#RIPUSA Obama shows his colours ( finally) Israel and Zion .... Two Presidents Two Policies

 

#RIPUSA Obama shows his colours ( finally) Israel and Zion .... Two Presidents Two Policies . . On just about everything else.... LBGTQ rights, Abortion Right, Privacy, Freedom of the Press, Donald Trump spells disaster .....back to 60 and 70's but on Israel, Zion and Judaism he may edge Truman as the post pro Israel President yet.

So what happens when the most powerful country in the world effectively has two presidents at once? Its policy regarding one of the most complex conflicts on the planet collapses into a muddled mess.

Or, more precisely, you have what unfolded over the last 48 hours: The Egyptian government submits to the UN Security Council a resolution against Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. This raises the possibility that the Obama administration could express its opposition to Israeli settlement policy by abstaining from the vote, rather than vetoing the resolution as it had with a similar one in 2011. Enraged Israeli officials call up Donald Trump, who tweets that the United States should veto. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the president of Egypt, abruptly calls off the vote. At some point during all this, Trump has a phone conversation with Sisi where they chat about jointly solving various issues in the Middle East. Anonymous Israeli officials, essentially siding with the incoming Trump administration, criticize Obama in unusually harsh terms for plotting with the Palestinians to abandon Israel at the United Nations. A day later, Malaysia, New Zealand, Senegal, and Venezuela reintroduce the resolution, which comes to a vote and is adopted by the Security Council, including Egypt, with the United States abstaining. Barack Obama delivers a powerful parting message to Israel’s leaders that is powerfully undercut by Donald Trump’s opening message. “As to the U.N., things will be different after Jan. 20th,” Trump tweets shortly after the vote.

Still with me?

Transitions of power are always awkward, uncertain moments in the life of a nation and its relations with the world. Richard Nixon’s campaign aides, for example, allegedly interfered with Vietnam War peace talks organized by Lyndon Johnson. But Donald Trump has involved himself in international affairs like no U.S. president-elect in recent memory. NBC News reviews some of the history:


President Bill Clinton told the press after his 1992 victory that he would “reaffirm the essential continuity of American foreign policy” and recognized “that America has only one president at a time.”

President George W. Bush declined questions on topics like North Korea and Israel until he took the oath of office in early 2001. “We have one president, and we’ll have one president, and the current president is President Clinton, and our nation must speak with one voice,” Bush said at a press conference.

In 2008-2009, Barack Obama’s transition team repeatedly invoked the norm that the United States has “only one president at a time” to explain why Obama was staying silent on issues like the Gaza War. That “constitutional principle,” Obama’s incoming press secretary said at the time, is “extremely important in the arena of foreign policy,” where it must be “clear who is speaking on behalf of the United States.” Noting the “delicate negotiations” that were occurring at the time between Israelis and Palestinians, Obama argued that “we can’t have two voices coming out of the United States when you have so much at stake.”

Yet in the waning days of 2016, two conflicting voices on high-stakes international issues is exactly what we have. Barack Obama is vowing to retaliate against the Russian government’s interference in the U.S. election; Donald Trump is questioning whether Russia interfered and thanking Vladimir Putin for his “very nice” Christmas card. Obama’s Pentagon demanded that China return a U.S. underwater drone seized in the South China Sea; Trump elevated the incident to an “unprecedented act” and then suddenly reversed course, suggesting the Chinese just “keep” the darn thing. Obama is dismantling a registration system for visitors from many Muslim-majority countries; Trump might soon revive it.

These contradictions have created such confusion in recent weeks that Jared Huffman, a Democratic congressman from California, has introduced legislation to amend the 1799 Logan Act, which prohibits unauthorized private citizens from conducting U.S. foreign policy. Huffman wants to clarify that the law applies to presidents-elect, since “only the president, not the president-elect who is fresh off the campaign trail and not yet in office, has the authority to make critical foreign-policy decisions that impact America’s safety, economy, and global standing.” The legislation is still pending, with weeks to go before inauguration.

