In Memory: Irena Sendler

It has been brought to my attention that there are factual errors in the section about Irena Sendler. These were posted inadvertently, as the result of having received a 'viral' email from a well meaning friend. I have corrected those errors and encourage all readers to visit the link provided for Irena Sendler, as well as the link to the documentary film made about her, provided in the comments section (comment no. 1). CrazyComposer.

Seventy years after the beginning of the Second World War, the second ‘war to end all wars’, the rhetoric regarding historical facts seems to be something that becomes more and more ‘up for debate’ with the passage of each day. At the same time, if one takes the time to look around it is still possible to see living examples of the uncommon heroes that resisted the tyrannical fascist machine as it attempted to devour Europe and all those who did not fit into the paradigm of the master race. The truth, as horrific as it may be, should not be allowed to be silenced even when it contradicts the sensibilities of those who are incapable of believing that an act so inconceivably evil was carried out against not only the Jewish people of Europe, but against the other perceived enemies of the Third Reich. The list of untermenschen (sub-humans) that the Nazis deigned unworthy of living, aside from der Juden (the Jews) under their rule included homosexuals, individuals with various disabilities, including mental illnesses and mental retardation, Magyars, Communists and other political activists, ethnic Poles and Slavs, and numerous religious individuals who would not bow to the regime of the crooked cross. While the pursuit of the truth, particularly in areas where the truth has been difficult to perceive in the past, is never something that should be discouraged, the increasingly common trend amongst those claiming to be scholars seems to demonstrate that there is something of a variable nature when considering historical facts. Many of these contemporary scholars have not been conducting research into issues surrounding the Second World War at all, preferring to indulge in their own ‘search’ for the truth. This has not involved research insomuch as it has served as an opportunity for these ‘researchers’ to codify their own warped opinions regarding what really happened during the Holocaust, placing their unsupportable assumptions alongside other conspiracy theories that are not founded in truth but rather in poorly crafted propaganda aimed at supporting the racist agendas that lead them down the road of historical revisionism, where changing facts rather than displaying any interest in the discovery or preservation of the truth becomes the priority.

The active distortion of history has become the vocation – perhaps something of an obsession – for several organizations operating with the singular purpose of distorting the history of the past in order to suit the ideological slant of their personal agendas. These overtly racist agendas that deny the attempted genocide of several peoples, not only the Jews, during one of the darkest periods in the history of humanity, can be found in many publications and across many websites that proclaim to preach the ‘truth’ about the ‘history’ of what happened during the war, only to proclaim insidious lies, distortions, and perversions of the truth that cannot be substantiated except with manufactured evidence and the fanatical ravings of neo-fascist evangelists who imagine the possibility of an eventual emergence of a Fourth Reich. These distortions and lies could not make up for the fact that the overwhelming historical evidence could not be dismissed so easily. The evidence of things that had not only been documented by first-hand observers and by those who escaped the horrors of the holocaust, bringing with them the testimony of their own survival may not be convincing enough for some, but when you pair that with the records kept by the very perpetrators of the acts themselves who, in their manic pursuit of creating a purified race, kept concise records regarding the numbers of innocent lives exterminated in the name of ethnic cleansing. Having had an opportunity to examine a great deal of this evidence as it has been well documented and verified by witnesses (proud Nazis who unrepentantly told of their exploits as members of the Einsatzgruppen), and having had the honour to meet some of the individuals who survived the holocaust, there is nothing that could shake my view of the historical facts that many try so desperately to invalidate with their ‘revised’ versions of history.

I grew up learning about the Holocaust from my family and from survivors that I met when visiting relatives in New York. There was never any doubt in my mind as to the horrors that had been inflicted upon humanity by the unchallenged evil that had been allowed to ravage Europe in the hopes that the Nazis would destroy the Soviets and still be brought under control when it became necessary. With the political foot-dragging by the United States the Nazi war machine was able to develop into the nearly unstoppable beast that it was, which ultimately nearly defeated the combined allied forces allayed against it; alas, this allowed for the extermination of many more innocent lives than if there had been a concerted effort to stop the genocidal acts of the Nazis from the beginning of their aggression in 1939. After everything that I had thought that I'd known about the atrocities of the Holocaust, and the stories of heroism that had come out of the unspeakable horrors, it surprised me to discover the existence of a woman who, like Oskar Schindler, saved the lives of thousands of Jews (in the case of Sendler 2,500 Jewish children).

Over a week ago I received an email from a friend telling me about the death of this hero about whom I had never heard, and yet I was deeply saddened to hear of her death, even at the age of 98. I could not help feel a sense of loss at not having had an opportunity to find out something about this remarkable woman before she died. Who was Irena Sendler? How had she managed to find herself in a situation where she could save the lives of 2,500 infants and children, smuggling them out of the Warsaw Ghetto in her plumbing toolbox? The story seems completely unbelievable ... and it is: that is what I received in an email, but it turns out that Irena was not a plumber at all, she worked as a senior administrator in the Warsaw Social Welfare Department, which operated canteens throughout the city, before the establishment of the Warsaw Ghetto. These canteens had provided meals as well as financial aid, clothing, medicine and money for the Jews who were registered under fictitious Christian names. In order to prevent inspections by the Nazis, Jewish families were reported as having highly infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and typhus.

Having read what little I have about Irena Sendler I feel deeply enriched for having discovered the story of her life, a story that I am now be able to share in some small part in order to battle those who attempt to perpetuate lies about the Holocaust which they maintain 'did not happen'.

The Warsaw Ghetto was established in 1942: a 16 block area in which hundreds of thousands of Jews were sealed behind walls, their dignity and hope stolen by the Nazis as everything they had was taken in exchange for the smallest advantage they could eek out in order to survive. When Irena Sendler saw the conditions of the Ghetto she decided to join the Zegota, the Council for Aid to Jews, which was organized by the Polish underground resistance movement and which carried out numerous operations throughout the occupation of Poland by the Nazis. Sendler was one of their first recruits and directed the rescue of Jewish children.

In order to enter the Warsaw Ghetto legitimately, Irena was issued a pass from the Epidemic Control Department (what would be considered a branch of the Public Health Department), which allowed her to visit the Ghetto on a daily basis. It was during this time that Irena Sendler, with the help of many others, including the assistance of the Polish church, that almost 2,500 children were saved from the clutches of the Nazis. The children were given a chance at the one thing the did not have in the Ghetto: life.

During the war Irena kept a record of the names of each of the children that she managed to smuggle out of the Warsaw Ghetto, hiding them in a glass jar under a tree in her backyard. At the end of the war it was her hope to reunite as many families as possible, but most of the parents had gone to the gas chambers and the majority of the children went into foster homes and were adopted.

