalswahljahr für Deutschland, sondern das Schicksalswahljahr, in dem es um die staatliche Parteienfinanzierung für die Pöstchenhocker in sich kränkelnder, von den Grundlagen her vollkommen unklarer, kompromißhafter Parteien geht. Der nationalistische Befreiungskampf um den Aufbau einer Neuen Ordnung kann und darf hierauf keine Rücksicht nehmen.
9. Die Soziale Frage ist der politische Hebelpunkt! Im Ringen um die Gestaltungsmacht zündet die nationale Idee dann, wenn sie sich der besten und psychologisch feinstens abgestimmten Methoden der Propaganda bedient und ihre Strategie & Taktik an den Problemlagen unseres Volkes ausrichtet - statt an den eigenen Befindlichkeiten und Zwängen!
10. Denn nur in Städten wie Leipzig mit seinen 500.000 Einwohnern ist es möglich, aus der Isoliertheit nationaler Demonstrationen und Kundgebungen auszubrechen. Im grauen Asphaltdschungel bspsw. der Hauptstadt geht man mit seinen Anliegen sang- und klanglos unter. In keinster Weise wird man dort mit seinen Bekundungen und seiner Form der Ansprache von der Masse wahrgenommen. Man ist dort lediglich nützliches Werkzeug zur Inszenierung eines Parteizirkus.
11. Das sind die Gründe, weshalb wir in Leipzig demonstrieren: a)Propagandaschlacht in Leipzig: Aktionsgruppen nationaler Aktivisten bedienen das gesamte Leipziger Stadtgebiet über Wochen vor dem 1. Mai mit Hunderttausenden von Flugblättern und rufen die Bevölkerung zur Teilnahme auf. Mit gnadenloser Sozialdemagogie wird der alte Glauben zerstört und der Weg zur Durchsetzung der nationalen Idee bereitet! b)Durchbruchsschlacht in Leipzig: Ein an Intensität zusehends zunehmender Trommelwirbel unserer Propagandaaktivitäten wird die Unhaltbarkeit eines Systems entlarven, das unser Volk vergreisen läßt - und es seiner Heimat entfremdet! Dieses System ist aufgrund seiner inneren Widersprüche hinsichtlich der sozialen Frage dem Untergang geweiht.
12. Heraus zum DEUTSCHEN 1. Mai nach Leipzig!
Initiative "Für Volksgemeinschaft & Sozialstaat"
Postfach 68 01 12 - 10265 Berlin - 0178/5244343
www.1Mai.net
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Subject:
Zgram - Where Truth is Destiny: Now more than ever!
January 24, 2004
Good Morning from the Zundelsite:
I am still waiting for an official report on how the Friday hearings
went. I talked to Ernst on Friday evening, and he thought that
things went extremely well - he called it "wonderful!" - but I don't
want to summarize on my own; I'd rather wait for one of Paul Fromm's
descriptive write-up that always make me feel as though I had been
there.
On Friday, a CSIS agent was on the stand, being cross-examined on
what grounds and with what evidence he had compiled the viciously
hostile report, and he was forced to admit that he had not "publicly"
seen anything that would have justified the smears. His
cross-examination will continue on Monday and will be another fine
piece for the record. That's how the Zundelists write Modern Galileo
History!
There is another important story breaking both in the United States
and Canada that might be of benefit to Ernst because it suggests
nasty collusion between the two governments in railroading another
deportation victim into a horrid nightmare. This one isn't a
convenient target as a White Male with politically incorrect views
unflattering to the Holocaust Lobby; he is a young Arab professional
with a young family and apparently no political Black Page. It will
be much harder to demonize him as Ernst has constantly been demonized
to keep the shekels flowing for his foes.
Read on:
[START]
Canadian sues U.S. over expulsion, torture in Syria
By Grant McCool
NEW YORK, Jan 22 (Reuters) - A Syrian-born Canadian sued U.S.
Attorney General John Ashcroft on Thursday for deporting him to Syria
as an al Qaeda suspect and said government officials knew he would be
tortured in a Damascus jail.
The lawsuit filed in Brooklyn federal court is the latest development
in a case that has strained relations between the United States and
Canada, raised security and human rights issues and led to a new
deportation deal between Ottawa and Washington.
Computer technician Maher Arar was arrested between international
flights at Kennedy airport in New York in Sept. 2002. He was
interrogated for 13 days and expelled to Jordan and then Syria, where
he said he was held for more than 10 months in a "dark, damp hole"
and tortured.
Arar was freed in October 2003 and returned to Canada, but he is
barred from the United States. At a news briefing in New York to
announce the lawsuit, Arar talked by speakerphone.
"I believe that the persons who sent me to Syria knew that I would be
interrogated under torture there," said Arar, 33, who lives in Ottawa
with his wife and two children. He has been unemployed since his
return from Syria after years of working for a high-tech company.
Arar added that he had "never knowingly associated with terrorists"
and that under brutal treatment in Syria, he "falsely confessed to my
torturers."
One of his lawyers, Steven Watt, said: "Syria released him as an
innocent man and an innocent man he remains today."
In a statement on Thursday, the U.S. Department of Justice headed by
Ashcroft said it believed Arar was a member of al Qaeda, the radical
Islamic group blamed for the Sept. 11, 2001, plane strikes and other
attacks.
CABINET MEMBERS NAMED
The lawsuit named Ashcroft, Homeland Security Department Secretary
Tom Ridge, FBI director Robert Mueller and a dozen other officials as
defendants. It said Arar's deportation broke U.S. and international
laws against torture.
The Justice Department said its information about Arar could not be
made public because it was classified.
"In removing Mr. Arar, we acted fully within law and applicable
international treaties and conventions," it said.
Lawyers for the Center for Constitutional Rights said the suit was
the first to challenge the government's "extraordinary renditions"
program of keeping foreigners suspected of being a security risk out
of the country.
"Federal officials removed Mr. Arar to Syria under the program
precisely because Syria could use methods of interrogation to obtain
information from Mr. Arar that would not be legally or morally
acceptable in this country or other democracies," the lawsuit said.
It was filed on Arar's behalf by the Center, which has been at the
forefront of legal challenges to U.S. detention and deportation
policy of Muslim men since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Arar requested a court declaration clearing him of any association
with terrorist organizations or suspected terrorists. The lawsuit
seeks a declaration of the unconsitutionality of his detention and
rights violations.
Thirdly, he demanded unspecified monetary damages for economic losses
and emotional and physical injuries.
***He has also asked for a public inquiry into the role, if any, of
the Canadian police and spy agency in the case*** (emphasis added),
which has been a sticky issue for new Prime Minister Paul Martin.
In Canada on Wednesday, the story took another twist when police
raided the office and home of Ottawa journalist Juliet O'Neill to
investigate possible leaks of classified information about Arar. The
probes prompted widespread media outrage.
Martin said he was "quite concerned" by the raids.
[END]
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Subject:
1-25-04
Oh, Boy -- Demokwacy!
Joe Mexican, a U.S. fast-food worker: "I'm voting for Senator Joe X. Schmoe. I like his ideas."
Reporter: "Which ideas of his do you like?"
Joe Mexican: "Uhhh.....uhhhmmm...."
Reporter: "Where does Senator Schmoe stand on gun control?"
Joe Mexican: "Uhhhhh.....I don't know....but I like what he said about taxes on TV the other night!"
