1. Allyson Rowen Taylor said:

Bill Levinson has written one of the most brilliant and helpful pieces , along with Lee Kaplan to expose the lies, hate, and calls for death that the ISM/PSM/Palsolidarity/Al AWDA/MECA/ groups promote. I suggest we all bombard the IRS, and the Homeland Security office , as well as every University that helps the promotion of martyrdom and the murder of Jews . Free speech at what cost? Plans to inflitrate Birthright Programs? Refuse and Resist trainings for destruction of Caterpillar showroom? DIvestment against Israel? Blowing us Buses? If these peole were to plan this type of conference against any other ethnic group they would be considered racist. However, when it come to bashing Jews, they get student funds, the blessings of a Christian University, and the protection of a country, that they hope, one day to destroy with the promotion of radical Islam.

2. James Emanuel said:

Bill, judging by Muaddi's previous post it appears that he has lost interest in continuing this argument with you. I don't blame him either. While he has proven his point and moved on, you've attempted to change the subject numerous times. Perhaps you're fishing for an opportunity to remain on top - I'm not sure. Regardless, I would like to hear a radio debate between the both of you. I believe that it would be rather amusing. In the mean time, I suggest that you pick up a copy of Edward Said's "Orientalism" (1978).

3. Hal Hartley said:

Oh please. When was Muddi ever interested in an "argument"? His sole interest was in silencing Bill Levinson, first by threats and later by ridicule, neither of which worked.

4. Ed D said:

Bill, I congratulate you on this brilliant piece in "settings ideals correctly". Not having seen the original piece by this OTHER man, I can conclude that he advocated all violence against Jews.

5. Shelley said:

Bill, your expose of this bunch, the whole bunch, is outstanding, even entertaining. What is really comical is that they think this is just another "Zionist" web site. Having taken the time to read this site for awhile, I can unequivicolly inform them that it's participants are nothing short of brilliant and that they are really in it over their heads. They may have figured this out by now, but I doubt it, hence their pathetic, immature responses, particularly the fake ones. Even I can spot them.

It's criminal that these Islamist groups are allowed to infect our universities and churches in North America. I hope your expose is just the beginning of the end of them. They have no credibility with anyone who has taken the time to try and understand the truth about the conflict between Israel and the "Palestinians". Meanwhile, the infection is spreading, and the time to stop it is running out.

6. Bill Levinson said:

James Emmanuel said, "Bill, judging by Muaddi's previous post it appears that he has lost interest in continuing this argument with you. I don't blame him either. While he has proven his point and moved on, you've attempted to change the subject numerous times."

He's proven what-- that the word "martyrs" means firefighters and other emergency workers who risk their lives because of their professions, as opposed to (1) the traditional meaning, someone who "witnesses" for a religious faith or other cause and might be persecuted or killed as a result, (2) a "martyr" like Rachel Corrie who acts as a human shield on behalf of the Palestinians, or (3) the new meaning (suicide hijacker or suicide bomber) that the word acquired after the Intifada and 9/11?

Please excuse me if I inferred #2 from his original article and the context of possibly having to die for one's beliefs. As I said previously, the Internet does not carry mental telepathy and I had no way of knowing he was REALLY thinking about a firefighter who gave his life to save a baby.

7. James Emanuel said:

He never stated that he wasn't referring to peace activists like Rachel Corrie. She just as well could be lumped into a "martyr" category with firemen and doctors. After all, like them she did dedicate her life to helping people - and died doing it. I'm quite confused over why you would assume that Rachel Corrie's actions were wrong. No Palestinian forced her to stand in front of that bulldozer. She chose to do it because she felt as if the actions of the IDF were wrong. Why are you drawing a parallel between Rachel Corrie's actions and terror activities? Her intentions were pure... she did not deviate from a her commendable principles... and she paid the ultimate price for doing just that. I can't think of any other word to describe her than "martyr". A "hero" would entail that she saved someone, would it not? Perhaps you are being too narrow with your understanding of the word.

