I'm still not sure how what was intended as a slightly humorous thread about hysterical schoolgirls got onto the Palestinians. But as it did here's some breaking news.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7286945.stm

SNIP

The Israeli government has ordered its military to reduce its operations in the Gaza Strip, Israeli officials say.
The order comes after a sharp drop in rocket fire from militants in the Palestinian territory.
…..

Rocket fire into Israel from Gaza dropped from dozens every day a week ago to a few over the weekend.

END SNIP

From the Israeli perspective a cessation of rocket fire is victory enough.

So Has Israel succeeded in deterring Hamas' rocketeers?

For all their much vaunted re-armament Hizbullah has not fired a single rocket across the Lebanese border since the cessation of hostilities in 2006.

Let's see what happens.

The Jewish school girls behaviour reminds me of a couple of similar incidents:
i) One school girl of a different religious persuasion ( indoctrination?) took to wearing a religious head covering to a public school in western Sydney. She was portrayed by her supporters (many from various secular camps ) as something of a martyr .Eventually the state govt caved-in, though girls wearing similar non-religions head coverings are still covered by the ban.
ii) Three athletes who gave black power salutes in the 1968 Olympics , and one athlete who carried a non-national flag in the 2000 Olympics – all as I understand it contrary to Olympic protocol– are now in popular folklore, portrayed in saintly hues.
We as a society tend to be suckers for such ego-centred grandstanding.

Easy times >”It stuns me why crazy Jews like these ones bother to live in the West when they have Israel? I thought that’s what the Jewish state was for so that Jews like these ones could live there.”

So you’re obviously not a supporter of multiculturalism. I suppose that is a good start, however why restrict yourself to the “Jews” what about the people who burnt down embassy’s because someone published a picture they don’t like? The people who issued death threats to western writers and directors who made art they didn’t like? The people who throw acid in the face of women who aren’t covered up. Get some perspective!

More sanity >”So it is let's bash Palestinians and Islam week, as usual. As if there wasn't spontaneous celebration over Palestinian deaths. As if extensive video coverage of those deaths was allowed.”

Typical of the islamist terrorists western apologists to make excuses for the disgusting scenes in Palestine. Don’t let the little fact that you don’t see mass community celebration in Israel when 8 children are assassinated because it doesn’t happen get in the way of your pathetic justifications.

Demos> “it will be sufficient punishment if they have to earn a crust at wimpy's, and marry a deli clerk instead of a doctor.”
I wonder whether your fantasies of an ideal democracy have room for your snide anti-Semitism?

Steven >”I have no sympathy for the nine girls. I think they behaved like, well, like hysterical schoolgirls.”

I happen to agree with you. I would note however that they have been encouraged in this type of ridiculous behaviour by the ongoing actions of British Gov’ts in granting bizarre and dangerous appeasements to the nations’ muslim fanatics. You know the types who sit on welfare for ten years taking full advantage of western generosity at the same time preaching hatred of their hosts. For example, a British prisoner recently sued and won over the prison systems refusal to offer traditional Arabic meat like camel and goat on traditional muslim feast days. See http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_1_urbanities-steyn.html for a great read.

I agree, these girls are being stupid, as for the rabbi ...

Surely we aren't going to see any Jews go down the path of a particular Islamic groups in Britain ...

The world gets collectively dottier by the second ...

Islamic scholar , Dr. Martin Lings (Abu Bakr Siraj ad-Din) claims Shakespeare ... aka ... Shaykh Zubair was very likely a Sufi, and Romeo & Juliet a direct plagiarization of Leila and Majnoon; Othello’s smiting “a malignant and a turban’d Turk” was somehow satisfying.

An irate Muslim stated that Lings was a deviant, and if not a kafir, definitely a liar.

Variously, Goethe, and Abraham Lincoln’s mother, have been identified as Muslim; whilst the Napoleonic Code is claimed to be based on Sharia law.

Apparently in the US, some teachers are finding it difficult to refute these statements. PC
has gone absolutely, totally, stark raving mad!

I aplogise, as I am going to be pedantic:

It would have been very interesting to know the exam questions presented to the girls. Shakespeare is multi-layered ... Whilst he threw up prevailing sentiments of his time, he also gave pause for thought ...

Shylock: "Hath not a Jew eyes"

Shakespeare, doubtless, would never have met a Jew during his life. Jews in England had been expelled by decree of Edward 1, 1290, only being re-admitted under Cromwell nearly some four hundred years later, 1656. Thus, Shylock is to a degree a stereotype. However, Antonio does not come off well.

Considering the waves of hysteria against Jews across the Channel, one could, perhaps, read a condemnation of this treatment. “The Merchant of Venice” was written 1596-8. Act 1:Sc.1, alludes to the “Andrew dock’d in sand”, which scholars accept as referring to San Andres, a Spanish vessel captured in an expedition to Cadiz, 1596. The Inquisition was still in full swing in Catholic Spain & Portugal, an “enemy” of non-Catholic England.

The idea of “revenege” would not carry the import to Elizabethan audiences, as it does to us.

Dueling was so prevalent, that there was a real fear that young aristocrats would kill themselves off - James I, and Chas. II banned it, only to have young bloods cross to France to satisfy some slight. Manuals were written about the code of duelling, including the necessity of, and when to challenge another. Bernard Mandeville (d.1733) argued that duelling was essential to maintain courtesy both at court and within upper-class urban society.

Danielle, the girls were being examined on The Tempest, not The Merchant of Venice.

Thank you for the historical context of the Merchant of Venice. No, neither Antonio nor Lorenzo come off well.

Once again I'll let the Bard have the last word:

Shylock speaking:

"...If you prick us, do we not bleed?
if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison
us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not
revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will
resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian,
what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian
wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by
Christian example? Why, revenge. The villany you
teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I
will better the instruction."