BRITISH CRITIC OF ISRAEL TO HEAD 60TH ANNIVERSARY FILM FESTIVAL

British critic of Israel to head 60th-anniversary film festival (JPost)
A fierce critic of Israel has been chosen by the British Council to play a key role in the annual British Film Festival in Israel next month.

British filmmaker Judy Price, an activist in the fringe group Jews for Justice for Palestinians, has been selected to curate a series of archival film screenings around the British Mandate period for the festival marking Israel's 60th anniversary.

Price, in turn, invited Israeli-born anti-Zionist film lecturer Haim Bresheeth to take part in the festival. However, Bresheeth turned down the request, saying he said he would not come to the "racist" state to speak, as Israel had "crossed all the boundaries of a civilized nation."

"The best and only thing we could and should all be doing is having no contact whatsoever with official and institutional Israel, certainly not being part of the celebrations of the destruction of Palestine," he said.

"My whole family was destroyed by the Nazis in the death camps and ghettos, and will not participate in any action which denies the rights of the Palestinians, or which celebrates the victory‚ of their oppressors," he added.

In response, Price said she saw the festival as "an opportunity to bring to the forefront the British Mandate's role in the Nakba and establishment in the State of Israel and to construct a program that could not in any way be interpreted as jingoistic or nationalistic."

A spokesperson for the British Council in Tel Aviv told The Jerusalem Post that Price had been chosen for her artistic credentials.

HARRY POTTER STAR DONATES GLASSES FOR HOLOCAUST EXHIBITION

Harry Potter star donates glasses for Holocaust exhibition (JPost)
"Harry Potter" star Daniel Radcliffe, who captivated moviegoers as the bespectacled schoolboy wizard, has donated the first pair of glasses he wore as a child to an art exhibition marking the horrors of the Holocaust.

The British actor joins several other celebrities and members of the public whose spectacles will be linked together in the shape of a railway track, recalling the trains that carried many of the Nazis' victims to concentration camps throughout Europe. An estimated 6 million Jews died.

The exhibition in Liverpool will open January 21. The port city in northwest England will host Britain's Holocaust Day commemorative service on January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

Muslim leaders are set to attend the multicultural service, which is the culmination of a series of lectures, exhibitions, stage shows and musical events recalling the Nazi atrocities and more recent genocides. Jason Isaacs, who stars as the sinister Lucius Malfoy in the "Harry Potter" films, will also take part in the service.

The 18-year-old Radcliffe, whose mother is Jewish, sent the oval, gray metal-framed pair of glasses he wore as a 6-year-old.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, US chat-show host Jerry Springer and Yoko Ono, the widow of Beatle John Lennon, have also donated glasses to the exhibition.

NEW PBS FILM ON AMERICAN JEWS

PBS film shows U.S. Jews as outsiders trying to get in (JTA)
With a few blips, PBS's new three-part documentary offers a fresh, intelligent take on the story of Jews in America. Structured around the themes of identity and adaptation, it uses the clever technique of having Jews tell their own ancestors' stories. Full Story

VIDEO: Watch a short clip from the documentary.

PHOTOS: Jewish Americans through the years.

ON TV: Program schedule.

MOVIE REVIEW: "KIKE LIKE ME"

Kike Like Me John Podhoretz (Contentions)
Yesterday, the New York Times ran a piece called “Vexing Questions about Jewish Identity” that was the talk of the town, its subject being a documentary with the outlandishly provocative title Kike Like Me. Its director and star, Jamie Kastner, travels from Lubavitch headquarters in Brooklyn to Pat Buchanan’s house outside Washington to a Paris suburb to a Berlin Holocaust memorial to a Krakow synagogue and finally inside the gates of Auschwitz in an exploration of Jewish identity and what being a Jew means today. The movie is made Michael Moore style, with Kastner playing the role of ingenuous naif lost in the woods and looking for help trying to get himself out. The influence of Moore, combined with Kastner’s seemingly cutesy refusal in interviews to say whether or not he is in fact Jewish and its appearance on a cable channel associated with the reflexively leftist Sundance Film Festival, led me to expect Kike Like Me would be a standard-issue work of self-examination in which Jews and Jewry would effectively be put on trial, not anti-Semitism.