8. Bill Levinson said:

James, I never said that Rachel Corrie was an evil person or a terrorist; she falls into category #2, a nonviolent person who dies while acting as a human shield. Young adults in their late teens and early 20s have far more idealism than good sense and I do not think the ISM, PSM, or whatever it calls itself next week or next month should be allowed to recruit more Rachel Corries without plenty being said to discourage Georgetown University students from participating. ISM leader George Rishmawi had in fact made a very disturbing statement about it being "useful" to get foreign activists like Rachel killed in confrontations with the IDF, and a Hamas terrorist said openly that she was more useful to "the cause" dead than alive.

I also find it very disturbing that her so-called "friends" in the ISM stood and watched her get run over but not one lifted a finger to pull her out of the construction vehicle's path. GU students, parents, and alumni need to know about that so Rachel Corrie is the LAST idealistic peace activist whom the ISM will EVER stand up in front of a bulldozer to die so the Palestinians can write propaganda with her blood.

9. Bill Narvey said:

To Bill Levinson,

You have outdone yourself.

Whether you are dealing with a Nadeem Muaddi, some other pro-Palestinian supporter or just your regular left wing ideologue, it always seems to turn out the same.

You as a pro-Israel advocate posit your views to an internet blog on a topic pertaining to the Israel -Palestinian war or radical Islam and you are met by comments from pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel advocates attacking your views and positing their own contrary views which invariably stay on their ideological and revisionist history message.

It is a situation of talking at each other and not engaging in dialgue.

Invariably inviting an open debate is ignored or arrogantly rejected as being a waste of time as these pro-Palestinian anti-Israel advocates arrogantly impute to the pro-Israel side, their own intransigent narrow thinking.

Unfortunately these narrow single minded pro-Palestinian anti-Israel ideologues are doing just fine in the public forum spewing their lies and disingenuous propaganda through a tolerant accomodating Western media, Western universities that hail themselves as the bastions of free speech and through the internet.

They know full well that engaging in an open debate serves your interests and not theirs for they would be the ones who would be at the greater risk of being exposed for the disingenuous propagandists that they are.

While it would be great to hear you in action Bill, I highly doubt that you are going to get any takers to debate you from the pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel and left wing crowd.

10. James Emanuel said:

Humor me:

ISM = International Solidarity Movement = adovcates for citizens of the international community to enter the West Bank & Gaza for the purpose of nonviolently resisting illegal Israeli occupation. Obviously they use internationals in order to help publicize the struggle to people throughout the world that may have otherwise remained ignorant. Also, the IDF is less likely to attack internationals than Palestinians. Why? Because we all know that attacking internationals would only bring bad press upon the IDF.

PSM = Palestine Solidarity Movement = student organized movement advocating the divestment of funds from companies that do business with Israel. Modeled after the university driven divestment movement targeting South Africa's apartheid regime in the 1970s and 1980s. Does not formally advocate for members to travel to the West Bank and/or Gaza in order to nonviolently resist Israel's illegal occupation of Palestinian land. They seem to only be concerned with achieving divestment.

Is it possible that some students are members of ISM and PSM? Yes. Is that problematic? Probably not. Having similar acronyms does not equal having the same mission and/or organization. PSM also stands for the popular periodical "Play Station Magazine" - however, there is no correlation. Do you see what I am driving at?

Making it seem as if the upcoming PSM conference at Georgetown will be used as a recruiting ground for ISM activists is false. Just because ISM people may attend does not mean it is their conference. Remember, the conference is open to the public. That means even you may attend.

11. Shelley said:

James Emanuel, this is from ISM's website today:

"ISM lends support to the Palestinian resistance...through the following activities:

...challenging crippling checkpoints...confronting tanks and demolition equipment...."

Clearly, you cannot say with certainty that Rachel Corrie chose to confront that tank that day. She may have been ordered by ISM to go there. In any event, she did go there at least knowing that ISM supports this kind of resistance. And they continue to support it TODAY even though it cost Rachel Corrie her life.

Could Rachel Corrie have rationally deduced that confronting this bulldozer would end her life? I don't think so as it had never happened before. Now that it has, I find it repulsive and irresponsible that ISM is still employing this tactic. I can only conclude that they want more "martyrs".

