2013-05-21T09:21:59-04:00 Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/author/index.php?author=yoni-goldstein Copyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Yoni Goldstein Good old fashioned elbow grease. tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3264702 2013-05-13T12:25:09-04:00 2013-05-13T12:25:16-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/
That only begins to describe what occurred at the Western Wall in Jerusalem on Friday, when thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews bullied a few hundred women attempting to pray at the holy site, hurling water bottles, chairs and verbal abuse. If police hadn't protected the women, there would almost assuredly have been physical assault as well.

But the Women of the Wall held firm. The Jewish women's organization that has been attempting, by political and activist methods, to gain access to the Wall so that it may worship there in its preferred style -- in which women read from the Torah, wrap phylacteries and don prayer shawls, religious acts and garb in the ultra-Orthodox world reserved exclusively for men -- for years braved the gang to chant and sing, even as the ultra-Orthodox mob tried its best to stop it. And in the process, Women of the Wall a) took a giant leap forward for Judaism, and b) dealt a staggering blow to the ultra-Orthodox.

Female participation in prayer at the leadership levels is entrenched in every Jewish sect except for the Orthodox, and even there among the modern Orthodox women have been gaining more and more prominent roles in the last 10 years (including in a burgeoning egalitarian strain and, most recently, with the ordination of three female quasi-rabbis in New York).

But not at the Western Wall, where the ultra-Orthodox have ruled since Israel captured it during 1967's Six Day War. There, Women of the Wall, and, frankly, all of progressive Jewish thought, is reviled -- especially if it involves women and prayer. At the Wall, women are second-class citizens, just as they are in ultra-Orthodox communities (ghettos is probably a better word), where women are expected to breed and keep silent and out of sight so as not to arouse within men any thought that is even remotely untoward. And that's if they're lucky: in some communities, the women are forced to work -- in addition to keeping house and taking care of what is more often than not a large litter of children -- in order to support their husbands, who are too busy studying the Bible and Talmud to get a job. For the ultra-Orthodox, the mere existence of Women of the Wall is inconceivable -- disgusting, disgraceful, wrong.

And so you get what happened last week.

Israeli governments have been searching for years for a solution to Western Wall governance, most recently enlisting Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky who served up the lame idea of building a separate -- read: not the Western Wall -- area for progressive, egalitarian prayer groups like Women of the Wall. That isn't good enough -- the only equitable resolution is that these women, and any other Jewish person or group who wishes to pray at the Western Wall, be granted equal access (though I wouldn't necessarily be against banning outright the Neturei Karta). The Wall should be for all, not just the few who think they are holier than the rest.

This can never be achieved unless the rulership of the ultra-Orthodox at the Wall ends. The good news is, it looks like that's precisely what's coming to pass. A recent Israeli poll found half the country supported Women of the Wall's right to pray at the Western Wall (the poll was conducted before this most recent incident; support for the group, which has been rising, will undoubtedly rise further after Friday's debacle), so it appears the public is on board. And with the new Israeli coalition government already looking to crack down on the ridiculously unfair benefits the ultra-Orthodox have enjoyed for far too long (most significantly, exemption from mandatory army service and generally living off the public dole), ultra-Orthodoxy is clearly in the crosshairs. Quite right: this is the era of the Women of the Wall -- we're way beyond the shtetl.

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Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ should do so.

There are more than enough reasons for Americans to feel justified in sitting this Arab conflict out, as they have done so far (with the exception of providing opposition forces with some humanitarian aid and items of minor military import). After a disastrous war in Iraq and grueling camping in Afghanistan that left thousands of U.S. soldiers dead, countless more maimed and psychologically damaged, cost over a trillion dollars and resulted in little or no perceptible decline in the rise of radical Islam and along with it anti-American sentiments that translate into terrorism, the Americans are understandably wary of getting involved in another Arab fight.

The Syrian civil war presents a further complication in that revolutionary forces have been infiltrated by Islamists with ties to al-Qaida; there is reason to believe if the opposition does indeed defeat Assad's troops it will impose the tenets of radical Islam, especially hatred of America, on Syrians. U.S. military (and monetary) aid won't change that, as it hasn't in other Arab countries, like Egypt.

In short, there is no discernible tactical benefit to the U.S. getting involved in Syria. In fact, there is every reason to stay away -- to let two enemies continue their war against each other to the bitter end, then re-evaluate how to engage (or not) whomever emerges.

(On the other hand, Israel, which fired rocket volleys into Syria on two occasions over the weekend, has what to fight for: with the eventual fall of Assad, Hezbollah, with help from Iran, will try -- evidently, it's already trying -- to get its hands on the substantial cache of weapons stored across Syria. Advanced rockets of the type targeted by the Israeli airstrikes could wreak havoc on the Jewish state -- and by moving two of its Iron Dome batteries to the Syrian border, the Israeli government has effectively admitted it may not be able to completely stop Hezbollah from stocking up. Add to that sending a healthy reminder to Iran that Syria is nothing but a side-show in the grand scheme of things.)

The only good reason for the Americans to get involved is humanitarian: the massacres of entire families and villages and indiscriminate shelling and strafing of civilian areas by the Assad regime insult America's sense of human decency and credo of defending the weak and defenseless.

The UN, slow to react to catastrophe at the best of times, is further neutered on the Syria file due to Russia and China, who continue to defend Assad (though less vigorously of late). As for the Arab League, no one expects much help there -- it seems as though Arab countries are perfectly satisfied to sit and watch as their cousins kill each other. How the Arab League rationalizes this is beyond me.

So it falls to the U.S. to save the day, as it has so many times before, a thankless task for the benefit of an unapologetic enemy. The Americans will arm the Syrian rebels who in turn will topple Assad -- and whether some form of democracy will emerge from this disaster is anyone's guess. But it's a safe bet the next leaders of Syria will maintain the current edition's hatred of the United States, will harbor terrorist organizations, including perhaps al-Qaida, and by doing so endanger Americans at home and abroad. They will also prevent ordinary Syrians from experiencing a more prosperous and more equal way of life, and perhaps that is the greatest tragedy.

But such is the burden of the benevolent superpower in a world where no one else can, or possesses the will to, fight injustice on a global scale. Great power comes with great responsibility, they say, and sometimes that means defending even your enemies because no one else will. Lesser nations, as we are seeing now and have seen before, don't seem to understand why it must be this way.

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]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3176405 2013-04-29T10:55:24-04:00 2013-04-29T13:59:20-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/
I have always believed that clothing is more important than most people give it credit for. How we dress reveals a lot about us -- how we view ourselves, and how we want others to view us. If people choose to dress in cheaply made, uninspiring clothes, they are effectively saying they don't care how they look and, by extension, how the rest of the world looks at them. The conclusion is simple: wearing well-made, distinctive garments will make you look better and, in turn, will make others consider you more closely.

