Blog Archives
Check out Fjordman’s Review of ‘The Uniqueness of Western Civilization’
John R. Houk
© May 13, 2013
Fjordman produces a favorable book review of Ricardo Duchesne’s historical tome “The Uniqueness of Western Civilization”. I checked out the price and it is a bit spendy on Amazon. I found it amazing Duchesne’s book is $268.60 in paperback and less in hardback at $133.97 to as much as $366.79 through online vendor Amazon. Even the $133 price tag is a bit much for me. I think I might have gone as high $60 with the Fjordman book review. O well, as Doris Day used to sing – Que Sera Sera. I’ll keep looking and eventually I’ll find a used version that is more in my price range.
Let me leave you with one thought that I think I gleaned from Fjordman’s book review. Western Civilization is unique because the culture bred individuals that had the wander lust to discover what is over the unknown horizon. This unknown horizon is more than just exploration for new lands but also the exploration of new concepts because someone had the audacity to think outside the well accepted box to find something that brought innovation to humanity.
JRH 5/13/13
Learn the Islam that Apologists will not Tell YOU About
John R. Houk
© March 20, 2012
You do realize it is important to teach religion as history in public schools. It is important because the culture we live in today is largely the result of Greek, Roman and Judeo-Christian culture. People should know the roots of their culture to understand the present.
Since 9/11 the American education system has been drawn to add more information in text books for grade levels six through twelve. That is understandable because prior to 9/11 Americans thought of Muslims more as Arabs. And Arabs were thought of as camel jockeys stuck in medieval mode in a modern age.
The image is not exactly a complimentary one in the description of Muslims. The 9/11 attack perpetrated on American soil did little to brush up that image with the American mind. The majority of the Muslim terrorists that hijacked jets were of Saudi Arabian origin and all were at least Middle Eastern.
The fact that the terrorists were from a nation in which Radical Islam is the State Religion of the land is important to know. The Saudi kingdom is dominated by Wahhabism. The purist Islam of the Wahhabis is derived from a Sunni Muslim Cleric that lived in the 18th century. The founder of Wahhabism is Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (c. 1702–c. 1791).
The 9/11 terrorists were influenced by the Wahhabism of Saudi Arabia (the bin Laden al Qaeda origin); the Wahhabis are not the only Caliphate minded Radical Islamic (i.e. purist Islam) groups around. There are others. I will not pretend to make an exhaustive list here but here are a few other Radical Muslim groups:
Jihadi ideology is based today on what is commonly known as Salafism, an ambiguous concept that has served to designate various and very different movements throughout the years. The term is derived from the word Salaf, which means �to precede.� In Islamic vocabulary, it is used to describe the followers of al Salaf al salih, the virtuous fathers of the faith who were the companions of the Prophet. The group includes the first three generations of Muslims.[1] Since they learned Islam directly from the Prophet, they understood the true meaning of the religion. Salafis aim to eradicate the impurities introduced during centuries of religious practice. Interpretations not based on the original sources of the religion are viewed as distortions that lead Muslims to stray from the path of God. Salafis have constructed a method (manhaj) to help the search for religious truth. It is a methodology for determining the correct interpretation of the religion, based on the Koran, the Sunna, and the example of the first Muslims.
The method is based on a series of core concepts, foremost among them the tawhid or belief in the uniqueness of God.[2] Another essential concept in Salafi ideology is bid’a or any innovation in the faith. Salafis argue that since the Koran and Sunna reveal the true nature of Islam, any innovation is a distortion of the path to God and is therefore to be rejected.[3] Salafis also devote considerable attention to the science of the hadiths, and call themselves the �People of the Hadith� (Ahl al-Hadith).�In their opinion, the hadiths are, according to the Koran, the most important source of religious knowledge and guidance, providing the best example of how Islam was practiced when it was first introduced. Hence, many Salafi scholars devote themselves to the science of the hadiths in order to eliminate those that are false and thus be able to propose an exact version of the tradition of the Prophet. Lastly, Salafis consider the division of Muslims into separate schools to be unacceptable, because there can only be one correct interpretation or opinion. One of the main problems the Muslim community is experiencing is precisely this blind adherence or imitation (taqlid) of a particular school. Salafis insist, therefore, that the truth is to be found in the sources, not in the texts written by jurists.
Salafism is thus a path and a method to search for religious truth, a desire to practice Islam exactly as it was revealed by the Prophet. The Salafi mission is grounded on avoidance of bid’a and shirk, strict adherence to the principle of tawhid and a desire to transcend the differences between the various schools, as well as the quest for religious truth in the original sources of Islam.[4]
…
… The most radical Salafis base their interpretation of jihad on the writings of Ibn Taymiyya [10] and, like him, they consider that actions by governments that are contrary to Islamic law can be considered proof in order to declare them non-believers. The takfir thus became an instrument that could be used to oppose any regime whatsoever through armed struggle.
…
In tandem with the evolution of Salafism, jihadi ideology gradually gained ground in Afghanistan and eventually merged with Salafism. Its chief proponent was Abdallah Azzam, who in 1984, founded the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK), an office for recruiting Arabs to fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan. Azzam was to have a decisive influence on Usama bin Ladin. In his work, The Main Obligation of Muslims is to Defend the Land of Islam, Azzam writes that jihad is a moral obligation for all Muslims, the sixth pillar of the faith. Using an epic and mystic language, he sets out a vision of the world based on strict Salafism and on calls to martyrdom, stressing the permanent state of humiliation suffered by the umma, as a result of the actions of �crusaders and Zionists.� His work was to have a decisive influence on the jihadi radicalism of the 1990s.[12]
…
The global proliferation of fighting Salafism and its fusion with jihadi ideology were further consolidated under bin Ladin. His declaration of war on the West-backed by the creation in 1998 of the World Islamic Front for Jihad against Jews and Crusaders caused groups that had originally been set up to provide logistical support to al-Qa’ida (e.g. the Islamic Group of Moroccan Combatants) and had originally sought to purify and punish society, to now set their sights on the West. The struggle was no longer confined to the nearest enemy but also to those further away. Fighting Salafism assumed the role of globalizing the jihad born out of the Afghan experience and became the core ideology of the new radical Islamism.