12. James Emanuel said:

Shelly:

A) What do things written on the ISM's website have to do with the PSM?

-and-

B) What is wrong with "challenging crippling checkpoints...confronting tanks and demolition equipment"? After all, the IDF is there illegally. Furthermore, these are all non-violent tactics of resistance. If I'm not mistaken, many Israeli settlers non-violently resisted the IDF when it came to remove them from their illegal settlements.

The point is, there is nothing that can stop them because they aren't breaking any laws.

13. Bill Levinson said:

James, re: "What is wrong with "challenging crippling checkpoints...?" Why don't you go to a U.S. airport and try to help unknown persons bypass the security checkpoints that screen passengers for weapons and explosives? You will find out very quickly from your interaction with law enforcement personnel what is wrong with "challenging crippling checkpoints" that are designed to stop terrorists.

And yes, helping people who may be terrorists bypass security checkpoints IS breaking the law (see above) and so is interfering with another country's police forces or armed forces.

Oh yes, and thank you for contradicting Mr. Muaddi on what he meant by "martyrs." You brought him back to human shields (my opinion, for which he threatened to sue me) like Rachel Corrie from firefighters, emergency service workers, and so on.

14. James Emanuel said:

Bill:

A) Security checkpoints at airports are deemed legal. However, checkpoints within the West Bank are deemed illegal by not only the Palestinians - but international law as well.

-AND-

B) I didn't contradict Muaddi. Soldiers and firemen are types of "human shields". It doesn't appear that he was trying to sue you over that. On the contrary, it appears that he was stating that he will sue you because you were making the indirect assumption that he supports terror. Human shields are not illegal - or wrong - as long as the "shield" (if you want to call it that) is willing to participate. Again, there were plenty of "human shields" at the settlements the IDF were dismantling this past summer.

15. Laura said:

ISM itself should be considered a terrorist organization by our government, the same as hamas, hezbollah, al qaeda.

16. Bill Levinson said:

More from our good friend Nadeem Muaddi. He seems to have an ambiguity problem with his columns, like this one: http://www.ramallahonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2024 "Suicide Bombing: Not the Issue

"Though I am not offering a justification for the practice of suicide bombing or any other violent act, I am explicitly stating the source of this violence. Since Sept. of 2000, 3,805 innocent Palestinians and 1,017 innocent Israelis have been murdered as a direct result of the violence stemming out of Israel's illegal occupation of the Palestinian land and its people."

So out of one side of his mouth, he says he is not offering a justification for suicide bombing or other forms of violence but, out of the other, he says Israel's "illegal" occupation of the land is responsible for the violence. He continues,

"Israel violently oppresses the Palestinians, while Palestinians are sometimes forced to violently resist this oppression. While some frustrated observers are quick to succumb to the notion that this crisis is an equation without a solution, I disagree. It is clear that the only effective solution to the conflict is to end the occupation. All other issues, including suicide bombings, are derivative."

This paragraph justifies the Palestinians' "violent resistance," which consists almost exclusively of murdering civilians as opposed to using violence on military and police personnel who are allegedly perpetrating the violent oppression. It then dismisses suicide bombings as a non-issue.

Now for another act of obfuscation in the same opinion piece, Mr. Muaddi writes, "This, however, is proven false solely by the fact that the first Palestinian suicide bombing occurred in 1994, 27 years after the illegal Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip first began. In attempting to understand why pro-Israeli activists would want to cloud the issue of the occupation with one of its symptoms - suicide bombing - only one likely conclusion can be drawn. Perhaps they fear that any violations of international law and human rights that Israel openly partakes in will draw worldwide attention, or God forbid, possibly even criticism."

He cleverly "forgets" that, even if the first suicide bombing took place in 1994, it was preceded by countless prior acts of terroristic violence like the Ma'alot school massacre and the Munich Massacre (early 1970s).

