Editorials are posted and archived on thejewishnews.com
Dry Bones
Blind To Mideast History
A
recent set of international sur-
veys indicated that since the
start of Barack Obama's presi-
dency the image of America has grown
more positive in every country but one.
The exception is Israel.
It seems unlikely that last month's visit
of U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
to Jerusalem will do much to change that.
On the issues of freezing West Bank
settlements and responding to the nucle-
ar threat of Iran it appears, instead, that
the gap between the United States and
Israel is widening.
Gates denied that the Obama adminis-
tration is "naïve" about Iran's intentions
and the threat it poses to Israel. Yet to
many Israelis, and their supporters in
America, that is exactly the word that
comes to mind.
The president seems intent on pursu-
ing negotiations to dissuade Iran from
developing a nuclear capability. Yet there
is little in the history of Iran's theocratic
government that would seem to support
such hopes.
Its intransigence in the face of mas-
sive popular opposition to the conduct
of the last election and its insistence that
to oppose the will of the government is
to oppose the will of God, do not leave
much room for compromise.
The slightest expression of friendship
towards Israel by a government offi-
cial was enough to get him removed as
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's chief
deputy.
Iran continues to confront Israel
through its proxy terrorist organizations,
Hezbollah and Hamas. So it is with some
justification that Israelis look askance at
America's professed eagerness to negoti-
ate.
In addition to this is President Obama's
conviction that West Bank settlements
hold the answer to peace with the
Palestinians and through them with the
entire Arab world. Gates informed Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that only
those settlements in which construction
actually has begun will be allowed to
expand.
The Israeli government finds this
unacceptable, insisting that the natural
population growth of existing settle-
ments must determine expansion.
Obama's Jewish supporters, and there
are many, insist that he is only trying to
ISRAEL'S RUSE
COMMUNITY IS
DEMONSTRATING
FOR EQUAL
RIGHTS!
bring a dose of reality
to an Israeli govern-
ment that refuses to
bend on the issues
that would lead to a
Palestinian state.
But several Jewish
groups, most nota-
bly the Zionist
Organization of
America, left a White
House meeting
with the president
dismayed by a lack
of sympathy for
sweeping accom-
modations already
made by Israel and a
lack of recognition of
Palestinian intransi-
gence on issues that
go to the core of Israel's identity.
At the moment these are concerns
rather than defeats. The ties remain
strong. But several commentators report
that Obama's statements have left Israelis
shaken and determined to chart their
own course when it comes to Iran.
An attack on Iran's nuclear facilities
ORUSE
NEWS
THEY'VE ALREADY
DEMONSTRATED
THEIR EQUALITY
www.DryBonesBlog.com
unsupported by the U.S. government,
either covertly or otherwise, would be a
disaster. But other American presidents
also took office with hopes for a Mideast
peace, only to see them dashed on the
rocks of Arab duplicity.
President Obama would not be the
first to revisit that course. ❑
Reality Check
Voodoo News
T
here are a good many
Americans who apparently
believe the country's major
sports have been infiltrated by witch
doctors. I don't know how else to
explain this outbreak of "curses" that
ostensibly have been cast against certain
teams because of wrongs committed in
the past.
Babe Ruth and the Boston Red
Sox. Bobby Bragan and the Cleveland
Indians. The owner of the Billy Goat Inn
and the Chicago Cubs. Finally, Bobby
Layne and the Detroit Lions.
I was happy to see the Free Press
recently debunk ... yet again ... the entire
stupid Layne story. According to this
voodoo hooey, when Layne was traded
to Pittsburgh three games into the 1958
season, he said the Lions would not win
another championship for 50 years.
And by golly it all came true.
No matter that his former teammates
all swear that this would have been
totally out of character for the
fun-loving, high-living quar-
terback. No matter that it has
been traced to a blogger who
concocted it out of thin air a
few years ago.
It has been reprinted as fact
by people who refuse to accept
that decades of mismanage-
ment are far more powerful
weapons than curses when
it comes to losing football
games.
But there are several darker
aspects to this phenomenon.
There is strong evidence
that Layne was being investigated by
the feds back then for associations
with unsavory friends. He threw five
interceptions in half a game against the
College All Stars before the 1958 season
and then made two game-deciding mis-
cues in a game three tie with Green Bay.
In both instances, the Lions were
heavy favorites and big
money came out of Detroit
against them late in the week.
The Lions were told to get
him out of town in a trade or
face the consequences. His
teammates are much more
reluctant to deny that version
of events than the curse story.
Beyond that, however, is
the power of the Internet to
persuade its users to accept
the implausible. That is the
major tragedy of the decline
of newspapers as a primary
news source. It is not so much
that people are uninformed. It is that
they firmly believe things that are sim-
ply untrue.
As British author G.K. Chesterton
put it in another context: "The danger
in the decline of religious belief is not
that people will believe in nothing. It is
that they will believe anything." Or, if
you prefer, the Stevie Wonder version:
"If you believe in things that you can't
understand then you suffer."
We chuckle at the gullibility of our
forebears who were taken in by hoaxes
that seem obvious to our enlightened
eyes. Yet on a daily basis, I am sent
alarming e-mails about any number of
subjects; the slightest fact check on any
of them would reveal that they are false.
Or attributed to a celebrity who never
said any such thing.
Of course, I'm probably as guilty as
anyone. I held on to my Lions season
tickets for years on the misbegotten
belief that someday soon they would
again emerge as a championship team.
If that isn't believing in magic, I don't
know what is.
❑
George Cantor's e-mail address is
gcantor614@aol.com.
August 6 2009
35