And…I was very, very wrong. Kike Like Me is bracing and tough-minded, and is, in fact, a study not of “Jewish identity” but of 21st century anti-Semitism. When Kastner, a Canadian with a modest and inoffensive manner, asks Pat Buchanan about a paragraph in one of his books that calls the patriotism of neoconservatives into question, Buchanan takes a quick look at the curly-headed Kastner and instantly terminates the interview. In London, he interviews Richard Ingrams, the odious one-time editor of Private Eye who has famously declared that he glances at the bottom of letters he receives to see whether its author has a Jewish name for, if so, he will simply not read it. An American expat in London tells him she has decided to return home because she is unable to have a single conversation with English friends in which the supposed perfidy of Israel is not referenced.

He wanders through Krakow looking for a Jew but finding only restaurants that cater to Jews, Israelis primarily, who have traveled there to see evidence of Polish Jewry before its destruction. Even the old woman in the Krakow shul who hands him a yarmulke isn’t a Jew, and once he discovers the fact, he takes back the $5 he gave her.
Read the rest of this entry »

MEDIA'S ANNUAL "ISRAEL AS THE GRINCH" BASH

The Grinch That Destroys Christmas (HonestReporting)

It's that time of year again - the media prepares to take a festive bash at Israel.

Writing in The Times of London, Michael Gove observes:

There's one invariable sign that Christmas is almost upon us - a story about how Bethlehem is suffering at the hands of wicked Israel.

It has become almost as much a feature of seasonal journalism as stories about how Nativity plays are being subverted and commentaries on how commercialism is snuffing out the true meaning of the festival....

Indeed, HonestReporting has covered the media's less than festive reporting from Bethlehem in 2006, 2005 and 2003 and we have no reason to suspect that this year will be any different, with National Geographic kicking off the season.

CHRISTIANS IN THE HOLY LAND - THE REALITY

In the rush to blame Israel for the precarious position of Christian communities in the region, the foreign media has almost ignored the increasing pressures on Palestinian Christians, particularly since the rise of Hamas and other extremist Islamist forces. Here are some recent stories you may have missed:

• In December, Muslim gunmen tried to kill a Palestinian Christian in the Gaza Strip following the kidnap and murder of another Christian in October. "The latest incident is aimed at sending a message to all the Christians here that we must leave," said a Christian leader. "Radical Islamic groups are waging a campaign to get rid of us and no one seems to care."
• The only Christian TV station in the Holy Land stopped its broadcasts at the end of October due to security and financial problems. For over a year the director and owner of The Nativity TV station reportedly received death threats and intimidation. His five siblings have already moved abroad and he is expected to follow them once the station is closed.
• In October Pastor Isa Bajalia, a Palestinian-American Christian working in Ramallah, fled to Jerusalem following threats and demands for protection money.

REPORT: CHRISTIANS TO DISAPPEAR FROM PA IN 15 YEARS

A report by the JCPA's Justus Weiner concludes that Christians in the West Bank and Gaza are likely to dissipate completely within the next 15 years as a result of increasing Muslim persecution and maltreatment. The Jerusalem Post comments:

Trying to survive under the Muslim thumb, PA Christians keep a low profile, strive to give no offense and often even toe the most extremist Arab line to evince loyalty and remove the threat from themselves. Many publicly blame Israel for their plight, while murmurs of protest against Islamic domination grow ever-fainter, presumably for fear of making things even worse for beleaguered Christians.

The silence of Christian Arabs and Christians abroad in the face of the desecration of Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity by Muslim terrorists who invaded it a few years back was a case in point. Israel was condemned for seeking to remove the raiders, when it was the violent intruders who should have been denounced. Fanatical Arabs are dreaded. Israelis are not.