From my time in fashion writing, I can confirm what most people suspect about the fashion world: It is vacuous, soulless, and obscenely commercialized. Virtually every item of clothing, every accessory and beauty product featured in fashion magazines is selected to satisfy advertisers, not because it's the ultimate representative of this or that sartorial trend. The fashion business sacrifices all things substantial in favour of surface appearances -- and the irony is the finished product we see has been digitally edited and altered to the point that no matter how hard you try, you can never achieve the same appearance because it does not actually exist. And yet, there's something to that. There is value in surface appearances, because that's where our impressions of each other begin to form: If you don't try to impress on the outside, the chances of anybody wanting to find out how interesting you are on the inside drops significantly.

The predominant argument in favour of disposable fashion is it affords the vast majority of people who can't afford actual nice clothing a modicum of fashion-forwardness without having to spend a lot of money. As I say above, I don't think Joe Fresh produces clothes that impress fashion-wise to say the least, but the economic consideration also doesn't work. In fashion, as in most things, a bigger price tag signifies better quality materials and more rigorous production standards. You can buy a $10 shirt from Joe Fresh that's bland and will wear out quickly because it's poorly constructed, or pay $30 or even $50 for something that will actually look good and last a long time. I can't think of any good reason not to spend the extra money.

In the wake of this latest tragedy in Bangladesh, there will be more calls for Canadians to buy clothes made at home (or very nearby), where worker safety isn't a joke and neither are wages. But that misses the point: There's no reason good clothes can't be made in Bangladesh, or anywhere else in the developing world, for that matter. All it would take for garment workers there to achieve better working conditions is for more people here to put some thought and care and cash into the way they look. And Joe Fresh just isn't gonna cut it for that.

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]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3129754 2013-04-22T17:08:12-04:00 2013-04-22T17:38:38-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ Ruslan Tsarni, theorized during a press conference Friday from Montgomery Village, Maryland, it seems clear which side of the family the brothers inherited that particular gene from.

For amid all the craziness in and out of Boston that day -- including a city-wide lockdown that, in effect, achieved what these terrorists sought, and what all terrorists always seek -- uncle Ruslan's impassioned declaration of the loser-ness of his nephews seemed to me the craziest. Regardless of the relationship between the Tsarnis and Tsarnaevs -- and Ruslan made it very clear the two families are not on speaking terms, and haven't been for some time -- the way he sold out his nephews was just pathetic.

There were some alternative responses available to Mr. Tsarni when he stepped in front of media encamped outside his house. He might have questioned the allegations against the two boys, like their Toronto aunt, Maret Tsarnaeva, did. Even if her words hinted at the same sort of probably-ridiculous conspiracy theories that would be put forward by the boys' parents later in the day (and by "false flag" nuts within minutes of the bombings last Monday), she was clearly shocked by the events. Ms. Tsarnaeva appeared unhinged and angry, and she delivered a perfectly natural response -- when faced with a massive contradiction between what she believed these boys to be and what others now said they were, she defaulted to personal experience and observation. The boys were innocent in her eyes, even when all signs pointed to their guilt.

Mr. Tsarni could also have taken a lesson from the responses of Dzhokar's school friends, a number of whom came forward to be interviewed on television Friday and uniformly expressed astonishment their buddy could have been a terrorist. Like Dzhokar's aunt, when they compared their personal experiences to the massive police presence slowly closing in on a 19-year-old who closed the entire city of Boston, they could only find incongruity. Perhaps because the bonds of friendship at that age are almost always weaker than family ties, the boys seemed particularly adept at taking in the news about Dzhokar without emotion -- they managed better than the boy's aunt and uncle to remain detached from the discrepancies in Dzhokar's story, recognizing there were two sides to the story that could not, at least at that moment, be reconciled. There's probably a lesson in that.

Of course, the uncle could have just kept quiet. Maybe that would have been too much to ask for on a day when seemingly everyone had something to say about the Tsarnaevs. Still, it would have been the most decent thing to do.

Predictably, because he a) appears to be older than, say, 45, and b) is not a native English speaker, Tsarni used the "L" word incorrectly. The word is employed almost exclusively in our time by young and young-ish people as a form of generally benign insult. "Loser," obviously, comes from "lose" and in early times referred to a person (or an animal, like a racing horse) who lost in one form of official competition or another, but it's modern, slang-ish definition -- in effect, one who is simply a failure in one or more of even the most minute aspects of life -- doesn't really apply to the Tsarnevs, certainly not Dzhokar. He was well-liked by his peers, athletically gifted and working toward a career as a doctor. He was definitely not a loser -- a terrorist, yes, probably, but not a loser.

When it comes to terrorism perpetrated in the name of (radical) Islam -- as it is rapidly becoming more apparent this terrorism was -- we're used to seeing and hearing parents, family and friends celebrating the terrorists with after-the-fact homilies (mothers wishing they had conceived more children so that they, too, could be suicide bombers is a common trope) and dancing in the streets. I suppose in that sense uncle Ruslan's dissociating reaction was something of a step forward. And yet it left me deeply uncomfortable that he would seek to decimate his nephews when it could have no discernible effect other than to benefit him -- and, further, that he would use the language of children in a lousy attempt to explain a very adult tragedy.

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]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3082888 2013-04-15T16:32:58-04:00 2013-04-15T16:50:47-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/
Had Tom Mulcair's coming-out party been held two weeks earlier, the NDP would have had a news cycle to itself to tell us what it envisions for this country (last weekend wouldn't have worked, with the Liberal leadership candidates making final statements in Toronto); held next week, the party might have taken a stab at blunting Justin Trudeau's momentum, and thereby its own decline. Instead, the NDP and Liberals went head-to-head, but with the latter holding the hammer -- Trudeau during primetime Sunday night -- and thus perfectly positioned for a political take-out Monday morning.

It was a stupid, stupid mistake because this weekend was more important for the NDP than for the Liberals. Trudeau's leadership win has been a fait accompli for so long that the discussion has moved on to whether he can beat Stephen Harper in the next federal election (recent poll results suggest he can). The NDP has much more at stake right now: (Re)introducing voters to a leader who has fallen to third in popularity (and stands now to fall even further behind), an all-important debate over whether to remove the word "socialism" from its constitution, and thus move to the political centre, and an opportunity to reaffirm what the current seating arrangement in the House of Commons illustrates -- that the NDP is no less than the government-in-waiting.

