The Dangers in Conspiracist Nonsense

“A Conspiracy!” cried the delighted lady, clapping her hands. “Of all things, I do like a Conspiracy! It’s so interesting!” - Lewis Carroll, My Lady, Sylvie and Bruno (1889)
Conspiracism is probably best characterized as a form of mental illness. Some researchers in psychiatry plainly agree. It is the attribution of control of world events to a hidden cabal of omnipotent conspirators. It is the claim that an organized "hidden hand" lies behind world developments. It is probably best treated in clinics with padded walls.

 

Perhaps the best example of conspiracism in recent years has been the attempt to dismiss the fact that thousands of eyewitnesses saw passenger planes full of civilians crashing into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9-11 and that the hijackers were all Arab al-Qaeda operatives. Crank conspiracists insist instead that the CIA, the Mossad, the Council on Foreign Relations (which publishes Foreign Affairs magazine), the Jews, the freemasons, the "Illuminati," the Vatican, or some other nefarious group were really behind the attacks.  (In the case of the fabricator of the "theory" of a SHABAK conspiracy behind the Rabin assassination, it seems to be ALL of the above!)

 

Many of us have a tendency to dismiss people making such conspiracist claims as harmless lunatics and amusing eccentrics. This is all the more true because quite a few conspiracy “theorists” also endorse crackpot claims about UFOs and abductions by space aliens. But conspiracism can be quite dangerous, and conspiracism in Israel has played a particularly harmful role in recent years. Moreover, Israeli conspiracists at times promote the very same “theories” as Holocaust Deniers and anti-Semites, and often on the very same web sites.

 

In the US conspiracism has emerged with special popularity in relation to the 1963 assassination of President Kennedy. Polls show that large numbers of Americans believe conspiracy "theories" about Kennedy's death. But there was no conspiracy there at all. The very best article debunking JFK conspiracism is still “Yes, Oswald Alone Killed Kennedy,” by Jacob Cohen in Commentary Magazine, June 1992.

 

Outside Israel, conspiracism is closely linked with anti-Semitism, and many of the "grand cabal" theories of the conspiracists involve supposed plots by Jews (or “Zionists") to "take over" the world, or at least American foreign policy. Conspiracism is common among the Neo-Nazi fringe Right, the far Left, and the "anarchists". There are tens of thousands of internet web sites devoted to their “theories”.

 

It would be a mistake to dismiss all such people as mere harmless buffoons. In North America a handful of university professors endorse conspiracy “theories” about the collapse of the World Trade Center, including Brigham Young University physics professor Steven E. Jones, and a professor of economics at the University of Ottawa Michel Chossudovsky (who is also a Holocaust Denier). It is all the more alarming to see the spread of conspiracism into Israel.

 

Perhaps the best analysis of the conspiracist mindset is that of Daniel Pipes in his seminal book “Conspiracy: How the Paranoid Style Flourishes and Where it Comes From” (the Free Press, 1997). Pipes defines “conspiracism" as “fear of a nonexistent conspiracy.” Pipes shows that nonsensical theories of a single institution or cabal plotting to take over the world go back at least 250 years. “Conspiracism,” according to Pipes, is a form of paranoid delusion that tends to take over the entire lives and personalities of believers. Embracing conspiracism strongly resembles the totalitarian immersion of cult members into herd thinking.

Let's Make More Global Warming!

As P. J. O'Rourke said, everyone wants to save the planet but no one wants to help Mom do the dishes.

For years most of us have believed that the Nobel Peace Prize could not possibly be debased any worse than it has been.  Shimon Peres and mass murderer Yassir Arafat were granted a Nobel "Peace Prize" for plunging the Middle East into an endless cycle of terrorist aggression against Israel and for putting Israel's very survival into jeopardy.  Arafat's share of the loot was used to buy weapons.  True, the decision to elect Peres as President of Israel is so much more absurd that the Nobel Committee looks lucid in comparison.  The only "peace" the Prize really celebrates is that where Arafat now Rests In.

