For those who may not be aware, Abie Nathan recently celebrated 80th birthday. Being one of the many people in Israel who enjoyed listening to Abie’s Voice of Peace radio station: “that’s right, 1540 on your FM dial”, I was thoroughly pleased to listen to the birthday tribute made to him today by the DJ’s and staff of a local station, 100 FM who recreated the Voice of Peace today, May 12, in commemoration of this wonderful human being who has given so much of himself in the cause of peace and humanity.
In a previous article I posted a short while back, it was written that Abie’s main wish for this day was to be given the means to end his suffering; i.e. to take his own life. In his present condition, Abie Nathan feels that he has been forgotten by the very humanity he tried so much to help. It’s not just his poor state of health that depresses him now – it’s how both Israel and the rest of the world seem to have swept both him and his dreams under the rug of history. With all that is going on in this world of ours today, especially during the past 7 years, I for one wonder what Abie Nathan would have done to help alleviate the suffering of people in so many disasters, natural and man-made, which have occurred around the planet. I can only speculate, but here are some of my ideas as to how Abie would have reacted to the following events:
1. 9-11: Abie would have certainly gone to New York City and stayed there at least a few weeks assisting in the search for victims of the World Trade Center attack, and to do what he could to help the survivors and next of kin of those who perished. He would have done this despite the backgrounds of those who became innocent victims of terror.
2. The tsunami tidal waves in Southern Asia, in December, 2004: Judging on past natural tragedies in which Abie was involved, he would have organized a large shipment of medical and other humanitarian supplies to assist the survivors of this mega catastrophe that killed nearly a quarter million human beings. One would have surely seen him in the middle of some of the worst hit areas, passing out candy and other items to children to put a smile on their stunned faces. It wouldn’t have mattered if it were in Indonesia, Thailand, India, or Sri Lanka, Abie would have gone to where he was needed.
3. Hurricane Katrina in August, 2005: Abie would have been right there on the spot to assist in the rescue of people trapped in flooded buildings in New Orleans and other areas. He also would have organized relief supplies and temporary shelter to people on the stricken Gulf Coast – many of whom who were from poorer backgrounds and not given aid fast enough during the first crucial days following the category 5 mega-storm.
4. Lebanon and Israel, July-August, 2006. Abie would have reacted immediately to the tragedy of this conflict, and if allowed would have surely aided the Lebanese as well as his own countrymen who suffered from this short but terrible war. Abie Nathan’s philosophy was to help anyone who was in need of assistance; and he would have done all he could to help those who were suffering on either side of the Israeli-Lebanese border. As it turned out, private individuals and organizations reacted much quicker than government ones; a situation still being talked about to this day.
5. Darfur in the Sudan: This conflict, now being referred to as the new holocaust of the 21st Century, would not be strange to a man like Abie Nathan as he often went to conflict torn regions, including the Congo, Ethiopia, and other places where man’s inhumanity to Man is reaching a scale of shocking proportions. Though not yet on the scale of the horrors of the Rwandan tribal massacres of the early 1990’s, what is presently happening to the inhabitants of this unfortunate region needs much more attention that what is being given by the rest of humanity. In fact, Abie suffered his first stroke while on a similar mission in Africa in 1995. Tragedies such as these only show how big Abie Nathan’s heart was in regards to helping to relieve human suffering.
While these are only a few examples of crises areas where Abie Nathan would have given his able assistance, they indicate what he would have done if given the opportunity. In the realm of promoting peace, Abie Nathan had his few moments of glory in which he could reap the personal satisfaction of helping to make it all come about – one of these being in the aftermath of the 1978 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt. The ink was barely dry on the document signed by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israel Prime Minister Menachem Begin, when Abie broadcasted a VOP program from a night club in the center of Cairo. It’s too bad that he won’t have the opportunity to do this again from a similar location in the center of Beirut or Damascus.
Abie Natthan may be old, sick, and infirm; but he is certainly not forgotten. Not by many of us who still pray for the day when peace and understanding will finally come not only to Israel and her neighbors, but in many other parts of our world as well.
Happy birthday, Abie, and many, many happy returns!
The American presidential race is off with a bang, and this fact is none the less dramatized within the Republican Party. One of this party’s presidential hopefuls, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, has made his presidential bid even more ‘interesting’ by his recent disclosures that he had an extra-marital affair during the period prior to impeachment proceedings against former U.S. President Bill Clinton. The revelation by Mr. Gingrich shouldn’t be startling to anyone who is familiar with the former Georgia Congressman, who made a similar disclosure during the investigations against President Clinton. Gingrich, who as the 59th House Speaker held one of the most powerful political positions in America, eventually resigned this position, as well as his seat in the House of Representatives. The incident also cost him his marriage as well.
This is a nice edition to the blog world. The Israeli consulate in New York has a blog called 
I was sent this 
(Hat Tip: Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times)
Is the cat out of the bag, or is this something most people really knew all along? Only days after U.S. President Bush met with Pakistan’s president (or is it Dictator) Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in New York during the opening session of the U.N. General Assembly, the release of the General’s book, In the Line of Fire, some very revealing details concerning Pakistan’s “real relationship” with the United States. Musharraf, who himself is not lily-white when it comes to how he became the supreme ruler of the world’s only (so far) nuclear armed Islamic country, has now made a virtual confession concerning how he had no alternative other than to ‘change horses’ and give support to the U.S. led War on Terror following the Al Qaeda planned attacks against the U.S. in September, 2001.
September 11, 2001 started out as any ordinary day: Clear blue skies and nice weather. On 8:46 am flight number 11 of American Airlines crashed into the northern tower of The World Trade Center (also known as The Twin Towers) in New York. The plane hit floors 93-99 and created a fire of 1000 degrees. The collision ruined the elevator shaft and prevented access to the emergency stairs. About 1300 people were trapped on the floors above the crash. At 9:03 am another plane crashed, this time into the southern tower. Another 600 people were trapped inside the second building. 
Today at 9 a.m. E.D.T., and 4 p.m. M.E.T. (for those living in Israel and other similar time-zone countries), ceremonies will mark the fifth anniversary of what is now being considered the worst single attack against the United States, since Pearl Harbor. The events of this modern ‘day of infamy’ have been shown during the past few days by news networks all over the world. All the major U.S. new programs have been screening the horrible occurrences, in which at least 3.000 people lost their lives; most of them at the sight of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan, New York City. Particularly as these events are re-screened, the nightmare of that fateful day becomes real again, almost a real as it was too many, a mere five years ago.
A joint video taped speech by No. 2 Al Qaeda leader Ayman Muhammad al-Zawahiri, and his American ‘spokesman’ Adam Gadahn, known in Al Qaeda circles as “Azaam the American” appeared over the weekend. The tape in which “Azzam” was speaking in English and al-Zawahiri in Arabic with English subtitles appeared to once again be reaching out to Westerners, especially Americans. Both Gadahn and al-Zawahiri were wearing white, which in Islamic religious circles symbolizes both purity and mourning, offered unbelievers an ‘opportunity’ to convert to Islam, before it is too late. 
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