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Arthur Herman, writing recently on OpinionJournal, says that Winston Churchill understood that the Jews are the bedrock of Western tradition.

A student of history, Churchill came to feel that Judaism was the bedrock of traditional Western moral and political principles-and Churchill was of a generation that preferred to talk about principles instead of “values.” For Europeans to turn against the Jew, he argued, was for them to strike at their own roots and reject an essential part of their civilization-”that corporate strength, that personal and special driving power” that Jews had brought for hundreds of years to Europe’s arts, sciences and institutions.

To deny Jews a national homeland was therefore an act of ingratitude. Churchill became a keen backer of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which broached the idea of creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. As a friend to Zionist leader Chaim Weizman, and as colonial secretary after World War I, Churchill made establishing such a homeland a matter of urgency. “The hope of your race for so many centuries will be gradually realized here,” Churchill told a Jewish audience in Jerusalem during his visit in March 1921, “not only for your own good, but for the good of all the world.”

That Churchill was a key figure in the establishment of modern Israel in 1948 can’t be denied, but Mr. Herman’s hagiographic essay is somewhat lopsided in its portrayal of Churchill as a supporter of the Jews and Israel from purely altruistic motives. Winston was, first and foremost, a man of the British Empire, and the interests of the Empire trumped eveything else for him.

As a reader points out on the response page, Mr. Churchill was not always so gracious about Jews. There are many examples but the first letter cites a recent lost Churchillian piece on the subject of discrimination.

More to the point, Herman apparently authored a volume called, “Gandhi and Churchill,” so I am very surprised that the blatant geopolitical rationale of the Jewish State is not mentioned. When the Empire took over the Presidencies and Territories from the East India Company in 1858 (can you imagine-India was the source of corporate ‘outsourcing’ since the subcontinent was a private corportation), the first project was to reduce communication and transportation times between Home and There.

In 1869, the first step was taken in Suez. But, the region was so unstable and so anti-Western that the Empire had to take further steps to bring order to the poor benighted masses laboring under local despots and thugs (a wonderful term named after an interesting cult group in Northern India that did not appreciate the incursion of the white man into Bharata). Mind you that the area had been a political football throughout the 19th century what with Crimea, the Iranian expedition, and various other actions requiring various fleets, admirals, generals, and gallants against the Turk and what not. WWI brought the program to a head. General Allenby, among others, criss-crossed the region slicing up the Ottoman armies and local resistance.

The ultimate goal of the empire was to put in place a new polity in the area to stabilize the region with Western Oriented Gentlemen who knew which end was up and were beholden to the Age of Reason and Enlightenment. Since Churchill was against slicing up the Empire, any love he may have had for the Jewish Nation would be more for their deportment to Palestine than anything else. San Remo and Balfour conventions, at the fall of the Ottoman Empire, were as much about planting a European (read: British) center of capitalism (those Jews and money) than anything else.

From my days in International Studies at the University of Washington, the received wisdom of the then dominant paradigm was that the opening up of a Jewish Homeland was along the same lines as fomenting the Muslim Hindu conflict or inter-caste/community conflicts-divide and rule. In fact, much of the current legacy of Israel/Palestine is from the Mandate-the British Administration. I am forever awed by how much Israeli legal bureaucratic structure resembles Modern Indian bureaucracy-The Raj. The buildings are the same, the “work to rule” is the same, and the incredible viscosity of getting anything done is the same.

No, from Herman’s examples I hear and can visualize the Conservatives and the Liberals debating a la Rhodes or Baden-Powell (the architects of colonialism and its bureaucracy) politely debating instituting the political importance of a new British colony, the Jewish Homeland, on the merits of 1000, 2000, or even 3000 years of history or the Abrahamic claim to the Cave of Makpalay in Hebron (bought for 400 pieces of silver and given to Isaac who gave it to Jacob/Israel). What a hoot! Winnie the Pooh only cared about Empire and history was its tool. Since when did the House of Commons pay attention to history other than to rewrite it?

About the images. Both were taken in Prague, 2005. I went with Susan who was on business to the annual meeting of the Claims Conference (the agency that has been fighting for reparations from the German and Austrian governments to material claims from WWII-yep, still going on). These pictures are taken on the edge of Jew Town. The first image is looking down the street into Jew Town. The dark building to the left is one of the oldest synagogues in Europe-the Maharal’s shul from the mid 13th century. On the right, in the foreground, there are a series of very nice building facades from about 1910, built during the economic spurt Prague experienced before WWI. These buildings were part of a world’s fair sort of deal, very swank, and have just been renovated during the post communist age. The one on the far right, is filled with couples from the different social classes of Prague-husbands and wives face each other silhouetted with their headgear/hairstyles, the coats of social station, and some sort of symbol of their class/station between them. Of course, at the top are the nobles, noblettes, and symbols of their station. A gorgeous building with delicate painted decorations restored with artistic grace and loving skill.

