10/09/2002 - Entry #32 - 11th of September Celebratory Special!
It's that time of year again, folks. Kids are going to bed excited, parents are putting out glasses of sherry and mince pies for Father bin Laden, and the sound of Boeing 747 jet engines can be heard on a faraway sleigh. It's 11thOfSeptember Eve!
All the commemorative stuff is being wheeled out, as you'd expect. It's understandable, of course, a lot of people lost their lives. To those people I give a nod of acknowledgement (it's the closest I'll get to grief, let's face it). But sadly the whole thing will inevitably be used to push more 'patriotic' guilt onto people and spur the impending war on Iraq on a little further.
Speaking of which, I see Bush has been reeling out the same bizarre gibberish he did after the WTC attack last year. Did anybody see the speech he gave to students of some American University a few weeks ago? I can't find a news article about it, sadly, so I can't quote directly, but he essentially reiterated rubbish about how "They don't understand freedom. They hate seeing us free, with our nintendos and TVs. They hate it." Seriously, that's as close to a direct quote as I can get. It's the same stuff he said a year ago, and it's no more true now than it was then.
"They hate what America stands for. They hate our religious tolerance. They hate our freedom of speech. They hate freedom of the press. They despise freedom. They despise freedom."
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020328.html
See what I mean? If that weren't bad enough, First Lady Laura Bush chipped in with a stunning insight into the psychology of middle eastern terrorist factions with this bewildering statement: "The brutal oppression of women is a central goal of terrorists." I wouldn't really mind this, but the media march in lockstep with these kind of ridiculous statements, perpetuating the fallacious logic and basically denying the real reasons for these kind of attacks.
The media and politicians are, naturally, one of the prime sources of information regarding current affairs, and dictate to a large extent how people will feel, and indeed react, to certain situations. When they're lied to with ludicrous claims like those above, you have to wonder just how many people know that these terrorists are in fact lashing out at US foreign policy. Now, I know this is merely my personal belief, and I guess we might never know the exact, precise motivation behind the 11th of September attacks, but I can't help but think it lands squarely in Israel. Obviously that's always been a major factor in the al Qaida's motives, but I think it's much more important than people realise.
Now, I'm not pro-Palestinian, before that crops up. In the case of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I'm pro-Israeli. The Palestinians have been offerred virtually everything they could possibly hope for on more than one occassion, and they've only responded with more violence and terrorism. They've lost absolutely any political sympathy they once had, and anything that happens to them is their own fault, quite frankly. So on that issue, I'm pro-Israel. But on a more global (and speculative) level, I'm fairly anti-Jew. I really don't want to use the word anti-Semitic, because it implies I just hate all Jews, for being what they are, which really isn't the case. I dislike the Jewish Lobby's political designs, and their conspiratorial power. You're now probably thinking of the term "Zionists," but again that conjures implicit beliefs that I don't necessarily hold, so I'm loathe to associate myself with it. That said, it's probably the most accurate description to how I feel, so I guess I'll have to settle for it. My problem is simply the fundamentalist Jewish belief that non-Jews are inferior. Sounds like a paranoid delusion, doesn't it? Well...
"Just the Jews are humans, the non-Jews are no humans, but cattle"
- Kerithuth 6b, page 78 Jebhammoth 61
"Sexual intercourse with non-Jews is like sexual intercourse with animals"
- Kethuboth 3b
"The non-Jews have to be avoided even more than sick pigs"
- Orach Chalim 57, 6a
"The birth rate of non-Jews has to be suppressed massively"
- Zohar 11, 4b
"As you replace lost cows and donkeys, so you shall replace non-Jews"
- Lore Dea 377,1.
"The non-Jews have been created to serve the Jews as slaves"
- Midrasch Talpioth 225
Take particular note of the last one. "Created to serve the Jews." So the Talmud explicitly states that non-Jews are nothing but tools to achieve a goal. It's this that worries me. "But how many Jews can possibly believe that kind of fundamentalist dogma?" you ask. I don't know, to be honest. How many people take the Bible literally when it says homosexual intercourse is unnatural as decreed by God? All I can say is "Mwi'unno." But certainly in theory, I think it's a concept with legs. I'm gonna run with it, pretty much for the sheer hell of it. I doubt it'll be hard to pick holes in this rant (I'm looking at you, S_O), but it might bring a few points to light also. I'm genuinely concerned with the possibility of an incredibly strong 'Zionist' Jewish Lobby acting behind the scenes, pulling strings in US foreign policy and making enemies left, right and centre. Allow me to elaborate:
Many people argue that political lobbies are counter-productive and unfair because they represent specialised interests over general interests. Should minorities have an equal voice in governmental affairs or should their very minority status be reflected? Lobbies are an incredibly effective means for select political causes to gain power. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is considered the second most powerful lobby in Washington, despite Jews only accounting for 2% of the American population. That's a highly disproportionate voice in politics. As a result of AIPAC's work, the United States gives 3 to 5 billion dollars a year to Israel, roughly one sixth of all foreign aid. That's around $1000 for every Israeli citizen, for anyone who's interested.
