ara baliozian

Saturday, April 27, 2002 ******************************* When a terminally ill 16-year old girl in Canada refused blood transfusions because they were against her religious convictions, there was a legal battle and the final ruling was that she was not mature enough to make life-and-death decisions. # When a 14-year old Palestinian boy (he looked more like ten) on his way to kill himself and Jews changed his mind and went home, his mother almost repeated word by word the Canadian judge’s words. # The language of justice and love (or should I say, the language of reason and common sense) and the language of politics are mutually incomprehensible even when they use the same vocabulary. # We are told that a good chess player thinks five moves ahead and remembers as many as five thousand patterns. In politics or history it’s enough to think of only the next move and to remember only one pattern: namely, a tribal people should never challenge the might of an imperial power, and it makes no difference if the tribal people are Armenian revolutionaries at the turn of the century or Palestinians freedom fighters today. But politicians are too lazy or ignorant, and probably both, to do even that much, perhaps because they don't think in terms of justice, love, common sense and reason, but in terms of hatred which happens to be deaf, dumb, and very, very stupid.

P.M. [26 April, 2002] ******************************* # Being an Armenian is hard work. I wouldn't apply for the job even if they promised a fat salary, the very best in fringe benefits, and a sky-is-the-limit expense account. # To those who accuse me of not liking Armenians, I say: "I will answer you after I survive them." # And to those who enjoy reminding me that my arguments have so far fallen on deaf ears, I say: "It has never been my intention to reform the lunatic fringe. Remember, my friends, far better men than myself tried and failed. Why should I let that bother me?" # There is no such thing as a family, a community, or a nation without mutual trust, and trust is not something that can be willed or legislated. Trust is above all a history of trust. Which is why we must begin here and now. # Only after discovering my identity as a human being did I acquire a better understanding of my identity as an Armenian.

Friday, April 26, 2002 ***************************** # Armenians disagree on many things, but I think they agree on this: that being an Armenian means exposing oneself to a large quantity of Armenian crap – make it, Ottoman crap parading as Armenian simply because it bears the -ian ending. They may disagree on their definition of crap, but then, they will disagree on anything, including the multiplication table and one plus one. # If you insult with lies you will be mortally wounded by the truth. Morality and justice are not human inventions. Rather, they are extensions of reality and its inflexible laws. # It is not that some Armenians are not Armenian (as one of my pundit friends asserts) but that they are not human. But they can be easily recognized by the many layers of the flag with which they wrap themselves to hide their true identity as apes and swine. # Criticism: exposing contradictions. Armenian criticism: verbal abuse. # According to a work in progress titled LA VERA HISTORIA DEL DON QUIJOTE DE LA MANCHA by a descendant of the Don (a professor of Spanish literature at the University of Barcelona), Cervantes got it all wrong. Don Quixote was not mad, but very much like Hamlet, he only pretended to be. He knew Desdemona to be a common slut, but he also knew that when very young, she had been brutally raped by the owner of the windmill, who by then a cardinal in Rome, was beyond his reach. What drove the Don to attack the windmill was not madness compounded by myopia but rage! According to another work in progress by a descendant of Othello, now a professor of English literature in Zimbabwe, Desdemona was a nymphomaniac. Moral: Don't believe everything you read on the internet, in the papers and in books, including the classics of world literature.

P.M. [April 25, 2002] ************************** # No one likes to admit that he is a bloodthirsty bastard on his way to hell. Which is why, killing in the name of God has been such a popular support throughout history. # I could have been a far better writer if I had better detractors instead of riffraff. But alas, it looks like I am destined to remain a minor, negligible, and forgettable scribbler. # When your critics contradict themselves – when, that is, one accuses you of being a Tashnak or a capitalist and the other tries to expose you as a Ramgavar and a communist, you may be justified in suspecting that you are on the right track. # We have among us an astonishing number of skinheads who are convinced that writers are the true enemies of the people. Give this riffraff power and their first priority will be hanging anyone who refuses to recycle their particular brand of crapola. # Truth cannot set you free if you are a prisoner of your own ego. Likewise, historical truth will not be accessible to you if you are a chauvinist.

