Sorry Pat, but you don’t act very Christian
by Bonnie Chernin Rogoff | View comments |
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Pat Buchanan has never been a friend of Israel.
Syndicated columnist and political analyst Patrick J. Buchanan is a very intelligent man. He is an articulate man and when he writes, people read and listen. That’s what makes him all the more dangerous.
Patrick J. Buchanan wrote two articles published in World Net Daily replete with the most vile anti-Israel, anti-Jewish statements that I have seen or read for some time. His articles are so disturbing that even Mr. Joseph Farah, publisher and CEO of World Net Daily, wrote a stinging rebuke to Pat Buchanan.
Here are some select quotes from Mr. Buchanan’s piece, "Where are the Christians?"
“Now, Israel’s rampage against a defenseless Lebanon – smashing airport runways, fuel tanks, power plants, gas stations, lighthouses, bridges, roads and the occasional refugee convoy – has exposed Bush’s folly in subcontracting U.S. policy out of Tel Aviv, thus making Israel the custodian of our reputation and interests in the Middle East.”
“The Lebanon that Israel, with Bush’s blessing, is smashing up has a pro-American government, heretofore considered a shining example of his democracy campaign . . . Bush sounded less like the leader of the Free World than some bellicose city councilman from Brooklyn Heights.”
“But what Israel is doing is imposing deliberate suffering on civilians, collective punishment on the innocent people, to force them to do something they are powerless to do: disarm the gunmen among them . . . Such a policy violates international law and comports neither our values nor our interests. It is un-American and un-Christian.”
Pat Buchanan neglects to mention all the Israeli citizens that have been killed. For 15 years Israel controlled the Security Zone in southern Lebanon and seven Israelis were killed. Just in the seven days since the start of this new conflict, 20 Israeli civilians have already been killed. Hundreds have been seriously injured in Haifa and the surrounding communities. The unprovoked and indiscriminate launching of rockets into civilian areas of Israel is what triggered the IDF’s response. A secure and terrorist-free southern Lebanon would ensure the safety of the innocents on both sides of the border.
To state that Lebanon is defenseless is outrageous. He omits the fact that southern Lebanon was annexed by Hezbollah to launch its terror campaign against northern Israel. The Jerusalem Newswire reports that Tehran ordered Hezbollah to attack Israel and divert military defenses to allow for a possible Iranian missile attack on Israeli cities. This comes from a group of Iranian exiles (Azadegan Foundation) that placed an ad in the Washington Times on Wednesday, July 19. The missile attacks against northern Israel were planned and executed by the Islamic Republic because they want to divert Israeli missile defense systems.
Buchanan's despicable comment that President Bush sounded like a so-called “bellicose city councilman from Brooklyn Heights” leaves little to the imagination, and harkens back to Buchanan’s comment years ago about Israel’s “amen corner” in the United States.
As for Israel’s response in Lebanon being “un-American and un-Christian,” apparently Buchanan does not believe that keeping Israel’s northern border secure would ultimately protect Christian holy sites in Israel if an Iranian assault were launched.
These quotes are from Buchanan’s second piece entitled “No, this is not our war:”
“One wonders if these Christians care about what is happening to our Christian brethren in Lebanon and Gaza, who had all power cut-off by Israeli air strikes, an outlawed form of collective punishment, that has left them with no sanitation, rotting food, impure water and days without light or electricity in the horrible heat of July.”
“But there is no evidence Iran has any tighter control over Hezbollah than we have over Israel, whose response to the capture of two Israeli soldiers had all the spontaneity of the Schlieffen Plan. And then again Hezbollah attacked Israel, not us.”
The Israeli counterattacks against Hezbollah have had some unintended consequences for both innocent Christians and Muslims in Lebanon. While very regrettable, these defensive actions were necessary to protect civilians from these terrorists. Israel has always protected Christians and their holy sites within its borders.
Buchanan is incorrect when he states that Iran has no influence in Lebanon. The Hezbollah movement is backed, funded and armed by Iran. In 1982 Iran founded a Lebanese branch of Iranian Hezbollah – Party of God. Soon thereafter foreign nationals in Lebanon were being kidnapped and killed, culminating in the deaths of 241 U.S. Marines and 56 French paratroopers. Today, Hezbollah has outposts in over 20 countries around the world.
The xenophobic Buchanan continues to urge Americans to turn a blind eye to the Middle East conflict and Israel’s plight because he claims it does not affect us. He forgets that ultimately this chaos may reach our shores again.