17. Dan Barkye said:

James, what you're doing is splitting hairs, b/c you, in Nadeem footsteps, employ semantics, while we, here, talk about real life, something dynamic that doesn't recognize such subtle differences as you point to them, which may be, or even are, correct and accurate.
It's sheer naivete to think that *they*, all of them, from Fatah, thru Aksa Brigades, to Hamas and Islamic Jihad and al-Qaeda, think of the term "martyr" as "one who dies as a lamb for a cause", as of something that even remotely reminds suicides and suicidal types of action, something pure, innocent and radiating self-sacrifice in a peaceful, surrendering way.
They think, consciously or unconsciously (and this pt is important, very much so: consciously or unconsciously), of "martyr" as one who blows himself in a Sbarro pizza shop when it is full w young mothers w their babies in their cradles and carts, as one who blows himself near a bus carying school children in Iraq, and so on and so forth and on it goes in utter, absolute extremism that leaves no room to any other type of action, b/c their credo, their motto, their flag, as expounded in literally thousands of similar actions, is: "It's mine or it's no one else's!", "My way, or No way!", "All, or Nothing at all!"

No use to talk w and to them, no use at all, under any circumstances. I don't believe one iota of what they say. The Islamic culture is a culture of deception and delusion, self-addressed and externally. We simply talk two different languages, incompatible by nature.

For me, the Jewish revolutionary movement, modern and progressive to boot, the Zionist Movement, in its two oposite factions, the Revisionist and Socialist, is the caravan that is passing by while the dogs are barking. We went thru the valley of death and came out stronger EVERYTIME it happened. This is fact, and no other nation can boast of such fate and history. This caravan, my caravan, our caravan, is passing by, brothers, and will pass by no matter what, no matter who. By God!

Dan

18. Abu Abubu said:

James Emanuel, what planet do you come from? Obviously a sympathiser and liar for the ISM.

At the Ohio State Palestine Solidarity COnference Adam Shapiro was recorded stating that PSM and ISM are the same thing, a consortium of groups that advocate the end of Israel:

www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11010

As for Edward Said, he was a member of the Palestine National COuncil that dispatched the Munich murderers to kill Israel atheletes in 1972. Said once said, "Facts don't matter, only emotions matter. Write your own history." That fits nicely with the paradigm of the ISM/PSM and Arab dissembling. In other words, "lie to get what you want." Said was cenured by the faculty senate at Columbia for throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers and was proven by Justice Weiner to have lied about being a Palestinian, since he was born in Egypt (like Arafat).

As for Orientalism, the book is junk sophistry. Said claimed Europeans cannot be experts on Middle East history or culture because they look at it from a "Colonialist" perspective, as if genetics play a role in the study of history. What he really mean was Arabs report history based on tribalism and not facts, the same mentality that keeps the war roiling against Israel forever as they teach bullshit to their children about Israel and the West.

I suggest Emanuel you go to google and type in ISM + comcast and read about the ISM. They dissemble by saying they are peace activists, but are a war support group for the PLO and terrorists. Peace activists donot call terrorism "legitimate resistance" and do not take sides. The ISM is clearly a Palestinian front group of AMerican and European Anarchists and Communists.

As for Muuadi's article referring to firefighters, Emanuel can I offer you for the price of $100 a full halfownership of the Brooklyn Bridge or some swampland in Florida soon to be a luxury high-rise hotel?

Please stop supporting terrorists who callthemselves "peace activists."

19. Jaya Chemayel said:

How do you tell when an ISM activist is lying?

When he says he is a "peace activist" and supports "legitimate resistance."

By the way, 98% of the Palestinian population of the PA is under Palestinian rule so not occupied.What these jerkoffs meanis all of ISrael is occupied and must be dismantled to create another shithole Arab state. Gaza shows what it will be like.

20. James Emanuel said:

It's a shame that you all believe this way. I won't try to change your points of view because you are all probably past repairing. But I will say this: I'm ever so thankful that you only represent the views of a marginalized minority. Such right wing Zionist hate speech does not represent all of our people. Israelis are much more sensible than this. For the most part, we understand that it is settlement supporters like yourselves that is holding Israel back from becoming all it can be. Interestingly enough, I am willing to wager that the majority of you are not Israeli citizens either. Such sadness.