Regardless of whether Mulcair made a good showing (most say he did), whether removing socialism from the preamble to the party's constitution will bring any discernible change in policy (probably not -- the NDP will continue to be the least unsocialist party in Canada), the NDP lost this weekend to the Liberals. Its fate is now in the hands of Trudeau: if his popular surge continues, the Liberals will have no trouble overtaking the NDP, and perhaps the Conservatives, in 2015; only if he stumbles badly will the NDP be able to maintain second place. Either way, there's nothing for Mulcair and Nathan Cullen and the others to do but sit and wait and see what happens.

Maybe we shouldn't be surprised by the way this weekend played out, for has it ever not been thus for the NDP? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with finishing third perennially, but that is essentially what the NDP always did (fourth if you count the Bloc as a federal party, which I don't). Sure, Jack Layton improved the party when he took over from Alexa McDonough, but still never enough to get a sniff at official opposition, let alone win an election. The best the NDP could ever hope for was to get to play kingmaker in a centre-left coalition government.

And then 2011 happened. Michael Ignatieff was boring as all hell (the Conservative attack ads helped, too), the Bloc Québécois imploded and, most importantly, Layton was just on, and before you knew it 4.5-million Canadians had voted for the NDP, good enough for over 30 per cent of the popular vote and 103 seats in the Commons. It was a heroic, unexpected victory, a real feel-good story.

And then Jack Layton died, and Tom Mulcair just hasn't been as good. Who could blame him? Layton would be a tough act for anyone to follow. Anyone not named Justin Trudeau, that is.

The 2011 election was an anomaly, a perfect centre-left-francophone storm ridden to perfection by a man going all-out on what was to be his final mission, dying yet smiling. I think a lot of Canadians were curious how the NDP would do playing the role that had been the Liberals' for so long, but here we are less than two years later. Canadian politics recovered its equilibrium this weekend: Conservatives on the right, Liberals on the left and the NDP somewhere off in the corner.

Saying you're not socialists anymore is easy; shedding a loser's psyche is a lot harder.

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]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2989415 2013-03-31T23:35:26-04:00 2013-03-31T23:35:23-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ motion to condemn sex-selective abortion in Parliament is really about.

I think there are Conservative MPs out there (and, yes, constituents, too) who want to reopen the abortion debate in Canada, and this is another attempt -- à la Stephen Woodworth in September last year -- to get a foot in the door.

Otherwise, what's the point here? What benefit might Canadians expect to gain from a debate in the Commons over whether or not to "condemn" (whatever that means) sex-selective abortions? And let's say Warawa had been permitted by Prime Minister Harper to bring forward his motion -- let's even say it passed a Commons vote, as it very well may have. Then what?

Either a) the abortion talk stops there, or b) the far-righties in the Conservative party, having succeeded finally in getting the government to talk about abortion, however obliquely, try to take another step toward fully re-opening the abortion debate and Harper has less of a foothold to stop them. Only the second scenario makes any sense.

The Prime Minister is going to come out of this looking bad within his own party because he bullied one of his backbench MPs in order to keep his word about not reopening the abortion debate, even though it's clear members of his caucus want to do just that.

Last week's mini-rebellion shows the battle lines are being drawn in the Conservative party, and that Harper's astonishing record of success since taking over as leader of the political right in 2004 is starting to matter less and less to others in the party.

This is for two reasons: One, Harper is in his 10th year as leader and those beneath him are getting antsy for their turn at the helm; two, there are those concerned the Conservative Prime Minister isn't conservative enough, that the party of the right wing in Canada should be more like the party of the American right, and one of the main differences between the two is their approaches to abortion. In the short term, Harper can probably retain his leadership and keep the abortion debate off the table without the Conservative party tearing apart at the seams. In the long run, he can't.

That's why Liberal and NDP support for Warawa under the guise of defending "MP rights" -- notably NDP House leader Nathan Cullen in Parliament on Thursday -- has been so disappointing: Neither party would have been likely to come out in favour of the sex-selective abortion motion, and, if Harper had allowed it, would have been quick to nail him for re-opening the abortion debate he said he'd never reopen. Politics is worst when it's played that way, when scoring political points gets in the way of ideology.

Harper has supported the left on two of its most high-profile planks: abortion and same-sex marriage. On the former, his shut-down of Warawa, and of Woodworth last year, show that whatever the right-wing religious plot lurking within the Conservative party is -- and I don't think now there's any doubt something is up -- Harper isn't part of it.

Same goes for gay marriage, which goes hand-in-hand with abortion on the right-left spectrum (except if you're a conservative and your son comes out as gay) -- the Prime Minister has also said he wouldn't reopen that issue, and he hasn't.

In the U.S., liberals appear to be finally turning the corner on same-sex marriage; in Canada, it's a given, and the number one reason it remains that way is, of all people, the leader of a conservative majority Parliament.

So what if Harper muzzled an MP? It's not as though sex-selective abortion is a matter of national import, and denouncing it, as Warawa would have it, would have had no practical implications in and of itself. The only value of his motion would have been to reintroduce the word "abortion" into the national conversation, and that's something Liberals and NDPers, I imagine, don't want. They should stop posturing and get behind the Prime Minister -- he's the best friend liberals have right now.

]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2898618 2013-03-18T12:23:35-04:00 2013-05-18T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ "status quo."

Sensibly, the agreement laid the foundation for the separation of state and synagogue in Israel, but its legacy has been the separation of Israel's ultra-Orthodox, the Haredim, from the rest of the country. Over the decades, ultra-orthodox political parties -- "political" being a relative term, since these parties serve a population that denies outright the validity of the modern, secular Israeli state -- have used the "status quo" to achieve a raft of social, educational and economic benefits unavailable to other Israelis, and to have thousands of seminary students (students is another relative term -- many ultra-Orthodox men are nominally students for life, i.e., they don't work) excluded from Israel's mandatory army service. It was a wholly unfair system and, thankfully, it now appears to have ended.

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled his new coalition government Friday, the biggest revelation was that the ultra-Orthodox parties had been excluded after serving in nearly every government since the late-1970s. The result will be a rolling back of all those benefits that have effectively allowed the ultra-Orthodox to ghettoize themselves -- doing so is a central demand of Netanyahu's new political partners.

Within a few years, Haredim will be serving in the army and, when their service to the state is complete, be forced to go out and get jobs to support their families instead of wasting away on the government dole. (A significantly reduced cohort of students will still be allowed to study Torah and Talmud instead of joining the Israel Defense Force, and one hopes the exemption will be applied to the top young ultra-Orthodox scholars -- the ones whose studies may actually benefit all of Jewry in some way.) But if Netanyahu's new government is set to end the highway robbery of the ultra-Orthodox, it is opening the door to another, potentially more damaging, problem -- that of the settlers.

Among Netanyahu's new partners is The Jewish Home, the religious Zionist party that bagged 12 seats in the January national elections. Jewish Home's 40-year-old leader, Naftali Bennett, who was previously the leader of the pro-settlement Judea and Smaria Settlement Council, advocates annexation of the entire West Bank -- land the Palestinians want for their own state.

