From Haifa to Baghdad (An un-PC idea)

It is not often, when Purim comes, that Haman (rattle, rattle) can be hung on St. Patrick’s Day. It is even better when an equally snakey Haman, incarnated in the universally beloved and beneficent ruler of the world’s largest gunnery range, Iraq, is offered as the red dot laser-lit attraction at the forthcoming multinational military “necktie party.” Given Turkey’s decision to disallow US and British troops using northern-border bases as the start lines for the Allied southern thrust toward the oil fields, an alternate “road map” must then be adopted.

Why not Haifa as a launch point for the troops? So long as the U.S. State Department has offered Israel an unworkable “road map to peace” (where, in the grave?) for Israel, as yet another fragmentation shell in its unrelenting barrage of mixed signals and “fog and smoke” ambiguity of intent, it is respectfully submitted in a spirit of justice and equity that this alternate plan be adopted by the Allies for their thrust toward Baghdad. It is guaranteed that there would be no obstacles whatever to an Allied landing and staging of equipment at the sunlit port of Haifa. There shall the British and Americans be greeted by genuinely grateful and cheering crowds of Israeli citizens waving, not burning, the Stars and Stripes and the Union Jack.

From there, it is only appropriate that a parade to the border with Iraq through Jordan be organized. After all, it is only right that the nations most responsible for the creation of the forthcoming Palestinian state confront face-to-face those citizens of the proposed Arab state, those who are the recipients of this great Western beneficence.

In the tradition of the gigantic parades of the U.S. Civil War, let the formation be led by marching bands, and at the front of the formation let there be a clutch of diaphanously-clad, belaurel’d nymphs in the persons of rabbi Michael Lerner, Edward Said, Yossi Beilin, and Shimon Peres casting rose petals before the thunderous formation as it tramp-tramp-tramps through the grateful, welcoming crowds of Nazareth, Jenin, Shechem, Ramallah and thence to Jerusalem. The formation shall then turn left and east to head into an equally warm reception in Amman. Let Colin Powell, Madonna, and Dame Vanessa Redgrave be parade masters, riding atop the turret of a flower-bedecked M1 Abrams tank, waving blissfully at the crowds of Arabs who cheer them as they pass through. From the reviewing stand, Arik Sharon and Chairman Arafat, overcome with emotion, shall spontaneously embrace in a tearful expression of brotherly love. Thrill as Hamas, Hizbollah and Islamic Jihad fire their rifles and rocket grenades into the air, gasp with glee as a band of suicide bombers offer a twenty-one person salute.

A more probable scenario to unfold would be that were such action undertaken, the heads of Colin, Madonna and Dame Vanessa would be on the ends of poles waved before crowds of flag-burning Arab rioters screaming “Death to America! Death to England!,” and the Allied troops would be fighting for their lives before they got past Nazareth, a far worse fight than I believe they will confront in Iraq. And if the IDF stood by and watched from a distance sipping sodas and shaking their heads, thinking, “So now you know the situation on the ground in Israel today,” who would blame them? But, of course, they would not. The IDF would fight to the last warrior on the Allies’ behalf, just as they are doing now, if one gives the matter three seconds’ thought. The issue is not just Israel’s survival, but that of Western civilization. Like the lady said, “You’re next, buddies.”

And is this scenario so ridiculous? What do you think every Israeli citizen is doing right now, but trying to march in the parade of their normal lives, while feeding, out of their own tax dollars, the very people who wish to exterminate them? The Israeli people are fighting the battle of their lives.

The march is on now, Mr. Powell. Come to Israel and walk a mile in Israeli shoes. Then you may draw up road maps in the sand for other people’s countries. And a happy St. Patties’ and Purim to you. Aye, and may our conciliatory policies not have made of the USA and Britain the next battlegrounds before we get a chance to finish our drinks.

Another Good one Jackson!

Here was the Author's first:

What Do Arabs Want?
Walter James O’Brien
26 November 2002

It is time to cut through the media’s shimmering wall of soap and pantyhose advertisements to review the key issue surrounding the current troubles of the Middle East. Motivations, who claims what, which slights are to be avenged, whose property and lives are to be expropriated by which state, all seem secondary to the main issue: What do the Arabs want?

As plainly as I can discern, and by their own open admission in their mosques and in their press, the following non-negotiable items are on their agenda. All the items listed below I have read in so many words at one or another Arab website, so sue me; I am sick of working. And, please, correct me if I have missed any of their straightfaced demands:

* Kill all the male Jews on the planet, and enslave all their women;
* Destroy by whatever means available the evil and malevolent Western civilization and substitute for it something more progressive and appealing, such as the luxuriously limitless and cutthroat slums of Karachi, where the primary entertainment available to the public will be the stadium beheading of housewives for showing an ankle or using lipstick;
* Eliminate all figurative art, public performance of music, and any and all “Jewish” literature, which I take to mean any collection of words on the printed page using an alphabet other than Arabic;
* Exterminate any and all labor organizations and unions in manufacturing and production facilities, substituting the ultimate management-versus-labor mechanism of the “dhimmi” slave chained to the floor working for the “sheikh” master;
* Destroy the democratic governments of the world and substitute them with enlightened and joyous caliphates. You know, something similar to those existing Moslem regimes, praised by their citizens to such an extent that fully two million Muslims a year desperately pound on the doors of democratic governments’ embassies to escape from such corrupt and predatory regimes;
* Oh, I nearly forgot! Also, Christianity and all other infidel faiths must be annihilated, and their churches converted into mosques, as it is as likely Mohammed visited the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City as he is likely to have visited Jerusalem, by teleportation, pogo stick or garbage truck.

How impolite of me to repeat in open, unedited form what all of Islamic media is screaming daily. Are you not overwhelmed by a vision of beauty and peace as it unfolds before your mind´s eye, as we contemplate the prospect of a universal Islamic social and economic reality? One can hardly remain coherent in anticipation of the benefits to the individual that will immediately accrue upon forcible conversion of all of civilization to Islam. Personally, I am ecstatic at the very prospect. Perhaps the West should emulate Islam’s past behavior toward Christian and Jewish minorities in their own countries - to show our true gratitude for all the kind words they have bestowed upon us.

Does the aforementioned mockery constitute a hate crime, please? Am I therefore a thought criminal?

I respectfully submit that the foregoing is not one-tenth as venomous or malicious as that which appears each and every day, by the thousands of column inches, directed at the West, without cause or reason by the august members of the Arab press. If one thinks otherwise, one need only consult their Internet websites. I am underwhelmed by the extent to which Islam reciprocates our tolerance of their intolerance.

So, what do Arabs truly want? Obviously, no friends, supreme command of the earth, all the money, the right to bully whom they choose, and the desire to die horrible deaths, in this life and the next. Alas, I fear the world will only oblige with the satisfaction of the first and last listed wants. However, starting around, oh, February 2003 or so, the decision will be made on the battlefield as to whose G-d is Lord.

Walter James O’Brien writes from Everett, Washington.
Copyright 2002 Walter James O’Brien

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.