August 22 and Iran

Iranian military exercise and August 22. Debka:

Washington is keeping a sharp weather eye out for Tuesday, August 22, which this year corresponds in the Islamic calendar to the date on which many Sunni Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on his winged horse Buraq to “the farthest mosque”, which is traditionally identified with Jerusalem.

According to the Muslim legend, on that day, a divine white light spread over Jerusalem and the whole world.

DEBKAfile’s intelligence sources report that information rated “highly credible” has reached US undercover agencies of a secret report presented to Iran’s supreme ruler Ali Khamenei by Abdollah Shabhazi, one of the heads of the Supreme National Security Council. He claims to expose a mega-terror plot against Jerusalem scheduled for August 22, which aims at killing large numbers of Jews, Arabs and Christians. This atrocity will reportedly arm the United States and Israel with the pretext for hitting Iran’s nuclear installations, as well its capital, Tehran, and other big cities. Shabhazi says the US and Israel need to launch a military campaign to restore the deterrent strength they lost in the Lebanon war. The massive attack will reportedly focus on the Old City of Jerusalem and its eastern suburbs. The Iranian report claims that the plotters, who are not identified, are eager to recreate the divine white light whish spread over Jerusalem in the year 632. It does not rule out the use of a non-conventional weapon.
DEBKAfile reports that the authorities in Israel do not appear to be taking this threat seriously, unlike Washington – and Tehran.

US to push for sanctions if no joy from Tehran. Vital Perspective: 'On Thursday, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said the U.S. will push quickly for sanctions if Iran fails to suspend uranium enrichment by an end of August deadline, set by the Security Council. Tehran has said it will respond by August 22 to an offer of economic incentives from the P-5 + 1. The incentives would be in exchange for a suspension of Iran's nuclear enrichment activities.'

North Korea link? CTB: 'When news broke Friday that North Korea may be preparing for an underground detonation of a nuclear device, the question that immediately arose in my mind was whether this was linked to Iran's self-imposed Aug. 22 deadline for providing a final answer about its nuclear development. Certainly the two countries have cooperated in the past.'

Bernard Lewis explains it all. Via LGF, historian Bernard Lewis explains the significance of the August 22 date:

In Islam, as in Judaism and Christianity, there are certain beliefs concerning the cosmic struggle at the end of time--Gog and Magog, anti-Christ, Armageddon, and for Shiite Muslims, the long awaited return of the Hidden Imam, ending in the final victory of the forces of good over evil, however these may be defined. Mr. Ahmadinejad and his followers clearly believe that this time is now, and that the terminal struggle has already begun and is indeed well advanced. It may even have a date, indicated by several references by the Iranian president to giving his final answer to the U.S. about nuclear development by Aug. 22. This was at first reported as "by the end of August," but Mr. Ahmadinejad's statement was more precise.
What is the significance of Aug. 22? This year, Aug. 22 corresponds, in the Islamic calendar, to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427. This, by tradition, is the night when many Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to "the farthest mosque," usually identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back (c.f., Koran XVII.1). This might well be deemed an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of Israel and if necessary of the world. It is far from certain that Mr. Ahmadinejad plans any such cataclysmic events precisely for Aug. 22. But it would be wise to bear the possibility in mind.

A passage from the Ayatollah Khomeini, quoted in an 11th-grade Iranian schoolbook, is revealing. "I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers [i.e., the infidel powers] wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom. Either we shake one another's hands in joy at the victory of Islam in the world, or all of us will turn to eternal life and martyrdom. In both cases, victory and success are ours."

In this context, mutual assured destruction, the deterrent that worked so well during the Cold War, would have no meaning.

August 22 and uranium enrichment. DebkaNet Weekly (subscription): 'Next Tuesday, Aug. 22, Tehran will reveal to the world that it has made important progress in uranium enrichment development following a breakthrough in the activation of P-2 centrifuges.
A loud international outcry is expected to ensue, together with another urgent demand from Washington to impose punitive sanctions on the Islamic Republic. However, foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki predicts that the Lebanon war’s impact will mute Western protests and persuade the Europeans more easily to oppose sanctions for long enough to give Iran more breathing space. The Russians and Chinese and their vetoes are in the bag. He is sure Europe will now shrink back from any military showdown with Iran and even the United States will reconsider any planned assaults.'