To suggest he is not in favour of Palestinian statehood is a drastic understatement: Bennett has bluntly said "I will do everything in my power to make sure they (Palestinians) never get a state." Bennett's supporters, moreover, are the same people who recently lobbied to have Palestinians segregated on separate buses when traveling from their homes in Palestinian-controlled areas of the West Bank to jobs in Israel-run parts of the West Bank.

The other main partner in Netanyahu's coalition, the Yesh Atid (There is a Future) party, has mostly de-emphasized the Palestinian issue in its mandate and instead focused on the growing disparity between rich and poor in Israel. As for Netanyahu, we already know he's less than willing to lead on peace negotiations. And U.S. President Barack Obama -- the one person who could jump-start peace talks if he really wanted to -- reportedly has no plans to do so when he arrives in Israel Wednesday for a visit.

On one level, Netanyahu's trading in of the ultra-Orthodox for Jewish Home and Yesh Atid appears to be a worthwhile transaction, since revoking the Haredim's special status will mollify the other 92 per cent of hard-working Israelis who have been protesting, quite rightly, against the rapid deterioration of the middle class while the ultra-Orthodox, who contribute nothing of tangible value to the Israeli economy or social fabric, continued to suck from the government teat.

Then again, at least the ultra-Orthodox never appeared inclined to rock the national boat so long as they got paid. By empowering the settlers, Netanyahu has enabled a far more outward belligerence -- when Obama, or the next president, eventually decides to re-pursue peace between Israel and the Palestinians, the settlers will stand in the way, just as they did during the disengagement from Gaza in August 2005.

In the long run, Jewish Home's insistence on growing settlements (with tacit approval from Yesh Atid) could very well prove more injurious to the future of Israel than the black-clad, uneducated Haredim who want nothing more than a return to the shtetl life and a couple of shekels thrown their way.

For Netanyahu, it was a question, ultimately, of pick your poison.

Editor's note: Jewish Home party leader Naftali Bennett lives in Ra'anana. Incorrect information appeared in the original post. We regret the error.

]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2850966 2013-03-11T12:10:30-04:00 2013-05-11T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ "a picture is worth a thousand words" was a damn fool. For what can we actually glean from the photo of Toronto mayor Rob Ford and former mayoral candidate Sara Thomson at an event in Toronto last Thursday night? From my view, just two benign bits of information:

1. Ford's shirt is stained.
2. Thomson is smiling, widely.

Now, we can attempt to extrapolate from these bare details if we please -- Ford's shirt is dirty because in his drunken state, as alleged by Thomson, he spilled something on himself; Thomson's smiling countenance is hiding anger and shock and pain after being groped and propositioned, as the Toronto Star's Heather Mallick has suggested.

Then again, maybe Ford, who is not the most graceful of creatures at the best of times, merely knocked over a harmless glass of water by accident. And perhaps Thomson's smile reflects a mischievous scheme she's been concocting in her head to accuse Ford of sexual and verbal assault just as soon as she could log on to Facebook and attach said photo.

It should go without saying that Thomson's allegations must be investigated -- even though she herself has bizarrely refused to press charges thus far. Sexual assault is always a contemptible offence, and should be punished harshly, but it is more so when the accused represents an entire city of people. If Ford did indeed grab Thomson's buttocks, he must be prosecuted and removed from his job. And if Thomson has made up the whole thing -- to add fuel to her next mayoral campaign or simply to frame her former opponent -- her political career will be ruined and she might very well be fired from her job. She has a lot to lose here, too.

As for those who have taken to vilifying Ms. Thomson -- predominantly on social media -- for making her accusations, this is unfortunate but also unavoidable. It is certainly true women must be taught the essential thing to do in instances of assault is to speak out, loudly and immediately, because even if the alleged perpetrator is never prosecuted, publicizing the crime will make the perv and others like him think twice before they next cop a feel. Maybe more important than that, it reinforces what we try to teach women: If you don't say anything, the sickos win. If Ford did what she said he did, Thomson is a very brave woman for coming forward.

Still, I find it hard to blame those who have questioned Thomson's story on account of lack of evidence, the fact her story changed somewhat during the course of her Friday media tour and, yes, even her smiling face in the photograph.

There is also her attempt to get Ford to grope one of her colleagues, which, frankly, makes no sense. Most damning is the fact she has not pressed charges -- having made her version of the facts so public, why didn't she act within her legal right?

Perhaps she was/is still shocked by the incident and fearful of the repercussions of a legal battle, but it is her duty as a woman -- moreover as a woman with a public profile -- to take the next step and get law enforcement involved. A Facebook post isn't enough.

Meanwhile, Mayor Ford keeps bumbling along from one scandal to the next -- how he manages to get any political work done amid all the accusations (some proven true if not actionable) is beyond me. I suppose it's too much to ask that he resign so Toronto could stop being a laughingstock, but it's completely reasonable to request he not run again -- surely there is another GTA pol who could eliminate the gravy train without spilling everywhere along the way.

It's not unreasonable to assume that, if Thomson is proven to be a liar, he will use this episode to his political advantage, which would be to his great shame. One envisions the mayor blaming this sad story on downtown Toronto elites when what he should do is use his position for some good -- to speak out against sexual assault and encourage women to speak up when they are victimized.

]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2809356 2013-03-05T12:29:03-05:00 2013-05-05T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ Whatcott ruling are. And I don't think you do, either, since the written decision was so infuriatingly obtuse -- really, couldn't the court have just come right out and told us exactly what we can and can't say? Alas.

At least most of us can take solace in the fact we're not bigoted enough -- or stupid enough -- to say out loud things that might get us into trouble. But on the other hand you just never know what a human rights commission is going to come after you for because hate speech is evolutionary -- statements that don't seem inappropriate right now could very well become inappropriate at a later point, just as statements that in the past wouldn't have got you in trouble now will.

If you truly want to cover your bases, there is only one solution: Stop speaking altogether. Excessive? Maybe, but it seems to me you can't get accused of hate speech if you don't speech in the first place. And besides, there are lots of good reasons for you and me to shut up.

Consider:

- Half the people who hear anything you have to say -- no matter what it is -- will immediately think you're wrong or stupid or racist: This is unavoidable and in the Twitter age more people are emboldened to tell you exactly why they think you're an idiot, and who wants to hear that? You will feel compelled to respond to them, ensuring the cycle starts again. Do you really want to spend your time talking to people who implicitly think the opposite?

- The other half of people agree with you: Great, except you have nothing to talk about. It's like speaking to a mirror.

