Bonjour Sagesse! "These Lands Are Our Home; We Have No Other"

From the British philosopher Sir Roger Scruton and other European intellectuals, the so-called Paris Statement regarding the current malaise of Europe and what must be done to overset it.  ( "We ask all Europeans to join us in rejecting the utopian fantasy of a multicultural world without borders")

Inter alia (emphasis added), from a long and heartfelt document which deserves to be read and pondered in its entirety:

"Europe belongs to us, and we belong to Europe. These lands are our home; we have no other. The reasons we hold Europe dear exceed our ability to explain or justify our loyalty. It is a matter of shared histories, hopes and loves. It is a matter of accustomed ways, of moments of pathos and pain. It is a matter of inspiring experiences of reconciliation and the promise of a shared future. Ordinary landscapes and events are charged with special meaning—for us, but not for others. Home is a place where things are familiar, and where we are recognized, however far we have wandered. This is the real Europe, our precious and irreplaceable civilization....

The patrons of the false Europe are bewitched by superstitions of inevitable progress. They believe that History is on their side, and this faith makes them haughty and disdainful, unable to acknowledge the defects in the post-national, post-cultural world they are constructing. Moreover, they are ignorant of the true sources of the humane decencies they themselves hold dear—as do we. They ignore, even repudiate the Christian roots of Europe. At the same time they take great care not to offend Muslims, who they imagine will cheerfully adopt their secular, multicultural outlook. Sunk in prejudice, superstition and ignorance, and blinded by vain, self-congratulating visions of a utopian future, the false Europe reflexively stifles dissent. This is done, of course, in the name of freedom and tolerance....

 The true Europe is at risk because of the suffocating grip that the false Europe has over our imaginations. Our nations and shared culture are being hollowed out by illusions and self-deceptions about what Europe is and should be. We pledge to resist this threat to our future. We will defend, sustain and champion the real Europe, the Europe to which we all in truth belong....

As the nation states of Europe became more established and distinct, a shared European identity became stronger. In the aftermath of the terrible bloodshed of the world wars in the first half of the twentieth century, we emerged with an even greater resolve to honor our shared heritage. This testifies to the depth and power of Europe as a civilization that is cosmopolitan in a proper sense. We do not seek the imposed, enforced unity of empire. Instead, European cosmopolitanism recognizes that patriotic love and civic loyalty open out to a wider world....

 The true Europe has been marked by Christianity.... The autonomy of what we call civil society became a characteristic feature of European life. Moreover, the Christian Gospel does not deliver a comprehensive divine law, and thus the diversity of the secular laws of the nations may be affirmed and honoured without threat to our European unity. It is no accident that the decline of Christian faith in Europe has been accompanied by renewed efforts to establish political unity—an empire of money and regulations, covered with sentiments of pseudo-religious universalism, that is being constructed by the European Union....

The true Europe has never been perfect. The proponents of the false Europe are not wrong to seek development and reform, and there is much that has been accomplished since 1945 and 1989 that we should cherish and honor. Our shared life is an ongoing project, not an ossified inheritance. But the future of Europe rests in renewed loyalty to our best traditions, not a spurious universalism demanding forgetfulness and self-repudiation. Europe did not begin with the Enlightenment. Our beloved home will not be fulfilled with the European Union. The real Europe is, and always will be, a community of nations at once insular, sometimes fiercely so, and yet united by a spiritual legacy that, together, we debate, develop, share—and love....The true Europe is in jeopardy. The achievements of popular sovereignty, resistance to empire, cosmopolitanism capable of civic love, the Christian legacy of humane and dignified life, a living engagement with our Classical inheritance—all this is slipping away. As the patrons of the false Europe construct their faux Christendom of universal human rights, we are losing our home....

 The false Europe also boasts of an unprecedented commitment to equality. It claims to promote non-discrimination and the inclusion of all races, religions and identities. Here, genuine progress has been made, but a utopian detachment from reality has taken hold. Over the past generation, Europe has pursued a grand project of multiculturalism. To demand or even promote the assimilation of Muslim newcomers to our manners and mores, much less to our religion, has been thought a gross injustice. A commitment to equality, we have been told, demands that we abjure any hint that we believe our culture superior. Paradoxically, Europe’s multicultural enterprise, which denies the Christian roots of Europe, trades on the Christian ideal of universal charity in an exaggerated and unsustainable form. It requires from the European peoples a saintly degree of self-abnegation. We are to affirm the very colonization of our homelands and the demise of our culture as Europe’s great twenty-first century glory—a collective act of self-sacrifice for the sake of some new global community of peace and prosperity that is being born.