Amerikwa: once a White republic, now a Brown demokwacy where any idiot can vote even though he couldn't find his ass with both hands and a mirror.
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Subject:
Does the shabaz goy George (Georgette?) Bush have sugar-in-his-shorts? Check out all three links on the following page.....Mike Kaye
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/resistancepoliticalfront/message/22019
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Subject: guns and cops
Gun Owner Fires Back
Do you remember that recent story about the Wilmette (IL) home owner and
father, Hale DeMar, who shot a burglar who had broken into his house TWICE
in two nights...only to be charged with violating some mamby-pamby gun
control law about updating his ID card? And do you remember how the police
chief there suggested the proper response would have been to lock himself in
a room and call 911...and that residents would be safer if they didn't have
guns for self-protection?
Many of you wrote to the chief and town leaders in response to our Brushfire
Alert on this.
Well, in an extraordinary letter-to-the-editor published this morning in the
Chicago Sun-Times, Mr. DeMar justifies his actions and tells the town's
political leaders to "Stick to Parade Schedules & Planting Our Parks." If
you cherish the Second Amendment, you have GOT to read this letter. And I
hope you will distribute it FAR and WIDE.
I'm on my way down to CPAC this morning. In the meantime, Mr. DeMar's
letter is posted on the new News & Views website. Read it Below or Just go to:
http://www.chuckmuth.com/newsandviews/nv.cfm
Chuck Muth
Citizen Outreach
Gun owner: I, not cops, got bad guy
Chicago Sun-Times
January 22, 2004
Three days after Christmas, someone broke into the DeMar family home in Wilmette through a dog door, stealing a television, an SUV and the keys to the home.
The next night, Hale DeMar was prepared for a return visit. With his children upstairs, DeMar, 54, shot burglar Morio Billings, 31, in the shoulder and calf, police said.
Billings was caught at a nearby hospital and charged with felony residential burglary and possession of a stolen car, authorities said.
And, in a move that has drawn criticism, DeMar was cited with breaking Wilmette's ban on handguns and with failing to update his firearm owner's identification card.
The misdemeanors are unlikely to bring jail time. Wilmette Police Chief George Carpenter did not criticize DeMar for protecting his family but said homes are safer without handguns.
DeMar, in a letter sent to the Chicago Sun-Times, is now speaking out:
Village Trustees ... Stick to Parade Schedules & Planting our Parks
Many of us have experienced a sense of violation upon returning to our homes, only to find that someone else has been there. Someone else has trespassed in our bedrooms, looting and stealing that which is readily replaced. Many of us, still haunted by that violation, will never again have a sense of security in our own homes. Few, however, have awakened to realize that they had been violated as they slept in their beds, doors locked, as family dogs patrolled their homes. For me, the seconds until I found my children still safely tucked in their beds were horrifying. The thought that a young child may have been hurt or abducted was incomprehensible.
The police were called and in routine fashion they came, took the report and with little concern left, promising to increase surveillance. Little comfort, since the invader now had keys to our home and our automobiles. The police informed me that this was not an uncommon event in east Wilmette and offered their condolences.
What is one to do when a criminal proceeds, undeterred by a 90-pound German shepherd, an alarm system and a property ... lit up like an outdoor stadium? And now, he had my house keys and an inventory of things he'd like to call his own. Would the police patrol my dead-end street as effectively the second time as they had the first? Would my small children be unharmed the next time? Would the career criminal be satisfied with another automobile, another television or would he feel the need, once again, to climb the staircase up to the bedrooms, perhaps for a watch or a ring or a wallet, again risking little?
Would my children wake to find a masked figure, clad in black, in their bedroom doorway, a vision that might haunt them for years? Would the police come again and fill out yet another report, and at what point should I feel comfortable that the 'bad guy' got everything he wanted and wouldn't return again, a third time?
I went to the safe where my licensed and registered gun was kept, loaded it for the very first time and tucked it under the mattress of my bed. I assured my frightened children ''that daddy would deal with the bad guy ... if he ever returned.'' Little did I imagine that this brazen animal was waiting in the backyard bushes as I tucked my children into bed.
Fifteen minutes after bedtime, the alarm went off. Three minutes after the alarm was triggered, the alarm company alerted the police to the situation and 10 minutes later the first police car pulled up to my home, but only after another call was made to 911, by a trembling, half-naked father. I suppose some would have grabbed their children and cowered in their bedroom for 13 minutes, praying that the police would get there in time to stop the criminal from climbing the stairs and confronting the family in their bedroom, dreading the sound of a bedroom door being kicked in. That's not the fear I wanted my children to experience, nor is it the cowardly act that I want my children to remember me by.
Until you are shocked by a piercing alarm in the middle of the night and met in your kitchen by a masked invader as your children shudder in their beds, until you confront that very real nightmare, please don't suggest that some village trustee knows better and he/she can effectively task the police to protect your family from the miscreants that this society has produced.
This career criminal had been arrested thirty times. He was wanted in Georgia and for parole violations in Minnesota. How many family homes had he violated, how many innocent lives were affected, how many police reports went into some back office file cabinet, only to become some abstract statistic? How is it that rabid animals like this are free to roam the streets, violating our homes and threatening the safety of our children?
If my actions have spared only one family from the distress and trauma that this habitual criminal has caused hundreds of others, then I have served my civic duty and taken one evil creature off of our streets, something that our impotent criminal justice system had failed to do, despite some thirty odd arrests, plea bargains and suspended sentences.
Hale DeMar, Wilmette
======================================
Subject: Vonbluvens
LACK OF WHITE NATIONALIST ETHICS http://www.vonbluvens.org/012604.pls (01/26/04)
Panzerfaust intrigue...National Alliance...Pornography and Dr. William Pierce...this and much more
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Subject: jews and Catholics
Cardinals Meet For a Dialogue With Top Rabbis
By NACHA CATTAN In a move that may reestablish the World Jewish Congress as the primary Jewish partner for dialogue with the Roman Catholic Church, this week the organization arranged an unprecedented gathering of top-level Catholic and Jewish religious leaders from around the world.
The two-day "open dialogue" included current and former chief rabbis from six countries including Israel, as well as heads of the three main Jewish religious denominations. Catholic participants included 10 cardinals from four continents including Africa and Asia. In addition, two of the Vatican's most senior officials, Cardinal Georges Marie Cottier and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, appeared in videotaped speeches. Organizers claimed it was the largest assembly of cardinals ever held outside of Rome.
The hastily arranged meeting also broke ground by bringing together one of the largest groups of Orthodox Jewish representatives ever to attend an interfaith event. Orthodox rabbis at the event outnumbered Conservative and Reform officials combined by a ratio of at least three to one.
The WJC, in partnership with Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger of Paris, orchestrated the event independently of the formal channel for dialogue between the worldwide Jewish and Catholic communities that was created in the wake of the 1965 Second Vatican Council. By doing so, some observers said the WJC might be attempting to break a logjam that has slowed the pace of formal dialogue in recent years, and even further in recent months. Given the deteriorating health of Pope John Paul II, considered the most sympathetic pontiff ever to Jewish concerns, there appears to be a mounting sense of urgency among Jewish communal leaders to restore and solidify relations with the church leadership in advance of the next papacy.
"The dialogue sometimes may be too important to be left to professional dialoguers," said the chairman of the World Jewish Congress, Rabbi Israel Singer. The dialogue "needs to be taken off-center."
