'Tis The Season To Be Jolly!

In This Edition:

Gaza's grim reaper

The Madoff Scandal:

- "It's Kristallnacht Two!" An Ethnic Cleansing in America
- Madoff "it’s virtually impossible to violate rules."
- "The List" of victimized investors
- Israel Shamir and James Petras on Winners & Losers
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Gaza's grim reaper
16/12/2008 10:11:00 PM GMT

Israel always manages to commit its worst deeds when no one else is looking.

By Paul J. Balles

While Americans concentrate on the cost of rescuing the U.S. financial system, and Europeans worry about how the worldwide financial crisis will affect them, Israel blithely, with U.S. government and European community approval, deprives Gaza's entire civilian population of food, medicine and clean drinking water.

When pushed to explain their behaviour, they claim self-defence. Defence against whom? More than 50 per cent of the population in Gaza is comprised of children under the age of 15. Few people outside of Gaza even notice this slow genocide.

Israel always manages to commit its worst deeds when no one else is looking. If they happen to be caught, they blame it on the Palestinians – on a few resistance fighters lobbing rockets into Israel in retaliation for a broken cease-fire. To the Israeli, the actions of a few violent Palestinians are justifiable cause for genocide of the entire Palestinian population in Gaza.

Joe Mowrey writes:

As conditions in the Gaza Strip approach a catastrophic level of deprivation, the world media, and in particular the U.S. media, remain largely silent. The United Nations, whose truckloads of food and medical supplies continue to be denied entry into Gaza by Israel, appears to be one of the few international voices of dissent concerning the collective punishment of 1.5 million human beings.

As soon as someone takes notice of what Mowrey is talking about, the Israelis open the gates to allow a smattering of fuel or food into Gaza. Ironically, Khaled Meshaal has noted even Arab and Islamic regimes have remained silent about the tragedy resulting from the "criminal blockade" of Gaza.

Andrea Becker, head of advocacy for Medical Aid for Palestinians, has written about how the blockade has affected the hospitals and medical facilities. These are hardly resistance fighters:

...a child on life support doesn't have the oxygen of a mechanical ventilator. A nurse on a neo-natal ward rushes between patients, battling the random schedule of power cuts. A hospital worker tries to keep a few kidney dialysis machines from breaking down, by farming spare parts from those that already have. The surgeon operates without a bulb in the surgery lamp, across from the anaesthetist who can no longer prevent patient pain.

The hospital administrator updates lists of essential drugs and medical supplies that have run out, which vaccines from medical fridges are now unusable because they can't be kept cold, and which procedures must be cancelled altogether. The ambulance driver decides whether to respond to an emergency call, based on dwindling petrol in the tank.

Joe Mowrey reflects on the most bitter irony of all:

Has the sense of exclusivity and entitlement created by the Zionist experiment in Israel become so great that people there no longer see themselves in the mirror of their own history? The irony of Jews ... denying food to hundreds of thousands of children in order, allegedly, to insure their own security, is breathtaking. Who could ever have imagined such a thing?

The Jewish Studies Global Directory of Holocaust Museums lists 61 memorial sites, including four in Israel and 24 in the United States. Reminders to the world? But not to Israelis? Not to Jews in America? Is it conceivable that Jews who remember the Holocaust only recognize genocide when they are the victims?

Rabbi Meir Hirsh, Neturei Karta Palestine, provides an answer:

How long will Jewish and non-Jewish leaders who claim the mantle of civilization and morality remain silent in the face of the ongoing state terrorism practised by the Zionist state against the Palestinian People, most visibly today in Gaza, where the Zionists believe they can starve the Palestinians into submission in violation of all tenets of international law, all religious values in general, including the values of the Jewish faith?

-- Paul J. Balles is a retired American university professor and freelance writer who has lived in the Middle East for many years. For more information, see pballes.com. This article appeared in Redress Information & Analysis.

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Madoff Scandal

Alexander Cockburn nails it with his analysis of Madoff and, as noted previously in these pages, the larger pyramid scheme, which includes the American economic system and the "Endless Growth" paradigm:

"On the larger canvas, what exactly separates Madoff’s operation from those of the banks rewarded for their shady follies by a $700 billion bailout? Just like Madoff, the banks finally had to admit that all their public financial statements were false, that the supposed assets were worthless.

The operating assumption of the Ponzi scheme is that the tide will always rise, that old investors can be repaid by the infusions ponied up by the fresh recruits. For the past twenty years the entire American economy has become—to quote Bernie’s succinct résumé of his business to his sons —'a giant Ponzi scheme,'."