…
Salafism is first and foremost a method for the search of the religious truth; a desire to practice Islam exactly as it was revealed by the Prophet. It is a religious method whose influence has spread throughout the Arab world and also in Europe, thanks to the support received from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, which have helped expand this peculiar vision of Islam that is very close to Wahhabism. Its influence is on the rise and it has successfully impregnated several Islamist movements, including some sectors of the Muslim Brotherhoods. …
The fighting version of Salafism has also become the core ideology of the global jihadism sponsored by al-Qa’ida and the radical utopia of Abdallah Azzam. This ideology, aided by the proselytizing work of radical clerics, has led to the emergence in Europe of small groups with the capability to carry out independent terrorist strikes. … [Excerpted from a very long essay – Read Details in Entirety. I am guessing the question marks is grammar my browser did not pick-up correctly]
Barelvi Islam:
The Legacy Of Syed Ahmad Barelvi In India
By R. Upadhyay
October 30, 2010
[Excerpts]
…
Despite the continuity of Islamic rule for centuries in larger parts of the sub-continent, the Muslim community in India was sharply divided into two exclusive segments namely those who were the descendents of Arab, Turk, Iranian and Afghan conquerors known as Ashraf (Noble Muslims) and those neo-convert Indians who were known as Ajlafs (Low category Muslims). Since the priestly class of this society mostly remained aligned with Ashrafs, orthodox Islam did not penetrate deep into the daily lives of the Muslim proletariat (Ajlafs) who maintained continuous emotional link with their Hindu past and were even practicing their pre-Islamic customs and celebrations. Therefore, Waliullah’s movement was meant for purifying the Ajlafs. It is said that Waliullah era was the beginning of Muslim renaissance following the decline of Islamic rule.
After the death of Waliullah in 1762 , his son Abdul Aziz (1746-1822) succeeded him in the theological saddle of Delhi and carried forward the ideological heritage of his father’s movement. Since the Marathas were already on retreat after their defeat by Abdali in the third battle of Panipat in 1761 and the British were marching towards Delhi, he converted the movement launched by his father into Jihad against the British after declaring India as Darul Harb (House of war). When the British army marched to Delhi in 1803 and Mogul emperor became a British vassal, he also issued a fatwa appealing to the Muslims for launching Jihad against the British and for restoring the rule of Islamic glory. Finding his disciple one Syed Ahmad Barelvi who was born in November 1786 in Rai Bareilley in the present Uttar Pradesh and belonged to the family distantly related to his family suitable for leading the Jihad, … Later he sent Ahmad Barelvi to Mecca in order to acquire the ideological knowledge of Islam from the Wahhabi clerics of Arabia. During course of his stay in Arabia he was greatly influenced with the spirit of Wahhabism and returned to India sometime in the early years of 1820s.
On his return from Mecca, Ahmad Barelvi also known as founder of Wahhabi movement in India, founded an organization namely Tariqah-i Muhhamdiyah (The Way of the Prophet Muhammad) and designated himself as Amir al Mumin (Commander of the Believers). Fully inspired with Waliullah’s political thought for converting the Ajlafs into true Islamists, he toured the length and breadh (sic) of the country particularly Bihar, Bengal, Punjab and Kashmir and found that the Ajlafs were still following Islam within their pre-Islamic cultural mindset like visiting even the Hindu mystics, also following their recommendations for overcoming their worldly problems, having no inhibition in wearing their pre-Islamic dresses. They constituted the larger majority of Muslim society and were therefore the main target area of Barelvi for their brainwashing and turning them into full-fledged Muslims.
[The above excerpts are written by a person notably that is an aficionado of Marxism. Read the essay in Entirety]
____________
Syed Ahmed Shaheed Barelvi
June 11, 2010
[Excerpts]
…
The Mujahideen Movement
Syed Ahmed Shaheed Brelvi started a great movement in the North of India; this movement is known as “The Mujahideen Movement” or “The Movement o Jihad”. This movement arranged a power for the struggle of freedom in Muslims which produced a spirit of survival and they started freedom struggle.
Background of the Mujahideen Movement
Syed Ahmed Shaheed Brelvi selected a particular way on the command of his spiritual guide Shah Abdul Aziz and devoted himself in the preparation of the holy war. He started a national movement for this purpose in 1818 and organized this movement after [h]is arrival from Hajj as the Mujahideen Movement in 1831.
Objectives of Mujahideen Movement
He wanted to make the Muslims as the true lover of Islam, for this purpose he started the Mujahideen Movement.
The main objectives of the Mujahideen Movement were following;
· To preach unicity of Almighty Allah.
· To revive the teachings of Islam and prepare the Muslims to pass their lives simply according to the teachings of Islam.
· To protect the Muslims against such acts and ideas which are contrary to Islamic values.
· To protect the Muslims from the worship of other things except Allah.
· To preach Jihad because it was not possible to get freedom from evil force without armed struggle.
Syed Ahmed Shaheed Brelvi wanted to eliminate the domination of Sikhs in Punjab and N.W.F.P to revive Islamic values and traditions.
______________________
Barelvi Islam
[Excerpts]
Deobandis and Barelvis are the two major groups of Muslims in the Subcontinent apart from the Shia. Barelvi Hanafis deem Deobandis to be kaafir. Those hostile to the Barelvis deprecated them as the shrine-worshipping, the grave-worshiping, ignorant Barelvis. …
…
The differences between these sects can be difficult to understand. For the Barelvis, (who are mostly from the Pakistan province of Punjab) the holy Prophet is a superhuman figure whose presence is all around us at all times; he is hazir, present; he is not bashar, material or flesh, but nur, light. The Deobandis, who also revere the Prophet, argue he was the insan-i-kamil, the perfect person, but still only a man, a mortal. Barelvis emphasise a love of Muhammad, a semi-divine figure with unique foreknowledge. The Deobandis reject this idea of Muhammad, emphasising Islam as a personal rather than a social religion.
…
… The Wahhabi (Arabia), Deobandi (Pakistan and India) and Jamaat-I-Islami all are anti-sufi, and against the over devotion to Muhammad, whereas the Barelvis emphasize Muhammad’s uniqueness. Indeed, nearly 85% of South Asia’s Sunni Muslims are said to follow the Barelvi school, closer to Sufism. The remaining 15% of Sunnis follow the Deobandi school, more closely related to the conservative practice of Islam. Most Shiites in the subcontinent also tend to be influenced by the Sufis. Pakistan’s Muslims, like other Muslims in the region, tend to follow a school of Islam which is less conservative, and hence the support for strongly and overtly religious parties has been minimal.
