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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL: A SUNFLOWER
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, June 30, 2011. |
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""One photo out of focus is a mistake,
HOW I GOT THE SHOT: Israelis love their "geranim," their seeds, and every spring and summer vast swaths of fertile farmland buzz with these monster yellow blooms. Standing a dozen rows deep in this flower forest, I felt I had entered a science fiction movie, as some of these giants towered above me at over nine feet tall. That, of course, wreaks havoc for photographers, who often prefer to be eye-level with their subjects. Predicting this predicament, I had planned to bring a ladder, but that thought remained stranded somewhere in a senior moment. I never cease to be amazed by the creative process. A dead end in one direction leads the mind to re-chart its course. Having scrapped my vision of a high-angle shot of the entire field, I narrowed my search and discovered these flowing petals, brought alive with texture and motion injected by the back lighting. It is the somewhat unusual composition, however, that distinguishes this shot. The subject is familiar to most viewers, so tight cropping draws attention to the petals without the feeling that something is missing. This is a technique I learned from shooting portraits, where a very tight crop on a person's face can deliver great feeling and intimacy without rendering the subject's identity unrecognizable. Finally, the background, although severely blurred, provides context for the setting and a nice color complement to the photo's center of interest. Technical Data: Nikon D700, 28-105 zoom at 105mm, f5.6 at 1/500 sec., ISO 200.
Contact Yehoshua Halevi by email at smile@goldenlightimages.com
and visit his website: |
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WELFARE FOR DICTATORS
Posted by Susana K-M, June 30, 2011. |
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This is by Aram Roston, winner of the 2010 Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding International Investigative Reporting. He is the author of The Man Who Pushed America to War: The Extraordinary Life, Adventures, and Obsessions of Ahmad Chalabi (Nation Books 2008). He's covered crime, corruption, conflicts, politics and national security for more than seventeen years. He has worked as a CNN correspondent, an NBC News investigative producer and a NY city police reporter, and he's written for The Nation, Playboy, GQ and other magazines and newspapers. This article is archived at the Daily Beast
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Officially, the U.S. does not pay other governments for rights to military bases. The logic is straightforward: funneling money to the treasuries of foreign dictators cannot form the foundation of genuine strategic alliances. Yet, to fight wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while staring down the mullahs in Iran, over the last decade the Pentagon has come to rely in an unprecedented way on a web of bases across the Middle East. And a Newsweek investigation of Pentagon contracting practices in Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, and Bahrain has uncovered more than $14 billion paid mostly in sole-source contracts to companies controlled by ruling families across the Persian Gulf. The revelation raises a fundamental question: are U.S. taxpayer dollars enriching the ruling potentates of friendly regimes just as the youthful protesters and the Arab Spring have brought a new push for democracy across the region? Take a look at Abu Dhabi. The wealthiest of the United Arab Emirates, it hosts a U.S. Air Force base at Al Dhafra, which is a vital refueling hub in the region. As is the case in most Gulf states, Abu Dhabi is ruled by a single family that dominates both government and business. Here it is the Nahyan family, and the emir is 63-year-old Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who is known for his interest in camel racing, is worth $15 billion, and controls the country's national oil company, ADNOC. As it turns out, every drop of fuel America buys for its planes at Al Dhafra — more than 200 million gallons a year, costing $5.2 billion since 2005 — is purchased from the Al Nahyan-controlled ADNOC. Yet, according to contract documents, that money has bypassed the competitive bidding process that is supposed to accompany any purchase — of firearms, flak jackets, or fuel — by the Pentagon. In Abu Dhabi, "we may be essentially buying our presence," says Alexander Cooley, a professor at Barnard College who studies U.S. basing strategy. The U.S. regularly pays rents to foreign landowners, but those payments are separate from base rights, which are government-to-government agreements. On bases, Cooley says, "there is a quid pro quo that is tacit." Nearly three decades ago, after a spree of spending scandals — there was a $436 hammer and a toilet seat that cost $640 — Congress passed the 1984 Competition in Contracting Act requiring competitive bidding. The principle is simple: competition drives down prices and increases quality. According to Charles Tiefer, a member of the federal Commission on Wartime Contracting, "The law mandates competition with very limited exceptions." Abu Dhabi has exploited one of those exemptions brilliantly. Five years ago, at the height of the Iraq War, an American fuel contractor based in Florida called IOTC challenged a $500 million sole-source contract teed up for ADNOC. The award "must be open to full competition," a contract lawyer, Ronald Uscher, wrote in a protest letter to the federal Government Accountability Office. The Pentagon fought back, citing what it said was U.A.E. law, but IOTC's lawyer says the military "was unable to produce any such law or decree." Internal Pentagon emails obtained by Newsweek under the Freedom of Information Act show confusion even inside the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), which handles procurement for the military. After a colonel questioned the sole-source process with ADNOC in 2008, the acting division chief of the agency responded, "Basically, it's the only company we are allowed to source fuel from as per the local gov't." Later, a U.S. contracting officer asked, "Is there any documentation or history" about the Abu Dhabi law? Even the U.S. Embassy in Abu Dhabi said that it could not actually find a copy of the law. Only a few months later, the Pentagon issued another $918 million sole-source contract to ADNOC. In Tiefer's estimation, "you are turning the keys to the treasury over to the sheikdom." The Pentagon says it did what it had to. "We have an option," a DLA official told Newsweek. "Do you want to be in that country and fly out of the airfield and use the fuel they provide, or not?" (ADNOC would not comment.) As Ronald Neumann, a former ambassador in the Middle East, says, the dilemma is "a potential effect of doing business in nondemocratic countries." Ruling families hosting other U.S. bases in the Gulf seem to be profiting in the same way. Consider Kuwait, where Arifjan, the major U.S. base, serves as the chief military supply route to Iraq. Like the Al Nahyan family in Abu Dhabi, the al-Sabah clan runs Kuwait, as well as its national oil concern, Kuwait Petroleum Co., which has received some $4 billion in Pentagon contracts since 2005, much of it in sole-source contracts. The DLA explains, "Contracts providing fuel destined for Iraq are sole source due to Kuwaiti restrictions." Or look at the kingdom of Bahrain, where Arab Spring protests have raged this past month. It's also home to the 60-acre headquarters of the U.S.'s Fifth Fleet. King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa rules the country, and as it happens, Bahrain is also host to the regional headquarters for the DLA's energy operations — the office that buys all fuel for the U.S. military in the first place. Every year Bahrain's national oil company routinely wins a chunk of a huge Pentagon contract, called WestPac, to provide fuel to U.S. military operations in the western Pacific. Bahrain's national fuel company has achieved a rare status: the kingdom, which has a population of barely more than 1 million people, has became one of the American military's chief fuel suppliers, taking in billions. The DLA points out that Bahrain's fuel sales are not a sole-source contract like the ones in Abu Dhabi. Instead, the Pentagon says, Bahrain always wins because its bid is low; it offers vast quantities of fuel; and it has few, if any, competitors among the "traditional suppliers" in the region. David Kirsh, a director at the oil-consulting firm PFC Energy, says, "The Bahrain Petroleum Co. probably would not be winning these contracts if not for the base." The official at the DLA says the agency does its best to provide fuel at low cost to U.S. forces around the world. The question remains whether these strategic alliances are floating on more than a fast-flowing river of taxpayer money. Contact Susana K-M by email at suanema@gmail.com |
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THE AUDACITY OF DUPES: AN OPEN LETTER TO ALICE WALKER & HER FELLOW FLOTILLA TRAVELERS
Posted by Richard L. Cravatts, June 30, 2011. |
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You recently wrote an essay, "Why I'm Sailing to Gaza," in which you tried to defend the indefensible; namely, your intention to violate international law by attempting to penetrate Israel's legal blockade of Gaza, purportedly for the purpose of delivering aid to the suffering Gazans — although in this case the aid was only a cache of letters of solidarity and the true purpose of your voyage is a misguided, self-aggrandizing incitement designed to ultimately reflect badly on Israel. You are a writer and know that words are important and can be powerful, but you are best known for your works of fiction and evidently have failed to come to grips with the facts, the historical realities of the Israeli/Arab conflict. Your obsession with exculpating the Arabs from any responsibility for their condition and statelessness, and your habit of singularly condemning Israel for all the defects in the region, is disingenuously framed with your fatuous comparisons between the conditions in Gaza and those experienced by blacks in the Jim Crow south. While you give some credit to two "good" Jews, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, who you have to admit put themselves at risk by participating in, and dying for, the American civil rights struggle in the 1960s, you and your fellow activists regularly try to frame the Palestinian issue in the context of race, with Israel as a racist regime that humiliates, segregates, and discriminates against hapless, victimized Arabs on racial grounds, in your contorted view a system equivalent to apartheid. The "good Jews" of the civil rights era, you insinuate, have been replaced by the "bad Jews" of the brutal, colonial, occupying Israel. You ignore, of course, the reality that citizens of Israel are not all white, that some Israelis have skin darker than yours. More importantly, Israel's non-Jewish citizens, twenty percent of its population, enjoy more civil and human rights than they would ever enjoy were they to live in the surrounding Arab countries you fail to criticize, not to mention in Gaza itself. The reason that Schwerner and Goodman, as well as many other like-minded, committed activists, fought segregation in the South during the civil rights era was the fact that blacks were American citizens, that there, indeed, was a system of institutionalized racism in sections of the country, and that it was morally abhorrent for a certain class of Americans to be denied their fundamental human and civil rights based on the color of their skin. For you to try to frame the situation in Gaza and the West Bank as analogous to the segregation in 1960s America is both absurd and abhorrent. Palestinians are not citizens of Israel and Israel has no responsibility to afford them the protections and benefits it does offer Israeli citizens in a Western-style democracy with open and elections, a free press, and rule of law. But even more to the point, what you and your fellow critics of Israel habitually do is to ignore the reason that a blockade of Gaza exists in the first place, or why, similarly, the security barrier had to be built in the West Bank, and why there are checkpoints, roadblocks, and other security measures in place inside of Israel and in the territories. The reason is not, as you would like to believe, that "white" Israelis are oppressing "colored," perennially-victimized Palestinians and walling them out based on their race. In your Manichean world view that is a familiar, though defective, way to frame the issue. The actual reason that a blockade exists, and that the security fence had to be constructed, was that Palestinians were, and are, relentlessly intent on murdering Jews. Israel left Gaza completely in 2005 and would be totally uninvolved with it today were it not for the inconvenient fact you overlook that, since that disengagement, Hamas has seen fit to barrage southern Israeli towns with the full intention of murdering Jewish civilians as they sleep, shop, pray, or work. So by challenging the legality of the blockade, are you and your fellow flotilla travelers proclaiming that the continuing, barbaric attempts by Hamas to kill Jews are morally acceptable, or, as you are fond of saying, just? If you stand in solidarity with Hamas, as Noam Chomsky coddles up to Hezbollah in an equally ghoulish ideological alliance, do you feel inoculated from any moral judgment of you simply because you believe that standing up for the perceived victim is always the just thing to do? What you seem unwilling, or incapable, of doing is accepting the fact that Israel's so-called "brutal occupation" and its military incursions — now and in previous conflicts — were necessitated by Arab aggression and terrorism, and the use of force has not been a random occurrence based on the whims of a sadistic Israeli military. "One child must never be set above another," you wrote in justifying your participation in the flotilla, "even in casual conversation, not to mention in speeches that circle the globe." But setting one child above another is precisely what you and your fellow pro-Palestinian activists regularly do when you enshrine the Palestinian cause and continue to seek the weakening and destruction of Israel by supporting those who would, given the chance, eliminate it. You clearly have no concern at all for the Israeli children of Sderot, Ashkelon, Ashod, and other southern Israeli towns where some 10,000 Qassam rockets and mortars have rained down since 2005, launched from Gaza by Hamas with the specific intent to randomly murder Jewish children in schoolyards, synagogues, or as they sleep. And those children everywhere you profess to care about must not include children living in the town of Sderot, for example, where one third of 13 to 18 year-olds have trauma-related learning disorders. Are there letters of solidarity for them in the cargo of your humanitarian flotilla? The reason the "good Jews" you described were willing to fight hard against segregation in America is that there were clear moral principles at stake and it was the appropriate and just thing to do. And African Americans were not launching rockets into Birmingham neighborhoods. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his followers were not strapping bombs to their chests and immolating themselves and innocent civilians on crowded buses in Selma. Ministers in Jackson, Mississippi churches were not giving weekly sermons exhorting congregants to despise white people, to consider them subhuman monsters, and to martyr themselves by murdering white people randomly wherever they could find them. Your own obsession with the human rights and aspirations of the Palestinian people, and your comment that you seek "justice and respect" for Palestinian children alone, indicates that you and your fellow flotilla activists have already decided which children are deserving and which are not. True justice would be justice for Israelis and Palestinians alike, each with sovereign nations living "side by side in peace," but that is not your concern at all. Your evident contempt for Israel's right to self-determination, or even its right to protect the lives of its citizens — the purpose of the blockade you so cavalierly and recklessly intend to violate — demonstrates quite clearly that the safety and human rights of Jews are irrelevant to your world view in which the only individuals deserving of justice are those who you and other "progressives" define as victims, including your favorite Third World victim of the moment, the Palestinians. And those Palestinian children you pretend to care for so deeply, those children "whose impoverished, terrorized, segregated existence" you evidently believe to be solely the fault of Israel's, what circumstances of their lives are the direct result of the culture and ideology of the Palestinian Arabs themselves? Is any part of the Palestinians' lives their own responsibility, or is all of their existence defined by the Jewish occupation, dispossession, and brutality, that banality of evil you apparently can see in no other state on earth than in Israel? You have obviously overlooked the pathologies of Palestinian society, crystallized and made more malevolent by the rule of Hamas itself, in which Palestinian children are inculcated, nearly from birth, with seething, blind, unrelenting, and obsessive hatred of Jews and the 'Zionist regime,' so that kindergartners graduate with blood-soaked hands while toting plastic AK 47s and dedicate their lives to jihad, and older children are recruited to hide explosives on their bodies to transform themselves into shahids — a new generation of kindling for radical Islam's cult of death. Parents of these children you care so much about, in fact, glorify death and martyrdom and seek the death of their children if they distinguish themselves by murdering Jewish civilians. Hamas also broadcasts children's TV shows with animal characters who repeat hateful propaganda about Israel, and who encourage children to attack and kill Jews, behavior you failed to condemn as you boarded your ship, "The Audacity of Hope." Perhaps among your letters of solidarity that you carry on your ego-laden flotilla might be letters to Palestinian parents that suggest that textbooks their children use in school that depict Jews as apes and pigs, that erase Israel from history and geography books, that demonize Israelis in particular and Jews in general as subhuman monsters who are swindlers, thieves, and murderers may not be conducive to raising a new generation of Palestinian citizens eager to, or capable of, ever living in peace with Israel, regardless of where the eventual borders are. You also made the breathtaking statement in a recent interview that you "think Israel is the greatest terrorist in that part of the world," and that you "think in general, the United States and Israel are great terrorist organizations themselves." No, democracies that are attacked by enemies, either in conventional or asymmetrical warfare, are within their legal rights as sovereign nations to defend themselves and not allow their citizens to be harmed — by whatever means necessary and governed by the rules of warfare. Self-defense is not terrorism. The Hamas thugocracy of Gaza, on the other hand, that group whose aspirations and ideologies apparently you embrace, are in fact terrorists, which is precisely why they have been designated as such by U.S., Israel, the EU, Canada, and Japan. The group was founded for one purpose: not, as you like to believe in your rapturous affinity for revolutionary movements, for helping Palestinians to achieve statehood, but for the particular purpose of exterminating Jews. Their charter articulates very clearly Hamas' belief that "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it," and that "The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Muslims, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him." That you and the other flotilla participants so proudly proclaim your solidarity for the Gazans who are ruled by this genocidal group is yet another reminder of how self-defined activists like you inhabit a morally-inverted universe where any behavior by the weak against the powerful is acceptable in your pursuit of social justice. It is interesting, though, that you are silent, for instance, on the genocidal murder by Janjaweed Arabs and Muslims in Darfur of some 300,000 Christian and animist blacks since 2003, as well as the rape and displacement of hundreds of thousands more victims, but you singularly and regularly condemn Israel's efforts to defend its populace from unrelenting attacks. Have you sent letters of support to innocents oppressed and slaughtered by the government in Khartoum? No, it is only Israel that you and your like-minded "progressives" prefer to slander, demonize, and seek to weaken with your relentless attacks on its very right to survive. Attacking Israel takes no courage, and you pay no price for it in the court of world opinion. In fact, in the salons of the West and among the chattering class with whom you roam, it is something of badge of honor to despise Israel and exalt the oppressed Palestinians and you can shroud your true enmity toward Jews with a pompous moral self-righteousness. "We must do everything in our power to cease the behavior that makes children everywhere feel afraid," you wrote in justifying your flotilla participation, and if you truly believe that, perhaps you might consider doing your part to insure that Israeli children, too, will not have to live in a world where they must "feel afraid" in their daily lives because they are surrounded by people who want to kill them simply because they are Jews. Richard L. Cravatts, Ph.D. is Director of the Communications
Management Program at the School of Management at SIMMONS COLLEGE. His
website is at |
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THE FLOTILLA AND THE THIRD INTIFADA
Posted by Melanie Phillips, June 30, 2011. |
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This was written by Melanie Phillips. It is archived at
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Is a bunch of young Israeli lawyers working round the clock sustained only by Diet Coke, falafel and cigarettes about to pull off the legal equivalent of the Six-Day War? Israel famously won that war before it even started by destroying the Egyptian air force on the ground. Now it's beginning to look as if the Gaza flotilla of fools and fanatics may be holed below the waterline before it even sets off on its cynical and potentially murderous stunt. It was supposed to have sailed by now. Today, however, it was reported that it now may not set sail before next week. The main reason is a series of unprecedented and ingenious manoeuvres by Israeli lawyers which have tied up the boats in legal actions mainly concerning insurance and registration issues. And I can reveal that a separate legal move today threatens fourteen of the flotillistas with arrest if they enter Israeli territorial waters. Two Israeli soldiers in the reserves are seeking to bring a private prosecution against those activists who took part in the first Gaza flotilla — and who are planning to take part once again in the current one — for the crimes of assault and soliciting aid for an attack. The fourteen comprise one person from Ireland, two from the US, one from Cyprus, two from England, two from Spain, one from Greece, two from the Netherlands, one from Norway, one from Sweden and one from Qatar. Separately, the captains of the flotilla boats also face the possibility of criminal charges from a similar attempt at a private prosecution. In addition, the US Attorney General has threatened the 36 Americans on the flotilla that they will be liable for criminal prosecution if they sail. Already, the number of flotillistas has been whittled down from 1500 to 350, and the number of boats from 15 to ten. Most of the credit should surely go to the Israeli activist law firm Shurat haDin which believes in bankrupting terrorism through a creative use of the law. Here are some of the legal challenges to the flotilla which Shurat HaDin has initiated with seismic effect.
For the flotilla is out to provoke violence and mayhem. The claim that its mission is a humanitarian one to relieve Israel's 'siege' of Gaza is patently ludicrous. There is no siege. Israel allows in regular supplies, and Egypt recently opened its own Gaza border. No, the flotilla's real aim by its illegal breaking of the legal maritime blockade of Gaza is to provoke Israel into violence against those on board so that they can pose as martyrs and will thus trap Israel into blackening its own image. Yet however transparent the flotilla's real purpose, the media are
sanitising its true aims and potential for violence, as Just Journalism
spells out here
Well, the true aim was actually spelled out by Adam Shapiro, co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement and a board member of the Free Gaza Movement (which is behind the flotilla), at a meeting last November at Rutgers university in New Jersey to raise money to fund an American flotilla boat. I have obtained a video of this address (no link, I'm afraid). This is what Shapiro said: What we've been doing over the last ten years with the International Solidarity Movement, Free Gaza, and all the other outgrowth organisations and movements and groups is to ...work with Palestinian society to ramp up the resistance. This is all part of a Palestinian movement for Palestine...This is truly an international movement ... It's only Palestine, this cause that has been going on for over 60 years, that generates this kind of activism, this kind of resistance... Free Gaza is but one tactic of a larger strategy, to transform this conflict from one between Israel and the Palestinians, or Israel and the Arab world...to one between the rest of the world and Israel... [applause] It's not just the conflict, it's not just the siege, it's not just the home demolitions, it's not just the wall on the West Bank, it's not just the effort to continue to dispossess Palestinians of their land...it's also the attempt to define a place where 20 per cent of the population is Palestinian, to define the land underneath their feet as Jewish, to further dispossess them and subject these people to permanent second third or fourth class citizenship...Free Gaza is a tactic...all of it is part of a strategy now to transform the conflict and internationalise it and really undermine Israel where it gets its most support... Our ground is the whole world. And that's where our resistance has to be. The whole world... We already have a third intifada. It's going on right now. It's going on all over the world. [my emphasis] So from the horse's mouth we learn that the prime aim of the flotilla is not to provide humanitarian supplies to Gaza. It is not even to protest Israel's 'siege' of Gaza. It is instead a tactic in a campaign to undermine Israel itself on account of its 60-plus year existence as a Jewish state. In other words, the flotilla is part of a strategy designed to destroy Israel altogether. All decent people should hold their breath that Shurat haDin pull this one off, and turn 'lawfare' into a boomerang against the jihad and its nauseating fellow-travellers whose true aim is to exterminate the national homeland of the Jewish people. Ted Belman is a retired lawyer and the Editor of Israpundit. He made aliya from Canada last year and now lives in Jerusalem, Israel. Contact him at tedbel@rogers.com |
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THOSE GREY BOATS
Posted by Jack Cohen, June 30, 2011. |
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Sitting on the veranda of the Mini-Golf restaurant in Netanya, I admire the sunset over the Mediterranean sea. It's beautiful, not a ship in sight, the broad empty horizon of the sea stretching as far as the eye could see. It brings to mind two things. I remember a short story I once read by Amos Oz called "The Grey Boats" or something like that. Every day an old man in Tel Aviv gets up early and goes to the seashore and looks towards the horizon. Someone asks him why he does such a thing, and he replies "I am waiting for the grey boats to come." Of course, the "grey boats" represent the fear that we all have of the distant evil of the German Nazis, or the British or all the others, sailing to our small independent state and finally trying to finish us off. I was thinking that there are no boats on the horizon. Except for the flotilla, that is now making its way from Greece towards our shores. Oh yes, they are aiming for Gaza. But, make no mistake they are replicas of the "grey boats," they are its substitutes, of the so-called civilized world bearing down upon us, telling us what to do, what is moral. Do we need your advice after what you have done to us? It is full of self-satisfied, self-righteous "useful idiots" trying to teach us a moral message. What do they know about the Hamas terrorists firing rockets at our children, what do they know of the Hamas thugs throwing Fatah men off the roofs, what do they know of the hatred for Jews inculcated in their children in the UNWRA schools? So the "grey boats" are beginning to come. As I left the restaurant I was stopped short by the vision of the new building rearing up opposite the restaurant. It is 30 stories high and shaped like stairs with a tower on top. It looks like a huge grey ship. I had a sudden image of the two sets of boats, the grey building and the flotilla engaged in battle, each with the other. We have set deep roots in our land, when the pioneers came here there was nothing. The village of Uhm Khaled was located near where the main Post Office is today opposite the Sharon Mall. The Sheikh sold the land to the Zionists and told them "we have been waiting hundreds of years for you to return." Then, there was only sand, sea and sky. Now there is a bustling metropolis of nearly 200,000 people. Yet these interlopers have the temerity to question our right to exist, those who developed the land and built the cities and those of us that followed. So bring on your "grey boats," your flotilla of hate. We are here! Jack Cohen is an American who made aliyah. He lives in Netanya and blogs at www.commentfromisraelblog.blogspot.com |
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DUTCH PRO-PALESTINIAN ACTIVIST REFUSES TO BE USEFUL IDIOT, REVEALS RARE INSIDE VIEW OF GAZA FLOTILLA
Posted by Leonid Telinna, June 30, 2011. |
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This is a Joop-supplied English translation of an article written in
Dutch by Hasna El Maroudi. It appeared yesterday in The Joop
Opinion Online
and is archived at
Hasna El Maroudi, 26, can be described as a "Dutch pro-Palestinian activist/journalist of Moroccan descent." She had planned to join other activists aboard a Dutch ship to Gaza, until she learned that she would be going on a secret Hamas-organized mission and canceled her participation. On Wednesday she published a rare inside account of what she saw in Greece as the activists were preparing to set sail. This English translation of her account is meant to meant to help her discoveries traverse the language barrier. It is called "Parting with the Gaza Flotilla". |
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Why I am not sailing aboard the Dutch ship after all I have been to the Greek island of Corfu over the past few days. I got to know the activists and journalists intending to sail to Gaza and received training on non-violent resistance from Anne de Jong, a passenger in the previous flotilla. Although I had intended to report on the sail for Uitgesproken Vara and Joop, I was going first and foremost as an activist. I want Israel to lift the illegal blockade on Gaza and give the people that which they are entitled to have: Self-rule. And that is also the issue for me: The population there. The Palestinian youths who published a document last year in which they expressed their longing for leading a normal life. I didn't go for any political movement or for those in power. When I decided to subject myself to the sail and the long list of preparatory engagements and training sessions it entailed, I presented the organizers with one single crucial demand: I wanted to know exactly who would sail with me on the Italian-Dutch ship and requested to have the opportunity to meet them all in advance before embarking on the trip. I did not want to be surprised by the presence of figures or organizations with which I did not want to become involved. I was told that my demand was self-evident: There would be team-building and "we are going to have it in Greece." Despite assurances to the contrary, the Italian activists who were supposed to sail with us were nowhere to be seen upon our arrival in Corfu. More crucially, the Dutch delegation was isolated on the island. The rest of the flotilla was in Athens. I repeatedly I asked to receive a tentative list of all the passengers. Realizing that many difficulties had been put in the organizers' path, I did not expect to receive a complete list of participants. I would have been satisfied with the available information. None such information was given. Despite my insistence on receiving the list in advance, it was given to me when I decided to return to Holland. Too late. But there was more going on. The ship's funding remained unclear. Also regarding this point I repeatedly asked for information but as answers I was told of a loose web of associations under different umbrella and daughter organizations. The Nederland Gaza Association [the organizers of the Dutch boat ride] claims to be fully transparent. To me, this means publication of subsidies. If this complicates fundraising and scares off donors, so be it. It's the only way to show an already-suspicious Netherlands that you have nothing to hide. 
The presence of Amin Abou Rashed suggests there is something to hide. He, too, sailed last year to Gaza with the flotilla, and he was arrested by Israel. According to various media, he is Hamas' top figure in the Netherlands. He is also affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. How much of this is true, I do not know. How much of this is not true, I know even less. That is the problem, and it creates an atmosphere of suspicion. Over dinner Anne de Jong insisted that it was all lies and that Amin is a terribly nice man with an unbelievable amount of love for the Palestinians. However much I wished I could believe her and those blue eyes of hers, I could not do it. Simply because his involvement with the flotilla was kept secret until the arrival to Greece. And not only vis-à-vis the rest of the world, but also when it came to the flotilla participants. I find this to be detrimental. On this dangerous action, the participants are laying their lives on the line. It is therefore only fair that they be provided with the relevant essential information. Amin was there the day the Dutch delegation received a non-violence training but hung in the background. Wilfred van de Poll, a journalist for Trouw, spoke briefly with Amin about his presence and role within the organization. "The brain behind the flotilla" as the man elected to be described, arranged the purchase of the boat. He also provided for the lion's share of funding, according to Anne de Jong. If he played such a vital role, then why was it kept secret and why couldn't I know who or what he was? Our activists were told that the goods [aboard the ship] will be distributed by UNHCR, but it later turned out that this was not 100 percent sure. Few organizations beside UNCHR are capable of performing this task in Gaza. In fact, only one other such entity remains. Hamas. And I wanted to have nothing do with them. The bottom line is very simple. In a mission such as this one, the activists must be able to fully trust one another, like firefighters entering a burning building. My trust in the organization only diminished the further we progressed. The moment I expressed reservations about the information which was given out, Anne de Jong's reacted accusatory and snappy. "Would you rather we told you nothing at all?" she demanded, as though I should applaud her right away for getting to hear anything at all. And as though I had failed to understand the magnitude of the task of setting out against a great power such as Israel. It is regretful that the organization (according to my opinion) missed its mark. The boat is about to set sail, carrying many good intentions, too little experience and too many illusions. I wish everyone would come back in one piece. Over a period of one week I became truly attached to the Dutch group and I am convinced of their honest motivations in sailing. I hope they remain extra critical. The goal of freeing Gaza cannot be reached without openness. And it's up to us to set the example. El Maroudi's account generated interest in Dutch media. The following articles appeared the next day: "Censorship on the Gaza boat"
Furious at the paranoia, the dictatorial atmosphere, mutual distrust and outright opposition on board, all Dutch journalists decided to leave the ship on which the Dutch activists seek confrontation with Israeli marines in the Gaza Strip. According to the four editors who left, they were censored by the activists, who did not like critical questions, such as about the financing of the operational ship, which was bought for nearly three tons. The money is scraped together by for example collections in Dutch mosques, as this newspaper revealed earlier. Vara editor Hasna El Maroudi decided to quit because the organization did not want to tell her what other people would be on board: "I did not want to be surprised by the presence of figures or organizations that I want nothing to do with. It also remained unclear who financed the boat. Also, I have repeatedly asked about the funding, but the answer was suspended in a web of vague foundations and umbrella organizations." Hasna El Mouradi is a former NRC-columnist. Hamas Chief Now it appears that the infamous Dutch Hamas leader Amin Abou Rashed also been presented the training of the crew in Greece in recent days. El Maroudi: "Amin was present on the day the Dutch delegation, followed part of the non-violence training. Wilfred van de Poll, journalist for Trouw, just spoke with Amin about his presence and his role within the organization. "The brain behind the fleet" arranged the purchase of the boat. He also has a lion's share of funding provided." El Maroudi: "During the dinner Anne de Jong (one of the driving forces behind the fleet) raved that everything is lies and that Amin is a terribly nice man, who is committed to the Palestininas with incredible love. How much I would like to believe her and her blue eyes, I can not. Simply because his involvement in the fleet had been kept secret until arrival in Greece. Not only for the outside world, but also for the passengers." Paranoia Trouw reporter Wilfred van de Poll withdrew his participation, because he no longer trusted the organization. According to him, the organization was completely paranoid especially concerning possible leaks to De Telegraaf. The Trouw journalist talks about "childish accusations" and a "sphere of suspicion" that prompted the journalists to get off the boat. Closed Wereldomroep radio reporter Eric Beauchemin also quit: "After a week in Greece I have lost all trust in the Netherlands-Gaza foundation. Already at our first meeting on the island of Corfu things actually went wrong. One of the organizers was furious because a Dutch journalist allegedly leaked information to De Telegraaf. I have been working as a journalist for 25 years, but never have I seen such a closed organization. I wanted to make a video report of the mandatory two-day training in order to show how the activists prepared themselves. But the organization prohibited entrance to a lot of parts of this training." "Stunt" The Wereldomroep radio reporter talks of a "stunt" (boerenbedrog) Preceding the trip he attended the mandatory meeting in the Netherlands and went through a 'screening'. "When the organizers told me I was one of 'the chosen' I felt obliged to be happy. In hindsight this all looks like a trick: there was no select group of people and also no famous Dutchmen. Instead of the 32 Dutch participants, the organizations had trouble gathering even 10." Also freelancer Bud Wichers, an experienced crisis-reporter, backed off, and so his report for EenVandaag was also ruined: "The facts were constantly contradictory to what we had been told. At a certain point the breach of confidence had become irreparable." Transparent Martijn Dekker, spokesman for the Netherlands-Gaza Foundation, is deeply ashamed for the collective departure of the journalists. Dekker, a doctoral student for Political Anthropology at the Free University in Amsterdam, called the quarrel between the activists and the reporters 'shocking': "4 journalists that tell the same story is something you can't beat around. Being closed is the exact opposite of what we claim to be, namely open and transparent." Dekker: "We can be quite open about for example the origin of the money that the boat is paid with. We can look into the books of the donating foundation Israa. It shows that all donations come from Dutch individuals, not from a shadowy sheik from abroad. "Foundation Netherlands-Gaza says it can only release the list of passengers until after the fleet departs, as it still being changed. The Dutch action ship left yesterday and arrived today at an agreed rendezvous site, which has three other ships awaiting action. The foundation was forced to admit that Rashed was present in Greece, because of his involvement in the purchase of the ship. But the organization denies his involvement in training, selection and briefings. A unique picture has recently emerged (see above), where the Dutch Hamas leader Sheikh Amin Abou Rashed stands behind Yusuf al Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. This Al Qaradawi is hoping to transform Egypt into fundamentalist dictatorship. The Sheikh, fierce anti-Semite and notorious for his inflammatory speeches, lived in exile in Qatar. After the revolt against Egyptian President Mubarak he returned to Cairo. Al Qaradawi would like to stone gay people and adulterers, would "dismantle" Israel, encourage suicide attacks inside Israel and believes that men should whip "rebellious" women. [emphasis added] "Gaza flotilla surrounded by suspicion and deceit"
Summary: The Dutch journalists who decided not to participate in the Gaza flotilla do not have anything positive to say about the organization Netherlands-Gaza. Journalist Eric Beauchemin of the 'Wereldomroep' says never to have seen an organization as closed as Netherlands-Gaza. No filming was aloud during the two-day training in Greece, and it was kept a secret which Dutch people would participate in the fleet. It was said that well know people would participate, but this was untrue. It is unclear who is funding the Dutch participation. VARA journalist Hasna el-Maoudi cancelled the trip because she had the suspicion that the Hamas was involved in the funding.
Contact Leonid Telinna by email at leonid.telinna@gmail.com
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US IN CONTACT WITH EGYPT'S MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
Posted by Yardena, June 30, 2011. |
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"Today the world is the victim of propaganda because people are not intellectually competent. More than anything the United States needs effective citizens to do their own thinking." -- William Lewis The United States is now prepared to do business with the Muslim Brotherhood. Islamists associated with or akin to the totalitarian, salafist Muslim Brotherhood are poised to be the principal beneficiaries of any balloting that ultimately occurs in Egypt and Tunisia — and, perhaps in due course in, Syria, Yemen, Tunisia, Libya, Bahrain and beyond. The President's ongoing efforts to align the United States with Muslims, irrespective of whether they seek to impose shariah or otherwise seek our destruction, is a prescription for furthering what has emerged as the Obama Doctrine: Emboldening our enemies, undermining our friends and diminishing our country. It is also a formula for disaster. doctrine emboldening enemies undermining friends diminishing country nbsp formula disaster 
EDITOR'S ADDITION: This below comes from the BBC News from the Middle East
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Washington has had "limited contacts" with Egypt's largest Islamic group, the Muslim Brotherhood, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said. She said the US wanted to "engage with all parties" seeking peace and non-violence following Egypt's uprising. The Muslim Brotherhood has a strong following in Egypt but was illegal under ousted President Hosni Mubarak. The group is planning to stand in parliamentary elections scheduled for September. 'Respect our values' Mrs Clinton, on a visit to Budapest, told reporters that the Obama administration was "continuing the approach of limited contacts with the Muslim Brotherhood that have existed on and off for about five or six years". She went on to say that "given the changing political landscape in Egypt... it is in the interests of the United States to engage with all parties that are peaceful, and committed to non-violence, that intend to compete for the parliament and the presidency". She insisted that they would, in any talks, continue to press home the importance of democracy, non-violence, respect for minority rights and the full inclusion of women. The Muslim Brotherhood said it welcomed Mrs Clinton's remarks but that no "direct contact" had yet been made. "We are willing to meet in a context of respect," spokesman Mahmud Ghozlan told the AFP news agency. "If the US is truly willing to respect our values and support freedom, as it says it does, then we have no problem." The Brotherhood is still technically illegal under Egypt's constitution, which bans parties based on religion, class or regionalism. But it is assumed to be Egypt's best organised and most popular opposition movement, and has begun its campaign to be recognised as a formal political party. The Muslim Brotherhood has stressed that the new party it has set up to contest September's elections will be a civil, not a theocratic, group. But correspondents say that with its Islamist agenda and historical links to radical groups, the group is feared and mistrusted in the West and to some extent in Egypt. Contact Yardena at yardena3@aol.com |
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JEWISH VALUES FOR ISRAEL'S CODEX
Posted by Moshe Feiglin, June 30, 2011. |
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"This is the statute of the Torah that G-d has commanded" (From this week's Torah portion, Chukat, Numbers 19:2) For the past twenty years, former Chief Justice Aharon Barak and his associates have been working on a self-contained legal codex for Israel. There is no doubt that the existing situation in which the Israeli legal code relies on a disjointed cornucopia of court decisions and Roman, Ottoman and British laws must change. Israel deserves a genuine codex of Israeli law. But there is a poison arrow lurking here. The group that undertook this monumental task made sure to completely purge itself of any person who may have furnished the new codex with even a hint of Jewish law. Barak and his cohorts are not stupid. Nobody understands better than them that even when a law seems logical and good, there is a spirit of the law that goes above and beyond the specific, technical legal solution for a given problem. Every body of law — and certainly a harmonious legal codex — is predicated on values. It is no coincidence that Barak and his cohorts did not even open a crack for Jewish values to infiltrate the Israeli codex. A Jewish legal codex would highlight our connection to our Jewish sources and Jewish roots here in the Land of Israel. And that is something that the extreme Left cannot stomach — not even a little bit. Shabbat Shalom,
Manhigut Yehudit (Jewish Leadership) is a group of people inside the Likud party who want to see Israel adopt a more Jewish character. Moshe Feiglin, its cofounder, has emphatically said he does not want a theocracy, but he does want a State based on Jewish values. The Manhigut Yehudit website address is http://www.manhigut.org. To learn more about Manhigut Yehudit (Jewish Leadership) and to read their plan for Israel's future, visit www.jewishisrael.org. Or contact Shmuel Sackett, International Director (516) 330-4922 (cell) |
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NORTH KOREA TO HEAD U.N. CONFERENCE ON DISARMAMENT (NOT A SPOOF)
Posted by Anne Bayefsky, June 29, 2011. |
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On Tuesday, the United Nations again made itself an international laughing stock — except perhaps to the American taxpayers who continue to foot 22 percent of the bill — by appointing North Korea chair of the U.N. Conference on Disarmament. That would be the same North Korea that, according to an article this week by Senator John Kerry, head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has "twice tested nuclear weapons...is developing missiles to carry them...has built facilities capable of producing highly enriched uranium for more nuclear weapons" and has defied a U.N. arms embargo by exporting weapons and sensitive technologies to rogue regimes. Alas, Senator Kerry is also one of the lead champion of the United Nations in the Senate. According to the U.N., "The Conference is funded from the UN regular budget, reports to the General Assembly and receives guidance from it." North Korea assumes the Conference chairmanship by being the next state in the alphabetical rotation of the 65 members, which include five nuclear weapons states and 60 other countries such as Iran and Syria. North Korea will preside over the Conference for a four working-week period. North Korea's representative, So Se Pyong, was enthusiastic about his new job. He announced that he was "very much committed to the Conference" and that during his presidency he "welcomes any sort of constructive proposals that strengthened the work and credibility of the Conference on Disarmament." He also said that "he would do everything in his capacity to move the Conference on Disarmament forward." That might make sense, if by "forward" he means toward a nuclear winter, or by "constructive," he means steering clear of anything that might impede North Korea. The official mandate of the Conference looks a bit different and includes "all multilateral arms control and disarmament problems" with the following "main areas of interest": "cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament; prevention of nuclear war, including all related matters." North Korea's chairmanship was heralded by other U.N. aficionados, including the Iranian delegate to the Conference. Iran's Mohammad Hassan Daryaei told the Conference meeting: "I would like to congratulate the distinguished ambassador of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea for the assumption of the presidency and assuring him of my delegation's full support and cooperation." Iran's support is telling. Just yesterday Iran's Revolutionary Guards tested 14 long-range missiles that could carry a nuclear weapon, with the express purpose of hitting U.S. interests and Israel, according to the head of their aerospace division. Congratulations also poured in from such upstanding world citizens and U.N. fans as China. China's Wang Qun "welcomed the presidency of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea." It was left to the Canadian delegate to speak plainly. Canada's Marius Grinius said: "[I]n the last 13 years the Conference has failed to move forward on its core disarmament responsibilities, including the negotiation of a Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty...[T]he Conference on Disarmament is on life support because it no longer is the sole multilateral negotiating forum for disarmament. Indeed, it is not negotiating anything and has not been for a very long time." Why not just put it out of its misery and pull the plug? Anne Bayefsky is editor of EYEontheUN. She is also a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and at Touro College. Contact the organization at info@EYEonthe UN.org This article appeared today in the Weekly Standard. |
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U.S. DESIGNATES ISRAEL AS COUNTRY THAT TENDS 'TO PROMOTE, PRODUCE TERRORISTS'
Posted by Chuck Brooks, June 30, 2011. |
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Is there anyone left who believes that Obama is NOT doing everything he can to destroy Israel?! This below appeared in CNS News today and is archived at http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/ us-designates-israel-country-tends-promo. It was written by Edwin Mora. |
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(CNSNews.com) — In an implicit admission that Israel is so threatened by terrorism that it is not only surrounded by countries and territories that produce terrorists but also unwillingly harbors terrorists within its own territory in a way that most other nations in the world do not, the Obama administration is currently listing Israel among 36 "specially designated countries" it believes "have shown a tendency to promote, produce, or protect terrorist organizations or their members." Also included on the list — separately from Israel — are the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza, as well as Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, the four nations bordering Israel. All but five of the nations included on the administration's "specially designated country" list have majority Muslim populations (see the list below). The five countries on the list that do not have majority Muslim populations — Kazakhstan (47 percent Muslim), Eritrea (36.5 percent Muslim), Israel (16.9 percent Muslim), the Philippines (5 percent Muslim) and Thailand (4.6 percent) — have had internal problems with radical Muslim terrorists, as reported by the State Department. The State Department has designated Eritrea as a country that is "not cooperating fully" with U.S. anti-terrorism efforts. The Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General published the list of "specially designated countries" as an appendix to an unclassified May 11 report — "Supervision of Aliens Commensurate With Risk" — that was publicly posted on the Internet. (The appendix is on page 18 of the document.) As a matter of policy, according to the inspector general's report, citizens of Israel and other "specially designated countries" are subjected to a special security screening called a "Third Agency Check" (TAC) when they are actually detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the division of the Department of Homeland Security responsible for enforcing the immigration laws. ICE officers are supposed to check all aliens they take into custody against the Terrorist Watchlist, which includes the identities of individuals the U.S. government knows or reasonably suspects to be terrorists. When ICE holds a citizen from a "specially designated country" in its own detention facilities, according to the agency's standing policy, the individual is also supposed to be run through a TAC. "In addition to the Terrorist Watchlist screening, ICE uses a Third Agency Check (TAC) to screen aliens from specially designated countries (SDCs) that have shown a tendency to promote, produce, or protect terrorist organizations or their members," says the inspector general's report. "The purpose of the additional screening is to determine whether other agencies have an interest in the alien," says the report. "ICE's policy requires officers to conduct TAC screenings only for aliens from SDCs if the aliens are in ICE custody. As a result, ICE does not perform a TAC for the majority of its population of aliens, which includes those incarcerated or released under supervision." The inspector general recommended in the report that ICE change its screening policy "to require officers to conduct TAC screenings for all aliens from SDCs, not just those held in ICE detention facilities." "ICE's current TAC policy is ineffective because ICE does not perform a TAC for 99% of the population of aliens from SDCs," said the inspector general's report. "According to ICE, TACs have resulted in high-profile prosecutions of suspected terrorists." In its official response to the report, ICE objected to this recommendation by the inspector general because the agency says it does not have sufficient resources to do TACs on all aliens from the specially designated countries. Even though the adminisration includes Israel among "specially designated countries" that it believes "have shown a tendency to promote, produce, or protect terrorist organizations or their members," ICE Spokeswoman Gillian Christensen told CNSNews.com that the U.S. also considers Israel, as well as some other countries on the "specially designated countries" list, as partners in the struggle against terrorism. "The U.S. does not and never has considered Israel to have links to terrorism, but rather they are a partner in our efforts to combat global terrorism," Christensen said in a written statement. "Countries may have been included on the list because of the backgrounds of arrestees, not because of the country's government itself." "The United States maintains close intelligence-sharing relationships with many of these countries in order to address security issues within their own borders and in our mutual pursuit of safety and security around the globe," said Christensen. ICE declined to say who put Israel on the list or when Israel was put there. However, in her written statement, ICE spokeswoman Christensen said the "specially designated country" list had been created "at least" seven years ago — which would have been during the presidency of George W. Bush — and that ICE was not responsible for creating it. "This list of countries has been in existence for at least seven years," said Christensen. "Further, ICE does not issue such designations. As the OIG report notes, the purpose of the additional screening is to determine whether other agencies have an interest in the alien ICE has in custody." However, on Mar. 4, 2008, the McClatchy Newspapers published a report — "Law enforcement officials secretly profiling immigrants" — that cited a memo from Ted Stark, a supervisory special agent with ICE's Office of Intelligence, that proposed creating a single federal list of "special interest" countries (plus the West Bank and Gaza) to aid federal agencies in screening aliens. "So many federal agencies have created different lists that U.S. officials contemplated adopting a single one to streamline the process, Stark wrote," said the McClatchey report. "The proposed list, which officials said had yet to be adopted, includes 35 countries, most with significant Muslim or Arab populations." "The group of agencies — which included ICE, the National Security Agency and U.S. Customs and Border Protection — not only recommended one list but also suggested an interagency definition of 'special interest alien,'" said the McClatchey report. "Under the proposal, a special interest alien would be an immigrant with terrorist ties or an immigrant who by nationality, 'ethnicity or other factors may have ties or sympathies' with the listed country." The 35 countries plus the West Bank and Gaza that were on the proposed list discussed in the ICE memo uncovered by McClatchey in March 2008 almost exactly matches the "specially designated countries" on the list published by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General on May 11, 2011. There are only two differences: North Korea was on the list proposed in 2008; it is not on the May 2011 list. Israel was not on the list proposed in 2008; it is on the May 2011 list. The State Department currently lists only four countries as "state sponsors of terrorism," meaning they "have repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism." These state sponsors of terror are Iran, Sudan, Syria, and Cuba. Iran, Sudan and Syria are all listed along with Israel on the "specially designated countries" list published by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General on May 11. Iran, Sudan and Syria are also all majority Muslim countries. Cuba, the one state sponsor of terror that does not share a place with Israel on the administration's "specially designated countries" list, was 85 percent Roman Catholic when the Castro regime took power, according to the CIA World Factbook. It also had Protestant, Jewish, Jehovah Witness and Santeria populations, says the CIA. According to the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, however, Cuba currently has only a very small Muslim population that equals only one-tenth of one percent of the total Cuban population. North Korea, which was on the proposed list reported by McClatchey in 2008 but is not included on the list of "specially designated countries" that the DHS inspector general published in May, has a Muslim population that is less than one-tenth of one percent of its total population, according to Pew. CNSNews.com contacted the offices of Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, both of whom served as secretary of Homeland Security during the Bush administration, to ask if the department had listed Israel among "specially designated countries" during their tenures. Neither Ridge nor Chertoff responded. SPECIALLY DESIGNATED COUNTRIES Here are the countries and territories on the "specially designated country" list published on May 10, 2011 by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General. Except for Somalia and Yemen, the CIA's World Factbook is the source for each country's Muslim population percentage. For Somalia and Yemen, the source is the Pew Research Center's 2009 report, "Mapping the Global Muslim Population." Country or Territory Muslim Population Mauritania — 100 percent
Contact Chuck Brooks at chetz18@aol.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: DELEGITIMIZATION
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 29, 2011. |
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It's a constant battle, and one we must continue to fight with vigor. Here, a couple of examples: Six Democrats in the House of Representatives have written a letter to Secretary of State Clinton urging her to "do everything in [her] power" to "ensure the safety of all American citizens on board 'The Audacity of Hope (a ship that will participate in the Flotilla, carrying 36 Americans and flying the US flag).'" Cute, no? The letter was initiated by Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, not exactly a friend of Israel. The implication here is that innocent people on board, who have no intention of provoking violence, are at risk from the IDF. Such, of course, is not the case at all. The letter stated that the organizers of the ship "are fully committed to international law." And that is not true either, for international law gives us the right to maintain the naval blockade on Gaza. From this it was a hop, skip and jump to the statement of someone involved with the Flotilla, that, "We hope Secretary Clinton heeds this request from Congress (sic) and speaks out against threats from the Israeli authorities to attack us in our effort to break the illegal blockage of the Gaza Strip." ~~~~~~~~~~ I'll come back to the Flotilla in a moment, but first a look at another attempt at delegitimization: A few years ago, a bridge near the women's side of the Kotel that led from the Western Wall Plaza up to the Mughrabi Gate into the Temple Mount collapsed in harsh weather. This gate is the one used for entry to the Mount by non-Muslim visitors, and by our security forces. In 2007, there were fights over construction of a new permanent bridge, with (fallacious) charges leveled that the construction would destroy archeological ruins. The plans, which were controversial, were discontinued. At present, there is temporary wooden bridge in use. Plans to finally do a permanent renovation were in place by this spring, with approval having been cleared with all appropriate authorities — the Jerusalem municipality, the Israel Antiquities Authority, the Western Wall Heritage Foundation, etc. ~~~~~~~~~~ Among those with whom it was cleared was Jordan, which has considerable influence within the Wakf, the Islamic trust that administers day to day affairs on the Mount. It had been agreed mutually between Israel and Jordan that the temporary bridge was not secure and had to come down; it was scheduled to be torn down last week. But Jordan then turned around and participated with Egypt, Iraq, and Bahrain in filing a complaint against Israel with UNESCO, with regard to the renovations. Make no mistake about this: The issue is not really the nature of the bridge itself, but the fact that Israel is acting as sovereign authority in the matter. A spokesman for the Jordanian Foreign Minister spoke about UNESCO's "deep concern" regarding, among other things, the "failure of the Israeli side to provide the World Heritage Center [with] information..." And so, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee — the committee that has determined that Kever Rachel, Rachel's Tomb, is a mosque — has unanimously censured Israel and called on her to cease all plans to renovate the bridge. Israel has observer status at UNESCO, and our ambassador there, Nimrod Barkan asked to address the committee, but was blocked by Egypt. Another piece of the delegitimization. Barkan said Israel is "shocked" and "furious" with Jordan for its role in these proceedings. The committee also called for a UNESCO mission to visit the site and make sure that the project was halted. But Israel said, nothing doing. While there is a delay, fervently do I hope it is very temporary, and that we will proceed with construction of that bridge. ~~~~~~~~~~ Back to the Flotilla: Israel, having garnered considerable intelligence on the plans for the Flotilla, has learned that it is likely that terrorists will be planted among the participants on the various ships. This presents a different scenario from what happened last time, when all of the other ships were peaceful and only participants on the Mavi Marmara — which included a significant number of terrorists from the Turkish IHH — responded with violence. In fact, while there is no ship coming out of Turkey this time and the IHH ostensibly is not involved, it seems to be the case that members of the IHH will be among those terrorists scattered among the other participants. (For the record: While most of the far left participants are severely deluded with regard to the situation in Gaza, they are not likely to be violent. Blithely ignoring all information about Hamas activities, they actually imagine that they are participating in a noble effort to help a people that is suffering because of Israel.) There are intelligence reports of intentions to try to kill Israeli soldiers boarding the ships. This has been confirmed by Minister of Security Affairs Moshe Ya'alon. The most serious report indicates plans to do lethal damage to IDF troops via use of sulfur, which is flammable. That the IDF has this knowledge now means it has — please G-d! — the time and ability to prepare. According to latest reports, foreign journalists will be permitted aboard the Israeli ships that will contend with the Flotilla, thus affording them an opportunity to see for themselves and report first-hand. Hi tech equipment on the Israeli ships will allow almost instantaneous transmission of pictures and news reports by these various journalists. Looks like we're doing it right this time, praise be! ~~~~~~~~~~ The PA is seeking support from the Arab League for its bid for statehood via the UN. But PA prime minister Salam Fayyad, in a statement to AP today, has thrown cold water on the whole venture. It would be "something in the nature of a declarative victory," he declared, but unless Israel is part of the consensus, it won't change facts on the ground. "It is not going to be a dramatic result," he said, "and I do not believe it will be right to continue, for there to be preoccupation about something dramatic happening." He's quite right. Talk of statehood achieved via the UN will raise expectations within the population. Almost invariably, when there are unreasonably heightened expectations among the Palestinian Arabs that are then dashed against the rock of reality, increased violence ensues. ~~~~~~~~~~ But Abbas may yet be stopped in his tracks: The Senate today unanimously approved a bill that may have serious repercussions for the PA. The bill, sponsored by Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland and Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine, received the approval of all 89 Senators present. It stipulated that the Senate opposes "any attempt to establish or seek recognition of a Palestinian state outside of an agreement negotiated between leaders in Israel and the Palestinians." And it "urges the President to consider suspending assistance to the Palestinian Authority pending a review of the unity agreement between Fatah and Hamas...United States law precludes assistance to a Palestinian Authority that shares power with Hamas unless that Authority and all its ministers publicly accept the right of Israel to exist and all prior agreements and understandings with the Governments of the United States and Israel." A similar version of the bill will soon come before the House, where it is anticipated that it will pass without problems. ~~~~~~~~~~ Commented a "senior Israeli source": "Without the American money there's no Palestine. The Palestinians know it, and therefore they're at odds over what would be the right move for them." The PA's response — "We cannot sacrifice freedom for financial aid" — is a bit disingenuous coming from the political entity that receives more aid per capita than any other group, and which forever has its collective hand out. ~~~~~~~~~~ At the same time, according to a newspaper in UAE, Jordan intends to vote against a Palestinian state in the General Assembly in September. "Jordan's top national interests will be in danger if the Palestinian Authority declares statehood unilaterally — especially in everything related to the issue of refugees, water, Jerusalem, and the borders," a top Jordan official was quoted as saying. Abdullah perceives quite well that if the PA takes the unilateral step, Israel will then move unilaterally as well. Certainly Abdullah fears any move that would tend towards Jordan as the Palestinian state. And so this is the explanation given. But it's also the fact that there has been a cooling of the relationship between the PA and Jordan (with Jordan reportedly now preparing to cancel identification papers for Palestinian Arab leaders). And the Jordanian monarch has hardly been an advocate of a Palestinian state at his border, with the specter looming of a Hamas takeover in time. It's often tough to comprehend where Abdullah, who is feeling very squeezed, is coming from, and which side he'll stand with on any particular issue. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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RALLY 'ROUND MELANIE PHILLIPS
Posted by Laura, June 29, 2011. |
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This was written by James G. Wiles and it appeared today in
American Thinker
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It's when you're down and out that you find out who your friends are. Take a moment, then, to consider visiting the new website of conservative Daily Mail columnist, author and blogger Melanie Phillips. Ms. Phillips just exited the Spectator's blog under highly shrouded circumstances. Fleet Street is abuzz. Was it journalistic error? Or political persecution? It's simply impossible to get at the facts. At the bottom of it all appears to be the British ruling class' eroding support for Israel — a phenomenon not unknown elsewhere in the West. Like Caroline Glick at the Jerusalem Post and Pam Geller of atlasshrugs.com, Ms. Phillips has proved herself to be a great Lioness of Judah in resisting the rot. As such, in today's Western Europe, Melanie Phillips stands out. As one gleeful Muslim website recounts, this wasn't the first time Ms. Phillips' enemies got a piece of her fur. This second time, a complaint to the Press Complaints Commission was not acted on. Then the lawyers, apparently, were brought in. On the available — and highly disputed — evidence, Melanie Phillips and her host somehow got caught up in the in terrorem coils of British libel laws over something she posted on the Spectator's blog on January 28. Precisely how is a muddle. Ms. Phillips' original post blasted a Guardian contributor and former British government employee who had turned — as even many Conservative Brits are doing — against Israel. Last week, the Spectator posted an apology on its website. It said that some facts in Melanie Phillips' January 28 blog post were wrong. Pretty shortly thereafter, Ms. Phillips exited 22 Old Queen Street at top speed. You can read what she said yourself. Meanwhile, her original source denies any error. The Guardian, the New Statesman and some Islamist websites were gleeful. But, while her enemies may have wounded Melanie Phillips, they haven't silenced her. There she is this week on her website, melaniephillips.com, and in the Daily Mail, arguing that British teachers have a duty of care to their students and, therefore, shouldn't go on strike to protest government cutbacks. Last week, Ms. Phillips saluted Michelle Bachman as someone who plainly "gets it" over the importance to the West of the survival of Israel. Melanie Phillips' best-selling book Londonistan added a word to our political lexicon. Published in 2006, it joined Mark Steyn's Lights Out: Islam, free speech and the West and Christopher Caldwell's Reflections on the Revolution in Europe: Immigration, Islam and the West in sounding an alarm which needed to be sounded. It also made her a target. It would be useful to know if Melanie Phillips has just been persecuted as Mark Steyn was in Canada, as Gert Wilders was in the Netherlands and as journalist Andrew Bolt is now being persecuted in Australia. For now, it's anybody's guess. A little transparency is in order. Because the truth, as the saying goes, will out. As for me, I intend to go on subscribing to the Spectator. And reading Melanie Phillips. I just ordered her new book, The World Turned Upside Down: the global battle over God, truth and pwoer, just out in paperback from Encounter Books. Sounds like the lady just might know what she's talking about. Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com |
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COUNTERING THE IMPACT OF ARAB ANTI-SEMITISM
Posted by Shirley Lewis, June 29, 2011. |
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To Those that care about Israel: The myth of Palestinian "moderation" needs to be fully shattered in order for 1) the US to be forced to abandon its current appeasement policy where the Palestinians pay no price for incitement and rejectionism, 2) the world wide delegtimization of Israel comes to an end. The genocidal anti-Semitism that the so-called "moderate" PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas teach and preach to their own people vs what they tell the US/West incites hate and violence and is THE impediment to peace. Team Abbas champions an ideology only Hamas, Hezbolleh and al Qaeda could love. Generation after generation of Palestinians have been brought up with Jews blood libeled and Israel defamed and delegitimized. PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas "work" can be broken down to: 1) encouragement and justification for murdering Jews; 2) terror worship and adulation of terrorists; 3)promise of endless war, not peace, with Israel; 4)delegitimization of Israel by lying about the regions' history and any and all Jewish connection to ANY part of Israel — even Tel Aviv is taught to be rightly "Palestinian". PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas ideology and duplicity must be aggressively exposed so US appeasement is replaced with a policy that calls for the complete and total abandonment of the Team PA/Abbas hateful narrative, and its demonstration of compliance in both word and deed. To be emphatic, the US must withdraw all political and financial PA/Abbas support and insist other Quartet members to do the same. Palestinian Media Watch is the organization which meticulously catalogues the needed information — so meticulously, its principal, Itamar Marcus, has presented to Congress' foreign affairs committees. These are not "exceptions to the rule". They ARE the rule. To review all: www.palwatch.org. To converse with Mr. Marcus: pmw@palwatch.org. Sadly, this information is not widely known, Mr. Marcus says even Israelis are not sufficiently familiar with this. if they were they would be demanding that the israeli government go public with the proof of Team PA/abbas jihadism and duplicity. For the most part, mainstream Jewish organizations are ignoring PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas reality and are going along to get along with Obama policy instead of challenging it. So, how to begin an awareness campaign? Most mainstream Jewish organizations are based in New York with their lobbying offices in Washington, D.C. Four ads in a row in New York Jewish Week and Washington Jewish Week, that describes the stealth jihadism of Team PA/Abbas and sends readers to its web site for more, would serve as a wake up call to these organizations that the era of pretending Abbas is a "peace partner" is over and the era of expecting the US to lead the charge for Team PA/Abbas change, and Hamas' end, has begun. Possible ad examples are attached. With the new found awareness of Jewish voters, including those that are members of mainstream Jewish organizations, the pusillanimity of Jewish American leadership will also have to end. Any Jewish organization wishing to remain relevant, will have to get on board with the counter delegtimization strategy. Ads like the one ADL recently ran, "See Hamas For What It Really Is" gives PA the legitimacy it does not deserve by implying PA is at heart ideologically different from Hamas, which it is not. Only its tactics for destroying Israel are different. Abbas' mask needs to be ripped off. The purpose of running PMW ads is so the likes of ADL will run "See PA/PLO/Fatah/Abbas For What It Really Is" ads and demanding that there be no talks, none, until Palestinian society changes from top to bottom. When that starts to happen, US appeasement policy will have to be replaced with one of demanding the faux "moderate" Palestinian leadership abandon its stealth jihadism for ecumenism — and the complete and total loss of US financial and political support until the full transition to ecumenism is in place. After this initial phase, a similiar strategy will most likely have to be used in swing states such as Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania and beyond. The most likely Democratic nominee for Senate in Wisconsin is Rep. Tammy Baldwin, a signer of the infamous Gaza 54 letter. In New Mexico it is Rep. Martin Heinrich who refused to sign Congress' statement condemning the Goldstone report. Candidates paying a price for their willful blindness regarding the Palestinians (including presidential candidates) will also hasten the end of US appeasement policy — the necessary first step toward a safe and durable peace. I hope your contacts in the Israel advocacy world and you can make this counter delegitimization campaign, or another that you find more assertive, a reality. Please feel free to contact me for further discussion. Contact Shirley Lewis at slewis46@att.net |
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U.S. FUNDING RIGOROUS STUDY OF PALESTINIAN AND ISRAELI TEXTBOOK INCITEMENT
Posted by Israel Academia Monitor, June 29, 2011. |
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This was written by Naomi Zeveloff
(zeveloff@forward.com) and is archived at
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In an effort to settle one of the longest-running disputes in the Middle East peace process, American, Israeli and Palestinian researchers are conducting what purports to be the first scientific study of incitement in Palestinian and Israeli textbooks. The study, funded by a $500,000 grant from the U.S. Department of State, was commissioned by the Council of Religious Institutions of the Holy Land (CRIHL), a Jerusalem-based consortium of senior Islamic, Jewish and Christian religious figures in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. The study seeks to provide the first rigorously empirical and objective analysis of how Palestinian and Israeli textbooks depict the "other." "Our purpose is to help build a culture of peace there," said Bruce Wexler, the Yale University psychiatry professor who designed the study. "That is what the religious leadership council wants to do." The results will be released sometime at the end of this year or in early 2012. After that, the religious council will begin making recommendations on education reform to the Palestinian and Israeli governments, based on the research. According to Wexler, the study's methodologies "have not been used in textbook analysis before... We borrowed techniques in other areas of research to create a more objective, quantitative analysis." For years, Israelis and Palestinians have accused one another of incitement in their respective school textbooks and in other media. In the United States, charges of Palestinian textbook incitement have become a major talking point for many Jewish groups. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee has repeatedly called for an end to Palestinian incitement. The current project was initiated in 2009 when the CRIHL decided to weigh in publicly on the issue of education for peace in Israel and the Palestinian territories. The council, whose members include Oded Wiener, Director General of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, Munib Younan, Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, and Haj Salah Zuheka of the Palestinian Ministry of the Waqf and Religious Affairs, realized early on that there were inadequate data on the textbooks and how they relate to the conflict. This led it to commission the study, asking Wexler to design and implement it. Wexler applied for a grant from the State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor Affairs. In 2009, the Palestinian-Israeli textbook project received about $500,000, part of a $4 million fund designated for religious freedom work by Congress. Wexler's interest in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict began in 2006, after he published a book on the intersection of neurobiology and culture, "Brain and Culture." The book dealt with the way that uncontrollable events forge the human psyche at an early age, leading to rigid views of the world as adults. "Having grown up as a Jew when the State of Israel was born, and reading about Israel in the newspaper, I felt that there were ideas in my book relevant to trying to address the difficulties Israel finds itself in now," Wexler said. Wexler started an NGO called A Different Future, which publicized the voices of moderate Palestinians and Israelis through speaking tours and media appearances. It was Wexler's work with this group that brought him to the attention of the CRIHL. Well aware of the contention surrounding the incitement issue, Wexler decided to approach the study as a scientist. Borrowing methods from the field of psychiatry, he seeks to document both emotions and the intensity with which they are expressed. Wexler's research team isolates units of information found in textbooks — poems, narrative descriptions, maps, stories, photographs, and illustrations. Then, the team identifies both how the unit deals with a particular topic like religion, peace, or history, and to what degree. For example, one portion of the study concerns characterizations of individuals from the other side. The researcher is asked to denote whether these individuals are characterized "negatively, neutrally, positively, or very positively." The most negative categorization is one that employs biological or medical terms to describe the other — "vermin" or "cancer," for instance — while the most positive categorization is one of extreme glorification. Wexler's initial review of the existing literature on the topic of incitement led him to Daniel Bar Tal, a professor of child development and education at Tel Aviv University, and to Sami Adwan, a professor of education at Bethlehem University. Wexler asked them be his head researchers, earning a degree of criticism from right-wing Israelis, who saw Bar Tal as a leftist, and from militant Palestinians, who saw Adwan as a collaborator. Wexler also created an international Scientific Advisory Panel of 22 academics who had studied textbooks, most in the context of the Middle East. Bar Tal and Adwan have acquired 141 Palestinian books and 486 Israeli textbooks, from grades one through 12, for analysis. Almost all Palestinian schoolchildren are enrolled in the public school system set up by the Palestinian Authority after the Oslo Accords. When the Israeli government directly controlled the West Bank and Gaza from 1967 to 1993, Palestinian youth studied with Jordanian and Egyptian textbooks. After the Oslo agreement, the P.A. began to phase out those books; it replaced them with books that describe Palestinian history and culture. A very small number of Palestinians attend private religious schools, and Wexler's team recently acquired 25 textbooks from these institutions to supplement their research. The Israeli school system has three types of schools — religious and secular public schools, and private Orthodox schools — and each category has its own books. Bar Tal and Adwan hired a research team of six bilingual people — three Jewish Israelis and three Palestinians (from the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but not Gaza) — to review the books, categorize the information within them and log their findings into a computer program created by American IT Solutions. To avoid messy translations, the books are analyzed in the language in which they're written. To avoid researcher bias, half of the books are analyzed twice, by an Israeli and a Palestinian, and then logged into the computer program. The remaining books are analyzed once, half of them by an Israeli and half by a Palestinian. Wexler can access the computer program from the United States, keeping track of the project's progress. The CRIHL study is far from being the first inquiry into textbook incitement in the Middle East. But most of these studies involve one or several individuals who review the books and produce a narrative report of the content rather than a quantitative analysis. One such study of Palestinian texts by Itamar Marcus, an Israeli activist who lives in the West Bank settlement of Efrat, has been cited repeatedly by Israeli officials and Jewish groups but attacked by others as unbalanced. When she was a U.S. senator, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton brought Marcus to present his findings to the Senate. Marcus said that his organization, Palestinian Media Watch, reviews Palestinian schoolbooks by breaking their content down by theme and then compiling the data on these themes across the range of textbooks. "There is not one positive or neutral statement about Israel's existence or right to exist" in Palestinian textbooks, he said. "We can make an absolute and scientific statement about that. I don't know if a computer could make the same kind of analysis." AIPAC spokesman Ari Goldberg said that his organization will be interested to learn CRIHL's findings, and examine its methodology. Textbook reform "has been a major part of what the Palestinians need to do in terms of reconciling themselves to the Jewish state," he said. Some Palestinians, however, are unconvinced of the value of studying textbook incitement in the midst of the conflict. "The enmity between Palestinians and Israelis is not about emotions or misunderstandings that can be better understood through a textual analysis, It is about the Palestinian people being dispossessed from their land — not just once, in 1948, but repeatedly, and to this day," wrote Nadia Hijab in an email message. Hijab is the director of Al-Shabaka, The Palestinian Policy Network. "These are the issues that really need to be addressed if there is to be a just and comprehensive peace," she said. "After peace is achieved, a lot of healing will be needed and that's when such studies would have something to contribute." Nathan Brown, a political science professor at The George Washington University who has conducted his own study of Palestinian textbooks, also voiced some skepticism about the usefulness of the results to come from applying a "scientific," seemingly ahistorical approach. "To tell the Palestinian national story without offending Israeli sensibilities would be tantamount to asking American high schools not to mention the Stamp Act or to omit passages in the Declaration of Independence that seem anti-British," Brown said. "Of course, to many Israelis, such statements, however nationalistic, also have the effect of delegitimizing the Jewish state." Citing an historical pattern in which peoples in conflict have almost inevitably demonized the other side, Brown said, "This is like trying to teach Vietnam in an American school in the middle of the Tet Offensive." More importantly, Brown said, studies of incitement do not address the question of whether inflammatory rhetoric and violent images in textbooks actually lead to violent behavior. "The textbooks are more effect than cause," he said. "Why do a study unless you assume that textbooks affect political behavior? There is no evidence that they do. Just the opposite: Israel censored all textbooks in use in the West Bank and Gaza" from 1967 until the Oslo treaty led to the introduction of textbooks produced by the Palestinian Authority. "It was graduates of that system that launched both intifadas," he said. Wexler is unfazed. "The education effects take longer to play out and develop," he said. "These children aren't leaders in their societies yet. But the current leaders can take a look at what they're doing now... This self-appraisal by each community of what is in their textbooks could have an immediate effect." Contact Israel Academia Monitor by mail at e-mail@israel-academia-monitor.com |
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BRITAIN'S LONG, SAD JOURNEY OF JEW HATRED
Posted by Arutz-7, June 29, 2011. |
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Slogans like "Zionism is Nazism" and "Israelis are fascists" are most likely to be shouted by far-left radicals, of the type that perform the "weekly hajj" to throw stones and bricks at IDF soldiers at Bil'in. But they didn't invent those slogans — and neither did anyone else on the left, says Professor Robert Wistrich of the Hebrew University. "Those slogans — and that world view — was the stock in trade of the British elites, who spread stories about Zionism being totalitarian and Nazi during the 1930s and 40s." It's just one aspect of a long and rich history of Jew-hatred in Britain, says Wistrich, considered one of the world's leading experts on anti-Semitism. Britain, he says, has historically been one of the most anti-Semitic countries in Western Europe; not quite Germany, but far worse than France, for example. "Certainly today Britain is at the forefront of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism," he says. "For example, it's where the BDS (Boycott, Divest and Sanction) movement against Israel was first developed, and has been the most successful." The headlines — British labor unions and universities banning Israeli products and academics, the British government's obsession with arresting IDF officers for "war crimes," — are well known to Israelis. Britain is also the world's fountain of disinformation and lies about Israel and Jews, says Wistrich, with the British media — "the quality press, like the Independent and Guardian, the BBC and other media outlets, the churches, etc. — spreading the worst caricatures and falsehoods about Israelis, how they treat Arabs, and the like." Wistrich, himself born in England — "this gives me greater insight into the nuances and meanings of press reports and attitudes," he says — presented this history at a recent symposium hosted by Hebrew University's Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism (SICSA), titled "From Blood Libel to Boycott: The Changing Face of British anti-Semitism," an historic evaluation of British anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism over the years. And there is indeed much history to evaluate. Britain is not usually thought of as anti-Semitic country; it hasn't had a history of pogroms, for example. Although Jews were forbidden from living in the country for hundreds of years, it's very striking that Britain has had such an extensive history of anti-Semitism. Britain was where the blood libel — which persisted in Europe for centuries and has had a revival in the Muslim world today (there was even one in upstate New York in 1928) was invented, Wistrich says. "William of Norwich was allegedly crucified by the Jews, to duplicate the crucifixion of Jesus. This was the first time in European history that such a charge was made, and it quickly spread throughout England, and then to France." Britain was also responsible for the first expulsion of Jews, in 1290, another "innovation" that was later copied by other European countries. And although Jews were not allowed to return for at least 350 years, British literature — from Chaucer to Shakespeare, who may never have met a Jew — was rife with Jew-hatred. "Most people see Britain as the birthplace of tolerance and democracy, which it may have been — but not for the Jews," Wistrich says. In modern times, British attempts to prevent the establishment of the State of Israel are well known. Although the British government issued the Balfour Declaration in 1917, the "Arabists" in the Foreign Office — who were the vast majority and set British foreign policy — very quickly worked to drop their obligations of setting up a Jewish state in mandatory Palestine. They had no problem lopping off three quarters of the Mandate to establish the Arab mandatory state, Transjordan. And as the Nazis closed in on European Jewry, British officials went out of their way to prevent Jews from escaping to the one place where they had a chance of survival — the Jewish communities of the Land of Israel. The attitude of the British elites, both in the Land of Israel and in London, is striking. "There are many communications between Colonial Office officials in London and Mandatory officials in Palestine discussing the evils of Zionism and Zionists," says Wistrich. "The Zionists were accused of being Nazi-like, mistreating Arabs and considering themselves to be the 'master race' of Palestine; the youth movements were compared to Nazi Youth; and the Jews were seen to be at the heart of a cabal that sought to take over the world." Among the worst offenders was John Bagot Glubb, known as Pasha Glubb, who took command of Jordan's Arab Legion during Israel's War of Independence. Glubb's hatred for Israel and Jews extended to his advocacy of the theory that modern Jewry is descended from the Khazars — another "gem" that was also embraced by British elites, and eventually the Arabs, as well. Many Israelis attribute Britain's anti-Israel stances today to the large number of Muslims in the country — and the fear among ordinary Britons of what could happen to them if they don't toe the "Muslim line." But that influence is a bit overblown, Wistrich says. "Most demographers believe that there are between 2.5 million and 3 million Muslims in Britain — a substantial number, but less than the 6 million in France, whose official institutions and elites are far less hostile to Jews and Israel." No, anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism is something the British themselves have to take responsibility for. "Since 1945 — and especially since 1967 — Israel can do no right in the eyes of England," Wistrich says. "Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism may not be official British government policy anymore, but among the elites and those with the most influence in society, it's all too common." Contact Arutz-7 by email at news@israelnationalnews.com |
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REVIEW OF A DOCUMENTARY FILM ON HEBRON
Posted by Marion D.S. Dreyfus, June 29, 2011. |
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HEBRON, A Documentary
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When I saw the smarmy polemic piece of imbalance purporting to be this documentary, made by ignorant know-nothings who acknowledged they are not Jewish (no crime), know no Hebrew (not a crime, either), know no history (big crime), and in particular are too stupid to even be able to recognize the fact that 95% of their film was underwritten by, narrated and commented upon by ultra-Leftist haters of Israel, journalists who regularly and casually savage Israel, and Palestinians who simply lie and serve up self-conscious rubbish/spin to the perceived bland camera-wielders making this damaging piece of tripe, I was disgusted, at a rather full screening (unusual at 4 pm on a weekday) on the Upper West Side to hear and see how many of the largely elderly, probably Jewish audience vigorously applauded this ugly, poorly researched, untrue and troublingly distorted film. Luckily, it was people who are aware of the contextlessness of this unfortunate mess that spoke up at the Q&A, and told the clapping mouth-breathers that the film they applauded was untrue, unbalanced, unhistoric and fundamentally unwholesome — one saw how abashed they were listening to the knowledgeable, afterwards, openly discussing what a scandalous dissing of Israel and truth the so-called doc was. Israelis in the audience defended the history and questioned the rationale for omitting context and adding scabrous lies in the 90-minute sponsored piece of ordeal. One went to the film out of duty, because one easily predicted it would be painful and disrespectful of truth, but one must be witness to these lies in order to correct the public impression, and if one does not report on these dandled and fansified lies, the radicals win the day, hands down. The filmmakers, who admitted to NO knowledge at all of Hebron before they happened upon it as a topic for their film-making, were embarrassingly dumb, and admitted they did not really understand the history, and thus could not really probe into the background, relying upon the lies and misrepresentations of agenda'ed Leftists and radicals who would be and are blackballed in Israel for their offensive take. The film did not once even allude to the terrorism that stalked Israel for decades, or the REASON for the wars they just itemized as if it were a shopping list — the film failed to say that all the wars were initiated and carried out by arab belligerents. Somehow, the wars "just occurred," and the land was then "occupied." Patriots and citizens are repeatedly called "Fascists" by such as Uri Avneri, B'Tzelem anti-Zionists and troublemakers, and HaAretz writers as well as anti-IDF malcontents and radicals carrying the pennant for arabs — all of whom are victims, somehow, never perpetrators. Jewish women in Yesha are shown screaming and cursing, ditto kipa'ed kids who curse the filmmakers — we are not given the context of what makes them distrust the mischief-makers' ill-portrayals. On the side of balance were the occasional inputs by patriot David Wilder, a Hebron historian, and several Orthodox Judea and Samaria residents insistently identified as "settlers." The term is not one of approbation. Although the filmmakers said they left a great deal "on the cutting room floor," and they "could not cut any more," angry Israeli teens and upset wives not at their best were caught on camera, shown at length, without explanation for why they were so upset, and what made the teenagers furious at the filmmakers so angry. We were supposed to extrapolate the rage as just another symptom of craziness that the poor, underhelped, disavowed and unhappy arab residents of Israel have to cope with. Tsk. Corroboration of claims made by said arabs was of course omitted. The filmmakers took on faith (which?) whatever the arab locals opined. Few Israelis outside of Yesha were interviewed, but were carefully smeared as "deliberately unaware" of what goes on in Hebron. Why is this important? With a film about a misplaced elephant or a ladies hair salon in Kabul, the review of a film, and a film itself, makes no grave difference. But in the case of Israel, which impacts Jews globally, and Christians and muslims in the EU and the United States as wel;l as elsewhere, these movies make a decided difference: People who do not learn for themselves take a film as honest currency, and forever bear the branding of bad data and erroneous transmission. Anti-Israel sentiment is at an all-time high in the past decades, and current political events exacerbate these high-yaller sentiment. Thus a false and inflammatory documentary such as this one adds combustion to an already fiery mix. It ought not be, and is not, excused. The Hebron situation is a difficult and thorny one. Solutions are hard-to-impossible to come by. But this documentary is not helping, and does not contribute fairly to an understanding of the two sides of the issue. It contributes to a muddling of the circumstances, and serves to further murkify the waters that have been roiled for centuries. This reviewer has been to the wonderful ancient city on several luminous occasions, and has had the honor of working in the IDF a few months, too. My perspective is more informed than that of the two clueless filmmakers from France and Italy and other European venues not known for their empathy for Israel's circumstances. The film is one of the two dozen or so making up the Human Rights Film Festival. It is, of the dozen or so films I have screened in this festival, appallingly illegitimate and wrong, and does not belong in the festival — clearly a political interpolation into an otherwise-legitimate roster of films. Marion Dreyfus is a writer, travelor and poet; she has taught English in China on the university level. She can be contacted at dreyfusmarion@hotmail.com |
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REGAINING THE INITIATIVE! A CONFERENCE NOT TO BE MISSED!
Posted by Paul Lademain, June 29, 2011. |
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We hope your conference will not descend to the level of silliness recently exhibited by your posturing Nettie who gave the world permission to believe Israel needs Abbas to say "just six words." Israel doesn't need recognition by Abbas or any thieving Islamic. Israel exists. Period. Israel MUST turn off Shimon Peres' foolish blithering. Do give the old cooter a medal for treason and send him home to his bed. Or hang him high. Whatever. Israel holds all the cards it needs in its hands. It just needs steely-spined leaders to play them to Israel's advantage. There should be no more whining about Israel's "right to exist." Israel exists. Period. Jerusalem is its capital. S'bout time you say so. Judea and Samaria are inseparable from Israel. Same goes for the Golan Heights. And Gaza belongs to Israel and the Jews who handed it to Israel's enemies deserve to be buried in a Gazan tunnel because they are traitors. As for BHO — he's the ruination of our nation. In our opinion, far worse than Condi Rice and Colin Powell, or as he's known around here: Colon Bowel. Hillary's right hand woman is an arab with ties to the Muslim brotherhood. Silly-Hilly apparently thought this cozy arrangement would buy her some love from the Saudis who funded her hubby's presidential library. Silly-Hilly now realizes the arabs are laughing openly in her face. Hillary wasted her "intelligence" trying to rationalize her acceptance of evil. Proof enough that she is no statesman and no credit to the American People. The San Remo Resolution is a starting point for Israel and the foundation for Israel's reclamation of all the lands known as Palestine. Palestine in the Jewish Homeland. Jews who allowed the Waqf to occupy the Temple Mount are a disgrace to sanity and reason. In reality, arabs occupy the Jewish Homeland at sufferance. Hebrew peoples are proud peoples. Israelis are no longer related to the treacherous US Jews riding the flotilla. The "flotilla jews" are the pigs and apes described as filth by the muslim hordes. In this case, the muslim hordes are correct. Yellow-bellied Jews are the crazy left-overs of a spoiled society. They espouse any cause that denigrates their brethren. Which makes them dirty self-soiling Jews. Sorry to sound so harsh. But any Jew found on an invading vessel is lower than dirt. Hanan Aswari's effigy should be burned in every square. Viva to the Patriots of Israel from the Secular Christians for Zion (SC4Z) Paul Lademain is a Secular Christian for Zion (SC4Z). Contact him by email at lademain@verizon.net |
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GILAD SCHALIT AND THE INVISIBLE PALESTINIANS
Posted by Laura, June 28, 2011. |
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This article was written by Caroline Glick
and it appeared in the Jerusalem Post and is archived at
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Like the rest of the Left the media hold Israel responsible for Hamas's imprisonment of Schalit because they perceive the Arabs generally and the Palestinians specifically as objects rather than actors. Sunday was the first day of Sgt. Gilad Schalit's sixth year in captivity. Schalit was kidnapped on June 26, 2006 and has been held hostage by Palestinian terrorists affiliated with Hamas in Gaza ever since. For five years, Schalit has been held incognito. His terrorist captors have permitted him to send but one letter to his family and released but one video of Schalit over this entire period. He has been denied visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross. He was clearly emaciated in the video. Over the past five years, Hamas has engaged in periodic indirect negotiations with Israel through a German mediator and others. While their demands have varied from time to time, essentially they want Israel to release around 1,500 terrorists from its prisons in exchange for Schalit. And they want the terrorists to be released to their homes in Judea and Samaria and Gaza where they can pick up killing Jews where they left off. And it isn't only Hamas demanding these things. In an interview with IMRA news agency on May 25, Fatah negotiator Nabil Shaath said that the Fatah supports Hamas's demands. Shaath explained that once the Fatah-Hamas unity government is formed Schalit will become the responsibility of the unified Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority will continue to hold Schalit hostage and demand that Israel release thousands of terrorists as ransom for his release. As he put it, "We have 7,000 political prisoners in Israel by design — taken by the Israeli authority. They have to be also freed." So the Palestinian leadership from Fatah and Hamas alike are unified in their view that it is perfectly acceptable to hold Schalit captive. As far as they are concerned, it is acceptable to stand in breach of international law and basic standards of humanity in order to extort Israel to free mass murderers from prison. And it is acceptable to the Palestinians for these murderers to return to their work killing as many Jews as they can get their hands on. It is hard to think of a more despicable comment on the state of Palestinian society than their wall to wall support for the taking and holding of hostages or their desire to see mass murderers released from jail. A person could be forgiven for thinking that on the fifth anniversary of Schalit's abduction that the media would be full of articles describing in detail the evil that is Hamas and Fatah which celebrate Schalit's victimization and the suffering of his family. But that person would be wrong. The media coverage of the fifth anniversary of Schalit's kidnap devoted no attention to his Palestinian captors. In fact, if a person were simply going by what he learned from the Israeli media over the past several days, he would likely believe that either Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is hiding Schalit in his cellar, or that Netanyahu is colluding with Hamas to keep Schalit captive in Gaza. Aping the increasingly grotesque genre of reality television shows, local celebrities and washed-out headline-starved failed former security brass got together with Yediot Aharonot and put on a reality TV stunt for the public to mark the anniversary. One after another these supposedly concerned citizens walked into a knock-off solitary confinement cell furnished with a dirty toilet and television cameras. The beautiful ones sighed, cried, kicked, and whined for an hour apiece. Their performances were broadcast live on Yediot's Ynet news portal. Channel 2 rebroadcast the highlights on the evening news. The purported goal of the campaign was to "raise public awareness," about Schalit's plight. As if the Israeli public isn't aware of his plight. For the overwhelming majority of Israelis, the mention of Schalit's name evokes profound concern and sorrow.