The Differential Calculus 410 of the Turkish - Israeli Reconciliation Agreement with Zion

The Differential Calculus 410 of the Turkish - Israeli Reconciliation Agreement with Zion   While the agreement is unlikely to reset relations between two leaders who have profoundly different worldviews, it may catalyze economic and security initiatives that benefit mutual Israeli, Turkish, Palestinian, and U.S. interests. On June 29, the Israeli security cabinet approved a long-overdue deal restoring full diplomatic ties with Turkey by a vote of seven to three. The agreement effectively ends the Mavi Marmara saga that began in 2010, when a flotilla of ships led by a Turkish NGO sought to break Israel's maritime restrictions on Hamas-ruled Gaza. In the narrow sense, the negotiators focused on providing $20 million in compensation to the families of the nine Turks who were killed when Israeli forces raided the flotilla. Yet the deal, whose text has not been publicly released, will likely have much broader implications. Although no one anticipates that it will catapult the countries back to the golden age of their relations in the 1990s, an array of mutual interests make it a sine qua non to achieving other tantalizing political, security, and economic benefits in a volcanic Middle East. MOUNTING SECURITY CONCERNS The June 28 Istanbul airport attack was a reminder that Turkey faces many radical enemies. Ankara has alleged that members of the Islamic State perpetrated the attack in response to the brewing Israel-Turkey deal. In addition to needing more allies to combat the group's infiltration and other forms of violent radicalism, the Turks have bitterly opposed the rule of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, bringing them into conflict with his various Shiite allies (for more on Ankara's calculus, . For its part, Israel has come to believe that it needs as many friends as possible to deal with the region's turmoil. Thus when Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan stated the need for closer relations with Jerusalem earlier this year, his comments received wide attention in Israeli media and policy circles. Previously, both Erdogan and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had avoided concluding the reconciliation negotiations because other concerns and suspicions outweighed their need for regional allies. For example, Netanyahu feared that an agreement would only reinforce Erdogan's tendency to vociferously criticize Israel and support its sworn enemy, Hamas. PREVENTING ANOTHER GAZA FLARE-UP? One of the deal's most important implications is that it could prevent another round of fighting in Gaza, mainly by alleviating the territory's worsening humanitarian conditions. The Israeli military believes that improving quality of life in Gaza is the best hope for avoiding future wars against Hamas, and the deal with Ankara will facilitate such efforts. Specifically, Turkey will now be permitted to build a power plant in Gaza, which in turn will enable construction of a desalination plant to deal with the territory's water problems. To be sure, other restrictions will remain in place. For one, Israel will not allow Turkey to build a Gaza port or anchor a power-generating vessel offshore. Erdogan also realized that Israel would not end its economic restrictions on the territory, so he retracted his prior (and very public) insistence on that point -- a major change. Instead, the Turks agreed that all trade with Gaza would go through the Israeli port of Ashdod. Jerusalem has long insisted on such control due to security concerns about Hamas smuggling efforts. Interestingly, while Hamas routinely denounces any countries that improve their ties with Israel, the group did not criticize the Turkey deal, since it cannot afford to lose Erdogan's support. The agreement also indicates that Israelis are coming to terms with the Palestinian Authority's apparent lack of interest in resuming control over Gaza. Israel therefore felt compelled to make a deal with Turkey even if it allows Hamas to claim credit for any improvement in Gaza. Previously, Israel had insisted that the PA receive credit for improvements in Gaza. Although Palestinian discourse often nurtures conspiracy theories about Israel supposedly wanting Hamas to prevail against the PA, such thinking makes little sense in light of Gaza's current situation. Netanyahu has also been careful about avoiding any accommodation with Ankara that might anger Egypt. Hamas has long viewed itself as the Gaza branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, Cairo's bitter enemy, so President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi does not want to boost Turkey's influence in Gaza if it will help Hamas. Egypt is also furious at Ankara for not recognizing Sisi's government. While Netanyahu did not synchronize his position with Sisi in advance of the Turkey deal, he likely made sure that the agreement's terms contained no surprises for Cairo. Israel had no intention of institutionalizing a Turkish role in Gaza at Egypt's expense, and Cairo has developed a comfort level with Jerusalem given the extensive scope of their security relationship. Moreover, the deal comes at a time when Egyptians are preoccupied with more pressing economic matters at home. Another Palestinian dimension to the deal is that Ankara will no longer permit Hamas military operatives to use Turkey as an operational base for attacks in the