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May 24, 2013

Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb: When I didn't so 'humbly disagree'

Caroline B. Glick: Thank you, Hafez al-Assad

Diana West: From the Brooklyn Bridge to London
Morgan Housel: Why spotting bubbles is so much harder than you think

Environmental Nutrition editors: NuVal labeling to the rescue?

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Memorial Day: Jews Serving and KIA in War on Terror; Liberace Bio-Pic; Jew Wins "Survivor"; Shalom, Dr. Brothers; More

The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen: HIDE THESE FROZEN TREATS FROM THE KIDDIES!: Sangria pops; Irish cream pudding pops; mango Lassi pops

May 22, 2013

John Thorne: They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman

John Rosemond: 'Disciplinary math' adds up to parental successl

Warren Richey: Are prayers before public meetings OK? Supreme Court to decide
Rick Montgomery: Use of ADHD drugs as study aid raises concern on campuses

Brierley Wright, M.S., R.D.: 6 convincing reasons you should keep carbs in your diet

Eoin O'Carroll: Scientists examine nothing, find something

The Kosher Gourmet by Carole Kotkin: This soup is made from one of the great pleasures of spring: A wonderful pairing of rosy color and earthy tang

May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting

May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel


Jewish World Review Dec. 14, 2011 / 18 Kislev, 5772

The last days of a despot, Or: A nervous man sings a nervous song

By Paul Greenberg




http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | It won't work. Talking to Barbara Walters, interviewer to the stars, Syria's bloody dictator acted as if he were just an innocent bystander to his country's sufferings. Rather than their cause. By now Bashar al-Assad's act may not fool even Bashar al-Assad. Under the sharkskin splendor of that Beirut business suit, he has to be sweating.

His country is in spreading flames, bodies litter the streets of rebellious cities like Homs, the resistance is no longer waving banners but guns, a rival army of defectors is already in the field, and the revolution is following the same general arc as every other in the Arab Spring. It may have turned to winter elsewhere, but it's still fresh in Syria. And blood red.

Even as Bashar Assad explained how much his people supported him, the fate of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Moammar Gadhafi in Libya must have preyed on his mind. They, too, were the people's choice -- till the very moment they weren't.

Syrians call their dictator The Giraffe when they think his secret police aren't listening, and it is hard to look at his picture, with that long neck of his, and not imagine a rope coiled around it. He must feel it tightening every day. No wonder he sounds nervous. His days as a dictator, or just his days, are numbered. He sounded not only strange but estranged from reality.

Maybe it was the 70th anniversary of Pearl Harbor this year that did it, but a half-remembered ditty that Cab Calloway used to sing about another dictator keeps coming back:

Der Fuehrer's got the jitters, he's lookin' thin,

We made our reservations, and we're movin' in . . .

He don't know where, he don't know when,

But we made our reservations, and we're movin' in

Where, when and exactly how the House of Assad will fall remains uncertain. The bloody details always are as power slips out of the tyrant's grasp. Will it be the next slight breath that topples his house of cards, or the one after?

The endgame has begun in Syria, but how long before checkmate? The pieces -- pawns, knights, bishops, rooks -- are falling one by one. Or joining the opposition. Or fleeing the country. It is only a matter of time before the king is pushed over, and the game done. As he must know. No wonder he's got the jitters, and he's lookin' mighty thin.

The longer his regime struggles, the longer the innocent will be massacred. The death toll just topped 5,000. Even the United Nations has noticed. Why, even the Arab League has spoken up, and this time not to say it's all Israel's fault. (Surely, that will come in time.)

The specter of civil war and sectarian chaos, as in Iraq before the Surge, grows more real every day -- for Syria is a potpourri of creeds and ethnicities: Sunnis, Shi'a, Alawites, Christians, Kurds, Druse, Circassians, Armenians....

It's the Yugoslavia Syndrome. When the iron dictatorship that held all the restive sects and peoples together falls apart, civil war ensues. While the world stands back and goes tut-tut. Till it can no longer just look on and finally, finally imposes some kind of peace, or at least a diminished war. Chaos impends, if it hasn't already begun. Homs, the epicenter of the revolt, has been leveled before -- by Assad the Elder -- and now Assad the Younger may try a repeat. Before he himself is leveled.

As Syria's regime cracks, the world talks. And only talks. Or votes for empty sanctions. This country's ambassador to Damascus, a brave man who has spoken out against the dictatorship and raised hopes of freedom, is headed back to the spreading bloodbath in Syria. Quite aside from the question of whether Washington would have done better to withdraw its ambassador months ago, his heroism is admirable. But it will prove only a gesture unless the rest of the world does more than talk.

What can be done? The free world has just done it -- in Libya. It may have waited too long, but it did act at last. A coalition of the willing enforced a no-fly zone that gave the rebels the air cover they needed to begin advancing. All the way to the shores of Tripoli. Given that kind of support, Libyans freed themselves. The world knows what to do -- if only it will do it.

But the longer such a step is put off, the more innocents will be mowed down. For now the American secretary of state offers only pap. ("We certainly believe that if Syrians unite, they together can succeed in moving their country to that better future...." --Hillary Clinton in Geneva last week.) As for the American president and commander-in-chief, he dithers. As usual. While a country bleeds. How long, oh how long, must the Syrians wait for freedom?

Bashar al-Assad's fall is in the cards, but why wait till they are dealt one by one, atrocity after atrocity? He's on his way out, but there's no reason his departure shouldn't be hastened. Just as Moammar Gadhafi's was. For mercy's sake.

Now it's Bashar al-Assad who's got the jitters and looking thin. The world needs to move in.

Paul Greenberg Archives

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