"It's Kristallnacht Two!" An Ethnic Cleansing in America

http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn12192008.html


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Madoff "it’s virtually impossible to violate rules."

"In today’s regulatory environment, it’s virtually impossible to violate rules. And this is something that the public really doesn’t understand. And if you read things in the newspaper and you see somebody, you know, violate a rule, you say, well, you know, they’re always doing this. But it’s impossible for you to go—for a violation to go undetected, certainly not for a considerable period of time." Bernie Madoff
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/17/as_madoff_scandal_wipes_out_charities
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The List

Bernie Madoff's Victims: The List
Henry Blodget | Dec 14, 08 9:09 AM
Bernie Madoff's Victims
http://clusterstock.alleyinsider.com/2008/12/bernie-madoff-hosed-client-list
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Israel Shamir and James Petras on Winners & Losers

The Madoff Affair: A Guide to the Perplexed Antisemite


By Israel Shamir



The thinking-man's antisemite would be baffled what to make out of Madoff
Affair. Should he rejoice or bewail? If you read Jewish newspapers, you'd
think that "antisemites" - the vast majority of mankind, according to
Jewish sources ("scratch a goy and you'll find an anti-Semite") - should
be bursting with joy.



Bradley Burston enthused in Haaretz: "For the true anti-Semite, Christmas
came early this year. The anti-Semite's new Santa is Bernard Madoff. The
answer to every Jew-hater's wish list. The Aryan Nation at its most
delusional couldn't have come up with anything to rival this". He is
echoed by the execrable Lipstadt: "He is an antisemite's dream. The worst
of them could not have dreamt up such a story." And the ADL confirms: "We
expect the antisemites to have a field day. They will exploit it."



One would think that Jewish mega-cheats are a rare species, like white
ravens. This is hardly the case. Dr. William Pierce made his valuable
observation some years ago: "Jews aren't the only crooks, but they're
certainly the biggest crooks. If you hear about a 100-thousand-dollar
swindle, it could be anybody. If you hear about a 100-million-dollar
swindle, then you know that it has to be a Jew." Even more so if we hear
about 50-billion-dollar swindle!



Pierce reminded his readers about Michael Milken, Ivan Boesky, Marty
Siegel, Dennis Levine and the insider-trading scandal that nearly wrecked
Wall Street a dozen years ago--and incidentally bankrupted tens of
thousands of ordinary Americans who lost their investments as a result of
the artificial manipulation of stock prices. Every major actor in that
scandal was a Jew.



"Remember the enormous savings-and-loan catastrophe during the 1980s that
ended up costing American taxpayers 500 billion dollars? A big part of the
reason for the collapse of the savings-and-loan industry in the 1980s was
the huge investments in so-called 'junk bonds' by so many savings-and-loan
institutions. And the man behind the junk bonds --the financial genius
persuading the savings-and-loans to buy them--was none other than Michael
Milken."



One can fine-tune Pierce: the big crooks and swindlers are not necessarily
Jews but they are devoted to Jewish causes, be it the Holocaust cult or
the Zionist cause. When it comes to charity, an American cheat, whether
goy or Jew, does not care for poor Americans or for starving Africans. He
gives his tithe to the Jewish cause. This was the case with Madoff. He
contributed a lot to Jewish causes, so he had to be a swindler. (In "The
Man Higher Up" from my book Pardes, I explain why).



So, why should the proverbial antisemite rejoice at Madoff's fall, if it
was as much to be expected as the morning dawn? Is it because there were
"a number of prominent Diaspora Jews among the victims, including Nobel
laureate Elie Wiesel, movie director Steven Spielberg, and real-estate
magnate Mortimer Zuckerman", as the Wall Street Journal reported?



James Petras thinks it should rather disappoint antisemites: "Madoff
struck a severe blow against anti-Semites who claim that there is a
'close-knit Jewish conspiracy to defraud the Gentiles', laying that canard
to rest once and for all. Among Bernard Madoff's principal victims were
his closest Jewish friends and colleagues, people who shared Seder meals
and frequented the same upscale temples in Long Island and Palm Beach." 
[An edited version of Petras' article is appended below.]



This is also the view of Michael Hoffman: "Madoff's enormous heist .
undercuts a stereotype of the Jew-haters: that Jews are always .robbing
gentiles and profiting communally from the rip-off. This is sheerest
ignorance. Contrary to the received opinion, Judaism is not good for Jews.
They may cheat the gentiles first, but sooner or later they'll give each
other a haircut too." Hoffman goes even further and says, "The biggest
victims of Judaism are not gentiles but Jews themselves."



