The following is an editorial written by Larry Miller in the magazine 
"The Weekly Standard". Larry Miller is this comedian goof, who has 
appeared in movies such as The Nutty Professor (he was the bad guy dean 
who want to fire Eddie Murphy), and several TV shows (he's always on 
Politically Incorrect). This editorial is hilarious. By the way, I 
recommend that you guys go to the weekly standard webpage 
(www.weeklystandard.com), they are one of those conservative magazines 
who are very pro-Israel.


Whosoever Blesses Them
The intifada and its defenders.
by Larry Miller
04/22/2002 12:00:00 AM




Larry Miller, contributing humorist





I WAS WATCHING Greta Van Facelift on Fox the other night, 
and she and her guests made me talk back to the TV. Shout back, 
actually. Nothing witty or trenchant, you understand, just something 
like, "Oh, come on!" Now, to be honest, it was late, and I was 
downstairs alone, and I was a little, what's the word . . . loaded, yes, 
that's the word. I was a little shined up. A little spiffed and a little 
miffed, and I shouted something and angrily turned off the remote. I 
don't know exactly how angrily a remote can be turned off, but as 
angrily as you can push a pfennig-sized piece of round plastic, that's 
how angrily I did it. Then I walked back to the bar, made myself 
one-for-the-stairs (as opposed to one-for-the-road) and read some P.G. 
Wodehouse to restore my cheery nature. But back to the freshly-tightened 
Greta.


Her guests were (INSERT INDISTINGUISHABLE ARAB NAME), from 
Hamas, and their attorney, Stanley Cohen. No, that's not a joke. Would 
that it were. Stanley Cohen, the attorney for Hamas. Check that handle 
again: Stanley Cohen. I mean, if you tried to make up a better name than 
that, you couldn't do it. Let's give it a shot, though, shall we? Irving 
Lefkowitz. Nah, too obvious. Lew Fishman. No, no, sounds like a carpet 
salesman. Isaac Bashevis Singer? Now I'm reaching. Nope, you just can't 
beat good ol' Stan Cohen. Yes, Stanley Cohen, folks, a hard-left, 
righteously indignant true-believer, an honors graduate from the William 
Kunstler School of Just-Not-Getting-It-And-Never-Will, who had flown all 
the way from New York to sit next to his wonderful client over there in 
not the land of milk and honey. Stanley Cohen. A man who, if he listened 
very carefully, would no doubt hear voices in the next room planning to 
blow the eyes out of more of his nieces and nephews. Stanley Cohen, and 
even typing that name right now and remembering this horrible man 
damning his own people again and again and again, I crack a nervous 
smile, because they're my people, too, and, God help me, if I didn't 
laugh, I think I might cry.


Oddly enough, out of the three of them, the homunculus from 
Hamas didn't bother me at all. I mean, if you think about it, why should 
he bother any American? We know exactly who he is and, in a way, we 
should be grateful for that. Because if we're only willing to absorb 
their own words--nevermind their demonic deeds--he and his brethren have 
a perfectly uncomplicated point of view and agenda, and their clarity 
should give us our own clarity, and wouldn't that be refreshing? You 
want us dead? Well, now, isn't that a funny coincidence. Guess what we 
want?


My point is, if American TV calls up and wants to put these 
philanthropists on, who could blame them for saying, "Sure!" I can just 
see them bursting out laughing and slapping each other on the back. 
("They're going to put us on Fox TV! I told you terror works! And I'll 
bet their Green Room beats the snot out of Al Jazeera. I mean, please, 
how many olives can you eat?") If we're stupid enough to do that, I 
don't blame them for taking us up on it. All they have to do is take a 
few minutes away from packing rusty nails around the C4, pick one of 
their guys who looks, relatively, the least like a vicious scumbag, 
borrow a suit, and send him forth to smile for the cameras. With Stanley 
Cohen.


But let's leave the newly-stretched Greta for a moment, as 
well as our friends Stanley and Ishmael (no joke, his real name). A 
brief overview of the situation is always valuable, so as a service to 
all Americans who still don't get it, I now offer you the story of the 
Middle East in just a few paragraphs, which is all you really need. 
Don't thank me. I'm a giver. Here we go:


The Palestinians want their own country. There's just one 
thing about that: There are no Palestinians. It's a made up word. Israel 
was called Palestine for two thousand years. Like "Wiccan," 
"Palestinian" sounds ancient but is really a modern invention. Before 
the Israelis won the land in war, Gaza was owned by Egypt, and there 
were no "Palestinians" then, and the West Bank was owned by Jordan, and 
there were no "Palestinians" then. As soon as the Jews took over and 
started growing oranges as big as basketballs, what do you know, say 
hello to the "Palestinians," weeping for their deep bond with their lost 
"land" and "nation." So for the sake of honesty, let's not use the word 
"Palestinian" any more to describe these delightful folks, who dance for 
joy at our deaths until someone points out they're being taped. Instead, 
let's call them what they are: "Other Arabs From The Same General Area 
Who Are In Deep Denial About Never Being Able To Accomplish Anything In 
Life And Would Rather Wrap Themselves In The Seductive Melodrama Of 
Eternal Struggle And Death." I know that's a bit unwieldy to expect to 
see on CNN. How about this, then: "Adjacent Jew-Haters."