 There is a great deal of bad faith in this thinking. Most in our governing classes doubtless presume the superiority of European culture—which must not be affirmed in public in ways that might offend immigrants. Given that superiority, they think that assimilation will happen naturally, and quickly. In an ironic echo of the imperialist thinking of old, Europe’s governing classes presume that, somehow, by the laws of nature or of history, ‘they’ will necessarily become like ‘us’—and it is inconceivable that the reverse might be true. In the meantime, official multiculturalism has been deployed as a therapeutic tool for managing the unfortunate but ‘temporary’ cultural tensions....

Today, Europe is dominated by an aimless materialism that seems unable to motivate men and women to have children and form families. A culture of repudiation deprives the next generation of a sense of identity. Some of our countries have regions in which Muslims live with an informal autonomy from local laws, as if they were colonialists rather than fellow members of our nations. Individualism isolates us one from another. Globalization transforms the life prospects of millions. When challenged, our governing classes say that they are merely working to accommodate the inevitable, adjusting to implacable necessities. No other course is possible, and it is irrational to resist. Things cannot be otherwise. Those who object are said to suffer nostalgia—for which they deserve moral condemnation as racists or fascists. As social divisions and civic distrust become more apparent, European public life grows angrier, more rancourous, and no one can say where it will end. We must not continue down this path. We need to throw off the tyranny of the false Europe. There is an alternative....

In this moment, we ask all Europeans to join us in rejecting the utopian fantasy of a multicultural world without borders. We rightly love our homelands, and we seek to hand on to our children every noble thing that we have ourselves received as our patrimony. As Europeans, we also share a common heritage, and this heritage asks us to live together in peace as a Europe of nations. Let us renew national sovereignty, and recover the dignity of a shared political responsibility for Europe’s future."

Philippe Bénéton (France); Rémi Brague (France); Chantal Delsol (France); Roman Joch (Česko); Lánczi András (Magyarország); Ryszard Legutko (Polska); Roger Scruton (United Kingdom); Robert Spaemann (Deutschland); Bart Jan Spruyt (Nederland); Matthias Storme (België)

Read the entire statement here

More Travels in Eurabia (videos)

More of what Canadian broadcaster Ezra Levant found in Eurabia recently:

Top video:
'Meet “the hero of Cologne” — and other immigrants who love Europe's culture of freedom.'

Bottom video:
'Political dissidents across Europe are fighting back in the midst of the mass Muslim migration that is threatening to change their continent. I'll show you what they said, and tell you why it matters.'

"They Hate Israel Because They Hate Themselves"

'It isn't the Israelis who are paranoid – it's anti-Israel Europeans.  They're the ones who madly look upon one nation, one people, as toxic, destabilising, destructive, out to get us all and do over world peace.  Such swirling paranoia often means that anti-Zionism crosses the lines into antisemitism.

Some Israelis I spoke to [recently] seemed more upset about the turn against Europe in Israel than they were about the more immediate threat posed by Islamists in the Middle East.

It wasn't hard to work out why.  As one said, "We considered Europe a friend"; "We thought Europe and Israel had a lot in common, being Western and democratic."

This cuts to the heart of the Euro-elites' paranoia about Israel, their turn against it; it is really European values, the ideals of modernity and democracy that they've given up on.

The thing that riles them most about Israel is that it reminds them of what they used to be like, of the values they once espoused, before they lost the moral plot and sank into the cesspit of relativism and post-Enlightenment self-loathing.

Plucky, keen to protect its sovereignty, considering itself an outpost of liberalism ... Israel is a painful reminder to today's anchorless European thinkers and agitators of what their nations once were.

They hate Israel because they hate themselves.

Israel has become the whipping boy of guilt-ridden Western liberals who've given up on the very idea of the West." [Emphasis added]


So wrote the Brendan O'Neill, editor of Spiked Online, in an admirably perceptive article in the London Jewish News late last year that was picked up by the Australian Jewish News.

This video, in which the Canadian writer/commentator Mark Steyn (how wonderful it used to be to read his regular columns in the UK Daily Telegraph back in the days when Conrad Black owned that newspaper) declares Multiculturalism as "the slipperiest of all isms," illuminates the loss of direction and purpose that's befallen and bedevils the West. 

