You Don't Have To Go Home: but you can't stay here?At Slate, Emily Bazelon recently explored the rarely-discussed issue of African immigrants in Israel, noting that PM Ehud Olmert has complained about how many Africans sneak into Israel every year—a situation that raises issues of immigration, religion, economics, and infrastructure. These Africans are Christians and Muslims, which means they’re not eligible for Israeli citizenship, but Israel won’t extradite them back to their home countries because of their potential persecution for being affiliated with a Jewish State.

Many are sent to detention centers, where they languish doing manual labor in poor conditions, and others are sent to Tel Aviv, where they end up living near the bus station, in slumlike conditions that may be worse than the refugee camps they’ve fled in Africa.

Of course, this is nothing new: We previously posted about Darfurian refugees who were imprisoned when they arrived in Israel, because Sudan is technically an Arab country. After sneaking in via Egypt, they were kept on army bases, or put under house arrest on kibbutzim in the North while the Israeli government tried to figure out where to send them.

We also let you know when, more than a year later, 600 Darfurian refugees were granted temporary residency, and 2,000 illegal immigrants from Eritrea were granted work permits when it was made clear that their lives would be in danger if they were sent back to Eritrea.

I initially heard about this problem firsthand when an Israeli friend, who recently returned from his reserve duty in the Sinai desert, told me about the time he spent guarding the border with Egypt. He said some nights they caught as many as fourteen Africans in twelve hours, all trying to sneak into Israel. From Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, and the Ivory Coast, many of them sought out the Israeli soldiers, who “arrested” them, which entails having them checked out by doctors, given food, and sent to detention centers. In search of safety and well-paying jobs, hundreds of Africans attempt to cross into Israel via Sinai every year.

According to my friend, many are killed by guards on the Egyptian side of the border.

Israel likes to brag about reaching out to other communities in need after natural disasters and taking in Vietnamese boat people, but ultimately, Israel can’t and shouldn’t be the place that the huddled masses of the world turn to for good jobs and opportunities. I’m not one of those people who constantly worries about the survival of the Jewish State, and I’m not suggesting that illegal African refugees are somehow going to take over the country, but I’m not sure the current policy does enough to deter Africans from risking their lives and illegally entering a country that already has its proverbial plate-full of problems. Of course, those who make it in shouldn’t just be shipped back to their homes countries—that accomplishes little, and is inevitably expensive and politically problematic. Instead there should be a more organized policy for dealing with the border and, if necessary, Israel can grant more temporary work visas to bring African workers in legally, for a limited amount of time.

Wait a second. Did I just join the Republican party?

Rally in israel: to support Sudanese refugees A while back we told you about the plight of Sudanese refugees who had arrived in Israel via Egypt. They were jailed, stuck on army bases, or placed under house arrest on kibbutzim while the Israeli government tried to find other countries to send them to in coordination with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. Sudan is considered an enemy country, so Sudanese refugees aren’t eligible for asylum in Israel.

Thanks in large part to intense lobbying by NGOs, Knesset members, and people like Elie Wiesel and Aliza Olmert--the prime minister's wife--these refugees are now newly free, and are official residents of the Jewish state: More than 600 Sudanese refugees from Darfur have been granted temporary residency in Israel. Israel also gave work permits to about 2,000 refugees from Eritrea whose lives would be endangered if sent home.

Tempering this happy news is the report that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has directed authorities to expel 4,500 Africans, including people from Ivory Coast, Ghana and Nigeria, by the end of the week. Olmert's office declined to discuss the expulsion order, but it’s going to be difficult to locate the immigrants, who are likely scattered around the country, and even more difficult to figure out where to send them. Human rights groups are afraid that if sent back to a Muslim country, they will be persecuted for spending time in a Jewish state.

Related: Sudanese Refugees in Israel

There’s little to say about l’affaire bear that isn’t already apparent to anyone with the intellect of a toothpick. Even so, I think it deserves more aggressive scrutiny than it’s received thus far.

It’s too bad about that writers’ strike: This debacle could have been a virtually inexhaustible vein of comic gold, on the order of an OJ Simpson or a Monica Lewinsky. In a sense, though, it’s good that it hasn’t worked out that way. The Islamic world has a knack, though it may be a calculated knack, for going berserk about insults—like cartoons, ice cream bars, and teddy bears—that are so out-and-out preposterous that Westerners can do little in response but crack jokes. The time for jokes is over. Note that every atheist tract on the bestseller list in the past year or two contains explicit insults to the so-called Prophet. Why isn’t anyone “protesting” Sam Harris or Christopher Hitchens with a gigantic machete? I suppose all those words were too much of a brain teaser for the Teddy Bear Martyrs Brigade; I suppose it was much easier to go after this living caricature of kind-heartedness.