This pattern persists. Weiner noted that Bethlehem's ills are often ascribed to the security fence, because church representatives "sing the PA's tune" and are quick to censure Israel for everything.

The temptation to do so will increase in the Advent to Christmas, whose celebration in Bethlehem will to no small extent depend on the goodwill of Muslim PA overlords, who make a point of attending the midnight mass each year, all but appropriating the festivities. The grand entries made by Yasser Arafat have still not faded from memory; nor has the empty seat left posthumously for him in the Church of the Nativity, as if elevating him to singular spiritual status.

Like Arafat, his successor Mahmoud Abbas often poses in the guise of Christianity's protector, implying that it, along with Islam, is menaced by Judaism. Yet false and brazen though this cynical affectation is, it goes unquestioned in most of the world.

Click on the image above to see Justus Weiner talking about his report on CBN News.

As Michael Gove continues:

The truth is very different. The parlous position of Palestinian Christians, indeed the difficult position of most Christians across the Arab world, is a consequence not of Israeli aggression but of growing Islamist influence. Israel goes out of its way to honour sites and traditions sacred to other faiths while the radicals who are driving Palestinian politics seek to create an Islamist state in which other faiths, if they survive at all, do so with the explicit subject status of dhimmis. But when it comes to Israel's position in these matters it's still a case of O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see them lie.

THE ROLE OF SABEEL

If the above represents the reality of Christian communities in the Holy Land, then why does Christian anti-Israel sentiment continue to appear in the media and elsewhere? One driving force behind this is the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center. According to NGO Monitor, Sabeel is active in promoting an extreme anti-Israel agenda in Protestant churches in both North America and Europe. Sabeel's efforts have promoted the campaign to isolate and delegitimize Israel through the divestment campaign, which have recently been adopted by some church organizations.

As noted in a detailed study by Robert Everett and Dexter Van Zile, and cited in their Jerusalem Post article of July 10, 2005 "Reawakening the teachings of contempt", Sabeel is a major factor in extremist Christian anti-Israel activism. Sabeel's statements consistently highlight Palestinian suffering and place blame on Israel, while ignoring such issues as corruption within the Palestinian Authority, violence perpetrated against Israelis and Palestinians alike by armed Palestinian militias, and attacks against Christian Arabs.

Sabeel director Naim Ateek employs classical antisemitic theological themes, as reflected in the 2001 Sabeel "Easter message": "it seems to many of us that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him. […] The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily." In similar messages, such as a February 2001 sermon, Ateek accuses Israel of killing Jesus (the Palestinians) as infant, prophet and messiah: "Israel has placed a large boulder, a big stone that has metaphorically shut off the Palestinians in a tomb. It is similar to the stone placed on the entrance of Jesus' tomb…"

For more on Sabeel, see CAMERA's recent analysis.

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ON DECEMBER 19, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC WILL AIR, "THE LAST CHRISTIANS OF BEHTLEHEM." HERE'S HOW THE FILM IS DESCRIBE AT THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC WEBSITE:

In a time of mystical believers, fundamentalist doctrine, occupation and religious persecution, the most famous birth in human history happens. Here in Bethlehem, a boy is born whose brief life will transform the world forever. His followers build a shrine on the site of his delivery. And through the millennia, this shrine will bear witness to hope, wonder, violence, severe conflict and death. This is the story of the last Christians of Bethlehem. Caught between an Islamic majority amongst their Palestinian brethren and a wary nation of Israel who has cut the West Bank off from Jerusalem in order to keep its citizens secure, the Christians of Bethlehem have fewer reasons than ever to stay and protect their holy sites. EXPLORER delves deep inside the history of the Church of the Nativity, the Christians that protect it, and the indelible conflicts that this church has witnessed.

I HAVEN'T SEEN THE FILM, BUT I EXPECT IT TO BE FAIR. I KNOW THE FILMMAKER.