For the acts of bravery that she committed, and for the danger that this put her in, Irena Sendler not only saved the lives of thousands, she paid a terrible price: she was captured by the Nazis and thrown into the Pawiak Prison where the Gestapo broke her feet and legs. If anyone deserved the honour, Irena Sandler was a woman who truly deserved to be ranked amongst the Righteous Among the Nations the Holocaust Memorial in Israel that includes Oskar Schindler and thousands of other non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save the lives of Jews from the Nazis.

In May of 2007 Irena Sendler was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for her life saving actions during the Holocaust. The prize was awarded to former United States Vice-President Al Gore for his work on climate change. Irena Sendler passed away on May 12th, 2008. Her legacy lives on in the lives of each individual she saved and the families that they became.

(A documentary has been produced about Irena Sendler, 'In the Name of Their Mothers: The Story of Irena Sendler'. The url for this is in the first comment.)

To Honour Israel

This is an important year for the State of Israel and the people living in that land. As they celebrate their 60^th anniversary as a nation another people are observing another anniversary, one with less cheers to be sure, but a sober observance nonetheless. Those who have not been deemed worthy of being granted the “right of return”, something all Jews enjoy, mourn their disenfranchisement from land that had been in their families for generations and the systematic destruction of their people. Resettlement camps, refugee camps, security 'fences'; terms that sound like they refer to an age gone by, but no, they refer to the “modern” State of Israel; the modern Apartheid State, the Genocide State. In seeking a way to honour a land that I am entitled to become a citizen of by virtue of my birthright – something that my brother is denied by virtue of his – seemed like a necessary thing to do, and yet I struggled with the task; how can I, I asked myself, honour a nation that routinely murders innocent civilians through the use of military tactics and weapons that are designed to maximize collateral damage? Would that not be like endorsing their activities? Perhaps it boils down to what is actually said and the tenor of the message; it should not be doubted at this stage that these comments are being provided by someone even remotely sympathetic to the Zionist agenda. Having said that I will add that I am vehemently opposed to all violent approaches to settling the “Middles East situation”, save for the one where everyone who does not want to live together in peace is sent to a deserted island where they are allowed to starve to death ... unless they can cooperate and work out a way to get off the island. There is no excuse for violence; Period.

Thus, I have decided that the only appropriate homage to the State of Israel/Nakba of Palestine is through poetry. There are three poems below: the first is a simple Haiku, the second, entitled 'Being' is an exploration of an existential/metaphysical struggle, while the third, 'Hatikva', deals with the issues of promises. I hope you enjoy them. All poems are ©2008 by Peter Amsel, and the illustrations are © by Ben Heine.

Eretz Yisroel
Sixty years of promises
Krystalnacht again.

~fin~

Being

Being disappears, slowly at first
but inexorably with each passing moment
as our lives are crushed by the weight of others
bearing down upon us
like jackals to their prey,
seeking out the weakest
the youngest
the most vulnerable.

With teeth bared in a flash of anger it ends in an instant
the flash of blood and a muffled scream
the only reminders for the witnesses for what they have seen
once again
as death has its way
unfettered by any restraining forces
prowling with the voracious appetites of
unfulfilled lust ...
for blood and fear ...
for the sake of pure terror ...
for no reason at all.

Being dissolves – begins to fade
the memory a sun-washed derelict of days gone by
requiring much more repair than any will invest ....

Being rusts, it crumbles and rots ...
and disappears.

~fin~

Hatikva

The first lie is the hardest one to tell;
once told, you tell yourself,
it is only one ... and you have also learned to rationalize.
When you make up the excuses for what you know is wrong
for what you know is wrong ... and yet ...

You did it anyway;
there is no other way, you say, sometimes to yourself,
at other times out loud (hoping someone might hear)
praying someone will hear.
That becomes the second lie:
there is no other way,
there is no other way,
there is no other way ...

What there isn't always is the will to see
that other way;
the will to do something that is more difficult
just because it is the right thing to do.

There is always another way.
We won't see it with our eyes closed,
nor with hardened hearts and stiff necks,
our sympathies closed off to the pain of others,
to the suffering they feel, and
the tears they shed.

We won't hear the lies that are told, in our names,
when we cannot see that their stories
are our stories,
just as real;
their sufferings are ours,
their blood flows just as red.

So long ago in places with such terrible names;
names like Auschwitz and Sobibor,
Westerbork and Buchenwald ...
sobering names, to this day,
places where the ground will cry out
with the horrors of what took place
until the end of time,
just as it does for those who have been
dispossessed of their homes,
in modern pogroms and purges,
cleansing the land.

“My homeland, my homeland”, they cry,
calling upon the
Name of the Lord while driving others
from their homes.

Evicting them,
just as they had been driven out,
forced to live in Ghettos,
awaiting their resettlements,
awaiting their deaths;
knowing that the promises they were told
were worthless ...
worth less than the dignity they were being treated with ....

There was no astonishment;
they had been lied to, were being slaughtered,
and are now doing the same;
stealing with impunity,
leaving shattered lives amongst the broken promises ...
broken by both sides,
neither trusting the other, some would say
with cause, 'justifiably', with reason ...
There is no other way,
there is no other way, (They say)
the truth becomes just another casualty to a war that has
yet to begin tallying the total cost of its folly;
and why should they worry ...
another lie, after all, comes so easily now.

We have all mastered the art,
turning away when things are
too difficult to face,
too “hard” to watch,
or just something that we find distasteful.

After all, if you can survive without a home for sixty years,
why should we worry about another decade ... or two,
or four?

All we have to do (lies coming as easily as a waterfall) is
offer the palest promise of “peace”,
of reconciliation,
a promise of settling the issues,
once and for all ...
until it's time for the next bombs to fall.

~fin~

There is no alternative to peace; peace is not the result of war, nor is it the product of a “strong” security policy. Peace is a way of life that can only come through true dedication and desire; without that there is no hope.

A Time for Passion; A Time for Peace

Our species has been endowed and imbued with a spectrum of emotions, not the least of which is the ability to feel things with a tremendous amount of passion. Our expressions of passion may at times seem to go beyond that which would be considered normal, or acceptable, under “ordinary” circumstances, but we must always remember that this is one of the most powerful of emotions; passion is not only connected with our ability to love and express that important feeling, it comes into play with other emotional states as well. People often speak of being passionate about their work, there is passion involved in the creative act (something that I can attest to without any hesitation), and it is very evident whenever any sort of conflict that strikes an emotional note arises.