But money isn't the only transaction. It's no secret that Iraq and Israel aren't the best of friends, and this can only be part of AIPAC's agenda in the States. I mean, let's face it, Iraq really doesn't pose anywhere near enough of a threat to warrant immediate action. American 'propaganda' would have you believe the Iraqis are on the verge of nuclear weaponry, but reputable sources seem to think otherwise. The Bush administration recently stated that a siezed shipment of aluminium tubes on its way to Iraq is strong evidence that they're close to developing nukes. It's a claim with a basis in reality, but absolutely no grounding in logic. Anyone out there know how you make weapons-grade uranium? If not, I'll tell you. After the Gulf War, UN inspectors reported that Iraq had spent billions of dollars on two approaches to making weapons-grade uranium. The first involved constructing giant "calutrons." It's a pretty archaic technique which the major nuclear powers abandoned in the 1940s. The calutrons were destroyed and the Iraqis moved onto the second method, which is most definitely the modern technique of choice. This one involves a cascade of aluminium centrifuges which spin at extraordinary speeds. Iraq brought in centrifuge experts from Germany, and employed German and Swiss metallurgists to help construct a cascade. Sadly, they spoilt virtually all of the uranium, failing to shape it properly or otherwise maltreating it, and experts predicted that it would take them at least 6 years to achieve weapons-grade uranium via the centrifuge process. Now we're expected to believe that they're closer to nuclear weaponry despite apparently starting from scratch? Bear in mind there were no cascades operational a year ago, and they only just recently attempted to buy more aluminium tubes, according to Vice President Dick Cheney. Come to think of it, why is nobody pursuing the suppliers of said aluminium tubes? You'd think it'd be something of a priority to track them down and ask them precisely what they're doing. No, I'm afraid I don't quite buy the idea that Iraq are close to producing nukes. It's a fairly unequivocal fact that America's close support of Israel is leading to an increase in foreign conflict as Israel's enemies fight back against not only Israel, but also the allies who provide it with financial and military support. Beginning next year is a deal to supply Israel with 80 F-16I fighter planes. Clearly this kind of support makes the US a target of terrorist retaliation.
When the World Trade Centre was bombed in 1993 by Ramsi Yousef, US investigators openly admitted that the purpose was to punish the United States for its support of Israel. Though the bombing attempt was unable to achieve the objective of toppling the towers, the airplane hijacking last year was successful in that regard. The fact that the actual motivation for the World Trade Centre attack was admitted in the first attack and then later replaced by fictional motivations in the second attack, such as those offered by the Bush family, says a great deal about how the political climate has shifted so drastically that truth cannot be openly spoken.
In June, 2002, CNN reported that Yousef's original plan involved attacking Brooklyn neighbourhoods, telling his alleged accomplice Abdul Rahman Yasin that "I want to blow up Jewish neighbourhoods in Brooklyn." He eventually decided it would be more effective to blow up the twin towers because "the majority of people who work in the World Trade Centre are Jews." So far no official report has been released to verify the statistical accuracy of that statement, though anti-Semites claim that few Jews were killed in the attacks.
A video tape released in May 2002 repeats identical sentiments. In it, bin Laden directly states that "The war is between us and the Jews... Any country that steps into the same trench as the Jews has only herself to blame." He has been making these statements for more than five years though the media pretends to be unaware of their contents despite reporting them. There are plenty of reports on every news network that detail terrorist attacks on Jews, but does anyone really recall them being linked with the World Trade Centre incident? I certainly don't. If all this is common knowledge, then I apologise.
Whilst I've already admitted to being pro-Israel as far as Palestine is concerned, Israel is far from having a 'clean' reputation, in my books. They're one of the world's major arms dealers, and have supplied weapons to China, Iran and Nicaragua, all against the US's political wishes. Slightly more insidious is their spying on America (most famously Jonathan Pollard), and their attack of the USS Liberty. Doesn't paint the most wholesome picture of Israel, does it?
It's certainly true that the cause of an awful lot of Middle Eastern terrorism is the direct result of America's support of Israel. Even Mullah Omar offered advice with the words "There were reasons behind these great deeds. America should seek to remove these reasons -- and it knows them well -- so that such accidents do not reoccur."