And theirs wasn't even the only Orwellian award of the Peace Prize.  Bishop Desmond Tutu, who thinks the Israel Lobby is a manifestation of Nazism and supports anti-Jewish terror, also got the award.  For years Israel's Moonbatocracy has been trying to nominate Uri Avnery, Israel's Lord Haw-Haw, for one.  Israeli communists have been promoting terrorist accomplice Tali Fahima for one.  And let us not forget Goobers the Peanut Brain, the worst president in American history but a Nobel Prize holder!

But the decision to grant a Nobel Peace prize to Whacky Al Gore for his environmentalist hysterics and pseudo-scientific posturing must surely rival the earlier absurdities.  Gore, who was defeated in the Presidential election even though he tried to steal it by only recounting the ballots in his favor in Florida, is also the guy who claims to have invented the internet.  He has reinvented himself in recent years as a groupie of radical environmentalist nuttiness.

It seems that whenever countries get too rich and comfortable, their chattering classes start wringing their hands over the environment.  It is part of the price those countries pay for not having more serious national problems and challenges.

"Global Warming" has become the leading pseudo-cause of those practicing recreational compassion, people looking for a cheap way to impress their friends and neighbors about how caring they are.  Recycling bins on their lawns are their version of a PC creche.  As P. J. O'Rourke said, everyone wants to save the planet but no one wants to help Mom do the dishes.

Global warning is the cause celebre of the moral posturers, except when they are warning us about the dangers of global cooling (and there are many who still do THAT!).  They discover thinning ice shields in the polar regions except in the areas where it is getting thicker. They chant the mantra that George Bush and America's refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocol is behind the warming and the hurricanes.  Of course, if the earth is really getting a smidgen warmer it has nothing to do with humans.  Mars is getting warmer and its ice caps are melting a bit.  Gore will no doubt attribute that to selfish Republicans as well.

I have always thought that the idea that humans can change a planet's climate is a bit of megalomania.  A more believable take on planetary survivability is in this week's Torah portion, about Noah and the rainbow.  While there is doubt as to whether global warming is even taking place, there is no doubt at all that humans - if it is for real - have nothing to do with it.   

The global warming hysteria also ignores the many benefits and positive aspects of global warming.  Even those who are convinced beyond a doubt that it is occurring agree that its main manifestation is slightly warmer winter nights.  Since my heating system does not work very well, I for one would welcome warmer winter nights.  No one knows how warmer climate affects rainfall but it is likely to cause more of it, and that surely is good for Israel, and the British would deserve it!

Ever since the first shrieks about global warming were heard, I have been checking the beaches of Haifa, hoping to see a visible sign of some rise in ocean surface levels.  But alas, not even a bit.  On the other hand, all those tales about tropical orchids growing at the North Poll are actually reasons for celebration!

There are so many benefits from global warming, I think it behooves all of us to do our parts to create more of it!

First, if the ice pack over Greenland really does melt, this might be a nice place to create a "Palestinian state."   The terrorists could undergo career reorientation and take to cod fishing.  They could throw grenades at whales.  Ahmedinejad and his ayatollahs could be sent there, as a substitute for Alaska, where they want to send all the Jews.

Second, I can see numerous benefits for the world from any rise in ocean surface levels.  It would solve most of the problems of the Middle East!  

Flooding the Gaza Strip with ocean water due to rising sea levels would surely stop the Kassam rockets.  Now THAT is something worth buying an SUV over in order to achieve!  True, some other areas might be inundated.  But what is wrong with Ramat Aviv being under some nice sea water?  The leftist yuppies in the upper floors of their buildings would not be affected and would get capital gains on their oceanfront property.  The others could simply relocate and make aliya to Eretz Yisrael, getting new homes in Gush Etzion, Efrat and Ariel. 

Elsewhere, rising sea levels would erase Venice, California, and Santa Cruz.  The hills in Berkeley where the employed professionals live would be safe, but the Berkeley lowlands where the radicals posture and protest would be eliminated.  The more I think about it, the more I like the idea!

Israel is so small that it cannot be seen on most global maps.  But even so, we really should be doing more in order to hasten global warming.  Cutting taxes on imports of SUVs would be a good place to start and would also lower the traffic fatality rate.

So let's do our part to hasten global warming!  A Nobel Peace Prize may be in it for us! 