Rather than approaching a situation with calmness and logic, passionate feelings well up to the surface and reason is swept aside. At these times we seem to be reduced to unthinking organisms guided by something akin to a reptilian brain, that vestigial portion of our brainstem that controls the involuntary nervous system (respiration, for example) and which guides crocodilians on their quest for prey. If that sounds severe, if it sounds harsh or overly judgemental, please understand that it is said from the point of view of someone who understands the situation by virtue of having learned it first hand. This is not a case of the “reinvention of the wheel”, it is merely a statement of fact: if we allow ourselves to be guided by our passions in all things, we are doomed; Period.

While it must be acknowledged that emotions are vitally important to our lives and we would not be who we are without them, it is important to understand that when we allow them to guide the way we accept things without question and form our opinions based purely on how we respond to the situation on a purely emotional level we are then in danger of missing the real picture.

Rather than experiencing the range of emotions and enjoying them we become slaves to them, slaves to the anger that is stoked by blind rage, a rage that isn’t even understood in rational senses anymore. Emotionalism prevents us from seeing the evidence that contradicts our passionate stance on a subject, to the point of detaching ourselves from the world of facts and evidence-based reality: bodies lined up in streets become propaganda from the “enemy”, props that they arranged in order to elicit sympathy. War crimes are dismissed as being improbable acts, or as having been justified by the situation.

What needs to be done in order to solve the problems facing those living in Israel/Palestine is both difficult and easy; it is a solution that stares us in the face, and yet we do not see it for the elegance of its simplicity. In a time when the concept of “common sense” has been reduced to something no better than a campaign slogan of past campaigns for neo-conservative politicians attempting to sway the electorate in a land far removed from the peoples of the troubled Middle East, true common sense is often abandoned in favour of things that fly in the face of logic; the choice of strife is made over that of peace for the simple reason that to do otherwise would be to dishonour those who have paid for the land with the blood that flowed through their veins. It is this sort of rhetoric that paints them into the corner, leaving them without an alternative that doesn’t end in violence, violence for the sake of justice and the avenging of the losses that they have experienced, sometimes in the distant past. It does not allow for an alternative that doesn’t include a fanatical approach to the “protection” of the land, even if that means the use of techniques inspired by the lessons gleaned from the darkest days of Jewish history, the Holocaust and the Pogroms.

The solution is difficult because it goes against what seems to be the character of our species: we are a passionate and stubborn people by nature. We are a people that allow our passions to guide the creature rather than allowing our intellects to lead us, though we know that we are capable of taking control whenever we put our minds to the task. Our preference is to contend that there is no fault; there is always a way to justify that something is right even when everything points to the fact that our actions are wrong. We may call this the “natural” way of our species as many times as we desire, but that will never change the simple fact that the truth of the matter is quite different; we were never designed to be controlled by the passions that have led us, more times than need to be mentioned, past the point of no return. We were never meant to be led by unbridled passions that lead directly to the deaths of innocent lives for causes that could — and should — have been solved by the greater gift that our species has been endowed with: our intellect and our ability to reason through any issue with well-devised diplomatic solutions that do not involve the deployment of military forces and the deaths of countless innocent lives.

The reason that the solution for this is easy is quite simply because it calls upon the essential humanity found in each of us: rather than looking at the conflict in Israel/Palestine as it exists today, as an ongoing conflict between two different peoples struggling over the same piece of real estate, we must first recast the situation into an entirely new paradigm that will clarify the issue into a way that even the most intellectually challenged individual will be able to grasp the simplicity of the circumstances. Without being torn apart by our passions it becomes possible to see that the problems facing the people of Israel/Palestine are not that difficult to overcome, so long as you understand the importance of a simple word, a word that even the scriptures of the Old Testament say we should hold closer to our hearts than any other; that word is love.

In the fifth book of the Torah, or Deuteronomy as it is known in the Old Testament, Moses is given the “greatest commandment” from HaShem in the sixth chapter. It is important to note that this commandment is given at the time that the Lord God Almighty first promises the “Land of milk and honey”, which the Children of Israel decided to take possession of in a state of disobedience by not following the directions given to them by the Lord. The “greatest commandment” is revealed in Deuteronomy 6, a commandment that is repeated by another – Yeshua HaMoshiach – Jesus Christ – in the Gospel of Matthew (Mt. 22:37). After the “Sh’ma” is declared (“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one!”) we are given the commandment: “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.” In the Gospel of Matthew there is an interesting addition, which is also reflected in the teachings of Rabbi Akiva, that the second commandment is like the first, “you shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 22:39-40).

Why would love, and something that seems to come out of a children’s television show from the 1970’s, being neighbourly with others even when they are different from us, be a required skill to be able to solve a conflict that has gone on for generations? Indeed, that is a question that resonates with intensity for many, but the answer is simplicity itself: what is the real reason for this conflict? Why are Jews and Palestinians at war with each other? Why do Arabs in neighbouring countries, for that matter, have such hatred for the Jews – a hatred that is reflected back by the Israelis? When you look at the blood of Jews and Arabs, when you look at who their ancestors were, there seems to be no reason for enmity; both claim to be descendents of Abraham, brothers with different mothers. Even if you do not accept a Biblical account of their heritage, Semites hating other Semites makes about as much sense as an Austrian from Vienna hating another Austrian by virtue of their living in Salzburg, or the very real situation of people in the Dominican Republic hating and fearing people from Haiti – people who are ethnically identical by virtue of them all having come to the island as slaves – and yet the Dominicans feel that the Haitians are, somehow, “more black” than they are.

It is time to step away from the passions that are leading us towards inevitable destruction and look at how easy it is to live together in harmony when the common goal is to move forward with life rather than towards death through ignorance. During the Cold War a great fear was promulgated by the propaganda puppet-masters behind the American press: the constant message that I remember hearing through the administrations of Ronald Reagan and even, to some extent, his predecessor Jimmy Carter, was that the Soviets were a hair-trigger away from launching an all out nuclear assault against the west – a first strike attack. I never bought into this line of thinking for two simple reasons: First of all, it simply didn’t make sense to me. The Soviets – led by Brezhnev at the time – had to know that the United States possessed the capabilities, with their nuclear submarine force alone, to launch a retaliatory nuclear strike that would obliterate the Soviet Union several times over. Thus the term MAD: Mutually Assured Destruction (or Mentally Addled Decision-makers, depending on your point of view). There is, after all, no such thing as a “limited” nuclear war and the Soviets understood this.

The second reason that I didn’t accept the premise of what the war-mongers in the west were trying to pass off as the “truth” while simultaneously whipping up a frenzy of jingoism and nationalism was even more basic and fundamental: if we accepted the hypothesis that the Soviets loved their children even half as much as the people in the United States did then they would never want to see the horrors of war visited upon their nation again. More Russian lives were lost (Soviet citizens and soldiers combined) during The Great Patriotic War, what the Russians call World War II, than any other nation that fought in the war – on either side. The famines and purges that came after the war continued to claim victims, adding to the twenty-six million that the war had taken.