West Bank, even if the organization can retain an office there for other purposes. In Israel's view, Hamas operative Saleh al-Aruri was a key figure in the West Bank violence that led up to the 2014 war in Gaza, yet he was based in Turkey up until 2015 and was permitted to visit the country on more than one occasion over the past year. This issue was apparently one of the last sticking points in the negotiations. ECONOMIC TIES Netanyahu has devoted considerable effort to improving ties with Greece and Cyprus in the past few years, largely to ensure an optimal environment for Israel's natural gas development in the Mediterranean Sea. Similarly, the deal with Ankara should facilitate serious talks about exporting Israeli gas to Turkey. In addition to potentially serving as Israel's gateway to European gas markets, Turkey would welcome an inexpensive supplier to alleviate its own energy dependence on Russia -- particularly given the sharp tensions with Moscow that emerged last November after it shot down a Russian military jet. (One should not rule out the possibility that Netanyahu discussed the Turkey deal with Vladimir Putin during his June visit to Moscow; the timing of this week's Turkish "apology" for the shootdown is notable as well.) Israeli energy minister Yuval Steinitz, who met with Erdogan on the margins of the multilateral nuclear summit in Washington this March, has said that gas is an important bilateral opportunity, and that pipeline deals with Turkey would enable Israel to develop its offshore resources even more. Moreover, ongoing speculation about a potential peace deal in Cyprus this year will only heighten hopes for economic growth in the Eastern Mediterranean. Such growth is already evident -- Israel's trade with Turkey has more than doubled over the past several years and exceeded $5 billion in 2015. Over 13,000 trucks reportedly carried food, steel, machinery, medicine, and other items from Turkey to Israel last year, arriving at Haifa port and then moving on to Jordan via the Sheikh Hussein Bridge. These deliveries supplanted trucks that used to transit through Syria during more tranquil times. Yet the economic gains do not erase the downturn in bilateral ties, which began before Mavi Marmaraand accelerated afterward. On several occasions over the past few years, Erdogan has made vitriolic statements against Israel, even accusing it of "war crimes." And the relationship remained frosty despite the fact some elements of this week's deal were already more or less settled long ago. For example, in a phone conversation orchestrated by President Obama in March 2013, Netanyahu met one of Turkey's key demands by apologizing for any "operational mistakes" in the maritime incident. And Jerusalem has insisted for years that Turkey neither press nor support criminal charges against Israeli security officials for the flotilla raid -- a demand that was not formally accepted by Turkey until this week. Earlier today, Israel's chief negotiator for the talks told Yediot Aharonot that the $20 million in victim compensation would not be forthcoming until the Turkish parliament passed a law against such charges. In addition, three Israeli cabinet ministers voted against the deal, including newly appointed defense minister Avigdor Liberman. Education Minister Naftali Bennett also dissented, arguing that the principle of giving a compensation package to the Turkish flotilla victims sets a bad precedent on the Palestinian issue. While some ministers were upset that the deal was not linked to the return of two Israeli soldiers whose bodies are still in Gaza, Jerusalem apparently decided that any such linkage would give Hamas an effective veto over Israeli-Turkish relations. THE U.S. DIMENSION Washington has long been calling for such a deal between its allies in order to get a better handle on the region's growing turbulence. In addition to the Obama phone call in 2013, Vice President Joe Biden visited both countries this year (Ankara on January 21 and Israel on March 8), where he is believed to have discussed the need for rapprochement. In recent years, Turkey has used its membership in NATO to block different forms of outreach to Israel, so the new agreement should allow the organization to expand cooperation with Jerusalem. The chances of Israeli-Turkish cooperation against jihadist groups are less certain, though recent statements offer some potential for movement in that regard. According to a May 9 report in Hurriyet Daily News, Israel's consul-general in Istanbul, Shai Cohen, noted, "Ultimately, we see eye to eye with Turkey on eliminating jihadist extremist organizations, particularly in Syria, but [also] in the region in general. There is a lot to cooperate on that." It remains to be seen whether Turkey's presumably intensified conflict with the Islamic State will lead to closer sharing of information with Israel, at least on discrete subjects. The Israeli media is rife with speculation that pre-2010 bilateral arms sales will be renewed in some reduced form, but this cannot be confirmed. CONCLUSION The Israel-Turkey agreement is unlikely to mean a "reset" between leaders who have profoundly different worldviews on political Islam and other issues. Yet by ending years of political deterioration and vociferous recrimination between the two governments, the deal could be the catalyst that enables them to seize bilateral and regional opportunities when their strategic interests converge.