Answers to Answers to Answers

Chasing imaginary conspiracies works to neutralize the Israeli Right

The entire world saw those hijacked planes crashing into the WTC towers on 9-11.  Yet there are conspiracy nuts (one of whom is the main inventor of the Rabin assassination conspiracy "theory," at least when he is not busy publishing his articles on Neo-Nazi Holocaust Denial web sites) who insist that the collapse of the WTC towers was NOT caused by the exploding planes, or even claim that no planes at all crashed into the WTC.  The entire world saw Yigal Amir on the tape shoot Rabin, as did all the eyewitnesses, and Amir readily confirms he shot Rabin with live bullets.  I am reminded of that old Richard Pryor quip when I read the conspiracy "theories" about the assassination - "Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?"

Does Fendel seriously mean to argue that if Lincoln and Julius Caesar were assassinated, this proves that Yigal Amir is innocent of killing Rabin?

The blog entries that follow below must be read to make sense of this posting here.  So we agree that the "20 minute car trip to the hospital" was not 20 minutes and was based on inaccurate recordings of times by those involved.  So what?

1.  None of the MDs who at first thought Rabin was struck by three bullets or struck from the front think so today.  They themselves think their initial impression was wrong, and accept the findings of the Shamgar Commission.  Why does Fendel doubt their word today?  There was no third bullet wound at all. Rabin's spine was NOT sliced by the bullet. These "claims" were at best early innocent suspicions that turned out to be wrong and today are conspiracist misrepresentations, similar to falsehoods in the 9-11 conspiracy "theories." 

2.  Initial hospital reports made in the emergency room often bear little resemblance to actual final reports, especially when surgery is involved.

3.  I do not know if Miriam Oren thinks today Rabin was unhurt by the gunfire of Amir.  Maybe someone should ask her.  In any case, the simple fact of the matter is that he WAS.  So she was wrong.  The other eyewitnesses all saw things differently.  Did Oren also not see the planes crashing into the WTC on 9-11?

4.  UPDATE:  A security man checked the back seat of the car, closed the "mysteriously closing door" but did not ride with Rabin in the car's back seat on the way to the hospital.  No mystery!  No conspiracy!

5.  At the Columbine school shooting, the shooting in Virginia Tech, and at many others people thought they were hearing blanks because real bullets being fired do not sound like what people imagine.  Tell me, if it is now discovered that someone yelled "Felafel" close to the scene of the shooting, would this prove that Amir had fired felafel at Rabin?

6.  People injured by gunfire often continue to take steps and walk. This can confuse people like Miriam Oren and Hillel Fendel.

7.  Sneh himself says he was wrong in his earlier impression of the wounds.  He believes the Shamgar Commission report.  Why does Fendel not believe him today?

8.  Haber does not say that he destroyed evidence.  Neither does the Shamgar report.  Fendel says that.

9.  Fendel is not an expert on gunpowder residue.  The Shamgar Commission spoke with numerous experts.  They saw nothing to suggest Amir did NOT shoot Rabin.  Who is Fendel to second guess them?

10.  The best way to discredit Israel National News, to discredit the entire Israeli Right, and to ensure that the policies of the Israeli Left continue to be implemented is to try to recruit the "Right" into pursuing mindless conspiracy nonsense, chasing imaginary conspiracies for which not a single scrap of real evidence exists.  None of Fendel's "questions" constitute evidence.  At best they are his ponderings and conjectures.

11.  Here is a question of my own.  How is it that Fendel believes anything (and everything?) he is told by David Rutstein?  Does he know who and what Rutstein is?  Why does he consider Rutstein more credible than Shamgar?

Answers to Prof. Plaut's "Answers"

Actually by Hillel Fendel and posted by Baruch Gordon [byline is hardcoded in acc. to one who posts]

Shalom.  Here are my answers to Prof. Plaut's answers.  The original questions in my article are in regular font, Prof. Plaut's are preceded by carets, and my answers are in italics.

How is it that an eye-witness to the event, Miriam Oren, was filmed at the site telling reporters emphatically and repeatedly, "I saw that Rabin was not hurt"?
>> Because she was wrong.
She was there, saw it happen, and said over and over that he was not hurt - but those who were not there say she was "wrong."  Maybe they have ruach hakodesh?

How did Rabin's armored car back door close?
>> Because someone inside closed it.
The Shamgar Commission found that only Rabin was in the back seat; Damti was getting into the car as the door closed on the other side, and guard Rubin was tending to Rabin. No one else was inside.

