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Coming Soon! From Common Courage Press Recent Stories June 2, 2003 Arundhati Roy Day of the Jackals Norman Madarasz Behind the Neo-Con Curtain: Plato, Leo Strauss and Allan Bloom Alain Frachon and Daniel Vernet The Strategist and the Philosopher: Strauss and Wohlstetter Anthony Gancarski Anti-Imperialism, Then & Now Standard Schaefer Wasted at the Pentagon Jason Leopold Rocky's Advice to the Dems Guthrie & Albert HUAC 58 Years Letter Steve Perry The Politics of Terror Alerts   May 31, 2003 Alexander Cockburn A Whiner Called Horowitz Gary Leupp The Frauds of War Dave Lindorff Clinton, Bush, Lies and Impeachment Tom Stephens Does It Matter that the Bush Administration Lied? Sasan Fayazmanesh Who Is Next? Joanne Mariner Trivializing Terrorism Wayne Madsen Ayatollah Rumseld's Busy Week Larry Magnuson Is a Television a Radio or a Billboard? Elaine Cassel Wake Up, America! Gila Svirsky Waiting for the Lament to End Susan Davis Kitchen Dreams Chris Clarke Barbra Streisand: Environmental Hypocrite Chris Floyd Bush Locates Source of World Evil: God Adam Engel Gravity's End Zone Poets' Basement Reiss, Guthrie, Orloski, Albert   May 30, 2003 Ben Tripp Crouching Tiger, Hidden Agenda Neve Gordon The Bad Fence Todd Steiner Endangered Ocean Robert Freeman Bush's Tax Cuts: a Form of National Insanity Sean Carter Utah Gets Fired Up for Executions Daniel Bacher How Bush's War Violated International Laws Tariq Ali Re-Colonizing Iraq Steve Perry Bush Wars Web Log   May 29, 2003 CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Jason Leopold Despite Thin Intelligence Reports, US Plans Overthrow of Iran Regime Ron Jacobs Popular Uprising, Inc. Michelle Ciaccorra Bush's Nuclear Policy: Do As I Say, Not As I Do Yves Engler The Economics of Health Care in America: Pay More to Die Sooner Kimberly Blaker Vouchers for Jesus Harry Browne Stakeknife: Britain's Army Spy at the Top of the IRA Stew Albert Cops of the World Steve Perry Greens 04: In or Out?   May 28, 2003 David Vest DubyaCo.: It's Not So Funny Any More Dave Lindorff My Grandfather's Medal John Stanton America's Dying: Arts and Philosophy Hold the Key Bernard Weiner A PNAC Primer Robert Jensen Texas Dems Set a Standard for the Rest of the Party Ahmad Faruqui The Oil Business of Regime Change: the CIA and Iran Hammond Guthrie Disarming Conundrums Steve Perry What If There's No Such Thing as Al-Qaeda?   May 27, 2003 Kurt Nimmo Condoleezza Rice: Huckstress for Israeli Myths Anthony Gancarski Hillary: a Dem the NeoCons Could Love? Patrick Cockburn Terror, Bush and Joseph Conrad John Chuckman an Interpretation of Bush's Character Kathleen Christison What Sharon Wants, Sharon Gets Jeffrey Blankfort AIPAC Hijacks the Roadmap Steve Perry Trouble in the Hinterlands   May 26, 2003 Franklin C. Spinney Test Anxiety: Star Wars, Punctuated Epistimology and the Triumph of Medievalism Elaine Cassel Supreme Sacrifice Sam Hamod When Trained Killers Return Home Stew Albert The Final Conflict   May 24 / 25, 2003 Gary Leupp The Philosopher Kings: Leo Strauss and the Neo-Cons Uri Avnery The Hannibal Procedure Diane Christian Who's the Real Enemy? "Just Cause" or "Kill the Bastards" Alexander Cockburn Derrida's Double Life William S. Lind Is Saddam Really Out of the Game? William Cook Road to Nowhere David Krieger Bush's War on the Poor: Economic Justice Ilan Pappe Academic Freedom Under Assault in Israel Wayne Madsen American Idle Noah Leavitt Slowing Sowing Justice in the Killing Fields Walt Brasch Americans are Liars Lenni Brenner John Brown and Dutch Bill Mickey Z. Hope, Crosby & Al Qaeda Michael Ortiz Hill Grievous Harm Here and Abroad Adam Engel Towers of Babel Poets' Basement Albert, Guthrie, Alam, Orloski   May 23, 2003 Standard Schaefer Lifting the Sanctions: Who Benefits? Ron Jacobs Long Live People's Park! Michael Greger, MD Return of Mad Cow: US Beef Supply at Risk Elaine Cassel Tigar to Ashcroft: "Secrecy is the Enemy of Democratic Govt." Sam Hamod The Shi'a of Iraq Christopher Greeder After the Layoffs (poem) Steve Perry Bush's Wars Weblog 5/23         Hot Stories CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From Elaine Cassel Civil Liberties Watch Michel Guerrin Embedded Photographer Says: "I Saw Marines Kill Civilians" Uzma Aslam Khan The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War: What America Says Does Not Go Paul de Rooij Arrogant Propaganda Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.   Subscribe Online Search CounterPunch