UNREPENTANT NAZI DRAWS PENSIONS FROM 3 COUNTRIES

Unrepentant Nazi, 84, calls Auschwitz a 'ten star hotel' and tells Dachau victim 'you survived well' (UK Daily Mail)
An unrepentant old Nazi officer who served in some of the worst concentration camps gives the Hitler salute in Spain where he has hidden from justice for over 60 years. Now Paul Maria Hafner is the subject of a TV documentary called "Hafner's Paradise" which chronicles his life in exile – and how he manages to draw pensions from three countries.

Operation Last Chance, the campaign to round up the last Nazis in Europe organised by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Israel, has him on their wanted list. Yet although Hafner, 84, continues to make outrageous statements that would put him behind bars in Germany or Austria, no government has sought to prosecute him.

He calls the death camp of Auschwitz, where 1.1 million Jews were murdered, "a ten star hotel" where "Jews were sent for their own protection. All that stuff about murder is Allied propaganda crap." Of Hitler he says: "I regard him as the greatest man who ever lived, the most important person in the history of the world." He said he gets out of bed every day to give the raised arm salute to his Fuehrer.

He agreed to a documentary being made on him "because I want to set the record straight about our ideals and our cause during the Third Reich." He admits he dreams of seeing a "Fourth Reich" in Germany adding: "I am only sorry I will not be around to see it."

After WWII, Hafner found asylum in Franco's Spain, protected from allegations of war crimes and surrounded by old comrades. This is why Spain is "paradise on earth" for him - a place that allows him to continue to nurture his fanaticism, and yet protects him from the scrutiny of international justice.

"No Jew was ever killed under Hitler for being a Jew," he said, refusing to elaborate on what he did when posted to the concentration camps of Buchenwald and Dachau in Germany.

Hafner is not being pursued actively by governments although Nazi war crime sleuths in Israel believe him guilty of atrocities in the two concentrations camps where he worked and on the Eastern Front where he served as a fighting SS man.

He draws three pensions because he qualifies for a war pension from Germany, an old age pension in Spain where he worked for many years as a pig farmer and one from Italy because it is the land of his birth.

Being a former concentration camp guard is not a barrier to receiving a German pension.

In the documentary, Hafner is brought face-to-face with a survivor from Dachau. You survived quite well," Hafner responds matter-of-factly after the Jewish victim recounts his painful memories.

According to Hafner there are hundreds like him in Spain.

Gunter Schwaiger, who filmed Hafner's Paradise, said: "He is in close contact with people who are indeed wanted or have been convicted in other countries because of their anti-Semitic actions and declarations, or because they have denied the existence of the Holocaust.

"Paul María Hafner is neither a Martian nor a diabolical being, but an apparently respectable gentleman living in a smart Madrid neighbourhood who, aged 84, might be taken for a congenial grandfather, filled with goodness and affection.

"The defeat of the Third Reich was an enormous trauma for Hafner, from which he has not yet recovered. His convictions have simply become firmer. He is not troubled by the accounts of the victims, or that National Socialism led the world to disaster. His fanaticism remains just as intact today as 60 years ago."

The film is due for release in the UK in the spring.

RABBI BENJAMIN BLECH PANS THE NEW JIMMY CARTER DOCUMENTARY

HERE'S THE BEGINNING:

Watch out Gigli and Howard the Duck. You just might lose the contest for the worst movie ever made now that Jimmy Carter: Man from Plains has come to the big screen.

Produced by the same people who recently gave us the Al Gore documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, we're shown all the drama and excitement of a two-month book tour that is about as painful to watch as your last root canal without the incremental benefit of knowing that at least you gained something positive from the experience. An infomercial posing as entertainment and a distortion of facts masquerading as documentary, this film -- that would better have been called An Unconvincing Lie -- should probably be dismissed without comment were it not for the importance of its "hero" and the powerful impact it may yet have on a gullible public.

IT GETS EVEN BETTER (Hat tip: Sandy D.)