One hesitates to disabuse his noble heart. Though Hoffman's generous
statement certainly is correct in a deep spiritual sense, the Judaic
strategy, in the medium-run, is a winning one in the practical sense.
>From bankruptcy to bankruptcy, from swindle to swindle, from one
insurance fraud to the next -- the aggregate wealth of the Jewish
community permanently grows thanks to intra-Jewish philanthropy. Yes,
Spielberg and Yeshiva University lost some cash in this debacle, but
otherwise, billions of dollars came in and remained within the Jewish
community.

One may view Madoff as a Jewish suicide bomber: he blew himself
up financially, and the immediate losses to a few Jewish investors were
just so much collateral damage. But the bottom line was a major, permanent
transfer of gentile wealth to the Jews.



As always, denunciations of antisemitism serve to cover up the hard facts.
We hear of ruined Jewish investors, BUT the majority of Madoff's fools
were non-Jewish, correctly observed Peter Myers' correspondent Leo Schmit
from Kandahar, Afghanistan. "The majority of Madoff's fools were
non-Jewish individuals, banks, funds and firms. The claim that Jewish
foundations are taking the 'biggest hit' is evidently not true. The harm
to Jewish foundations is dwarfed by the damage done to numerous financial
institutions, funds and firms as listed by Henri Blodget."



So, antisemites have no reason to rejoice. A Jewish crook is nothing new;
a successful Jewish crook is nothing new, either. Dr Petras' joy was
premature, too, as he wrote: "The swindle may lessen funding for AIPAC's
purchase of Congressional influence and financing of propaganda campaigns
in favor of a pre-emptive US military attack against Iran." Not so fast,
Jim! Even if some Jewish and Zionist organizations lost money, the total
sum of Jewish holdings increased, and this new wealth will again find its
way to the Zionist Lobby and other such bodies. Does this mean that
nothing can be done about it? No. Where there is a will, there is a way.



While it would be unfair to confiscate the private funds of innocent
Jewish individuals in compensation for the Jewish fraudsters' misdeeds,
the holdings of "the Jewish people" are fair game. Now these vast holdings
are mortmain, as was Church property in the Middle Ages. Mortmain, or
"Dead Hand", means one can't sue them. All losses are yours, while only
the profits are theirs. Such a regime is too good to last forever. The
Reformation would never have taken place but for the Dead Hand rule of the
Church holdings. The princes finally had to expropriate the Church,
otherwise it would have become too powerful and undermined their own
economic dominion. Now is the time to deal with the Jewish Dead Hand. They
benefited from Madoff's misdeed, now let them pay for it.



These holdings are controlled by still uncaught Madoffs and other Zionist
leaders. The Jewish National Fund (JNF) "is a multi-national corporation
with offices in about dozen countries world-wide. It receives millions of
dollars from wealthy Jews around the world, most of which are tax-exempt
contributions. JNF's aim is to acquire and develop lands exclusively for
the benefit of Jews. It leases land to Jews only." Our friend Jonathan
Cook from Nazareth described it as a racist institution of immense wealth
and power. The JNF received funding from Madoff, and moreover, other
people who earned money through Madoff's schemes also supported the JNF.



Another possible mortmain body with vast holdings is the Conference on
Jewish Material Claims against Germany. This Fund, according to Haaretz,
received billions dollars' worth of real estate in East Germany under a
clause in German law that recognizes it as the owner of all assets
belonging to Holocaust victims without heirs. Do not worry: this money is
not helping poor old Jews anyway. A Haaretz headline relates that
"Survivors get tiny slice of Holocaust compensation". This bulk of cash
should be used to pay the defrauded gentiles.



While we're at it, these and other Jewish communal bodies may be charged
not only for the relatively tiny losses caused by Madoff, but for the much
bigger ones caused by the Talmud-swearing Alan Greenspan and his
Yeshiva-comrade Ben Bernanke. There is no reason to hate Greenspan or to
call him Public Enemy Number One: it will be enough to revert his main
deed, the massive transfer of wealth from ordinary Americans to the
super-rich and from them to the Jewish causes. Among these latter, the
Simon Wiesenthal Tolerance Center should also be a prime target; this
could save Jerusalem from the monstrosity that organization plans to build
in the centre of Jerusalem on top of Mamilla Cemetery. (In order to be
'tolerant', by Simon Wiesenthal Tolerance standards, you must support gag
laws and the bombing of Iran!)



Expropriation of these bodies will not harm a single honest person of
Jewish origin. It's the other way around: it would remove the major
reason for antagonism between Jews and non-Jews. Jews would know that
there are no separate funds to take care of them and would recognize that
they are in one boat with their non-Jewish fellow-citizens. And then the
Jewish Lobby would shrink to its natural size of, say, Cuban Lobby, and
the US would recover from its sickness.