There is no doubt in my mind that even the most hardened Politburo members and military advisors would have cringed over the images of the “motherland” being ravaged – yet again – at the possibility of a thermonuclear war, even on a “limited” scale. When they advised Brezhnev in regards to the deployments of their nuclear forces they would have been acutely aware of the fact that any first strike use of nuclear weapons by the Soviet Union against the United States or any of her allies would be inviting a nuclear holocaust upon mother Russia such as never could be truly imagined; it was, truly, an unthinkable option. After the near disastrous outcome of the Cuban Missile Crises, an event we are still discovering details about, forty-five years after the fact, where the world was led so close to the brink of a nuclear holocaust you can still taste the tinge of a nuclear winter when it snows in North America, it seems unlikely that the Soviets would have been so eager or willing to go as far down that path with the United States as they had with JFK.

The Soviets learned from their mistakes in Cuba. Now, what can we say of the Jews? Why should Jews be concerned with the issue of living together in peace? Only for the simple reason that this simple concept nearly led to our people being wiped off the face of the earth. When the Nazi propaganda machine began churning out its lies about the Jews being the cause of the economic woes of the German economy it wasn’t being original; the Jews of Europe had been blamed for causing the spread of the Black Death in the Middle-Ages as well. Anytime a scapegoat was needed all one had to do was find the nearest Shtetl and grab as many Jews as was necessary, perhaps enough for a private Pogrom.

The Holocaust, if nothing else, should demonstrate what happens when people fail in their responsibility towards all of humanity: we are not only the brothers and sisters of those who look like us, but of everyone, regardless of their race. The answer to that age-old question, “am I my brother’s keeper?” is, in fact, “yes, you are”. You are your brother’s keeper, and your sister’s; you are your niece’s keeper and your nephew’s, and you are your neighbour’s keeper, and anyone else who happens to fall within your sphere of influence as a human. That is what makes us human, that is what defines our humanity; we have the capacity to care for one another and when we allow ourselves to arise above our petty prejudices, we do so. We do not abandon those who do not have anyone to care for them nor do we leave the weak or the sick to die by the wayside. We do not kill a child whose mother has died in childbirth, we find someone to care for them, giving them love and raising them as their own. We love; actions define our humanity, not what we call ourselves.

As the Jews who were freed from the concentration camps often discovered when they tried to return to their pre-war homes, many things had not changed; their homes, if left standing, had often been stolen by other families who would not return them unless the “dirty Jews” could prove ownership (a difficult task considering they had been taken from their homes with few, if any, personal belongings – said belongings having been taken from them at the camps). The same thing went with bank accounts, accounts that to this day are being contested by families trying to prove rightful ownership.

Does this not teach us anything? What would have happened if the German people had stood up and said, “Why should we believe these ridiculous lies? These are my neighbours and I trust them!” If asked to take up stones against Jewish business, “but what have they done to us?” Of course, there is anti-Semitism. That is, alas, a fact of this world. As warped and demented as this fact is, it is even more demented to see such hatred between two peoples who have far more in common (including anti-Semitism, though the Arabs may be experiencing a bit more post 9/11, but the Jews aren’t far behind … neck-n-neck) than the main thing that divides them, religion. There is no “official” religion of the Palestinians, though there seems to be a predominantly Sunni portion with a sizable Christian minority as well, but this should not be used as an excuse for not being able to live in peace with each other.

Religion is what has blinded the Israeli position regarding the land that they protect with higher esteem than anything else; the land that has been granted, they believe, as a sacred covenant to them by the Lord God Almighty. The belief that the division of the land is impossible is seemingly fundamental to the tenets of Judaism, and yet this belief is as erroneous as the very idea that the present State of Israel is a representation of the Biblical Holy Land, the Promised Land, the Land of Milk and Honey.

Who amongst you can relate the story of how the Jews came into the Promised Land? The story is long, quite complicated at times, and filled with some of the most unpronounceable names that you can think of … until you read the Book of Numbers. There is an important preface to the story, contained in the Book of Joshua, that is found a bit earlier, when the Lord makes the actual promise of the land to Moses, in Exodus. Moses is told: “Little by little I [the Lord God Almighty] will drive them [the inhabitants of the Promised Land] out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land. And I will set your bounds from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the River. For I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you. You shall make no covenant [contract or agreement] with them, nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against Me. For if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you” (Exodus 23:29-33, NKJV, parenthetical comments are my additions).

So, what went wrong? After the death of Moses and the selection of Joshua as the new Prophet of the congregation things didn’t quite go according to the script and it all centres around a simple concept: disobedience. “Woe to the rebellious children,” says the LORD, “Who takes counsel, but not of Me, and who devise plans, but not of My Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; …” (Isaiah 30:1, NKJV). When the reputation of the children of Israel spread through the land the Gibeonites decided that the best way to survive was to avoid having to fight. They managed to convince the congregation and the leadership – including Joshua – to make a treaty [a covenant] with them, swearing it on the name of the Lord God of Israel. The result of this treaty is that the Gibeonites would serve as wood-cutters and water bearers for the Temple (they were slaves), but they were allowed to live.

Unfortunately, things did not go so well for the children of Israel. The Babylonians decided that slavery was an equal-opportunity career and thus, the Babylonian Captivity. Seventy years of … lets call it character building (2 Chronicles 36:1-21). Of course, the Jews were allowed to return to the Holy Land and they began the work of rebuilding the Temple, but that is not the end of the story (of course); rather than adhering to their covenant with the Lord, by not marrying anyone who was not of the twelve tribes, the disobedient Israelites took wives out of the pagans living amongst them (see Ezra 9)

As easy as it is to take the scriptures and point out all of the ways in which the Israelites disobeyed the word of God in regards to their inheritance, it is more important to examine the ramifications of those acts and what the reality of that situation is – for all of us – today. Whatever happened in the time before the Babylonian captivity is, as they say, ancient history. Nothing can change the fact that the children of Israel were carried away from their homes as slaves, just as nothing can change the fact that western imperialists carried millions of African slaves away from their homes to the “new world” and mistreated them for centuries. If there is any doubt that institutional racism still exists one need only look at the current presidential election (which has not even left the level of the primaries) to see the acrimony aroused as a result of racial issues (and gender); for this we should all be ashamed.

The only true solution to the Jewish/Palestinian “question” is to step back from our passions and allow reason to prevail; we must not allow ingrained prejudices to be freed to bubble up to the surface when we know they are inherently wrong, we must rise above the pettiness of racial divisiveness that makes us cringe when we see that our neighbour does not look as we do. For far too long we have lived lives of complacency, lives of disconnection from each other that permit the perpetuation of violent reactions against the people and things that do not adhere to our own way of life. There is no excuse for such barbaric behaviour; by these actions, by demonstrating that they are unable to live in peace with each other, the Zionists demonstrate that they have not learned anything from the lessons of history save for the worst, most despicable portions. The responses of violence from the Palestinians, of course, are no better, and may not be excused for any reason. Violence begets violence, and “an eye for an eye” will, in the end, leave us all blind.