- When you're speaking, you're not doing: The Mishnaic scholars who wrote Ethics of the Fathers offer the following advice: "Say little, do a lot." Wise words. It's the doing -- not the speaking -- that's important, and there's a lot to do. I'm busy, you're busy, we're all busy -- so stop talking and start getting stuff done.

- Any really important message can be conveyed with facial expressions and your two arms: Just like mimes do.

- Some people aren't going to "get" you: Let's say you're trying to make a joke about, oh I don't know, the Holocaust or how Jews control Hollywood -- it's going to go over a lot of people's heads. They'll think you were being serious when you were just having a laugh about Nazi gas chambers. Before you know it the Anti-Defamation League will be all over your ass -- and they don't let off Jews easy, either.

- It never sounds as good out loud as it does in your head: Or, why Tom Flanagan is an idiot who deserved to lose his many, many jobs. A lot of things sound perfectly reasonable when we say them to ourselves, but that's only because we thought of them ourselves in the first place -- your inner monologue isn't the greatest when it comes to constructive criticism. If you're the kind of person who thinks the punishment doesn't fit the crime when we're talking about the worst scum off the earth, keep it to yourself. I assure you there is no way to make that sound anywhere near intelligent out loud.

- Your breath smells and your teeth are crooked: It's disgusting.

- Speech is on the way out: You might think that texting kids are annoying, but theirs are the ways of the future -- and they almost never talk to each other. Some day soon we'll all have little, tiny computer chips in our brains that just send and receive messages to and from the little tiny computer chips in other peoples' brains. No one is going to speak to each other then, unless the WiFi goes down, which actually isn't that different from where we're at now.

- Nobody is listening to you: They're too caught up in their own speaking to actually hear what you have to say -- it just goes in one ear and out the other. When everyone is trying to get a point across to everyone else, the consequence is that no one actually listens. More listening would be a good thing.

There are so few original thoughts out there that the chances you or I are going to come up with one of them is virtually nil -- we're far more likely to just vomit up some less-than-smart idea that was on Facebook and everyone you know has already seen it. Why not avoid the hassle? Just think of all the time you'll save when you don't have to be thinking up things to say. You'll feel better, you'll look better and people will definitely like you better.

Just because we're lucky enough to live in a place where freedom of expression is still -- with some exceptions -- a basic right doesn't mean we should feel the need to actually express our thoughts. Keep it to yourself and we all win.

]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2757094 2013-02-25T02:37:08-05:00 2013-04-26T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/
Over the weekend, the Toronto Star revealed a disturbing trend at Sutton District High: Some students there have taken to sporting the Confederate flag "on bandanas, lighters, belt buckles, backpacks and pickup truck windows."

Yes, the same Confederate flag proudly flown by the South during the U.S. Civil War and a symbol for those who are still fighting to get back that old Southern way of life -- which included enslaving black people. And now it has been adopted by young people here in Canada ... where once slaves came to escape from their Southern masters, traveling along the underground railroad (it's a part of our heritage, dammit!).

First and foremost, the educators at Sutton should be blamed for this mess. Per the Star article: "The Confederate flag became popular at Sutton District High School in the last two years," according to the school's principal, Dawn Laliberté.

Wait a minute.

You mean to tell me this has been going on for TWO YEARS and the school has only now decided to step in? What exactly was the administration waiting for? A Ku Klux Klan meeting to break out at recess? Because that's the sort of people that fly the Confederate flag.

This should have been dealt with immediately, not allowed to fester for two years (with more and more students presumably infected as time went on). At first sight of Confederate paraphernalia, the school should have forced students to remove the emblem and instituted a school-wide ban with appropriate explanation as to why the Confederate flag is offensive. "Our first step is always to educate," Laliberté told the Star.

Wrong -- the first, immediate step should have been to force students to stop donning racist paraphernalia. Full stop. You want to make this a teachable episode? Fine, coming down hard at the first whiff of anyone bearing a Confederate flag on school property would have been the best possible lesson.

The school isn't completely to blame, though, for this fiasco. There are also the parents, who presumably saw their kids leaving for school sporting Confederate symbols yet said nothing. How could they have allowed their children to leave home that way?

There are two possible explanations -- one, that the parents were indeed aware of what their kids were wearing and saw no problem with it because they themselves identify with the Confederate flag or, two, that the parents had no idea of the underlying meaning of the symbol (beyond it being painted on the roof of the Dukes of Hazzard car). Frankly, I'm not sure which is worse, but both possibilities point to an egregious failure in parenting.

Finally, there's the students. They're the least to blame here, really, because a lot of kids are dumbasses -- so things like this are to be expected and the hope is they will grow out of it at some point (though they're clearly lacking in positive influences at school and at home). One student, an anonymous sophomore who "plans to keep wearing" Confederate paraphernalia, said "It's more about the country values, we don't think of it as racist." To him I say this: It is racist, and there's no place in your country's values for your "country values." The sooner you learn that, the less of disaster your life is going to be.

Now, having doled out a healthy portion of shame, allow me to conclude on a bright note. At the end of the Star story, a student says he'll continue to wear his Confederate accessories because the school's decision to ban them contravenes his freedom of speech -- to which another student responds by saying, "You can buy a f------ swastika if you want, it's still racist."

Bless that anonymous kid because s/he is the ultimate defence against the Confederate fad. The most potent antidote to what's going on at Sutton District High School is the students themselves, who will learn more in their four years there from each other than from all their teachers -- at any level of schooling (though something tells me the scholastic careers of the Confederate crew will probably go no further than Grade 12) -- combined. Smart students -- the ones who already understand how damaging racism can be, and why it must be fought at all times -- have the duty to educate their dimwitted classmates.

Because the adults sure as hell can't be trusted to do it.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2714153 2013-02-19T08:18:33-05:00 2013-04-21T05:12:02-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ especially especially if you're counting on young voters, most of whom are facing a foreseeable future of debt, low wages and diminishing workplace benefits, to carry your political career to the next level.

So, while Martha Hall Findlay's sucker-punch -- suggesting Trudeau's wealth renders him unable to comprehend middle-class voters -- during Saturday's leadership debate was crude, it nonetheless represented a real blow, the first in this contest, to Trudeau. And if Hall-Findlay's attack stung, wait till the Conservatives and NDP start to take their own jabs at Trudeau's silver spoon. There will be no halfhearted apologies then.

Justin Trudeau is wealthy, his financial disclosure to Postmedia last week makes that much clear: his trust fund stands at $1.2 million, most of the inheritance thanks to a wealthy grandfather (not his famous father); dividends from a numbered company have paid Justin as much as $200,000 a year from the time he came of age; and a speaking career, this gig mostly thanks to his father (more accurately, his father's death in 2000), pays him $15,000 a pop (including after he was already employed as an MP, though by then he had curtailed his schedule considerably and has since stopped speaking for cash altogether); he also gets about $10,000 a year in royalties from his father's autobiography, published in 1993. And anyways, as an MP with a $150K-plus salary, his bi-weekly paycheque is not insubstantial.