MORAL RELATIVISM AND THE DANIEL PEARL FILM

Moral relativism
The mother of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl is worried that the new movie about her son plays into the terrorists’ hands by comparing his murder to the detainment of suspects in the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay. (Ynet)

CAIRO FILM FESTIVAL REJECTS ISRAELI ENTRY

Cairo Film Festival Rejects Israeli Entry (AFP)
Organizers of the Cairo International Film Festival have loudly opposed an application by Eran Kolirin's "The Band's Visit," a fictional tale of an Egyptian police band that gets stranded in Israel.

The director said his movie, which won praise at the Munich and Cannes film festivals, sends a strong pro-peace message, but Soheir Abdel Kader, the festival's vice president, said: "It is out of the question that an Israeli film plays here."

A solid "anti-normalization" front exists in Egypt's cultural circles which reject collaboration or contact with Israeli artists or intellectuals, despite a peace deal signed between Egypt and Israel in 1979.

SAN DIEGO WOMEN'S FILM FESTIVAL REVERSES BAN ON ISRAELI FILMS

San Diego Festival Reverses Ban on Israeli Films (AJC)
The San Diego Women Film Foundation and Festival issued an apology about banning Israeli films. The apology came after AJC’s San Diego and Orange County Chapters protested the exclusion of Israeli films from the annual festival, which opens October 4. “We are pleased that the Film Foundation recognized the festival director's errant behavior and has moved expeditiously to correct the injustice of excluding Israeli filmmakers,” said Tad Seth Parzen, president of AJC’s San Diego Chapter. The Film Foundation’s apology was posted on its website, www.sdwff.org.

JEWS AND BASKETBALL

A new documentary chronicles the Jewish involvement in basketball, and how it helped make them Americans.

HOLLYWOOD EDITS OUT HONOR KILLING, LEAVES IN ANTI-SEMITISM

Hollywood takes honor killing out of movie; leaves in anti-semitism (Elder of Zyion)

An amazing article from Debbie Schlussel: The Muslim Honor Killing Hollywood Doesn't Want You to See (Anti-Semitic Scenes Remain).

As Robert Avrech points out, Hollywood producers don't have to worry about being killed when they bash Jews or Christians. The crude Muslim version of censorship - claim "Islamophobia" while subtly hinting that violence may happen to break out and threaten the set or the producer - works quite well, even in America.

THE SMILING FACE OF A CHILD MURDERER

The Smiling Face of a Terrorist Murderer - Frimet Roth
Ahlam Tamimi - the person who planned the Jerusalem terror massacre that killed my daughter Malki - and dozens of other Palestinian terrorists star in the Israeli documentary "Hot House." Shimon Dotan's film exposes astonishing aspects of life behind bars in Israel where convicted Palestinian terrorists enjoy country-club-like conditions. They all have access to Israeli and Palestinian radio, television and newspapers. They enjoy bi-weekly family visits. Prison garb is waived. Prayer halls are available for the free practice of the very faith that inspired their crimes. And many of them earn university degrees, at the Israeli citizen's expense.

Dotan says he sat with my daughter's murderer for two hours, having a "gripping" conversation. He asked whether she knew how many children had perished in the Sbarro bombing. Smiling, as she generally does, she guessed "three." "It was eight," Dotan corrected her. She seemed delighted and smiled again, asking, "really?" You may emerge convinced that this film conveys a balanced picture of the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict - a film without a single appearance by a victim of the terrorists. (Ha'aretz)

SEE ALSO: "Hot House": Cinematic Soapbox for Murderers (CAMERA)

NEW FILM COMPANY'S SAUDI/PALI BACKERS DON'T WANT CERTAIN MOVIES MADE

New Film Company's Saudi and Palestinian Backers (LGF)

In the New York Post gossip section, Cindy Adams has a disturbing bit of info about the head of Al-Arabiya and some Arafat cronies, in bed with a new US film company and already influencing the movies that get made: Look who's on studio board.