"The pope is old," Singer told the Forward. "Let's not kid ourselves. Who is going to succeed him? These guys are going to select a successor," he said, pointing to a group of robed cardinals deep in discussion of talmudic texts with students in the noisy study hall of Yeshiva University. The cardinals visited the study hall while at the Orthodox campus for a meeting with its chancellor, Rabbi Norman Lamm.
The event appears to have drawn the WJC back into the heart of interfaith affairs almost five years after church officials blasted the organization for "denigrating" the Vatican. The WJC was singled out, without being named, in an angry 1999 speech by Cardinal Edward Cassidy, then president of the Vatican's Commission for Religious Relations With the Jews, for its aggressive opposition to issues such as the proposed beatification of Pope Pius XII. Cassidy's speech ushered in a downgrading of relations between the Vatican and its traditional partner in Catholic-Jewish dialogue, the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations, or IJCIC, a worldwide coalition of which the WJC is a key member.
The international Jewish committee recovered from the 1999 slap and restored ties with the Vatican under a new chairman, attorney Seymour Reich. However, it suffered another setback two years ago when Cassidy's successor, Cardinal Walter Kasper, broke off contact with Reich following a public spat over access to the Vatican's Holocaust-era archives. Since then, relations have been on the mend. Singer and other Jewish leaders have been meeting with the Pope and Kasper. Last week, the pope hosted two chief rabbis of Israel for the first time at the Vatican.
Planners of this week's symposium, however, seemed to have been pushing to accelerate the often slow dialogue process by circumventing its formal partners on both sides, including Kasper's office. Kasper ultimately was invited and, while he did not attend, citing a busy schedule, he gave the conference his blessing, a church official said.
Singer insisted the event was not meant to sideline any dialogue body, especially IJCIC, which he co-chairs. "It's a parallel, supportive activity with IJCIC," he said. "It's not undercutting IJCIC."
Participants offered several explanations for the unprecedented Orthodox showing, which included some 16 rabbis, including two identified with the ultra-Orthodox community. Some theorized that it was a strategic move on Singer's part to woo the Vatican by delivering something the church has long sought, namely interlocutors from the segment of the Jewish community that many Catholic clerics regard as their closest religious counterpart. Others pointed to a rise in global antisemitic activity as explanation for the strong presence of chief Orthodox rabbis from Europe, as well as the former Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel, Israel Meir Lau. Many Orthodox leaders have long shied away from dialogue on any but the most secular topics, in deference to a ban against theological dialogue with other religions issued by the late Orthodox sage Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik.
The unofficial title of the symposium was "The First Among the Commandments." Most of the cardinals delivered religious papers on the commandments to love God and one's neighbor that quoted heavily from the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. Participants said that because there were no exchanges of views beyond the prepared papers, it did not formally qualify as theological dialogue. Still, it skirted close ‹ dangerously so in one rabbi's view ‹ to such debates. Yet several Modern Orthodox leaders told the Forward that the time has come to review Soloveitchik's ban.
Lustiger, who was born Jewish but converted to Christianity, told the Forward he was thrilled with the Orthodox participation at the event: "There is a gap between the knowledge of such part of Judaism and Christianity."
The cardinals made several overtures to mend fences with Jews. Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna expressed his concern to Lamm of Y.U. about those strains of Catholicism that seek to expunge the Jewish roots of their tradition. Lamm, in turn, referred indirectly to the controversy over Mel Gibson's movie "The Passion of the Christ" and said, "I know your hearts and minds are with us to overcome" this problem.
But the event hit a few snags. Some Jewish participants said they were uncomfortable during a visit to the site of the World Trade Center when some cardinals prayed that killers be forgiven. And a decidedly frank speech delivered by the talmudic scholar Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz turned a few heads. He said that the power of rabbis and cardinals has become a "facade." Rabbis, he said, can barely control their congregations, while cardinals wear "nice red garments" and minister to "a community of nice old women." Steinsaltz panned the current meeting as an exchange of pleasantries. He called for a theological dialogue that asks the tough questions, such as whether Catholicism allows for Jews to enter eternal paradise. Lustiger and Schonborn both said they sincerely appreciated his candor.
In the end, the symposium produced a formal declaration from the participants promising follow-up conferences on various continents. It stated that the next meeting "would address the challenges of general religious peace and confront the rise of hate and anti-Semitism."
http://www.forward.com/issues/2004/04.01.23/news4.html
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Subject:
Be it resolved that only professional jews shall have the right to misrepresent the nazis.
http://www.forward.com/issues/2004/04.01.23/news6.html
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Subject:
Religious Overtones Color a Murder in Texas
By SEAMUS McGRAW
The victim was a Jew, slaughtered in a Houston apartment, his throat slit so deftly with a 6-inch butterfly knife that he was nearly decapitated.
The killer was an Arab, a newly minted religious Muslim and the son of a millionaire Saudi businessman. He had been bailed out of trouble by the Saudi consulate after previous scrapes with the law, and in the hours after the slaying, authorities said, he plotted to flee to his homeland.
On the surface, the bizarre murder last summer of Ariel Sellouk at the hands of Mohammed Ali Alayed seemed to have all the elements of a classic hate crime, especially when viewed against the violence in the Middle East, continued uncertainty about American security in the wake of the September 11 attacks and the ongoing war on terrorism. But when Alayed appeared last week in a Houston courtroom to plead guilty to murder, there was no mention of terrorism or international intrigue.
The word "hate" with all its legal connotations was never even mentioned.
"It didn't help me," said Stephen St. Martin, assistant district attorney of Harris County.
"The hate crime statute would only enhance [the sentence] one penalty level, and murder is already at the highest level," the prosecutor said. "So I would just be stating something else that I would have to prove.... Why make my job harder?"
Precisely what led to Sellouk's gruesome slaying last year remains a mystery. According to police reports and interviews with the prosecutor and Alayed's defense attorney, the two young men met about two years ago as students at Houston Community College. According to his lawyer, George Parnham, Alayed was hardly religious at that time. On the contrary, he was a frequent customer at various local bars and often was seen with Sellouk, the son of a Jewish immigrant from Morocco. The two young men reportedly shared a fondness for darts and young women. Alayed was a guest at Sellouk's 21st birthday party.
A little more than a year ago, however, the two students parted ways. It is curious, Parnham acknowledged, that Alayed severed his relationship with Sellouk about the same time that he underwent a religious awakening and became an observant Muslim. Still, it is not clear whether Alayed's conversion played a role in the breakdown of the friendship. Nor is there any evidence that it had an effect on the mayhem that followed, Parnham said.
http://www.forward.com/issues/2004/04.01.23/news8.html
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Subject:
Canada's Court Weighs Religious Freedom
By SHELDON GORDON MONTREAL ‹ The Supreme Court of Canada heard an appeal this week by a group of seven condominium owners who contend that they have a constitutional right to build makeshift huts on their balconies in celebration of the autumn festival of Sukkot.
Julius Grey, a constitutional lawyer representing the group of Orthodox Jews, argued at the three-hour hearing that Quebec's Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms trumps the contract signed by his clients prohibiting such construction. B'nai Brith Canada, which is an intervenor in the case, contended that the lower court acted improperly by effectively choosing sides in a rabbinic dispute over the nature of the religious duty to erect the huts, or sukkot.
