Nearer My God to Thee

News from Arabia:

Red Sea Ferry Survivors Say Captain Abandoned Ship
By REUTERS
Published: February 5, 2006

SAFAGA, Egypt, Feb. 4 (Reuters) — Survivors of the Egyptian ferry that sank in the Red Sea said on Saturday that the captain had fled the burning ship by lifeboat and abandoned the nearly 1,400 passengers and crew members on board to their fate.

Rescue workers have recovered 195 bodies from the Red Sea, but about 800 more people, most of them Egyptian workers returning from Saudi Arabia, were still missing on Saturday.

About 400 survivors have been found since the ferry sank on Friday. The director of the Red Sea Ports Authority, Maj. Gen. Mahfouz Taha, said 378 survivors had come ashore on the Egyptian side of the sea. The Saudi authorities said they had picked up 22.

Some survivors, plucked from the sea or from lifeboats, said a fire broke out below decks on the ferry shortly after the vessel left the Saudi port of Duba on Thursday evening with 1,272 passengers and a crew of about 100.

The ship began to list but the crew continued to sail out into the Red Sea rather than turn back to the Saudi port, the survivors told reporters in the Egyptian port of Safaga, where the ferry was scheduled to land on Friday.

One of the Egyptian survivors, Shahata Ali, said the passengers had told the captain about the fire, but he and his crew told them not to worry.

"We were wearing life jackets, but they told us there was nothing wrong, told us to take them off and they took away the life jackets," he added, speaking to Reuters Television. "Then the boat started to sink and the captain took a boat and left."

Khaled Hassan, another survivor, said, "The captain was the first to leave and we were surprised to see the boat sinking."

Other survivors also reported that the crew had played down the gravity of the situation and withheld life jackets.

"There was a fire but the crew stopped the people from putting on life jackets so that it wouldn't cause a panic," said Abdel Raouf Abdel Nabi, one of the survivors.

Nader Galal Abdel Shafi, another passenger on the same rescue boat recalled: "There was a blaze down below. The crew said 'Don't worry, we will put it out.' When things got really bad, the crew just went off in the lifeboats and left us on board."

The 35-year-old Egyptian ship, Al Salam Boccaccio 98, sailing under a Panamanian flag, was traveling a regular route between Duba, Saudi Arabia, and Safaga, Egypt, and was carrying mostly Egyptian workers returning home for vacation. Also among the passengers, an Egyptian security official said, were 100 Saudis and one Canadian. At least 20 of the passengers were children.

An official at Al Salaam Maritime Transport Company, which owned the ship, said the captain, identified as Sayyed Omar, was still unaccounted for.

To read the rest of the article click HERE. (Registration required!)

While I am writing this, European embassies, consulates and the offices of other European organisations are burning all over the Middle East. I will spare you and myself one of the flip jokes saying that the rescue teams were too busy rallying against the Danish Mohammed-cartoons to do their job. This is not a time for flippancy.

I am, however, proud to be a daughter of the West. I am proud and happy that our God allows (no: asks!) us to have music and dance and that little hack musicians can -- and do -- become heroes.

Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer to Thee!
E'en tho' it be a cross
That raiseth me;
Still all my song shall be,
: Nearer, my God, to Thee! :
Nearer to Thee!

Näher mein Gott zu Dir,
Näher zu Dir!
Drückt mich auch Kummer hier,
Drohet man mir,
Soll doch trotz Kreuz und Pein,
Dies meine Losung sein:
Näher mein Gott zu Dir,
Näher zu Dir!

Mon Dieu, plus près de toi
plus près de toi,
c'est le cri de ma foi,
plus près de toi.
Dans le jour où l'épreuve
déborde comme un fleuve,
garde-moi plus près de toi,
plus près de toi.

This is NOT a Photoshop-job!

Photo: Reuters

Thanks again to KEWIL! Go to Fakten und Fiktionen for more pictures on the Muslim idea of freedom of speech and how European law protects it.

When a Nazi poofter in lederhosen speaks the truth, something stinks!