… [Read in Entirety]
______________________________
Sufi Militants Struggle with Deobandi Jihadists in Pakistan
Article from Jamestown Foundation (JF Homepage)
Pub. Date: 24 February 2011
Refworld (affiliated with UNHRC)
As Punjab governor Salman Taseer came out of a restaurant in an upscale area of Islamabad, one of his bodyguards uttered the slogan “Allahu Akbar” and fired on the man he was supposed to guard, killing him on the spot. The assassin in the January 4 killing, Malik Mumtaz Qadri, belonged to the Elite Punjab Police, a force specially trained in counterterrorism work and the protection of important individuals (Dawn [Karachi], January 5). Qadri was also believed to be associated with the South Asian Barelvi Sufi movement. The other bodyguards from the elite force did not try to stop him and the smiling Qadri surrendered to his fellow officers after he made sure the governor was dead. He later told the police that he had killed the governor because Taseer had insulted the Prophet of Islam by describing Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws as “black laws.” …
…
… the killer belonged to the Dawat-e-Islami, a Barelvi Sufi group which normally shuns violence and has been in the forefront of the struggle against Deobandism (a conservative Sunni religious movement that has become associated with militancy) and the Ahle Hadith jihadi groups. Founded in 1984 as a small group around Pir (spiritual leader) Mohammad Ilyas Attar Qadri, Dawat-e-Islami grew into a formidable organization by the mid-1990s when more than 100,000 persons gathered at its periodic ijtimahs (conventions). [1] Pir Ilyas Attar Qadri had sensed Deobandi extremism would grow as a result of the Afghan jihad and wanted to organize the Ahle Sunnat to face that challenge. However, Pir Ilyas believed in peaceful resistance. [2] Surprisingly, the Dawat-e-Islami is loosely structured on the model of the Deobandi Tablighi Jamaat (an international Islamic reform movement). …
…
Formation of the Sunni Tehrik
Pir Ilyas Qadri’s reluctance to adopt violence against Deobandi jihadi groups led to a mini-rebellion among his followers, particularly those who had studied at Barelvi madrassahs. Consequently, a small group led by Saleem Qadri founded the Sunni Tehrik in 1990. Saleem Qadri wanted to meet Deobandi violence with more violence, as Pir Ilyas Qadri’s “non-violence was not taking the Barelvis anywhere.” [4] However, Saleem Qadri did not break his religious allegiance to Pir Ilyas Qadri even after leaving his group, nor did he ask his followers to break links with the Dawat-e-Islami. This approach worked and soon the ranks of the Sunni Tehrik swelled. The membership of the Dawat-e-Islami and the Sunni Tehrik also overlaps at the lower levels with several other Barelvi groups.
The Sunni Tehrik was the first Barelvi group to articulate the demands of the majority Barelvi sect and to use violence to achieve them. Their four basic demands were:
• The protection of Ahle Sunnat beliefs.
• The protection of the rights of the Ahle Sunnat.
• The protection of Ahle Sunnat mosques.
• The protection of the Ahle Sunnat awqaf (religious endowments), such as shrines. [5]
The Sunni Tehrik was ready to use violence to achieve the last two demands in response to Deobandi groups’ use of violence to take over Barelvi mosques and awqaf property. …
…
… the most important thing was that the Jamaat Ahle Sunnat had adopted the Sunni Tehrik narrative of a forceful defense of Barelvi interests as its own. The Jamaat Ahle Sunnat emerged much stronger after the convention and began to play a major part in the country’s Islamist politics.
…
The assassination of Governor Salman Taseer shows that Sufi Islamism can be a bulwark against or an alternative to Deobandi and Ahle Hadith jihadism but it is in its own way as great a threat to international security as the militancy of the Deobandi and Ahle Hadith movements. [Read in Entirety]
Deobandi
Deobandi Islam: The Religion of the Taliban
Information provided and used with permission from the Defense Language Institute at: wrc.lingnet.org (Google goes HERE for the link)
Posted by GlobalSecurity.org
PDF dated: 2001
…
From its inception the school at Deoband made a sharp distinction between ‘revealed’ or sacred knowledge, and ‘human’ or secular knowledge. The school excluded all learning that was not obviously Islamic by firmly rejecting other religious traditions (the Hinduism of India and the Christianity of the British missionaries) and forbidding Western-style education and the study of any subjects not directly related to the study of the Quran.
The school was also highly critical of Islam as it was practiced in the modern world, especially India. They felt the established religious order had made too many compromises with its foreign environment and therefore Islam needed to be purified of these foreign elements. To live out the pure Islamic tradition they embraced Taqlid (acceptance of the old interpretations) and rejected ijitehad or reinterpretation of Islamic precepts to accommodate the changing times. It should also be noted that they are strict adherents to the Hanafi school of thought.xii
…
… In the late 19th and early 20th century the Deobandi school was embroiled, and to a great extent preoccupied, in a verbal “fatwa war” with the Bid’ati school. With more than a quarter of a million fatwas (legal opinions) being issued on some of the most ordinary issues of daily life, the fatwa war helped the Deobandi scholars clarify their thinking. It also served to harden their deeply conservative theological and ethical positions. As a result of the fatwa war the Dar-ul-Uloom madressa became much more traditional than it was when first established in 1866. That is, it moved much further to the right than the founding fathers would have ever imagined.
As the school grew in years it also grew in size and prestige. xiii Dar-ul-Uloon became ‘the’ place to prepare young men to become educated in the Islamic tradition. …
…
Indian independence from British rule in 1947 was met with a bloody partitioning of the subcontinent into two independent nations…India and Pakistan. …
Dar-ul-Uloon however, had a strong history as a hotbed for anti-British activities that were fueled by its conservative, uncompromising theological stance. After the creation of the nation of Pakistan in 1947 numerous satellite Deobandi madressas sprung up throughout Pakistan. These madressas carried on not only the strict Deobandi theological tradition but also its political activism, only now the target had changed. It was no longer the English but the Indian oppression of Muslims in the disputed area of Kashmir that inspired resentment. Later, with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 this resentment would expand to include communism. After the Soviets left the U.N. and the U.S. became demonized as the foreign invading and corrupting powers that threatened the pure expression of Islam.