BUT THEN, Yediot knows that. And raising public awareness was not the goal of their televised pimping of Schalit's suffering with the help of shameless celebrities and far-left retired generals. Their goal was to turn the public against Binyamin Netanyahu — Schalit's imaginary jailer. This message was delivered not only by the likes of radical failed Shin Beit chiefs Ami Ayalon and Carmi Gillon. It was delivered by Gilad Schalit's father Noam Schalit at his press conference on Sunday. Noam Schalit declared, "Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, you do not have the right to sentence Gilad to death. The weakness and the stubbornness you are showing in this crisis is an immediate danger for Gilad's life and health. More than that, it is a danger for the values of the State of Israel, on which generations of Israelis were raised." There is no doubt that Noam Schalit is acting as he is because he wants to get his son home alive. But there is also no doubt that by pressuring Netanyahu and the government and accusing them of being responsible for his son's captivity, Noam Schalit is only making things worse. Hamas wants to destroy Israel. Its terrorists in prison want to destroy Israel. Hamas's leaders view Schalit's illegal incarceration and the anguish it causes in Israel as a source of pride for the movement and Palestinian society as a whole. It views the release of terrorists as a means of strengthening the jihadist movement politically and militarily. Every time Noam Schalit blames the government for his son's plight and demands that our leaders free terrorists to bring him home, he strengthens Hamas's negotiating position. On Sunday, Netanyahu admitted that the pressure worked. Netanyahu did in fact agree to what had been Hamas's demands for the release of more than a thousand terrorists for Schalit and Hamas didn't even bother responding to the offer. On Monday, Hamas said that Netanyahu's offer was too low. With Noam Schalit and the media in its court, Hamas knows there is no reason to rush into anything. So its leaders raised the price still further.
SINCE SCHALIT was first kidnapped, his family has repeatedly invoked the plight of IAF navigator Col. Ron Arad who was taken hostage by Shi'ite terrorists when his plane crashed in Lebanon in 1986. Arad has been held hostage for the past quarter century. The Schalits say their pressure campaign against the government is fuelled by their desire to prevent their son from sharing Arad's fate. These statements show that the Schalits fundamentally misunderstand what happened to Arad and what is happening to Gilad. It wasn't for lack of will that Israel has failed to bring Arad home. Arad disappeared because Israel never had good intelligence information about his whereabouts. If it had, Arad would have been rescued, dead or alive. According to recently retired IDF chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, the same has been the case with Schalit. In their refusal to recognize that they are hurting their son by directing their anger at the government rather than the Palestinians and their international supporters, the Schalits are unconscionably egged on by the media. As Yediot marked the fifth anniversary of Gilad's internment with their celebrity solitary confinement stunt, Maariv marked the fifth anniversary by interviewing 25 celebrities about their activism on behalf of Schalit. All these celebrity attacks on Netanyahu are consistent with the past five years of media coverage of Schalit's confinement. It is also consistent with their past coverage of the captivity of every other IDF hostage taken by Arab terrorists in recent years.
THE SCHALIT family's counterproductive behavior is the result of a combination of desperation, ignorance and manipulation by PR agencies. But what explains the media's behavior? Why are they helping Hamas? Some media critics attribute their behavior to journalistic laziness and a desire to create sensational stories that will sell newspapers. No doubt there is some of that at work. But lazy reporters and editors in search of screaming headlines have other options. They could pit Noam Schalit against the father of one of the victims of the murderers whose release the Schalits and their supporters are demanding. That would make colorful page 1 copy. The media could have a reporter spend an hour researching the Israeli and international self-described human rights community's silence on Schalit's plight and the shameless absence of any concerted demand by the self-proclaimed human rights community for his immediate release. Over the weekend, Israeli and international "human rights" groups B'Tselem, Amnesty International, Israel; Bimkom; Gisha; Human Rights Watch; International Federation for Human Rights; Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Gaza; Physicians for Human Rights, Israel; Public Committee Against Torture in Israel; and Yesh Din all got together to release a statement about Schalit. They failed to call for his immediate release. Certainly a banner headline reporting this outrage would have sold papers. All of these stories and journalistic stunts are low-cost and would sell newspapers. And at a minimum, none of them would harm Schalit's chances of getting released. Yet the media have opted to sell the tale of the government's culpability for his suffering due to its failure to bow to Hamas's ever-escalating demands. The media's behavior is puzzling not merely because they have options besides supporting Hamas. It is puzzling because their obsessive coverage of Schalit arguably hurts their tireless efforts to sell the public on the notion that it is a terrific idea to give Judea and Samaria and parts of Jerusalem to Schalit's captors. By reminding the public of Schalit, the media are also reminding the public that the Palestinians are not interested in peace and that they use the land Israel gives them to attack us. That is, their Schalit campaign undermines their appeasement campaign. Finally, their demand that Netanyahu "release" Schalit is alienating their readers. In the face of their intense campaign, "for Gilad" according to a poll published last month by Maariv, only 41 percent of the public agrees with their surrender at all cost strategy and 51 percent opposes it. So by any rational measure, the media are acting against their own interests by pushing the pro-Hamas line. The only explanation that remains is irrational. But it is also consistent with the media's serial irrationality on everything concerning Israel's relationship with the Arab world generally and the Palestinians in particular. The explanation is that like the rest of the Left — in Israel and worldwide — the media hold Israel responsible for Hamas's imprisonment of Schalit because they perceive the Arabs generally and the Palestinians specifically as objects rather than actors. The only actors they see are Israel and the US. Just as the international Left sends ships to aid and comfort Palestinian terrorists in Gaza to fight the so-called "occupation" which ended six years ago, so the Israeli media says the government is holding Gilad Schalit hostage. In both cases, the Palestinians are invisible, and inert. To its credit, after five years of inaction, last Thursday, the Red Cross finally asked Hamas to prove Schalit is still alive. Gazans reacted to the move by attacking the Red Cross office in Gaza. This major story received little mention in the media. And that makes sense. How can they cover a story about a group of people they can't be bothered to notice?
Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com
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WHAT IF JEWS HAD FOLLOWED THE PALESTINIAN PATH?
Posted by Bruce Tuchman, June 28, 2011. |
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What a great article. Please read and share if you like. It was written by Warren Kozak and it appeared June 20, 2011
in the Wall Street Journal
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Postwar Jewish refugees left everything they had in Europe — no 'right of return' requested. It is doubtful that there has ever been a more miserable human refuse than Jewish survivors after World War II. Starving, emaciated, stateless — they were not welcomed back by countries where they had lived for generations as assimilated and educated citizens. Germany was no place to return to and in Kielce, Poland, 40 Jews who survived the Holocaust were killed in a pogrom one year after the war ended. The European Jew, circa 1945, quickly went from victim to international refugee disaster. Yet within a very brief time, this epic calamity disappeared, so much so that few people today even remember the period. How did this happen in an era when Palestinian refugees have continued to be stateless for generations? In 1945, there were hundreds of thousands of Jewish survivors living in DP Camps (displaced persons) across Europe. They were fed and clothed by Jewish and international relief organizations. Had the world's Jewish population played this situation as the Arabs and Palestinians have, everything would look very different today. To begin with, the Jews would all still be living in these DP camps, only now the camps would have become squalid ghettos throughout Europe. The refugees would continue to be fed and clothed by a committee similar to UNRWA — the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (paid for mostly by the United States since 1948). Blessed with one of the world's highest birth rates, they would now number in the many millions. And 66 years later, new generations, fed on a mixture of hate and lies against the Europeans, would now seethe with anger. Sometime in the early 1960s, the Jewish leadership of these refugee camps, having been trained in Moscow to wreak havoc on the West (as Yasser Arafat was) would have started to employ terrorism to shake down governments. Airplane hijackings in the 1970s would have been followed by passenger killings. There would have been attacks on high-profile targets as well — say, the German or Polish Olympic teams. By the 1990s, the real mayhem would have begun. Raised on victimhood and used as cannon fodder by corrupt leaders, a generation of younger Jews would be blowing up buses, restaurants and themselves. The billions of dollars extorted from various governments would not have gone to the inhabitants of the camps. The money would be in the Swiss bank accounts of the refugees' famous and flamboyant leaders and their lackies. So now it's the present, generations past the end of World War II, and the festering Jewish refugee problem throughout Europe has absolutely no end in sight. The worst part of this story would be the wasted lives of millions of human beings in the camps — inventions not invented, illnesses not cured, high-tech startups not started up, symphonies and books not written — a real cultural and spiritual desert. None of this happened, of course. Instead, the Jewish refugees returned to their ancestral homeland. They left everything they had in Europe and turned their backs on the Continent — no "right of return" requested. They were welcomed by the 650,000 Jewish residents of Israel. An additional 700,000 Jewish refugees flooded into the new state from Arab lands after they were summarily kicked out. Again losing everything after generations in one place; again welcomed in their new home. In Israel, they did it all the hard way. They built a new country from scratch with roads, housing and schools. They created agricultural collectives to feed their people. They created a successful economy without domestic oil, and they built one of the world's most vibrant democracies in a region sadly devoid of free thought. Yes, the Israelis did all this with the financial assistance of Jews around the world and others who helped get them on their feet so they could take care of themselves. These outsiders did not ignore them, or demean them, or use them as pawns in their own political schemes — as the Arab nations have done with the Palestinians. I imagine the argument will be made that while the Jews may have achieved all this, they did not have their land stolen from them. This is, of course, a canard, another convenient lie. They did lose property all over Europe and the Mideast. And there was never an independent Palestine run by Palestinian Arabs. Ever. Jews and Arabs lived in this area controlled first by the Turks and then by the British. The U.N. offered the two-state solution that we hear so much about in 1947. The problem then, and now, is that it was accepted by only one party, Israel. No doubt, the situation of Arab residents of the Middle East back then may have been difficult, but it is incomprehensible that their lot was worse than that of the Jews at the end of World War II. We don't hear about any of this because giving human beings hope and purpose doesn't make great copy. Squalor, victimhood and terror are always more exciting. Perhaps in the end, the greatest crime of the Jews was that they quietly created something from nothing. And in the process, they transformed themselves. Golda Meir is credited with having said that if the Jews had not fought back against the Arab armies and had been destroyed in 1948, they would have received the most beautiful eulogies throughout the world. Instead, they chose to stand their ground and defend themselves. And in winning, they received the world's condemnation. Meir said she would take the condemnation over the eulogies. Contact Bruce Tuchman at bruce.tuchman@wellsfargoadvisors.com |
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G-D IS NOT IN THE HANDS OF MAN
Posted by David Wilder, June 28, 2011. |
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The past twenty four hours have, seemingly, brought into the limelight, Rav (Rabbi) Dov Lior, Chief Rabbi of Hebron-Kiryat Arba, and the rule of law. Rav Lior, almost two years ago, wrote an approbation to a Jewish legal treatise called "Torat HaMechech," meaning 'the King's Torah.' The book deals with relationships between Jews and non-Jews. The primary subject at hand is that of 'Dinei Nefashot' that being, when is bloodshed an option. When is it permissible to use force, even at the cost of a person's life, in dealings between Jews and non-Jews. This is no small matter. Jews have faced anti-Semitic persecution for two millennia, with tens and hundreds of thousands killed because they were Jews. Expulsions, burning at the stake, and other torture led to the horrific climax seventy years ago, with the Holocaust leaving between six to seven million Jews dead at the hands of the Nazis and their partners. At present, the question still exists: when is it halachically (legal by Jewish-Torah law) permissible to kill. These laws are not simple; to the contrary, they are infinitely complex. So much so, that Rav Lior writes, "I don't think that there is any other work which collects all the subjects that belong to the realm this book deals with." Why is this so important? There are a number of reasons. Torat HaMelech deals with situations of war. In the words of the authors, 'It must be stressed that in our dealings with war in this book, we relate to war against enemies who are harming us only. Israel has been dealing with matters of war since the renewal of the state in 1948, and even before. Through the present day. Rav Lior: This is an area which is actual enough, especially during these days of Israel's return to its land, the opinion of true Jewish halacha (Jewish legal ruling) relating to all the abnormal situations we face should be known, providing proper, true direction for occurrences and our dealings with them..." The complexities of the issues can be exemplified by when comparing a 'true Jewish legal opinion' with that of 'ethics experts.' Rav Lior writes, "I saw, and was gladdened, seeing this wonderful creation, full of sources and opinions of subjects, beginning with the Talmud, via our Rabbis of centuries past, up to the most important Torah giants of recent generations. Between the lines it can be witnessed the tremendous amount of work and investment of the Rabbis (the authors) to learn these subjects..." (It should be noted, that no where, in Rav Lior's approbation, or in the book itself, are there instructions calling on anyone to randomly or otherwise, kill anyone.) However, the significance of this work, and Rabbis Lior, Ginsburgh, Yosef approbations, are much deeper. The question of 'when to use deadly force' did not begin with Torat HaMelech. This is an issue dealt with at the highest levels of Israeli government. The primary necessity to extract workable definitions can be found within the security forces, the IDF, the Israeli armed forces. Jews have always been thought of, not so much as warriors, rather as a merciful people. Where does mercy end; where does force begin; where does force transform into cruelty? Of course, questions dealing with war ethics are nothing new. But, perhaps, the key word is: HOW — how are decisions concerning such ethical decisions taken? What is standard by which the decisions are made? The so-called 'expert' on Israeli ethical conduct during war is one
Professor Asa Kasher. He is the author of the IDF ethical code of
conduct. Rather than trying to explain Kasher's thought process and
conclusions, it is preferable to hear it straight from the horse's
mouth: From 'The Moralist' by Jerusalem Post editor David Horowitz, — an
interview with Asa Kasher,
The Jerusalem Post, April 22, 2011
"Our responsibility is to maintain our moral standards. That's a very important starting point because in matters of war it can sometimes get blurred. People are always talking about factors like international law, public opinion, the Western world — that is, outside factors that we're supposed to match up to. No, I say we have to uphold our own standards. I suggest reading the entire interview. The above-quotes speak for themselves. Each and every person can relate to Kasher's opinions as they want. But the point so important here is not so much what he says; rather, what is the basis for his opinions, what are the pillars of his ideology? The answer is: Asa Kasher's own philosophy of life and his interpretation of how a 'democracy' should act. His source is somewhere inside his head. That's it. But I ask, of what value is whatever Asa Kasher thinks! Why do his ideas have any more value than mine, or of anyone else? Very simply, they don't. This is exactly why "Torah HaMelech" is so valuable. It is not based upon what I think, or what Rav Lior thinks, or what Rav Yitzhak Shapira thinks. It is, as Rav Lior writes, founded upon the teachings of our Torah and our sages, beginning thousands of years ago, expounded upon over the centuries. It is not a 'guide to killing goyim.' It is a legal tractate explaining Jewish Torah law and ethics, and as I believe it, the word of G-d. So why the witch hunt? Why did the police and the prosecutor's office decide to snatch an almost eighty year old rabbi from his car in order to question him for an hour? Why did they refuse to sit with him in his office, as is done with many other public officials, when the need so arises? Quite simply, Rav Dov Lior represents what authentic Judaism is all about, the total opposite of the Asa Kashers of Israeli society. Rav Lior stands for Jewish pride, for Torah, for Eretz Yisrael. He refuses, as did Mordechai during the days of Haman, to bow down to evil and idolatry. Acquiescence to Kasher's respect for the 'dignity of terrorists' is idol worship, based upon false truths, false gods, which have no place in a true Jewish society. Rav Lior has, for years, stood tall against the wickedness of corrupt, immoral 'leaders' who reject the Jewishness of Israel, preferring to relate to Israel as a 'state with Jewish residents' rather than a 'Jewish state.' This, leading to catastrophes as Yamit, Oslo, the Hebron Accords, the destruction of Gush Katif, and other such calamities. Rav Lior represents all which is good, all which is pure, which is G-dly, in direct contradiction with the ideologies and life styles of others, who see him as a threat to their very existence. For if he is right, and should his way succeed, their entire life structure would crumble, like a deck of cards. This is why he is hounded, for his belief that our lives are in the hands of G-d, that G-d is not in the hands of man. That is what he fights for, this is what he will continue to fight for, and this is why, not only will he never give up or surrender, but all of us, his students, will too, follow in the footsteps of this righteous man, a giant amongst giants, who really and truly understands the meaning of the rule of law — the authentic law, the law of G-d, the law of our holy Torah. ********************************** In the last posting sent out, concerning the Rabbi's fund established for the family of our friend Eyal Noked z"l, I neglected to add details for people wishing to contribute in Israel: So: in Israel, for fund number 3050 — Tel: 1-800-22-36-36 or from any cell phone at *072 or via deposit in Bank Pagi, Branch 185, Account 409526231, or by mail, POB 50112 Jerusalem, 91050. And to all those who have responded, thank you very much! David Wilder is spokesman of The Jewish Community of Hebron. You can contribute directly in Israel to The Jewish Community of Hebron, POB105, Kiryat Arba-Hebron 90100, email: hebron@hebron.org.il or phone: 972-52-431-7055. In USA, write to The Hebron Fund, 1760 Ocean Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11230, email: hebronfund@aol.com or phone: 718 677 6886. |
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GAZA FLOTILLA 2011: KEY ORGANISER IS ALLEGED HAMAS OPERATIVE
Posted by Mechel Samberg, June 28, 2011. |
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Key flotilla organiser is alleged to be a Hamas operative wanted for financially supporting militant networks in the West Bank and Gaza. This comes from The Wire
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Mohammed Sawalha, a key organiser of the second flotilla which is set to attempt to break Israel's blockade of Gaza later this week, is alleged to be a Hamas operative with long-standing connections to the militant organisation. Last year's flotilla resulted in widespread media coverage and international condemnation when nine individuals aboard the Mavi Marmara were killed by Israeli soldiers. Israel maintained that its soldiers had acted in self-defence after being attacked by activists from the controversial Turkish Islamist charity IHH. Just Journalism has already analysed how early coverage in the British media has begun presenting an inaccurate narrative of peaceful organisers, contrasted with Israel's belligerency. Yesterday Press TV, the British-based news outlet with strong ties to the Iranian regime, aired an interview with Sawalha. Appearing on the programme 'Remember Palestine', Sawalha, who is described as a 'Gaza aid flotilla coordinator', answers several questions about the logistics and aims of the fleet. He also gave the closing remarks at an IHH conference on 17 June. The IHH website describes Sawalha as the 'head of the International Committee to End the Siege on Gaza', one of the key organisers of the second flotilla. Sawalha's open involvement in the organisation of the flotilla is noteworthy given the repeated allegations that he has strong ties to Hamas. In 2005, The Sunday Times reported on his appointment at Finsbury Park mosque: 'Sawalha's link with Hamas emerged after he was named as a co-conspirator in an American court case involving racketeering and conspiracy. Last week the cleric, who arrived in Britain 15 years ago and has been given indefinite leave to remain, said that he still supported Hamas, notorious for its suicide attacks in Israel. A 2006 BBC Panorama investigation into the activities of Islamic charities in Gaza and the West Bank also repeated these allegations. 'Faith, Hate and Charity' included further information on Sawalha's role in fundraising for Hamas. According to the presenter, John Ware: 'From London, Sawalha is said to have master minded much of Hamas' political and military strategy. Wanted by Israel, he fled to London in 1990... In London, Sawalha is alleged to have directed funds, both for Hamas' armed wing, and for spreading its missionary dawah. Then, in January 1993, an operation Sawalha was involved in went badly wrong. Hamas would be forced to reorganise its funding arrangements. A senior Hamas man from America flew into London for instructions from Sawalha. Sawalha's visitor was en route to the Palestinian territories. The two men travelled to Sawalha's home. His visitor's name was Mohammed Salah. Salah's mission was to distribute funds. Sawalha told him who to meet in the Palestinian territories... With Sawalha's agreement Salah began distributing about a quarter of a million dollars to local Hamas operatives. Some was ear marked for military activities. Some for missionary dawah. More money was in the pipe line from his bank in Chicago. But the Israeli's had been tracking him. Stopped at a check point as he left Gaza, Salah was arrested.' Alongside reports of his ties to Hamas, Sawalha is also a signatory of the infamous 2009 Istanbul Declaration, which explicitly calls for all crossings to Gaza to be opened so that Palestinians can gain access to weapons for use against 'the Zionist enemy': 'The obligation of the Islamic Nation to open the crossings — all crossings — in and out of Palestine permanently, in order to allow access to all the needs of the Palestinians — money, clothing, food, medicine, weapons and other essentials, so that they are able to live and perform the jihad in the way of Allah Almighty. The closure of the crossings or the prevention of the entry of weapons through them should be regarded as high treason in the Islamic Nation, and clear support for the Zionist enemy.' Contact Mechel Samberg at mechelsamberg2@yahoo.com |
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WHY OBAMA IS OPPOSED TO ISRAEL
Posted by Dr History, June 28, 2011. |
For distribution to all those who voted for BHO, and at the same time
say they "support" Israel and believe his words that he "supports"
Israel. (Yes, France and other countries supported Biafra — until it
wasn't there anymore, swallowed by war!) There are many other examples
in history. Words are cheap. Look at his actions. BHO has
1) dictated the starting point for Israel to "negotiate" — the 1949 armistice lines. This below was written by E. W. Jackson Sr., who was there and understands that BHO's mind did not get wiped blank when he took up residency at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. E. W. Jackson is Bishop of Exodus Faith Ministries, an author and retired attorney. |
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A Black American Clergyman Points To The Source Of The President's Anti-Israelism Like Barack Hussein Obama II, I am a graduate of Harvard Law School. I too have Muslims in my family. I am black, and I was once a leftist Democrat. Since our backgrounds are somewhat similar, I perceive something in Obama's policy toward Israel which people without that background may not see. All my life I have witnessed a strain of anti-Semitism in the black community. It has been fueled by the rise of the Nation of Islam and Louis Farrakhan, but it predates that organization. We heard it in Jesse Jackson's "HYMIE town" remark years ago during his presidential campaign. We heard it most recently in Jeremiah Wright's remark about "them Jews" not allowing Obama to speak with him. I hear it from my own Muslim family members who see the problem in the Middle East as a "Jew" problem. Growing up in a small, predominantly black urban community in Pennsylvania, I heard the comments about Jewish shop owners. They were "greedy cheaters" who could not be trusted, according to my family and others in the neighborhood. I was too young to understand what it means to be Jewish, or know that I was hearing anti-Semitism. These people seemed nice enough to me, but others said they were "evil". Sadly, this bigotry has yet to be eradicated from the black community. In Chicago, the anti-Jewish sentiment among black people is even more pronounced because of the direct influence of Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam. Most African Americans are not followers of "The Nation", but many have a quiet respect for its leader because, they say, "he speaks the truth" and "stands up for the black man". What they mean of course is that he viciously attacks the perceived "enemies" of the black community — white people and Jews. Even some self-described Christians buy into his demagoguery. The question is whether Obama, given his Muslim roots and experience in Farrakhan's Chicago, shares this antipathy for Israel and Jewish people. Is there any evidence that he does? First, the President was taught for twenty years by a virulent anti-Semite, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. In the black community it is called "sitting under". You don't merely attend a church, you "sit under" a Pastor to be taught and mentored by him. Obama "sat under" Wright for a very long time. He was comfortable enough with Farrakhan — Wright's friend — to attend and help organize his "Million Man March". I was on C-Span the morning of the march arguing that we must never legitimize a racist and anti-Semite, no matter what "good" he claims to be doing. Yet a future President was in the crowd giving Farrakhan his enthusiastic support. The classic left wing view is that Israel is the oppressive occupier, and the Palestinians are Israel's victims. Obama is clearly sympathetic to this view. In speaking to the "Muslim World, "he did not address the widespread Islamic hatred of Jews. Instead he attacked Israel over the growth of West Bank settlements. Surely he knows that settlements are not the crux of the problem. The absolute refusal of the Palestinians to accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state is the insurmountable obstacle. That's where the pressure needs to be placed, but this President sees it differently. He also made the preposterous comparison of the Holocaust to Palestinian "dislocation". Obama clearly has Muslim sensibilities. He sees the world and Israel from a Muslim perspective. His construct of "The Muslim World" is unique in modern diplomacy. It is said that only The Muslim Brotherhood and other radical elements of the religion use that concept. It is a call to unify Muslims around the world. It is rather odd to hear an American President use it. In doing so he reveals more about his thinking than he intends. The dramatic policy reversal of joining the unrelentingly anti-Semitic, anti-Israel and pro-Islamic UN Human Rights Council is in keeping with the President's truest — albeit undeclared red — sensibilities Those who are paying attention and thinking about these issues do not find it unreasonable to consider that President Obama is influenced by a strain of anti-Semitism picked up from the black community, his leftist friends and colleagues, his Muslim associations and his long period of mentor-ship under Jeremiah Wright. If this conclusion is accurate, Israel has some dark days ahead. For the first time in her history, she may find the President of the United States siding with her enemies. Those who believe, as I do, that Israel must be protected had better be ready for the fight. We are. NEVER AGAIN! Contact Dr. History at drhistory@cox.net |
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THERE GOES THE NEIGHBORHOOD: QATARI INVESTORS IMPOSE SHARIAH IN WASHINGTON DC
Posted by Billy Mills, June 28, 2011. |
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This comes from Shariah Finance Watch, a project of the Center for Security Policy. Shariah Finance Watch exposes the risks of Shariah financing. Contact them by email at info@centerforsecuritypolicy.org |
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Nearly two years ago, SFW published an article in which we uncovered that a Kuwaiti real estate investment concern had successfully imposed Shariah on tenants of its facilities in Colorado by refusing to allow certain types of businesses to operate and activities to take place on their property: http://www.shariahfinancewatch.org/blog/ 2009/08/17/kuwait-islamic-bank-successfully- imposes-shariah-in-the-usa-courtesy-of-udr/ The article didn't get any particular degree of attention at the time, but it absolutely served as a stark example of how Shariah Finance is in fact a vehicle through which Shariah itself is promoted. The very purpose of Shariah Finance is to promote Shariah. By using their financial leverage, the Kuwaiti financial jihadists were able to impose Islamic Shariah law on non-Muslims. It was quite simple: "Either live by our laws or else we'll withdraw our money." This form of financial Islamic imperialism has now found its way to our nation's capital in a very similar case, this time involving investors from Qatar, until recently the long-time home of prominent financial jihadist, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi. In downtown Washington, there is a major real estate development known as CityCenterDC. This $700 million development is described as a combination of office space, retail space and residential space. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/22/ realestate/commercial/washingtons- citycenterdc-project-is-finally-under-way.html?_ r=3&scp=7&sq=citycenter&st=cse The owner of this development, which will be one of the biggest in all of the District, is Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Company. This is the real estate investment arm of the emir of Qatar himself, who rules the Gulf nation. At this point it may also be worth mentioning that the emir of Qatar has also been involved in funding other projects here in the US. For example, in 2009, he granted $576,000 to the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA), the non-profit operated by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf and his wife Daisy Khan, the primary promoters of the controversial Ground Zero mosque project. The $576,000 grant from the ruling regime of Qatar was by far the largest grant that ASMA received in 2009. We have attempted to research the Qatari ruling regime's real estate investment arm (Qatari Diar) but, as is so often the case with Shariah-Compliant institutions and projects, transparency is just not something with which they're concerned. For instance, in their FAQs section, they fail to even mention that they have projects in the USA. We can only speculate as to the reason for this omission. They list projects in many other nations, including Cuba, Sudan and Syria.
Most interesting for us, there is no disclosure at all on the web site of Shariah compliance or the employment of Shariah advisers. We suppose that these issues are raised after engagement on real estate deals has already begun. (In other words, after the Qataris flash their cash.) We would be especially interested in knowing whether the Muslim Brotherhood Jihadist Sheikh Qaradawi has any affiliation with Qatar Diar, since he has served as chair of the Shariah supervisory board of Qatar Islamic Bank and Qatar International Islamic Bank. As a result of the Qatari involvement in the CityCenterDC project, residents, customers and business owners will be forced to abide by certain tenets of Shariah law:
We suspect that these will not be the only restrictions imposed. They amount to the obvious ones. For instance, what if someone wanted to put a BBQ restaurant in the development, including pork ribs on the menu? Or what if a breakfast place wanted to open up? If bacon was a major aspect of their business, would that be permitted? What if the Israeli embassy wanted to open an annex in CityCenterDC? Or what if a church or synagogue wanted to move in? How would these issues be handled? Finally, what of zakat? Will a portion of CityCenterDC's assets be donated to Islamic charities to fulfill zakat obligations? Which charities? These are all questions for the Shariah supervisory board to decide... Which just goes to show that this is indeed a form of Islamic imperialism to impose Shariah restrictions on our way of life. This should also serve as a reminder that Shariah is the only form of religious law extant that is expressly designed to apply to people of other faiths. Shariah, right in our nation's capital... http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/ housingcomplex/2011/06/23/who-needs-liquor- laws-when-youve-got-qatar/ |
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HOLOCAUST WAS IGNORED WHILE IT WAS TAKING PLACE
Posted by Patrick Dempsey, June 28, 2011. |
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I agree here with you Mike, but I have long held the view, which I share with Lucy Dawidowicz, 'historians' tended to ignore the Jews of the Holocaust because they were in fact Jews. I mighht be libelling many, but we have to accept that the fact is; History's negligence of the Jews during WWII was only adding to the Crime Against Humanity already perpetrated! "...if they are not recorded in history, the events of the past vanish into memorylessness, irretrievably lost to the present and the future." Lucy S. Dawidowicz. There is a definite shift away from the history that has been recorded, with regard to the Jews, but we still have a way to go. Take the Rape of Jews? That is a subject lost within the Holocaust, and not just for gender specific reasons. Take the role of Women in the Holocaust? That too has been overlooked for the simple expedient that Auschwitz is more famous, der Einsatzgruppe more compelling and Anne Frank, as the most famous face there is, from within the Holocaust itself. I am guilty also, I have brought myself from the totality to the minutae, and have possibly overlooked too much. I am not a Jew, but if I were, I doubt I could have added more to the subject, in terms of my compassion for the Jews, with regard to the Testimony being denied them, or to the place we need to see the Jews occupy in that uniquely constructed arena that is The Holocaust. I do not hold either with the contention, that German women deserved to be raped by the Russiand because of what happened to the jews! Contact Patrick Dempsey at pd1010@hotmail.com |
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LYNCH SURVIVOR: I SAW MURDER IN THEIR EYES
Posted by Daily Alert, June 28, 2011. |
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This was written by Omri Ephraim and it appeared yesterday in
YNET news
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Nir Nachshon, the moving company employee who was extricated from a lynch after mistakenly entering the east Jerusalem village of Issawiya Sunday night, is still trying to digest the harrowing experience. Speaking to Ynet from his hospital bed he said that "they started throwing rocks and cement blocks right into the car. I realized I was going to die and I started thinking this isn't the way I want to die." Nachshon, 28, was on his way home to Ma'aleh Adumim from the Mount Scopus Medical Center but a GPS device mistake meant that he ended up in the Palestinian village. He was evacuated to the Ein Kerem Medical Center after sustaining light head injuries. The realization that he was in hostile territory, he said, came "just as I made the turn, I figured out that I made a mistake, but I didn't realize how big the issue was. This is Jerusalem. This is home." "Immediately when I made the turn a 12-year-old boy started screaming 'Jew, Jew'. Each time he called out dozens more people arrived." That is when they started throwing rocks and cement blocks into the car. Nachshon recalled how during the lynch he searched among his assailants for "children or young people, I tried to look them in the eyes and find an ounce of humanity in them but all I could see was murder in heir eyes. I felt my life would be over at any minute." 'It was a miracle' Nir then described how his life was saved: "Someone came out of nowhere and tried to rescue me from the people; there was screaming but he managed to get me to his house. I was still scared, I didn't feel safe, and the people in the house said they needed to get me out of the village or they would also come under attack. "I was scared to go out but three of the young guys inside the house said they were with me and would protect me no matter what." The rescuers were one of the village's muhtar's and his sons. "I owe these people my life," Nachshon added "I hope I'll get to meet them again soon and thank them in person." Nachshon's saviors took him outside to a police patrol car waiting outside the village. Meanwhile Border Guard forces were rushed to the scene as well as Magen David Adom units, which took the victim to the hospital. Police forces canvassed the area but no detainees have been reported. In addition to the physical trauma Nachshon received from being beaten by clubs, rocks and wooden planks, he has to contend with the emotional trauma. "I'm still trying to digest everything that happened, all I know is that this was a miracle, I got my life back and first and foremost, I thank God for the gift." 'Extremists are everywhere' Shortly after being released from the hospital, Nachshon received a visit from the village Muchtar, Darwish Darwish. "I condemn this act, I ask for your forgiveness and invite you to return to the village," said Darwish. "I am sure that if we weren't there, someone else would have come to your rescue," he said. Darwish wished Nachshon a quick recovery and expressed hope that "he won't keep a grudge," noting that "extremists are everywhere." The muchtar told Nachshon that "two months ago an Arab man was attacked by Jews in Jerusalem. I hope you will save the lives of Arabs just like we saved yours." Nachshon thanked Darwish and said, "I am staying out of politics, but I know I owe you my life. I don't know what would have happened if you weren't there." At the end of the meeting, Darwish reiterated his disapproval of the event, but stressed that "our village is neglected and our residents don't receive their basic rights. Our kids walk around in the streets and are only used to experiencing raids," he said. The Daily Alert is sponsored by Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and prepared by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA). To subscribe to their free daily alerts, send an email to daily@www.dailyalert.jcpa.org |
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ISRAEL MORE A FRIEND TO U.S. THAN NATO
Posted by John Cohn, June 27, 2011. |
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Eric Rosenberg laments the passing of NATO as a credible military alliance ("Weight of the world's wars," Thursday), and it is surely discouraging that, having been liberated and defended by American troops, Europeans shirk their obligation to join the United States in the common defense of common values. But there is one ally that shares our values, votes with the United States at the United Nations more than any other country, has its own citizen army that bears the overwhelming brunt of its defense without relying on our GIs, shares with us technology that protects our troops and enhances our military prowess, and provides intelligence to strengthen us against our foes, asking only for friendship in return. The dependable allies in that country don't burn American flags; they proclaim "God bless America." And that explains why Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu received 29 bipartisan standing ovations from Congress last month. Contact John Cohn at john.r.cohn@gmail.com. |
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IT IS HIGH TIME FOR ISRAEL TO GET SERIOUS ABOUT TREASON
Posted by Steven Plaut, June 27, 2011. |
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1. Why Israel Needs to Get Serious about Treason
Israel recently passed a law that would strip Israelis of their citizenship if convicted of espionage or treason. Condemned for this by countries all over the world, almost all of whom have far harsher anti-treason laws than Israel, the Israeli law has yet to be applied to anyone. Sometimes called the "Azmi Bishara Law," it was motivated by an Arab member of the Israeli parliament (or Knesset), Azmi Bishara, from one of the Arab fascist parties, who had openly engaged in espionage and treason, including passing on intelligence to the Hezb'Allah terrorist organization while it was firing rockets at Israeli civilians. Bishara is now in hiding and has yet to be prosecuted. The anti-Israel lobby has denounced this law as "racist," just as it denounces everything Israel does as racist (including rescuing Haitian earthquake victims). Treason itself is left undefined under this new Israeli law, and in general it has been interpreted by the legal authorities in Israel so loosely that virtually no one has ever been prosecuted for it. Israeli law defines treason as "acts that impair the integrity of Israel" or "impair its sovereignty," and the granting of assistance to the enemy during time of war. Based on British law, Article 99(a) of the Israeli Criminal Code states, "If a person with intent to assist an enemy in war against Israel commits an act calculated to do so, he is liable to the death penalty or to life imprisonment." It goes without saying that no one at all has ever been sentenced to either punishment for treason in Israel. Only a few people engaged in actual espionage, and this includes nuclear spy Mordecai Vanunu and some old-time spies for the Soviet Union, have ever even been so charged with "treason." This Israeli law is little more than a joke. Israeli Arabs, including almost all the Arabs who sit in Israel's Parliament, openly collaborate with the enemies of Israel, support their agendas, sometimes engaging in violence. Israeli Jewish far Leftists work against the sovereignty and integrity of their own country every day. Examples of this would include issuing calls for Israel's destruction or support for international boycotts against Israel. No one at all has been prosecuted for any of that. The Israeli Attorney General is quite militant when it comes to prosecuting Right-wing Israeli Jews for "incitement" and "racism," including offenders who wear politically incorrect Tee shirts or have bumper stickers on their cars that some might find in poor taste. Israeli Arabs and Jewish Leftists never go to jail for collaborating with the enemy during times of war. It is instructive and illuminating to examine the history of what other Western democracies have done with traitors, especially during times of war. It is important to see what sorts of anti-treason laws exist elsewhere in democratic countries. Some countries have been putting teeth into old anti-treason laws recently because of international terrorism. Britain's Treason Act, which allowed for the prosecution of British nationals supporting the enemy in time of war, goes back to 1351. It provided for mandatory execution of traitors. Britain executed sixteen traitors under the Act during World War II. The Act was suspended in 1946 and later was repealed. However, Britain has other laws against treason, and these are still being debated well into the 21st century. Under the British Crime and Disorder Act of 1998, the punishment for treason is life imprisonment, but it had been death up until that law was passed. Canada also has a Treason Act, where "high treason" consists of acts committed during time of war. The punishment is mandatory life imprisonment. Australian has a somewhat similar treason law. Turkey, Ireland and Brazil have Treason Acts that provide for execution of traitors, as do many Third World countries. The United States has had anti-treason laws that allow for execution of traitors, although these were seldom applied, and similar laws were once passed by some individual states. The US also has the Espionage Act of 1917. France's law provides for life imprisonment for treason, as do Hong Kong's, India's, and New Zealand's. Switzerland's Treason Act usually provides for softer punishments, but in some cases they can go as high as life imprisonment. Modern Germany also has an anti-treason law with punishments up to life imprisonment for high treason, but that is defined as attempts to overturn the constitutional order. Execution and life imprisonment were not the only responses of Western democracies to internal treason. In 1939 the British government under Winston Churchill passed Defence Regulation 18B. It suspended habeas corpus for Nazi sympathizers and allowed for their wholesale internment without a trial. While enemy aliens were interned under other laws, this law was used to intern British nationals. The law was used to jail pro-German citizens, including members of the pro-Nazi British Union of Fascists party, led by Oswald Mosley. The United States passed its first law against enemy aliens and against treason in the Alien and Sedition Act of 1798. It allowed for the internment of enemy aliens in time of war. It remained on the books, supplemented by the Sedition Act of 1918, an initiative of President Woodrow Wilson, which was later repealed. Abraham Lincoln may have been the most aggressive president when it came to prosecuting and jailing traitors. He ordered the suspension of habeas corpus in 1861. He used military tribunals and declarations of martial law liberally. More than 4200 trials by military commission were conducted. "Copperheads" or Americans in the North who identified with the rebellion in the South were arrested and jailed. Other Copperheads were deported and stripped of citizenship. Some traitors were executed. 13,000 people in the North were rounded up and jailed under martial law. The Union government took action against newspapers that identified with the rebellion, closing some. Under the Confiscation Act of 1861, the private property of those accused of treason, and not only Southerners, could be seized. Britain had historically made liberal use of internment as an instrument against the enemy, especially during the Boer Wars. After 1940 it arrested Germans, Austrians and Italians in larger numbers. The Treachery Act passed Parliament that same year and allowed for the prosecution of any alien suspected of espionage or hostile activity, and included provision for execution of foreign spies, In addition, over 7000 suspect aliens were deported, mainly to Canada and Australia. Tragically, in some cases these included non-British Jews, for fears that German spies might have infiltrated Britain while amongst them. Canada interned 80,000 people during World War I. While the massive internment of Japanese-Americans by the United States during World War II is well known, less well known is the fact that thousands of ethnic Japanese were interned by Canada. Australia also ran internment camps, holding as many as 7000 Australians, plus thousands of aliens sent there by Britain for internment. While their numbers were much smaller than those of the interned Japanese-Americans, hundreds of Italian-Americans were interned by the US during World War II, and other restrictions were applied to Italian-Americans who were not interned. German-Americans were subject to restrictions during World War I, over 6000 were arrested and over two thousand were interned. 11,000 alien Germans were interned in the United States during World War II. Surprisingly, given the widespread pro-Nazi sentiments among some American ethnic Germans and the operations of several pro-Nazi organizations in the 1930s in the US, German-Americans were not interned during World War II, although some other countries in the Western Hemisphere did intern domestic ethnic Germans. Small numbers of ethnic Germans were evicted from sensitive coastal areas of the US. After Pearl Harbor the United States outlawed the pro-Nazi "German American Bund." Throughout Europe before and during World War II, the ethnic German minority populations by and large supported Nazi Germany. After the war, these Germans well expelled en masse by many of those countries as retaliation for their identification with the enemy, including from democratic Czechoslovakia. The same people today whining that Israel's "Azmi Bishara Law" is "racist" have never had much to say about those expulsions. The irony is that Israel's Arab population more openly identifies with the country's enemies than do any of those groups interned during war by Britain and the other Western democracies. Most Israeli Arabs make little attempt to hide their contempt and intense hatred for the democratic country in which they live, while rarely seeking to move to any of the 22 countries that have an Arab ethnic majority. Most (but not all) Israeli Arabs support political parties and groups openly hostile to the existence of Israel, openly supporting the genocidal terrorist groups and Moslem countries seeking Israel's obliteration. Israeli far-leftist groups, awash in funding from hostile anti-Israel foreign governments and organizations, engage in sedition and treason during time of war, led by Israel's tenured Far Left. None of these have been targeted for prosecution by Israel's legal system or police. Why not? Why can Taliban John and Jihad Jane be prosecuted in the US, while traitors in Israel enjoy immunity? Israel, and not Israel alone, needs to start putting some teeth into
anti-treason legislation and enforcement.
2. Haaretz has a new cause celebre. It seems that Arabs are under-represented among University faculty in Israel. See http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/arabs- make-up-only-2-7-of-academic-teaching-staff- in-israel-1.369723 Only 3% of university faculty are Arabs. (Haaretz did not ask what the percentages of Arabs are among those holding PhD's. Having a PhD is a prerequisite to be a university faculty member.) You will notice that Haaretz had nothing at all to say about the fact that there are virtually no Chareidi ultra-Orthodox faculty members in Israeli universities. The Chareidim are about the same percent of the over Israeli population as are Arabs. And of course, if Haaretz were serious about battling against
numerical heterogeneity and against "under-representation" among
Israeli faculty in Israeli academic institutions, it would speak out
against the severe problem of the most under-represented group of all
— the non-leftists!
3. And yet another Jew is attacked by a lynch mob of peace partners:
4. University of Haifa vs. Hatikva:
5. Liberal Pseudo-Judaism is running out of Men:
A Liberal Jewish Woman Asks: The End of Jewish Men? What Hath Jewish Feminism Wrought? How "Liberal Judaism" Became A Virtually "Women's Only" Judaism Women are 50% of Reconstructionist "Rabbis," 65% of Reform clergypersons, & 80+% of Conservative; See also
6. Those thugs and hooligans who riot each week in the West Bank town of Bil'in, attacking Israeli soldiers and police: Sent: Friday, June 24, 2011 1:03 AM
"In practice most of the Palestinian protestors [AL: at Bilin] come
today to protest in return for payment for Leftist organizations. This
is a payment ranging from NIS 50 for young protestors who throw stones
up to NIS 4,000 for the leaders and inciters. The organizer of the
protests arrives at the place each week in a new black Hummer jeep."
Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
7. Getting serious about counter-terrorism?
8. Islamist Lawfare:
9. WHAT freedom of speech in Israel?
10. Speaking about getting serious about treason: Ben Gurion
University just announced that it will prosecute in internal
disciplinary proceedings members of the faculty who call for boycotts
against Israel. See this (In Hebrew):
I do not believe them. Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
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HOW ISLAMIC ABSURDITIES PROVE ISLAMIC VIOLENCE
Posted by Raymond Ibrahim, June 27, 2011. |
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The other day I saw a video of a sheikh warning Muslims against disregarding Muhammad's sunna, or the rules and customs the prophet prescribed for Muslims. To support his point, he read a hadith wherein Muhammad told Muslims: "When you wake up from sleep to pray, wash your hand before you put it in the ablution water, for you do not know where your hand has spent the night." Sheikh demonstrates how far up his rectum the rebellious man's arm was shoved for ignoring Muhammad's command Then the sheikh told about a man who, upon hearing Muhammad's words, had deridingly said, "What, am I not going to know where my own hand has been?!" This man woke up to find his arm — from hand to elbow — shoved up his anus. The moral of the story? It is dangerous to ignore Muhammad's words. The sheikh stressed the authoritative source of this absurd anecdote, Sharh Sahih Muslim, and read its closing warning: "Thus let the mortal fear Allah and not make light of the sunna — for see what happened to this man for rebelling and mocking the words of the prophet." There is a reason why Islam's guardians — past and present — always threaten Muslims to take the sunna seriously: Muhammad has said any number of bizarre or perverse things that naturally provoke abhorrence, if not laughter. Let us examine just one: the notion of adult breastfeeding, or rida' al-kabir in Islam, which started when Muhammad commanded a woman to "breastfeed" a grown man. Because it is contained in a canonical hadith, today, nearly 1400 years later, top Muslim authorities still advocate this perverse practice. After all, to reject it or any other canonical hadith is to reject the sources and methodology of usul al-fiqh — in short, to reject Sharia. Now, let us connect the dots to see how the bizarre in Islam demonstrates the violent by asking the following simple question: If Muslims are still compelled to be true to things like "adult breastfeeding," simply because 7th century Muhammad said so, is it not logical to accept that they embrace their prophet's even better documented and unequivocal words concerning the infidel? Look at it this way: the issue of adult breastfeeding is embarrassing for Muslims; far from providing them with any sort of advantage or benefits, it places them, especially their women, in a ludicrous position (indeed, it is ranked first in this list of "top ten bizarre or ridiculous fatwas"). So why is it still a relevant issue among Muslims? Because Muhammad once commanded it. Thus, like it or not, Muslims must somehow come to grips with it. What, then, of Muhammad's other commandments — commandments that, if upheld, far from embarrassing Muslims, provide them with power, wealth, and hedonistic joys — that is, commandments that jibe quite well with mankind's most primitive impulses? I speak of Muhammad's (and by extension Sharia's) commandments for Muslims to wage war ("jihad") upon the infidel, to plunder the infidel of his wealth, women, and children, and to keep him in perpetual subjugation — all things that define Islam's history vis-à-vis the non-Muslim. In other words, the Muslim mentality that feels the need to address adult breastfeeding, simply because Muhammad once advised it, must certainly be sold on the prophet's constant incitements for war and conquest. Living in an era where the Muslim world is significantly weaker than the infidel world, and so currently incapable of launching a full-on offensive, one may overlook this fact. But the intention is surely there. One need only look to how non-Muslim minorities, especially Christians, are treated in the Muslim world — where they are persecuted, kidnapped, raped and ransacked — to be sure of it. Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com This article appeared today in
FrontPageMagazine.com and is archived at
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WHY CAN ACADEMICS STUDY 'ISLAMOPHOBIA' BUT NOT ANTI-SEMITISM
Posted by Phyllis Chesler, June 27, 2011. |
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Recently, Yale shut down its Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Anti-Semitism (YIISA). Some claimed that the center was perhaps too "political." Almost simultaneously, on June 23, 2011, the University of California at Berkeley's Center on Race and Gender issued its first annual "Islamophobia" report. The report is a project of the Islamophobia Research and Documentation Project (IRDP), whose mission statement says: "The IRDP focuses on a systematic and empirical approach to the study of Islamophobia and its impact on the American Muslim community. Today, Muslims in the U.S., parts of Europe, and around the world have been transformed into a demonized and feared global 'other,' subjected to legal, social, and political discrimination." In our view, "Islamophobia" hardly deserves any academic attention compared to the much more serious phenomenon of anti-Semitism. According to the German scholar of anti-Semitism Clemens Heni, "Anti-Semitism, with its irrational, implacably genocidal dimension, is totally different [from Islamophobia]... [T]here are some Islamicists who openly advocate the takeover of Europe, the West and the world... [T]he Jews have never had or claimed such a goal." In addition, there are the facts. For example, in 2008, the FBI found that 66.1% of religious hate crimes in America targeted Jews, but only 7.5% of religious hate crimes targeted Muslims. On March 29, 2011, the Center for Security Policy released a revised edition of its groundbreaking longitudinal study, Religious Bias Crimes 2000-2009: Muslim, Jewish and Christian Victims — Debunking the Myth of a Growing Trend in Muslim Victimization. It is based on annual FBI statistics and contradicts the assertions that religious bias crimes against Muslims have increased in America and that the alleged cause is widespread "Islamophobia." In fact, the study shows that religious bias crimes — also known as hate crimes — against Muslim Americans have remained relatively low with a downward trend since 2001, and are significantly less than the numbers of bias crimes against Jewish victims. Guess what? This report on "Islamophobia" was co-issued by Berkeley's Center for Race and Gender and by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). As we all know, CAIR is an organization which just lost its non-profit status because it failed to file annual reports detailing revenues and expenses for three consecutive years. However, the 30 state CAIR chapters still have tax-exempt status. Two weeks after it lost its tax exempt status, CAIR continues to claim on its website that donations to CAIR are tax-deductible. Federal prosecutors also labeled CAIR an "unindicted co-conspirator" in the Holy Land Foundation's financial support for Hamas, a terrorist organization. This is the "scholarly" company that Berkeley's professors keep. In addition, the founder of Berkeley's "Islamophobia Research and Documentation Project" is none other than Professor Hatem Bazian, who was born in Nablus (Shechem) and who also founded Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). He is also a co-founder of American Muslims for Palestine. Dr. Bazian is a professor of Near Eastern and Ethnic Studies. Listen to the learned and objective Dr. Bazian. At a 1999 "United for Al-Quds" conference in San Francisco, he cited the hadith which says, "The Day of Judgment will not happen until the trees and stones will say, O Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him." In April 2004 at an anti-war rally in San Francisco, he said: "It's about time we have an intifada in this country." In 2005, Dr. Bazian told a Berkeley audience that modern-day "Palestinians" are direct descendants of the Philistines and that Israelis have no connection to ancient Jews. They are simply Russian converts to Judaism. Dr. Bazian presented his alleged findings about "Islamophobia" on June 23, 2011, in D.C. at CAIR's headquarters. Results include the conclusion that, on a scale from 1 (best situation for Muslims) to 10 (worst possible situation for Muslims), "Islamophobia" in America stands at 6.4. If Islamophobia is at 6.4, and there are eight times as many attacks against Jews as against Muslims nationwide, then how shall we measure anti-Semitism in America? According to the report, the "worst" promoters of "Islamophobia" include Dr. Steven Emerson, Dr. Daniel Pipes ("the grandfather of Islamophobia in America"), Dr. Frank Gaffney, as well as "Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and other violent extremists." We wonder what these genuinely sober, grave, and learned gentlemen will make of being lumped together with the arch fiend terrorist, Osama bin Laden. In its list of "Islamophobic" incidents in recent years, it includes the University of California at Irvine's 2010 decision to suspend the university's Muslim Student Union for one year after several of its members (including its president) heckled the Israeli ambassador to the U.S. during a speech, calling him a "killer." The report describes this as a "peaceful protest." Thus far, no one has protested the politicization of Race and Gender Studies at Berkeley. So far, no one has demanded that Berkeley shut down the project to document Islamophobia. We wonder whether Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt, who quickly praised Yale's decision to shut YIISA down and condemned YIISA for too much advocacy, will be writing about the unacceptable combining of propaganda, activism, and advocacy with scholarship — when the matter concerns Muslims and not Jews. In a shocking display of opportunism and moral obtuseness, Lipstadt condemned the brilliant Dr. Charles Small, who founded YIISA, for allowing advocacy to perhaps interfere with hallowed scholarship. As Ben Cohen writes in this week's Forward, the problem with YIISA is not that it's overly political but lies rather "in its determination to go against the grain. Yale may couch its justification for YIISA's closure in terms of academic standards, but that does nothing to explain the undercurrent of hostility from others on the Yale faculty. If Carmichael, heaven knows where that leaves Columbia's tenured anti-Zionist, Joseph Massad, or the London School of Economics, which carried out research funded by the Gadhafi Foundation. By closing YIISA after only five years, Yale has effectively sided with those voices that demean contemporary anti-Semitism as the fantasy of overzealous Israel advocates." We demand that the University of California at Berkeley consider whether its Center on Race and Gender meets the standards for Western scholarship or whether it merely provides pseudo-academic cover for anti-Semitic propaganda. Dr. Chesler is an Emerita Professor of Psychology and Women's
Studies at City University of New York. She is an author and lecturer
and co-founder of the still ongoing Association for Women in
Psychology (1969). Visit her website at
Nathan Bloom is an assistant to Dr. Phyllis Chesler. He majored in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago. |
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JEW! HE SHOUTED
Posted by Marc Prowisor, June 27, 2011. |
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"A little boy about age 12 shouted Jew, Jew! Every shout brought tens of people...then they started throwing blocks..." Statements like this have been heard throughout the ages, since Israel was destroyed and the Jews exiled over 2000 years ago. This report could have been made in Spain of the 1400's, Poland, and Germany, all of Europe till World War 2, Norwich, England in the 13th century and so many other places. But it wasn't from "way back when" this report happened a few days ago in an Arab occupied section of Jerusalem. A continuing symptom and result of approved "Jew bashing" in the world theatre and a weak and divided Israeli government and psyche. Nauseating, disgusting, frightening, Agreed. Isolated? Not at all. It is a peek into continued possible future scenarios, and not just in Israel, but coming to neighborhood near you soon. What happens to and in Israel affects Jews throughout the world, even if they don't like Israel, even if they consider themselves apart from Israel. Think of it as the "Big Picture." Many Jews of the world continue to fool themselves into thinking that if Israel gives up its heartland, Judea and Samaria to the Arabs, everything will be "nice": once the Arabs declare a new state, peace and harmony will rule. Then you have some others who say, let's just disconnect from "them" already. Who is "them"? the Arabs? Hello? Arabs are living in Israel, so whom are you disconnecting from? Of course let's not forget all of our "enlightened" who continue to disconnect themselves and their children from their own history, or their commitment to Israel. This is not just limited to the "Liberal" camp, but to many who consider themselves to be "religious Jews" also. Israel's heart is being thrashed, it is being heralded as a soon attainable prize to be quartered among our enemies, all of our enemies. A sacrifice on an impure altar. A call has been made, the gauntlet has been thrown down to the ground in challenge to all Jews, supporters and friends of Israel around the world...Fatah, PLO, Palestinian Authority, whatever name you choose, now claims they will demand statehood on the lands (at this stage) that make up Jewish history and heritage, they will ask the world to support them in this demand. Any being with a hint of brain cells know it will not stop there...but how far will it go, how far will the ripples reach? As Israel gets violated in the world so do Jews all over the world. The strategy of keeping quiet and being a "good little Jew" will not hold out for long. Sure you can claim that you are a Rights activist, you support Woman's Rights, Gay Rights, Porcupine rights, "down with Israel," "Free Gaza," whatever you are doing to hide and fit in, not make waves. Anything, so your professor will notice you in UC Irvine, Yale or Columbia, you need to be hip, and you need to be "in". You can even wait behind various closed walls in "Kosher" corners and "clubs." This "call", this Gauntlet, this challenge has been thrown down at YOUR feet, and inaction, ignorance and ignoring is not an option. This particular time in history is just another part of the roller coaster ride we all take part in, whether we are belted in for the ride is the question, and if not, how many loops we can survive. The world has become quite divided over the "Israel Question", how such a little piece of land can influence and affect so many is truly a wonder. Many in the world think Israel is so large compared to our neighbors, it must be, and it's in the papers every day, if not for the volatile nature of the region then for some life saving, ground breaking technology. Only a world power gets that attention, yes that we are. Impostors from all over the world make for our shores, as lies become truths and ignorance is hailed as enlightenment. Our little country has made more of a positive impact on this world than most countries put together, and we have done this in less than 70 years of renewed existence. Judea and Samaria is the backbone of this country, it is the history and the future of our people and all who consider themselves friends and supporters. It is also the target of all who hate Israel, all who hate the Jewish people, all who hate, or do not appreciate their own identity. That continues to be hidden from many of the Jewish people, on purpose. To conclude...It has been forecast that this process of calling for a new Arab state will bring renewed violence to the region, what else is new, I know, boring. What is not boring is how it will affect the Jewish communities and the Jewish people around the world. What is also not boring is how it will affect the entire world. All will be accomplices, all will be responsible. Payback will be interesting and all will contribute and all will be affected, whatever they choose to do or not do. We have a choice, a chance, choose the right direction and remain strong with Israel. The alternative is not pretty. Now is late, but not too late. Contact Marc Prowisor by email at marc@friendsofyesha.com. And visit http://yeshaviews.blogspot.com and www.friendsofyesha.com |
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BODIES IN THE WELL: THE JEWISH MARTYRS OF NORWICH
Posted by Victor Sharpe, June 27, 2011. |
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Eleven of the bodies were of Jewish children from the ages of 2 to 15 with five of them below the age of five. Why are they not reburied? The news of the discovery in Norwich, England of a presumed mass murder of Jewish men, women and children that took place in medieval times has left hardly a ripple, especially among the present day Anglo-Jewish community. This is passing strange as it now appears that the bodies — all 17 of them — were found as long ago as 2004 and have been kept in storage all that time without decent or respectful burial. The remains were discovered during the construction of a new shopping center and researchers from the Center for Anatomy and Human Identification at Dundee University have deduced that all 17 bodies were thrown head first down a well in either the 12th or 13th centuries. The conclusion from DNA research is that they were Jews and that at least five were from the same family. Eleven of the bodies were of children from the ages of 2 to 15 with five of them below the age of five. England was no different from most of Christendom during the Medieval period and beyond. Europe then was as much a charnel house for the stateless and hapless Jews as it was during the Holocaust. The same relentless hatred of the Jews lay like a psychosis among the vast majority of Europeans and England was no exception. Today that same aberrant behavior manifests itself in unfounded hatred towards the Jewish state and in a perverse ultra-support for the Arabs who call themselves Palestinians. In England, a catastrophe broke upon the Jews during the Third Crusade (1189-1192) when the coronation of Richard Coeur de Lion took place. Anti-Jewish mobs attacked and murdered Jews from Norwich to Dunstable and throughout many English towns because of a false rumor that King Richard had ordered the Jews, who had come to honor him at the palace, to be turned away. During the king's absence while on the crusade, the Jewish community of York tried to find refuge in the lord's castle from ravening mobs bent on the Jews' destruction. Rather than fall into the hands of the fanatical mob, the Jews, at least 150 in number, took their own lives on March 17th, 1190. Rabbi Yom Tov ben Isaac uttered these final words: "It is plainly the will of G-d of our Fathers that we die for his holy Law. And lo, death is at our door ... for if we fall into their hands, we shall die in mockery at their arbitrary choice." A rabbinic ban (cherem) prohibited Jewish residence in York after that pogrom. Peter Abelard, the French Christian scholar, himself a victim of persecution by the Church, was a lone voice in sympathizing with the harried and tormented Jews throughout so much of Europe. He wrote in 1135: "No nation has undergone such sufferings for God. Scattered among all the nations, having neither king nor secular prince, the Jews are oppressed with heavy taxes as if they must buy their lives anew every day ... The Jews are not permitted to own fields and vineyards ... Thus the only livelihood that remains to them is usury, and this in turn excites the hatred of the Christians." One of the earliest cases of blood libel, the rumors of ritual murder falsely spread against the Jews, was recorded in the same Norwich, England. In 1146, the local Jews were accused of having kidnapped, tortured and killed a Christian boy before the Passover. Thus began the blood libel that spread throughout Christendom and resulted for centuries in the massacres of countless Jewish victims. In Poland and Russia at Easter time, which so often corresponds with the Passover festival, Jews were routinely slaughtered in pogroms. In short, the discovery of the 17 presumably Jewish bodies in the Norwich well attests to the anti-Jewish hatred that permeated every facet of medieval life throughout Christendom from the Popes to the secular kings and princes on down to the superstitious peasants. That these bodies have been in storage since 2004 with, as far as I am aware, apparently no outrage expressed by the Anglo-Jewish community or its representative Board of Deputies is deplorable. If this story is true, then the bodies of the murdered Jews should immediately be flown to Israel — the Jewish biblical and ancestral homeland — where they will be given the appropriate and dignified burial according to the laws of Moses. If it has not already taken place, I hope Britain's Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sachs, will be addressing this appalling situation. One can only imagine the Muslim riots in British streets if these skeletons had been identified as belonging to Muslims and were being treated in this manner. Inflamed Christians leaving their respective churches during medieval times, and bent on murdering Jews after hearing vitriolic and hateful anti-Jewish sermons from their priests, were no different from today's Muslims who leave their mosques with a blood lust after hearing their imams preach anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-Hindu and anti-Buddhist diatribes. In contrast, most Christians in America have historically eschewed the hate that their European coreligionists spewed for centuries. Indeed, millions of American Christians have embraced the Jewish roots of their faith and have been stalwart friends of the reborn Jewish state. Their support has been an immense encouragement to embattled Israel whose enemies encompass it with growing strength and enmity. Sadly, however, too many liberal churches and denominations in the United States have fallen victim to the lies and modern day anti-Israel blood libels spewed by the likes of the Rev. Naim Ateek and his Sabeel organization — an appendage of the Saudi and oil rich Arab funded anti-Jewish and anti-Israel Palestinian propaganda campaign; a repetitious catalogue of calumnies against the Jewish state that surely gives the ghost of Josef Goebbels great delight. So if indeed the bodies in the well turn out to be Jewish victims and martyrs, Israel should immediately demand that they be transferred to the Jewish state as the only decent site for their Jewish burial. So too should a memorial be erected in Norwich to the martyred Jews, just as a plaque exists in York commemorating the martyred Jews of that city. Victor Sharpe is a freelance writer and author of Volumes One & Two of Politicide: The attempted murder of the Jewish state. Contact him at janvic42@gmail.com This appeared today in Arutz-7. |
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FROM ISRAEL: SEEING A DIRECTION
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 27, 2011. |
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For purely personal reasons of the best kind (another blessing: the bar mitzvah reception of my second grandson), I must at least try to make this post short. But it seemed to me that a post was very much in order. Abbas has apparently decided on his direction (although, who knows?): After a joint meeting of the PLO executive committee and the Fatah central committee, he has declared that the PA will be seeking recognition of Palestinian Arab statehood from the UN in September. ~~~~~~~~~~ Following this announcement there were the usual garbled statements from PA leaders regarding the way in which this move will enhance peace, and how negotiations would still be possible. Never mind... There is no need to panic about this turn of events. Not at all. ~~~~~~~~~~ You might find enlightening a briefing for the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs — www.jcpa.org by Linda Menuhin Abdul Aziz on "How Arab Media View a Declaration of Palestinian Statehood." (all emphasis added) "...Unlike the vibrant debate in Israel over the Palestinian plan to seek support for statehood in September in the UN General Assembly, the Arab media is occupied with the wave of changes sweeping Arab countries, leaving little room for discussion of the projected Palestinian plan. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Flotilla is coming. Expected later this week, with ships first doing a rendezvous from different points in order to approach Gaza together. Some of the steam (forgive the pun) has been taken out of the venture by the fact that the Turkish IHH ship is not participating. But as it is, 10 ships carrying people from Greece, France, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Canada and the US are expected to be involved; additionally there may be a ship leaving from Jordan and carrying Palestinian Arabs. The ship from the US is called — outrageously and significantly — "The Audacity of Hope" and will carry some very self-deluded Americans. Among them will be writer Alice Walker, and one Samuel Hart, a former US ambassador to Ecuador. The State Department has warned against the participation of American citizens, saying, that the Gaza coast is "dangerous and volatile" and warning that "Delivering or attempting or conspiring to deliver material support or other resources to or for the benefit of a designated foreign terrorist organization, such as Hamas, could violate U.S. civil and criminal statutes and could lead to fines and incarceration." ~~~~~~~~~~ Yesterday the Security Cabinet reviewed and approved the navy's plans for stopping the ships. Preparations are extensive, and Prime Minister Netanyahu has given the order to prevent any ship from reaching Gaza. All possible care will be taken to avoid loss of life, but action that may be required to stop the ships is sanctioned. Make no mistake about the determination of Israel in this regard. The maritime blockade is totally legal according to international law. Any claims that the people of Gaza are starving is nonsense, as unlimited humanitarian goods are being permitted by Israel to enter the land crossings into Gaza. This is a political ploy intended to give support to Hamas. ~~~~~~~~~~ With regard to the situation in Gaza, please see this, by Ethan Bronner of the NY Times: "Two luxury hotels are opening in Gaza this month. Thousands of new cars are plying the roads. A second shopping mall will open next month. Hundreds of homes and two dozen schools are about to go up. As pro-Palestinian activists prepare to set sail aboard a flotilla to Gaza, the Palestinian coastal enclave is experiencing its first real period of economic growth since the siege they are protesting began in 2007. 'The siege on goods is now 60 to 70% over,' said Jamal El-Khoudary, chairman of the board of the Islamic University, who has led Gaza's Popular Committee Against the Siege. ~~~~~~~~~~ And see this, by Kevin Meyers in the Irish Independent: "What is it about Israel that prompts such a widespread departure from common sense, reason and moral reality? As another insane flotilla prepares to butt across the Mediterranean bringing 'aid' to the 'beleaguered' people of Gaza, does it never occur to all the hysterical anti-Israeli activists in Ireland that this is like worrying about the steaks being burnt on the barbecue, as a forest fire sweeps towards your back garden? ~~~~~~~~~~ Humanitarian cargo — such as there may be, as delivering humanitarian goods is not the real purpose of the Flotilla — can be unloaded either in the port of Ashdod or at El Arish, Egypt. (The fact that Egyptian officials consented to the participation at El Arish seems to me a good sign.) The cargo will then be brought to Gaza. With regard to ships that don't cooperate, they will be towed into the Ashdod port and their passengers arrested. Cargo will be searched and then genuine humanitarian supplies brought to Gaza. ~~~~~~~~~~ Tamar Fogel, the 12-year old girl from Itamar who lost her parents and three siblings in a terrorist attack three months ago, has paid a condolence call to Jonathan Pollard, who has just finished sitting shiva for his father, whom he was not permitted by Obama to see. I confess: I am in awe of this girl, who seems to have strength beyond what is comprehensible. May the Almighty bless her with healing and with a life of purpose and love. ~~~~~~~~~~ I end here by sharing (with thanks to Judith N.) an excellent video of an interview of Prime Minister Netanyahu, in which he makes the case for Israel as only he can do. Share this broadly, please:
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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TAMAR FOGEL PAYS SHIVA VISIT TO JONATHAN POLLARD IN US PRISON
Posted by Justice for Jonathan Pollard, June 27, 2011. |
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Daughter of Itamar massacre victims visits Jonathan Pollard, who recently lost father, in US jail This is by Aviel Magnezi and it appeared in YNET News
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Tamar Fogel, who lost her parents and three siblings in the Itamar massacre, met with Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard days after the death of his father. The visit was scheduled before 95-year old Morris Pollard died. Accompanying Tamar were her grandfather, Rabbi Yehuda Ben Yishai, and aunt Hodaya. The contact between the two was first made when Pollard conveyed his condolences to the Fogel family through his wife, Tamar's uncle Yohai Ben Yishai told Ynet. As Pollard could not personally console the family, Tamar and her relatives decided to go to him. "And then Morris Pollard died, and my father who went to be consoled became the consoler," Ben Yishai noted. Pollard did not have a chance to say goodbye to his father, who died at an Indiana hospital earlier this month. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's request to allow him to visit his father was not met in time, nor did his request to attend the funeral. Ben Yishai said that Pollard welcomed the visit. "A very strong bond was created between my father and Jonathan. My father told me that Jonathan tried to 'put on a brave face' and inquire after our family's wellbeing despite his obvious suffering over his own loss." He noted that Tamar's presence in the meeting was unusual. "As far as I know this is the first time they allow a visit by a person under the age of 18. All these hard stories of the Jewish people connect in a way that intensifies them," he said. J4JP Adds: Esther Pollard was at her husband's side for the Fogel visit, acting as translator for the authorities. Rabbi Pesach Lerner brought the Fogels and Ben-Ishays to Jonathan, along with 2 other close friends of the Pollards who participated in the prison shiva visit to comfort Jonathan. Reach Justice for Jonathan Pollard by sending an email to
justice4jp@gmail.com and visit their website:
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GROWING RADICALIZATION OF MUSLIMS IN AMERICA CONSTITUTES A POLICY MINEFIELD FOR ISRAEL
Posted by Barbara Sommer, June 26, 2011. |
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This was written by
Alex Joffe, a New York based writer on history and international affairs. His web site is www.alexanderjoffe.net.
It appeared in YNET news
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Two recent reports indicate that the nature of the US Muslim population is changing. This will have important implications for Israel. In Somalia, a recent suicide bomber was revealed to have been raised in Minnesota. The Somali community there originated in the 1990s with a refugee population that had been relocated by the US government. There have long been local reports regarding the difficulty young Somali males experienced integrating into American society and their involvement with gang violence and crime. Many Somali youth have also returned to their homeland to participate in ongoing religious warfare. More American suicide bombers should be expected in Somalia and eventually in the US. A second report, in the policy journal Middle East Quarterly, points to the backdrop of growing Muslim radicalization in the US. Mordechai Kedar and David Yerushalmi used survey data from 100 mosques across the US to show that over 80% present sermons or other materials that praise religious violence. The results were strongly linked to the degree of religiosity exhibited by leaders and members of a mosque. These results echo those of the New York City Police Department study from 2007 that identified "salafi ideology" as a predictor of mosques' role in radicalization. A third non-American data point is the announcement of a change of British government policy designed to reduce the role of universities as centers for Muslim radicalization. Dozens of British Muslims radicalized toward violence by other students, local mosques and by student organizations have gone on to pursue violent jihad in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and elsewhere. Others have perpetrated acts of terrorism within the United Kingdom, such as the 7/7 attacks in London, the "shoe bomber" attack in 2002, and the Glasgow airport attack in 2007. While the Muslim demographics of US campuses are different, radicalization in this setting is another aspect of the future facing the US. If the Somali case is any indication, it is around the corner. US officials have responded to the emerging threats of radicalized Muslims in contradictory ways. On the one hand, law enforcement at the local and federal levels has been aggressive about thwarting plots, especially through the use of informants. On the other hand, political officials of different agencies have sought to mollify the Muslim lobby in the US through "outreach." The problem is that, like a majority of mosques, organizations such as CAIR are Muslim Brotherhood related. Their strategy is instant outrage whenever a Muslim terror threat is revealed or when the problem is discussed in order to cow federal and local officials. This approach has been shockingly successful. Moral idiocy Coupled with this is a political strategy of deliberately inflating the population numbers of American Muslims in order to exaggerate their electoral importance and aggressive public outreach to all levels of the educational system in order to present Islam in the best possible light. America's tolerant nature and politically correct culture treats Islam in the schools far better than Christianity. For Israel the result is a policy minefield. Intelligence sharing by Western states and Israel appears to remain excellent. But there are significant threats to the American Jewish community that will eventually bring it into direct confrontation with American Muslims, and blow back on to Israel. Muslim violence against Jews will not win American friends. But official indulgence of American Muslims, the result of both politically correct condescension and a fear of more widespread violence, may actually increase in the wake of attacks on Jews. That has been the pattern in the UK in the aftermath of 9/11, 7/7 and the Iraq War. The British government continues to throw immense amounts of money into programs aimed at the Muslim population with the hope of convincing young men to be less radical. Many programs have been shown to have been run by radicals themselves or by front groups. Those protesting such nonsensical policies are instantly derided as racists and Islamophobes. And calls for a more "even-handed" policy toward Israel in order to remove a source of "Muslim anger" and violence are also frequently heard. This paradox may yet occur in the US. American fear of speaking honestly regarding growing threats, and Muslims anxiously condemning honest discussions, will result in greater silence. It will also continue the search for "root causes", that is to say, means to accommodate and appease, radical Muslims. A recent example of this is US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's frankly unbelievable statement that concentrating terrorist screen efforts on Muslim men under the age of 35 was "not good logic." Another example is the responses to recent hearings by Representative Peter King on radicalization of Muslims in American prisons. Vituperative responses from American Muslim groups are to be expected. But as an illustration of the ludicrous efforts to deny reality, one of King's colleagues, Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, tried to change the subject by claiming "Christian militants" who wanted to overturn American laws about abortion were trying to "undermine" the country. Such practical and moral idiocy will not do the US any good, and if history is any example, Jews and especially Israel will be held up as the real problem. Contending with this is a challenge that Americans and Israelis are ill-prepared to face. Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com |
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THE NEAR LYNCHING OF PROF. BENNY MORRIS
Posted by Steven Plaut, June 26, 2011. |
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In the old novel Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut, there is a bizarre character in the story, a man who had been a Nazi war criminal, but after the War trained as a medical doctor and came to the Caribbean in order to save sick impoverished island people. He saves about a dozen people a week and he figure it will only take about 600 years to save more people than he had killed as a war criminal during the War. I gotta tell you that I am reminded of that story whenever I contemplate Benny Morris. Don't take this the wrong way — Morris was never any murderer or war criminal and I do not mean to imply that he was evil as a Nazi. Morris was one of the original and in some ways the most destructive of the "New Historians" Israel produced. He was essentially a pseudo-historian, inventing history "narratives" to reflect Arab propaganda and demonization of Israel. And he was good at it. He collaborated with filth like Ilan Pappe and Avi Shlaim. Because he was so viciously anti-Israel and because so much of his academic career consisted of churning out anti-Israel propaganda, Morris had trouble finding an academic position in Israel. He was eventually hired by Ben Gurion University, and rumor has it that the president of the university at the time, leftist Avishai Braverman, personally intervened so that Morris could get hired. Morris turned out Bash-Israel and Bash-Zionism books that were not very different from what Ilan Pappe produced, a lot about the 1948-9 Israeli war for independence. He also worked back then a lot for the Jerusalem Post during its phases under leftist control. (The Post shifts back and forth, from side to side, especially when its ownership is sold. It now seems to be moving leftward rapidly.) All this made Morris the darling of the campus Lefts in Europe and the US. They loved citing Morris to prove how evil Israel is and was. 12 years ago or so Morris would have been one of the most obvious targets for righteous Zionist rage and for being exposed, attacked and denounced as a pseudo-scholar, something like a Neve Gordon or Ilan Pappe. But then something happened. Morris suddenly appeared to have second
thoughts. He repudiated his earlier anti-Israel radicalism and
started espousing pro-Israel and pro-Zionist opinion, especially about
the 1948-9 war of independence. Not everyone is completely convinced
that Morris has wised up, and Efraim Karsh is the leading proponent of
the idea that Morris has not and is simply engaged in pragmatic
maneuvering. (See
I was skeptical of Morris' "conversion" at first, but over time it seems to me to be genuine. I think his very first public break with the Bash-Israel Left took place in Berkeley, when I happened to be in town. Invited to speak in a church, the place was packed with the usual Berkeley jihadists and Hitlerjugend expecting a blistering demonization of Israel. Instead Morris spent the entire talk explaining that the Middle East conflict is the fault of the Arabs, including any "refugee" problem. You can imagine the hysterical reactions in the local Berkeley drug-infested media. Later Morris would gave interviews and make statements that not only were outright Zionist, but he went so far as to argue that any expulsions by Israel of any Arabs that took place in 1948 were entirely justified! As a result, for 8 or 10 years now, Morris is the Israeli historian that the moonbats and the anti-Semites most love to hate. They have special hatred for him because, after all, he used to be one of them and "betrayed" them. Morris is frequently singled out for the venom of the barbarians, including in Israel. When invited a few months back to speak at Cambridge, the local anti-Semites made a fuss and insisted that Morris be dis-invited because he is a "racist." After all, anyone thinking Israel has the right to defend itself is a "racist" in such circles. His talk was cancelled. This is academic freedom in Britain! This past week, Morris was invited to speak at the London School of Economics, which — despite its name — is also crawling with leftist vermin. On the way to the talk he was almost lynched by a mob of leftists and jihadists. He was personally targeted in incitement to violence by the heads of the local BDS Hitlerjugend, where BDS is the "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" movement. Morris managed to escape and under heavy security presence he did give a talk to 300-400 students at LSE. That full story was in Friday's Makor Rishon. What does the one-time Post-Zionist and one-time "New Historian" Morris make of almost being lynched for being a Zionist? I do not know, but I think it raises the odds of his rededicating himself to expunging his old propaganda and doing real research that promotes the truth, or what some pseudo-academics prefer to call the "Zionist narrative." Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
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THE TOO ENTICING SMELL OF DEATH
Posted by Ari Bussel, June 25, 2011. |
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The United States of America under President Barack Obama will be accused one day of bringing about the next world war. It was President Obama who demanded President Mubarak of Egypt to leave. With an equally heavy hand, he demanded Libyan leader Gaddafi's exit. It worked successfully with Mubarak, America's closest Middle Eastern ally after Israel. It shocked many because no one expected a friend to sell out a friend, and the lesson left a very deep impression across the Arab world and Israel. With Gaddafi, the American President received a litany of outbursts. Gaddafi, the desert warrior wearing brown, waved a notebook, his country's governing document, along with billions in cash held in Tripoli and went on and on, expressing his exact thoughts and feelings toward the American President. A new kind of diplomacy, the straight-in-your-face kind. The world watched hypnotized, listening to the one who dared to stand up to Obama. Obama did not like this rebellion and instructed American missiles and assets on the ground to target Gaddafi. The President went so far as to deploy NATO forces, to-date unsuccessfully. Gaddafi may be a dictator, but he is still the ruling head of a sovereign country with which the USA is NOT AT WAR. The Allied Forces managed to murder Gaddafi's son along with many others, both supporters of Gaddafi and innocent rebels who were inspired by the Arab Spring. It was all brushed aside as casualties of weapons aimed at Gaddafi that missed their target. The world that is quick to condemn Israel releases itself from any like-culpability. And each day more casualties are added, compliments of the Free World. Gaddafi possesses the Fighter Spirit, a tribal leader who understands his people and the battleground better than outsiders. It is the intensity of his passion that has caused many around the world to giggle in uneasy laughter. Four months later, despite the enormous might of the United States of America and NATO, he remains in power, determined, now more than ever, to avenge his and his country's honor. Let us remember his words: "I am a fighter, a revolutionary from tents ... I will die as a martyr at the end." The U.S. President is used to getting his way quickly. It seemed to work with President Mubarak, now jailed and facing charges. Credit must be given to Egyptian President Mubarak. He, too, refused to leave his country. He remained devoted, symbolizing true leadership and loyalty to the very end. Except, he did not expect a friend and an ally to stab him right in his heart. Qaddafi was quick to learn the lesson. If one moves beyond the spin, the reality being shaped by Obama is detrimental to world safety. Egypt remains under the rule of the military, but it is the 2011 American President who singlehandedly ushered in the Muslim Brotherhood. A deed his predecessor managed to do in 1978 with Ayatollah Khomeini, as Carter ushered in the current disastrous regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Gaddafi proved to be a stumbling block, a nuisance. As time passes, our President needs to explain to the U.S. Congress his actions and intentions, something in which he chooses not to engage. Attention must be diverted elsewhere, as he continues his play of redrawing the map of the Middle East. Israel, America's staunchest ally in the region, has learned a lesson from President Mubarak's exit. President Obama is not a safe ally despite decades long relationships, contracts or treaties. Thus, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu availed himself of the podium of the U.S. Congress to tell a joint session and the nation that Israel knows she stands alone. He received resounding support from Congress and the American People. The President must have been quite frustrated. His efforts at redrawing the world's map to fit his overall intentions have failed miserably (or is it simply a reflection of utter inexperience and the inability to have a long term foreign policy?). Remember, it is the President who won the Nobel Peace Prize for doing, astonishingly, nothing! Thus, he lost interest in Gaddafi and Netanyahu and now has turned his attention to Syrian President Assad. Why do his advisors not warn him that as he advances farther toward Iran, the more dangerous every move becomes? Positioning American warships against the Syrian shore means little to Assad, but provides Turkey with impetus for grandeur. Turkey under Erdogan is looking toward the horizon with large visions. Erdogan remembers centuries of an Ottoman Empire and aspires to once again become a global player. He feels emboldened against Syria, much more than he ever felt against his previous ally Israel and gave orders to shelter Syrian refugees escaping with their lives. His air force is executing missions in Syrian airspace (at the moment only intelligence gathering) and his army has already engaged the Syrians at the border. Erdogan is a miniature version of Obama. He has already called for the ouster of Assad, thinking his power to be world shaping. He repeatedly treats Israeli leaders, from President Peres to Prime Minister Netanyahu as criminals, on the world stage at Davos and ever since. Funny, how his "Great Turkey" could become a pile of rubble if Iran sets its eyes on that prize. The devastation could take centuries to rebuild. Neither Obama nor Erdogan possesses strength or a realistic world vision. Ahmadinejad however does, and they are playing right into his hands. It would be the latter's decision when and how to act. He may come to the aid of Syria, conquering all in his wake and advancing onward to demolish Turkey, unless it surrenders completely. He already likes what he sees at the Lebanese border looking southward to Israel. Just eight months ago, President Ahmadinejad proclaimed in a speech in Lebanon that "Zionists will disappear" and that "Occupied Palestine will be liberated." It seems that both Obama and Erdogan fit well into this plan. The only obstacle for Islamic world domination, and the only countermeasure to American naïveté in foreign affairs under Obama, is Israel. A strong, unwavering, resolute, determined and courageous Israel. Other elements are trying to undermine Israel's position and her resolve. They will not succeed. If they do, this international chessboard will soon turn into the fiercest battlefield seen for the past seventy years. Can the world afford World War III? Who will survive the devastation once hatred erupts into actual annihilation? President Obama in frustration may, with the wave of a hand, throw many more key figures off the chessboard. In real life, however, unlike in an imaginary game or simulation, actions have consequences. Dumping Mubarak, trying to eliminate Gaddafi, angering Netanyahu and now Assad has awakened the sleeping beast. Once awake, he will not go back to sleep. The smell of the blood of millions is too sweet, too tantalizing, too tempting and simulating to allow for dormancy once again. Contact Ari Bussel and Norma Zager at busselari@gmail.com |
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THE DARK MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD WORLD OF HUMA ABEDIN WEINER
Posted by Paul Lademain, June 25, 2011. |
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This is Jamie Glazov's interview of Walid Shoebat in Front Page Magazine (http://frontpagemag.com/2011/06/24/the-dark-muslim- brotherhood-world-of-huma-abedin/?utm_source= FrontPage+Magazine&utm_medium=email&utm_ campaign=b01eedad7a-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN). Walid Shoebat is a former PLO terrorist and Muslim Brotherhood activist; he is the author of the new book For God or For Tyranny. Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in Russian, U.S. and Canadian foreign policy. He is the author of the critically acclaimed and best-selling, United in Hate: The Left's Romance with Tyranny and Terror. His new book is Showdown With Evil. He can be reached at jamieglazov11@gmail.com. |
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FP: Walid Shoebat, welcome to Frontpage. Shoebat: Thanks for having me. FP: You were the first to break the news on Huma Abedin, Anthony Weiner's wife, being linked to her mother Saleha Abedin, who, as you have exposed, has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. First, let me ask you: how credible are your sources? Shoebat: Al-Liwa Al-Arabi (translated here) leaked an extensive list, which was partially published by Al-Jazeera and several other major Arab newspapers. The detailed list included Huma's mother, Saleha Abedin. Another piece of the puzzle and what was common knowledge in the Arab world is that Huma Abedin has a brother named Hassan Abedin who sits in on the board of the Oxford Centre For Islamic Studies (OCIS) where Huma's brother is a fellow and partners with a number of Muslim Brotherhood members on the Board, including Al-Qaeda associate, Omar Naseef and the notorious Muslim Brotherhood leader Sheikh Youssef Qaradawi; both have been listed as OCIS Trustees. Naseef continues to serve as Board Chairman. This becomes an issue since Huma sits in the U.S. State Department with eyes and ears to classified government secrets. Was Huma unaware of all this as she accompanied Hillary Clinton to the Dar El-Hekma women's college in Jedda-Saudi Arabia? Huma's mother is the co-founder and a Vice Dean at the college and an active missionary on issues regarding Muslim women and is considered by the Egyptian security services as a dangerous member of the Muslim Brotherhood. FP: What would you say to those who would argue that the Sisterhood organization is a farce and that the Egyptian Al-Dostor broke the news but that there is nothing really to substantiate this case? Shoebat: The "Women's Division" within the Muslim Brotherhood can be found at the Muslim Brotherhood's official website. Here is an excerpt of its goal translated from Arabic states: "The Womens Organization's goal in accordance with the Muslim Brotherhood rules, is to gain and acquire a unified global perception in every nation in the world regarding the position of women, and the necessity of advocacy work at all levels in accordance to the message of the Brotherhood as written in Women in Muslim Society, and the rearing of women throughout the different stages of life." Al-Dostor's article is confirmed by top experts in Egypt including the Arab Center for Studies, headed by researcher Abdul Rahim Ali. That with the Muslim Brotherhood's own official statement gives us a solid case that this clandestine group called The Sisterhood exists, very active and very influential. So influential that they succeeded in getting Hillary Clinton to speak alongside two of its members; Abedin and Suheir Qureshi were also listed as members by several major Arab sources. Then we have the links, which shows damning evidence that this list was not created haphazardly. We did the research which we shall release shortly; so many of who are on the list are official members or wives/daughters of members ranging from spies, Nazi-style propagandists, Nazi affiliates from the Brotherhood's inception, Hijab advocates in Europe, and prominent conspiracy theory advocates with a span of influence over several international organizations from the United Nations to women advocacy groups worldwide. All these are not without a central direction and seem to follow the same agenda shown on the Brotherhood's official website. Our research will show links from the Muslim Brotherhood's own website and other media regarding the list. Be tuned in for the next press release and get ready for some serious shock therapy. FP: Can you please give us an example of one case? Shoebat: I will give a taste of one case. Keep in mind the Muslim Brotherhood is Egyptian and so is Huma's heritage. The Sisterhood List includes wives/daughters of top Brotherhood leaders mostly from Egypt. We have Najla Ali Mahmoud, the wife of Mohammed Aidalmrsi, who is a member of the Guidance Bureau of the Muslim Brotherhood and the current leader of the Justice and Freedom Party, (the new name for the Muslim Brotherhood). No one can deny his affiliation and his wife is definitely following his footsteps. So what is the leader of the Justice and Freedom Party (Muslim Brotherhood) saying these days under the new guise of moderation? We have volumes to fill worth of doublespeak that would take decades to translate. But perhaps to show how sick these people are: He recently stated on national television as to "why Egypt needs to ban western dress" and "no one with a full mental faculty can believe in the Trinity". He even condemned Egyptian monuments as "idols". Idols? Does this set the stage for what happened to the Bamian Buddha statue in Afghanistan? Will we see the Sphinx be blown up if this party wins? And according to this "moderated" leader, all Christians have a mental deficiency? And he is serious. This brings us back to Nazism. This is Nazi-style propaganda and nothing more. We have much-much more to say about this clandestine group called The Sisterhood. So stay tuned. FP: What do you say in response to those who would say that bringing Huma Abedin into all of this is an unfair and unwarranted "guilt-by-association" tactic? Shoebat: When westerners say "guilt-by-association" regarding Huma, they are comparing the Middle East with the Middle West. Westerners need to shift gears into the Muslim World and when they do they will begin to comprehend the significance of this connection. Huma's links to a family that is directly tied to the Muslim Brotherhood, including her brother and mother, creates a question that no one on earth can easily answer: Other than Huma Abedin, has there ever been any member of the Muslim Brotherhood or a prominent Islamist who will not openly denounce a "daughter" or "sister" that married a non-Muslim Jewish male? It is extremely rare to have Muslim women marry non-Muslims, much less to have conservative Muslims look the other way, unless Huma has a "higher calling" and a unique exception was made for her, since she is an ear into top U.S. sensitive information, or Anthony Weiner has converted to Islam or even both. There is no other way to answer this unless Huma comes up with an astonishing revelation. The highest authority in Islamic Sharia Faculty in Kuwait has deemed Huma's marriage to a male Jew as null and void, yet no word from her family or the Muslim Brotherhood to affirm the Isamic Sharia Faculty? Huma — keep in mind — was in contact with her mother when she visited Dar Al-Hikma University with Hillary Clinton. Huma's dress code alone would be a problem for her mother, much less her unequally yoked marriage to a male Jew. Huma's marriage should be a stab in the heart to religious Muslims. She comes from a prominent family. It's like saying a nun stabbed the Pope in the heart, yet the Vatican issues no condemnation and instead was sympathetic to the woman for simply being a woman. Something would be very fishy. Huma's Muslim Brotherhood connected family still has contacts, admiration and appreciation for her. FP: Ok, wait a minute. What do you mean exactly by saying that Huma might have a "higher calling"? Shoebat: The Middle East has already addressed Huma's "higher calling" long ago while the West slumbers. Take Dr. Mumen Muhammad in a news piece (translated from Arabic) gleefully wrote about Huma: "Abedin assures in press releases her continuance on the path with Hillary Clinton, even if Clinton failed as a candidate. The candidate's aids and other influential figures in the Democratic Party assure that they do not disregard Abedin running for election or taking her position in the political arena by the help in successive political administrations with the aid of the Clinton family itself." Huma has higher aspirations already to get well entrenched into the system and the Middle East is all but excited while the Brotherhood stays silent. FP: Look, some skeptics would still say: "So What? Huma is still not a member of the Sisterhood. And that's that." How would you respond? Shoebat: Imagine during World War II, the U.S. government accepted Eva Braun, Hitler's mistress or one of Hitler's henchmen daughters to work with our State Department and even be with the Secretary of State 24/7? After all "Braun" they argue "is not a member of the Nazi Party"; how will that bode with the American people? FP: H-mm. Ok, well then why is the U.S. State Department not taking this issue seriously? Shoebat: The U.S. current policy is to gain what they deem a "moderate Muslim Brotherhood." This is like saying that in order to win the Cold War with Russia, that we needed to promote "Capitalistic-Communism" or during WWII we should have promoted "pro-Jew Nazism" in Germany. To take our Nazi example during World War II and compare this to today's attitude, this policy is as if we decided to engage the Nazis through an inclusion policy in order to moderate them. This would be a moron inventing an oxymoron. FP: What would you say to those who would contest that it is not legitimate to compare the Muslim Brotherhood with the Nazis? Shoebat: It's not a far-fetched comparison. Americans are rarely educated on the history of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood was in bed with the Nazis. Hassan Al-Banna was well connected and collaborated with Haj Amin Al-Husseini the Muslim Nazi who was Hitler's henchman in the Middle East. In fact, and just in case one might think that this is an old issue and that the Muslim Brotherhood no longer takes pride in this dark history — think again — the Muslim Brotherhood takes pride in their Nazi connection, it's all over their websites. Al-Banna, the Muslim Brotherhood's Godfather was a friend of Al-Husseini. I should know this and like Tareq Ramadan, Al-Banna's grandson, Al-Husseini knew my grandfather too. FP: Ok, so Huma is connected to the Muslim Brotherhood and you have demonstrated that this is a serious problem. So how does this make Hillary look? Shoebat: Was the State Department not aware of all this? Hardly. Could someone claim that the State Department was oblivious to what was written publicly in Egyptian newspapers? The reason for all the silence by the State Department is that the current policy is to engage the Muslim Brotherhood and attempt to include them into what they believe is Moderate Islam. Hillary knew who Saleha Abedin is; she met with her in Dar-Al-Hikma in Jedda while the Arabic sources made fun of how all the girls at Dar Al-Hikma in Jedda mocked Hillary to her face. Of course only the Arab media covered this. 