Neighborhood Bully Bob Dylan's Pro Zionist Anthem

Over the past couple decades, Dylan has become a supporter of the Chabad Lubavitch movement, which holds a firm Eretz Israel line regarding the ongoing occupation of the West BankThe picture was taken at the western Wall in , Jerusalem in 2010 at his son's barmitzvah.
NEIGHBORHOOD BULLY 

WRITTEN BY: BOB DYLAN
 Well, the neighborhood bully, he’s just one man
 His enemies say he’s on their land
 They got him outnumbered about a million to one
 He got no place to escape to, no place to run
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 The neighborhood bully just lives to survive
 He’s criticized and condemned for being alive
 He’s not supposed to fight back, he’s supposed to have thick skin
 He’s supposed to lay down and die when his door is kicked in
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 The neighborhood bully been driven out of every land
 He’s wandered the earth an exiled man
 Seen his family scattered, his people hounded and torn
 He’s always on trial for just being born
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 Well, he knocked out a lynch mob, he was criticized
 Old women condemned him, said he should apologize.
 Then he destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad
 The bombs were meant for him. He was supposed to feel bad
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 Well, the chances are against it and the odds are slim
 That he’ll live by the rules that the world makes for him
 ’Cause there’s a noose at his neck and a gun at his back
 And a license to kill him is given out to every maniac
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 He got no allies to really speak of
 What he gets he must pay for, he don’t get it out of love
 He buys obsolete weapons and he won’t be denied
 But no one sends flesh and blood to fight by his side
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 Well, he’s surrounded by pacifists who all want peace
 They pray for it nightly that the bloodshed must cease
 Now, they wouldn’t hurt a fly. To hurt one they would weep
 They lay and they wait for this bully to fall asleep
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 Every empire that’s enslaved him is gone
 Egypt and Rome, even the great Babylon
 He’s made a garden of paradise in the desert sand
 In bed with nobody, under no one’s command
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 Now his holiest books have been trampled upon
 No contract he signed was worth what it was written on
 He took the crumbs of the world and he turned it into wealth
 Took sickness and disease and he turned it into health
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 What’s anybody indebted to him for?
 Nothin’, they say. He just likes to cause war
 Pride and prejudice and superstition indeed
 They wait for this bully like a dog waits to feed
 He’s the neighborhood bully

 What has he done to wear so many scars?
 Does he change the course of rivers? Does he pollute the moon and stars?
 Neighborhood bully, standing on the hill
 Running out the clock, time standing still
 Neighborhood bully

Bob Dylan’s Pro-Zionist Anthem

It is 33 years since the legendary and prolific American songwriter, Bob Dylan  unveiled his brilliant up-tempo Pro-Zionist anthem, the ironically-titled “Neighborhood Bully” on his Infidels album.

Written in just  prior to the 1982 Lebanon War and recorded in the spring of 1983, “Neighborhood Bully” is a passionate defense of Israel and her foreign policies.

For those who are not familiar with the song, do not be misled by the title. The phrase “neighborhood bully” is an ironic allusion to the accusation that Israel is an aggressor. The real bully, says Dylan, is the international community which has a “noose” around Israel’s neck. Another bully is Islamism, the ideology of “maniacs” who believe they have a “license to kill” Jews.

The song enables Dylan to take a swipe at anti-Semites who condemn Israel for simply “being alive” and he castigates so-called pacifists in the West who expect Israel to simply “lie down and die when his door is kicked in.” He also celebrates Israel’s remarkable contribution to medical science in which “sickness and disease” are “turned into health” but he laments the fact that Israel’s achievements are overshadowed by anti-Semitism.