…
In the spring of 1994 two teenage girls from the village of Sang Hesar were abducted by the majahedim and repeatedly raped at the local checkpoint. Mohammed Omar, a retired Afghan commander studying at a local madressa, gathered 30 fellow taliban (students) and mounted a successful rescue. The Majahedim commander was hung from a slowly ascending tank-barrel. This was the birth of a movement that came to be known as the Taliban.
…
The majahedim were Islamists who carried the banner of Islam and combated secularism and then communism in Afghanistan. Islamists are modernists who seek a contemporary political interpretation of Islam. Educationally they tilt towards Al-Azhor University in Egypt where they have been strongly influence by the political orientation of the fundamentalist group the Muslim Brotherhood. Because they drew from this model other governments were quick to recognize their authority and they were able to form highly organized political parties.
The Taliban are traditionalists who have only entered the political stream in Afghanistan since 1994. They view the roll (sic) of government and society very differently from the majahedim. They do not see Islam in political terms but in religious terms. They seek to return to the purity of the teachings of the Quran and the Sunnah (the practices of the Prophet). They are products of religious madrassas in Pakistan whose roots go back to the Dar-ul-Uloon seminary in Debond, India. Their history makes the Taliban inclined to organize themselves around regional associations rather than political parties.
Religious edicts are believed to have a divine source so they carry more authority in this society than humanitarian law that stress individual freedoms. The purpose of government is to be a reflection of the divine will (as interpreted by the Deobondi scholars), not a guardian of individual rights and liberties as insisted upon by the West. [Read PDF in Entirety]
So what the heck, John? Why are you rehashing these theo-political strains of Radical Islam?
Well feel lucky, I was going to examine some of the organization – I mean – terrorists that adhere to these Radical Islamic ideologies. You know like the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, Hezbollah, CAIR, Jamaat ul-Fuqra and so on.
The point of this exercise is that American text books are leaving this kind of information out. Since these organizations look back to purist Islam. It is important to tell American students that the Islam that inspires these Islamic terrorists and Radical Muslims is the Islam of Mohammed and the following so-called Rightly Guided Caliphs (i.e. First four Caliphs that were actual buddies with Mo).
ACT for America has put together an analysis of text books in America from sixth grade through twelfth grade. Here is the ACT email:
Textbook analysis report released today!
A special message from Brigitte Gabriel, President, ACT! for America Education
By Brigitte Gabriel
Sent: 3/19/2012 2:04 PM
Sent from ACT for America
www.ACTforAmericaEducation.com/
It is with great delight that I announce to you that today we released “Education or Indoctrination? The Treatment of Islam in 6th through 12th Grade American Textbooks.”
ACT! for America Education Executive Director Guy Rodgers and I began discussing this project nearly four years ago. Today, that project is a reality—and I believe that one year from now you and I will look back on this as a truly historic accomplishment that helped change the course of education in America.
This report shines a bright light on a pattern of errors, omissions and bias in the textbooks reviewed. Our children deserve better. Our children deserve facts and accuracy, not historical revisionism.
To give you just one example of the errors our research uncovered, in discussing the 9/11 attacks, the textbooks typically fail to mention the perpetrators were Muslims or that they acted in the cause of Islamic jihad. In one book the terrorists are portrayed as people fighting for a cause. In just a few years after September 11th, the history of what happened on that tragic day was rewritten in our school textbooks. Omitting this vital information, that jihad was the motivation for the attacks, makes it difficult, if not impossible, for today’s young teens, who don’t remember 9/11, to really understand what happened that day—and why.
Please forward this email to anyone and everyone you know. Help us get the word out far and wide! Over the next few months we hope to wake up America to what this report has uncovered!
To access the report log on to www.ACTforAmericaEducation.com/. Once there you will find the following:
· The Executive Summary of the Report, which was mailed to over 70,000 state and local school board members nationwide;
· The full Report;
· Sub-reports, sorted by each textbook publisher;
· A plan for taking action.
The few have always made a difference in this crazy, dangerous but wonderful world we live in. This is our time, those of us who “get it” and are concerned about the direction of our future, to come together and work together to make a difference for our country and our future generation.
I am honored to put my hand in yours and work with you to ensure our children receive the best historical education, and America remains the greatest and brightest nation on earth.
Brigitte Gabriel
Now here is the link to the Executive Summary to this analysis in which you can also access the full report:
http://www.actforamericaeducation.com/textbook-project
Below is the welcome message from Brigitte Gabriel to ACT for America Education.
JRH 3/20/12
A Leftist’s Lips Move Followed by Lying Revisionism
John R. Houk
© January 14, 2012
I received a comment from an obvious Left Wing – the Constitution is a living document – and perhaps an atheist Doug Indeep relating to this post at SlantRight 2.0: “The Homosexual Classrooms Act is an Assault on the Constitution and Christianity”. I am certain Mr. Indeep is a pseudonym relating to “Dug in deep”. His profile page on Blogger releases little information about him except that he is a lawyer and resides on the Left Coast; i.e. California. As of this writing Indeep’s blog is empty which indicates he created a profile to use the wisdom of the Left to annoy the Right.
Indeep’s line of thinking in refuting The Homosexual Classrooms Act post is to proclaim the Constitution is the bedrock of the existence of Separation of Church and State and that David Barton’s scholarship of the Founding Fathers is revisionist history according to Chris Rodda herself a Leftist ideologue that chose to attack the credibility of Barton’s sources.
So this is what I am going to do. I am going to post Indeep’s comment here in its entirety followed by some of my thoughts which will be followed by a refutation of Christ Rodda.
READ THE ENTIRE POST AT SlantRight 2.0
Why do Egyptian-Muslims Persecute Egyptian-Christians?
John R. Houk
© October 15, 2011
If you are a news watcher you are aware that Muslims in Egypt are assaulting, vandalizing and killing Christians. You probably are giving the conflict only a second glance because after all it is religious strife in the far off corner of the world.
