Judeosphere

Media Matters reports that on the May 10 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, CNN host Glenn Beck said the following:

Now, I have said on this program, “I would not vote for Joe Lieberman as president of the United States.” I think Joe Lieberman knows how to fight this war. I think Joe Lieberman really gets it. However, even if I didn’t disagree with him on so many social issues, I wouldn’t vote for Joe Lieberman at this time because of the complications it would add in this country or on the planet right now because of the way the Middle East would use it. That’s not saying the same thing as I wouldn’t vote for a Jew for president.

Hey, thanks for that important distinction, Glenn! I’d dearly like to ask him–given world history and the ongoing mess that is the Middle East–when does he think it wouldn’t be a complicated time to support a Jew for president?

The World Federation of the Deaf (WFD) has eight “special interest groups” (SIG) representing the unique problems confronted by various members of the deaf community (Deaf Immigrants, Deaf Lesbian, Gay, Transgendered and Bisexual People, etc).

Now, Mark Zaurov, a researcher at the Institute of German Sign Languages at the
University of Hamburg, has started a petition calling for the creation of a SIG for Deaf Jews, to confront the rising anti-semitism both inside and outside the deaf community:

Today, there are signs of increasing anti-semitism across Europe and the Islamic world, including hate speech, violence targeting Jews and Jewish institutions, and denial of the Holocaust….One might think that Jewish Deaf people are perhaps being discriminated in the general society. However, inside the Deaf community, anti-Semitism is to be found as well. A sad example is the banishment of Jewish Deaf from the Deaf Association in Germany during WWII. When we look into history, we see that many countries had and have separate schools for Jewish Deaf. The Jewish Deaf community has its own identity process, due to a different religious tradition and lifestyle, and a distinctive history which anti-semitism play a negative role. The Jewish Deaf community is a subgroup inside the Deaf community of which its history is only being researched recently. Their narratives and experiences, both in general society as in Deaf community need to be seen also. And most importantly: an awareness concerning antisemitism in the Deaf community needs to be raised.

The Deaf Jewish community around the world do need your help and support in this matter. We strongly recommend you to consider this proposal and work seriously. Many people prefer to sweep the issue of antisemitism under the rug and imply that there is no such issue in the Deaf community. We believe if WFD accept this proposal and it is willing to have an open dialogue on this issue, WFD will be living up to it’s mission statement. Currently, we all talk about this new “Deafhood” as a time for us to unite and work together. It also means we have to embrace all Deaf people from all cultural and ethnic groups including this small minority group: the Deaf Jews. We look forward to live in a free society with freedom to fully express who we are, and being treated equally.

Palestinian-American columnist Ray Hanania offers his views on the Hamas “Mickey Mouse” controversy:

The most depressing response is coming not from the Hamas extremists, who distort Islam to drive their ugly bastardization of their political religious goals, but from the “moderate” Palestinian leaders and the mainstream Palestinian, Arab and Muslim populations.

I was most disappointed in Mustafa Barghouti, who is the Palestinian Information Minister, chosen not because he understands fundamental media relations or professional public relations, but because he is a “moderate” balance to the extremism that dominates the Hamas terrorist movement that has placed a headlock on Palestinian government.

Barghouti crossed the line when he tried to argue that the mainstream Western news media only covers these types of incidents but fails to cover the fact that the Israeli military has killed innocent Palestinian civilians. Barghouti argued that the world’s media should instead focus on the plight of the Palestinian people in order to understand what motivated the show’s creators.

Let me get this straight, Mr. Barghouti. Are you saying that the two issues are somehow related? That the just struggle of the Palestinian people is in anyway a foundation for this kind of hate-trash?

Barghouti argued the show doesn’t represent the cause of the Palestinian people, but he turns to cause of the Palestinian people as a defense of sorts against the criticism.

The fact is the two are not related. And, this is not the place to argue that the Western media is biased, suggesting somehow that there is an excuse for this kind of anti-Semitism and vicious immoral TV programming.

The tragedy is that if the mainstream Western media is biased against the Palestinians — and I fully believe that to be the case — then what is Mr. Barghouti doing about it? Waiting for some extremist TV hate show to be spotlighted in order for him to raise the issue?

Bad media strategy. Bad public relations. There is no moral equivalency at all. The Western media is doing a poor job, but this is not the time in which to make that argument….The media reports are the results of journalists and the people they cover who each contribute to the story. The fact is Palestinians do a pathetic job of conveying their issues through professional strategic media techniques that are fundamental to communications. We simply insist that the media should recognize what is right and what is wrong, and the reality is they don’t.

Instead of complaining about media bias, fight it the professional and effective way on your terms. Learn the best practices in media relations, professional journalism, creating and writing effective press releases — something rarely seen in the Palestinian, Arab or Muslim community.

It’s one reason why we continue to see this kind of Hamas fanatic TV programming….We can either act like victims and blame everything on others. Or, we can stand up and live by one principle and one morality that if we apply to others, we must first apply to ourselves.

Columnist Mustafa Akyol offers this commentary in the Turkish Daily News:

Did you know that Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan and his wife are crypto Jews who secretly collaborate with the Mossad? And that they are trying to cook-up “moderate Islam” and destroy Turkish secularism for the sake of serving the Eders of Zion?

Well, I had no clue about that terrible conspiracy either, until I went into a major Istanbul bookstore last weekend and checked the bestsellers list. There were a few usual titles telling stories about how the beloved Secular Turkish Republic is targeted by internal and external plots — a highly popular and powerful paranoia in the country these days — but none of them were as informative as the one penned by a die-secularist named Ergün Poyraz. “The Children of Moses” is the title of Mr. Poyraz’s masterpiece….On the book’s cover, there is even a more stunning graphic message: a huge Star of David encircles the photos of Mr. and Mrs. Erdoğan

“The Children of Moses” sounds not only anti-Semitic but also Kurdophobiac. While exposing the alleged Jewish roots of the Erdoğan family — and how he does that is really beyond me — the writer also fervently unveils the Kurdish origin of some of Mr. Erdoğan’s current or previous advisors, as if it is something that one has to be ashamed of. It is clearly, and unabashedly, a racist book.

In my previous columns I have criticized Turkey’s “illiberal secularists” who do not respect the freedom of religion of our citizens — whether they might be Muslim or Christian. The book “The Children of Moses” represents the mindset of the most radical wing in this illiberal camp, and actually the term “illiberal” is not enough to define their worldview. To borrow a term from President Bush and to give it a little pun, I would rather call them “secularo-fascists.”

I hope the Western world will understand that the current political conflict in Turkey is not between “Islamists” and “secularists,” as some commentators put it. No, the two poles in the conflict are actually Muslim democracts and secularo-fascists. The latter group has potrayed itself as the Westernizing force in Turkish society for so many decades, but it was actually never Western in the democratic and liberal sense. Moreover, in the past five years, especially in response to the pro-EU stance of the Muslim democrats, it has become growingly anti-Western, and, as Mr. Poyraz’s lunatic book indicates, even anti-Semitic.