The outcome of the case, not expected for several months, could have far-reaching implications for Canadian society, especially in housing and employment law.
"I believe there is plenty of jurisprudence to the effect that the Charter prevails over clauses of leases, over clauses of collective agreements," Grey said. "Fundamental human rights prevail over everything, unless you're Ernst Zundel."
http://www.forward.com/issues/2004/04.01.23/news11.html
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Subject: McLaren
http://www.zinebook.com/interv/stayfree.html
When did you launch your zine? What inspired you to do so?
August 1992. up until then I'd been working in a copy store and college repping for Sony Music. to make the Sony job a little less awful (and as an excuse not to talk to people) I'd started a local Sony "zine" called Sonyland. It was extremely successful in that the execs at Sony loved it while most of the locals thought it was a parody, had no idea it was actually promoting (and funded by) Sony. After I a) got fired from the copy shop and b) realized what I was actually doing, I quit doing Sonyland and‹since that was the only thing I liked about the Sony job‹working for Sony.
Around the same time, I decided I wanted to put out a single by archers of Loaf and, since I really missed Sonyland, thought I'd make a zine to go with it. That was Stay Free No. 1. Also around that time, a guy who liked Sonyland approached me about starting a monthly community zine. In January 1993 we put out the first issue of Trash. After five consecutive monthly issues, I got really disillusioned about the zine thing and moped around for about three months (Trash kept publishing...and got really shitty!). Oh yeah, I put out another SF!, too, with a couple other local bands I like a lot, Spatula and (my roommate's band) Evil Weiner.
Anyway, three months post-Trash trauma, a girlfriend of mine suggested I start doing SF! as a tabloid a la Trash, and I did.
======================================
Subject: apostrophes
World Jewry Toppled by Correct Use of Apostrophes
New York, New York (UPI) -
Today world Jewry sued for peace and admitted complete
and total defeat after a reader emailed author Robert
S. Griffin a list of typos in his new book, "One
Sheaf, One Vine: Racially Conscious White Americans
Talk About Race."
"First, we were dealt a devastating blow by Alex
Linder's repeated, ongoing use of 'itz' on his
website, VanguardNewsNetwork; his brutal, relentless
attacks sent us reeling. And then the list of
corrections to typos in Griffin's new book, compiled
by a reader and emailed to Griffin today, completely
destroyed us once and for all. We hereby surrender to
the White Nationalist movement and are, as we speak,
working out the details of signing over our vast
holdings in the controlled media, and in business and
real estate, as well as all of our political
'goodwill', in exchange for peace and - let us be
frank - our very survival," the Jews said through a
Negro spokeslesbian during a press conference held in
New York city today.
Topping the list of corrections were Alex Linder's use
of the phrase "shrinking violent" on page 117 of
Griffin's book. It is impossible for the reader to
know if Alex himself had really actually used the
phrase "shrinking violent" rather than the correct
phrase "shriking violet," which is defined by the
Oxford English Dictionary as "a shy or modest person,"
and if this is merely an error in transcription, or if
it was due to ignorance on Alex's part. Second on the
list of corrections was an error made when quoting
Alex Linder on page 116, where an apostrophe is used
when a quotation mark is clearly called for. A third
error, another misuse of quotation marks in the Linder
interview, is left as an exercise for the White, or
possibly Jewish, reader. "I think it is safe to assume
that no Negro will ever read Griffin's book - indeed,
United States Census Bureau statistics, going back to
the very founding of this once-great nation, show
rather definitively that most Negroes, historically,
have not even been CAPABLE of reading, much less shown
any interest in doing so, even when forced to learn
how," the reader was heard to think.
The Reverend Doctor "Niggerhatin' Racetraitin'
Jewbaitin'" Solarbreeze, Jr
======================================
Subject: latest from hateDL
Here.
REGARDING MEDIA / TIM RUTTEN
ADL wants a postscript on Gibson's 'Passion'
January 24 2004
The leader of one of two Jewish organizations that
this week condemned Mel Gibson's forthcoming film,
"The Passion of the Christ," as an incitement to
anti-Semitism said Friday that his organization is
preparing an 11th-hour appeal for a cinematic
postscript to the movie.
Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the
Anti-Defamation League, said in an interview that he
has all but given up hope Gibson's final cut of the
film will omit problematic material from the
synoptic Gospels. Most mainstream Catholic and other
scholars now believe some material, particularly
quotations and chronologies drawn from the Gospel
attributed to Matthew, is not only inaccurate but
also a provocation to hatred of Jews. Gibson was
baptized a Catholic, but now belongs to a schismatic
congregation that rejects most of the practices and
teachings adopted by the church over the past 40
years.
Foxman said he is preparing a letter asking the
filmmaker, who self-financed the $25-million
"Passion," to append a personal statement to the
version scheduled for release Ash Wednesday (Feb.
25) in which Gibson would condemn any bigoted
interpretation of his Passion narrative.
"Mel Gibson, like all of us, has a right to freely
express himself," Foxman said. "As an artist, let
him have the film he wants to have. But, given the
film he has made, I would like to see him do a
postscript. Let him say, 'I did this film because I
believe I was inspired by the Holy Ghost. I believe
that Jesus suffered for all mankind. Some people
want to put the blame for his death on the Jews.
Don't do that. I've said I wanted to make a
"Passion" of love. Blaming Jews for Christ's death
would make this a "Passion" of hate.' "
Conversations between the ADL and Gibson broke off
some time ago over the organization's early
expressions of anxiety over the movie's content.
"But I haven't given up," Foxman said. "I'm sending
this letter today (Friday)."
A call to Gibson spokesman Alan Nierob seeking
comment on the ADL proposal was not returned.
As Lorenza Muñoz and Larry B. Stammer reported
Friday in The Times, Foxman - who like other ADL
officials has been barred by Gibson from screenings
of "The Passion" - finally managed to see a version
by surreptitiously entering a gathering of
Protestant ministers in Orlando, Fla., where it was
being shown by the filmmaker. What Foxman saw, he
said, "was a film that portrayed Jews as
blood-thirsty and unambiguously responsible for the
death of Christ. I now understand why Mr. Gibson
didn't want us to see it."
Foxman was joined in his condemnation by David
Elcott, director of interreligious affairs for the
American Jewish Committee. He, too, noted the film's
revival of anti-Semitic stereotypes and drew
particular attention to Gibson's decision to include
Matthew 27:25, in which the group of Jews present
when the Roman governor Pontius Pilate condemned
Jesus to death is supposed to have said, "His blood
be upon us and upon our children."
According to sources involved in Catholic-Jewish
dialogue in the United States, Gibson's inclusion of
such material in what is essentially a contemporary
Passion play has become a growing concern among some
American prelates. They have begun informal
conversations about the advisability of taking some
sort of action in advance of this film's theatrical
release, the sources say.
One possible step would be to draw Catholics'
attention to the fact that their church has a formal
set of "Criteria for the Evaluation of
Dramatizations of the Passion." Those guidelines
were adopted by the National Conference of Catholic
Bishops in 1988 and specifically warn against
inclusion of several points Gibson has incorporated
into versions of his movie now being screened.
