The Jewish Queen of Wimbledon

It being near the start of that glorious time of the year, Wimbledon Fortnight, I thought I'd briefly recall the period - not that I have firsthand memories of it, you understand! - when a Jewish girl from France was the queen of the courts at the All England Tennis Club and the toast of the stands.

With the dominance of the Williams Sisters on the famous grass courts of  the All England Tennis Club it's hard to appreciate that there was a time when the game of tennis was as white as the players' outfits.

The first black player to make her mark on the championships was the great Althea Gibson, from the USA, who in 1956 won the doubles crown with Britain's Angela Buxton.  Early in her tennis career Angela, who's Jewish, encountered antisemitic prejudice in some established tennis circles.  However, being Jewish didn't impede Suzanne Lenglen from becoming the darling of the sport - how well-known her Jewishness was I'm unable to say.

Suzanne Lenglen (1899-1938), the daughter of a businessman in Compiègne, a city north of Paris, was encouraged to take up the sport in childhood to build up her strength, and won her first tournament in 1915.  Her earliest appearance at Wimbledon was in 1919.  It was the first time she'd played on grass, but she progressed to the final,where, watched by  8000 spectators including King George V and Queen Mary, she defeated seven-times winner Dorothea Lambert Chambers of the UK.  The match, which went to 44 games, was the longest in tennis history up the that time.

In contrast to her opponent, who like other female players of the time, wore garments with long sleeves and ankle-length skirts, Suzanne was clad in sleeveless outfits and  billowing calf-length skirts.  She moved around court with the agility of a gazelle, both feet frequently leaving the ground.

Here's her Wimbledon record:

Singles Champion: 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922, 1923, 1925.

Doubles Champion: 1919, 1920. 1921, 1922, 1923, 1925.

Mixed Doubles Champion: 1920, 1922, 1925.

She's still a legend among all who, like me, avidly follow tennis.  I believe her final appearance at Wimbledon was rather unfortunate, when having inadvertently been an hour late for the beginning of a match, she was booed by spectators for the perceived slight to Queen Mary, and left the court soon afterwards.

Suzanne Lenglen's style - of dress and of play - is seen in this video of 1926 when she faced the American champion Helen Wills [Moody]:

Pamela Geller On The Dangers Facing Israel (video)

As most people will be aware, Pamela Geller runs the celebrated Jihad-watch blog "Atlas Shrugs".  In this interview she tells of the dangers facing the tiny State of Israel now that the Arab narrative has managed to capture so much of world opinion.

Hat tip: reader Rita

Funny – That Rifle Doesn't Look Jewish!

Here's a photo that appears on an anti-Israel page on Facebook. It gives the impression of an IDF soldier stepping arrogantly and brutally on the chest of a Palestinian child while her distraught mother looks on.

It's attracted the usual often intemperate denunciations of Israel (and of Jews) from the usual suspects, in such comments as these eight, chosen by me at random:

"This is beyond depressing. Words cannot express how heart breaking this picture is. What's worse is that this is a child for God's sake. Shame on them"

"Khazar Jews do not respect peace or love. They only respect violence and hate."

"A nation without feelings go to the endless hell Israel"

"Terrorists...Cowerd"

'“So that Jews will hide behind trees and the tree will say “Muslim! The servant of Allah! Come, look there is a Jew behind me, he hid here, behind me, come and punish him”. Only the tree Gharqad will not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.” (Kitab al-Fitan, hadith. 2239)'

'... there [sic] book talmud teaches them so"The jews are only human and nations of world(gentiles)are not human but beast-baba necia 114b'

 "This is heart breaking but to the brothers and sisters cursing and then praising Allah in the same line... can you please not do that"

"Muslims are required to unite to stop this cruelty.. no one else would do that for us!"

 But at least one person with an Arab name isn't fooled:

"I do not want to understand that I am defending the Israeli occupier but i think that the weapon carried by the soldier indicative of something Force the Israeli army is American-made M-16 The weapons that are in the picture is a Russian-made Kalashnikov"

Nevertheless, the "Like" button has been clicked after a comment demanding: 

"share this"

Don't be surprised, therefore, to see the picture on a placard at a demo near you!

A Century of Science and Technology in Eretz Israel (video)

Israel has become a scientific and technological powerhouse, producing innovations and inventions and making medical breakthroughs beneficial to the world.  This video celebrates the establishment and achievements of the Haifa Technion, the Israel Institute of Technology.

Professor Benny Morris on Israel's Security and the "Arab Spring" (video)

Here's Israeli Benny Morris, Professor of Middle East History at Ben-Gurion University, speaking on the above theme to the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London on 14 June:

 

He also spoke the other evening at the London School of Economics on the theme "Reconsidering the  1948 Arab-Israeli War" and you can see the entire video here (It's very long!):

How The "Settlers" Have Benefited The West Bank

In an important article that is not to be missed, George Gilder undermines the received wisdom that the Israeli "settlers" have had a deleterious impact on the Palestinian Arab population of the disputed territories west of the Jordan.