THE SUBTLE ART OF MAKING MORTAL ENEMIES ****************************************** The aim of literature is not to make yourself hateful but to understand reality. But if you speak of reality to an audience that has taken refuge in a world of illusions, or if you speak the truth to an audience of dupes, or if you try to be honest among charlatans, you will be hated; and if your audience is Armenian, you will be hated unto death. To be hated unto death in an Armenian environment: nothing could be easier. All you need to do is identify your adversary. If he is a crypto-Stalinist, call him a Stalinist. If he is a neo-Nazi skinhead, call him a fascist. If he is a pro-Palestinian anti-Zionist who supports bloodthirsty fanatics yelling "Death to the Jews!" and "Death to the USA!" tell him if Ariel Sharon is not awarded the next Nobel Peace Prize it will be because the Nobel committee is staffed by anti-Semites. If he is an elitist snob who looks down at his fellow Armenians, dismiss him as white trash. If he is a self-assessed genius, refer to him as an inbred moron. And if he is a minor scribbler like me, ignore him, pretend he doesn't exist – which is why I am grateful to all my readers, including the critics…especially the critics because they have been and continue to be my main source of inspiration. If it weren't for them I would have run out of things to say years ago. Thank you and God bless all of you!

LATER THE SAME DAY ******************************* # Q: What is larger than the universe? A: A bloated ego. # If you start arguing on the assumption that you were right yesterday, you are right today, and you will be right tomorrow, you condemn yourself to remain a prisoner of your own closed mind. # Self-esteem is not a reliable index of worth, in the same way that dogmatism is not an index of certainty. # The danger of ignorance is in its unawareness. If I know that I don't know, I am harmless because I will concentrate my efforts on educating myself – an activity that can harm no one. But if I don't know that I don't know, then I might as well be a blind man negotiating a busy intersection.

Wednesday, April 24, 2002 ********************************* An argument that flows from the ego ("It’s right because I say so," or "Arafart said so!") is never right because it overestimates the reasoning capacity of a non-thinking organ (the ego) at the expense of the brain. Which makes as much sense as trying to appreciate Vermeer with one’s ears and Mozart with one’s eyes, or playing the violin with one’s toes. # Another reason I am against censorship is that the very same Armenians I would like to see silenced are also the ones who illustrate and dramatize all the negative aspects of our identity that I have been trying to expose. # An Armenian hates his enemies more than he loves his country, and he may preach hatred of the Turks but he prefers to practice it on his fellow Armenians. # One of the worst things that could be said about a man is that his most highly developed organ is his ego. # Because I am anti-humbug, I am described as anti-Armenian by Armenians engaged in humbuggery.

Tuesday, April 23, 2002 ****************************** # "Vengeance is mine, said the Lord." By that it is not meant that God keeps an account of every transgression down below, but that in His infinite wisdom He has inserted a punishment in every transgression. So that, when a fool makes an ass of himself in public, his punishment is exactly that: making an ass of himself in public. No use trying to reason him out of his foolishness, which would amount to being an instrument of his salvation. # He who hates you, will hate you if you are wrong; but he will hate you even more if you are right. # God is popular because it allows the riffraff to parade as noble specimens of humanity and homicidal maniacs as humble servants of the Lord. # As an Armenian writer I have been subjected to two forms of criticism, the first of which may be described as "Sling as much mud as you can in the hope some of it will stick," and the second as: "Hurl a steady barrage of insults in the hope at least one will hit a vulnerable spot." Did I say "forms of criticism?" make it, verbal sewage.

THE MORE THINGS CHANGE… ********************************* # In a collection of American graffiti of the 1960’s I remember to have read one that said: "Kill a commie for Christ!" At the turn of the century in the Ottoman Empire it was "Kill a giaour for Islam!" and now in the Middle East: "Kill a Jew for Allah!" # Some day organized religions and ideologies will be exposed for what they are: nests of bigots, homicidal maniacs, and child molesters. # All political arguments boil down to: My homicidal maniacs are better than yours. # Arthur Koestler, one of the most intensely political writers of our time, gave up writing on politics in the second half of his life and concentrated on psychology and biology. His aim: to investigate what is it exactly that transforms a decent, law-abiding citizen into a homicidal maniac. His tentative conclusion: the evolution of man is incomplete. Objective thinking is not the norm but the exception. In his own words: "Detached, rational thought is a new and fragile acquisition; it is affected by the slightest irritation of the old brain which, once aroused, tends to dominate the scene." By "old brain" Koestler means our primitive, crocodilian instincts, of which we remain unaware because, in the words of a biologist (MacLean): "The visceral brain is not at all unconscious but rather eludes the grasp of the intellect because its animalistic and primitive structure makes it impossible to communicate in verbal terms." # To explain why fanatics, homicidal maniacs, and the lunatic fringe in general lack a sense of humor, Koestler writes: "Laughter makes a man equally unable to kill or to copulate."