Why was the call, "Blanks, blanks!" heard when the shots rang out?
>> Because people who heard the shots thought at first they were blanks. This is not unusual near actual shootings.
It's not unusual for people who hear gunshots to start spouting off their opinions about whether they were blanks?!?  How many people do you know who know the difference between real shots and blanks - and would choose the shooting of a Prime Minister, of all times, to tell everyone?
On the other hand, it could be that if no one - including the target of the shots - was hurt, someone might conclude that it was blanks...

Why was the assassin not killed immediately?
>> Because he was wrestled to the ground. Since when are assassins killed on the spot in Israel?
Since forever, according to Shabak procedure.

The last three questions have been asked publicly by Rabin's daughter, former MK Dalia Rabin-Pilosoph?
>> No they were not.
Yes, they were.  I guess you didn't read the Olam HaIshah interview cited in the article.  I assume many of the other readers did.

>> The Rabin children "ask questions" designed to "prove" that the entire Israeli Right and especially the Likud were behind the murder. Claims that the Rabin children endorse the loony "conspiracy theory" about Peres ordering the Rabin assassination or about Rabin supposedly being killed by his own guard are complete fabrications by people with disturbed minds.
How can these questions possibly prove that the right-wing did it?  If you read what she said, you'll see that she does not endorse any conspiracy theory - I never implied otherwise - but rather that she is very bothered by some of the same questions that bother the "conspiracy nuts."

Why did then-Health Minister Dr. Ephraim Sneh say on television that that Rabin had been wounded by bullets to the chest, stomach, and spinal cord?
>> Because he thought that was so at the time, based on the hospital's preliminary superficial examination. He was wrong.
A 'preliminary superficial examination'? Do you really think the hospital would be anything less than 100% thorough in a case like this?  Three top doctors who operated him filled out their report that he was wounded to the chest! In addition, Sneh was speaking after Rabin was unsuccessfully operated on!  It was clear to them, and Hospital Director Barabash, and to Sneh, that the bullet entered the chest. Yet you know that Sneh was wrong?

Why did security guard Yoram Rubin testify before the Shamgar Commission that Rabin was shot at 9:50 PM, when in fact Yigal Amir was arrested at 9:30 PM?
>> Because he made a mistake, or had not looked at his watch or his watch was fast.
Yeah, right, people always walk around with a watch that's 20 minutes fast, or testify at a government commission about things they don't know...  I mean, if bloggers can write about things they don't know, then why should witnesses at a government commission be different?
By the way, the Shamgar commission concluded that the death was at 9:50...  Don't tell me you're siding with those lunatics who disagree with Shamgar?  (See also what you wrote in the next line)

Why did Rabin's driver, Menachem Damti, testify that he drove to Ichilov Hospital in less than two minutes, when the ride actually took over 20 minutes?
>> It did NOT take over 20 minutes. The admissions time stamp at the hospital was 20 minutes after the shooting, but hospital time stamps are not made as ambulances pull up, only later, as anyone who has ever been in the emergency ward knows.
Well, most of us have been in an emergency ward before, so tell us: Are the people in charge of writing down ambulance pull-up times supposed to be accurate, or is it OK if they fudge it by 20 minutes or so?
Anyway, as I wrote above, Shamgar concluded that the shooting happened at 9:50, so maybe you should "review your premises..."

Why did Damti testify that he was opening the door for Leah Rabin when he heard the first shot, when in fact Leah Rabin was standing on the steps nowhere near her husband when the shots were heard?
>> Because he made a mistake and because wives do not always stand right next to husbands.
This question did not appear in the final version of the article.

Why did Rabin's top aide Eitan Haber destroy evidence?
>> He did not. What he took was not evidence, if indeed he really took anything.
He said he did.  Should I believe him, or you?

Why did MDs say Rabin died of a shattered spine with bullet entry through the chest?
>> That was their initial guess and it was wrong. Same MDs later corrected their statement.
Four top doctors who were there make unanimous g u e s s e s  about the murder of a Prime Minister?!