Uri Grossman, 1985-2006

Last night I responded to the book meme posted by JMK. Among the books I mentioned (one that "made me cry") was See Under: Love by the Israeli novelist David Grossman.

Only a few hours later, David's son Uri Grossman was reported killed in Lebanon. As the Jerusalem Post notes, 'In a press conference convened by author David Grossman along with fellow writers A.B. Yehoshua and Amos Oz last week, the three pled with the Israeli government to reach a cease-fire agreement – two days later, Grossman's son, Uri, was killed in Lebanon. ... The three authors initially expressed unequivocal support for a military act of self-defense at the outbreak of the war, but later changed their position in the face of the cabinet's decision to expend operations in Lebanon. Grossman himself argued that Israel already exhausted its self-defense right.'

Arutz Sheva: 'The son of left wing author David Grossman was killed in action in southern Lebanon on Saturday. The soldier, Sergeant First Class, Uri Grossman, is from Mevasseret Zion, outside Jerusalem. Grossman was killed when his tank was hit by a missile in the south Lebanese village of Khirbet Kasif.'

Imshin has more: 'Our girls grew up on a steady diet of Grossman’s wonderful Itamar books, when they were little. I also loved reading them to them, over and over again. He must be a wonderful father to write such magical children’s books. My favorite is called ‘Itamar the Dream Hunter’, in which Itamar’s father teaches him to deal with the demon that haunts his dreams by facing it. ...'

Book Meme

Tagged by: Jeremayakovka

1. One book that changed your life

Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, Halakhic Man

This one book changed my entire way of thinking about Orthodox Judaism and completely demolished the stereotypes I'd been taught by the liberal Jewish world.

- and -

Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon

This book helped me to come to terms with my dysfunctional family background. Macon ("Milkman") Dead has to deal with a lot of tough problems, including external oppression (from a racist society) and internal oppression (from within the family). He learns to liberate himself by understanding the mistakes his parents made - and by accepting the magical secret that they passed on to him. I'm planning to write a post on SoS one of these days.

2. One book you have read more than once

Daniel Pinkwater, Lizard Music

This book is simply sublime.

3. One book you would want on a desert island

Samuel R. Delany, Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand

4. One book that made you laugh

Alison Bechdel, Dykes to Watch Out For (the series)

5. One book that made you cry

David Grossman, See Under: Love (tr. by Betsy Rosenberg)

-and-

Audre Lorde, The Complete Poems

6. One book you wish had been written

Stephanie McLintock, The First Half: My Life and Works at Age 42

If only.

- also -

Tammy Bruce, Mary Cheney, and Irshad Manji, GWOT: The Gay War On Terror; Why the Queer Community Must Unite Against Islamic Fascism

I'm thinking of using that for a post title.

7. One book you wish had never been written

Sayyid Qutb, the complete works

8. One book you're currently reading

Bernard Lewis, The Middle East
Richard Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics

9. One book you've been meaning to read

Stephen Wolfram, The Mathematica Book

A tragic update: David Grossman's son Uri has just been reported killed.

War Bulletin: The Fog of War

Michael Totten's new podcast (8:17) from Metulla on the Israeli/Lebanese border paints a picture of tight-lipped Israeli soldiers crossing into Lebanon on foot. Now - after a seemingly endless and apparently pointless delay - Israel's ground invasion has begun.

A report from Stratfor (subscription) notes the unusually high level of infighting within the Israeli government, but does not ascribe the delay exclusively to that - or to any other known factor. "Something is holding the Israelis back", the report observes; "there is an aspect to Israeli thinking that we do not understand".

Maybe the events of the coming week will make things clearer.