For example, in the matter of that verse from
Matthew - which appears in none of the other Gospels
- the bishops' guidelines warn that it can be used
in a manner "clearly implying a 'blood guilt' on all
Jews in all times in violation of [the Second
Vatican Council's] dictum that "what happened in his
Passion cannot be blamed on all the Jews then living
without distinction nor upon Jews today.' Hence, if
the Matthean phrase is to be used (not here
recommended), great care could have to be taken
throughout the presentation to ensure such an
interpretation does not prevail."
Similarly, the bishops' guidelines caution that
traditional accounts of Jesus' trial before the
Jewish authorities are historically suspect. The
Catholic Study Bible officially approved by the U.S.
church has a similar cautionary note and footnotes
the passage from Matthew: "Guilt for Jesus' death is
not attributable to all the Jews of his time or to
any Jews of later times."
Gibson's "Passion" has received the support of the
conservative Catholic League (which is not
affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church) whose
president, William Donohue, issued a statement
Friday condemning the "unseemly campaign to
discredit" the film. "The guilty include
journalists, Catholic and Jewish theologians and
Jewish activists," the statement read. "Their goal
all along has been to portray Mel Gibson as [an] ...
anti-Semite, and to upend his film with charges of
violence in the streets. But their relentless
campaign is ultimately futile: At the end of the
day, the people will judge the movie."
Since his youth, Foxman has enjoyed an unusually
close relationship with the Catholic Church. As a
Jewish child in wartime Poland, he was separated
from his parents and saved by his nanny, who had him
baptized and raised him as a Catholic. After the
war, he was reunited with his parents and returned
to Judaism.
"I have," he said, "a tremendous love and respect
for the church that gave me life again. Forty years
ago, we in the ADL helped the bishops to write those
guidelines that permit artists to be honest about
their faith without being hateful in their work.
What Mel Gibson is doing is as much an attack on the
Catholic Church and the Second Vatican Council as it
is anything else."
Why should that matter?
"Because it's now likely that more people will see
his Passion in two months," Foxman said, "than saw
all the Passion plays ever staged in the previous
2,000 years."
======================================
Subject: every jew a jew
http://www.salon.com/books/int/2004/01/23/morris/index.html
"The Arabs are after our blood"
Benny Morris
Israeli historian and onetime peacenik Benny Morris now says Palestinians don't want peace -- and that all the Arabs should have been driven out of Israel in 1948.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Christopher Farah
Jan. 23, 2004 | In 1988, historian Benny Morris sent shock waves through Israeli society with a book called "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem," which, through a careful inspection of previously classified Israeli archives, revealed that Israel bore significant blame for the displacement of 700,000 Palestinians during the war of 1948 that created the modern state of Israel -- blame that the establishment had always denied. That same year Morris, an outspoken opponent of Israel's occupation of the territories it captured in the 1967 war, refused his mandatory military service in the West Bank as the Palestinian intifada began. He landed in prison.
A decade and a half has gone by, and once again Morris is scandalizing Israel -- but this time in a totally different way. Now, even as he releases an updated version of his book, he is defending what with brutal honesty he describes as the "ethnic cleansing" that brought the Jewish state into existence. In a recent interview with the liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Morris not only justified the 1948 expulsion of the Palestinians from Israel, but also said that then-Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion failed in his task by not expelling all Arabs from the nascent Jewish state: "If he was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job."
Morris went on to say that renewed expulsions of the Palestinians -- those in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and even those who are Israeli citizens -- could be "entirely reasonable" in circumstances that are "liable to be realized in five or 10 years." Unwavering Arab hatred of Israel, he argued, meant that the best way to deal with the Palestinians for now is to "build something like a cage" for them (some would argue this is already happening with the ongoing construction of the so-called "separation wall.") The Arab and Muslim world, in his eyes, consists of barbarians who don't appreciate the value of human life, barbarians knocking on the gates of the civilized West.
Of course, anyone can make bold and inflammatory statements, and when it comes to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, many people do. What makes Morris' statements seem so outrageous is that they are apparently not the words of a fanatic. They are the words of someone who has thought a great deal about his beliefs, someone who seems to be logical and rational, someone who was not only raised as a liberal, but who also still claims to hold leftist ideals and to vote for progressive Israeli politicians.
Morris does not retract anything he wrote in the original 1988 book. Indeed, the updated edition, "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited" (just published by Cambridge University Press) proves the Israelis to be even more culpable. Drawing on 300 pages of new material from recently declassified documents, Morris has found evidence of no less than 24 Israeli massacres of Palestinians, with the numbers of victims ranging from four or five to 70 to 100. The infamous massacre at Deir Yassein, Morris reports, was just one of many. He also reports a dozen cases of rape.
More crucially, Morris concludes that these atrocities did not occur in a vacuum: they were the result of a clearly understood policy, coming from Israeli leader David Ben-Gurion, to expel or "transfer" Palestinians out of their ancestral land, land that was to become Israel. Explicit military orders were given in some cases to expel the populations of Palestinian villages. It's true that Morris also finds documentation in Israeli archives of Arab orders to evacuate women and children, and at times men, from some villages, offering some support for the long-held Israeli position that the Palestinians simply left because Arab leaders told them to before the fighting began, promising that they would soon return after a great Arab victory. But if the book places some blame for the flight of the refugees on the Arab leadership, that blame is far outweighed by that born by the Israelis.
But despite these harrowing findings, Moris says he remains an unapologetic Zionist -- indeed, he says he was always one, even in his first book, popular belief to the contrary. He never questioned the legitimacy of the founding of the state, blood-drenched and founded on ethnic cleansing though he acknowledged it was. Morris can be harshly critical of Israel, particularly its role as occupying power. In "Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict 1881-2001," one of the best histories of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he wrote, "Israelis liked to believe, and tell the world, that they were running an 'enlightened' or 'benign' occupation, qualitatively different from other military occupations the world had seen. The truth was radically different. Like all occupations, Israel's was founded on brute force, repression and fear, collaboration and treachery, beatings and torture chambers, and daily intimidation, humiliation, and manipulation." Yet even as Morris challenges the Israeli establishment, he never questions its right to exist.
Do Morris' extreme views reflect mainstream Israeli beliefs? Yes and no. Like many other Israeli liberals, Morris' optimism about peace, and whether the Palestinians really wanted it, was shaken by the outbreak of the second intifada in 2000 -- after the Oslo peace accords and the Camp David talks had convinced many that a resolution was at hand. With the collapse of the Camp David talks amid mutual acrimony and the escalation of violence, in particular the rise of suicide bombings within Israel, many Israeli peaceniks became disillusioned, feeling that they had found no true "partner for peace" in the Palestinians. Many Palestinians, on the other hand, argue that they wanted peace and a two-state solution, but that the terms offered by Israeli negotiators -- and the expansion of settlements on Palestinian land that continued unabated throughout the Oslo period -- showed that Israelis were the ones who weren't ready for a just peace.
"You go to have coffee with your equally liberal friends, you talk peace and human rights and Palestinian independence, and if you are lucky the place blows up only after you leave," says Tom Segev, an Israeli author who like Morris was dubbed a "new historian" for writing books that challenged the traditional Israeli version of history. "So you are frustrated and angry and, worst of all, you feel stupid. This is what terrorism does to free people and to free countries as well."