P.M. ***************** # A recurring experience: Unless I write what is expected of me, even my best friend becomes my mortal enemy. I am reminded of Turks and Armenians at the turn of the century – so many things these days remind me of Turks and Armenians! From their most loyal ethnic group we became vermin to be exterminated. # When I speak of Ottomanized Armenians, I don't expect to have their affection. # An Amnesty International poster shows a bearded man behind bars and the words read: HIS CRIME: TO THINK. IF FORGOTTEN, HE WILL DIE. Armenian version: HIS CRIME: TO BE HONEST. IF INSULTED REPEATEDLY, HE MAY BE SILENCED. To which I can only say: Sorry to have disappointed you so far, my good friends and gentle readers; but keep trying please, and may the best man win. # Is the pen mightier than the sword? No, not in an environment where the tongue is sharper than a Turk’s yataghan and more venomous than a cobra’s fangs.

Monday, April 22, 2002 ******************************** # If you promote moderation, you will be criticized by fanatics. If you speak in favor of solidarity, dividers will crap on you. If you preach love, you will be crucified by haters. And if you defend vegetarianism, you will be devoured by cannibals. # Where religious love enters, political hatred follows. # David may slay Goliath provided he doesn't commit hara-kiri first, which is exactly what a nation does when, after dividing and subdividing itself, it engages in cannibalism. # There is a natural tendency in the brainwashed to resent anyone who refuses to be brainwashed. # In case you don't know: the most effective way of refuting a writer is to ignore him. # Why would anyone in his right mind would want to read a writer who echoes his sentiments and thoughts? Why would anyone in his right mind take a human parrot seriously? # Just because I assume the role of devil’s advocate, some of my readers think I am Lucifer. # Even if you disagree with everything I say, you must agree that I speak in defense of something that is infinitely more important than you and me: namely, free speech.

MONOLOGUES ***************************** There is a type of reader who dismisses your ideas as garbage, and when you ignore him, he accuses you of preaching dialogue and practicing monologue. But I question the sanity of anyone who wishes to engaged in dialogue with garbage. And please note that I am not talking about hooligans now but about our creme de la creme. Pity the nation whose creme de la creme is its creme de la scum. I am reminded of Arabs who teach their children to say "Death to the Jews!" after which they make public declarations to the effect that they want to negotiate peace with the Jews. To those who say, Jews too brainwash their kids to say "Death to the Arabs!" I reply: If true, then let us agree to say "A plague on both your houses!" Because the alternative is to assert: "My lunatic fringe is right, but your lunatic fringe is wrong!" This kind of reasoning (make it, unreasoning) will make sense only to lunatics. And I happen to be of the opinion that you cannot solve a problem by joining a lunatic fringe. It has been said that you cannot solve today’s problems with yesterday’s answers. Neither can you solve the problems of a lunatic fringe with the solution of another lunatic fringe (assuming they have one). # My hope is that one of these days an Armenian comedian (do we have one?) will see the humor in my writings, use them to create a monologue, and get lots of laughs from his audience. If some of my readers find me humorless it may be because they see reflections of themselves in my writings, and no one who takes himself seriously thinks of himself as funny, and that is his misfortune.

SOMEDAY… ****************** There will come a time when Arabs and Jews will coexist in relative peace the way Armenians and Turks now coexist in Istanbul. But in the meantime the haters will have their "15 minutes" of popularity, and their "pound of flesh" – the haters, the fanatics, the butchers, the hyenas and crocodiles, the talaats, hitlers, stalins and their dupes who believe the only good enemy is a dead enemy… in short: the lunatic fringe of mankind whose destiny is the garbage dump of history. I am not saying hatred, terror and war will disappear. No, of course not. To think or hope so is utopian. Because man will always find a new target for his hatred. And when it comes to such targets, history tells us man can be very resourceful and prolific and there will always be those who preach hatred in the name of compassion and war in the name of peace. "Praise be to Allah, the compassionate, the merciful, and the owner of the day of judgment." "Death to the Jews!’ "Death to the USA!"

