Search Results for: Jews

An End to Holocausts, Hiroshimas and 9/11s?

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(Excerpt): We are all conditioned to believe that being “right” about ourselves, our politics, traditions and religions, is more important than living and letting others live in peace. We have to be “right” about so many things—about who the bad guys are, who started it, who was at fault, what happened, who meant well and who didn’t, who did what to whom, whose ideology or form of government or religion is superior….
(Excerpt): The truth is, in this confusing world, it’s difficult to find agreement even amongst our best friends and those most “like” us, about what life is all about—what we’re doing here, and how best to look upon the world, ourselves, and one another. Even the greatest scholars realize that the more they know, the more they know they don’t know. This is why, in every conflict, humility, acceptance, mutual respect, support, and yes, forgiveness, are the wisest guides to being “right.”
(Excerpt): Wars cannot prevent catastrophes; war itself is a catastrophe, as attested by all those whose lives are touched by war. Soldiers and soldiers’ families are always catastrophically exploited by war. Ninety percent of the victims of war are civilians. We who so proudly march into war have no idea what future injustices those wars will inevitably loose upon innocents on all sides. Continue reading →

Are Hiroshima and 9/11 Morally Equivalent? Obama and Wright Disagree.

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(Excerpt): Although I support Obama’s candidacy wholeheartedly, I disagree with him here, preferring Reverend Wright’s logic. With Wright, I see no moral difference between a weak, fallible organization (or individual) setting off a suicide bomb in a marketplace, and a big, powerful, fallible nation dropping an atomic bomb on a civilian population—except, of course, that powerful nations have more options. (Excerpt): War doesn’t prevent injustices. War itself is always a grievous injustice to all involved in it. Most soldiers and their families are catastrophically exploited by war. 90% of the victims of war are civilians. Unfortunately, when citizens manipulated into vindictive indignation over present and past injustices march into wars, they rarely consider all the many future injustices which that war will inevitably inflict on both sides.
Whether or not we act violently, injustices occur. Whether we fight wars or rise up together in peaceful protest, some people will suffer unjustly, some will die. The Jews died in the Holocaust despite the war effort and perhaps also because of it. Europe is now united; tyrants come and go. No matter whether we choose peace, terrorism, or war, we cannot prevent all injustices. But we can avoid adding to their sum by accepting compromises, listening to all sides, and steadfastly rejecting the gravest injustice of all—war itself. (Excerpt): Too often, we prefer being “right” to living and letting others live in peace. We think we have to be right about so many things—about who’s the bad guy, who started it, who’s at fault, what happened, who meant well and who didn’t, who did what to whom, whose ideology or form of government is superior, whose religion is true, who is weird and strange and cultish and backward and disgusting, who gets to be in control, who gets to be the one with the gold who makes all the rules…. (Excerpt): When we insist on being ‘right’ rather than making the compromises necessary to live together in peace, we are making the choice of terrorism/war over freedom. What is freedom, if not the freedom to live one’s life and pursue one’s dreams in peace? Continue reading →

Roadmap to Peace

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Peaceful political arrangements in the Middle East are a good place to start, but real and lasting peace will come only when, one-by-one, we in the United States and Iran and Iraq and China and Israel and Palestine and everywhere else, we Christians and Jews and Muslims and Buddhists and atheists alike, first humbly strive to embrace peace in our own hearts, endure injustices without adding to their sum, renounce violent resolution of conflicts, and offer to all others in this and every nation that same forgiveness, acceptance, and love we so long for ourselves (the universal “Golden Rule.”) Continue reading →

Rachel Corrie Uncensored, Bullies and Martyrs, Lambs and Lions, AIPAC, and Messianic Voices Off

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(excerpt): Rachel Corrie had no affection for bullies. Burning with a wish to stand up to power and deadly violence, she seemed born to resist injustice. I think she would have been just as eager to oppose Palestinians attacking innocent Israelis, were she drawn to their plight first. (Excerpt): I was saddened to think that some who cherish holocaust narratives like The Diary of Anne Frank would try to censor Rachel’s inspired voice and words for partisan reasons. I doubt any peaceful Jew seeing this play would urge such censorship. (Excerpt): Peaceful Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other Americans are often so aggressively intimidated by their own extremist factions that they rarely speak out publicly against the vengeful actions, bloody rhetoric, and sheer barbarism of all they see, on all sides. Caught within the context of a violent century’s heightened emotions, most moderates—peaceful Jews and Christians and Muslims and citizens of all nationalities everywhere—are too frightened to say “Enough” against even the extremist voices within their own groups. (Excerpt): As long as demagogues and partisan extremists freely pressure and intimidate moderates, worldwide anti-Islamism, anti-Semitism, and anti-Americanism will continue to grow. And if the hot-blooded AIPAC successfully pushes extremists in America and Israel into another bloodbath, this time against Iran, the potential for anti-Semitic, anti-American, and anti-Islamic blowback upon moderates in all these groups everywhere will be as terrible as the cataclysmic impact upon the direct victims of the war. (Excerpt): Extremist Jewish leaders preaching the wisdom of ten-eyes-for-an-eye, and depicting Israel as a tiny beleaguered island within a vast sea of murderous Muslims all wanting to kill Jews and “erase Israel from the map” are as repellently manipulative as extremist Palestinian leaders claiming to be merely a defenseless band of ragtag refugees confronting the combined wrath of the world’s largest and most powerful military forces, or American Christian-extremists sounding the alarm of American invasion by rapacious outsiders and infidels, or American patriots bristling with nuclear arms , self-righteously claiming to be the victims of nations working frantically to develop even a single one. (Excerpt): Violence, or violent extremism, or terrorism—that is, resorting to violence to resolve conflicts—turns out to be “the problem” itself, and not, as many have tried to persuade us, any particular ideology, ethnicity, religious tradition, or national affiliation. The burning question is always: who is committed to non-violent resolution of conflicts, and who isn’t? Continue reading →

