Free Republic

Shalom chaveriem, Let me start by saying that it is with great sadness that I share your grief over the deaths of more than 40 brave Israelis who lost their lives — many while trying to save others in the great fire near Haifa. My country, the Netherlands, is amongst other countries helping to put down this fire, which is threatening the lives and property of thousands of your compatriots. I offer my heartfelt condolences to the families of those who perished. My thoughts are with them. Israel is an immense source of inspiration for me. When I came to...

While the world was harrumphing yesterday because Israel’s new foreign minister affirmed the obvious futility of the Annapolis peace conference, an axe-wielding Palestinian terrorist slaughtered a 13-year-old Jewish boy and wounded another. This disgusting crime took place at the town of Bat Ayin, a Jewish settlement a few miles southwest of Jerusalem.

Professors imprisoned in Marxist cliche and socio-economic determinism have concluded--on the basis of no evidence whatever-- that the suicide bombers, mostly products of middle-class families, act out of poverty, hopelessness, and despair. Professor Alexander discusses three of these academic apologists. Of the variegated forms of murderous assault that the Palestinian Arabs have unleashed against Israel since they began the Al-Aqsa Intifada (the Oslo War) in September 2000--pogroms, lynchings, roadside and drive-by shootings--none has proved so cruel or lethal (or so perfectly embodied evil absolute and entire) as suicide bombings; and none has exercised so hypnotic a spell upon the...