Mary, 'Palestinian refugee'

When it comes to the politicization of the Christmas story, I thought I had seen it all. But the London Independent's shameless mischaracterization of Mary, the mother of Jesus, as "a Palestinian refugee" takes the proverbial cake. The story by Johann Hari published Dec. 23 begins: "In two days, a third of humanity will gather to celebrate the birth pains of a Palestinian refugee in Bethlehem - but two millennia later, another mother in another glorified stable in this rubble-strewn, locked down town is trying not to howl."

It goes on to describe a 5-year-old tale of an Arab woman who claims she was stopped from entering Israel to deliver her twins and forced to go 20 minutes in another direction to an Arab hospital.

It's amazing. It's bizarre. It's breathtaking at what passes for Western journalism in the Middle East today. First of all, was Mary "a Palestinian refugee"? No, Mary was a Jew, living in the occupied territory of Israel. She wasn't trying to get to a Roman hospital to have her child. She was traveling with her husband from her home in Nazareth to Bethlehem, where the Roman authorities decreed those from the House of David would pay their taxes.

Who are these anti-Israel activists the Western press dispatches to cover the Middle East? Where do they come from? Where are they trained? Where are they educated? How is it possible that such drivel is actually published? What is it exactly that the so-called Palestinians want? Do they want their own homeland or not? It seems to me they've got it. But now they want to be able to travel into Israel for medical care? What's wrong with their own hospitals? Why is it that they don't decide to buy more medicine and fewer guns?

Don't get me wrong. I don't blame "the modern-day Mary" in this fable for wanting first-class medical care in Israel. And had Bethlehem remained under Israeli governance, that's exactly what the people of Bethlehem would have received. But the so-called Palestinians demanded their own country. Unfortunately for them, that means Palestinian hospitals, too.

Is that context not important for people unfamiliar with the region to understand? Is it not important for reporters covering the region to understand? Let's call this what it is: Deliberate deception. It is the worst form of propaganda. In another time, we labeled it agit-prop. What is the purpose? Is it to stir up more hate and violence?

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Woman turned away by doctor - for being American: "An American woman has been refused treatment by a doctor in Blekinge in southern Sweden because of her nationality. The woman's husband has now reported the incident to the Medical Responsibility Board..... But when the American woman, accompanied by her husband and niece, went to meet the doctor in his treatment room, he declined to examine her. Rather than introduce himself, the doctor waved the patient's papers and shouted "she doesn't have strep throat, she doesn't have strep throat". He then added that he would not treat her. "He said he didn't like Americans," said Johansson. He also disliked hearing English spoken in his treatment room and soon walked out. According to Johansson, the doctor was a Palestinian who objected to American foreign policy in the Middle East." [Israeli doctors treat Palestinians all the time of course].

Read here how the NYT refused to correct a lying story about abortion even after the paper's own ombudsman condemned the story. They are really arrogant and totally dishonest SOBs there. I guess that's Leftism for you.

Another way Britain gets people out of their evil cars: "Train fares will rise above the rate of inflation tomorrow for the fourth consecutive year, with passengers on longdistance services facing the highest increases. Bus passengers in London will find fares rising by more than double the rate of inflation, with the single cash fare up 33 per cent to œ2. Passenger groups said that the increases would encourage people to abandon public transport. Rail fares that are set by the Government, including season tickets and some off-peak tickets, will rise by 4.3 per cent. But the 60 per cent of fares set by private operators will rise by up to 11 per cent."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason

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