The reality is the Christians in Egypt represent some of the most stalwart faithful Believers still left residing in a Muslim nation. When the Muslims conquered Egypt the land spoke Egyptian and was a Christian population. The Egyptians were not Arabic nor did they speak Arabic. Muslim apologists love to tell you that the conquering Muslim armies were liberating Egyptians from the oppression of the Byzantine (Eastern Orthodox) Empire. Muslim apologists base this claim on the fact that Egyptian Christians were Monophysite Christians disagreeing with the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic that believe Jesus Christ is both fully human and fully divine. Monophysites believe that Jesus Christ is one nature of the Divine submerging the human nature. Present day Coptics (or Copts) have a problem as being pegged as Monophysites as defined by the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD. Here is the Coptic Church view of the nature of Christ:
However, it should be pointed out that, officially, the Coptic Church has never believed in monophysitism the way it was portrayed in the Council of Chalcedon. According to a statement by the Coptic Church:
“Copts believe that the Lord is perfect in His divinity, and He is perfect in His humanity, but His divinity and His humanity were united in one nature called “the nature of the incarnate word”, which was reiterated by Saint Cyril of Alexandria. Copts, thus, believe in two natures “human” and “divine” that are united in one “without mingling, without confusion, and without alteration” (from the declaration of faith at the end of the Coptic divine liturgy).
These two natures “did not separate for a moment or the twinkling of an eye” (also from the declaration of faith at the end of the Coptic divine liturgy).“
This split in the church ended up taking the form of persecution against the Coptic Christians of Egypt. After having survived the persecution of the Roman Pagans, they were once again besieged, now by other Christians. Hence, when the Arabs invaded Egypt in the mid-seventh century AD, they met little resistance form (sic) the native Christian population. (AN OVERVIEW OF THE COPTIC CHRISTIANS OF EGYPT; BY LARA ISKANDER AND JIMMY DUNN; TourEgypt.net)
Notice the last part of the above quote asserts the Coptic Christians of Egypt offered little resistance to invading Muslims. There is truth in this because the Byzantine Empire under the auspices of the Council of Chalcedon treated the Monophysite Christians as heretics; however the fact often forgotten by Muslim apologists is that the Coptics soon discovered the Eastern Orthodox persecution of Monophysite Christians was a picnic compared to the Islamic persecution that followed conquest. The Arabic-Muslims went on a transformation binge of Arabizing the Christian-Egyptian population with the typical convert, experience the humiliation of a second class dhimmi or die. Indeed the Coptic-Christian Egyptians rebelled a few times against their conquerors only to be put down in the severest of manners.
Now Muslim apologists are attempting to revise history by claiming the Christian Copts of Egypt were not ever Christians because they were rejected by the Eastern Orthodox Church of the Byzantine Empire. These various history revisionist Muslim apologists are calling the Monophysites prototypical Muslims and calling the Monophysites by the name of Arian Christians.
Muslim apologists are doing some big stretching because the Arian theological nature of Christ is vastly different than the predominating Monophysite-Coptic theological nature of Christ. Monophysites placed Jesus as one nature with the emphasis that was born a human but at the Resurrection Jesus assumed full Divinity absorbing His human nature; hence the human nature disappeared. Arians believed that Christ was born a human and thus was not an uncreated Divine being. For Arians the Lord Jesus Christ is a separate created entity from the uncreated Father God; thus Christ is created and the Father is uncreated (There is a lot of similarities to the present day Mormons).
Muslim apologists like to claim the ancient Egyptian Christians conquered by Islam circa 640s AD were Arians because a Jesus created by God is akin to Islamic theology of Jesus is a created human being that was a great prophet; hence the appellation of prototypical Muslims. The problem for these Muslim apologists is that the Christians of Egypt that were conquered were of the Jesus is one Divine nature of God. Oops, Muslim apologist revised history simply does not work and is yet another example of present day Islam deceiving Westerners about the reality of Islam.
Diana West takes into account the history of Islam pressing Coptic Christians into a persecuted group of people by the so-called religion of peace – Islam – that is something that has occurred ever since Egyptian Christians were conquered by Islam. The Muslim-Egyptian persecution and killing of Egyptian Christians is merely a continuation of the Islamic rules of conquest in which Islamic Supremacism overrules all other religions. In the case of Egypt that means Christians must know their place or be open to violence and murders.
JRH 10/15/11
Move Arab Refugees back to their Respective Home of Origin
John R. Houk
© October 3, 2011
The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is very near on taking a vote on whether the Arabs that call themselves Palestinians should acquire a sovereign nation even if doing so will steal the land of Jewish heritage from Israel which includes ONE-HALF of Jerusalem the Israeli capital city.
I realize I am in the global minority on what land belongs to whom when it comes to Judea and Samaria (known as the West Bank by those who believe Palestinian propaganda); however I am a Bible guy and definitely NOT a Quran guy. Biblically much of the land under control by Muslims was God-given land promised to Abraham, Isaac (NOT ISHMAEL) and Jacob (renamed Israel by God Almighty); the little sliver of land the Jewish State has as sovereign land is not the land deserved.
Biblical Christians agree with Jewish Zionists about the land of Israel that should be Israel’s. Now I realize as a Biblical Christian/Christian Zionist my reasoning for the “why” of a united Jerusalem and a Greater Israel may differ from Jewish Zionists; nonetheless the goal is the same.
Any Muslim claim is based on Islamic imperialism after the period of pseudo-prophet (probably really “profit” since Islamic imperialism was based on booty and slaves as much as conversion) Mohammed’s death. The Jews en masse were given the boot by Romans that grew weary of Jews desiring an independence from Roman rule roughly between 70 AD and 135AD. A few Jews were retained in the land of Israel renamed Palestina by spiteful Romans. You can see the parallel between Palestina and the modern rendition of Palestine. The Romans adopted the name Palestina as a derivative of the Jewish ancient enemy actually vanquished by the Kingdom of David and Solomon – the Philistines. The primary people left in the Holy Land were the Aramaic people after the Roman enforced Diaspora of Jews. As Rome turned to Christianity so did most of the subjects under Roman rule. This included the Aramaeans. After the wars between the Byzantine Empire (East Roman) and Parthian Empire (Persian Zoroastrians) weakened them immensely, Imperialistic Muslims stepped into the vacuum and conquered the cradle of Christianity in the circa 638 AD. The Aramaeans that attempted to retain their cultural heritage maintained their Christianity for hundreds of years. Eventually Muslim oppression took its toll on the Aramaean peoples and conversions to Islam began alongside the cultural exchange of Arab civilization and the Arabic language.
So check this out: the Philistines were not Arabic and did not speak Arabic even of any ancient rendition of the Arabic language. The Philistines were closer in relation to the Phoenicians which also established the ancient Roman enemy of Carthage. The Hebrew tribes of Israel found themselves expelled except for a small remnant. And even in the case of a small remnant Jews came back in small doses and then larger doses after the Spanish Inquisition. Even the City of David – Jerusalem – began to grow in a Jewish population reaching the majority in the mid-1800s.
