yea but most women don't have a nuclear arnesal at thier disposal.

Israel's attempts to portray itself as "the good guys" don't seem like a good strategy to me. Israel is not exactly the kind of country that is likely to be popular. When they say "We will embrace any peace effort any time", they look hypocritical, no matter how sincere their intentions are.
That's why unilateral approach makes more sense to me. The attitude "We will denfend ourselves even if you don't like it" seems to bring better results.

Fleischer seems like a good guy, but I just can't get past those awful people he's chosen to align himself with.

By that I mean, of course, the Yankees.

I hear where you are coming from Ivan but speaking for the 98% of the American public who are not citizens of Israel (yes, I think dual citizenship is an insult to our soverignty be it Israeli or the proposed Mexican dual citizenship), I have to ask the question that seems to be missing here. Is that in the American interest ? I'm not so sure. I think a peaceful region is what we want and if that means we have to drag Isreal to the peace table, so be it.

On another note, I am baffled why evangelical Christians seem to be weakening their support for Israel (I mean the real fundamentalists, not the Beltway ones). Traditionally they have always stood behind Israel for a varity of reasons (including some millenarian prophecies of times to come). The rank and file are not where they once were and I am baffled as to why. I hope it has nothing to do with the Gibson film. Some of the strongest voices supporting Israel (Commentary magagazine, Charles Krautheimer, Safire come to mind) were also some of the leading ones attacking Gibson. What many people may have heard was Gibson made a film about his faith and he gets labeled a Nazi. I wonder if there is a connection. I hope not for American Christians remain one of the few friends Isreal has.

Von Bek,
I agree that peace in the ME is in American interest, but I don't think politicians like Arafat, Saddam, and the mullahs in Iran are the kind of people who can be responsible for peace.
I think we've been attacked as a civilization, and these attacks are being instigated in that region. As long as this is the case, it's not peace for us, and I see no reason why it should be for them. When jihad becomes marginal enough not to worry about it, then we can ignore it, but until then, the West had better maintain the will to crush it. Right now, the US and Israel are among the few countries who do.

As for Gibson's film which I haven't seen, I've heard that all the bad characters in it look distinctly Jewish, while all the good ones look Arian. We live at a time when a lot of people are confused and frightened, and insanities are rampant. In times like this, people always tend to blame the Jew first. So the lack of support for Israel may have nothing to do with the film.

Totally agree with you on jihad. It's us vs. them as it has been since the days of Tours, the Crusades and Lepanto.

I have seen the film and Mary looks pretty Jewish as do some of the disciples. I do think that Jewish critics of the movie overplayed their hands though and ended up alienating the overwhelming Christian majority of this nation.

There is a major gap here between people of faith and the movie divided us along those lines. Christians have been pushed around in the public square for too long and Jews are vigilant for anti-Semitism. They saw the movie from different eyes.

Kenneth Woodward notes that in the June/July First Things:

"The day the film opened, Rabbi Eric H. Yoffie was in the audience in a sold-out theater in Times Square watching The Passion of the Christ unfold. Yoffie was deeply offended by what he saw as Jewish stereotypes. “The Jews in this film are evildoers,” he later wrote to his colleagues on Reform Judaism’s website. But he also noticed the woman next to him sobbing throughout the film, and gradually came to the conclusion that such Christians are responding out of deep belief and “really do not understand the charge of anti-Semitism and what Jews are talking about.”

The good rabbi has a point. But he fails to note that Romans were also evildoers in this movie and Satan is there all the while. Was Gibson supposed to have the Irish or the Aztecs in Jerusalem during the last days of the reign of Tiberius ? Of course not.

I think people of the Judeo-Christian traditions have to stand together at this time. I think the critics of the movie (and attackers of religion in public life) did more to divide us than the movie itself.

Wow, I'm so jealous. I miss Ari. I loved that guy.