There will always be those who are friends of Israel and those who are enemies. There are many Christian writers, such as Joseph Farah, Cal Thomas and others who understand what’s at stake in the Middle East if the United States pressures Israel into scaling back its offensive. Real Christians support Israel. Pat Buchanan, you have never been a friend of Israel. You are what you write, and you don’t act very Christian.
bcr1954@hotmail.com
Read more articles by Bonnie Chernin Rogoff
Buchanan is manifestly wrong on Israel. He is profoundly right on other questions, more so than Bush. Still, his stance on Israel must disqualify his election to public office or any other place in goverment. Why, Pat, Why? Why betray our greatest friend in The Cold War? Historic Israel is not the same as the bumbling, liberal "reformed" Jewry that mimics "mainline" Christianity in it's tepidness and timidity. Our Lord, Pat, is a Jew, who loves Israel, as a Hen who wanted to cover the children. Our Lady, Sir, is a Jew, the Catholic belief that Our Lady is The Masterpiece of His Hands. At once His Handmaid, His Mother, His Spouse. That Celestial Diamond was born a little Jewish girl! Pat! Don't let this hatred be the arsenic slowly poisoning you! Wake up, my brother. Let the scales fall from your eyes. We need you in the battle that is presently raging. We all sin. We get up. Donnie McClurkin, a Christian artist, says in his song, "We Get Up!" "For a saint is just a sinner who got up.." Get up, Pat, get up!
Comment by Joseph | July 24, 2006
Pat Buchanan is almost the only right-wing conservative Christian I can name who is ANTI-Israel. I thought the frightening growth in anti-Semitism was on the left these days, and I am worried that all the good work achieved by conservatives in this area of awareness (note: I am not a Christian) can be undone. Isn't the establishment of a Jewish homeland a precursor for the end of days?
Israel is a fact, Pat. Live with it.
Comment by alex | July 24, 2006
Joseph, not that I don't agree with you, mate, but the Mother/Spouse thing
is a little creepy to my Protestant sensibilities…
Comment by Lane Russell | July 24, 2006
Well, if Mr. Farah doesn't like him… are you nuts? Farah is a complete nutball. Why would any sane person care what he thinks.
Comment by obi juan | July 25, 2006
Pardon for my unabashed parochialism. There may be a more appropriate venue for discussing the Trinitarian Mystery of 3 Persons in one God, but I think in your Sunday school they discussed Mary "concieved of the Holy Spirit" (i.e. Spouse), giving birth to The Emmanuel (Mother). The Magnificat tells us Mary is The Handmaid of The Lord, (i.e. daughter). Our sensibilities have to conform to His. There is no marriage in Heaven, The Lord tells us. We will all be brothers and sisters in Heaven. Your daughter, wife, nephew, uncle no more. All brothers and sisters having served in different roles helping each other home. "May you be dead a half an hour before the devil knows your gone…" Peace, my friend.
Comment by Joseph | July 25, 2006
[Mat 1:23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.]
I don't get mother out of this
[Mat 22:30 For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.
Mar 12:25 For when they shall rise from the dead, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; but are as the angels which are in heaven. ]
I don't see a brother sister relationship here. Everytime an angel is described in the bible they are described as young men, there is no description of female angelic beings
[Zec 2:3 And, behold, the angel that talked with me went forth, and another angel went out to meet him,] notice him, male gender.
[A man of God came unto me, and his countenance [was] like the countenance of an angel of] male again.
Have a good day Joseph, we all see through the glass darkly, myself included.
Comment by Gary Hyde | July 25, 2006
Raised a Catholic (16 years of parochial education, millions of hail mary's etc.) I left Catholicisn after studying scripture for 10 + years) I can say three things. Catholics are not Christians as a Bible believer would anticipate, Christ is an afterthought, worship of Mary, saints and popes is paramount. The Buchannan's are typical of Catholics, anti-semetic because the most familar scriptures are what they hear during Easter, which without any context as to the spiritual interpretation makes the Jews stand out among all men as evil sd evidenced by the fact that Catholics often express the view that all people are basically good, but a Bible reader quickly learns that man's natural state is evil and only made holy by the Holy Spirit. My father, a fan of Buchanan, was also an anti-semite. I told him that Catholicism is the closest thing on earth to the Pharisees brand of Judiasm he despised. He read the bible, recognized that it's all about Jesus, the Creator of the world, recognizing that the Bible like our US Constitution means what it says. My father now keeps the Sabbath to honor the Creator and was baptized in comemoration of the death burial and resurrection of Jesus. Christians not keeping the Sabbath as instructed has kept most Jews from accepting Jesus. Sunday keeping is a lie designed by Satan to keep the Jews blind to Jesus. In Revelation 12:17, His people keep the Law and have the testimony of Jesus. Most Jews keep the Law and Christians testify to Jesus, and so few do all that He asks! Like our Supreme Judges interpreting the Constitution, Christians pervert the scriptures. Christians who love God, obey Him and can truly save Israel when they recognize our obedience to the Law.
Comment by Mary | July 25, 2006
Dan, you useful idiot. You say Israel is the source of all the strife in the middle east? What then is the cause of the Islamofacists bombing people in the Philipines, and Spain, and England, and Iraq, and the USA, and the riots in France, and the killing of school children in Russia, and anywhere else the crazed moslems are killing people? Open your eyes: Moslems are a plague on civilization. They cause strife where ever they go.
Comment by M. Ray Johnson | July 25, 2006
"Pat is not acting like a Christian, he is acting like a realist."
Unless of course one is a christian and christianity is the ultimate in realism. In that case Pat is just denying biblical prophecy.
For those of you who do not beleive in christ, and like to make trite little comments about we who do, enjoy yourselves for there is a grand suprise in store for you when the lights go out.