Okay, so the Adjacent Jew-Haters want their own country. 
Oops, just one more thing. No, they don't. They could've had their own 
country any time in the last thirty years, especially two years ago at 
Camp David. But if you have your own country, you have to have traffic 
lights and garbage trucks and Chambers of Commerce, and, worse, you 
actually have to figure out some way to make a living. That's no fun. 
No, they want what all the other Jew-Haters in the region want: Israel. 
They also want a big pile of dead Jews, of course--that's where the real 
fun is--but mostly they want Israel. Why? For one thing, trying to 
destroy Israel--or "The Zionist Entity" as their textbooks call it--for 
the last fifty years has allowed the rulers of Arab countries to divert 
the attention of their own people away from the fact that they're the 
blue-ribbon most illiterate, poorest, and tribally backward on God's 
Earth, and if you've ever been around God's Earth, you know that's 
really saying something. It makes me roll my eyes every time one of our 
pundits waxes poetic about the great history and culture of the Muslim 
Mideast. Unless I'm missing something, the Arabs haven't given anything 
to the world since Algebra, and, by the way, thanks a hell of a lot for 
that one.


Chew this around and spit it out: Five hundred million 
Arabs; five million Jews. Think of all the Arab countries as a football 
field, and Israel as a pack of matches sitting in the middle of it. And 
now these same folks swear that if Israel gives them half of that pack 
of matches, everyone will be pals. Really? Wow, what neat news. Hey, but 
what about the string of wars to obliterate the tiny country and the 
constant din of rabid blood oaths to drive every Jew into the sea? Oh, 
that? We were just kidding.


My friend Kevin Rooney made a gorgeous point the other day: 
Just reverse the numbers. Imagine five hundred million Jews and five 
million Arabs. I was stunned at the simple brilliance of it. Can anyone 
picture the Jews strapping belts of razor blades and dynamite to 
themselves? Of course not. Or marshalling every fiber and force at their 
disposal for generations to drive a tiny Arab state into the sea? 
Nonsense. Or dancing for joy at the murder of innocents? Impossible. Or 
spreading and believing horrible lies about the Arabs baking their bread 
with the blood of children? Disgusting. No, as you know, left to 
themselves in a world of peace, the worst Jews would ever do to people 
is debate them to death.


Mr. Bush, God bless him, is walking a tightrope. I 
understand that with vital operations coming up against Iraq and others, 
it's in our interest, as Americans, to try to stabilize our Arab allies 
as much as possible, and, after all, that can't be much harder than 
stabilizing a roomful of supermodels who've just had their drugs taken 
away. However, in any big-picture strategy, there's always a danger of 
losing moral weight. We've already lost some. After September 11 our 
president told us and the world he was going to root out all terrorists 
and the countries that supported them. Beautiful. Then the Israelis, 
after months and months of having the equivalent of an Oklahoma City 
every week (and then every day) start to do the same thing we did, and 
we tell them to show restraint. If America were being attacked with an 
Oklahoma City every day, we would all very shortly be screaming for the 
administration to just be done with it and kill everything south of the 
Mediterranean and east of the Jordan. (Hey, wait a minute, that's 
actually not such a bad id . . . uh, that is, what a horrible thought, 
yeah, horrible.)


There's bad news on the losing moral weight front, and the 
signs are out there. Last week, the day after Secretary Powell left on 
his mission (whatever that was), the Los Angeles Times ran its lead 
editorial in one hundred percent support of the trip and the pressure he 
and President Bush were putting on Israel. Here's a good rule of thumb: 
If the Los Angeles Times thinks you're doing a great job, everything 
you're doing is wrong, stupid and mortally dangerous. If they think 
everything you're doing is wrong, stupid and mortally dangerous, you're 
doing a great job, and, in fact, your chances are probably very good for 
getting on the fast track for sainthood.


So, now, back to Greta. You know what made me mad enough to 
shout? You might not even think it was that big a thing.


After the show she said to these guys, "Thank you, 
gentlemen, for being my guests." "Gentlemen." "Guests." "My guests." 
That's what it's come to with these non-judgmental hosts and hostesses. 
Nice, huh? "Thank you, Mr. Stalin, sir, for being so gracious in giving 
us your valuable time." "My eternal gratitude, Chairman Mao, for taking 
precious moments away from your splendid Five-Year Plan and visiting 
with us in this most convivial way."


And I winced, and grunted, and shouted. Oh, yeah, and made 
that drink.


I mean, please, folks. In 1941, did reporters feel it was 
their duty to give equal time to Hitler and Hirohito? Would Stanley 
Cohen have represented them? Ok, Stanley probably would have, but would 
any American have stood still while he told us about it?


Larry Miller is a contributing humorist to The Daily 
Standard and a writer, actor, and comedian living in Los Angeles.