The Best (and Only) Way to Solve Our Terrorism Problem

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(excerpts): Consider: what if an imagined, vastly more powerful Muslim alliance had invaded and occupied the United States five years ago? We wouldn’t be “generating vigorous, sustained condemnation” about an occasional American suicide bomber way over in Iraq, consumed as we would we be already, here at home in America, with simple day-to-day survival, with burying and mourning our million dead brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters, with caring for five times that million beloved wounded, with desperately fleeing the violence along with the millions of our fellow Americans abandoning their homes and trying to pick up the pieces of their lives and dreams anywhere else….
Just who is it, Mr. Friedman, who is “erasing basic norms of civilization” by terrorizing—Islamic suicide bombers, or our own invading and occupying armies?
Both, of course.
I have no doubt that many extremist Muslims are every bit as crazy as some of our very own home-grown terrified fundamentalist Christians and Jews who stand ready to nuke whole Islamic nations right now with no more questions asked. Yes, there are violent, ignorant, vengeful people everywhere, and this is a big big problem. And adding more violence, suffering, anger, and fear to all of their lives is being done to what good purpose? (Excerpts): Friedman argues that it’s up to Muslim leaders to “remove this cancer” of terrorist violence. No. It is up to western leaders to remove this cancer of military-backed hegemony, this cancer of “might makes right,” this cancer of trampling the rights and traditions of smaller and weaker peoples.
Unless Mr. Friedman and I can somehow agree upon which of our children and grandchildren we’re willing to trade for a steady flow of cheap Middle Eastern oil, and which of our cities we’ll willing to exchange for bigger earnings for American stockholders, we should support leaders capable of shifting our nation and the world into to a new era of non-violent global cooperation, for the sake of all in both the east and the west. Continue reading →

Here's A Blogger's Theory on Our War That's Worth Giving Serious Consideration To…Thank You Corvuswire

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I know that there are a great many peace-loving, non-racist Jews in Israel and the U.S. who would welcome a non-apartheid government with equal civil rights for all people in Israel/Palestine, and who reject war as a way to resolve conflict as thoroughly as they reject terrorism…. I believe that Ahmadinejad has said he wants to wipe the current war-mongering/anti-Islamic regime off the map; he explained to my satisfaction that he was mistranslated–he didn't mean harm to peaceful Israelis who see Palestinians as part of a universal brotherhood…. And I also think we Americans still hope to solve our oil problem by controlling the flow and price of Iraqi (and Iranian?) oil, and that's one reason the oil companies and neocons behind Bush pushed him (sad patriotic misguided dupe that he is) into going to war in Iraq in the first place…. I think some fundamentalist Christian beliefs about Armageddon and the Apocolypse (they are too unloving to give my attention to) are behind much of the support for anti-Islamic-pro-Israel lobbying in America too….I'm sorry to think also that much of the American mainstream media is controlled by people who think like this article describes…. Sadly, most Americans think like this too, because of the brainwashed and brainwashing media…. When America asked, “Why do they hate us?” the media did not tell us…. Our truly inadequate educational system where history and civic curricula are determined by ignorant locals who are equally brainwashed must also be transformed to a more global, caring message, not the empirical, right-makes-might message, the America-is-better-and-thus-must-rule message many schools put out now…. I think all of the forces cited in the article (click on “more” below) are pushing us all to get into a catastrophic war with Iran for all of the reasons given…. But we won't, because we will all join hands around the world and our peace will overcome them….Thank you, Corvuswire, whoever you are, for your courage in writing/sharing your thoughts, most of which I agree with….I hope that the AIPAC/Anti-Defamation League will see that I love Jews but don't love hateful messages…. I believe in non-violent, caring, humanitarian solutions to world problems…. Please read this short piece (click on “more” below) and after you read it, write to njcpace@gmail.com to tell me what you think of it? Thanks…. Nancy Pace Continue reading →