Every act of inequality, every racial slur and every violent action perpetrated against our fellow man diminishes each and every one of us collectively. As neighbours in this continually shrinking world it is far past the time to put aside our differences and begin the process of living together in peace. If our neighbours do not go to our church, or synagogue, if they happen to go to a mosque, or if, God forbid, they don’t go to any house of worship at all, then so be it; let them go where they would, in peace. If that is such a difficult proposition for someone than I have another, even simpler solution: get off the planet and leave it to those who are able to live in peace with each other. The cost of war fostered by human ignorance and stupidity is far too great to be allowed to continue.

New Extremist State: Israel at Work

Hate is a terrible thing; it festers in one’s spirit, leading to the commitment of dreadful acts. We are not born with hate in our hearts, nor do we gravitate to this most unnatural of human emotions, children must be taught to hate. The evidence of this is easy to see in any playground populated by pre-schoolers who have not been influenced by the political, religious or other biases of their parents. When there are other children present in the playground the children will play together, even when not having been introduced. Why is this? Why should children be capable of doing something that adults seem so incapable of accomplishing?

The reason is simple, and it is something that adults need to re-learn: while older children will become judgemental as they are introduced to the “adult” world, the innocent pre-schooler has yet to develop the ability to judge others. When does this change? When parents begin defining a child’s place in society it sets the course for the ingrained prejudices that will rule the mind of the growing child; by limiting who they are able to play with, who they are allowed to visit after school, and all of the other influences that go into the rearing of a child a child learns what is “good” and what is “bad” and establishes a demarcation zone within their mind in which all things to be hated are placed.

Having lived in neighbourhoods that have been very multi-cultural I have seen, with my own eyes, the truth of how beautiful it is to see children playing together in peace: a rainbow of colour, laughing and running around, totally absorbed in the very real business of having fun. I have also seen the obscenity of a parent physically dragging their child away from a sandbox because they shouldn’t be playing with such “dirty” children. It wasn’t difficult to understand that the parent was addressing the brown skin of the Lebanese children, and she even gave me a nasty glare as she passed me, errantly assuming that one of the “dirty” urchins in the sandbox was mine. As a response to this ignorant individual I gave her a greeting of “good afternoon” … in German … with a click of my heels and a slight bow of my head. Somehow it seemed appropriate to bestow as much of a Nazi salute as I would give, without raising my arm.

Hatred is what allowed the Nazis to thrive, survive, and drive across the continent, killing with impunity. Their hatred against anyone who did not fit into their paradigm of the “master race” was fanatical beyond comprehension, leading to the attempted extermination of not only the Jews but the Gypsies, homosexuals, people with disabilities and scores of others who fell into the category of “unter menschen”. The “sub-humans”, individuals that the Nazis deemed unworthy to share the world with, were gathered up, shipped off and slaughtered. Their rights were taken away, subjugated as slave labour they fed the war machine the weapons used to kill other innocent lives until their usefulness wore out due to sickness, exhaustion or through the mere malice of the concentration camp guards who killed with impunity.

While the Holocaust ended in 1945 the lessons learned by the horrors of the hatred perpetrated by Hitler and his henchmen have not been passed down through the generations of surviving Jews into the land that was supposedly created as a haven from another holocaust. According to an article that DesertPeace posted there is a law in the State of Israel making it a criminal offence to call any act of the Israeli government a “Nazi act” of aggression. The most recent outcry coming from the extermination of an entire Palestinian family while they slept in the middle of the night on the 15th of February. Three children and their mother died when the Israeli Air Force used precision munitions to assassinate their father, Ayman Al Fayeq, who was suspected in “acts of terror”.

I was born of Jewish parents and am aware that at anytime I can travel to Israel and claim the “right of return”, but I have not done this nor do I plan to do so: in fact, until my brother, Ishmael ibn Ibrahim is granted the same “right of return”, I shall not set foot in the land that has become a model of Zionist Fascism. I am not constrained by the laws of Israel so I shall say what DesertPeace cannot: the actions of the Israeli government are no better than those of the Third Reich. They use terror tactics to control weaker individuals, they control every avenue of economic advancement of people living within the land who are not Jewish, often preventing them from earning a living by closing the checkpoints that Palestinians must pass through in order to travel from their homes to their places of employments, and they impose punishments upon people without having had the benefit of a trial.

Ayman Al Fayeq and his entire family were slaughtered by the IAF in the middle of the night. How can this possibly be acceptable? Even if Al Fayeq was a terrorist, what could his children have done to warrant being immolated by a bomb in the dark of night? The Nazis did similar things to the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto, the Lodz Ghetto, through the travelling Einsatzgruppen, and other terror forces that made the Third Reich notorious for their inhuman treatment of non-Aryans. How is this different from what the Zionist Fascists are doing in Israel?

The land was given to us by God. We cannot divide the land. We must protect Israel. It is very easy to fall upon the old scriptures that promise the land to the children of Israel, forgetting that they immediately fell into disobedience and disobeyed the instructions that the Lord provided for the people before they took possession of the land. Inconvenient, and yet … what does it mean? First, you cannot go back in time and erase the mistakes of two thousand years with genocide today. The argument about not dividing the land that God has given as an inheritance hinges upon the first issue: since this present state of Israel is NOT that which was given to the children of Israel, there is no injunction against giving land to the Palestinians, though I still contend that living together is the best solution.

Defending the land must be proportional to the force being used by the attacker. You do not respond to a stick with snipers, you do not fire artillery at unarmed demonstrators … unless you are in Israel. When Hezbollah launched Katyusha Rockets, weapons that do not have sophisticated navigational equipment and rarely hit their targets with full effect, Israel has regularly responded with precision bombing and artillery far beyond the proportion of the original attack, striking the neighbourhood from which the rockets were launched. Given that the IAF has munitions that are capable of striking within 9.6 metres of the designated target (standard JDAM available for the F-16, used in the slaughter of the Fayeq family) it would seem reasonable that the IAF might start resorting to the "surgical strikes" that the USAF has been employing since the development of these precision guided munitions to such great effect in Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq.

If the Israeli government does not want to have their actions and policies likened to those of the Nazis all they have to do is start acting more like humans and less like the monsters that they have modelled themselves after; take the lessons of history and apply them now, before it is too late.

Cultural Protection or Xenophobia?

