Tonight is the seventh night of Hanukkah, a celebration of a great Jewish military victory over enemies bent on their destruction.
Today is also the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, “a day that will live in infamy.” This was war, and our enemies were willing to fight to the last soldier. The fate of the entire world was at stake.
As always, when I see soldiers and veterans, I tell them a simple message.
Whether they are winning World War II, showing the heroism of the Maccabees, or defeating Kathy Griffin (I can see her bigoted idiocy from my house), the sentiment is the same.
“Thank you, and welcome home.”
Rather than offer the same homilies and bromides found on every other institution of prose, today is a day to celebrate the links between the heroes of Hanukkah and Pearl Harbor. There are no veterans of both wars, given the 2000 year differential in battle. Yet links do exist through lineage.
For those interested in a couple of stories about Jewish soldiers at Pearl Harbor, here they are.
http://www.fau.edu/library/br096.htm
http://jewishgen.blogspot.com/2009/12/jewish-soldiers-at-pearl-harbor.html
Normally South Beach in Miami involves decadent pursuits. Yet tonight in the heart of Miami Beach a pair of Jewish men, ages 90 and 94, will be speaking about their experiences at Pearl Harbor.
http://www.jewishpresstampa.com/news/2010-11-19/Culture/Two_Jewish_Floridians_to_share_Pearl_Harbor_Day_me.html
A website that is strictly reserved for Jewish jokes of all kinds has a rendition of what would have happened had the BBC reported on Pearl Harbor.
http://www.jewishmag.com/45mag/humor/humor.htm
“If BBC had reported Pearl Harbor the way they report the Middle East ….
PEARL HARBOR (Hawaii) – December 8, 1941 US Navy officials reported earlier today that a number of Navy warships in the American settlement of Pearl Harbor were suddenly discovered to be sinking. Unnamed sources blamed the incident on a training exercise being conducted by the Japanese Navy nearby.
In Tokyo, Japanese officials said while some civilian fishing boats were in the area, they were unaware of any unusual activity. They repeated their commitment to the peace process, and said that any violence was the direct result of continued American aggression. They emphasized that only peaceful negotiations based on a US acceptance of Japan’s leading role in Asia could reduce the tensions between the countries, and called for an international inquiry.
US President Roosevelt, who leads the hard-line Democratic Party, accused the Japanese Navy of a deliberate ‘sneak attack’ on the American fleet. He said thousands of American soldiers had been killed on ‘a day that will live in infamy.’ There was no independent confirmation of those figures, which respected Japanese sources say are greatly exaggerated. Because of the belligerent tone of the right-wing American President’s remarks, many Japanese consider him to be a war criminal.
The region, in which the US has built hundreds of illegal settlements since its unilateral annexation of Hawaii, has been a flash point since US Admiral Perry’s visit to Japan in 1853, which some Japanese consider to have been a defilement of holy Japanese soil by an uncivilized foreigner. Japanese civilians have repeatedly called for spontaneous ‘days of rage’ to protest the intrusion by the American military, which is against international law. Since Perry’s visit, more than 120 million Japanese have died, many of them children, and more than 73 typhoons and 213 earthquakes have struck Japan. No earthquakes were recorded in the US.”
I will claim that things never would have gotten to that point. The Jayson Blair Times would have given away the secret troop movements with help from Wikileaks, getting all of our soldiers killed in a stunning defeat. MSNBC analysts would have debated whether to celebrate the defeat and protect the liberal President or blame it on the mess that his conservative predecessor left behind 9 years earlier.
I would like to thank every World War II Veteran and every other veteran before and after for preserving my freedoms. As for the Jewish heroes, Israel and the Jews have endured everything from pre-Hanukkah death to the Holocaust. Now we are balloting Islamofascists who wish to murder us and wildfires threatening Israel.
Whether Nazis or Jewish home, one phrase says it all.
“These colors don’t run.”
May next Hanukkah and Pearl Harbor Day be more peaceful.
This will happen if we do everything we can to take our enemies and crush them.
Civilization is at stake.
Victory is the only option.
eric
To compare WWII to anything happening today is stupid.
JMJ
You do it all the time with your Nazi references and crap
I don’t make Nazi references all the time. I rarely do at all. But remember, the Nazis were just a (huge) part of WWII and thw hole gereneal conflagration of that era. WWII, and really most of the first half of the twentieth century, represents the greatest world-wide conflagration in history. Most of the world was embroiled in war to one extent or another. Here’s a timeline that takes you from the 1901 Boxer rebellion through to the American involovement in WWII in 1942: http://militaryhistory.about.com/od/timeline/a/20thcentime.htm
There’s no comparison to make. Today’s world is a very different place, and no extistential threat to any of the world powers exists. We are at relative peace – Paxos Americanus, if you will. That’s why it’s so pathetic to see the sleazy cons in the GOP even talking about blocking the latest START treaty, especiallly in a time when Russia is being so helpful with Iran and with missle defense, whilst China is now showing some possible tacit support for bringing down the DPRK. The last thing we need is a even a lsightest return to the Cold War. And this is alaso why ot’s so incrredibly stupid for America to be standing a 2-friggin’million man military. We simply do NOT need it. We’re going broke because of that ridiculous military and it’s getting to the point where we’re desparately reaching for any nonsensical excuse to deploy it.
No, Micky, it really is intensely stupid to compare anything happening today to WWII. Even in posting this, our good host was careful to point out a similar opinion.
JMJ
“I don’t make Nazi references all the time. ”
Okay, you’re forgiven.
But dont sit there and try to pretend to the world that theres no comparison between Pearl and 911
That is STUPID.
You might want to take into consideration that the Muslim brotherhood studied the Nazis regime, ideology and philosiphy for a reason and that Mein Kampf is still one of the best sellers in the middle east
There is absolutely ZERO comparison between 9/11 and Pearl Harbor, let alone between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Third Reich . None. Nada. Zilch.
JMJ