Christopher Hitchens Rants Again

by Daniel Pipes
Tue, 19 Aug 2003
updated Tue, 10 Jan 2006

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On August 1, Christopher Hitchens devoted his column to insult the just-deceased Bob Hope ("a fool, and nearly a clown, but … never even remotely a comedian"). Hitchens is the poseur and eccentric who earlier attacked Mother Theresa (book title: The Missionary Position), Elie Wiesel (a "contemptible poseur and windbag"), and Winston Churchill (article subtitle: "Incompetent, Boorish, Drunk, and Mostly Wrong"). For good measure, he wrote a book calling for Henry Kissinger's incarceration as a war criminal.

And on August 11, Hitchens mustered his bluster and rudeness against me. Others have come to my defense, including such liberals as Steven I. Weiss and "The_Bell," so I will to take up just one issue, the one that appears most to have riled Hitchens' delicate sensibilities: my having once referred to "the so-called Palestinian refugees." Hitchens deems this term of mine a "crude trick of language" that insinuates there was no Palestinian dispossession.

Actually, I was not commenting on dispossession at all - typical sloppy Hitchens style to make a faulty assumption and then go on the rampage against it - but on the peculiar and specific United Nations definition of a "Palestinian refugee" that differs from the definition of any other refugee.

That happens to be the topic of my column today, "The Refugee Curse," which I hope Hitchens will keep quiet long enough to read and learn from. (August 19, 2003)

Oct. 21, 2003 update: I provide another instance today of Hitchens' deep thinking at "The ‘October Surprise' Theory."

Dec. 23, 2003 update: I called Hitchens a "poseur and eccentric" above, not deceitful. However, after reading Sean Wilentz's brief but incisive exposé of Hitchens' claimed reaction to 9/11, maybe that would also be an appropriate adjective.

June 5, 2004 update: For the Hitchens-Pipes debate concerning the lasting impact of Ayatollah Khomeini's edict, see "Is Salman Rushdie Now Safe?."

June 17, 2004 update: Hitchens wrote today in a eulogy that Ronald Reagan was "as dumb as a stump … an obvious phony and loon," garnering the predictable outraged reaction. What puzzles me is why anyone pays attention to this provocateur whose unserious utterances are designed merely to ruffle feathers. I expect the public eventually to catch on to his game and ignore his antics.

April 8, 2005 update: In keeping with Hitchens' attacks on the other recently dead, he today calls Pope John Paul II "an elderly and querulous celibate, who came too late and who stayed too long."

Jan. 5, 2006 update: In the case of Ariel Sharon, Hitchens could not even wait for death to slander him, but did so hours after Israel's prime minister experienced a massive stroke. Endorsing Noam Chomsky's view, Hitchens writes that Sharon was "the effective and conscious author of the massacre" at Sabra and Shatilla in 1982 (which is nonsense). He also hurls a variety of epithets at Sharon, including "brutal," "demagogic," and "ruthless."

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