Prague: entering the Jewish section

The second picture shows the lowest floor above the doorway to the building. I looked all over for a reference to the Jews of Prague, who lived about 50 meters to the left. Susan spotted the frieze. Here is the Jewish couple with bent postures, hawk noses, and a pile of money between them. Yep, that’s how the Europeans saw the Jews in 1910. Either send them back home (Palestine) or find some other permenant solution.

Palestinian Media Watch reports,

Just a day after Israeli and Palestinian leaders at the Annapolis peace conference pledged to negotiate a peace treaty by the end of 2008, Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority continues to paint a picture for its people of a world without Israel.

An information clip produced by the Palestinian Authority Central Bureau of Statistics and rebroadcast today on Abbas-controlled Palestinian television, shows a map in which Israel is painted in the colors of the Palestinian flag, symbolizing Israel turned into a Palestinian state.

The description of all of the state of Israel as “Palestine” is not coincidental, and is part of a formal, systematic educational approach throughout the Palestinian Authority. This uniform message of a world without Israel is repeated in school books, children’s programs, crossword puzzles, video clips, formal symbols, school and street names, etc. The picture painted for the Palestinian population, both verbally and visually, is of a world without Israel.

The fact that this campaign continues before the ink on the Annapolis agreement is even dry appears to contradict the central promise of the Palestinians at the Annapolis conference: that Israel has a right to exist.

You can view the video on PMW website.

Here are five provocative and thought provoking essays by Asia Times essayist Spengler.

Israel, the hope of the Muslim world

They made a democracy and called it peace

Why Europe chooses extinction

Christian, Muslim, Jew - Franz Rosenzweig and the Abrahamic Religions

What the Jews won’t tell you

The man I am sitting with in the photo below, taken in Jericho last Saturday, is Bassem Eid, the founder and manager of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group. Mr. Eid is a Muslim and a member of the largest Arab tribe in the West Bank.

Right to left: the author, Bassem Eid, Ruth Lautt.

Mr. Eid formerly helped monitor and investigate claims of human rights violations by the Israelis. After the founding of the Palestinian Authority by the Oslo agreements, Eid noticed that no one was paying attention to HR violations by the PA or Palestinian militias. So Eid founded the PHRMG in 1996.

PHRMG’s latest revelations of human-rights violations by the PA and Hamas were released yesterday, entitled, “Fatah and Hamas Human Rights Violations in the Palestinian Occupied Territories from June 2007 to October 2007″ (PDF online).

No one else is doing the work that Bassem Eid and his small number of assistants are doing. He was arrested by the PA in the 1990s, but was held only a day. The fact that his tribe is the largest in the West Bank - and therefore has the most muscle to retaliate against anyone who might harm him - is almost certainly the only reason he is still breathing.

I’ll post a summary of our conversation with Mr. Eid soon.

The news today is that Israel fired missiles into Gaza to kill Mubarak al-Hassanat, a top-ranking Hamas member directly involved with firing Hamas’ homemade Kassan rockets into southern Israel. Hamas has been firing the anti-personnel rockets into Israeli towns and countryside with regularity for years. I went to Israel on Oct. 15 and returned just tonight. Two days ago I visited the town of Sederot (sometimes spelled Sderot) and nearby Ashkelon. Sederot is a little more than a kilometer from Gaza:

That’s me standing on the southern edge of Sederot. Gaza is only a few hundred meters on the other side of the tree line behind me. Six rockets fell on Sederot a few hours before we arrived. Here are the remains of three of them.

There is a large rack of exploded rockets outside the town’s police station. They have a diagram explaining how the rockets are made.

These are purely anti-personnel rockets. They lack the explosive power to penetrate reinforced buildings. The warhead section is loaded with pellets or small ball bearings intended to do nothing but shred flesh, propelled by only a couple of pounds of high explosive. However, if they do hit an ordinary building (as a rocket did this week) they can damage it substantially:

Israel has tethered three blimps around the northern perimeter of Gaza with automated warning sensors and systems.

The town official who showed us around said it is optically based. When a launch is detected, every warning speaker in the town - there are a lot of warning speakers - announces “red dawn” over and over. Townspeople have only 20 seconds to seek shelter before the rockets hit. The town continues to build shelters such as this one:

On Oct. 22, I took a video of the rack of recovered detonated rockets. This rack shows only six months worth of rockets launched. People in Sederot and surrounding areas have died from these attacks, including children. While “only” six rockets fell the day I was there, 20 were launched against Israeli civilians on Oct. 23, and six more the day after that.

In light of the recent rounds of rocket attacks, Israel is considering sanctions against Gaza in addition to selectively targeting Hamas officials responsible for the attacks.

A committee headed by Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai has recommended that electricity supplied by Israel be cut off to northern Gaza during certain evening and nighttime hours. The city of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, and environs, comprise the area from which most of the Kassam rockets are fired. The committee also recommends cutting down Israel’s supply of fuel and goods to Gaza.