“Neighborhood Bully” is also something of a Jewish history lesson. Within 11 verses, Dylan refers to the descent into Egypt, the Babylonian exile, the “trampling” of holy books by the Nazis and the Six-Day War. There is a clever reference to the fierce battles that took place in late 1947 and early 1948 when the Yishuv/Israel fought the Arabs using “obsolete weapons.” And there is a superb and acerbic rebuttal of the United Nations which condemned Israel’s bombing of an Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981:

"He destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad:

The bombs were meant for him. He was supposed to feel bad".

What is particularly intriguing about the song is that Dylan does not differentiate between the State of Israel, the ancient Israelites or the Jews driven out by the Romans in 70 CE. It’s as if the Book of Genesis, the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the modern-day Islamic terrorist threat are happening at the same time to the same people.

"The neighborhood bully been driven out of every land

He’s wandered the earth an exiled man

Seen his family scattered, his people hounded and torn

He’s always on trial for just being born

He’s the neighborhood bully."

But Dylan takes this poetic conceit even further. As well as conflating time and space, Dylan makes this personal – literally. The Jews – whenever and wherever they are – are bound together so tightly that they are “one man.” This man, who was exiled from Judea by the Roman Army, is now told that he doesn’t belong anywhere, not even in his historic homeland:

"Well, the neighborhood bully, he’s just one man

His enemies say he’s on their land

They got him outnumbered about a million to one

He got no place to escape to, no place to run."

This single individual or corporate personality can perhaps be interpreted as the third patriarch of the Jewish people: Jacob, ancestor of the Israelites. According to Jewish tradition, Jacob experiences many personal struggles both in the land of Israel and out of it, which foreshadow the trials and misfortunes of the Jewish people as they fight for their dignity and their inheritance.

But, argues Dylan, the Jewish people have essentially triumphed over history by returning to Eretz Israel, even if the rest of the world is hostile to that fact. “Every empire that’s enslaved him is gone,” he sings. Egypt, Rome and Babylon have all perished but the Jewish people live on and have made “a garden of paradise in the desert sand.”

But will Israel survive, he asks, if anti-Semitism and terrorism continue to undermine the morale and security of the Jewish people?

In the end, the answer is “Yes.” Israel will survive because it is a miraculous nation. The enigmatic final verse hints at Israel’s closeness to G-d. Israel is “standing on the hill”. Not just any hill, but the hill, which is probably an allusion to the Temple Mount, the place where God chose the Divine Presence to rest and where G-d gathered the dust used to create Adam. It is also the place where the Third Temple will be built, thus ushering in the Messianic era. As it says in Isaiah 2:2:

"And it shall be at the end of the days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be firmly established at the top of the mountains, and it shall be raised above the hills, and all the nations shall stream to it.

Dylan’s paean to Zionism surprised (and angered) many of his fans, but the song was really a natural outflowing of his Jewish heritage and his love for Israel. Dylan considered moving to a kibbutz in the early 1970s and he has made several trips to Israel, both personal and professional.

According to Meir Kahane, the American-Israeli rabbi whose ultra-nationalist views about Israel outraged many liberals, Dylan attended several meetings of the Jewish Defense League in the 1970s.  And in a 1971 interview with Time Magazine, Dylan made positive comments about Kahane. “He's a really sincere guy,” said Dylan. “He's really put it all together.”

Dylan converted to born-again Christianity in the late 1970s but he never forgot his Jewish roots and his songs continue to be soaked in imagery from the Tanakh.

In the early 1980s, it was alleged that Dylan had returned to Judaism. He was rumored to be studying with Chabad Lubavitch and had recorded an (unreleased) album of Hassidic songs. Even today, Dylan refuses to clarify his religious beliefs.

It is even harder to determine whether Dylan still stands by the sentiments expressed in “Neighborhood Bully.” At one point in his career he seemed to distance himself from the song, but Dylan has always been enigmatic and enjoys ridiculing journalists who question him about the messages in his music..... but at the moment no version of this song or for that matter any other song  by Bod Dylan is available free  Youtube . The Bohemian Anti Establishment  Folk Rocker of the 60's is now a rip roaring Capitalists and  insists you spend 50c and buy his songs on itune.