June 6, 2003 Nathan Sharansky's View of Jesus "Crucifixion is a Privilege" By ANTHONY GANCARSKI Never let it be said that Israeli Cabinet Minister Natan Sharansky doesn't know how to cut a promo. On the June 2 edition of C-SPAN's Washington Journal Sharansky, who the National Christian Leadership Conference for Israel dubbed "the long-imprisoned symbol of the Jewish struggle for freedom and human rights", was asked by a caller to reconcile Jewish support for the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth [apparently, said caller had access to the Zogby of the day] with the idea that "Jews... are the Chosen People." To me, the caller sounded like a garden-variety heckler, the kind a slick operator like Sharansky, recently lauded by the Jerusalem Post for having "opened his traditionally Russian-based party to the Anglo community", should've been able to squash with just a smile and a reminder to C-Span viewers to support their local AIPAC representative. After all, the former Soviet Refusenik wasn't in Washington to enjoy the June balm; a cynic might suggest that it was Natan's "turn" to bid for Congressional contributions. But I digress. How did Sharansky respond to this heckler? In a long-winded fashion, he explained that Israel [and by extension, all of those who keep the Jewish Sabbath] have special prerogatives, responsibilities to God and his creation due to their unique positioning in Yahweh's eyes. So long-winded was Sharansky's response, in fact, that one could've missed him saying that "the crucifixion of Christ" was a "privilege." Mistakes happen, apparently, and Messiahs get offed. Sharansky, who thought Jonathan Pollard deserved to be freed, since he committed espionage not for an enemy but for one of America's many friends in the world, is entirely willing -- on a fund-raising trip to the US, no less! -- to write off the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth as a clerical error. Sharansky, who in 1997 denied that such an entity as the "Russian mafia" existed, right around the time he threatened to bolt from the Israeli guvmint because his party didn't have final say on who the Israeli Ambassador to Moscow would be, cuts quite the figure. In a country where politicians have built careers around piddly crap like cutting funding to the NEA, leading the charge against flag-burning, and protecting our nation's youth from the menace of reefers, or blunts, or whatever the rappers call them on ClearChannel radio these days, Sharansky makes light of the crucifixion of Christ in the United States. May I remind Sharansky why that's a problem? The United States, nominally a Judeo-Christian nation, fortifies Israel in no small part because of the Christian Zionist assumption that such profligate aid buys certain Christians the best possible seats for the impending end times. A lucrative cottage industry, the US-Israel alliance, as everyone from Pat Robertson to Bill Kristol can attest. But loose talk like Sharansky's will undermine the foundation of that cottage, built on the illusory foundation that there is such a thing as a shared "Judeo-Christian" interest to use Israel as a pivot point for US domination of what is called the Middle East. No skin off my nose, though. I know why Sharansky, an advocate of massive Russian immigration into the war-torn state of Israel, has come to America. To secure another billion, or two. To remind Congress that the last few dozen stragglers who refuse Israel unconditional support need to be purged. To observe the American scene. And it's just as well that his trip stateside coincided with the President's absence. If Bush had heard Sharansky, who accepted $85,000 in "charities" from Israeli convict Grigory Lerner [international embezzler, with ties to the apparently mythical Russian Mafia], downplay the significance of Christ's crucifixion by claiming that it's just another "privilege" due "the Chosen People", he may have choked on a pretzel. Anthony Gancarski is a regular CounterPunch columnist. He accepts emails at Gancarski@Hotmail.Com Today's Features Arundhati Roy Day of the Jackals Norman Madarasz Behind the Neo-Con Curtain: Plato, Leo Strauss and Allan Bloom Alain Frachon and Daniel Vernet The Strategist and the Philosopher: Strauss and Wohlstetter Anthony Gancarski Anti-Imperialism, Then & Now Standard Schaefer Wasted at the Pentagon Jason Leopold Rocky's Advice to the Dems Guthrie & Albert HUAC 58 Years Letter Steve Perry The Politics of Terror Alerts   Keep CounterPunch Alive: Make a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online! home / subscribe / about us / books / archives / search / links /