That said, it surely can't be said that the terrorists are any better. Whilst terrorism is often the last resort and only viable means for a group to attempt to achieve its political ideologies, it's still largely frowned upon. Whether that's simply because of its overt nature, juxtaposed against seemingly more acceptable covert dictatorship, I honestly can't say. History tells us that today's terrorism may well be the seed of tomorrow's revolution. After all, the founding fathers of the United States most certainly fit today's definition of a terrorist, but their guerilla conspiracy of rebellion is hailed as the birth of freedom now. How do the writings of those founding fathers compare to the 'ramblings' of Osama bin Laden?
"God forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, & always, well informed... what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms... The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is it's natural manure."
- Thomas Jefferson to William S. Smith on Nov. 13, 1787. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Julian P. Boyd, vol. 12, p. 356 (1955).
It seems reasonable to consider the ideas of people willing to take action instead of merely spouting rhetoric, even if their cause is unpopular. You don't have to agree with them, but it is to your advantage to understand them instead of accepting the media's marginalisation and dismissal of their ideology because they are concerned with difficult topics that the media would rather not be considered in the public consciousness. I'd much rather read up and learn about the motives of terrorists than immediately dismiss them as 'evil', as George Bush has done. I can always dismiss them later, if need be.
"The American government, we think, is an agent that represents the Israel inside America. If we look at sensitive departments in the present government like the defense department or the state department, or sensitive security departments like the CIA and others, we find that Jews have the first word in the American government, which is how they use America to carry out their plans in the world and especially the Muslim world.
The presence of Americans in the Holy Land supports the Jews and gives them a safe back. The American government, in a time where there are millions of Americans living on the street and those living below the standard of living and below the poverty line, we find the American government turning toward helping Israel in occupying our land and building settlements in the Holy Land.
The American government is throwing away the lives of Americans in Saudi Arabia for the interests of the Jews. The Jews are a people who who Allah cited in his holy book the Koran as those who attacked prophets with lies and killings, and attacked Mary and accused her of a great sin. They are a people who killed Allah's prophets - would they not kill, rape and steal from humans?
They believe that all humans are created for their use, and found that the Americans are the best-created beings for that use. The American Government is driving America to destruction and those same ones have no doubts about America being a superpower in the next decade.
So, we tell the American as a people, and we tell the mothers of soldiers, and American mothers in general, if they value their lives and those of their children, find a nationalistic government that will look after their interests and not the interest of the Jews."
- Osama Bin Laden, 1998
"You keep talking also about collective punishment and killing innocent people to force governments to change their policies; you call this terrorism when someone would kill innocent people or civilians in order to force the government to change its policies. Well, then you were the first one who invented this terrorism.
You were the first one who killed innocent people, and you are the first one who introduced this type of terrorism to the history of mankind when you dropped an atomic bomb which killed tens of thousands of women and children in Japan and when you killed over a hundred thousand people, most of them civilians, in Tokyo with fire bombings. You killed them by burning them to death. And you killed civilians in Vietnam with chemicals as with the so- called Orange agent. You killed civilians and innocent people, not soldiers, innocent people every single war you went. You went to wars more than any other country in this century, and then you have the nerve to talk about killing innocent people.
And now you have invented new ways to kill innocent people. You have so- called economic embargo which kills nobody other than children and elderly people, and which other than Iraq you have been placing the economic embargo on Cuba and other countries for over 35 years...
The government in its summations and opening said that I was a terrorist. Yes, I am a terrorist and I am proud of it. And I support terrorism so long as it was against the United States Government and against Israel, because you are more than terrorists; you are the one who invented terrorism and using it every day. You are butchers, liars and hypocrites."
- Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, 1998
In early March the Bush administration released a document to the press outlining its plans to consider using nuclear weapons in attacks against seven countries it considers enemies. The purpose of this was to show that it no longer acknowledges the taboo against using nuclear weapons and that it is willing to use any level of force in order to maintain control over countries that do not comply with the demands of the US and its allies.
This type of thinking emphatically demonstrates a lack of appreciation for the consequences of nuclear war but is not a new problem that can be ascribed to the general stupidity of the current president. In 1976, George Bush Sr. made the remarkable claim that nuclear war is winnable.
With the widespread availability of unaccounted nuclear weapons from the former Soviet Union, it is fairly probable that a nuclear attack by the United States would result in a major US city being nuked in retaliation. Even the threat of a US attack might result in a pre-emptive nuclear attack against the US to show that targeted countries will not turn the other cheek when destructive intentions are declared against them. This is especially likely when tensions between the United States and the Middle East remain high as a result of US support for Israel.