When an Arab or an Arab calling them self a Palestinian stands up and tells you the people designated as Palestinians are an ancient people they are lying or are deluded or both. The closest thing to ancient for the Arab refugees was 1948 when 6 to 9 (I never get the number right) invading Arab Armies lost to little Israel thus losing their honor in allowing a non-Muslim nation to exist in their midst. The appellation of Palestinian to these Arab refugees did not occur until after Arab Armies again failed to destroy Israel in 1967. The year 1967 is the date that Israel regained control of all of Jerusalem (Where the Jewish Quarter existed prior to 1948 incidentally) and all of Judea and Samaria (renamed West Bank via conquest by then Transjordan in 1948).
After the 1948 Arab-Israeli war Transjordan became Jordan because its monarch decided that the land east of the Jordan River was the East Bank and the land occupied by Jordan’s Arab Legion would be the West Bank. So where is the Justice in forcing Israel to accept creating a nation by international fiat made up of the descendants of Arab refugees created by Jew-hating Arabs and Muslims trying to destroy the Jewish State of Israel?
Gordon James Klingenschmitt, who was booted out of the Navy Chaplain Corps for praying in the name of Jesus, has initiated a petition to Congress to stay true to:
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Secretary of State should withhold United States contributions to the regularly assessed biennial budget of the United Nations for purposes of the General Assembly of the United Nations if the General Assembly adopts a resolution in favor of recognizing a state of Palestine outside of or prior to a final status agreement negotiated between, and acceptable to, the State of Israel and the Palestinians.
AND
Expressing support for the State of Israel’s right to defend Israeli sovereignty, to protect the lives and safety of the Israeli people, and to use all means necessary to confront and eliminate nuclear threats posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, including the use of military force if no other peaceful solution can be found within reasonable time to protect against such an immediate and existential threat to the State of Israel.
Resolved, That the House of Representatives— …
Chaplain Klingenschmitt sent the email below with all the proper links to sign the petition.
JRH 10/3/11
Muslim Apologist Lies on American Campuses
John R. Houk
© December 10, 2010
Ari Bussel writes about the deceit of pro-Palestinian elements on American campuses. I have nothing against pro-Palestinian elements presenting their case; however I do have a problem when the Israeli perspective is restricted or non-existent. I am extremely pro-Israel and hence tend to get extremely upset when a Palestinian half-truth is told to demonize Israel. Arabs that call themselves Palestinians and their apologists consistently fail to tell how these particular Arabs are taught to hate Jews from the cradle to the grave. The failure lay in that almost nearly from Israel’s modern inception the Muslims of the Middle East have attempted to destroy Jews from their hereditary homeland via Islamic Supremacist violence.
The new Israel that became independent in 1948 won their freedom to exist on a fraction of their land that Jews have been ejected from by force for more than a millennia. Even after many Muslim-Arabs fled in 1948 at the behest of Muslim-Arab invaders to save them from what the invaders thought would be a bloody carnage decimating losing Jews, these Arabs expect the right to return to land voluntarily left from. The Arab version is that the Jews forced the Arabs to leave land by force. Although some Arabs experienced the wrath of independence minded Jews, the reality is this was the exception more than the rule. The reality is that wherever Jews came under the control Arab armies they suffered atrocities. The reality is that the land occupied by then Transjordan in 1948 resulted in the forced expulsion of Jews from their homes (some of them ancient as in the Jewish Quarter of the Jerusalem Old City that later became dubbed East Jerusalem) while Synagogues and revered Jewish burial sites were desecrated. You can tell the difference between Jewish and Muslim sense of history. In 1967 when Israel regained their land from occupying Jordan, the Israeli government then allowed the Islamic Supremacist Waqf to maintain its authority on the Temple Mount allowing Muslim Mosques (Al Aqsa and Dome of the Rock) to stand. If Israel had followed the example of Muslim-Arabs established in 1948, Jews could have desecrated the two Mosques on the most holy parcel of Land to all Jews worldwide.
I could go on and on about how Muslim-Arab apologists have managed to prevail about portraying themselves as the victims. Three thousand years of Jewish victimization including the present day is being failed to be presented. Ari Bussel elaborates on this.
JRH 12/10/10
******************************
Israelis, Haters of Israel
Arab Film Festival
By Ari Bussel
Sent: 12/9/2010 5:10 PM
A two-day Arab Film Festival was held recently at the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. The event was part of a yearlong program of USC’s Arts and Humanities Initiative called Visions and Voices.
“Eyes on the Middle East” was focused on a very narrow area of interest: The Israeli Palestinian conflict. Dubbed, “complex and controversial” the “conflict” was depicted by “filmmakers on both sides, using cinematic media to express a variety of perspectives about the struggles and the quest for peace.”
More accurately, the sixteen hours of movie watching looked, with the exception of eleven minutes, at only one side: the Palestinian Narrative. During a “rebuttal” time, the true colors of the Palestinian narrative were shown, in their own words, from UNRA schools in Gaza. These, however, were cut short and were declared repeatedly to be “advocacy pieces” by Israel.
In short, Professor Jeremy Kagan, who did not try to disguise his own bias, has successfully exposed students and guests of one of USC’s premier schools to the most creative weapon in the Arab’s arsenal: Manipulating the world’s public opinion via the use of storytelling.
The Muslims have successfully engaged in deceiving the Western World. Deceit is permitted by their religion, even encouraged if it helps them attain their goals (of spreading Islam and reaching global dominance). It seems there was no one who excelled in it better, in recent history, than Arafat himself. He created the notion of a “Palestinian People,” of some “Nationhood” and craving for Jerusalem as its “eternal capital.” In short, he stole the Jewish-Zionist two thousand year history and rewrote it into his own narrative.
So successful was Arafat, that hardly even three decades later, the world itself stands saluting the idea of a Palestinian Statehood (in the boundaries of what was once known as Israel), with a Right of Return of millions of Palestinians that were kept in refugee camps throughout the Arab world, and with Jerusalem as their eternal capital.
For Professor Kagan, Palestine exists and is very real. Palestinians are hurting, and it is all because of the Israelis. The necessary outcome: Jews must return to their original homelands, Germany, Poland, the United States of America, and return Palestine to its original owners. To achieve this, to bring down the Goliath, cinema “can play a powerful role in increasing international awareness and understanding.”