21. Bill Levinson said:

James Emanuel, you are right about my not being an Israeli citizen. I am a Yankee infidel pig and kafir, whom the Islamofascists will kill or enslave with every other infidel and kafir on earth if they get their way. The war is not between Israel and the militant Palestinians but between Civilization and Islamofascist barbarism and chaos.

In case you hadn't noticed, the dictator of Iran is talking about the Mahdi (Messiah or Expected One) and he claims that his followers see an aura or halo around him when he speaks. He is also trying to acquire nuclear weapons and he has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map." However, in an elaborate public relations ritual, he showed the Israeli flag (on a sphere) falling through an hourglass in which the United States flag already lay broken on the bottom.

As far as I am concerned, Israel and/or my own country are justified in taking this guy out with a conventional (and possibly nuclear) first strike. His actions-- a lethal threat coupled with display of the imminent means of carrying it out-- would probably constitute "reasonable cause" for a preemptive response under civilian law, and I suspect the same applies under international law and custom.

22. Terry Thompson said:

"Such right wing Zionist hate speech does not represent all of our people." "Our people" is what? Self-hating Jews? Moonbats? Morons?

Note also his casual use of lies such as "illegal checkpoints" and "illegal occupation." Don't you love it when terrorist apologists get all weepy about the "checkpoints" and "occupation" but just stand by and shrug when their pals commit *real* war crimes and violations of interenational law?

23. Dan Barkye said:

Say it again, pls, James! "Beyond repair"? We? I take it as an insult. Mind yourself, your words, and behave, man! The fact that you have something to say and you can do it, something you won't be able to do under the benevolent rule of the IslamoFascist mullas, doesn't give you the right to insult!