The following is (almost) incredible. And while it is sad that anything like that could happen at all, it is even more sad that only political parties right of center, including the BZÖ, party of Jörg Haider, has the backbone to resist politically correct pressure and speak up against the immanent danger of Islamisation.

Demonstratively lederhosen-less: This picture of Haider was published 1994 in "News". I found it here. The article covers the discussion about Haider's alleged homosexuality against the background of the strong homoerotic overtones the Nazi male society generally carried. The article is an interesting read, but It is not truly germane to the topic of this entry.

I am reminded of the old joke, saying that the Austrians are clever people who managed to make a German out of Hitler and an Austrian out of Beethoven, having thus placed the reponsibility for the Nazi past firmly at the feet of their German brethren. Maybe it is that very sort of callousness that enables them to let a cartoon character who looks like a poofter in lederhosen (I’m pretty sure that guy had a facelift and wears makeup, mascara and all!) become a serious politician. And the fact that this erstwhile "yuppie fascist" and his ilk, of all people, are left to speak the truth just shows how far we have gone already down on our self-paved path to hell.

This is from the Austrian newspaper Kurier:

Fathers demand hijab for teachers

Three Muslim fathers demanded obligation wearing of a hijab for female teachers in an elementary school in Linz, which caused a lot of anger. Landesschulratspräsident [senior official in charge of state schools] of Oberösterreich [Austrian federal state] Fritz Enzenhofer spoke of "insanity" and made it known immediate steps had been taken. Herbert Kickl, secretary-general of the FPÖ [center-right political party] demanded in response a "hijab ban" in schools. BZÖ spokesman Uwe Scheuch called the demands of the Muslims "inacceptable".

Being on first-name-terms

The school … is considered an integration elementary school. The native language of three quarters of the 178 children is not German. A teacher sent a letter to the staff council, in which she complained in the name of her colleagues about three fanatic Muslim fathers - two Bosniaks and a Chechen. They demanded that the (female) head teacher and all (female) teachers wear hijab. Further, that the children must not be reproached publicly by their (female) teachers. On top of that, they denied the (female) teachers the "Sie" address [German form of address of respect for people with whom one is not on buddy-terms, gramatically comparable to the English "you". While in English the familiar "thou" has been replaced by first-name-usage, it's still used in German ("du") and can be highly offensive -- AND regarded, depending on context, as a criminal offense -- if applied to somebody with whom one is NOT on buddy-terms!], because they, as women, did not merit this. In addition, their pupils were not to participate in singing performances, which would be "prostitution". And no teacher should be permitted to ask why the daughter does not participate in swimming, one of the fathers demanded. The teachers ought to consider themselves lucky to have so many Islamic children, otherwise the school would have to be closed down.
[…]

Homeschooling

He [Landesschulratspräsident Enzenhofer] would expect that an Islamic organization would speak up and state that such a parental behaviour was undue and to discipline their own people. He referred to the option of removing children from a public school to homeschool them [which is, different from Germany, basically not banned in Austria] and forwarding proof for it.

Leaving the country

FPÖ secretary-general Kickl stated that immigrants had to adapt to the customs common in Austria and not the other way round. Hijabs for teachers are out of the question. "Rather, a hijab ban in schools and all public institutions, which France introduced already, seems now necessary." BZÖ spokesman Scheuch affirmed that it could not be tolerated that Muslim fanatics should force their customs upon the domestic population: "If they don’t want to conform to Austria, they are always free to leave the country".

Article dating 23.01.2006 apa aho, translation mine.

Thanks to Kewil who posted this in his Blog Fakten und Fiktionen.

Postscriptum: Maybe this will provoke some second thoughts with our American friends, who know squat about German history, mentality and tradition, but who nevertheless so stridently demand that we Germans introduce homeschooling, although I doubt it.

Cheap Compassion

I guess people who are faced with a situation like those mothers can hardly be blamed for what they are doing on a gut-feeling level, but do they REALLY think that their appeal will change the mind of the murderous scum that kidnapped their sons one little bit? For heaven's sake, was Margaret Hassan, who was 'executed' by shooting her at point blank, intending to harm Iraq? Was any of the other many victims murdered in Iraq, for that?

