First Amendment or Israel First?

by Mohamed Khodr

"Americans must find the courage, the same courage they possessed to overthrow the occupying power of England during the Revolutionary war to stop Israel's "tentacles of rage" in our internal affairs and ensure that our same beloved freedom and liberty applies to the occupied Palestinians. Only when Palestinians are free from the lies and guns of Israel will our nation have peace and freedom of fear."

"We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the civilized world. No longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men." -- President Woodrow Wilson

A Boston mosque finds itself guilty until proven innocent of unsubstantiated allegations it must "disprove" in order to justify its existence to the few self-proclaimed protectors of tolerant Boston. Rationally it would seem safer for Boston to have Muslim "terrorists" congregate in one mosque for easier FBI monitoring than be dispersed throughout Boston in secret "cells" plotting their "radical Islam" take over of the city and establishing a "Radical Caliph as Mayor."

What Americans don't know about Islam and Middle East has squandered our taxes and killed our youth. If it wasn't for Oil and Israel, the Middle East would remain a forgotten desert.

How does this relate to the opposition to the Boston Mosque? One only needs to look at the crusading players involved to see the common thread of Israel supporters---Boston Herald, Boston Fox affiliate, David Project, Citizens for "Peace and Tolerance" (CPT), Pat Robertson, along with media support by Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe, Steve Emerson, Daniel Pipes and the usual "suspects" of Israel firsters.

The Boston Herald was owned until 1994 by Rupert Murdoch, Chairman of News Corporation, which also owns the Fox network whose Boston affiliate "followed with broadcasts on the charges". Patrick Purcell, the paper's publisher is a News Corporation executive. Mr. Murdoch is a strong supporter of Israel throughout his media empire. (See: Washington Report on Middle East Affairs; June 2003, pages 24-26, "Rupert Murdoch and William Kristol: Using the Press to Advance Israel's Interests", By Richard H. Curtiss).

Another anti-mosque group is the David Project, a self-proclaimed Pro-Israel group. These statements are from their website. "The David Project leads the ideological effort against the forces intent on defaming, weakening and destroying the Jewish State.. committed to building Jewish leadership; increasing the support for Israel on campus; strengthening the pro-Israel and pro-Jewish sentiment"

The Citizens for Peace and Tolerance (CPT) has warned that Boston can become "a potential radical Islamic center". This doesn't speak well of Bostonian's intelligence. The C.P.T. is led by Dennis Hale of Boston University who coincidentally is the Founder and Director of the Episcopal-Jewish Alliance for Israel and a recipient of grants from three known Conservative right wing foundations: the Bradley, Olin, and Earhart Foundations. It's puzzling that Dr. Hale has not asked to meet with members of the Islamic Society of Boston despite ISB member's involvement in interfaith dialogue with the Jewish and Christian community having established good relations. (See: Harper's Magazine "Tentacles of Rage", by Lewis H. Lapham, Sept. 1, 2004)

As an Episcopalian Dr. Hale may find it ironic that while he's opposing the Boston mosque, Qatar, a Muslim nation has donated a large parcel of land to the Anglican Church to build a new £4-million facility in Doha, its capital. On Pat Robertson's website (cbn.com) in an article entitled: "Boston Mosque: the Rise of Radical Islam?" By Dale Hurd, Dr. Hale is quoted saying: "There are many people who wonder why we would be picking on a mosque. This kind of teaching plants a bomb in the heart. There is such a thing as radical Islam. It's real. IT'S EVERYWHERE." No hysterical exaggeration here.

The article also quotes Walid Fitaihi, an ISB leader, as having written an article with "Anti-Semitic" remarks by stating that Jews are the murderers of prophets." Surely Pat Robertson is aware that Jesus said the same thing? Luke 13:34. "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killer of prophets and stoner of the apostles that were sent to her" (also in Matthew 23:37; Matthew 23: 1-39 contains Jesus' criticism of the Scribes and Pharisees, and 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16)