“We have no alternative other than to employ these measures,” Deputy Minister Vilnai explained Thursday on Army Radio. “The situation cannot continue in which we supply the Palestinians with all their needs as usual while they fire at us. Gaza is a hostile entity, and this is a gradual disengagement.”

Some 62.5 percent of Gaza’s electricity, and all of Gaza’s fuel, including diesel, gasoline and natural gas, comes from Israel. Another 28.6 percent of Gaza’s electricity comes from Gaza’s power plant, which depends on Israeli fuel.

Before this latest round of rocket attacks, Israeli officials told my group that since Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza last year, all humanitarian supplies provided to the Gazans have been provided by Israel, except four truckloads that came from Jordan.

Hamas, of course, has explicitly stated that its goal is the destruction of the state of Israel. After the disengagement from Gaza by Israel, the Gazans elected Hamas to rule them. This was less a vote for Hamas than and electoral rebellion against the Palestinian Authority, whose corruption under Yasser Arafat was so complete that after Arafat died, his successors in the PA were forced to campaign against his legacy as much as against Hamas. Fighting broke out between Hamas and the PA, which the PA lost. There is now no PA component to Gaza’s political life.

My group - nine other Methodist ministers, plus one Catholic nun and a Presbyterian pastor - also spent some time inside Palestinian-controlled territories in the West Bank talking to Palestinian figures. More to come. (Linked at OTB’s Traffic Jam.)

One hundred thirty Muslim scholars have sent a letter to Pope Benedict and other Christian religious leaders calling for competition between Islam and Christianity ” ‘only in righteousness and good works.’ “

“If Muslims and Christians are not at peace, the world cannot be at peace. With the terrible weaponry of the modern world; with Muslims and Christians intertwined everywhere as never before, no side can unilaterally win a conflict between more than half of the world’s inhabitants,” the scholars wrote. …

Using quotations from the Bible and the Koran to support their message, the scholars told people who relished conflict and destruction that “our very eternal souls are” at stake “if we fail to sincerely make every effort to make peace and come together in harmony.”

So let our differences not cause hatred and strife between us. Let us vie with each other only in righteousness and good works.”

The letter was signed by Muslim scholars from around the world, including the Algerian religious affairs minister, Bouabdellah Ghlamallah, and the grand mufti of Egypt, Ali Gomaa.

These are very fine sentiments and the letter should be warmly received by the Pope and the other Christian leaders. Let me propose, however, that sentiments (by either faith) will not do the job. Both sides much adopt and teach true “think and let think” habits among their faithful. This will be much more difficult for Muslims than Christians. Freedom of personal conscience and personal religion will have to be adopted by Muslim societies before the sentiments expressed by the scholars can become reality.

Example: while the scholars were writing their letter, the secretary-general of the Assembly of Muslim Jurists in America (AMJA), Dr. Sheikh Salah Al-Sawy, issued a fatwa declaring “that marriage between a Muslim woman and a non-Muslim man is forbidden and invalid, and that children born of such a union are illegitimate.” The fatwa says, among other things,

“A person must have some buffer between him and [deeds] that will bring him to perdition. A person about to commit suicide may expect society to intervene in order to safeguard his right to live. This is why shari’a prohibits marriage between a Muslim woman and a non-Muslim man - because it is the first step towards religious suicide, whether [it is the woman’s] suicide or that of the children she will bear. This [form of] suicide is much worse than actual suicide, which also [involves] the murder of [unborn children]. The woman can expect Muslim society to stand between her and this fate, thereby safeguarding her faith and her salvation in the world to come.”

Not that at least some Christians don’t need to look in the mirror when it comes to intolerance:

Slash-and-burn columnist Ann Coulter shocked a cable TV talk-show audience Monday when she declared that Jews need to be “perfected” by becoming Christians, and that America would be better off if everyone were Christian.

Coulter made the remarkable statements during an often heated appearance to promote her new book on advertising guru Donny Deutsch’s CNBC show “The Big Idea.”

In response to a question from Deutsch asking Coulter if “it would be better if we were all Christian,” the controversial columnist responded: “Yes.”

“We should all be Christian?” Deutsch repeated.

“Yes,” Coulter responded, asking Deutsch, who is Jewish, if he would like to “come to church with me.”

Deutsch, pressing Coulter further, asked, “We should just throw Judaism away and we should all be Christians?” She responded: “Yeah.”

Coulter deflected Deutsch’s assertion that her comments were anti-Semitic, matter-of-factly telling the show’s obviously upset host, “That is what Christians consider themselves: perfected Jews.”

A transcript of their conversation about Jews appears at the link. It must be read to believed. Ann Coulter is probably the most religiously uninformed public figure I have ever heard of. I do not consider myself a “perfected Jew” as a Christian, nor can I help but gagging at the idea Ann expressed (see transcript) that Christianity is the “Federal Express” way to heaven compared to Judaism. Before Ann or any other Christian starts talking about “perfecting Jews” they need to pay attention to perfecting Christians, for which there is very way long to go.

Foxnews.com has more about the scholars’ letter.