Morris' hawkish views started to come to light after the Al-Aqsa Intifada broke out in 2000. In columns in the British paper the Guardian, Morris lambasted the Palestinian leaders, particularly Yasser Arafat, for their failure to sign a final-status agreement with Israel, and blaming the increasingly violent intifada (and Israel's increasingly violent reprisals) on the Palestinian desire to destroy the Jewish state. Then came an interview between Morris and former Prime Minister Ehud Barak -- whose offer Arafat rejected -- in which Barak stated that culturally, Arabs just didn't understand the principle of honesty. Conservative Jewish publications like Commentary began running stories about Morris' apparent conversion to their side.
"Benny has always attracted controversy," says Ian Black, the Guardian's former Middle East correspondent, who also coauthored a book with Morris about the history of Israeli intelligence agencies. "He's a controversialist and to some extent relishes it."
Morris's conversion may be more dramatic, and more agonizingly paradoxical because of his willingness to admit the bloodshed at the heart of the Zionist project, but it is representative of the change many Israelis have gone through in the last three years.
"Although his case is high-profile and very visible, the phenomenon is a broader one," Black says. "It's clear that Benny's own revision of his views, a much more conservative twist in his own intellectual odyssey, is born of the disappointment, the disillusionment that there isn't a viable partner on the Palestinian side. He's fairly representative of a wider trend."
Until the Haaretz interview two weeks ago, anyway. Although Morris had in other publications mentioned the idea of transfer (the euphemism generally used to mean the deportation of the Palestinian population out of the occupied territories), broaching such a taboo subject in one of Israel's most popular newspapers set off a new wave of controversy. This time, it seemed, his comments went beyond the pale. Soon afterward, Haaretz printed dozens of letters from Jews and Arabs alike, almost universally condemning his comments.
When I tell Black, who hadn't read the interview, about Morris' comments, he exclaims, "I didn't realize he had gone that far." After reading the interview, Black e-mailed me this about his old friend: "I disagree strongly with the views expressed."
"Basically I think Benny Morris flipped out as result of three years of terrorism," says Segev. He added sympathetically, "Happens to many of us."
plenty more...
http://www.salon.com/books/int/2004/01/23/morris/index.html
Ed. Note: Jewish ethics boils down to: "We have a right to do whatever we want. If you object, you're an anti-Semite, a jew-hater."
======================================
Subject: broken Pope saltues broken dancing
Break-dancers perform for the pope
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Jan. 25, 2004 | VATICAN CITY (AP) -- In an unusual spectacle at the Vatican, Pope John Paul II presided Sunday over a performance of break-dancers who leaped, flipped and spun their bodies to beats from a tinny boom box.
The 83-year-old pontiff seemed to approve, waving his hand after each dancer completed a move, then applauding for the entire group. He watched the performance from a raised throne.
"For this creative hard work I bless you from my heart," he said.
During the show, one dancer -- part of a Polish group that helps poor and marginalized youths -- planted his head on the inlaid marble floor of the Vatican hall and spun to loud applause from his group and from Vatican officials. Another performer flung his body around in a series of spins and handstands.
"Artistic talent is a gift from God and whoever discovers it in himself has a certain obligation: to know that he cannot waste this talent, but must develop it," John Paul said.
Earlier Sunday, members of an Italian Catholic youth organization enthusiastically cheered the pope's weekly remarks in St. Peter's Square. A few were invited into his papal apartment and helped him release doves from his window.
The pope, who suffers numerous ailments but appeared relatively strong Sunday, called out to the other children cheering below his window.
"I love you all. I love you very much," he said.
======================================
Subject: another down chopper
http://www.salon.com/news/wire/2004/01/25/copter_crash/index.html
Army chopper crashes in Iraq; 2 on board
By Paul Garwood
Jan. 25, 2004 | TIKRIT, Iraq (AP) -- A U.S. helicopter crashed in the Tigris river while searching for a missing soldier on Sunday, and the aircraft's two crew members were missing, the military said.
It did not say what caused the crash of the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter, attached to the 101st Airborne Division.
The helicopter was searching for a soldier missing when the boat he was in capsized earlier Sunday while on patrol. The other three soldiers in boat were safe, but two Iraqi police officers and an Iraqi translator were confirmed killed in the incident, said Maj. Josslyn Aberle, a spokeswoman for the 4th Infantry Division.
She said the search for the two pilots was underway. U.S. troops and Iraqi police sealed off the area and established checkpoints to secure the search and rescue operation.
U.S. troops rushing to the scene came under "limited and ineffective small arms fire," the spokeswoman said. An Iraqi policeman manning one of the checkpoints was killed in a drive-by shooting, witnesses said.
It was the fifth helicopter crash in Iraq this month -- three of them due to hostile fire.
======================================
Subject: fresh round of jew lies trotted out to deflect attention
New data on Nazis' victims comes to light
By Larry Neumeister
Jan. 25, 2004 | NEW YORK (AP) -- A flood of new revelations about grisly medical experiments on Jews during World War II show there probably were thousands more victims than had been previously thought, an expert said Sunday.
So far, 1,778 Jewish victims of Nazi medical experiments from 33 countries have responded to Jewish groups dispersing money from Holocaust settlements recently reached through lawsuits filed in U.S. courts.
Their stories -- shocking even to those familiar with what was already known -- should prompt a re-examination of the magnitude of experimentation done by Dr. Josef Mengele and his Nazi cohorts, said Gideon Taylor, executive vice president of the Conference on Jewish Materials Claims Against Germany.
A few of the written testimonies submitted to a settlement committee in the last year are being released Monday, Taylor said.
"We certainly didn't expect this number," Taylor said. He added that many of those who responded said they were more interested in having their stories known than in the $5,400 payouts, which will begin getting mailed this week.
Taylor said such a large number of people making claims indicates there were thousands more who died during the experiments or have died since. "Our knowledge has been significantly broadened," he said.
Data collected from the claimants show there were about 178 different types of medical experiments conducted in more than 30 camps and ghettos. Some victims were not Jewish, including a group of Polish nuns, Taylor said.
One 82-year-old man described an experiment in which Nazi dogs with poison on their teeth were let loose to chase him and another man and rip flesh from their legs.
A 73-year-old woman told of Mengele pulling her from a line of people headed to the gas chambers at Auschwitz to go to his laboratory, where she was injected with drugs and chemicals and "they made cuts into my body and left the wounds open for them to study."
"I was used as a guinea pig for medical experiments," she writes. At another point, she says, "As bad as the experiments were, without them I would not be here today to write this."
Reading the testimonies "forces you to believe the unbelievable," Taylor said. "These people have been through hell. There's no other way to describe it."
The victims' written statements will be given to Holocaust institutions, including the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington.
Here is a list of the countries from which victims have responded and the number from each: Argentina, 6; Australia, 53; Austria, 6; Belgium, 12; Brazil, 10; Canada, 99; Chili, 1; Croatia, 1; Denmark, 6; France, 38; Germany, 65; Great Britain, 16; Greece, 5; Hungary, 182; Israel, 389; Italy, 3; Luxemburg, 1; Monaco, 1; Netherlands, 25; New Zealand, 2; Norway, 3; Peru, 1; Romania, 7; Serbia-Montenegro, 4; Slovak Republic, 66; South Africa, 3; Spain, 4; Sweden, 52; Switzerland, 6; United States, 707; Urugay, 1; Venezuela, 2 and Yugoslavia, 1.
======================================
Subject: shitskins pollute Iowa
Here.