German mothers plead for Iraq hostages' lives
Thu Feb 2, 2006 11:49 AM EST

BERLIN (Reuters) - The mothers of two German hostages kidnapped in Iraq made emotional pleas for their sons' lives on Thursday as the government said it was still trying to make contact with their captors.

The mothers of Rene Braeunlich and Thomas Nitzschke were filmed by ARD television making an appeal which was due to be shown later by Arab broadcaster Al Jazeera.

"We have seen our sons on television. We are very afraid for their lives," said one of the women, whose names and location were not given.

"Thomas and Rene travelled to Iraq with no political motive. They never intended to harm your country. We appeal to your charity and mercy and ask you with all our hearts to spare our innocent sons. Please, let Thomas and Rene go free," said the other mother, her voice almost breaking.

The two engineers were abducted on January 24 outside their workplace in the Iraqi industrial town of Baiji, 180 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad.

"As far as the work of the crisis center is concerned, I can tell you we are obviously still in the process of establishing contact" with the hostage-takers, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on Thursday, declining to give further details.

An evening vigil for the two men was planned in their home region of Saxony, where local people placed flowers and lit candles throughout the day at a church in the city of Leipzig.

In a video dated January 29 and broadcast by Al Jazeera on Tuesday, the kidnappers set a 72-hour deadline for Germany to end its cooperation with Iraq and close its embassy.

The tape of the two kidnapped German engineers showed them next to masked individuals who pointed automatic rifles at them.

For the whole article click HERE.

Instead of staging another one of those unbearable candlelight vigils the people of Germany better ought to distance themselves from Muslim atrocities. One holds candlelight vigils (if one really can't suppress the urge, but who knows, maybe it's a sort of mental diarrhoea) for the ill or otherwise grief-stricken. The two men in Iraq are neither. They are crime victims and victims of crime can expect active solidarity and denunciation of the perpetrators, not some soppy and noncommittal garbage that has only one effect: to make the participants feel better. Where is the outrage? And if we really HAVE to have candlellight vigils: Where were they when Daniel Pearl's head was cut off or Margaret Hassan was shot? To name just two of the many victims of Islamist terrorists. But then, they had been no convicted murderers about to be executed by the evil Americans.

And thank you, Osthoff and German government, for paving the way for more blackmail, kidnapping and murder. Sure there are some more terrorists waiting to be released in German prisons? Not to speak of those excessive million Euro to fill the coffers for the good cause of destroing the West.

I'm sure those candlelight vigils at stoning-to-death sites will be really cute!

The Phony Face of Grief

"Peace activist" Cindy Sheehan was removed from the audience of President Bush's State of the Union Address yesterday.

FrontPage magazine informs us:

Those who have looked for more information about Sheehan’s disturbance have learned she concealed a t-shirt that read “2,245 Dead – How Many More??” until she got inside the chamber. Capitol Police Sgt. Kimberly Schneider recalled, “She was asked to cover it up. She did not.” This is as far as most mainstream media sources go.

Well, according to the GERMAN mainstream media to which I listened yesterday, she was thrown out "because she wore and anti-Bush t-shirt". Full stop!

Here is the whole story according to FrontPage:

Thus far, only the Washington Post has revealed, “She was also vocal, said U.S. Capitol Police Chief Terrance W. Gainer, and after she ignored instructions to close her jacket and quiet down, she was led out and arrested. Demonstrating in the House gallery is prohibited.” (Emphasis added.)

Why was she vocal enough to get ejected from her seat – in Gallery 5, seat 7, row A? Because she was following the orders of a pillar of the radical Left. In addition to the t-shirt, Sheehan wore a pink scarf, in solidarity with Code Pink, the far-Left organization that donated $600,000 in cash and supplies to “the other side” in Fallujah in 2004. This radical organization, founded by supporters of the Nicaraguan Sandinistas, has been the most vocal section of Sheehan’s “amen corner” since before she rose to national prominence. This weekend, Sheehan returned from a trip to meet Venezuela’s dictator Hugo Chavez* with Code Pink leaders Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans. Earlier yesterday, Sheehan joined the Code Pink brigades and another leftists in front of the White House chanting, “You’re evicted! Get out of our house!”