July 11, 2007 — PAY attention: A new movie company called the Film Department has just been born. Its CEO is Mark Gill, for mer Miramax and Warner Independent exec who masterminded "March of the Penguins." Two of its board members are Sheik Waleed Al Ibrahim and Zeid Masri.

The Saudi Arabian sheik runs stations that are mouthpieces for the Saudis. Like for instance, Al Arabiya news network, which is not known to be pro-U.S.

Zeid Masri runs the McLean, Va., operation SilverHaze, which has in the past secretly invested Palestine Liberation Organization money through front companies. His SilverHaze caused the Bowlmor scandal this newspaper broke in 2004. Bowlmor, a Greenwich Village bowling hall that does big business in bar mitzvahs, took in an infusion of fresh capital years ago. When Bloomberg's Markets Magazine hit a strike and came up with information that the cash was, in fact, Yasser Arafat's own dirty millions, the deal fell down faster than a tenpin.

Now, while the Palestinian people are starving, SilverHaze is dabbling in stateside entertainment.

This all came to light when a development deal with Mark Gill was suddenly axed. "Dove Hunting," an action film/love story about two agents trying to stop a terrorist attack, had a go in December 2006. In March 2007, it was full speed ahead pending financing of this new studio. Came financing of this new studio and, with it, six weeks ago, an e-mail trail that canceled the project. Seems some of the fledgling studio's backers were not pleased with the subject.

DANIEL PEARL'S FATHER BLASTS MORAL RELATIVISM OF NEW MOVIE

Moral Relativism and "A Mighty Heart" - Judea Pearl
There can be no moral equivalence between those who seek to build a more liberal, tolerant world and those who advocate the annihilation of other faiths, cultures, or states. Thanks to the release of "A Mighty Heart," the movie based on Mariane Pearl's book of the same title, the legacy of my son, Daniel Pearl, is once again receiving attention. Yet the film compares Danny's abduction with Guantanamo and compares al-Qaeda militants with CIA agents. I am concerned that aspects of the movie will play into the hands of professional obscurers of moral clarity.

Danny's tragedy demands an end to this logic. There can be no comparison between those who take pride in the killing of an unarmed journalist and those who vow to end such acts - no ifs, ands, or buts. Moral relativism died with Daniel Pearl, in Karachi, on January 31, 2002. There was a time when drawing moral symmetries between two sides of every conflict was a mark of original thinking. Today, it reflects nothing but lazy conformity. (New Republic)

MICHAEL MOORE TO SHOW HIS FILM AT IRANIAN FILM FESTIVAL

Michael Moore comes to Iran (ISNA)
TEHRAN, July 02 (ISNA)-Writer, producer and director, Michael Moore is to come to Iran for the screening of his new production SICKO in the first international documentary film festival held here. This festival will be held from the 15th to the 19th of October in Tehran.

According to reports in SICKO, Michael Moore interviews Americans who have been denied treatment by the U.S. health care insurance companies, whose policies are designed to maximize profits at the expense of providing essential care. The consequences of these individuals' plights range from bankruptcy to the unnecessary deaths of loved ones.

SEE ALSO: Iranian film festival invites Michael Moore to Tehran (HotAir)

INTERESTING, CONSIDERING MOORE WON'T ALLOW HIS FILMS TO BE SHOWN IN ISRAEL. HE ALSO HAS A HISTORY OF TAKING WHAT MANY CONSIDER TO BE ANTI-SEMITIC POSITIONS:

Quotes from Michael Moore’s book, "Dude Where’s My Country?” (Warner Books, 2003) regarding the United States support for Israel:

Moore dedicated his book "Dude, Where’s My Country?" to Rachel Corrie, an International Solidarity Movement volunteer who was killed March 16 when she climbed in front of a Caterpillar bulldozer that was destroying tunnels used by Palestinian terrorists to illegally smuggle weapons from Egypt into Gaza

"Of course many Israeli children had died too, at the hands of the Palestinians. You would think that would make every Israeli want to wipe out the Arab world, but the average Israeli does not have that response. Why? Because IN THEIR HEARTS, THEY KNOW THEY ARE WRONG, AND THEY KNOW THEY WOULD BE DOING JUST WHAT THE PALESTINIANS ARE DOING IF THE SANDAL WERE ON THE OTHER FOOT."