Let’s Trade in “Realpolitik” for More Realistic (Idealistic and Moral) Politics

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(Excerpt): I just read a hasty translation of the remarkable letter written to President Bush by Iran’s President Ahmadinajad, the neocons’ newest target for demonization. In his passionate letter, this bold spiritual leader outlines his perspectives about international relations in terms of spirituality, religion, philosophy, history, and politics, courteously pointing out the west’s moral inconsistencies and asking many hard questions, while offering specific suggestions and proposals for world peace and for resolving conflicts.
(Excerpt): I wonder whether President Bush will brush off his handlers’ warnings and actually dare read the letter? For just as Americans risk war by listening only to the current angry neocon drumbeat against Iran, so can Mr. Bush choose to risk peace by hearing out Mr. Ahmadinajad. Already the letter has been spun and skewed by war advocates as the usual self-serving drivel. I see it as a profound peace offering by a rising spiritual leader.
(Excerpt): I have no respect for the Bush-Cheney-Rice strategy for solving our energy crises by controlling the price and flow of oil through Mideast political and military coercion. It’s not nice, and has been far too pricey (not, of course, for oil companies) and has never really worked, especially when you count the whole cost of our lengthy dalliance with Saddam Hussein.
(Excerpt): I’m not alone in my distaste for global bullies, either. No one likes schoolyard bullies who throw their weight around, thinking only of themselves, not caring who gets hurt so long as they get what they want. Powerful bullies may prevail in the short run, may even gain opportunistic allies eager to share in the spoils of easy wars against weaker opponents. But soon enough, everyone on the playground finally gets sick of being pushed around, and all gang up to confront the bully.
And the bigger the bully, the harder he falls. (Excerpt): Far from offering Americans security and safety, belligerent approaches to international relations create only more enemies, drain our coffers, strain our political freedoms, distract our leaders from solving our real problems, demean our integrity, lower our national pride and morale, ruin our reputation, weaken our alliances, threaten our trade, and do nothing at all to make us safer than we were before. We can stand up for our traditional rights and freedoms without insisting that hard, practical considerations and the advancement of our own expansionist national interests are the sole principles of our interactions with others. Continue reading →

Ninety Lives … For What They’re Worth

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(excerpt):Since when do traditional American values speak only for American citizens? Since when do our philosophies declare all men created equal, with Americans just a little more equal than all the rest? Since when does Jesus love the little children of the world, especially American children? (excerpt): News analysts have two jobs, to both reflect and create public attitude. This Sunday’s weekly news roundup created and reflected total American indifference to the suffering of human beings in the Middle East. Our otherwise distinguished news analysts were so busy interrupting each other over the fall of DeLay and the immigration gridlock in Congress that they couldn’t spare a moment to mention the fact that last week, the equivalent of a whole Shiite village was blown to hell by terrorists, as they gathered to pray to the very same God America prays to, even if we call Him by a different name. (excerpt):Americans claim to have democratically decided to throw $500 billion of our hard-earned taxpayers’-dollars—not to mention our darling children and grandchildren—toward the goal of bestowing freedom and democracy upon our beloved Iraqi friends. Or has a tiny crackpot group of neocon warmongers managed to misuse our democratic processes in order to herd American citizens around like sheep? Perhaps this nutty fringe group of extremists think that when Iraq is safely “democratized,” then they can similarly ride herd on the Iraqis in order to commandeer their oil. (Excerpt): If not, if we so love the Iraqis, then why couldn’t we come up with just one silent moment of programming time during three hours of major-network weekly news roundups to show the minimum of respect for the ninety murdered souls on whose behalf we’re supposedly fighting and dying? Continue reading →

Another Holocaust?

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When Hitler painted all Jews everywhere with his hate-filled brush, many people were caught up in his scary “logic,” and the result was a Holocaust. Today’s Jews should be the group least susceptible to the rampant prejudice that is currently damning all of Islam with sweeping fear-based generalizations. The lesson of the Holocaust for all of us is never again should anyone buy into paranoia and bigotry concerning a whole people, culture, religion, ethnicity, or lifestyle. /
Yet, here we go again. /
If you don’t like some Muslims (or Jews or Chinese or Hutus …) well, that’s human. But if you hate and fear most (Muslims) because you think they’re all pretty much the same, that’s ignorance and prejudice. /
It’s simply not true that most Muslims are quarrelsome, narrow-minded, blood-thirsty fanatics out to dominate the world. Yet I have recently heard that repugnant argument for war from Jews and Christians alike. /
Of course we’re all frightened, Muslims too. But violent extremists are found in every culture. America had its own bloody civil war, not to mention lynchings, attacks on civil rights marchers and labor unions, gang wars, office and schoolyard shootings, rapes, widespread child and domestic abuse, crime, and murder. We have our own home-grown steady supply of trigger-happy nutcases, D.C. snipers, Unabombers, and Oklahoma terrorists, all continually egged on into fear and violence by faithless media demagogues and opportunistic politicians, in just the same way that Hitler once terrified the German citizenry into insanity. /
FDR gently reminded us that the only thing we have to fear is: fear, itself. During this difficult time, may we have cool heads, loving hearts, open minds, and an abiding faith in the golden rule, so that we may respect and support all of God’s beloved children, everywhere. Continue reading →

Left, Right, Left, Right…Wrong?

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I received a letter from a reader of the conservative political persuasion who has kindly and thoughtfully taken the time to outline our political differences. In hopes of continuing our dialogue, I herein reprint his letter, followed by my response. Continue reading →