In it, Hitchens fallaciously equates male circumcision with female clitoral circumcision by insinuating that male circumcision has the same negative effect on sexual pleasure as that of female clitoral circumcision. It reveals an obvious fallacious absurdity that cannot be attributed to mere ignorance but is most certainly a deliberate tool with which to bash Judaism. Furthermore, he purposefully ignores the fact that even today the vast majority of Christian men are circumcised yet blames female genital mutilation purely on Judaism which it has never practiced nor ever condoned.

Hitchens is a clever rhetorician. But in this case he is too clever by half, as he has revealed an ugly underside to his otherwise polished demeanor, not to mention a cruel vindictiveness against what is obviously a kind but unprepared victim.

Its called “Holocaust Denial On Trial”.

I dont think he is antisemitic, he just happens to be very opposed to all religions(and that also makes him anti – judaic aswell as anti – christian and anti – islam). One good example is hes criticism of Mel Gibson and “the passion of the Christ”.

Howewer, like I said, theres a few things I dont agree with or rather hold into question.

For once I dont agree with the war in Iraq. I think its a shame that so many people have been killed by this war, and that the US has lost so many soldiers down there. Its not only that, but also I am against the use of torture, whatever the charge, in which makes me against what happened at Guantanamo Bay.

BTW, what happened on 911 was terrible, but not all iraqis are responsible for that.

On the other hand, I put into question hes stances of David Irving.
I fully support freedom of speech, even though the views may offend me.

Howewer, what I put into doubt is not the fact that he supports David Irvings right to free speech, but the way that he does it.

“And incidentically Irving has not once described the Holocaust as a hoax”.

Certainly not, but no Holocaust – denier describes the Holocaust as a hoax.
Although they deny the fact that there was ever a plan to exterminate the jews by the nazis – which of course makes them deniers.

I recently came across a web – page that challenges Holocaust – denial. Its called http://www.HDOT.com.

As for Holocaust – denial, I think it has to be challenged – the democratic way. And weather we are atheists or not.

Anon: I never questioned the seriousness of Finklestein and Silberman. Nor did I defend (or subscribe) to the literalness of the Exodus narrative. Nor for that matter to the literalness of the Torah itself (notice I said “Moses, its putative author,” and I also mentioned that the Torah itself states that Moses died before the it was completed).

Instead, I point out that the Exodus narrative was composed before King Josiah of Judah supposedly created it out of whole cloth (as do Finkelstein/Silberman). I also point out that neither Finkelstein nor Silberman are themselves categorical on the entire subject. Indeed, they try to have it both ways. (In their own words it “…is neither historical truth nor literary fiction.” What the heck does this mean?) As for their primary interest being the coalescence of the Canaanites into the Hebrew race, that is correct, that is their primary focus. Unfortunately, the case isn’t as closed as they would like it to be. Many other archaeologists have taken them to task. Ultimately though, as anything in history, we can never know 100%. What I tried to do is be the skeptic. In their assessment of the Exodus, they state that the expulsion of the Hyksos provided the basis for this narrative. Certainly this is possible. They then go to say that this violent upheaval resounded throughout the centuries among throughout the Semitic world. Really? I then asked: which Semites likewise appropriated the Hyksos story as their own? The Phoenicians? The Assyrians? The Chaldeans? Anybody else? No. Surely they could have added a few more pages of text to their wonderful book quoting Ugaritic bullae or Canaanite epigraphy that described the enslavement and then heroic confrontation of their ancestors in Egypt. That is why I characterized Finklestein/Silberman’s take as “a glib assertion.” They simply made it up without offering any proof that this was so. I then asked. Why did the Hebrews appropriate it (if they in fact did appropriate it)? I don’t know, but then again, I’m not making any categorical statements about what did or didn’t happen. Even Finkelstein and Silberman look upon the Exodus mythos in pretty much the same way I look at it: as a theological statement of a despised group of outcasts who stood up to the mightiest king on earth. I stand with F/S in stating that the Exodus is perhaps the first saga in human history in which justice is promulgated as a virtue.

As for whether or not Hitchens is anti-Semitic I can’t say. I choose to take him at his word. However, I definately believe that he is virulently anti-Judaic. And while I will admit that the possibility exists that there can be a difference between anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism, I also know that in the minds of pagans (both neo and ancient), this is invariably a distinction without a difference. To prove the point of his anti-Judaism, I quote him extensively.

As for MacDonald, he himself denies that he is anti-Semitic. I therefore must take him at his word. MacDonald however is true to his Darwinist convictions –something which I can’t say about Hitchens. He is quite literally a moralist, MacDonald is not. For MacDonald and those who are true Darwinists (materialists who believe in random evolution), there can never be any right or wrong, only tooth and claw. That Hitchens refrains from going down this path towards uber-materialism shows to me that he is very much on the side of the angels in most instances. Yahwism is at the very least a moral code, one that is in constant tension with naturalism.

As for “guilt by association,” I see your point. However, on more than one occasion, Hitchens has come down on the side of anti-Semites, often only on principle. He’s defended David Irving and Robert Faurisson, both Holocaust-deniers whenever they were either hauled into court or denied permission to publish their books. I too believe in freedom of expression and would have defended both men in their right to publish their books on principle alone. So in this sense I was probably being gratuitous. But Hitchens won’t stop there. In his attacks on circumcision, the sexual taboos found in the Mosaic code, its dietary laws, etc., he invariably use the most virulent language possible. Indeed, the laudatory language he uses to describe Antiochus IV Epiphanes for attempting to do to the Jews that which Europeans did to the darker races of mankind prove to me that he has lost his balance (at best) or that he really doesn’t like the Jews at all (at worst). If the former, he’s nothing but a hypocrite, one who lauds the ancient Greeks in one breath while condemning the modern Anglo-Saxons with the next. (If you subscribe to the theory of the utter beneficence of the ancient Greeks, I ask you to google Pericles’ “Melian Dialogue,” in which he tells the poor unfortunates of that island that they have no choice to but accept the slaughter that the Athenians were going to inflict on them. I challenge Hitchens or any of his defenders to find a single such sentiment being uttered by Victorian imperialists.)

As I quoted him in the conclusion of the essay, his hatred of Judaism causes me to defend him by using the old cliche “he may not be an anti-Semite but he does an awfully good impression of one.”

But the main problem is there’s not any evidence of Hitchens actually being “Anti-semitic”, so the author meanders about until he gets ready to take some real cheap shots: guilt by association with Holocaust denial is almost absurdist – as if comparing archeological evidence against narrative religious texts is akin to wholesale falsification of *modern* history. Pulling in MacDonald – I guarantee Hitchens wouldn’t subscribe to his views – is gratuitous. I’ve read almost ever work here sited, and whatever one wants to claim about them individually, they do not form a seamless garment.

All in all, unworthy.

For all the foolishness to be refuted, which is written against Christίanity, the mountains would have to be minds, the trees, pen holders, the sea, ink, and the fields, paper!
We always have a boss: Either God, or the devil and our passions.

Christ’s coming into the world caused idolatry to crumble and the demons of darkness to flee.