Hola. ¡Mi nombre es Maria y soy una pequeña muchacha esquimal gorda de Islandia!
Okay so I decided to check out where my blog readers are coming from, as I sometimes do. (Hah yes, I spy!). Usually most readers are Americans or Israelis, so I don't look into it. But this time (a long with yet another pervert from The United Arab Emirates) I was delighted to see that someone from Spain had looked me up and translated my blog into Spanish! I have now realised that my blog is the best in Spanish, it's even better than German (although German remains the best language for insults and anger). So check out my blog and my profile in Espanol!
I don't like the BBC. Infact, I pretty much hate the BBC. They frequently shock me, and I have often sent them letters of complaint, as I have written here before. I do however, read BBC News. I barely leave the house without reading Al Jazeera. I'm also a longtime reader or Arab News, etc. I read pretty much everything. Well you know what they say, know thy enemy!
So, the BBC may be extremely anti-Israel, but they do provide a reader with an interesting read from time to time. Such as today, when they published "views on the ceasefire". They published the views of the Israelis, as well as the views of the palestinians. One may (or may not) wonder how selective they were about their informants...
What strikes me when reading the comments of the people, is how obvious facts are being ignored, especially by the Arabs, such as Abu Mazen's past (indicating how he really feels about Jews):
The Memri Institute for monitoring media in the mid-east reports that Arafat’s newly appointed ‘prime minister’ for the PA, Mahmud Abbas completed a doctoral thesis in 1982 titled “The Secret Connection between the Nazis and the Leaders of the Zionist Movement”.
In his thesis, Abbas wrote that the estimated number of Jews killed during World War II was “less than one million.” Abbas stated that the Zionist leadership collaborated with the Nazi regime to “facilitate the wide-spread destruction” of Jews. Abbas’ ‘research’ was later printed by a publisher located in Amman, Jordan.
Also, the palestinians view that "the Israelis are to blame for everything". Yet, I have a feeling that the BBC published interviews with the most "rashional" palestinians they found, or at least some of them. I am quite certain that a great majority has a more negative attitude towards the Israelis than the ones in question, and experience has proven my theory to be correct.
Following a hopeful summit meeting at Sharm, The Guardian maintains the ideological blame game.
This week's summit meeting of Israeli and Palestinian leaders in Sharm el-Sheikh furthered the general optimism that's brewing in the region. On a day of handshakes and hopeful pronouncements, most of the media depicted the event in positive, forward-looking terms, as illustrated in this cartoon by Gary Varvel of the Indianapolis Star:
Martin Fletcher of NBC News noted the key recent event that has made everything possible: 'What today's agreement shows is that America and Israel were right when they said that Yasser Arafat was an obstacle to peace.'
It's broadly understood that Arafat blocked progress because he was stuck in a 'blame-Israel-no-matter-what' mode. That type of thinking doomed previous peace negotiations, and is what the whole civilized world is now trying to move beyond.
Yet The (UK) Guardian is stuck promoting this very message. An editorial cartoon by Steve Bell spins the Sharm summit ¯ the most peaceful moment of the past four years ¯ as some sort of Israeli force-play against the Palestinians:
Steve Bell of
The Guardian
The starting point for any credible newspaper is a modicum of objectivity. But Bell's cartoon demonstrates that The Guardian is more aligned with the fringe anti-Israel ideology of Yasser Arafat, than it is with the ideal of journalism.
The Guardian employs Bell ¯ who has drawn a daily cartoon at the paper since 1981 ¯ to promote the paper's basic editorial positions. With this cartoon, The Guardian positions itself outside the bounds of objective journalism, stuck in an advocacy role of 'just blame Israel.'
I have such interesting teachers at my university. Today I was in Hebrew class. My Hebrew teacher is very nice, but his pronounciation is hopeless, and I don't really think he knows Hebrew all that well. Okay so I'm taking a class in "Biblical Hebrew". So today the teacher corrected me when I read something, and pronounced the letter "tav" as a "t" sound. He said I shouldn't do that, and that I should pronounce it as a "dhhh". I found this to be strange, so I had the following dialogue with him, while in class:
Maria: But it's a "t" sound, isn't it? Teacher: No, No it's NOT a "t" sound!!! Maria: Okay, so is this like a difference of pronounciation between Biblical and Modern Hebrew? Teacher: No! It's just not a "t" sound! And if you had learned the Hebrew alphabeth, you would know this! Maria: I do know the Hebrew alphabeth, and it tells me that the letter "tav" is a "t" sound. Teacher: No it's not! It's "dhhh". It's "DHHH"!!!! Maria: But in Israel everybody pronounces it as "t". Teacher: Yes that is IVRIT. Here we don't study IVRIT. Here we study Biblical Hebrew, and that is an entirely different language. Israelis go to school to study Biblical Hebrew, and THEY FAIL it, just like you guys!