What of Steve Emerson: The credibility of Steve Emerson, a journalist, as a "terrorism" expert with immediate access to television shows and Congressional hearings is at best controversial. In a January/February 1999 article in "Extra", the magazine of the organization "Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (fair.org) founded by Jeff Cohen; John Sugg, senior editor of the Tampa Weekly Planet discredits Emerson's many false terrorism claims against American Muslims. Most profound was Emerson's immediate claim after the Oklahoma City Bombing that the act was of Middle Eastern origin. [http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1443}

The Christian Science Monitor (1/22/96) said of Steve Emerson: "Moreover, since the end of the cold war, Islam is increasingly described by a coterie of writers and policymakers as a new seedbed for anti-Western aggression, replacing communism. Some journalists have made a virtual industry out of this view. The most prolific is Steven Emerson, whose film 'Jihad in America,' shown recently on PBS, describes America as a training ground for Islamic terrorism. Muslims almost universally know and loathe Mr. Emerson's work, calling it biased and distorted." (Who is Steve Emerson: http://www.cair-net.org/html/emerson.htm)

Despite claims to the contrary Law enforcement agencies and a 2005 internal FBI leaked report have found no evidence that terrorist networks or "sleeper cells" exist in the U.S. Boston is a beloved intellectual hub and thus must reject the machinations of the few who are being used to further a foreign agenda not of America's interests. No greater colossal disaster of influence peddling by NeoCon officials, primarily Jewish, and their media mouthpieces exists than the costly and deadly quagmire of the illegal invasion of Iraq, a sovereign nation that posed no threat to the U.S.. Without any shame or accountability to the American people, this Israeli Amen corner who ensure that the fighting for Israel is done with American soldiers and dollars, are now pushing a naive President to invade Iran, Syria, Lebanon, the Sudan, and eventually Saudi Arabia.

Notice that the majority of "experts" on television and "pundits" in newspapers and magazines are Jewish with no counter arguments allowed by anyone else, even other American Jews who oppose Israel's brutal occupation. A monopoly of opinions, corrupt campaign donations (Abramoff et. al), A.I.P.A.C. (the foreign agent of Israel) currently investigated by the FBI, the conviction of Scooter Libby and the firing of Israel's front page "run amok" journalist Judith Miller are all JEWISH whose allegiance and dual loyalty is to Israel not to America. Pity this naive powerful nation that has surrendered its intellect, academic, financial, media, and Hollywood institutions to the few who ensure Israel's primacy in our domestic and foreign aid with huge tentacles into our military and treasury. Ironically its the courageous Israeli media that exposes Israel's maddening influence and control of America's political institutions and not cowardly pandering media such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, all three Powerful Jewish owned newspapers.

"Arabs may have the oil, but we have the matches”. -- Ariel Sharon; Mark Gaffney, “Dimona, The Third Temple: The Story Behind the Vanunu Revelation”, Brattleboro, VT, 1989, Amana Books, page 165

"In the course of the past year, a new belief has emerged in the town: the belief in war against Iraq. That ardent faith was disseminated by a small group of 25 or 30 neoconservatives, almost all of them Jewish, almost all of them intellectuals (a partial list: Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, William Kristol, Eliot Abrams, Charles Krauthammer), people who are mutual friends and cultivate one another." -- Ari Shavit, "White Man's Burden", Ha'aretz (Israeli paper), April 5, 2003

"All we knew was that a large-scale killing of civilians was inseparable from the futuristic combat style the Israel Defense Forces have chosen... It could be assumed that the operation would kill 100 civilians, give or take a few.... It was important for us to kill them, because the yawning gap between the unlimited sacrosanct importance we attribute to our own lives and the very limited sacred character we attribute to the lives of others allows us to kill them. We killed them out of a certain naive hubris, believing with absolute certitude that now, with the White House, the Senate, and much of the American media in our hands, the lives of others do not count as much as our own. Believing we really had the right to instruct 400,000 people to leave their homes within eight hours... and treat their homes as military targets...and drop 16,000 shells on their villages and small towns...and we have the right to kill without being guilty.... It was very important to us that the victims stay faceless, nameless people. People who are quite unreal."
-- Ari Shavet, Ha'aretz, “Qana: 102 Faceless Dead”, May 21, 1996 (On Israel's Deliberate Attack and Murder of Lebanese and Palestinian Civilians taking Refuge in a United Nations Camp in Qana, Lebanon)