The awareness is not of homicide bombings by Muslims, the steps taken by Israel to minimize the deaths of innocents when her enemies fire from within civilian population centers or the tedious, unending process Israel has undergone to ensure human rights equal for all and to maintain her democracy at a very high cost to her Jewish citizens.
The awareness stays away from brainwashing, hatemongering, glorifying terrorists and promising an afterlife rewarded with sexual pleasures to those who kill in the name of their god.
This “so-called” awareness dismisses anything that impressionable souls may find offensive and focuses instead on blood libels.
How was this conveyed during the festival?
Stories were shown in a continuum, taken out of context, without the proper background or timeline. Thus, we were exposed to Palestinian workers who are in Israel illegally, hiding during the night in the fields at a “nine star hotel,” being chased by the police. Interestingly, the construction site supervisors knowingly employed illegal workers.
The worker’s reasoning: There is no work back at home (in Ramallah), so they come to Israel.
Update: Since the movie, Arabs are no longer employed in construction. Foreign workers were brought from East Asian countries. They work hard and send much of their earnings to their families back at home.
Does that sound familiar to any American? Have we ever bothered to extend a hand to the thousands of homeless people in our streets, many who served our country, others who are mentally ill?
The next story was of two young men sent to execute a homicide mission in Tel Aviv. Their senders recruit others, but will not dedicate their own lives to reach that paradise full of virgins. There is a fence that needs to be crossed, separating “Palestine” and Israel, designed exactly to prevent such occurrences. As the movie shows, a fence can be very effective, but this one is torn open – allowing free passage.
As they cross, there is an Israeli waiting to take them to their destination. He and his girlfriend will be paid once the mission is complete – once murder and mayhem rule and innocent blood is spilled.
There is a human side to terrorism, a toll even, and the viewer becomes absorbed and sympathizes with the perpetrators, almost wanting to participate himself.
All the while in Israel, Jewish (Israeli) and Muslim (Arab) parents try to bring about peace by sending their children to a bi-lingual, bi-national school. The very premise of the school is faulted, for Arab Israelis are citizens who already possess equal rights in Israel.
At the school, children celebrate Hanukah and are taken to a mosque to pray. Worse of all, the teachers present completely opposing viewpoints: Israel’s independence day is celebrated by the Jews yet is a day of mourning for the Muslims – it is their “Catastrophe.”
Two life-changing moments in the movie, according to the filmmaker, were two friends, a Jew and a Muslim from the same class who go to the Jewish boy’s grandma’s house for lunch. There, over spaghetti and meatballs, the grandma, who is in shock due to a terrorist attack that happened earlier the day, asks very poignant questions of the Arab boy. Were the questions justified? Not to a boy that age, but they highlighted the real theater in which this experiment took place, where Palestinians will butcher the Jews just because they are Jews and in order to take over.
The other scene is two girls, best friends; a Jew and a Muslim from the same class. They go with the father of the Muslim girl to celebrate, and as they sit and eat, the Jewish girl, much older and wiser for her age, asks her friend’s father why is her friend never permitted to admit she is in love with a boy.
The father states that even when the daughter reaches the age of 25, if she decides to fall in love and dares to say anything, he himself will kill her and then go to the police station to confess.
This example of childhood innocence versus a backward society trying to force us back into the 7th Century should have been expunged from the movie, claim Arabs. Like any other reality that is unpleasant to western ears and eyes.
To highlight co-existence, there are wonderful examples of minorities living in Israel without promoting the right of such minorities to overtake the country. The country was founded as a Jewish state, in which minorities have full rights. Those who view the very founding of the nation as a catastrophe have a choice: to leave. To overcharge young impressionable minds of third graders with a conflict of one nation to destroy another nation is neither fair nor warranted.
Again, bring it close to home: Think about those aspiring to be Americans learning the language, celebrating our holidays and trying to become productive citizens. If they are actively engaged against the United States of America, their place is not here. [There are several recent examples of Americans aspiring to bring down the Government and establish Muslim Shaaria Law, including going and fighting against American forces in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.]
There was another story of a father and a son driving together. The father recognizes the reality in which he lives and submits to checks at roadblocks designed to prevent the free passage of terrorists en route to homicide bombings or carrying other terrorist acts. The son is influenced by his uncle’s “heroic” death (as a terrorist, Palestinian “Freedom Fighter”) and despises the father’s behavior.
The son wants to fight the brutal Zionist oppressors, to rid the country of them. He is tomorrow’s Shaid, martyr, ready for the struggle.
The filmmaker explained during a panel discussion the difference between him, a Palestinian, and the new generation. Interestingly, he is an Israeli-Arab from Northern Israel. But his observation is correct: The new generation is ready to fight to death until they destroy the Jews. It is a generation raised on hatred, in what they see on TV, hear on the radio, see and experience in hip hop videos and are brainwashed and trained in schools and summer camps.
It is a generation lost to hatred, a generation that will fight to murder, for the sake of rewards in the afterlife, for glorification after their deaths in classrooms and city squares, on stamps and in textbooks and stories.
The same filmmaker made another true observation – Palestinians are excellent storytellers, but their story has not been heard until recently. This very Film Festival is a testament to how effective story telling can be as a weapon, when the story is false yet it creates an illusion of authenticity and humanity.
The next full feature was damning to the Jews. It is a great movie about a sleazy politician who becomes Israel’s Minister of Defense. He and his wife move into a house his wife designed, bordering a lemon grove belonging to a widowed Palestinian woman whose family has been tending the grove for generations.
A decision is made to uproot the grove, due to security considerations vis-à-vis the safety of the Minister’s family’s life. Compensation is offered, which goes beyond what the law requires. The widowed owner, who depends on the lemon grove for her livelihood, decides to fight.
We witness a politician in all his rotten glory, from making opposing statements as may befit the situation, having a possible affair with his young aide, forcing his wife to submit to his career, and otherwise a story not much different from Desperate Housewives.
There is indeed a love affair between the widow and her lawyer, about half her age, and the story of a women fighting to save her lemons and the soul of the grove her father cultivated before her.
At the end the Israeli Supreme Court upholds the military court’s ruling, removing the requirement for any compensation but prohibiting uprooting the full grove, just trimming it down to nothing.