"Hey, here’s a way to stop suicide bombings – give the Palestinians a bunch of missile-firing Apache helicopters and let them and the Israelis go at each other head to head. Four billion dollars a year to Israel – four billion dollars a year to the Palestinians – they can just blow each other up and leave the rest of us the hell alone."

"Now I’m not just talking about your everyday anti-Semites. No, I’m talking about a perceived notion that we Americans are supporting Israel in its oppression of the Palestinian people. Now where did those Arabs come up with an idea like that? Maybe it was when the Palestinian child looked up in the air and saw an American Apache helicopter firing a missile into his baby sister’s bedroom just before she was blown into a hundred bits."

In 1987, Moore was honored by the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee for his "courageous efforts in journalism." (ADC Times, January 1990, page 4)

In 1990, speaking before the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Moore announced that he would refuse to attend a screening of his movie "Roger and Me," which was being held in Jerusalem. He was quoted as saying that he would not attend until Israel ceased to occupy the West Bank and Gaza. (Arab American News, 1990)

Moore attended and spoke at a June 5, 1990, demonstration protesting the continued Israeli occupation at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. (Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, July, 2001)

In October 2003, Moore was honored by the Muslim American Public Affairs Council (MPAC) with a media award. (www.mpac.org)

In his book "Stupid White Men and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation," Moore proposed that Congress give Israel 30 days to end the bloodshed taking place in its name, and if Israel did not do so, funding to Israel should be cut. He also noted that while individual terrorism is bad, state-sponsored terrorism is truly evil. Moore also proposed that the Palestinians be given their statehood and receive twice as much economic assistance from the United States as Israel receives.

"In Liverpool, [Moore] paused to contemplate the epicenters of evil in the modern world: "It’s all part of the same ball of wax, right? The oil companies, Israel, Halliburton." (David Brooks in the New York Times, June 26, 2004)

Recently Moore had no comment when questioned about the rumor that members of Hezbollah had been involved in the distribution of "Fahrenheit 9/11." (http://www.moorewatch.com)

Moore tried to prevent "Fahrenheit 9/11" from being shown in Israel. (New Yorker Magazine, February 16, 2004)

Moore stated: "Anyway, the support Bush and the Republicans feign for Israel is because Israel is near our oil. If the oil wan't there, I bet those same Republicans wouldn't [care] about Israel." (Los Angeles Times, June 22, 2004)

AHMADINEJAD REJECTS OLIVER STONE FILM BID

Ahmadinejad says No to Oliver Stone (Kaminger)
Mehdi Kolhar, Ahmadinejad’s media adviser, said “Ahmadinejad rejected Oliver Stone’s request [to make a film about Ahmadinejad]”. He said “I sent Dr Ahmadinejad’s rejection to Oliver Stone because even though he is in the opposition in the states, but even the opposition in the states is a part of the big satan”. He added “We believe that the American movie-production system does not contain any element of culture or art and is only a tool”. “I must add that Dr Ahmadinejad was personally against this”. He concluded, “However, it is very clear why Stone asked for doing the movie. He [Ahmadinejad] is an appealing figure in the world and the Americans always look for what can return their investment”.

FATHER OF VICTIM DECRIES NYT TERRORIST WHITEWASH

'That Female is Our Child's Murderer' (LGF)
At Solomonia, Arnold Roth, whose daughter Malki was one of 15 murdered by Palestinian terrorists in the horrific Sbarro Pizzeria bombing in August 2001, responds to a particularly despicable New York Times whitewash: ’That female is our child’s murderer’.