Bedevils the West and betrays its sons and (especially) its daughters, as well as generations yet unborn.

 Some of the serfs, however, are getting restless.

Update, a well-deserved little dig at the feministas, although the use of the word "spastic" in this context is to be deplored: (hat tip Ian):

The Swedish Disease

Significant elements in several Western countries – especially the United States, Great Britain, and Israel – believe their own governments to be repositories of evil, and see terrorism as just punishment for past sins. This "we have met the enemy and he is us" attitude replaces an effective response with appeasement, including a readiness to give up traditions and achievements.... 

Self-hating Westerners have an out-sized importance due to their prominent role as shapers of opinion in universities, the media, religious institutions, and the arts. They serve as the Islamists' auxiliary mujahideen.

So observed Daniel Pipes in 2006.

How the contagion continues to spread.  In Sweden, for example,

'Many former Marxists have become passionate Multiculturalists, so much so that we need to analyze what these doctrines have in common. How come so many white Marxists are aggressively hostile to their own civilization and almost seem to derive pleasure from the idea of wiping out their own people? Is Globalist Multiculturalism on some level a replacement Communism or is it in fact a direct continuation of Communism? In traditional Communism the “oppressive class” should be forced out of power, stripped of their assets and perhaps physically eliminated. If we assume that whites, and by that I mean people of European stock, are seen collectively as the “global oppressive class” who uphold the capitalist system and prevent a just world order, breaking down whites becomes the road to implement equality. Perhaps if traditional Communism put its emphasis on economic differences, this new form of Communism puts emphasis on breaking down cultural and genetic differences in order to achieve global equality. It could thus be thought of as cultural and genetic Communism.

If we assume that the ideology of Globalist Multiculturalism has totalitarian tendencies, we should remember that totalitarian ideologies usually have a Villain Class, a group of evil oppressors that can be blamed for all the ills of society. If the ruling ideology falls somewhat short of producing the Perfect Society it has promised, this will be followed by even more passionate attacks on the Villain Class, be that the Jews, the capitalists, the bourgeoisie, etc. The Villain Class of Multiculturalism seems to be European culture and persons who happen to be born with a white skin. Any problems will automatically be blamed on “white racism.” One of the hallmarks of a Villain Class is that its members can be verbally or even physically abused with impunity. The Villain Class is subject to public scorn and has de facto or de jure less legal protection than other groups.

The radical feminist Joanna Rytel wrote an article called “I Will Never Give Birth to a White Man,” for the Swedish daily Aftonbladet, stating things such as “no white men, please… I just puke on them.” After receiving a complaint because of this, Swedish state prosecutor Göran Lambertz explained why this didn’t qualify as racism: “The purpose behind the law against incitement of ethnic hatred was to ensure legal protection for minority groups of different compositions and followers of different religions. Cases where people express themselves in a critical or derogatory way about men of ethnic Swedish background were not intended to be included in this law.”

In 2006, Chancellor of Justice Göran Lambertz discontinued his preliminary investigation regarding anti-Semitism at the great mosque in Stockholm. He wrote that “the lecture at hand contains statements that are strongly degrading to Jews, among other things, they are throughout called brothers of apes and pigs.” Furthermore a curse is expressed over the Jews and “Jihad is called for, to kill the Jews, whereby suicide bombers — celebrated as martyrs — are the most effective weapon.” Lambertz thought that the “recently mentioned statements in spite of their contents are not to be considered incitement against an ethnic group according to Swedish law.” His conclusions were that the preliminary investigation should be discontinued because this incitement against Jews could be said to originate from the Middle East conflict.

It is illegal to suggest that certain groups are worse than others. If you criticize oppression of women, you should be careful to state that all men are equally bad and that Western men are at least as bad as Muslim men. The Marxist politician (from the “reformed” Communists) Gudrun Schyman in a 2002 speech posited that Swedish men were just like the extremely brutal Islamic Taliban regime. A male columnist in newspaper Aftonbladet immediately agreed with her: Yes, Western men are like the Taliban.

http://www.meforum.org/5141/palestinian-sister-wives

A note to Ms. Schyman: A feminist culture will eventually be squashed because the men have either become too demoralized and weakened to protect their women, or because they have become fed-up with incessant ridicule. If Western men are pigs and “just like the Taliban” no matter what we do, why bother? Western women will then be squashed by more aggressive men from other cultures (whom women often voted to let in because of their “kind and compassionate” Socialist sympathies), which is exactly what is happening in Western Europe now. The irony is that when women launched the Second Wave of Feminism in the 1960s and 70s, they were reasonably safe and, in my view, not very oppressed. When the long-term effects of feminism finally set in, Western women may very well end up being genuinely oppressed under the boot of Islam. Radical feminism thus leads to oppression of women.