That’s what demands our outrage. When Jyllands-Posten published cartoons insulting the Prophet, it meant to do just that. Gillian Gibbons, on the contrary, is guilty only of trying to bring a single Lite-Brite peg of happiness to one of the darkest hellholes on earth. Of course, it doesn’t matter whether one is guilty of any provocation; a provocation can be manufactured easily enough. Bullies have operated in this fashion since the dawn of time, and likewise there have always been victims willing to pay the danegeld. Consider the reaction of some Western Muslims, reported in The Economist:

Many stressed that the treatment of Ms Gibbons was at odds with a Koranic injunction to treat visitors hospitably. “Sudan’s official response to this incident is the exact opposite of the model that Muslims are supposed to emulate,” said Firas Ahmed, deputy editor of Islamica, a glossy magazine. Musharraf Hussain, a well-known imam from the English Midlands, said Ms Gibbons had set out to help Sudanese children with “great enthusiasm and sincerity” and it was embarrassing for British Muslims to see her being punished for making an unintentional cultural mistake.

Perhaps the hardest question that Muslims in the West face from sceptical fellow-citizens is whether they are prepared in any circumstances to defend the harsh penalties, such as lashing and stoning, which the sacred texts of Islam prescribe, in particular for sexual offences, or blaspheming against the faith.

Tariq Ramadan, an influential Muslim philosopher, has called for an indefinite moratorium on capital and corporal punishment, using elaborate theological arguments to support his view that these penalties have resulted in horribly cruel treatment for vulnerable people, including women and the poor. Scholars in the Muslim heartland do not go far enough when they say the necessary conditions for the application of these traditional punishments are “almost never” fulfilled, Mr Ramadan has argued. Some westerners (including France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy, in the days when he was interior minister) taunted Mr Ramadan over the use of the word moratorium: did that mean stoning might resume in the future? But to traditional scholars, Mr Ramadan is clearly going too far. The gap he is trying to straddle is already a wide one, and the story of Ms Gibbons suggests that it risks growing even wider.

There is something almost sweetly naive about appealing to various “Koranic injunctions” to try to influence the behavior of radical Muslims. Anyone with the slightest insight into human behavior knows that the desire to punish very often precedes the justification for punishment, and anyone who can get riled up over a stuffed animal is stuck squarely in the “desire to punish” stage.

It’s an appropriate coincidence that the article quoted above refers to the “gap [Ramadan] is trying to straddle,” because several days ago I read this Telegraph piece on the teddy bear fiasco just moments before noticing, in the obituaries section, that Evel Knievel had died. I felt a slight twinge of disgust when I saw a photo captioned: “Evel Knievel: appealed to America’s love of excess.” Fine, but the excess that America loves is a distinctively American variety, dramatic, individualistic, and wild at heart. The urge to jump a canyon just because it’s there is nothing to be ashamed of. As for the heinous urge to behead a harmless schoolmarm—well, the yawning chasm between Us and Them has never looked deeper or wider. I don’t think Evel himself would have attempted it.

(UPDATE: Gillian Gibbons has been “pardoned.” We’re supposed to be grateful for this, I guess?) 

A British schoolteacher working in Sudan polled her students for a name for a class teddy bear. They came up with Muhammed, and she was arrested for insulting the prophet:

If found guilty, the teacher, Gillian Gibbons, who taught at one of Sudan’s most exclusive private schools, could be sentenced to 6 months in jail and 40 lashes.

The bear? To be hanged by the neck until dead. But not for being called Muhammed. For being Zoroastrian.

This past Sunday, Michael Ignatieff wrote an essay in the Times Magazine entitled “Getting Iraq Wrong,” ostensibly a come-clean admission of his misguided support for the war. David Rees of the Huffington Post expected Ignatieff to acknowledge fault and was sure disappointed in the result: [The New York Times] [The Huffington Post]

The first nine-tenths of Ignatieff's essay, far from being an honest self-examination, is a collection of vague aphorisms and bong-poster koans. It hums with the comforting murmur of lobotomy.

Rees is particularly unimpressed with Ignatieff’s new professional status—from Harvard academic to Canadian politician—being used to justify his initial support for the Iraq invasion:

Right off the bat, he's saying: "It was right for me to support the Iraq war when I was an academic, because academics live in outer space on Planet Zinfandel, and play with ideas all day. But now, as a politician in a country that opposed the war, I'll admit I screwed up, because politicians must deign to harness the wild mares of whimsy to the ox-cart of cold, calculated reality."