Was it not Hillary Clinton, the Muslim Brotherhood mule who lifted the ban on Tariq Ramadan? Was it not her who allowed him entry into the United States? Ramadan is the grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Nazi Hasan al-Banna and has ties to Islamic terrorist groups. Was it not her husband Bill Clinton that heaped praise on the Naqshabandi Sufi Imam Fethullah Gülen, the Turkish Imam and notorious Islamist conspirator that fled Turkey for the U.S. after attempting to overthrow Turkey's secular government? Yet Americans haven't got beyond the myth that Sufis are not as "peace loving" as they thought. Perhaps they need to watch Naqshabandi Sufist Imam Nazim Kibrisi giving a lecture in Turkish in Germany to Recep Erdogan of Turkey and see how he vowed to "make the West bow to Islam" and yes "by military might." Gülen is also Sufi and since Sufis are "peace-loving mystics," they are given refuge. Gülen even airs his messages on Turkish television on how his followers could best seize power from the Turkish secular government. But this is an old story; the Islamists have already ceased all the power thereof in Turkey with little to be done in amending the Constitution. What has the U.S. Government done besides passing gossip that later leaked via Wikileaks? Today, the Muslim Brotherhood has been legalized in Egypt. The AKP Islamist Party in Turkey has become the admiration throughout the Muslim world. Islamists have never seen more opportunity in decades as much as they have seen in 2011 and have accomplished more than in any other time in recent history. The victories are well expressed throughout Middle Eastern news, yet the West seems to only like to address the sex scandals. FP: I want to return to something you said as it piqued my curiosity. You said that when Hillary met with Saleha Abedin in Dar-Al-Hikma in Jedda, that the Arabic sources made fun of how all the girls there mocked Hillary to her face. Tell us what happened. What were the themes of ridicule about Hillary and why? And how come the western media didn't report this? Shoebat: Anyone can put it in 'Google Translate' Al-Mshhad.net, Nabd and several Arab news agencies reported articles on how Hillary was denounced by many who came to her face point blank and told her off. One of the reports describes the scene: "Unlike the reports that came out of the New York Times, a group of girls who were educated with high moral values, came out donned with the Palestinian scarf ...and after all the orchestrated questions were finished and all the phony photo ops were done...these girls with the Palestinian scarf walked up to the American Secretary of State and spoke to her seriously: 'We do not respect you. You occupied Iraq and Afghanistan. You struck Pakistan. You support Israel. It would be a shame to get your autograph. We object to your policy'. Then these girls continued one after the other, with the same sentiment objecting to America's terrorism." This was the truth that was kept out by American mainstream media and never told by Hillary. FP: Alright, so what do you think the media should be investigating and why do you think the U.S. government is silent about all of this? Shoebat: Jamie, national security should always take precedence over sexual scandals. But it's not the fault of the media that it wants to feed the demand for gossip. It's the American people that are concerned more about "diet for the body" then "food for the mind". Today we find rumors that Hillary is having a lesbian affair with Huma; this is food for the tabloids. Let me ask: how many agencies are there that monitor what is said in the Middle East? Who is exposing the doublespeak? Why was I the first to break the truth of Feisal Abdul Rauf Islamist manifesto from his Arabic? Why was I the first to translate from Arabic his open support for terrorism in the Middle East? Who in the U.S. translated Rashad Hussein's words to Al-Ahram newspaper in Egypt on how he will intervene to gain president Obama's ear regarding Iran's nuclear issues? How many even published the findings? Why was I the first to translate terrorist Abu Hammam Yusuf Al-Balawi's blog on how he wanted to detonate and kill American guards? Was that an exaggeration? Conspiracy theory? Indeed he did detonate himself and CIA agents were massacred. Where were the CIA Arabic interpreters? How well can we trust them? What are their affiliations? How have the FBI and police been infiltrated by Islamists? These are "checkmate" style questions. They are not easily answered and the American people need to start waking up instead of dreaming about sex scandals and tabloids. FP: Why hasn't the mainstream media picked it up on this story? Shoebat: Fact is: Islamists have already conditioned people to be afraid of being labeled with Islamophobia — while during World War II everyone was a proud Nazi-phobe. Today everyone is afraid of being accused of racism. The Islamists figured it all out long ago and like a typical Arab bazaar, the American naïve "tourist" cannot detect the "terrorist" in plain sight dragging him into his shop of goodies. "Welcome welcome" the Islamist says "you want moderates? We have them, come in just take a look. Moderates in all shapes colors and forms. We have moderates with Hijab, without Hijab, professors, Imams..." and while the tourist thinks he is buying something worthwhile, he is not aware that he is being sold as a slave in the bazaar and only learns when it's too late. And the Islamists understand very well how America thinks. They know very well that America is concerned more with racism than anything else. So they made it tight proof for the customer not to escape the bazaar and they question any suspension with: "Are you being racist"? Yet I am dumbfounded; since when does questioning a religion or an ideology constitute racism? We are a nation that has less racism than anywhere on earth, yet we seem to be discussing it more than anywhere else on earth and yet they rarely discuss it where it truly happens everywhere else on earth, especially in the Muslim World where they exercise more Islamophobia-phobia than anywhere else on earth. This is a longwinded explanation, but it fits — perfectly. FP: Walid Shoebat, thank you for joining us today and thank you for being such a courageous warrior for the truth. Shoebat: Your Welcome. God Bless America.
Paul Lademain is a Secular Christian for Zion (SC4Z). Contact
him by email at lademain@verizon.net
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WILDERS ACQUITTED: "CITIZENS SHOULD NEVER ALLOW THEMSELVES TO BE SILENCED"
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 25, 2011. |
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This morning the Court of Amsterdam has acquitted Geert Wilders of all charges. "I am delighted with this ruling," says Geert Wilders. "It is a victory, not only for me but for all the Dutch people. Today is a victory for freedom of speech. The Dutch are still allowed to speak critically about islam, and resistance against islamisation is not a crime. I have spoken, I speak and I shall continue to speak." 
Yesterday was a beautiful day for freedom of speech in the Netherlands. An Amsterdam court acquitted me of all charges of hate speech after a legal ordeal that lasted almost two years. Yesterday, the Dutch people learned that political debate has not been stifled in their country. They learned that they are still allowed to speak critically about Islam and that resistance against Islamization is not a crime. |
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SHOLEM ALEICHEM: LAUGHING IN THE DARKNESS
Posted by Marion DS Dreyfus, June 25, 2011. |
| This was directed and written by Joseph Dorman. |
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This is a remarkable but somewhat painful film, "Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness." Notwithstanding the film title, one does not remember a single laughter anywhere in this faithful picture of the past century of tsarist pogroms and Stalinist anti-Semitic attacks against innocent scapegoat citizens of their colder and less hospitable vastnesses. It is a source of wonder to see how a 93-minute biography of a man whose life occurred largely before the advent of moving pictures, and before the art of photography was quite invested in the world, could be made using just an assemblage of photos, newsreel clips and world-renowned Yiddishists and literary recalls, plus photos that may be B/W and faded, but startlingly fresh. But director Dorman has achieved something great, and greatly moving. Aleichem's granddaughter, the famed writer Bel Kaufman, contributes poignant family stories from her own recollections at her grandfather's knee, along with Harvard scholars (Ruth Wisse), think-tank mavens, archivists and literary figures. The archival research involved in such a film is amazing. That the filmmaker succeeded in creating such a lively recall of the brilliant folklorist and writer of Yiddish parables and classics is commendable. But well-done homage to a man who lived through so much horror and ugliness to Jews in Russia, in Poland, in Europe, and here and there, all the time writing his remarkable stories and books in Yiddish, a disregarded, almost despised but virile language, is not to say this is an easy entertainment to sit through. Perhaps it is this reviewer, whose history seems to be so interwoven with its passages of sadness and movement, of shifting and readjusting — the great writer's birth name, Rabinowitz, was this reviewer's family name before it was what it is now — and the knowledge that this man was a forebear, that was cause for some thoughtful mulling and gestational processing. Born Sholem Rabinowitz in 1859 in today's Ukraine, Aleichem was a champion of the common people who saw in him their muse and Homer. When the volk heard a reading, saw a play or read a story by this taleteller, they resonated to its tumultuous rhythms and precarious adventures, since no one, with few exceptions (much later, Isaac Bashevis Singer being a notable standout) wrote in this language that spanned the continents, and in many ways joined the Jewish people in disparate countries and extremises. His contemporaries wrote in literate Hebrew or, not Jewish, Russian (Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoievsky). Jews could converse with each other if they came from Greece or Bulgaria, from Argentina or Lithuania — everyone, old and young, wealthy (who spoke French and Russian, as well as Yiddish) or poor could speak voluminously with anyone from other countries who also spoke their momma loshen — mother tongue. Yiddish is as rich a language as any the world has seen: It incorporates wildly colorful shtetl phrases with the raffish black humor emerging from centuries of murderous rampages in all of Europe, with phraseology from the French, German and Russian, with bits and pieces of Polish, Hungarian, even English and other languages that have hosted Jews for their transit through hectored anguish and emergent industry. It is the lingua franca of Jews the world over — even, to an extent, the Hebrew-dominant Israel — because it bespeaks and subsumes their turbulent lives in each of these sometime-hosts. Aleichem's idea to write in this 'subterranean low language' of the people was itself a revolutionary recognition of its myriad charms and multiple inflections. As to Yiddish humor, the Larry Davids, Jackie Masons and Woody Allens would not exist but for the choice to live, and laugh, through the nonstop vale of tears. Born quite poor, Aleichem was fascinated by the stock market. Once he was married to the daughter of a wealthy merchant, he could indulge and play the market all day, every day. Then write far into the night. He was convinced he would make a fortune from his perambulations in stocks and bonds. Why not? Others seemed to do it. When, late in his career, no longer wealthy (he lost 30,000 rubles in one fell swoop, an inconceivable fortune in the early 20th century) because of market debts incurred in one catastrophic market crash (what we might fashionably call a big 'correction') when he lived in Kiev, his mother-in-law then supported him and his family for years, but never spoke to him again, once he lost the inheritance from her husband. He came to the United States, lofted on the shoulders of thousands in New York, and his name — which in Yiddish means Hello! How are you! Well be it with you! As well as So long — was shouted in approbation, Sholem Aleichem! This was the creator of Tevye the Milkman, Fiddler on the Roof, Tevya, and countless other beloved if bittersweet icons of Jewish folklore. But his two plays in the Yiddish theatre in the Lower East Side were poorly received by the critics, and he returned to Europe, to London, where eking out a living was always difficult. Sick with diseases he would have eliminated or managed to a large extent had he lived today — TB, prostate, diabetes — and alone without his wife and six children...he had accomplished much though he died too young. Of the United States, he knew, and stated, that for Jews, the United States was "the best country for Jews that had ever been." He was widely considered the Yiddish Mark Twain. A telling anecdote: When asked what he thought of the peregrinational, quintessential Yiddish writer, Mark Twain called himself "the English-speaking Sholem Aleichem." This biography offers an extraordinary wealth of rare pictures, even remarkable photographs of the writer's 1916 funeral in New York, where an unprecedented throng of some 200,000 showed up, making it probably the city's largest funeral attendance to date. Incidentally, when someone hails you with Sholem aleichem, the correct response is Aleichem sholem! Go in peace. For lovers of the written and spoken word, this is vivid, involving biography-transcription. This portrait of a genius adroitly, if with weltsmertz, captures the world of chrysalis birthing, through acerbic and painful humor, as a brilliant observer explored the struggle to fashion a modern Jewish identity Ironically, Aleichem's seesaw finances improved considerably after his death. His estate is worth a great deal more than he could have ever imagined in 1916. As someone famously remarked about the ever-popular and fiscally sound Elvis after his premature demise: Dying: a smart career move. Marion Dreyfus is a writer, travelor and poet; she has taught English in China on the university level. She can be contacted at dreyfusmarion@hotmail.com |
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A QUESTION OF THE PALESTINIAN DINAR
Posted by Seth J. Frantzman, June 24, 2011. |
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Terra Incognita: What currency will the Palestinians use in the wake of their quest to seek recognition for a state in September? |
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There is a Facebook page circulating that purports to show an unofficial Palestinianpassport stamp designed by an artist named Kahled Jarrar. But Jarrar's homemade stamp is less important than another pressing issue: What currency will the Palestinians use in the wake of their quest to seek recognition for their state in September? 
It isn't a simple matter, as history will show. After the US declared independence in 1776, it was 10 years before Congress actually approved the use of the dollar as the official currency. And it wasn't until 1792 that the first US mint, sanctioned by the government to print money, was inaugurated in Philadelphia (then the American capital). By the time of the Civil War, the question of currency had gained more urgency. Only a month after the Confederate States of America had been formed, it began to issue its own currency in April 1861. As is well known, the Confederate dollar quickly depreciated, since it was not backed by assets, and became virtually worthless by 1864. To examine the successes and failures of new national currencies, it is worth looking at several examples. East Timor seems to be a prime case. Slightly smaller than Israel, East Timor is at the end of the Indonesia archipelago. In 1975 its colonial occupier, Portugal, decided to withdraw, and the Timorese declared independence in November of that year. However, only a month later, it was invaded by Indonesia in a campaign of massacre that began 25 years of brutal rule. The UN never recognized Indonesian sovereignty, and declared the country a "non-self governing territory under Portuguese administration." In 1999, after Indonesian human rights violations became widely known, a UN-sponsored referendum resulted in the territory becoming independent. The Timorese got rid of the hated Indonesian rupiah, but instead of adopting their own currency, they began using the US dollar. The imposition of the dollar on the Timorese was completely a product of the UN's semi-colonial administration that ran the country in 2000, and whose tentacles have never been completely removed. For a brief period, the UN National Consultative Council favored using the Portuguese escudo, but that idea was scratched when it became clear that the Portuguese were embracing the euro. The rupiah couldn't be retained, not only because it was disliked, but because it was an unstable currency, and it meant East Timor's future would be tied to the Indonesian economy. Luis Valdivieso, head of the IMF office in East Timor, said: "I think the main consideration has been one of pragmatic consideration given the fact that t is urgent now [in 2000] to receive the payments on execution of the budget." Yet the local people wanted their own currency. A coalition of former resistance leaders noted: "We believe the national currency should be an affirmation of independence and sovereignty." To no avail; the East Timorese continue to be honorary Americans, in the economic sense. Kosovo is another case in point. Kosovo became part of the Ottoman Empire in the 14th century, when the Turkish sultan overran what was then part of the Kingdom of Serbia. While it was once part of Serbia or Yugoslavia, a 1999 rebellion by Kosovo Albanians resulted in a bombing campaign by NATO and the occupation of the province by the UN. That year, the UN adopted the German mark as a replacement for the Serbian dinar. Use of the mark led directly to the imposition of the euro when the country declared independence in 2008. Yet, like East Timor, Kosovo remains in many ways a colony of the UN and various NGOs and international organizations. Because Kosovo hopes to join the EU one day, it has been using the euro rather than adopting the Albanian lek, the currency of its ethnically related neighbor. Somaliland presents a more unique story. A large and sparsely populated country on the horn of Africa, Somaliland was initially colonized by the British. In 1960, after a few days of independence, it joined with Italian Somaliland to form modern-day Somalia. After years of misgovernment and a long running civil war, the territory decided to seek independence, which it declared in 1991. In 1994, Muhammad Haji Ibrahim Egal inaugurated a new currency, called the Somaliland shilling. The currency was briefly minted in England at the Pobjoy Mint, which prints money for 37 small countries and overseas territories. It doesn't seem that the currency has been very successful, and it isn't currently being minted. Another breakaway republic, Western Sahara, was governed by its colonizer, Spain, until decolonization in 1975, when Morocco and Mauritania occupied the country. The local independence movement briefly attempted to create its own currency called the Sahwari paseta, pegged to the old Spanish paseta. Other countries have successfully established currencies. The post-Soviet states that gained independence in 1990 have mostly created their own currencies. Latvia, for instance, re-instituted the lats — once used in 1922 — to replace the ruble. Perhaps it is interesting to look at Israeli history to see how a new currency can be created. The British invaded Palestine in 1917, but continued to use the Ottoman lira alongside the Egyptian pound until 1927. In that year the Palestinian pound was introduced, and was pegged to the British pound. After independence, it took Israel four years to fully adopt the Israeli lira. By contrast, the Jordanians adopted the dinar in 1949. The Palestinian pound continued to circulate in the West Bank until 1950, when it was replaced by the Jordanian dinar, and in Gaza until 1951, when it was replaced by the Egyptian pound. What do the Palestinians think they will use as a currency? On May 31, The Washington Post reported that there was some discussion about replacing the shekel, which is used in Gaza and the West Bank. Jihad al-Wazir, governor of the Palestinian monetary authority, has noted that "all options are open." Some argue for bringing back the Palestinian pound. Others prefer a closer connection to the Jordanian dinar. One Palestinian woman with whom I spoke dismissed my confusion: "Won't it be a Palestinian lira?"
Seth J. Frantzman has a PhD from Hebrew University, and is a fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies.
Contact him at sfrantzman@hotmail.com and visit
his website: This article appeared in the Jerusalem Post
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WHY IS OBAMA SO TOUGH ON ISRAEL AND TIMID ON SYRIA?
Posted by YogiRUs, June 24, 2011. |
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This was written by Jackson Diehl, Deputy Editor, Washington Post editorial page |
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One of the hallmarks of the Arab Spring has been the emergence of a new and more modest American foreign policy. The Obama administration has insisted on not taking the lead in promoting democratic change; it has declined to act unless not just the French and British but the Arab League go first. It still can't bring itself to say that Bashar al-Assad, a dictator and implacable U.S. enemy who is using tanks and helicopter gunships to slaughter his people, is not qualified to lead Syria to democracy. Yet there is one big exception: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. On a Middle Eastern front that has remained mostly quiet in 2011, the position of the United States is: a) it possesses a detailed solution; b) action must be taken immediately; and c) it doesn't matter whether the people concerned — Israelis and Palestinians — are agreeable or ready. Obama the timid suddenly turns tough when the "peace process" comes up. He has spoken in public on Syria just twice since its massacres began three months ago. But he chose to spell out U.S. terms for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations without the agreement of Israel's prime minister, on the eve of meeting him at the White House and with only a few hours' notice — arguably the most high-handed presidential act in U.S.-Israeli relations since the Eisenhower administration. Now, with prodding from the European Union, Obama is attempting to strong-arm Israelis and Palestinians into beginning negotiations on the parameters he set. The talks must be agreed to this month, says Washington; they should begin by September. U.S. and European envoys were shuttling between Jerusalem and Ramallah last week in an attempt to extract a "yes" from Binyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas. It would be wonderful if this imperialist diplomacy succeeded. If it does, it will disprove the Obama administration's nascent doctrine about the limits of U.S. power and influence in the Middle East. Consider the two parties who would be dragged to the negotiating table. Netanyahu heads a right-wing coalition that would almost certainly collapse if he agreed to Obama's terms — which, in any case, he opposes. A senior Israeli official last week gave me a long list of fixes he said would be needed before his government could accept the Obama formula — and even then, he added, the proposal wouldn't fly "unless there was a deep reservoir of mutual confidence" between the two leaders, "which doesn't exist." Then there is Abbas, who at 76 is planning his retirement. He has committed himself to spending the next year seeing through a reconciliation with the Hamas movement, arranging elections for his successor and seeking recognition for Palestine at the United Nations. For two years he has refused to negotiate with Netanyahu, whom he despises. Even Yasser Arafat appeared more disposed than this Palestinian leader to make the wrenching concessions needed for a deal. And who would guarantee that the Palestinian president elected next May would pick up where Abbas left off? What's extraordinary about Obama's initiative is not its details, which don't differ meaningfully from the ideas of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush or, for that matter, several of Netanyahu's predecessors as prime minister. It is, rather, its superpower chutzpah — the brazen disregard for the views and political posture of this Israeli government, and the fecklessness and disarray of the current Palestinian leadership. Never mind, goes the implicit Euro-American line: We will make this happen. What could account for such an attitude, given the timorous approach to the rest of the region? Part of it is understandable frustration with years of Israeli-Palestinian impasse, which is magnified by the conviction in much of official Washington that the terms for peace are well known and widely accepted, and need only be implemented. Part is legitimate worry that the Israeli- Palestinian front, though quiet now, could explode later this year after a United Nations vote, helping extremists in places such as Egypt. Yet the damage to U.S. interests from a U.N. resolution on Palestine would pale compared to the consequences of an Iranian-backed victory by Assad in Syria or the failure of NATO in Libya. Those crises have not moved Obama to lead. There is, in his diplomacy, an implicit conviction that the United States must first of all deal with the sins of its own client. "Here are the facts we must all confront," Obama declared in his speech to the AIPAC conference last month, before proceeding to deliver a lecture about Palestinian demography, Arab politics and the United Nations. It wasn't that he was entirely wrong. But it's revealing of this president that he is determined to speak truth to Binyamin Netanyahu — and not to Bashar al-Assad. Contact YogiRUs by email at YogiRUs@aol.com |
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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL:THE BEACH AT HABONIM NATURE RESERVE
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, June 24, 2011. |
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"Often while traveling with a camera we arrive just as the sun slips over the horizon of a moment, too late to expose film, only time enough to expose our hearts." — Minor White HOW I GOT THE SHOT: One measure of success of a photograph is how much the viewer desires to be in the place depicted in the image. With the heat of summer upon us, who doesn't long for a lazy day at the beach? Israel is blessed with many miles of beautiful Mediterranean seacoast. This week's photo features the beach at Habonim Nature Reserve, located about halfway between Tel Aviv and Haifa. I had been camping there with my family which gave me the freedom to explore the area with my camera during the optimal late afternoon sunlight. Photographing wave action on the ocean's edge is akin to trying to hit a formless and fast-moving target. Waves, like snowflakes, are infinitely variable but it's free and easy to fire off 15-20 shots in quick succession and sift through the results later. The rocks on either side of the photo determine the composition, but the appeal of this image begins with the streak of sunlight cutting across the water and casting a golden glow on the wet sand. The light sets the mood and feeling for the entire scene: warm, refreshing and inviting. Nothing left to do but dive in. Technical Data: Nikon D200, 12-24 zoom at 12mm, f9 at 1/800 sec., ISO 400.
Contact Yehoshua Halevi by email at smile@goldenlightimages.com
and visit his website: |
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THE CORRUPTION OF THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE: A NATIONAL PERIL
Posted by John Trudell, June 24, 2011. |
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Here is an excellent article by my friend Mike Fox documenting the Global Warming Fraud. The clearer it all becomes, the more incredible it seems that a scam of this magnitude could have been so persuasive, and so damaging to Western Economies. Before there was a George Soros, there was a Maurice Strong. Who says there isn't evil in the world? |
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As time passes the global warming fiasco becomes more and more understandable, and more incredulous, more unbelievable. Hard-nosed physical evidence of man-made global warming has yet to be provided by the promoters of warming, even after a nominal $80 billion dollars have been spent in the attempt to do so. Since some of the ideas for mitigating man-made global warming (yet to be demonstrated) involve trillion dollar measures, it is crucially important that we get the science right. If we don't get the science right, we'll never get the policy right. Some of the measures being considered and employed are to limit the amount of fossil fuels being used for the production of electricity and for transportation. The United States derives about 50% of its electrical energy from coal and another 20% from natural gas. Crippling these energy sources obviously will cripple the United States economy and millions of jobs in those companies using the electricity. We learned in World War 2 that a nation can be crippled or destroyed by crippling or destroying their energy production infrastructures. We are also learning that international powers have organized into the formation of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is part of the United Nations for the purpose of limiting or abolishing the production of CO2 from the combustion of fossil fuels. While the US is clearly targeted for these crippling measures other members of the UN other developing nations simply will not be implementing with these suicidal measures. The IPCC is also the brainchild of Maurice Strong, a billionaire socialist working closely with the UN. At the Rio conference of the IPCC in 1992 Maurice Strong made this statement to thousands of supporting fans and international leaders: "Isn't the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn't it our responsibility to bring that about?" — Maurice Strong, head of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and Executive Officer for Reform in the Office of the Secretary General of the United Nations. (http://www.whale.to/a/strong_h.html). This horrendous statement reminds one of the recent statement by Barack Obama calling for the limiting fossil fuels and the resulting skyrocketing costs of US energy costs. (http://tinyurl.com/5pbzrd). Many nations have recognized the importance of electrical energy is the development of their economies and the advancement of prosperity in their nations. China builds a large new coal plant per week, and now has some 20 nuclear power plants under construction. It has also recently completed the largest hydro facility in the world at the 3 Gorges site. Other nations have recognized the importance of large supplies of affordable energy in that some 67 new nuclear plants are currently under construction around the world and that many more are in final design. So who are these international leaders and energy experts with so much contempt seeking to oppose reliable sources of low cost energy in the US? Who are these leaders in the UN, the IPCC, the EPA, the White House, and elsewhere so hell-bent on crippling the US economy and much of the developed world? The answers are emerging. Why the deceit and deceptions about climate evidence? Lorne Gunter writes in the National Post (http://preview.tinyurl.com/3mjl3ce) about the IPCC using environmental groups' literature to bolsters its major publications. For example, in 2009 and 2010 it was shown that the UN's (IPCC) had included questionable data on Himalayan glacier melt in its major 2007 climate assessment report and that it had done so deliberately to provoke government leaders to speed up environmental legislation. The IPCC scientist in charge of the Himalayan glacier discussions conceded he was aware at the time that the melt prediction had not been peer-reviewed, but included it anyway because "we thought that if we can highlight it, it will impact policy-makers and politicians and encourage them to take some concrete action." In other words good science be damned, what the IPCC wanted was the science fiction of glaciers melts, not sound science. By the end of March 2010 evidence had shown that at least 16 claims of impending climate doom in the IPCC's vaunted 2007 report had been based on work done by environmental activists, most of which had not received independent reviews before being swallowed whole by the UN climate body. For instance, the IPCC's insistence that up to 40% of the Amazon rain forest was under imminent threat came from a World Wildlife Fund-International Union for the Conservation of Nature joint report written by a scientist-consultant and a freelance environmental journalist. These processes have nothing to do with science; they have nothing to do with honesty, nothing to do with sound defensible science policy. They have a lot to do with low-grade uninformed environmental advocacy being involved with international energy policy. More recently Christopher Booker of the Telegraph
What only came to light when the full report was published last week was the peculiar source of some of the extraordinarily ambitious claims. It was based solely on a paper co-authored last year by an employee of Greenpeace International and something called the European Renewable Energy Council. This Brussels-based body, heavily funded by the EU, lobbies the European Commission on behalf of all the main renewable industries, such as wind and solar. The chief author of the Greenpeace paper, Sven Teske, was also a lead author on Chapter 10 of the IPCC report, which means that the report's headline message came from a full-time environmental activist, supported by a lobby group representing those industries that stand most to benefit financially from its findings. Greenpeace adds nothing to the serious debate of future energy supplies or climate change yet here we have the IPCC letting Greenpeace have complete access to its reports. In fact the presence of Greenpeace advice in these IPCC pages diminishes and destroys the credibility of the IPCC. See for example, this link (http://tinyurl.com/68xohrf). Let us examine some of the words of the founder of Greenpeace, Patrick Moore. Too few Americans and far too few media people know anything about the environmental movement and its transformation over the past 40 years into something vastly different. In Moore's words they have become far more extreme and whose politics is little more than neo-Marxism in green garb. Moore was quite specific and pointed out some of the characteristics of the environmental movement today: Tend strongly to be anti-human
Greenpeace can hardly be considered expert in science let alone in energy policy. As Patrick Moore told me, they aren't very interested in humans either. They are environmental hacks with financial interests in generating and spreading their nonsense with the full force and support of the IPCC, UN, and US agencies. In a recent report Dennis Ambler describes in detail many of the personnel relationships between the IPCC, the EPA, and many of the contractors shared by each of them (http://tinyurl.com/3qm8lew). Ambler also provides some of the academic credentials of many of the people involved. Many do not have serious scientific credentials let alone in the highly specialized science of the new discipline of climate. This is not the place for looking for solid scientists or science literature and expertise. Who are these people? David Lundgren has recently written (http://tinyurl.com/25cpeat) that American leaders such as NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco still regard the IPCC as the "gold standard" for climate science. American leadership, both state and federal, seems incapable of separating sound science from political hearsay. They threaten the future economy of the US, our liberties, our freedoms, and national security. As a result our nation remains in great peril.
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THE HEIGHTS
Posted by Chuck Brooks, June 24, 2011. |
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U.S. and Israeli policymakers are yet to acknowledge that their decades-long push to use the Golan to make peace with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is a far-fetched dream This was written by Lee Smith and it appeared in Tablet Magazine
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The Obama Administration's decision to refer Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to the International Criminal Court for alleged human-rights abuses suggests that U.S. policy toward his government is finally shifting. The Damascus regime's radical violence against its own people seems to have disabused the White House of the notion that the Syrian president is a reform-minded and Westernized Arab leader with whom they can do business. With the death toll mounting and thousands of Syrian refugees crossing the border into Turkey for fear of reprisals from Assad's security forces, the White House finally seems to have concluded that a humanitarian crisis is unfolding, one for which Assad, his brother Maher, and their clique are responsible. For more than 20 years — through both Republican and Democratic administrations — bolstering the Assad regime and securing a peace deal with Israel have been important goals of both American and Israeli policy. In the decades-old fantasy that Washington policymakers now appear to be abandoning, Bashar, like his father Hafez before him, was seen as a pragmatist who would forgo his alliance with Iran and Hezbollah in exchange for Israel returning the Golan Heights. So what if Israel was giving up a strategic plateau that the Syrians could use to rain down fire on the villages of the northern Galillee as they had before 1967, went the thinking — there was going to be peace with Syria. Unlike the Palestinian track of Middle East peace negotiation — which was beset by competing factions and the meddling of Arab neighbors — the Syrian track, managed by one Arab strongman who can make and enforce decisions, was seen as the easy peace. Israelis would finally get to have hummus in Damascus! Negotiations advanced far, under both Prime Minister Ehud Barak and other Israeli leaders. But over the last three months, the premises on which this joint American-Israeli policy were based have been shown to be insane. Assad's actions — the torture, mutilation, and murder of teenagers, using tanks and artillery to lay siege to towns, and now the use of helicopter gunships against unarmed civilians — are a public repudiation of every one of the premises of what has been the dominant school of thought in Israel-Syria relations. And yet almost no one has said anything about these ideas being wrong — a silence that means that regardless of who ends up ruling Syria, the Golan is going to be on the table again, and American and Israeli officials are going to be pushing Israel to make a peace deal with Damascus. Among the few pundits who have admitted they were wrong is Israeli columnist Sever Plocker of Yediot Ahronoth. Long a believer that "Israel can achieve peace with Assad's regime in exchange for willingness to withdraw from the Golan Heights," as he wrote in April, Plocker now admits he was mistaken. His error, he says, was that he "did not take into account the Damascus regime's tyrannical character." Plocker's confession is heartfelt, but he's still wrong. Who did he think was responsible for killing tens of thousands of Syrians at Hama in 1982 if not then-President Hafez al-Assad, Bashar's father? Plocker could not see the nature of the regime because he was afflicted with the same vanity that has corrupted Israeli and American policymakers who have sought for decades to arrange for the lamb to lie down with the lion, and be crowned as peacemakers: an obsession with peace, which blinded them to the character of a regime that murders its own citizens with conscience. He is still wrong because he thinks the problem is simply that Israel should not make peace with such a regime, when the reality is that peace is not in Israel's power to make. Jerusalem cannot make a deal because the Syrians are incapable of cutting such a deal. The reasons for this are strategic, historical, and existential. The strategic reasons have been obvious for years, even as many U.S. and Israeli officials have chosen to ignore them. It is only Damascus' proxy war with Israel, through its alliance with Iran and support for Hezbollah, that has earned this state sponsor of terror the prestige that U.S. engagement has afforded this mid-sized Arab state with very limited natural resources. The regime's self-image requires it, as Assad said in a speech Monday, to demand respect according to its historical size, not its geographical size. For U.S. diplomats, a peace deal means that they get to take Syria off their to-do list and move on to other problems. But for Assad it means that he has cashed in the only chips he had and is no longer able to project regional or international power. Some argue that knocking Syria down to size would leave it resembling something like Jordan: a second-tier Arab power without oil. The difference is that unlike Jordan's Sunni Hashemite royalty, Syria's ruling family is drawn from its Alawite minority, and it is received wisdom in the region that minority regimes can't cut a deal with Israel. Only the Sunnis, the regional majority, have the final say over such major decisions in the Middle East. For centuries, the Sunnis have had it in for the Alawites, whom they consider heretics. Prior to Syrian independence, a group of Alawite notables petitioned the French mandate authorities for their own state so that they would not have to live with the Sunnis. "The spirit of hatred and fanaticism embedded in the hearts of the Arab Muslims against everything that is non-Muslim has been perpetually nurtured by the Islamic religion," read the letter — one of whose signatories was Suleiman al-Assad, said to be Bashar's great-grandfather. Eventually, the Alawite accommodation with their countrymen was to out-Sunni the Sunnis regarding Israel. After Hafez al-Assad lost the Golan to Israel twice, first as defense minister and next as president, he turned to resistance, a trend amplified by his son. While Assad warns that he'd be replaced by the much more dangerous Muslim Brotherhood or other Islamist factions should his regime be toppled, the current ruling structure is the exaggerated cartoon version of a radical Sunni regime, which is to say that if Assad falls, there's nothing worse that will follow. In fact, some argue that a Sunni regime might represent the best chance for a peace deal, as Israel's two peace treaties are with Sunni powers: Egypt and Jordan. And yet some analysts seem to have misunderstood the significance of the opposition's chant, "No Iran, no Hezbollah. We want a Muslim who fears God." To be sure, the Sunni-majority opposition is against the Shia-led resistance bloc, but not because they favor living in comity with their Jewish neighbors in Israel. It simply means they despise the Shia and their allies, like their own Alawite regime, as well as Israel. Syria is not a state in the Western sense but rather is an interlocking network of tribal and sectarian systems. At present, the clique around Assad, including the security services and paramilitary forces, represents the most powerful gathering. They have spilled rivers of blood in tribal areas like Daraa not because they do not understand that their murders and mutilations have incurred blood debts against them that will last generations, but to show that they are powerful enough not to care. In other words, any peace treaty signed by Syria's ruler would not be between states, but between confessional sects and tribes. The Alawites can't cut a deal with the Jews, because they don't have a deal with the Sunnis. The Assad regime is the culmination of many hundreds of years of intra-Arab civil war. Before Syria's ruling establishment is capable of making peace with Israel, it will have to preside over a peace process between Syrians themselves. And before that can happen, Syrians are going to have to get tired of shedding each other's blood. That's some way off yet. In the meantime, there's no point in leading the Israelis to slaughter as well.
Contact Chuck Brooks at chetz18@aol.com
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GAZA CONVOY — "ISRAEL CANNOT AND SHOULD NOT LET HUMANITARIAN SHIPS THROUGH"
Posted by Daily Alert, June 24, 2011. |
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This was written by Jade-Yasmin Tänzler |
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Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg is an international and maritime law expert who teaches at Europa-Universität Viadrina in Frankfurt. He has also served as an adviser to the Turkel Commission that Israel established in the summer of 2010. The commission has been tasked with determining how and why violence erupted on 31 May 2010 between passengers on the Gaza humanitarian convoy and Israeli soldiers. ZEIT ONLINE: The deployment of Israeli forces in May of last year against a humanitarian convoy headed for Gaza unleashed cries of protest worldwide. Now a second and far larger international convoy is on its way to Gaza — a convoy that aims to break Israeli's sea blockade of Gaza. Is this blockade even allowable from a legal standpoint? Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg: Well that depends on how you characterize the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. When jurists come together, they often disagree on this matter. But there's definitely a consensus on one thing — namely that what you have here is an armed conflict. Which means that the laws governing such conflicts apply; and under these laws, sea blockades are allowed. ZEIT ONLINE: But doesn't the conflict also have to involve two or more states? Heintschel von Heinegg: Right. And the problem is that Palestine is not a state — at least not yet — which is why many feel that the conflict is not an international armed conflict. And if you take that view, then blockade laws don't apply. But if you take an objective look at the relevant legal analyses, it's readily apparent that the basic admissibility of the Israeli blockade has never been called into question. ZEIT ONLINE: You yourself have characterized Israel's action against the convoy in 2010 as being perfectly legitimate. Why is that? Heintschel von Heinegg: If a blockade is allowable in this conflict, then it's also allowable to take measures to set up such a blockade. There's only one principle that characterizes a blockade: the principle of effectiveness. In other words, the blockade has to prevent ships from entering or leaving the blockade zone. If the blockade fails to do this even once, it is ineffective and thus immediately becomes legally ineffective as well. ZEIT ONLINE: So this means that when it comes to this blockade, Israel is in a catch-22 situation, right? Heintschel von Heinegg: Right. The Israelis simply can't afford to let any ship through, if they want to prevent another ship from passing through the blockade zone a few hours later. ZEIT ONLINE: The operators of the 2010 humanitarian convoy said right from the outset that the ships were headed for Gaza. Didn't saying this make them subject to criminal prosecution? Heintschel von Heinegg: The mere fact that they set sail for Gaza does not constitute a criminal act. But: if you come out and say, in a public forum, that you're heading to Gaza for the express purpose of breaking the blockade, this is clear evidence of a blockade breaking attempt. And when that happens, the state that has imposed the blockade doesn't need to wait until the ship in question reaches the 20 nautical mile boundary; instead, it's got the right to intervene beforehand. Because the state that's imposing the blockade is not only entitled but also duty bound to maintain its blockade. ZEIT ONLINE: What do you think the people onboard the current humanitarian convoy are going to be facing? Heintschel von Heinegg: Any ship that actually breaks the blockade simply has to reckon with the fact that that military force is going to be used against them. Plus the state that's imposing the blockade is under no obligation to wait until someone actually crosses the blockade line. All that has to happen is for there to be clearly discernible intent — in which case measures can be taken long before the blockade line is crossed. ZEIT ONLINE: What form could or should such measures take? Heintschel von Heinegg: Normally such measures unfold without any major problems. The state imposing the blockade stops the vessel, orders it to proceed to a specific port, inspects the ship's cargo, and then turns the matter over to the courts. But if there's resistance to the measures taken by the state that's imposing the blockade, then this state needs to quell this opposition. Which means that any attempt to evade the blockade or the forces enforcing it needs to be met with reasonable force. "The motivation of the blockade breakers is irrelevant from a legal standpoint." ZEIT ONLINE: In your view, was Israel's reaction to the humanitarian convoy in 2010 a smart move given the humaniarian situation in Gaza? Heintschel von Heinegg: Well this is how it always is when it comes to such legal issues. In such situations, the actors don't always act logically, or judiciously; nor are such actions necessarily the politically smart thing to do. A state that imposes a blockade is obligated to supply the civilian population in the blockaded zone with the goods they need in order to survive. But the Israelis have always done this. At the time of the humanitarian convoy in 2010, it was the same in that they said: Feel free to sail into the harbor; we guarantee that we'll hand over your humanitarian cargo. But it was clear from the get-go that certain parties didn't want that at all, because then they wouldn't have achieved the same impact on public opinion. ZEIT ONLINE: What would you advise the Israeli Prime Minister to do if the next humanitarian convoy approaches the boundary of the blockade zone? Heintschel von Heinegg: If the Prime Minister wants to maintain the blockade, then he's simply got to enforce it. If he doesn't enforce it, it'll be a dead letter; and then he'd have to resort to other measures; and then the legal situation wouldn't be so simple. Because then he'd have to invoke the right of self-defense, which is often invoked in cases where it's simply not appropriate to do so. Our [Germany's] anti-terrorism operations are a prime example of this. ZEIT ONLINE: Do you think the Israelis are going to react to this second convoy the same way they reacted to the first one? Heintschel von Heinegg: I think Israel is better prepared this time around. Last time they tried to approach the convoy ships in rubber dinghies and then climb onboard from these dinghies, in order to take control of the ships. And then they used helicopters. I suspect that the Israeli forces were simply unprepared for the resistance they met from some of the passengers on board those ships and were taken completely by surprise. ZEIT ONLINE: Is the legal situation now more touchy due to the fact that there's already been a conflict with a convoy? Heintschel von Heinegg: I think the reverse is the case. I hope that the relevant legal principles won't be misused again, since the law of armed conflict applies here — not a cockeyed human rights perspective. Also, Israel didn't act at all capriciously the first time around. It would have been quite difficult for the Israelis to sink those ships without concerning themselves with the fate of the passengers and cargo onboard. Israel only took measures that were prescribed by law — namely preventing the ships from reaching Gaza. This was the most moderate measure available to them. ZEIT ONLINE: People are suffering in Gaza, even though they have access to the goods they need in order to survive. Isn't it legitimate for people to want to help the citizens of Gaza? Heintschel von Heinegg: The motivation of the blockade breakers — regardless of whether they're acting for virtuous or reprehensible reasons — is completely irrelevant from a legal standpoint. I, of course, have great respect for human rights activists who give of their time to pursue their goals, but you can't get around the fact that there are certain legal boundaries. Also, I presume that these humanitarian actions are also publicity stunts aimed at mobilizing public opinion. No one would argue the fact that the citizens of Gaza have it really tough, compared to our own standards. But I don't really see any pressing humanitarian need here. ZEIT ONLINE: In your view, is there an alternative to these humanitarian convoys? Heintschel von Heinegg: Sure there is. There are a few humanitarian organizations out there that have impeccable credentials that no one in their right mind would call into question — the most important one being the International Committee of the German Red Cross. If you really want to help the citizens of Gaza, you go to the Red Cross — an organization that the Israelis accept without hesitation. ZEIT ONLINE: The border crossing between Gaza and Egypt was recently reopened. Do you think this will have a counterproductive effect on the naval blockade? Heintschel von Heinegg: Israel has traditionally been able to rely on Egypt, and the border between Gaza and Egypt hasn't been particularly permeable in the past. But this has changed. The strategic importance of the blockade in terms of protecting Israeli security has definitely declined. But nonetheless, the reliability of Israel's maritime measures will not be affected in any way by the change in the status of the Gaza-Egypt border. Contact Chuck Brooks at chetz18@aol.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: NOW WHAT?
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 24, 2011. |
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PM Netanyahu was doing great — standing strong against Obama's demands. But then on Sunday, at the Cabinet meeting he made statements that seemed to indicate a reversal — or perhaps a shift — in his position. Or perhaps not... As reported by Haaretz, Netanyahu made his statement during the course of a report on demographic changes in Israel within the Green Line, and in Judea and Samaria, that was being delivered by the Jewish People Policy Institute. The Institute had included in its presentation demographic data from Professor Sergio DellaPergola; his material suggests a "demographic time bomb," with trends indicating that we will, in the course of time, see a Palestinian Arab majority between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. What Netanyahu said was this: "It does not matter to me whether there are half a million more Palestinians or less because I have no wish to annex them into Israel. I want to separate from them so that they will not be Israeli citizens. I am interested that there be a solid Jewish majority inside the State of Israel. Inside its borders, as these will be defined." According to Haaretz, Uzi Landau and Limor Livnat asked that demographic data from someone like Yoram Ettinger — who says that there is no severe demographic threat — also be presented, but the prime minister cut the discussion short.
~~~~~~~~~~ Unsettling, for sure. And not a statement we needed right now. What is going on? On the one hand, what we see is that the prime minister is continuing to be strong in other respects. He has maintained the position that we will negotiate with the PA/PLO only if there is no unity government with Hamas, and only if Abbas recognizes Israel as a Jewish state. The second point was reiterated most recently this week at the closing session of the Israeli Presidential Conference in Jerusalem. Additionally, on at least a couple of different occasions, he has reportedly told foreign leaders that the PA is being treated like a spoiled child. By this he means that the PA is cut slack, while demands are made only on Israel (and more on this below). ~~~~~~~~~~ But on the other hand, the specter of negotiations for a "two-state solution" continue to loom large, and he may be talking to this — playing his game of showing how willing he is. Or warning his Cabinet with regard to what may be coming. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Quartet, which will be meeting very soon in Brussels, is going to be under pressure by the EU to find a way to avert a PA bid for statehood in the UN. According to one "senior Israeli official" cited this week by the JPost, the EU wants to "give something" significant to the PA to entice them from that bid. That "something" is said to be adoption of Obama's formula of adopting the '67 lines as a base for negotiations. At the very same time, there are no plans to demand that the PA give assurances with regard to Israeli security or that it acknowledge Israel as a Jewish state. It's a one-way proposition, with Israel expected to do all of the giving. This is hardly a new mindset, but it is what prompted Netanyahu's "spoiled child" comment to individual leaders. You might want to see the JPost editorial on this subject:
~~~~~~~~~~ To make matters more obscene, on Sunday, in the context of the monthly meeting of EU foreign ministers, Luxembourg's foreign minister, Jean Asselborn, who is host for the month, held a dinner on the Middle East. EU policy chief Catherine Ashton was included, as were ministers from 11 European countries, as well as representatives from: Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Iraq, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the Arab League, and the PA. But not Israel. Although, without a doubt, Israel was a main subject of the conversation. This would have been obvious on the face of it, but in a blog posting about the dinner, Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt made this clear, as he spoke about "large parts of the Arab world" having "given up virtually all hope of progress" with the present Israel government. ~~~~~~~~~~ So, were Netanyahu's words his response to this climate? What must never be forgotten for a second is that neither the Quartet nor the EU makes policy for Israel. The Israeli government does. If we don't agree to sit down at the table with Abbas if he hasn't recognized Israel as the Jewish state, then we don't sit down with him. If we refuse to begin negotiations with the '67 lines as a basis for discussion, then negotiations won't begin there. Standing strong is imperative. ~~~~~~~~~~ Meanwhile, we are seeing additional signs indicating that Abbas may be backing off from that UN bid because he's seen the handwriting on the wall regarding the fact that this will not be a panacea for his political problems. Khaled Abu Toameh wrote a major piece — "Searching for a ladder" — on this subject today: "President Mahmoud Abbas is beginning to realize that he climbed a very high tree regarding the plan to ask the UN to recognize a Palestinian state in September, and is now crying out for someone to provide him with a ladder to come down. "This is how a senior Palestinian Authority official in Ramallah responded when asked this week where Abbas stood on the issue of the statehood bid." Abbas is coming under increased pressure to abandon both the statehood initiative and plans for unity with Hamas. In Ramallah, says Abu Toameh, the feeling is that he will not be able to withstand that pressure and will ultimately reverse his plans. "Abbas is now saying he would rather return to the negotiating table with Israel than proceed with the plan to seek statehood unilaterally. But to do so, he needs Israel to give him something so it won't appear as if he has once again surrendered to outside pressure. ~~~~~~~~~~ Is this picture clear? The PA was prepared to 1) abrogate commitments under Oslo by seeking statehood unilaterally, and 2) unify with an overtly terrorist group that espouses "resistance." Then, if, under pressure from the international community, the PA backs off from these we're supposed to reward it. And the onus will be placed on Israel to "give" Abbas something so he's not embarrassed as he backs off from what were horrendous decisions. Abbas, who has behaved exceedingly reprehensibly, will expect Obama to come down on Israel, thus delivering for him. ~~~~~~~~~~ Before switching gears, I will add one other factor — not new to my readers — indicative of the fact that Abbas is indeed backing off: Hamas yesterday made the charge that Fatah, having succumbed to US and EU pressure, is reneging on its reconciliation agreement. The response from a PA official, as cited in another article by Abu Toameh: "Hamas is nothing but a tool in the hands of Iran. (This is true, but Abbas didn't care until now.) There can be no agreement with a movement that serves the agenda of a regime like Iran, which is a threat to Arab national security." So.. bye bye unity agreement. At least for today. ~~~~~~~~~~ I wrote recently about the analysis by Yonatan Halevi that indicated an eagerness on the part of Khaled Mashaal, Hamas politburo head, to solidify that unity government; his goal is Hamas control of the PLO — recognized as the international representative of the "Palestinian people." And so, in the face of backtracking by Abbas, Hamas officials have to be mighty furious right now. Said one such official: "It seems that the man [Abbas] has no struggling background and had never resisted the occupation in his life. He has fallen in love with the enemy...Abbas's statement raise questions about his qualifications to lead the Palestinians." Hmm... it may be that, while Abbas wants to be done with Hamas, Hamas is not done with him. ~~~~~~~~~~ I am reminded here of the saying, "Man proposes, God disposes." We think we know where we are headed, but sometimes the Almighty above laughs at us. My hope — and the hope of many others — was that once and for all Oslo would be finished, and with it the farce of a "two-state solution." But that hope may have been premature. We'll see. I had written about a window of opportunity that might be opening with a bid for unilateral statehood by the PA: a window that would have made movement towards sovereignty over Judea and Samaria more possible. But we now have to see how matters play out. What I will emphasize here is even if that window does not open right now — via a PA abrogation of Oslo — it remains imperative that we continue to educate the world at large, and the Israeli populace in particular, regarding the futility of "two states" as a "solution, the rights of the Jewish people in the land, and the existence of a more viable and equitable solution. We must institute a process that will shift the paradigm of thinking over time. ~~~~~~~~~~ Other issues will have to wait until after Shabbat. Here I end with a real "good news" piece: Please see the article, "Did Moses miss the good stuff?" This is an allusion to the old joke, that Moses turned in the wrong direction since he led us to a land without oil, while all around is oil. The message here is that there IS oil in Israel. Word about this has come out before, but it made news again today because of a panel entitled "New Energy for a New Tomorrow" at the Israeli Presidential Conference. Participating in the panel was Dr. Harold Vinegar, of Israel Energy Initiatives, who presented possibilities for recovering vast quantities of oil within the shale rocks in Israel. This is not going to happen tomorrow. It involves a new process — in which rods are placed deep in the rock and slowly heating so that oil can be extracted — that does not present the same ecological threat as early methods. It is still being tested, and then the process itself moves slowly. However, Vinegar estimates that in time it may be possible to extract an enormous 250 billion barrels of shale oil.
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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EGYPT: CHRISTIAN GIRLS KIDNAPPED AND 'SOLD'
Posted by Raymond Ibrahim, June 23, 2011. |
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Two teenage Coptic girls, cousins, were recently kidnapped and then "sold" in Minya, Egypt — the same region where a Coptic church was recently attacked and desecrated. I tried to find this story in English-language media and, as expected, found nothing, except for one report in Al-Masry Al-Youm titled "Clashes between police and Coptic protesters in Minya" — as if that's the important story (as usual, the media prefers headlines portraying harried Christian minorities as equally culpable as their Muslim persecutors, thereby justifying use of the preferred phrase, "sectarian strife"). 
At the end of the Al-Masry Al-Youm report, we get a trailing sentence alluding to "claims" that two Christian girls "were abducted by Muslims and forced to convert to Islam" as the reason why Copts were demonstrating and clashing with the police in the first place. One must again turn to Arabic sources for the telling details. I have put together the following narrative and quotes based on these two Arabic reports: The two girls, Christine Azat (aged 16) and Nancy Magdi (aged 14) were on their way to church Sunday, June 12, when they were seized. Their abductors demanded $200,000 Egyptian pounds for their release. The people of the region quickly put their savings together and came up with the ransom money; but when they tried to give it to the kidnappers, they rejected it, saying they had already "sold" the girls off to another group which requires $12 million Egyptian pounds to return them. Christine's father, who has been harrying the police since the minute he discovered the girls were kidnapped — to little avail — says he and his family "have been in a living hell since Christine's abduction." Nancy's father laments that "My daughter has not even outgrown childhood; she is only 14 years old, the youngest in the family, our baby...Since her disappearance my household has been living in continuous depression, misery, and weeping." Some have tried to pass the usual rumor that the girls "willingly" ran off and converted to Islam, but even Egyptian officials reject this, saying that Al Azhar, which is the institution that formally recognizes conversions to Islam, has not acknowledged the conversion of underage minors. What will become of Christine and Nancy? Since the exorbitant ransom will likely not be raised, will the teenage girls be killed — like the Christian Iraqi youth who was recently beheaded when his family couldn't ransom him from his abductors? Probably not; as females, their lot is to be raped, enslaved, and sold off to some rich, depraved man who believes it his divine right to own infidel sex-slaves. Therefore, next time you hear about an Egyptian Muslim preacher boasting that Islam permits Muslims to abduct and ransom infidels as a great way to make a living and own female sex-slaves, or when you hear about a Kuwaiti political activist praying to Allah that Kuwait would formally institutionalize sex-slavery, do not brush these aside as mere words, for here are their fruits.
Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com
This article appeared today in
FrontPageMagazine.com and is archived at
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ISLAM BUYS OUT WESTERN ACADEMIA
Posted by Avodah June 22, 2011. |
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This was written by Giulio Meotti, a journalist with Il Foglio. He is the author of the book A New Shoah: The Untold Story of Israel's Victims of Terrorism. It is no wonder that universities are so hostile to Jews and Israel, look at their funding. |
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Founded in 1789 by the Jesuits, Georgetown, the oldest Catholic university in the United States, must explain why it accepted $325.000 from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which the FBI identifies as the US channel of Hamas. The donation, revealed by Pajamas Media, was transferred to Georgetown by the Organization for the Islamic Conference for the purpose of organizing a symposium on "Islamophobia". The famous Catholic university already received 40 million dollars from the Saudi prince Alwaleed bin Talal and the Qatar Foundation in 2005. The story of the Saudi donations in the United States dates back to 1976, when Riyadh transferred one million dollars to the University of Southern California. In 1979, Saudi Aramco World magazine published a list of Middle Eastern gifts, including $200,000 from the Saudis to Duke University for a program in Islamic and Arabian development studies; $750,000 from the Libyan government for a chair of Arab culture at Georgetown University; and $250,000 from the United Arab Emirates for a visiting professorship of Arab history, also at Georgetown. Until that time, Ryadh spent one hundred billion dollars to spread Wahhabism, the most anti-Semitic and extremist version of Islam. Leading the list of "beneficiaries" is Harvard, with about 30 million dollars. The jewel of the Ivy League received 20 million in 2005 alone. 20 million dollars were donated to the Middle East Studies Center at the University of Arkansas; 5 million dollars to the Center for Middle East Studies at Berkeley, in California; 11 million to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York and a half million dollars to Texas University (the seventh university, in order of size, in the United States); 1 million to Princeton; 5 million dollars to Rutgers University. The Arab donations are spreading in Europe as well. In April, a scandal involved St. Andrews University, the third most important in the British academy and a cradle of royal nobility. Hundred of thousands of pounds were discovered to have been sent from Damascus to fund a center for "Syrian studies" there. In March there was the scandal involving the London School of Economics, one of the best known universities in the world that conferred a doctorate to Saif al Islam Gaddafi, the son of the Libyan dictator. Shortly after receiving his doctorate, Saif al Islam "dropped" a donation to the university of a half million pounds, donated by the Gaddafi Foundation named after his father. Oxford has a research center funded by the Iranian regime, while at Cambridge the funds come from Saudi Arabia, Oman and Iran. Scholarships and degree programs are the favorite and easiest weapons of the Islamist regimes to influence the Western academies and their freedoms. Eight universities, including Oxford and Cambridge, have accepted more than 233.5 million pounds sterling from Saudi and Muslim sources since 1995. The total sum, revealed by Anthony Glees, the director of Brunel University's Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, amounts to the largest source of external funding to UK universities. Universities that have accepted donations from Saudi royals and other Arab sources include Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, University College London, the London School of Economics, Exeter, Dundee and City. The consequences of the funding have been very clear: 70 per cent of political science lectures at the Middle Eastern Centre at St Antony's College, Oxford, were "implacably hostile" to the West and Israel. At Georgetown, the money was funneled toward its Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, which was quickly renamed the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding. The center, part of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, trains many of America's diplomats and it spreads anti-Semitic and anti-western ideas. There are 17 federally funded centers on American college campuses devoted solely to Middle Eastern studies centers and most of them support pro-Islamist ideas. The Soviet Union during the Cold War invested much less for its propaganda operations in the West. But there is another big difference. The Western intelligentia fought the Communist efforts to subvert the West. Their post-modern heirs are offering appeasement to the Islamist agenda. The glorious Western academy is becoming a madrassa. Contact Avodah at Avodah15@aol.com and visit his website:
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A BLOODY DAY IN JERUSALEM
Posted by Barbara Ginsberg, June 22, 2011. |
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"Beyond Words" is a newly-published seven volume collection of Rabbi Meir Kahane's writings that originally appeared in The Jewish Press, other serial publications, and his privately-published works. "Beyond Words" also includes a number of extra features:
If you are interested in buying this new collection of Rabbi Meir Kahane's writings, write to Levi Chazan at: Levi1@hotmail.com. For people living outside of Israel "Beyond Words" will shortly be sold by Amazon.com. If you did not receive this Rabbi Kahane article personally and would like to be on my weekly Rabbi Kahane article e-mail list, please contact me at: BarbaraAndChaim@gmail.com To view previously sent Rabbi Kahane articles go to:
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May 12, 1989 The Rabbi (Sotah 46) comment on the Biblical law concerning the finding of the body of a murdered Jew with his murderer unknown. The law decrees that the respected elders of the nearest town or city come out to the place of the murder and declare: "Our hands did not shed this blood!" Meaning: the elders, the leaders, must declare before man and G-d that they did everything possible to insure that this Jew would not be murdered. I have just spent two days of my life in an Israeli prison. Two more days. And I say, unequivocally, that what happened in Jerusalem last week, as two Jews were murdered and the police protected the murderer and other Arabs even as they tear-gassed Jews, is the clearest evidence that this Jewish government can never say, "Our hands did not shed this blood." For surely they did, by a policy that is not only un-Jewish, but sheer madness. I arrived shortly after the two murders. But first consider its circumstances. The murders took place in broad daylight, a little before 11A.M., with tens of people in the street. It took place in Jerusalem's main street, Jaffa road. It took place across the street from the main Post Office. And it took place around the corner from the main police station, in the Russian Compound. And there is more. The murderer, according to the police has "a security background." Meaning, he was arrested in the past for terrorist and nationalist involvement. Arrested, freed, and allowed to remain in the country. He had spent the night before at the Al Aksa Mosque that desecrates the Temple Mount and, there, listening to the Moslem hate and incitement, decided to murder Jews. The Arab approached the bus station on Jaffa Road and without warning pulled out a knife and stabbed Nissim Levi and Kalman Vardi as well as three other Jews. Kalman Vardi died on the spot. He was 76. Nissim Levi also died there. He was 91. One of the seriously wounded was a woman of 81. As the Arab fled, he was caught, and as an infuriated Jewish crowd attempted to get him, a policeman fell on the Arab, covered him with his body and saved his life. Police then physically beat up Jews and drove the Arab away. When I arrived shortly thereafter, furious Jews were milling about, frustrated, bitter, impotent. I climbed on a railing and spoke to them. I said that things could not continue this way. I said that Arabs were not the problem but rather the Jews in power, the government that was so impotent, the leftists who give such moral, financial and legal support to the Arabs, the Israeli news media that so encourages them. I said that until Arabs are dealt with with a heavy hand, Jews will continue to be murdered in their own land in increasing numbers. I began marching east, towards the Old City. But now hundreds, if not more, had gathered and walked behind me. The police reinforcements were arriving, and as we reached the end of Jaffa Road, the police official in charge of the operation, Natan Kremersky, stopped me and said: "If you go further there will be blood." Thinking he meant that the Jews would shed Arab blood, I said: "If you had done that, things might have been different." "No", he said, "I mean that we will use force against you." When I informed the crowd, they were so furious that they shouted, "Go ahead. We will follow you." We began marching toward the Old City and as we neared the walls, a solid line of police horses and others with helmets and clubs barred the way. More ominously, they had their gas masks on and we could see the gas guns aiming at us. As we came face to face with the police, the head of the Jerusalem Patrol, known as "Velvel" (from a religious family in Jerusalem, though he is no longer so), raised a portable bullhorn and shouted: "This is an illegal gathering. I will give you a reasonable time to disperse. You have three minutes." I approached him and said: "If your grandfather would be here, he would slap you in the face." Velvel reddened but did not reply. At that point, with not more than a minute elapsed, I saw Kremersky approach Velvel and say something to him. Suddenly, without warning, the horses charged the crowd with tear gas blasting. I received a full blast in the face and the police began hitting Jews. My people dragged me away; I could hardly breathe. The nearest building was the one used as a court by the municipality and the people inside opened the doors, giving us water and muttering against the police. We remained for about half an hour and then, with my eyes burning but able to see, I walked down Jaffe Road with a number of Kach people. The police were there, in force still, and as I passed they arrest us. I spent the next 48 hours, two full days, in a small cell with six other Kach members. The fact that the Jewish prisoners and the police inside treated us as kings made no difference. Inside with us were some 80 Arabs, eating, drinking and being kept there at Jewish expense. The police told me that they were afraid to mistreat them because the news media and the Red Cross would immediately intervene and they (the police) would be reprimanded and suspended. Their frustration was evident as was their growing weariness. It was clear to me sitting in that foul-smelling cell with a toilet in the room (a "Turkish toilet," as it is known, with only a hole over which the person much perch) that the State of Israel was collapsing and that the prime culprits were the "elders," the leaders, the government. It was also clear to me that there must be a change, a fundamental change in the very system of the government, from the present fraudulent democracy (which is, of course, not democracy at all) to strong government that will save us from ourselves. As I was freed, a few hours before Shabbat, I heard over the radio that Shamir had visited the wounded and said, "Jews must defend themselves and not leave the attackers in one piece." I thought to myself: How long will we continue to accept this paragon of hypocrisy and disaster? And when a Jew does defend himself and shoots an Arab, what does the government of Shamir do to him? It arrests him and places him on trial. The problem is not Arabs; it is Jews. Jews such as Shamir and Arens and Rabin — not to mention the leftists — whose babbling lack of policy allows an intifada to continue for 18 months (!) and for Jews to be murdered in their own cities. They must go. Or there will be terrible things in Israel. |
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NOT STEALING PALESTINE, BUT PURCHASING ISRAEL
Posted by Ted Belman, June 22, 2011. |
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This article was written by Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University. It appeared in National Review Online
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Zionists stole Palestinian land: That's the mantra both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas teach their children and propagate in their media. This claim has vast importance, as Palestinian Media Watch explains: "Presenting the creation of the state as an act of theft and its continued existence as a historical injustice serves as the basis for the PA's non-recognition of Israel's right to exist." The accusation of theft also undermines Israel's position internationally. But is this accusation true? No, it is not. Ironically, the building of Israel represents almost the most peaceable in-migration and state creation in history. Understanding why requires seeing Zionism in context. Simply put, conquest is the historical norm. Governments everywhere have been established through invasion and nearly all states came into being at someone else's expense. o one is permanently in charge; everyone's roots trace back to somewhere else. Germanic tribes, Central Asian hordes, Russian tsars, and Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors remade the map. Modern Greeks have only a tenuous connection to the Greeks of antiquity. Who can count the number of times Belgium was overrun? The United States came into existence after the defeat of Native Americans. Kings marauded in Africa, Aryans invaded India. In Japan, Yamato-speakers eliminated all but tiny groups such as the Ainu. The Middle East, due to its centrality and geography, has experienced more than its share of invasions, including the Greek, Roman, Arabian, Crusader, Seljuk, Timurid, Mongolian, and modern European. Within the region, dynastic froth caused the same territory — Egypt for example — to be conquered and re-conquered. The land that now makes up Israel was no exception. In Jerusalem Besieged: From Ancient Canaan to Modern Israel, Eric H. Cline writes of Jerusalem: "No other city has been more bitterly fought over throughout its history." He backs up that claim, counting "at least 118 separate conflicts in and for Jerusalem during the past four millennia." He calculates Jerusalem to have been destroyed completely at least twice, besieged 23 times, captured 44 times, and attacked 52 times. The PA fantasizes that today's Palestinians are descended from a tribe of ancient Canaan, the Jebusites; in fact, they are overwhelmingly the offspring of invaders and immigrants seeking economic opportunities. Against this tableau of unceasing conquest, violence, and overthrow, Zionist efforts to build a presence in the Holy Land until 1948 stand out as astonishingly mild, mercantile rather than military. Two great empires, the Ottomans and the British, ruled Eretz Yisrael. In contrast, Zionists lacked military power. They could not possibly achieve statehood through conquest. Instead, they purchased land. Acquiring property dunam by dunam, farm by farm, house by house, lay at the heart of the Zionist enterprise until 1948. The Jewish National Fund, founded in 1901 to buy land in Palestine "to assist in the foundation of a new community of free Jews engaged in active and peaceable industry," was the key institution — and not the Haganah, the clandestine defense organization founded in 1920. Zionists also focused on the rehabilitation of what was barren and considered unusable. They not only made the desert bloom, but drained swamps, cleared water channels, reclaimed wasteland, forested bare hills, cleared rocks, and removed salt from the soil. Jewish reclamation and sanitation work precipitously reduced the number of disease-related deaths. Only when the British Mandate of Palestine gave up power in 1948, followed immediately by an all-out attempt by Arab states to crush and expel the Zionists, did the latter take up the sword in self-defense and go on to win land through military conquest. Even then, as the historian Efraim Karsh demonstrates in Palestine Betrayed, most Arabs fled their lands; exceedingly few were forced off. This history contradicts the Palestinian account that "Zionist gangs stole Palestine and expelled its people" which led to a catastrophe "unprecedented in history" (according to a PA twelfth-grade textbook) or that Zionists "plundered the Palestinian land and national interests, and established their state upon the ruins of the Palestinian Arab people" (writes a columnist in the PA's daily). International organizations, newspaper editorials, and faculty petitions reiterate this falsehood worldwide. Israelis should hold their heads high and point out that the building of their country was based on the least violent and most civilized movement of any people in history. Gangs did not steal Palestine. Merchants purchased Israel.