In 2005, a TV program which caused some stir quoted Irene von Wachenfeldt, chairwoman of ROKS, The National Organization for Women’s Shelters, as saying: “…when war breaks out, it is fully ok to use violence openly. I sometimes say that we are involved in a civil world war, a gender war. Men are animals.” In the organization’s magazine, the extreme feminist Valeria Solana was hailed in a review. She writes in her manifesto: “To call a man an animal is to flatter him: He is a machine, a walking dildo, a biological mishap.” In the TV documentary, Irene von Wachenfelt was asked whether she agreed with Solana, and she did. ROKS has received millions in public funding.

In Sweden, you cannot say that certain ethnic groups are more involved in crime than others. That’s hateful and banned by law. But you can say that all men are animals, and you will get state support for doing so. You can also belittle the traditional culture of the natives. This is not just allowed but encouraged. As mentioned before, the “conservative” Prime Minister Reinfeldt has stated that the native culture was merely barbarism and that everything good has been imported from abroad. Had a public figure said something similar about the culture of an immigrant group, he or she would have had to resign immediately and most likely would have faced a trial for hate speech and racism.

Jonathan Friedman, an American Jew living in Sweden, mentions that the so-called Integration Act from 1997, two years after Sweden joined the European Union, proclaimed that “Sweden is a Multicultural society.” The Act implicitly states that Sweden doesn’t have a history, only the various ethnic groups that live there now. Native Swedes have formally been reduced to just another ethnic group, with no more claims to the country than the Iraqis who arrived there last Thursday. As Friedman puts it, “it’s almost as if the state has sided with the immigrants against the Swedish working class.”

“Exit Folkhemssverige - En samhällsmodells sönderfall“ (Exit the People’s Home of Sweden — The Downfall of a Model of Society) is a book from 2005 about immigration and the welfare state model called “the people’s home,” written by Jonathan Friedman, Ingrid Björkman, Jan Elfverson and Åke Wedin. According to them, the Multicultural elites see themselves first of all as citizens of the world. In order to emphasize and accentuate “diversity,” everything associated with the native culture is deliberately disparaged. Opposition to this is considered racism: “The dominant ideology in Sweden, which has been made dominant by powerful methods of silencing and repression, is a totalitarian ideology, where the elites oppose the national aspect of the nation state. The problem is that the ethnic group that are described as Swedes implicitly are considered to be nationalists, and thereby are viewed as racists.”

Jens Orback, Minister for Democracy, Metropolitan Affairs, Integration and Gender Equality from the Social Democratic Party said during a debate in Swedish radio in 2004 that “We must be open and tolerant towards Islam and Muslims because when we become a minority, they will be so towards us.”

This was a government which knew perfectly well that their people risked becoming a minority in their own country, yet did nothing to stop this. ...'

 Read much much more here

Down Under, They're Just Wild About Wilders (updated with extra video)

Hate speech: sowing discord in the Victorian community

As reported by J-Wire, Jewish bodies in the Australian state of Victoria have signed a statement extolling the benefits of multiculturalism and expressing disquiet about the visit to Australia of Geert Wilders (incidentally, see this video for what veteran Aussie broadcaster and champion of Islam George Negus thinks of him, and this video for the way Wilders once dealt with a certain Mr Cohen).

"Victoria is a multicultural and multifaith society in which racial, religious and linguistic diversity is embraced as a strength. This vibrant diversity has generated social, cultural and economic benefits for all Victorians.... 

Community harmony in Victoria is strengthened by a long-standing, shared commitment across government, community and business – and in a range of settings, including on the sporting field – to respect and embrace difference, to respond appropriately to unjust treatment and vilification, and to recognise and celebrate our common bond as proud Victorians and Australians.

We have a collective responsibility to respect our fellow citizens and preserve the social cohesion and harmony that characterise Victoria and makes our society great. We also encourage genuine and constructive engagement and dialogue as a means to achieving greater understanding and acceptance of diversity.

We welcome challenging ideas and debate, however, inciting hatred and animosity towards specific cultural or faith-based communities has no place in Victoria. All Victorians have a right to practice their faith and observe their cultural traditions and languages."