Beyond the Whore/Madonna Complex: A Sense of Self

There's a great new post by Tekanji at Alas, a Blog on modesty vs. raunch culture. Although I find her critique of "modesty" too sweeping, she makes some excellent points about the culture of shame that drives the objectification and fetishization of women. Here is part of her critique of exhibitionistic "raunch culture":

... just as the choice to adopt “modest” dress does not live in a vaccum, neither does the choice to wear “revealing” clothing. There is a lot of pressure on young girls to adopt a particular style of dress. ...

Raunch culture guilts and shames women into putting on a sexual performance for men, whether they want to or not. It sets up a “right” way to express sexuality, and by pushing the notion that men are entitled to sexual gratification, even if it’s just in the form of women wearing low-cut shirts, it ignores the fact that true sexual liberation comes from people being able to make choices about what makes them happy without being guilted and/or shamed into acting a certain way. In that way, it is very much a part of, and a method of perpetuating, a sexually negative culture.

The political Right (as I noted in an earlier post) is sometimes schizophrenic on this. The neoconservative side of the brain waxes eloquent about the oppression of women under the burqa-enforcing yoke of Islam, but the social-conservative side of the brain thinks women ought to stay covered up. But what really matters is our freedom to set our own limits.

In a Purim-related post in 2004, I wrote:

Vashti, the queen of Persia, commits an open act of defiance against the King. After seven days of feasting, King Ahasuerus, in his cups, commands that the his wife the queen be brought before all the men “wearing a royal diadem” – and nothing else, as the traditional interpretation has it. Queen Vashti, furious, refuses this degrading order.

The king is so taken aback that he has to consult his advisers as to what to do next. An official named Memucan opines that Vashti’s insurrection will “make all wives despise their husbands” and that therefore she must be exiled immediately, lest there be “no end of scorn and provocation.” This edict, he continues, should be promulgated “throughout the lands of Persia and Media,” after which the king should take another bride “more worthy” than Vashti, so that “all wives will treat their husbands with respect.” King Ahasuerus does exactly as Memucan instructs.

Let us notice the implications. It is the king’s honor, and not the queen’s, that is of concern here. In fact, simply by insisting on her own dignity and autonomy, the insubordinate queen is a threat to his honor. And finally, the king, as ruler of his country, has an obligation to uphold this patriarchal value system lest it infect the lower classes.

What is the right that was so important to Vashti? Simply put, it is the right to wear clothes. It is the right to define her own boundaries, and to claim her body as her own. It is her right to exist.

It is also the right to present herself to the world in a fashion of her own choosing. Beyond the need to keep warm, beyond our basic instinct for decency, we wear clothes to express ourselves. Getting dressed is the first creative act we do every day. There is something so fundamental about this need that people will risk punishment for it. In contemporary Iran, some women deliberately wear colored socks, or allow a forbidden strand of hair to show, simply to assert their own autonomy in the face of Islamic totalitarianism. ...

I also argue (as does Tekanji) that our right to choose our mode of dress is intimately linked to our gender expression: 'By covering ourselves, we create the possibility of defining our own relationship to gender. Transgendered individuals, like the defiant Iranian women, have often risked harrassment and physical violence in order to dress according to their own identities. Those of us who do not identify with our socially dictated “assigned gender” can identify with that Persian queen: Vashti’s right to wear a dress is my right to wear a dress.' (See also my post on the Kabbalah.)

Go read Tekanji's full post at the link. And don't forget to bookmark Alas, a Blog.

Somewhere between totalitarianism and anarchy there is a world where we are free as individuals to define our own boundaries. It's a world where we can express ourselves - and conceal ourselves - without fear of persecution or exploitation. It is a free world, a world that we can make a reality.

Sharansky Assails Fumbling Olmert

Jerry Gordon at Israpundit:

Today, I heard from one of the few in Israel’s Knesset with any moral clarity, renown international human rights icon and former Likud cabinet member, Natan Sharansky.