Somewhat amusingly, it has also been suggested that if Iraq were attacked by the United States, Iraq would retaliate against Israel because the US is too far away to be harmed by conventional means and Israeli interests are the cause of the United States aggression. This is what happened in 1991 during Operation Desert Storm, when Scud missiles were launched at Israel though Israel was not directly involved in the United States attack.
Osama bin Laden told Americans plainly that their freedom would be suspended, but did not say who would do it.
"America will never taste security and safety unless we feel security and safety in our lands and in Palestine," he said.
"They will not feel safe until the troops of the United States of America withdraw from the Muslim holy places."
http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/meast/10/07/ret.peres.attacks/index.html
The hastily passed 'Patriot Act' quickly seized an opportune moment to undermine the last of the remaining rights in the land of the once free. Almost immediately, thousands of cameras were deployed with cutting edge technology in New York City, Washington, and other major cities. The witch-hunt continued as the government began collecting previously private information such as phone records, tollbooth passes, food purchases, library books, and everything else stored in computer systems, all gathered without judicial oversight. This came even after several people leading these new policies were caught actively attempting to supress press coverage of ideas unfavorable to their plans.
Leading this effort is John Ashcroft, an insane Judeo-Christian picked for the role because he was so politically inept that he lost an election to a dead man and therefore eagerly complies with the agenda assigned by his handlers. Ashcroft is the front man for Operation TIPS (Terrorist Information and Prevention System), a system that encourages citizens to spy on and report one another to authorities for perceived violations of law.
Privacy advocates have long warned the public that any major catastrophe could be used by the government to justify the unleashing of extreme surveilance measures. By working with the media to generate fear completely out of proportion with reality, the government has been able to easily encroach upon civil freedoms.
While advocates of government control take advantage of the generated fear to pass laws requiring biometric registration such as retinal scans and fingerprints, the concept of utopia as a police state is hardly a new one. In 1791, the fantastically soulless Jeremy Bentham published plans for a revolutionary prison called Panopticon. The idea was to perpetually observe prisoners, but never allow them to know when they were being watched. This model prison was premised on the idea of total and forced obedience through persistent visibility - an idea that has become popular in settings such as factories, schools, and office environments, all of which are modeled after this prison configuration.
As Michel Foucault meticulously explained in Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, any Utilitarian approach ultimately requires the destruction of the individual spirit so that conformity can be forced in compliance with the demands of the current ruling authority.
David Hume wrote: "it is seldom that any liberty is lost all at once." This phenomenon of gradually constricted freedom is nearly imperceptible to most people, like lobsters being cooked in increasingly heated water. Still, the end result is the same; perhaps even worse given the lack of general awareness for what has happened.
While people will continue to wave their flags and obsequiously display slogans of prostration, the spectacle of martyred patriotism seems little more than another manufactured distraction to keep people from understanding the reasons for what happened and why they will continue to happen. The reasons are simple, yet the public is encouraged to turn away from comprehension.
Could it not be said that by carrying out a carefully orchestrated retaliation against the United States government for its support of Israel and immoral behavior in the Middle East, Osama bin Laden masterfully provoked the US to destroy the supposed freedom it claims as its distinguishing factor among nations. Though not a noble or respectable act, does his fulfilled prophecy demonstrate a profound understanding of how America really works?
I, of course, don't necessarily believe everything in this entry. You ought to know me by now. I'm merely extending one side of the argument, for consideration. I heartily acknowledge that it's a fairly one-sided rant, and that it would be very naive to expect a perfect government. On top of that, I absolutely hate conspiracy theories. By their very nature they're very hard to believe, and I tend to steer clear of them, and certainly wouldn't blame anyone for being skeptical. But I'd say that the prospect of a 'Zionist' conspiracy might be more plausible than we'd be willing to admit, and is probably a lot more dangerous than localised jihads in the Middle East. Again, I'm not necessarily saying it's true, because I'm probably as hesitant to believe it as you are, but it's definitely food for thought.
Oh, ha. In other news, China has banned all its citizens from accessing Google. The only credible reason I've heard so far is that searching for Chinese President Jiang Zemin's name on Google returns a Falun Gong website in the first page. Yahoo does not return said website, and thus has not been banned. What did I tell you? China re-heally hate that spiritualist group. :)
Anyway, mull over this entry. I'm going away for a while, so this is your last entry for now. I'm not sure when I'll be back, to be honest. Not too long, I guess. Feel free to keep checking up on the site, though. :)
Have fun.
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