Inter alia, he notes:

'A few simple statistics suggest that the Israeli "settlers" (and to the PLO all Israelis are settlers) once again are the solution rather than the problem in the region. Since the foundation of the State of Israel in a land that is half desert with no rain for six months of the year, the population has risen tenfold. While the amount of land under cultivation has nearly tripled, agricultural production has increased sixteenfold, producing some $800 million worth of Israeli farm exports last year. At the same time, industrial output has surged fiftyfold. Meanwhile, Israeli use of water has decreased by 10 percent.

....With an array of new hydrological innovations, Israel provides the crucial answers to the acute water crisis that afflicts the Middle East and much of the rest of the world. Just as the Israeli settlers enabled the emergence of an economy in Palestine, so they offer the prospect of saving the entire region from water exhaustion and poverty after the oil boom ends.

America's enemies in the Middle East well understand that no American military goals or resources in the Middle East are as remotely as important to the region as is Israel, with its ever-growing panoply of technical, economic, moral, and military assets. Israel cruised through the recent global slump with scarcely a down quarter, with nary a deficit or "stimulus plan" and with an ascendant shekel, while increasing its global supremacy, behind only the U.S., in an array of leading-edge technologies, from microchip design, network algorithms, medical instruments, and water recycling to missile defense, robotic warfare, and unmanned aerial vehicles....

Meanwhile, contrary to all the floods of mendacious propaganda purveyed by an ever-gullible mainstream media, Netanyahu's bold economic and humanitarian policies in the West Bank and Gaza have succeeded in fostering a brisk economic revival in the territories, with a recovery rate of near 10 percent in Gaza alone. As George Will acerbically noted in a particularly brilliant column, "Turkey was claiming to bring humanitarian aid to Gaza, a land with higher incomes and longevity than Turkey itself."'

 Read the entire article here: http://spectator.org/archives/2011/06/08/the-economics-of-settlement/2

The NIF's Naomi Chazan On Why BDS Is Wrong

Here's something that should make the anti-Israel Left pause for thought.  Speaking at the Newtown Synagogue in Sydney this week, leftist Israeli Professor Naomi Chazan, President of the New Israel Fund, who can hardly therefore be described as a "hawk," outlined why the BDS movement is wrong.  (I don't necessarily endorse some of the incidental points she makes, and I'm sure regular followers of this blog will easily guess which!):

"The aim of the BDS is to purportedly bring Israel to end its occupation of the territories conquered in 1967 and bring it to the negotiating table.

But I will give you six arguments why it probably does precisely the opposite:

·     First, it is ineffective. BDS is not affecting the Israeli economy. Israel’s economy is burgeoning, and many envy us for how we got through the GFC [Great Financial Crisis] without experiencing the GFC. If at all the BDS is adversely affecting working-class people. The last people in Israel who should be victims of BDS – the workers – are the first to be affected.

·     Second, the global BDS, because it is directed against Israel and all Israelis, indirectly or directly undermines the very existence of the state of Israel. To question the existence of Israel is akin to calling for the elimination of Israel. Sometimes it’s a codeword for a one-state solution, which denies the right of Israel and Jews to self-determination. I have no suicidal tendencies whatsoever. I will not be party to my own self-destruction. I have one passport – an Israeli passport – and I intend to keep it and am perfectly happy for our borders to shrink substantially to do so.

·     Third, BDS has become counterproductive. It strengthens those Israelis who really believe that the entire world is against us. I come from a country that is very strong but is guided by a victim mentality. Every day that the BDS movement exists, it is strengthening the right wing and extremist forces in Israel. In Israel we call it a boomerang!

·     Fourth, if anybody suffers today from BDS, it is the already-weakened left in Israel – precisely the progressive forces we want to fortify. The BDS movement has been used as an excuse to carry out a series of witch-hunts against progressive forces in Israel, and against me personally, and it is tremendously damaging for those Israelis who have been carrying out the struggle for a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

·     Fifth, the most offensive part of the BDS movement is that it has been directed against academics. Israeli academics have been singled out, not invited to conferences, their articles rejected in major journals, because they are Israeli, not because of the content. The vast majority of academics are peaceniks and progressive. You are doing the work of the Israeli far right. As an academic, there is one haven of real debate and that’s in academic circles; supporting BDS goes against the grain of academic freedom.

·     Finally, the most important point, though I don’t know if it’s the most significant. Look how much energy we are expending, even in Australia. I understand there were pitched battles on the subject in Sydney! If someone wanted to invent a diversion, BDS is it.

If you care about a just peace in the Middle East, expend all your energy bringing it about and not arguing about the method. The time has come to realise a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel for the benefit of both peoples."

Thanks to the J-Wire news service for this extract and the photograph of Professor Chazan.  See also:
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/2760806.html