Do I wake or sleep?

Senate passes resolution, Obama supports it, to have moment of silence for murdered Israeli athletes.

Yes! It's an absolute disgrace it's taken this long. Just unbelievable. The IOC failed miserably back in '72 and Avery Brundage was a wretched example of Olympic ideals. (God, he sucked. From refusing to support a boycott against the Nazi Olympics to being a complete dick about the travesty of Jim Thorpe's stripped gold medals to ignoring the massacre of the Israeli athletes--a massacre that was enabled by HIS shoddy security practices--in every way he was just a terrible, terrible human being. He also had a female athlete, a gold medal favorite, kicked out of the Olympics for drinking champagne refusing him after he hit on her.)

On the Washington Post website, Sally Jenkins wrote:

Sally Jenkins: Hi. I agree with you: this is the most egregious violation of the Olympic ethic that I've ever seen, and it's my fifth Olympics. They should cut down the Iranian flags at every venue and Fed Ex them back to the Iranian governement. And they should revoke Iranian membership. Period. End of debate. There are no ifs ands or buts about this one.
however, the IOC is notoriously shy of controvery. [sic]

And this (from an article on the Post):

During the Opening Ceremonies on Friday, the Israeli team received a tepid reception from the 77,000 spectators. In contrast, the much smaller Palestinian team strolled around the stadium to rousing cheers.

That is just so goddamn sad. Berlin '36, Munich '72. And now this. In the scheme of things, that kind of insult isn't so bad--it just really bothers me that the spectators have no historical perspective at all. That there is even an Israeli team at all is a miracle, since many of them were murdered in cold blood by the countrymen of these "cheered" athletes, and were given a hero's welcome. I don't begrudge the Palestinian team getting cheered--maybe they can find a way to bridge the gap--but I would be kissing the hands of the Israeli athletes. I would be embracing them.

I'm reading a book right now called The Jews of Primetime by David Zurawik, about how Jews have been represented, by Jews (since there is a huge Jewish presence on the executives of network TV) and how they employed self-censorship either to supress Jewish themes or simplify them to easy jokes based on stereotypes. The secondary theme of this is the "self-hating Jew"--are the Jews of TV self-hating because they can mine their culture for humor turned inward, or is this healthy? So far I've read through the sections on Rhoda, Friends, Will and Grace and Seinfeld, the latter of which was originally passed on by Brandon Tarkitoff (Jewish) who thought the show was "too New York, too Jewish." The whole book is very interesting.

Last week I skipped through Queen Noor's autobiography, A Leap of Faith. Interesting but really one-sided re: the Arab-Israeli conflict. She just keeps hammering home this theme of Israeli aggression and ignoring or trivializing Arab on Jewish violence--suicide bombers aren't mentioned at all, Munich '72 rates a barely passing reference. The constant putdowns of Israeli media are annoying and unnecessary--eg., she's talking about a heart incident her husband had--"typically, Israeli radio kept saying he'd had a heart attack." Whatthefuckever, LISA. (She talks about her giving her mother "license" to mistakenly call her "Lisa" after she'd been renamed "Noor" in the wake of her marriage, conversion to Islam, and ascension to the throne. But after awhile she demanded to be called "Noor." Jeez--that woman carried you for nine months and bore you. I think she can call you pretty much whatever she wants.) The most interesting part is when she talks about the Palestinian uprising in the early '70s, when Palestinian terrorists tried to overthrow the government. Very very interesting account, and she wasn't even there yet--she heard the story from other members of the royal family.

One part that annoyed me especially was when she's talking about the Six Day War, and how Israel won because of their superior arms buildup and equipment, but really, Jordan had the better soldiers--better-trained, "more courageous." Wow, LISA. Israel must have tanks capable of driving themselves and planes capable of flying themselves if one tiny country can beat THREE others, SURROUNDING them. Get over it, LISA--you lost. Israel played you and Syria and Egypt and won. And yes, sorry, they did indeed have much better soldiers. They kicked your asses up and down the Arabian peninsula.

There's a line in Florence King's book Southern Ladies and Gentlemen where she talks about the impact the Six-Day War had on Southern good ol' boy sensibilities--"I doubt if the world has ever seen such a rapid cease-fire in anti-Semitism. I heard boy after good ol' boy say things like 'By dern, them Jew boys shore can fight!' One man I knew seriously recommended Congress pass a law giving Moshe Dayan US citizenship, and make him Secretary of Defense. His reasoning: 'That one-eyed bastid would wipe anyone off the map whut gave us trouble.'"

Jesus.

I'm surfing the net and come across the official site for the documentary One Day in September, about which I wrote months before. I came across this little tidbit:

To Palestinians Black September was September 1970 when King Hussein of Jordan took up arms against the unruly Palestinian militias based in his country, killing over 4,000 and expelling the remainder. Taking its name from this event the terrorist organisation Black September initially concentrated on revenge against the Jordanian regime. In Cairo on 28th September 1971 Black September assassins shot dead Wasfi Tell, the Jordanian Prime Minister, afterwards kneeling down beside their victim to lick up his blood.

Good. God. Savages. Unbe-fuckin'-lievable. They licked his blood. And these people were hailed by their countrymen as heroes after the Munich slaughter.

I feel sick. I can't believe I share a species with these animals.