======================================
Subject: Congo fun
Warriors kill men, rape women
Bukavu, Congo - Tribal fighters boarded wooden canoes traveling on Lake Albert in volatile northeastern Congo and killed 100 male passengers, raped women and forced them to carry looted cargo, a UN spokesperson said on Friday.
"We got this information from interviewing two survivors ... including one who said he hid under dead bodies to save his life" Isabelle Abric, spokesperson for the UN mission in Congo, said by telephone from Bunia, capital of the troubled Ituri province.
However, the accuracy of the death toll is in doubt "because these people were busy saving their lives" and it was impossible for them to count the dead under the circumnstances, Abric told The Associated Press.
The slaughter took place January 15, one day after two dozen Lendu tribal fighters boarded five of the canoes - the main form of transport for residents - saying they would protect the estimated 180 passengers travelling in them from Mokambo, some 100km north of Bunia, Abric said.
However, the fighters ordered the canoes to stop at Gobu, 40km south of Mokambo, killed most of the male passengers and ordered the women and children to carry cargo looted from the vessels, Abric said.
The UN has sent "troops and human rights officials to the area to investigate exactly what happened" and determine casualty figures, said Major General Samaila Iliya, a Nigerian and the new commander of United Nations force in Congo.
"There are still conflicting stories. Some say hundreds (of people were killed), some say 50, some say 15," Iliya said in Bukavu.
Ituri, 480km north of Bukavu, remains volatile as Lendu and Hema tribal fighters battle each other as well as the UN troops trying to stem the bloodshed months after peace deals ended major fighting in the 5-year civil war in Africa's third-largest nation in which an estimated 3 million people have died, mainly from war-induced hunger and disease.
The Hema and Lendu have traditionally fought over land and other resources in the region twice the size of Belgium or the US state of Maryland.
======================================
Subject:
Paul Harvey Comments on "The Passion" by Mel Gibson
The majority of the media are complaining about this movie. Now Paul Harvey tells "The rest of the story" and David Limbaugh praises Gibson. Most people would wait and see a movie before giving the reviews that have been issued by the reporters trying to tell all of us what to believe.
Paul Harvey's words:
I really did not know what to expect. I was thrilled to have been invited to a private viewing of Mel Gibson's film "The Passion," but I had also read all the cautious articles and spin. I grew up in a Jewish town and owe much of my own faith journey to the influence. I have a life long, deeply held aversion to anything that might even indirectly encourage any form of anti-Semitic thought, language or actions.
I arrived at the private viewing for "The Passion", held in Washington DC and greeted some familiar faces. The environment was typically Washingtonian, with people greeting you with a smile but seeming to look beyond you, having an agenda beyond the words. The film was very briefly introduced, without fanfare, and then the room darkened. From the gripping opening scene in the Garden of Gethsemane, to the very human and tender portrayal of the earthly ministry of Jesus, through the betrayal, the arrest, the scourging, the way of the cross, the encounter with the thieves, the surrender on the Cross, until the final scene in the empty tomb, this was not simply a movie; it was an encounter, unlike anything I have ever experienced.
In addition to being a masterpiece of film-making and an artistic triumph, "The Passion" evoked more deep reflection, sorrow and emotional reaction within me than anything since my wedding, my ordination or the birth of my children. Frankly, I will never be the same. When the film concluded, this "invitation only" gathering of "movers and shakers" in Washington, DC were shaking indeed, but this time from sobbing. I am not sure there was a dry eye in the place. The crowd that had been glad-handing before the film was now eerily silent. No one could speak because words were woefully inadequate. We had experienced a kind of art that is a rarity in life, the kind that makes heaven touch earth.
One scene in the film has now been forever etched in my mind. A brutalized, wounded Jesus was soon to fall again under the weight of the cross. His mother had made her way along the Via Della Rosa. As she ran to him, she flashed back to a memory of Jesus as a child, falling in the dirt road outside of their home. Just as she reached to protect him from the fall, she was now reaching to touch his wounded adult face. Jesus looked at her with intensely probing and passionately loving eyes (and at all of us through the screen) and said "Behold I make all things new." These are words taken from the last Book of the New Testament, the Book of Revelations. Suddenly, the purpose of the pain was so clear and the wounds, that earlier in the film had been so difficult to see in His face, His back, indeed all over His body, became intensely beautiful. They had been borne voluntarily for love.
At the end of the film, after we had all had a chance to recover, a question and answer period ensued. The unanimous praise for the film, from a rather diverse crowd, was as astounding as the compliments were effusive. The questions included the one question that seems to follow this film, even though it has not yet even been released. "Why is this film considered by some to be "anti-Semitic?" Frankly, having now experienced (you do not "view" this film) "the Passion" it is a question that is impossible to answer. A law professor whom I admire sat in front of me. He raised his hand and responded "After watching this film, I do not understand how anyone can insinuate that it even remotely presents that the Jews killed Jesus. It doesn't." He continued "It made me realize that my sins killed Jesus" I agree. There is not a scintilla of anti-Semitism to be found anywhere in this powerful film. If there were, I would be among the first to decry it. It faithfully tells the Gospel story in a dramatically beautiful, sensitive and profoundly engaging way.
Those who are alleging otherwise have either not seen the film or have another agenda behind their protestations. This is not a "Christian" film, in the sense that it will appeal only to those who identify themselves as followers of Jesus Christ. It is a deeply human, beautiful story that will deeply touch all men and women. It is a profound work of art. Yes, its producer is a Catholic Christian and thankfully has remained faithful to the Gospel text; if that is no longer acceptable behavior than we are all in trouble. History demands that we remain faithful to the story and Christians have a right to tell it. After all, we believe that it is the greatest story ever told and that its message is for all men and women. The greatest right is the right to hear the truth.
We would all be well advised to remember that the Gospel narratives to which "The Passion" is so faithful were written by Jewish men who followed a Jewish Rabbi whose life and teaching have forever changed the history of the world. The problem is not the message but those who have distorted it and used it for hate rather than love. The solution is not to censor the message, but rather to promote the kind of gift of love that is Mel Gibson's filmmaking masterpiece, "The Passion."
It should be seen by as many people as possible. I intend to do everything I can to make sure that is the case. I am passionate about "The Passion." You will be as well. Don't miss it!
****************************************
This is a commentary by DAVID LIMBAUGH about Mel Gibson's very controversial movie regarding Christ's crucifixion. It, too, is well worth reading.
MEL GIBSON'S passion for "THE PASSION"
How ironic that when a movie producer takes artistic license with historical events, he is lionized as artistic, creative and brilliant, but when another takes special care to be true to the real-life story, he is vilified. Actor-producer Mel Gibson is discovering these truths the hard way as he is having difficulty finding a United States studio or distributor for his upcoming film, "The Passion," which depicts the last 12 hours of the life of Jesus Christ.
Gibson co-wrote the script and financed, directed and produced the movie. For the script, he and his co-author relied on the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, as well as the diaries of St. Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) and Mary of Agreda's "The City of God."
Gibson doesn't want this to be like other sterilized religious epics. "I'm trying to access the story on a very personal level and trying to be very real about it." So committed to realistically portraying what many would consider the most important half-day in the history of the universe, Gibson even shot the film in the Aramaic language of the period. In response to objections that viewers will not be able to understand that language, Gibson said, "Hopefully, I'll be able to transcend the language barriers with my visual storytelling; if I fail, I fail, but at least it'll be a monumental failure."
To further insure the accuracy of the work, Gibson has enlisted the counsel of pastors and theologians, and has received rave reviews. Don Hodel, president of Focus on the Family, said, "I was very impressed. The movie is historically and theologically accurate." Ted Haggard, pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo., and president of the National Evangelical Association, glowed: "It conveys, more accurately than any other film, who Jesus was."
During the filming, Gibson, a devout Catholic, attended Mass every morning because "we had to be squeaky clean just working on this." From Gibson's perspective, this movie is not about Mel Gibson. It's bigger than he is. "I'm not a preacher, and I'm not a pastor," he said. "But I really feel my career was leading me to make this. The Holy Ghost was working through me on this film, and I was just directing traffic. I hope the film has the power to evangelize."
Even before the release of the movie, scheduled for March 2004, Gibson is getting his wish. "Everyone who worked on this movie was changed. There were agnostics and Muslims on set converting to Christianity...[and] people being healed of diseases." Gibson wants people to understand through the movie, if they don't already, the incalculable influence Christ has had on the world. And he grasps that Christ is controversial precisely because of WHO HE IS - GOD incarnate. "And that's the point of my film really, to show all that turmoil around him politically and with religious leaders and the people, all because He is Who He is."
Gibson is beginning to experience first hand just how controversial Christ is. Critics have not only speciously challenged the movie's authenticity, but have charged that it is disparaging to Jews, which Gibson vehemently denies. "This is not a Christian vs. Jewish thing. '[Jesus] came into the world, and it knew him not.' Looking at Christ's crucifixion, I look first at my own culpability in that." Jesuit Father William J. Fulco, who translated the script into Aramaic and Latin, said he saw no hint of anti-Semitism in the movie. Fulco added, "I would be aghast at any suggestion that Mel Gibson is anti-Semitic." Nevertheless, certain groups and some in the mainstream press have been very critical of Gibson's "Passion."
The New York Post's Andrea Peyser chided him: "There is still time, Mel, to tell the truth." Boston Globe columnist James Carroll denounced Gibson's literal reading of the biblical accounts. "Even a faithful repetition of the Gospel stories of the death of Jesus can do damage exactly because those sacred texts themselves carry the virus of Jew hatred," wrote Carroll. A group of Jewish and Christian academics has issued an 18-page report slamming all aspects of the film, including its undue emphasis on Christ's passion rather than "a broader vision." The report disapproves of the movie's treatment of Christ's passion as historical fact.
The moral is that if you want the popular culture to laud your work on Christ, make sure it either depicts Him as a homosexual or as an everyday sinner with no particular redeeming value (literally). In our anti-Christian culture, the blasphemous "The Last Temptation of Christ" is celebrated and "The Passion" is condemned. But if this movie continues to affect people the way it is now, no amount of cultural opposition will suppress its force and its positive impact on lives everywhere. Mel Gibson is a model of faith and courage.
Please copy this and send it on to all your friends to let them know about this film so that we'll all go see it when it comes
Ed. Note: Always funny to listen to a comedian like Paul Harvey doing his impression of forthrightness. In every other instance, conservatives like him blame criminals for their crimes. They bellow high dudgeon over "liberals" who blame society. But when it comes to the jews who murdered Jesus, why, that's a different kettle of gefilte fish. When the criminals are kikes, all of a sudden the Harveys switch sides, and blame themselves - blame you and me and us and "we"! Hmmm... To my glorious eye, the Book and the jews themselves say about as clearly as it can be said that they're responsible. No, no matter what the cowardly conservatives say, jews killed Jesus. Atheists and real Christians can say that.
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Subject:
Here.
Poll: 18% of Britons 'moderately anti-Semitic'
Douglas Davis Jan. 23, 2004
About one in five Britons is moderately anti-Semitic, would be unhappy with a Jewish prime minister and considers that Jews wield too much power, according to a poll published by the Jewish Chronicle in London on Friday.
The poll also reveals that one in seven Britons believes the Holocaust has been exaggerated, while a minority -- 37 percent -- believe Jews have made a "positive contribution" to British society.
In an interview with the Jewish Chronicle, Home Secretary David Blunkett expressed "deep concern" at the numbers who believe the Holocaust is exaggerated.
He found the result "worrying and disappointing. It means people are prepared to set aside not only the evidence, but the overwhelming emotion that goes with it.
"They delude themselves into believing that the Nazis are not what we know them to be, and this is very depressing."
Lord Greville Janner, chairman of the Holocaust Educational Trust, told the paper it was "tragically sad that in... the greatest anti-Nazi country in the world, there are people who don't believe in the Nazi horrors." But he was surprised that the numbers who believed that Jewish suffering had been exaggerated were "so low, given the anti-Semitic, racist element present in this country."
A spokesman for the Conservative Party, which is led by a Jew, Michael Howard, described the 18% who would be unhappy with a Jewish prime minister as "very sad indeed... Politicians should be judged only on their policies and their party's beliefs. Religion is of no relevance."
And a spokesman for the Commission for Racial Equality said the poll results came as "no surprise at all. We have seen a rise in anti-Semitic feeling."
Israeli analysts, however, took a more positive view of the poll.
Professor Dina Porat, director of Tel Aviv University's Stephen Roth Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism, described the results as "very good," particularly as Britain topped the league for anti-Semitic and violent attacks against people and property for a three-year period in the Nineties.
Professor Robert Wistrich, head of the Hebrew University's Vidal Sassoon Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism, was also sanguine about the results.
Noting that the poll shows between 15% and 20% of Britons have some prejudice against Jews, he said it was "a better result than many Jews might have expected." But he added that if the poll had included a question about Israel, "this would have changed the results radically."
The poll found that working-class pensioners were most likely to harbor anti-Semitic sentiments. Some 24% of 65-plus age group believe Jews have too much influence, compared to 15% in the 25- to 34-year age range.
Despite Holocaust education programs in virtually all schools in Britain, some 19% of 18- to 24-year-old Britons believe the Holocaust is exaggerated, compared to 20% among the over-65s.
Ed. Note: Polls like this are largely meaningless. They are not intended to measure genuine sentiment but to provide a platform for fresh propaganda campaigns. Levels of "anti-Semitism," about as meaningless a term as you can get, are always at a certain level: high enough we must take note, low enough society isn't going to explode overnight. Yawn.
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Subject: Gibson's "Passion"
from the descriptions i've read.. this passion is going to prove that you can make an anti-semitic and market it even with jewish resistance. it will be a big loss for jewish prestige. they're not invincible after all? they can be beaten?
at the same time let's be honest. the only reason this film got anywhere was because of who mel is, and because of the neutral media position and conservative support. the psychological impact will be the same, but this isn't really a victory over the establishment- the establishment didn't resist it.
finally, the actual effect of the movie. will it give courage to catholics, especially leading church catholics? will it reinvigorate their faith? will it have a real influence on them? i think that's mel's intent, and if i don't doubt the possibility, espec. on catholic viewers around the world, european catholics, christian palestinians, etc. all in all this is going to be a big win for us and a big loss for the jews. very proud of mel. he's given up everything for this. one has to stand back and have total respect for his beliefs. for that reason alone everyone should see it.
Ed. Note: If you have $25 million, yes, you can make whatever film you want. But that doesn't mean you'll get the distribution and publicity an ordinary film would. We can help out by attending. Hey, Gibson. If you leave the line in, I'll go twice.
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