France has a problem, and it isn’t going to get any smaller before it gets any better. In a move that smacks of the “Language police” in Quebec, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has moved to shut down France’s multilingual TV news service, France 24, announcing on Tuesday his plans to replace the channel with a new, French-only version. [You may read the complete article on CBC Arts here.]

What is the big deal? Well, on the surface it doesn’t seem like such a great tragedy, until you examine the issue under stronger magnification, at which time you discover that France 24 broadcasts diverse programmes in several languages including French, English and Arabic. There were plans for the addition of a Spanish service some time in 2008 which have now been abandoned in favour of Sarkozy’s plan for “France Monde”, which will broadcast only in French.

In a country that is, much like Canada, multi-cultural in its social makeup, the provision of television programming in languages that are spoken by the population can only makes sense. By not providing such services the government is displaying an overt act of alienation and is demonstrating their disdain and overt hostility to those who are perceived as not being “truly” French for whatever reason happens to be in vogue at the time.

Protectionism does not protect culture, it crushes the spirit of those living within the confines of the system being “protected”; it has been tried several times in the twentieth century, each time failing miserably. In the former Soviet Union “western” music, art and literature were labelled as “bourgeois”, with the artists, composers and writers being encouraged to adhere to the ideal of “Socialist Realism” in order to celebrate the wonderful benefits that the Revolution had endowed upon each citizen. The result, unfortunately, was less effective than Stalin and his successors would have liked: composers such as Shostakovich managed to escape the strictures of the Officials by applying relativistic programs (stories) to their works – after the fact – thus avoiding the scrutiny of the censors.

The most profound example of this “musical relativism” in action can be seen (and heard) in the “Fifth Symphony” of Shostakovich which was composed in the turmoil following the withdrawal of his “Fourth Symphony” after it was being prepared for its premiere. The 4^th was described as being “too bourgeois” and Shostakovich was warned to not continue composing “absolute” music (music that is without a program, something like the 1^st, 2^nd, 4^th, 7^th, or 8^th symphonies of Beethoven). In response to this Shostakovich added an intriguing “dedication” at the beginning of his 5^th Symphony: “A Soviet artists response to just criticism”, and in one fell swoop he created “musical relativism” by snubbing his nose at Stalin with a piece that was “absolute” to the Nth degree, and yet … it fulfilled the requirement of being “realistic” because Shostakovich said it was, and thus it was so.

The Chinese had the “Cultural Revolution”, attempting to eradicate all western cultural influences through any means possible – including the burning of books, works of art, musical instruments, and the occasional artist that wouldn’t change their ways (but who’s counting). Obviously that worked well … oh, I forgot … it didn’t.

North Korea … ok, that may have worked, but look at the nation: who really wants the “culture” of North Korea? I can guarantee that there won’t be any connections to this article from that nation – access to the internet is so strongly controlled (if someone can actually afford a computer, let alone food), that the ability to read a dissenting opinion is something that just does not exist.

Then there is Israel, a nation trying its best to control the spread of dissenting opinions, even when said opinions come from 79 year old Holocaust survivors. A disturbingly compelling interview with Hedy Epstein, the dissenter in question, was posted by DesertPeace (note the new address) here, and is well worth reading. By using violence and intimidation tactics against their own citizenry, not to mention those who are visiting from other nations, Israel has demonstrated that they lack even the most basic humanity, preferring to terrorize an innocent old woman in the hopes that they might persuade her from telling the truth about what is going on in the occupied territories.

I have to ask the question, what is French President Nicolas Sarkozy afraid of? Why does he fear the possibility of the people becoming better informed? Perhaps there is a connection to this attitude and Sarkozy’s near fanatical love of all things American (save for, apparently, the “freedom of the press” guaranteed by the Constitution). This love for America, if taken to an extreme, could lead to a fear of having dissenting opinions being broadcast into the nation, particularly when one of the languages being broadcast is the tongue of his “best friend’s” arch enemies. Broadcasts in Arabic, of course, could include coded messages for sleeper-cells operating in France, awaiting their activation codes … oh bother ….

Didn’t that sound ridiculous? Of course it did … but, I’m willing to wager that someone in Sarkozy’s office had to mention that possibility; another name for it is racial profiling, and it is not only a racist thing to do, it is utterly useless in tracking down the real terrorists.

Sarkozy has shown his hand and it is an ugly one; if France continues on this course of overt discrimination against individuals who do not speak French government entrenched xenophobia will become the policies under which things operate rather than exceptions to the rule. In this day, when wars are being fought over whether or not people can set aside their differences and live as neighbours, in peace, it seems exceptionally sad that a nation with as long a history as France should choose this time to take such a turn away from decency back towards the Vichy government of occupied France.

New Year’s Wishes: a Lump of Coal in your Stocking?

A Seasonal Missive from the CrazyComposer
Cartoons © by Ben Heine
A recent comment to submitted to this blog (posted here only recently due to a moderation error) asked my opinion on the content of a particular website relating to “a Machiavellian Perspective on the Middle East conflict”. I have neglected to respond to the question, though the intervening time has given me a great deal to think about. Before addressing the issues raised in the website, however, there are some other things that I would like to say (well, it is my blog): The end of the year is always a time that arouses mixed feelings for me as I reflect on the things that have been accomplished, the many things that have not been done (for whatever reason), and the numerous other things that have been added to the list of things that I now want to do at some point in time. This is also the time that is used to reflect upon the events that have taken place in the world; what news has emerged as the most significant of the year, what individual(s) have had the most influence on our world … for better or worse.

Thus, the question regarding my thoughts on a website relating to Jewish/Palestinian relations seemed more than appropriate as it fit in perfectly with the seasonal reflections that my mind has been making; near existential musings, perhaps, on the state of our species and its ability to drag itself out of the mud and mire in which it is so firmly entrenched. The discussion of politics and political issues is one that can become deeply frustrating for me (quite quickly, at times, as it would seem my patience for the level of human idiocy is growing shorter and shorter with the passing of days), particularly when those involved refuse to allow themselves to see any other side of an issue merely because it represents an ideology that is foreign to their own political beliefs. This is especially apparent when it comes to the issues surrounding the “Jewish” state, also known as Israel, and the “Palestinian” question … or the “occupied territories”, or whatever other term has been used from time to time.


Let me be quite blunt about my position relating to Israel from the beginning, before even referring to the site in question and anyone else’s comments: if you are incapable of living in peace next to someone who is not of the same ethnic background, religion or political persuasion, you should move to another continent, shave all of your body hair off, cover yourself in honey and roll around in a nest of fire-ants. You should only dress in pink taffeta, and have the word “idiot loser” tattooed upon your forehead. The idea that we are unable to live next to people that are different from us, today – in the 21st century – is beyond anachronistic; it is a reflection of the most closed-minded, racist, bigoted, xenophobic idiocy that has ever inhabited this planet. If this is a description of a Jewish Israeli, too bad; if it describes a Palestinian, tough: when you point a finger at one person there are several pointing back towards you, so there are NO innocents in this conflict when people pre-judge their neighbours.