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FOR ANTI-SEMITES WHO CONSIDER THEMSELVES DECENT PEOPLE
Posted by Jock L. Falkson, June 22, 2011. |
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After a lifetime in South Africa I retired in 1993 to live in Israel — among my people — at long last. Without exaggeration, this was a happy decision. In my 73 years in S. Africa I never once came face to face with anti-Semitism. Yet I was certainly aware of its existence. I would avidly read up on the subject. Before too long it became clear to me that the origin of anti-Semitism had nothing to do with the accusations levelled against Jews. It had everything to do with our accusers. It was the Christian finger of guilt which pointed to the Jewish people throughout the generations for their so called "killing of Christ". An untruth which denied the fact that this observant, temple-going Jew was tried and crucified by the Romans for attempted sedition. Pontius Pilate called Jesus "King of the Jews" and a crown of thorns was placed on his head to mock him. Responding to Jews who criticized his verdict Pilate brusquely brushed aside them aside, saying "What I have written, I have written". Jewish religious practices like circumcision and the kosher way of slaughtering animals led to the uncontrolled hatred of Jews. Completely disregarding the fact that Jesus and his apostles were themselves circumcised. And observed all the 613 commandments to be found in our bible. Throughout the generations Christians were unfortunately taught to see Jews as their enemy for whom, torture, limb smashing, lashing, bashing, forceful conversion, raping, gassing and genociding were all deserved punishments. And, except for the infamous Inquisition, unworthy of any legal process. Not that the Inquisition rendered true justice. One of the most common anti-Semitic accusations levelled against Jews during the last 100 years, is that in contrast to upstanding human beings, Jews were money mad. It became a given that money was our God — for which we would do anything. While non-Jews were naturally profligate in their disdain for the filthy lucre. Such sheer nonsense led to much Jewish suffering. Jews were likewise accused of poisoning wells — as if they had secret wells they alone could drink from. And of spreading the plague — as if they were magically protected from their contact with the said diseases. Jews were also accused of killing Christian children in order to drink their blood. Exactly how Jews would benefit from this remains a mystery, never mind God's prescription that His people were prohibited from drinking even a single drop of blood! (Hence the kosher method of killing animals — which ensures that all blood is drained before the meat can be sold or eaten.) Such anti-Semitic nonsense was trotted out as justification to hate and attack Jews, and to frequently rob them of their money and possessions. Also to mercilessly rob them of their lives — no doubt to teach other money mad, blood sucking Jews a lesson. Nor were poor Jews spared — they too were robbed, tortured, maimed and murdered for no rhyme or reason other than that they were Jews. Anti-Semitism continues to be alive and well in these times in many countries, with notable exceptions of the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Have I erred by not including Britain? No I have not. The Asian countries such as India, Japan and China were never anti-Semitic. The rise of the Jewish State of Israel has unfortunately served as the focus for the current wave of anti-Semitism. The reasons are couched in political terms but the motivation is the same. It is none other than hatred of Israel because it is a Jewish state. Of course, the nations offer political justification for being anti-Israel. Like human rights violations, racism, apartheid, oppression, occupation — all of them apparently fitting reasons for hatred, boycotts, flotillas and high minded anti-Israel votes at the United Nations'. Nevertheless, as I shall demonstrate, all the so called justifications fit the definition of anti-Semitism: hatred of Israel because it is a Jewish state. Take the accusation of racism and apartheid. How come Israel is excoriated, yet India is not condemned for its vicious racism and apartheid against its estimated 150 million Dalits — 'untouchables' — who have lived there in virtual slavery for centuries? Think of it — 150 million Dalits with no human rights whatever!! (Imagine the venomous political hysteria if Israel treated its Arabs as India treats its Dalits.) Nor do the anti-Semitic nations protest China's continued occupation of Tibet. Nor Russia's occupation of Chechnya, Dagistan, North Ossetia, Tatarstan and the Japanese islands of Kuril. Nor the Turkish occupation of half of Cyprus since 1974. And other occupations. Should we be amazed that the anti-Israel nations do not have the honesty, the decency, northe fortitude to give Israel credit where and when it is due? Surely it's due to Israel in spades for its countless inventions and innovations which have been so beneficial to mankind? Many more continue in the pipeline. Here are some which I have copied from 21c's blog from April to date: 1. June 12, 2011 — Israel is the only country that permanently opens its arms to children sick from radiation caused by the Ukrainian nuclear disaster 25 years ago. 2. June 5, 2011 — Hebrew University researchers have discovered how a single gene can keep malignant cancer cells from spreading to healthy tissue. 3. May 29, 2011 — An Israeli medical consortium was called in to set up adult male circumcision clinics in an effort to halt the HIV-AIDS epidemic among the Zulu in South Africa. 4. May 22, 2011 — Israeli researchers have discovered a way to reverse the aging process and rejuvenate the immune system in mice. 5. May 15, 2011 — Israel's Vacciguard introduces a unique biotech system to develop immunizations against some of the world's deadliest maladies, from cancer to CMV and West Nile virus. 6. May 8, 2011 — Under a $250 million agreement, Israel's Evida will supply the batteries, cooling systems and software tools for Mia Electric's vehicles in Europe. 7. May 1, 2011 — Israel's AnyClip has cut a dream deal with Universal Studios to bring favorite clips from the production house's enormous library to the Internet. 8. April 24, 2011 — Israel was among the first countries to send medical aid and crucial supplies to Japan following the devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami. 9. April 17, 2011 — Researchers from Tel Aviv University are working on a nasal two-in-one vaccine that could protect against both Alzheimer's disease and stroke. The proposed vaccine appears to repair vascular damage in the brain by marshaling forces from the immune system. 10. April 10, 2011 — Israeli startup Bioexplorers has developed a foolproof, non-invasive and easy method to sniff out contraband, drugs and terrorists — using mice. 11. April 3, 2011 — Israel Aircraft Industries has developed an airplane "tugboat," Taxibot Dispatch Towing System, in partnership with Airbus. Taxibot will allow pilots to cut the engine to and from gate and runway, potentially saving billions in fuel. 12. March 27, 2011 — New York-based ICare4autism plans to build the first global research and education center for autism on Jerusalem's Mt. Scopus. The campus will house the world's first university-level school of autism studies, with the aim of raising therapeutic standards worldwide. 13. March 20, 2011 — Intel is investing $2.7 billion in its Israeli plant in southern Israel, which will produce next-generation 22-nanometer chips to make computers faster, smaller and lighter. 14. March 13, 2011 — Only about 1.2 million of the world's 400 million ethnic Arabs live in Israel, yet the sole registry for Arab bone marrow donors is located in Jerusalem's Hadassah Medical Center. 15. March 6, 2011 — Israeli scientists at IBM Haifa joined colleagues from the United States, China and Japan to put the brains in Watson, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered supercomputer. The full list of Israeli achievements over the last 25 years is probably breathtaking. Regrettably these are not listed anywhere as far as I know. However, the 244 which are published in 21c's blog since July 2005 — even though incomplete — are concrete evidence of a small nation developing projects that benefit mankind. Certainly worthy of encouragement and approbation in the councils and universities of the world, Instead of which it is mostly lashed by the cruel whips of their anti-Semitism. For shame. To be put on Jock Falkson's email list, contact him at falkson@013.net For more information on Israel's achievements, go to
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RIOT IN SYRIA AFTER AHMED JIBRIL FAILED TO PAY FAMILIES $10,000 PER DEAD PROTESTOR HE PROMISED
Posted by Avodah, June 22, 2011. |
Zvi Mazel (A former ambassador to Romania, Egypt and Sweden, and a
fellow of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs writes:
"When Ahmed Jibril, head of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), headquartered in Damascus, tried to make a speech praising Assad and blaming Israel for the deaths, his voice was drowned by protests. Soon the protest turned more violent, and protesters vented their anger on the PFLP-GC's headquarters, setting the place on fire. Two guards were killed in the onslaught; Jibril's security officers opened fire, killing 14 protesters and wounding hundreds. "The violent protests probably explain why Assad did not send more people to the Golan the following day and why his army restored the roadblocks on the road leading to it." An estimated 100,000 Palestinian Arabs took part in the mass funerals, chanting slogans against the Syrian president. "The background to the riots that broke out in the Yarmuk refugee camp the day after the demonstrations on the Golan Heights was largely the failure to pay the money that had been promised to the participants: $1,000 for each participant and $10,000 for anyone who became a 'martyr' — killed in the demonstrations," the source said. "The families of those killed were furious with Ahmed Jibril, whom they blamed for dragging their children to a confrontation with the Israelis. Hundreds took part in the demonstration because they had not been paid. Jibril's security guards feared that he would be harmed, and they opened fire, killing 14 residents of the camp. At the time there were senior Hamas figures in the camp." Senior Israeli source: Iran actively helping Syria squash demonstrations This is by Avi Issacharoff and appeared in Haaretz
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A senior Israeli source says Iran is involved in the suppressing of the anti-regime demonstrations in Syria. Iran's Revolutionary Guard and the Al-Quds force, commanded by Gen. Qassem Suleimani, are operating throughout the country, the source says. The source told Haaretz there is clear information on Iran's involvement in the crushing of the protests, as well as the participation of Hezbollah. Their role is not limited to shootings; Iran has also supplied equipment to the Syrian army, including sniper rifles and communications systems for disrupting the Internet in the country, the source said. Syrian residents and media reports say men in military uniforms have been heard speaking poor Arabic or Farsi among themselves. "In the Syrian army there is a ban on beards, so when we see military people with beards we can assume they're not part of the regular Syrian army," the source said. Iran's involvement reached a new zenith, the source said, when the Revolutionary Guard organized the demonstrations against Israel on the Golan Heights as part of the events on Nakba Day on May 15 and Naksa Day on June 5. "Initial reports about the presence of Iranians in the suppression of the demonstrations were from the town of Daraa, where the mass demonstrations began. However, since then it is possible to see Iran's presence in many other places," the source said. "During the Palestinian memorial days, the Revolutionary Guard organized the busing that was required to transfer the demonstrators to the border. The initiative was not Syrian. However, the Syrian army approved the transfer of the buses to the border. On Nakba Day they [the Iranians] were also involved in the demonstrations in Lebanon, something that was not backed by Hezbollah and was opposed by the Lebanese Army. This is the reason why in Lebanon there were not confrontations and demonstrations on Naksa Day," the source said. On Naksa Day, the Revolutionary Guard rallied Ahmed Jibril's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine — General Command to send hundreds of demonstrators to the border. "The background to the riots that broke out in the Yarmuk refugee camp the day after the demonstrations on the Golan Heights was largely the failure to pay the money that had been promised to the participants: $1,000 for each participant and $10,000 for anyone who became a 'martyr' — killed in the demonstrations," the source said. "The families of those killed were furious with Ahmed Jibril, whom they blamed for dragging their children to a confrontation with the Israelis. Hundreds took part in the demonstration because they had not been paid. Jibril's security guards feared that he would be harmed, and they opened fire, killing 14 residents of the camp. At the time there were senior Hamas figures in the camp." The senior Israeli source said the likelihood of similar demonstrations on the Israel-Syria border in the near future is low. He agreed with Defense Minister Ehud Barak's assessment in an interview with Haaretz two weeks ago: The process that will end the Assad regime is irreversible. "His regime's legitimacy is lost. The harder he strikes, the more people take to the streets," the source said. He added that "in the end certain senior officers in the Syrian army — Sunnis — will reach an agreement with senior Alawi officers, providing sufficient security guarantees for the Alawi community. They will find a political solution that will extricate the country from the crisis and remove President Bashar Assad from power." However, desertions from the Syrian army have so far been limited to the lower ranks — below battalion commanders. The senior source says there is a certain amount of resentment in the army because regular forces and "military security" forces have been used to suppress demonstrations. He added that at Jisr al-Shoughour a "military security" force was sent to deal with the demonstrations but ran into an ambush, and 120 soldiers were killed. [according to Der Spiegel-Germany "there were no 120 dead soldiers. Instead, 20 to 30 people, some of them soldiers, had been shot dead by local residents defending their city."] "There are weapons in many places in Syria, as in all parts of the Middle East, and so far many soldiers and members of the security forces have been hit by gunfire fired by armed supporters of the opposition," the source added. Meanwhile, as confrontations between demonstrators and the military continued in Syria yesterday, Assad announced yet another amnesty for everyone arrested in the protests. A pro-Assad demonstration took place in Damascus, but Arab media outlets noted that the participants had been forced to attend, sometimes by labor unions. Contact Avodah at Avodah15@aol.com and visit his website:
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OBAMA'S NIGHTMARE
Posted by Susana K-M, June 22, 2011. |
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This was written by David Suissa
and it is archived at
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Apparently, President Barack Obama believes that whenever the Israelis and the Palestinians sit down for peace talks, the holiest site in Judaism — the Western Wall — will be with the Palestinians. I didn't realize this either, until I listened to some knowledgeable commentators. It comes down to a careful reading of Obama's suggested formulation for restarting peace talks: "1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps." As Jennifer Rubin writes in The Washington Post, "This formulation is a recipe for undermining the Israeli bargaining position." Rubin quotes former deputy national security adviser Elliot Abrams: "1967 lines with agreed swaps means you're saying to Israel that 'You think you have the Western Wall [of the ancient Jewish temple in Jerusalem] as part of Israel, but we don't ... [and] you need to come up with some swaps that Palestinians believe acceptable to keep the Western Wall in Israel.' " This is not just semantics. Obama is saying to Israel: The starting position for future peace talks is that you don't have the Western Wall, at least not until the Palestinians say you do. Incredible, no? Of course, Obama and his Jewish supporters in high places are hoping — praying? — that not too many people will catch this. So they have launched a major diplomatic offensive to convince us that everything Obama is doing is actually good for Israel. This will be an uphill battle. Notwithstanding Obama's many lofty statements about the "unshakable bond" between Israel and the United States, his record of fairness to Israel in peace talks has been shaky — from demanding draconian construction freezes before negotiations even started to the latest precondition on "1967" borders. As David Horovitz wrote in The Jerusalem Post, "Obama is urging Israel — several of whose leaders have offered dramatic territorial concessions in the cause of peace, and proven their honest intentions by leaving southern Lebanon, Gaza and major West Bank cities, only to be rewarded with new bouts of violence — to give up its key disputed asset, the biblically resonant territory of Judea and Samaria, as stage one of a 'peace' process. "But he is not [explicitly] demanding that the Palestinians — whose leaders have consistently failed to embrace far-reaching peace offers, most notably Ehud Olmert's 2008 offer of a withdrawal to adjusted '67 lines and the dividing of Jerusalem — give up their key disputed asset, the unconscionable demand for a Jewish-state-destroying 'right of return' for millions, until some vague subsequent stage. ..." As Horovitz laments: "Only a president who ignores or underestimates Palestinian hostility to Israel could propose a formula for reviving negotiations in which he set out those parameters for high-risk territorial compromise without simultaneously making crystal clear that there will be no 'right of return' for Palestinian refugees." In my view, that summarizes Obama's biggest mistake: a vexing pattern of letting Palestinians off the hook and putting serious pressure only on Israel. Rubin quotes a Capitol Hill Democrat as being "dismayed" by Obama's lack of evenhandedness: "The perception that Obama's position on the starting point for Middle East peace talks is the same as Abbas's is not only hurtful to his support among pro-Israel Democrats, but has not moved us closer to peace." What's crazy is that in his obsession with pressuring Israel, Obama is ignoring the 800-pound gorilla in the room: Hamas. Remember when Obama stood at the AIPAC convention last month and called the agreement between Hamas and Fatah an "enormous obstacle to peace"? And when he said Israel "cannot be expected to negotiate with Palestinians who do not recognize its right to exist"? And when he demanded that Hamas "accept the basic responsibilities of peace: recognizing Israel's right to exist, rejecting violence, and adhering to all existing agreements"? That made so much sense: If you're going to have a precondition for peace talks, wouldn't recognizing you exist be the natural one? But that was then, and this is now. Away from the klieg lights of AIPAC, our president has decided that the only precondition to peace talks should be Israel agreeing to the Palestinian opening position on borders. And Obama wonders why so many people don't trust him on Israel. If you ask me, Obama's nightmare is to be forced to veto the Palestinian initiative at the United Nations in September. This would single him out in dramatic fashion as a supporter and defender of the Jewish state, thus undermining his internationalist agenda. So, in a desperate attempt to avert that moment of truth, he's putting ridiculous pressure on a great American ally and virtually groveling to entice the rejectionist and conniving Palestinians back to the peace table. How sad. The most powerful man in the world is afraid to utter these simple words: "Our friend and ally Israel has said repeatedly that it is willing to return to the peace table. We call on the Palestinians to do the same; we call on Hamas to agree to the Quartet conditions; and we call on the world community and the United Nations to endorse an immediate return to peace talks between Israel and a Palestinian partner that does not include a terrorist entity." That would have been the right thing to do. Instead, Obama has decided to hand over the Western Wall to the Palestinians as a starting point for negotiations. The only polite Jewish response that I see is, "No, you can't." Contact Susana K-M by email at suanema@gmail.com |
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SYRIA — WORLD ALMANAC OF ISLAMISM
Posted by Matthew RJ Brodsky, June 21, 2011. |
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In May 2011, with the help of former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, the American Foreign Policy Council (AFPC) formally unveiled their groundbreaking new analytical resource on radical Islam, the World Almanac of Islamism. Quite simply, as Secretary Ridge put it in his remarks at the National Press Club, it is "the first, comprehensive, ongoing resource of its kind for tracking Islamism as a political phenomenon." A print version of the Almanac will become commercially available by mid-summer. The bulk of the project — including studies of the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Qaeda, Iraq and Somalia, as well as dozens of other countries and movements — are already available and well worth your time. Please check out the Almanac's online home at http://almanac.afpc.org/. AFPC's goal is to make the Almanac an indispensable resource for all those who are studying and covering the long war against radical Islam. Below is the chapter on Syria authored by JPC's Director of Policy, Matthew RJ Brodsky. It is a timely release given the recent events in the Middle East in general and Syria specifically. |
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OVERVIEW For the past five decades, Syria has used terrorist tactics to advance its goals internally and throughout the Middle East. The methods have varied according to needs and circumstances, however. In the past, Syria has used both its own agents and proxy organizations to launch terrorist attacks. While the regime continues to seek a balance between the promotion of secularism domestically and Islamism abroad, Syrian President Bashar al-Asad has not limited his support to specific ideological strains of Islam. His government, working in tandem with the Islamic Republic of Iran, supports the Shi'a Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, even as it offers varying degrees of assistance to the Sunni Salafist Fatah al-Islam in northern Lebanon. Syria similarly supports and hosts the external leadership of the Sunni Palestinian Hamas movement (an outgrowth of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood), while clamping down on the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood within Syria. Since the fall of Saddam Hussein's Iraq in 2003, Syria also has served as the primary gateway for foreign jihadists entering Iraq. ISLAMIST ACTIVITY Organized and effective Islamist opposition in Syria ceased to exist after President Hafiz al-Asad's brutal crackdown on the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1982. Nevertheless, there remains several groups — notably Jund al-Sham (the Army of the Levant) and Ghuraba al-Sham (Strangers of the Levant) — that remain active in Syria.[1] Jund al-Sham is an amorphous Islamic militant organization, and it remains unclear whether it is the creation of Syrian intelligence or of the late al-Qaeda lieutenant in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, or both. Yet the Syrian regime has claimed that the group carried out several attacks in 2005 and 2006, and that their security services managed to foil several terror attacks at its hands within Syria.[2] The official stance toward Ghuraba al-Sham is similarly muddled, as it is difficult to ascertain whether the organization is truly independent or an invention of the government to provide an outlet for Sunni Islamist tendencies.[3] For example, in June 2006 Syrian security services clashed with terrorists who were allegedly planning an operation in Umayyad Square in Damascus. Those killed and apprehended were found in possession of CDs with sermons from the preacher of the Ash-Sharour mosque in Aleppo, Mahmoud al-Aghasi, also known as Abu Qaqa.[4] Known for his anti-American sermons and calls for the creation of an Islamist state in Syria based on sharia, he preached under the banner of Ghuraba al-Sham, albeit with a contradictory message.[5] In one television interview he credits Jund al-Sham with the attack while at the same time denouncing the Muslim Brotherhood. In another interview he calls for working with the government to "achieve national unity in an Islamic manner."[6] The protests that have been sweeping the region have touched Syria as well. On March 6, 2011, security forces arrested 15 teenagers for spraying anti-regime graffiti on a wall in the southern city of Deraa.[7] Their continued detention sparked massive demonstrations in the city and were met by the regime's brutal crackdown using live fire and tear gas. Asad's response ultimately led to the protests that spread across the country and continue as of this writing.[8] As in other Middle East states in the "Arab Spring," the protests were not designed to bring about a greater role for Islam in the government. Nevertheless, Islam still played in a role to the extent that the mosque is where people congregate for Friday afternoon prayers and the largest protests have come on Friday afternoons, after prayers. ISLAMISM AND SOCIETY Given the high degree of repression inside Syria, it has been difficult for opposition activists to organize within the country. This trend has continued throughout the 2011 protests as well. One observer in Syria noted in April 2011, "There is almost no organization inside Syria among the protesters... As I told my friend, the problem is that unlike Cairo's Tahrir Square, all the demonstrators are dispersed across the country and do not have enough time to talk to each other to decide what they wanted."[9] Nevertheless several dissident groups operate abroad, notably in Western Europe. The former Syrian Vice President, Abd al-Halim Khaddam, formed the National Salvation Front (NSF) with the London-based leader of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, Sadr al-Din Bayanuni, in March 2006.[10] The NSF is an amalgamation of both secular and Islamist opposition groups outside Syria and they held regular meetings with Bush administration officials in 2007 to discuss democracy promotion in Syria.[11] By 2009, the Muslim Brotherhood left the NSF, as differences in the approach to regional issues came to the fore, highlighting the fact that what had unified those in the NSF was opposition to the Asad regime, not the role of Islam in society or manner in which muqawama — resistance — should be practiced. For example, Bayanuni supported Hamas during Israel's Operation Cast Lead at the end of 2008 and supported the Asad regime in its support for the resistance, whereas Khaddam, opposed Hamas and supported Lebanon's secular and pro-freedom March 14 coalition.[12] In recent years, Sunni Islamism has become more pronounced, especially in Syria's larger cities. However, civil society's ability to extend external support to Islamist groups, or the ability of those groups to form an internal base within Syria itself, is nearly nonexistent, given the authoritarian nature of the regime. Instead, such Islamic fervor is harnessed and driven outward to neighboring countries to serve the needs and wishes of the Syrian regime. Even with the current uprising during the "Arab Spring," most of the Salafist groups within Syria have been penetrated by the regime and focused against its enemies in Iraq and Lebanon.[13] While Shi'a Muslims currently constitute only around two percent of Syria's 18 million people, their numbers have grown considerably from 1953, when they numbered no more than 0.4 percent of the Syrian population. Official and reliable statistics pertaining to the birthrates among confessional groups in Syria are tightly regulated by the regime, but an increase in conversions from Sunni to Shi'a can be clearly observed. This increase is, first, the consequence of geography and history. The Shi'a of Syria possess a considerable number of institutions and shrines in the country, such as the tomb of Sayyida Zaynab and the Mosque of the Drop in Aleppo. Numerous pilgrims who help disseminate Shi'ite ideas and doctrines visit these sites. The Shi'a also build houses of study next to their shrines and establish religious authorities there, which has given them more independence with respect to religious rulings. When tallied in 2009, more than 500 husayniyyas (Shi'a houses of prayer) were said to be under construction in Syria; according to other sources, that number refers to husayniyyas in Damascus alone.[14] A drift toward greater expression of Islamic sentiment within Syrian society has received extensive coverage in the media in recent years. More women wear the hijab while more men have grown beards and declined to wear wedding rings.[15] There has also been an increase in the number of Islamic book shops and Islamist sayings that have replaced Ba'ath Party slogans.[16] Additionally, numerous nightclubs and restaurants that serve alcohol have been shut down.[17] The regime's ability to channel Islamic fervor is best demonstrated by Syria's harsh response to the Danish cartoon episode of September 2005, when the newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, published the likeness of the Prophet Muhammad. At least a thousand people held a demonstration outside the Danish embassy in Damascus where dozens then stormed and burned the embassy and replaced the Danish flag with the Saudi flag that reads, "There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his Messenger."[18] At the same time, demonstrations were organized with signs supporting Hezbollah and Hamas.[19] Such behavior does not ordinarily occur in Syria, and should be viewed as a governmental decision to allow Islamists and their sympathizers to direct their anger externally rather than against the regime. The 2011 uprising provided a unique glimpse into some of the tensions that exist within Syrian society. During the initial uprising in Deraa in which the 15 teenagers were arrested, the usual response from the families would have been to quietly seek the intervention of religious and tribal leaders. However, their continued detention sparked massive demonstrations focusing on the Deraa's historic Omari mosque where even the state-vetted Sunni preachers were swept up by the popular passions as demonstrated by their cries over the mosque's loudspeakers.[20] By the time the teenagers were released, the flashpoints between the Syrian security services and the protesters had already claimed many lives. This began the cycle of funerals, which became rallying points for further protests — much like Iran's student movement in 1979.[21] By March 15, the demonstrations had swept across the county. Syrian specialist, Gary Cambill described the revealing disparity: "Secular liberal dissidents took to the streets in relatively small numbers and avoided confrontations with the police, while Kurdish groups largely abstained. In contrast, the demonstrations in Deraa and other predominantly Sunni flashpoints were 20 to 30 times larger, organized under the semi-inviolable protection of mosques and clearly intended to provoke the security forces. While it is premature to characterize the protests as an Islamist uprising, there is little doubt that those most eager to risk death or severe bodily harm are overwhelmingly Sunni and deeply religious."[22] ISLAMISM AND THE STATE Syria has been a stronghold of Arab secularism since the Ba'ath Party seized power in 1963. As scholar Eyal Zisser observed, "The Regime forbade preaching and religious education outside the mosques, increased its involvement in the appointment of clerics to religious institutions in the country, took over the management of the Waqf institutions, and did not hesitate to arrest or even execute clerics who demonstrated against it."[23] The chief political and economic casualty from the rise of this coalition was the urban class in which the Muslim Brotherhood was grounded. Following the rise to power of Hafiz al-Asad in November 1970, the regime attempted to improve its relations with Islamic elements within the state. Softening the anti-Islamic line held by his predecessors, Asad began to participate in prayers at Sunni mosques in Damascus, made a pilgrimage to Mecca, raised the salaries of clerics, and actively tried to gain religious sanction for his minority Alawi community.[24] The result was a 1973 fatwa handed down by Musa al-Sadr, the leader of the Lebanese Shi'a community, which legitimized the Alawis, declaring them to be lawful Shi'a and therefore Muslim in all respects. Nevertheless, in 1976, Islamic militants, some of whom were former Muslim Brotherhood activists, rose up in a violent struggle against Hafiz al-Asad's regime with the goal of toppling the government and replacing it with an Islamic state. The Muslim Brotherhood joined this struggle soon thereafter, drawing their support from the urban Sunni middle class, especially in the northern region of the country. While the Sunnis represented 60 percent of Syria's population (today they represent closer to 70 percent), half the number lived in rural areas and the periphery and did not support the Muslim Brotherhood's vision. The Islamic Revolt lasted from 1976 until 1982, reaching its peak in 1980. It ended in February 1982, when Asad quashed the Muslim Brothers in Hama, the state's fourth-largest town, obliterating the movement as an organized and active force. Tens of thousands were killed and many more were forced to serve long prison sentences. The group's leaders were forced into exile.[25] According to the Brotherhood, some 17,000 party members are either missing or detained inside Syria.[26] The 1990s saw an improvement in the regime's relations with Islamic circles both inside and outside of Syria. The new direction was aimed at endowing Syria with an Islamic look and feel, but stopping short of full religious substance. Official Syrian sponsorship of Islam had the express purpose of preventing the mosque from becoming a source of rebellion. This was manifested through greater official openness to demonstrations of religious faith among Syrian citizens, and the release many members of the Muslim Brotherhood who had been held in Syrian prisons since the suppression of the Islamic Revolt.[27] Nevertheless, the regime continued to repress the Brotherhood, refusing to allow it to resume its activities in Syria. It became clear that Asad's conditions for reconciliation — namely, for the Brotherhood's leaders to repent, confess guilt, and express contrition over the Islamic Revolt and commit not to renew their political activity as an organized movement in Syria — were too difficult for the group to accept. Bashar al-Asad became president after his father's death on June 10, 2000, and he continued efforts to promote an Islamic posture, including further efforts to Islamize the Alawi community. The Muslim Brotherhood, for its part, tried to forge a relationship with the regime in Damascus following Hafiz al-Asad's death, driven by hopes that the organization — whose leaders had become increasingly irrelevant after years of exile — could again become a player in Syria's political scene. These aspirations proved futile, however; the regime under Bashar showed little readiness for compromise. Other Islamist groups have fared little better. The regime's decision to promote a state-sponsored version of Islam has left no alternative means to express any other form of political Islam. The only other prominent Islamic party is the Islamic Liberation Party (Hizb al-Tahrir al-Islami), and its members are subject to frequent arrests by Syrian authorities. The group, which calls for restoring the Islamic caliphate, is banned in most countries and has only a small following in Syria. Asad's regime remains vigilant in arresting and detaining those suspected of Islamist activities with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.[28] While the 2011 Syrian uprising has been largely free of Islamist overtones, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood still seeks a more prominent role and has capitalized on the opportunity to reinvent itself as a street movement. Zuhair Salim, a London-based spokesman for the Syrian branch of the Brothers explained, "We have a desire to coordinate the position of the opposition." Nevertheless, he declined to assume credit for the protests: "We are supporters, and not creators. The voice of the street is a spokesperson for itself."[29] Salim has become more visible in Arabic-language television programs since April 2011, when the Brotherhood decided to back the protest movement, or what the group refers to as a "peaceful, popular intifada," or resistance.[30] The Muslim Brotherhood's attempts to stear the opposition, however, has been hampered as a result of several factors. Since 1980, membership in the brotherhood has been a capital offense and after the brutal crackdown in 1982, most of its leaders were sent into exile. The devastation wrought upon the party also made other anti-government figures wary of political Islam as an effective tool to challenge the regime and unsure of how to engage the group that has had no operational base within Syria for decades. The Brotherhood left the NSF in 2009, and there has been a power struggle for leadership in exile, with Muhammad Riad al-Shakfa replacing Bayanuni as head of the organization in the summer of 2010. Failed alliances coupled with brief overtures to the Asad regime have raised doubts over the their ability to even lead the anti-regime movement from abroad, let alone within Syria.[31] As one Paris-based opposition member and scholar of contemporary oriental studies, Burhan Ghalioun, explains, "Those 30 years destroyed their organization, and they lost their legitimacy because they changed positions so much without explanation over the past five years."[32] Nevertheless, those gathered in Syria's streets have not yet coalesced around a central ideology or political platform. And as of yet, the Brothers do not possess anything tangible to offer the secular protesters. However, the longer the protests remain in a stalemate, the more appealing the Muslim Brotherhood's organization skills and funding may become. After all, despite the Brothers limited organizational ability, it remains one of the oldest anti-government movements in Syria with loose, external affiliations with other Arab Muslim Brotherhood movements.[33] They will likely continue to try to create an organized front with the secular protesters on the streets. The longer the uprising drags on, the larger the role the Brotherhood may play in the future of Syrian politics if the Asad regime falls. If the Syrian government has long succeeded in co-opting Islamism at home, it has been active in the promotion of it abroad as a tool to increase its geopolitical standing in the region. The careful promotion and regulation of Islam pursued by Asad pere and fils were a clear departure from the traditional policy of the Ba'ath regime, which had sought to deprive Islam of any role or influence. Lebanon Syria's relationship with Lebanon's Shi'a militia, Hezbollah, dates back to the group's inception in 1982, when Damascus allowed the Iranian regime to send around 1,000 members of the Revolutionary Guards to the Beka'a Valley of eastern Lebanon, an area occupied by Syrian forces. At the time, Syria was also vying for influence over its smaller neighbor in the Levant. In the years that followed, Syria came to view Hezbollah as an integral tool in its struggle against Israel, as well as a means by which to project its influence onto the world stage. By 1991, Damascus had become Lebanon's de facto overlord. This was the result of Syria's participation in the coalition to oust Saddam Hussein from Kuwait. In return, Asad was given carte blanche to act against General Michael 'Awn, the pro-Iraqi General who stood as an obstacle to achieving Syrian hegemony in Lebanon. The signing of the "Agreement of Fraternity and Cooperation" in May 1991 granted the Asad regime unprecedented control over Lebanon's political system, and allowed it to help shape Hezbollah's role in the country. Relations between Syria and Hezbollah in the 1990s were a marriage of convenience. Syria had a clear interest in continuing to sponsor paramilitary attacks against Israel so long as the Jewish state retained the Golan Heights, and it permitted Hezbollah alone to serve as its chosen proxy. Although there were other militant groups that were allowed to launch occasional small-scale attacks, only Hezbollah was allowed the full range of terrorist activities, from recruiting and training, to deploying a sophisticated resistance apparatus. As such, Hezbollah represented Syrian interests in applying pressure on Israel, which in turn served as Hezbollah's main source of support and legitimacy from within Lebanon. Yet Hafiz al-Asad always applied strict political and military constraints on the group's operations. The subsequent assumption of power by his son Bashar in the year 2000, coupled with Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon the same year, significantly altered the relationship between Damascus and Hezbollah. Whereas Hafiz al-Asad had maintained a measure of distance from Hezbollah's leadership, Bashar sought a more intimate connection. By 2001, Hezbollah's unqualified support for Syria's occupation of Lebanon — at a time when opposition to Damascus had been growing among most sectarian communities in Lebanon — elicited an unprecedented degree of support for the militia from the Syrian regime. Under Bashar al-Asad's direction, Syria has increased its support of Hezbollah in several spheres. It has provided direct military support to the militia, complementing the massive support it already receives from Iran. In the years leading up to the 2006 summer war between Hezbollah and Israel, Syria gave Hezbollah 200mm rockets with 80-kilogram (176 lb) warheads with a range of 70 kilometers (almost 44 miles), and 302mm rockets with 100-kilogram (220 lb) warheads with a potential range of about 100 kilometers (about 62 miles).[34] In addition, Syria gave Hezbollah advanced anti-tank rockets and missiles and quite probably anti-aircraft missiles as well.[35] According to some estimates, 80 percent of the 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli targets by Hezbollah during that conflict came from Syria.[36] Although the flow of weapons from Syria to Lebanon has continued for decades, recent reports indicate that both the quantity and sophistication of the weapons systems has grown. Reports surfaced in 2010 that Syria is transferring Syrian-made M-600 missiles (a Syrian variant of the Iranian Fateh-110 missile) to Hezbollah.[37] Media reports also claimed that Syria transferred Scud D missiles to the Lebanese terrorist group as well.[38] Additionally, in March 2010, Israeli Brig. Gener. Yossi Baidatz told the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that Syria had transferred the Igla-S portable air defense system to the terrorist group.[39] Estimates of Hezbollah's current arsenal, acquired overwhelmingly thanks to Syria and Iran, is estimated at between 40,000 and 60,000 rockets.[40] Syria continues to reassure Hezbollah that it is committed to their relationship. In a September 2008 interview with Hezbollah's Al-Manar television, Asad explained Syrian policy: "We don't see an interest in abandoning the resistance [i.e., Hezbollah]... Our clear position remains in all our political discourse — our steadfast position for resistance" in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine.[41] One month later, Syrian Ambassador to Washington Imad Mustapha referred to Hezbollah as a "close ally" which his country regarded with pride.[42] Hezbollah is not the only Islamist force in Lebanon that Syria supports, however. Following the February 14, 2005 assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri, both Lebanese outrage and diplomatic pressure compelled Damascus to withdraw its military presence after their 30-year occupation. Rather than allowing the Lebanese government to go its own way, the Syrian regime exerted pressure by sponsoring radical, Sunni terrorist movements. This has had the added effect of providing insurance against an ascendant Hezbollah, should a rift between the group and Damascus ever develop. Several Sunni Islamist groups are active today in Lebanon. Much like Syria's porous border with Iraq, the regime allows certain jihadists free passage into Lebanon and assists Salafi Islamist parties there.[43] Sources in Beirut have accused Syrian intelligence of helping to strengthen the Salafi fundamentalist group Fatah al-Islam, a splinter group of the Syrian-created Fatah al-Intifada (established in 1983 to challenge Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement in Lebanon).[44] Reports in the Arab press suggested that Damascus provided weapons to Fatah al-Islam and used the group to assassinate thirty-six people in Lebanon opposed to the Syrian regime.[45] Fatah al-Islam was named by the U.S. as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity on August 13, 2007.[46] Its leader, Shaker al-Absi, had been acting as a Syrian agent since 1983. In 2003, Absi joined the insurgency in Iraq, where he worked with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, then the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Absi was also wanted in Jordan for the October 2002 murder of U.S. diplomat Lawrence Foley — a murder planned by the network set up in Syria by Zarqawi between May and September 2002.[47] Nevertheless, in working to promote Salafist (Sunni) Islamism abroad when it suits the needs of the regime in Damascus, Asad has created a problem for himself. Sensing the recent weakness of the regime in light of the recent 2011 protests, Fatah al-Islam called for Jihad in Syria in a statement disseminated on jihadist websites. The statement was signed by Abu Huraira al-Badawi also known as Khattab al-Maqdisi and it urged Sunnis to awaken and come to the aid of their brothers in Daraa. It also called Muslims in Syria and Lebanon to come to the aid of Fatah al-Islam in their fight against the Shi'ite encroachment from Iran and the "Party of the Devil" (Hizb al-Shytan) — the term used to mock Hezbollah. It should be noted that the statement was not disseminated through an accredited account on jihad forums but rather by members who posted it on behalf of Fatah al-Islam.[48] It is therefore difficult to tell with certainty if this was a true declaration from the terrorist group purely independent of Syrian instructions or whether it was ordered by the Asad regime in its early and ongoing effort to cast the blame for the protests on Islamist elements. Israel and the Palestinian Authority Syria has provided training, weapons, safe haven and logistical support to both secular leftist and Islamist Palestinian hardliners. Damascus is the headquarters for Hamas' external leadership and for the far-left Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command. It also hosts the headquarters of the fundamentalist Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), which draws support directly from the Syrian government.[49] Syria provides both direct and indirect sponsorship and support for Hamas, the main Palestinian Islamist movement. The leading authority of the movement is its "external" leadership, headed by Politburo chief Khalid Mishaal, which currently resides in Damascus with the permission of the Syrian regime. Damascus directs and supports Hamas by political and operational instructions, the transfer of millions of dollars per year, the training of operatives, and the provision of funds for purchasing weapons that are later smuggled into the Palestinian Authority and the Arab states.[50] This connection enables Damascus to directly influence Palestinian politics, from Palestinian Authority reconciliation efforts to the adoption of ceasefires. Moreover, in recent years, Damascus' ability to exercise direct control over the group is said to have increased.[51] The Asad regime was quite happy with the results of the Palestinian Legislative Council elections in January 2006, which saw a Hamas victory and the formation of a Hamas-led government.[52] Since that time, Syrian activity in the Palestinian arena has increased significantly. On the political level, Damascus has stepped up its coordination with several Hamas representatives, including numerous meetings with Khalid Mishaal and meetings between Asad and senior members of the Palestinian government.[53] According to the U.S. State Department's Country Reports on Terrorism 2008, Mishaal's "use of the Syrian Ministry of Information as the venue for press conferences this year could be taken as an endorsement of HAMAS's message."[54] Syria helped Hamas more directly as well. Media reports indicate that Hamas used Syrian soil to train its militant fighters.[55] The Syrian government also facilitated Palestinian conferences organized by Hamas, the PFLP-GC, and PIJ in January 2008, and another conference organized by Hamas and funded by Iran in November. With Mishaal's April 2009 reelection as leader of Hamas' Political Bureau, more Hamas leaders from Gaza traveled to Damascus for meetings and the election of a new politburo.[56] The 2011 uprising in Syria has strained the Syrian-Hamas relationship. Reports surfaced in early May that Hamas might be seeking another home.[57] The apparent spat came as a result of Hamas refusing to publicly condemn the protests. A senior Hamas official at a Palestinian camp near Damascus explained, "The Syrian government said to us, 'Whoever is not with us is against us.' It wants us to express clearly our position over what is going on in Syria. It wants us to be against the Syrian demonstrations. We told them we are neutral. We said to them we are living in the country as visitors and we have no right to comment or interfere in the country's problems."[58] Khalid Mishaal later dismissed rumors that Hamas was seeking to move to Qatar. Whether it is true or not, Hamas has been unwelcome in most Arab capitals and previously had little choice but to accept Syrian patronage. The "Arab Spring" opens up the possibility of creating new bases in Egypt and beyond. This would have grave consequences for the Asad regime, which views Hamas as an asset to balance the more moderate forces of Fatah and the Palestinian Authority. Since Asad's regional value comes from his ability cause mischief throughout the Middle East, losing control over Hamas or Hezbollah weakens his political hand and his ability to project power across the region. Iraq Syria has armed, trained, financed, encouraged, and transported foreign jihadists to fight against Coalition forces in Iraq and against the emerging Iraqi government since Saddam Hussein's regime was toppled in 2003.[59] In Syrian terms, assisting the insurgency in Iraq is not regarded as terrorism but as legitimate resistance to U.S. occupation, and is supervised by Syria's intelligence services.[60] The Syrian trafficking system, which accounts for a large part of the foreign jihadist industry, "is organized into independent rings of smugglers, generally transportation specialists who operate within a given territory and pay an established tribute to one of several officials with authority in that area."[61] The hand of the Syrian state is present throughout. From 2003 to 2007, Syria facilitated both components of the Sunni Iraqi insurgency: the Iraqi Ba'athists and al-Qaeda in Iraq. The "New Regional Command" that was formed by former members of Hussein's regime received finances and directions from Syria.[62] According to estimates in 2004, Syrian financing of insurgents in Ramadi reached $1.2 million per month.[63] Signs of direct Syrian operational presence were also abundant; "U.S. troops in Fallujah, for example, found a GPS system in an explosives production facility that showed routes originating in western Syria. Coalition forces also captured a GPS system that showed waypoints in Western Syria."[64] The following year, Iraq's defense minister charged that 400 detainees had trained in Syria.[65] The foreign fighter network in Syria represented a major contributor to ongoing instability and violence in Iraq. As early as 2004, General Richard Myers, then-chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a press conference in Baghdad, "There are other foreign fighters. We know for a fact that a lot of them find their way into Iraq through Syria for sure."[66] Other estimates suggest that as much as 80 percent of the foreign fighters who have infiltrated Iraq have come through Syria and are responsible for the most lethal suicide bombings in Iraq.[67] Indeed, an Italian investigation of foreign fighter recruitment in Italy found that "Syria has functioned as a hub for an Al-Qaeda network."[68] A large number of these foreign fighters arrived in Syria via the Damascus International Airport.[69] The flow of foreign fighters through Syrian territory reached a high of 80 to 100 a month in mid-2007 and despite repeated appeals Syria did not stem the flow of Sunni suicide bombers into Iraq.[70] 2008 showed a significant drop in the number of jihadists allowed into Iraq, but American sources claim this was the result of Iraqi and Coalition forces operating along the Syrian border — that is to say, not a result of Syrian actions.[71] Despite the short respite, in May 2009, terrorist traffic from Syria spiked again.[72] Examples of Syria's facilitation of terrorist movement into Iraq continued throughout 2010, but have dropped off substantially in 2011.[73] This activity has created a causal connection between the Asad regime and al-Qaeda. Documents seized in a September 2007 raid on an al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) safe house in the border village of Sinjar in Western Iraq revealed that from August 2006 until August 2007 the Syrian city of Dayr al-Zawr along Iraq's border was an active and important logistics hub for fighters en route to Iraq. According to the documents, "AQI has relied on at least 95 different Syrian 'coordinators' to provide such services. Illustrating a sense of how well organized this system was, the coordinators appeared to specialize in working with prospective foreign fighters and suicide bombers from specific locales."[74] It appears from the 606 captured personnel records that all of the listed jihadists entered Iraq from Syria and Syrians comprised the third largest nationality of foreign fighters, behind only Saudis and Libyans.[75] Indeed, the Syrians coordinated the insertion into Iraq of almost all the foreign fighters listed in the Sinjar records.[76] Syria also allowed key al-Qaeda activists in Iraq to use its territory for weapons, supplies, and financing. This came to light in the wake of a U.S. special forces operation in the Syrian village of Sukkariyeh near the Iraq border on October 26, 2008. Abu Ghadiyah, a senior al-Qaeda operative was killed in the raid. American intelligence sources claim he had operated in Syria on behalf of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi where he smuggled money, weapons, and fighters into Iraq and he continued to do so after Zarqawi was killed in 2006.[77] "U.S. intelligence indicates that Abu Ghadiyah supplied foreign jihadists with false passports, trained them, provided them with safe houses, and supplied them with weapons and other supplies. The volunteers came from many countries in the region — Morocco, Libya, Algeria, Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. Abu al-Ghadiyah made housing arrangements for them in Damascus and in the port city of Latakia with the help of Syrian intelligence officers. After moving the volunteers into Iraq, Abu Ghadiyah would continue to see to their logistical needs."[78] American military sources further claimed that Syria has allowed al-Qaeda operatives to train in Syria since 2003.[79] Senior American officials also claim that Syria supplies al-Qaeda in Iraq with bomb-making materials to improve the lethality of their explosives.[80] Footnotes [1] Seth Wikas, "Battling the Lion of Damascus: Syria's Domestic Opposition and the Asad Regime," Washington Institute for Near East Policy Policy Focus< 69, May 2007, 24. [2] "A Look at the Terror Group Jund al-Sham," Washington
Post, September 12, 2006,
[3] Wikas, "Battling the Lion of Damascus," 24. [4] Chris Zambelis, "Violence in Syria Points to Growing Radical
Islamist Unrest," Jamestown Foundation Terrorism Focus 4, iss. 3,
June 13, 2006,
[5] Sami Moubayed, "Terror within Syria," Al-Ahram Weekly
(Cairo), June 14, 2006,
[6] Nicholas Blandord, "In Secular Syria, an Islamic Revival,"
Christian Science Monitor, October 3, 2003,
[7] Leila Fadel, "Syria' Bashar al-Assad faces most serious unrest of
his tenure," Washington Post, March 24, 2011,
[8] Leila Fadel, "Protesters shot as demonstrations expand across
Syria," Washington Post, March 25, 2011,
[9] "Raw Intelligence Report: A View from Syria" STRATFOR,
April 25, 2011,
[10] Eli Lake, "Syrian Opposition to Open Washington Office," New
York Sun, October 20, 2006,
http://www.nysun.com/foreign/syrian-opposition-to-open-
washington-office/42005/; Phil Sands, "Syrian Opposition Group Collapses," The National
(Abu Dhabi), April 21, 2009,
[11] National Salvation Front in Syria, "NSF delegation meets US
officials, announces opening of Washington DC office," April 19, 2007,
[12] "Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Withdraws from Opposition Group,"
Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), April 6, 2009,
[13] Lee Smith, "Crack-up," Tablet Magazine, April 28, 2011,
[14] Khalid Sindawi, "The Shiite Turn in Syria," Hudson Institute Current Trends in Islamist Ideology 8 (2009), 89. [15] Eyal Zisser, "Syria, the Ba'th Regime and the Islamic Movement: Stepping on a New Path," The Muslim World, January 2005, 60-62. [16] Ibid. [17] Ibidem. [18] "Uproar at Syrian cartoon protests," BBC (London), February 5,
2006,
[19] Ibid. [20] Gary Cambill, "Assad's Survival Strategy," Foreign
Policy, April 6, 2011,
[21] Ibid. [22] Gary Cambill, "Assad's Survival Strategy," Foreign
Policy, April 6, 2011,
[23] Zisser, "Syria, the Ba'th Regime and the Islamic Movement," 45. [24] Ibid. [25] Thomas Mayer, "The Islamic Opposition in Syria, 1961-1982," Orient 24 (1983); Patrick Seale and Maureen McConville, Asad of Syria: The Struggle for the Middle East, (London: I.B. Tauris, 1988), 320-338. [26] Jared A. Favole, "Brotherhood Raises Syria Profile: Islamist
Group Tries to Organize Opposition to Assad Regime, as Protests Waiver,"
Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2011,
[27] They were released in several presidential amnesties in December 1991 (2,864 prisoners), March 1992 (600 prisoners), November 1993 (554 prisoners), November 1995 (1,200 prisoners), and 1998 (250 prisoners). [28] Wikas, "Battling the Lion of Damascus," 25. [29] Jared A. Favole, "Brotherhood Raises Syria Profile: Islamist
Group Tries to Organize Opposition to Assad Regime, as Protests Waiver,"
Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2011,
[30] Ibid. [31] Ibid. [32] Ibid. [33] Ibid. [34] Reuven Erlich, "Syria as a Strategic Prop for Hezbollah and
Hamas," Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for
Special Studies, August 3, 2006, 4,
[35] Ibid. [36] Yaakov Amidor, "Misreading the Second Lebanon War," Jerusalem
Center for Public Affairs Jerusalem Issue Brief 15, No. 16,
January 16, 2007,
[37] "Report: Hizbullah Deployed Syrian-Made Missiles Capable of
Destroying Israel," Naharnet, January14, 2010,
[38] Yaakov Katz, "Barak: Syria-Lebanon arms transfer violates UN
resolutions," Ha'aretz (Tel Aviv), April 13, 2010,
[39] Andrew Tabler, "Inside the Syrian Missile Crisis," Foreign
Policy, April 14, 2010,
[40] Simon McGregor-Wood, "Missiles on Menu as Hezbollah, Iran and
Syria Dine," ABC News, February 26, 2010,
[41] "Al Asad lil Manar: Mowqifna min al muqawama thabit was lam
yataghayir [Al-Asad to Al-Manar: Our Position On The Resistance Remains
Steadfast And Unchanged]," Al Manar (Beirut), September 4, 2008,
[42] "Syria Envoy: Future Generations Will Pay If Israel Scuttles
Peace Talks," Ha'aretz (Tel Aviv), October 22, 2008,
[43] "Lebanese Salafism: Between Global Jihad and Syrian
Manipulation," NowLebanon, n.d.,
[44] Benny Avni, "Syrian Intelligence Linked to Terrorist Group,"
New York Sun, October 25, 2007,
[45] "Militant Mastermind Flees from Lebanon to Syria," Ya Libnan
(Beirut), June 5, 2007,
[46] "Individuals and Entities Designated by the State Department
Under E.O. 13224," in U.S. Department of State, Office of the
Coordinator For Counterterrorism, Terrorism Designations, June
23, 2010,
[47] For more on Shaker al-Absi, see "The Inside Story of Fatah al
Islam's Leader Shaker al-Absi," Ya Libnan (Beirut), June 16, 2007,
http://yalibnan.com/site/archives/2007/06/
lebanon_the_ins_1.php; Dani
Berkovich, "The Stand-off Between the Lebanese Army and 'Fatah
al-Islam': A Test of the Siniora Government's Determination," Tel Aviv
University Institute for National Security Studies Tel Aviv Insight no.
19, June 3, 2007,
[48] "Fath Al-Islam Calls for Jihad in Syria," Special Dispatch
— Syria/Jihad & Terrorism Threat Monitor No. 3709, MEMRI, March
28, 2011.
http://www.memri.org/report/en/
0/0/0/0/0/0/5140.htm.
[49] "Anti-Israeli Terrorism, 2006: Data, Analysis and Trends,"
Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Center for Special
Studies, March 2007, 91,
[50] Ibid. [51] Kifah Zaboun, "Hamas: Who is in Charge?" Asharq Alawsat, February 14, 2009, http://www.aawsat.com/english/news.asp? section=3&id=15728. [52] George Baghdadi, "Syria Congratulates Hamas on Gaza 'Victory,'"
CBS News, January 24, 2009,
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_162-
4750858-503543.html; "Assad:
Hamas Win Decreases Int'l Pressure on Damascus," Ha'aretz (Tel
Aviv), March 6, 2006,
[53] "Chapter 3: State Sponsors of Terrorism, Syria," in U.S.
Department of State, Office of the Coordinator For Counterterrorism,
Country Reports on Terrorism 2008 (Washington, DC: U.S.
Department of State, April 30, 2009),
http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/crt/2008/122436.htm; David Schenker,
"Syria, Hamas, and the Gaza Crisis," Washington Institute for Near East
Policy PolicyWatch no. 1121, July 10, 2006,
[54] [liv] "Chapter 3: State Sponsors of Terrorism, Syria," in Country Reports on Terrorism 2008. [55] Ibid. [56] "Masha'al Reelected as Hamas Leader," Al Bawaba,
April 27, 2009,
[57] Ethan Bronner, "Tensions Rise as Hamas Refuses to Take Sides in
Syria," New York Times, May 2, 2011,
[58] Ibid. [59] "Engaging Syria? U.S. Constraints and Opportunities," International Crisis Group Middle East Report no. 83 (February 11, 2009), 3. [60] "Syrian President Bashar Assad Meets Iran's Supreme Leader,"
Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA), August 20, 2009,
[61] Brian Fishman, ed., Bombers, Bank Accounts & Bleedout:
Al-Qa'ida's Road In And Out Of Iraq (West Point, New York: Harmony
Project, 2008), 3,
[62] Ryan Mauro, "Has Damascus Stopped Supporting Terrorists?" Middle
East Quarterly, Summer 2009, pp. 61-67,
[63] Mauro, "Has Damascus Stopped Supporting Terrorists?"; Thomas E. Ricks, Fiasco: The American Adventure in Iraq, 2003 to 2005 (New York: Penguin Press, 2006), 409.
[64] Mauro, "has Damascus Stopped Supporting Terrorists?"; See also
Nicholas Blanford, "More Signs of Syria Turn up in Iraq," Christian
Science Monitor, December 23, 2004,
[65] "180 Terrorists Escape to Syria at Start of Operation Steel Curtain," KUNA (Kuwait City), November 5, 2005. [66] "Coalition Provisional Authority Briefing," Baghdad, Iraq, April 15, 2004. [67] "Jihadist Blowback?" The Economist (London), October 2, 2008; Fishman, Bombers, Bank Accounts & Bleedout, 6. [68] Sebastian Rotella, "A Road to Ansar Began in Italy," Los
Angeles Times, April 28, 2003,
[69] Joseph Lieberman, "Al Qaeda's Travel Agent," Wall Street
Journal, August 20, 2007,
70] Karen DeYoung, "Terrorist Traffic Via Syria Again Inching Up:
Pipeline to Iraq Back In Business After Lull." Washington Post,
May 11, 2009,
[71] Ibid. [72] Ibidem. [73] Robert Burns, "Syrian Envoy Denies Aiding Insurgency in Iraq,"
Seattle Times, November 11, 2009,
[74] Joseph Felter and Brian Fishman, Al-Qaida's Foreign Fighters
in Iraq: A First Look at the Sinjar Records, (West Point, New York:
Harmony Project, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, December 19,
2007),
[75] Ibid. [76] Fishman, Bombers, Bank Accounts & Bleedout, 3, 32, 36; The insertion of the Saudi terrorists is especially instructive as Saudi Arabia shares a lengthy and porous border with Iraq. The Saudi jihadists presumably choose to travel to Iraq through Syria because Asad tolerates what the Saudi leadership will not. It is also possible that the total Syrian numbers are underrepresented, since Syrians formed a majority of the detainees held at Camp Bucca, the main U.S. detention camp in Iraq. [77] Amir Kulick and Yoram Schweitzer, "Syria and the Global Jihad: A
Dangerous Double Game," Institute for National Security Studies
Strategic Assessment 11, no.3, January 2009, 67; See also Mark
Hosenball, "Targeting a 'Facilitator:' A Commando Raid into Syria Aimed
at Al Qaeda in Iraq," Newsweek, October 27, 2008,
[78] Amir Kulick and Yoram Schweitzer, "Syria and the Global Jihad: A Dangerous Double Game," Strategic Assessment, Institute for National Security Studies, Vol. 11, No.3, January 2009, 67. [79] "Department of Defense News Briefing with Maj. Gen. Kelly from
Iraq," Baghdad, Iraq, October 23, 2008,
[80] See federal district court ruling in Washington, D.C.,
Francis Gates, et al., v. Syrian Arab Republic, et al., Civil
Action No. 06-1500 (RMC)
This is archived at
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AN OBAMA FOREIGN POLICY
Posted by HandsFiasco, June 21, 2011. |
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This was written by Caroline B. Glick
and it appeared in Jewish World Review.com
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Robert Gates' recent remarks signal that the president's handling of US foreign affairs is about to undergo a dramatic transformation Outgoing US Defense Secretary Robert Gates is worried about the shape of things to come in US foreign policy. In an interview with Newsweek over the weekend, Gates sounded the warning bells. In Gates' words, "I've spent my entire adult life with the United States as a superpower, and one that had no compunction about spending what it took to sustain that position. It didn't have to look over its shoulder because our economy was so strong. This is a different time. "To tell you the truth, that's one of the many reasons it's time for me to retire, because frankly I can't imagine being part of a nation, part of a government... that's being forced to dramatically scale back our engagement with the rest of the world." What Gates is effectively saying is not that economic forecasts are
gloomy. US defense spending comprises less than five percent of the
federal budget. If US President Barack Obama wanted to maintain that
level of spending, the Republican-controlled Congress would probably
pass his defense budget. What Gates is saying is that he doesn't trust
his commander in chief to allocate the resources to preserve America's
superpower status. He is saying that he believes that Obama is willing
to surrender the US's status as a superpower.
THIS WOULD be a stunning statement for any defense secretary to make about the policies of a US President. It is especially stunning coming from Gates. Gates began his tenure at the Pentagon under Obama's predecessor George W. Bush immediately after the Republican defeat in the 2006 mid-term Congressional elections. Many conservatives hailed Obama's decision to retain Gates as defense secretary as a belated admission that Bush's aggressive counter-terror policies were correct. These claims ignored the fact that in his last two years in office, with the exception of the surge of troops in Iraq, under the guidance of Gates and then secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, Bush's foreign policies veered very far to the Left. Gates's role in shaping this radical shift was evidenced by the positions he took on the issues of the day in the two years leading up to his replacement of Donald Rumsfeld at the Pentagon. In 2004, Gates co-authored a study for the Council on Foreign Relations with Israel foe Zbigniew Brzezinski calling for the US to draw closer to Iran at Israel's expense. Immediately before his appointment, Gates was a member of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group. The group's final report, released just as his appointment was announced, blamed Israel for the instability in Iraq and throughout the Middle East. Its only clear policy recommendations involved pressuring Israel to surrender the Golan Heights to Syria and Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria to a Hamas-Fatah "national unity government." In office, Gates openly opposed the option of the US or Israel attacking Iran's nuclear installations. He rejected Israel's repeated requests to purchase weapons systems required to attack Iran's nuclear installations. He openly signaled that the US would deny Israel access to Iraqi airspace. He supported American appeasement of the Iranian regime. And he divulged information about Israel's purported nuclear arsenal and Israeli Air Force rehearsals of assaults on Iran. A month before Russia's August 2008 invasion of US ally Georgia, Gates
released his National Defense Strategy which he bragged was a "blueprint
for success" for the next administration. Ignoring indications of
growing Russian hostility to US strategic interests — most clearly
evidenced in Russia's opposition to the deployment of US anti-missile
batteries in the Czech Republic and Poland and in Russia's strategic
relations with Iran and Syria — Gates advocated building
"collaborative and cooperative relations" with the Russian military.
After Russia invaded Georgia, Gates opposed US action of any kind
against Russia.
GIVEN THIS track record, it was understandable that Obama chose to retain Gates at the Pentagon. To date, Obama's only foreign policy that is distinct from Bush's final years is his Israel policy. Whereas Bush viewed Israel as a key US ally and friend, from the first days of his administration, Obama has sought to "put daylight" between the US and Israel. He has repeatedly humiliated Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. He has abandoned the US's quiet defense of Israel's purported nuclear arsenal. He has continuously threatened to abandon US support for Israel at the UN. Not only has Obama adopted the Palestinians' increasingly hostile policies towards Israel. He has led them to those policies. It was Obama, not Fatah chief Mahmoud Abbas, who first demanded that Israel cease respecting Jewish property rights in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. It was Obama, not Abbas, who first called for the establishment of a Palestinian state by the end of 2011. It was Obama, not Abbas, who first stipulated that future "peace" negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians must be predicated on Israel's prior acceptance of the indefensible 1949 armistice lines as a starting point for talks. All of these positions, in addition to Obama's refusal to state outright that he rejects the Palestinian demand to destroy Israel through unlimited Arab immigration to its indefensible "peace" borders, mark an extreme departure from the Israel policies adopted by his predecessor. Aside from its basic irrationality, Obama's policy of favoring the Palestinians against the US's most dependable ally in the Middle East is notable for its uniqueness. In every other area, his policies are aligned with those adopted by his predecessor. His decision to surge the number of US forces in Afghanistan was a natural progression from the strategy Bush implemented in Iraq and was moving towards in Afghanistan. His use of drones to conduct targeted killings of terrorists in Yemen and Pakistan is an escalation not a departure from Bush's tactics. Obama's decision to gradually withdraw US combat forces from Iraq was fully consonant with Bush's policy. His decision to engage with the aim of appeasing the Iranian regime while supporting the adoption of ineffective sanctions against Iran in the UN Security Council is also a natural progression from Bush's policies. His bid to "reset" US relations with Russia was largely of a piece with Bush's decision not to oppose in any way Russia's invasion of Georgia. Obama's courtship of Syria is different from Bush's foreign policy. But guided by Rice and Gates, Bush was softening his position on Syria. For instance, Bush endorsed Rice's insistence that Israel remain mum on the North Korean-built illicit nuclear installation at Deir-A-Zour that the Air Force destroyed in September 2007. As for Egypt, as many senior Bush administration officials crowed, Obama's abandonment of 30-year US ally Hosni Mubarak was of a piece with Bush's democracy agenda. Obama's policy toward Libya is in many respects unique. It marks the first time since the War Powers Act passed into law 30 years ago that a US President has sent US forces into battle without seeking the permission of the US Congress. It is the first time that a president has openly subordinated US national interests to the whims of the UN and NATO and insisted on fighting a war that serves no clear US national interest. Notably, Gates has been an outspoken critic of the war in Libya. In interviews in March he said that Muammar Gaddafi posed no threat to US interests and that no vital US interests are served by the US mission in Libya. Yet even Obama's Libya policy is not as sharp a departure from Bush's
foreign policy as his Israel policy is. Although Bush wouldn't have
argued that the UN gets to decide where US troops are deployed, he did
believe that the US needed UN permission to deploy troops.
TO A degree, it is the basic incoherence of Obama's Libya policy that puts it in line with all of his other foreign policies except Israel. Those policies — from Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay — are marked by inconsistencies. Like Libya, there is a strong sense that Obama's foreign policy to date has not been guided by an overarching worldview but rather spring from ad hoc decisions with no guiding conceptual framework. But if Gates's words to Newsweek are any indication, all of this may be about to change. If Gates believed that Obama would continue to implement the policies of Bush's last two years with minor exceptions while sticking it to Israel, he would likely not have spoken out against Obama's policies so strongly. Apparently Gates believes that Obama's foreign policy is about to undergo a radical transformation. And this would make sense, particularly if, as Obama has said a number of times, he is more committed to transforming America than winning a second term in office. Until the Republicans won control of the House of Representatives last November, Obama was able to concentrate on passing his domestic agenda. Obama's willingness to lose the elections in order to push through his radical health care reform package demonstrated his commitment to implementing his policies at all costs. With the Republicans in charge, Obama can't even pass his 2011 budget let alone his far reaching plans to transform US immigration policy, labor policy, environmental policy and Social Security. In these circumstances, the only place where the power of the presidency gives him wide-ranging freedom of action to transform the US is foreign affairs. What Gates's fiery departure indicates then is that for the rest of his term, Obama's entire foreign policy is liable to be as radical a departure from Bush's foreign policy as his Israel policy is. The war in Libya is a sign that things are changing. The fact that in recent months even Gates has taken to attacking Obama's Iran policy as too soft, further attests to a radicalization at work. Then there is Obama's Afghanistan policy. When in 2009 Obama announced his surge and withdraw policy, Gates minimized the importance of Obama's pledge to begin withdrawing US combat forces in July 2011. In recent months, Gates has joined US combat commanders in pleading with the White House not to begin the troop drawdown until next year. But to no avail. Not only is he unwilling to delay the withdrawal of combat troops. Obama is suing for peace with the Taliban. As Republican lawmakers have argued, there is no way the empowerment of the Taliban in Afghanistan can be viewed as anything but a defeat for the US. Gates's successor at the Pentagon will be outgoing CIA Director Leon Panetta. US military and intelligence officers believe that Panetta's chief mission at the Pentagon will be to slash US defense budgets. Since his appointment was announced, sources inside the military have expressed deep concern that the planned budget cuts will render it impossible for the US to maintain its position as a global superpower. More than anything else, Gates' statements to Newsweek indicate that he shares this perception of Obama's plans. To date, Obama's stewardship of US foreign policy has been marked by gross naivete, incompetence and a marked willingness to demean and weaken his country's moral standing in the world. Imagine what will happen if in the next year and a half Obama embarks on a course that makes his Israel policy the norm rather than the exception in US foreign policy. Contact HandsFiasco at handsfiasco@webtv.net |
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THE LAST JEW IN KABUL
Posted by Marion DS Dreyfus, June 21, 2011. |
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A true story. |
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Like the last Ishi Marion Dreyfus is a published poet. She reads her poems frequently. Contact her at dreyfusmarion@hotmail.com to find when the next reading is scheduled. She runs two workshops for writers and poets as well as teaching business writing. |
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"LAND SWAPS" AND THE 1967 LINES
Posted by Daily Alert, June 21, 2011. |
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This below is a summary of an article written by Dore Gold and
it appeared in the Weekly Standard
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When President Obama first made his controversial reference to the 1967 lines as the basis for future Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, he introduced the idea that there would be "mutually agreed swaps" of land between the two sides. Yet neither UN Security Council Resolution 242 nor any subsequent signed agreements with the Palestinians stipulated that Israel would have to pay for any West Bank land it would retain by handing over its own sovereign land in exchange. So where did the idea of land swaps come from? During the mid-1990s, Israeli academics involved in backchannel talks accepted the principle that the Palestinians would obtain 100% of the territory, just like Egypt received 100% of the Sinai Peninsula, and they proposed giving Israeli land to the Palestinians as compensation for any West Bank land retained by Israel. In July 2000 at the Camp David Summit, the Clinton administration raised the land swap idea that had been proposed by Israeli academics, but after the collapse of the Camp David talks, President Clinton stipulated: "These are my ideas. If they are not accepted, they are off the table, they go with me when I leave office." Prime Minister Ehud Olmert resurrected the land swap idea in 2008 as part of newly proposed Israeli concessions. However, the Palestinians said they would demand land swaps of "comparable value" — meaning, they would not accept some remote sand dunes in exchange for high quality land near the center of Israel. Given the limitations on the quantity and quality of territory that Israel could conceivably offer, the land swap idea was emerging as impractical. What is the standing of ideas from failed negotiations in the past that appear in the diplomatic record? Just because an idea was discussed in the past, does that make it part of the diplomatic agenda in the future, even if the idea was never part of any legally binding, signed agreements? The Daily Alert is sponsored by Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and prepared by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA). To subscribe to their free daily alerts, send an email to daily@www.dailyalert.jcpa.org |
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DENNIS MILLER ON ISRAEL
Posted by Bryna Berch, June 20, 2011. |
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This below is usually attributed to Dennis Miller, the comedian who provides straight talk about Israel and the Middle East. It certainly sounds like him. However, according to Snopes (which is fairly reliable except when it comes to something that might damage the Left or make the Right look good), it actually was written in April 2002 by Larry Miller, who is also a humorist. Whichever Miller, the product is right on the mark. |
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"Let me share my current thoughts on the blockade of Gaza by Egypt and Israel". 'A brief overview of the situation is always valuable, so as a service to all Americans who still don't get it, I now offer you the story of the Middle East in just a few paragraphs, which is all you really need. Here we go: The Palestinians want their own country. There's just one thing about that: There are no Palestinians. It's a made up word. Israel was called Palestine for two thousand years. Like 'Wiccan,' 'Palestinian' sounds ancient but is really a modern invention. Before the Israelis won the land in the 1967 war, Gaza was owned by Egypt, the West Bank was owned by Jordan, and there were no Palestinians.' As soon as the Jews took over and started growing oranges as big as basketballs, what do you know, say hello to the 'Palestinians',weeping for their deep bond with their lost 'land' and 'nation'. So for the sake of honesty, let's not use the word 'Palestinian' any more to describe these delightful folks, who dance for joy at our deaths until someone points out they're being taped. Instead, let's call them what they are: 'Other Arabs Who Can't Accomplish Anything in Life and Would Rather Wrap Themselves In The Seductive Melodrama Of Eternal Struggle And Death.' I know that's a bit unwieldy to expect to see on CNN. How about this then: 'Adjacent Jew-Haters'. Okay, so the Adjacent Jew-Haters want their own country. Oops, just one more thing: No, they don't. They could've had their own country. Anytime in the last thirty years, especially several years ago at Camp David. But If you have your own country, you have to have traffic lights and garbage trucks. And Chambers of Commerce, and worse, you actually have to figure out some way to make a living. That's no fun. No, they want what all the other Jew-Haters in the region want: Israel. They also want a big pile of dead Jews, of course that's where the real fun is — but mostly they want Israel. Why? For one thing, trying to destroy Israel — or 'The Zionist Entity' as their textbooks call it — the last fifty years has allowed the rulers of Arab countries to divert the attention of their own people away from the fact that they're the blue-ribbon most illiterate, poorest, and tribally backward on God's Earth, and if you've ever been around God's Earth, you know that's really saying something. It makes me roll my eyes every time one of our pundits waxes poetic about the great history and culture of the Muslim Mideast. Unless I'm missing something, the Arabs haven't given anything to the world since Algebra, and, by the way, thanks a hell of a lot for that one. Chew this around and spit it out: Five hundred million Arabs; five million Jews. Think of all the Arab countries as a football field, and Israel as a pack of matches sitting in the middle of it. And now these same folks swear that if Israel gives them half of that pack of matches, everyone will be pals.. Really? Wow, what neat news. Hey, but what about the string of wars to obliterate the tiny country and the constant din of rabid blood oaths to drive every Jew into the sea? Oh, that? We were just kidding. My friend, Kevin Rooney, made a gorgeous point the other day: Just reverse the numbers. Imagine five hundred million Jews and five million Arabs. I was stunned at the simple brilliance of it. Can anyone picture the Jews strapping belts of razor blades and dynamite to themselves? Of course not. Or marshaling every fiber and force at their disposal for generations to drive a tiny Arab state into the sea? Nonsense. Or dancing for joy at the murder of Innocents? Impossible. Or spreading and believing horrible lies about the Arabs baking their bread with the blood of children? Disgusting. No, as you know, left to themselves in a world of peace, the worst Jews would ever do to people is debate them to death. However, in any big-picture strategy, there's always a danger of losing moral weight. We've already lost some. After September 11th our president told us and the world he was going to root out all terrorists and the countries that supported them. Beautiful. Then the Israelis, after months and months of having the equivalent of an Oklahoma City every week (and then every day) starts to do the same thing we did, and we tell them to show restraint. If America were being attacked with an Oklahoma City every day, we would all very shortly be screaming for the administration to just be done with it and kill everything south of the Mediterranean and east of the Jordan. |
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THE ECONOMIC WARFARE INSTITUTE BLOG
Posted by Ken Jensen and Rachel Ehrenfeld, June 20, 2011. |
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From the Editors of the Economic Warfare Institute Blog From Ken Jensen Welcome. This is the first posting of the Economic Warfare Institute Blog, a
continuing collection of important news, analysis, and opinion. EWI is
part of the American Center for Democracy:
The breadth of the items listed below should be taken as an indication that we will provide the social and political "context" for economic warfare issues and the threats to U.S. security. Economic warfare issues, of course, include terrorism finance, Shari'a-compliant banking, and economic threats posed by non-state global actors and countries such as China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States and Iran. Some emphasis will be placed on developments in the cybernetic, space, and energy arenas, as well as in those of commodities and natural resources. From time to time, this blog will include exclusive commentary from experts active in the commercial, financial, business and law enforcement sectors. Topics in the blog will be listed by region, then subject matter-beginning with the Middle East and ending with threats to energy. A list follows immediately below that shows the rough order of topics. Needless to say, subsequent postings will be more brief than this first effort, which consists of 128 items and covers a good deal of the spring of 2011. We provide suggestions for reading largely without commentary. For the most part, article titles speak for themselves. TOPICS THAT FOLLOW (not all topics will be covered in each posting and new topics will be added): REGIONS Middle East & Africa . Saudi Arabia . Persian Gulf . Palestinians
. Syria . Egypt . Sudan . Yemen . Libya . Turkey . Iran . Nigeria
ISSUES . Energy . Finance (Markets & Companies) . Cyberwarfare . Banking . Sharia Banking/Investment . Multinationals . Tax Evasion/Money Laundering/Transparency . Terrorism Funding (States & Non-State Actors) . Illegal Drugs . Commodities . Transnational Crime . Global Institutions (IMF, World Bank, UN)
From Rachel Ehrenfeld Welcome to the EWI Blog. Until recently, "economic warfare" was identified as actions undertaken by states against other states. In the last decade many states have used international terrorist and transnational criminal organizations to carry out "economic terrorism" against other states. This entailed varied, coordinated and sophisticated actions aimed at disrupting the economic and financial stability of a state, a group of states, or a society (e.g., market-oriented western societies) for ideological or religious motives. Actions undertaken in economic warfare may or may not be violent. They have immediate effects, psychological as well as real, which in turn have economic consequences. Massive threats against infrastructures have already been addressed, although the growing centralization of utilities, communication services, food manufacturing and supplies have increased the potential threat. The threats of chemical, biological and nuclear (CBRN) attacks against populations have been also discussed, as well as cyberattacks. However, potential coordinated actions against the U.S. and Western economic and financial systems seem to be ignored: for example, manipulations of the energy market by OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries), and ALBA (the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas); abuse of the Mobile Payment systems, incremental dollar sell-off; currency and commodity manipulations; "short selling;" "high frequency" trading; the rapid rise of "Exchange-Traded Funds (ETF)-potentially changing the trading of assets currently over $1,5000 billion under management-from equities to commodities, and Shari'a compliant financing — the last three being especially opaque — are a few examples). Terms of Use: THE EWI Blog is a private sending to the friends of the Institute. Please do not quote from it. Keeping this version of the blog private allows us to avoid copyright problems and provide full texts (which are more expeditious than links), and, on occasion, graphics and photographs. Recipients may ask us to include other readers or to have them contact us to be included. A straight-forward email to kjensen@acfr.org will take care of this. If you do not wish to receive this blog, a straightforward email to the same address will take care of the matter. |
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OBAMA'S EFFORTS TO REFORM THE UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL HAVE FAILED MISERABLY
Posted by Eye on the UN, June 20, 2011. |
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This was written by Anne Bayefsky, editor of EYEontheUN. She is also a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and at Touro College. Contact the organization at info@EYEonthe UN.org This article appeared today in the Jerusalem Post. |
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On Friday at 6 p.m., the Obama administration's promises to fix the disreputable UN Human Rights Council by becoming a member died a predictable death at the General Assembly. Knowing they were headed for certain defeat, Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of International Organization Affairs Esther Brimmer gave a speech at a Washington institute last Wednesday touting President Barack Obama's "reform" accomplishments from inside the UN's top human rights body. And her whitewash was supplemented at the end of the week by a barrage of statements and press releases from the State Department. It didn't even pass House Speaker John Boehner's "straight-face test" for the president's foreign policy. While the GA was nailing the coffin shut on council reform in New York, the council itself was wrapping up its latest session in Geneva with its usual systematic efforts to demonize the State of Israel. Though Brimmer's speech included a disingenuous declaration that US membership in the council was especially beneficial for Israel, Friday's events will solidify the growing perception of the president's dangerous disinterest in Israel's welfare. The council was the "reformed" version of the UN Human Rights Commission, which once flaunted a Libyan chair. The Bush administration and its UN ambassador John Bolton opposed this 2006 "reform" on the grounds that the changes were superficial and there were no membership criteria for election to what was, after all, the UN's top human rights body. The European Union, however, was bought off by including a five-year review plan. That review ended Friday with the adoption of a GA resolution that kicked any further reconsideration down the road "10-15 years." From the day it began, the council has proved to be even worse than its predecessor. Sitting in judgment on human rights violations worldwide are such luminaries as China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia. Member Libya had no difficulty being elected, and its suspension didn't occur until March of this year, when the numbers of dead finally proved too embarrassing. But throwing women in jail for driving, outlawing freedom of religion, rendering homosexuality a capital offense and periodically cutting off heads haven't made a dent in Saudi membership.
ON THE contrary, the most recent council election, which took place on May 20 at the GA, looked like this. Just before the vote, candidate Kuwait gave each state's representative in the Assembly Hall a little box decorated with its flag and containing four delightful fresh dates. Austria gave delegates a package of cookies with a pretty bow marked "taste of Austria." Costa Rica distributed a colorful red wooden toy cart. India handed out "high elevation darjeeling tea," and Romania gave out a very nice large calendar. Along with Burkina Faso, where most of the female population has undergone female genital mutilation — aka torture — they were all duly elected. With their actual human rights credentials off the table, council members adopted a fixed agenda of only a few items to govern their proceedings. One item is devoted to Israel alone and one to all other 191 UN member states. The Human Rights Commission spent 40 years adopting country-specific criticisms, a third of which condemned Israel. Fifty percent of the "reformed" council's country-specific resolutions and decisions are devoted to Israel-bashing. There have been 12 special sessions in the last five years, and half of them have been on Israel alone. There has been only one "urgent debate" on a country — Israel. There have been more human rights reports commissioned on Israel than on any other state. And only one country is not allowed even to attend the lobbying and information-sharing regional meetings associated with the council sessions — Israel — while "Palestine" is invited to all of them. Rather than discredit a body that calls itself a human rights authority but reeks of discrimination, and is tasked with promoting tolerance but provides a global platform for hate-mongering, Obama decided to give it American credibility and taxpayer dollars. His No. 1 excuse was the promise to reform it from the inside. Here's Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and UN Ambassador Susan Rice on March 31, 2009, explaining the reason to join: "The Council... is scheduled to undergo a formal review of its structure and procedures in 2011, which will offer a significant opportunity for Council reform." US Ambassador to the Council Eileen Donahoe, in a September 13, 2010, New York Times editorial, called the review "a serious self-reflection exercise" and claimed that "if we do not sit at the table with others and do the work necessary to influence the process, US values and priorities will not be reflected in the outcome." Even as late as March 25 of this year, a poker-faced administration spokesperson said: "The United States... looks forward to working with UN member states as the HRC review process continues in New York. There is still room to... ensure greater scrutiny of the human rights records of candidates for election to this body."
ON FRIDAY, those promises were shown to be utterly fraudulent. Every major recommendation that American negotiators made over a process spanning many months, including instituting membership criteria and changing the discriminatory anti-Israel agenda, was rejected. Only four states voted in the GA against the outcome of the non-reform reform: Israel, the United States, Canada and Palau. Gloating over the total defeat of the Obama plan were Syria (speaking for the Arab group), Russia (speaking for a revealing "cross-regional group" comprising Algeria, Belarus, Bolivia, China, Cuba, Iran, Nicaragua, Pakistan, Syria, Venezuela, Vietnam and Yemen), Tajikistan (speaking for the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC)), Iran and Egypt. Syria called the president's bluff this way: "Warmest thanks... Our efforts were crowned by arriving at the document before us today... The main objective of our work was... not reform because the Council was already a reform of the Commission." Islamic states have reason to be pleased. The council majority is held by a combination of two regional groups — African and Asian — and OIC members are the majority on both of these groups, thus giving them the balance of power. The consequences of this political landscape were reinforced by Friday's events at the council session in Geneva. The council wrapped up its latest session by adopting one more resolution on Israel — this time about the eight Turkish extremists killed a year ago trying to ram a legal blockade of terrorist-run Gaza. There was no resolution on Syria — further condemnation by the council was put off until next session, three months away. And nothing from the council on Yemen, on account of insufficient data. Of the eight votes in total held at this session, the US was on the losing side for six of them. According to the Obama administration, however, the current US approach to the UN is supposedly good for Israel. In Brimmer's words, the council has "improved as the result of direct US engagement. If we cede ground, if our engagement in the UN system is restricted — these bodies likely would be dominated by our adversaries. A scenario... not good for the United States and certainly not for Israel." The Obama line about knowing what is in Israel's best interests is beginning to wear very thin. The council's vote on the flotilla resolution was 36 for, eight abstentions and one against — the United States. US membership has made no difference to the outcomes on Israel. But it has given those outcomes a credibility that they don't deserve. After Friday's GA vote, Obama diplomat John Sammis labeled the council's "effectiveness and legitimacy" as "compromised," called its agenda "unfair and unbalanced," and said its membership policy "discredits, dishonors and diminishes" the body. Talk is cheap. The decent thing for the US to do after finally coming to such a conclusion would be to announce its departure or at least allow its term to expire next year. But Obama has done nothing of the kind. Ensuring the American team had no bargaining power, the administration declared in March — three months before the end of negotiations and a whopping 18 months in advance of the next election — that the US would run for a second term. Not coincidentally, on Friday the administration decided to circulate a list of the council's accomplishments at the last session. In addition to itemizing mere statements from groups of countries on issues that the council itself refused to handle, they pointed to the Council decision to launch a new study of discrimination and violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation and gender identity. For Obama, progress on other human rights issues takes priority over the unequal treatment of Israel and Jewish self-determination. It's an old trick, playing groups off against one another. But at the end of the day there is no escaping the fact that in the name of human rights, the administration has trashed the fundamental norm of human rights protection — equality. And genuine human rights advocates ought to know only too well how exemption clauses on human dignity are bound to turn out. |
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EXPLAINING HISTORY TO THOMAS FRIEDMAN. AGAIN.
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 20, 2011. |
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This was written by Evan Pokroy and is archived at
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Sometimes I get tired of hashing over the same arguments again and again. Unfortunately "respected" people keep making the same debunked arguments again and again, ignoring hundreds of years of history and thinking that, this time, things will be different. Case in point: Thomas Friedman. I know his disdain for Israel and her safety is nothing new. The problem is, he keeps spewing his idiotic ideas and the New York Times, which for better or worse is still a widely read and respected rag, keeps publishing his drivel. There is really no need to read the stuff, it's all pretty boilerplate. The Israeli intransigence is the reason behind the lack of peace in the Middle East. Really, that's all there is to it. If only those darn Jews would forget the last 64 years of Arab denial of their right to exist, all will be well. This is actually what he says. He suggests that the UN Security Council adopt a binding resolution based on General Assembly Resolution 181, A Palestinian Arab state and a Jewish state based on the pre-1967 borders. The UN would then recognize the nascent Palestinian state and negotiations could proceed. Where to begin? This has the distinct whiff of the Pelosi "we have to pass the bill to see what's in it" type of stench. Let's give the Palestinians exactly what they want and go from there. Well, not everything they want, those things are left up to negotiations. Land swaps? What incentive do the Arabs have to make land swaps after the UN has already agreed that the land is theirs? What does Israel get out of this? Hundreds of thousands of refugees expelled from their homes, expelled from land that, with the exception of 18 years between 1949 and 1967, has been the home to Jews since time immemorial? This doesn't even address the issue of the Arab demands to return to places in which their great grandparents might have lived for a half dozen years, before leaving of their own free will in 1948. What of the Arabs currently living within those pre-67 borders?Will they all move over the line to make the one state Jewish and the other Arab, or does Friedman expect that only the Jews currently living on the "wrong" side of the armistice lines have to leave their homes? For the record, Israel already is officially recognized as a Jewish state. The original Mandate for Palestine voted on at San Remo in 1920 was specifically to create a sovereign Jewish state in Palestine. That resolution was accepted as binding as part of the UN charter. It was the Arabs that have always refused to accept the existence of a Jewish state, as a matter of fact their refusal to accept the possibility that the Jews could rise from their traditional state of Dhimmi is fundamental to their world view. I would remind Mr. Friedman that, for the past 70 years, the Jewish population of Israel has been telling the Arab population that it would be happy to live in peace. It has been the Arabs that have repeatedly declined any compromise. It was the Jews who accepted UN resolution 181 and the massed Arab/Muslim states who rejected it and attacked the newborn Jewish state. It is the Arabs who sent constant raids into Israel well into the 60s. It was the Arabs who tried to block the flow of the Jordan River into Israel in the mid-60s who, against all treaties and agreements, closed the Straits of Tiran to Israel in 1956. It was again the massed Arab armies who threatened to throw the Jews into the sea in 1967, which lead to the return of the traditionally Jewish lands of Judea, Samaria and Gaza to Israeli control. It wasn't the Israelis who attacked unprovoked in October of 1973. This was followed by continuing terror attacks from Lebanon by the PLO into the 80s until Israel acted to protect its Northern civilian centers. Until this day, all of the Arab states, without exception, demonize Israel in their press and education. Even the states with which Israel ostensibly has peace treaties routinely publish the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and the Arabic translation of Mein Kampf is a bestseller in the Palestinian Authority and other Muslim states. All of Israel's military excursions are in direct response to Arab attacks on it civilian populace. All of these things Friedman discounts as if they never were. In his eyes it is only Israel that needs to give in and compromise. I will remind Mr. Friedman that we are not suicidal. When we say Never Again, we mean, Never Again. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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UNIVERSITY OF LONDON RECEIVES SAUDI FUNDS
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 20, 2011. |
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This was written by Jonny Paul, Jerusalem Post
Correspondent and is archived at
This is 'completely unacceptable' for a university that prides itself on its support for human rights, says director of student rights. |
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LONDON — A prestigious London university has been accused of having a banned "terror preacher" on the editorial board of one of its department's journals and receiving funding from the Saudi royal family, according to a report published by a British counter-extremism organization. Student Rights, a London-based organization tackling extremism on campuses, said on Thursday that the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) received funding from the Saudi Arabian regime and Islamist preacher Yusuf Qaradawi, the spiritual inspiration for Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, who is banned from the UK, Israel and the US. The information, obtained through Freedom of Information requests by Student Rights, shows close ties between the university and the Saudi Royal family, who have donated £755,000 to the school, which is renowned for its Middle East program, between 2006 and 2010. The findings in the report led to a formal response from the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the UK, Mohammed bin Nawaf Saud, who issued a statement on Friday confirming the funding to SOAS. "If Saudi money is questionable, then following a change in British law we will willingly abide by this and change our policy accordingly," the ambassador said. Student Rights says the funding source runs counter to the university's standpoint on freedom of expression and discrimination, as well as the UN Declaration on Human Rights. The money was donated to fund the SOAS Journal of Qu'ranic Studies, which has Qaradawi on its board, a preacher who supports suicide bombings against Israelis and has endorsed the killing of pregnant Israeli women and unborn children. "It is completely unacceptable for a university that prides itself on its support for human rights and freedom to be effectively in bed with the Saudi Royal Family," said Raheem Kassam, director of Student Rights. "No stone must be left unturned in a completely transparent, independent investigation to get to the bottom of how this relationship emerged and why it was perceived as beneficial. It's shameful." In a statement, the university maintained that Qaradawi only makes a small contribution to the journal. "Yusuf al-Qaradawi and some other editorial advisers from the Middle East only advise on the Arabic section of the journal, and not on the English section. "His academic peers and Muslim scholars in the UK and across the globe consider him to be one of the most outstanding scholars of the Koran in the Arabic and Islamic world," the university said. Also noted in the report, which was coordinated with Conservative MP Robert Halfon, is the university's ties to former Lybian president Muammar Gaddafi's regime. In 2006, SOAS established links with the regime-controlled Al-Fateh University in Tripoli. Halfon, who tabled an Early Day Motion [a formal motion submitted for debate in the House of Commons] in Parliament in response to the report, said: "I am deeply concerned at the findings of this report by Student Rights. I will be writing to the vice chancellor of SOAS asking for an explanation." Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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MORRIS POLLARD
Posted by Alexander Dymshits, June 20, 2011. |
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Yesterday, on June 18, 2011, Morris Pollard — the father of Jonathan Pollard, z''l, — died in Memorial Hospital, South Bend, IN. He was very good man and father, outstanding researher in the field of microbiology and fought for his son's release for many years. He considered the long J. Pollard's inprisonment as absolute miscarriage of justice. Cruelty of Obama and his administration, which did not allowed Jonathan to visit his father in the last moment of his life, is obvious. The funeral will take place on June 20, 2011 in the Jewish orthodox cemetery at 10:00 a.m. The more detailed information about this can be seen here. Also see this. For a local news stories, see here. Contact Alexander Dymshits at alex8well@yahoo.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: PERSPECTIVE
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 19, 2011. |
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This Shabbat we read the Torah portion about the spies (meraglim) — a group consisting of a leader from each of the twelve tribes, sent to scout out the land that the people were about to enter. Ten of the spies — Joshua and Caleb being the exceptions — brought back a negative report: the land devours its inhabitants, and the people are huge. "We were like grasshoppers in our eyes..." The people became afraid then, and cried to return to Egypt. Whereupon God asked, "How long will these people provoke me? And how long will they not have faith in me, despite all the signs that I have performed in their midst[ being taken out of Egypt, brought to the revelation at Sinai, etc.]?" In the end God decreed that the generation that was afraid would wander the desert for 40 years and not enter the land. ~~~~~~~~~~ For me, today, it comes together clearly: In 1948, Ben Gurion announced the independence of the State of Israel. Never before had a people returned to a land from which it had been deprived of sovereignty — with the bulk of the population having been banished — for 2,000 years. Never before had the sense of peoplehood been retained for two millenia in spite of dispersion and banishment. Never before had an ancient language been revived for daily use. Yet, this was what happened here, as the ingathering that had been predicted by the prophets began. Almost at once the Arab League attacked in order to destroy the new Jewish state. Leaders of the world were certain Israel would be defeated. However, not only were we victorious, we also secured additional area of land in the course of the war. ~~~~~~~~~~ In 1967, the Arab states were determined once again to destroy Israel, but in a stunning six-day victory we acquired control of the land of our heritage from the river to the sea. At first, Jordan, at our east, did not participate in the war being waged by Egypt and Syria. The Israeli government had sent a message to King Hussein saying that we would leave him alone if he did not attack. But the Egyptians put out broadcasts saying they were on the verge of victory, and Hussein, wishing to be on the winning side, hit us. Thus did we, engaging Jordan, secure eastern Jerusalem with Har Habayit and the Kotel. As well as Hevron, and a great deal more. ~~~~~~~~~~ In 1973, our enemies attacked again, this time on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year. Not only were we victorious, we waged the war with extraordinary skill — from a military perspective, victory here was even more stunning than in 1967. ~~~~~~~~~~ Since that time, Israel has grown stronger in multiple ways. Jews have continued to return, and the land has prospered. We are at the cutting edge in hi-tech and medical discoveries. We have endured recent financial difficulties better than many nations: the shekel stands stronger than the dollar. We are a first world nation, developed in spite of hardships and threats, boasting a population that is, according to surveys, among the most contented in the world. We have one of the world's strongest armies, and unquestionably the most ethical and humane. We are a blessing to the world, via our scientific discoveries and our readiness to help in times of disaster. Who could have imagined all this? Is there a way to explain it without seeing that the hand of God is inside what has happened? ~~~~~~~~~~ There are Jews today who look around at the enemies we face, and beat their chests, crying, "Oi vey, we are doomed! We're so alone in the world." Alone? Not quite. We have a true friend in Canada, and the support of the American Congress, and the devotion of millions of Christian Zionists. But most of all, we have the Almighty above. Perhaps, these days, he has returned to his ancient question: "How long will they not have faith in me despite all of the signs?" ~~~~~~~~~~ To trust in Heaven does not mean sitting passively, however, and letting God take care of matters. It means working our tushies off, protecting Israel, speaking in defense of Israel, working to build Israel, and all the rest. But it also means that we need not — must not! — feel like grasshoppers in our own eyes. "In our own eyes" is what counts most! We must not define ourselves by how the world chooses to see us. As we express faith in what is possible, and act on that faith, we will continue to know miracles. ~~~~~~~~~~ We all need a laugh from time to time, and so I share this: As reported by AFP on Thursday, Palestinian Authority negotiator Mohammed Shtayeh told reporters in Ramallah that: "We are by all means going to the United Nations, whether there are negotiations or no negotiations.. Right... ~~~~~~~~~~ Then we have our nemesis, Thomas Friedman, of the New York Times. He's a clown, but somewhat more dangerous than Mohammed Shtayeh, because there are people who take him seriously. He wants to bring back the UN partition resolution 181 of 1947, but change it to acknowledge '67 lines as border. I mention it here only to shoot it down. From a dozen perspectives it makes no sense. Starting with the fact that the resolution was from the General Assembly and thus not legally binding, and ending with the fact that the Arabs refused it. That, I think, is the key point. Why, in Friedman's opinion, do the Arabs deserve another chance when they rejected the state they might have had? He wants to reverse history on their behalf. What makes them so deserving? ~~~~~~~~~~ The following, on the other hand, from the PA news agency Maan, has real significance: Hamas's Ismail Haniyeh said yesterday at Islamic University in Gaza City that "we were able to establish a [unity government] deal that reflects the people's will...not the outside will and unjust agreements with Israel[Oslo]." Of central importance, he said, was the forming of national security departments that do not cooperate with Israel. "Protecting the resistance weapon" should be a priority. "A national strategy should be established to protect the resistance weapon within the framework of living our lives amidst the stages of liberation from the occupation." "The resistence weapon." We all understand what this means. This is not a surprise, but it is spoken confirmation of what we understood was very likely. The PA "security forces" that the US has been funding and training, so that they could fight terrorists, may be about to turn on us. ~~~~~~~~~~ I hedge with a "may be" for only one reason: the unity government, it turns out, is still not a done deal. Seems I spoke too soon in reporting that Fatah and Hamas were going to meet in Cairo this week and finalize the government. They did announce this, but now have un-announced it. Seems there is still squabbling about who should be prime minister, and so the meeting has been postponed "indefinitely." "Indefinitely" sounds serious, and this must be watched closely. There are all sorts of implications here with regard to how Abbas will play his hand. Can he/would he go to the UN if there were no unity? ~~~~~~~~~~ The IHH, the Turkish "humanitarian" group with terrorist links, whose flagship is the Mavi Marmari, has pulled out of the flotilla that is planning to try to break the Israeli maritime blockade of Gaza again later this month. Allegedly because it had sustained so much damage last time around that it could not be repaired in time — but in fact most likely for other reasons. According to Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Ankara probably pressured the IHH to pull out to avoid seeing it designated a terrorist group. Israel, however, is preparing all the same, as "activists" representing various other groups, including some from the US, intend to launch ten other ships in that flotilla. ~~~~~~~~~~ In a related story there is this: A rarely used, little known, 18th century statute, still on the books, allows a plaintiff to privately seize ships outfitted in the US for use against a US ally. It is about to be invoked with regard to ships being prepared for participation in the flotilla, using funds raised unlawfully in the US by groups such the Free Gaza Movement. The plaintiff is Dr. Alan Bauer, an American-Israeli, who, with his young son, was severely wounded in a terrorist attack in Jerusalem in 2002. Represented by attorneys Robert Tolchin of New York, and Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of Shurat HaDin, Israel Law Center, Bauer is seeking to confiscate the ships. Nitsana does fantastic work — fighting terrorism via the law — with little publicity. Last week one of the ships that was scheduled to participate in the flotilla learned that its maritime insurance company — after having received a letter from Shurat HaDin — would not be covering it. ~~~~~~~~~~ We read in an article in Haaretz that: "[Last] Tuesday, eight MKs from right-wing parties entered Nablus [Shechem], and under the heavy guard of Palestinian policemen and Israeli soldiers, they arrived at Joseph's Tomb, prayed there, and hastened to issue reports to the press about how moved they were by this historic occasion: It was the first time in 11 years, since the outbreak of the second intifada, that such a visit was made in broad daylight and not under the cover of darkness." Read the entire article here:
Knesset Speaker Ruby Rivlin played a pivotal role in making this happen. Hurray for his persistence! But note, please, the constant concern on the part of Israeli security lest there be Arab rioting. Do we always have to gauge our actions according to Arab behavior? ~~~~~~~~~~ What kind of man is Barack Obama? A rhetorical question intended here, with the implicit answer anything but positive. He has ignored the pleas, from the prime minister of Israel, as well as from legislators and key former officials within the US, to right the wrong of continued imprisonment of Jonathan Pollard. Recently, Pollard's very elderly father, Morris Pollard, 95, fell ill, and there were pleas, again, this time for "compassionate leave" for Jonathan to visit his father one last time. They were denied. ~~~~~~~~~~ Now Morris Pollard has died and the effort has turned to permitting Pollard out for 24 hours, in order to attend the funeral, which will be held in South Bend, IN, tomorrow. The JPost reports that the volume of furious phone calls to the White House shut down the switchboard. There has been a demonstration outside the US Embassy in Tel Aviv joined by some MKs; PM Netanyahu made his own request for this compassionate leave. We should expect nothing of Obama, whose inflexible stonewalling is totally without moral justification. Mark this well, for with this behavior he exposes the true darkness at the core of his heart. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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RADIO TALK SHOW HOST EPITOMIZES AMERICAN NAIVETY ON ISLAMIC DECEIT
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 19, 2011. |
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This is what happened when Walid Shoebat was on Bill Carroll's talk show. |
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Walid tries to explain to Bill Carroll Talk show host of KFI the second largest station in Los Angeles the issue concerning women in Islam and the potential problems having someone who has close associations with the Muslim brotherhood advising our Secretary of State as well as having access to sensitive information. We are not picking on Bill Carroll but he epitomizes the ignorance of Americans and the American mindset concerning Islamic deceit, remember one of the 99 names of Allah is "the great deceiver". America must stop thinking like Americans when it comes to the threat of Islam but understand the thinking of Middle Easterners and Muslims. Be as wise as a serpent but peaceful as a dove! A women who marries a non Muslim based on the fundamental principles of Islam should be killed. Since Huma Abedin is a "practizing Muslim" and her family are Muslim Bortherhood and Muslim Sisterhood operatives and players then why has she not been killed or ostracized for marrying a Jew. There are only two possible reasons that she has not been killed period 1. Anthony Weiner may have officially converted to being a Muslim, there is strong circumstantial evidence that this could be the case Omar Abu-Namous is the imam of the Islamic Cultural Center in New York and he is encouraging Huma Abedin — a practicing Muslim — to stand by her husband, New York congressman Anthony Weiner. Why would this imam support Anthony Weiner, who was raised Jewish, in a marriage with a practicing Muslim woman? Every Islamic scholar agrees that it is forbidden for a Muslim woman to marry a non-Muslim. Former Muslim Walid Shoebat has translated the Arabic declarations relative to the validity of the marriage between Weiner and Abedin last year. One such publication Shoebat translated was the Al-Marsid newspaper, which reported on the Weiner/Abedin marriage specifically: Dr. Anwar Shoeb of the faculty of Islamic law in Kuwait declared that the marriage between Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin is null and void, considering it adultery as confirmed in the Sharia position, prohibiting the marriage of a Muslim woman to a non-Muslim, regardless of whether he is a Jew or a Christian. In this case, he assured the invalidity of the marriage certificate between them. Abu-Namous is in direct opposition to his Islamic superiors? Why? 2. That she is just using Al Taqiyah and her marriage to Weiner to give her more cover to do the bidding of the Muslim Brotherhood to infiltrate the highest levels of our government. click for interview which starts about 15 minutes into the audio link
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BARRY DID GOOD!