It’s also worth noting that he has defied the BDS movement by playingand visiting  in Israel many times.

Whatever his political views, “Neighborhood Bully” remains an authentic expression of one man’s outrage over the way Israel and the Jewish people are slandered by the press, the public and politicians.

And for the record, it is one of my favorite (and most-played) Dylan songs.


Infidels Album

Infidels is the twenty-second studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on October 27, 1983 by Columbia Records.

Produced by Mark Knopfler and Dylan himself, Infidels is seen as his return to secular music, following a conversion to Christianity, three evangelical, gospel records and a subsequent return to a less religious lifestyle. Though he has never abandoned religious imagery, Infidels gained much attention for its focus on more personal themes of love and loss, in addition to commentary on the environment andgeopolitics. Christopher Connelly of Rolling Stone called those gospel albums just prior to Infidels"lifeless", and saw Infidels as making Bob Dylan's career viable again. According to Connelly and others, Infidels is Dylan's best poetic and melodic work since Blood on the Tracks.

The critical reaction was the strongest for Dylan in years, almost universally hailed for its songwriting and performances. The album also fared well commercially, reaching #20 in the US and going gold, and #9 in the UK. Still, many fans and critics were disappointed that several songs were inexplicably cut from the album just prior to mastering—primarily "Blind Willie McTell", considered a career highlight by many critics, and not officially released until it appeared on The Bootleg Series Volume III eight years later.





Recording sessions

Infidels was produced by Mark Knopfler, best known as the frontman of the band Dire Straits. Dylan initially wanted to produce the album himself, but feeling that technology had passed him by, he approached a number of contemporary artists who were more at home in a modern recording studio.David Bowie, Frank Zappa, and Elvis Costello were all approached before Dylan hired Knopfler.

Knopfler later admitted it was difficult to produce Dylan. "You see people working in different ways, and it's good for you. You have to learn to adapt to the way different people work. Yes, it was strange at times with Bob. One of the great parts about production is that it demonstrates to you that you have to be flexible. Each song has its own secret that's different from another song, and each has its own life. Sometimes it has to be teased out, whereas other times it might come fast. There are no laws about songwriting or producing. It depends on what you're doing, not just who you're doing. You have to be sensitive and flexible, and it's fun. I'd say I was more disciplined. But I think Bob is much more disciplined as a writer of lyrics, as a poet. He's an absolute genius. As a singer—absolute genius. But musically, I think it’s a lot more basic. The music just tends to be a vehicle for that poetry."

Once Knopfler was aboard, the two quickly assembled a team of accomplished musicians. Knopfler's own guitar playing was paired with that of Mick Taylor, a former lead guitarist of the Rolling Stones and now touring with them again. Having been introduced to Taylor the previous summer, Dylan had developed a friendship with him that resulted in the guitarist hearing the Infidels material first during the months leading up to the April sessions. In addition, the sessions benefited as well from Taylor's ability as a slide guitarist.

Knopfler said about the instrument he plays on Infidels: "I still haven't got a flat-top wooden acoustic, because I've never found one that was as good as the two best flat tops I ever played. One … was a hand-built Greco that Rudy Pensa, of Rudy's Music Stop lent me. I used … the Greco onInfidels."

Knopfler suggested Alan Clark for keyboards as well as engineer Neil Dorfsman, both of whom were hired. According to Knopfler, it was Dylan's idea to recruit Robbie Shakespeare and Sly Dunbar as the rhythm section. Best known as Sly & Robbie, Shakespeare and Dunbar were famed reggaeproducers as well as recording artists in their own right.

"Bob's musical ability is limited, in terms of being able to play a guitar or a piano," said Knopfler. "It's rudimentary, but it doesn't affect his variety, his sense of melody, his singing. It's all there. In fact, some of the things he plays on piano while he's singing are lovely, even though they're rudimentary. That all demonstrates the fact that you don't have to be a great technician. It's the same old story: If something is played with soul, that's what's important."
Songs

Beginning with Infidels, Dylan ceased to preach a specific religion, revealing little about his personal religious beliefs in his lyrics. In 1997, after recovering from a serious heart condition, Dylan said in an interview for Newsweek, "Here's the thing with me and the religious thing. This is the flat-out truth: I find the religiosity and philosophy in the music. I don't find it anywhere else … I don't adhere to rabbis, preachers, evangelists, all of that. I've learned more from the songs than I've learned from any of this kind of entity."