Baruch Gladstein, proved categorically that one gun shot was fired into Rabin at point-blank range - about a half-meter closer than Amir ever got to Rabin?
>> Who says he "proved" that?
Again, you have to read the sources before you ask questions like that.  His proof is linked in the article.

>> And since when is a half meter not point blank range?
 Gladstein told Amir at Amir's trial, ”You placed the gun on his back on the second shot and fired." Amir said, "We need a new expert because I didn't shoot from point blank range."  This shows that the shots that the experts were analyzing were not shot by Amir.

Adir Zik believed there was a conspiracy?
>> Adir Zik was wrong.
Oh.

>> Yigal Amir confirms he murdered Rabin. There is no reason not to believe he did. 
Except for the questions in the article, and many more.

>> There is not a shred of real evidence to support any of the lunatic conspiracy "theories" that have been making the internet rounds ever since the assassination.  These "theories" are as mindless as the conspiracist claptrap popular on the web about Jews or Israel being behind the 911 attacks on the US.
or maybe as accurate as the conspiracies to kill Hitler, or Julius Ceasar, or Abraham Lincoln. I wonder if we'll ever find out? If you have your way, we certainly won't...

Answers to Hillel Fendel about Rabin Assassination

In a companion article on the Israel National News web site, Hillel Fendel asks some questions about the Rabin assassination. Here are the answers.

Answers to Questions:

How is it that an eye-witness to the event, Miriam Oren, was filmed at the site telling reporters emphatically and repeatedly, "I saw that Rabin was not hurt"?

>> Because she was wrong.

How did Rabin's armored car back door close?

>> Because someone inside closed it.

Why was the call, "Blanks, blanks!" heard when the shots rang out?

>> Because people who heard the shots thought at first they were blanks. This is not unusual near actual shootings.

Why was the assassin not killed immediately?

>> Because he was wrestled to the ground. Since when are assassins killed on the spot in Israel?

The last three questions have been asked publicly by Rabin's daughter, former MK Dalia Rabin-Pilosoph?

>> No they were not. The Rabin children "ask questions" designed to "prove" that the entire Israeli Right and especially the Likud were behind the murder. Claims that the Rabin children endorse the loony "conspiracy theory" about Peres ordering the Rabin assassination or about Rabin supposedly being killed by his own guard are complete fabrications by people with disturbed minds.

Why did then-Health Minister Dr. Ephraim Sneh say on television that that Rabin had been wounded by bullets to the chest, stomach, and spinal cord?

>> Because he thought that was so at the time, based on the hospital's preliminary superficial examination. He was wrong.

Why did security guard Yoram Rubin testify before the Shamgar Commission that Rabin was shot at 9:50 PM, when in fact Yigal Amir was arrested at 9:30 PM?

>> Because he made a mistake, or had not looked at his watch or his watch was fast.

Why did Rabin's driver, Menachem Damti, testify that he drove to Ichilov Hospital in less than two minutes, when the ride actually took over 20 minutes?

>> It did NOT take over 20 minutes. The admissions time stamp at the hospital was 20 minutes after the shooting, but hospital time stamps are not made as ambulances pull up, only later, as anyone who has ever been in the emergency ward knows.

Why did Damti testify that he was opening the door for Leah Rabin when he heard the first shot, when in fact Leah Rabin was standing on the steps nowhere near her husband when the shots were heard?

>> Huh?  Question makes no sense.

Why did Rabin's top aide Eitan Haber destroy evidence?

>> He did not. What he took was not evidence, if indeed he really took anything.

Why did MDs say Rabin died of a shattered spine with bullet entry through the chest?

>> That was their initial guess and it was wrong. Same MDs later corrected their statement.

Baruch Gladstein, proved categorically that one gun shot was fired into Rabin at point-blank range - about a half-meter closer than Amir ever got to Rabin?

>> Who says he "proved" that? And since when is a half meter not point blank range?

Adir Zik believed there was a conspiracy?

>> Adir Zik was wrong.

Yigal Amir confirms he murdered Rabin. There is no reason not to believe he did.  There is not a shred of real evidence to support any of the lunatic conspiracy "theories" that have been making the internet rounds ever since the assassination.  These "theories" are as mindless as the conspiracist claptrap popular on the web about Jews or Israel being behind the 911 attacks on the US.

Amir, The REAL assassin of Yitzhak Rabin