Monday, October 30, 2006
ACROBATIC GESTURES ATTEMPTED
It hasn’t been a great week for Palestinian terrorists:
A wanted Palestinian terrorist showering at his parents’ home last week escaped an Israeli arrest raid by jumping out a window and running naked through a densely populated refugee camp ...
Continued the Brigades leader: “I went out of the bathroom and from the second floor I jumped to the roof of our neighbors. From this roof to another one and than to the street. Soldiers were already far from me at my parents’ house. I started running almost 200 meters (about 650 feet) in the camp street naked trying with acrobatic gestures to hide my buttocks and my sexual organ.
“If I saw somebody in front of me so I put one or two hands on my sexual organ; if there was nobody in front of me and I heard people speaking or laughing behind me I put my hands on my buttocks,” related the terror leader.
Another, presumably clothed, fellow found himself in even worse trouble:
A Hamas militant died Sunday while digging an underground tunnel to be used in the Islamic group’s fight against Israel, Hamas said in a statement. The group did not identify the location of the tunnel.
Or the location of his hands.
CHANGE THIRSTED
Reuters political correspondent John Whitesides anticipates big juicy Democrat victories:
Democrats enter the final week of the fight for Congress with a commanding edge over Republicans, who hope a major voter turnout effort and shift in focus away from Iraq can limit their losses.
Recent polls show that growing Democratic momentum, fed by dissatisfaction with President Bush’s leadership and the war in Iraq, threatens Republican power in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.
The public’s thirst for change in Washington has Republicans pondering how bad things will be in the November 7 election and calculating whether they can stop Democrats from picking up the 15 House and six Senate seats needed to claim majorities.
Pollmeister Scott Elliott notes recent Republican gains, however—which may continue if John Kerry keeps this up:
The military record of a Democratic House candidate was under attack. So, Senator John F. Kerry ventured to the Philadelphia suburbs last week to defend Patrick Murphy—and deliver the kind of speech the senator never quite gave when his own wartime service was called into question in 2004.
“Attacking Patrick Murphy for his service is a little bit like Jessica Simpson attacking Albert Einstein’s IQ,” the Massachusetts Democrat proclaimed Thursday at a chilly outdoor rally at Bucks County Community College.
Kind of artless with the jokes, isn’t he?
PLEASE TRY LATER
The Webdiary crisis continues:
Webdiary is experiencing technical problems:
please try later
If anyone has any idea how we can transfer the DB from drupal to a system that actually works, that would be good
* NB - the fact that no-one seems to be able to access the DB is the complicating factor ...
If you know how to achieve such a transfer, please contact Webdiary. Which might be easier if they’d left an email address. In other pointless internet news, this site just recorded its most popular month yet—at least since the dawn in May of the Sitemeter era. More than two million happy customers in six months.
BOATS VANISHED
“This,” reports the Sydney Morning Herald, “is a picture of Sydney’s future. Rising sea levels will submerge or threaten billions of dollars worth of property, both public and private, by 2100.” Take a look at the Spit Bridge now, and as the SMH imagines it may appear following 94 years of global warming:
Where have all the boats gone? Isn’t it a quality of boats that they float, thereby making them invulnerable to rising sea levels? Is a rise of less than one metre, upon which the SMH’s projection is based, somehow capable of submerging all those sea craft? Did the owners of these vessels set sail for higher ground? Are yachts banned under our future Islamic government? We need answers! Perhaps an SMH reader can explain things:
The Earth used to be like an innocent girl. She was widely loved and respected, and even when she was occasionally abused, she had places she could retreat to, where she could heal herself. But then she began to get forcibly dressed up in things she didn’t want to wear, made to look like something she wasn’t, and then those that dressed her up ignored her innocence, and showed her less and less respect, exploiting her beauty, raping her riches and discarding torn and poisoned body. She was sad but was shown little sympathy, hurt but denied a chance to heal, with no safe-place left for her to go. And yet she was still willing to forgive, but humanity kept treating her the same way, giving little in return and even demanding more. She eventually grew sick and then bitter, and finally thought about revenge ...