Posted by Paul Lademain, June 19, 2011. |
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Barry: You did Good! Now shorten it and repeat, repeat, repeat. The Unbearable Lightness of Mainstream Thinking on Israel-Palestinian
Issues by Barry Rubin.
We the SC4Z already have a name for the yellow-bellies, we call them "perjurers for peace". We think Belgium, beloved of belligerent arabs and muslims, should offer their lands in exchange for world peace with jihadists. If the Belgians really love peace as much as they say the Israelis ought, they should jump at the chance to exchange their little spot on this planet for world peace. Viva to the Patriots of Israel who bravely battle the forces of islamic imperialism. --- SC4Z (Secular Christians for Zion) Not polite. Not politically correct. Not Left. Not Right. Just 4 Justice 4 Israel. |
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"The Unbearable Lightness of Mainstream Thinking on Israel-Palestinian
Issues"
Recently I appeared on a panel. I gave what I thought was a devastating and detailed analysis on why there wouldn't be an Israel-Palestinian peace: the PA wasn't ready Fatah was led by radicals; the Palestinian people hadn't been prepared for peace (and had been prepared to see any compromise as treason); Hamas might take over or would use any PA compromises to attack and defeat its rival; there were too many problems with what would happen after a two-state solution was implemented. Afterward, another participant was asked what he thought of my presentation. He said that, of course, peace wouldn't be easy but it was really important to make peace, that time was against Israel, and that we should keep trying. Five things struck me about the response. First, he made no attempt to refute a single point I made. In other words, the we-must-make-peace-right-away types never tell you about these problems. Why? Because they cannot answer this analysis since it is accurate. If they honestly presented these things to an audience, the audience would be convinced that there isn't going to be any peace. I call this "lying for peace." Yasir Arafat once said something like this: "If I'm willing to die for Palestine I'm certainly willing to lie for Palestine." Thus, instead of being an analyst one who twists the facts to "help the cause of peace" becomes an activist, deliberately withholding information because it undermines what one wants to happen. In addition, of course, this becomes an "analysis" based on wishful thinking. But lying doesn't bring peace, just like distorting any situation achieves a goal that is otherwise unachievable. Lying about the economy doesn't help solve the problems of the economy. Lying about health care isn't going to improve health care. Pretending that Communism (or Islamism today) was not so bad neither ended the conflict with that ideology nor spread the cause of freedom. Israelis aren't going to take risks and make concessions on the basis of lies. They prefer peace but don't start out by saying that peace — meaning a piece of paper — is the only goal and nothing else matters. The goal is national survival, the country's flourishing, and individual benefit. Second, the person in question withheld in the later remarks what he had said before: that the two sides were very close and that PA leader Mahmoud Abbas was eager for peace. In essence, these statements were — according to the later position — lies told in order to help the cause of peace, supposedly. Either you have to admit that the PA does not want a compromise peace with Israel or prove that the PA leadership really wants peace and is eager to obtain it. You can't have it both ways. Third, there's nothing more ridiculous than the notion that Israel must make peace before the situation gets worse. It's like saying that the British and French should make concessions to Hitler because he's about to go to war. If we know Egypt is turning radical, Lebanon has a Hizballah-dominated government, that Hamas is getting stronger, and that the current U.S. government cannot be trusted those are all arguments against Israel making concessions at this time! Fourth, he had said that Mahmoud Abbas, the PA leader, really wants peace. Near the end of his career, he seeks to leave a legacy of having created a Palestine state for his people. That's what they used to say about Arafat. Precisely. And it wasn't true then either. But if peace is desperately needed then Israel must be forced to bring about peace "for its own good" and whether it wants to accept the terms or not. In other words, ignorant people who aren't telling the truth want to press Israel into a situation that suits neither its interests nor the will of its people. And if peace is desperately needed and the PA really wants peace, then Israel must be at fault for the lack of peace. Therefore Israel must be pressured and possibly punished. Here we have the three premises of the Obama Administration: The status quo is untenable and peace is desperately needed; the PA wants peace and cannot be pressed since it won't listen while Arabs and Muslims won't stand for it; Israel is stubborn and doesn't know what's good for itself. And what is meant by peace? A paper signed by everyone whose terms quickly fall apart? A new equivalent of the Oslo accords? A celebration that lasts a while and soon dissolves into more bloodshed and a new generation of conflict? A new equivalent of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty that would be renounced by a new regime or when a new balance of power makes that possible? Finally, as for the demographic argument, it is a ridiculous joke, a straw man. Who cares how many Palestinians there are in the West Bank and Gaza Strip? Israel will never annex those territories. But it is also a perfect symbol for the absurdity of the argument. In effect, it says: Quick! Make peace because there are more and more Palestinians! But if Israel makes huge concessions in an agreement won't the Palestinians tear it up when they increase in number even more and feel stronger? And then won't Israel be much worse off than it is now, having turned over territory and full sovereignty to a more powerful enemy? Here's what bothers me most: I have no problem with people arguing that it is important to pursue peacemaking efforts despite all the problems of Palestinian intransigence, Fatah extremism, Hamas' power, the radicalism of Palestinian public opinion, and the tremendous problems that would occur in a post-two-state-solution situation. But if they tell people that the Palestinian leadership is eager for a comprehensive peace agreement and leave out all of these problems that is called lying. And lying will only produce failure. First, it will produce the failure of its own efforts, since conducting a diplomatic campaign without accurate analysis is a game of blind man's bluff. Second, if they were ever actually to "succeed" that would lead to disaster since a peace agreement made on false premises will not stand. Thomas Friedman is another example. He's one of the leaders in the lying-for-peace movement. He can make as his main argument that it's bad for Israel to occupy the West Bank permanently because the demographic shift will make Israel into an apartheid state. First, Israel isn't occupying the West Bank at all in the post-1967 sense because the Palestinian Authority governs the population there. Second, Israel has accepted in principle that its presence in the West Bank is temporary, pending a real peace settlement. Third, the demographic gap is far smaller than is being presented. Fourth, demography doesn't matter since Israel has no interest in annexing, or even running directly, the West Bank and thus the number of Palestinians is no more significant than the number of Egyptians or Jordanians. And finally the apartheid argument has no actual relevance whatsoever since West Bank Palestinians aren't subject to any Israel rules of this sort. In other words, an argument repeated in the largest newspapers, television, classrooms, and so on, is totally false but is never subjected to the test of a serious critique that points out the flaws and the need to respond to it. Some of the people who repeat such mantras are merely ignorant or simply imitating. Others are leading the lying for peace movement. Many or most are also promoting their careers by saying what might be "politically correct" but is actually factually incorrect. Lying for peace, just like lying to prevent "Islamophobia" are nominally good causes but are realy lying for bloodshed and political disaster. Is it rude to point this out? It would be if this were just a game. But the lives of millions of people are involved. This experience has confirmed my belief that the hegemonic arguments in Western governments, academia, and mainstream media are not only wrong but are so weak that they can only be kept from collapsing by making sure most people never hear cogent critiques. These premises — on which we are supposed to bet our lives — have no basis in reality. Paul Lademain is a Secular Christian for Zion (SC4Z). Contact him by email at lademain@verizon.net |
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I CAN NO LONGER LISTEN TO EVEN ONE WORD ABOUT ISRAEL ARAB-"PALESTINIAN" "PEACE PROCESS"
Posted by Nurit Greenger, June 18, 2011. |
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My position on the world's state of affairs has hardened. It is in fact, immovable, resolute. I can no longer listen to even one word about Israel Arab-"Palestinian" "peace process"; I am simply past it. I do not question myself nor do I have the least twinge of feelings of guilt. Moslems, Muslims, Islamists, Islamofascists, Islamonazis, or whatever other name they appear to be identified by, are simply the inheritors of Hitler's dream, or maybe Hitler was the inheritor of Muhammad's dream...but who cares, who came first; Hitler was then and the Islamofascists are very much the NOW. In either case, it adds up to the very same. "Old Europe" is right back to where it was. The Europeans are back to being as anti-Semitic as they were in 1939, or even way before then. They never really left their anti-Semitic deep sentiments, only pretended, for a short while, they did. The Middle East and North Africa uprising, to which, the "illuminated-Progressive" world uses the romantic term "Arab Spring", will surely widen beyond its present North Africa and Middle East boundaries, and sooner than we even dare to think. I predict that within one year, a radical-Islamist bloc will be formed from this Arab pretended-Spring. In all likelihood this Islamofascist bloc will be led by the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and it will be frighteningly enormous, united, more radical, and emboldened by Western weakness and naïveté. Barack Hussein Obama's legacy to the world will be the weakening of America and the great strengthening of Islamofascistic Islamism. This is a process he began almost immediately after he was inaugurated. If we look back we can see to whom Obama gave his first-ever interview as President; it was not CBS, ABC, NBC; it was not CNN, MSNBC, and surely it was not Fox News. The newly-inaugurated, first time black man, democratic American President gave his first interview to Al-Arabiya television. The reader needs to note that Al Arabiya, based in Dubai Media City,
is a 24-hour Arabic-language news channel broadcasting across five
continents to millions of viewers. With a global network of
correspondents and bureaus in 40 major cities around the world, Al
Arabiya has become a leading source of Arabic-language news throughout
the world —
Who was the first political leader to speak to the new American President, Obama? The Arab-"Palestinian" Mahmoud Abbas-Abu-Mazen. Why? We, the American people, are at war against Islamists, against all Moslems who want to harm our country, all of us, and they sure do wish to harm us! More precisely, the Islamists are at war against us, the American People. But, sadly, maybe 10% of Americans know this, or are ready to acknowledge it. Meanwhile, and as I write this, today's rant, Americans and Afghans
officials are having peace talks with the Taliban: America has opened
peace talks with Taliban, says Afghan President Hamid Karzai —
Does anybody, besides few of us, sees here, a 21st Century new Chamberlain and Hitler? Will Kandahar be Czechoslovakia of the year 2011? We should all pray that in fifty (50) years there will still be Americans around to honor G-d, Jesus and the soldiers who fought and won THIS war. Conversely, I fear those who used to be Americans may, by imposition, be chanting "Allahu Akbar" as they celebrate the anniversary of the demise of the Great Satan, the United States of America. That is where we are, today, and the future is grim. And if we do not take these facts on the ground and in Washington seriously and change the tide, really change the tide...we are doomed. And that is where we are right now, today! Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
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MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD LEADER CAUGHT LYING — WHILE SWEARING TO GOD
Posted by Raymond Ibrahim, June 17, 2011. |
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Sobhi Saleh, a top Muslim Brotherhood leader who was elected by Egypt's Supreme Council to be on the constitution amendment committee, recently gave a speech wherein he insisted that Brotherhood men should only marry Brotherhood women, since they are "superior" to other Muslim women in Egypt — and so they can "produce little Brotherhood kids." He also likened Egyptian secularists to atheists (that is, infidels) and referred to Egyptians disagreeing with the Brotherhood as qaum lut, the "People of Lot," the Koran's unflattering appellation for sexually depraved societies. 
To "clarify" his position, which he received some heat for, Saleh recently appeared on Dream TV, debating Muslim intellectual Khaled Montaser. At one point, because he was unable to refute Montaser, Saleh snidely remarked that he was unaware the show was going to be an "inquisition" and that he wasn't even informed that Montaser would be debating him. The host Mona al-Shazly, protested, adding, "Yes, you did know you would be facing Montaser." Saleh kept insisting otherwise, including by swearing to God — all with a very sincere look. The host, visibly stunned, pointed out that she and the whole studio team were present when the coordinator called Saleh and told him who the other guest would be, adding in a very disappointed tone, "I have a great problem that you would swear to God on the air, when I know for a fact that you're lying." Watching the video, it is clear that Saleh was mortified and speechless, to the point that, to break the awkward silence, the host said, "Okay, we've passed this, let's move on now." This anecdote is ultimately for the benefit of those Western peoples uninitiated in Islamic lore, who — by projecting their own ethic onto Islam — may find it incongruent for a Muslim who piously seeks to order society around God's laws, do so by taking false oaths in that same God's name. Yet, the fact is, Saleh's lie accords well with Islam's notorious doctrines of deception that permit Muslims to deceive in order to empower Islam — which is precisely what the Muslim Brotherhood and all Islamist organizations, violent and nonviolent, are all about. Why Saleh resorted to lying is further telling: his opponent was armed with facts, which always beat sophistry. For example, when Saleh began arguing that a Brotherhood-led government for Egypt would be wonderful for Coptic Christians, Montaser proceeded to read from a number of fatwas issued by the Brotherhood's former grand mufti, Abdullah al-Khatib — fatwas asserting that it is forbidden to build new churches in Egypt, that in certain situations it is obligatory for Muslims to destroy churches — a regular occurrence in Egypt — and that it is forbidden to bury Christians in Muslim cemeteries, "lest they [the Muslims] suffer from the Christian's torments of the grave." 
Incidentally, Saleh is the same Brotherhood leader who was portrayed affectionately in the New York Times: "He is a distinguished 57, clean-shaven, with white hair, wearing an orange sweater and black flip-flops. He has a leopard tissue cozy: not a leopard-print container, but what looks like a toy stuffed animal around his tissue box... He is immediately engaging, the kind of person you shake hands with at a conference then find yourself telling people, 'He's such a nice guy,' without really knowing why." Why, indeed. Probably because he is a master at letting people hear what they want to hear, especially in English. (Watch Saleh as he leads an Egyptian mob chanting intolerant Islamist slogans and calling for the implementation of Sharia, and somehow he won't appear like "such a nice guy.") Thus, as the U.S. director of national intelligence foolishly describes the Brotherhood as "a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence," and as President Obama asks Israel to make concessions to similar organizations, one must ask: If top Islamist leaders have no problem lying about silly things to fellow Muslims — while swearing to God — how trustworthy are any of their words and promises to Western and Israeli leaders, that is, the hated infidels?
Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com
This article appeared today in
FrontPageMagazine.com and is archived at
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FROM ISRAEL: UNRWA AND MORE
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 17, 2011. |
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Please see an article of mine that just went up on American Thinker:
The subject is UNRWA, which is putting out serious misrepresentations regarding the need for its services — and the severe conditions in Gaza, as well as the quality of the services it does provide. The villain in its reports is, of course, Israel. ~~~~~~~~~~ I noted with interest today, after my piece went up, an article on related issues in the JPost. Says the Foreign Ministry, "UNRWA's report is false, biased." Seems UNRWA released a report saying that the children in their Gaza schools attend classes on a double shift. This is because 100 new schools must be built to meet enrollment requirements, but Israel has only approved building of eight schools (i.e., will permit building materials for eight schools to come through the crossings into Gaza). In other words, it's Israel's fault that the kids of Gaza can't study properly. The truth, as exposed by COGAT (Israel's Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories) is that UNRWA never filed a request to build 100 schools. Officials first heard about this via the media. Israel has approved 32 educational projects in Gaza for UNRWA — 24 for new schools and others for expansions. However, UNRWA has only begun bringing in building supplies for 11 schools. Chris Gunness, UNRWA's spokesman, when queried about this, made a valiant effort to keep his finger pointed at Israel. His response: "...projects were delayed since donors did not want to give funds after previous donations were not used for past projects due to...Israel's refusal to approve projects presented years ago." Huh? This guy is something else. ~~~~~~~~~~ One other note of great significance on the issue of UNRWA. I had mentioned in my piece, and it's here in the JPost as well, that UNRWA claims unemployment in Gaza has increased to 45%. (I.e., the situation is deteriorating because of Israel's blockade.) I had pointed out facts and figures indicating that there had actually been an economic upswing in Gaza in the last year — which puts the lie to what UNRWA said. Now the Foreign Ministry has taken a look at something else: It is the "refugee" population that saw an increase in unemployment. Among non-refugees, unemployment dropped by 9%. So then the question has to be asked as to how UNRWA manages those "refugees," that they are not participating in the overall economic growth in Gaza. Here's another sign that UNRWA has to be dismantled. ~~~~~~~~~~ On the political scene, we continue to spin around without quite going anywhere. Sometimes matters tilt in one direction and sometimes in another. Back not so long ago, I had speculated that Abbas might be having second thoughts about going to the UN to have a state declared. The sign I saw was that he was stonewalling on the question of the prime minister for that unity government — insisting that it be Fayyad, even though Hamas despises him. This held up matters. Now there has been an announcement that a unity government has been selected, with names to be revealed shortly. A step towards a joint Palestinian Authority. Abbas has backed down on his insistence that Fayyad be PM, but reportedly there is no final decision yet on who will be selected. And so, as of now, this is my take: Abbas has weighed his options — has seen that Obama cannot move Netanyahu to pull back to those '67 lines, as he hoped might happen — and so has decided to go with the UN after all. ~~~~~~~~~~ This doesn't mean that a delusional Obama is not still continuing his efforts to "break the stalemate" and get the two parties back to the table, so that he won't have to cast a veto in the Security Council with regard to membership of a Palestinian state in the UN. I have only words of praise for Netanyahu, who has held tight to his position. He has spelled out his parameters, again, and again, and again. They include: [] Recognition of Israel as the state of the Jewish people ~~~~~~~~~~ European Parliament President, Jerzy Buzek, of Poland, was here this week. I want to look just briefly at a statement he made in the course of a press conference, because it so typifies international thinking: "There is a unique opportunity for Israel and the Palestinians to shape a future based on dignity, unity and prosperity, which will be achieved only by negotiations. A window of opportunity. I wish I had a shekel for every time someone over the years has alluded to that window. It's amazing: it never closes. Whenever people want to push negotiations, behold! they see it. I would have far more respect for Buzek, and others like him, if they would say, look, it's a lousy time, we know this. But we have to try anyway, have to bring matters back from the brink. But as it is, there is no grappling with reality, no intellectual honesty whatsoever. This is how it is. ~~~~~~~~~~ I want to reiterate what I said some days ago: There is no way within UN process or international law for the UN to bring a state into existence. And yet the media keep referring to this, public figures insist on alluding to this. The fact is that we don't know exactly what will happen: It depends on whether the General Assembly will play by the rules. But what we do know is that it's not a sure thing. ~~~~~~~~~~ Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon has been in Latin America, and Netanyahu is visiting states in Europe — focusing now more on eastern Europe. The goal is to achieve what Netanyahu is referring to as a "moral minority." If the General Assembly should take some irregular action in voting a Palestinian state into existence, the point is that it should not be done unanimously. If the Western democracies in some substantial number — the goal, I believe is 30 nations — stands opposed, the weight of that vote is undercut. ~~~~~~~~~~ There were reports just a couple of days ago indicating that the EU was opposed to unilateral Palestinian Arab action on a state. Buzek had been quoted as saying such a move could be "dangerous." However, he qualified this in the press conference I alluded to above. The EU is not opposed to a Palestinian bid for statehood in the UN, he said, it's just that "it is better to negotiate the solution. It is much better to have a dialogue and understanding." Here's a man hedging his bets. ~~~~~~~~~~ If the PA does go to the UN, or otherwise takes unilateral action in the establishment of a state, then this will automatically void Oslo. Israel will be absolved of her obligation to pursue changes in the status quo that exists between Israel and the PA via negotiations. See Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's comments on this here:
Thus, I see the possibility of a real window of opportunity here. Not the one Buzek was referring to, I assure you. I wrote last about a mini-conference to be held here in Jerusalem on Monday night on the subject of Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria as an alternative to the failed two-state solution. What I've seen in the time since I wrote is enormous enthusiasm in several quarters. This might be a beginning — the very start of establishing a solid momentum. Call it working towards a paradigm shift — getting people to see that another way is not only possible but desirable. It will require commitment and planning and organizing. The point is that after the UN convenes in September may be the right time to really get this going. I'll have more to say after the conference. ~~~~~~~~~~ Lt. Col. (ret.) Yonaton (Yoni) D. Halevi — one very savvy researcher — has done a briefing for the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs — http://jcpa.org — on "Power Dynamics Inside Hamas": There has been "overt confrontation between Mahmoud al-Zahar, the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Gaza, and Damascus-based Hamas political bureau leader Khaled Mashaal [that] reflects underground currents feeding the tension within the Hamas leadership in Gaza and Syria. "Al-Zahar is demanding that Hamas-Gaza be given more weight in decision-making, while the Hamas leadership abroad contends that the center of power should remain outside of Palestine. What caught my eye was this, which is has enormous implications: "...The current main interest of Mashaal and his colleagues is to promote reconciliation with Fatah in order to pave the way for Hamas to join the PLO and take over the organization that is recognized internationally as the sole representative of the Palestinian people." If Hamas should gain control of the organization that is charged with negotiating on behalf of the "Palestinian people," would people like Buzek still see a window of opportunity? Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD AND EGYPT
Posted by M.S. Kramer, June 17, 2011. |
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In the early days of the so-called Arab Spring, many pundits warned that the rebellion in Egypt could lead to a government controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood, not one run by exuberant, freedom loving youth hooked on social media. It seems that prediction is coming true. What is the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) and why should Israel and the West be worried? We can learn a lot from the MB's website: http://www.ikhwanweb.com. The aim of the site is to "present the source of the MB's vision and rebut misconceptions about the movement in Western societies." Sheikh Hassan Al-Banna, a devotee of Adolph Hitler and the Nazis, founded the MB in 1928. Al Banna managed to build a movement whose members, distributed in most Islamic countries and Muslim communities in the West, lead Islamist activities in seventy countries. The organization's motto is as follows: "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope." Along with its jihadist creed, the MB, like many other Muslim organizations, camouflages itself by offering welfare services for the Muslim community parallel to, and often more efficient than governmental services. It's membership includes many intellectuals and professionals, like Daniel Pearl's murderer, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who joined the MB at age 16 and later received a degree in mechanical engineering from a university in North Carolina. Al Banna considered all the Islamic nations (including much of Europe and elsewhere) to be one homeland. He said "... every region in which there is a Muslim saying: 'There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah,' is our homeland, inviolable and sacred, demanding love, sincerity, and sincere effort for the sake of its welfare." "The Muslim Brothers are most faithful people to their homelands ... they work for a homeland like Egypt, fight for its sake, sacrifice their lives in this jihad; because Egypt is an Islamic land, and the leaders of the Muslim nations; also, they do not stop this feeling at such limits, but they include with it every Islamic land and every Islamic homeland ... [they believe] that leaving any span of land on which a Muslim is living is a crime which is not forgiven, till they restore it or die while trying to restore it; Allah won't forgive them except through this." Therefore Al Banna confirms that Palestine is the homeland of every Muslim, the cradle of prophets, and the location of the Al Aqsa Mosque, around which Allah bestows His blessing. Al Banna sees that "the Palestinian cause is the cause of every Muslim." The primary Palestinian parties, Fatah and Hamas, were both founded in "the MB womb." and both share its aims, Fatah covertly and Hamas overtly. Al Banna made his message perfectly clear in a communication that he sent to the British ambassador to Cairo — published in the Al-Nazeer newspaper in December 1938 that, "The Muslim Brothers will sacrifice their lives and their money for the sake of keeping every span of Palestine with its Arab and Islamic identity until doomsday." He reiterated this in a message sent in May 1939 to the Egyptian Prime Minister, Mohamed Mahmoud, "The British and the Jews will understand only one language, the language of revolution, force and blood." (The above selections are all found on the MB website.) As its modus operandi, the MB adopted social activism, underground ideological work, and violence. Assassinations by the MB fueled government-led crackdowns on the movement at various times. In 1987, the Palestinians formed an offshoot of the MB, Hamas (acronym for "Islamic Resistance Movement"). Through Hamas's success, anti-Israel militancy increasingly became one of the chief ways in which the MB has attempted to establish its Islamist credentials and win new recruits to its organization. The MB has branches in 70 countries, including the Muslim Students Association in America. "From the Muslim Brotherhood's perspective, Hamas has succeeded in reviving the political atmosphere of the 1940s, when jihad in Palestine secured the loyalties and desires of Islamist militants throughout the region. As a practical matter, Hamas's emphasis on the national struggle against Israel as a way of unifying its constituency and establishing its rule means postponing — and even confronting — any other Islamist project that might potentially prove ideologically and organizationally divisive. This includes global jihadist movements such as al-Qaeda and their ideologies." (Jean-Pierre Filiu, Hudson Institute) In 1954, Egypt outlawed the MB after its failed assassination attempt on Egyptian ruler Abdel Nasser, although the organization was still able to back politicians not officially linked to it. Now with Mubarak out of the way, the Egyptian interim government has officially recognized the MB's political party, the Freedom and Justice Party, which will allow the MB to participate in September's parliamentary elections. The new party will contest about half the seats, leading to predictions that the MB will be a dominant force in the political landscape. What happens if the MB, which was bitterly opposed by former Egyptian leaders from Nasser to Mubarak, leads Egypt? Egypt has the largest army, air force, and navy of all African states. It's army and air force rival (but are probably inferior to) Israel's, while its navy is larger and better equipped. Though Israel has many enemies threatening it, near and far, what enemies threaten Egypt? If the MB succeeds in gaining control of Egypt and it military establishment, the pressures on Israel will be multiplied by having a huge and hostile neighbor on its long border with the Sinai Peninsula. In addition, Egypt is the largest and arguably the most important Arab country. A takeover by the MB will have huge repercussions throughout the region, all of which will be negative for the West. But maybe this scenario will not occur and fresh, young faces will emerge from the "Arab Spring" and introduce democracy and peace to Israel. Just don't bet on it. Steve Kramer lives in Alfe Menashe. He has written a weekly opinion column for the Jewish Times of southern New Jersey (www.jewishtimes-sj.com) for the last ten years. He writes, "They're about history, politics, touring, or whatever excites me." He is author of "Encountering Israel — Geography, History, Culture." Contact him at mskramer@bezeqint.net and visit www.encounteringisrael.com |
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SYRIAN STATE DOCUMENTS 'SHOW ASSAD ORCHESTRATED NAKBA DAY RAIDS ON GOLAN HEIGHTS'
Posted by Susana K-M, June 16, 2011. | |
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This was written by Michael Weiss, Communications Director of the Henry Jackson Society and the Spokesperson of Just Journalism, which monitors the British media's coverage of Israel and the Middle East. | |
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I have just been forwarded what appear to be Syrian state documents leaked by the governor of al-Qunaitera, in south-west Syria, which suggest that the regime fully orchestrated the "Nakba Day" raids of Palestinian refugees into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on May 15. The document (below) which bears the Syrian Republic emblem, is dated May 14, 2011 and describes an "urgent meeting" of Major General Asef Shawkat, the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Armed Forces, and the chiefs of security and military intelligence branches in the province in Al-Qunaitera, which is located at the Syrian-Israeli border. The memorandum outlines how the regime ordered the dispatching of 20 buses, each one with a passenger capacity of 47, to cross the border into Majdal-Shamms in the Golan Heights in order to precipitate a confrontation between Palestinian refugees and Israeli soldiers and UN peacekeeping forces, thereby distracting international attention from the Syrian revolution. I quote the entire document, attributed to the "Office of the Mayor" in Al-Qunaitera province:
The Golan border dash, combined with similar raids along the Israeli-Lebanese and Israeli-Gazan borders, killed 13 people in total and injured dozens more after Israeli troops opened fire on demonstrators who had pelted with them stones. Two hundred refugees broke through the border fence in the Golan Heights, though some, according to Israeli press accounts, were actually seeking asylum from Syrian violence, not protesting the "catastrophe" of Israel's founding. This document — which I have good reason to believe is absolutely genuine — appears to represent the first piece of regime-created evidence that Assad has cynically tried to manipulate Western and Arabic media during three-month Syrian uprising. 
Contact Susana K-M by email at suanema@gmail.com |
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WE'RE ALL SONS OF THE COVENANT
Posted by Ted Roberts, June 16, 2011. |
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Everybody's talking about Bris/circumcisions these days and since I attended my grandson's Bris last month (and offered much advice which was ignored — why don't kids listen?) let's talk about Brisses. I'm stuffed with material like a kishke. Obviously, this is an easier topic for a Jewish writer with a flat imagination than 800 words on Hezekiah's inauguration — which I did not attend. In order to behave correctly at the Bris of my first grandson and in order not to embarrass him intellectually, I went back to the chumash to study the origins of this venerable ceremony. Sartorially, I was under the control of my handlers, the father of the Brissee and his mother. They had already laid out a blue, sedate suit with white shirt and dark blue tie — not my favorite tie with the green fluorescent lady who winked when you twisted it. So, at least externally I appeared as dignified as the rabbi. But I needed some data, so I could turn to a guest and say something besides; "Abraham was the first mohel, ya know". It's all in Chapter 17 of Genesis. The Almighty appears to 99 year old Abraham and delivers several major news bulletins. 1) Abram's name shall now be Abraham because he shall be a "father of nations". 2) A covenant shall exist between the newly designated Abraham and the owner of the universe; the signature of the covenant shall be the rite of circumcision. Abraham, you can well understand, is having a portentous day. Usually, the morning starts with a jug of goat's milk, a piece of bread and a light round of morning talk with Hagar, Sarah and his shepherd employees. Today, the Lord of Hosts has appeared before his eyes and offered him a majestic destiny. Abraham's head is reeling as he rises from the dust to consider his new grandeur. But wait, that's not all, says his heavenly visitor. Sarai becomes "Sarah" (the princess) and it wouldn't be inappropriate to pick up some blue accessories for the tent, because "Sarah shall bear you a son". What a day he's having — this newly crowned Abraham. And it's not over. He must yet do the ritual surgery on Ishmael who is 13 at this time. From this passage in Our Book comes the Moslem tradition of circumcision on the 13th year — obeyed by Ishmael's heirs, to this very day. Soon after, Isaac is born. And true to the instructions from above, Abraham circumcises him on his 8th day of life. The Book gives us no explanation of the timing, but I'm told by my doctor friends, who are richer and smarter than me, that the blood clotting capability of an infant is not active until the 8th day. Hospital circumcisions that take place the first or second day of life usually require a shot of Vitamin K to assist clotting and healing of the wound. Remarkable, is it not, that somehow this wisdom found its way into a 2000-plus year old text. So — all this; Genesis Chapter 17, the medical aspects of the Bris, and my grandson's well-being was whirling through my overcrowded brain as I slipped into that dull blue suit that would have looked great with my green fluorescent tie — had I been allowed it. Another disquieting thought was the name of my grandson. Orthodox tradition says it may not be revealed 'till the day of the Briss. I had begun questioning the parents eight months ago. Lightly, nonchalantly — so as not to threaten; "So, well, hmmm — what'll you call him?" (No doubt it would be a boy to add to my bevy of four golden, giggling granddaughters.) My son gave me a look like Isaac gave Abraham on the way to Mt. Moriah when Pop told him there was no sheep for the sacrifice; or the look Joseph's brothers threw at him when they spied his new, neon coat. My kid knew I was picky about names. He knew I suffered nightmares about Yathulem, Zerubbubel, Balshazzor and Grossenhazor. They knew with blandishment or wiles, I would try to influence the naming process. Didn't a plain, simple "David" beat "Arpachshad"? Couldn't you see this child forty years from now — standing in front of the Chief Justice of the United States — his hand on the Chumash; "And do you Zerubbubel Malacathlion Roberts promise to uphold the Constitution..." etc. He'd NEVER get the job — ANY JOB. "Uh, thank you for your time, Mr. Roberts, but your name simply won't fit on any of our standard employment contracts and our customers will never remember it anyhow. Wish it was David - Bye." So you can imagine the strain I was under the morning of the Bris. I had eaten three slices of corned beef off the Saran wrapped tray and I was still nervous. Then as I was desserting on a couple of strudel chunks they'd never miss — here comes my son. "Dad," he whispers in my ear, "relax, your grandson's name is Ezra. Fasten the Saran Wrap over that tray of corned beef and come into the sanctuary." Ezra — my first grandson. With that name and my heredity, no telling how far he'd go. Ted Roberts' essays appear in the Jewish press, web sites,
and magazines. He is author of The Scribbler On The Roof, a
book of short stories and commentary. Visit his websites at
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THE NEW ISRAEL FUND — THE BAD AND THE UGLY
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 16, 2011. |
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This is from the Fresno Zionism website
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The following is from an article by Anne Hertzberg of the intrepid NGO Monitor: ...a group of NGOs, primarily funded by European governments, the EU, and the New Israel Fund (NIF) have initiated a campaign to denigrate the Israeli justice system in order to bolster efforts to have Israelis arrested for "war crimes" in Europe, and in order to support the PLO's application to the International Criminal Court for an investigation of Israel. They also play an integral role in the PLO strategy to use UN frameworks, not to resolve the conflict, but to "internationalize the conflict as a legal matter" and to "pave the way for (the Palestinians) to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice" as Mahmoud Abbas tellingly revealed in a May 17 New York Times op-ed... Adalah, an Israeli NGO heavily funded by the NIF and the EU, is a leader of this strategy. At a 2008 conference in Brussels funded by the Swedish government, Adalah's General Director Hassan Jabareen recommended that Palestinian activists "should try to portray Israel as an inherent undemocratic state" and "use that as part of campaigning internationally." Adalah has implemented this strategy in many submissions to UN committees, including the Human Rights Council. Additionally, in 2009, Adalah filed an "expert" opinion on behalf of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) in a lawsuit brought by the group in Spain seeking the arrest and imprisonment of seven Israeli officials for alleged "war crimes" arising out of the killing of a senior Hamas terrorist, Salah Shehade. In 2007, Adalah presented its proposal for a "Democratic Constitution" for Israel. In its introduction, Adalah begins by demanding that The state of Israel must recognize, therefore, its responsibility for the injustices of the Nakba and the Occupation; recognize the right of return of the Palestinian refugees based on UN Resolution 194 [understood by Arabs as return of any 'refugees' who choose to do so — ed]; recognize the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination; and withdraw from all of the territories occupied in 1967. The constitution proposal also contains several options for providing the Arab minority with a veto over all decisions of the Knesset. There is lots more, and it's clear that the adoption of this constitution would mean the end of the Jewish state. As Hertzberg wrote, Adalah is supported in part by the New Israel Fund (NIF). In fact, Adalah received more than one million dollars from the NIF between 2006 and 2010. This is the same NIF that was a center of controversy last year when it was revealed that the great majority of NGO's that contributed 'evidence' for IDF 'war crimes' to the Goldstone report — most of which consisted of the repetition of unsubstantiated charges made by Gaza residents in the presence of Hamas officials and translators — received funding from the NIF. This is also the same NIF that made news again this year when it became known that the NIF funded an extremist group called "The Coalition of Women for Peace" which had little to do with women or peace but a great deal to do with demonizing and promoting the boycott of Israel. Its 2008 IRS form 990, the most recent one that I have, shows that the NIF distributed more than $20 million in grants in 2008. Not all of the NIF's projects are anti-state, and these programs are pointed to by its defenders to justify their support. For example, there is a grant for "support for women suffering battering or sexual abuse." There are numerous grants for "religious pluralism" which I presume means support for non-Orthodox Judaism. There are grants for environmental purposes (although in many cases 'protecting the environment' means opposing the security fence). But the overwhelming thrust of the NIF's grantees is antagonism to Israeli society as it is. Over and over one sees grants for promoting or protecting 'rights' for various groups (mostly Arabs, but also women and some Jewish immigrants). There are a great many grants for 'community organizing', and for 'promoting equality' in one or another realm. The overall impression is that Israel is oppressive and undemocratic, and NIF funds are used to pressure the 'establishment' into changing its ways, following the example of the civil rights movement in America. And then of course there are things like a grant of $140,000 to "promote peace" (there are numerous large grants for this purpose) and $700,000 for "protecting human rights of all populations in Israel", $308,000 for "protecting the human rights of the Arab minority in Israel", and multiple grants totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars for "protecting human rights in the occupied territories". There was even a grant of $458,500 for "promoting democracy and human rights in the media". Could Israel's media possibly be made more democratic? The NIF is big business. Its 2008 income was almost $35 million in contributions and grants (the Ford Foundation gave it $5 million). Its CEO in 2008, Larry Garber (the present CEO is Daniel Sokatch), was paid more than $228,000 in that year, a consultant named Aaron Back was paid $235,000 for 'program management services', and there were seven additional employees with annual salaries over $100,000. Just because it's a non-profit doesn't mean that nobody profits! This huge enterprise is focused on one tiny, embattled democratic country, aiming to remake it in accordance with the fantasies of an ideal society as imagined by liberal American Jews. This is bad enough, but it also funds a darker enterprise, which is to delegitimize and demonize the Jewish state. I'm sure its supporters would claim that they are only trying to bring about peace (by opposing the policies of its democratically elected government), but the effect is to weaken the state and strengthen its enemies. Oh — did I mention that this is the same NIF as the one of which Rabbi Richard Jacobs, the incoming president of the Union for Reform Judaism, is a board member? The URJ has said that Rabbi Jacobs will step down from his outside board positions for the first years of his presidency, "in order to focus his energies on the task ahead of him." What he should do is resign from the NIF altogether, insofar as that organization is hurting, not helping, the state. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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END OF THE MIDDLE EAST CHRISTIAN?
Posted by David Isaac, June 16, 2011. |
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A little over a month after former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's fall, Ayman Anwar Mitri, a Coptic Christian, was beaten by Islamists inside his apartment, which they had torched. "When they were beating me, they kept saying: 'We won't leave any Christians in this country,'" Mr. Mitri recalled to The Wall Street Journal. Nina Shea, director of the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom, recently wrote: "Since [late February], a heightened campaign of violence is being directed against Egypt's Copts and is presaging a mass exodus from the country..." You'd never guess this listening to President Obama's speeches. In a major speech on the Middle East in May he declared: "In Tahrir Square, we heard Egyptians from all walks of life chant, 'Muslims, Christians, we are one.'" Apparently Obama didn't get the memo that they are no longer one. Egypt's Copts are not alone. The war against Iraq's Christians began when the U.S. invaded Iraq. U.S. troops were unable to protect the Christians, an estimated half of whom had fled the country by 2009. Ironically, they were safer under Saddam Hussein. President Obama seems to have missed this development as well. In that same speech he declared: "In Iraq we see the promise of a multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian democracy." To be sure, Christians of the region have long ceased expecting support from Western (ostensibly Christian) nations. When Lebanon's Christians suffered a similar fate in the 1970s, the West ignored their plight. As Shmuel writes in his book Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine, (Bantam Books, 1973): "Here was the only Arab state in which the Moslems had to share power and even to accept a minor share in it. Indeed, the original raison d'etre and the whole modern history of Lebanon was primarily of a Christian enclave, of a haven for Christians in an unfriendly Moslem environment. In recent years in particular, with the increasing discomforts and unease suffered by Christians in some of the Arab states, Christian immigrants from those countries were being absorbed by Lebanon. By the agreed Lebanese Constitution of 1943, the President and the Commander in Chief of the Army were always Christians, while a Moslem was Prime Minister. A Moslem was also Speaker in the Parliament, but the Christians held a majority of its seats." But Muslims could not abide a status less than domination. Shmuel wrote in "Hypocrisy in Lebanon" (The Jerusalem Post, August 31, 1979): "That, after all is the source and root of the horror and destruction the Moslems have brought down upon Lebanon. It began early in 1975 with the combined onslaught by Lebanese Moslems and Palestinian Arab terrorists to crush the Christians and destroy their power in the country. The attack was sponsored by the Syrian Government, who had two objects in view. Following closely upon the crushing of the Kurdish revolt in Iraq, the attack in Lebanon dovetailed into the overall purpose of extinguishing the pockets of non Arab-Moslem independence in the 'Arab world.' The second purpose was to establish specifically Syrian hegemony over Lebanon — which they claim as part (like Palestine) of 'Greater Syria.'" Brigitte Gabriel, founder of ACT! For America, describes what it was like living in Lebanon in the 1970s: "When the Moslems and Palestinians declared Jihad on the Christians in 1975, they started massacring the Christians, city after city. I ended up living in a bomb shelter underground from age 10 to 17, without electricity, eating grass to live, and crawling under sniper bullets to a spring to get water." As Shmuel relates in Battleground (updated edition, 1985): "Large sections of [Beirut] the once flourishing westernized city, banking and business metropolis of all the Arab states, were reduced to rubble, and day after day tens, and later hundreds, of people, mostly civilians, were killed. After a year of civil war, at least twenty thousand people had perished. One might say that the coup de grace to this decades-long process begun in 1975, (and delayed for a time by Israeli intervention), took place this Monday. Lebanon announced the formation of a new government dominated by the terrorist organization Hezbollah. Thus is a new Syrian-Iranian client state born out of the ashes of a formerly peaceful Christian country. The Christian world did nothing for Lebanon's Christians. It did nothing for Iraq's Christians. It will do nothing for Egypt's Christians. The reason, for the most part, is that the Christian world has stopped considering itself Christian, whereas the Muslim world has not stopped considering itself Muslim. In No Solution to the Arab-Palestinian Problem (Dawn Books, 1985), Shmuel wrote: In the Arabs' view, they were humiliated for hundreds of years, especially in the 18th and 19th centuries, by the Western Christian powers — even though they, as Muslims, are the bearers of a superior religion. The Arabs never lost that feeling that they should rule by divine right. Indeed, in the midst of an Islamist resurgence they believe this more than ever. The Christian West, on the other hand, has replaced its Christianity with a toxic blend of multiculturalism, environmentalism and assorted politically correct pieties. Given the imbalance, which side do you think will win?
David Isaac is editor of the Shmuel Katz website:
www.shmuelkatz.com. Contact him at david_isaac@shmuelkatz.com
This article is archived at
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PROPOSED GRAY PROPAGANDA FOR DEPLOYMENT AT CAMPUSES IN RESPONSE TO ISRAEL APARTHEID WEEK, GAZA FLOTILLA
Posted by Bill Levinson, June 15, 2011. | ||
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ISM Safety Advisory for Female and Gay Activists | ||
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The International Solidarity Movement has made it clear that "The ISM is not an organization, but rather a movement which all organizations, groups and/or individuals who agree with our principles can join." This means the ISM is not a legal entity (e.g. a corporate person or an actual organization) against which anybody can take legal action, and it doubtlessly enjoys the fact that "you can't hit a ghost." As far as we can see, however, the fact that the ISM is NOT a legal entity such as a corporate person, organization, or business means it has no exclusive right to the name "International Solidarity Movement." Oops.
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT SAFETY ADVISORY FOR WOMEN AND GAY PEOPLE "From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will be Free" The International Solidarity Movement welcomes the assistance of women and gay people (e.g. QUIT, Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism) in resisting the Zionist entity's occupation of Palestinian land. Your participation in Israel Apartheid Week at a university, direct action in Palestine, or participation in a Gaza flotilla all help the Palestinian cause. As a female or gay activist, it is important for you to understand the cultural differences between your country of origin and that of Palestine. Please follow these guidelines to make your participation in Israel Apartheid Week, a Gaza flotilla, or your visit to occupied Palestine both safe and productive for the Palestinian cause. Guidelines for Women
Gay Activists: Don't Ask and Don't Tell Sharia defines homosexuality as an abomination, and it is punishable by death in Iran. Per http://www.glapn.org/sodomylaws/world/palestine/psnews003.htm: " Sodomy carries a three to 10-year jail term in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Palestinian legal experts say enforcement is at the discretion of local authorities and usually requires that the accused be caught in the act. ...Israel, which decriminalized sodomy in 1987, is considered among the more liberal of societies when it comes to gay rights." EDITOR'S NOTE: Some of the comments that added useful information:
And this tongue-in-cheek-one:
This appeared yesterday on Israpundit
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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL: THE WALLS AND GATES OF THE OLD CITY
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, June 15, 2011. |
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"That which matters most is more than f-stops and lenses, more than pens and papers,
more than notes and strings, more than knives and clay.
That which matters most is a child's laugh, a lover's hug, an open heart."
HOW I GOT THE SHOT: The walls and gates of the old city are quiet. Built to protect those who dwelled within before the modern city arose, these days the ancient stones often serve as artistic compliments to a variety of civic celebrations. Beginning tonight and continuing through June 22, the old city will host the Jerusalem Festival of Light, now in its third year. For anyone who already appreciates the old city in its never mundane, day to day look, this is a chance to stroll the historic alleys with a colorful, electric accent provided by several world renowned light artists. This week's photo shows the Damascus Gate in one of its illuminated incarnations from last year's festival. The old city's most intricately designed gate was lit with a 10-minute changing light spectacle that combined colored gel washes and spotlights to highlight the gate's ornate features. The low level of projected light called for the use of a tripod, which I set up atop the stairs directly front and center of the gate, as far back as I could stand. I used my widest lens as well to encompass the full breath of the majestic structure. As the show progressed, I fired off several shots to capture the different dramatic renderings. The festival runs from 8 p.m. to midnight and is mostly free (there are some exhibits which require a fee to enter) and well worth a visit. Technical Data: Nikon D300, 12-24 zoom at 12mm, f8 at 1/3 sec., ISO 400.
Contact Yehoshua Halevi by email at smile@goldenlightimages.com
and visit his website: |
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HOW LANGUAGE IS USED AS A TOOL AGAINST ISRAEL
Posted by Paul Lademain, June 15, 2011. |
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Solving the problems facing Israel today requires a better understanding of how language is used as a tool against Israel by its enemies. Such tools are also used by the Jews who service Israel's detractors by helping them "piece-away of the lands of Israel." The largest component of these subversives speaks English. Many of them comprise a loud minority in the Jewish Homeland itself. They are found in larger numbers in the British Foreign Office and attending every Saudi/UAE-sponsored cocktail party. To outsiders such as ourselves, there appears to be some kind of deficiency in the Hebrew language (which we don't speak) because of an apparent paucity of words that should be used to describe the activities and motives of Israel's resident subversives. The majority of Israelis call them "lefties" or "leftists" but we think this word lacks flavor — it's far too polite and confers a sense of unwarranted dignity upon Israel's twisted antagonists. Because we only speak English, it seems to us that Hebrew-speakers lack the necessary words they ought to use to put their enemies down and thus we have come to believe that this explains why israelis are so prone to succumb to the self-serving and powerful terminology created against them by their arab and British enemies. For instance, when the arab invaders surged into Israel and claimed they were "palestinians" the language-deficient and then care-free Jews put that very word in their own mouths and through their own usage, allowed the arab invaders to win half the battle launched against Israel's sovereignty. In short, the care-free Jews gave the undeserving arabs a leg-up over all Israelis by subjugating Jews in Israel as well as US bureaucrats to "Muslim jargon." And thus Muslim-jargon, having deftly obscured the truth, ruled the day. Sad to say, the more the word "palestinian" was used by Muslims, Jews, Israelis, British, JImmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Hillary, etc. etc. to describe "arabs-surging-into-the Jewish-Homeland-from-unknown-places," the more real became the Big Lie sponsored by the Saudis, to wit: the invention of an "arab people" who in fact do not exist and never have. Historically, the term "Palestine" was the appellation for the region long settled by Jews and recognized as The Jewish Homeland by the San Remo Resolution last century. We are the SC4Z and are well acquainted with the nuances and slang of the English language and we kindly offer you a word to use when describing the subversive Jews and Israelis who are helping the arab invaders and Muslim imperialists undermine the state of Israel. We found the perfect appellation for them here:
http://onlineslangdictionary.com — and this in turn led us to:
The word "yellow-belly" means "coward" in English slang. Doesn't this word describe every Jew who sides with their would-be conquerors? As an adjective, this word, "yellow-belly" can be applied to every Jewish subversive who bows down before Abdullah and "Yosi Beilin, or Neve Gordon. In fact, it describes the latter's club members perfectly. How's this sound to your ears?: "Yellow-bellied Gordanites support the attack against Israeli arabs loyal to the state of Israel." One might refer to Shimon Peres as the self-annointed king of the yellow-bellies. One can describe Olmert as the yellow-bellied Jew who surrendered Israel's land to the Muslim imperialists and their arab and euroid henchmen. Who promoted Goldstone Lie? The Yellow-bellies! What do you think? Comments welcomed. --- SC4Z. Not Left. Not Right. Not Polite. Just 4 Justice 4 Israel. . Paul Lademain is a Secular Christian for Zion (SC4Z). Contact him by email at lademain@verizon.net |
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PRESIDENT OBAMA — NO, HE CAN'T!
Posted by Yoram Ettinger, June 15, 2011. |
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President Obama pressures Israel to adopt his initiative, which is based on the 1949 cease fire lines, including the repartitioning of Jerusalem and land swaps. He implies that Israeli rejection of his initiative would undermine US-Israel relations, while advancing Palestinian maneuvers at the UN. However, Obama lacks the domestic backing to effectively pressure Israel, which has recently gained in bi-partisan support on Capitol Hill and among constituents, while Obama lost the "Bin Laden Bounce" and is struggling with a less-than-50% approval rating. Obama's power constraints are derivatives of the Federalist system, which is based on limited government with a complete separation of powers and checks and balances between Congress and the White House, Congressional "Power of the Purse" and the centrality of the constituent in a political system of bi-annual elections. Therefore, legislators are more loyal to — and fearful of — their constituents than to their party or to the president. Moreover, the loyalty to constituents constitutes a prerequisite for re-election. Obama's constraints in pressuring the Jewish State emanate from the unique attitude of Americans — as early as the 1620 landing of the Mayflower, as well as the Founding Fathers — to the idea of reconstructing the Jewish Commonwealth in the Land of Israel. The solid and sustained support enjoyed by Israel in the USA derives its vitality from the American people and from their representatives on Capitol Hill and in the legislatures of the 50 states more than from the president. While the president plays a major role in shaping US-Israel relations, constituents and legislators laid the foundations to this relationship and they continuously codetermine its direction, tone and substance. They can also initiate, suspend, terminate and amend policies, direct presidents and overhaul presidential policies. The results of the November 2010 Congressional elections revealed that Obama's policies had lost the support of most constituents. According to a May 26, 2011 poll by CNN — which is usually critical of Israel — most Americans do not share Obama's attitude towards Israel. 82% consider Israel an ally and a friend, compared with 72% in 2001. 67% support Israel, while only 16% support the Palestinians, compared with 60%:17% in 2009. In fact, the Palestinians (16%) are are as unpopular as are Iran (15%) and North Korea (17%). These CNN findings exceed the February, 2011 Gallup poll (68% considered Israel an ally), the April 2011 Rasmussen Report (most Americans opposed foreign aid to Arab countries but supported foreign aid to Israel) and the April 2010 Quinnipiac Polling Institute (66% expected Obama to improve treatment of Israel). But, the "Poll of Polls" is conducted daily in Congress — a coequal branch of government — where hard-core support of the Jewish State has been bi-partisan, robust and steady. Majority Leader, Senator Harry Reid and Minority Whip Congressman Steny Hoyer publicly criticized (fellow-Democrat) President Obama's focus on the 1967 ceasefire lines. Other key Democrats — whose cooperation is critical to Obama's reelection campaign — have clarified that they expect him to veto any anti-Israel UN resolution. Just like their constituents — most Democrats value Israel as a unique ally, whose alliance with the US is based on shared values, mutual threats and joint interests. Will Prime Minister Netanyahu leverage this unique American support, defying pressure and solidifying Israel's posture of deterrence in the face of an unpredictably violent Middle East, where concessions breed radicalism, terrorism and war? Or, will he succumb to the psychological warfare launched by the White House? Ambassador Yoram Ettinger is a consultant on US-Israel relations as well as the Chairman of Special Projects at the Ariel Center for Policy Research. Formerly the Minister for Congressional Affairs to Israel's Embassy in Washington, DC, Ettinger also served as Consul General of Israel to the Southwestern US. He is a former editor of Contemporary Mideast Backgrounder, and is the author of the Jerusalem Cloakroom series of reports. Contact him at yoramtex@netvision.net.il This article is archived at
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A STORY ABOUT A BAMBOOZLED PEOPLE
Posted by Nurit Greenger, June 15, 2011. |
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In the Bible, the Book of Exodus, Chapter XIX, when the Nation of Israel agreed to received the Bible-the Torah, at the foot of Mount Sinai, the Jewish People said to Moses, 'We will do and hear,' rather than we will hear and then do. Throughout Jewish history and according the Jewish Sages' sayings, this phrase, 'We will do and hear,' became the clear expression of an unqualified acceptance and conditions of the Torah, and according to the Jewish tradition, the attitude to this statement is positive, expressing a welcome obedience of the Torah's authority. Since they won the 1967 war, the Israelis' behavior is, 'We will do and hear.' The Israelis want peace; to achieve this goal they signed the Oslo Accords and the Road Map and began complying with what they agreed to and signed on. The Arab-"Palestinians" did not comply with even one sub-clause of these same agreements they also agreed to and signed on. The Israelis want peace; to try achieve this desirable goal, they promote and assist the Arabs-"Palestinians'" economy and fund much of it. The Israelis want peace; thinking they can achieve it, they agreed to give large portion of their land, Sinai and Gaza, in return for "peace," ("Land for Peace"), they unilaterally removed Jewish community from Judea and Samaria, but, in return, they received nothing but more terror and violent protests in which the Arabs express that the existence of the state of Israel is their catastrophe, their "Nakba". The Israelis want peace; they are willing to go the extra mile, the extra mile the Arab-"Palestinians" are willing to accept from them along Yaser Arafat's plan, which, in the '70s, he used to call the 'three steps solution: 1. Make "peace" with Israel and take back as much land as we can, On June 13, 2011, Israel National News published the article, 'PA:
Arab States Cut Off Our Cash,
It is well known that the Arab-"Palestinians'" leadership at the Palestinians Authority (PA) are nothing more than a bunch kleptocrats. They do not have any means to finance themselves and they squander a lot of the money, given to them, unaccounted, by the international community; it is a bottomless cup. For many months I have been demanding that Israel and the USA will lead the way to defund the Palestinian Authority (PA). Many members of Congress are in favor of such action because,
Time to end the charade and lying to ourselves. The PA are murderers living on Other People's Money, an OPM's outfit. If Israel is to follow the Arab States' conduct and cut the PA supply of electricity, fuel, gas, cement, medicines, telecom services, to name a few of what Israel supplies then, they will implode without one bullet shot. Thereafter, we, the people, will need to demand that the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), not United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), will settle these Arab-"Palestinians" in any country that will take them in. They can even stay in the State of Israel, under Israeli law, entitled to full human rights, but no citizens' rights, so long as they become a friendly to the Jewish State element. Israel must not continue to provide funds, amenities or materials to these Satanic people. Goodness goes that far but not farther! Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
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IT IS FAR PAST TIME WE UNDERSTOOD SYRIA AND WHAT HAPPENED IN LEBANON
Posted by Jerome S. Kaufman, June 14, 2011. |
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p>The Levantine Crucible
By Michael J. Totten Publisher: Encounter, 360 pages This below was redacted from a more detailed review by Sohrab Ahmari Commentary Magazine, June 2111 Archived at: http://israel-commentary.org/?p=735 Sohrab Ahmari is coeditor of Re-Orient, Palgrave Macmillan's forthcoming anthology of essays by young Mideast reformers. |
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Modern Terrorist attacks, Regis Debray has argued, are "manifestos written in other people's blood." In the winter of 2005, one such manifesto was inscribed in the blood of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and 20 of his associates. (Hariri was assassinated on 14 February 2005 when explosives equivalent to around 1000 kg of TNT were detonated as his motorcade drove past the St. George Hotel in the Lebanese capital, Beirut.) Its drafters were bent on subjugating Lebanon to the will of their Syrian and Iranian paymasters. More important, they sought to prevent Hariri from moving his compatriots beyond the failed ideologies that had defined Lebanon for more than a generation. But rather than cower in fear and submit, a majority of the Lebanese — usually notorious for their sectarian fractiousness — united around the March 14 movement, calling for political freedom and the withdrawal of Syria's occupation force from their country. In The Road to Fatima Gate, Michael J. Totten offers a masterful account of this Cedar Revolution, as it came to be known, and its tragic aftermath. He ends up far more clear-sighted than the many analysts who claim objectivity but share neither his love of the region and its inhabitants nor his concern for its future. Totten's Lebanon is a Mideast crucible, foretelling the promise — and peril — of the democratic uprisings that would rock the region in 2009 and then again last winter. First, the promise In Lebanon, it was represented by more than one million people who — in what was then an unprecedented sight in the Arab world — peacefully took to the streets of Beirut in response to Harari's assassination. Beyond their specific demands, the young leaders of the March 14 movement were determined to radically alter the very nature of Lebanese politics. "We want to rebuild our country," one tells Totten. " We stand not only for freedom and independence, but also national unity and a new, modern, common, tolerant Lebanese identity." The remarkable realignment of political attitudes among Lebanon's sectarian elites could not be credited solely to March 14′s moral accomplishments. It also reflected a long-term shift in the balance of power in Lebanese society-and the growing menace of the Iranian backed Shia terrorist organization Hezbollah. Totten makes his way into Hezbollah's squalid, backward stronghold in the dahiyeh (suburb) of Haret Hreik, among other Hezbollah-controlled areas. What he finds "looked, alternately, like a slum of Tehran or Damascus." Here, Lebanese Shia are kept dependent on Hezbollah's welfare system, force-fed a steady diet of anti-American and anti-Semitic propaganda, and taught to seek "martyrdom" rather than help rebuild Lebanon. ...The mullahs' foothold in the Levant allows them to wage jihad against Israel at minimal cost to the Islamic Republic. As Totten leams, Hezbollah's method of launching thousands of blind rockets at Israeli border towns, while cheap and crude, is nevertheless unimaginably cruel. Indeed, the most terrifying firsthand experience he relates is of covering northern Israel during Hezbollah's rocket campaign. "When you're under fire from above," he writes, "the sky feels like a gigantic malevolent eyeball." Of course, when Israel retaliates, as it did in the July 2006 war, Lebanon foots the bill for Iranian aggression and adventurism. Israel's 2006 excursion into Lebanon produced, at best, mixed results. The IDF rattled Hezbollah's leadership, but failed to folly dismantle the organization's terror infrastructure. As soon as hostilities ceased, Iran began replenishing Hezbollah's rocket stockpiles. Then, in 2008, a cornered Hezbollah lashed out northward, placing the March 14 movement in its crosshairs. Nasrallah sought to accomplish by brute force what he could not in the realm of con sensual politics, and he succeeded. Hezbollah snipers — aided by the fascist thugs of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party — conquered Beirut once more. In the process, they permanently disrupted Lebanon's carefully balanced sectarian power-sharing structure. Totten frequently quotes the Druze warlord Walid Jumblatt to the effect that the solution to his country's troubles lies in Tehran. It is appropriate, then, that Totten's narrative of modem Lebanon's failed quest for freedom should end not in Beirut, but in the Persian capital. In 2009, the angel of history seemed poised to vindicate Beirut's defeated liberals in Tehran, the very heart of the Shia empire of "resistance." Alas, the angel's vengeful wrath could not overcome the mullahs' limitless brutality. Last winter, it took flight from Tehran to Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, where the self-immolation of a fruit vendor led to the fall of a rotten autocracy. From there, it traveled to Cairo, Benghazi, Manama, Sanaa, Daraa, and so on. The outcome of each of these uprisings hangs in the balance. Their future in the Middle East is neither guaranteed nor immune from the region's underlying geopolitical realities. It is never enough, then, for liberals to merely compose manifestos with beautiful watchwords like "compromise" and "consent" when their opponents write theirs in blood. Contact Jerome Gordon by email at jerome_gordon38@yahoo.coom |
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FROM ISRAEL: ANTI-ISRAEL ORIENTATION
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 14, 2011. |
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Yesterday I attended a lecture at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs given by Dexter Van Zile, Christian Media Analyst for CAMERA, on "The World Council of Churches and its stance on the Arab-Israeli conflict." His comments, with some additional material provided, merit mention here. Founded in 1948, the World Council of Churches (WCC) is an umbrella organization for 349 Protestant and Orthodox churches in 110 countries that seeks one Eucharist fellowship, i.e., one communion for all church members. The Roman Catholic Church is not a member, but the Council has relations with the Vatican. An organization with a liberal bent, which embraces PC positions on issues such as the environment and women's rights, the WCC, says Zile, "is anti-Israel by default and by design." It demonizes Israel, applies double standards and delegitimizes Israel. At the same time, it is in denial about Muslim anti-Semitism and anti-Israel positions. While it condemns anti-Semitism in principle, it never takes a stand against it. ~~~~~~~~~~ Part of the problem is that the Middle East Council of Churches — a constituent organization of the WCC — keeps Israel on its agenda at all times. Here in Israel there is an Ecumenical Accompaniment Program, initiated by the WCC jointly with local churches, with anti-Israel material coming out of the Old City of Jerusalem. The accompaniment program, according to the Global Ministry website, is: a program..."to accompany Palestinians and Israelis in their non-violent efforts to bring about an end to the occupation and a resolution to the conflict...stated objectives are to express solidarity with Palestinian and Israel peace activists and empower local Palestinian communities/churches and to be an active witness that an alternative, non-violent struggle for justice and peace is possible to end the illegal occupation of Palestine." ~~~~~~~~~~ Particularly problematic is the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem (Director, Naim Ateek), which has turned churches against Israel. "Liberation," of course, refers to "Palestinian Liberation." According to ADL, the Center is a driving force behind divestment programs and takes an anti-Zionist stand based on theology: "It has promoted the idea that Zionism is based on a false reading of the Bible and that it stands for injustice and in opposition to God. In addition, Sabeel often compares the Palestinians to the crucified Jesus, and Israel to his murderers, alluding to the ugly and false deicide charge against all the Jewish people..." ~~~~~~~~~~ Desmond Tutu of South Africa, a bishop in the Anglican church, is a patron of the Sabeel Center and a "master of the double standard." ~~~~~~~~~~ In terms of theology, Zile notes that those who subscribe to supersessionst theology (replacement theology, which says the Christian church has superseded Israel as the chosen of God) are terribly threatened by the existence of Israel, which is a sign of God's continuing protection of the Jews. ~~~~~~~~~~ Zile sees the WCC as too sophisticated to be ignorant of what's going on. To a considerable extent what's fueling the organization, he believes, is fear. There is an extreme reluctance to confront either Muslim anti-Semitism, or Jihadism. Confrontation with Muslims can be dangerous. Criticism of Israel, on the other hand, is safe. ~~~~~~~~~~ As WCC has failed to raise its voice in criticism of Muslim treatment of Jews, it is now finding it difficult to do so with regard to Christians. Muslims conduct religious cleansing of areas and take Christians hostage without real protest from the WCC. The organization conducts interfaith dialogue with Muslim groups without raising the issue of how local Christians are treated. ~~~~~~~~~~ Zile believes that it's important to deal with these issues publicly, to "shame" the WCC. A prominent Christian Zionist who was present, however, suggests that there is little chance of changing the WCC: an attack on the group would not be productive. As a major part of the problem is that the WCC positions on Muslims and Arabs provide validation for Christians to assume anti-Israel attitudes, she suggests that local pro-Israel Christian groups have to be strengthened so that they can provide an alternative voice. ~~~~~~~~~~ For those who live in or near Jerusalem: A mini-conference on "The Preferred Option: Israel Sovereignty over Judea and Samaria." This will provide an opportunity to explore the issues and create serious discussion. As organizer Yoel Meltzer puts it: The purpose of the evening is to break the ice and start a process, namely the active promotion of Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria as the eventual alternative to the two-state solution. Monday night, June 20th. The OU-Israel Center, Keren Hayesod 22, Jerusalem Doors open at 7:00 PM, program at 7:30 PM Speakers: Yoram Ettinger, Ambassador (ret.)
There is a modest fee. Please, pass the word locally. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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WOLFENSOHN BARRED FROM BEIRUT U., LEARNS ARAB GRATITUDE FIRSTHAND
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 14, 2011. |
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This was written by Aryeh Ben Hayim
And it appeared in Arutz-7
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When the Sharon government uprooted the Jewish residents of Gaza, former World Bank chief James Wolfensohn personally bought the hothouses of the evicted Jews for millions so they could be delivered intact to the Palestinians. This was intended to help underpin the Gazan Arabs economically and strengthen the presumed peace that he expected to see flourishing after Israel's surrender of the territory. The Palestinians promptly burned the hothouses as a prelude to how peace with Gaza, and their governance of it,would look. The PA rebuilt them. But Wolfensohn had shown the Arabs that his heart was in the right place and in recognition of this and other assistance projects, he was scheduled last Friday to deliver the keynote address at the commencement exercises at the American University of Beirut. Wolfensohn had to change his plans once students and faculty discovered that he had business ties with Israel. These include support for the electric car company Better Place and the Ieftist Israel Democracy Institute. More than 90 faculty members signed a petition, entitled "Not in our name: AUB faculty, staff and students object to honoring James Wolfensohn." The university folded although the president Peter Dorman attempted to defend "Wolfensohn's long and devoted record of work on behalf of the Arab world," including his opposition to U.S. policies after Hamas won elections in 2006, and a 2007 award he received from the Palestinian Authority for his work to rebuild Gaza. Dorman was roundly attacked by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, condemned for his defense of Wolfensohn, which PACBI called an attack on "his own community and the Lebanese community at large." PACBI was founded in Ramallah, "the Palestinian capital," in 2004 to promote a comprehensive boycott of all Israeli academic and cultural institutions. The university issued a statement reading, "AUB regrets to announce that Sir James Wolfensohn, out of concern that his presence at the June commencement ceremony would distract from the celebratory nature of the event, has decided that he will not attend." Wolfensohn will have to console himself with an honorary doctorate from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem this Sunday, where they appreciate his work on behalf of Palestinians and Israeli democracy. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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THE SHOFAR-BLOWER IS ARRIVING
Posted by David Wilder, June 14, 2011. |
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I've spent most of today, and some of yesterday and Sunday, looking for photos. You might think, sitting in front of the screen for a few hours, viewing pictures, not too stressing. But in truth, it hasn't been easy. I've been searching for photos of my friend, Eyal Noked, who, a few months before his forty-first birthday, passed away on Saturday night. 
<p>At about 11:15 PM, the beeper message sent out to people's homes and individual pagers had only three words: <i>Baruch Dayan HaEmet</i> — Blessed is the true judge. Such words are recited upon notification of a person's death. No name accompanied this sad communication, but unfortunately, it was not necessary. All understood. Eyal was gone.
<p>However, I think that Eyal didn't 'die' as such. As is written about Eyal's favorite prophet, ) Eyal's life was certainly filled with challenge. While serving in the army, he was attacked by terrorists who tried to steal his weapon and shot at him. Here in Hebron,he was, among other things, a paramedic. A number of years ago, attempting to help people wounded in a terror shooting at the Tel Hebron (Rumeida) neighborhood, he was shot in the shoulder by the terrorist. A few years ago, while driving a special paramedic motorcycle down the hill from Kiryat Arba to Hebron, Arabs starting throwing rocks at him. Swerving, attempting to dodge the rocks, he fell, with the motorcycle on top of him, breaking his leg in two places. Eyal opted to forgo surgery, knowing that the recovery time (and pain) would be extended by a number of months. Yet, despite the seriousness of the injury, one day I found him on the treadmill, next to me, in Hebron's gym room. And he was moving much faster than me.
Some years ago Eyal was diagnosed with cancer. Several surgeries seemed to have removed the growth, and his recovery appeared complete. But a couple of years ago it returned. At some point he had no choice but to leave his position here in Hebron, investing his time in an attempt to again overcome the illness. It's difficult to describe Eyal's role in Hebron. He did so much, in so many different positions. Not only as a colleague, but also as a friend. As one of the speakers at the funeral declared, many many people looked at him as their best friend. Here, in our offices, Eyal had an integral role in building Hebron, both on paper and physically. He was instrumental in major building projects, working day and night at Beit HaShalom, Beit Shapira and in the "Shalhevet neighborhood," otherwise known as the 'shuk.' He was a firm believer in the 'greening' of Hebron, and spent many an hour finding places to plant flowers, trees, and bushes, which really beautified the city. He was also a paramedic and ambulance driver, on-call whenever needed. He also served as a senior advisor to one of Hebron's executive directors, and was elected to the Hebron community council. In addition he spent months in Gush Katif, prior to the expulsion, living and assisting in numerous projects undertaken at that time. He dedicated his life to Eretz Yisrael. But, in truth, none of the above really describes Eyal. Perhaps the most fitting description portrayal of Eyal can be expressed in the words of his oldest son, Baruch Tzuri, seventeen years old, who, eulogizing his father at the funeral said, "Dad, you taught us that everything, but everything, comes from HaShem, from G-d. Just as you had no complaints, so too, we have no complaints to HaShem. We will continue in your path, knowing, believing, and living this axiom, that everything comes from HaShem." Much is written, in sacred Jewish literature, about the goal of every Jew, that being, 'devakut with HaShem' — roughly translated as 'bind to HaShem, being at one with HaShem. This was, quite literally, the way Eyal lived. We have a job in this world, to do our part, but whatever happens is the Will of G-d. This is the way he lived and it's also the way he died. I met him outside one day, and when he asked how I was, I sort of looked at him and raised my hands to the heavens, with the expression on my face not one of joy and happiness. He questioned me, as to the problem, and when I just looked at him he just smiled and said, 'not because of me. Everything is fine, HaShem has me exactly where he wants me.' In the past few weeks, even as his strength dwindled, he maintained his inner strength. A couple of weeks ago, despite that fact that his ability to speak, decreased, he lay in bed and spoke with a friend for two hours about faith and the goodness of G-d. And so it was with others, time and time again, up until the end. Eyal taught me many things, different classes to listen to via internet, how to drive my car, and how to think clearly. A couple of years ago I was supposed to visit the US for an extended visit. A few people had invested a lot of time to help organize the trip. The only problem was that I became ill, with what later was diagnosed as mono, and really didn't have the strength to travel. On the other hand, I didn't want to offend the people who were working very hard to help me and Hebron. I was in a real bind, not knowing what to do. Eyal happened to be in the office that day, so I decided to ask his advice. He thought for a moment and then asked, "Did you ask them, in the US, what would happen if you had to cancel?" "No," I answered. "So call them and listen, not only to what they say, but also how they say it. If they're really upset, go. But if they can deal with it, stay here." Very simple advice. And it worked. Another man, speaking at the funeral, told how he had been involved in an accident, which crushed his leg. He'd been brought to the hospital, but was left lying in the emergency room, without being treated. After a while, not knowing what to do, he called his friend Eyal and asked him what to do. Eyal heard him and then asked, "Your head, it's ok? And your neck, your arms and your stomach, they're all ok? And your leg, left or right? Left — and above the knee or below the knee. Below? That's all? Your injured only on your left leg, below the knee? Man, you have to laugh!" And Eyal started laughing, over the phone, until his friend too started laughing, almost rolling on the floor, thanking G-d that the injury wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. Eyal's wife of about 20 years, Einat, told of Eyal's passing. 'Eliyahu (Elijah) the prophet, was Eyal's favorite prophet. He read about him over and over. On Thursday, after I read to him the verses describing how Elihayu left this world, he said to me, "I'm not on the level of Eliyahu, but that's the way I feel." On Shabbat afternoon he told me, "we are not separated. We will always be together, I'm just moving up one floor." Later, after Shabbat, he tried to tell me something, but couldn't talk. He motioned with his arm, and I realized he wanted someone to study Torah with him, to pray with him. I called one of his friends, and when he came over and started recited Torah and prayers, Eyal's eyes opened and he radiated with joy. Later, we were all there in the room. I called a righteous doctor, who could discern the exact moment of the soul's departure from the body. He sat opposite Eyal, staring at his eyes. Eyal's face and eyes emanated rapture, seeing the angels awaiting him, above him. He had said that he did not fear death, that he was totally at peace with his situation, and so it was. Suddenly the doctor yelled, 'Shema Yisrael' and then all those present did so, and you could actually see his neshama, his soul, leave his body. We weren't crying, it was a moment of Divine exaltation.' Last Rosh HaShana eve, following services, I went over to Eyal's house to wish him a happy New Year. His kids told me that he wasn't home, that he'd gone to Ma'arat HaMachpela to pray. I told them that if he wanted, there would be prayer services at Beit Hadassah the next morning. But they said that he'd worship again at Machpela. The next morning, despite his illness and weakness, he was there. But he didn't only pray. He also trumpeted the Shofar, the ram's horn, blown every Rosh HaShana. The shofar isn't blown once. Rather, one hundred times. The laws concerning this special mitzvah are detailed and intricate. Many times, if the sound produced is not exactly right, it must be repeated. Eyal stood and blew the shofar, on the first day, one hundred times. And he blew the Shofar again, on the second day of Rosh HaShana, one hundred times. And he did not make one mistake, on either day. Not one time did he have to repeat himself. And the sound that he produced from that ram's horn, I've never heard anything like it in my life. So it was, Eyal, sick with cancer, less than a year ago. Not yet forty one, nine children, and one grandchild, born less than a month ago. I have no doubt whatsoever, that as Eyal's neshama, as his soul left his body, in the heaven's above, hundreds and thousands of ram's horns began trumpeting, with a voice heard, above them all, 'the Shofar-blower from Hebron, the Shofar-blower from Ma'arat HaMachpela is arriving. The Shofar-blower is arriving. Let us all go greet the shofar-blower from Hebron.' Next Rosh HaShana will not be the same. Eyal will be sorely missed, for many many years to come. On a personal note, Eyal left a widow and nine children, only one of whom is married. The youngest is 18 months old. The brit of his first grandson was two weeks ago. You can see a video that I filmed of the brit via a link in the above article. Thank G-d, Vaad HaRabbanim (The Rabbinic Council) in Jerusalem has agreed to open a fund for the family. They are quite in need of assistance. Vaad HaRabbanim collects donations specifically for the family, all of which are kept in a fund only for the Noked family. All money donated goes to the family. They don't take any percentage or fee. Money donated in the US (or Canada) is applicable for a tax exempt receipt. We are asking all people we know to make a contribution via this fund immediately, in order to assure the family a minimal income for as long as needed. Donations can be made monthly via credit card payment. Here in Israel we are asking people for 40 shekels a month, which is about $15, for 50 months. However, if you can make a larger donation, it will certainly not be wasted. The address and phone number of Vaad Rabbanim is:
When you write or call, you must specify the fund number: 3050 — Fund for nine orphans of the Noked family Your assistance is a bracha-blessing for the family, and I'm sure will be a bracha for you too. We should only know happy occasions and raise contributions for smachot! Thanks very much. With blessings from Hebron,
David Wilder is spokesman of The Jewish Community of Hebron. You
can contribute directly in Israel to The Jewish Community of Hebron,
POB105, Kiryat Arba-Hebron 90100, email: hebron@hebron.org.il or
phone: 972-52-431-7055. In USA, write to The Hebron Fund, 1760 Ocean
Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11230, email: hebronfund@aol.com or phone: 718 677
6886.
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HOLOCAUST-ERA MEZUZAHS FOUND IN DUTCH HOME
Posted by Hillel Fendel, June 14, 2011. |
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Amsterdam: Shoah Mezuzahs Found |
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"I feel like I received warm regards from my Holocaust victim grandparents whom I never knew," says Miriam Hanina, nee Tafelkruijer. The regards came in the form of two mezuzahs her grandparents hid in a wall in their Amsterdam home during the Holocaust, and which were found during the course of refurbishing work several years ago. The woman who currently lives in the house took the time and trouble to track down the original owners, leading to a "reunion" with their granddaughter Miriam who now lives in Even Shmuel, near Be'er Sheva. "I never knew anything about my grandparents or about my aunt," Miriam told Israel National News, "because my father, the only survivor of his family, refused to talk about anything having to do with that period. Now, all of a sudden, I feel that I have received a 'hello' from them." Both Miriam and the house's current owner, Suzanne Rodrigues-Pereira, are descendants of Anusim (known in the past as Marannos) who arrived in Amsterdam from Portugal around the late 15th century. In the course of routine refurbishing work inside the house several years ago, Suzanne found two mezuzah scrolls — small parchments with Torah passages that, in accordance with Biblical law, are affixed to the doorposts of Jewish homes — wrapped one inside the other, close to the place where one should have been affixed. She immediately realized that this was a significant find, and set out to find who had put them there. Miriam herself was born in 1945, after her father Meir, a member of the Dutch underground, was hidden together with his wife and son in the home of a Righteous Gentile Dutch doctor. Miriam, who made Aliyah to Israel on her own in 1967, said that her grandparents' home was emptied of its Jews during the Holocaust, and a Gentile family was placed there instead. It was through a member of this Gentile family that Suzanne was able to locate Miriam — the daughter of the man who inherited the house from his Holocaust victim parents who hid the mezuzahs. The Tafelkruijer family living there for years prior to the Holocaust was religiously observant, Miriam recounts, and therefore the only explanation for the deviations from Jewish Law — two scrolls in one, wrong placement — is that they were forced to hide the mezuzahs. "They had to make sure the Nazis and their Dutch accomplices, of whom there were not a few, would not see them," she said. Suzanne arrived recently in Israel to hand-deliver the mezuzahs to Miriam, who showed them to her husband — a former ritual scribe — to check their status. Amazingly, he found that one of them, the larger of the two, was still kosher, and Miriam has decided to return it to its place in her father's home. One Will Stay Here The other one did not withstand the ravages of time, at least in terms of its kashrut, and Miriam donated it — together with a collection of Holocaust-era documents from the Jewish community in Amsterdam that her father amassed — to the Holocaust Museum in Kibbutz Lochamei HaGetaot. Miriam noted that her unique maiden name, which apparently means Table-porter, will live on in future generations only in the merit of this story of the found mezuzot, as no male children with that name have been born into her family. This coming summer, Miriam and her daughter will visit Amsterdam, where an official "mezuzah-restoring" ceremony will be held. In addition, Miriam said, "there was an old shack behind the house, used for a Sukkah during the Holocaust... I have bought another mezuzah that I will affix there as well." Other Houses on the Street Yet another result of this story is that Suzanne and her neighbors have researched the former Jewish owners of many of the buildings on their street. She has established an Internet site that provides many long-lost details, including information on family members and relatives who lived there. Hillel Fendel is Senior News Editor for Arutz-Sheva (www.Israel National News.com). |
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OBAMA'S ISRAEL POLICY : F-JEWS — THEY WILL VOTE FOR US ANYWAY!
Posted by Yid with Lid, June 14, 2011. |
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President Obama gave Bibi Netanyahu an ultimatum on renewing negotiations with the Palestinians, according to reports cited by Israel Radio Sunday morning. According to the ultimatum, Netanyahu has to decide within a month whether he agrees to accept President Barack Obama's platform and resume talks based on 1967 lines. 
The President has been working on getting the leaders of major Jewish organizations on their side realizing that some of them, such as Abe Foxman of the ADL are more concerned about advancing their power in the progressive political world than their organization's Jewish mission. According to Eli Lake of the Washington Times the Obama White House appealed to Jewish leaders on Friday that the request of Israel was part of an effort to head off Palestinian plans to declare an independent state at the United Nations Defenders of the President insist that the President's "1967 borders with land swaps" is nothing new. But it certainly is. As Jennifer Rubin reported in theWashington Post, "On Saturday I asked a State Department official authorized only to speak on background: Does "1967 borders with land swaps" mean "1967 and then we discuss swaps" or does it mean "1967 borders plus the swaps that the parties previously agreed to in negotiations including the Jerusalem suburbs"? The latter, I pointed out is consistent with the 2004 Bush-Sharon letters, but the former is not. In fact, if it is 1967 and then they discuss land swaps, that is the same as starting with the 1967 borders. Period. And sure enough the State Department official told me, "It means swaps that the parties will agree on in the course of direct negotiations." In other words, Obama wants Israel to start negotiating under the assumption that that the Kotel, the old city and the Jerusalem suburbs are Palestinian property, cancelling up prior understandings that these areas would never be part of a Palestinian state. That has never before been the U.S. government's demand, and it weakens Israel's bargaining position." In other words, there is zero difference in the Obama plan between "1967 borders" and "1967 border with land swaps." In both, the starting point is borders Israel has deemed indefensible. At the same time President Obama has not made similar demands of the Palestinians, not even requesting the most basic of concessions that the Palestinians recognize Israel as the Jewish State. When you put it all together, Obama is asking Israel to make concessions with a government which is comprised of two terrorist organizations bent on its destruction, Fatah makes their calls for Israel's destruction in Arabic only, and Hamas who calls for the destruction of Israel is clear in any language. It's time for the President to remember the famous words of Albert Einstein "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result." The last time Obama called for one-sided concessions by Israel (the settlement freeze), the only result was a break off in talks because the Palestinians used the administration's demands as preconditions for further talks. The bottom line is that the Palestinian Authority is not ready to sign a peace deal that recognizes Israel as a Jewish State, whether the boarders are the 1948 armistice lines or the small UN Mandate borders. Supposedly Obama is making the demands because he does not want to be forced to veto the unilateral Palestinian Statehood declaration in September. The truth is that the Palestinians are well aware their unilateral statehood push has no chance; its only purpose is to continue the international de-legitimization of Israel. Obama's demand for the 67 borders as a starting place is serving the same purpose, because there is no way Israel can agree to it. An Israeli concession on borders prior to talks even start robs them of their one bargaining chip. And there is no corresponding Palestinian concession. Unfortunately it looks as if the administration will be able to have it both ways. While the President's strategy is being exposed here and in much of the conservative media, the progressive mainstream media, most of the Jewish press, normally pro-Israel democratic legislators and even leaders of major Jewish organizations are reluctant to stand in front of the camera and break with their progressive meal ticket Barack Obama. 