Ignorance kills; period. End of statement. While ignorance is near the top of that list, nationalism that is allowed to overrun an individual’s ability to reason is another thing that leads to death; such vehement belief systems are found within the supporters of Zionism and the fundamentalist supporters of the Palestinian movement. If this seems extreme, that is too bad; I’ve been listening to stories about the “war” going on in Israel since I was born, since the Israelis captured Jerusalem in 1968. If anyone honestly believes that this can be resolved by anything less than a fundamental shift in human behaviour. In order to promote such a change I propose a United Nations Joint Resolution: Be it resolved that all parties in Israel/Palestine shall live peacefully or they shall be deported to Albania (I hear it is lovely at this time of year … not). Any use of force or violence of any kind will result in an immediate deportation and fines against the government of no less than $1,000,000 (U.S. funds), to be paid to the families of victims/survivors.

I certainly doubt there would be too many “repeat offenders”.

The main premise of the author’s comments, from what I have gleaned from the reading, is that the peace process is doomed to failure, essentially, for the simple reason that the Zionist cause is honourable and just while the Arabs (also known as the Palestinians in this little saga) are completely untrustworthy, inherently dishonest, and predisposed to being deceptive when it comes to matters relating to negotiations.

From the outset the author has established that they do not believe that a lasting peace between the Jews and Palestinians (though he stubbornly refers to them as “Arabs” or, on rare occasions, “Palestinian Arabs” throughout the text) is not only impossible, it is “unusual, immoral, and illegal”. The only thing unusual about the author’s comments is that they so thinly veil the racism and hatred that the author possesses for the non-Jewish individuals making claims on the “Holy Land”. When reading things like “Peace process is highly unusual … illegal … immoral …” amongst many other completely meaningless straw-man arguments that are based on the acrimony aroused by generations of stubbornness making communication and reconciliation impossible.

The issue of peace in the middle-east, especially in Israel, always seems to come back to the subject of the land and the myriad issues that arise from the various parties involved. Is it possible to placate every side with one, all encompassing solution, a resolution that will satisfy the Zionist positions while also placating those of the Palestinians? Anyone that believes that it is, that the vitriol of centuries – nay, millennia – may be resolved after some discussions has allowed themselves to become enamoured by the seductive idea that “peace on earth, good will towards man” is something more than a line in a cleverly composed Christmas carol.

There truly is problem with the peace process, but unlike what the author of “We need a respite from peace” has written, it is not about what the Arabs/Palestinians bring to the table; it has everything to do with the process itself and the inherently flawed philosophy that has been invested into the very nature of the Holy Land and its relationship to Jews, Christians and Moslems. Any people proclaiming to be members of any of the aforementioned faiths who then use violence in order to advance their cause are, quite simply, hypocrites; they are anything but what they claim to be, and are certainly not representatives of the three faiths that call that piece of real estate the Holy Land.

We view the three religions as mere labels to apply to people regardless of the actions that are carried out in the names of those religions. Millions have been killed in the name of “God” (or “Allah”) while at the same time it is asserted that “Yahweh is merciful” and “God is love” and “Allah is benevolent” in classes for young believers in each faith. The problem is not that this teaching is flawed (this isn’t a polemic on the primacy of one faith over another, nor will I entertain such questions – my position should be apparent from previous posts), it lies in the fact that fundamentalism breeds fanaticism and fanaticism breeds minds that are perfectly prepared to be taken advantage of by ruthless individuals bent on promoting their own agendas, regardless of the costs in human lives.

I remember when a particularly vicious terrorist attack took place in Israel when I was a child, living in Sudbury. My parents tried to explain the situation to me as best they could, but the savagery of the situation made even their astute comments seem unable to fully explain the situation. It all boiled down to this, my father ultimately said; “how can you stop someone that is prepared to kill themselves in order to advance their cause?” It didn’t seem to matter whether or not you supported the claims of the Palestinians or disagreed with the policies of Israel; could you do so and agree with the tactics of the terrorist elements acting on behalf of the Palestinians?


No; violence does not bolster any position, it undermines the moral grounds of every argument and diminishes the legitimacy of any claim that may have existed. Violence begets violence and breeds mistrust, hatred, and a myriad of other negative things that work in opposition to true peace. More than anything else violence breaks the human spirit which then seeks something else to fill the void created by the legacy of violence.

There is only one way in which the Holy Land can experience the fruits of a genuine peace process, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the pale counterfeit that has been plaguing the region since the re-establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. True peace will only come when the land is forgotten and people are given the priority that they deserve, the dignity that all humans are entitled too, regardless of their race, religion, or creed. When people are able to accept the differences that have driven them apart and decide that they can live beside each other in peace, there will be true peace; until then the process is an utter waste of time.

A recent example of the curse of fundamentalism has been provided through the brutal assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The subsequent suicide bombing (by the same deranged individual) left many others dead and injured. Do not forget that there are other places in the world where “peace process” is a concept arousing desperation and acts beyond anything in which any sane individual should be engaged. Can anything profitable ever come out of this sort of violence; is it not possible to imagine that there is at least one qualified individual in all of Pakistan to replace Bhutto as the leader of the PPP?

Who was responsible for this act of ultimate inhumanity? There are some that are already saying that al-Qaeda is to blame, raising the question as to who had the most to gain from this vicious act. In the end, it doesn’t really matter who had the “most” to gain from this and other despicable acts; supposed gains made through violence are rendered as worthless as lead, tainted by the blood shed for them. It is easier to see that everyone loses when violence is used: we lose our dignity as humans, we abdicate our morality, and our spirits are diminished in the process.

If there is one comment the author of “Respite” has made that truly demonstrates the futility of the argument espoused by the Zionist fundamentalists it is the following: “Peace process is highly unusual. Every other nation destroyed whatever aborigines happened to live on the land that nation chose to build a state.” What the writer of those comments forgets, as many of their predecessors have and, alas, as many of those who follow in their footsteps shall inevitably do so as well, is that this is not an intellectual exercise in the realm of theories; we are dealing with real, living people here, people that have not been eliminated through a war of conquering or a subsequent genocide (how terribly inconvenient for Israeli). The people that Israel has to contend with have been living in the land for as long as the land has been promised to the Children of Israel. Is it the fault of the Palestinians that the forefathers of the modern Israelis were incapable of obeying the commands of the Lord?