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But he's not that wealthy. The $1.2 million isn't really that big an inheritance -- enough to own a nice house and car, pay tuition at private schools for your two kids and save for a comfortable retirement, but not enough to sit on and do nothing for the rest of your life, especially if he intends to pass on the wealth to the next generation of little Trudeaus. To his credit, Justin hasn't sat around twiddling his thumbs -- he was a teacher, one of the noblest professions I can think of and not an easy job by any stretch. No one should begrudge him his oratory career, either -- it's a job, after all, and if people were willing to pay him to speechify, more power to him. And he doesn't appear to flaunt his wealth, that is an encouraging sign of humility.

Still, he has much more than most of us can ever dream of having, a monetary cushion that has allowed him to pursue whatever path he chooses, be it backpacking through Europe, a mid-$40K teaching job or politicking, without any financial burdens. He is one of the lucky few blessed with that opportunity, and for that, fairly or not, he will be viewed with some suspicion by those who slave at jobs they don't like and for their efforts are paid unsatisfactorily. These people will question how Trudeau can claim to understand middle- and lower-class problems, especially among young people, when he has never experienced them and never will.

The short answer is, he can't. But he can significantly limit the backlash by addressing the other, far more damaging, limitation he has displayed thus far in the leadership campaign -- namely, his inability and/or refusal to spell out his vision of Canada and how he intends to make life better for Canadians. If he begins telling voters what exactly he has in mind for this country, instead of relying on the maddening vagaries he has gotten away with thus far, his fat bank account will start to matter less. And if his plan sounds convincing to enough people, the money won't matter at all.

The question is whether Trudeau is ready to take that step, whether he has the guts to cancel the coronation and turn the Liberal leadership campaign into an actual exchange of ideas that gives Canadians something to chew on. His response to Hall Findlay on Saturday suggests not -- it was filled with the same moronic babble about "identity," "service" and "community" that has rendered this leadership contest, and the Liberal party, a farce.

Justin can keep dodging Hall Findlay and Marc Garneau all the way to victory at the Liberal convention -- nobody can stop him from winning there. But after that, if he still doesn't give people something to think about, and when the Conservatives and NDP start in on him, that trust fund is going to come into play very quickly. The only way for Trudeau to convince voters, especially the younger ones, he's not just a playboy cashing in on his father's legacy and grandfather's investments is to prove to them there's more to him than that.

Otherwise, money will talk.

]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2659929 2013-02-11T02:56:53-05:00 2013-04-12T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ Torah from Heaven: The Reconstruction of Faith, England's Rabbi Norman Solomon argues the concept of "Torah Mi Sinai" (that the Five Books of Moses were dictated, word for word, by god to Moses on Sinai and that that is the version of the Torah Jews read and study to this day), which is the foundation of Orthodox Jewish thought, is nothing more than a myth.

While historians have long supported Solomon's thesis, with convincing proof moreover, it is earth-shaking for Orthodox Jews that one of their own would suggest it, even though Solomon argues revealing "Torah Mi Sinai" as a myth does not delegitimize the words of the Bible. As Rabbi Dr. Martin Lockshin explains in a glowing book review, Solomon believes "the claims that 'Torah is from heaven' and that Moses wrote the Torah are, in a certain sense 'true,' as they are Judaism's 'foundational myth.'" In other words, no matter how or when the Bible as we know it was cobbled together, the Sinai story still matters, even it isn't really accurate because generations of Jews were taught to believe it was accurate.

Lockshin has been denounced by the Vaad Harabonim of Toronto (a conglomerate of the city's most prominent Orthodox rabbis, who lean toward the "ultra" end of Orthodoxy) for daring to suggest Solomon might be on to something. The group responded to Lockshin's review with a statement: "Halacha [Jewish law] rules, unequivocally, that the denial of the godly origin of 'even a single word' in the Torah ... contravenes this principle [of 'Torah Mi Sinai'] and constitutes 'kefiroh baTorah' [heresy]."

A prominent Toronto Orthodox rabbi, Daniel Korobkin, followed with an op-ed aimed at Lockshin and Solomon in the Canadian Jewish News in which, among other things, he questioned whether Solomon, who, according to Lockshin, describes himself in his book as a "skeptical" Orthodox Jew, should in fact be considered an Orthodox Jew: "after examining the stated creed of the movement for Reform Judaism, one concludes that Rabbi Solomon has become a Reform Jew. And that's fine; people change all the time, and he wouldn't be the first Orthodox Jew to leave the fold and become 'enlightened' (although he is about two centuries late)" -- and Korobkin cynically called on Lockshin to retract his praise of Torah from Heaven.

The rabbis' response to Solomon and Lockshin was appalling and indecent -- indeed, a great deal of the business of this rabbinic board, and others like it, leaves a bad taste in my mouth -- and reveals how terrified the Orthodox hierarchy is by the idea of modernizing religion to correspond to new revelations from the academic world.

Still, I'd be lying if I didn't admit a small amount of sympathy for the position Solomon's book is putting Orthodox leaders in. Altering the narrative of the Bible heritage is profoundly more dangerous to the continued viability of Orthodox Judaism than the recurrent debates about how to reconcile modern life with what the Bible says -- to take but one example, regarding homosexuality.

The latter is a matter of massaging textual interpretation and making accommodations (or not, as is often the case) for the development of humankind -- a sensitive issue, no doubt, but one that has come up before and been successfully dealt with, at times in positive ways that have made the religious sect stronger by rendering it more welcoming and diverse.

But what Solomon is suggesting is no less than a direct threat to the future of Orthodox Judaism. If the principle that god dictated the Torah to Moses at Sinai is false, then the entire movement begins to unravel -- if that isn't true, what else isn't true? Most Orthodox Jews' beliefs would be shattered in an instant -- and Solomon's notion of "foundational myth" is not going to be much of a consolation prize.

I'd probably have more sympathy for the rabbis quarrelling with Solomon and Lockshin, though, if they weren't mostly to blame for this predicament. They continue to choose not to educate their young people to think critically, embrace difference and thrive on mental gymnastics (beyond those on such frequent exhibit in the Talmud). In doing so, they have failed to develop the kinds of strong minds that could process the idea of a Sinai-less Bible, let alone learn to appreciate -- religiously -- the Bible for the myth it is.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2624275 2013-02-05T13:48:55-05:00 2013-04-07T05:12:01-04:00

Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ vidéo virale filmée avec un téléphone intelligent le 29 janvier illustre parfaitement en quoi Montréal est devenue une honte nationale. Dans un segment de quelques secondes tourné tout près de l'Université McGill, on voit une jeune femme lutter pour garder son équilibre au milieu d'un torrent causé par la rupture d'un aqueduc âgé de 88 ans. La force du courant l'empêche d'avancer, tandis que divers débris dévalent à grande vitesse la rue qu'elle tente de traverser.

