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CORRECTION #2
Professor Juan Cole, currently being put to rights by Martin Kramer, apologises in a different style; he doesn’t really apologise. After claiming that Osama bin Laden had engineered September 11 “in response to the Israeli attack on the Jenin refugee camp”—an operation that took place seven months after 9/11—Cole wrote:
I post late at night and sometimes am sleepy and make mistakes ... If someone wants to accuse me of occasionally making minor errors, then sure. I occasionally make minor errors.
But that error—suggesting a motive for September 11 that isn’t chronologically possible—doesn’t seem much like the sort of mistake one makes due to weariness, or keyboard slippage. Cole didn’t misspell a word or post a broken link; he invented a rationale for 9/11 that bin Laden himself couldn’t possibly have claimed, and sheeted it home to the al-Qaeda bigshot. Talk about projection. Cole subsequently called for a Daily Kos-led fatwa against Kramer:
Please do up an oppo research diary on Martin Kramer. Who is he? Where did he come from?
Nobody knows! Cole—a “leading US commentator on the war”, according to leading Australian commentator on nothing Margo Kingston—was also outraged and appalled by suggestions that the London terrorists may have been British citizens:
First, we still have no idea who did this. It is very likely the “Qaeda al-Jihad in Europe” group that claimed responsibility immediately. Their statement appeared very quickly after the bombings and yet had none of the appearance of being rushed. That suggests it was carefully composed before the fact. The rumors that the statement has errors in the Arabic or the Quran citation are absolutely incorrect ...
The statement was probably not written by a second-generation Arab Briton or even by a long-term, integrated Arab Briton resident.
So, if the statement is a guide to the identity of the attackers, this bombing could not have emanated from the British Muslim community.
As Tony Badran asks: “My question is, did he get anything right on the London attack?!”
Hey, the Pearl Harbor attack was bad, I’m not condoning it or anything, but maybe we should have thought of that before Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Posted by Jim Treacher on 2005 07 14 at 01:54 PM • permalinkFirst Brian Leiter wants to expose Juan Non-Volokh’s identity because he dared to criticize him, now Juan Cole wants dirt to be dug on somebody who criticized him. Those lefty academics really don’t take criticism well, do they.
But don’t dare to accuse them of intellectual McCarthyism. After all, only evil right-wingers are capable of intimidating people into silence.
I’d say the existence of Juan Cole pretty much proves Martin Kramer’s contention that the academic Middle East Studies world is worthless.
Posted by Ernst Blofeld on 2005 07 14 at 02:24 PM • permalinkNothing like cheap entertainment. I wonder what Juan Cole would do for his next trick if we tossed a few coppers in his cup?
Posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher on 2005 07 14 at 02:26 PM • permalinkI have a useful book for Juan Cole: Where did I come from
Posted by lewisinnyc on 2005 07 14 at 03:04 PM • permalinkHe at least acknowledged there was an attack, so he got that right. I think his first impulse was to stick his fingers in his ears and scream, “La la la! I can’t hear your Jewish lies!”
Posted by Matt Moore on 2005 07 14 at 03:13 PM • permalinkSee, the Jenin attack as inspiration for 9/11 is a minor error not in the sense that it’s like a typo, but in the sense that the inspiration for 9/11 is a minor fact.
We all know it was our fault, the rest is just details.
Posted by tim maguire on 2005 07 14 at 03:17 PM • permalinkI know that charging “anti-Semitism” is a bit like yelling “racism” at anyone who disagrees with Cynthia McKinney on a question of policy. Not everyone who opposes the West Bank settlements actually regrets Hitler not finishing what he started, and so perhaps it is wise that we shy away from making such accusations. But I have to wonder: when are we going to start calling a spade a spade? Especially after this latest gaffe, isn’t it becoming a bit obvious how Juan Cole looks at the world and everything that happens in it:
For Juan, it’s all about Sharon.
It’s all about Likud.
It’s all about Israel.
It’s all about the American “Likudniks” and “neocons” in Sharon’s pocket.
In short, it’s all about the Jews. Oh, Juan Cole rarely uses the word “Jews,” but his code-words are as transparent and amateurish as Amiri Baraka when he wrote, “Who told 4000 Israeli workers at the Twin Towers/ To stay home that day.” Because it’s not anti-Semitic, you see, if you say “Israelis” instead of “Jews.”
Enough. This is how Juan Cole understands and analyzes the world. In his all-consuming, all-explaining paranoid fantasy, it is the Jews who control the world’s sole superpower, and the world itself, through a shadowy cabal. They are the source, at root, of all evil in the modern world.
We have a word for this philosophy, or pathology.
The man is an anti-Semite. It is time to stop ignoring this, whether through politeness or embarrassment.
Best,Craig Bryant
Breaking News:
I have discovered an excerpt from a vintage Juan Cole column:
FDR seems unaware that according to the September 11 Commission report, Adolph Hitler conceived the invasion of Poland in some large part as a punishment on the UK for supporting Winston Churchill’s iron fist policies toward the Falklands. Hitler had wanted to move the operation up in response to Churchill’s threatening visit to the Isle of White, and again in response to the British attack on Dresden.
So basically this guy’s approach to finding a motive for S11 is to look for some kind of inciteful action that occured prior to S11 and assume that was it. I mean, it’s not like there has to be supporting evidence like communication intercepts, documents, witness accounts etc. because if he was looking for those things he would never have made the error, because there never ever was a possibility that he would find such.
It’s like, “well they did something bad to you over here because, because… oh there it is, because you did something bad to them over there! Oh shit, chronology…”
What amazes me is that the Left is not the least bit embarrassed by Cole’s repeated amateurish gaffs. It’s as if they don’t even register: their tiny little minds delete them before he does.
Posted by Spiny Norman on 2005 07 15 at 02:23 AM • permalinkIn other news, Hillary Clinton, (google her, she’s hot stuff), claimed to have been named after some Sir Hillary guy who climbed Mt Everest for no apparent reason, although he didn’t actually do that until she was six or something.
But when exactly has the left cared about facts?
Posted by zeppenwolf on 2005 07 15 at 05:15 AM • permalink
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Cole is seconds away from making UFO claims. I mean it. He is wrong so much it is epic.