We, the Israelis, would be the biggest beneficiaries of such a move. Isaac
Deutscher ascribed the negative developments in Israel to the influence of
super-rich American Jews: "A wealthy American Jew is at heart proud to be
a member of the Chosen People, and in Israel he exercises his influence in
favour of religious obscurantism and reaction. He keeps alive the spirit
of racial-talmudic exclusiveness and superiority. It feeds and inflames
the antagonism towards the Arabs". If they are made to pay for their
tricks, not only antisemites, but Jews as well will have good reason to
rejoice.



Appendix:

In Praise of Bernard Madoff

by James Petras

(edited by Israel Shamir)



Wall Street broker Bernard ('Bernie') Madoff, former president of NASDAQ,
revered and respected investor confessed to pulling off the biggest fraud
in history, a $50 billion dollar scam.



In a few days, one individual, Bernard Madoff, has struck a bigger blow
against global financial capital, Wall Street and the US Zionist
Lobby/Israel-First Agenda than the entire US and European left combined
over the past half century! He has been more successful in reducing vast
wealth disparities in New York than all the white, black, Christian and
Jewish, reform and mainline Democratic and Republican governors and Mayors
over the past two centuries.



Unlike the leftist pundits, bloggers and protest marchers, whose earnest
and public activities have had no effect on the rich and powerful, Madoff
has aimed his blows where it hurts the most: Their mega-bank accounts,
their confidence in the capitalist system, their self-esteem and, yes,
even their cardiac well-being.



There is no reason to mount the barricades for Bernard Madoff. It's
enough to recognize that he has inadvertently rendered an historic service
to popular justice by undermining some of the financial props of a
class-ridden injustice system.



It is worthwhile to list the inadvertent positive outcomes of Madoff's
mega-swindle.



1. The swindle of $50 plus billion dollars may make a big dent on US
Zionist funding of illegal Israeli colonial settlements in the Occupied
Territories, lessen funding for AIPAC's purchase of Congressional
influence and financing of propaganda campaigns in favor of a pre-emptive
US military attack against Iran. Most investors will have to lower or
eliminate their purchase of Israel bonds, which subsidize the Jewish
State's military budget.



2. The swindle has further discredited the highly speculative hedge funds
already reeling from massive withdrawals because of deep losses.



3. Madoff's long-term, large-scale fraud was not detected by the
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) despite its claims of at least
two investigations. As a result, there is a total loss of credibility.



4. Madoff's long-term association with NASDAQ, including his chairmanship,
while he was defrauding his clients of billions, strongly suggests that
the members and leaders of this stock exchange are incapable of
recognizing a crook.



5. Apart from severe bank losses, tens of thousands of influential,
affluent and super-rich lost their entire accumulated wealth. The result
is a weakening of the financial stranglehold over investor behavior and
the demise of an important sector of the parasitic 'rentier' class.



6. Since most of the money stolen by Madoff came from the upper classes
around the world, his behavior has reduced inequalities - he is the
'greatest leveler' since the introduction of the progressive income tax.



7. By swindling life-long friends, self-same ethno-religious investors,
narrow ethnically defined country club members and close family members,
Madoff demonstrates that finance capital shows no respect for any of the
pieties of everyday life:



8. Among the many ruined investors in New York and New England, there are
a number of mega slumlords (real estate moguls), sweatshop owners (fancy
name-brand clothes and toy manufacturers) and others who barely paid the
minimum wage to their women and immigrant laborers, evicted poor tenants
and swindled employees out of their pensions before moving their
operations to China. In other words, Madoff's swindle was a kind of
secular 'divine' retribution for past and present crimes against labor and
the poor.



9. Madoff struck a severe blow against anti-Semites who claim that there
is a 'close-knit Jewish conspiracy to defraud the Gentiles', laying that
canard to rest once and for all. Among Bernard Madoff's principle victims
were his closest Jewish friends and colleagues, people who shared Seder
meals and frequented the same upscale temples in Long Island and Palm
Beach.



10. Madoff's swindle will likely promote greater self-criticism and a more
distrustful attitude toward other potential confidence people posing as
reliable financial know-it-alls.



The final and 11th point is the demise of Madoff's enterprise and his
wealthy liberal Jewish victims will adversely affect contributions to the
52 Major Jewish American Organizations, numerous foundations in Boston,
Los Angeles, New York and elsewhere, as well as the Clinton/Schumer
militarist wing of the Democratic Party (Madoff bankrolled both of them as
well as other unconditional Congressional supporters of Israel). This may
open Congress to greater debate on Middle East policy without the usual
high volume attacks.