The Old Testament tells us that the Children of Israel were commanded to “cleanse” the land, before taking possession of it, which they did not do; they decided that their way was better than that of the Lord God Almighty. By deciding to follow their own devices the Children of Israel cut themselves off from the promises of the Lord, opening themselves up to the troubles that have befallen them for the past several thousand years.

What I am saying is that you cannot now decide to commit the genocide that you failed to commit when you were brought to the Promised Land. Above all else we must learn lessons from history, lest we allow ourselves the curse of repeating the mistakes and tragedies of the past. History tells us that there is indeed a tradition of the vanquished peoples of the world becoming enslaved and extinguished, but that is not something that should be exalted, it should be observed with the solemnity that hindsight allows the learned pupil to provide insight and wisdom, that those mistakes need not be repeated by future generations.

By stating that the peace process is “unusual” for the reason that vanquished peoples do not live side by side with those who defeated them is tantamount to endorsing genocide; it is a comment that demonstrates that the Zionist movement has learned nothing from the lessons of history. It demonstrates that the Zionist movement has taken nothing from the ravages of war that nearly led to the vanquishing of the Jews in the middle of the twentieth century; is this the type of history that the Jews should be trying to perpetuate against another people? Should Jews not be fighting to the death to live in peace with others, knowing the awful price that nationalism exacts when taken to extremes.

If anyone should have learned about the importance of setting aside differences in the name of being able to live together in peace it is the survivors of the Holocaust: a people that were nearly wiped off the face of the earth by the xenophobic racial purity theories espoused by the Nazis. What is the difference between the near-genocide perpetrated against the Jews (Slavs, Gypsies, Homosexuals, disabled, and numerous others) and the ongoing atmosphere of apartheid and attempted genocide that has been enacted against the Palestinians over countless years?


I have met survivors of the Camps, both Jew and non-Jew, and there has always been a common denominator amongst these remarkable individuals: they share a desire to see a world without war, a world where everyone can live together in peace. This is something that they would gladly give up their lives to achieve. The violence perpetrated over the “Holy Land” is the worst example of historical ignorance, of a people refusing to learn lessons that cannot afford to be explained more than once. Even little children know that there is nothing to be gained from hatred, when will the Zionists and other fundamentalists grow up and follow their lead?

The Trouble with Remembrance

Once again the day that has been set aside for us to remember those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in the cause of freedom is upon us and I am left with an uneasy feeling: what, exactly, are we remembering these days?

While it has never fallen upon me to take up arms to defend my country (for which all Canadians should be grateful as my skills are surely best served without things like an M24 in my hands … though it does have an interesting appeal at times) I have always observed Remembrance Day with a sense of solemnity, making a point – wherever possible – to watch the services from the National Memorial which is always broadcast on television.

The thing that has triggered my question this day stems from the modern face of war and the ways in which we have managed to sweep aside the conflicts in the name of political expediency. We do not want to offend our neighbours to the south, I’m sure, so in the service today you won’t hear (I’m quite sure – this is being written before they take place) any condemnations of the “immoral” or “illegal” war that is currently taking place. You won’t hear a single word spoken about the war of “revenge” and “retribution” that has cost now more American lives than the acts of terrorism that, ostensibly, caused them to be started. God forbid we should remember those who have been killed in this unholy war.

When the various ministers pray today we will not hear them plead to God for the nations that posses the wherewithal to intercede in the ongoing genocide taking place in Darfur to extract their heads from their stinking self-interests and begin the job of serving humanity rather than paying lip-service to lobbyists representing the special interest groups that have dictated everything that appears on the government agenda.

So what are we remembering this November 11th? Those soldiers who were killed in the great war of royal insanity; a war triggered by the assassination of an insignificant member of a family significant only for the fact that democracy had not visited itself upon the “empire”. The fact that this sparked a conflagration that sucked in virtually the entire world is testament to the fact that humanity is virtually incapable of standing idly by when a good fight is taking place.

Are we remembering the 69th anniversary of Krystalnacht (Nov. 9th), the millions of Jews, Russians, Poles, Hungarians, homosexuals, disabled people and other “untermenschen” that the Nazis murdered in the concentration camps, or are we only remembering the soldiers? Frankly, I have never been able to remember the one without the other: the great sacrifice paid by the soldiers must be remembered, to be sure, but dare we forget the victims of what began as a democratically elected government?

The “police action” of Korea – a war that, to this day, technically has not officially ended (a cease fire doth not a treaty make).

Which (if we exclude Vietnam which Canada didn’t “officially” participate in) brings us to the “current” conflicts. The peace keeping efforts in which Canadians have died are numerous and, alas, truly worth remembering.

It has always made me smile (and proud to be Canadian) when I think that those blue-bereted UN Peacekeepers exist because of a Canadian proposal and that Canadians have served in virtually every peacekeeping mission since the inception of the force in 1956, at the suggestion of then diplomat and future Prime Minister of Canada, Lester Pearson.

Our nation has a proud one of being there when it counts, when we are outnumbered and outgunned; but time and again Canadian soldiers have fought with tremendous courage and valour that belies the size of the forces deployed. Not willing to be the sacrificial lambs tossed into the waiting jaws of death, Canadian servicemen consistently demonstrated that they were more than “up to the task” of dealing with the enemies that were laying in wait for them. The roles played by Canadians in WWI and WWII, in which a combined number of over 100,000 died, is a terrible reminder of the costs of war.

Perhaps on this Remembrance Day it would have been fitting for the Chaplin to have summoned the courage to speak words that truly reflect the gravitas of the times in which we live rather than serving up the piece of ecumenical pap that was broadcast across this great nation. In closing I am now going to do something that I do not normally do in this blog – I am going to openly pray. If this is offensive to you, scroll down to the end of the post to see the final pictures of the poppies (my own photos) that are included in this post.

Heavenly Father, we gather here today
to remember those who paid
the ultimate sacrifice so that we may live in this land
with the freedoms that we enjoy on a daily basis.
Lord, we ask you to forgive us;
for we have squandered the great price
that these brave young men and women
offered through the letting of their own blood,
just as we often squander the gifts that
You have given to us when do not live
in peace with our neighbours.

We pray, Lord, that even while we remember
those who have fallen in past conflicts
You would raise up a force that would prevent
the further loss of life in places like Darfur, and that
You would put an end to the meaningless conflict
that is being fought in Iraq.

We pray for our Peacekeepers, Oh Lord,
not only in Afghanistan but wherever
their services may be needed,
even unto the ends of the earth.
Above all else, we pray for peace
in every corner of the world;
in all of Africa and Asia,
in all nations that see each other as enemy
rather than brother and sister,
and within each nation as well,
that every conflict may be settled by
the simple word of love.
This I pray in the precious name of Jesus,
Y’shua HaMoshiach; Amen.