SEE: NYT MOVIE REVIEW CUDDLES UP TO TERRORISTS

NYT MOVIE REVIEW CUDDLES UP TO TERRORISTS

Middle East Moral Equivalency: Anti-Israeli Terrorists as "Warriors" (TimeWatch)
Neil Genzlinger on "Hot House": "The film, though, is necessarily ambiguous as to whether all this will lead either side to be more accommodating or will simply result in smarter warriors." The same "warriors" who kill Israeli children in suicide bombings?

"An Odd Understanding Reached in Israeli Prisons" is a review by staff editor and frequent Times contributor Neil Genzlinger of "Hot House," a Cinemax documentary airing tonight,about Palestinian terrorists being held in Israel prisons. Genzlinger's piece was accompanied by a flattering photo of a young, smiling female prisoner, Ahlam Tamimi, identified in the caption as "among about 10,000 Palestinians being held in Israeli jails."

Genzlinger added: "A former Palestinian newscaster, Ahlam Tamimi, recalls the day she dropped a suicide bomber off at his target, then coolly went on television to report on the resulting bombing."

What the Times didn't mention is Tamimi's actual target, a Sbarro pizza restaurant in Jerusalem in August 2001, one of the most infamous of all the myriad Palestinian suicide bombings, one which killed eight children, a fact that failed to wipe the smile off Tamimi's face.

Genzlinger didn't use the word "terrorist" in the course of his short review, which is suffused with a tone of moral equivalency.

"Mr. Dotan, who grew up in Israel, is so successful at revealing the world inside the prisons, where about 10,000 Palestinians are held, that by the end of 'Hot House' you may feel more than a little annoyance at the two sides in this endless conflict. These enemies know each other absurdly well. They learn from each other, and talk openly about doing so. Yet they can't seem to break the cycle: a cat and mouse addicted to their own game."

He even lumped the terrorists along with Israeli soldiers as "warriors" in the last line: "The film, though, is necessarily ambiguous as to whether all this will lead either side to be more accommodating or will simply result in smarter warriors."

The same "warriors" who kill children in suicide bombings?

FILM: "THE MAKING OF A MARTYR"

New Film: The Making of a Martyr (LGF)

Film maker Brooke Goldstein traveled to the West Bank and filmed more than five hours of interviews with terrorists and their brainwashed children. She went into it believing the situation had been exaggerated—but found it was worse than she could have imagined: Recruited To Die.

As the group walked through the town, they spoke to Palestinian Arab children in schools and on the street. "Our fixer was encouraging us to speak with the children. I think I'd always, deep down, had a hard time thinking the problem was really that bad. I thought maybe it was a lunatic fringe," she said.

In fact, the fanaticism was worse than she ever imagined. "The most shocking thing was reconciling the normal appearance of these kids and what was coming out of their mouths," she said. "I was holding these beautiful children in my lap, and my translator was translating words of hate."

The story was always the same. "No child ever said, 'I don't want to be a martyr.' They talked about fame, paradise, virgins, and Ferris wheels [after death]. They were happy to tell me they hated Jews," she said.

The children were more fanatical than their parents. "When we interviewed Hussam's family for the film, his parents were distraught. They don't believe in this whole child suicide bomber concept," Ms. Goldstein said. "Then I interviewed his sister, who was like, 'I'm so proud of my brother. Hamas says he's a hero.' At one point she had a loser, dwarf, mentally handicapped brother. Now she's the coolest girl in class, and very proud."

In addition to the children, Ms. Goldstein interviewed Mr. Zubeidah, commander of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in Jenin. At the time, the Israel Defense Forces had made five attempts to assassinate him. In person, Mr. Zubeidah was not the harsh figure she had expected. "It was like talking to any other kid, about 27 years old," she said. "He was smiling. My translator told me, 'He's talking about killing Jews.'"

"The Making of a Martyr" is being shown at the Brooklyn International Film Festival on Saturday and Tuesday.