Comment by Gary Hyde | July 25, 2006
Then there's this. Soppose you have a barn on your property and a pack of rats move in, they don't disturb you but they come over to my place and eat up all my corn and spread fecal matter all over my land.
You do nothing because the rats say they'll eat your corn if you mess with them, so being the weak coward you are you let the rats steal your barn and defile my property from inside your borders.
My solution is to burn your barn to the ground and kill all the rats I'm able. Then we put you up a new barn and teach you how to destroy rats.
Comment by Gary Hyde | July 25, 2006
As I said, you can call names all you wish, you avail nothing. When you are asked to stand and deliver, will you have the fortitude to own your actions, or just try to blame it on willful ignorance??
Comment by Gary Hyde | July 25, 2006
Buchanan is one of the very few public figures with the guts to call it as he sees it where Israel is concerned. Most do not have the courage to stand up to the hysterical namecalling which inevitably results from any questioning or criticism of Israel. I don't know which I find more loathsome: those Jews whose dual loyalty is fired by their unwillingness to make aliya or those Christians who would apply Bronze Age mumbo-jumbo to today's very serious problems.
Comment by John J. Geyer | July 25, 2006
Pat Buchanan is a great man, a patriot through and through, and he is spot on right about Israel.
Comment by J. Wenzel | July 26, 2006
Buchanan's latest commentary on the Arab-Israeli conflict is another addition to
a career-long canon which consistently exposes his blind and virulent anti-semitism.
Comment by R. B | July 27, 2006
No nation is above criticism for its actions, whatever their religion or history.
Comment by Max Godwin | July 27, 2006
Mary! I havn't forgotten about you! I apologize for your poor post-Vatican II catechesis. Benedict XVI, when Cardinal Ratzinger, most famous book was called, "The Reform of The Reform". He advocates a return to Tradition. When John XXIII and Paul XI unleasehed "aggornamento", much of the rich Tradition of The Church was lost and some filthy things climbed in that "open window". I won't bore the readers with aplogetics but please go to catholicanswers.com or ewtn.com for some good reading and people who will talk to you about your concerns. God Bless You. If you want to know how The Church evolved into the American Atrocity it is today please read Malachi Martin. He has several books. His novel, "Windswept House" should be read by all, and pray one day, into a movie. "The Davinci Code" is utter gnostic fantasy, but "Windswept House" is the real scandal afflicting Holy Mother Church. Fr. Martin died mysteriously from a reported fall down some stairs. His Website is still up, "St. Michaels's Sword". God Bless You, Mary. God rest the soul of His Servant, Priest, Exorcist, and Prophet, Father Malachi Martin.
Comment by Joseph | July 27, 2006
The authentic conservative position is NOT to support Israel.
As Russell Kirk said, real conservatives do not support Israel. However, many neoconservatives have 'mistook Tel Aviv for the capital of the United States."
Comment by Tim | July 27, 2006
The Christian postion is neither to support Israel nor the Muslims. They are both terrorists.
I agree with Russell Kirk. A real conservative would never support Israel.
Comment by John | July 27, 2006
Joseph, the Triumph Communications cassette tapes of several hours of interviews of Malachi Martin were the catalysts in my wife and my conversion to the Latin Mass. They are well worth purchasing.
Comment by Derek Leaberry | July 27, 2006
Fr. Martin was hated by his own order, The Jesuits. He had the ear of the the tiny majority of the Heirarchy in The Church who trusted him to air publicly their concerns. 10 years ago he wrote about the rectories, seminaries, and convents becoming a den of sin for sodomites. He was the bane of the late Cardinal Bernadin. He also suggested that there were some strange occult things happening in the Vatican apart from The See of Peter. I believe he was killed. God rest his soul!
Comment by Joseph | July 28, 2006
I am appalled by the gullibility of a majority of Europeans when considering the muslim worldwide threat: they were just the same in 1938 when they denied the nazi threat. They are still assessing the Middle-East situation (as well as the European muslim invasion) in legalistic terms when they should consider the balance of power changing the wrong way for the Western world. We are no longer in a courtroom gentle play, we are already at war.
The Israeli war is the beginning of a world war; they have long realized the threat we all face. As a non-Jew French, I try to open the eyes of my fellow citizens: the Israelis are fighting our war. Continue the good job in Lebanon, our comrades-in-arms. You have the strength of the survivors, you might save us all.
However, the European Jews, who are opinion leaders through the medias and various political pressure groups, must stop intellectualizing and do their own aggiornamento: to convince themselves first and then the other Europeans to defend the Western world best interests against the muslim lethal threat.
First, to realize who is our worst enemy. Second, who are the enemies of my worst enemy. In the end remain only two coalitions. Unfortunately, we are not there yet ! Still a lot of work to be done, as fast as possible, it is getting hot.
Gérard
Comment by Gerard Lamarche | July 30, 2006
The Israeli war in Lebanon is de-Christianizing that nation- just as the American war in Iraq is making life miserable for that country's Christians, who did not suffer any more persecution than any other Iraqis, under Saddam. Is is a surprise that Buchanan defends his fellow Christians? And why aren't more American Christians doing the same?
Comment by Ted | August 9, 2006