But since you said it, let me take pride in it, infinite pride. Pls, let me explain why I am so proud of being in the extreme right of the Zionist Movement, why I say that you're splitting hairs in the martyr debate, and what are really the ISM and PSM.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Poor beyond repair me - In all revolutionary movements, only people like me, and the like of me, kept the course of the movement from deviating into a defeatist path. I'm aware that I am only a small part of the Jewish body politic and nation, but it is my voice that keeps the flag flying and the hope flickering in the hearts of the John and Jane Does of ours, of the Itzhacs and the Iakovs, of the Sarahs and the Rivkas among us. It is us who blow the winds in the wings of our right and legitimate battle. Recognizing my role as being what I described, I will not stray from my convinctions. We are the ones who pull the cart of our fight, laden with the few who fight it, and followed by the passive masses who don't have the stamina, or the drive to fight. Every liberation movement has those three distinctive parts of participants: The first line fighters, the field fighters, and the masses behind them, conscious or not, approving or not, of the fight.
~~~~~~~~~~~~

Martyr? In the Islamic Arab lingo context?

Exam question.
What is a martyr for Islamists?

A firefighter?
A paramedic?
A scout trying to cross an old lady the road amid heavy traffic?
A young man wearing a tuxedo and black tie, laden w explosives laced with nails and roll balls?
A daisy in the sun?

Of course I know the answer: NOT the daisy, NOT the firefighter, NOT the paramedic, and NOT the scout. Guess who! The deluded, bewildered, young martyr of theirs.
Sacrifice yourself by killing in one hit tens of innocent human beings, women, babies, children, men, in Russia, in Iraq, in Israel, in Sudan, in the Phillipines, in Thailand, soon in Sinkiang, i Indonesia, in USA, in Spain,in Britain, in France (chasing away the firefighters and the ambulance crews from houses on fire and old people nurseries), in Holland or Belgium, I don't remember (killing the movie personality, who was an antisemite, but they decided that he had to die b/c they thought he insulted Mohammad and his God, Allah), in all of Yougoslavia provinces, and tomorrow in Canada, in New Zeeland and Australia.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As for the ISM/PSM confusion you are stuck in.
It's obvious that you do not have a clue as to what are the means of illegitimate, or shunned, organizations to propagate and advance their agendas. It has a name: Relay Organizations. If you have, then somehow you're not reading the right page.
Relay Organizations do not appear to be connected to the main body behind the curtains that rules them and guide them, not in cadres, not in leadership, nor in budgetting. They are front faces that the main body uses behind the stage, hoping to destract the attention from themselves, in "peaceful" activities and speech, and so have a respectable aura. Essentially, it's a mask, not more, not less. A well, and deliberately designed mask.
Subversive, illegitimate, activities will not stand a chance of survival w/o such front organizations. Why do you think that any "liberation" movement tries so hard to distance itself in public from its military arm? ETA, IRA, Fatah, etc., all have distinct politic and military bodies that are kept apart, specifically for the cultivation of such a public respectable image. All leaders of all the political arms chant the same refrain: "I am not connected in any way to the military arm. They are an independent body, one that takes no orders from me. What they do is w/o my knowledge and consent". You believe it? I do not!

24. James Emanuel said:

I hear Bill Levinson's real name is Rachel Golem. Do you know what a Golem is? A living creature with no soul. Now I understand. I finished.

25. Shelley said:

James, the war will not stop with the dismantling of the settlements. Nothing short of the destruction of Israel and the elimination of the Jews will satisfy the majority of the Palestinians and the Arab nations.

James, I live in Canada and I am not a Jew, or a Christian for that matter. In Canada, as in all Western nations, there is a well-organized and belligerant network of pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel activists who are gaining in popularity. They are infiltrating our Universities, our churches, our municipal, provincial, and federal governments. They are, in the main, Muslims. Some of these Muslims are Islamists. The Islamists object to any support our government and citizens give to Israel.

They seek to diminish Israel by whatever means they can use, through propoganda, demonstrations, conferences, boycotts, and divestment. Their business is the demonization of Israel and they are very good at it.

Yes, it is sad, but not in the way that you think it is.

26. Bill Levinson said:

James wrote, "I hear Bill Levinson's real name is Rachel Golem. Do you know what a Golem is? A living creature with no soul."

Actually I'm a fan of Cordwainer Smith's Menschenjager (Man-Hunter), an autonomous fighting machine from the Ancient Wars that was something like a golem. As one of these machines describes itself in the story Mark Elf, "I am built to identify German thoughts and to kill all men who do not have true German thoughts." (The American Kaskaskia Effect was even worse; it killed everyone of normal or superior intelligence, along with the Menschenjagers' electromechanical computers although animals and people with VERY simple minds could survive it. Needless to say, the Kaskaskia Effect would suit Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's purposes perfectly, as it would destroy the entire human race and leave Islamofascists to inherit the entire planet.)

Anyway, I heard that an Israeli weapon designer built a Menshenjager and programmed it to "detect Islamofascist thoughts and kill all persons with Islamofascist thoughts." The machine was deployed along the border to stop terrorists but the terrorism continued unabated. The Menschenjager was, in fact, observed standing completely idle while several bomb-toting terrorists walked right in front of its guns. Finally an Israeli general grabbed the weapon designer and screamed, "Detect Islamofascist THOUGHTS? Of course the &_(&#)!! machine doesn't do anything!"

Anyway, here are two more problems for the Palestine Solidarity Movement to deal with. http://www.israpundit.com/archives/2006/01/nadeem_muaddi_l.php and http://www.israpundit.com/archives/2006/01/palestine_solid.php

27. Dan Barkye said:

I can understand different points of view on different subjects. I cannot understand blindness professed and utter credulity by otherwise perfectly intelligent and somber peersons. James et al, are you here? Reading? Reflecting?

28. kuhnkat said:

James Emanuel,

why thank you for showing that you think we are all morons here.

Those checkpoints and bulldozers and other horribly un humanitarian actions you are whining about are all known to be necessary measures to stop smuggling of weapons and explosives used to murder INNOCENT ISRALEI CIVILIANS INCLUDING MUSLIMS AND ARABS!!!!!

Fascist MORONS like you need to remember that some of us lived through the Soviet Propaganda campaigns and STILL RECOGNISE THAT TYPE OF ACTIVITY!!!

If you seriously believe any of the crap you are unloading here you are stupider than I think you are!!!