Debbie Schlussel Rants Steve Jobs’ Father Is Not Muslim – OpEd

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In an eccentric reversal to the ‘Obama is a Muslim’ meme, we now have a ‘Steve Job’s father is not a Muslim’ from one of the more unstable members of the neocon right-wing Islamophobes, Debbie Schlussel.

True to style, Debbie Schlussel wrote a rather distasteful tribute to Steve Jobs using his sad demise, as an opportunity to spew her poison. Recall the time when she couldn’t bear that Lebanese American, Rima Fakih won the Miss USA beauty pageant. Perhaps Debbie’s feared Rima would make Hezbollah ‘acceptable’. That was then, but this time it was Steve Jobs Muslim biological father, that caused her to rant:

Jobs was raised by Paul and Clara Jobs. The Syrian, Abdulfattah John Jandali, is now, at age 80, Vice President of a Nevada casino, so he’s clearly not a religious Muslim.  And Jandali never met Jobs nor did he even know Jobs was his son until a few years ago.’

Some pure Debbie Schlussel vitriolic bigotry follows:

It’s a safe bet that if Steven Jobs had been raised as an Arab Muslim, there would be no Apple.’

Continuing with:

a religion that has very few of its adherents among the great geniuses, scientists, technology innovators, and  inventors in the world.’

Debbie obviously missed out on history lessons. Never mind, help is at hand at muslimheritage.com she can learn about what Muslims have contributed to the world.

She then makes this hyperbolic claim:

And it’s about the kind of innovation and technological spirit that only happens in two countries in the world: the U.S. and Israel.’

This is just a bold faced lie. Without wishing to denigrate the contributions of the USA and Israel, it is nevertheless worth mentioning that not all countries are represented in the Nobel prizes, so the Nobel prizes alone are not an accurate indicator of scientific achievements.  Israel’s average IQ is 94, which puts it at the lower end of the European range and lower than the world average. Note the double standard hypocrisy here, whilst Debbie derides liberals, they are the ones who are the high achievers in both the countries she mentions (USA and Israel). The Israeli education system is based on the European liberal one. The Orthodox religious schools in Israel are considered an impediment to progressand are considered to inhibit progress and a burden on society. In the USA, it is the liberal establishment that is at the forefront of academic and scientific achievements. Thus, whilst deriding liberals and their organisations and values, she is simultaneously stealing the credit for their contributions which actually are based on liberal values in both the countries that she mentions. Some chutzpah!

Media Matters followed this up and  reported on her bigoted statements. MJ Rosenberg who also has a column at Al Jazeera tweeted :

I am pretty sure @DebbieSchlussel is a fake. I hear from friends in MI that she’s not much of a Jew at all, not part of the community.’

Debbie retorted back in her trademark crazy style. As expected, poor George Soros gets the obligatory bashing:

As you may know, Media Matters gets millions of dollars from organizations funded by George Soros,   I am a one (wo)man shop without the gazillion dollars in funding that this organization–which calls me a “Fake Jew”–has. ’

Finally, she ends with touting the Orthodox like herself as being the standard bearers of faith, denouncing the MJ Rosenberg type liberals  with a self righteous:

They’ve left the religion and substituted liberalism for Judaism.  Most religious Jews are conserative and voted for John McCain.  95% of my synagogue voted for McCain and against Obama.  It’s the Reform and Conservative synagogues, not the Orthodox, where you will find the majority of liberal Jews and Jewish Obama supporters.’ 

This is the same woman who loves throwing around accusations of ‘Islamic Supremacism’ but who is not above touting herself to be superior to lesser mortals such as liberal Jews. Who is the supremacist here?

Perhaps realising her growing irrelevancy, Debbie exploits this incident and seizes upon it as a chance to make hay while the sun shines:

If you want to respond to Media Matters, the best way you can is to donate to the continued operation of this site by clicking the Paypal button on the upper left-hand side of this page.’

One is inclined to retort maybe she should thank Media Matters for giving her an opportunity to  beg readers for donations instead of portraying the organisation in the role of a bully. The perverse logic being  that just because Media Matters is a richly funded organisation, entitles her to ‘donations’ to spew bigotry and lies under the cover of playing victim. A kind of reverse snobbery, which is particularly odd in light of the fact that she has accused her rival Pamela Geller of something similar, when she is unwilling to give an untimely death the dignity it deserves.

Farha Khaled

Farha Khaled is a columnist for the Saudi based Arab News. She blogs at: http://farhakhaled.blogspot.com Twitter: http://twitter.com/farhakhaled 

2 thoughts on “Debbie Schlussel Rants Steve Jobs’ Father Is Not Muslim – OpEd

  • October 9, 2011 at 11:56 am
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    Debbie was off medications when she said that. If Israel didn’t get US aid, it would collapse, why are we giving so much aid when our own people are fighting for jobs?

    Reply
  • October 9, 2011 at 8:36 pm
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    @Jones:
    You are completely right. It pisses me off when people talk about a group as a whole. Shows me how much of a hypocrite they are! Also, many of my friends go to Israel for summer break (they call it Palestine.) You should see the pictures and stories they bring back. It is horrible. For one of my friends, she was 3 and witnessed 2 Israelis soldiers murdering her parents for no reason. We are paying for the weapons they are using….so both me and you helped in killing her parents! Horrible. And not many people realize that, unfortunately.

    Reply

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