Code Pink made public its intention to shout down the president last night in every venue it could. A typical “Action Alert” on its website advertises a State of the Union get-together: “The only way to stomach the prez without pepto-dismal [sic.] is among lots of hot pink sistahs shouting ‘bull shit’ simultaneously as he sputters!”

Other action alerts encourage Code Pinkos from Pittsburgh to San Francisco to meet in public places and:
“BRING ON THE NOISE!!! bring drums, pots, pans, noisemakers”;
“[We] welcome you to bring music, drums, pots, pans, horns, and your voice to drown him out.”;
“Bring on the Noise! Drown Out Bush’s Lies.”;
“Our plan is to make a lot of noise & shoot nerf toys at the TV every time we hear BS”;
“We want to give everybody a chance to drown out the State of the Union with our own noise!!!”
The D.C. group Sheehan protested with before leaving for the State of the Union, organized under the banner of the new radical leftist front organization World Can’t Wait, followed suit. Again, the Washington Post reports:

Earlier last night, a band of banner-waving antiwar demonstrators clustered outside the Capitol and took the start of Bush's speech as a cue to let loose with an ear-splitting outburst of noise…At the moment when a nearby TV set showed Bush beginning his address in the House chamber, the protesters responded with bongo drums, maracas and whistles…As the president concluded, the noise reached a peak as protesters banged pots and pans, shouting “Bush step down, people rise up.”

Previously, Code Pink activists have been arrested in front of the White House. Co-founder, Medea Benjamin, takes pride in setting up the violent 1999 World Trade Organization riots in Seattle. Another co-founder, Gael Murphy, disrupted Dick Cheney’s speech at the 2004 Republican National Convention and interrupted Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld as he was apologizing for isolated abuses at Abu Ghraib prison.

Now Code Pink’s most visible partisan had the opportunity to bring home the big game trophy: interrupting the president’s State of the Union Address live on national television. But before the street theater could begin inside the joint session of Congress, Sheehan blew it and started bellowing too early, discovering the Capitol police do not tolerate juvenile antics during the hallowed moments of Constitutionally mandated proceedings.
*Emphasis added by me!

Anything for a nice anti-Bush sneer in the German media, right? And to hell with investigative journalism and integrity! Cindy is about as credible as a "peace activist" as Hugo Chavez is as a democrat. (Not that the fact of Sheehan's rubbing shoulders with Chavez is NOT known in Germany, mind you!)

There are people who would do anything (but ANYthing!) for their five minutes in the limelight!


Picture courtesy of FrontPage: "Cindy Sheehan’s last grinning arrest in September 2005."

Words from The Wise

In an email, my friend Gudrun Eussner says how it is:

Heute steht es in meinem Provinzblatt klipp&klar: die Karikaturen-Affäre wurde angeheizt aus den Palästinensergebieten nach dem Sieg der Hamas. Mit von der Partie war die Leitung der Muslimbruderschaft in Kairo, obgleich Ägypten kein "diktatorisch regiertes Land" sei (sic!).

Die arabischen Staaten wollen es m.E. jetzt wissen. Es scheint eine Machtprobe zu sein: wenn Ihr die Hamas nicht weiter finanziert, dann gibt's Ärger auf allen, selbst in entferntesten Bereichen, wo der Islam vorwärts kommen könnte. Mir ist es sehr deutlich: wenn jetzt die EU und die USA (!!!) nachgeben, dann ist uns die weitere Islamisierung Europas sicher. Das kann doch aber in niemandes Interesse sein.
_______________________________________

Today, my [French] one-horse-town rag says it in no uncertain terms: the cartoon-affair was fuelled from the Palestinian territories after the victory of the Hamas. The Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo was part of the team, although Egypt is no "dictatorship" (sic!).

I believe that the Arab countries are going to compel a decision now. To me, this seems to be a showdown: If you don't pay for Hamas anymore you'll regret it, even when it comes to peripheral issues, as long as they will support Islam. I think it's very clear: if the EU and the USA (!!!) are giving in now, further Islamisation of Europe is imminent. But that can't be in anybody's best interest.