Saturday, April 20, 2002 ******************************* # Some of my critics remind me of the fact that in medieval times Armenian mercenaries were the most ferocious fighters money could buy. # Subservience does not mean saying yes when you mean no, but being grateful to those who deceive, exploit, degrade, and dehumanize you. In American legal parlance, it means not only dropping your pants but also bending over. # Don't talk to me about dedicated partisans with ethics. Power does not corrupt; rather, it is the corrupt who lust for power. Trying to reason with them is like trying to cross a Brazilian river teeming with ravenous piranhas. If you reach the other shore weighing half as much, you should thank God and count your blessings.

SLOGANS / 2 *************************** # Some of my readers are so eager to prove me wrong that they think by doing so they will have solved the problems of the world, including the Middle East. # We all agree that peace is better than war if only because in time of war bad things happen to good people. We also agree that coexistence is better than endless conflict if only because in endless conflict the innocent and the unborn are also victimized. Let us also agree that slogans like "Death to the Jews!" and "Death to the USA!" are not conducive to coexistence and peace. And if you were to say, Jews and Americans too teach their children to parrot anti-Arab slogans ("Death to the Arabs!"), I say, if true – and I repeat, if true! -- what makes you think any sane man would say the Jews and Americans are right but the Arabs wrong? # Scenario: Suppose after ten or a hundred years the Arabs see the light, unite and are successful in driving the Jews into the sea. Does anyone in his right mind think that the Jews are so different from the Arabs that they will not generate their own lunatic fringe with predictable results? # If familiarity breeds contempt, how does one explain the popularity of slogans? # Nothing bad ever dies. Hitler and Stalin live. But their followers are not stupid enough to identify themselves as Nazis and Stalinists, or, for that matter, as anti-Semites and Communists. They prefer harmless labels, even noble-sounding labels like environmentalists. But regardless of their cunning disguises, sooner or later they cannot help exposing themselves by supporting anyone who shares their agenda – "Death to the Jews!" and "Death to the USA!" # Environmentalists believe in protecting the environment, including the spotted owl and the polar bear. They also believe they will have a much better chance of doing so if they first get rid of Jews and Americans because, you see, Americans and Jews teach their children to repeat such dangerous slogans as "Death to the spotted owl!" and "Death to the polar bear!"

SLOGANS *********************** Arab children today grow up mouthing such slogans as "Death to the Jews!" and "Death to America!" and they are brainwashed to believe to kill the enemy is the shortest way to paradise. In a few years there will be…maybe there already are… several million fanatical teenagers who will do their utmost to reach New York, London, or some other population center in the West and kill as many infidels as they can. Most of them will never make it, of course, but some will and the very same people who now feel sorry for the poor, defenseless, underdog Palestinians will change their minds and before anyone can say Jack S. Avanakian, they will not just loathe Arabs but hate them unto death, especially if a member of their family is maimed or killed. # "Death to the Jews!" "Death to America!" These slogans must be music to the ears of anti-Zionists, anti-Semites, crypto-Stalinists, neo-Nazis, fascists, skinheads, racists and useful idiots in general, because every political movement has its share of useful idiots, in the same way that every community, society and nation has its lunatic fringe – and who is to say if those I have listed above are not exactly that -- the lunatic fringe of the West?

Friday, April 19, 2002 ********************************* # Confronted with the choice between changing the world and changing themselves, members of the lunatic fringe will invariably choose to re-creating the world in their own image. # When they ask for positive or constructive criticism or solutions, what they mean is for you to join them and mouth their favorite slogans: "Death to America!" "Death to the Jews!"" # "Death to the Jews?" What’s next? Heil Hitler? # They want me to apologize for refusing to be the useful idiot of an alien ideology that has been consigned to the garbage dump of history. # I have known many charlatans but I have never heard any one of them admit to being one. Charlatanism and confession are mutually exclusive concepts. Murderers may confess; charlatans, never! # People who are incapable of hurting a single human being don't mind repeating such slogans as "Death to the Jews!" and "Death to America!" What a book one could write ] on the contradictions of the lunatic fringe.

The victim is right to hate his victimizer. The victimizer is wrong to hate his victim. Why are there victims and victimizers? That's like asking: Why is there injustice and evil in this world? The answer is: I don't know. No one does.