Though Infidels is often cited as a return to secular work (following a trio of albums heavily influenced by born-again Christianity), many of the songs recorded during the Infidels sessions retain Dylan's penchant for Biblical references and religious imagery.[5] An example of this is the opening track, "Jokerman". Along with Biblical references, the song's lyrics reference populists who are overly concerned with the superficial ("Michelangelo indeed could've carved out your features") and more about action than thinking through the complexities ("fools rush in where angels fear to tread"). A number of critics have called Jokerman a sly political protest, addressed to an antichrist-like[6] figure, a "manipulator of crowds … a dream twister."

The second track, "Sweetheart Like You", is sung to a fictitious woman. Oliver Trager's book, Keys to the Rain: The Definitive Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, mentions that some have criticized this song as sexist. Indeed, music critic Tim Riley makes that accusation in his book, Hard Rain: A Dylan Commentary, singling out lyrics like "a woman like you should be at home/That's where you belong/Taking care of somebody nice/Who don't know how to do you wrong." However, Trager also cites other interpretations that dispute this claim.[7] Some have argued that "Sweetheart Like You" is being sung to the Christian church ("what's a sweetheart like you doing in a dump like this?"), claiming that Dylan is mourning the church's deviation from scriptural truth. The song was later covered by Rod Stewart on his 1995 album A Spanner in the Works.

A few critics like Robert Christgau and Bill Wyman claimed that Infidels betrayed a strong, strange dislike for space travel, and it can be heard on the first few lines of "License to Kill". ("Man has invented his doom/First step was touching the moon.") A harsh indictment accusing mankind of imperialism and a predilection for violence, the song deals specifically with humanity’s relationship to the environment, either on a political scale or a scientific one, beginning with the first line: "Man thinks because he rules the Earth/He can do with it as he please." A skeptical opinion toward theAmerican space program was shared among other evangelicals of Dylan's generation.

The song "Neighborhood Bully" is a song from the point of view of someone using sarcasm to defend Israel's right to exist; the title bemoans Israel's and the Jewish People's historic treatment in the populist press. Events in the history of the State of Israel are referenced, such as the Six-Day War and Operation Opera, Israel's bombing of the Osirak nuclear reactor near Baghdad on June 7, 1981, or previous bomb making sites bombed by Israeli soldiers. Events in the history of the Israelites as a whole are mentioned, such as being enslaved by Rome (commemorated on the Arch of Titus, and extensively in the Jewish Talmud), Egypt (remembered on the Jewish holiday Passover, and the Book of Exodus), and Babylon (commemorated on the Jewish holiday Tisha B'Av and the Book of Lamentations). Events in modern Jewish secular history are noted as well, such as the ridiculing of holy books by anti-semitic groups like the Nazis and the Soviet Union, and Jews' historic role in the advancement of medicine ("took sickness and disease and turned them into health"). Historic restrictions on Jewish commerce are mentioned as well.[10] In 1983, Dylan visited Israel again, but for the first time allowed himself to be photographed there, including a shot at Jerusalem's open-air synagogue wearing a yarmulkah and orthodox Jewish phylactories, and tallith. Dylan made some roundabout comments on the song in a 1984 interview with Rolling Stone In 2001, the Jerusalem Post described the song as "a favorite among Dylan-loving residents of the territories".Israeli singer Ariel Zilber covered "Neighborhood Bully" in 2005 in a version translated to Hebrew.