During the administration of George H.W. Bush, probably the most anti-Israel American presidency prior to this one, Secretary of State James Baker once commented on whether his anti-Israel stance will hurt the Jewish vote for Bush's reelection campaign. His famous response was, "F*** the Jews, they won't vote for us any way." Today the administration of Barack Obama has a similar attitude, "F*** the Jews, they will vote for us whatever we do!" Sadly they are probably right. Jewish money still pours into Democratic Party
coffers even though the President from their party is the most anti-Israel in
history, and the legislators are two cowardly to confront him in public.
Hopefully when it comes time to vote in 2012, American Jews will wake up and
smell the hummus. If this administration is this anti-Israel in the middle of a
re-election campaign, I shudder to think what will happen during a second, lame
duck campaign when he no longer needs any Jewish support.
This article is archived at
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SHIMON PERES AND THE BETRAYAL OF ISRAEL
Posted by Prof. Paul Eidelberg, June 12, 2011. |
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A propos of Caroline Glick's article "Confronting our subversive institutions," (Jerusalem Post, June 14, 2011) |
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Seven years ago, Prof. Wolf Perlman and I co-authored an article on Shimon Peres which we sent to the members of the Knesset before they voted a second time — the first vote ended in a draw — on who was to be Israel's President: Peres or Moshe Katzav. If memory serves, Peres lost by one vote. We can't be certain, but that article of ours may have been the decisive factor. The article started with a quote from former Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett's memoirs, Personal Diary, published in 1957. Sharrett said this of Peres: "I have stated that I totally and utterly reject Peres and consider his rise to prominence a malignant, immoral disgrace. I will rend my clothes in mourning for the State if I see him become a minister in the Israeli government." Well, Mr. Peres is again campaigning for Israel's presidency, and I shall show once again that his election would constitute, in the words of Moshe Sharett, a "malignant, immoral disgrace." Last summer, Israel suffered an incalculable defeat in the Second Lebanese War. According to former Chief of General Staff Lt. Moshe Ya'alon, what precipitated that war was the Government's policy of "unilateral disengagement" from Gaza. That policy not only led to the ascendancy of Hamas, a proxy of Iran; it also encouraged Hezbollah, another Iranian proxy, to attack Israel from the north. No one who supported withdrawal from Gaza, which involved the expulsion of 8,000 Jews from their homes, should be elected President of Israel — certainly not the most persistent advocate of that defeatist policy, Shimon Peres. But there are even more compelling reasons why Peres should not be elected President of Israel. Peres has a record of political perfidy which antedates his desertion of the Labor Party in 2005 to join Kadima where he expected to be Ariel Sharon' s key negotiator for a Palestinian state. Recall the First Lebanese War of 1982, known as "Operation Peace for Galilee." Israel's failure in that war not only resulted in the tragic loss of Jewish lives but also in Hezbollah's subsequent entry into southern Lebanon. I contend that Israel's failure in the Lebanese War of 1982 was a basic cause of the Lebanese War of 2006, and that Peres was largely responsible for that failure. The first Lebanese war broke out on 6 June 1982. Menachem Begin was then Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon was his Defense Minister, and Peres was the leader of the opposition Labor Party. Now it so happens that a visiting American congressman, Mark Salinger, expressed astonishment by the enormous difference between the truth he himself had witnessed at the front in Lebanon and how the media were covering the war. Of course Israel's media was dominated by the Left, hence Labor. Aryeh Naor, a former Likud cabinet secretary, maintains that Operation Peace for Galilee was subverted by the scathing criticism of the Government by opposition politicians, journalists, and Peace Now demonstrations. This is confirmed by Tsali Reshef, a Labor Party candidate in the 1999 elections. In his 1996 book Peace Now, Reshef admits that Peace Now's propaganda campaign went into full swing on 16 June, ten days after the start of the war. This was followed three weeks later by a "100,000" demonstration culminating with an anti-Government rally led by Shimon Peres. To undermine the Government, the Peres camp accused Defense Minister Sharon of having failed to inform Prime Minister Begin of the true aims of the war. Yet, in April 1983, Yossi Sarid (then a Labor MK) revealed that "the Labor Party leadership knew from the start that the Peace for Galilee Operation would [go beyond the 45 kilometer line and] reach Beirut." (Ma'ariv, 26 April 1983.) This revelation prompted Likud demands that Peres apologize to Begin for disseminating the "falsehood" that Labor was not informed from the outset that the operation would go beyond the 45 kilometer line and reach Beirut. No less than Yitzhak Rabin is reported to have said that "Two months before the war, Begin and Sharon revealed the 'Big Plan' to the Labor leadership ..." (Ma'ariv, 7 April 1984.) This was confirmed by Communist MK Meir Wilner in a speech to the Young Communist League. Although he should not have been privy to such highly classified information, Wilner boasted that he knew, on 10 April 1982, that the "war plan of Begin and Sharon is to conquer Lebanon including Beirut and transfer power to the ... Phalange." (Ha' aretz, 11 April, 1982.) So who leaked Israel's war plan to Wilner? On Saturday night, 5 June, Shimon Peres convened a meeting of his inner circle of colleagues, among whom was Yossi Sarid. In an article published five years after the war (Ha'aretz, 21 August 1987), Sarid said Peres reported that "the war in Lebanon would commence the following morning with the operational intention of reaching Beirut to join up with the Christian forces." Sarid's article goes on to say that Peres, upon returning from a visit to the front on 15 June, told his party's inner circle: "Comrades, we have to admit they [Begin and Sharon] have got a trump card going for them. The Americans are supporting and collaborating... Many of our chilling forecasts have proved to be hollow... The war is near to attaining all of its principal goals. In a few days — it is impossible to deny the facts — a peace treaty between Lebanon and Israel will be signed. This will be their [the Likud's] second treaty [the first being with Egypt]. They will also succeed in expelling Arafat and all his terrorists and disperse them to the winds. In short, they will break up the PLO"! (Because these Likud accomplishments boded ill for the Labor's political future, the next morning Labor commenced its anti-war campaign.) Sarid concluded his article (unwittingly incriminating himself) by saying that "On one substantial issue I agree with Ariel Sharon: the Labor Party must be investigated regarding its stance and behavior during the various stages of the war! If the party critically damaged the war effort — as others contend — it must certainly render an account to the nation." No such investigation has ever been made, even though the withholding of Peres' favorable assessment of the Government's goals and achievements in Lebanon on the tenth day of the war had devastating consequences. It largely explains the media's denigration of Israel, the shattering of the nation' s morale, and the succumbing of public opinion to the propaganda of Peace Now. Responsibility for Israel's fiasco in Lebanon and its perilous consequences to Jews living near Israel's northern border can be traced to Shimon Peres. Peres was also responsible for the Oslo Agreement, which brought Yasser Arafat into the Land of Israel, where he established a base for terrorists that murdered more than 1,500 Jews. This same Peres remains in office and is once again campaigning to become Israel's President. Let me repeat former Prime Minister Moshe Sharett's warning: "I have stated that I totally and utterly reject Peres and consider his rise to prominence a malignant, immoral disgrace." Yes, but that Peres could remain in office for five decades despite his malignant deeds and policies is also indicative of a malignant system of government. He must not become Israel's President, and this system of government must be radically overhauled. Professor Paul Eidelberg is an Internationally known political scientist, author and lecturer. He is President of the Foundation For Constitutional Democracy, a Jerusalem-based think tank for improving Israel's system of governance. Contact him at list-owner@foundation1.org This article was published October 30, 2006. |
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OBAMA'S "THE MUSLIMS FIRST" FOREIGN POLICY
Posted by Daniel Greenfield, June 12, 2011. |
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Since 9/11 we have sunk billions of dollars into the Muslim
world
This appeared today in Canada Free Press and is archived at
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In France, American embassies and consulates have been directed to "empower" Muslims and push for the passage of "social reforms" that will benefit them. In the UK, American diplomats were directed to again "empower" Muslims and made outreach to them a top priority. In Israel, the US consulate in Jerusalem caters only to Muslims and does its best to pretend that Jews and Israel don't even exist. And when Obama visited Greece, what else did he do but push the political and religious authorities to open more mosques and Islamic schools. America's own interests and our obligations to our allies have been put aside to focus on a single goal of overriding importance. Pandering to the Muslim world. It's as if we have no other foreign policy goal anymore beyond keeping Muslims happy. The United States has its first Special Representative to Muslim Communities in the person of Farah Pandith. We also have Rashad Hussain, a Special Envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference. (No relation to Barack Hussein Obama. The name Hussain is common among Muslims as a tribute to Mohammed's grandson, Hussain ibn Ali, the `Martyr Of Martyrs' in Islam.) Hussain (Rashad, not Barack) had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, which helped create both Al Qaeda and Hamas, and defended Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian. Farah Pandith is a Kashmiri Muslim who began her career as Barbara Bush's secretary. But just creating two new Muslim posts in the diplomatic sector isn't enough. NASA Administrator Bolden told Al Jazeera that the agency's new priority is outreach to Muslims. After gutting NASA and killing its space program, the agency focused on its new top priority by appointing Waleed Abdalati, as its new Chief Scientist. Waleed Abdalati is a twofer, as a Muslim and a Global Warming researcher. So the Obama Administration gets to kill off the space program and replace it with Global Warming junk science headed by a Muslim. It's what the devil would call synergy. Is any of this working? Does the Muslim world love us now? No they don't Is any of this working? Does the Muslim world love us now? No they don't. And France, the UK, Israel and Greece like us less for tampering with their internal affairs at Muslim instigation. All the outreach in the world can't help, because it's not outreach, it's pandering. Not only is it condescending, but it sends a message of weakness and desperation. When we pressure our allies on behalf of Muslims, we're sending them a signal that our first priority is fulfilling the marching orders we received from the Muslim world. And this not only fragments our traditional alliances, but it encourages Muslim regimes to support further acts of terrorism to improve their position. Since 9/11 we have sunk billions of dollars into the Muslim world. Usually we had to defeat a country in a war before we began rebuilding them, but now we rush to throw money at hellholes like Pakistan and Indonesia where human rights is a punchline and the mass murder of non-Muslims is an ongoing event. Taking a look at the fortunes we have plowed into Taliban's godfathers in Pakistan, the round the clock duty that American soldiers perform securing and rebuilding Afghanistan and Iraq, the death grip that Bin Laden's own adoptive Saudi royal family has on our foreign policy, our bankrolling of the Palestinian Authority, not to mention the money that we paid and are still paying to Baathist and Taliban terrorists in exchange for not attacking us — and even the least terrorist prone country in the Muslim world can't help but think that it could do better for itself by bombing us, than by trying to be our friend. This frantic flurry of outreach reveals that we consider Islam to be the primary threat to global stability and a major national security threat This frantic flurry of outreach reveals that we consider Islam to be the primary threat to global stability and a major national security threat. The positive image reveals the negative. We're so obsessed with pandering to Muslims because we're afraid of them. The Muslim world knows it, and gloats, when it isn't busy acting offended. The American public knows it too, even behind the camouflage tarp of learning about other cultures, that we're trying to defuse the violence. But trying to defuse violence through appeasement is not a good strategy unless you're willing to go all the way to Dhimmitown. By enslaving our foreign policy to Islamic interests, we're already much of the way there. Chief Justice Stephen Breyer has adopted a new Constitutional understanding of free speech, in which you're free to say what you want as long as it doesn't run the risk of getting Muslims violently angry. In Europe you can be arrested for yodeling even in the shadow of the Alps — if it offends a Muslim. A 21st century revival of The Sound of Music might now feature the Von Trapp family escaping into the mountains only to end up under arrest because some immigrant from Algeria, Morocco or Turkey was offended because the sound of "The Lonely Goatherd" resembled his own prayers to Allah a little too much. What does this have to do with foreign policy? Everything. If we treat the Muslims of the world as a collective group always balanced on the edge of exploding, then there is no more difference between foreign and domestic policy when it comes to Muslims. Accordingly every Western country with a Muslim minority must pursue only Muslim approved policies at home and abroad. If Thailand, Israel or India begin fighting Muslim terrorism — they must join in on the Muslim side. If France passes a Burqa ban, then the United States must begin lobbying to overturn it. If Danish cartoons in a local newspaper offend Muslims, then the Prime Minister of Denmark must be compelled to apologize for his country's free speech before being allowed to become NATO's Secretary General. The combination of Muslim terrorism and immigration eradicates all differences between foreign and domestic policies The combination of Muslim terrorism and immigration eradicates all differences between foreign and domestic policies. There is only one policy. A Muslim policy. And the bottom line of the Muslim policy is that Muslims get what they want. At any cost. Any price. Freedom, morality, loyalty, national values and human rights are dispensable now. Appeasing Muslims is not. Appeasing Muslims had tied the free world in an infernal knot. Each country pressures its own citizens and other countries to do whatever Muslims want. This would be unjustifiable even if it worked, but the damnedest thing of all, is that it doesn't actually discourage Muslim violence. It actually encourages it. And why not? If countries pandered to murderers, rapists and robbers instead of putting them in prison — would there be less murders, rapes and robberies. Or would there be more? The only way we can justify our craven appeasement is through the belief in the discredited Blowback Theory of Muslim violence The only way we can justify our craven appeasement is through the belief in the discredited Blowback Theory of Muslim violence. The Blowback Theory holds that Muslim violence is only retaliatory. That every time Muslims kill people, it's only because they're retaliating for a wrong done to them. Whether that wrong be a Predator drone taking out a terrorist (who was only retaliating for being yodeled at), drawing a cartoon of an illiterate 7th century pedophile worshiped by a billion people with deficient morals, or some battle fought 600 years ago. Whatever it may be — the Blowback Theory holds that Muslims are always in the right to kill us. And we're always in the wrong to defend ourselves against being killed. The corollary to the Blowback Theory is the Infinite Muslim Terrorists Theory. The Infinite Muslim Terrorists Theory holds that every Muslim grievance creates new terrorists. Like an angel getting its wings every time a bell rings, the Infinite Muslim Terrorists Theory warns us that every time we offend Muslims, it bring forth new terrorists. And shooting them does no good. Because shooting terrorists only offends Muslims even more. And that generates still more terrorists. Kill a terrorist and four more take his place. And if the process keeps going, there will eventually be more Muslim terrorists in the world than there are Muslims, causing the entire world to implode into the event horizon of a singularity. The paradox of the Infinite Muslim Terrorists Theory is that it insists that the vast majority of Muslims is peaceful, and yet threatens that every single one of those peaceful people can be converted into homicidal maniacs if we're not careful. And when combined with Blowback Theory, it puts the blame for the instant terrorist conversion on us. Like Gremlins that we're afraid of feeding after midnight, we take care to step lightly around Muslims, for fear that they will suddenly turn into monsters bent on killing us. Such thinking might be considered bigoted, but with Blowback Theory we know that if they do turn into homicidal monsters, it will be entirely 100 percent our fault. Project this mode of conduct on a global scale, and this is what our foreign policy looks like. All our envoys to Islam. Our Muslims First foreign policy. Our retrofitting of policymaking at every level to accommodate the whims of the prophet's beard. And for all the cringing and crawling, appeasing and advocating, the violence continues to grow. Because you can end violence by taking a firm stand, not by falling to your knees. Daniel Greenfield is a columnist and author. He was born in Israel and is currently living in New York City. He comments on political affairs with a special focus on the War on Terror and the rising threat to Western civilization. He maintains a blog at http://sultanknish.blogspot.com. |
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BACK FROM ISRAEL
Posted by Laura, June 12, 2011. |
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This was written in French by Guy Millière and is available at
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"I returned to Europe, and I feel like returning to a vast insane asylum. I will return to Israel to find the truth. I can also be found in America, those who are neither Semitic nor useless idiots, volunteers nor blind, nor anti-Arab racist. There are, fortunately. In Europe they are an endangered species." I just spent a week in Israel. It was a very short stay, and it will give me a good reason to come back but I need reasons to come back? The answer is no, because I love being in Israel, and I love the Israeli people. This trip was an opportunity for me to give several lectures and meet hundreds of people. I know many of those who wanted to come hear me talk with me and could not for lack of space. I tell them this: it will only be postponed. Other conferences will be organized in the coming months, further meetings, in larger rooms and, as I did this time, I will take all the time required to be available. My only goal is to understand and provide the intellectual means to decrypt the world. Being in Israel gave me the opportunity to meet friends, many, but also to immerse myself in places full of meaning. I can not be in Jerusalem without thinking about all the spiritual past of which this town is loaded and without feeling that the harmonious beauty that is his is a much more harmonious beauty: the pervasive and palpable trace of more than two millennia of history. I can not take the road from Tel Aviv and not feel embraced by emotion at the thought of those who fought in the valley and the mountains to the rebirth the country, sixty three years here. Looking at the roads, houses, high buildings, beside Ayalon, give the city the look of downtown Manhattan or Los Angeles, I can only ponder the immensity of the progress in so little time. Six decades ago, and one of the most modern, most innovative in the world. I wanted to cross the desert, and I took the road down to Eilat along the border with Jordan. I went back along the Sinai and then veering Mitzpe Ramon and the tomb of David Ben Gurion, on which I went to collect. The proximity of so many hostile countries around I could not leave the mind. The edge of the Red Sea in Eilat, there are three countries: Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. The population lives, quietly, as if there was no threat, and one feels a force in her quiet and determined, far removed from the inept and vile speech we can hear about it in France and Europe. Being with my daughter, I wanted to take him to the Dead Sea to Masada and then, explaining the significance of place: eighteen centuries before the American Revolution, and the words of Patrick Henry, "Give me liberty or give me death "of Jews standing up against the Roman invaders have uttered similar words. In the ruins of Masada, on rocky hills, often means that the currency in Israel, "Masada will not fall a second time" makes sense. The road passes near Jericho: I have not been there, because Jericho is in the territories of Judea and Samaria were occupied by the Palestinian Authority, and wait for the PA disappears to make the trip. I have no doubt that the Palestinian Authority will disappear one day, maybe not so distant. At the height of the Dead Sea, the road goes back between the Kingdom of Jordan and the Palestinian West Bank. It crosses Jewish villages and Arab villages. We believe, as elsewhere in Israel, very few police and a few soldiers. Again, the reality is far removed from the silly and ignoble speeches you hear in France and Europe. Arabs who sell jewelry and offer camel ride along the road say they are Israelis, and to designate the place of origin of semi-precious stones used to decorate the rings and necklaces set in their stalls, saying that they come from northern Israel. Arriving at Lake Tiberias, Galilee and browsing, I decided to go through Nazareth, and I see that the Christian church in downtown is surrounded by speakers spouting verses from the Koran and promising signs bearing registration Worst punishment for those who do not join the Muslim faith: traces of proselytism, the spirit of conquest and Islamic intolerance. Along the road to Haifa, I cross the seats of various companies that remind Israel is not only a modern and innovative, but the first country in the world, per capita, in terms of technological innovations in several critical areas ranging from biotechnology to medical artificial intelligence. Discernible in Israel, as in Silicon Valley in the United States, wealth is created, and only creation. On the coast, cities like Netanya and Ashdod evoke in me their equivalent in California, and I say to my interlocutors: the difference is that California is now bankrupt while Israel was not affected by the crisis economic and financial crisis since 2008. The time to go through the trays Guysen Television for a debate, and meet my friend David Sebban, and I must go. Another of my friends, Jacques Kupfer gives me the book he just published and I will comment soon. I spend an hour at Yad Vashem: I've already gone. I come back every time. Because it should never be forgotten. Strictly ever. I owe a very special moment for my friend Florence who I am going to Ofra, a Jewish town in Judea and Samaria. The first Jewish town in Judea and Samaria have been rebuilt after the Judea and Samaria was liberated from Jordanian occupation. Itamar was murdered when the family is just not Fogel. Ramallah is also within walking distance, but I will not go more than I went to Jericho. It is, as we know, the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority. I will wait, again, that the PA disappears to make the trip. I do not frequent the killers. The people I meet are nice to Ofra, intelligent, lucid, very different from what you said about them in the speeches we hear callous and despicable in France and Europe. One of them is a historian and wrote several books on Eretz Israel. On ascending a hill, one sees throughout the region: there is land to cultivate, build villages, huge blank spaces. Jewish villages to protect themselves. If the Arabs weren't impregnated with hatred and fanaticism, they could live in peace and cooperation with the Jewish villages, and they would not have to protect themselves. I cross several times the security fence, and I write it here: it is aptly named. It is a barrier erected for safety. Hatred and fanaticism involve barrier and security measures. I have read and listened to the inadmissible statements referring to Barack Obama "1967 borders", I am mindful of the news: these statements do not surprise me at all. I know, since the time of the 2008 election campaign, Obama is an enemy of Israel and a friend of the Islamists. I know he is an enemy of freedom and dignity of human beings. Responses and Netanyahu's speech seem to be the least, and a legitimate reaction against the absolute impropriety of a man who should never have been President of the United States. In France and Europe, Obama is being cheered and booed that Netanyahu. This is terrifyingly logical: it is consistent with the logic that I expose in "As if preparing a second Holocaust". I returned to Europe, and hearing what I hear about Israel, I hear about a country I've never been and where I can not go, because it exists only in the head those who speak ill of. There is hatred and fanaticism that instills in the occupied territories by the Palestinian Authority, and the hatred and fanaticism are two victims: Israel must protect itself, and Arabs who are taught hatred and fanaticism which, rather than live their lives are transformed into wild animals and barbarians. There is also, in Europe, the United States, to the White House, accomplices of hatred and fanaticism. I consider those describing Israel as a militaristic police state as forgers and those who, since then demonize Israel and intend to strangle Israel in terms of "1967 borders" as anti-Semites: some of them are Jews. It may, unfortunately, being Jewish and anti-Semitic. There are even anti-Semitic Jews in Israel. I consider those who speak of "Palestinian people" as forgers, too. I consider those who speak of the Palestinian Authority as a "partner for peace" and a blind eye to hatred and fanaticism as useless idiots, the blind volunteers and racist anti-Arab because they think Arabs are just good to have sordid and corrupt leaders, and by supporting or accepting that is funded by Europe and the United States to inject hatred and fanaticism, the Arabs use as tools of hatred and fanaticism. I feel we can be racist anti-Arab and anti-Semitic: it's what all the "pro-Palestinian" in the world because they support the sordid and corrupt leaders aforementioned, the Arabs because they use as tools of hatred and fanaticism, or consent to such use, and because they use the tools, or consent to the use of tools, provided that they are killing Jews, and undermine Israeli democracy, and prosperity of wider. I returned to Europe, and I feel like returning to a vast insane asylum. I will return to Israel to find the truth. I can also be found in America, those who are neither Semitic nor useless idiots, volunteers nor blind, nor anti-Arab racist. There are, fortunately. In Europe they are an endangered species. Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com |
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Ha'Tikvah
Posted by Nurit Greenger, June 12, 2011. |
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Tikvah in the Hebrew language means hope. The title of the state of Israel national anthem is ' Ha'Tikvah' — which mans, 'The Hope'. The text of Ha'Tikvah was written in 1878, in Zolochiv, Galicia, a historical region in Eastern Europe, by the Jewish poet Naphtali Herz Imber. Originally it was a nine-stanza poem named Tikvateynu, meaning 'Our Hope'. Imber's poem describes his thoughts and feelings in the wake of the establishment of Petach Tikvah, one of the first Jewish settlements in Ottoman Palestine. Subsequently, the poem was adopted as the anthem of Chovevei Zion — considered the forerunners and foundation-builders of modern Zionism — and later of the Zionist Movement at the First Zionist Congress in 1897. Also, it served as the anthem of several Jewish settlements in the 1880s. The origin of Ha'Tikvah's melody is disputed. It is either based on a common European folk tune, La Mantovana, 'Gasparo Zannetti — La Mantovana': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-JFmOXlMbI, or, a Romanian folk-song tune 'Carul cu boi', http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adTjy-TIW_Q. It was finally arranged by Samuel Cohen, an immigrant from Bessarabia, a historical region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west. On May 14, 1948 — 5 Iyar, 5708, at 16:00 PM, David Ben-Gurion opened the State of Israel Independence Declaration ceremony by banging his gavel on the table, prompting a spontaneous rendition of Ha'Tikvah, not yet, officially proclaimed as the national anthem, sang by the 250 guests. Though was known to be the national anthem, only in November 2004, when the Israeli Parliament Knesset sanctioned it in an amendment to the Flag and Coat-of-Arms Law, now renamed, the Flag, Coat-of-Arms, and National Anthem Law, Ha'Tikvah became the State of Israel official national anthem. Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaKohen Kook was the Chief Rabbi before Israel was re-established. As a world renown poet and philosopher, in the early 20th century he wrote the poem, Ha'Emunah, The Faith, as an alternative anthem to Ha'Tikvah. Though he respected secular Zionists and their work, Rabbi Kook was in the opinion that Ha'Tikvah was lacking the name of the Creator. Ha'Emunah, the Faith, refers to the three Jewish pilgrimage festivals — Passover, Shavuot (Pentecost) and Sukkot (Tabernacles) during which, when the Holy Temples stood, Jews came to Jerusalem to celebrate. Rabbi Cook's alternate national anthem for the State of Israel places the Torah as the central component of the Jewish People's returning to their Land of Israel, and sees this process as a bigger step for the redemption of Israel, and by extension, the world. In its modern rendition, the official text of the anthem, Ha'Tikvah, incorporates only the first stanza of the poem. The predominant theme in the remaining stanzas is the establishment of a sovereign and free nation in the Land of Israel, a hope that was fulfilled with the founding of the State of Israel. The emphasis is the anthem is twofold: 'To be a free people in our land,' and 'The land of Zion and Jerusalem.' This year I was invited to attend Israel's independence Day celebration party given by the Consul General of Israel in Los Angeles, California. Though it was an elegant party, as for me, it was not Israeli enough, it had no national tune to it. The multiculturalism atmosphere was profound. What bothered and irked me greatly was that we did not sing our Ha'Tikvah; strangers sang our anthem for us. Usually and especially during Israel's Independence Day celebrations, the gathered celebrating crowd signs Ha'Tikvah. Not this time. It was sung by a talented, but funky, group of American, not even Jewish, kids, who had no connection to the song nor did they understand the deep meaning of its words to the Jewish people. For them it was merely a performance, lacking all Israeli nationalistic posture. A nation's anthem and flag are the icons that unite its People into one. No matter where the ceremony takes place and to what country it relates, when the subject nation's national flag is displayed and the national anthem is sung, the citizens of that country become emotional along their signing of their anthem. More so Israelis, their Jewish nation has struggled for 2000 to get its Homeland back. More so for Israelis who are still fighting for full independence and everlasting peace. The State of Israel is the only country on earth its legitimacy is questioned and challenged and its citizens are, collectively, the target of anti-Semitism, in the form of boycotts, divestment, sanctions, dehumanization, demonization and delegitimization. The Arabs and their enablers are out to demolish the Zionist enterprise. When, the Consul General of the Jewish State of Israel farms out the singing of the national anthem, Ha'Tikvah, to non-Israelis who do not even speak Hebrew, he has made the first step to relinquish Israel's sovereignty, even as a symbolic gesture. And Israel's enemies are waiting at the door for such gesture. Over five million Israelis and many Israel's supporters around the world are on alert, from morning to night, to make sure the state of Israel is protected and defended. I am one of them. I do not want to ever be part of any celebration in which our anthem is sung by anyone other than us. And when it is sung I want to see the sparkle of the tears of joy in each person singing, eyes. Ha'Tikvah is the hope, the expectation, the anticipation, the wish and optimism each and every Israeli and Israel's supporter has. To have an ever lasting peace so that the state of Israel can fulfill its mission to be light unto all other nations and the guiding force in the full redemption of Israel, and by extension, the world. Ha'Tikvah versions renditions in favorite order: Hatikva at Bergen-Belsen as WWII ended *Hatikva-The National Anthem of Israel Heavy metal Marty Friedman -"Hatikva" Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
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UNHRC GAVE ASSAD, OTHER DICTATORS A FREE PASS, STUDY SHOWS
Posted by Gil Ronen, June 11, 2011. |
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UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has turned a blind eye to most of the world's worst abusers, UN Watch has found. In an exhaustive study, the watchdog group examined all statements by Pillay published on the UN website between September 2008 and June 2010. The findings show "a questionable sense of priorities," the group reported. "Ms. Pillay turned a blind eye to most of the world's worst abusers... She failed to voice any concern for victims in 34 countries rated 'Not Free' by Freedom House — meaning those with the worst records, and the most needy victims." Syria was among the nations that received no criticism from Pillay. In July 2010, two renowned Syrian human rights lawyers, Haytham al-Maleh and Muhanad al-Hasani, were convicted for criticizing the Syrian authorities. In March 2010, Syrian military detained journalists, bloggers and writers for exposing government abuse and corruption. However, the High Commissioner did not respond to any of these events, and over the course of her tenure, did not make any public comments about the state of human rights in Syria. Pillay only woke up to the problematic regime in Syria last Thursday when she called on it to stop "its aggression against its people," and urging Syria to allow an UNHRC fact-finding mission to investigate the violence, including the killing of 120 security personnel at Jisr a-Shugour. Pilllay said in a statement: "This is very unfortunate that the government tries to force its people into submission using tanks, artillery and snipers. I urge the government to stop this assault on basic human rights of its people." Among the countries not criticized between September 2008 and June 2010 despite severe human rights abuses: Algeria, Angola, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Brunei, Cambodia, Cameroon, Congo (Brazzaville), Côte d'Ivoire, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Gabon, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Mauritania, North Korea, Oman, Qatar, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. There were 21 statements on countries in the Middle East and North Africa. However, of these, nine were on Israel, the only democracy in the region. UN Watch slammed the UNCHR earlier this year for its hypocrisy regarding mass murder of rebels in Libya. Ms. Pillay failed to issue any public statement in response to the well-documented violence against demonstrators in Iran following the June 2009 presidential elections. Her first comment appeared three months after initial reports and video evidence of government-backed paramilitary forces arbitrarily arresting, beating and killing protestors were released. She called on Iran to respect human rights in her traditional opening speech at the UNHRC session in September 2009 but did not give a press conference and chose not to issue a dedicated statement on the matter. The UNHRC is the body that commisioned the now-discredited Goldstone report that slammed Israel for alleged war crimes in Operation Cast Lead against Gaza terrorists. This was written for Azutz-7 and is archived at
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POLLARD: LET ME SEE MY DYING FATHER
Posted by Justice for Jonathan Pollard, June 11, 2011. |
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Jonathan Pollard's relatives issue plea for compassionate leave from US authorities to allow him to leave prison, see father in hospital after receiving news he 'may not last through day'. This was written by Ronen Medzini and appeared today in
YNET
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Relatives of Jonathan Pollard — incarcerated for the past 26 years for espionage — are entreating US officials to allow him to see his father, 95-year old Morris Pollard, following the latter's hospitalization in dire condition. Esther Pollard, his wife, said she received a call from her crying husband Saturday. "He was crying so hard that it was difficult to process, and now I'm crying too. He said his father Morris was dying and they don't know if he will last through the day," she said. The wife added that the father and son had tried speaking on the phone, but that the elder Pollard was too weak even to hold the receiver to his ear. She said his sudden illness had come as a shock because he had been relatively healthy for his age. "Jonathan told him how much he loves him and thanked him for all he had taught him throughout the wonderful years they had together," Esther recounted. "Jonathan's voice broke when he told his father how sorry he is that the hopes and dreams of being together over the vacation were not realized, and asked him in a choked voice to kiss his mother when he gets to heaven, to tell her he loves and misses her." The wife says her husband pleaded with her to do everything in her power to convince the authorities to allow him to leave the prison and be with his father in his final hours. "We ask the Israeli government to be actively and uninhibitedly involved, and to file an official request with the US administration to give Jonathan clemency for humanitarian reasons," she said. "When Jonathan's mother died he didn't get the chance to say goodbye. We appeal to the US administration with pleas to allow Jonathan to kiss his father for the last time." Adi Ginsburg, who is close to the Pollards, told Ynet it was the spy's dream to see his father again. "If it can give him even a moment's peace after a lifetime of torture then it should be done," he said. Ginsburg added that the family had tried to get in touch with the Prime Minister's Office throughout the day, but to no avail. "We call on the prime minister, all of the ministers and the Opposition chairwoman to use their influence with members of the Senate, the Congress, and anyone else to put everything aside and join the battle," he said. Reach Justice for Jonathan Pollard by sending an email to
justice4jp@gmail.com and visit their website:
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NO ONE BUT THE JEWISH PEOPLE CAN SAVE THE JEWISH PEOPLE
Posted by Ari Bussel, June 10, 2011. |
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"There can only be one state of mind as you approach any profound test; total concentration, a spirit of togetherness, and strength." Pat Riley When the history of the Jewish people is recorded, it will point to present times as the last stop at the end of a once-great religion. Why is this moment in time so pivotal? Jews have survived pogroms, holocausts, inquisitions, crusades and all other manners of murder and intolerance. Why now should anyone worry or assume they cannot endure one more difficult challenge? The answer is a simple one, yet fraught with complications arising from years of abuse and neglect. When a child is beaten, the repercussions from those beatings may manifest themselves in later years. So too, is now the time for the problems of the past to manifest and create a personality devoid of the ability to any longer exist and interact with humanity. The Jewish people have lost their soul and their will to live, and now we will all watch as a great people publically self-destruct. They have chosen their destroyer and are plying him with money and accolades, and joining in the death march as he leads. More than other religions, Jewish people have been forced to watch as millions of their children were murdered. In the death camps, adults were taken in one direction and the children led into the gas chambers. Only those children who looked strong enough to work or be used as guinea pigs in horrific scientific experiments by the evil Joseph Mengele were kept alive. Most American Jews, safe and sound in their homes, were oblivious to the screams of babies as blood flowed from their fatal wounds. European Jewry unsafe from Hitler's wrath was herded into camps to be tortured and killed to fulfill Hitler's Final Solution. Jewish life was cheap and easily accessed by the many enemies who gladly helped the cause. Yet, many Gentiles hid Jewish people behind walls, in attics or in cellars and risked life and limb to save a fellow human being. Why? Why put life and limb at risk for a Jew, especially when fellow Jews slept well at night? Jewish people cheered on and worshipped a President who turned the St. Louis, carrying innocent Jewish lives, around to return to Germany and be killed in the camps. To this day Jewish people speak of Roosevelt, a man who caused the deaths of Jewish men, women and children, like a god. New books have been written to deny his role in the St. Louis and claim he was trying to help the Jews. Bottom line, he was the President of the United States and he said "no." How do you excuse or rewrite that? How stupid are we? Yes, we are just that stupid. And now, today, we are repeating the mistakes of the past. We are supporting a President who is hell bent on the destruction of Israel to achieve his own political agenda. A President who is so arrogant that even now, before his reelection bid when he will need Jewish money, he is not afraid to alienate the Jewish people by eroding Israel's security. He is that certain of our stupidity. That sure he can pull the wool over Jewish eyes. That certain, as he does with all others who get in the way of his goals, he can exclude Israel from his plans by simply eliminating it. What does that say about us as a people? I fear it speaks volumes. I have seen the craziness of the last few weeks since Bibi Netanyahu stood up to a man who threw his country under the bus. In statesman-like fashion he told the world: Sorry, no deal. Israel has the right to exist, and we will not march willingly into the camps once again, Mr. President. Bibi bleeds with Jewish blood and will see no more spilled. And who are Obama's greatest defenders? Jews. I did not hear one word of support for Israel from a Jewish senator or congressman. Only the gentiles spoke up. The same ones who would be willing to hide a Jew while other Jews helped to out them. In Netanyahu's speech, he claimed history would not offer the Jewish people more chances. How right he was. The difference this time is that it is the Jewish people themselves who will be the ultimate destroyers who will sacrifice Jewish blood knowingly and willingly to the enemy. While the Hollywood Liberals write their generous campaign checks, Jewish peace groups push for appeasement and the Jewish guilt ridden masses continue to support a man who cares nothing for their welfare and places the safety of Jewish children far behind his own narcissistic desires, we will merely have to stand by and shake our heads in wonder at the total insanity of it all. When the blood of one Jewish child is spilled, all Jews must bleed. If we are callous to the suffering of our children, we have crossed the line from a pathetic, needy nation desperate for love and acceptance to a sociopathic and pathetic observer of evil. Every Israeli soldier who dies must be on the mind and heart of other Jews. Every drop of Jewish blood must fall upon us as a human stain. A reminder of what a failure we are as a people to allow our enemies to succeed. As long as Gilad Shalit is a prisoner, so are we all. What an oblivious group of fools we are as a nation, as a people. Once again history will record the destruction and naïveté of the Jewish people. Only this time it will be for all time. Jewish people have always used their checkbook as a weapon. Now it is time to ensure its use to garner a positive result for not only Jews, but for America. Israel is not only important to the Jewish people; it is vital to the world. How can defending the mindset of a government that promotes murder and killing of all Jews wherever they may be in their Charter, be right? How can defending any government that is built on hatred, murder and lies be defensible to good people? I am amused by the way some Jewish people believe that money can appease a murderous ideology. That if they stand up publically and say, "I side with the Palestinians," they will rewrite a charter, an ideology that clearly states to kill all Jews everywhere. How does the US benefit from aligning itself with murderers? I am reminded of conversations with Germans who, when asked why they ignored Hitler's threats, answered, "We never believed he would do it." Well, after six million died, did you finally get the message? Believe him now? Jewish people have always thought more of their enemy than their own people. Who cares if you disagree with your neighbor, if the Jewish people next door are a pain, if you are Reform and your cousin is Orthodox? Does anyone in his or her right mind believe the enemy will ask if you and your fellow Jews were in agreement before they kill you? Are we that crazy? I guess we are. Stop and think of a Jewish soldier lying bleeding at the hands of an enemy, a Jewish child lying by the road after a bombing, his young life oozing out, or the parents who will suffer and mourn him until their last breath. Stop! Think! For once, care for the people with whom you share a heritage, a past of torment and inhumanity. Stop the murder of the children, now and forever before there is no one left to save. No one but the Jewish people can save the Jewish people. Remember that truth next time you write a campaign check or support a philosophy that is detrimental to your very existence. Contact Ari Bussel and Norma Zager at busselari@gmail.com |
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WE'RE ALL SICK OF THESE MUSLIM PAEDOPHILE GANGS
Posted by Nick Griffin, June 10, 2011. |
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Rape, paying for sexual services of a child, trafficking a child and controlling child prostitution. This is not the plot of some horror story from the past, but the true story of Rochdale today. Eight Muslim men have been remanded in custody over allegations of grooming[*] and committing sexual activity with underage teenage girls in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. They will appear at Bolton Crown Court on 22nd June. The charges against them include rape, paying for sexual services of a child, trafficking a child and controlling child prostitution. Those charged are among 26 arrested in relation to the brutal sexual exploitation of young girls in the town. In addition to the eight remanded in custody, three men aged between 34 and 43 were re-bailed to later dates, a further five men are due to answer bail on 21 June and five other men have been released without charge, while three more are not on bail. Police said one man had been handed over to the UK Border Agency, while a further man failed to answer bail and is now wanted by police. Muslim paedophile gangs are all too common in the North of England. In February this year, our Voice of Freedom newspaper (issue no. 120) carried the harrowing tale of this continuing Muslim attack on our young girls and warned the police to "Protect Our Girls — Or We Will". But the establishment continue to cover up these sorts of offences in the name of 'community cohesion'. But we won't be silent. Recently, Barnados — the Children's Charity — said that they wanted to establish a support network for youngsters, especially homeless ones, in the Blackpool area; the grooming 'problem' is a key thing that they say needs to be addressed. As this is a very good cause, and close to our hearts, I sent them a £500 personal donation. But they sent it back! Remember Charlene Downes in Blackpool. Groomed, drugged, raped, murdered and sold as kebab meat, and the monsters charged with that crime still running the takeaway, where vulnerable young girls are still plied with drink and drugs. To my mind the vulnerable children in Blackpool really need that help that I was prepared to help fund. So I'm going to take that £500, double it, and put it into helping a grassroots campaign that has asked for my help, following my promise in February that we would do all we can to help Protect Our Girls. But I want to do more than just helping them with money. I am also putting our design and publicity team and internet experts at their disposal. We are going to help build a campaign to get street grooming made a specific crime and to pressure the police, the government and the media to take really effective action. Imagine how you would feel if it were your daughter or son, your sister, niece or granddaughter. Can you help us secure justice and support for the victims and their families, education for the vulnerable, and prison and deportation for the Muslim perverts? ------------------------ [*] Street grooming in England: gangs of older men court a girl aged usually from 11-16, initially showering her with gifts and attention, then plying her with drink and drugs and finally abusing her and pimping her to other men. In an article in Mailonline, January 5, 2011, (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1344218/ Asian-sex-gangs-Culture-silence-allows-grooming- white-girls-fear-racist.html), of 56 men prosecuted, 3 were white, 53 were members of the British Pakistani community. The practice appears to be wide-spread and under-reported. Another article (uk.reuters.com, Jun 29, 2011), reported over 2000 victims since January 2008, with a very large number of sex gangs. Nick Griffin, MEP, heads the British National Part (BNP). Their email address is newsletter@bnp.org.uk. |
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IS THE US DELIBERATELY HARMING ISRAELI COVERT OPS IN IRAN?
Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, June 10, 2011. |
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This was written by Caroline Glick and it archived at http://www.carolineglick.com/e/2011/06/ is-the-us-deliberately-harming.php |
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One of the dirty secrets about Western trade with enemy states like Iran is that the Western companies trading with them may also wittingly or unwittingly serve as espionage assets for their home country or for other Western countries. Consider the Stuxnet computer virus which reportedly caused great harm to at least one and perhaps multiple nuclear installations in Iran. The virus penetrated the Iranian systems through Siemens industrial control systems. In recent years, Siemens was subject to widespread criticism from US policy makers for its massive trade with Iran. And this criticism was justified. But it is important to admit that if Siemens hadn't been trading with Iran, whoever developed the Stuxnet virus would have had to find another, probably less accessible platform to penetrate Iran's computer systems. The Stuxnet story shows the problematic flipside of trade embargos against rogue states like Iran. The less access you have to enemy markets, the less ability you have to gather information about enemy targets and the less capacity you have to sabotage enemy targets. The more access you have, the more capacity you can build to infiltrate, gather information and sabotage enemy targets. The boycott drive against states like Iran uses a legalistic framework to deal with complex military challenges. And since the nail doesn't exactly fit the hole, it stands to reason that the damage sanctions can do to military or intelligence operations may in certain circumstances outweigh the benefit they bring to diplomatic operations. Since last week's announcement by the State Department that it was sanctioning the Israeli firm Ofer Brothers' Shipping for reportedly violating US law by trading with Iran, there has been a deluge of news reports alleging that the Ofer Brother's ships were used by the Mossad and perhaps the IDF to infiltrate and exfiltrate agents into and out of Iran. There are number of troubling aspects to the story. First, it strikes me as odd that the announcement about the sanctions was made by the State Department. If I am not mistaken, these decisions and announcements are usually made by the Treasury Department. Why would the State Department have taken the unusual step of announcing the sanctions and take the step against an Israeli shipping company? Second, it strikes me as odd that former Mossad chief Meir Dagan felt compelled to issue an impassioned defense of the Ofer Brothers Shipping Company. Dagan is in the midst of an unprecedented, arguably illegal and certainly unseemly campaign to delegitimize Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. It seems strange that in the midst of this offensive Dagan would divert his attention to the Ofer Brothers Shipping woes. He must have been deeply shocked by the US move to do so. (And yes, eventually I will probably address Dagan's unacceptable abuse of his position to weaken Israel's political leadership and limit its policy options against Iran.) The third reason this is so shocking is that the timing of the announcement cannot be viewed as coincidental. The rare State Department announcement came just after Netanyahu wiped the floor with Obama in the Congress and as the Republicans are wisely using Obama's hatred of Israel and his love for anti-American political forces in the region as a campaign issue for 2012. It is hard not to reach the conclusion that the announcement was deliberately released at this juncture to weaken US public support for Israel. If my hunch is right, and the Obama administration decided to use the sanctions as a means to humiliate Israel, then this represents a stunning blow to the US's credibility as an ally. It is impossible to believe that if the Ofer Brothers subsidiary ships were used for intelligence operations in Iran that the US did not know about it. So if the ships were used by Israeli security agencies then the US knew that exposing the Israeli identity of the ships would make it impossible for Israel to continue using them. And if this is the case, then the US also knew that by exposing the information, it was liable to leave Israeli agents currently in Iran stranded there. Since Obama came into office, both he and his advisors and Israeli politicians and security service commanders have repeatedly mentioned that intelligence and military cooperation between the two countries has grown steadily. If my sense of what happened with the Ofer Brothers Shipping firm is even partially correct, then Israel should immediately reconsider its willingness to maintain that cooperation. If Obama may use information shared in joint intelligence meetings to harm Israel for political purposes or, for that matter for any purpose, then Israel can no longer share information with the US. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel and Gamla. He is a member of the Board of Directors and a research associate of the Freeman Center For Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm). |
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SUNLIGHT ON THE AMERICAN MOSQUE
Posted by FSM, June 10, 2011. |
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This was written by Diana West and it appeared today in FSM
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y best guess is the sun is hot. I feel its heat. I see by its light. I understand its role in the growth of crops and other living things. If I were to come across scholarly data attesting to its high temperatures, I would probably look at the fiery pictures (if there were any) and turn to something else. On one level, I approach a new study on violence and Islam in the Middle East Quarterly in much the same way. That is, I've lived through 9/11 and the 17,298 Islamic terror attacks since (as tabulated by the website thereligionofpeace.com). I've seen pictures of Muslims rampaging around the world over a cartoon. I also understand Islam's animating role in the terror and subversion designed to extend Islamic law (Shariah) to a point where an Islamic government, or caliphate, rules the world. But there is something transfixing about the new study, "Shari'a and Violence in American Mosques." The authors have amassed a solid bank of peer-reviewed data attesting to the presence and promotion of literature advocating violence in the majority of 100 randomly selected American mosques. And yes: that's majority of "American" mosques. Not Saudi mosques. Not Pakistani. Not Iranian. Not Turkish. Not even British mosques. American mosques. There goes that post-9/11 myth — the one that tells us that American Islam is a happily assimilating creed, wholly different from the aggressive Islam transforming Europe. The new data collected by Israeli scholar Mordechai Kedar and attorney David Yerushalmi of the Center for Security Policy (and one of my 18 co-authors on the book "Shariah: The Threat to America") indicate that most American mosques are sanctioning, if not also promoting, the study of material of similar peril. For me, the six tables of data boil down to two simple and stunning facts. More than 80 percent of the mosques in the study feature Islamic literature that advocates violence. (The authors divide the "violence-positive material" into two categories: 30 percent "moderate" violence, and 51 percent "severe" violence.) Further, 85 percent of the imams recommend this literature — both lay-written and authoritative Islamic texts (not including the Quran or Sunnah, writings said to be words and deeds of Mohammed). It is a slim 19 percent of the mosques that don't feature such violent materials, and an even slimmer 15 percent of the imams who don't recommend it. I guess it is in these small fractions where we might find the real "tiny band of extremists" — perhaps among the followers of the four imams in the 100 mosques who, the authors point out in a footnote, "instructed against the study of violence-positive material." The authors follow a line of inquiry into whether signs of adherence to Shariah (Islamic law) within the mosque — for example, sex-segregated prayer, regimented prayer lines, bearded imams — indicate the presence of inflammatory material. Take sex-segregated prayer. They found that 95 percent of the mosques where men and women pray separately contain violent literature. At the same time, however, so do 74 percent of the mosques where men and women pray together. Similarly, 94 percent of the imams presiding over sex-segregated congregations recommend the study of violence-positive material; but so do 80 percent of the imams leading co-ed services. So, yes, Shariah-adherence is a sure-fire indicator, but it's not the only indicator. No wonder the authors consider the conclusions to be drawn from their survey as "dismal at best." But what will those conclusions be? What should they be? I conclude, just for starters, that there is an urgent need to halt Islamic immigration to ensure that the demographic for more such mosques doesn't grow. But having dug up the hard data on the textual embrace of Islam-inspired violence within organized Islam in America, the authors almost seem content to throw it all away: "This survey suggests that, first and foremost, Muslim community leaders must take a more active role in educating their own faith community about the dangers associated with providing a safe haven for violent literature and its promotion." The data may be new, but this is the same old mistake we've made since 9/11: outsourcing our response to the ideological threat posed by Islam to "Muslim community leaders" — and usually linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. This isn't an internal Islamic problem. These alarming data on the promotion of violence within Islam in American mosques are for the wider, still non-Islamic society to address, and before it's too late. |
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MARTIN GILBERT LECTURES ON PERFIDIOUS BRITAIN
Posted by Steve Kramer and Howard Epstein, June 10, 2011. |
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The End Of The British Mandate And The Establishment Of The State Of Israel |
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My friend Howard Epstein recently attended a masterful, comprehensive and detailed presentation at Tel Aviv University, given by Sir Martin Gilbert, the noted historian and official biographer of Sir Winston Churchill. Howard related the gist of the event to me: Gilbert opened his lecture on the British Mandate by saying that at the conclusion of WWII, there were approximate 600,000 Jews and double that number of Arabs in Palestine. An influx of 100,000 Jewish survivors was expected from Europe. The British had controlled Palestine under a Mandate granted to them by the League of Nations following the end of WWI. In 1946, Ernest Bevin, the post-war Labor government's Foreign Secretary, was intent on implementing the (anti-Jewish immigration) White Paper promulgated by the former Conservative government in the 1930s, which coincided with Hitler's plan of genocide against European Jews. The former prime minister, Winston Churchill, however, wanted to see the establishment of an overwhelmingly Jewish state in Palestine. David Ben-Gurion, leader of the Yishuv (pre-state Jewish community), said the British would have to use "brutal force" to maintain the White Paper and that violent resistance to it was justified. In the US, President Harry Truman, recognizing the importance of the Jewish vote in the upcoming presidential election, urged the admission of 100,000 Jews to Palestine, despite the opposition of a delegation of US ambassadors to Arab and Muslim lands. During 1945, the British allowed only 10,000 European Jews into Palestine and urged the European powers not to allow Jews to depart for Palestine from European ports. Worse, the British declared that they would no longer feed the Jewish displaced persons (DPs) waiting in Berlin, who were to be treated as prisoners of war rather than as refugees! In protest, the British ambassador in Warsaw personally sought to reject his government's policy, while the British ambassador to Poland said: "[Europe] is one huge cemetery for Jews. Has not the Jew wandered long enough?" Bevin replied: "The Jews have had a ghastly time but they are not a separate nationality." The 1946 Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry was set up in an attempt to agree upon a policy regarding the admission of Jews to Palestine. In February 1946, the Committee visited a DP camp in Vienna, where they interviewed Jewish survivors as to their preferred destination. 98% of them declared: "Palestine", one young Jewish survivor admitting to the Committee that his mother had found her way to the United States. He was asked why he did not want to join her there. He replied that she had: "betrayed the destiny of our nation." The Anglo-American Committee recommended a solution based on partition. Bevin rejected their proposal outright and fumed that the Jews "should not push to head of the queue [in Palestine]," claiming it would cost £200 million to transfer the Jews to Palestine. Frustration then overcame the Yishuv. Bridges were blown up all over Palestine. There were mass arrests by the British. The Yishuv's foremost spokesman, Chaim Weitzman, condemned the terrorism but said that it showed the depths of Jewish desperation. Barely two weeks later, the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, the site of the central offices of the British Mandatory authorities, was bombed by the Irgun paramilitary force, leaving 91 dead and 46 injured. Ben-Gurion condemned the "terrorism", at which point the Irgun broke away from the mainstream Jewish Agency and its Haganah fighting force. There was deep anger in Britain, and Jews landing in Palestine were deported to DP camps in Cyprus. Churchill warned: "Do not spurn Jewish aspirations" and the British Cabinet was split. Prime Minister Clement Atlee counselled against alienating all the Jews, urging that only the extremists be punished. In the meantime, no less than 64 ships with 73,000 Jews from Europe arrived on the shores of the Holy Land. Chaim Weitzman, addressing the 1946 Zionist Congress, urged an end to terror, which he called: "a cancer in our body politic. Zion will be redeemed through righteousness, and not by any other means." His policy was voted down. The days of moderation were ebbing away. In Palestine, there were floggings on both sides; then a British policeman was killed. The British press demanded an end to their Mandate. The Cabinet was told that huge cost of controlling Palestine was caused by the need for one British soldier for every six Jews. Churchill urged that the Mandate be returned to the UN, adding: "We are covering ourselves with blood and shame." By then the British government had recognized the looming importance of oil and that the Middle East would become the focus of oil production. Prime Minister Bevin advised the cabinet that unless the UK took the initiative, American influence would grow at Britain's expense. A unitary state of Palestine (with an automatic Arab majority) was favored by Bevin, yet there was a secret cabinet memo which concluded that such an outcome — without partition of the land between Jews and Arabs — would represent a "gross betrayal of Jews". Frustrated, the British decided to wash their hands of Palestine and the Mandate and that the problem should go to the UN. In July 1947, the British shot at an "illegal" ship entering Palestine waters, killing three Jews. The ship, renamed "Exodus", briefly docked in Palestine, but was ordered to return to Europe, where the refugees were forced ashore and herded into a DP camp.
Henry Morgenthau, a shocked American diplomat, contacted President Truman, imploring him to pressure the British to allow the Exodus Jews into Palestine. Truman confided to his diary, after the Morgenthau call: "They [the Jews] care not how many Estonians, Latvians, Finns, Poles, Yugoslavs or Greeks get murdered or mistreated as DPs as long as the Jews get special treatment. Yet when they have power, physical, financial or political, neither Hitler nor Stalin has anything on them for cruelty or mistreatment to the underdog." There was to be one more twist. The violence in Palestine continued with the hanging in Acre prison of four Jewish freedom fighters. In retaliation, two British sergeants were taken by the Irgun and hanged in an orange grove. There was an outburst of anti-Semitism in Britain. At the UN, Partition was formally proposed on November 29, 1947. The vote was 33 in favor, 13 against, and 10 abstained. The USA, despite Truman's diary outburst, was amongst those voting for partition, as was the USSR. The plan called for an Israeli state, an Arab state, and for Jerusalem to be an international city administered by the UN. The Jews agreed reluctantly to the plan; the Arabs rejected it out of hand. Ignoring the the United Nations vote, in May of 1948 six Arab armies attacked the newly declared State of Israel, setting the stage for a continuing conflict. Sir Martin Gilbert has written many volumes on the Middle East as well as other topics. See his bibliography at www.martingilbert.com. Steve Kramer lives in Alfe Menashe. He has written a weekly opinion column for the Jewish Times of southern New Jersey (www.jewishtimes-sj.com) for the last ten years. He writes, "They're about history, politics, touring, or whatever excites me." He is author of "Encountering Israel — Geography, History, Culture." Contact him at mskramer@bezeqint.net and visit www.encounteringisrael.com |
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YALE, JEWS, AND DOUBLE STANDARDS
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 10, 2011. |
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This was written by Caroline B. Glick and it appeared in
Jewish World Review
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Last week Yale University announced its decision to close down its institute for the study of anti-Semitism. The move has been widely criticized as politically motivated. For its part, the university claims that the move was the result of purely academic considerations. While not clear-cut, an analysis of the story lends to the conclusion that politics were in all likelihood the decisive factor in the decision. And the implications of Yale's move for the scholarly inquiry into anti-Semitism are deeply troubling. The Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Anti-Semitism (YIISA) was founded in 2006. Its purpose was to provide a scholarly approach to the study of contemporary and historical anti-Semitism. It was attached to Yale's Institution of Social and Policy Studies. It was fully funded from private contributions. Yale did not in any way subsidize its activities from the university's budget. Since its inception, under the peripatetic leadership of its Executive Director Dr. Charles Small, YIISA organized seminars and conferences that brought leading scholars from all over the world to Yale to discuss anti-Semitism in an academic setting. Its conferences and publications produced cutting edge research. These included a groundbreaking statistical study published by Small and Prof. Edward Kaplan from Yale's School of Management that demonstrated a direct correlation between anti-Israel sentiment and anti-Jewish sentiment. At a large conference last August titled, "Global anti-Semitism: A Crisis of Modernity," among other things, YIISA confronted the genocidal nature of Islamic anti-Semitism. The conference produced more than 800 pages of scholarly research materials on all facets of anti-Semitism, including anti-Semitism in Western academia. Senior Yale lecturers like Yale's diplomat-in-residence and eminent international security studies scholar Charles Hill, and Yale's Sterling Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature and Holocaust survivor Geoffrey Hartman, served on YIISA's faculty advisory committees and participated in its activities. According to YIISA's website, several dozen Yale professors and lecturers from throughout the university community were associated with YIISA. Their participation in its activities contributed to the institute's comprehensive study of anti-Semitism. As the only center of its kind throughout North America, YIISA's activities were widely covered by the media. Small and other YIISA personnel have been regularly interviewed in the US and global media on subjects related to the world's oldest and most resilient form of bigotry. In response to my query over the weekend, Yale's Press Secretary Thomas Conroy wrote that the decision to close YIISA was made by a faculty committee during a routine five-year review of the program. The committee "concluded that [YIISA] had not attracted a critical mass of relevant faculty or stimulated sufficient new research." Yale Prof. Donald Green, who heads the Institution for Social and Policy Studies that housed YIISA, released a statement explaining that YIISA, like all other programs, was evaluated by two set criteria: Its success in publishing articles in top-tier academic journals and its success in attracting a large number of students to its courses. Green claimed that unlike his institute's centers for the study of American Politics, Agrarian Studies, Field Experiments, and its Ethics, Politics and Economics major, YIISA failed to achieve the required success in instruction and publication that would merit an extension of its operations. On the face of it, these measures of success appear to be reasonable measuring rods of the worthiness of YIISA's continued operation. But upon reflection, the use of these criteria to determine YIISA's academic viability is deeply unfair. These criteria are reasonable for politically neutral or popular subjects like agrarianism or American politics. But sadly today, at Yale and throughout the world, the subject of anti-Semitism is steeped in controversy and an objective analysis of its various aspects is considered politically incorrect. Consequently, a decision to use routine standards of assessment for a non-routine subject is not a fair decision. Indeed, it is reasonable to argue that it is a politically motivated decision. From several perspectives, YIISA's conference on anti-Semitism last August was a stellar success. The conference, which was held over three days, attracted more than a hundred top tier scholars and policymakers from around the world. It was heavily covered by the American and global media. In its willingness to address head-on the genocidal nature of Islamic anti-Semitism generally and Iranian anti-Semitism in particular, it was a path-breaking event in academia. The same can be said of its willingness to host open discussions of the prevalence and policy implications of Palestinian anti-Semitism. But as far as campus politics were concerned, YIISA's conference was a failure. Like nearly all university campuses in the US, Yale is dominated by the political Left. YIISA's conference was denounced by the leftist blogosphere which alleged that it was discriminatory against Muslims. The Left's rage at the conference was further incited by the PLO's decision to condemn the proceedings. In a letter to Yale's President Richard Levin, the PLO representative in Washington, DC Maen Rashid Areikat, demanded that the university disassociate itself from the conference. Areikat wrote, "It's shocking that a respected institution like Yale would give a platform to these right-wing extremists and their odious views, and it is deeply ironic that a conference on anti-Semitism that is ostensibly intended to combat hatred and discrimination against Semites would demonize Arabs — who are Semites themselves." Then there is Iran. In January 2010, Iran announced that it was instituting a boycott of 60 institutions. Yale was among them. Although the regime did not explain the reason for the boycott, university officials attributed Tehran's decision to YIISA's activities in spotlighting the regime's role in promoting genocidal anti-Semitism. Due to the boycott, Yale professors involved in research in Iran were forced to end their activities. These professors reportedly blamed YIISA rather than Iran for the cancellation of their research projects. Deputy Provost and Political Science Professor Frances Rosenbluth served on the faculty committee that reviewed YIISA's performance and concluded that the university should close the center. In recent years Rosenbluth appointed Judge Richard Goldstone and Iran-regime apologists Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett to serve as senior fellows at Yale's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs. Last September the Leveretts brought their students to New York to hold a seminar for them with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Unlike the YIISA conference, the move did not stimulate any significant controversy at the university. Sources involved with YIISA allege a senior university official privately complained that "YIISA's activities harm the Yale Corporation." The clear insinuation was that due to YIISA's activities, Yale has had difficulty raising money from Arab sources. Politics arguably has also played a role in YIISA's difficulty in publishing articles in top tier academic publications and even in attracting students to its courses. Today the discourse on anti-Semitism has been corrupted by politics. In the current atmosphere, publishing scholarship on topics like Islamic Jew hatred, or anti-Semitism and progressive politics is widely viewed as a career ender. Scholars who are interested in these subjects are therefore likely to opt out of publishing articles or books on them. By the same token, the toxic nature of the intellectual environment related to anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism and contemporary forms of both arguably renders top tier journals averse to publishing articles on them. So too, in light of the politically correct echo chamber that governs university politics and appointments, it is eminently reasonable to assume that an article about these subjects would be harshly treated in peer-reviews. In this context it is worth recalling the history of cowardice at Yale in the face of Islamic criticism. In 2009, Yale University Press was slated to publish a book about the 2005 Muhammad cartoon controversy. When the decision was met with furious responses from various Islamic quarters, Yale caved. It decided to censor the cartoons that were the subject of the book from the book itself. In short, the discriminatory atmosphere that dominates academic discourse on anti-Semitism generally and Islamic anti-Semitism in particular makes it difficult to use the generally objective assessment tool of the number of publications in top-tier journals to judge the academic value of YIISA. As for student participation, the predominance of political correctness on university campuses acts as a deterrent for students who would otherwise be drawn to courses on the subject. A Yale student who aspires to an academic career will be quick to recognize the study of anti-Semitism — and particularly its contemporary manifestations — is an academic dead end. There are Jewish organizations that are dedicated to educating university students about anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism in all their varieties. Foremost among these organizations is Stand With Us, which in its 10 year history has become active on scores of campuses in the US and worldwide. Stand With Us publishes fact sheets and booklets to inform students about the facts regarding Israel and the Middle East that are systematically removed from their course syllabuses. While significant, the contribution these groups make to the discourse on anti-Semitism is generally limited to the level of student activism. Professors and their politically correct measuring rods for academic worthiness are largely insulated from their efforts. The inequities in the academic treatment of research and instruction on anti-Semitism make Yale's decision to close YIISA all the more lamentable. Indeed, in and of themselves they justify a move by Yale and other universities to aggressively promote YIISA's activities and establish similar institutes. If a top-ranking university like Yale had been willing to truly back the academic study of anti-Semitism, it would have empowered students and faculty alike to research and study the subject. In their responses to inquiries about the decision to close YIISA, Yale spokesmen were quick to say that Yale remains committed to studying anti-Semitism. They pointed to Yale's Hebrew and Jewish studies courses as proof of the university's support for free inquiry on the topic. But their protestations ring as hollow as the message of YIISA's closure is clear. The study of Islamic anti-Semitism is an academic third rail. Do it at Yale and you are done for. YIISA's closure also sends a clear message to Jewish donors concerned about the anti-Jewish turn that so many top universities are taking. To date, wealthy Jewish donors have operated under the assumption that they can impact the hostile discourse on Jewish issues on campus by providing piecemeal support for specific programs. In the case of YIISA, Jewish donors believed that they had developed a beach head in a hostile campus environment that would bring a dose of reality into the otherwise hallucinogenic discourse on Israel and the Islamic world. Yale's decision to close YIISA indicates that the piecemeal approach is not effective. One institute cannot impact the virulent faculty hostility to Jewish related issues on campuses like Yale. It also cannot compete with the deep pockets of Arab governments. YIISA's closure indicates that a new strategy of concentrating Jewish philanthropic resources is required. Supporting a handful of carefully selected universities will probably have a greater longterm impact on the general discourse on issues like contemporary anti-Semitism than spreading smaller amounts of funding across a larger number of institutions. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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BOYCOTT THE BOYCOTTERS
Posted by Steven Plaut,, June 10, 2011. |
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This was written by Nadav Haetzni and is called "Boycott the
Boycotters". It is archived at
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In the past few weeks the phenomenon of Israelis pushing the entire world to boycott us has become decidedly salient. The phenomenon is nothing new, but the boycotters have recently recorded a number of successes, honing the grave danger posed by their activity. For many, the most painful was the Pixies' decision to cancel their performance here. Before that they urged Elton John and Leonard Cohen and every other artist who was planning to perform here to cancel the visit. They are responsible for the boycott of products that are manufactured in Judea and Samaria, they have brought about the boycotting of Israeli universities, they have brought about arrest warrants being issued against high-ranking officers and so forth. That band of people has only bad things to say about us, and their worldview is anti-democratic and offensive. Since they have despaired of persuading us of their extremist positions, they try to force them on us from the outside. As long as they boycotted settler products they barely bothered a soul. But now the trend has changed, mainly since the damage that was done to the holy of holies — the Pixies. A majority of Israelis are furious with that band and suggestions have already been made to use the current body of law against them, to pass new legislation, to revoke their citizenship and so forth. All of that is certainly justified, but in the meantime those bad people are continuing to go about their affairs and live among us as if nothing were wrong. We politely shake their hand, we invite them to talk shows, we hire them for work and we show up to hear their lectures as if they hadn't shown up as the spearhead of Israel's enemies. They render our blood forfeit in the world and turn us into lepers, whereas we smile at them with a closed mouth. This is an absurd situation that runs contrary to any logic and fundamental instinct. After all, what could be more natural than boycotting back the people who are boycotting you? That simple means is in the hands of each and every one of us: they want to turn us into shunned people? So let them receive, at least in our midst, a wall-to-wall shunning of their own. Of course, they must not be physically attacked, but the time has come for Israeli society to respond like a public that has the basic desire to survive and to defend itself. The people who break the rules of the game and try to ostracize us from the fraternity of nations is going to find himself ostracized from us. This is simple and easily done, and each and every one of us can contribute. Take a person like Professor Emmanuel Farjoun from the Hebrew University. He was interviewed by Channel Two and he admitted that he was trying to bring us to our knees by means of an international boycott. Professor Farjoun has students, colleagues, research assistance, neighbors, relatives. There are stores he shops in, cafes he frequents. Each and every one of those locations ought to turn him into a persona non grata. And wherever it is legally possible, they ought to refuse to serve him, to give him work; they ought to turn him a cold shoulder. The same applies to Professor Neve Gordon from Ben-Gurion University. This man has worked to have IDF officers prosecuted by foreign courts. The same applies to Kobi Snitz, an Israeli mathematician who belongs to the group that led to the cancellation of the Pixies' concert. The time has come for students to refuse to enter lectures given by Neve Gordon, for people to refuse to work and fraternize with Kobi Snitz, for their aunts, relatives and acquaintances hang up the phone on them. Of course, there are more people and groups on the list, such as Yesh Gvul. They all repudiate the right of Israeli and Jewish society to determine its own fate. They are all trying to twist our arm by means of foreign courts and governments. They have all become far more dangerous than Ahmadinejad and Nasrallah, and the time has come for us to respond accordingly. Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
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THE COMING CRISIS IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Posted by Barry Rubin, June 10, 2011. |
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The gap between dominant Western perceptions of the Middle East and the region's reality is dangerously wide. While the "Arab Spring" is celebrated as an advance for moderation and democracy, in fact the advance is going to revolutionary Islamists. Developments in Turkey and Egypt especially threaten to plunge the Middle East back into an era of conflict, instability, and the worst threats to Western interests in decades. |
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There are several things very much predictable about the future of the Middle East area during the next year. First, on June 12, 2011, Turkey will have an election. That election will probably be won by the government, whether or not it gets a two-thirds majority. The current rulers will interpret this as a signal to take a much tougher line toward Israel and the United States. It is possible that the extent of the increase of Turkey's enmity toward Israel after that election will astonish the world. If the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) wins a two-thirds majority, this means it will have control of rewriting the Turkish constitution. They will try to create a presidential regime, Erdogan will run for president, and Turkey will move into an increasingly visible alliance with Iran, Syria, Hamas, and Hizballah. This is not alarmism, it is a serious analysis. Second, the Palestinian effort at the UN to gain unilateral recognition for a Palestinian state will fail. The United States will veto this, but it will to be a mess, a mess created by the incompetence of the Obama administration, which could have prevented this. Third, is in regards to Egypt. There is no doubt that the Egyptian revolution is just as significant and just as bad as Iran's 1979 Islamist revolution. That development so destabilized the region and promoted revolutionary Islamism that it helped lead to six wars (Iran-Iraq; Iraq's invasion of Kuwait; U.S.-led invasion of Iraq; U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan; Hizballah-Israel war; Hamas-Israel war) and September 11 as well as to various Islamist upheavals, terrorism, and civil wars elsewhere (including in Algeria and Egypt). Egypt will hold parliamentary elections in September 2011. As of now, the moderate democrats have not organized any serious party. The only serious parties organized are Islamist parties, not only the Muslim Brotherhood but others, and left-wing parties or radical nationalist ones. THE COMPREHENSIVE TRANSFORMATION OF EGYPT INTO A RADICAL STATE To put it simply, what has happened in Egypt is not just the undoing of the "Mubarak regime" but the undoing of the "Sadat regime," that is, the revolution Anwar al-Sadat brought to Egypt in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Sadat changed Egypt's course from being a radical state seeking to destabilize other Arab countries, destroy Israel, and oppose U.S. interests. He deemphasized spreading revolution, made peace with Israel, and allied Egypt with the United States. Now, with assistance from President Barack Obama, those processes have been undone. Egypt will return to the pre-Sadat era. The only question is the proportion of radical nationalism and Islamism in that mix. It is not clear whether there will be an Islamist majority, but there will be a radical anti-American majority in parliament. There is no doubt of that. It literally cannot be any other way, so this will have to be covered in the media. It will be interesting to try to predict what the headlines will look like in the New York Times the day after the election. How will they spin this? What will they say? What can they say about this? This is very, very serious. At that point, it should be clear that the Obama policy has been a catastrophe. He helped bring down the Egyptian regime and the result is a radical anti-American regime that is ready to go into conflict with Israel. The opening of the Gaza border is one step in that direction. What then does it mean that they are opening the border, even if not now but when a new elected president and parliament take office? It means that weapons, terrorists, and money will flow freely into Gaza. This in turn means that Hamas will become bolder, and at some point, perhaps in 2011-2012, it will attack Israel with rockets and mortars. Israel will then have to respond militarily. Though at that point, everyone will have to ask the question of what Egypt will do. What will the Egyptian government do? If Amr Moussa is president with a radical parliament or even an Islamist parliament, they could send troops. It could become an Egypt-Israel war. There are, however, other possibilities. Perhaps they will simply let thousands of Egyptian volunteers go into Gaza to fight. Perhaps it will allow, or not be able to stop, or not try too hard to stop attacks across the Egypt-Israel border. Again, this is not some alarmist fantasy but realistic scenarios that one must be prepared for. If Amr Moussa, who is not an Islamist or a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, is elected president, will he be able to resist pressure from parliament and the masses in order to maintain a tough stance? Will he want to do so? Instead, won't he try to take advantage of this to promote his own interests and anti-Israel beliefs? This is especially true, as Egypt's terrible economic situation would not permit him to offer the masses a better life or even food at current prices. Now, one can say not to worry, that they won't do anything because the Egyptian military wants to continue to receive American aid money. That is indeed an argument, but is that enough? Can the entire Middle East strategy be based on that hope? There have been cases where countries and governments have been willing to give up American aid for political goals. Remember that the Iranian revolution threw away all the American aid and military sales. Thus merely to maintain that everything will be fine because of that money issue is not a satisfactory argument. Moreover, one must keep in mind that Egypt is going to face a major economic crisis for which there is no solution, and no amount of U.S. aid is going to resolve that problem. The price of food will continue to increase. The Egyptians will not be able to build new housing. They will not be able to handle the problem of unemployment. They will not be able to create jobs. This is the reality. What then will happen when — as is fully predictable — Egypt's government is unable to deliver on its promises and the country goes into crisis? This turn of events is completely predictable; and yes, they are being ignored in the media. Now the new line is that the Muslim Brotherhood are "good guys" and moderates, while the problem is the radical jihadi Salafi groups. The Muslim Brotherhood is good; jihadists are bad; but the Muslim Brotherhood is a jihadi group and is an alliance with these groups. It is thus ridiculous to make this distinction. Thus, a series of totally predictable crises lie ahead, yet there has been no serious analysis of the problems — much less the solutions — by the U.S. government, media, experts, and the public debate generally. Moreover, even those three crises leave aside other issues. As of June 2011, the U.S. government has still not done anything at all on Syria. Sanctions on Iran are leaking, and the three main reasons for this are known — they are China, Russia, and Turkey. The U.S. government, however, is doing nothing about that. In fact, it is consciously permitting leaks to continue. There is a serious crisis ahead, one that might be seen as the return to the 1970s with Islamists in place of Arab nationalists. Yet again, all of this is totally predictable. While the Obama administration strategy on Israel is problematic, that is not the main problem. Nor is the problem the U.S.-Israel relationship. The problem is U.S. strategy in the region. In saying this, what has been observed is the following: First, there are a significant number of people in the Arab world who agree with this analysis since it corresponds with their thinking. The fact that Saudi Arabia, with all of its faults, has had to take the lead in battling Iranian and Syrian influence shows that the U.S. government has not been doing its job properly. Second, it is increasingly being recognized by the American foreign policy establishment — although more privately than publicly — that the above statements are accurate, that the situation is dangerous, and that the White House in particular is doing a terrible job. There are also more and more people at the State Department, the Defense Department — including the secretary of defense and at least partly the secretary of state — who seem to be aware of these issues and problems. However, as long as they do not have the support in the White House, there is clearly little they can do to change this. IMPLICATIONS FOR ISRAEL There are options in dealing with these threats. Israel can deal with this to a large extent successfully, or at least as successfully as possible. The first thing, which is already happening, is the need to rebuild what in Israel is called the Southern Front, which is the defense along the border with Egypt. This will be costly and Israeli army reserve soldiers will have to serve additional days, but it can be done. Israel will also have to deal with the flotilla, which arrives in mid-June 2011. In addition, Israel will have to deal with any attempts by people to cross its border. What Israel does or does not offer the Palestinian Authority (PA) in negotiations is pretty much one of the least important issues for Israel at the moment; it is currently not a central issue. The ideas held by Western governments, experts, and pundits are very much out of date. The central issue is not what borders Israel has or the future of Jerusalem. Rather, one is dealing with strategic issues. One must deal with 2011; the 1980s and 1990s have passed. Nonetheless, by returning to the 1970s, this means going back to a time when Arab governments were radical or were intimidated by the radicals; when Arab governments seriously contemplated and did go to war with Israel; when Arab governments did not respect the United States as the world's sole superpower, and movements genuinely believed they would lead a revolution throughout the region to transform their societies in a radical and undemocratic manner. Today, Iran and Turkey have joined in on that destabilizing set of beliefs and policies. There is no real U.S. pressure on Israel. The Israel-Palestinian issue is not the core problem in the region. It is a sideshow. It is not important. At any rate, people focused on the wrong sentence in Obama's May 2011 speech. They focused on the sentence about the pre-1967 borders. The important sentence was the sequential plan, which was for Israel to turn over the entire West Bank to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for some unspecified security guarantees, thus producing a de facto Palestinian state. What is important is not this sentence: "The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states." Rather, it is these two sentences that matter: "The full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in a sovereign, non-militarized state. The duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated." Obama says, again it is important to repeat it, that Israel should withdraw to the 1967 borders and Palestine should become a non-militarized state. Then the two sides will negotiate about refugees, Jerusalem, and final borders. Obama was thus calling for the 1967 borders, with Israel giving up all of its bargaining leverage, and then — and this might never happen — the independent Palestinian state would agree to some border swaps. In effect, this means that Israel will return to its 1967 borders without "mutually agreed swaps." In effect, what Obama told the PA is not to go through the UN, that his administration would give the PA what it wants in exchange for very small things. Of course, according to Obama's plan, the PA will have to agree to security guarantees and demilitarization, both of which they can disregard as an independent state. What then will Israel do when it is back to its 1967 borders and the state of Palestine builds an army and lets cross-border terrorist attacks take place? Will it launch an invasion of a neighboring country? Will it depend on Obama to force the state of Palestine to keep its commitments? Obama won't even force the PA to keep its commitment not to partner with a group that rejects the entire peace process framework (Hamas) or force Egypt to maintain its commitments under the Egypt-Israel peace treaty, guaranteed by the United States. Obama has no credibility, and no country — not only Israel, but nobody — can rely on him. At the same time though, there is no pressure on Israel at all from the U.S. government. Obama is telling the truth when he says that in fact the security relationship is quite good. Thus his talk about the peace process is just words, but his conduct of U.S. strategy is dangerously real. WHAT SHOULD U.S. POLICY DO? The United States should call for the downfall of the Syrian and Iranian government. Even a purely verbal policy is superior to what is currently going on. It would encourage the opposition forces in those countries, who have been publicly saying, "Nobody is supporting us. Nobody is helping us." It is true. The first step is a purely declaratory policy. Whatever possibility there is of an Islamist takeover in Egypt and Libya, there is less such prospect in Syria. First, one must remember that the Sunni Muslim Arab population of Tunisia is 100 percent. The Sunni Muslim Arab population of Egypt is 90 percent. The Sunni Muslim Arab population of Syria is 60 percent. Moreover, there seem to be proportionately more moderate democrats among Sunni Muslim Arabs in Syria than in Egypt. Is the Muslim Brotherhood a threat in Syria? Yes, definitely. Is it less of a threat than in virtually every other country except for Lebanon? The answer is also, yes. CAN THE SYRIAN OPPOSITION OVERTHROW ASAD? The Syrian opposition is not likely to be able to overthrow Asad, though there is a chance. They should be supported, and the people of Iran should be supported (and those in Lebanon and Turkey should also be supported). At present, none of them are being supported by the United States. Why have a policy of being nice to your enemies and nasty to your friends? Yet again, when discussing this, it is not just a matter of Israel. It is a matter of wide variety of political forces. As for Egypt, the end of the peace treaty in practice is a certainty. Here is the problem: If Egypt no longer adheres to the treaty but does not publicly say that, then it becomes a judgment call for the United States. In other words, the Obama administration will have to decide whether or not it believes that the treaty is being kept. Thus for all practical purposes the treaty may be torn up, but the United States will refuse to acknowledge this. If the PA and Hamas are able to agree on a joint cabinet — which may or may not happen — they will try to do it in a way that allows them to say, "Oh, no, Hamas is not part of the government." The U.S. government then will have to interpret whether or not it deems Hamas to be part of the government. Therefore, it is not inevitable that this would trigger a cutoff of U.S. aid to the PA or even any change in U.S. policy on the "peace process" issue at all. The Obama administration can say no, Hamas is not part of the government, and the United States should continue to give aid. Then Congress will have to decide whether or not it views the PA to be in violation of the congressional law on aid and relations with the PA. Will there be a massive battle between Congress and the administration? Again, this is something that is terribly predictable, and people are not dealing with it. The Obama administration can say that Hamas or no Hamas, supporting the PA is a vital U.S. interest. It can, indeed already is, saying the same thing about Hizballah participation in Lebanon's government. Soon it will have to decide on the Muslim Brotherhood and Egypt's government, though Obama has preemptively said that it is okay with him. So the U.S. government will have no problem with the participation in governments of three different groups calling for genocide against the Jews and jihad against America. What is needed is a strategy that recognizes that the principal regional problem is the challenge of revolutionary Islamism. The United States needs to take the lead in developing an alignment that brings together the United States, the Europeans, the relatively moderate Arab regimes, and Israel. They must build a strategy that supports the oppositions in Turkey, Iran, and Lebanon, and that recognizes the enemies are Iran and Syria, Hamas and Hizballah, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Iraqi insurgents. They must then deal with that in the manner that the Soviet Union and its allies were dealt with during the Cold War. It is very simple, and of course one would have to get into the details, but they are not going to do it. What is truly amazing is that all of these things are visible; and yet people in positions of power — political, media, and intellectual — are simply pretending it is not happening. As a result, they will not be prepared. As a result of their not being prepared, the crisis will be worse. Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and co-author of "Yasir Arafat: A Political Biography" and "Hating America: A History" (Oxford University Press). His latest book is The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). Prof. Rubin's columns can now be read online at http://gloria.idc.ac.il/columns/column.html. Contact him at profbarryrubin@yahoo.com |
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NO JEWS IN JUDEA
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 9, 2011. |
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This was written by Sarah Honig, columnist for the Jerusalem Post and
is archived at |
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Just try to imagine what would have happened had Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu stood before some Jewish forum and exclaimed that "from now on we won't allow the presence of one Arab in our independent Israel with Jerusalem as its capital." The cacophony of condemnation from abroad, we can safely assume, would instantly surge into hysterical pandemonium. Livid politicos, their press and the public opinion they mold would seethe and fume as if nothing more racist were utterable. Inside Israel, the righteous ruckus would be no less frenzied and deafening. But we can heave a sigh of relief. Luckily these words could never conceivably cross Netanyahu's lips. This unkind sentiment, however, isn't unfamiliar in our neighborhood. The Palestinian Authority's head honcho and self-styled moderate keeps serially mouthing it — though in reverse. Addressing a recent emergency session of Arab League foreign ministers in Doha, Qatar, Mahmoud Abbas unabashedly declared that "when an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital is established, we won't allow the presence of one Israeli in it." Not to put too fine a point on it, this is the Arabic version of the German-minted Judenrein — "clean of Jews." Yet no Arab diplomat was discomfited or shocked. Abbas consistently accentuates the same sentence with only trivial verbal variations. In December 2010, for instance, he put us on notice that "I will never allow a single Israeli to live among us on Palestinian land." He was most specific on July 28, 2010, when, in an uber-compromising mood, he intoned: "I'm willing to agree to a third party that would supervise the [possible future Israeli-Palestinian] agreement, such as NATO forces, but I would not agree to having Jews among the NATO forces, or that there will live among us even a single Israeli on Palestinian land." Presumably, in the spirit of liberal pluralism, Abbas would subject all prospective peacekeepers to the toughest of scrutinies to make sure that not even a camouflaged part-Jew manages to sneak in and contaminate Palestine's legitimately Judenrein jurisdiction. Such understandable precautions would plausibly comprise the sort of progressivism which the Western world countenances. Clearly the international community relishes reviling ultra-tolerant Israel while it ignores and even justifies crude Arab racism. But there's more here than glaring hypocrisy. The fact that Abbas never neglects to emphasize that Israelis (which really means Jews) would be strictly banned from his state should signify how impossible it is to reach any workable and sincere peace. Abbas, the world's pampered, petulant child, harbors no qualms about denying Israel any quid pro quo for what he demands of it. Thus Abbas upbraids Netanyahu for "demanding recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. We have rejected, and will reject, this demand. We know what his intention is. He wants to undermine the Palestinian-Arab presence inside Israel and prevent the return of refugees." In other words, rather than be accepted as rightfully a Jewish state, Israel is in fact regarded at most as a multinational temporary entity and a candidate for impending Arabization. It wouldn't be left in peace unless it submitted meekly to said Arabization and the eradication of its Jewishness. It's fair and proper for Israel to contain a large Arab minority, and to be further overrun by millions of hostile Arabs, but it's entirely out of the question for any Jews to remain living in Judea. That such racist stipulations are fine and dandy with the dysfunctional family of nations constitutes the single most gigantic obstacle on the path of peace. There's nothing for which Abbas may agitate — no matter how inequitable or unreasonable — that is likely to get shot down. Not unexpectedly, outright impunity and invulnerability whet his appetite and embolden him to press for ever more and more besides. The sky is the limit. Overseas onlookers are sure to indulge his every whim. Such license for limitless Palestinian mischief renders any peace agreement unlikely. No Israeli government, no matter how conciliatory and forthcoming, can contract an accord with the PA. Peace is foiled because the Palestinians aren't restrained. The very amenable Ehuds — Barak and Olmert — got nowhere despite having made egregiously generous offers. In the end, everything hinged on whether or not Israel would commit suicide. Even the appeasement-minded Ehuds couldn't quite bring themselves to slit our collective throat. There's no getting away from the fact that whatever pipe-dreams are promoted in our midst, they entail the most complex of arrangements because this land is so tiny and the communities so intricately intertwined. No clear divisions are possible. Therefore, the indispensable prerequisites for any sort of compromise are goodwill, mutual respect and plain honesty. The practical minutiae of hypothetical understandings — all technically cumbersome — would be impossibly difficult even were the best of intentions prevalent. As is, only terminally naïve wishful thinkers can take for granted that the cooperative spirit would descend upon us from cloud nine and color our existence a blissful pink. Infantile credulity in vague idyllic future harmony is hardly a reliable policy guideline. In this context, past experience is far more instructive. We have already attempted to implement deals that called for coordination and teamwork. These were hardly as complex as would be mandated, say, in Jerusalem streets. Yet even these relatively straightforward arrangements ended up highlighting the palpable paucity of honorable intentions. The Oslo concoction created an infrastructure of joint patrols. One such covered the slender strip between Arab Kalkilya and Israeli Kfar Saba. Things seemed to proceed without a hitch on September 29, 2000 — until, out of the blue, Israeli Border Police officer Supt. Yosef Tabaja, 27, was murdered by the Arab partners with whom he had just shared a midmorning snack. After they ate, bantered and had a laugh together, the Palestinian patrolmen knelt to pray. Then they rose, approached the Israelis with drawn weapons and fired, screaming, "Allahu akhbar (God is Great)!" Tabaja was shot in the head at close range. Another Israeli, Shalom Malul, was wounded but managed to drive off. Official Israel expressed surprise because the joint patrols were regarded as a feather in the cap of peace. "Things were going so well until now," quipped then-prime minister Barak in disbelief. The second intifada was about to erupt. [2]Can greater goodwill be dependably predicted for future joint patrols? Can mutual respect be rationally anticipated when the PA unremittingly repeats that no Jew may reside east of the Green Line but that everything west of the Green Line is envisioned as space to be inundated with vengeful Arabs? By no objective criteria can this credibly augur well for coexistence — particularly given the conspicuous absence of a cacophony of condemnation abroad for Abbas's blatant racism. No change is likely until censure for Arab hate surges globally into hysterical pandemonium; until livid foreign politicos, their press and the public opinion they mold, seethe and fume; until a frenzied and deafening righteous ruckus arises from within Palestinian society. But we better not hold our breath. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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SOCIAL NETWORK USERS CALL FOR DAYS OF RAGE IN YEMEN, BAHRAIN, LIBYA AND ALGERIA
Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, June 9, 2011. |
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The uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt have not been spontaneous but, were planned, funded, organized and armed by the Muslim Brotherhood — probably in sync with a nuclear Iran. The "Social Networks" have done too good a job. They intend to reach their declared goal of a Global Caliphate for Islam by implementing their own form of "Shock-and-Awe" — a forced project by consecutive and sequential "Days of Rage" in every Muslim country in the encircling ring around the Middle East and North Africa. They have laid out their plans precisely in "Facebook" with 'pretty pictures': DAYS OF RAGE to be held in YEMEN, February 3 and 11; BAHRAIN: February 14; LIBYA: February 17; ALGERIA: February 4 and 17. We have previously written about these Muslim countries labeling them: "THE POISONED NECKLACE". Count them left-to-right: Morocco (maybe), for sure: "Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. That numbers 15 or 16 Muslim countries in a row, ready to rumble for a Global Islamic Caliphate. A total of 57 Muslim countries in the world are likely to join if any or all of these countries are successful in initiating a successful world uprising. Provoking an uprising against their own Arab/Muslim dictators is not that difficult, given their brutal treatment of their own people. The trick is to follow-up a popular uprising by riding in on the back of those rioting in the street, thinking they are going to get freedom, only to find that they have fallen into the hands of predatory Islamist/Jihadists who will rule them with even greater brutality in the name of Allah. The pattern was set by Iran and, so far it's being repeated perfectly. When the history of this colossal blunder is written, it will be laid correctly at the feet of an inexperienced man-child president, a pro-Arab State Department and America's vaunted 16 Intelligence Agencies who either failed to detect the Islamic build-up or were ignored if they tried to alert a president who is appeasing Islam. What do the countries of the Free West have ready to stop the imminent threat of Islamic Shari'a Law to the democratic, freedom of speech, religion, assembly, press and pursuit of happiness? First, they need to understand what they're up against. That means that they must commence an urgent, in-depth study of Islam and its well-known M.O. (Modus Operandi). Second, they must unite in common purpose to defend our way of life and liberty. Third, they must thoroughly internalize that this is a religious war. Fourth, they must know that this is literally a fight for life or death. Emanuel Winston is a commentator and Middle East analyst. His articles appear often on Think-Israel and Gamla. He is a member of the Board of Directors and a research associate of the Freeman Center For Strategic Studies (http://www.freeman.org/online.htm). |
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FROM ISRAEL: WORDS, WORDS, WORDS
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 9, 2011. |
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And in the end, when we weed out grandstanding, innuendo, sensationalism and rumor, how much will matter? Today's JPost carried the headline, "PA may delay UN bid, Palestinian official says." Oh Wow! But wait a second. This requires a closer look. The PA leadership would consider postponing a UN move if there were international guarantees that Israel would refrain from "creating new facts on the ground" and "provocations" in the coming months. So, what constitutes a "new fact" or a "provocation." It would seem that this is simply a different, slightly more subtle, way of demanding a total freeze. Hey, a kindergarten build in eastern Jerusalem, which the Arabs claim as theirs, would be called a "new fact on the ground." ~~~~~~~~~~ I wrote last about the possibility that Abbas is rethinking his UN bid, because he's come to understand that it may well not succeed. Now the JPost reports that the cited PA official said, "We are under pressure from the Americans and some Europeans to postpone the plan to ask for UN recognition in September." In point of fact, this week Obama was quite direct with regard to the matter. He and visiting German Chancellor Angela, at a joint news conference, spoke out against Palestinian Arab efforts to seek recognition of a state at the UN. So the PA leadership is recalibrating its position, or presenting the semblance of having done so. While assuming the role of "good guys" who are willing to compromise, they actually compromise on nothing. ~~~~~~~~~~ Acting US Middle East envoy is due here in the next few days to further explore ways to "jumpstart the peace process." No one in a leadership position, it seems, has the political capital or courage to cry, "The Emperor has no clothes!" There is no "peace process" possible. Words, words, words... ~~~~~~~~~~ I've written quite a bit lately about international law and implications of a Palestinian state. Dr. Amichai Magen, in a piece called "Towards Responsible Sovereignty," written for BESA, addresses relevant issues and provides considerable broad-based insight: We are dealing now, he tells us, with a situation of "failed states," so that the system that pertained internationally for 350 years now is breaking down. ~~~~~~~~~~ I would also like to share a very somber piece by Barry Rubin, on "What I Have Learned In My Long Visit to America." "...Recently, I have been involved in a number of exchanges in which I presented facts only to be told they are biased opinions. Interlocutors cited no evidence or even gave any specific examples of how what was said wasn't accurate. They don't have to do so any more since feeling has become truth and identity has become proof. To get them to understand that to make an argument one must have evidence, not just a personal feeling or can put a label on the person making the statement, is difficult. (emphasis added) (With thanks to Don M. for calling this to my attention.) Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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FREE IDF HANDS. LET IT PROTECT THE HOMELAND
Posted by Nurit Greenger, June 9, 2011. |
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In April 2011 The Jerusalem Post published the lengthy article,
'Editor's Notes: The Moralist', by David Horovitz,
On June 5, 2011 hundreds of Syrians have decided to partake in
"Naksa" Day, the day the Six Day War begun. To commemorate their loss in
this war, this mob thought it could simply make its way into the
territorial land of Israel with impunity. The UN, once again, was
immediately at its usual anti-Israel slogan. Navi Pillay, the UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights, chastised Israel over the Golan border
clash. Pillay expressed her concerns over the Israeli forces' use of
live ammunition against, simply, protesters who were about to cross
enemy lines into Israel.