Dear Gudrun, you are so right, but if one's own best interest were of any importance, the world, or rather: our own lemming-society, would be a better place.

No comment...

Just a few reminders:

Fatah members burning Danebrog (Photo: AP)

The evidence demonstrates a clear and consistent bias in EU funding for politicized NGOs that ignores the context of terrorism and conflict, and are among the leaders in the demonization and delegitimation of Israel (the "new anti-Semitism").

The EU funds a number of self-proclaimed human rights organizations that advocate the standard Palestinian position in the conflict with Israel, and ignore the background of Palestinian violence and the context of Israeli policies. When many EU funded NGOs mention terrorism, it is marginalized, and not reflected in action items.
[...]
EU human rights NGOs have consistently ignored the issue of anti-Semitism, including physical attacks, incitement, and hate literature, such as the propagation of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion."

From:NGO Monitor Special Edition 22 April 2004

...the Israeli government had already given them [i.e. the MEPs] volumes of captured Palestinian documents providing evidence that the PA was using EU funds to pay for homicide bombings, the upkeep of terrorists, weapons, and bomb-manufacturing plants; vacations, travel, scholarships and medical treatments for members of the Palestinian leadership and their families; and — not least — Chairman Arafat's personal bank accounts.
[...]
Despite thousands of the PA's own documents — some signed by Yasser Arafat himself — Patten, Swoboda, and many other MEPs not only continue to deny that European tax money has funded Palestinian terrorism, but also claim that the PA documents, authenticated by American, German, and Israeli experts — and even by the Palestinians themselves — are "forgeries produced by Israel."

The IMF report "Economic Performance and Reforms under Conflict Conditions," released last September in Abu Dhabi, was based on the same PA documents that the Israeli government had earlier provided to Patten and the European Parliament. The report concludes that at least 8 percent ($135 million) of the PA's annual budget of $1.08 billion is being spent by Arafat at his sole discretion — and does not even take into account Arafat's control of 60 percent of the security-apparatus budget, which leaves him with at least $360 million per year to spend as he chooses. In addition, the report states that $900 million in PA revenues "disappeared" between 1995 and 2000, and that the 2003 budget for Arafat's office, which totaled $74 million, was missing $34 million that Arafat had transferred to pay unidentified "organizations" and "individuals."

Patten and many of the MEPs constantly deny that EU funds have been misused. They refuse to acknowledge that the PA leadership is corrupt and uses its aid money to fund terror, choosing instead to grant the PA ever more aid...

The EU's moral standing and fiscal accountability are also questionable. For the ninth year running, the EU Court of Auditors refused to approve the EU's €100 billion annual budget because the auditors could not account for 90 percent of the funds to the PA. The MEPs claimed that it was not the EU but the IMF and the CIA that supervised the PA budget. But the IMF has publicly denied this responsibility many times, and there is no evidence that the CIA has had anything to do with EU funds to the PA.

As for evidence that aid money was used to pay homicide bombers, Swoboda insisted that "there is no proof that any terrorist acts they committed were ordered by the PA — they may have been acting alone. Only if the DNA of the suicide bombers will match the DNA of those who received euros will we accept it as evidence."
[...]
In the meantime, the Belgian police announced that the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), together with Belgian and German police, began investigating the payment of EU aid money to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades — one of Yasser Arafat's Fatah terrorist groups, listed by the EU as a terrorist organization.

It seems that the stronger the evidence of EU complicity in funding Palestinian terrorism, the stronger is the MEPs' refusal to acknowledge their role. Their anti-American and anti-Israeli attitudes explain their willingness to give ever more funds to Arafat while pressuring Israel to compromise its national security. Moreover, the EU continues to support other Islamist terror organizations dressed as NGOs, such as Hamas, that operate throughout Europe.

Further aid payments should cease until the PA explains how it spent more than $6 billion in aid during the last decade, and returns the missing funds to the Palestinian people. But, incredibly, the World Bank last week gave an additional $15 million in aid to the PA, and, over the weekend, the EU awarded the PA $40 million for "reforms and emergency economic aid."