More discord ...

This "motherhood" statement was endorsed by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry.

All very civilised.  All very honorable.  And all very well.

Who doesn't want peace and harmony and a quiet existence?

But the statement's basic premise is that all cultures are created equal.  And that tends to stick in the craw, because, although impeccably politically correct, in some respects it's a betrayal, a betrayal of enlightened values.

No matter that some cultures espouse ideologies and permit practices at odds with modernism, democratic principles, and gender equality.

Whether a woman outraged by a credo of inherent female intellectual inferiority (and other insults to the female sex), or a Jew distressed by the allegation that s/he is "the descendents of apes and pigs" or a person of whatever background alarmed by Islamist-driven antisemitism and delegitimisation of Israel, we must all, it seems, be cultural relativists now.

... and cultural enrichment

Comments one opponent of the statements referred to above:

"I’m still at odds trying to work out why the JCCV [Jewish Community Council of Victoria] and the ECAJ have put this statement out.

It doesn’t make sense.

What’s the issue?

What are they afraid of?

 Many countries are coming out and saying multiculturalism doesn’t work and here we have these organisations saying it does.

Multiculturalism asks for people to bring their ‘culture’ and that they never really need to become ‘Australians’.

Multiculturalism implies that people can change this country to suit their values, which becomes unacceptable.

 British Prime Minister David Cameron said during a panel discussion attended by German Chancellor Angela Merkel

 “Under the doctrine of state multiculturalism, we have encouraged different cultures to live separate lives, apart from each other and the mainstream,

“We have failed to provide a vision of society to which they feel they want to belong.”

He said the “hands-off tolerance” in Britain and other European nations has encouraged Muslims and other immigrant groups “to live separate lives, apart from each other and the mainstream.”

More still, as this democracy-decrying Sydney conference showed

He further said

 “Multiculturalism, was undertaken for the highest of motives. It was intended to create a more tolerant society, one in which everyone, regardless of colour, creed or culture, felt at home. Its effect has been precisely the opposite

Multiculturalism, entered into for the noblest of reasons, has suffered from the law of unintended consequences. By dissolving national identity it makes it impossible for groups to integrate because there is nothing to integrate into, and by failing to offer people pride in being British, it forces them to find sources of pride elsewhere.”

This has been echoed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy'

 Comments another:

"Everything being presented ... about multiculturalism in Australia – the same multiculturalism that European leaders admit has been a demonstrable abject failure in the countries they lead – points to a profound misunderstanding of what multiculturalism is.

 Everything being presented ... about Geert Wilders’ message demonstrates that they either have never heard what he has to say or have heard but not listened.

Read his lips: It is not about muslims. it is about islam.

You will find apostate muslims and non-mus[l]im migrants from muslim countries among Wilders’ supporters. Listen to them.

The fact that so many venues cancelled his appearance out of fear shows that Australia has succumbed to fear.

Not all 1938 Germans were evil. That was not about Germans...."

 Here (hat tip: reader Shirlee) is an ABC (equivalent to the BBC) segment regarding Wilders in Oz, beginning with remarks from pro-Islam leftist detractors and going on to feature interviews with the man himself and others:

"You should open your eyes and learn from the mistakes we made in Europe," Wilders says in this video.

He warns that, if Australians "fail to be vigilant" against the inroads of radical Islamism, women, gays, and, yes, Jews, will be the first "to pay the price".

But let's give the last word to the man who for decades bestrode the Australian Jewish communal leadership scene like a Colossus – a man who warned (here) two or three years ago:

'It is surely high time for Diaspora leaders to stop living in denial and get their act together. Instead of competing with each other in oozing political correctness, they should display some backbone and call a spade a spade.

We are currently witnessing the greatest revival of global anti-Semitism since the Middle Ages. This permeates all classes of society, and, ranging from academics to illiterates and European leaders who retain office despite making unabashed neo-Nazi remarks about Jews to mobs at anti-Israeli demonstrations carrying placards "gas the Jews."

It encompasses the entire political spectrum, but is spearheaded by liberals and Muslims. Muslim radicals relate to Israel in a manner reminiscent of the Church's medieval attitude toward the Jews. They promote popular TV programs depicting the blood of Muslim children being used for baking matzot, and have revived The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as a best-seller. They certainly compare favorably with the worst Nazi Jew baiting, with imams quoting genocidal religious texts to the faithful, inciting them to murder Jews, "the descendants of apes and pigs."