Raped, was she? Wouldn’t have happened if she kept her meat covered.
UPDATE. Further images of Sydney’s future, courtesy of the very latest in computer projection technology ...
Sydney Harbour in 2006 ... and Sydney Harbour in 2100:
Bondi Beach in 2006 ... and Bondi Beach in 2100:
Sydney birdlife in 2006 ... and Sydney birdlife in 2100:
UPDATE. Via Dan Lewis, computer projections showing a typical Sydney girl in 2006 ... and 2100:
BEAZLEY UNMOVED
The Australian’s Rebecca Weisser:
By the time Saddam Hussein’s thugs were through with him, Hussein Khoshnow’s fingers had been crushed, his legs broken and there was a gash on his right cheek stretching almost from his nose to his jaw.
Mr Khoshnow, a Kurd who fled Iraq in 1991 and now edits an Arabic newspaper in Sydney, was photographed by his torturers with his head bandaged and wearing a torn shirt drenched in blood.
He was only 16.
But a direct appeal by Mr Khoshnow to Kim Beazley last week, urging him to commit to staying the course of the war in Iraq, left the federal Labor leader unmoved.
Mr Beazley told him it was time for the Iraqis to work things through for themselves.
Were it up to Beazley, Saddam Hussein’s goons would still be working through people like Khoshnow.
(Via Currency Lad)
“NORMAL HUMAN CONTEXT” MISSING
Taliban embed David Loyn fields a few questions from BBC viewers:
Q: Do the Taleban foresee a time when they will lay down their arms and stop fighting? What is their objective and can they see a time when there will be peace?
Edward McCarthy, Edinburgh, UKA: ‘Islam’ means ‘the way of peace’. That is their dream. But it may not be achievable in any normal human context, Edward. Rather like the dreams of communism the struggle may be as important as the result. They were very surprised that when they brought relative security to most of the country in 1996 the international community did not congratulate them.
Ingrates. More on this from J.F. Beck.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
RETURN OF THE PEACE MERCEDES
The Calgary Herald reports:
Anti-war demonstrator Christina Fraser joined others outside the Harry Hays Building in Calgary on Saturday to protest Canada’s involvement in Afghanistan.
Note Christina’s sign, hastily revised once she realised she was carrying an advertisement for Mercedes-Benz. Previous Benz promotions here and here.
(Via andycanuck)
ONCE, TWICE, THREE TIMES HILALI
The Australian’s Richard Kerbaj—who deserves a Walkley award, and police protection, for his work exposing the views of Australia’s Muslim leaders—continues checking the record:
Taj Din al-Hilali has praised militant jihadists in Iraq and Afghanistan, calling them men of the highest order for fighting against coalition forces - which include Australian soldiers - to “liberate” their homelands.
In an interview on Arabic radio two weeks ago, the imam based at Sydney’s Lakemba mosque said he was opposed to terror attacks in Madrid, London and New York but strongly endorsed fighters in the Palestinian territories, Iraq and Afghanistan.
In the interview, Sheik Hilali pays tribute to Sayyid Qutb, the ideologue of the Muslim Brotherhood and intellectual mentor of Osama bin Laden and al-Qa’ida.
“Jihad of the liberator of Palestine, that’s the greatest and cleanest and highest ... jihad which lifts our heads in pride in south Lebanon,” Sheik Hilali says in the October 17 interview.
Hilali is on the same page as insurgent groupie Antony Loewenstein:
The Iraq war has never been more unpopular and delusions have never been greater. Working towards, and advocating, “Coalition” defeat has been achieved.
Further from Imam Antony:
The simple truth is that Israel’s long-term security lies with the Arab world, not a superpower thousands of miles away. A superpower, it should be noted, that has suffered an inglorious and welcome defeat in Iraq ...
Loewenstein has previously claimed not to be anti-American. Speaking of liars, wailin’ Hilali is spinning like a Wankel:
On Thursday the imam of the Lakemba Mosque, Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly, went on television and lied. Brazenly. In an interview with A Current Affair, Hilaly was asked to justify his comments that women bore the ultimate responsibility for the crime of rape, specifically his comment: “If one puts uncovered meat out in the street then the cats come and eat it, is it the fault of the cat or the uncovered meat? The uncovered meat is the problem.”