Thursday, April 18, 2002 ********************************** # Nothing comes easier to an Armenian than to assume Armenians are smart except the fools who refuse to be taken in by his brand of recycled crap. # Recycled crap is recycled crap and when coupled with intense emotion is a symptom of a single-digit IQ. # Sooner or later all Armenians must admit that they have many enemies and most of them happen to be Armenians. # It is easy to lie with words but the body never lies and words too have a body. # The only thing we have learned from our Genocide it seems is publishing books about it. # Recycled crap is not conducive to dialogue and recycled Armenian crap is no exception. # To say "My recycled crap is pure gold but your is just crap," is another symptom of advanced cretinism.

WHY I LOATHE ARABS AND ADMIRE JEWS ********************************************** I loathe Arabs because they are theocratic, dogmatic, intolerant, traditional to the point of being medieval, hidebound, gullible (72 virgins), superstitious (720 virgin: because he who believes in 72 will also believe in 720, or as Hitler said: "The bigger the lie, the better!"), authoritarian, tribal, undemocratic. Because they are racists (they hate not only Jews and Americans but also the West, all infidels, and women – except virgins of course, provided they are imaginary, abstract, non-existent, metaphysical virgins because they represent the least threatening form of femininity). Because they are masters of the blame-game, which means, they are irresponsible and dishonest. I loathe them because they are perennial losers, which means, even if they win they lose because they divide, subdivide, and cannibalize, just as we do. And as this final statement suggests: I don't have to go to Arabia to understand Arabs; all I have to do is read what our own writers have said about us and examine my own heart. I admire Jews because even when divided among themselves, they are united against the enemy. Because they are progressive, and not just modern but shapers of modernism. I admire them because they believe in democracy and are not afraid of self-criticism – which also means they have an open mind. And now a short lesson in semantics: the difference between loathing and hating: you loathe something that arouses your disgust, like a fly swimming in your soup. You hate something that is a source of dread and fear, like Ariel Sharon, and to make him even more hateful and fearful, you call him a Nazi war criminal. If I offended anyone’s sensibilities, may I say like Shahan Shahnour: "I apologize to Mount Ararat." But if I damaged anyone’s colossal ego, no harm done. An Armenian’s ego is the most fragile and the most indestructible thing in the world. You will get over it. In conclusion: the Arabs have nothing, absolutely nothing, to teach us. We can learn one or two things from the Jews. And to quote President Bush on America: "God bless Armenia!"

quote:Originally posted by sen_vahan:"Turks hating Armenians, Nazis hating Jews, Muslims (also Armenians) hating Americans and Israelis: to me they are equally repellent." If you are honest in your thoughts then go through the backward direction too. Armenians hating Turks, Jews hating Nazis,... And see what you can get from that. Do not be surprised! # "At one time or another the Jews have been hated by Pharaohs and Popes, Nazis and Stalinists, skinheads and born-again Fundamentalists. But Jews, unlike some of their haters, continue to exist because that’s what hatred does to the hated: it gives them a reason to persevere ..." Yes , Dear Ara, right you are. If you open Dostoevsky's memories you will find a note about Jews where he says that he has never seen such a hatred to russian people as that from Jews. Vice versa, a?? And why is that Jews were hated in Egypt, Russia,..? one should ask this question too I guess (as well as for Armenian case). Among VIPs that were "fried" by Stalin were Trozky, Zinov'ev, Kamenev,... all jews. And I would not say that we have simply a nationalism here. "in order to prove the world wrong, and to say: "We are better than you think and if you give us a chance we may even succeed in proving that we are better than those who hate us unto death." Again, you are right. And those hating jews, as you say, did not survive whereas jews did. They appeared to be stronger than those hating them. And since hating one you make him stronger as well as hating you become stronger(you may argue that), let me just guess whose hatred was stonger - that of jews' to others or those (who did not survive) to jews. Sorry for the "anti-isms". Vahan i think it is right for a victim to hate his victimizer. Because if he loved his victimizer, he would also love his status as victim. Absurd! The Jews were hated because they could never share the nationalism of their country of adoption, and because to do so would mean for a Jew (in France, for example) to hate a Jew in Germany. There are other reasons: the best book on the subject is Jean-Paul Sartre's THE ANTI-SEMITE AND THE JEW. / ara

ARMENIANS ARGUING ****************************** …make it, tearing each other to shreds, or, to paraphrase Oscar Wilde, the unspeakable cannibalizing the uneatable… Armenians arguing remind me of what happened to us during World War II. In case you have forgotten allow me to reminisce and recapitulate: Some Armenians fought under Hitler, others under Stalin, and both died (or is it, killed one another?) in the name of two causes that have been consigned to the dustbin of history where they belonged to begin with. And now let us speak of the dead: do we remember them as heroes or as esh nahadags (jackass martyrs)? If heroes, then we should be grateful to both Hitler and Stalin for allowing us to fight and die like heroes, that is to say, like noble specimens of humanity and thus to enhance our collective prestige in the eyes of the world. If jackass martyrs, the very least we can do is learn to be martyrs without being jackasses – without, that is, allowing ourselves to be deceived, misled, hoodwinked, bamboozled, flimflammed, seduced, and sodomized by alien interests. Now then, my good friends and gentle readers, go right ahead, make a spectacle of yourselves and tear each other to shreds!