It is macabre to observe the alliance between liberals and jihadists who represent the antithesis of everything the Left purports to represent. The extremist Islamists are the most reactionary elements in the world. They reject fundamental human rights, proscribe freedom of expression and religion, promote the degradation of women and, to this day, implement barbaric laws including stoning of adulterers and homosexuals and the amputation of limbs for petty crimes. More than 50 Muslim countries deny Judaism or Christianity equal standing with Islam....

This is taking place at a time when the Muslims have the audacity to promote legislation at the UN and elsewhere which would make any criticism of Islam a criminal offense. The response of the Obama administration has been to reiterate the ludicrous mantra introduced by president George W. Bush describing Islam as "the religion of peace" and blatantly deny the reality that present-day terrorism is essentially a Muslim phenomenon, even though that does not mean all Muslims are terrorists....

 Alas, Jews who exaggerate the presence of Islamophobia become leading proponents of the campaign to sanitize and understate Islamic extremism. This is especially bizarre, given that Jews, especially in Europe, but also increasingly in the US, are facing far greater threats of violence than Muslims. It is also synagogues, rather than mosques, which are continuously being desecrated and vandalized, in many cases by Islamists.

In that context, the relative tranquility which Muslims experience in Western societies is a great tribute to tolerance – a tolerance unlikely to have been extended to Jews in similar circumstances. Imagine the response if Israel had a track record like some of the Arab states, or if Jews in Western countries were blowing up their neighbors...."

The Silly Shameful Slurs On Robert Magid

Last week, Australian Jewish News publisher Robert Magid wrote a profoundly sensible and entirely reasonable op-ed in his newspaper concerning asylum seekers arriving in Australia.  He expressed concern at the illegal smuggling of bogus refugees who are actually economic migrants, pointed out that such activity is unfair to genuine refugees who patiently await asylum, noted that Jews escaping Nazism were glad of any place of refuge, not picking and choosing as these people do, advocated a limit upon immigrant numbers, and warned of the impact for Australian and Jewish security of the mass unvetted intake of Muslims.  He did so in a perfectly civilised fashion.


A storm of misplaced criticism, including accusations of hate speech and the issuing of an online petition in the guise of an open letter, has greeted Mr Magid's article, with (as Ha'aretz notes here) many of the great and good of the Australian Jewish community excoriating his views, along with the so-called Australian Jewish Democratic Society (not known as a particularly robust ally of Israel) and a number of assorted leftwing Jewish activists, the kind of people who are apt to cry foul when any fellow-Jew has the temerity to evince a conservative viewpoint regarding immigration and its consequences.

"You should be ashamed of yourself," such leftists cry.  And to those who point to what is happening in Eurabia, and urge Australia not to emulate what some realists are openly calling "the European tragedy," the inevitable response is: "You're an Islamophobe!"  Some particularly zealous lefties have even been known with malice aforethought and an exquisite contempt for freedom of speech to contact one's boss or employer alleging unconscionable views, as I've disclosed in previous blogposts.

Like other Australians, Jews have to deal with the world as it is, and not how we imagine it or wish it to be.  Look at the plight of Europe.  Look at the exponential rise in antisemitism there, and note what elements are fuelling it.  Is that – is this – what we want for our children and our children's children?  Of course we need to be compassionate, but compassion is due to our fellow-Australians and our progeny too.

Reports Ha'aretz:

'Asked to respond to the torrent of criticism, Magid told Haaretz he stood by his article. “It’s not a question of who’s more compassionate,” he said. “The Jews who had the gas chambers behind them would have gone to any country. I feel a hell of a lot more sympathy for people starving in Darfur. “These are the people who should have first priority not people who have the money and cunning to jump the queue."

He said he believed “most Australians including most Jews would agree with me but don’t have the guts to come out and say it."'

The Sydney Morning Herald adds (hat tip: reader Ian):

'Last night, Mr Magid said he stood by every word of his article. ''I think the majority of people agree with me but they are not willing to come out and say what I am prepared to say. It is a very cogent statement.'''

 An eminently respectable Jewish friend of mine observed recently:

"I know I should be in favour of providing refuge for our endless procession of boat people but the fact that most of them are Muslim causes me great concern. The new census figures put them up to about 400,000."

Quite so.

Here's a warning to Canada.  It stands as a warning to Australia too: