BOLD like a Leopard

The year was 2008 and for many Americans an economic meltdown, the War in Iraq, and the waning failing days of the Bush Administration had spawned a feeling that change was needed. But for me, at the time a struggling engineering student at the Technion’s pre-academic program, the idea that voting would change that wasn’t even in my mind. I’d moved to Israel four years before, served in the army, and didn’t vote in my first eligible American election.  Leaving the USA I’d pretty much come to the conclusion that the American political system was dominated by two hogs wrestling over corn cob.   But the truth was that by 2008-09 I had also become fatigued and culturally alienated despite being from an extended family largely made up of Israelis. I was living in the Hadar neighbourhood of Haifa, a warren of dilapidated early 20th century Bauhaus homes populated by a population of the city’s poorest, heroin addicts and alcoholics, elderly Russian immigrants, and Filipino ...

The Three Musketeer s   as Reinterpreted by Tara Subtle Tingler We join our brave D’Artagnan in the midst of his meeting with the Duke of Buckingham (Ch. 21). All of the previous chapters are victim-shaming colonialist apologies. D’Artagnan blushed up to the whites of his eyes. He saw that the duke was searching for a means of making him accept something and the idea that the blood of his friends and himself was about to be paid for with English gold was strangely repugnant to him. “Let us understand each other, my Lord,” replied d’Artagnan, “and let us make things clear beforehand in order that there may be no mistake. I am in the service of the King and Queen of France, and form part of the company of Monsieur Dessessart, who, as well as his brother-in-law, Monsieur de Treville, is particularly attached to their Majesties. What I have done, then, has been for the queen, and not at all for your Grace. And still further, it is very probable I should not have don...

CHAPTER XI. (FORGET THE OTHER CHAPTERS. JUST ANACHRONISTIC SEXISM) “COME in,” says the woman, and I did.  She says:  "Take a cheer.” I done it.  She looked me all over with her little shiny eyes, and says: “What might your name be?” “Tara Subtle Tingler. I am the social media director at the Chronicles of Geographic Palestine and the Levantine Shore .  Where ’bouts do you live?  In this neighborhood?’ “No’m.  In Hookerville, seven mile below.  I’ve walked all the way and I’m all tired out.” "HOLD ON! Did you just say the H-word??!! Are you slut shaming? I'll have you know that SEX WORKERS are human beings too. You stupid chauvinist pig! How does a child your age develop into such a degenerate male pig!!" So then ten minutes later she had washed my mouth out with soap and finally calmed down. “Hungry, too, I reckon.  I’ll find you something.” “No’m, I ain’t hungry.  I was so hungry I had to stop two miles below here ...

Note: This is a post that I had submitted to the Times of Israel  blogs in response to a campaign of  disinformation against a fellow blogger and casual acquaintance named Fred Maroun . I submitted it on Sunday, September 30 2018, and it was rejected by the blog editors. The rationale given was that "[t] his post is not approved for publication because it contains false assertions and makes slanderous, ad-hominem claims against an identifiable person. "  Unfortunately no action has been taken against the person in question for her own slanderous and ad hominem attacks against her critics from other TOI bloggers like Maroun to common Facebook users, because she is herself affiliated with Times of Israel .  I am also expanding the article somewhat (highlighted in grey) as there are less time constraints. You can therefore judge the piece on the basis of both its original form as submitted as well as the new updates the I've added. Last week, as some of you r...

  Expecting Jeremy Corbyn supporters to change their view of him even based on his own public statements is too much to hope for given the inspirational attraction he has on them. ( Wikimedia commons - Fair use ) There remains a seemingly bottomless pit of grainy handheld videos showing people asking UK Labour Party chief and Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn questions pertaining to Israel, Zionism, the Middle East, or other topics and him answering with candid vitriol toward the country that seems to be his eternal gadfly. And above that bottomless pit is an infinitely tall tower of individuals and organizations that condemn him and call for him to "address" the issue of anti-Jewish activity within Labour. Those people can keep talking, but it's not going to amount to a hill of beans because they are not convincing the multitudes of young Labour voters that joined the party due to his sensational success in the 2015 leadership campaign that saw him earn 2...

. . . And it's going to get worse thanks to us, their peers and families.  Rather than showcasing human suffering, #IfNotNow's spokespeople like Noah Wagner engage in insufferable hoaxes. I was drawn to write this by a NOW THIS  video shared by Pakistani pro-Israel activist  Naveed Anjum . In the clip, a young peach fuzz faced person from #IfNotNow explained the rationale behind their protest at Birthright. This is a reflection on why this is happening, and how I would answer it. As a youngster I surfed the still new internet during the Netscape years, playing computer tennis online at the library and reading all sorts of intriguing pieces of content while sitting at the library across the street from my late mom's condo. It was through hours of reading there, both online and offline, that I came to be part of the Jewish left of the early 2000s. I still believed in a Jewish state, but I was sure that given the deaths and suffering of so many Palestinians that th...