Though Deputy Alcira Argumedo is not a member of the governing party, today’s Pagina/12, the Izvestia of the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, generously donates space to her in today’s edition of the paper. Deputy Argumedo is superficially concerned with the current spat between Venezuela and Colombia but what’s really on her mind is something else; the Jews.
Continue reading ‘It’s The Jews! Another Comforting Signal to Iran From Buenos Aires’
In the late, unlamented Soviet Union, the phrase “international Zionism” was the communist version of that Tsarist-era fabrication, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Hugo Chavez’s regime in Venezuela has picked up the baton:
The bêtes noires of the far left - the US and Israel - have rushed to bring aid to earthquake-devastated Haiti. So it won’t come as a surprise to learn that the counter-attack against these imperialist dogs has begun, led by Hugo Chavez.
Speaking on his weekly television rant, “Alo Presidente,” Chavez claimed that the real goal of the US was the military occupation of Haiti. Addressing President Obama with the racist pejorative “chico” - “boy” - he issued the following instruction: “Obama, send doctors, boy. Do you understand me? Send doctors, rescue workers, medicine, water, instead of sending soldiers.” (Click on the “shotlist” tab in the previous link to see this quote.)
One pressing matter which Chavez didn’t address is the punishing debt of $167 million which Haiti owes to Venezuela. Last July, the Paris Club agreed to cancel $214 million of Haitian debt, but no similar announcement has been forthcoming from Caracas, even after the earthquake. Perhaps Chavez has earmarked those funds for Hamas.
Eamonn McDonagh adds:
That’s not the half of it. According to this story in ABC he’s now accusing the USA of actually having deliberately caused the quake. And why would the US do a thing like that? It’s all part of a plot to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran by means of an earthquake attack. I kid you not.
El Comandante is showing increasing signs of not being right in the head.
In Iran, it’s a case of escalation, escalation, escalation. The Times of London reports that “Iran is working on testing a key final component of a nuclear bomb.” Meanwhile, the repression of dissidents takes on a crueller, uglier quality. If proof was needed that the chador is a symbol of humiliation, look no further than the photo of student leader Majid Tavakoli, forced to pose while wearing one by the regime’s thugs (a tactic that has backfired now that Majid’s male supporters are distributing photos of themselves adorned in the same garb.) Then there are the additional arrests of dissidents for allegedly tearing photos of Ayatollah Khomeini, the Islamist tyrant who seized power in 1979. Then there are the three young Americans arrested by the regime and now likely to face trial on espionage charges. Are we done? No. Hamas leader Khaled Meshal paid a visit to his paymasters over the weekend. And don’t forget Hugo Chavez; Venezuela’s answer to Robert Mugabe doesn’t want to feel left out, so he’s declaring fealty to the theocrats of Tehran too.
A couple of weeks ago, MJ Rosenberg wrote a rather pompous piece chiding AJC for our new film on Iran.
As the creator of the film, I can categorically state that I wasn’t joking about anything contained within - not the bombing of the AMIA center, not the appalling repression which Iran metes out to its citizens, not the vile public executions which the regime revels in, and certainly not the spectacle of a nuclear attack launched by the mullahs. By contrast, Hugo Chavez finds this latter prospect deeply amusing. I trust that MJ Rosenberg, political commentator and now, apparently, film maven, will be preparing an equally stern lecture for the tyrant of Caracas.
Assailants threw an explosive at a Jewish community center on Thursday, but nobody was hurt in the blast. The attack comes less than a month after the desecration of the Tifereth Israel synagogue in Caracas (see picture) - widely suspected to be the work of government agents. “It seems there are people in the country dedicated to sowing terrorism,” said Abraham Garzon, president of the Jewish Community Center in Caracas.
Indeed.
Hugo Chavez’s explanation of the circumstances of the attack on the Tifereth Israel synagogue in Caracas hasn’t impressed everybody.
Ibsen Martínez is a Venezuelan journalist and writer and there follows my - slightly shortened - translation of a recent op-ed piece by him in El País of Madrid.
Continue reading ‘Chávez: “Showgirl of the Oliver Stone Left”’
On Jewcy, Daniel Debow asks whether, in the aftermath of last week’s desecration of a Caracas synagogue, Jews are becoming the new scapegoat in revolutionary Venezuela.
As we mentioned here yesterday, on Friday night an armed gang made up of about 15 people took over and vandalized a synagogue in Caracas. While in control of the building they vandalized its library and study rooms, threw objects and scrolls sacred to Jews on the floor, painted antisemitic slogans on the walls and urinated wherever the urge took them.
A synagogue in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, was attacked and vandalized last night. The assailants sprayed slogans like “Death to the Jews”and “Jews Get Out”on the walls. The thugs also destroyed Torah scrolls and prayer books.
Hugo Chavez says that “the blood shed in Gaza is the blood of humanity. Venezuela kisses each and every one of you and stresses that it supports the Palestinian people and all those who suffer from the occupation.” Quite the humanist, our Hugo, no? Except that the above photograph shows him embracing Zimbabwe’s dictator, Robert Mugabe, whose most recent contribution to his country’s suffering is a cholera epidemic that has claimed 1732 lives.
Continue reading ‘Mugabe’s Friend Declares Solidarity With Gaza’
Having not long ago decided to expel Human Rights Watch from Venezuela, President Hugo Chávez has now decided to send the Israeli Ambassador packing too. The Foreign Ministry statement announcing the decision is a monument to both pomposity and bias and I’m only going to translate the last paragraph.
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