False Moral Equivalence as a Tool to Demonize Israel; Turkey Builds Mega-Mosque in U.S., Blocks Churches in Turkey...

In this mailing: Manfred Gerstenfeld and Jamie Berk: False Moral Equivalence as a Tool to Demonize Israel Uzay Bulut: Turkey Builds Mega-Mosque in U.S., Blocks Churches in Turkey False Moral Equivalence as a Tool to Demonize Israel by Manfred Gerstenfeld and Jamie Berk  •  April 18, 2016 at 5:00 am False moral equivalence is one of a series of major fallacies. False moral equivalence comparing Israel's actions to those of the Nazis was used by several prominent social-democratic politicians, including French President François Mitterrand, Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme and Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou. Another example of false moral equivalence is calling Israel an Apartheid State. Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter made this comparison in his 2006 book, Palestine Peace Not Apartheid -- which incorporates the false moral equivalence in its title. The false comparison between Zionism and racism has been repeated countless times through United Nations and UN-sponsored declarations and conferences. Another category of moral equivalence pretends that the intended murder of innocent civilians is equal to the accidental deaths of civilians in targeted assassinations. For instance, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry compared the three civilians murdered in the 2013 Boston Marathon to the nine activists who had planned violence and were killed by Israeli soldiers they attacked on the Mavi Marmara ship in 2013. The fallacious arguments of South Africa's retired Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu, blaming the Holocaust for Palestinian suffering, are yet another distortion leading to the obfuscation of the factual events. The Palestinian Nakba was a direct result of the war initiated by the Arab states and Palestinians against Israel to massacre Jews. (Image source: World Economic Forum) Among the many tools mobilized for the demonization of Israel, one frequently used is a mode of argument known as false moral equivalence. The term "moral equivalence," originates from a 1906 address by American philosopher William James.[1] It is the claim that there is no difference between two actions of greatly varying character. It is frequently used to emphasize similarities between two otherwise dissimilar acts. False moral equivalence undermines norms and values in a society, blurring the lines between good and evil also right and wrong. False moral equivalence comparing Israel's actions to those of the Nazis was used by several prominent social-democratic politicians, including French President François Mitterrand,[2] Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme[3] and Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou. [4] Continue Reading Article Turkey Builds Mega-Mosque in U.S., Blocks Churches in Turkey by Uzay Bulut  •  April 18, 2016 at 4:00 am As yet another enormous mosque has opened in the U.S. (funded by the Turkish government), Christians in Turkey are waiting for the day when Turkish state authorities will allow them freely to build or use their churches and safely pray inside them. In Turkey, some churches have been converted to stables or used as storehouses. Others have been completely destroyed. Sales of churches on the internet are a common practice. Meanwhile, Turkish President Erdogan said during the opening ceremony of the Maryland mosque that the center was important at a time of an "unfortunate rise in intolerance towards Muslims in the United States and the world." How would Muslims feel if mosques in Mecca were put up for sale on the internet, turned into stables, or razed to the ground? How would they feel if a Muslim child were beaten in the classroom by his teacher for not saying "Jesus is my Lord and Savior?" How would they feel if they continually received violent threats or insults for just attempting peacefully to worship in their mosques? Before Muslim political or religious leaders lecture the world about the non-existent threat of "Islamophobia" or "intolerance against Muslims" in the West, they should take moral responsibility and address the real abuses against Christians in their home countries, and the actual Christian genocide taking place across the Muslim world. The Istanbul Protestant Church officially requested last year that local Christians be allowed to worship in the Meryem Ana (Mother Mary) Church -- in the hands of the city of Kayseri and used in the past as a sports center. City officials indicated that the church would instead be turned into a mosque or used as a museum. On April 2, a gigantic Ottoman style of mosque was opened in Lanham, Maryland by the president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The mosque, according to Turkish officials, is "one of the largest Turkish mosques built outside Turkey." Funds to build it, as reported by the Turkish pro-government newspaper, Sabah, came from Turkey's state-run Presidency of Religious Affairs, known as the Diyanet, as well as Turkish-American non-profit organizations. The mosque is actually part of a larger complex, commonly referred to as "Maryland kulliye." A kulliye, as such Islamic compounds were called in Ottoman times, is a complex of buildings, centered on a mosque and composed of various facilities including a madrassa (Islamic religious school). Erdogan recited verses from the Quran inside the mosque after the mosque was opened. Continue Reading Article