Also in Mideast news:

From the JTA: A poll found that most Israelis favor expelling illegal Sudanese refugees. Egypt, Israel and the Sudanese Israel should think twice about sending Sudanese refugees back to Egypt, where they are treated barbarically, argues a Jerusalem Post editorial. [The Jerusalem Post]

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf pulled out from a council of hundreds of Pakistani and Afghan tribal leaders aimed at reining in militant violence. [The Washington Post]

In her first novel, Dalia Sofer tells of a Jewish family in Tehran during Iran’s Islamic revolution. [The New York Times Book Review]

Prime Ministers from Iraq and Turkey both station troops in Iraqi Kurdistan to control the Kurdish rebel group PKK. [Iraq Slogger]

The PKK may be facing tough times ahead, and not only from the Turkish military. In a dramatic turn of events, Kurdistan's Prime Minister Negervan al-Barazani on Tuesday confirmed the presence of a limited number of Turkish troops inside the governate, explaining they are in northern Iraq with the permission of the Kurdish regional authorities.

Meanwhile, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki signed a memorandum of understanding with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, agreeing to join with Anakara in combating the Kurdish rebel group that has long enjoyed sanctuary in Kurdistan.

Dohuk, Iraq: A PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) patrols during an early morning training session at the Amedia area in Northern Iraq, 10 km near the Turkish border.

Mahmoud Abbas’ close adviser, Jibril Rajoub, is holding secret talks with the Gazan Hamas government spokesman Ghazi Hamad. [Debka]

19-year-old Saudi, Ahmed Abdullah al-Shayea, was recruited as a jihadist and volunteered to go to Iraq as a fighter. Once in the Iraqi capital, he refused to be a suicide bomber and instead was coerced by Al Qaeda into driving a fuel truck through central Baghdad. Militants blew up a nearby truck behind in order to ignite Shayea's. Shayea lived to tell the tell from a Saudi rehabilitation center. [MSNBC/Newsweek]

"I realized that all along, I was wrong," Shayea said in an interview with the Associated Press recently at a hotel in Riyadh, where he was taken for a media encounter before being returned to interior ministry custody. "There is no jihad. We are just instruments of death."

Now 22, Shayea may yet have a life. The Saudi program holds out the promise of release, with jobs and help in finding a wife, for jihadis who are judged truly repentant. If Shayea qualifies, as he is on course to do, he will probably be the first suicide (or is it "homicide") bomber to survive his own detonation and win his freedom.

• Britney goes gangster on photographer. [TMZ]
• UN approves 26,000 peacekeepers for Darfur. [The New York Times]
• "There's no guarantee yet that (a) the UN member countries will actually come though with the troops or (b) Sudan will allow the troops to be deployed. But it's a start." [The Washington Monthly]
• Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, discloses a broader spying program conducted by the Bush administration. [The Boston Globe]
• Cheney admits he was wrong. Come again? (Don't worry, it's not about spying.) [Reuters]
• Clinton won the battle; Obama will win the war. [The Politico]
• But the polls show Hillary moving ahead. [Breitbart]

The Los Angeles Times: A group of Sudanese from South Sudan are living at a shelter in Northern Israel. They say they have had the same religious and cultural repression as those from Darfur.

• "Israel is cracking down on a recent influx of illegal immigrants, many of whom are Sudanese, over its 140-mile border with Egypt." [The Los Angeles Times]
• Amnesty slams Israel and Lebanon for civilian deaths in last summer's 34-day war. [The Jerusalem Post]
• Bush behind the podium to discuss Iraq at 10:30 this morning. [Yahoo]
• A Times profile on a woman exiled by Katrina. [The New York Times]
• Sex sells. Posh sex sells more: David and Victoria Beckham strip to their knickers for W Magazine. [Daily Mail]
• "Hillary is from Mars, Obama is from Venus." [Salon.com]
• In Slate's blog roundup, eulogizing McCain and firing Alberto Gonzales. [Slate.com]
• Robert Novak on whether John McCain can make a comeback in his presidential bid. [The Washington Post]

Agence France-Presse: Pakistani security forces began their assault on the mosque compound before daybreak on Tuesday, just hours after talks broke down to end the eight-day siege in central Islamabad.

Olmert calls for Syria to resume peace talks with Israel; Blair pushes for greater authority in his peacekeeping role; Iranian executions for rape, adultery, insulting religious sanctities, and homosexuality; The Jewish Agency will house 58 Sudanese refugees near Sderot. [Jewish Telegraph Agency] [The New York Times]

Bloody battle ends, leaves 82 dead at Red Mosque in Islamabad, Pakistan. [The Washington Post]
Craig Cohen, deputy chief of staff at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, discussed the deadly military raid at Pakistan's Red Mosque -- which ended an eight-day standoff with anti-government, pro-Taliban forces -- and the impact it will have on President Pervez Musharraf's control of the U.S.-allied country. [The Washington Post] [The Los Angeles Times]