After Hebrew class I started walking towards town, listening to Beri Saharof, quite caught up in my thoughts as usual, when my research methods teacher from last year suddenly appears:
Teacher: Hey there Maria: (feeling bad cause I knew he was about to discuss the results of my final report) Hi Teacher: So, did you see you grade? Maria: Yah.. Teacher: And did you notice that it was, not very good? Maria: Ehrm yeah.. So... What was the deal with that? Teacher: Well. Your report was just, incredibly awful. Maria (first time ever getting a negative comment from a teacher, apart from the first assignment I ever did at university, which was the only time I ever failed.): Ehm, how so? Teacher: Well, you just kept writing about your own opinions "I think, I this and that". You should only do that in your results. You should come discuss this with me. Maria: Ehhh
Teacher: Or maybe you don't want to and you're just happy to have it over with?
Maria: Well, yeah sort of... Teacher: You need it for the next time you do research and bla blah etc etc etc Maria: Mumbles something in agreement about coming to discuss the flop of a report (but probably won't).
Okay this is taking some serious time away from my studies. I'm laughing like an idiot by my computer. This is so much fun. Check this out:
Maria is so cool and she deserves some chocolate ice cream
Italian: Maria è in modo da raffreddisi e merita un certo gelato del cioccolato
Maria kicks some serious butt!
French: Maria donne un coup de pied un certain bout sérieux!
Italian: Maria dà dei calci ad una certa estremità seria!
Greek: Η Μαρία κλωτσά κάποια σοβαρή άκρη!
German: Maria tritt irgendeinen ernsten Kolben!
Who do you think you're messing with, buddy??
Russian: Вы думаете вы messing с, buddy??
German: Mit wem denken Sie Sie verwirren, Freund?? (Oh I have to memorize that).
Portugese: O quem você pensa de você messing com, camarada??
I have an axe stuck in my head, but nobody knows it (hey, you never know what might come in handy someday):
German: Ich lasse eine Axt haften in meinem Kopf, aber niemand kennt ihn
Spanish: Hago un hacha pegar en mi cabeza, pero nadie la sabe
I can't believe it! Thanks to Lisa for pointing this out!
Click here to enter the url of a website and have it translated. Shit is "shit" in Russian! Man I'm gonna have some fun with this! It's a pity it doesn't translate into any languages I understand, for me to check how well it works. Oh I think I better go find myself an Italian blog and translate it into English now! Ciao a tutti!
Update: I have been translating blogs. It is (apparently) customary to describe things (I haven't quite figured out what it means yet) as "spiny" in Italian. Such as a "spiny argument" (that makes sense though).
I also translated the Japanese CNN website. Japanese, apparently, is very strange. Here's an example: "The former priest, with boy rape guilty decision", and "24 businesses of pub possibly England", along with "Superbowl, winning successively achievement". Oh and this one I can't resist "Don marry no, and the Steve young palace entering NFL".
Okay, enough slacking. But try this website, it's a lot of fun!
The Real Story on Aid to SE Asia (Hat tip: Israpundit)
It is important to note that now with about $2 billion in aid pledged by countries, companies, and individuals that the largest donor nations have been (in order of amounts provided) Japan, U.S., U.K., and Sweden.
Israel, one of the smallest country in the world, sent major rescue and aid teams and packages to Sri Lanka, Indonesia, India and Thailand. Israel's aid works out to be the highest per capita donation of any country in the world.
Some of Israel's initial aid was refused for political reasons. It seems some countries would rather have their people die than accept aid from Israel. Someone suggested that all donor countries should put Israeli flags on their packages and then let the recipients decide if they want the aid or not.
It should also be noted that most of the countries devastated are either Moslem or have very large Moslem populations (Indonesia is the world's largest Moslem country). Despite this fact, none of the Moslem countries including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE (with all their oil and the huge sums of capital they has gathered over the past year of oil price gouging) have not pledged nor sent anything.
It reminds me of the saying by Rabbi Hillel: "If I am not for myself, who will be? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?" Just thought it might be nice to know the real story for a change. You certainly won't see or hear any of that from the Christian Science Monitor, the LA or NY Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, The Guardian, National Public Radio, CNN or the BBC.
SHARM EL-SHEIKH - Echoing the words of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas moments before, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Tuesday announced an agreement to end more than four years of hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians.
Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas meeting during the Mideast summit in Sharm el-Sheikh on Tuesday. (AP)
"Today, in my meeting with Chairman Abbas, we agreed that all Palestinians will stop all acts of violence against all Israelis everywhere, and, at the same time, Israel will cease all its military activity against all Palestinians everywhere," Sharon said at the close of a day-long summit in the Red Sea resort town.
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I'm not going to to pretend to be some kind of an oracle. I certainly hope that something good will come out of this. That's all I will say.
