Last weekend I was informed (loudly, repeatedly and, in my not-so-humble opinion, obnoxiously)  that I am a supporter of genocide. The story follows and you can judge for yourself.

Ala Abu Dehein had an unremarkable life, by all accounts. But he will be remembered in death as either a martyr or a terrorist, depending on your political and religous idealogy.

He entered the Merkaz Harav yeshiva, a school for Rabbinic students, with an AK-47 and an automatic pistol and began firing. When he was done, eight students would be dead. The bodies of some of the students would be found laying among copies of the Torah, the Talmud and other religous works.

The gunman was from E...

Misha Defonseca is a sweet looking woman, 71 years old, living in Dudley, Massachusetts. She is also the author of a best-selling book that chronicles a remarkable story of how she, as a child, traveled 1,900 miles across Europe, sometimes in the company of a pack of wolves, in search of her deported parents.

The book, entitled "Misha: A Memoire of the Holocaust Years," has been translated into 18 languages and made into a feature film in France.

Not one word of it is true.

Defonesca i...

Despite the bold words that are being bandied about ("Failure is not an option" by example) there will be no peace in the Middle East. This week's incident at the Rafah Gate shows why.




Hamas has been firing hundreds of missiles into Israel. Why? Aside from the usual hatred of Jews, they want to make sure that the current round of peace talks is derailed. Hamas is heavily invested in making sure that there is no peace. The have refused to acknowledge Israel's right to exist under any cir...

Every year there seem to be more and more articles by people who complain that Christmas isn't getting its fair share. There aren't enough Christmas specials on TV (something less than 24/7), the (obvious) Christmas Tree in the office is called something else, people say "Happy Holidays" as if Jews, Muslims and Hindus might think you actually know what our holidays are.....but the real truth is that people in America need more of an education in tolerance, not less.

Last week in New York City...

Thanks to my son, Jon, for making me aware of this.

According to the witness, the driver of the Cadillac said "I'm a ninja in my Caddy" and then ran Brian Deneke down.

The date was December 12th, 1997. The place was Amarillo, Texas. The driver of the car, who would be convicted for the murder, was Dustin Camp. Dustin was an athlete, a high school football player and a "clean cut" kid. His lawyer kept on stressing how clean cut he was at his trial. It must have worked, because Dustin got 10...

On November 22nd, 1963 at 12:30 PM CST in Dallas, Texas, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States of America, was shot and killed.



There are moments and events that define generations. December 7th, 1941, the day that Pearl Harbor was attacked was one. September 11th, 2001 was another. If you were alive on those days, days which may have begun as ordinary days, you will remember the moment when you heard the news. Life would go on for most of us, but in retrospect,...

I am going to ask an open question: What is victory in Iraq? (Or the opposite, what is defeat?) Answer as you will.

I am not going to try to sway anyone except to offer this observation.

In 2003, if you had said to the American people that Saddam would be removed from power, a democratic government elected, a constitution ratified and Saddam tried in an Iraqi court, convicted and then executed, that would generally have met most people's definition of victory.

On the other hand, if you...

I had a "Homer Simpson" moment yesterday. I actually thought my beloved Michigan (pronounced "Meeeeeechigan" during college football season) was leading the nation in an important category only to find, upon further investigation, that we were actually only number 6.

The category in question is obesity. Click the link below to see an animated map.

Link

But all my hopes and dreams were dashed when I read the following from the Trust For America's Health site:

"Michigan ranked 6th in t...

I was debating with a neighbor of mine about prayer in American schools and I suggested that we would probably live to see it become an issue again....just not the way that we thought.

The prayer book may well be the Quran.

Islam is the fastest growing religion in America. Muslims are now the largest minority religion (counting all forms of Christianity as the majority) and have a high birth-rate. In some European countries, the birth-rate of the Muslim minority is often cited as being t...

A general strike, orchestrated by Hezbollah and supported by Syria and Iraq, has flared into violence. The intent of the strike was to topple the pro-Western government of Sinoria in favor of a Hezbollah led government. Opposing the Shiite Hezbollah forces is the Sunni Future party, which is headed by Saad Hariri, the leader of the parliamentary majority and son of Rafik Hariri, the former prime minister many Lebanese believe was murdered on Syria’s orders. Hundreds of followers of each ...

There is an old joke to the effect that every Jewish holiday can be described as "They tried to kill us, we survived, let's eat." Hanukkah (or Hannukkah or Channukah or..well, you get the idea) is no exception. Tonight begins the Hanukkah festival.

After Alexander the Great died, his empire split into three parts. Egypt was ruled by the Ptolemaic kings, while Syria was ruled by the descendants of Seleucus. The kingdoms fought amongst themselves and in 198 BC Antiochus III defeated the Egyptia...

The Simon Wiesenthal Institute is convening a video conference of testimony by 70 Holocaust survivors to refute the Holocaust denial meeting being conducted in Tehran. Holocaust survivors from around the world are being invited to contribute their testimonies.

In Los Angeles, artifacts from the concentration camps will also be on display.

For anyone unfamiliar with the Simon Wiesenthal Institute and the Museum of Tolerance, this is their Mission Statement:

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is...

More than Al Queda, I fear the growing power of the Shiites and the possibility of a pan-Shiite state.

Iran is on the verge of becoming a nuclear power, if it is not already one. 90% of the Iranian population is Shi'a. The country is a theocracy, ruled by the Supreme Leader (Rahbare Enghelab) currently the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, although the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appears most often in the media. A substantial amount of evidence points to Iran as the leading supplier of arms a...

Regular readers of mine (if there are any such) know that I teach Sunday School at the Ann Arbor Jewish Cultural Society, a secular Jewish institution. Today we went on a field trip to the JCC West Bloomfield for “Zap! Pow! Bam!” an exhibit on the Jewish influence in comic books. The trip was fun and also educational. Among other things that we learned were:

Superman the character was created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, two Jewish teenagers from Cleveland. Superman embodies the Jewish va...