La jeune femme tient bon une trentaine de secondes, mais se fait emporter après avoir tenté d'éviter un débris de grande taille. Résignée, elle se laisse glisser les fesses dans l'eau vers le bas de la pente, jusqu'à ce qu'elle soit hors de portée de la caméra. Cette vidéo est tout simplement pathétique, en grande partie parce que l'auteur de la vidéo, ses amis et les autres témoins de la scène n'ont pas pensé à tendre la main à cette jeune femme. C'est après 45 secondes, alors que celle-ci disparaît de la vue, qu'un homme s'exclame: « Dude, somebody should probably go help her. » (Quelqu'un devrait peut-être aller l'aider.) Cette attitude est emblématique de la négligence généralisée qui prévaut maintenant dans la Métropole. Et dire que ces étudiants sont les mêmes qui ont marché dans les rues du centre-ville tout l'été pour réclamer la gratuité scolaire.

La Commission Charbonneau, qui tente actuellement de faire la lumière sur la corruption et la collusion dans l'industrie de la construction, révèle au reste du Canada l'état de pourriture avancée dans lequel se trouve Montréal. Ciblant une douzaine de grandes compagnies, la Commission met en vedette des entrepreneurs qui ont manipulé les contrats municipaux pendant des années afin d'être payés plus pour travailler moins. Le plus grave est que les élus des deux principaux partis municipaux (au fait, le multipartisme est-il vraiment nécessaire à Montréal?) ont eux-mêmes trempé dans ce système de pots-de-vin, de ristournes et de dons illégaux. La classe politique au grand complet semble avoir pris part au stratagème, incluant celui qu'on surnomme désormais « Monsieur trois pour cent ». Tombé en disgrâce, l'ex-maire Gérald Tremblay a dû démissionner mais a nié jusqu'à la toute fin avoir quoi que ce soit à se reprocher.

Pour couronner le tout, l'ancien directeur général du CUSM, qui supervisait le chantier du méga-hôpital anglophone, s'est enfui en laissant derrière lui des dettes de plusieurs centaines de milliers de dollars et la réputation de s'être associé avec un trafiquant d'armes présumé.

La Commission Charbonneau a pris une tournure « sexy » la semaine dernière lorsque Michel Lalonde (l'un des gros bonnets de la construction ayant avoué leur corruption), a pris la barre des témoins. Durant quatre jours, M. Lalonde a raconté avec moult détails comment les entrepreneurs et les firmes de génie-conseil (dont la sienne) ont systématiquement versé des sommes d'argent aux élus et aux fonctionnaires, y compris à l'ancien directeur général de la Ville de Montréal, afin de rafler des contrats bien juteux. Non contentes d'avoir noyauté le marché, ces firmes ont facturé à la Ville des dépassements de coûts frauduleux, et contribué en retour à la caisse électorale des partis ainsi qu'à la réélection de politiciens complices incluant des maires d'arrondissement. Mardi dernier, M. Lalonde a résumé la situation en ces quelques mots : « On a des projets, on contribue. »

En matière de politique et de conduite des affaires, la Commission Charbonneau en général et le témoignage de M. Lalonde en particulier sont un cauchemar devenu réalité. L'on se rend compte que ces deux sphères d'activité ont fusionné et qu'elles sont contrôlées par des escrocs, au détriment de tous les contribuables. Il faudra beaucoup de temps pour corriger la situation. Jeudi dernier, un promoteur immobilier cité par le chroniqueur Henry Aubin dans The Gazette a d'ailleurs déclaré qu'il faudra « au moins une génération pour reconstruire notre ville et sortir de ce merdier ».

Pour l'instant, les crapules qui dirigent Montréal semblent déterminées à la laisser tomber en ruine, morceau par morceau. Quant à l'aqueduc de la rue McTavish et aux autres canalisations centenaires prêtes à crever à tout moment, je n'ose même pas croire qu'elles seront correctement remplacées. La compagnie qui a obtenu le contrat de réfection dans ce secteur est nulle autre que Louisbourg Construction, appartenant à la famille de Tony Accurso, l'un des entrepreneurs au centre de l'enquête publique menée par la juge Charbonneau.

Bien entendu, il restera toujours la fabuleuse culture montréalaise, son histoire fascinante, les boutiques et les restaurants de son Vieux-Port, les Canadiens et Arcade Fire. Montréal demeure une belle ville, si ce n'est la plus belle au Canada. Je n'ai jamais dit qu'il ne fallait pas la visiter. Au contraire, je vous encourage à profiter de ses attraits, mais faites attention de ne pas tomber dans une gigantesque crevasse, et n'oubliez pas d'enfiler votre combinaison de plongée.

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Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ viral cellphone video of the January 29 flood on the campus of McGill University was a perfect demonstration of why Montreal has become a national embarrassment. In the video, a young woman struggles to stay upright as a torrent of water burst from an 88-year-old water main fills the thoroughfare she was trying to cross, bringing along with it various articles of debris. She can't move forward because of the force of the water, but she holds her ground for about half a minute.

Then, another piece of flotsam approaches, she loses her balance, is swept up by the current and, resigned to her fate, floats squarely on her ass down the street and out of view. It's a pathetic video (not least of all because neither the filmmaker nor any of his friends -- nor anyone else in the vicinity, for that matter -- even thinks to lend the poor girl a hand until 45 seconds in when, as the girl fades out of view, someone finally says, "Dude, somebody should probably go help her," and yes, these are the same young people who marched downtown all summer demanding free university education) that encapsulates Montreal's current state of crappiness.

The ongoing Charbonneau Commission investigating Montreal's construction industry is showing all of Canada just how rotten the city is. It has uncovered a litany of offences among a dozen or so construction companies who conspired for years and gamed the municipal contracts system so that they could get paid more for doing less work. But much, much worse than that, what has been revealed is that politicians from every major party in the city (another annoying thing about Montreal: are the municipal political parties really necessary?) are alleged to have been in on the scheme and to have lined their pockets with kickbacks and illegal donations from the construction companies. Virtually everyone who's anyone in Montreal politics has been implicated, including the man we have come to know as Mr. Three Per Cent. The former mayor, Gérald Tremblay has resigned in disgrace, claiming he knew nothing about what was going on.

(And in other local news, the former head of Montreal's MUHC superhospital project, who owes a couple hundred thousand dollars to the hospital and is in business with a purported international arms-dealer, has skipped town.)