Tuesday, April 16, 2002 ********************************* There are those who say anti-Semitism is not the same as anti-Zionism and anti-Zionism is not racism. But I suggest anyone who hates unto death is not in a position to make such subtle distinctions. # Turks hating Armenians, Nazis hating Jews, Muslims (also Armenians) hating Americans and Israelis: to me they are equally repellent. # There are those who say to loathe racists is racist, which amounts to saying, to hate rapists is the same as being for rape, and to hate murderers is to support murder. # There are those who assert Ariel Sharon is a war criminal and a Nazi exactly because he is neither a war criminal nor a Nazi; because if he were a war criminal and a Nazi he would do to Palestinians what the Nazi war criminals did to his people: he would exterminate them not by the hundred or the thousand but by the million. And if Sharon were to adopt a passive stance and do nothing and allow the Palestinians to kill indiscriminately, the very same people who now call him a Nazi and a war criminal would call him a gutless coward and a contemptible worm and hate him even more. That’s the way it is with hatred. If love is blind, hatred is deaf, dumb, stupid, and subhuman to the point of being crocodilian. # At one time or another the Jews have been hated by Pharaohs and Popes, Nazis and Stalinists, skinheads and born-again Fundamentalists. But Jews, unlike some of their haters, continue to exist because that’s what hatred does to the hated: it gives them a reason to persevere in order to prove the world wrong, and to say: "We are better than you think and if you give us a chance we may even succeed in proving that we are better than those who hate us unto death." # You cannot prove to the hater that his hatred is irrational and wrong and that it harms him more than it harms his victim, in the same way that so far mankind has failed to prove that war and massacre, rape and murder, tyranny and oppression, ignorance and prejudice are wrong. These things have existed since the beginning of time and a thousand messiahs, prophets and philosophers have failed to change the mind of a single tyrant, murderer, rapist, and racist. # Why do I write? My reason tells me miracles don't happen, but something else tells me the universe, the world in which we live, existence itself is a miracle, and the act of writing itself has something of the miraculous in it. Perhaps the word I am looking for is hope – the hope of making a difference… but as always, I have my doubts….

LATER THE SAME DAY ****************************** # On several occasions, Armenians who disagree with me have accused me of trying to promote and sell my books. That’s what I call Levantine paranoia: to see the profit motive everywhere. I have also been accused of being a paid agent of the Mossad. # When asked to choose between one or another lunatic fringe, I prefer the Biblical dictum: "A plague on both your houses!" # My loathing of despotism is such that I'd rather live in a democratic hell than in a despotic paradise. # In their efforts to prove they are nice, some people can get really nasty. # Hazlitt: "If a person has no delicacy, he has you in his power." # Lichtenberg: "The great with their long arms often do less damage than their lackeys with short ones."

Monday, April 15, 2002 ******************************** # Acts of terrorism, wars and massacres are not to me spectator sports or popularity contests, and I don't understand those who treat them as such by taking sides, by supporting one side against the other, and by celebrating when one side wins. # A victim is a victim and a corpse a corpse regardless of national origin. # Even the Americans at one point reconsidered their position in Vietnam and gave up. Ditto for the Russians in Afghanistan. If all losers were to behave like the Palestinians, there would now be wars and civil wars in every corner of the planet and peace would be a utopian concept to be found only in books by science-fiction writers. # If we accept the concept of resistance to oppression as legitimate, we must also accept its reverse: the right of a state to defend itself. # There are philosophers and historians (among them St. Thomas Aquinas) who speak of just and unjust wars. But I like to believe all wars are initiated by the lunatic fringe. The same applies to all murders and rapes. # Where do we go from here? It’s always the same story: as long as we allow the lunatic fringe to take over the leadership of a nation, we condemn ourselves to be victimized by it.