It is now rather clear that the Syrian authorities encouraged the civilians to protest in an area where landmines had been planted. More, so, Israel warned its neighboring countries to halt the protestors' march as she will not hesitate to practice her full sovereign right to protects her borders and her citizens. An army that announces, in time, to the government and to the civilian population its upcoming attacks, through leaflets, thrown from helicopters, through text messages it sends to all the mobile phones of the companies that provide cellular service to the area designated for an attack, and by announcements from vehicles, passing through the streets, is a humane army. Do you know of any other army in the Arab and / or Western world that behaves more ethically than the Israeli army? No! Which country has a moral army that behaves as the Israeli military behaves? None, not even one! In Israel's case, fighting terror organizations, when terrorist organizations and advocates of war — not peace — take advantage of civilian population and use them as political tool or human shields, the whole world roars of Israel's harshness and immediately shows pictures of "innocent" protestors carried in coffins to their burial, or children who died because Israel had to attack the terrorists who were hiding behind women and children in their neighborhood. All this, despite the fact that the responsibility rests on the shoulders of the terrorists, who are willing to sacrifice their children. Terrorists insert venom, hatred and incitement; they elect to fight from areas of dense population for one, to prevent the IDF to be able to respond immediately, and, when the IDF retaliates and there are fatalities, they can use images to create solidarity among world public opinion that will jump at any occasion to show its anti-Israel sentiments. We have to chase these terrorists and strike them as hard as possible, for one, to show to the world their warfare methods and the clean hands of the Israeli army on the other hand. Only then Israel can, both, deter terrorism and, finally, expose the network of lies these loathsome people use, as long as they enjoy the West's support, from the UN, European countries and various haters and opponents of the State of Israel. In conclusion I don't believe in altruism fighting. I don't believe in proportionate warfare. The whole concept of war is to defeat your enemy and to prevent him from ever coming back. I believe that if your enemy threatens you, you do not wait until they attacks. I believe that you need to kill your enemy before they kills you. I believe that if the enemy hides among civilian population, you kill them all because it is their problem being there, not yours. I believe that if the enemy has a cache of weapons, you blow it all up before they can use it. If you know where your enemy weapons' supply comes from, destroy the supply and the suppliers. I believe that if a terrorist is captured, he should be executed after he is drained of all vital information. I believe that if you know where the enemy leaders are, you assassinate them, as soon as you possibly can. Make me the Commander in Chief and I will end the belligerence without further ado. Good guys do not win in wars. What is the use of having a potent military if one does not use it to its maximum capability? Rather blunt, but some thoughts to digest! Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
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PRO-SYRIAN PALESTINIAN GROUP KILLS 11 REFUGEES
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 9, 2011. |
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"There has been a mood of deep frustration in the camp since Friday that Palestinian blood is cheap and Palestinians were being used by the Syrian regime to deflect attention from its internal crisis," one of the sources at the camp said. This was written by Khaled Yacoub Oweis
and is archived at
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AMMAN (Reuters) — Gunmen from a Palestinian faction loyal to Syria shot dead at least 11 Palestinians at a refugee camp near Damascus Monday in a dispute over the group's backing for Damascus, Palestinian sources said Tuesday. Hundreds of angry refugees had tried to storm the headquarters of the Syrian-backed Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) in Yarmouk camp on the edges of Damascus. They accused the group of sacrificing Palestinian lives by encouraging protesters to demonstrate at the Golan Heights, where several were shot by Israeli forces. Syria said 23 people, including a woman and a child, were killed and 350 wounded Sunday when Israeli troops fired on Palestinian protesters who surged against the fortified boundary fence on Syria's Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israel, with U.S. backing, accused Syria of orchestrating deadly confrontations on a ceasefire line between the two countries as a distraction from Damascus's bloody crackdown on an 11-week-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad. "There has been a mood of deep frustration in the camp since Friday that Palestinian blood is cheap and Palestinians were being used by the Syrian regime to deflect attention from its internal crisis," one of the sources at the camp said. He was referring to sympathy among Palestinian refugees for the plight of Syrian protesters calling for political freedoms in demonstrations during which hundreds of civilians have been killed by security forces, according to human rights groups. The sources said that the unrest at the camp began when mourners at a funeral for eight Palestinians killed in the Golan turned into a protest against leftist pro-Syrian Palestinian factions during which mourners threw stones at Palestinian figures who had praised Assad. Hundreds of refugees armed with sticks and stones then headed to the PFLP-GC headquarters and tried to storm it. Several protesters managed to get in and killed one PFLP-GC gunman, they added. "The confrontation lasted from the afternoon to well after midnight," another source said. Like several other Palestinian factions in Syria, the PFLP-GC, which is headed by veteran guerrilla leader Ahmad Jibreel, is regarded as a terrorist organization by the United States. Gabrielle Goldwater is a Member of "Funding for Peace Coalition"
[FPC] (http://eufunding.org.uk) |
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THE SETTLEMENTS: DISMANTLEMENT OR DECONSTRUCTION?
Posted by Ted Belman, June 8, 2011. |
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This below was written by David Matas, a human rights expert and a senior honorary counsel to B'nai Brith Canada. He is based in Winnipeg and author of Aftershock: Anti-Zionism and Antisemitism. While I have great respect for David Matas, a fellow Canadian, and agree as a matter of law with what he articulates, he allows for a situation where Jews remain in an Arab state in Judea and Samaria to be created. Netanyahu also in his speech to AIPAC said some settlements will remain east of the agreed border. They both know this isn't workable. Ultimately those settlements will be abandoned by the Jews. I don't understand what's to be gained by his suggestions. Whatever we call them the Arabs will still want 100% of the land. The gap that divides us cannot be bridged with semantics. For me, the Jews have a better claim to these lands than do the Arabs. Area C has 300,000 Jews and only 10,000 Arabs. Why should we give this land away? Obama wants us to negotiate based on the '67 lines rather than the Jordan River. Why? The '67 lines lead to the Arabs attacking Israel both in '67 and in 73. It is insane to expect us to go back to these lines. I am willing to give the Arabs autonomy in A and B but that's all. I don't care if we get a peace agreement. It will not be reliable. I don't care if we are offerred an international force to protect us. It will be unreliable. I rely only on peace through strength. |
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We are constantly told that Israeli settlements in the West Bank are an obstacle to peace. I was part of a B'nai B'rith International delegation meeting with various United Nations permanent missions in New York recently. We were told at a meeting with representatives of a mission of a European Union state that with every new settlement, it is more difficult to find a peaceful solution to the conflict. Every member of the Security Council, except for the United States, in February 2011 voted in favour of a resolution condemning all Israeli settlements established in occupied Palestinian territory since 1967 as illegal. Even the US ambassador Susan Rice agreed that the settlements are illegitimate, but vetoed the resolution anyways, stating that the resolution "risks hardening the positions of both sides." Yet, what is tendentiously labelled as 'settlements' are nothing other than Israeli Jews in the neighbourhood. To say that Israeli Jews cannot live in the West Bank is racist. The fact that Israeli Jews had to be evacuated for their own protection once Israel gave up control of Gaza was a testimonial to the murderous antisemitism of elements of the population of Gaza. It makes no more sense to say Israeli Jews cannot live in the West Bank than to say Israeli Arabs cannot live in Israel. There is no international law breached by Israeli Jews living in the West Bank. The laws of war prohibit the forced transfer of nationals of an occupying power to occupied territory. No Israeli Jew, not one, has ever been forced to live in the West Bank. Moreover, the West Bank is not territory occupied at international law. The West Bank was never called occupied territory when Jordan had control before the 1967 war. Yet, at international law, the status of the West Bank is the same since 1967 as it was before 1967, the only difference being a change in the name of state in control of the territory. For there to be an occupation at international law, there has to be an occupying and occupied power both of which are members of the community of nations. The only conceivable occupied power for the West Bank is Jordan. Yet Jordan has renounced all claims over the West Bank. For the February vote at the Security Council, no state made sense. It was illogical for the US to call the settlements illegitimate and then worry about the Palestinians hardening their positions. No Security Council state insists that Jews live only within certain areas of their state. Why should these states treat the West Bank differently? The presence of the settlements is, then, not an obstacle to peace. It is rather the label 'settlements' and 'occupied territory' that are obstacles to peace. It is the labels that envenom the dispute, harden the Palestinians in their positions and drive them away from the negotiating table. The labels 'settlements' and 'occupied territory' are elements of anti-Zionist war propaganda against the Jewish state. If we want peace, we have to avoid using the vocabulary that impels to war. Any peace treaty that would endorse this war propaganda would be inherently unstable. To anti-Zionists, the language of settlements and occupied territory applies to all of Israel. The very phrase "occupied Palestinian territory since 1967" in the vetoed resolution implies that there is other Palestinian territory occupied before 1967. For a Jewish Israeli state to live side by side in peace with an Arab Palestinian state, Jews must be able to live side by side in peace with Arabs. Israeli Jews have shown that they can do that in Israel. Palestinian Arabs have so far shown the exact opposite in both Gaza and the West Bank. Objectively, there is nothing wrong with Israeli Jews living in the West Bank. The settlements are an issue only because Palestinians have made them an issue. If they drop the issue, the problem of the settlements will simply go away. The European Union permanent mission to the UN, which the B'nai B'rith International delegation visited, got things exactly wrong. With every new reference to the vocabulary of settlements and occupied territory, it is more difficult to find a peaceful solution to the conflict. To get to peace in the Middle East, we do not need to freeze and then dismantle the settlements. We rather have to deconstruct and then drop the settlement vocabulary. Ted Belman is a retired lawyer and the Editor of Israpundit. He made aliya from Canada last year and now lives in Jerusalem, Israel. Contact him at tedbel@rogers.com |
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ISRAEL'S MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
Posted by Victor Sharpe, June 8, 2011. |
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In my last published article: In prayer, Jews face Jerusalem but Muslims face Mecca, I received this simple but profound question from a reader. "You wrote that for 19 long years from 1948 to 1967, Jordan had occupied Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and the eastern half of Jerusalem. Then why didn't Israel Annex the West Bank after 1967 and why doesn't it annex it now?" Indeed, why have the last 44 years since June 1967 been wasted and Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people's biblical and ancestral heartland, not been annexed to the reborn Jewish state? Unfortunately many Israeli leaders at the time were socialists, leftists and some even atheists. They were not well grounded in the religious history of the Jewish people and its attachments to its holy places. Despite pleas from religious and conservative Jews, these leftists refused to fully appreciate the precious nature of those lands to the Jewish state: A tragic, missed opportunity. The leftwing leaders also undertook a repeated policy of appeasement towards the hostile Arabs, and didn't seize the opportunity for annexation that arose in 1967 after the Six Day War. Israel's left leaning government at the time thought that by not annexing the territory it would lead to goodwill negotiations where everything would be on the table. This, and the failed policy of appeasement was a historic mistake. The most extreme example of this appeasement was the immediate turnover of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem (the site of the two Jewish Temples) to the Arab Waqf by Moshe Dayan, Israel's Defense Minister in the then leftwing Israeli government. Now the Waqf is deliberately destroying ancient Jewish and Christian antiquities, which Israeli authorities are unable to monitor. More appeasement of the Arab Muslim world leading to Muslim desecration and a crime against history and civilization. Later — and still continuing the failed appeasement policy — subsequent prime ministers under the rubric of "land for peace" caused the woeful surrender of Jericho, of Hebron, (King David's first capital city) of Shechem (Nablus), and so much of Judea and Samaria to illegal Arab development. Even conservative Prime Ministers like Menachem Begin and Binyamin Netanyahu fell into the trap of believing that the Muslim world would finally accept a Jewish state in return for endless concessions. Begin gave away all of the Sinai peninsula and Netanyahu in his first term as Prime Minister gave away Hebron — one of Judaism's four holy cities. Again, this was a fatal mistake for the empirical fact is that Islam will never accept a non-Muslim state in lands once conquered in the name of Allah. This simple and enduring truth is nigh impossible for secular westerners — be they Israelis or Americans — to understand and yet without this realization, all talk of true and enduring peace is a grand delusion. As time went by, fatal euphemisms began to be employed such as "the peace process, land for peace, and the two-state-solution." All these baseless phrases led not to peace but to more Muslim Arab demands, war and terrorism against Israel. Yet still the Left remained deaf and blind. The "Two State Solution," has now been embraced by politicians and journalists alike, repeated endlessly, and touted as the panacea for a just, equitable solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict. It has assumed the repetitious role of a muezzin's call to Islamic prayer. But it is based on erroneous geography and history; on a mixture of wishful thinking, naiveté and a brilliant Arab propaganda campaign of disinformation and falsehood. The Holocaust denying leader of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, and Israel's supposed peace partner — a man who is a wolf in sheep's clothing — has publicly rejected any willingness to accept Israel as a Jewish state; a sure indication of the falsity of any Arab claim to live in full and lasting peace with Israel, especially now Abbas has embraced within his government the malignancy known as Hamas. The creation of yet another Arab state — this will be number 23 — based upon the two-state-solution and carved out of Judea and Samaria within the mere 40 miles separating the Mediterranean and the Jordan River, is a recipe for war and for the piecemeal destruction of the Jewish state. Israel is being pressured to shrink to a mere 9 miles wide as it was prior to the defensive war Israel was forced to fight in June, 1967. These lines were called the Auschwitz lines because of the impossibility of defending them against Arab genocidal hostility. Any new Arab state will more than likely fall under the control of the Islamist Hamas movement, itself a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, which seeks the annihilation of Israel and a worldwide Islamic Caliphate. Gaza, and what it has become, is living proof of Palestinian Arab genocidal intentions towards Israel The Iranian mullahs, perhaps soon armed with nuclear weapons, will have a command and control base within the territory already given away to the Arabs. They will be ensconced in Gaza on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, interested in launching ever more lethal terror against what is left of Israel and threatening Europe. If Israel foolishly gives away parts of Judea and Samaria, there will be no part of Israel or Jerusalem safe from Palestinian Arab missile attacks. When President Bush was still Governor of Texas he flew over Israel's tiny width and remarked, "Why, in my state we have driveways longer than that." That nightmare for Israel is the most likely outcome of the current proposed Two State Solution west of the Jordan River, which the Obama Administration is pushing with the flawed zeal of a misguided zealot. Indeed, Barack Hussein Obama is practically demanding Israel be pressured to return to the pre-June 1967 armistice lines; essentially calling for Israel's national suicide. This may well reach a crescendo in September. But to truly create a just and equitable solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict there must be a Two-State Solution, not within the territory west of the River Jordan, but on both sides of the river. The present day Kingdom of Jordan occupies four-fifths of geographical Palestine and, as the population is three fourths Palestinian Arab, it follows that the solution to the creation of a Palestinian Arab state should be within the present day Kingdom of Jordan and east of the River Jordan. Let us also be reminded that the Jewish birthrate in Judea and Samaria (the so-called West Bank) is increasing and the Arab birthrate decreasing. The fear of an Arab demographic bomb is receding according to statistics regularly provided by Yoram Ettinger. If there is a desire within the international community to truly arrive at a "just and equitable" solution, then this would be it. Of course, if this was a perfect world, it would satisfy historical, geographical, religious and ethnic considerations. But, alas, it is anything but a perfect world and the fanatical desire by so many Arab and Muslim nations to wipe out all vestiges of a Jewish state is a depressing reality. In the 44 long years since Israel liberated the territories from Arab occupation it has missed opportunities to annex Judea and Samaria. History might have been so different if the leaders of the Jewish state had not been ignorant of their biblical and post-biblical history or of their essential Jewish faith; so inextricably intertwined with the Land of Israel and its 3,000 year old Jewish capital: Jerusalem. So many of the early Israeli politicians were from the Left and were not moved by faith to redeem the hills and valleys of biblical Judea and Samaria — the very heartland of the Jewish people and their history. And still today, the Israeli Left is blinded by a veritable veil of deception. Peace Now, for example, despite every manifestation of Jew hatred by the Muslim and Arab world, does all it can to drive fellow Jews out of their ancestral lands. And a dominating Leftwing bias among Israeli tenured professors and a left-leaning Israeli Supreme Court often jeopardizes Israeli security. The corollary to this is that the Jewish state must not succumb to the enemy within — the Left — and the enemy without — the Arab and Muslim world — or give away any more of its native, ancestral, biblical, spiritual and physical homeland to a people whose Islamic religion demands of them no true peace with Israel, no true negotiations with Israel, and no true recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. There is no time for anymore missed opportunities. Victor Sharpe is a freelance writer and author of Volumes One &
Two of Politicide: The attempted murder of the Jewish state.
This appeared to day in Canada Free Press,
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SINCE THE UPRISINGS IN THE MIDDLE EAST, THE MEDIA'S BALANCE AND SCRUTINY HAS BEEN MORE PROPORTIONATE
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 8, 2011. |
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This was written by Carmel Gould and it appeared in the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/ 08/media-obsession-with-israel/print |
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The Arab spring has had a remarkable effect on the media's appetite for Middle East news which doesn't revolve around Israel. Over the first three months of this year, correspondents usually engaged full time in counting Israeli bricks going down in the West Bank were dispatched to Tahrir Square and Tripoli, because something even bigger was happening. A recent report by Just Journalism documents how in 2010, when the stirrings of mass discontent were surely detectable across the region, Middle East coverage by the British broadsheets and the BBC News website was disproportionately focused on Israel. Across all outlets and in news, comment and editorial categories, Israel was by far the most discussed country. In the case of the BBC, coverage of Egypt, Libya and Tunisia combined and doubled still amounted to less than was produced about Israel. Recently, Greg Philo of Glasgow University Media Unit complained on these pages that having pored over 4,000 lines of text from main UK broadcast bulletins during the 2008/9 Gaza war, not enough was said about Palestinians killed by Israel prior to the events being reported. Nothing could better illustrate the media obsession with Israel than the presence of such quantities of material for Philo to wade through. It is highly doubtful that 4,000 lines of text from main UK broadcast bulletins exist in relation to the closing weeks of the Sri Lanka war, also in 2009, in which up to 40 times more civilians died than in Gaza. It's also worth noting that for all the dozens of headlines last month about Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu's "defiance" and "refusals" regarding taking the necessary steps for peace, the fresh proclamations by Hamas about how they have zero intention of ever accepting the existence of Israel attracted virtually no coverage. The battle for control over the narrative of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has led to accusations that Zionists control the media. This is hard to believe, given the daily offerings of Jerusalem correspondents about settlement expansion, the Gaza blockade, loyalty oaths, racist rabbis, demolitions, checkpoints etc. If anyone is leaning on these reporters it plainly has no effect. It's a different story in Gaza where Hamas thugs recently beat a Reuters journalist with a metal pole and threatened another with being thrown out of a tall building. In reality, what detractors of Israel refer to disparagingly as the "Israeli PR machine" usually consists of defensive appearances on TV and radio by government officials, who are grilled by newscasters about whatever Israeli behaviour is being fixated upon that day. The themes are always familiar: why is Israel so obstructive to peace? Why does it breach humanitarian law? Why is its use of force so disproportionate? Mark Regev is one such representative and a particular focal point for venomous attack, generating headlines such as, "Mark Regev, Israel's master of public relations" with the attendant accusations of being "horribly compelling". Or inconveniently plausible. Last year, however, something relatively unprecedented happened. In the midst of yet another Israel-centred media storm, after the deaths of nine passengers on the Mavi Marmara during a violent confrontation on the high seas, Israel released clear footage, backing up its contention that its forces were attacked by a baying mob on board the boat. Regev was around but this time his smooth talking was less important. The news-viewing public had seen for themselves Israeli commandos descending one by one on ropes on to the deck and being set upon by peace activists with sticks and poles, while their comrades could be seen carrying chairs and other objects for use against the brutal invaders at the bottom of the scrum. The media response to this vindicating Israeli evidence is instructive on the issue of the British narrative on Israel-Palestine. A stalwart of the Palestinian PR machine, Sarah Colborne of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, who was on board the boat, was generally given free rein across the media to accuse Israel of inexplicable mendacity. However, it was only when subjected to a rare grilling on the BBC's Today programme that she came unstuck. Sarah Montague's questioning about who started the violence and the presence on board of wannabe martyrs, left her implausible tale of innocence seriously compromised. The latent journalistic interest in previously unreported swaths of the Middle East landscape has revealed the horrors of Syrian torture chambers from which dead children are returned to their parents without their genitals, and endless other gruesome realities, previously concealed from British media consumers. Hopefully, in light of these major events, a more balanced and proportionate approach to reporting from a complex region will emerge and remain.
Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com
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HOW DID THE NAKBA HAPPEN? READ RFK
Posted by Doris Wise Montrose, June 7, 2011. |
| This was written by Gil Ronen for Arutz-7, www.IsraelNationalNews.com. |
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On June 6, 1968, Robert F. Kennedy succumbed to gunshot wounds inflicted a day earlier by an Arab terrorist, Sirhan Sirhan. His daughter later said that this was because of his support for the Jewish state. Lenny Ben-David, former head of AIPAC, writes in his blog that "Years later his daughter told me, 'My father was killed by a Palestinian terrorist because of his strong support for Israel.' He was killed on the first anniversary of the 1967 Six Day War." Ben-David links to another blog that contains excerpts from a series of articles written by RFK for a now-defunct Boston newspaper, after his visit to "Palestine" in March 1948. The articles show some things have not changed at all and point to the roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict which are no different 63 years later. The Arabs are most concerned about the great increase in the Jews in Palestine: 80,000 in 1948. The Arabs have always feared this encroachment and maintain that the Jews will never be satisfied with just their section of Palestine, but will gradually move to overpower the rest of the country and will eventually move onto the enormously wealthy oil lands. They are determined that the Jews will never get the toehold that would be necessary for the fulfillment of that policy. While the Arabs are unabashedly hostile, the Jews appear naively proud about the benefits they have brought their neighbors: The Jews point with pride to the fact that over 500,000 Arabs in the 12 years between 1932 and 1944, came into Palestine to take advantage of living conditions existing in no other Arab state. This is the only country in the Near and Middle East where an Arab middle class is in existence. One thing that seems different in the period RFK describes is Jewish national spirit and morale, which he describes as "101-percent": The Jewish people in Palestine who believe in and have been working toward this national state have become an immensely proud and determined people. It is already a truly great modern example of the birth of a nation with the primary ingredients of dignity and self-respect. (...) Kennedy describes "annihilation" of the Jews as the Arab purpose: Within the Old City of Jerusalem there exists a small community of orthodox Jews. They wanted no part of this fight but just wanted to be left alone with their wailing wall. Unfortunately for them, the Arabs are unkindly disposed toward any kind of Jew and their annihilation would now undoubtedly have been a fact had it not been that at the beginning of hostilities the Haganah moved several hundred well-equipped men into their quarter. Jews in that period were actually proud of their settlements: The Jews have small settlements or community farms such as Givat Brenner in completely hostile territory. They take pride that, despite the great difficulties, they have not evacuated any of them. From the very tip of Galilee right down to the arid Negev these communities exist... Kennedy agreed with the Jewish claim of British hostility toward the Jews: The British government, in its attitude towards the Jewish population in Palestine, has given ample credence to the suspicion that they are firmly against the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. RFK described preparations for the war which would result in the "Nakba" Arabs cry about today: When I was in Tel Aviv the Jews informed the British government that 600 Iraqi troops were going to cross into Palestine from Trans-Jordan by the Allenby Bridge on a certain date and requested the British to take appropriate action to prevent this passage. The troops crossed unmolested. It is impossible for the British to patrol the whole Palestinian border to prevent illegal crossings but such flagrant violations should certainly have led to some sort of action. The fight continues. Doris Wise Montrose is with Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors. Contact her at doris@cjhsla.org. |
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BORDER ISSUES
Posted by Paul Rotenberg, June 7, 2011. |
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If you cross the North Korean border illegally you get years in prison at hard labor. 2. If you cross the Iranian border illegally you get imprisoned indefinitely. 3. If you cross the Afghanistan border illegally you get shot to death. 4. If you cross the Saudi Arabian border illegally you get imprisoned. 5. If you cross the Chinese border illegally you disappear, period. 6. If you cross the Venezuelan border illegally you get tried as a spy. 7. If you cross the Cuban border illegally you get to rot in prison. 8. If you cross the English border illegally you get imprisoned and deported. 9. If you cross the Russian border illegally you get sent to Siberia as a spy. 10. If you cross the Israeli border illegally you get a job, welfare rights, a place to live, free education, free health care, support from social justice lobbies, media sympathy, a U.N. certificate for the protection of immigrants, the right to protest about not being treated properly, and if you have a child, citizenship. All the countries 1 to 9 get ignored, Israel gets denunciations from around the world, including from the countries named in 1 to 9, for its poor treatment of refugees. That's on a good day, on a bad day the U.N. Human Rights Council will pass a resolution condemning Israel and the General Assembly and/or the Security Council will add their "opinion". Paul Rotenberg lives in Toronto, Canada. Contact him at pdr@rogers.com |
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CONNIVING FACE OF ISRAEL'S ENEMY!
Posted by Steven Shamrack, June 7, 2011. |
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Conniving Face of Israel's Enemy! The Palestinian Authority leadership, while telling the world it supports peace talks with Israel, continues to say otherwise when talking to its people through its own television channels. The Palestinian Media Watch research institute presented on its website on Tuesday a video which aired on PA television on May 14, as part of the official events in Ramallah and in Gaza to mark "Nakba Day" — the day the Palestinian Authority mourns the 'catastrophe' of the creation of the State of Israel. The video shows that in PA President Mahmoud Abbas' speech in Gaza on Nakba Day, delivered in his name by his advisor and representative, he denied that Jews have a history in the Land of Israel and claimed a fictitious 9000 year-old Palestinian history dating back to 7000 BCE. This history, said Abbas, made Palestinians "the owners of history." Furthermore, Abbas taunted in his speech Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, saying: "National reconciliation (between Hamas and Fatah) is required in order to face Israel and Netanyahu. We say to him (Netanyahu), when he claims — that they (Jews) have a historical right dating back to 3000 years BCE — we say that the nation of Palestine upon the land of Canaan had a 7000 year history BCE. This is the truth, which must be understood and we have to note it, in order to say: 'Netanyahu, you are incidental in history. We are the people of history. We are the owners of history.'" Abbas' so-called history is a brazen distortion of known facts. Judean and Israeli history in the Land of Israel, says the report, dates back thousands of years and is documented by ancient Jewish and non-Jewish sources. Palestinians, however, is a term that has only recently begun to be used to identify Arabs in the region. There is no reference to a Palestinian-Arab nation in antiquity as Abbas claims. PMW notes that Islamic sources as well do not refer to Palestinians. In fact, the holy Muslim book the Quran refers to the people of Israel and to the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Food for Thought by Steven Shamrak Israel is the only reliable US security partner in the Middle East ! It includes: strategic weapons storage and airfields availability, intelligence gathering on Arab states and Islamic terrorists, new weapons and communication development programs. All of this is to protect oil interests of the United States — Israel buys oil from Russia! PA has no Interest in Peace Progress A week ago PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas said that Israel must accept the Arab refugees right of return and even compensate them for deportation. Abbas also noted that, despite Netanyahu's statements against negotiations with the PA when Hamas is an integral part of it, "Hamas is part of the Palestinian people". (So-called Palestinian refugees left following directive of their leaders and since the end of the Independence war they are willing participants of anti-Israel terror and diplomatic campaigns.) Usual Zigzagging Policy of the US MK Danny Danon (Likud) responded to U.S. President Barack Obamas AIPAC speech by saying that Obama "is zigzagging in accordance with whatever will bring him more votes... We must stand firm in order to make sure that this does not come at the expense of Israel." Politics of Blackmail and Deception Recently Abbas said, "We will review... the steps we will take — persisting with negotiations as the fundamental way to achieving a resolution. If we fail in reaching this solution, then we confirm that we will go to the United Nations." "All options (including terror) are now open," made it clystal clear the PLO Secretary-General Yasser Abed Rabbo, following an emergency meeting of PLO and Fatah officials in Ramallah. Another Palestinian official, Nabil Sha'ath, went as far as announcing that Netanyahu's speech before Congress was nothing less than a declaration of war. (It is the Arabs' side continstantly talking war and and propagating hate!) Funding of Fake Democracy Movements International lenders are aiming to provide $40 billion in funding for Arab nations trying to establish free democracies. The message from President Barack Obama and the other G-8 leaders meeting in this Normandy resort appeared to be warning autocratic regimes. (Nobody is protesting against funding of fictitious democratic movements. The US is over 14 trillion dollars in debt — where is the money coming from? Wishful thinking will not make them democratic!) Saudi Bid to Curb Iran Saudi officials have approached Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Central Asian states to lend diplomatic support — and potentially military assistance in some cases — to help stifle a majority Shiite revolt in Sunni-led Bahrain. Europe Calls Bibi Arrogant Europe is willing to throw Israel and the Jews to the wolves in order to appease the Muslim world. Europe regards Bibi's refusal to agree to commit national suicide as "arrogant". The fact that leaving Israel with an indefensible 9 mile wide state open it to attack matters not at all to a Europe that couldn't care less whether Israel survives. In fact they would welcome Israel's demise. Turkey Uses anti-Israel Rhetoric in Political Campaign In an effort to prevent exploitation in Turkey's national elections in June, J'lem is turning a deaf ear to Davutoglu's anti-Israel comments. (In many countries, even so-called democracies, anti-Semitism has been commonly used to 'inflame' political support of the mob!) Illegal Migrants — Another Issue Israel does not Deal with Foreign nationals from Eritrea attacked inspectors from the Oz unit who were working in Bnei Brak, after the inspectors asked to check the papers of a Nigerian national who refused to identify himself and tried to flee. Flotillas are anti-Israel Provocations The Turkish-based IHH group said that reopening of the Rafiah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip will not change its plans to send a second flotilla to Gaza. ('Flotillas' have nothing to do with the help to 'poor' Palestinians, but are deliberate anti-Israel propaganda ploy!) The 'Show' did not Last Long Just four days after the much-heralded opening of the Rafah crossing between the Palestinian Gaza Strip and Sinai, Cairo virtually shut it down on Tuesday, May 31. It was shut down in response to a US warning that since the crossing's opening PA and al Qaeda terrorists had been roaming at large across Sinai exposing the Suez Canal to attack. Quote of the Week: "To send a signal to the Palestinians that America will increase its demands on our ally Israel, on the heels of the Palestinian Authority's agreement with the Hamas terrorist organization, is a disaster waiting to happen. At this time of upheaval in the Middle East, it's never been more important for America to stand strong for Israel and for a united Jerusalem." — Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota governor Illegitimacy of PA State
An international group of some 60 attorneys, including former Foreign Ministry legal adviser Alan Baker, has appealed to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to prevent a General Assembly resolution on unilateral Palestinian statehood, based on the pre-1967 lines. The attorneys noted that such a resolution would be a violation of all past agreements between Israel and the Palestinians. They added that it would also contravene UN resolutions 242 and 338. According to the attorneys, the legal basis for the establishment of the state by the League of Nations in 1922 affirmed its presence on territories that included Judea, Samaria, and what is now east Jerusalem, (as well as trans-Jordan!) According to Article 80 of the UN Charter, the attorneys said, rights granted to all states or people by already existing international instruments — including those adopted by the League of Nations — remain valid. As a result, the attorneys said, the "650,000 Jews who presently reside in the areas of Judea and Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, reside there legitimately." Past resolutions have called for a negotiated solution to the conflict, the attorneys affirmed. Additionally, attempts to unilaterally change the status of the territory would be a breach of the 1995 Israeli-Palestinian agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. When the Palestinians agreed to the Oslo Accords, they knew that the settlements existed and would be one of the issues that would be negotiated during talks for a permanent-status arrangement. The Olso Accords did not limit settlement activity. Steven Shamrak was born in the former Soviet Union (USSR) and participated in the Moscow Zionist "refusenik" movement and currently lives in Melbourne, Australia. He publishes internet editorial letters on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He can be reached by email at StevenShamrak.e@gmail.com |
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A LEAFLET ABOUT OCCUPATION
Posted by Steven Plaut, June 7, 2011. |
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There is a leaflet being distributed thru the web by the "National Jewish Staff" group, a right-leaning Zionist activist group in Israel. The content of the leaflet is in Hebrew and is unsigned, but I found it amusing and have translated it here. Not sure who deserves credit for composing it. Here 'tis: "We are all opposed to Occupation" 1. We oppose occupation — of the legislative and executive branches of Israeli government by the judicial branch. 2. We oppose occupation — of the Supreme Court by the radical Left, where judicial appointments are made by one friend bringing another, 3. We oppose occupation — of the Land of Israel by foreigners who have infiltrated, including those Arabs who migrated into Israel as a result of Zionism to benefit economically. 4. We oppose occupation — of Jerusalem by the Moslems, who were a mere 18% of its population in the year 1900 and 14% in 1912. 5. We oppose occupation — of the Israeli electronic media by the Bolshevik Left. 6. We oppose occupation — by illegal Moslem infiltrators from Sudan, Eritrea, and elsewhere in Africa. 7. We oppose occupation — of Israeli institutions of higher education by the radical demented Left. 8. We oppose occupation — of Israel's cultural and art institutions by the anti-Zionist Left. Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
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THE ILLUSION OF TWO STATES, LIVING SIDE-BY-SIDE
Posted by Ari Bussel, June 7, 2011. |
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Time to React |
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There was a barrage of e-mails after Obama's and Netanyahu's speeches, what should Israel do, what should the USA do? Some warned Israel's supporters that action is necessary for Israel cannot survive Obama. Others still use the recent speeches against Israel, blaming her for the fact that peace remains elusive after 63 years. The President will remain in office for another year and a half. The Prime Minister's coalition government also seems stable enough. Even in the Israeli political sandbox, it is likely to withstand any mishaps or votes to break it down. Thus, the lines are drawn and each must accept the other. Netanyahu has very little maneuvering room. His back is against the wall, in a corner, facing challenges of both the physical sort like missiles and terrorism, and the still-intangible form of demonizing the Jewish People. He is a realist, knowing whatever he and other Israeli Prime Ministers have offered to the Palestinians the latter rejected. Given the historical record of more than two decades, it is evident the Palestinians do not want peace and that any notion that land-for-peace will succeed is only true insofar as "land" is the totality of the "Land of Israel." Nothing less will satiate the Palestinian appetite for destruction of the Jewish State. Facts are further supported by official incitement, repeated over and over again into young, impressionable minds of children. Anyone who wishfully thinks peace is even a remote possibility is mistaken given the levels of hatred handed down from the highest levels of the Palestinian Authority. Peace, for those who may wish to consult the recent chronicles of history, is possible — between Arabs and Jews, right in the Middle East. Israel and Jordan and Israel and Egypt have enjoyed solid peace treaties. In both instances, there was a partner who was willing to do what it takes, including taking the necessary risks and commitments, to achieve peace. Not so with the Palestinians. So Netanyahu chose to say what everyone conveniently likes to ignore, pressing on the two core issues: Jerusalem and refugees. Jerusalem's fate over the millennia was to be destroyed when the Jewish people were not unified, when the Jews strayed the right path. Jerusalem today is thriving, all religions allowed to freely worship. It is a renaissance not seen for centuries, especially not under the short Jordanian or centuries-long Turkish (both Muslim) rules. The city has developed, expanded and strengthened, and anyone toying with the idea of tearing it apart for anything but a Jewish capital is sorely mistaken. Even the Arab inhabitants, full residents of Israel, do not wish this to happen. Refugees are an equally alarming and contentious matter. No, it is not the worry that refugees will flood Israel. Rather, it is the end of one of the longest surviving enterprises of misguided philanthropy. Tens of thousands of people are employed by the UN, which spends billions, to perpetuate the "Refugee Problem." There is only one Perpetual Refugee in the world, the Palestinian. They and their descendants, forever and ever be considered refugees, ensuring the following: the flow of money, the continued existence of a huge bureaucracy and their effectiveness as a tool in the arsenal against Israel. None of the Arab states wanted, or did anything, to assimilate the Palestinians. They are the same ethnicity, same culture, same skin color, same language and same hatred toward Israel, but in the social ranking the Palestinians are the lowest of the low (human slaves, common in enlightened countries like Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, do not even enter this scale, for they are an object). Every time you fill up a tank of gas and pay close to five dollars a gallon, think of all the trillions of dollars flowing from our pockets to the super-rich Arab oil producing countries. There is clearly not a shortage of money to rid oneself of a refugee "problem," but there is no incentive whatsoever. Not while they are serving their agenda to destroy Israel. Israel, with meager resources, but an iron will, absorbed millions of refugees. First and foremost from the Arab countries who vomited the Jews from within as the modern State of Israel was forming. Today, even non-Jewish refugees (Sudanese and other Africans) are absorbed by the tiny Jewish state. The love of humanity and force of life make Israel do the impossible, create miracles and ignore difficulties. Arab nations, will you ever try to do the same with your own brethren? Thus, Netanyahu sharpened the notion of "Refugees." If there are "two states for two people," a Jewish and a non-Jewish state, then all the non-Jewish refugees will have to be absorbed in the non-Jewish state. A child would say the logic is "no brainer," but the Palestinians immediately protested with outrage: this is a "Declaration of War!" they exclaimed. Of course it is a declaration of war, for the only way to have two states, living side by side in peace, whereby one has no land, no capital, no right to exist is when Israel if finally obliterated for good from this world. This, my friends is the essence of the struggle. The Palestinians want nothing less than the complete and final destruction of Israel and the end to any manifestation of the Jewish people on this planet. And President Obama? He is misguided by advisers, some of whom are the most prominent Jews and ex-Israelis, telling him that a "divided Jerusalem," the "1967-borders" and "pressure on Israel" will do some good. While he already won one Nobel Peace Prize, he will not receive a second for shoving the Palestinians down Israel's throat. Israel finally understands that if she knuckles under to pressure, she has no future. She is waking up to the realization she has no friend in the White House and that speeches to AIPAC are meaningless when flip-flopping routinely occur as soon as the speech, handshakes and photo-ops are over. Israel must continue to wake up, look around and assess the events, the currents and the undercurrents. The Jewish State will survive only if she stands firm, and this she can do. The alternative will be final annihilation and this is no option for Israel. Contact Ari Bussel and Norma Zager at busselari@gmail.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: THE IDF DID GOOD
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 7, 2011. |
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Tonight begins Shavuot — the celebration of the Jewish people having received the Torah at Sinai 50 days after Pesach. It lasts for one day here, and two days outside of the Land. Because of its association with Torah, the night of Shavuot is spent in study. I usually make it to about 3 AM. And here is where we can see one of the special joys of living in Yerushalayim: I've been in a quandary as to which shiurim (study sessions) to attend because there is so much available. Such problems! Such blessings! Traditionally, as well, dairy foods are eaten on Shavuot. Not a bad combination: religious study and cheesecake. ~~~~~~~~~~ At the end of the day, on Sunday, at the Syrian border in the Golan — across from the Druse village of Majdal Shams and at the abandoned Syrian town of Kuneitra — the IDF held off those hundreds attempting to breach our border. Lessons had been learned from May and effective techniques were in place; high level commanders were on the scene, as well. The Syrians are claiming 20 dead, Israel is saying it was fewer but I don't have an official number — the Northern Command is saying eight to 10. At any rate, Israel is holding Syria, which encouraged the rioters for its own purposes, responsible for deaths. Whether there were 20 dead or eight, the number pales in comparison with the number of protesters killed by the Assad regime inside of Syria. The point is being made by multiple commentators that the Syrians are using the Palestinian Arabs as ploys to their own end. And the question is how long Palestinian Arabs will consent to play this role. ~~~~~~~~~~ But by no means does the relative IDF success on Sunday signal that we are home free. What we've dealt with until now is merely the beginning. Sunday marked the start of the Six Day War in 1967. Friday marks the day on which Jerusalem was reunited in the course of that war. Calling it Al-Quds day, the Arabs are planning riots at our borders and in Judea and Samaria. Needless to say, Israel is preparing diligently. ~~~~~~~~~~ Netanyahu envoy Yitzhak Molcho and PA negotiator Saeb Erekat have reportedly both been in the US in the last couple of days for separate secret consultations — in the case of Erekat, at least, with David Hale, acting US Middle East envoy (acting, now that Mitchell has resigned). The goal, clearly enunciated by a State Department official, was "to work on getting both sides back to the table." Obama wants to "jump start" negotiations to preclude that UN vote in September. The betting is that he will veto anything that comes before the Security Council with regard to a Palestinian state. But he will do it most reluctantly, as this places him in opposition to Arab or Muslim elements that he regularly courts and allies him publicly with Israel. And so, if there's a way around it, by bringing the parties to the table (in which case Abbas will withdraw efforts at the UN), he's all for it. The fact that it is an impossible situation, and that "negotiations" cannot possible lead to a peace agreement is irrelevant. This is about politics, and the Obama image, not about peace. ~~~~~~~~~~ It is imperative, of course, that Netanyahu hold that tough line in consultations with the US now. No being a "nice guy" and making it easier for Obama by conceding on certain issues in order to bring Abbas back to the table. ~~~~~~~~~~ As to Abbas, I offer a purely speculative thought. A couple of reports have surfaced lately regarding the fact that Abbas really knows that the UN ploy is not going to succeeded in bringing a Palestinian state into existence. With this recognition, if indeed it exists, might come a restructuring of Abbas tactics. He had been courting Hamas for a unity government in order to be able to go to the UN and say that the PA represented all Palestinian Arabs who would constitute the population of the state. But now it is the PA/Fatah that is the stumbling block to the formation of that unity government, which was supposed to have been in place by now. Abbas is holding tight to his promotion of Fayyad as prime minister, in the face of furious Hamas objections, and the PA is still holding Hamas prisoners in Judea and Samaria. Is Abbas sabotaging the unity agreement? Is he back to playing both ends against the middle? Hoping to mollify Obama sufficiently so that the president might lean harder on Israel? I don't have answers, only questions. ~~~~~~~~~~ What I will say is that secret negotiations on what each side will do to re-start peace talks makes me nervous. I find this potentially more unsettling than that UN vote. Although I still strongly suspect that at the end of the day Abbas's demands will make it impossible to proceed. No, let me alter that comment: It is Obama's proposals (I won't call them "demands" although they sure come close) that may make it impossible. According to Haaretz (which may be seriously inaccurate, as it promotes a decidedly leftist position) the US is trying to get both parties to agree to come to the table based on the Obama outlines from his recent State Department and AIPAC speeches. After what Netanyahu said in his press conference with the president and then in Congress? Could this be? No worry, if it is the case. Netanyahu is not about to agree to start negotiations with pre-'67 lines as the starting point, and issues such as Jerusalem and refugees to be tabled until we've conceded Judea and Samaria. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Freedom and Justice Party, created by the Muslim Brotherhood, and chaired by Mohamed Morsi, has been officially approved by the Egyptian Committee of Parties' Affairs. It is the first party to officially declare since Mubarak's fall. Not a good sign. Carolyn Glick wrote about "The Real Egyptian Revolution" the other day: "...As for the military, its actions to date make clear that its commanders do not see themselves as guardians of secular rule in Egypt. Instead, they see themselves as engines for a transition from Mubarak's authoritarian secularism to the Brotherhood's populist Islamism. ~~~~~~~~~~ Not a good scene: According to the Iranian news agency FARS, Iranian submarines, accompanied by Iranian warships, are in international waters in the Red Sea, on an intelligence gathering mission. ~~~~~~~~~~
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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MUSLIM WOMAN SEEKS TO REVIVE INSTITUTION OF SEX-SLAVERY
Posted by Raymond Ibrahim, June 6, 2011. |
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Last week witnessed popular Muslim preacher Abu Ishaq al-Huwaini boast about how Islam allows Muslims to buy and sell conquered infidel women, so that "When I want a sex-slave, I go to the market and pick whichever female I desire and buy her." This week's depraved anachronism comes from a Muslim woman — Salwa al-Mutairi, a political activist and former parliamentary candidate for Kuwait's government, no less: She, too, seeks to "revive the institution of sex-slavery." A brief English report appeared over the weekend in the Kuwait Times (nothing, of course, in the MSM): 
Salwa al-Mutairi: "In the Chechnyan war, surely there are female Russian captives. So go and buy those and sell them here in Kuwait; better that than have our men engage in forbidden sexual relations." Muslim men who fear being seduced or tempted into immoral behavior by the beauty of their female servants, or even of those servants "casting spells" on them, would be better to purchase women from an "enslaved maid" agency for sexual purposes. She [Mutairi] suggested that special offices could be set up to provide concubines in the same way as domestic staff recruitment agencies currently provide housemaids. "We want our youth to be protected from adultery," said al-Mutairi, suggesting that these maids could be brought as prisoners of war in war-stricken nations like Chechnya to be sold on later to devout merchants. The Arabic news website, Al Arabiya, has the sordid details, including a video of Mutairi addressing this topic. I summarize and translate various excerpts below (note: I am not making any of this up): The Kuwaiti female activist begins by insisting that "it's of course true" that "the prophet of Islam legitimized sex-slavery." She recounts how when she was in Mecca, Islam's holiest city, she asked various sheikhs and muftis (learned, authoritative Muslims) about the legality of sex-slavery according to Sharia: they all confirmed it to be perfectly legal; Kuwaiti ulema further pointed out that extra "virile" men — Western synonymous include "sex-crazed," "lecherous," "perverted" — would do well to purchase sex-slaves to sate their appetites without sinning. Here's a particularly interesting excerpt from her taped speech on the rules governing sex-slaves: A Muslim state must [first] attack a Christian state — sorry, I mean any non-Muslim state — and they [the women, the future sex-slaves] must be captives of the raid. Is this forbidden? Not at all; according to Islam, sex slaves are not at all forbidden. Quite the contrary, the rules regulating sex-slaves differ from those for free women [i.e., Muslim women]: the latter's body must be covered entirely, except for her face and hands, whereas the sex-slave is kept naked from the bellybutton on up — she is different from the free woman; the free woman has to be married properly to her husband, but the sex-slave — he just buys her and that's that. She went on to offer concrete suggestions: "For example, in the Chechnyan war, surely there are female Russian captives. So go and buy those and sell them here in Kuwait; better that than have our men engage in forbidden sexual relations. I don't see any problem in this, no problem at all." Mutairi suggests the enslaved girls be at least 15 years-old. She further justified the institution of sex-slavery by evoking 8th century caliph, Harun Rashid — a name some may recall from Arabian Nights bedtime stories; a name some may be surprised to discover politically active Muslims modeling their lives after: "And the greatest example we have is Harun al-Rashid: when he died, he had 2,000 sex slaves — so it's okay, nothing wrong with it." Harun Rashid: Inspiration for Disney characters in the West, pious role model in the Middle East. Mutairi's rationale is ultimately guided by a sense of efficiency, a desire for the good of society: legalizing sex-slaves helps prevent Muslim men from transgressing Allah's laws (as we have seen, extramarital relations with fellow Muslim women is strictly forbidden, but not with infidel sex-slaves, since they are scarcely considered human). Thus, the institution of sex-slavery provides a convenient, Sharia-compliant way of satiating the libidinous urges of Muslim men. This direct approach has non-Muslim parallels. For example, in the West, some seek to legalize marijuana, arguing that, since people will use it anyway, let's make it so they won't break the law. In the Muslim world, we have those who seek to legalize sex-slavery, arguing that, since Muslim men will use women anyway, let's make it so they won't break Sharia law. Such are the inevitable differences between the Western mindset (based on reason and universal rights) and the Sharia mindset (based on the life of a 7th century Arabian caravan-raider and slave-trader). Mutairi concluded by piously supplicating Allah: "Oh I truly wish this for Kuwait, Allah willing — Oh Lord, Lord, you are bountiful..." While she waits, Mutairi can take solace in the fact that, if sex-slavery is not institutionalized in Kuwait, it thrives underground throughout the Muslim world, where non-Muslim girls — mostly Christians — are routinely abducted, enslaved, and forced into lives of unspeakable degradation. After all, just because a practice is not formally institutionalized does not mean that those who deem it their divine right are not practicing it.
Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com
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WE'RE NOT GREAT AT EVERYTHING, YA KNOW; WHEN ME AND SOPHIE MET ISAIAH; SECRETS OF PRAYER
Posted by Ted Roberts, June 6, 2011. |
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Three stories of mine from the humorous to the serious. |
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WE'RE NOT GREAT AT EVERYTHING, YA KNOW I know, I boast too often about Jewish achievements — philanthropy, the arts, science. Jewish names are sprinkled through the list of winners. But Mr. fixits are not. When the water pipe from my house to the street breaks, I want a Jones, not a Greenberg. And how many Jews understand what we used to call a carburetor? (I think they adjust them from an IPod now.) Why are we so deficient in these kinds of skills? You few hardy Jewish craftsmen, pardon me. I'm generalizing from me and my family, but I think I'm correct. I'd bet a bunch and give odds 2 to 1 that Albert Einstein, Phillip Roth, and Jonas Salk could not stop my upstairs toilet from its two hours of running after a healthy flush. I'll throw in Spinoza and Maimonides. (I'll have to lower the odds to 3 to 2.) Two hours of misery and tension. I'm afraid to leave the house. What if it never stops running? Can you imagine my water bill? But no one is perpetually cursed. Blessings and curses — sometimes hard to distinguish — both come from the Creator of humans and demons and angels. Take the other day for example. My lawn mower loses its motorized soul — it won't go. Outside Walmart, sparkling in the sun is a fleet of push mowers. "I'll take that one," I tell the salesman. He says, "Follow me," and walks me into the store to a huge stack of boxes — a skyscraper of boxes. I rebel. "I don't wanta box, I wanta lawn mower," I wail. He explains the lawn mower is in the box. How can that be, I'm thinking. The box isn't as big as the lawn mower. This guy is also a clairvoyant 'cause the next thing he says is, "You gotta assemble it". He knows I'm worrying about putting this puzzle together. He evidently doesn't know I'm Jewish. We sell or write things or eat things — we don't assemble things. No way would he sell me that shiny red sparkling assembled machine that caught my eye. So, I took home the box. And I put it together. It wasn't a lawn mower, it was a wheelchair. It had four small wheels, an uncomfortable place to sit and a handle for someone to push you. I wrestled with it an other two hours — this time it clearly was a carpet cleaner. I had now devoted two hours to several useful devices, but not a lawn mower. Maybe a motorcycle. I gave up. Whatta mess. I was going to have to load t his stack of tin back into the miniature box — probably bringing on a hernia in the process. Then the embarrassment at the store. "I'm Jewish, I can't assemble this thing, but we did cure Polio, you know." I retire to the couch with a great book called Maimonides, Spinoza, and You. The doorbell rings. A seedy-looking guy asks if he can have my old lawn mower, which I've put out on the street and looks like a bicycle that detonated an IED in Afghanistan. First, I look up to Heaven from whence this saint came. Then I recall all the Midrashim about the Tzadik (and even Elijah) disguised in rags, so their glory wouldn't show, visited the pious, like me. I hesitate. "Know anything about lawn mowers?" I gently ask. "Oh yeah, a little," the perfect humble answer from a divine visitant. I show him my wheel chair/carpet cleaner combination. I explain its supposed to cut grass. I explain when I pull the rope handle, it won't start. "Oh, you got it backwards — the handle goes on the other side — you're pulling the cord from opposite of the housing." He flips the handle over to the right side — now it looks like a mower — pulls the cord directly from the housing, and the roar of a 4.5 horsepower Braggs and Stratton engine fills the empty air of my backyard. He is a Tzadik or maybe a fix-it type unknown to Jewry. And I know who sent him. And I know why. Because I generously gave away my old lawn mower. And you should have seen his happiness in loading my shattered old pile of junk into his pickup. He actually had faith that he could turn it into a machine that once again would cut grass. He was as ecstatically happy as Noah when he discovered his ark floated like a feather — didn't sink like a stone. And I was so overwhelmed by my heavenly visitation that I shouted, "Shalom and be well," to the departing pickup.
WHEN ME AND SOPHIE MET ISAIAH There's never been a Bar Mitzvah teacher who didn't loudly declare that he learns from his students — a slogan of our profession; a pious protestation that advertises our humility — our open mindedness. And occasionally, it's true. We Bar Mitzvah teachers have said it for years — a half truth. But I did learn from Betsy Silverstein — at our lunch lesson — that mustard on a Swiss cheese sandwich wasn't half bad. Her mama had run out of mayo. She also taught me that the Haftorah blessing could be sung to the tune of God Bless America and nobody but the rabbi and Irving Berlin, spinning in his grave, noticed. But that's before I met Sophie, the student you dream of when your real-life student tells you he's converting to Buddhism because his folks have agreed to sponsor a three-month vacation in Tibet and Buddhists have no Haftorah requirement. Sophie was a whiff of pure oxygen to a fatigued, over-age Bar Mitzvah teacher on his last gasp. Girls are always better students. Rarely do their athletic interests compete with their studies. And they're not strong enough to snap the ropes you've used to bind them to the dining room table with the Haftorah open in front of them. Girls are better. Most young ladies prefer mall to football, which though more expensive doesn't demand two hours of practice five days a week. Besides, Sophie had a talent all too rare among teenagers. She was obedient to her teacher as Rabbi Akivah was to Torah. Five lines of her Haftorah by Tuesday? A done deal. You could bet on it. But her greatest attribute was her birthday, which in the complicated world of synagogue programming, landed her Bar Mitzvah smack on the 7th of August. So what, you ask. Well, the Haftorah for that day is Isaiah 49. So you might say that this 12 year old, diligent achiever introduced me to Isaiah. Oh, I knew him before, but not as well as Sophie — who due to my insistence — repeated Chapter 49, in Hebrew, ten times on tape. And obligated by my sense of responsibility, I listened ten times. Like I say, after several similar assignments, she knew him better that I. Well, Isaiah is her Haftorah, not mine. Why shouldn't she know him better than me? (Besides, she was nowhere near my level of expertise on Amos and Jeremiah.) "Ted," she says, "did you see those beautiful metaphors that Isaiah uses?" (I prefer "Ted" to "Mr. Roberts, my teacher and persecutor".) Sophie had an ear for beauty. Isaiah 49:14 makes Wordsworth, Keats and even our own Hayim Bialick sound like jingle writers. The prophet who wrote almost 3,000 years ago (only a heartbeat away considering the breadth of eternity) is as fresh as Krispy Kreme Doughnuts. Naturally, he retains his charm and currency. Why should that be surprising since prophets can see over the rainbow. They know the language of every tomorrow. Shakespeare, Chaucer, even the English sonneteers of the Elizabethan Age sound rusty to our ears, but not this troubadour of Israel who wrote in a 3,000 year old lingo. Isaiah speaks to you as though this morning you personally signed the covenant with the God whom Isaiah variously symbolizes as Mother, Father, lover, bridegroom, Feudal Lord; the awesome, but merciful magistrate that looms over your personal world. He makes the ultimate case for your acquiescence to the covenant. He has a knack for talking solely to you, as though the Book of Isaiah began, "Dear Ted" or "Dear Sophie". The prophet's song reminds us of that old love affair of God and Israel; whose Ketubah is the covenant. This brought on a unique thought. Why couldn't the liturgy for the Holidays and Sabbath match the inspiration of Isaiah? We all have trouble coping with the length of the services and our short attention span and the dreary repetition (yes, I know it's traditional) of Amidahs, Kaddishes, and other prayers. The Amidah, gray with age; it's cluttered and clumsy language has no power after all these years. We've worn it out like a comfortable, but ragged shirt. Likewise, the Kaddish goes flat after three or four recitations. And even if the Mosiach, himself, arrived after the second hour of prayer, we might not notice. Who can stand on spiritual tiptoes after the second hour? In my humble view, the overwhelming, stifling length of our service is a major attendance wrecker. Even the Baal Shem Tov had to stop his spiritual exaltation to chop wood once in a while. And who knows how many times Maimonides looked up from his prayer book to worry about that patient with the festering wound on his forearm? We are all far too human to spend hours in elevated ecstasy. A conversation with our Creator cannot be measured in earthly minutes. Two hours of prayer may not be as good as a microflash of heartfelt inspiration. On a practical level, guess how many more Jews will come home to temple and synagogue if the service is halved? I know an unconventional rabbi in Memphis, Tennessee who bows to tradition with a teasingly simple solution to this problem. "Cut nothing," he says. "Don't amputate the service, just jiggle your arrival time." He sees many levels of stamina in his congregation. Some come promptly at the beginning and stick it out, with joy. Others straggle in late like reluctant school boys. Finally, there's my friend, Herb — an extremist — who shows up about kiddush time. "I rarely miss Adon Olam," he claims. I say — give 'em more of Isaiah and his prophetic colleagues instead of repetitive Kaddishes and Amidahs and their like. I'll consult Sophie, who like her teacher, adores Isaiah. I think I know her answer.
SECRETS OF PRAYER Those mortals — they just don't get it. Of course, I'm only a class III angel, so I don't know everything, but I've been up here a few thousand aeons. So, you know I've picked up a little knowledge of the system. I mean up here and down there. We class III angels are each assigned to a shetle, a village, a municipality. My little town has only me. New York has 500. We think of ourselves as guardian angels, but we really are the prayer filters. G-d Almighty, himself, can't handle the load. That fellow, Mark Twain — not exactly a saint, you know, but a heckuva humorist — marveled at the flawed human understanding of heaven. He couldn't believe that the one thrill that motivates human behavior even more than money, the subject they think about, long for, and whisper about constantly was not in the Sunday School definition of heavenly activities. Singing, playing the harp, napping on clouds, but never that other recreational activity. You know what I mean. Well, I'm not giving away any secrets. Humans are confused about a lot of things. Take prayer for example. They never have understood that, either. Hannah, you know in Samuel II, prays like a wild woman (remember Eli thought she was drunk) for a child and we delivered Samuel — greatest priest in all Israelite history. Sarah is as quiet as a church mouse (pardon the expression) and we also deliver — Isaac, in her case. You think the Boss can't hear Sarah's plea without her mouth forming the words? He reads the language of the heart, you know. Yeah, I know what you cynics are gonna say next. You're gonna tell me about the Chasidic farmer — Belzach — who was so righteous that he wouldn't let his hens lay eggs on Shabbos. Poor man, he had a sick wife. He prayed for her recovery every day like my rabbi davens on Yom Kippur. Nothing happened. His friends and students were appalled. If his prayers were unheeded, what hope did they have? They fled from their faith like dandelion seeds sail over the meadow. Trouble is, being human they couldn't see the plan. Most folks are more interested in what goes on AROUND them than what goes on ABOVE them. It's like watching a dog sniff out a lost child. They don't understand why he confidently turns off the road to follow a footpath that leads to the valley caves and the whimpering child. Talk about understanding the Creator of heaven and earth — we don't even understand the G-d-given tracking ability of a dog. But back to the Holy man and his ailing wife and the hidden plan. She was so bad they had to take her to the healer in Gdansk. Guess what? The next day the river flooded and for its amusement, stood up over its banks, dunked the empty house in the river, then reduced it to straw and splintered boards. If the wife had been well — if they had not gone to the healer — the whole family would have been fish food. And another thing humans don't get. Sometimes, it's a zero sum game. If a supplicant asks for a thousand rubles — its gotta come out of someone's pocket. We don't print money, you know, like most governments these days. You pray for Amalgamated Computer Chips to go up — and some short seller looses his stake. Listen, when it comes to prayer, conflict is everywhere. Take Becky, a nice, 15 year old maiden with facial skin like a serpent; three times a week she begs me for beauty because her heart yearns for that Belski boy whose father runs the vodka store. But so do twelve others. And the town doctor has a lotion he sells for 300 groshen a bottle that turns serpent skin into velvet. (You need to smear on a bottle a week for 20 weeks.) And he's got a kid on the way and needs all the income he can get. He's gotta make a living, you know. See how complicated it gets. How to make everybody happy? And A wants to buy a cheap wagon (and may the seller throw in two healthy horses!). But B, the wagon seller, prays for a fat price. And even if I grant A's prayer, in a week he's back at me for a zoftig wife (she should have red hair, he tells me) sitting beside him in his discounted wagon. The there's that corny line I hear ten times a week from the same pleader. "Just gimme this one and I'll never bother you again." Oh yeah. It's like jellybeans and popcorn — the more you give 'em, the more they want. Of course, we've all got our favorites. Those who you hate to refuse. Those who ask for others — not themselves. As soon as I arrived up here I chose prayer as my area of specialty. Smart move — some of my angelic colleagues chose sacrifice, which seemed a promising field. 700-800 BC. After all, the Temple was operating 24/7. But today they don't have much of a career field. The very first thing they taught us was how to respond to human complaints about the efficiency of prayer The overriding answer when you encounter a cynic is: When we answer G-d's prayers, well, that's the day He'll answer ours. G-d's prayer? What can he mean? I mean about 300 times in the Torah G-d asks us to behave — to walk in his ways, to obey his commandments, to act like a man or a woman instead of a baboon. Over and over he pleads with us. In YOUR language He PRAYS — yes, He prays — that we honor the covenant. The day we answer his supplications He'll wake up and answer ours. Seems fair to me. Ted Roberts' essays appear in the Jewish press, web sites,
and magazines. He is author of The Scribbler On The Roof, a
book of short stories and commentary. Visit his websites at
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TERRORIST WHO MURDERED FOGEL FAMILY PROVES HIS MOTHER LIED TO PRESS
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 6, 2011. |
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This was written by Dr Aaron Lerner, Director of IMRA, Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict. Its website address is http://www.imra.org.il Write him at imra@netvision.net.il |
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How many times has the following scene been repeated? In Awarta, Hakim Awad's mother, Nouf Awad, told AFP it was "impossible" that her son had committed the murder. "It wasn't my son who did it," she said. "It is impossible that it's him, he
was with me the whole night that the incident happened."
AFP report — 17 April 2011
He now has confessed to the crime. Will reporters go back to his mother — and the rest of the villagers who swore to the media that no one from the village had anything to do with the murders? More important: the next time you see a terrorist's mother swearing on TV that her son didn't do anything remember Hakim Awad's mother. And the next time you read the "testimony" of someone to one of the "human rights" NGO's against Israel, taken at face value by the NGO as the unvarnished truth, remember Hakim Awad's mother.] — IMRA — Independent Media Review and Analysis Website: www.imra.org.il Palestinian youths charged with slaughter of Fogel family
"I'm proud of what I did...I did it all for Palestine," one of the suspects says during an appearance in court, "I would do it again." Two Palestinian youths from the West Bank village of Awarta, arrested in April on suspicion of murdering five members of the Fogel family in Itamar, were charged with five counts of homicide at a military court on Sunday. The defendants, 17-year-old Hakim Awad and 18-year-old Amjad Awad, who are from the same clan, have confessed to stabbing and shooting two young brothers, their parents, and a three-month-old baby in the attack. "I don't regret what I did, and would do it again," Amjad Awad told reporters in court. "I'm proud of what I did and I'll accept any punishment I get, even death, because I did it all for Palestine," he added. The charge sheet detailed how the two saw two young brothers sleeping in their beds, 4-year-old Elad and 11-year-old Yoav, snuck into the home, and stabbed them both to death. They then entered the parents' bedroom, where they launched a knife attack on Ehud and Ruth Fogel. The parents fought back, attempting to fend off the attackers. Ehud died of stab wounds and Ruth was shot dead by the attackers with a stolen M-16 gun. The two then left the house, before hearing cries from three-month-old baby Hadas. Awoken by the attack, the baby lay in its crib in the parents' bedroom. "They went back into the house and stabbed the baby to death to silence her cries," a security source said following the arrests in April. Gabrielle Goldwater is a Member of "Funding for Peace Coalition"
[FPC] (http://eufunding.org.uk) |
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DARWIN AWARDS ON THE BORDER, AND END THE OCCUPATION OF CORSICA!
Posted by Steven Plaut, June 6, 2011. |
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1. Proportionality? Proportionality has been the bludgeon that the anti-Semites and Hitlerjugend have been throwing against Israel and the Jews for years. When genocidal terrorists kill 3 Jews, it is a crime against humanity and a genocidal non-proportional response if Israel retaliates and kills 4 terrorists. And now there are new arenas of proportionality First, there is the matter of foreskins. So let's see if we have this straight. On the Left Coast of the US, where every fourth store front is a tattoo parlor and next to it is a body piercing parlor, the local Moonbatocracy is demanding that circumcisions be banned because it is inhumane. This in the same San Francisco that wants to deal with drug addiction by passing out clean syringes and erects "No Drugs Zones" signs close to schools so the locals know which streets should be avoided when they shoot up dope. The jihad against circumcision:
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/ cityinsider/detail?entry_id=77247 A particularly nasty comic book was prepared to support the ban against circumcision, entitled "Foreskin Man," and it portrays Jews in images taken directly from Nazi magazines in the 1930s. Then we have the other "proportionality" matter. The Syrian fascist regime murders hundreds of its own civilians each week but then it sends groups of Syrians to the border with Israel in order to create a media diversion, hoping the world will stop talking about the regime's own massacres. And suddenly Hillary is whining that ISRAEL needs to display restraints and, of course, proportionality. These people get paid significant amounts of money by Assad to get shot at. In an unusual Darwin Award ceremony, they march across mine fields, getting limbs blown off for the cameras. They toss Molotov cocktails about, which often land close to the rioters themselves and start fires in the dry brush, and then it turns out the Darwin Award winners forgot to bring with them fire extinguishers. And when Israeli troops stop firing at them to allow the rioters to extract their wounded comrades, instead of extracting them the thugs exploit the moment to advance on Israel's fence and attack Israeli troops. The Syrian-paid Darwin Award winners attack the border fence and get shot at by Israeli troops, who all too frequently use tear gas and rubber bullets instead of live ammo. No other army on earth would react to such behavior with "crowd control methods." I would love to see ethnic German civilians attempt to force their way into Russian Kalingrad in what was once East Prussia. Here are some related stories: A. Statement of the Syrian Reform Party:
CONCERNING THE ASSAD STOMPERS OF THE GOLAN HEIGHTS SUNDAY, 05 JUNE 2011 10:35 RPS SYRIAN OPPOSITION FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Washington DC, June 5, 2011. The Reform Party of Syria has learned today, from intelligence sources close to the Assad regime in Lebanon, that Syrians storming through the Golan Height next to the Quneitra crossing are Syrian farmers who have migrated in recent years from the drought-stricken northeast Syria to the south. Estimates put the number at 250,000 impoverished migrants. Information received cite the regime has paid hundreds of these farmers $1,000 each to show-up and $10,000 to their families should any of them succumb to Israeli fire. In Syria, an average salary is about $200 a month and to these impoverished farmers, such a one-time sum can keep them economically afloat for six months. Such tactic was used in the past by another defunct Ba'ath Party in Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, to pay Intifada-driven Palestinians the sum of $25,000 to their next-of-kin should they die throwing stones. That measure had a worldwide impact and it seems the Assad regime is using the same play from a twin playbook. It is obvious, with this action, Assad wants to divert the attention of the world away from his own massacres and brutality that resulted in some 70 deaths yesterday and about 30 today in Jisr al-Shoghour. RPS expects, on the basis of today's success, for these operations of incursions to multiply in scope in the near future for two reasons: 1) Divert the attention away from Assad's barbarism and savageries, and 2) Stand tall again in the eyes of the regime's supporters whose morale has taken quite a beating the last 3 months because of the violence perpetrated by Assad against unarmed civilians. On this day of Naksa, RPS strongly believes in ownership and title of its Golan Heights. But unlike a regime bred on the use of violence, the Syrian people, demonstrating how peaceful they are as they endure one massacre after another, believe in peaceful negotiations to repatriate our lands. If Assad really wanted the Golan Heights, he would walk the same peaceful path Anwar Sadat walked long before him. But then, if he does, how can he justify his own existence as the "Commandant de la Résistance". For Assad, winning through peace means also losing the war against his own people. B. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/ 0,7340,L-4078816,00.html IDF: Protesters caused their own deaths Probe of 'Naksa Day' events reveals Syrian protesters ignited minefields, threw firebombs without preparing extinguishers. IDF called three ceasefires to allow Red Cross to evacuate wounded, but protesters used this to gain ground Hanan Greenberg The IDF said Monday morning that many of the Syrian protesters who stormed the border fence and Quneitra crossing in honor of 'Naksa Day' were responsible for their own deaths by igniting mine fields on the border. Sources said the protesters who ignited the fields did not bring fire extinguishers with them and thus posed a danger to themselves and others by behaving irresponsibly. Others threw firebombs near Quneitra crossing to the same effect, they said. Paying Up Syrian opposition: Anti-Israel rioters paid $1,000/Ynet Protestors at northern border promised $1,000 reward by Assad's regime, Reform Party of Syria claims; Israeli officials: Damascus encouraged rioters. Syria says IDF killed 23 people, wounded 350; army says figures inflated Military sources are also assuming that many protesters were hurt or killed as a result of the Red Cross's inability to reach them, due to protesters' refusal to cease violence in order to allow for medical evacuations. IDF officials say commanders ordered three ceasefires, each of which were taken advantage of by the protesters in order to gain ground. Many protesters remained on the border throughout the night but most had dispersed by morning, an IDF source said, stressing that soldiers were still on high alert for additional breaches of the fence. Dolan Abu Salah, the mayor of Majdal Shams, was unconvinced that the protesters had dispersed, claiming that they had probably gathered on a hill known to be unobservable from Israel. Police still surround the Druze village and the IDF has declared the village a closed military zone, though residents continue to move around at will and daily life continues normally, aside from a school strike. Checkpoints have been set up around the village in order to prevent residents from reaching the border and joining protests. Meanwhile, the IDF continues to investigate Sunday's events. Syria claims 23 protesters were killed on the border and 350 injured, but the army says that number is a gross overestimate. Hundreds of Syrians, most of them Palestinian refugees, stormed the border near Majdal Shams and the Quneitra crossing in honor of 'Naksa Day', which marks the "Arab downfall" of the Six Day War. They were prevented from crossing by IDF troops, who were prepared due to a similar border breach on 'Nakba Day' last month. Sources from the Syrian Opposition claim that President Bashar Assad's regime, under fire from civilians vying for overhauling reform recently, offered to pay demonstrators who join in the border protests $1,000 for participating, or give their families $10,000 in the event of their deaths. C. Assad's Help Wanted Sign: $25,000 Reward For Being Killed by IDF
The Syrian regime paid poor farmers in the north $1,000 to travel to the border at the Golan Heights border and challenge the IDF and another $25,000 to their families if they were killed, according to the opposition Reform Party of Syria. The death toll in Sunday's confrontation was reported at 23 by the government-controlled Syrian media, and the IDF is on high alert for more attempts on Monday to infiltrate into Israel. The Reform party said that farmers, suffering from a severe drought, make less than the average Syrian salary of $200 a month, one-fifth of the amount of money they received to demonstrate and try to cross the border. "It is obvious, with this action, [Syrian President Bashar] Assad wants to divert the attention of the world away from his own massacres and brutality that resulted in some 70 deaths yesterday [Saturday] and about 30 today in Jisr al-Shoghou," the party's website said. The opposition party also expects more clashes so that Assad can "stand tall again in the eyes of the regime's supporters whose morale has taken quite a beating the last three months because of the violence perpetrated by Assad against unarmed civilians." The party's platform specifies the strategic Golan Heights, captured by Israel in its defensive Six Day War in 1967, as part of Syria, but also believes in "peaceful negotiations." Its website added, "For Assad, winning through peace means also losing the war against his own people." More than 1,500 people have been killed and another 35,000 arrested or harassed by Assad's forces in the eight-week uprising that has escalated from demands for reform to demanding his ouster as president. *** 2. Finally, France has announced that it plans to join the latest anti-Israel pogrom and will vote for the creation of a "Palestinian" terrorist state with Jerusalem as its capital. And it is in preparation for that that I call upon all honest people of good faith to immediate join the campaign for self-determination and independence! Support Self-Determination, Liberation and Independence! Friends, Comrades, Zionists, the time has come for us all to come out openly in support of the National Liberation Front of Corsica — Fronte di Liberazione Naziunale Corsu, or FLNC. France must end its inhumane and oppressive illegal occupation of Corsica once and for all. The activists and militants of the FLNC deserve world support! Moreover, this illegal French occupation of Corsica has lasted for over two centuries! It is true that the FLNC has used violence and bombs in the past, but that just proves how oppressed the Corsicans are and how just their cause is! The way to prevent further violence is for France to agree to the demands of the FLNC at once. Corsica must be made independent. Part of Paris, the section around the Invalides where the most famous Corsican of all lies, must be liberated from French occupation and must serve as the capital of independent Corsica. French settlers living in Corsica must be removed and sent back to their own country. For years the FLNC has been demanding this, in its manifesto:
3. Fighting back at York:
4. Latest on the Olive Tree Atrocity: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/ are-jews-funding-israels-foes/ Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist,
a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author
of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and
satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic
community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
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SCOTLAND GOES MAD FOR ISLAM
Posted by Sergio (HaDaR) Tezza), June 6, 2011. |
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This is by Daniel Greenfield,
columnist and author. He was born in Israel and is currently living in New York City. He comments on political affairs with a special focus on the War on Terror and the rising threat to Western civilization. He maintains a blog at http://sultanknish.blogspot.com.