“American Jews sympathetic to Israel dominate key positions in all areas of our government where decisions are made regarding the Middle East. This being the case, is there any hope of ever changing U.S. policy? President Bill Clinton as well as most members of Congress support Israel — and they know why. U.S. Jews sympathetic to Israel donate lavishly to their campaign coffers…The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post — and most of our nation’s print media — are owned and/or controlled by Jews supportive of Israel. It was for this reason, I deduced, that they sent so many reporters to cover Israel— and to do so largely from the Israeli point of view….Over five decades now, Zionists have killed Palestinians with impunity” -- Grace Halsell, “What Christians Don’t Know About Israel”, Washington Report on Middle Eastern Affairs, May/June 1998, pg.112, 126

“We’re in bed, you might say with the Israelis and we won’t even talk to the leaders of the Palestinians,” -- President Jimmy Carter, Palestine Media Watch, “Carter: U.S. ‘in Bed’ with Israel”, October 15, 2002

Our government has cut aid to America's poor, its children, students, and elderly by $40 Billion, $8 Billion a year for five years, but has no guts to cut Israel's foreign aid which amounts to $8 Billion. We have an Israeli Amen Congress terrified of losing Jewish money and media neglect or persecution if they sway from pandering to anything Israel. The most shameful and embarrassing annual spectacle of our politicians pandering, praising, and sucking up to a powerful Jewish lobby is the annual A.I.P.A.C conference where politicians who stay away risk the wrath and revenge of the Jewish Lobby.

Without knowing, America has been paying and dying for Israel for the last fifty years. Yet the guilt of WW II, which neither America nor American Jews were involved in, the constant Holocaust media and Hollywood industry that never allows Americans to forget "never again" only applies to Jews and no other victims around the world, and the powerful "Scarlet Letter" worn by an intimidated population--the power of "Anti-Semitism"-- that has been conveniently transformed and hijacked to mean "anti-Jewish" when in fact Semitism refers to Middle East languages only and not to Judaism or any other faith or race.

"I've never seen a President -- I don't care who he is -- stand up to them [the Israelis]. It just boggles the mind. They always get what they want. The Israelis know what is going on all the time. If the American people understood what a grip those people have got on our government, they would rise up in arms. Our citizens certainly don't have any idea what goes on." -- Admiral Thomas Moorer, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff under President Ronald Reagan.

If Israel is the "Promised Land" for the Jews then why are more Jews living outside of Israel in comfort, wealth, and power and not immigrating to Israel. For the last one hundred years when Jews were given the opportunity to migrate to Israel or elsewhere, millions chose to go elsewhere, especially to the United States, a generous, kind, and welcoming nation, yet a nation distracted by a "Toy R Us" mentality being played like foolish children by a brilliant, sophisticated, well organized, financed minority that has allowed Israel, a small nation of six million steer the power of American money, guns, and politics to allow Israel to snub its nose at the entire world while ensuring "their" Congress, not ours, constantly bashes every nation that stands in the way of "Greater Israel". Stand against Israel and you're paraded in front of the world given a "kosher" flogging.

Islam is being demonized because it's the last barrier to American and Israeli hegemony in the Middle East.

The Ha'aretz reports Elon said: "It's clear that Islam is on the way to disappearing. What we are now seeing across the Muslim world is not a powerful surge of faith but the dying embers of Islam. How will it disappear? Very simply. Within a few years a Christian crusade against Islam will be launched, which will be the major event of this millennium. Obviously, we will be up against quite a large problem when only the two great religions of Judaism and Christianity remain, but that's still a long way off." -- Israeli Tourism Minister Benny Elon (As reported by Democracy Now, May 6, 2003

James Madison said: "The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become instruments of tyranny at home."

Americans must find the courage, the same courage they possessed to overthrow the occupying power of England during the Revolutionary war to stop Israel's "tentacles of rage" in our internal affairs and ensure that our same beloved freedom and liberty applies to the occupied Palestinians. Only when Palestinians are free from the lies and guns of Israel will our nation have peace and freedom of fear.

Does America have such courage? Only time will tell, only truth will set us free.