Here too there are several observations that are quite interesting and to which attention would not be normally paid: First, the Supreme Court hearing was before a panel of three women judges. In Israel, there is a woman on the Supreme Court (in fact, the Chief Justice is a woman) and there is also an Arab (non-Jew) as a Justice.
Also, although it is presented differently, only in Israel can anyone approach the Supreme Court, be the person an Israeli citizen or not, be heard and receive a fair trial. Moreover, unlike the USA, where a case may or may not be heard and the process is particularly lengthy, the Israeli Supreme Court hears cases constantly, one does not need to mortgage’s one very existence to be heard, and the Court has traditionally been supportive of action that would seem to be contrary to interests of the State.
Indeed, it is the very same court that has constantly upheld individual’s rights over those of the State, and much of the “Wall” has had to change due to its decisions under Aharon Barak, the previous Chief Justice.
The movie also highlights a closed, backward society in which a widow is threatened not to defile her dead husband’s reputation, although he has been dead for ten years—she must remain in solitude for the rest of her life.
There are themes, throughout the two day event, that are recurring: the notion of Paradise (and the confusion that murdering in the name of an All Merciful will bring one to a heaven full of virgins), lemon trees and oranges and the soul of the groves (replacing somewhat the olive trees, as no one seemingly is interested in peace any more), demolitions and taking over the houses and belongings of the Arabs, the notion of David, the victim, voiceless Palestinians against the Military Might of the Israeli Occupation Machine, WALLS, more WALLS, and the glorification of homicide bombings and generally breaking the law.
The next day started with a Palestinian whose grandfather was born in Jaffe either under Ottoman or British rule. She was born and raised in Brooklyn, and now she comes to Israel to first get her grandfather’s inheritance (bank account from the pre-1948 War to eliminate the Jewish State) and to claim his house back.
She stops at nothing, from robbing a bank (which happens to be Arab) that refuses to give her the money, disguising her lover-comrades to lying and threatening. Everything is permissible and no laws are to be observed as long as she thinks she it is right.
She ends up being deported back to the United States, but in the meantime succeeds in persuading herself and us that she was wronged, that Israelis must leave this country and return everything to the rightful owners. To what is it similar? To coming to New York and requiring that all the high rises, everything the eye can see, be left there and the residents leave, disappear. That Manhattan be returned to the Indians to whom they paid a mere $24.
The movie is full of overlaid juxtaposition of images of demolitions and Jewish immigrants and checkpoints and walls and separation, making us constantly aware the Jewish State was built over the remains of someone else’s country. That Israelis are interlopers without rights or justification for their existence.
Interesting, of course, are the scenes taken out of context, like construction sites that associate destruction rather than building and growth. This, indeed, is the difference between the Jews who made a desert flourish, dried the swamps, fought malaria and changed something barren into a living paradise and the Palestinians who want to ruin it all, turn it to ashes and bloodshed, into a large graveyard.
Most touching was the movie that compared the sorrow and grief by Israeli mothers whose sons and daughters were murdered in homicide bombings and other terror attacks with the Palestinian mothers mourning their sons and daughters, the Shaids, martyrs.
Something was missing however, like how the Palestinian children were killed in an explosion (a work accident while constructing rockets or booby trapping a residential area?) or by Israeli Settlers SHOOTING TO MURDER? The only instances known are those of Palestinians shooting dozens of bullets into passing cars or sharp shooters doing the same to murder Jews simply because they are Jews.
Alas, I am told, the reasons make no difference. The story is about mothers grieving for their lost offspring. And this is exactly the point: There is NO MORAL EQUIVALENCY BETWEEN THE VICTIMS AND THE PERPETRATORS. Israelis value life more than anything— theirs or their enemies. The Muslims place no value on anyone’s lives, not theirs and definitely not their enemies.
It is a culture of death vs. the sanctity of life, and the director has committed a great sin against humanity by comparing the grief and equating it.
These subtleties are so refined, the message so intertwined, that the Arab Film Festival managed to do a purely amazing job at relating a story, of a Palestinian people who are all good, who crave for nothing more than what is theirs, and who will find the courage from within to fight the evil empire to achieve justice.
What is wrong with this picture? The fact it is the height of deceit?
For me, the most amazing observations were the following two:
First, most of the movies were filmed in Israel, by Israelis and with the support and financing of the Israeli Government. One filmmaker explained it is the strength of Israeli society that allows itself to self-criticize. I see it as a great weakness in a society that allows self-hate to take over and refusing to see the harm in perpetrating lies.
Second, there was no presence, other than one individual who usually fights alone, like Don Quixote. After the Turkish Terrorist Flotilla, he managed to videotape a sixteen-year old courageous stance against a mob of Muslims, generating 800,000 hits and raising the morale of the Jewish People all over the world.
During the weekend festival, he managed to bring the short film, dubbed by the organizers “advocacy” and “propaganda,” and succeeded in having a few minutes of the film shown. That tilted the hands of justice from a total lie to a small semblance of balance.
Noticeably absent were representatives of Israel. The State of Israel vis-à-vis her local representatives, has focused on filmmaking and bringing filmmakers to Israel. Here, some of her best were showcased, all in a light that disgraced her very being.
Why were the Israeli representatives, both Government diplomats and others, not here?
For those who attended the Arab Film Festival and managed to get a glass-full of lessons in Palestinian suffering, as seen by Israeli eyes, created and crafted by Israelis and financed by their own government, the conclusion must have been simple: ISRAEL IS AT FAULT AND SHE RECOGNIZES IT.
I beg to differ: Israelis who hate Israel are at work while Israel stands idle and does nothing. This must change, if Israel is to survive the war to destroy her. Her enemies from within and without are winning battles day after day and soon the Jewish people will awaken, too late, to their own demise.
_______________________
Muslim Apologist Lies on American Campuses
John R. Houk
© December 10, 2010
________________________________
Israelis, Haters of Israel
The series “Postcards from America—Postcards from Israel” by Ari Bussel and Norma Zager is a compilation of articles capturing the essence of life in America and Israel during the first two decades of the 21st Century.
The writers invite readers to view and experience an Israel and her politics through their eyes, Israel visitors rarely discover.
This point—and often—counter-point presentation is sprinkled with humor and sadness and attempts to tackle serious and relevant issues of the day. The series began in 2008, appears both in print in the USA and on numerous websites and is followed regularly by readership from around the world.
© “Postcards from America — Postcards from Israel,” December, 2010
Contact: bussel@me.com
First Published November 21, 2010