It was printed in
Front Page Magazine
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The West Dunbartonshire Council led by the loony Scottish National Party has decided to ban books from Israel. The first book on their list should be the Bible, a notorious Zionist tract which claims divine sanction for a Greater Israel. But the Bible will likely remain on the shelves of West Dunbartonshire libraries, while zealous SNP members will keep a watch for books by Amos Oz, who agrees with them on all the essential details. The silly thing about European boycotts of Israeli books and movies is that it almost always comes down to leftists boycotting other leftists. Imagine the UK boycotting Michael Moore to protest the War in Iraq and American leftists reciprocating with a ban on Ian McEwan. Purging Amos Oz from libraries and Samuel Maoz from theaters does Israel a favor. It also does America and Europe a favor by sparing them from the prolonged leftist diatribes of the cafe crowd. And maybe that's why directors like Ken Loach and writers like Iain Banks bring down the axe, it spares them the competition. Why import leftist writers and directors to Europe? You might as well ship coal to Newcastle. Keeping Israeli books off the shelf won't help the people of West Dunbartonshire, which has the worst unemployment in the UK, with thousands out of work. It might move another one or two of Ian McEwan's depressing tomes to the register and into someone's suicide kit, but it won't create any more jobs. It does however make for a useful distraction. The SNP will try to divert attention from their funding cuts with a round of "Bash the Jews." Considering the minute number of Jews in Scotland, they have to make do with Israel. Of course it's not entirely fair to blame the SNP for all this. The actual idiotic motion came from Councillor Jim Bollan, of the Scottish Socialist Party, formerly of the Communist Party. To clear up any confusion between the two, the Scottish Socialist Party has a red flag with a yellow star, with optional clenched fists on it, and its abbreviation is one Cyrillic letter away from that of the Soviet Union. It's not clear what the difference between the SSP and the Communist party is, except that it's easier to get elected to the West Dunbartonshire Council as a Socialist than a Communist, whereupon you are then free to tackle such vital issues as the surplus of Israeli books in community libraries and boycotts of Marks and Spencer for selling Zionist underwear. According to itself, the Scottish Socialist Party is a "fresh, forward-looking party which dares to be different." And there is no better way to be fresh, different and forward-looking than by waving the red and yellow flag of a bankrupt ideology that not even the Russians and Chinese want anything to do with anymore. But what doesn't sell in Russia, China or even Cuba still passes muster in Scotland, where the welfare state has become a way of life and the SNP makes David Sutch's Official Monster Raving Loony Party seem downright sensible. Scotland is in the midst of an economic disaster and the SSP and SNP are bent on turning it into an even bigger disaster. The SSP has a bold program of opposing the war, independence and taxing the rich. This distinguishes it from the SNP which also opposes the war, wants independence and a local income tax. But neither the SNP or SSP really want independence. Their own economic policies make Scottish independence all but impossible. Their only real election program is the welfare state, and independence would kill the golden goose that makes it possible. Instead, they look to the EU to take over where the UK would leave off. But someone still has to foot the bill. For a party running a country into the ground during an economic crisis, the Scottish National Party spends a peculiar amount of time obsessing over Israel. But then considering the SNP's dueling Marxist and Fascist roots, that's hardly surprising. Before Arthur Donaldson headed up the SNP, he was cooling his heels in a cell for his enthusiastic desire to be Scotland's own Vidkun Quisling. SNP founding member Hugh MacDiarmid championed Scottish fascism before switching to the Communist party. Another SNP founder, Andrew Dewar Gibb, met with Nazi emissaries to prepare for an independent Scotland under German rule. Today, the Scottish National Party is pro-independence and pro-EU, an echo of the time when it was pro-independence and pro-Third Reich. Now it's Pro-Islamic as well. The likes of Osama Saeed and Hamza Yousaf are the SNP's new defenders of Scottish values. Osama Saeed, who was a spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood, a supporter of Yemeni Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar Al-Awlaki, was also a Scottish National Party candidate and an adviser to Prime Minister Salmond. Osama Saeed, named one of Scotland's Top 100 thinkers and opinion formers, wrote an article for The Guardian championing the return of the Caliphate. "A restored caliphate," Osama explained, "is entirely compatible with democratically accountable institutions." It would be just like the EU, except its leader would be called a Caliph, its law would be Sharia and if the US and Britain are really sincere about helping Muslims, they should support the restoration of the Caliphate. In an astoundingly short time, the Scottish National Party has gone from collaborating with Nazis, to collaborating with Islamists. Its talk of Scottish values has become a farce. SNP candidate Humza Yousaf took his oath of allegiance in the Scottish Parliament in Urdu. Jahangir Hanif became known as the Kalashnikov Councilor over a video of him firing an AK-47 in an armed camp in Pakistan. And the SNP has funneled hundreds of thousands of pounds to the Scottish Islamic Foundation, which has served as a forum for Muslim Brotherhood speakers. The unemployed of West Dunbartonshire face cuts, but there's always money on hand for the Scottish Islamic Foundation. The SNP's obsessive anti-war rhetoric is not Pro-Scotland, it is Pro-Islamist. Salmond's dirty deal that set the Lockerbie bomber free is more of the same. Salmond defended the release of the murderous terrorist as following the principles of Gandhi, but it is more likely that he was thinking of Gaddafi. SNP's European parliamentarians remain obsessed with Israel, while giving Hamas a pass. Salmond's Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, a good friend of SNP's first Muslim councilor, Bashir Ahmad, has never missed a chance to blast Israel in support of Muslim terrorists. And at a time when NHS Scotland was facing shortages and cuts, she took the lead in offering free medical aid to Hamas run Gaza. The Scottish National Party may still wave the saltire, but it might as well replace it with the star and crescent. Muslim immigration has boosted its political fortunes, but the aging Scottish population is being displaced by Pakistani immigrants. As immigration rules funnel more Muslims to Scotland to replace the native population, the Scottish National Party is aligning itself with an Islamist agenda. Mosques are clashing with traditional pubs. Scottish medical workers have been barred from eating at their desks during Ramadan. The Burka is being promoted and Scottish Muslims have been planning to set up an Islamic state in some remote part of Scotland. But they might as well do it in Glasgow. Scottish leftists have gone mad for Islam and are trading in their national heritage and culture, for a Muslim welfare state. Sergio Tessa can be reached at Hadar-Israel@verizon.net. |
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ARAB "CAUSE"?
Posted by Paul Lademain, June 5, 2011. |
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Arabs from who-knows-where scheme to invade Israel, sans uniform with weapons and pikes, chanting about their "cause". We heard you, arabs squawking about your "cause". Heads up, arabs: You don't got no "cause." You're liars and toads and we know you have no right to stake any claims to the Jewish Homeland. You arabs are invaders. Get back to your own country and fight it out with your filthy, grubby, greedy tyrants. Leave Israel alone or be tossed into the dark hole where rots that dead and decaying Egyptian terrorist, Yasser Arafat. Down with the cowardly Jewish Quislings and slimy politicians. When Israel cleans house it should begin with that blabbering senile old bag of garbage who slobbered on Hillary and was recently drooling when he was allowed to hold hands with fat-ass Abbas. Israel is the only nation in the middle east that offers more freedom to arab occupiers than it does to its citizens. That, too, must change. The arabs who are disloyal to the sovereign rights of Israel must be booted back to the arab homelands. Viva to the Patriots of Israel. Down with dirty Duisenberg and her ninety money-grubbing nasties. A pestilence upon that cob-nosed viper Hanan Ashwari. Viva to the Patriots of Israel from the Secular Christians for Zion.. Paul Lademain is a Secular Christian for Zion (SC4Z). Contact him by email at lademain@verizon.net |
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FROM ISRAEL: STRENGTH IN UNITY
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 5, 2011. |
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At the end of the day, it's not our enemies, who certainly threaten us (see below), who are our biggest problem: It's a lack of internal unity: Unity among Jews here in Israel, and unity among Jews outside Israel with regard to standing with Israel. That unity is our greatest strength, and it is what I wish to address today. I was sent the following by a reader (thanks, Helaine!). It is a quote from Rabbi Lazer Brody, who teaches on issues of faith: "Jerusalem is the heart of all the Jewish people. If you cull other Jews or cut yourself off from any group... then you cut yourself off from a part of Jerusalem. No wonder Jerusalem is under the threat of being split! It's all the result of infighting and hate, no matter how seemingly justified it may be. The Chafetz Chaim says that Hashem doesn't want hate or contention in any form, even if you think it's a mitzvah [e.g., to oppose people who are not observant]. So, if you care about Jerusalem remaining unified, love every Jew. You don't have to agree with his ideology or lifestyle, but you are commanded to love him like yourself. This is solidly in sync with traditional Jewish teaching: We are told that we lost the Second Temple because of baseless hatred (sinat chinam) among Jews. ~~~~~~~~~~ Another reader (for this, thanks Cheryl H.!) sent a video — the "Rabbi and the Paratroopers" — that models for us how we should all act. It's five years old — dating to the time of the Lebanon War. Is it a coincidence that it came to me now? See it, please. An Orthodox rabbi, with a long white flowing beard, embracing secular soldiers with a pure love that he expresses in action. It will warm your heart and just may bring tears to your eyes, as it did to mine.
~~~~~~~~~~ And then, an article that addresses division — division sufficient to bring a different kind of tears to one's eyes. This is a situation of great seriousness that must be addressed. Daniel Gordis — Senior Vice President of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem — has written stunningly on the question, "Are Young Rabbis Turning on Israel?" Gordis, musing on the powerful feelings evoked in Israel during Yom HaZikaron (Israeli memorial day), writes: "I read a recent message sent to students at the interdenominational rabbinical school at Boston's Hebrew College, asking them to prepare themselves for Yom Ha-Zikaron by musing on the following paragraph: 'For Yom Ha-Zikaron, our kavanah [intention] is to open up our communal remembrance to include losses on all sides of the conflict in Israel/Palestine. In this spirit, our framing question for Yom Ha-Zikaron is this: On this day, what do you remember and for whom do you grieve?' ~~~~~~~~~~ Gordis, in attempting to understand how this could be happening, focuses on a few key issues. "Memory is the first factor. As I have chatted with these students over the past months, it has become clear that the profound differences in our instincts and loyalties can be traced, in part, to the differences in our formative experiences." Gordis then described the communication from one California rabbi: "..'We are not the generation of rabbis hoping to abandon Israel. We are the generation of rabbis who hope that God will give us the merit to be peacemakers.' How a rabbi holding a pulpit in West Los Angeles is going to become a peacemaker in the Middle East is never explained. But one thing is clear from [this] article: peacemaking, this generation believes, requires imagining that we do not have enemies. Neville Chamberlain would have appreciated the company. ~~~~~~~~~~ There is more. Read the entire article, please:
And then, if you are terrified, as indeed you might be, think long and hard please, about what you — if you are an American Jew and particularly an affiliated American Jew — can do about this situation. ~~~~~~~~~~ As I write, the IDF and other Israeli forces are engaging with those trying to cross the border in the north via Syria, in the Golan Heights, or rioting in Palestinian Arab areas. They are calling this "Naksa" Day — a commemoration of the tragedy of the war in 1967, when we acquired all of Judea and Samaria, and Gaza. Abbas called this the new "nuclear weapon" for Palestinians: They feel they have a new way to get us, and it is not going to be easy. How do you win against people who say they'll reach their "homes" in Israel or die as martyrs trying? How do you convince the world that those who come "unarmed" sometimes throw chunks of concrete at the heads of soldiers? They have attempted to structure the situation so that the world sees them as "innocents" and Israel as the big bad Goliath. And yet, they cannot be permitted to breach our borders. The IDF has non-lethal means such as tear gas at its disposal, and uses crowd control methods — including warnings by loudspeaker in Arabic — when possible, but sometimes finds it necessary to use live fire as well. When shooting is necessary, shots are aimed at the lower parts of the body. At one point a Molotov cocktail that was thrown by demonstrators caused the explosion of four mines on the Syrian side of the border. Reports on casualties vary. Some of the best video footage I've located yet is here:
The IDF is expressing general satisfaction with its ability to keep the situation under control. I will have more complete information on this tomorrow. ~~~~~~~~~~ Acknowledging that Israel has a right to defend herself, the State Department none-the-less declared itself "deeply troubled" by the situation at our border with Syria. The call was for "restraint" by "both sides." I love these even-handed statements. ~~~~~~~~~~ In Judea and Samaria: — A border policeman was lightly injured by rocks thrown at the Kalandia checkpoint, which was then shut down. In additional to rocks, Molotov cocktails were thrown at security forces and burning tired were hurled into the air. ~~~~~~~~~~ Hakim Awad and Amjad Awad of Awarta have now been formally charged in military court with the murder of five members of the Fogel family, in Itamar. Amjad said: "I am proud of what I did and will accept any punishment I receive, because I did it all for Palestine...I would do it again." Proud of stabbing a baby to death. I am not a violent person, normally, but... ~~~~~~~~~~ France has made an offer to host a parlay at which there would be an attempt to restart the "peace negotiations." Abbas has said he'll be glad to attend if Israel first stops all construction and agrees to negotiate according to the '67 lines. Apparently there was tension between Fatah and Hamas with regard to how to respond to this proposal. Netanyahu, while expressing interest, says Israel will not negotiate with a unity government of which Hamas is a constituent part. ~~~~~~~~~~ Khaled Abu Toameh, writing in the JPost, reports that: "One month after the Egyptian-brokered Hamas-Fatah reconciliation accord was announced in Cairo, the two parties are continuing to squabble over the establishment of a unity government." The new government was supposed to be announced this week, but there is a major stumbling block with regard to selection of prime minister. Hamas is fiercely opposed to the selection of the incumbent, Salam Fayyad, while Abbas continues to push for him. Additionally, the PA continues to clamp down on Hamas in Judea and Samaria. ~~~~~~~~~~ It was clear from the beginning that the movement towards that unity government was motivated by some very pragmatic concerns — such as presenting a united front at the UN — and not because of a deep and genuine reconciliation between the parties. Should the unity government fail to be forged, or should it immediately and precipitously fall apart, there would be multiple political/diplomatic implications. ~~~~~~~~~~ A small correction: I wrote the other day about countries to be approached by Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, with regard to not supporting a unilaterally declared Palestinian state. One of those countries is Colombia, which I erroneously spelled Columbia. (thanks, Marta) |
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THE GAZA FLOTILLAS TO COME: SOME GROUND RULES BEFORE SETTING OUT
Posted by JCPA, June 5, 2011. |
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This was written by Alan Baker. The entire article is available as a Jerusalem Issue Brief, Vol 11., No 3, Jun3 5, 2011, published by Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA). An ostensibly civilian, humanitarian flotilla was employed in May 2010 to demonstratively breach the Israeli naval blockade of the Gaza coast. This flotilla was organized by the Turkish IHH, which has extensive links to extreme Islamic terror groups. Provoking a confrontation with Israel continues to be the primary aim.Since May 2010, the Israeli government has altered the manner in which it administers the limitations on the transfer of goods to Gaza. It now specifically prohibits only those materials that might be taken and directed by Hamas and other terror groups in furtherance of their hostile purposes. There is no humanitarian emergency among the civilian population in Gaza, and hence there can be no justification for conveying emergency shipments intended to alleviate an emergency that clearly does not exist. Any genuine wish to provide materials to the Gaza population can be directed through Israeli ports and the relevant authorities. Hamas routinely fires missiles randomly at Israeli civilian targets. Thus a situation of ongoing armed conflict exists between Hamas and Israel, which has the prerogative to institute a naval and land blockade to prevent the introduction of weapons and materials that could serve belligerent purposes. Such a blockade is well established in international law and practice. It is internationally accepted that any attempt to breach such a blockade may be prevented by Israeli naval patrols. Such a process may take place outside the area of the blockade if the declared intention of the flotilla is to violate the blockade. Furthermore, any vessel refusing to respond to the demands of the naval forces may be stopped forcefully. |
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HOW EUROPE LOST FAITH IN ITS OWN CIVILIZATION
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 4, 2011. |
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This was written by Frits Bolkestein,
an author, retired center-right Dutch politician and
former European commissioner for internal market and services.
It wss published today in Wall Street Journal
Beset by Christian guilt, the Continent won't defend Christians persecuted by Islamists. |
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This year the leaders of France and Britain declared that their countries' policies of multiculturalism had failed. As when Germany's Angela Merkel made similar statements last year, Nicolas Sarkozy and David Cameron sparked a political firestorm. Europe's debate over multiculturalism, and how to deal with non-European immigrants, will only intensify as the full effects of the Arab Spring play out on our continent. But it's worth stepping back to consider how we arrived at this point — how it became so controversial for a Western leader to affirm a preference for his own culture. In short, how did Europe lose confidence in its own civilization? In their modern forms, the noble Western traditions of self-assessment and self-criticism have often degraded into sentimental self-flagellation. Consider Africa, whose underdevelopment many people blame on the West. This guilt over Africa's poverty is a sentiment that underlies Western development aid. But the question to ask is not, "Why are poor countries poor?" The right question is, "Why are wealthy countries wealthy?" In the beginning we were all poor. Whoever wants to study the rise of the West and the roots of our prosperity should go back to the Renaissance, if not to classical antiquity. Colonizing Africa had nothing to do with it; the interior of most of Africa was inaccessible until late in the 19th century. European colonizers also came late to North Africa and the Middle East, which for many centuries was ruled by the Ottomans. Europe is no more responsible for the underdevelopment of Africa than Rome was for the underdevelopment of Gaul. Many people also hold great sympathy with the Palestinian people. That is understandable because their situation is indeed pitiful. But who bothers about the lot of Christians in the Middle East? Their situation is at least equally pitiful as that of Palestinians, if not more so. At least 10% of Egypt's population is Christian (Coptic). They are repressed and frequently live in misery. The Christian minorities in Syria, Iraq and Pakistan are also discriminated against. In Somalia, Islamists hunt down anyone in possession of a Bible. Yet no one in Europe seems to get excited about these crimes. Christianity appears to be a spent force in Europe, with the exceptions of Poland and Ireland. But for Christians in Asia, Africa, Arabia and beyond, it is not the anemic religion that it has become here. Third World Christians rightly feel deserted. If they have any doubt about the importance of Christianity in contemporary Western life, these non-European Christians need only look to locales such as England's Oxford. There, in a land with an established Christian church, the municipality has decided to replace Christmas with a "Winter Light Festival." According to a spokesman, this ensures that equal attention is paid to all religions. Europeans weren't always so self-hating. The 19th century saw the high tide of imperialism, and Europe was brimming with self-confidence. What has happened? The past century witnessed the cataclysm of World War I, the rise of collectivist dictatorships during the interbellum, World War II and the Holocaust, Stalinism and the societal chaos of 1968. These events eroded our cultural certainties and ushered in the era of multiculturalism, which enjoins us "not to judge" that which is different. The other foundation of our current masochism is, ironically, the very Christianity that modern generations have been so eager to cast off. Whether we like it or not, our civilization remains deeply marked by Christianity. Consider the Gospel of Saint Matthew, which states that "whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted" (23:12). Friedrich Nietzsche characterized this as "slave morality." But one does not have to go that far to realize that this saying, along with instructions to "turn the other cheek" and "go the extra mile," do not exactly prod people to stick up for their own. If Islamic civilization may be described as a shame culture, Christianity is a guilt culture. Listen to Bach's "Passion According to Saint Matthew." The chorus — that is to say the people — sings, "I shall be punished for what you [Christ] have suffered," and, "You are no sinner, like we and our children." Pride joined guilt and we in Europe soon came to believe that the mote in our eye was heavier than the beam abroad. This would not be a problem if the burden of a bad conscience came with atonement, forgiveness, confession, expiation or any of the other theological or liturgical forms for purging guilt from the sinner. Formerly, Catholicism and Lutheranism provided for the atonement of guilt. But these traditions no longer have credibility in Europe. Feelings of guilt are not sublimated. This also goes for Calvinism, which in its purest form knows no remission of guilt in this life. Its effects have been deep in Europe and outlast the doctrine. Thus in 1996 the Dutch government declared that its "debate about multiculturalism must be conducted on the principle that cultures are of equal merit." And so it has gone, for years. In 2002 right-wing politician Pim Fortuyn was assassinated during national elections, three months after he had called to remove an anti-discrimination clause from the Dutch constitution. The day after his murder, the editor in chief of the NRC-Handelsblad, a leading Dutch newspaper, wrote that "The pride of the Netherlands is precisely that we do not find one culture better than the other." The writer apparently did not realize that his pride exalted Dutch culture over others — supposedly against national values. And in 2009, when Utrecht University theologian Pieter van der Horst wanted to devote his valedictory address to "the Islamization of European Anti-Semitism," the institution forbade it, letting its fear of Islamic displeasure take precedence over another ostensibly protected right in Holland: free speech. The effects of Christian guilt and European self-hatred can be seen around the world, having been picked up by other cultures and used against Europe. After World War II the West set up the United Nations, in part to weaken its own hegemony. Within 30 years the U.N. had grown an automatic majority bent on castigating the West and Israel. The U.N. Human Rights Council, based in Geneva, elected Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to join its ranks and judge the state of others' civil liberties. For 13 years the U.N.'s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) was led by Senegalese teacher Amadou-Mohtar M'Bow, a Soviet-backed, virulent anti-Westerner who ran the organization as if it were an African village and he its tribal leader. In 1984 the U.S. pulled out of Unesco, and in 1985 the U.K. and Singapore followed suit. Continental Europe's nations remained and let themselves be duly castigated. So much the better that a handful of European leaders now are attempting to reverse our slow cultural suicide. If Europe can retake pride in its own classical values, it and the world will be better off.
Gabrielle Goldwater is a Member of "Funding for Peace Coalition"
[FPC] (http://eufunding.org.uk) |
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NAKBA DAY, NAKSA DAY: A WAY OF PLAYING VICTIM
Posted by Ashraf Ramelah, June 3, 2011. |
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Recently Egyptian freedom-fighters revisited Tahrir (Liberty) Square in Cairo to reinforce demands for democratic elections. While the Muslim Brotherhood and other anti-democratic groups are asking for elections in September, pro-democratic forces are calling for a new constitution before elections are held which would no doubt postpone the September timeframe. Meanwhile about two weeks earlier on May 15, pro-Islamic forces were officially mourning the birth of the nation of Israel in a day of recognition called Nakba. Nakba is an Arabic word meaning catastrophe, and it centers on self-pity. The concept was originated and circulated by Egypt, Syria and Jordan after the Arab-Israeli war of 1948 when Arab air and ground forces against Israel were wiped out within days. In short, as all Jews and freedom-loving people celebrated the sixty-third anniversary of the state of Israel this year on may 15, those who hate democracy and deny human rights were remembering their Nakba. This "celebration" dates back to 1998 when Yasser Arafat, the former head of Arab terrorists, for political reasons reached back fifty years to appropriate this long-forgotten Arabic term to create an Arab-Muslim counter to the celebration of the anniversary of the Israeli state. The small bit of geography known as Israel to the entire world is still called Palestine today in many Arab-Muslim countries. From the time of Moses when the Jews left Egypt more than 3300 years ago, Jews settled in the land officially recognized as Israel today. The original Palestinians, who occupied the land upon the arrival of the Jews, were not Arabs. The Jews fought and won this new land promised to them by God, and biblical history does not record much more about the Palestinian people upon defeat by the Jews. World history indicates that Israel was then occupied by the Romans as was Egypt and many others parts of the Middle East before facing invasion by barbarians from the Arabic peninsula. It was the first time invaders brought religion — the purpose of the "gund Allah" (soldiers of Allah) was to force their captives to submit to a way of life called Islam. By the seventh century Arab-Muslims occupied Palestine and many other lands of the Middle East. Unlike under Roman occupation, the Jews now were known as "Kafirs" ( infidels) to their captors and suffered persecution and oppression for their faith similar to the Copts of Egypt then and now under Muslim occupation. We also know from history that Arab-Muslims set about eradicating important places of Jewish worship including the destruction of the Temple Mount and the building of the Al Aksa Mosque in its place. The Prophet Mohammed never visited the Al Aksa Mosque as Arab-Muslim claims because it was erected some time after his death. As a testimony to the democratic state of Israel today, many thousands of Arab-Muslims live in freedom and peace as Israeli citizens and are elected members of the Knesset in contrast to the Islamic majority of Egypt which has controlled and oppressed the Christian minority under "democratic" regimes. When the reorganization of the State of Israel occurred in 1948 King Farouk of Egypt accepted it favorably but was strong-armed into joining other Islamic states in the Jihad against Israel led by the Muslim Brotherhood. The subsequent Palestinian refugee problem was fabricated by Arab-Muslims who refused to accept the United Nations solution and Israel as a state, inciting and losing the war against the Israeli nation. This Israeli victory indirectly led to the overthrow of the Egypt's King Farouk in the 1952 Coup by Nasser, the Egyptian military man who was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood — the excuse being faulty weaponry attained by Farouk which led to their catastrophic defeat (later known as Nakba, catastrophe, to the Arabs). Before long, a second coup was led by Nasser against General Mohanmed Naquib, the leader of the Coup, because of their differences regarding the future rule of Egypt. The overthrow of Naquib was the first of Nasser's efforts to secure his total control. Nasser, in short order, rid his regime of Muslim Brotherhood by arresting and jailing those who helped him come to power. After eight bullets were shot at him in Alexandria on October 26, 1954 in an assassination attempt by fellow Muslim Brotherhood member Mahmoud Abd Al-Latif from which he escaped unscathed, he cracked down on the radical fundamentalists. To this day Egyptians wonder if Nasser staged the event to give him the excuse to do so and have sole power. As a charismatic figure, Nasser had a positive affect on average Egyptians who were largely uneducated and, by nature, good humored and simplistic. His long-term plan for Islamizing the country began with implementing socialism and forcing the Jews to leave Egypt, abandoning their businesses, homes and personal possessions — much of which was sold to the loyal, pampered Egyptian military families at a very cut rate. The Christian Copts also suffered the nationalization of their businesses and lands and were prohibited from all high ranking positions in government and military. Copts, for the first time, began to leave Egypt in favor of the West where one could find equality and human rights. Nasser waged war against Israel and was defeated again in 1956, however it wasn't until 1967 that Egyptian, Syrian, and Jordan aggression toward Israel and their subsequent defeat did Nasser address the matter to his people using the new term "Naksa," meaning a setback in the Arab-Muslim goal to destroy the Israeli state and create the Arab Omma. On Monday, June 5th, 1967, Israeli forces destroyed Arab military aviation in its entirety in less than five hours constituting an embarrassment to the Egyptian military. Nasser's use of the word Naksa in his first speech to the Egyptians on June 9th after days of silence toyed with the emotions of his people and indicated Egypt's defeat was not the fault of the Egyptian army but due to him alone. Knowing full well that Egyptians could be manipulated to want him more by his admission of guilt, he pronounced himself solely responsible and, along with all of Egypt, a victim of the Jews. In this way he curtailed the anger of family members who lost loved ones in the war and reinstated himself in the eyes of all his people as an even stronger leader. The Arab-Muslim pity party this May called Nakba will soon be followed by the Naksa (June 5th), Arab-Muslim commemoration of the 1967 crushing defeat of Arab forces forty-four years ago when Arab aggressors were made "victims" by the brilliant maneuvers of Israel's self-defense. At the time, Egyptians fully expected to receive their lost lands back from Israel and still do today — their entitlement is both laughable and pathetic. Ashraf Ramelah founded the Voice of the Copts. Contact him at aramelah@voiceofthecopts.org |
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MAKING THE PEACE PROCESS SIMPLE
Posted by John R. Cohn, June 3, 2011. |
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David Brooks has taken an issue that others made complex and boiled it down to its essential point, "The Arab reform process is the peace process". In so doing, he movingly contradicts the stubborn belief of too many that if only Israel made more concessions there would be peace. But the problem is not that Israel won't let the Arabs have a state; it is that the Arabs won't let the Jews have one. In http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/03/opinion/03brooks.html, David Brooks has taken an issue that others made complex and boiled it down to its essential point, "The Arab reform process is the peace process". In so doing, he movingly contradicts the stubborn belief of too many that if only Israel made more concessions there would be peace. But the problem is not that Israel won't let the Arabs have a state; it is that the Arabs won't let the Jews have one. His article is called "The Depravity Factor". |
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By now you have probably heard about Hamza Ali al-Khateeb. He was the 13-year-old Syrian boy who tagged along at an antigovernment protest in the town of Saida on April 29. He was arrested that day, and the police returned his mutilated body to his family a month later. While in custody, he had apparently been burned, beaten, lacerated and given electroshocks. His jaw and kneecaps were shattered. He was shot in both arms. When his father saw the state of Hamza's body, he passed out. The family bravely put video evidence of the torture on the Internet, and Hamza's martyrdom has rallied the opponents of President Bashar al-Assad's Baathist regime. But, of course, his torture didn't come out of nowhere. The regime's defining act of brutality was the Hama massacre in 1982 when then-President Hafez al-Assad had more than 10,000 Syrians murdered. The U.S. government has designated Syria a state sponsor of terror for 30 consecutive years. The State Department's Human Rights Report has described the regime's habitual torture techniques, including pulling out fingernails, burning genitals, hyperextending the spine, bending the body around the frame of a wheel while whipping the victim and so on. Over the past several weeks, Bashar al-Assad's regime has killed more than 1,000 protesters and jailed at least 10,000 more, according to Syrian human rights groups. Human Rights Watch has described crimes against humanity in the town of Dara'a, where boys have been mutilated and men massacred. All governments do bad things, and Middle East dictatorships do more than most. But the Syrian government is one of the world's genuinely depraved regimes. Yet for all these years, Israel has been asked to negotiate with this regime, compromise with this regime and trust that this regime will someday occupy the heights over it in peace. For 30 years, the Middle East peace process has been predicated on moral obtuseness, an unwillingness to face the true nature of certain governments. World leaders have tried sweet-talking Syria, calling Bashar al-Assad a friend (Nancy Pelosi) or a reformer (Hillary Clinton). In 2008, Nicolas Sarkozy invited Assad to be the guest of honor at France's Bastille Day ceremonies — a ruthless jailer celebrating the storming of a jail. For 30 years, diplomats and technocrats have flown to Damascus in the hopes of "flipping" Syria — turning it into a pro-Western, civilized power. It would be interesting to know what they were thinking. Perhaps some of them were so besotted with their messianic abilities that they thought they had the power to turn a depraved regime into a normal regime. Perhaps some of them were so wedded to the materialistic mind-set that they thought a regime's essential nature could be altered with a magical mix of incentives and disincentives. Perhaps some of them were simply morally blind. They were such pedantic technocrats, so consumed by the legalisms of the peace process, that they no longer possessed the capacity to recognize the moral nature of the regime they were dealing with, or to understand the implications of its nature. In any case, their efforts were doomed. In fact, the current peace process is doomed because of the inability to make a categorical distinction. There are some countries in the region that are not nice, but they are normal — Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia. But there are other governments that are fundamentally depraved. Either as a matter of thuggishness (Syria) or ideology (Hamas), they reject the full humanity of other human beings. They believe it is proper and right to kill innocents. They can never be part of a successful negotiation because they undermine the universal principles of morality. It doesn't matter how great a law professor or diplomat you are. It doesn't matter how masterly you sequence the negotiations or what magical lines you draw on a map. There won't be peace so long as depraved regimes are part of the picture. That's why it's crazy to get worked into a lather about who said what about the 1967 border. As long as Hamas and the Assad regime are in place, the peace process is going nowhere, just as it's gone nowhere for lo these many years. That's why it's necessary, especially at this moment in history, to focus on the nature of regimes, not only the boundaries between them. To have a peaceful Middle East, it was necessary to get rid of Saddam's depraved regime in Iraq. It will be necessary to try to get rid of Qaddafi's depraved regime in Libya. It's necessary, as everybody but the Obama administration publicly acknowledges, to see Assad toppled. It will be necessary to marginalize Hamas. It was necessary to abandon the engagement strategy that Barack Obama campaigned on and embrace the cautious regime-change strategy that is his current doctrine. The machinations of the Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are immaterial. The Arab reform process is the peace process. Contact John Cohn at john.r.cohn@gmail.com. |
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AMNESTY'S ANTI-ISRAEL POGROM
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 2, 2011. |
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Giulio Meotti, a journalist with Il Foglio, is the author of the book A New Shoah: The Untold Story of Israel's Victims of Terrorism. This is archived at
Human rights group helps create climate that sanctions the murder of Israelis |
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Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (1977) for shining a spotlight on political prisoners, Amnesty International claims to be the "conscience of the world." This July marks the 50th anniversary of the London-based human rights group, yet Amnesty's emblem has been degraded and is now the symbol of an ideology estranged from the glorious history of Western human rights. In fact, Amnesty today constitutes one of the scariest faces of the new anti-Semitism, in the form of its assault on the Jewish people's right to live as an equal member of the family of nations. Amnesty just hosted in London an event titled: "Complicity in Oppression: Do the Media Aid Israel?" Organized by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, this anti-Israel conference featured Abdel Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper. In 2007, Atwan declared that he would dance "in Trafalgar Square if Iran attacked Israel" and in 2008 he said that the terrorist attack on the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva in Jerusalem, where eight Israeli students were murdered, "was justified." The event was cosponsored by the Middle East Monitor Online, run by Daud Abdullah, a signatory of the Istanbul Declaration which states that it is the obligation of the "Islamic Nation" to "carry on jihad and Resistance" against Israel. Even a liberal and a non-Zionist like writer Salman Rushdie has accused Amnesty of "moral bankruptcy," because the organization is serving as an effective weapon in the hands of human rights' most dedicated enemies. Amnesty has played an important role in the portrayal of Israel as the epitome of human rights violator. In 2002, the UK group falsely accused Israel of committing "war crimes" in Jenin: This was a myth and a mockery of international law, but the legend of the rubble and corpses buried with it is still used to assail Israel and the Jews. Indeed, Amnesty's reports have formed the political and legal infrastructure for producing the blood libel of Israel as an illegal settler "entity." Among other things, Amnesty has asked the Obama Administration to "immediately suspend military aid to Israel." 'Zionism is apartheid' Amnesty's fatwa on Israel's "apartheid wall" and "apartheid roads" has been one of the most repugnant propagandistic manipulations ever suffered by the Jewish State. Contemporary anti-Semitism finds expression not only in the "Zionism is Racism" indictment, but the further indictment of Israel as "an apartheid state," Amnesty's euphemism for justifying Israel's destruction. The "Zionism is apartheid" ideology is used to justify Islamic terrorism and the efforts to deny Israelis the basic human right of self-defense against being ripped apart in bombings on buses and in restaurants. In Amnesty's immoral doublespeak, protecting Israelis from suicide attacks and slaughter has become "apartheid." The group has been generous in promoting the books of anti-Israeli firebrands such as Ben White's "Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner's Guide. Amnesty's "soft war" against the Jews has been crucial in the World Conference Against Racism in Durban, where 3,000 NGOs convinced the United Nations to condemn Israeli "racism." Well-known NGOs such as Amnesty International and Save the Children attached their names to the conference. A few weeks later, the Second Intifada broke out. These NGOs will soon have another opportunity to showcase their Jew-hatred: The United Nations will hold "Durban III" in New York, just a few days after the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Amnesty's played a prominent role at the UN Human Rights Council, where Israel has become a pariah state while major human rights violators enjoy exculpatory immunity, and at the Conference of the Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions, where Israel became the first ever state to face a country-specific indictment. Recently, the head of Finland's branch of Amnesty International, Frank Johansson, called Israel "a scum state." In 2006, the year of the Second Lebanon War, Amnesty produced more documents against Israel than on the genocide in Darfur. The group also played a major role in turning Mordechai Vanunu, the Dimona plant's technician who offered Israel's nuclear secrets to the highest bidder all over the globe, into a hero. Amnesty is crucial in biased reports against Israel submitted at the UN, like the discredited Goldstone Report, and in the campaigns for boycotts, divestment and sanctions against the Jewish State in European courts. Amnesty also plays a role in the ongoing legal indictments against Israeli politicians and the country's military. In the Middle Ages, the "mystery plays" that portrayed the Jews as the killers of Jesus helped fuel the pogroms. Today, with its verdicts portraying Israelis as "war criminals," Amnesty is staging a contemporary mystery play: the Israeli Jew, legally and humanitarianly sentenced to death. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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THE OWNERS OF HISTORY
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 2, 2011. |
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This was written by Sarah Honig and it is archived at
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The remarkable ease with which the world hails Palestinian figurehead Mahmoud Abbas as a "man of peace" beggars the imagination. This has become so axiomatic that even Israel's most forthright headliners hesitate to depart from the bon ton, lest they be judged as "anti-peace." And so falsehoods become entrenched as self-evident truths. Elements of this travesty are paradoxically consistent. After all, Abbas (Abu Mazen) is nothing if not a consummate counterfeiter, who honed his craft at Moscow's Communist-era Russian University for Friendship between People (a.k.a. the People's Friendship University of Russia, also a.k.a. the Patrice Lumumba Friendship University). As befits Friendship U's academic ambiance, Abbas specialized in revising history, an endeavor which in 1982 ripened into a PhD dissertation that both denied the Holocaust and yet blamed Zionists for it. Two years later, Dr. Abbas further expanded and embellished his "research." He never apologized nor retracted a single nuance of his learned treatise. Nonetheless, political correctness stringently prohibits discussion thereof. The emboldened manufacture of lies is graciously overlooked because it's too troubling to debunk cock-and-bull chronicles and expose the faithful followers of fanciful fabrications as fools. Harping on misrepresentation is impolite, uncool and so yesterday. Best leave the sham undisturbed or — better yet — enshrine it. Accordingly, not a peep of protest could be heard anywhere when the "man of peace" diplomatically intoned: "Oh, Netanyahu, you are incidental in history; we are the people of history. We are the owners of history." Abbas's "we" refers to Palestinians. Local Arabs — among them itinerant migrants from Syria, Egypt, Libya and the Maghreb — became acquainted with the name Palestine (minted by the Romans to humiliate defeated Judea) only after the British Mandate introduced it here. They vehemently rejected the moniker which until 1948 applied solely to Jews. Then tactics changed. King Hussein explained why at the Arab League summit in Amman in November 1988: "The appearance of a distinct Palestinian national personality comes as an answer to Israel's claim that Palestine is Jewish." In so many words, said the Hashemite monarch, the Palestinian identity is an artificial propaganda ploy. But the lie spawned vibrant offshoots of amazing variety and boundless scope for expansion. Hence scholarly Abbas could proclaim a couple of weeks ago that not only do Jews have no history whatsoever in this land (an extraordinary assertion in itself), but Palestinian-Arab history here dates back to 7000 BCE, i.e., 9,000 years! Brazenly trampling chronology and fact, Abbas (on whose capacity for veracity hinge all peace deals) contended in his recent New York Times op-ed that "shortly after" the 1947 UN Partition Resolution, "Zionist forces expelled Palestinian Arabs to ensure a decisive Jewish majority in the future state of Israel, and Arab armies intervened." He himself, he wrote, was forcibly driven out as a child from his native Safed. The aggrieved victim pose becomes a basic Arab tenet — the crucial justification for terror and for refusing to relinquish the so-called "right of return" by Arabs to what are described as homes which violent interloping Jewish conquistadores usurped. Biased world opinion willingly falls for the Palestinian freedom-fighter fable. But foolhardy carelessness — or trust that nobody listens to intra-Arab discourse — occasionally pulls off the painstakingly painted mask. On July 6, 2009, Abbas waxed nostalgic on Al-Palestinia TV and inadvertently let the truth slip out. When he was 13, he recalled, his well-off family made a calculated decision and "left at night, heading to the Jordan river...Eventually we settled in Damascus... My father had money, and he spent his money methodically. After a year, when the money ran out, we began to work. "People were motivated to run away...They feared retribution from the Zionists — particularly from the Safed ones. Those of us from Safed especially feared that the Jews harbored old desires to avenge what happened during the 1929 uprising. This was in the memory of our families and parents... They realized the balance of forces was shifting and therefore the whole town was abandoned on the basis of this rationale — saving our lives and our belongings." So here it is from the mouth of the PA's head honcho himself. He irrefutably verifies that nobody expelled Safed's Arabs. Their exile was voluntary, propelled by their extreme consciousness of guilt and expectation that Jews would be ruled by the same blood-feud conventions that prevail in Arab culture. Misguidedly, they anticipated that Jews would do to them precisely what Arabs had done to Safed's Jews. If that was their premise, they indeed had grounds for panic. The "uprising" Abbas alluded to was one among the serial pogroms instigated by infamous mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini, who's still revered throughout the Arab world. An avid Nazi collaborator, he spent World War II in Berlin. The Allies declared him a wanted war criminal postwar. In August 1929, Husseini rallied Arabs to slaughter Jews on trumped-up allegations of Jewish takeover attempts at the Temple Mount. Sixty-seven members of Hebron's ancient Jewish community were hideously hacked to death. That was the most notorious massacre, but others were perpetrated throughout the country. In the equally ancient Jewish community of Safed, 21 were butchered no less gruesomely (a cat was stuffed into one grandmother's disemboweled abdomen). A child and a young woman due to be married the next day were cold-bloodedly murdered by Arab constables whom British mandatory officers had assigned to watch over the majority of Safed's Jews when they sought safety in the police courtyard. The British proposed that all Safed Jews be evacuated "for their own safety," as was the case in Hebron. The offer was flatly refused. Thereafter, principally during the 1936-39 mufti-led rampages, the Hagana and Safed's own IZL cells protected the town's 2,000 Jews. Such was the uprising for which Abbas's kinfolk assumed they deserved just reckoning. Ironically Jews were alarmed by the Arab exodus, figuring it presaged a formidable onslaught by invading Arab armies (which indeed came). In many areas (Haifa, for instance) Jews pleaded with local Arabs to stay. But Arabs in Safed and elsewhere — heeding their leaders' exhortations to pull out and hounded by fears arising from their own vengeful traditions (but not Jewish ones) — did what was prudent in light of their surmise that Jews would behave according to Arab codes. On the eve of the April 16, 1948, British withdrawal from Safed, the mandatory authorities turned over the town's police stronghold and Mount Canaan's military fort to the Arabs. They offered to escort all Jews out of town "for their own safety." As in 1929, the Jews refused unequivocally, though memories of the horrific carnage should have inspired more dread among them than among the fleeing Abbases. Why wasn't Abu Mazen's pivotal testimony accorded due resonance in the media? Perhaps because it's too troubling to debunk cock-and-bull chronicles, expose the faithful followers of fanciful fabrications as fools and altogether veer into that undesirable zone of the impolite, uncool and so yesterday. Perhaps preserving the myth of Jewish culpability is too enticingly de rigueur, a hallmark of enlightenment.
Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: TOUGH GOING
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 2, 2011. |
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Let me start with something good, to fortify: In September (which is shaping up to be some month!) the UN at its NY headquarters is having a 10th anniversary commemoration of the 2001 Durban conference. That original conference was an anti-Semitic anti-Israel horror, and this commemoration is highly unlikely to be anything other than obscene. Now we learn that the US will not be participating. Until this announcement, it was only Canada and Israel that had declared intention to not participate. As a State Department representative put it, the US opposed the "resolution establishing this event because the Durban process included ugly displays of intolerance and anti-Semitism, and we did not want to see that commemorated. " Anne Bayefsky, of Eye on the UN, believes this decision, made at this time — so many months after Canada had announced its decision — was made in response to the backlash to Obama's speech calling for a return to the '67 lines. I don't know if Obama has sufficient clout internationally any longer for this decision to influence other Western nations with regard to participation. ~~~~~~~~~~ You may remember that just weeks ago, when a group of Bretslav Chassidim went to pray at Kever Yosef in Shechem (Joseph's Tomb, in what the Arabs call Nablus), they were shot at by PA security personnel. Shot, actually, when they were leaving the area, not when entering. Ben-Yosef Livnat was killed and four others were wounded. The group had gone to pray without securing clearance from the IDF, which would have paved the way with PA security, as the Tomb is in Area A, controlled by the PA. (Never mind that it's a sickening thought, that a Jewish site of sanctity should be controlled by Palestinian Arabs — who were committed to providing ready access for Jews, but do not.) But the security forces, according to knowledgeable individuals, knew the Bretslav Chassidim and certainly knew that they came to pray and were not dangerous. The IDF has completed its investigation of the matter and has concluded that the security forces shot intentionally and aimed to kill. Chief of Staff Benny Gantz has said this act was without justification, done when the security forces knew their lives were not in danger. Gantz has not used the word "terrorism," but a defense ministry official has — and I do. These guys may be "security," but they are terrorists. What is more, my best information at this writing is that these forces were US-trained. If and as this is confirmed, I will address this issue again. ~~~~~~~~~~~ The Palestinian Arabs are not going to miss a trick, with regard to their efforts to establish a state in September, and one that will be a full member of the UN, as well. PA foreign minister, Riad Maliki has said that, if there is a veto in the Security Council, they will seek an emergency session of the General Assembly known as "Uniting for Peace" to override any veto. What he's referring to is this: In 1950, North Korean invaded South Korea — generating a threat to world peace. But there was dissension within the Security Council, with the Soviet Union boycotting, and thus creating a stalemate. The General Assembly then passed Resolution 377, which established the "emergency special session" framework. It read: "...if the Security Council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security in any case where there appears to be a threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression, the General Assembly shall consider the matter immediately with a view to making appropriate recommendations to Members for collective measures, including in the case of a breach of the peace or act of aggression the use of armed force when necessary, to maintain or restore international peace and security." ~~~~~~~~~~ An emergency session of the General Assembly can be called within twenty-four hours after the Secretary-General has received a request from the majority of the members of the GA. At present, the PA does not have that majority. This is where the decisions of various states that are still on the fence become important. ~~~~~~~~~~ I was back on the phone today with an international lawyer who serves as a professional source of information for me. He says, yes, the PA is likely to be able to convene an emergency session of the GA. ("Emergency" here simply means a session not regularly scheduled.) But, he says, whatever is decided will be a recommendation and not binding in any event. He does not believe that the parameters at work at the time of the Korean War are applicable in this case. Put simply: a decision about a Palestinian state having membership in the UN does not exactly qualify as constituting a threat to international peace. He makes this judgment because he's speaking with a legal mind, rationally. But can we be sure that the UN will not decide that a Palestinian state is so important that denying it "rights" constitutes a threat to world peace? At the UN, which panders to the Palestinian Arabs, anything is possible. What this will depend upon is the readiness of a majority of the states to bend or break the rules. The president of the GA has already made a statement indicating that if the Security Council vetoes, there is nothing the GA can do. And the illegality of GA action on a Palestinian state is what the letter signed by international jurists that was sent to the Secretary-General addressed. So the Palestinian Arabs do not have it all wrapped up. One last note: Maliki talks about overriding a veto. In any event, I do not believe this is possible. What the General Assembly could do, at most, would be to recommend that the Security Council reconsider the matter. ~~~~~~~~~~ Knowing full well that it isn't all wrapped up for them, the Palestinian Arabs are trying other tactics at the same time. Riyad Mansour, who represents the PA at the UN (observer status), has now said that they are ready to take to the streets, and follow in the footsteps of the Tunisians and Egyptians. "I need to mobilize the largest number of forces, whether [on] the ground or [on] the political front...we have other tactics that we can use in order to flex additional muscles in order to make it very, very difficult for anyone to obstruct our effort." It's my opinion that the mere fact that he can make such statements is prima facie evidence that the Palestinian Arabs do not deserve a state. A responsible governing party does not threaten violence at every turn — especially when peaceful alternatives are at hand. But who's going to notice this? ~~~~~~~~~~ We are all familiar with the claim made so often by Obama that the Arab states are concerned about establishment of a Palestinian state. Does this sound as if the Arabs care about the situation of the Arabs in PA areas: In a press conference yesterday, PA prime minister Salam Fayyad said the PA is experiencing a financial shortfall. The Arab states, he said, are delivering much less than they committed to. Collectively the PA is receiving $452.5 million a month from the Arab states. ~~~~~~~~~~ A poll of a representative sample of Israeli adults was carried out by Geocartography Knowledge Group last week for Israel Television Channel One's Politika program. Key results: 66% would oppose any part of Jerusalem going to a Palestinian state 73% would be opposed to international control of the holy places in the context of a peace agreement 67% opposed to freezing construction beyond the '67 line. You might want to save this to refer to when you hear claims that most Israelis are for dividing Jerusalem for peace. ~~~~~~~~~~ In ceremonies of Yom Yerushalayim yesterday, Prime Minster Netanyahu shared childhood memories of a divided Jerusalem: "From Sanhedria in the north to Talpiot in the south, the city was constantly under fire or the threat of fire. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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STOP THE LEAKS
Posted by Barbara Taverna, June 2, 2011. |
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This was written by Ian Campbell
and it appeared May 27, 2011 in the Irish Times
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Israel is pioneering innovative water technologies that will make it possible for the country to survive and thrive without rainfall
A WOODEN STAFF and a little help from God were all Moses needed to draw water from a rock, but as the executive of an Israeli water company pointed out, he didn't share the technology. In a country where water scarcity is a hard fact of life, farmers, scientists and technologists have had to rely on innovative ideas rather than miracles. Today, the global water industry is worth $500 billion (€354 billion) a year, with water technologies valued at $100 billion alone. But despite the big numbers, it's a conservative sector dominated by utility companies that shy away from innovation. Not so in Israel, however. A world leader, the Israeli water tech sector is valued at $2 billion, a figure that the government wants to increase to $10 billion over the next five years. Proving that necessity really is the mother of invention, we wandered between rows of jojoba trees on a patch of land south west of the Negev desert. About 95 per cent of Israel is classed as arid or semi-arid, but companies such as Netafim are clawing back the land and making it fit for agriculture. Its drip irrigation techniques increase crop yields by 50 per cent while using 40 per cent less water than alternative methods. Igal Aisenberg, chief executive of Netafim, pointed to a hole in the earth and a small underground pipe that runs the length of the field. This is the company's product at work. Intermittently spaced drippers release water into the ground beneath the trees, a patented piece of technology that made the company a global success story and drip irrigation viable. While it remains more expensive than sprinklers and flood irrigation, drip technology is a lot more efficient, releasing water with pinpoint accuracy, an important consideration with such a scarce commodity. "It's not just a hole in a pipe," says Aisenberg. "It is pressure compensated so every dripper gives out exactly the same amount of water regardless of location." Just south of Tel Aviv we see the source of the water and more cutting-edge technology. Vast man-made basins dominate the landscape, part of an industrial recharge-recovery system that reclaims waste water for use in irrigation. Run by Mekorot, Israel's national water company, the Shafdan plant is the most advanced in the Middle East — 75 per cent of household waste water is recycled in Israel and reused for irrigation. According to Amiad, another Israeli firm and one of the world's leading water-filtration companies, the only obstacle to drinking recycled waste water is psychological. Filtration techniques have become so sophisticated that quality is not an issue. People are already drinking seawater. On the Mediterranean coast, Israel has the two largest reverse osmosis desalination plants in the world, run by a joint venture between indigenous firm IDE Technologies and French company Veolia Water. Pressurised seawater is pumped through thousands of polymer membranes that extract the brine and discharge it back to the ocean. Two cubic metres of seawater make one cubic metre of drinking water in industrial facilities that already supply 50 per cent of the country's household water, a figure that will increase to 70 per cent with the completion of a third plant. Part of Israel's agenda is to export its expertise and even wet countries such as Ireland are in its cross hairs. "You had a drought last winter because you couldn't find the leaks in your infrastructure," says Benjamin Levy, director of marketing at Miltel, a company that specialises in automatic metering and water management systems. He said 17,000 litres of water can be lost in month through a 3mm leak. Again, Israel is leading the world in tackling the problem. Only 12 per cent of water leaks out in the country's infrastructure compared to 25 per cent in Europe, and 35 per cent to 40 per cent in underdeveloped countries. Miltel has a partnership with IBM, highlighting how water tech is becoming a credible sector in the wider world. Its monitoring systems are integrated with IBM middleware to deliver smart water management and metering solutions. Miltel claims that houses with automatic reading systems encourage people to use water carefully and lead to a 15 per cent drop in consumption. Whitewater Security is another export success, selling sensors and systems for tracing water contaminants to more than 30 countries. Sales manager Rani Weinberg plays down the terrorist threat as a principal reason for deploying its technology but admits that interest in its products spiked in the United States after 9/11. Whatever the drivers, the company's technology solves a problem. "Traditionally, laboratories are used to test water and it can take 24 to 48 hours to get the results," said Weinberg. " With our sensors in the pipes, it's a matter of minutes." Booky Oren, a former chairman of Mekorot, spells out the sum total of all this innovation. "By 2015, the target for Israel is to be independent of natural water resources. We won't care if it rains or not," he said. As chairman of Watec, an international water technology exhibition that shows off indigenous expertise to the world, he was quick to point out that water scarcity is not just Israel's problem. There will be a 50 per cent increase in global water demand in the next 20 years, and he is concerned that an inherently conservative industry will struggle to keep up. "Countries can't rely on natural resources; they need to implement new technology," he warns. Contact Barbara Taverna at bltaverna@yahoo.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: FINDING OUR STRENGTHS
Posted by Arlene Kushner, June 1, 2011. |
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MK Tzipi Hotovely (Likud) is advancing legislation that would require Hebrew names only — and not Arabic — to be used for all Jerusalem neighborhood, on signs and in official Israeli broadcasts. While this may seem like a small matter, it is not — and Hotovely is thinking clearly. There is great psychological impact inherent in a name. As she explained: "In our battle for Jerusalem, it is important to recognize the historic Hebrew roots of the city... Whether the proposed bill passes or not, we might all take our cue from her. ~~~~~~~~~~ Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon (Yisrael Beitenu) left for Mexico City today, after which he will travel to El Salvador and a meeting of the Organization of American States. His goal is to counter the Palestinian Arab campaign for recognition of a Palestinian state. Mexico remains on the fence in the matter, and — if convinced to not to recognize a Palestinian state — might have considerable sway over El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Panama. Another country to be lobbied in this respect is Columbia. Considered Israel's closest ally in South America, this country currently sits on the UN Security Council; there is hope that it might vote with the US against UN membership for a Palestinian state. The US would prefer to not cast a vote in isolation, but to have backing in at least some quarters. ~~~~~~~~~~ Clarification: There are 15 members of the Security Council, five permanent and 10 additional members serving two year terms. For a state to be approved for UN membership, it must receive nine votes out of the 15, with no veto by a permanent member. The US, alone, can stop the process. The desire to not stand alone is primarily political/diplomatic and not legal. ~~~~~~~~~~ Meanwhile, the PA's Nabil Sha'ath has announced his plans to visit Mexico and Columbia to promote the Palestinian state. ~~~~~~~~~~ The argument is being made by the US government that Obama gave his '67 borders speech in order to convince European nations not to support a Palestinian state. And so we see here, too, Obama's eagerness to get other states on board with his position. But if the cost of stopping recognition of a unilaterally declared Palestinian state is international pressure on Israel to move back to untenable, indefensible lines that deny us basic rights, then I say bring on the unilateral declaration. This is no favor to Israel. ~~~~~~~~~~ We have a great deal to cope with in the coming weeks and months: There has been talk for some time now, especially via Facebook, of plans by Palestinian Arabs to flood across our borders in September, when the Palestinian state is declared, or the vote is brought to the UN. Now there is additional talk about such an effort in June, to coincide with the Six Day War. Mass rallies are being called for, to begin this Friday, and run through June 7. There are detailed plans for marches on Israel's borders from Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Gaza. Additionally, there will be marches inside Jerusalem by Israeli Arabs to the Al Aksa Mosque on the Temple Mount. According to a spokesman in the prime minister's office, Israel is ready to use "any means necessary" to protect its border... "We're prepared for any eventuality, whether by use of the police, army, security forces, Foreign Ministry and of course the Prime Minister's office, to provide a security response to attempts to enter our territory... "The borders are under our sovereignty and will be maintained, whatever the cost." The IDF and related forces, having coped with attempts on "Nakba Day" to cross our borders, will undoubtedly be better prepared this time. And when it comes down to it, because the sanctity of borders must be maintained, we will do what is necessary. But one of the goals is to avoid casualties as much as is possible, because provoking massive casualties is part of their goal. ~~~~~~~~~~ The IDF has learned another lesson, as well. This is with regard to those damned flotillas attempting to break our naval blockade of Gaza. Chief of Staff Benny Gantz says Israel is now prepared for the next flotilla, which may be coming later this month. (Or may be delayed a month or more if they don't have their act together yet.) The navy — utilizing commandos from the Israeli Navy Flotilla 13, the Shayetet — has been conducting training exercises with the air force. Members of the Police and Prison Service who specialize in quelling civilian riots will also be involved. "We will order the ships to stop, but if they don't we are prepared to intercept and board the ships," a senior navy officer said. There would be a number of "surprises" for the ships participating in the flotilla. Here, too, action will be taken as necessary, but the goal will be to take the ships without casualties. ~~~~~~~~~~ I've previously used this video "Our Best Defense," which sings "If I forget you, Oh Yerushalayim," and so yesterday I decided to run something else. But it's still the most moving (brings me to tears) and so I share it as Yom Yerushalayim draws to a close:
~~~~~~~~~~ Neither would our day be complete without hearing the magnificent late Ofra Haza sing "Yerushalayim Shel Zahav" (Jerusalem of Gold).
Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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THE BLUE AND WHITE LOGO, "I AM MADE IN ISRAEL"
Posted by Nurit Greenger, June 1, 2011. |
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A version by Lily Steiner appeared at
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At the end of the 20th Century and during the first part of the 21st Century, Israel has invented and created some amazing and of the best technologies, and the produce and the array of food products she exports worldwide are amongst the best in the world. Yet, Israel has not been able to fully accredit her phenomenal achievements. Only when Israel finally recognizes her, all around, strength, being 'the best in so many fields', and owns this fact, the delegitimization issue she is facing and fighting will no longer be effective, and the United Nations (UN), the European Union (UN) and all other pro-anti Israel dogmas will no longer be able to brand the Jewish state a pariah state. As a whole, the majority of individuals in the world are not obsessed with Israel in any way. Family 'stuff', work and sports, amongst thousands of other matters take a much higher priority than to worry what the State of Israel is or is not doing. In that case, when the vast majority of the population, of most countries, start noticing a new tag, or label, on the electronic items or the food and produce items they are seeing and buying in the stores, new awareness will enter their subconscious. When the public will see a small, blue and white shape, on each item, that means, it was made or developed in Israel, all of a sudden, not only they will be educated how much Israel is involved in world economy, but they will start developing a positive association with the Jewish State Israel. They may not be interested in wars, Israeli and/or Arab-"Palestinian" issues, but, just like that little Intel chip logo, when they start seeing the 'Made in Israel' logo, on more and more of what they purchase and use, that is a pretty powerful and positive association, isn't it? No need for the art of words, no need for pictures, just a small, blue and white logo, will do the talking and the seeing. I am certain the blue and white logo will eventually become more recognizable than the Intel logo. Instead of Israel being worried and afraid of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanction (BDS) Campaigns, simply challenge them to get along without products with an Israeli connection. Be proud of what is invented and is made in Israel and trust that people want to buy the best products available and they are smart enough to know that Israeli products are good and the Israeli People are the good guys. Instead of being afraid of that small BDS group, made of loud noisy naïve impressionable radicals, who were sold a pack of distortion, half truths and lies by the very same groups who have kept the Arab-"Palestinians" in squalor, as a 'showcase' for political cause and propaganda, Israel must trust the majority of the population who know better and finally let the truth win right out. Yes, It is true, the Israelis are and always have been the good guys. The Government of Israel, wake up! You need to stop selling Israeli goods to the Arab nations under a disguise. Your technology and quality of goods is too valuable to be hidden and kept under the radar. If the Arabs do not want to buy the best, let them buy from others. The choice is theirs. You also know that there are many items they cannot buy from anyone else in the world, therefore, why allow them to make you small, insignificant and belittle you? Israel must announce and proudly display what she has created. Simply put a small emblem on every single product that, as much as even, contains one part that was developed or produced in Israel. Israel must proudly brand its accomplishments. If the Arabs, the anti-Semites and the hypocrites of all sorts can make a better product or food item, let them try — but let the brand of 'Made In Israel' stand proudly behind all the good things the State of Israel shares with the world. Let every medical device or medicine, every piece of technology, together with every piece of food or produce, from oranges and cucumbers, to tomatoes and apples, and even flowers, be the symbol of the Israeli Parliament-Knesset and the Jewish Nation they represent. If an Israeli part, whether invented or produced, is inside a telephone, whether Panasonic or Motorola, or a computer, simply rewrite the marketing contract that must mandate to display the Israeli Parliament-Knesset Symbol on the device and the packaging, and that mandate must be non-negotiable, as it is a mandate from the government of Israel. Enough is enough already. End walking in the mist. Let these Symbols proudly announce 'I Am From Israel,' 'I Am What The Jewish People Give To The World.' Isn't this a better, more productive and probably more effective way, than trying to fight the boycott and divestment and the useful idiots on the Left camps, both, within Israel and the Diaspora? If an Arab country does not permit an Israeli passport holder, or even an individual, carrying a passport stamped by Israel's custom authorities to enter into their country, let alone products made in Israel, let them know they are the ones who are missing out because of the bias and wrongful politics. Israel is Proud who she is, what she stands for and what she does. Israel must list the aid it gives to the Arab-"Palestinians", together with the commerce it provides. Israel is loved when it is strong; remember the Six Day War victory, the mission impossible rescue from Entebbe, the elimination of the Osirak reactor on Iraqi, to name a few. Israel's medical corp. was the first to arrive in earthquake stricken Haiti where they opened the first filed hospital and Israeli invention had much to do with saving the life of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Make the awareness of Israel's contribution to everyone's life so well known that her enemies cannot hide behind their lies, like, for instance, the farce so many adopted that Israel is causing humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Israel must take back its pride and stop lurking in back doors. Brand it 'Made In Israel', be proud! Note: Contribution to the article was made by Lily Steiner Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
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SHAME OF BRITAIN'S MUSLIM SCHOOLS: PUPILS BEING BEATEN AND 'TAUGHT HINDUS DRINK COW P***'
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, June 1, 2011. |
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This is by Tazeen Ahmad, reporter for Mail Online and it
appeared February 13, 2011 and is archived at
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1356361/Shame-Britains- Muslim-schools-Secret-filming-shows-pupils-beaten.html |
It is an assembly hall of the sort found in any ordinary school. Boys aged 11 and upwards sit cross-legged on the floor in straight rows. They face the front of the room and listen carefully. But this is no ordinary assembly. Holding the children's attention is a man in Islamic dress wearing a skullcap and stroking his long dark beard as he talks. 'You're not like the non-Muslims out there,' the teacher says, gesturing towards the window. 'All that evil you see in the streets, people not wearing the hijab properly, people smoking ... you should hate it, you should hate walking down that street.' He refers to the 'non-Muslims' as the 'Kuffar', an often derogatory term that means disbeliever or infidel. 
Welcome to one of Britain's most influential Islamic faith schools, one of at least 2,000 such schools in Britain, some full-time, others part-time. They represent a growing, parallel education system. The school is the Darul Uloom Islamic High School in Birmingham, an oversubscribed independent secondary school. Darul Ulooms are world-renowned Islamic institutions and their aim is to produce the next generation of Muslim leaders. In fact, these schools have been described as the 'Etons of Islam'. This school is required by its inspectors to teach tolerance and respect for other faiths. But the Channel 4 current affairs programme Dispatches filmed secretly inside it — and instead discovered that Muslim children are being taught religious apartheid and social segregation. We recorded a number of speakers giving deeply disturbing talks about Jews, Christians and atheists. We found children as young as 11 learning that Hindus have 'no intellect' and that they 'drink cow p***'. 
And we came across pupils being told that the 'disbelievers' are 'the worst creatures' and that Muslims who adopt supposedly non-Muslim ways, such as shaving, dancing, listening to music and — in the case of women — removing their headscarves, would be tortured with a forked iron rod in the afterlife. In 2009 this school was praised by Government-approved inspection teams for its interfaith teachings. The report said that 'pupils learn about the beliefs and practices of other faiths and are taught to show respect to other world religions'. It seems that the inspectors were unaware of the teaching methods revealed by our undercover reporter, Osman. He was taken on as a volunteer at the Darul Uloom school in Birmingham in April 2009 and was allowed to sit in on some lessons — but not their Islamic classes. So, in July last year, he went into one of the rooms where we'd heard they taught Islamic studies and left a secret camera to record the lessons. Filming intermittently over a period of four months, the camera recorded children being taught a hardline, intolerant and highly anti-social version of Islam. During the same period our reporter also attended the Markazi Jamia mosque in Keighley, West Yorkshire, after hearing of serious allegations that children were being hit at its madrassa. Madrassas in the UK are part-time after-school or weekend classes, often held in mosques, where children are taught to read the Koran. In Keighley it is not what they are being taught that is the problem, but how. Again, Osman went into the mosque and left the camera in the room where classes took place. The film shows children as young as six sitting on the floor of a large room in the mosque, one of the biggest in the country. The boys are hunched over wooden benches, rocking backwards and forwards as they rote-learn the Koran in Arabic. A man with a long white beard dressed in a traditional shalwar kameez — tunic and trousers — sits at the head of the class. Periodically he gets up and walks behind the boys. As he passes, the children appear to cower and watch him nervously. It soon becomes clear why. He unexpectedly raises his hand and slaps a young boy hard on the head. Moments later he strikes another. And then he kicks a third child. In just two days of filming in December 2010, the camera recorded the teacher hitting children as young as six or seven at least ten times, in less than three hours of lessons. From what we could see, every single blow was pretty much unprovoked. We soon realised that the beatings were routine. The behaviour of the boys, the way they flinched and backed away when he approached, indicated that they were long-accustomed to being hit and kicked as they studied. In another incident an older boy, left in charge of a class while a teacher is out at prayer, picks up a bench and threatens to hit a younger boy with it. During the making of this Dispatches film I have often counted my blessings. I received my Islamic education at home. My mum would read the Koran with me and most of my knowledge of Islam came from within the family. Others have not been so lucky. Osman was subjected to beatings at four separate madrassas in the East Midlands as a child. He says that for the nine years he spent going to after-school Koran classes, he was hit regularly, at least a couple of times a week. 'It destroyed my confidence,' he says, 'and the worst bit was never knowing when it was going to happen. I had a horrible teacher who would use his fists, a stick, a shoe, anything he could find. He'd just get angry and lash out.' 
Osman's young cousins go to the same madrassas he attended and told him the beatings were still continuing. This persuaded Osman to try to reveal the truth behind the private world of faith schools. Over a period of two years he bravely placed cameras in both schools and collected highly sensitive material for us. His experience of madrassas is not uncommon. But persuading people to go on camera about this has been difficult. One family who were willing to talk were too frightened to do so openly. 'Salma' and 'Ayesha' are a mother and daughter whose identities we are protecting. Ayesha is now sitting her A-levels but when she was seven she was beaten at her Koran classes. She says: 'The teacher would sit there, tell me what to read, pronounce it to me — then if I said it wrong he would hit me on the hands with a ruler.' Her younger brother, only five at the time, would be hit on his feet with a stick. They dreaded going to those classes but did not tell their mother. Salma eventually withdrew her children from attending madrassas for a completely different reason: she learned that they were being taught an intolerant version of Islam. 'They were using terms like "Kaffir" just because somebody isn't of the same religion,' she says, 'and I'm teaching my children to integrate and not be racist so I pulled my children out.' Academic and theologian Dr Taj Hargey invited me to visit his part-time Islamic school in Oxford where children are taught in mixed-gender classes. Here I witnessed a modern and refreshing method of teaching. Pupils were told to respect other faiths, ask questions about their religion and recite from the Koran in English as well as Arabic. Dr Hargey told me he set up this school because of claims that Muslim parents had made to him about beatings in other madrassas. 'It's an outdated, archaic concept,' he says, 'and if we inflict this violence we will sow the seeds of violence in them.' Sir Roger Singleton, former Government chief adviser on the safety of children, and Ann Cryer, former MP for Keighley, want the law to change to ban physical punishment in supplementary classes, as it does in full-time schools. 'It just isn't acceptable,' says Cryer. 'We wouldn't allow this to happen to white kids going to Sunday schools.' 
We approached the Darul Uloom Islamic High School in Birmingham with the findings of our film. It claimed that the senior student who gave the speech about Hindus was later reported by other students, and has been expelled, and that no teachers were present 'during the incident'. The school said that a speaker who made comments about Jews was 'visiting' and his views did not represent school policy. It denied that its religious instruction was hardline or extremist and said it did not tolerate hatred towards any faith group. In a statement, the school said: 'Our ethos is for students to be full and active participants of British society.' It also said that it would study our evidence and take 'disciplinary measures' if required. Regarding the Keighley madrassa, we were told that the Jamia Mosque committee was firm in its resolve to take whatever action was necessary to protect children being taught at the mosque and that it would give its full co-operation to any enquiries resulting from our film. If the law on physical punishment does change, that would be one way to protect the very young that attend these classes. But these part-time and full-time Muslim schools also need closer scrutiny — the regulatory system needs to be tightened up. However, we have a Government that, on the one hand, gives grand speeches about tackling the causes of extremism, as David Cameron did last week, while, on the other, encouraging local communities to set up their own schools — including faith schools. It's time to stop these mixed messages. And Muslims can no longer sweep this under the carpet — they need to face up to what is happening behind closed doors. Many warn that if we don't all tackle this toxic mix of hatred and violence head on, we will reap the whirlwind in years to come.
Gabrielle Goldwater is a Member of "Funding for Peace Coalition"
[FPC] (http://eufunding.org.uk) |
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MYTHS AND TRUTHS OF ISRAEL'S FOUNDING
Posted by Leslie Korshak, June 1, 2011. |
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Okay, sometimes enough is more than plenty and the myths about Israel's founding go to the very core of the matter. To begin, Israel is situated where three great continents meet (Africa, Europe and Asia) it is only appropriate that human life began there, but there is where truth both begins and concludes... Israel was never supposed to happen, it was intended to be a form of global apology for the atrocities of the Nazis throughout Europe. When the British had control, under their mandate, Israel was shaped as a roughly hewn rock, both round and defensible, what the rest of the world carved out was just the opposite a sliver constrained by a bottle neck and divided east to west. While the state was intended to go from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River the rest of the countries saw to it that it would never happen ...those 16,000 Freedom Fighters (my Great Uncle among them) were supposed to be left to die in the sand of the ever encroaching desert. Truman's first 'friendly' official act was to throw a blockade around the nascent country and a blockage is an aggressive act announcing impending war... some friend! ... Here's where the real richness of our history becomes decayed by governmental truth... Were it not for the likes of Myer Lansky, Sid Korshak and Frank Sinatra who both bribed and charmed the Mexican government to run the blockade, those brave, rare people would be left for dead. As a Jew, one is allowed to claim their birthright as a full citizen as did Lansky prior to his testimony in front of a hostile senate sub-committee. After two years Israel caved into the threat of America's demands, ironically, he never did testify and was acquitted ... He died at the age of ninety; ironically he was born on the Fourth of July. No safe harbor meant no more safely large, deposited money and so American Jewish support for their state was left to the likes of Steven Spielberg who during the last years of the Intifada sent one whole million dollars to the children of terrorism while at the same time spent twelve million dollars so that his wife and her horse could have their privacy during their dancing classes (dressage) near the beach. If he continues as "Mr. Israel" it will take all of Prime Minister Netanyahu's efforts and energy to keep the state afloat. My next question is why is Lansky's name so offensive to American Jews? He helped the CIA defend against Nazi gatherings here in the 'land of the free and the home of the brave...' He organized the American run on the blockade. So why all this shuddering, why all this shame? Was he a thug or a gangster? He most certainly was not. He was an accountant who found crime and along with the likes of Korshak (an attorney) organized it, keeping normal people out, often ridding the country of greater evils. Hasn't the time come to get over all of this tangled web we have woven? In Israel, four generations of children ate meals with their parents while living together, raising themselves. My closest friend is a Sabra (first generation Israeli woman) and to see the strength of their union is to see something truly fine and rare. I was lucky enough to claim my citizenship during the worst days of the last (?) Intifada and what I learned was astoundingly simple... wars, differences, belief systems nothing mattered. After all these years Israel has learned the essential magic of simple everyday kindness. You can buy flowers anywhere, but if you want a big motherly hug along with them go to the German Colony on Shabbat... it never fails. The sheer civility of a people of every nation has brought back a language long thought to be dead. There is a magic in Jerusalem that exists nowhere else... when embraced by stranger after stranger when asking for simple directions, when tears roll down their beautiful, young faces and they tell you your being there gives them hope, you walk forever with a new and deeply ingrained humility — for they have learned that kindness brings with it hope, and hope is life it is the future. As the old American folk song asks,"when will we ever learn? Oh when will we ever learn?" A proud and most humble citizen, Leota Contact Leslie Korshak at lesliekorshak@gmail.com |
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READER-SELECTED VIDEOS
Posted by Various Readers, June, 2011. |
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The San Remo Mandate From Gadi Eshel (30jun11) Danger to Israel of Return to 1967 Lines From Susana K-M(30jun11) A link to my interview on the BARRY FARBER SHOW From Buddy Macy (30jun11) On the bottom of the page on the left, simply click on "Click to play all audio posts. Countering UN & EU claiming Jerusalem as Arab-Muslim capital From UCI (29jun11) Dr. Jacques P. Gauthier's speech Terror Camps In USA, Right Underneath Our Noses From Gabrielle Goldwater (29jun11) HELP SAVE THIS VIDEO ON THE IDF From Alexander Dymshits (28jun11) This is about the ship with Iranian armaments intercepted in the Mediterranean. YouTube wants to remove it by using the excuse that "not too many people are logging in". Please forward this email to your friends, so that more people log in, the video clip remains available and the IDF's message is heard Porcelain Unicorn From Truth PRovider (27jun11) Here's the prize-winning entry in the "Tell It Your Way" competition. Tom Friedman's love song From UCI (27jun11) Netanyahu interview From UCI (27jun11) Topics: Arab Revolution started in Iran, Israel is only place where Arabs Have Rights This is Gaza From Avodah (27jun11) Subject: The Real Reason for NATO Attacking Libya EXPOSED From David Pisanti (27jun11) Some believe it is about protecting civilians, others say it is about oil, but some are convinced intervention in Libya is all about Gaddafi's plan to introduce the gold dinar, a single African currency made from gold, a true sharing of the wealth. "It's one of these things that you have to plan almost in secret, because as soon as you say you're going to change over from the dollar to something else, you're going to be targeted," says Ministry of Peace founder Dr James Thring. "There were two conferences on this, in 1986 and 2000, organized by Gaddafi. Everybody was interested, most countries in Africa were keen." Congressional Research Service: Fatah-Hamas unity government cannot receive US aid From Gabrielle Goldwater (26jun11) An awesome Israeli technology that helps the world From Barbara Taverna (25jun11) Yissum Research Development Company Ltd., the technology transfer company of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, presented today at the Israeli Presidential Conference, a virtual cane that will significantly improve the orientation and mobility of sight-impaired people. This new device can assist blind people in estimating the distance and height of various obstacles. The invention was registered as a patent by Yissum, which is now seeking strategic partners for further development. Currently there are almost 200 million visually impaired people globally, 40 million of which are legally blind, and most face multiple difficulties in orientation and navigation. One of the main challenges facing blind people is the ability to assess the height of various obstacles as well as to identify far away objects in their surroundings. The white cane, the current solution, offers only a very partial solution to these challenges. Dr. Amir Amedi from the Institute for Medical Research Israel-Canada (IMRIC) and the Edmond and Lily Safra Center for Brain Sciences (ELSC) at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his team recently developed a device to help in spatial navigation for the blind. The invention, which functions as a virtual flashlight, can replace or augment the classic white cane. The virtual cane emits a focused beam towards surrounding objects, and transmits the information to the user via a gentle vibration, similar to a cell phone vibration. The cane incorporates several sensors that estimate the distance between the user and the object it is pointed at. This allows the blind person to assess the height and distance of various objects, reconstruct an accurate image of the surroundings and navigate safely. The virtual cane is extremely small, easy to carry, accurate, can function for up to 12 hours and is easy to charge. Using the device is highly intuitive and can be learnt within a few minutes. PM calls Pollard imprisonment a tragedy From Justice for Jonathan Pollard (25jun11) Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu expressed hope that US president Barack Obama would release Israeli agent Jonathan Pollard in a video clip uploaded to YouTube by the Prime Minister's Office on Wednesday. In the clip, Netanyahu called Pollard's continued imprisonment a tragedy and said he still hoped Obama would release him on a humanitarian basis. The clip was uploaded following a decision by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations expressing dismay and regret that Pollard was not allowed to attend the funeral of his father Morris in Indiana on Monday. 13 yr old bilingual Songwriter-singer Luisa Hank sings From Donald Hank(25jun11) Jay Black sings From Hal Rosenthal (25jun11) This Yiddish song was recorded by Jay and The Americans, a group of New York Jewish boys primarily known as rock and roll singers in the 1960's. Jay Black sings it first in Yiddish, then in English. The art is by Marc Chagall. Melanie Phillips — The World Turned Upside Down From Susana K-M (24jun11) Barry Rubin: The Best Presentation I've Seen on the Current Mess in Intellectual Life The Glenn Beck Show June 1, 2011 From Ivor Silverman (24jun11) Bureaucracy short video — the way it really is From LS (23jun11) This is a Spanish short film about Bureaucracy. Subtitles included. Same all around the world... Tom Mullica — Smoking Magic — INCREDIBLE! From Fred Reifenberg (23jun11) The YouTube the Palestinian Authority Does Not Want You to See From David Nathan (22jun11) A YouTube video depicting the history of the Temple Mount may be yanked after Arab complaints that not enough people view it, according to the poster. The video documents the Temple Mount's Jewish history and shows Jews facing the Western Wall and Arabs with their backsides to the holy site while facing Mecca. The YouTube clip also quotes an a Palestinian Authority professor stating the attachment of Jews to the Temple Mount, a statement that PA officials and Muslim clerics in the Arab World have tried to refute in recent years. Civil Administration Works to Reduce Harmful Impacts of Coal Production Sites in West Bank From Gabrielle Goldwater (22jun11) Environmental hazards at Coal industry sites : An interesting argument From Albert Wendroff (20jun11) Shariamerica: Islam, Obama, and the Establishment Clause Artificial Organ Regrowth — NOVA scienceNOW From David Pisanti (19jun11) MUSLIMS GONE WILD... From Susana K-M (18jun11) What will it take for good Americans to realize that shariah-Muslim thugs, directed by the Muslim Brotherhood, want to destroy American and everything that has been built over the past 235 years! Toronto mosque promotes sharia, stoning, cutting off hands (video) - Creeping Sharia From Gabrielle Goldwater (17jun11) Vital History: Jerusalem, Stolen Arab Land? Really! From Gabrielle Goldwater (17jun11) According to the liberal media East Jerusalem is "occupied terrritory." Well! Our friends over at Honest Reporting give us some hard facts that the average person who knows nothing needs to know. President Reagan Tells a Joke From Truth Provider (16jun11) Pat Condell — Islamic cultural terrorism From Dr. History (16jun11) Archie Bunker was smarter than all of us. From (16jun11) Archie reacts to Obama via a little artistic video-editing Not in our name From Nurit Greenger (15jun11) This young man is blatantly naïve, more so, dangerously destructive. Lucas is the epitome example of the Left brainwashing of their useful dullards, who, then, act in a self-defeating and significantly counterproductive way, based on lies and deception and verbally expressed in a vile and insidious language. Lucas Koerner is apparently, a sophomore at Tufts University, located in Medford/Somerville, near Boston, Massachusetts, majoring in International Relations and Spanish. Koerner, appearing to be an American Jewish activist, wearing a skullcap-kippa and a keffiyeh, the terrorist neckerchief. He attended Jerusalem Day, the day the Israelis celebrate the unification of their Holy City and participated in a pro-Arab-"Palestinian" rally. Koerner, a foreigner and a guest in the State of Israel, had the chutzpah to stand near the Damascus Gate where he discharge his venom: "Israel is occupying the 'Palestinian' people in my name, in the name of world Jewry and I, myself, an American Jews, I am here to say that it is completely unjustified and ethically reprehensible. World Jewry and all people in the world will not stop until this occupation ends. And until the Palestinians people have their right, their right of return, the right to live without occupation and equal rights from Israel. I say to the people of Israel that they must join the world consensus. The entire world has decided that this occupation cannot go on, that the refugees cannot remain where they are. The world has decided they must all come home and the occupied territories shall be fee. Israel is the pariah state, Israel is a rogue state, and the United States, my government is responsible. I am here to say that not in my name, not in the name of the American people." What Israel has done to itself, when she began cooperating, allowsi Jews who do not live in Israel, like unJew-JINO (Jew In Name Only) Lucas Koerner and anti-Israel organizations, such as J Street, to trash her from abroad and when visiting Israel. Lucas Koerner does not speak in my name! And since the "in our name" is a favorite slogan of our enemies which they often use, we need to use "not in our name" as a counteraction slogan for them to see and understand that we can turn their slogan against them, and we will indeed do so. Al-Qaeda Exploits Loopholes From (15jun11) A new video released by Al-Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn, calls on "lone wolves" in the United States to buy assault rifles at gun shows to attack Americans. al qaeda tells terrorists how to get guns Prager University: The Middle East Problem From Fred Reifenberg (15jun11) When things get rough, our specie has the need to put blame on someone. The Jews have been the perfect solution/scapegoat...History sure do repeat don't it ? Prager. Brilliant presentation. Israel has many friends in the USA. Obama is certainly NOT one of them From Sergio HaDaR Tezza (15jun11) >Listen carefully to what she says about the Middle East: standing with Israel, NOT bowing down to muslim blackmail and dictatorships. Pyramids: Good Questions From David Pisanti (14jun11 Listen carefully to what she says about the Middle East: standing with Israel, NOT bowing down to muslim blackmail and dictatorships. Israel sitting on as much oil as Saudi Arabia? From Barbara Sommer (13jun11) If true, this is incredibly exciting. And dangerous, too. One more reason to hurt or destroy Israel before it becomes the new arbiter of oil production in the world. Conversely, it could also be a peace factor if the manna is shared with the Arabs, assuming they're smart enough to cooperate rather than try to steal it. Interesting also that apparently all the oil reserves so far have been identified under Israel proper and Jordan... but nothing in the West Bank! he Palestinians can have their state if they want. Soon, they're not going to be in any position to dictate anything anyway, recognition by the UN or not. Water Fuel Cell From David Pisanti (12jun11) Occupied or dispute land — LEGAL facts From Udi Schayat (10jun11) Israel freed the Palestinian PEOPLE in 1967 from the Corfu the Jordanian, forced by Jordanian army, and Israel gave them a self management on their day by day life in the west bank cities/farms, right after the 1967 war. Muslim Israelis now are rejecting any plan to be moved to future Palestine under any deal between countries, as they know the Israeli take better care of them. My new video From Rafi Dobrin (10jun11) Loyalty to Israel From Truth Provider (9jun11) Glenn Beck and Senator Joseph Lieberman: Gen. Uzi Narkis: Yom Yerushalayim From Barbara Taverna (8jun11) A never-released personal account of the liberation of the Old City of Jerusalem by Gen. Uzi Narkis who commanded the liberating forces in June 1967 — filmed by Ashley Lazarus 10 days before General Uzi Narkis passed away in 1997. Music by Yehuda Jordan Kaplan. With thanks to Brig.Gen. Yoram Agmon, who arranged the interview. Liberation of Old City of Jerusalem The Israeli Heart From Yogi R Us (7jun11) Hey AMIR! Why do you Lie? From Susana K-M (7jun11) other videos from The United West Bibi being interviewed From Fred Reifenberg (6jun11) IMPORTANT: HARRY REID'S SPEECH TO AIPAC From Truth Provider (6jun11) Jerusalem: 4000 Years in 5 Minutes From Dr. History (5jun11) Palestinian Prehistory and the Generals' expert opinions From LS (5jun11) The Territories — who do they belong to? From Robin Ticker (5jun11) Jackie Mason on the '1967' Borders From Gabrielle Goldwater (4jun11) The PLO leaders honor their terrorists From Walid Shoebat (4jun11) We are told by the left that terrorists blow themselves up because of their abject poverty and desperation. Here is a dinner with everybody dressed in nice suits and attire at a party honoring families of terrorists. Most of the terrorists who are being honored carried out their crimes after the Oslo peace accord was signed by Arafat. The world and even our own political leaders need to ask ourselves how corrupt we are, that we would tolerate "making peace" with such duplicitious and evil people. "They have cast lots for My people, they have given a boy (Israel as payment) for a harlot (false religion of Islam), and sold a girl (Israel) for wine (oil), that they may drink. Joel 3:3 Gilbert and Sullivan updated — brilliant From Fred Reifenberg (4jun11) Ron Butler: Obama! A Modern U.S. President (musical spoof) GitziaKohana) From Yael Goor (3jun11) Strong Rebuttal to President Obama's Latest Speeches From Truth Provider (3jun11) Rabbi Chaim Richman, Director, International Department, The Temple Institute, Jerusalem, Israel. what it means to be a " Natural born citizen according to the US constitution From Avodah (3jun11) Klavan's One-State Solution: Give the Middle East to the Jews From David Pisanti (3jun11) Beck: Why are we standing with those who are against Israel? From Susana K-M (2jun11) Giving Away Eastern Jerusalem To The Pals From Wmani (2jun11) This video, produced by HonestReporting is well worth watching as we combat the Obama narrative that Jerusalem is to be divided with eastern Jerusalem being given to the pals. as their capital. Can anybody rationalize why they demand eastern Jerusalem and why they are not being challenged on this demand? The Sharia Threat to America From Gabrielle Goldwater (2jun11) The History of Jerusalem in Five Minutes From Walid Shoebat (1jun11) The history of Jerusalem proves beyond a shadow of a doubt the Jewish ties to the land and the "colonialists" are all the nations today that accuse Israel and Jews of the very crime they are guilty of. Pat Condell From Truth Provider (1jun11) These are links to Pat Condell's humorous but serious comments. He speaks about the suicidal folly of being politically correct, the desease that causes the downfall of our Western civilization. The making of a terrorist, brainwashed by his Immam From Pierre Rehov (1jun11) Fukushima Day 83 (June 1, 2011) From David Pisanti (1jun11)
"It was even worse than the worst imagination of the media" — Radiation now "leaking through cracks in the containment and melted holes" after total meltdown (CNN VIDEO)
"Gov't answer to protecting children in Fukushima from radioactive fallout? Wear long-sleeved shirts while at school"
"500,000 Bq/kg of radioactive Cesium found 75 miles from Fukushima plant"
"Oil spill at Fukushima — Near Reactors No. 5 and 6"
"Russian Nuclear Expert: TEPCO is concealing information about amount of radioactive pollution in environment"
"French drought fears cause government to set up 'surveillance cell'"
Sarah Palin Dons Star of David Necklace for NYC Visit From Chuck Brooks (1jun11) Dearborn Is A Racist Islamic Enclave From Walid Shoebat (1jun11) Israel Security Needs From Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (1jun11) In light of President Barack Obama's speech calling for Israel to return to the 1967 lines, this video details Israel's critical security needs for defensible borders to prevent threats to its existence — a defense policy rooted in a broad consensus that spans both past and present Israeli governments. |
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