Virginia Tech engineering professor Liviu Librescu, 77, was buried today in Israel where his sons live. One said at the graveside service:
"’From our childhood, you taught us to care for people, to work hard to succeed. But you never taught us to be heroes. That was more theoretical a lesson than aerodynamics.’"
Worth a read.
UPDATE Some of the students who fled as Librescu barred the door to his classroom told his widow that they feel guilty they didn’t stay to help him.
As Michael, a commenter at SimplyJews, puts it: "So many Holocaust survivors feel guilty, wondering why they lived when others died. I guess we now know why Prof Librescu lived."
So far, Israeli engineering professor and Holocaust survivor Liviu Librescu, 77, is the only one of the victims of Virginia Tech killer Seung Cho known to have fought back. He blocked a door while his students jumped out windows. If a few had stayed to help him, would it all have turned out the same?
UPDATE Nice to be in such company as Mark Steyn: "It is a poor reflection on us that, in those first critical seconds where one has to make a decision, only an elderly Holocaust survivor, Professor Librescu, understood instinctively the obligation to act."
Comments Off on The hero
Tagged Holocaust, Israel, Liviu Librescu, Seung Cho, Virginia Tech
Headshots at 300 meters standing with an unzeroed bullpup? An instructive video on Israel’s latest automatic infantry assualt rifle, the Tavor-built TAR-21.
Via Defense Tech
Think the Iranians pose no immediate threat to the American homeland? Think again. This missile, 18 of which Iran is believed to have purchased from North Korea, so far can only reach Europe, Israel and targets throughout the Middle East. But Debkafile says it is believed to be the missile that Allaeddin Boroujerdi, chairman of the Iranian parliament’s national security and foreign policy commission, says is being modified to launch a 300 kilogram spy satellite. "Once Iran learns how to put 300 kg into earth orbit," says Uzi Rubin, the former head of the Israel Missile Defense Organization, "it could adapt the satellite launcher into an ICBM that could drop more than 300 kg anywhere in the world, for instance, on Washington, D.C….every time the Iranian satellite passed above the U.S., it would remind America of Iran’s potential to strike it."
UPDATE Aviation Week’s slightly different take on this is here predicting a different rocket to be used for the Iranian space launch, and soon.
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Tagged BM25 space launcher and ICBM, Debkafile, Iran, Israel, North Korea, USA, Uzi Rubin
The "poisoned" green balloons of death, according to Hezbollah. A benign newspaper promotional gimmick which drifted on the wind into southern Lebanon, according to the Israelis. But the moonbats and their terrorist pals will never believe that. Quick, someone call Jimmy Carter!
Via Little Green Footballs
It won’t be personal in the least, it will be over in minutes, and it might be that no one, including the USA, will respond:
"The second holocaust will be quite different. One bright morning, in five or 10 years, perhaps during a regional crisis, perhaps out of the blue, a day or a year or five years after Iran’s acquisition of the Bomb, the mullahs in Qom will convene in secret session, under a portrait of the steely-eyed Ayatollah Khomeini, and give President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, by then in his second or third term, the go-ahead."
A plausible, and therefore chilling, read. Fortunately, it’s only one scenario.
Eye on the UN‘s recent tally of condemnations since the fall of 2006:
How about Sudan? Nothing. Syria? Zip. China? Nope. Saudi Arabia? Zilch. And so on.
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Tagged Anne Bayefsky, Eye on the UN, Israel, terrorism, The Long War
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 