"Union Sundown" is a political protest song against imported consumer goods and offshoring. In the song, Dylan examines the subject from several different angles, discussing the greed and power of unions and corporations ("You know capitalism is above the law,/ It don't count unless it sells./ When it costs too much to build it at home you just build it cheaper someplace else." ... "Democracy don't rule this world,/ You better get that through your head./ This world is ruled by violence/Though I guess that's better left unsaid."), the hypocrisy of Americans who complain about the lack of American jobs while not paying more for American-made products ("Lots of people complainin' that there is no work./I say, 'Why you say that for? When nothin' you got is U.S.-made? They don't make nothin' here no more"), the collaboration of the unions themselves ("The unions are big business, friend'/ And they’re goin’ out like a dinosaur."), and the desperate conditions of the foreign workers who make the goods ("All the furniture, it says “Made in Brazil”/ Where a woman, she slaved for sure/ Bringin’ home thirty cents a day to a family of twelve/ You know, that’s a lot of money to her." ... "And a man's going to do what he has to do,/ When he's got a hungry mouth to feed.").

"I and I", according to author/critic Tim Riley, "updates the Dylan mythos. Even though it substitutes self-pity for the [pessimism found throughoutInfidels], you can't ignore it as a Dylan spyglass: 'Someone else is speakin' with my mouth, but I'm listening only to my heart/I've made shoes for everyone, even you, while I still go barefoot.'"[14] Riley sees the song as an exploration of the distance between Dylan's "inner identity and the public face he wears".

Infidels' closer, "Don't Fall Apart On Me Tonight" stands out on the album as a pure love song. On past albums like John Wesley Harding and Nashville Skyline, Dylan closed with love songs sung to the narrator's partner, and that tradition is continued with "Don't Fall Apart On Me Tonight", with a chorus that asks "Don't fall apart on me tonight, I just don't think that I could handle it./Don't fall apart on me tonight, Yesterday's just a memory, Tomorrow is never what it's supposed to be/And I need you, yeah, you tonight."

Ma Nishtana, One Song, Four Questions and Different Traditions in Zion

The Four Question come down to us through the generations. The original Ma Nishtana (Why Is This Night Different?) questions found in the ancient codes of law, the Mishnah and subsequently in variations in the Talmud. Included in these early versions was a question about roasting the Passover sacrifice — which was the practice when the Holy Temple stood in Jerusalem. As the Temple rites faded from memory, the question about sacrifice was replaced with a question about leaning while eating.

The order in which we find the Four Questions in most modern American Haggadahs, follows the Ashkenazi custom. It starts with matzah vs. bread, moves on to maror/bitter herbs, considers double dipping and concludes with reclining. But the Ma Nishtana order in the Sephardi, Mizrahi and Yemenite tradition is a little different. They begin with double dipping, then go on to matzah, come round to maror/bitter herbs and similarly conclude with reclining.

Another notable difference between the historic Ashkenazi and Sephardi/Mizrahi customs around the Four Questions was language. In Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazi communities, the Ma Nishtana were traditionally sung in Yiddish. Sephardi and Mizrachi Jews, by contrast, chanted them in Hebrew and not in Ladino or Judeo-Arabic.

The tune that today is nearly universal is a modern invention and speaks to the Zionist vision to create a new Jewish culture. It was composed by Ephraim Abileah.  Abileah was born in Russia in 1881 and was originally called Leo Nesviski. The son of a cantor and a gifted musician, he came to value music as integral to Jewish life and founded The Society for Jewish Folk Music in St. Petersberg. But as Nesviski took to the Zionist vision of a homeland for all Jews in the land of Israel, he made his way there in 1922.

Understanding the power of music in culture, Abileah became part of a movement that composed music that like his new name, would move away from the culture of Diaspora and create a new sound for a new vision of Judaism. In 1936, he composed an oratorio called “Chag Ha-Cherut,” the holiday of freedom. The work was a modern Zionist Passover work that told the story of the Exodus.

While “Chag Ha-Cherut” was performed in full only once, the tune for the Ma Nishtana became a global Jewish standard. In many ways this short simple melody harnessed the power of folk music and achieved what Abileah set out to do. He created a new version of the Four Questions that is today sung by Jews in all parts of the world. This Israeli version has supplanted the Yiddish version nearly completely and is even sung in many Sephardi and Mizrachi homes as well and even by the Jews of Uganda! So while his oratorio may have failed, Abileah succeeded in creating an enduring new vision of global Passover folk music.