Andrew Adler, the owner and publisher of the Atlanta Jewish Times, has apologized after running a column that lists three options for Israel to deal with its current threats that included killing Barack Obama. The column went out of its way to make sure that readers “read ‘three’ correctly” — “U.S. based Mossad agents” should kill the president. The column is just one more example of how religious writers and politicians use faith as a vehicle for hate and violent speech. Given our discussion of Santorum’s honorary campaign chairman (who denounced gays as making God want to vomit), one has to wonder about the intestinal fortitude of the Almighty during periods of sectarian extremism.
Adler listed three options for Israel to counter Iran’s nuclear weapons in his weekly newspaper last Friday. The first is to launch a pre-emptive strike against Hamas and Hezbollah. The second is to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. Then there is the third option:
Three, give the go-ahead for U.S.-based Mossad agents to take out a president deemed unfriendly to Israel in order for the current vice president to take his place, and forcefully dictate that the United States’ policy includes its helping the Jewish state obliterate its enemies.
Yes, you read “three” correctly. Order a hit on a president in order to preserve Israel’s existence. Think about it. If I have thought of this Tom Clancy-type scenario, don’t you think that this almost unfathomable idea has been discussed in Israel’s most inner circles?
Another way of putting “three” in perspective goes something like this: How far would you go to save a nation comprised of seven million lives…Jews, Christians and Arabs alike?
You have got to believe, like I do, that all options are on the table.
A bit hard to peddle back from that. The readers of the Atlanta Jewish Times will hopefully use this disgraceful column as a vehicle to reexamine the rhetoric and extremism displayed by Adler and others in today’s political discourse. An apology for such a hateful and extremist column falls a bit short of convincing. It comes off as an “I should not have put it in print” apology.
Source: Gawker
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