Hilaly’s response, in Arabic, came via his translator and spin doctor, Keysar Trad: “He’s saying that the man is responsible, that the cat is responsible.”
Absolute rubbish.
It’s all part of a campaign to demonise Islam:
A radical Islamic group accused of infiltrating mosques and urging Muslims to rise up against Australian troops serving in Iraq has again been caught distributing inflammatory leaflets.
Members of the Hizb ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation) were seen handing out leaflets outside Sydney’s Lakemba mosque, claiming the furore about Sheik Taj Din al-Hilali’s comments was the latest effort in the West’s “campaign to demonise Islam and intimidate the Muslim community”.
Hizbies are legal here, for some reason.
UPDATE. Medical drama in Lakemba:
An ambulance and riot squad officers have arrived at the Sydney mosque where Muslim leaders are meeting to discuss the future of controversial cleric Sheik Taj al-Din al-Hilaly.
Two paramedics took oxygen resuscitation equipment into the sheik’s office at the Lakemba mosque but it was unclear whom they were going to treat.
An ambulance spokesman said officers were tending to a person who was believed to have collapsed.
It’s a rare collapse that is attended by the riot squad:
Officers from the NSW police riot squad arrived at the mosque shortly after the ambulance turned up.
NSW police said they were there as a precaution.
UPDATE II. Sheik down:
The beleaguered Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly has been rushed to hospital after falling ill as a meeting with the Lebanese Muslim Association met to decide his future.
AUSLIMS ARRESTED
Convert to Islam and see the world:
At least three Australians with suspected links to al-Qaeda are facing terrorist charges after being arrested in Yemen for alleged arms smuggling.
A foreign affairs department spokesman in Canberra confirmed reports from Yemen that Australian passport-holders were among eight foreigners arrested in Yemen ...
Government sources in the Yemeni capital said that all eight had converted to Islam earlier this year and received religious instruction in Yemen.
Apparently the Yemeni three are all from NSW.
(Via J.F. Beck)
DO NOT REACT
George W. Bush on Islam’s victimhood culture:
If it’s not the Crusades, it’s the cartoons.
And always with the rioting and the chanting and the burning that follows most every perceived insult. Which makes amusing this plea from West Australian Muslim leader Ameer Ali:
He is urging people not to react to the mufti’s comments.
“Let’s ask the community not to take the law into their own hands and do anything rash ...”
GREAT WORK, DAVE
Chris Masters blames wilful excerpting for the perception that his Alan Jones biography concentrated unfairly on Jones’ sexuality:
The extraction and concentration of controversial material in the first excerpt published in The Sydney Morning Herald did appear to colour a more measured portrait.
And who was the SMH’s sex-obsessed excerpter whose unnecessary emphasis coloured Masters’ “measured portrait”? Step forward, David Marr:
I did the excerpts.
(Via Andrew Bolt)
HOT CAUSES COLD
Headline in the Buffalo News:
Was surprise snowstorm caused by global warming?
Similar warm-makes-cold headlines (“October snowstorm sparks fears of global warming”) have reportedly also turned up in Australia.
BERNIE BURNING
Bernard Slattery is on a winning streak hot enough to liquify polar bears. Back Tawqeet and Pop Rock in the Melbourne Cup.
UPDATE. Lloyd Williams agrees with miracle tipster Bernie.
DEMOCRACY UNGUARDED
Webdiary offline; now is the time for Bush/Howard forces to pounce.
THOSE ACCURATE, RADIOACTIVE JEWS
Robert Fisk asks:
Did Israel use a secret new uranium-based weapon in southern Lebanon this summer ... ?
Israel could have done. After all, Fisk knows his Israeli weaponry:
The Israeli missiles had pierced the very centre of the red cross painted on the roof of each vehicle. Did the pious use the cross as their aiming point?
Meanwhile, Fisk is still yet to mention a recent goofy claim that 655,000 Iraqis died due to coalition liberation. He ain’t believin’ it.