Abbas convenes the Palestinian legislature; Hamas boycotts. [The New York Times]
According to Abbas, “thanks to the support of Hamas, Al Qaeda is entering Gaza.” [The New York Times]

Reuters: A Pakistani man cried for his brother, who was inside the Red Mosque in Islamabad as the Pakistani military stormed the complex

• Talks fail; nearly 50 Pakistanis dead in early-morning raid on mosque. [The New York Times]
• NAACP holds mock funeral in Detroit to bury the 'n-word.' [Chicago Tribune]
• Almost half of the country say they want Bush impeached. For Cheney, more than half. [Counterpunch]
• Slate on Staying the Course. [Slate.com]
• Since the Hamas coup on June 12th, economic crisis in Gaza. [International Herald Tribune]
• Severe punishment for bad seafood: China executes ex-food and drug chief. [The Washington Post]
• More than 2000 Sudanese refugees in Israel, and they're often dropped in unsafe places. [The Jerusalem Post]

WE GET LAID BECAUSE OF ‘MUNICH’

THE NEWS:
“Knocked Up” gives off-handed discussion of Jewish power. [The Jewish Telegraph Agency]

THE CHATTER:
“This film is every man’s wet dream.” (i.e. the fat dude with the Jewfro gets in Katherine Heigl’s pants.) [Rotten Tomatoes]
Director Judd Apatow of "40-Year-Old Virgin" and "Freaks and Geeks" won’t settle for just a superficial laugher. [Rolling Stone]
Eric Bana kicked ass as Mossad agent in "Munich," but too bad Spielberg butchered history and Tony Kushner made up Golda Meir quotes. [National Review Online]

OK, WE ALSO GET LAID BECAUSE OF ZIONISM

THE NEWS:
This year, some 300 Jewish New Yorkers, most in their 30’s, are making aliya to Israel. Wanna guess how many are single and lonely? [NYC Jewish News]

THE CHATTER:
Birthright perversions can wait – they may be sharing their new neighborhoods with Sudanese refugees. [Power Line Blog]
Don’t worry about finding work in Tel Aviv, you can just go shopping and they’ll pay you. [expatriates.com]

NAZISM, COMMUNISM, BABS

THE NEWS:
Streisand settles for less than a mil, plays first ever concert in Germany. [The Jewish Telegraph Agency]

THE CHATTER:
Rumor had it that Babs wouldn’t play in Germany because of the Holocaust. [Reuters]
Forget WWII, the singer said she hated her birthplace, Brooklyn. Now that’s unholy. [Ticket4-You.com]

JEWS IN THE HOOD

THE NEWS:
Infamous Jewish blogger, “Bagel in Harlem,” leaves the ghetto, and she hasn’t been heard from since January. [Big Shirtless Rob]

THE CHATTER:
One woman’s love affair with a storied NYC neighborhood. That is, until some homeless dude whacked her over the head with a bag of cans. [Bagel in Harlem]
Where Jews go, Asian cuisine follows: new sushi spot in Harlem. [Harlem Fur]

PENISES TO THE LEFT, VAGINAS TO THE RIGHT

THE NEWS:
Jewish independent school in Sweden segregates the sexes. [SperoNews]

THE CHATTER:
But what if same-sex learning makes them better at chess? [The Federation of Jewish Communities]
If the men and women don’t mix, and they wear black polyester in the winter, are Hasids really all that different from the denizens of ummah? [Gates of Vienna]

THIS IS WHY ISAIAH BERLIN DIED A VIRGIN

THE NEWS:
The perfect posh kosher wedding for only £100 per minute. [The Jewish Chronicle]

THE CHATTER:
Please, don’t get the M&M’s with his and her names. Actually, don’t even get married in the UK. You could have your fairytale wedding in Texas for the subscription price of London Weddings magazine. Plus in Texas you smash a beer can instead of a champagne glass. [London Weddings]
Ladies, don’t forget the modestly high neckline and long sleeves. [WeddingGuideUK.com]

MORE BOYCOTT BOLLOCKS

THE NEWS:
Eric McDonald, the Transport and General Workers Union’s Birmingham branch secretary, who encourages boycott of Israeli goods, says, “Israel is very intolerant and sometimes its behavior is not dissimilar to that of the Nazis.” [The Jewish Chronicle]

THE CHATTER:
TGWU writes letter to Blair regarding last summer’s war in Lebanon. [T&G]
Is it hypocritical if the lads down at TGWU love falafel?

5,000 YEARS OF HOT LOVIN’

THE NEWS:
Jews are great in bed because of guilt. [thisisby.us]

THE CHATTER:
If only the hole in the sheet business were true... [Judaism 101]
You might as well get that bullseye tattoo on your lower back since Jewish cemeteries still debate the penalty for body desecration. [The Boston Globe]