I note that Thomas Friedman of the Times wants to give the Nobel Peace
Prize to Ayatollah Sistani for bringing about the possibility of a peaceful
society in Iraq.  Maybe so.  Certainly, our feelings about Bush's war to
one side, we all hope for such an outcome.  But we're still very far from
being there, and if Friedman is ready to hand out a prize for unfinished
work, so am I -- but with different winners.

The prize for peace should go to Satmar.  Not to any one person since that
would ignite a fight that none of us would live to see concluded, but to
that fractious and contentious community (a community in constant war with
itself) which has bestowed on the world a great gift: it is not involved in
Israeli or near-eastern politics.  If Israel is already facing an internal
threat to its survival, think of what the situation would be if Satmar, the
world's largest hasidic dynasty and by all odds its most irrational,
bone-ignorant and pugnacious, were to enter the fray.  If Satmar were
Zionist some of its hooligans (who have to settle these days for attacks on
other hasidim and sometimes on other Satmar factions) would long ago have
found their way to the temple mount, al-haram al-sharif and Israel would be
at permanent war with the entire Muslim world.

So a muted hurray for the Teitelbaums.  May they remain in Williamsburg
forever.

Norman MIller