The occasion was a conference call convened by One Jerusalem and host Allen Roth with several bloggers, among them ‘Atlas Shrugs, ‘Boker Tov, Boulder,’ ‘Right Wing News,’ and me representing ‘Israpundit.’

We were granted an unprecedented opportunity to ask questions and hear a response from M.K. Sharansky. Who despite his leave taking from the incapacitated Sharon’s cabinet in 2005 over last August’s Gaza unilateral disengagement is nevertheless a member of Knesset security committees. So, he is privy to much of the IDF war plans and security cabinet debates and decisions and what lies behind them. Because of his book ‘The Case For Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror,’ cowritten with Ron Dermer and laudatory comments from President Bush and his visits in Washington, he also presumably has the ear of key decisionmakers in the Bush Administration and the Congress.

Sharansky repeatedly described the Olmert government as ‘hesitant, tentative, unsure’ in its decision-making when as he graphically pointed ‘two million live in bomb shelters’ every night. The impression that Sharansky lent during the call is that virtually all of the population want this war prosecuted and fast and is behind the IDF to do it.

Drinks on a plane!

Wisdom from the LiveJournal universe, via rhiannonstone:

First they came for the knitting needles, and I didn't speak up
Because I wasn't much of a knitter
Then they came for the shoes, and I didn't speak up
Because I wear sandals
Then they came for the lighters, and I didn't speak up
Because I don't smoke
Then they came for my Dr Pepper
And now it's on, motherfuckers.

Islamic Fascists Object to Being Called "Islamic Fascists"

Via Atlas: CAIR objects to Bush's use of the term "Islamic fascists".

We believe this is an ill-advised term and we believe that it is counter-productive to associate Islam or Muslims with fascism,” said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations advocacy group.

Tough shit.

Steven Vincent: Honoring a Life

What are we doing here?

What is it, exactly, that gets us from one day to the next, that gives our lives meaning, and that makes tolerable the intolerable fact that, as surely as we live, we will one day die?

To know how each person answers this question is to know the person. Those who had the honor of knowing Steven Vincent in life, know how he would have answered.

I did not get to meet Steven, but I did meet his widow, Lisa Ramaci-Vincent, in New York last November. I was struck by her strength, her poise, and her dedication to the same ideals that Steven gave his life for. This is what it means to truly respect a person, to honor them, and to support them: it is understanding and striving for the highest values that guided the other's life.

A couple of weeks ago, a screen pal on an online community I belong to wrote that she'd seen "Gunner Palace", and that until then, she hadn't had much compassion for US soldiers "in the abstract"; but after learning that so many of them were uneducated people with no other options, she was able to muster some form of sympathy.

Now as you can see, here the "compassion" is wholly dependent on the individual's own moral and intellectual superiority. It is a compassion that kicks in once its subject can be cut down to size. This person knew I was a veteran, but never thought to satisfy her curiosity about military life (and she must have been curious, because she took the time to watch the movie) by asking me directly. Because she was unable to see me "in the abstract".

Countercolumn has a great post on this, responding to a "Support the Troops" article at left-wing Mother Jones:

How about showing your support for your wife by condescending to her, infantilizing her at every turn, constantly telling other people what a dupe she is, and by opposing and hating everything she does?

Think she'll appreciate that?

Just askin'.

So back to Steven Vincent. A few months ago, I showed a friend the laptop I'd had signed by various luminaries at the Pajamas Media launch - including Lisa Ramaci-Vincent. "Don't know if you recall who Lisa Ramaci-Vincent is," I prompted, because it was clear she didn't know, "but she's the widow of Steven Vincent, the journalist killed in Iraq."

My friend rolled her eyes piously and let out an anguished sigh. "So many," she mused. Well, the theatrics were nice, but was there any curiosity about who this Steven Vincent person had been as an individual? What he had stood for, what he'd believed in, what he lived and died for? There was none.

You cannot "support" or "honor" anybody without knowing something about them - who they are and why they do what they do. Today we have honored Steven Vincent's memory with blog posts; tomorrow, and every day for the rest of our lives, we can honor his memory by the way we live.