The Charboneau Commission got particularly sexy this week, as Michel Lalonde, one of the admitted crooked construction bosses, took to the witness stand. Over four days, he methodically described how construction companies, including his, doled out bribes to city officials, including the city manager, in order to win municipal contracts at inflated prices, which they then abused even more by invoicing the city for bogus cost overruns and the like. Lalonde said those same companies displayed their gratitude to the officials who granted them those contracts by donating lots of money to various politicians' re-election campaigns, including some borough mayors, and all the political parties' war chests. Lalonde put it succinctly Wednesday: "You get projects, you donate."

Lalonde's testimony in particular and the Charboneau Commission in general are proving our worst fears about politics and business -- that they are inseparable, are both populated by crooks and the rest of us are paying for it. It is appalling, and it will take a long time to make things right again in Montreal. As a real estate developer, quoted by Gazette columnist Henry Aubin, put it Thursday: "It's going to take another generation to build ourselves out of this crap."

And in the meantime, the scumbags who run the city will let it crumble, piece by piece. In fact, I wouldn't even count on that burst pipe, and all the other 100-year-old pipes that could burst at any moment, getting a proper fixing: The city awarded the repair contract to Louisbourg Construction, a company owned by the family of Tony Accurso who is, natch, one of the allegedly crooked construction bosses the Charboneau Commission is investigating.

But what about all the great culture and history in the city? The shops and restaurants and Old Montreal? The Canadiens? Arcade Fire? Well, yes, there's no doubt all that's there, and that Montreal is a beautiful city -- arguably even the most beautiful in Canada. And, hey, I never said anything about not visiting -- just be careful you don't get swallowed up the next time a massive sinkhole opens up downtown. And remember to pack your wetsuit.



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Yoni Goldstein http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoni-goldstein/ I argued Benjamin Netanyahu was the wrong man to lead Israel going forward. Netanyahu wasn't solely to blame for the latest round of fighting, which killed 130 Palestinian civilians and saw Palestinian rockets land alarmingly close to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem -- as long as Hamas leads the Palestinians, Israel will be forced into this sort of offence-as-defence action from time to time.

But there's no doubt the Israeli Prime Minister's apparent eagerness for a fight was a contributing factor, and, moreover, that he is unwilling to make the hard sacrifice necessary for peace. Namely, accepting a Palestinian state on Israeli land traded for peace. A Peace Now study issued this week reporting settlements have expanded at a record rate under Netanyahu's leadership and the prime minister's approval last month of new settlement construction in the particularly contentious "E1" area of the West Bank drove home that point once again.

Alas, the majority of Israelis don't agree that Netanyahu's time has passed. As the country prepares to go to the polls Tuesday, Netanyahu's Likkud party and its coalition partner, the Yisrael Beiteinu party, which is even more right-wing and led by Avigdor Lieberman, who resigned in December as Israel's foreign minister amid an indictment on fraud and breach of trust charges, appears destined to form the next government. Re-elected to another term, it is likely Netanyahu will continue to lead in the same belligerent way he has led until now.

U.S. President Barack Obama spoke out earlier this week against Netanyahu -- according to Jeffrey Golderg, writing for Bloomberg, in response to the Israeli prime minister's settlement-expansion plan Obama "told several people that this sort of behavior on Netanyahu's part is what he has come to expect, and he suggested that he (Obama) has become inured to what he sees as self-defeating policies of his Israeli counterpart."

Further, "in the weeks after the UN vote (on granting non-member observer status to the Palestinians, in which the U.S. voted against the Palestinians), Obama said privately and repeatedly, "Israel doesn't know what its own best interests are." The president's use of the term "self-defeating" is particularly revealing in that it echoes former Israeli foreign minister Abba Eban's famous quip about the Palestinians -- that they never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

In essence, what Obama is saying is Netanyahu's brand of leadership is evening the political playing field in the Arab-Israel conflict. If the U.S. and the rest of the West lose faith in Israel's political leaders, they cannot support Israel -- certainly not to the extent the Jewish state has enjoyed over the last few decades. Harsh words, indeed, from Israel's best friend.

Which raises the question: What the hell is Netanyahu thinking?

To begin with, I think he believes the Middle East is so topsy-turvy right now -- much more so than usual -- that no one has the energy to stop him, whatever he does. There are too many other, bigger problems to worry about: the Syrian civil war rages on and will likely require Western intervention before all is said and done; Egypt is still trying to figure out its identity post-Mubarak, and its new leaders, Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, are sending mixed messages about how they intend to deal with the West; a new al-Qaida-infused conflict in Mali (plus a confrontation in Algeria) has Europe occupied; and the Palestinians are still led by a) Hamas and b) a spineless Palestinian Authority that Hamas could replace fairly easily if and when it wants to. On top of that, the Americans are counting the seconds till they can escape Afghanistan. An expansionist Israel ranks far down the list of real and potential problems in the Middle East.

On top of that, Netanyahu has been emboldened by the unmitigated success of the Iron Dome system, which knocked Hamas rockets out of the sky with great success just a few months ago and has, by many accounts, only gotten better since (the system even improved markedly within that one-week Hamas barrage). The security fence in the West Bank has effectively ended the efficacy of Palestinian and Islamist suicide bombers -- there's another one on the Lebanese border and Israel this month announced plans to build yet another fence along the Syrian border. If Hamas and Hezbollah can't send militants into Israel to blow themselves up, and if their rockets aren't doing damage, what does Israel have to fear?

That leaves but one worry for Netanyahu: Iran, which will go nuclear soon unless its centrifuges are destroyed (sanctions aren't going to stop the Ayatollahs and the insane Mahmoud Ahmadinejad). I don't subscribe to the theory that the November Gaza campaign was meant to be a warning, or warm-up, for Iran -- localized fighting with inferiorly armed, poorly trained militants does not prepare one to do battle with an A bomb-wielding enemy.

If Israel and Iran are to go to war the stake will be much higher, and there will be immediate global implications -- and that's what Netanyahu is counting on: The Americans, Europe and the UN are going to be forced to help, or at the very least not discourage, Israel -- because a nuclear Iran is an existential threat to Israel, but it is also a top-rung problem for the rest of the West. For all their disagreements, Obama will stand squarely behind Netanyahu when it comes to Iran.

So, yes -- it does appear Netanyahu has his bases covered: strong support from Israeli voters, a robust defence against Palestinian and other Muslim terrorists and international backing to take on Iran if/when the time comes. But what he lacks is the vision to see a Middle East that's different from what it is today, and the determination to put an end to the wars, fear and hatred. Peace will come eventually -- or at least we must hold onto the hope it will come -0 and when it does Netanyahu will be remembered as one among many Middle East leaders who could not summon the courage to do what was right -0 for his people and for all the Middle East.

Surely even bellicose Bibi doesn't relish that legacy.]]>