History gives us little reason to think the PA will stop funding terrorism. Maybe it's time to hold European donors legally accountable for the return on their investment.

From:EuroCash
What does the Palestinian Authority do with European money?
By Rachel Ehrenfeld

A Palestinian Civil Police Development Programme (PCPDP) has recently been produced cooperatively by the Civil Police and EU COPPS and will soon be available in Arabic. The 3-year Programme consists of both Transformational and Operational Plans which lay the basis for the urgent delivery of badly needed equipment and training that will enable the police to patrol the streets effectively and deliver better services to the Palestinian people as well as fundamental organizational change. Objectives include maintaining safety and security for all citizens, reducing crime and the fear of crime, and securing public confidence in the rule of law and the police.

Physical needs include vehicles, communications equipment, office equipment, and infrastructure repair. The PCPDP will serve as a blueprint for building a modern, democratic and accountable police service and as a framework for donor assistance.

Spain, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Denmark are the EU Member States currently providing financial assistance, training and specialized equipment under EU COPPS. Norway is cofunding a Police Communications Project with Denmark to enhance communications capacity in Gaza and build new infrastructure in the West Bank.

From: EU COUNCIL SECRETARIAT FACTSHEET

Previous NGO-Monitor analyses have documented the politicized approach and bias present in EMHRN reports. Their latest 21st October press release describes the findings of a delegation sent by EMHRN to the Gaza strip in October 2005. The mission was hosted by EMHRN member PCHR, an NGO with an almost exclusively political and politicized sphere of activity (even extending to support for the boycott and prosecution of Caterpillar Inc. in early 2005 ) despite its claim to be an “independent Palestinian human rights organization.” Co-sponsored by the Interchurch Organisation for Development Co-operation (ICCO) in the Netherlands, the mission included representatives of the International Commission of Jurists - Sweden (ICJ-Sweden) (whose bias is well documented), the Bruno Kreisky Foundation, Austria and EMHRN Denmark. All of these organisations were part of the working group that contributed to the condemnatory report by EMHRN on “A Human Rights Review on the EU and Israel 2003-2004” which accused Israel of “systematic human rights violations” and violation of “international humanitarian law,” and the EU of “actually facilitat[ing] Israel’s violations of international human rights and humanitarian law”.

From:NGO Monitor 10 November 2005:
Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN):Discrepancy Between Mission and Actions Continues

As an aside: For the next case of AMERICAN flag burning read this:

Jerusalem Cloakroom #86
In spite of US foreign aid, Arafat has remained Saddam's staunchest ally, declaring that "any offensive against Iraq is an offensive against the Palestinian People" (Al-Quds Palestinian daily, May 4, 2000). He has strengthened ties with Iran, Libya, Sudan and Afghanistan, undermining the stability of the Hashemite regime in Jordan, claiming sole representation of all Palestinians (two-thirds of Jordan's population), and facilitating Russia's reassertive profile in the region. Arafat has harbored Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists and has drafted to his security forces Palestinian terrorists implicated in the murder of 12 US citizens. The PLO has condemned US pursuit of Osama Bin-Laden, who is a major shareholder of the PLO telecom company (PalTel). Burning Ol' Glory and anti-US (and anti-Jewish) incitement have become a routine ritual in PLO-controlled areas, favorably reported by Arafat's controlled media.

The PLO's massive abuse of human-rights has been highlighted by the oppression of the Christian minority, causing a massive emigration (Bethlehem used to be 80% Christian and is now 80% Moslem!), transferring land from Christians to Moslems, and erecting mosques next to existing churches.

US foreign aid to the PLO was appropriated in return for commitments made and systematically violated by the PLO, following the accords of Oslo, Cairo, Hebron, Wye and Sharm el-Sheikh. The PLO has tolerated expansion of Hamas infrastructure, has exacerbated anti-Israel incitement (Mein Kampf is a best seller!), has proliferated illegal firearms, has increased its security forces to 50,000 (beyond the specified 20,000!) etc.